travel lightly and carry a big stick

Isreali Christmas

2006-12-25T08:47:00.000-08:00

Egypt didn't really seem like the place for christmas, so where did? Well how about Bethlehem? sounded good to us, so on the 23rd we crossed into Isreal and headed north for Jerusalem. Crossing into Isreal was no mean feat, but required an extensive search of baggage etc to ensure that we weren't undesirables, luckily we weren't found out. One poor american student in the line in front of us was carrying a copy of the Qu'ran and consequently had to undergo a severe psycological exam. Seemingly the logic of Isreali security is you are what you read, as bags are unpacked and all books have to be looked at. As predictably i'm carrying ten books at any one time, this led to quite a review of my current literary influences. Hopefully they found my choices to be in good taste (although most of the good taste comes from liz's side of the equation which I'll admit here before she points it out to me upon reading this entry....)

Anyway, we arrived in Jerusalem. After a couple of grueling days of travel. Getting out of the white desert had involved hitching a lift in a tomato truck, which took us across the most desolate stretch of sand before we linked up with a bus to cairo. The following day after a visit to the mammoth government building in central cairo for visa extention (which turned out not to work in the end, but thats another story) we got an overnight bus across sinai to the Isreali border, crossed about 6 am and from there a bus to Eilat and another 5 hours on to Jerusalem.

We stood outside the Damascus gate of the old city's Muslim quarter, which is the site of a busy market and had our first sight of the walled city. Entering through the medieval gateway, the old city is amazingly preserved. Most of the buildings date from the Ottoman area, such as our hotel, a mere 500 years old, some are much older. Our hotel's entrance was just a door off of the narrow alley which is the busiest Souq in old city, and we had to push our way through the packed shoppers to find it, no doubt taking out a few unwary people with our backpacks. I think I can safely say that we were immediately enchanted by the old city. Yes there are alot of tourist shops, fleecing pilgrims is a business that has been going on here since the time of Soloman, but in this place more than anyother history, faith, and myth collide. I guess its a bit of a theme park for grown ups, but there arn't many places where you turn a corner and hey, there's another station of the cross!

We walked around the city for 4 days, taking in all the major sites and learning a little on the way, Liz did sterling work recalling all those Sunday school lessons from years ago. The main point of this escapade of course was Bethlehem at Christmas, and we got there by signing up with a trip with Jerusalem's Anglican Cathedral. We set off from Jerusalem at 7pm on Christmas eve, and crossed through the front line into Palestinian territory to arrive at Bethlehem at about 8.

The church of the Nativity is a huge rambling stone structure, the oldest parts about 1500 years old and it looks more like a fortress than a church. The square outside was packed with people, but security was high and it looked as though only people associated with a church were being let in. Once we got inside, we were taken to a smallish back chapel which the Greek Orthodox church had kindly lent to the Anglicans for the day (the Greeks in their wisdom knew the 'real' christmas wasn't for another couple of weeks but were kind enough not to point this out). So inside this chapel we had a couple of bishops (anglican and orthodox) a couple of ambassadors (UK and South African) and Mahmud Abbass the Palestinian president, us and about 75 other people most of whome were taking thousands of pictures of the president whilst asking each other 'who is he??'. All that was left at this point was the singing, and the question, would 'little town of bethlehem' be sung to the British tune or to the sacreligious American 'tune' (more like a wail for those in the know). I was confident that the would Anglicans righteously confound those Episcapalean splitters with our soaring melody, however with the dangerous concentration of Yanks in the congregation and no musical accompniment to keep them from straying from the true path, things were still in the balance. In Carols, as on Earth and weak is the will of man, I was left shaking my head, not because Liz won the bet, no no, but because those about me had fallen so low, shame. shame.

Leaving Isreal we head over the border to Jordan, intending just a quick visit to see Petra. On our first day however we discovered that Petra was 'snowed in' and yes before you ask, it is a desert. Anyway, taking this in our stride we jumped on a bus to Wadi Rum instead, the place where T E Lawrence based himself for the campaign against the Turks in WWI. Wadi rum consists of flat desert divided up by truely massive stone megaliths, some of them going straight up vertically 1000 meters. Take a look at the photo below and try and spot the tiny cars in the bottom right hand corner. You can only see a small portion of the cliff that they are next to. Because the desert it so featureless it is often difficult, even when you are there, to judge distances and sizes given that there are no frames of reference like trees etc. We stayed with a Beduin family in their tent for a couple of nights, and it was cold! but really enjoyable. After a couple of days though we left and tried to reach Petra.

We got a lift down to the main road and sat there waiting for a bus which never came. By an incredible stroke of luck we were picked up by a German family who were driving their huge 4x4 truck converted into camper, and two Chevy off roaders to Petra. This was particularly lucky as the road was still closed and the motorway had a ten mile tailback of parked trucks which we simply sailed past by driving just off the side of the road. Once we past the trucks we negotiated our way through the road block which had closed the road and were on our way to Petra. The road was snowed up in places, and a couple of times had to dig the truck out of drifts and then use it to pull the Chevies out, but eventually we made it. So thats it, after Petra, which was incredible, but I can't really put into words, even if I wasnt' too tired, we went south again, back in to Egypt and now we're at Dahab.

See below some pictures from Egypt, Isreal and Jordan.

Wadi Rum Vegetation

Wadi Rum

Jerusalem from the mount of olives

Inside the Holy Sepulchre church

Jerusalem street with view to the Dome of the Rock

Egypts white desert

More white desert

Perfect Dune

Dune for many miles, Dakhla Oasis

Al Qsar, ancient mudbrick town, Dakhla

Do you know Lionelle Richie?

2006-12-08T07:52:00.000-08:00

Phew, Egypt, well its defineately not Europe, what a difference a strip of water makes. Egypt really started on the plane, it took nearly 40 minutes for all the passengers to sit down and put their hand luggage away, we just sat and watched the chaos unfold. When at last everyone had sat down the plane started to take off, which naturally meant someone had to go to the toilet, during takeoff. The next two hours were cocophanous and chaotic. The aircrew worked around the scrum in the aisle as best they could only running over a couple of rampaging ten year olds.

Cairo is crowded and hectic but more than anything its noisy. At street level it sounds like hundreds of car horns going off simultaneously presumably signalling each time an important traffic rule is broken. The walk from the faded and crumbling grandeour of the colonial downtown to the medieval heart resulted in ringing ears, so it was with relief that we recollected ourselves in the meditative calm of Al-Azhar mosque, the oldest remaining university in the world. Recollected and recharged we hit the streets of the old town, narrow, muddy, cows, donkeys, motorbikes pretty much sums it up. There was just so much going on that I felt unable to really think, the city is one where your senses just seem so overwhelmed with all the information pouring in that the rest of your brain just shuts off in protest. Its rather like India in that way.

Our introduction to the world of 'Backsheesh' or bribes/tips was here, for a small sum a huge wooden door twice as high as me, with a handle that you need to reach up to was unlocked with one of those massive keys you think are only in movies and we were allowed into the backrooms of an ancient mosque. We found our way up onto the roof and from there up one of its minarets. At the top we had an incredible view over Cairo, stretching out to the desert. Those medieval people didn't have too much regard for safety and as a conseqence the barrier between me and a deadly fall was a little scant, suffering from dizzying vertigo i had to pin myself to the inside wall. Between photos I prayed that the call to prayer didn't start because the loud speakers all around would probably have completed the job of deafening us for good.

That brings me to the title. Egyptians are very keen to talk to foreigners, I have found that I have an amazing number of 'friends'. One such friend started chatting to us in an internet cafe. This gentleman turned out to have a keen interest in 'romantic and sentimental' music. He wondered if I had heard of 'Lionelle Richie' whome he found very inspiring. I answered that I had heard of him but wasn't 'familiar with his work'. Although i thought this was a polite way to end the conversation, he interpretated as a desire to familiarise myself with said work. He then began to recite the words of 'Hello' to me. I smiled politely and tried to hide my discomfort, which grew when he insisted on showing me the photo galleries of his favourite Egyptian pop idol and wrote liz and I a poem.... Although there is much more hassle from touts etc here than in Turkey the people have a much better sense of humor and none of the machismo.

I started writing this a few weeks ago but never got to finish. Now we've spent a few weeks here, travelling down to the south via the Nile and then north again via the desert oases. The historic sights were magnificent of course but we probably enjoyed the desert more than anything. We camped in a small oasis with a hot tub sized hot spring and enjoyed a night under the stars, climbed a thousand foot dune untouched human, animal or anything and camped again in the 'white desert' a kind of whitewashed chalk death valley. So thats the short version, I probably wouldn't get around to publishing a long one. Ok I hope everyone is good, Have a good Christmas all!

Out of Asia

2006-11-22T02:24:00.000-08:00

Winter came to Turkey, rain and grey in the North, crisp freezing cold and dry in the center. We spent a few days in the countries lakes region, walking and cycling. As we are planning to fly to Egypt out of Athens we decided to head back north and east to Bursa which was the original capital of the Ottoman empire. Bursa is built on the slopes of one of Turkeys highest mountains and has many old mosques and loads of hot springs which feed its many bath houses. The city center has plenty of character by Turkish standards and we enjoyed a couple of days there. We went to a real whirling dervish ceremony (we were the only tourists), sipped Sahlap (a drink made using wild orchids) in an old caravaneserie and managed to hire the most luxurious private room in an old Bathhouse for half price by being dumbstruck foreigners. In short, lived it up Ottoman style.

From Bursa it was a small matter of 5 hours on the bus to Istanbul and then a further 10 to Plovdiv in Bulgaria. On reflection Turkey is interesting country and incredibly dichotomous. We encountered and got to know the super rich in Istanbul, businessmen and socialites and nomadic shepherds in the hills. Some Turkish will try to cheat you or generally treat you with disdain, others show suprising kindness. Their religion preaches purity yet the young men feel free to leer at and cat call western women in the street and talk openly of their love of 'Russian girls'. Our friends in Ankara (aspiring bureaucrats) took us to an Mozart Opera while on the street the idea of union with Europe is rejected. Many of the people openly display patriotic pride that tends to jingoism but you get the sense that this pride is fragile and hides a deep uncertainty. Perhaps this uncertainty stems from a Europeanized bureaucracy and army that at once promotes Nationalist sentiments whilst rejecting Turkish culture, the only culture the majority of the people understand.

We arrived in Plovdiv in the early hours. Without guide book or any idea where we were going. The only thing we were armed with was one word (probably mispronounced) starigrad - old town. We wandered around the bus station repeating this word to bemused locals like a broken record with tourettes until someone pointed us in the right direction. The contrast with Turkey was immediate, far more old buildings, albeit often neglected, and the architecture gave the immediate feeling of being in Europe. People smiling, laughing, kissing in the street, all unusual sights in Turkey, made an immediate impression. When we eventually found the old town (a trail of bemused locals in our wake) we wandered around until someone stuck their head out of a window several stories up and asked if we were looking for a hostel. Why Yes!

Bulgaria has been really enjoyable so far, its old towns are still not dominated by tourists, (this might just be the time of year) and the food is so much better than in Turkey. We looked around a few old castles and many churches. In the summer it must be great here. The place does have large number of estate agents with English signs which reflects the foreign invasion going on, land being cheap as there are few jobs and the population is quickly shrinking as the young move west and those who stay cannot afford many kids. Another country that will probably change dramatically in the next few years. They join the EU Jan 15th.

Thats it for now, we're planning to fly to Egypt on the 27th so not long now!

Turkey Photo Blog

2006-11-08T04:56:00.000-08:00

Ancient Cave paintings

Today i'm just going to post up a view of the photos from the past month, for those of you who like pictures.....

Cappadocian Monestry

'Lovers Valley' Cappadoccia

The village of Goreme in Cappadoccia

A beautiful sunset at Antalya

This was the perfect campspot, before the huge lightning storm that is....

Liz and pack

Dozing off a large lunch in the shade of an olive tree at noon

Rock cut tombs in the cliffs above ancient Myra

These Lycian tombs are found all along the walk, these are part of a large Necropolis where we camped for the night

These flowers grow abundently even in the driest of areas

A perfect place for a midnight swim

A Shepard shows off his flock
The lagoon at Oludeniz where the trek starts

Meditation man
This is the hidden beach of Kabak. The only way down is on foor or mule and its a bit of a secret hippy colony.

The Pools at Pammakule

A Shot from the blue cruise of a flottilla

The Da'Pigeon Code

2006-10-30T07:16:00.000-08:00

The overnight bus pulled into Goreme at 6am. We stepped off groggy, and feeling slightly nauseus due to lack of sleep. The air was much colder and dryer in Goreme than it had been on the south coast, more like Tibet than the Med. Rather than immediately marching around the village banging on pension doors ( I felt that my hard ball haggling tecniques would be less than welcome at 6.30) we climbed up the steep side of the valley in which Goreme nestles. Fifteen minutes later with the sky starting to brighten we were standing on a cliff edge overlooking several of the wide canyon-like valleys which typify the area. On our right a squadron of hot air ballons lifted hesitently into the air and behind them the sun. The village was in front of us, consisting partly of new buildings and partly of conical 'fairy chimneys' of stone - several stories high and hollowed out to contain rooms and windows. To the left was the dramatic rocky outcrop of Uchisar, a Byzantine fortress carved out of solid rock and the highest point in the region.

The Cappadocia region in the centre of Turkey is no doubt the most memorable part to date. The land which was once flat has been spit open by water erosion creating a network of canyons and weird rock formations. Above the valleys the land is sparsely vegetated, just vinyards and occational scrubby trees but in the valleys are green pasture, fruit and tall poplar trees. For 4000 years people have burrowed into the rocks and 'fairy chimneys' creating homes, underground cities and dove cots. Millions of dove cots. Cut into cliff faces 50 foot up and high rocky outcrops. They went to great trouble to accomodate their pidgeons, even giving the fronts a nice white wash to attract the birds' attention. 'Why did they do this?' I asked every local that I could get my hands on (to Liz's increasing irritation), I just couldn't accept the answer people kept giving me, which was a shrug of the shoulders and 'they liked pidgeons'. I was incredulous, people for thousands of years built elaborate houses for pidgeons in hard to reach places because 'they liked them' !?!!?! I think not, no fad lasts that long.

It was when we were exploring one of the ancient monestries that early christians built in the area, (the area was predominately orthodox christian until the Greek - Turkish population exchanges of the 1920's) , that I got my answer. The monestry's numerous chapels are on the interior reminicent of dark gothic churches, with arched ceilings and stone pillars - only that the walls and ceilings are adorned with (now rather faded) frescos painted 900 years ago. In one of the frescos the artist had dipicted one of the monk's beloved pigeons. Ah Ha! ever the wannabe Dan Brown I'd cracked the first part of the mystery - religous symbolism! The doves weren't just 'liked' by the locals but clearly had some kind of spiritual significance. Genius. Right?

Well actually, just to prove that art is by its nature subjective, I later discover that the answer was not religion but in fact faeces and, perhaps improbably, alcohol. Yes, those clever monks shoveled guano off of the floor of their cavernous dove cots in industrial quantities to use as fertilizer on their vines. And this is how they made the region famous for its fine wine. Simple!

A walking wander

2006-10-19T04:35:00.000-07:00

We wandered out of the bush a couple of nights ago. If anyone had been wondering where i was, 2 -3 weeks of sweat, dirt, bush camping, squatting, non-showers, foraging for wild berries and hunting antelope with nothing but my bare hands and a keen sense of smell are now over. We’ve been trekking along the South western coast of Turkey, lugging huge packs in the blazing sun and hoping against hope that around the next corner would be a well without too many rats in it so we could drink freely. As i trudged on the broken rocks in the midday sun with the masochistic tendency that only Enlglishmen, maddogs and a particular Yankee girl can muster i often pictured myself in the shoes of TE Lawrence trudging across the Sinai, head bent forward stumbling in dehydrated semi halucination. That must be about when i wrestled that antelope. My brother Richard and his wife Enmma had joined us for this adventure, although they were mostly miles ahead wondering how far being the ‘hardened travellers’ were, while the hardened travellers wondered how far ahead the beach huts and mango shakes were.

The trail winds its way through the various ruins of the ancient Lycian kingdom that in ancient times existed in this corner of Turkey. It largely follows the coast and thus gives ample oppurtunity for running into the clear blue ocean at the end of the day to cool off. We mostly camped, when we weren’t being invited to stay at the house of a local family or sheltering from huge thunder storms in shepards huts at the top of the tallest point for miles or being chased off of beaches by enraged emaciated organic eating ‘don’t touch me i know yoga’ hippies.

The locals mostly think of walking around a coast with a perfectly adequate bus service as slightly nutty and regailed us with tall stories about the ‘bears and wild boar’ that lived in the forest. Naturally we laughed this off, up until the point that is when a large boar compete with big heavy head, Brown fur and dark main running down its back crashed its way straight out of an Asterix comic onto the forest track in front of us and hammered back into the trees on the otherside. After this the debate changed tone slightly from ‘what if’ to ‘is it beter to jump behind a big tree or climb a large rock when boars charge at you?’, ‘can boars climb?’ and ‘when the hell it boar breeding season anyway and why is our education system so deficient in this regard’

To sum up everything else, we left İstanbul about a month and a week ago now and although most of the time we have been walking we’ve also been to some of Turkeys big tourist sights and spent a week lazing on the deck of a boat on a ‘blue cruise’. We were sharing the boat with four Belgium’s who indulged their passion for mild radiation posioning while we trod on sea enenomies and snorkelled around a sting ray that i was afraid had mistook me for Steve Irwin. I’ve been told that a little and often format for my blog is more appropriate than an essay and ‘who the hell was that Nigel guy anyway?’ arrangement, so i’ll leave it there. Hope everyone is well!!!!

Istanbull

2006-07-09T07:25:00.001-07:00

Istanbul, the name of course has a mystique. Our apartment, although perfectly functional, however is sadly lacking in this department. It’s many times better than our London slum, and after all it’s the people that’s important, not the place, right? Mystique may not be the word, on the other hand drama certainly is.

It’s all about Rula. A Greek ex-pat, once of Manchester, now a Harrison-Jones housemate. Rula is 30+ but with the social skills of a twelve year old. The only person who has ever told me without a trace of irony that she ‘doesn’t want to learn manners’ and gives lectures on why we ‘can’t tell her what to do’ before leaving little notes around instructing others on household behaviour. A request to turn down music and her penetrating laugh at four in the morning was refused. Rula eloquently illustrated her point by dropping to her hands and knees and yapping like a dog in a bizarre demonstration of free will. Use her pots and they will fly across the kitchen with your dinner in them, creating spinach frescos that adorn the walls for a couple of weeks. She successfully drove her last set of housemates to distraction and out of the building and this bunch is showing signs of dropping. Tanya and Ronny are in actual fact leaving anyway. However, Thelma a softhearted Californian flower child is being swiftly wilted by Rula’s pesticidal personality and we are weighing up the choice’s of a war of attrition or moving to a different flat where our bedroom wouldn’t have a balcony…. We really love this balcony…

Domestic issues aside, our part of Istanbul is on the Asian side, 20 years ago there was nothing here but trees, beach and a few holiday apartments, of which this is one. Now the city has sprawled in style, stretching in urban earnest to here and several more miles down the coast besides. It is reckoned the cities population is around 20 million, a good 10 million up from the seventies. Ours is an affluent area, minutes from the sea and ‘Bagdat Street’, the Beverly Hills Drive of Istanbul, a palm lined thoroughfare with designer boutiques and slick new restaurants. Reaching the old town is a 40 to 60-minute trip by bus and ferry, and that’s where the mystique very much kicks in.

The ferry docks in the shadow of the mosque of Suleyman the Magnificent, (of siege of Vienna fame). Nearer the water is the ‘New Mosque’ no prizes for guessing that it’s not too much of a spring chicken. Squeezing your way off of the ferry and following the crowds past the numerous kebab and grilled fish places, perhaps pausing to munch a fresh muscle stuffed with rice and a twist of lemon, you’ll soon find yourself at the station where the Orient Express rolled into town. Continuing up the hill, past the carpet shops positioned for maximum tourist grabbing potential and tracking the high walls of the Sultans palace you reach the heart of Sultanahmet, an open park surrounded by the palace gateway, the 1500-year-old Aya Sofya and the Blue Mosque. It would be easy to bang on about all the ancient buildings and history of this place and really there is so much it’s not worth attempting it. Just to realize this place was a pulsating metropolis when London was a couple of shacks in a swamp gives some measure of the history of the place.

We divide our time between teaching, seeing the sites, the gym and the tea gardens. I’ve been brushing up on my history of the crusades courtesy of a fascinating book I hitherto didn’t get around to, now I’m delving into one of Emma Harrison’s international relations text books, also interesting stuff, if a little dense. Liz has been studying for a law school entrance exam, which she has passed in the top 25% of takers, which gives her a shot at most of the best schools.

Well I’ll leave this entry there and let the pictures do the talking. Enjoy.

ahhh!

From the walls of Babylon

The Rose Garden

Coffee Pots

The new mosque and Suleyman's mosque

Mary and a pulpit

Dinner!

Back in Blighty, Proust in Prague, Incitement in Istanbul…..

2006-05-30T05:59:00.000-07:00

It wasn't long between touching down on the tarmac at Heathrow and being back at my desk at Morgan Stanley watching the minutes tick by. I put my Asia honed negotiating skills to good use right away securing a 15% pay rise on the initial offer. I took a temporary job, knowing that I couldn’t be relied upon in my position, which means being paid by the hour. I've never worked by the hour before; it strikes me as conspicuously more honest to me. It’s an accepted economic truth that charging people according to usage rather than a flat rate is desirable - i.e. the move to water meters, the planned abolition of road tax in favour of a by the mile toll system etc. Why this isn't always applied to pay seems criminal, or more precisely like usury. Clearly paying salaries allows the inefficiencies in a work place to remain, as the employer has no incentive to solve them. They do pay for them of course in people taking 'stress' related sickies but they are too short sighted to link the two phenomena. So being paid by the hour, it’s fairer - I calculated that if I’d been paid by the hour when I worked at the bank previously it would have translated into a 180% rise - now I realise how much I was used, but then, as I heard the other day, employers like to employ young people because they have no idea what they are worth. So I've resolved that my first action as minister for employment would be to ban unpaid over time.

The strangely amusing thing about being paid for your time in this way is that your brain starts to convert everything you buy into your time spent and you start to sound like a Master Card advert.

Train ticket - one hour
Lunch - 15 minutes
Your entire life - sadly not priceless, just a few hundred a day

Of course if you're of a pedantic nature like me, you have to recalculate this on an after tax basis, meaning that lunch takes considerably more time to earn than to eat. The nature of time changes when in an office environment. Months can pass in the blink of an eye, a year in an astonishingly short amount of time. Time is, after all, completely relative. Being just the way our mind orders our memories, when you create no new memories time does compress. This being the case, my re-entry into the corporate world draws strong parallels to an astronaut being put into suspended animation before a long space journey. Unfortunately, instead of waking up at Mars it'll just be with a couple of extra zeros on my bank balance and a few months chipped off of the quota.

Being back in London, I resolved that this time around I'd actually take advantage of it and do some of those cultural things that you don't get elsewhere. With this as our aim, Liz and I tried to fit at least one gallery and play into every week and pretty much succeeded. The National Film Theatre was also hit several times. Although Liz had only spent 9 months here previously, she knows the city much better than I do so did a pretty good impersonation of a guide. Highlights were a hilarious and thought provoking 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf', which we picked up front row seats for, and the 'Wild Life Photography of the Year' exhibition at the Natural History museum. What a couple of culture vultures. Unfortunately there aren’t any anecdotes about cleaver wielding cooks here, but nowhere has everything.

Getting up at 5 for work and home exhausted about 6 pretty much ensured that I've been piling the pounds back on at an impressive rate. I've spent so long sitting in front of a computer in the last couple of months that I actually wheeze trying to make it up to the top of the stairs in my house. In my defense I am on the second story. Canary Wharf is as much a temple to consumerism as usual. Apparently the average Brit wears around £600 of clothes on any given day. I doubt that that paltry amount gets the average Wharfer safe from an indecent exposure charge. Spend, spend, debt and more debt, work and work. Credit cards undoubtedly are the contemporary tickets to indentured servitude and they're selling fast. The masses of Indians who left their homes 150 years ago to toil on British plantations indentured themselves in order to eat and escape the poverty of their homes. These days we do it for a flashy handbag and I can't escape the feeling that it’s completely nuts. It’s almost comical but when put in a wider perspective it is really saddening but speaks volumes about the power of image and advertising. So action number one as home secretary: ban advertising.

After a couple of months of toil we decided to take a break, as I needed to catch up on some sleep. Ummmed and Ahhed but in the end got some flights to Bratislava in Slovakia. Touched down about 11pm and found the airport’s 24hr information desk, which was conveniently closed. Luckily had brought the LP, which told us which bus to get to the train station in town and after a bit of wandering around outside the airport found the bus stand. We found out that we could get an overnight train to Prague and decided that that sounded like a good idea. So less than an hour after entering the country we were on our way out. We found one of those cabins with seats facing each other, like the first class cabins BR trains used to have. Locked the door and slept. I woke up with a start with some guy standing over me in the middle of the night, which gave me a shock and had me convinced we were about to be robbed. In retrospect I’m not sure which of us was more worried as he hurried from the cabin after I exclaimed loudly and start furiously checking our bags.

We got into Prague at 5 a.m. in the morning and headed straight down to the famous Charles Bridge before the hordes of tourists arrived. A lucky burst of sunshine through a sky that was largely overcast meant that the photos worked out pretty well. Later in the day the bridge was completely full of people and street performers. We stayed in this great 1920’s art deco hotel that apparently was used in one of the Mission Impossible films. Walks around the castles and Cathedrals, a classical concert, and plenty of beer cellars and wonderful ‘beer snacks’ made up the activities. Any country that has a ‘beer snacks’ section on the menu must be a source of real genius, which of course it is. We weren’t the only ones grasping Kafka novels hoping that Prague might anoint them with some of that wisdom.

We also visited Terezin, a town about two hours north of Prague, which is surrounded by enormous 19th century earthworks and was used in WWII as a concentration camp. We also did overnight trips to Kutna Hora, a town which a few hundred years ago rivaled Prague in wealth and influence but lost out when Prague was picked as the capital. Now it still has many of the grand buildings but set in a sleepy little town. One of the massive central European castles was also on the agenda and lastly Olomuch, a university town in the east of the country which has what we have decided is the greatest cellar bar of all time and some great beer snacks. From there we re-entered Slovakia and caught the plane back.

Back in London, after this break, it was becoming apparent that we both weren’t going to find satisfactory work anytime soon. We decided that Liz would head out to Istanbul and take up a teaching position there and I would follow a month later once the rental agreement was up on our flat. Naturally I used this month to revert to type and become a sloth like hermit.

I’ve been in Istanbul almost a week and I’ve almost got myself stabbed already! The city is pretty modern, at least the area we are in on the Asia side. I’ve been busy training and teaching but what I’ve seen of the old town on the European side of the Bosphorus has been full of character. It’s a huge city though. Back to the stabbing, and unsurprisingly it involved football. There are two teams in Istanbul, which are huge rivals, the local one being Fenabache. It was the last day of the season and Fenabache and Galataserey, their rival, were both in the running for the title. We were invited to watch the decisive game at a local bar but were running late so headed out to have dinner instead. By the time we came out of the restaurant the streets were filled with Fenabache fans and despite their apparent loss they were chanting and beeping horns and waving flags wildly. Great! A bit of local colour and atmosphere, this is what living in other countries is all about. It was about 10 seconds after stepping on the street that I got someone’s shoulder in my chest.
‘What the??’
I, in my ignorance, thought the guy just didn’t look where he was going. However, then I looked up and saw that everyone on the street was looking at me rather strangely – as if they had taken a sudden dislike to my face. Quite understandable I hear some of you say. But honestly even I don’t make so many people so hostile quite so quickly. Someone gabbled something at us in Turkish and Liz replied,
‘Err I don’t know’
Luckily this was enough to let them know that they had a dumb foreigner in their midst. A couple off the street stopped and spoke very urgently to us.
‘You must change now! You are wearing bad team colours!’
‘Quick, quick! Now, now! Take off your shirt!’
They then pointed at Liz’s cardigan and suggested that it might be a better choice? Marching through a crowd of crazed football supporters wearing a tiny, tight, pop up cardigan, with chest hair poking out of the top, and my belly out of the bottom is a better choice?!? OK…. So on what in Istanbul terms is Oxford Street I pulled off my red and yellow striped shirt (the offending colours) and replaced it with the cardigan. A hundred yards down the street a mob of supporters spotted a car moving slowly in the traffic that must also have displayed the evil red and yellow. Within seconds it was enveloped by guys standing of the roof, the bonnet, and boot, kicking furiously at the sunroof, windscreen and rear screen, while others on the sidelines bashed away at the windows. Although, relieved to be out of my red and yellow stripes, my tight black cardi didn’t exactly feel like a suit of armour. We headed on down the street trying to look as completely inconspicuous as possible. Another group of fans about 30 abreast and 20 yards deep marched towards us filling the whole street. Their chanting and air punching arm extensions brought neo Nazi’s to mind. I just prayed that my outfit wouldn’t lead any to start questioning my sexuality, and therefore be forced to pummel me in a similar fashion to the car’s windscreen. Fortunately they passed on, apparently oblivious to anything except red and yellow in combination.

We reached our flat without incident, the only further danger being crossing the road in front of it. Rival fans were driving down the four laned road at idiotic speeds with huge flags flapping from the back of their cars. Like knights at the tilt, opposing cars of opposing colours would race past each other in opposite directions blasting their car horns in auditory joust. Well, I suppose I won’t be wearing that again any time soon!

Hellova Halloween

2005-11-07T13:05:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned before, they take halloween pretty seriously on this side of the pond. So to give myself a shot at really exploring the culture we headed south to Madison, site of the maddest halloween party in the midwest.

It all started with the outfit. As children of the 80's will already have recognised I'm beetlejuice, all credit goes to Liz on the choice of character. Notice the stripy suit, i made that. After an intolerable (for others) amount of moaning, complaining, hours of work, backache, toil etc, i managed to spray paint straight lines down a white jacket and trousers and produce a masterpiece. I have new respect for clothes designers. If i ever see another roll of masking tape in my life i might go into spasm. For those not aquainted with Beetlejuice, he's a rather flamboyant and unpleasent fellow from a comedy horror film who has a penchant for grabbing with crotch, (all in good time). Liz backed me up as the punky Lydia (another character from the film).

Our drive down to Madison was accompanied by a gradual sense of being poisoned from the fumes coming off my sprayed suit. After using all the black spray paint had we moved onto metal spray paint and the piece de resistance anti rust spray as each ran out in turn. The chemical cocktail was combined with the news that the police would be out on the streets of Madison in force - there having been riots the previous year, and a crowd of 20,000 people expected. oh yes. party like its 1999.

The evening kicked off about 7 and I recognised pretty soon that i was going to the love it. Every 5 meters or so, down a mile long street, people were shouting 'beetlejuice! beetlejuice! beetlejuice!', 'hey BJ' 'you are like the most awesome beetlejuice EVER!' etc. It really was a youngest childs dream. Families out on the streets to look at the costumes, photographed me incessently "(and others admittedly) as did a chinese tourist who wanted to have a photo with me - her eyes almost popping out of her sockets when I spoke Mandarin to her. People tapped on the windows of restaurants as i passed to take yet more photos - and for a few precious hours, I, Nigel Peter Harrison was a star. Actually it wasn't so different from being in China thinking about it, the difference being you actually understand what people are shouting at you. The first bar I went to, I had the temerity to proclaim that Beetlejuice's get free drinks and it worked! at first at least. After a few we wandered up and down the strip seeing and being seen. Probably half the people on the the street, which was pretty much packed, were in costumes. Although often, not particularly halloweeny, apparently just dressing up is the important bit. So there were contingents of jocks dressed as beer cans and that kind of thing. I 'hung' (check out my command of the local venacular) with Kiss, Fruit of the Loom, the cops, the fake cops and eventually completely destroyed my vocal cords doing a poor voice immitation of BJ. There is only so many times you can say 'you're working with a professional here' in one evening.

Then it was back to a bar for dancing until kicking out time, at which point everyone flooded onto the street. The police had erected huge floodlights to light the street hoping to discourage bad behaviour. At the end of the night in order to move everyone on mounted police rode through the crowd, spread out and then back again to try and push the revellers back down the street. At the sight of this one portion of the crowd morphed into a bunch of english soccar hooligans and began jumping up and down chanting at the police. People like me, stood by the side to see what happened. It was one of those times when you wonder whether having the police there really just stirs things up. Eventually hearing idiots shouting idiotic things and engaging in a dance up and down the street with increasingly frustrated looking police we called it a night. Having no place to stay we reverted to type and in true tramp fashion slepted in the back of the car in a multistory car park - classy.

I'll just finish up with some photos. Heading to Chicago in a couple of days so probably will have something to report from there......

Here come the cops
Fruit of the loom

A pie sized slice of Americana

2005-10-19T21:48:00.000-07:00

A great man once said, “America is a large friendly dog in a very small room. Every time it wags its tail, it knocks over a chair”. Actually it was Arnold Joseph Toynbee and I’ve never heard of him. I’ve discovered a lot in the past few weeks and not just the joy of writing with a quotation dictionary to hand. When the Brits think of America in their ubiquitous patronizing but indulgent way they think they know everything. Just like a parent who thinks they know their child but as soon as they turn their back, the child goes off and invents the atom bomb. America can still surprise.

I’m not sure whether to start by smashing a few preconceptions or reinforcing a few, but in the spirit of making everyone back home more comfortable I’ll start with what we ‘know’. Who needs a pick up truck with a bonnet that comes up to the same height as your shoulder? Apparently, a surprising number of folks (people). This has been a point of some self righteous indignation on my part since my arrival but I have now discovered the cause is not careless wastefulness on the part on the locals but a money saving scheme. Sounds strange? Let me explain.

In an alleged effort to boost the construction industry, the US government has introduced tax breaks on vehicles over 3 tons in weight – the effect being the US car companies hugely increasing the number of 3 ton cars produced at rock bottom prices. In effect it acts as a tax break on US produced cars as no foreign manufacturer can produce gun-less tanks and pay the import costs. Once the tax benefit comes into play, the same price buys you a nice sensible car or a monster truck. As someone who orders steak over salmon on the basis of price to weight ratio I understand the rational choice on offer. Very clever. This is why even here in Eau Claire, a modest town half the size of Portsmouth, can still support a huge Hummer dealership.

America isn’t just New York and Los Angeles, there’s a huge space in between that most people only take the trouble to fly over, and that is know as ‘the mid west’. By mid west we don’t mean its halfway between the modern world and a saloon bar shootout but more like the people from here aren’t from either coast and don’t want to be lumped together with the Texans. It is in this large middle area that I have found my home away from home. Liz’s parents have welcomed us with open arms and we’ve been enjoying some wholesome Wisconsin hospitality and the chance to explore the real America.

Wisco, as it is known to the natives, like so many US states, has a nickname – The Cheese state. Not too terrifying or inspiring you might think but certainly a step up the ladder from The Mosquito State of New Jersey, or the delightfully descriptive Tar and Turpentine State of North Carolina. Supporters of the local football team, the Green Bay Packers don huge foam cheese wedge hats on match day, striking fear into the opposition, perhaps one to suggest to the Pompey fan club.

The state has a huge amount of woodland and lakes which I’ve been exploring on foot, bike and kayak. Due to its massive and apparently out of control, deer population everyone who calls himself a man hunts. Walking into a sports store the other day, I was slightly taken aback by finding that it was in fact an armory. Rifles, pistols the length of my fore arm, cross bows and long bows stretched as far as I could see (due to the high shelves admittedly). I felt for a second like Neo ‘I need guns, lots of guns’, but no need to escape the matrix here, so I left them put. I did toy with the idea of getting a rather nice faux leaf pile body suit though. This time of year, you should wear orange in the woods to prevent anyone from mistaking you for a dear that talks and walks on its hind legs and duly shooting you.

Last month we took a trip up to the U.P. which is upper peninsular Michigan. It’s pretty remote and fairly well preserved in its natural state. The folks here are known as yupers – no relation to the much hated 80’s bourgeoisie social sect – this is a harsh land, but a beautiful one, lying on the shores of Lake Superior. Pity I accidentally deleted all my photos. We went to an area known for ship wrecks and went diving on three of them – my first wreck dives.

On the cultural side of things I’ve been to a performance by second city – a Chicago based improvisation comedy group and a performance of Broadway classic songs, of which I knew none – surprise, surprise, I’ve been laboring for years under the delusion that South Pacific was a place. Breaking away from the genteel we sampled the delights of the local Oktoberfest celebrations and a country music bar – where I left the crowd in stunned silenced with my partner swinging, doe-si-doeing, willow stripping (that’s a dance people!) antics. Actually we didn’t win the ‘slow dance’ prize on offer, because at the end, the incompetent judge said he couldn’t decide who should win and said the first person to get on stage and give him a ‘hell yeah’ would take the prize. I got to stage first but was frozen by the thought ‘what the hell is a ‘hell yeah’’ some kind of strange hand slapping ritual? No, just shouting ‘hell yeah’ as loud as possible and it seems I was too late.

Who ever said the US doesn’t have history!?! Well pretty much that’s true, but they’ve got something better; pretend history and it’s far more fun. We spent a day at the Renaissance festival, a big fair that runs for two months of the year just outside of Minneapolis. Everyone gets to dress up in costume, put on ridiculous British accents and basically live just like they did, way back when….. Eating turkey legs, onion rings, buying souvenirs, the usual. Actually the costume and jousting were a little more medieval than renaissance but now I’ve learnt that to get the most out of life you sometimes have to let these ‘details’ pass. They have a lot of stages putting on entertainment throughout the day, one of the most popular ones being, ‘vilification tennis’. Two teams insult each other across a net and a judge awards points for the vilest insult (your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries, that kind of thing). I don’t remember that from history class but some humor is timeless.

Last but not least, the hugest celebration of the year here is coming up next week. No, not Thanksgiving but Halloween. They love it. I’ve seen houses decked out with lights and statues for the last two weeks in preparation. The pumpkin carving parties started at the start of the month, ‘won’t they rot?’ I said. Not to worry was the reply, this way you get to carve twice as many. Perhaps not surprising from the people that gave us global warming (sorry Liz, admittedly below the belt). We’ve been working on costumes this week, something I mention in order to prove I am spending my time productively, and expect to be indistinguishable from Beatlejuice this time next week. So that’s all for now, perhaps now I’ll try to write less and more frequently, I guess we’ll see…..

PS yes yes, before I get comments about incorrect spelling its the heretical version of word I'm using.

A new home online

2005-10-16T13:28:00.000-07:00

My previous site, http://www.whereisnigel.mytraveljournals.com just got too damn expensive and not strictly being a traveller anymore, just a lazy layabout, it didn't make much sense to shell out 30 quid a year for something i couldn't afford. All of the entries previous to this one are transfered from the other site to here, although not the photos because there are hundreds and that would be too much like hard work. I read somewhere (i read alot of stuff, generally somewhere) that although millions of blogs are started every year, most don't get beyond a couple of entries, so everone to break trends i'll try and make it at least til three. Thanks and enjoy.

There and back again, a forlorn job seekers tale…..

2005-08-06T13:49:00.000-07:00

I kept putting off the next journal entry ‘I’ll write when I have some news’ I thought to myself, expecting at any moment some life changing, earth shattering opportunity to miraculously spring forth like a desert oasis, which I could then boast fully proclaim to the world. Naturally, It never happened. Leaving tiny Yangshuo for the big bad city of Hong Kong, and looking for a ‘proper job’ seemed a sensible and responsible thing to do a couple of months ago. In retrospect, after two months of penny pinching, illegal working and slowly but steadily dwindling funds it looks more like an exercise in self-delusion. Of course you can get jobs in Hong Kong, but mostly only if you’re in London, which makes perfect sense. I mean, I can’t blame the good firms of that East Asian metropolis really, who would want to employ some smelly backpacker who turns up and demands work, even if he is Nigel Harrison (clearly the implications of this were completely lost on my potential employees). Unfortunately, I was hampered by what I call a ‘vicious suit-less circle’. No job-no money-no suit, no suit-no job-no money, clearly a downward spiral in anyone’s book. That isn’t to say I turned up at interviews in my Thai fisherman’s trousers, an Indian peasent smock and sporting an eclectic array of traveler’s bangles from a variety of admittedly exotic locations. Nor did I wax lyrical, in the frustratingly self satisfied manner of many travelers, about all the places I had had the good fortune to visit and that the poor desk bound interviewer probably would never get around to. I leave that variety of life reassurance to these pages. All I mean is that my M&S trousers, shirt and tie combo weren’t quite doing it for me. I can place myself in the interviewers shoes, having had the pleasure of wearing them myself in the past and no doubt some of what was in their mind was ‘is this guy really going to stay here? He hasn’t even bothered to buy a suit in a city where you can’t walk down the street without being accosted by countless tape measure wielding south Asian tailors’. Guilty as charged. Sometimes you get the (self defeating) feeling that something is just not going to happen and invariably (inevitably) you’re right.Hong Kong of course is a city of many delights, the greatest of which is quite the opposite of living in Chungking mansions my HK home from home. No one who has not lived there can quite understand this infamously shabby concrete tower block placed incomprehensibly in the center of Kowloon’s golden mile ‘shoppers paradise’. As an aside what on earth does ‘shoppers paradise’ mean anyway? Other than Nigel’s personal vision of hell. I don’t recall Dante mentioning Kowloon in the Inferno but just maybe Chungking mansions made it in there. I definitely think there is something in the honeycomb of airless, windowless, furniture-less, strip lighted box rooms crammed with immigrant families that would have appealed to the poet. They say that you can find every nationality on earth living in Chungking. I can vouch, that if you step into one of the shuddering-oh-so-slow-please-god-don’t-break-when-I’m-in-here lifts and you are not joined by ex-residents of at least 4 continents then you have a rather unusual group. In this block (unlike in the rest of HK) Liz and I could consider ourselves practically royalty, possessing not only a window but air-con. They have actually made a movie about this place. To allow some natural light into the interior of this Dark Continent, skylights are bored into the monolithic slab. Looking down from the window in the toilet of my top floor guesthouse into one of these was like looking into some mine shaft that in a Hollywood post apocalyptic epic (probably inadvisably and expensively made at the urging of Kevin Costner) has become the last refuge of a dejected and degraded version of humanity. So the Hong Kong section of this story came to a slow and painful end and I retreated dejected and rejected to the safety of China. Liz stayed an extra couple of weeks to finish her work and meet a friend who was visiting. Returning to Yangshuo was like putting on a favorite outfit that has been worn in over many years and now although comfortable gives you the sneaking suspicion that really you ought to get a new one. Just when it seemed that things couldn’t get much worse that desert oasis turned up in the form of two free round trip flights from Hong Kong to Chicago (face value about 1500 quid). We won them by entering a competition in a Hong Kong restaurant, good thing Liz didn’t listen to me when I was said we should spend the evening in our tiled cell in Chungking to save money. So that made our decision pretty easy, Chicago being within touching distance (8 hours by road apparently – remember this is America where everything is bigger) of Liz’s parents in Wisconsin. This means an extra and completely unforeseen addition to my trip and the welcome opportunity to examine the land of the free in detail and of course meet the future in laws, (will have to remember to pack my devastating charm). So Asia ends on September the 9th aboard the earliest free flight available and until then we are working out our time in beautiful Yangshuo, not a bad purgatory. So life consists of teaching English, reading and studying tai chi in the local park with the tai chi shi fu (teacher), a very Zen type whose English only extends as far as ‘relaaaaax’, ‘slooooowly’. Hope everyone is having a good day.

Tales from china, the 25 pence affair

2005-04-06T14:17:00.000-07:00

So its been a long long time. Well, the plan has reconfigured and mutated and bought me to Yangshuo in China. Its another land of towering rock karsks (a la halong bay, but on land). I'm looking for work in Hong Kong at the moment (via the net mostly) and living here to save money. Spent a couple of weeks in the city before making a break for the mainland, I'm just over the border from HK really. Well, i say just over the border, its a 12 hour bus ride, but this is china remember. Of my adventures in last month (or more) being attacked by meat clever wielding locals definately highlight. Liz (my yankee girlfriend) and I went out to get dinner the other week; in yangshou they set up resturaunt stands every evening near the town centre, each run by a local family. I guess there must be 15 or so stands, each with collection of trestle chairs and tables and a food table stacked with local produce which you basically point at, and ask them to cook. These tables are an adventure in themselves, stacked up with ducks, chickens, pork, beef, bamboo, greens of a million varieties, egg plant mushrooms, snails, big tubs of live fish, (which they'll batter to death on your command) and everyones personal favorite mountain rat. Yes, its a massive 18 inch rat skinned for cooking and with huge teeth - yum! Apparenty their teeth are famously strong and the chinese keep live mountain rats in cages and get them to bite metal in order to test its strength and thickness. Anyway, I digress;So Liz and I think we are pretty china savvy, so start the process of negotiating prices for each dish we want, which we agree, with the chubby restraunter, 15 quai (thats one pound) for a plate of scrambled egg and fried tomato (a chinese fave) and fried potato and egg plant. We sit down and the kid (who Liz claims looked cute, but later turns out to be the embodiment of lucifer) gives us a bowl of rice, which he says we need to pay 4 quai for (25p). Now rice is free for chinese people and foriegners normally get charged 2 quai, combined with the fact they presented us with the smallest plate of egg and tomatoe ever we get up and leave refusing to pay - basically they were trying to rip us off, and we weren't having it. Unfortunately the owners resented our display of principle and decend on us. The husband and number one son grabbing huge metal cleavers, that they had just been using to dismember fish and cut chicken throats, and started waving them with alarming proximity to my head whilst bawling at us in mandarin. Son number 2 (having been told by L in chinese not to touch her) crabbed me also, as did the wife, so in total I initiated my escape with a small chinese family of four clinging on to me, two of which were ready to carry out a quick gutting. Liz thinking that they wouldn't chop her up kept diving between me and the cleaver men, and I, naturally doing my best to prevent her getting sliced and diced kept shoving her back, creating a rather ridiculous dance where we circled each other constantly ringing chinese. By now the other stall owners, people eating, passers by etc had gathering to watch the charade, probably at least fifty people hemmed us in (this is pretty normal when the chinese get into arguement in public - these passers form of quasi peoples court). I stood helpless and Liz was screeming at the chinese cook who screamed back at her, it was in chinese but i'll do by best to translate:L: YOU CHEATED US, YOU ARE A CHEATING PERSONC: I DIDN'T CHEAT YOUL: YOU ARE A CHEATING PERSONC: I DIDN'T CHEAT YOUL: YOU ARE A CHEATING PERSONC: I DIDN'T CHEAT YOUyes, real school yard stuff, not helped by our rather limited command of the language. A chinese student of english then turned up to try and disolve the situation and we explained to her what was going on, and she exlained this to the impromptu peoples court, who couldn't understand why she was defending us. That is until we mentioned that they tried to charge us four quai for rice, from the reaction of the crowd who flinched at this laughable price we sensed the tide of arguement was turning, so Liz changed her arguement (again i'll translate)L: YOU CHARGED US 4 QUAIC: NO I DIDNTL: YOU CHARGED US 4 QUAIC: NO I DIDNTL: YOU CHARGED US 4 QUAIC: NO I DIDNTAgain, persuasive stuff from the foreigners, and the chinese cook lady started laughing nervuously, which in chinese culture means 'i'm losing face and don't no what to do' but continued to demand payment for food we refused to accept. As quickly as it started we were told that we 'could now go' as a local had paid and the crowd dispersed in seconds. Apparently they didn't want China to loose face so gave her the money. Obviously I wasn't happy she'd gotten away with it - she really was a CHEATING PERSON. Good news is, I've still in full possession of my limbs.

An ending and a begining

2005-02-19T13:55:00.000-08:00

left varanasi for agra on an overnight train which i should have missed due to traffic but luckily in the age old british tradition the train was running comfortably late so had just enough time to get it. Arrived in Agra early the next morning and devoted the next few days to some serious monument spotting, taking in Agra fort, an ancient city some 40 km out of town and of course the Taj. Well its big and its white. Actually it is pretty impressive, worth the 10 quid to get in (this doesn't sound like much, but could easily last me 4 days). Delhi followed and more monuments.Right now i'm out in the desert in Jaisalmer, an old golden sandstone town, with a fort with a whole village inside. Its nearly all beautifully carved, like the whole town has been fashioned from one big block. The thing to do here is a camel safari and although i had already done one in china i signed up for four days - having been assured by the salesman that i would be with 2 other english and 2 canadians so have lots of company. Of course what the kind salesmen meant to say was i'd be with 6 french, 2 of which are technically canadian, leaving me with just a stinky camel for company - some people just have no shame.... seriously wasn't too bad, it turns out that me and the camel shared a passion for shakespeare. Lots of sand, stars and campfires was the order of the day. Thankfully not too many hours a day on the camel as sitting would now be (more) impossible. Now for the title... for those who haven't heard this may be a bit of a suprise, but it maybe sometime before im back in england, have decided to stay in asia and get a job. Of course i miss everyone at home and its been a big decision but just can't help myself. will be leaving india in the next week or so and that will be the end of this part of the story but i'll keep up this site and try to give you all some idea of what i'm getting up to. OK bye all, hope you enjoyed crossing a zillion countries, a few mountain ranges, close encounters with wierd beasties and those horrendous unforgettable bus trips with me. And remember, if you want to do the same, stop making excuses and in the immortal words of nike corporation.....just do it....

Into India

2005-02-02T14:04:00.000-08:00

My last week in Nepal was spent seeing some of the sights of Kathmandu and catching up with some friends before striking out in search of india. The origional plan was to take an overnight bus to the border and then leave on the last day before my visa expired but when i got to the bus station it emerged that the rebels had caused a strike in one of the areas the bus was to pass through and consequently it was cancelled. So instead the next day I had to catch one in the morning taking a route that was the two slow sides of a triangle. Pulled into the border town of sunoali sometime late and checked into an empty hostel with a ever present order of urine, taking a top floor room, which according to the proprietor 'smelt better'. It was a pretty seedy and muddy little town, and like most border towns had more than its fair share of deranged looking characters. The owner of the hotel tried to sell me hash by the kilo which he said he could supply on the indian side of the border so i suspect there may be a little bit of a drug trade going on....Crossed the border first thing in the morning and after a battle with the travel agents who were supposed to give me the ticket i'd bought in Kathmandu but instead tried to extract more cash first i got under way. It now turns out that i got out of nepal just in time, as yesterday the king chucked out the government there and has cut all communications and imposed martial law....India is just so amazingly crowded. everywhere is a teeming mass of people jostling and shouting, arguing and fighting. everyday life seems to be executed in a war zone. Varanasi is an ancient city on a bend in the ganges. everyday pilgrims climb down the flights of limestone steps that seperate the sometimes ancient and often crumbling buildings from the toxic river and wash away their sins. Starting at about 5 in the morning, temples along the front begin to fill and priests perform rituals that appear prehistoric. Bells clang incensently whilst in front of the alter a man baring what seems to be a medievil flame thrower chants and spins, waving his blazing metal torch. By the riverside, the pyres which burn 24 hours a day immolate a cease procession of embalmed corpses, and barges arrive piled high with the wood to supply this endless market.I'm staying in the narrow alleys of the old city, a world only a meter wide. Apparently this is still wide enough for bikes, motorbikes, people and cows to exist in, although not quite side by side. People told me that india was going to be dirty, and they weren't wrong, there is an astounding amount of excrement. But i guess thats only to be expected with quite so many cows everywhere. These bovine baronets wander imperiously around, facing down oncoming traffic and napping calmly in the middle of busy streets whilst the tides of life flow around. So thats Varanasi.

Trekking Rhinos and other photos

2005-01-21T14:19:00.000-08:00

In the last month plus a bit I’ve been trekking in the mountains of northern Nepal and the jungles of the south. The Annapurna circuit, 300 km through the mountains of northern Nepal, climbing from 900m to 5416m and back through sub tropical, temperate and alpine terrains with a touch of semi desert. Frankly, it’s all fairly impressive. The journey started about 150 km from Pokara, Nepal’s 2nd city. The local bus achieved an average of 25 kmph to get us there in a speedy 6 hours. Due to the civil war going on here (yes, I am in a war zone, how very daring) the bus in regularly impeded by road blocks and young men with guns. Most of the buses and trucks here have "40 kmph speed limited!" written on the sides, with helpful advice such as "go slow, live long" so I suspect the Nepalese have never really been used to a completely smooth transport infrastructure.The trek can be split into three sections, firstly the climb up, following a river valley for 10 days or so (slowly in order to acclimatize and mineralize altitude sickness) to about 4500m. Then breaking away from the river (barely more than a stream at this point) you head up and over the 'largest pass in the world' Thorong La before dropping down into another river valley on the other side which then can be followed back towards Pokara.We set off in a group of six, although this dwindled to 4 after a few days, a couple of the guys eager to rush on ahead to get back for Xmas, hmmmm something I was to miss by 10 days. The scenery on the way up was naturally stunning. As there are no roads in this area the only traffic on the path are the long trains of mules that bring food and such trekking essentials as chocolate and beer. The mules jingle their way past, large bells hanging from their necks like Swiss cows with dyed yak tail headdresses, largely ignoring us walkers, (who if not careful may be struck by a packed saddle bag) as if to say ' I don't feel in the least bit silly with part of an ex yak protruding from my forehead'. The path is an ancient trade route between Nepal and Tibet and threads its way through numerous settlements, the inhabitants of which are either subsistence farmers or guesthouse/tea shop owners.As we climbed the temperatures quickly dropped, the 4th day or so, we were encountering kids tobogganing down frozen sections of the path and had to don our Tibet gear in order to stay unfrozen. After about a week we'd reached a small Tibetan style town called Manang where we holed up for a few days to acclimatize ready for the climb. Although I was keen to press on, concerned about the coming of the snow, we spent 3 days relaxing, just visiting the local glacier. The day we set off again my fears were realized, in the afternoon just as we reached a guesthouse a bit of a blizzard commenced. It snowed most of the night and as we huddled round a table with hot coals in a bucket at our feet I grew increasingly despondent. The next day the sky had cleared completely, and the valley had a thick layer of snow. The bushes of Yak Karcha (translation - Yak meadows) had been transformed into a field of huge white mushrooms on which a herd of extravagantly horned yaks munched happily. This commenced one of the hardest days, a climb from 4200ish to 4800m often in the snow, the last hour being a steep 300m slog into high winds. At one point, whilst follows a high path along a steep sided valley edge we heard frantic shouts from the opposite side of the valley. A couple of Nepalese, little more than pinpricks at this range, were waving a large red cloth at us and calling unintelligibly. Of course we thought this was some kind of distress call, so gamely I headed on a straight path down the snow covered slope, backtracking and losing 200m in height (understand every meter is hard won up there) before crossing a river and up the other side in order to help. However, my vision of pulling off some kind of high altitude rescue was soon shattered, when I realized it was just a cunning plow by the locals to get us to buy tea at highly inflated prices from them (they claimed the path we were on was dangerous.....a likely story). In our irritation proceeded to pull out Mars bars and munch them conspicuously whilst sitting on their seats, pointedly ignoring the array of biscuits they foolishly hoped to sell us. That night was spent at Thorong La high camp. At that height, it’s extremely cold and sleep is very difficult. Spent the first few hours of rest in a part hallucination, a kind of waking dream before eventually dropping off for a couple of hours, waking at 6 for the climb to the top. Set out at 7am, the wind having dropped, which is how it remained until the afternoon, (this is nearly always the case, clear mornings, the wind and clouds build throughout the day) but still in a partial darkness. My toes were ice cubes in my boots, having lost all feeling, whilst we tottered our way along a narrow and icy section of path with a smooth, steep and frozen slope dropping off on our right. As at Everest base camp, progress is slow, steps small and breathing controlled. Any overexertion leaves you gasping. After about an hour of climbing the sun broke over the mountains at our backs - a welcome tide of warmth, lifting spirits and defrosting digits. At 9.30am after a multitude of false dawns, we turned the corner around which was the top of the pass. A mass of prayer flags and cairns marked the top. I celebrated with unprecedented quantities of chocolate and by building a cairn to mark our passing. Then it was time for a knee jerking, calf killing, 4 hour and 1600m decent into Mucktinath. From Mucktinath onwards the walk took on a far more relaxed pace and attitude. No longer having to worry about the weather or any climbs we really took it easy. I took to loudly singing Christmas carols as we walked, much to the bemusement of the locals and the irritation of the zealously agnostic duchies that were in the party. On Xmas eve we wrote to Santa, and although he wasn't quite as generous as usual, he did manage a bounty bar in my stocking, I guess it’s a pretty long way from Lapland. Nearly at the end of the trek we reached the village of Tatopani, which literally translates as 'hot water'. This being due to the hot springs in the village which feed two steaming bathing pools by the rivers edge. The village is gathered around a single cobbled street, a mass of stone houses, fully laden mandarin trees and enormous point-setter bushes. The original plan had been to remain here for a couple of days before heading back to Pokara for New Year. Things however didn’t work out that way. The lure of a beautiful location and steaming ponds to sit in meant that New year and the days on each side comprised of sitting in the garden or springs reading and soothing my poor poor feet.Eventually the circuit was finished in a total of 25 days and made it back to Pokara. After a few days in this lake side town, again more relaxing combined with a bit walking and sailing and a very bracing swim in the lake, which slightly amazed the locals, who circled in their canoes in disbelief. From Pokara caught the bus for another very slow trip to Chitawan national park in the south of the country. The southern part of Nepal, which borders India, is known as the terrain. This is a flat plain rather unlike the mountainous north. Chitawan is famous for its Rhinos and Tigers which I was hoping to see. Hired a guide for a 3 day hike in the jungle. After seeing hundreds of crocs, both fresh water and salties throughout the first day, we arrived at a lake as the sunset. Just before reaching a hide a deep reverberating bellow in the bushes a flurry of birds taking flight indicated a rhino was nearby. Having heard a story from a guide about his battle with a rhino I wasn’t to keen to take it on, so when instructed to climb a tree wasted, no time getting up one, forgetting to take by large pack off first. A pair of these massive armored beasts had come for a quick drink. At the village the previous day, I had patted the ‘pet’ rhino that was hand reared by the residents so had become acquainted with the stone like quality of their heads. Over the course of the walk we encountered numerous monkeys and wild peacocks (which look amazing in flight) as well as going into some rarely visited (by foreigners) villages, where we became the animals of interest. Due to the Maoist rebels calling a bus strike on the last day, we stretched the walk to four days and had to stay an extra day before heading back to Katmandu. Which is where I am at the mo. Will be heading to Varanasi in India in a few days, will be sad to leave this place.

i'm alive!

2005-01-04T14:03:00.000-08:00

heyhey, not a proper entry this one.... literally just got back from 25 days on the trail (ok ok 5 of which where spent blissfully bathing in hot springs and reading). climbed up to 5416m, thats 4 x ben nevis and 1000m higher than mont blanc, not that easy so deserved the rest. ok, will hopefully put in a proper entry soon, hope everyone had happy new year + xmas......

Lhasa to Kathmandu

2004-12-07T14:09:00.000-08:00

god, where to begin, i know, been completely remiss in everyway. So, have reached Kathmandu, via a bumpy 5 day landcruiser tour over the tibetan plateau. Left Lhasa a chilly friday morning after fortunately and after some difficulty finding a bunch of people willing to take me on (and with space to spare in their 4x4). First few days consisted largely of monestry hopping, taking in many monks, buddhas and their abodes. The journey took us through a frozen but dry tibetan landscape, white flat rooved houses dotted in mountain encircled valleys, shepards and herdsmen driving their livestock from one patch of thin emaciated grass to another. On the forth day, taking advantage of a perfect clear sky we turned from 'the friendship highway' (the lhasa to kathmandu track) and headed to the roof of the world.Arrived at Everest basecamp at around noon, the sun powerful, but at 5200m it can always feel a little chilly. From the bace camp we stared at the imposing north face, a white glistening wedge impailing the sky. The many memorials dotted around attested to its victims, cairns mostly with plaques baring the names of many nationalities and from every year. Hiking over the rolling scree pushed up in waves by the weight of the glacier sliding from the mountain left me gasping for breath with each slope. Just a 20m climb required several stops and a very slow pace, i tried to imagine extending these 20m acents to the 3500m odd i needed to cover to reach the summit - incredible. Due to the danger of a frozen solid engine we left everest without spending the night, the camp is totally deserted this time of year anyway. Headed for Tingri, the last town before the border along the 'old tingri road'. This little used track (or never used) bumped and splashed itsway along a valley through small villages that clearly hadn't seen a motor viehicle in some time. Kids rushed to the roadside to wave and the only other traffic were the locals pony and carts. Our driver clearly hadn't some this way in a long time either, looking around him as if reliving some boyhood journey. No disasters luckily, only once crashed through the ice of a frozen stream we were crossing, but luckily wasn't too deep, some heavy thottle seeing us to the otherside. The decent from Tibet into Nepal perhaps has to go down as my favourite journey so far. The road crossed a high tibetan plain, driving straight toward the main himalayan ridge (which contains everest and most of the highest peaks). At first i wondered how on earth we were going to traverse these imposing walls of tibet but as we neared we dropped down and started to follow a narrow gorge, cut by a river that had scoured a route through the ridge. As we followed the ravine and it widened into a valley, the landscape changed dramatically in the space of a few miles. At the top was the tibetan semi-desert, so yellow and sparse but as we decended suddenly trees started to appear and green! (a colour i hadn't seen in about a month) this was joined my flowers and high grass, warm air and a sweet aroma. Had a huge grin on my face the entire time, drinking in the sight of this beautiful and fertile world. Kathmandu is perfect, or pretty close to. This is the winter the the perpetual low sun gives the city a hazy indian summer golden glow. The streets are full of the bustle and crazyness of a real asian city, a relief after the relative calm and orderliness of china. Arrived into the thick of the action, a narrow streeted maze called Thamel, by night a cocophany of neon, people, rickshaws, bikes and taxis. One of which, driven by a nepali who proudly announced he was 15 and therefore didn't have a liscence, sped us through to 'freak street' the old hippy centre of town. The city is full of temples and palaces which of course are ancient, but everywhere in the streets, venerable houses with crumbling brick work and beautiful woodcarved door and window frames line the alleys. Have spent the last week or so really relaxing, after china its all so easy, english speaking everyone, cheap restaurants with sunlit roof terraces and well stocked book shops make for a perfect chill out venue. Tommorow it all changes as i'm heading off to Pokara to start to Annapurna circuit, a 3 week, YES THREE WEEK trek that encircles the annapurna mountain range and climbs to a gasping for air 5400m. All this means, no email, phone or communication of ANYKIND! so if i don't get the chance before i start, HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR ALL!

Desert to Lhasa

2004-11-23T14:01:00.000-08:00

Set out from Beijing last Sunday morning boarding a 24-hour train to zhongwei, a desert region on the border of Inner Mongolia. The train past through an increasingly dry and barren landscape, flat valleys made habitable only by a vast irrigation network bounded by mountainous ridges. Smoke pluming up from factories and power plants filled the low-lying areas with smog, creating turneresque sunsets and dawns. Arrived in Zhongwei and caught a bus after some general wandering the street style confusion. The bus took us to a spot some 15 km out of town where the irrigated plain comes up against the rolling dunes of the desert. The Chinese government has installed a desert research base here to investigate ways to prevent the further encroachment of the sands. Apparently this place is a bit of a Chinese playground, but that must be in the summer as we were the only people there. All the locals stared with the same 'crazy white people!' expression on their faces. Enquiring after the location of the hostel it we were informed that it was closed. oh dear. Not to be deterred negotiated a stay in one of the camel owners huts in the dunes before heading off to the slopes for some sand sledding. Unfortunately being the winter there was no chair lift, so each ride down the steep dune slope, required a rather painful walk back up. Next was the sheep skin rafting, yes that’s right, floating down a river on fifteen dead inflated sheep. Although not exactly white water stuff, I found the whole thing hilarious, the sheep with there backs into he water and legs poking through the bottom of the raft around you.Spent the night huddled round a hot stove in our shack while a friendly chap bustled around stoking the fire and cooking noodles. Non-instant noodles and beer as opposed to usual remote place in china fare, instant noodles and beer, made a real change..... 3 viscous sounding Alsatians tied up outside barked whenever we left the hut, apparently to scare off the wild dogs that roam the desert. Woke early to see the dawn and then to mount our steeds for the day, a rather furry set of camels, trained together with ropes attached to pins in their noses. Not very comfortable I imagine. Probably about as uncomfortable as sitting on a camel for 8 hours solid. Now camels are ok, as long as they don't get it in their heads to raise the pace beyond walking. Unfortunately when they get yanked in the nostrils they tend to raise the pace rather swiftly, resulting in rider having to cling on in every feasible way. Not having stirrups makes a trotting camel rather a bouncy affair and several times I came close to flying off sideways.By the time we'd got back to base the last bus to town had already left, having been 2 days and a camel ride without washing etc, another night in the shack didn't appeal to much so sat by the road hoping the flag down the first taxi/lift back into town. In taxi arrived fairly soon, although already with a passenger, using my finest, get out lonely planet and point where you want to go style communication, managed to get across where we wanted to get to. After some indecipherable chatter (i.e. Chinese) from the driver to her passenger they let us in. After we start driving in the opposite direction in pursuit of a rather fancy looking car I made I’m confused noises at the driver, who signaled that we were going somewhere else first, the passenger showed a press pass identifying him as a journalist - curious I thought. Curious indeed, the car in front was filled with finely suited businessmen who ushered us with them to look at some ancient statue head which evidently been dug out of the ground. Although we couldn't communicate with them in anyway the group proceeded to inspect a building site where presumably the found had been unearthed, telling us to follow. We got back to the cars, thinking well that was nice, and were all ready to go when the big boss looking guy waves to follow him and the others into a restaurant. On out table, laid for 9 - us included, sat a huge hot pot surrounded with plates full of meats and vegetables for cooking in it. On of the men fetched a bottle of rice whiskey and I was sat at my very first Chinese business dinner. It was pretty lucky I’d read the etiquette section in my LP, so although had no way to speak to them made sure I poured others tea before mine, handled business cards (of which I now have a collection) with 2 hands and of course never refuse yet another shot of rice whiskey. 2 hours, and the best meal in ages, later we got driven back, payment being refused for food and taxi, just a photo shoot in the town square being requested, each of them getting to stand next to us for a picture, and several group shots. Bizarre.After a day inspecting Zhongwei I caught a train the next evening - hard seat unreserved, this wasn't fun. Sitting on floor of carriage with a multitude bustling past holding onto my rucksack as no luggage space left, trying to sleep, as was the midnight train. 10 hours later arrived at Xining and caught a 32-hour bus to Lhasa. Although the guy selling me the ticket assured me that it was an official route now (special permits are required to enter Tibet), having to hide whilst we crossed the border from the men with the helmets and the guns rather makes me doubt the truth of that. Arriving at one in the morning in considerable back pain (camels, train floors and 32 hours immobile combined) still paranoid at the sight of any official looking character in a pointy cap, leapt into a taxi and crashed out in a hostel.The next day I got up to inspect the jokang temple, the spiritual center of Tibetan Buddhism. The temple has a continuous stream of pilgrims circulating it clockwise. Most swinging their hand held prayer wheels whilst chanting under their breath. Others prostrate themselves in front of the temple doors whilst the incense from two, three-meter high burners swirls around them. Inside the temples wall more pilgrims circulate the inner sanctum, spinning the large prayer wheels, which surround it. The Potala palace, the (ex)seat of the Dalai Lama is a truly magnificent structure, huge 13 stories high and painted white and with a deep red ochre. Inside are amongst a huge number of chapels the tombs of former Dalai Lamas, their remains contained within huge gold and jewel encrusted stupas reaching from floor to the high ceilings.Picked up my Nepalese visa this morning, so will be heading for Kathmandu relatively soon. At request of the consulate staff spent half and hour helping the locals fill out their application forms as all in English. What a nice chap. Anyways, nuff self congratulation for now.

cells and walls

2004-11-13T13:59:00.000-08:00

ok so once i realised that beccoming a kung fu king probably takes more that a couple of days, i dispatched the idea of hanging around and getting beaten up by 5 year olds. instead left it to the pros to swing swords around, break sticks and iron bars across their heads, thrust their necks onto spear tips etc etc. Saw a demonstration of the monks doing all this and more before marching up the holy mountain that provides the backdrop to the monestry at Shaolin Si. The Monestry is beautiful, and although largely restored, still has a fantastic atmosphere with ancient trees growing up in its courtyards and monks shadow boxing in front of temples.Once in Beijing, courtasy of a muderous night in a hard seat train carriage, and safetly installed in a dorm, our welcoming party was probably the most eccentric character i've yet encountered on my trip. A long frizzy haired,shaggey bearded, gangling looking guy, wandering about in long johns and a Tshirt addressed us with a sly grin,'Where you from?' - a fairly normal opening i grant, to which i reply and enquire after his own origin.'guess!' followed by a brief fit of giggles 'hahaha!' i couldn't 'Iran!'delighted at my mild suprise 'haha!'ok so i ask what he is doing in china'eating and sleeping!' he staccatoes out in his rather squeaky tone 'hahaha!''and how long, pray tell, have you been here?''Guess!haha!' grinning, and utterly self satisfied at the inginuity on his comeback 'one year' his bed is surrounded by a sea of boxes and newspapers. 'haha!'His artful conversation, combined with a penchant for several hour long showers a day, the daylight hours spent hiding under the covers of his bed and then his nightly surjourns to 'embassy' suggested that perhaps i'd stumbled across one of those nortorious al queda sleeper cells (apologies)..... perhaps not.Have spent the last few days in Beijing exploring the forbidden city (you've seen the pictures, like that but with a maelstrome of tourists and pennant waving tour guides), temple of heaven (nice park, beautifully cloured temples) and summer palace (really beautiful park studded with temples and palaces - highly reccomended) before heading out of the city yesterday to clamber over the wall. Took a taxi out to an enrestored section where i suspect they don't really let tourists go and were led by a smiling guide who gabbled on in chinese to us, (presumably) about the wall, clearly oblivious to the fact we didn't have a clue what he was on about. This section was orginional but still in amazingly good repair, although overgrown with saplings. In fact the only places where it wasn't more or less in tact was where the local farmers had pillaged it to build retaining walls for there neat terraces of chestnut and strawberry guava trees. We scambled up and down several steeps sections running along the top of a gorge, through the trees and balancing on the wall's edges. at each crest the watch towers still stood, almost in perfect repair, and from the top of these a fantastic view showed the wall snaking off over hill tops and over the horizen in both directions. And not a tourist in sight - perfect.AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! just spent several hours trying to get some photos online but unfortuneatly computer crash has wiped everythiing so giving up. soz. need to go break some crockery now

Model horse rider

2004-11-05T14:10:00.000-08:00

well the trip to chengdu was an experience. We thought getting the bus rather than the train would be 1: less comfortable (correct) although 2: cheaper (incorrect) 3: faster (ha couldn't have been more wrong). How do you turn an 18 hour motorway journey into a 30 hour struggle for survival? well thats easy, first you have a dodgy unlicenced driver that keeps getting pulled over by the cops and having to spend hours negotiating, then you take your sleeper bus down a 1 lane, unfinished, one way, muddy track, IN THE WRONG DIRECTION. When in the other direction is coming half of chinas trucks (seriously probably close to a thousand passed us). a 2 km stretch of road took 6 hours alone as we bumped from passing place to passing place using gaps in a line of trucks that litterally stretched as far as the eye could see. add to this, the mankiest blanket known to man, bed bugs or somekind of vicous blood suckers, chain smoking fellow passengers and a large alsatian constantly wimpering (i know how it felt). To top it all off the toilet facilities consisted at opening the door at speeds of up to 120 kph whilst changing lanes on a busy motorway and relieving yourself onto the adjacent carridgeway. well you gotta laugh, and suprisingly i did.Chengdu is a modern chinese metropololis (ie breathing asking for trouble). Skyscrapers and hugh flashing advertisements surround an austere looking Mao in the central square - not sure this was exactly what he had in mind. In the parks, water, large rocks and a prefusion of flowers create havens from the bustle where the older play rapid games of Majong, pieces flashing across the table and being slammed down accompanied by a variety of grunts and exclamations from the players and bystanders. Chengdu is also the place for giant panda spotting, most commonly spotted wandering at the 'panda research facility'. And i wasn't disapointed, there they were. yeah, they're big, fluffy, etc was delighted when they took time out from the cuddly stuff to get into a ruck with each other, one grasping the other around the neck, hehe now thats what i call entertainment! well, it was all in fun really ;) Headed north from Chengdu to a small(ish) place called songpan in the highlands. Although formally a sleepy place its well on the way to being touristified, all they need to do is get the water working and build a proper road and i'm fairly confident that you won't be able to move for the tour group camera wielders. Took a 3 day horse trek in the mountains surrounding the town. all kit etc in the saddle bags, wrapped against the freezing winds in hats, scarfs, gloves, thermals, longjohns (i'm a convert) several layers etc, atop by mount felt all heroic and adventuresome. Couldn't resist whistlying the opening bars of magnificent 7 repeatedly for first few hours. Was rather taken with the whole horse thing, reccon i'm a natural in the saddle, next time maybe i'll move it up to a canter...... Countryside was alpine, all gushing streams, frosted pines and autumnal colours. Temperaturewas freezing, ie, bed of pine branches, then ground sheet and 3 blankets, then double bagging sleeping bags (ie mine inside the one they provide), then 2 duvets and a blankets ontop, and this just about staves off frozen blood. Actually was fairly toasty, but water bottles froze overnight as did my contact lenses into their solution, chilly. It amazing what our guides could cook up over an open fire with a couple of iron pots though, we had, stir fry, boiled potatoes, fresh bread, fresh doe nuts, soup with fresh pasta (ok so they brought alot of flour) etc etc, anyway, i was impressed. Another mad succession of bus journies and minor run outof money in town with no banks scenario and Xi'an was reached. City of the the terracotta warriors. Yes there are lots, they stand there, you've all seen the pictures etc etc. Last night attempted to find a bar in Xi'an for a quiet beer, but they don't really seem to have many there, so when we spotted the word 'PUB' in large glowing letters, thought we had struck it lucky. Walking through the enterance and metal detector (good thing i wasn't packin) were ushered into lift. At the top walked into what turned out to be one of the ritziest bars in the city, drinks 6 times normal prices, bottles of champers first thing on the menu, more staff than you can imagine (all in tartan kilts and tops) and Xi'an's finest. We get pointed to a table in prime position in front of the stage, looking rather tatty in dirty combats (fresh from horses back) walking boots (still caked) and fleece. oh yes, quite an entrance. Entertainment was a succession of english songs being murdered in public (when celine dion 'the heart must go on' started it was time to call it a night) and to increase the feeling of the sureal the staff took the opportunity of our presence to call a photo shoot with myself as star model with the bar in the background for promotional purposes. Unfortuneatly was unable to explain concept of 'image rights'. Left Xi'an early this morn and am now at Shaolin Si, yes thats the place where the monks hang out and am currently staying at school of 7000 kungfu students, a multitude of cutless wielding 8 year olds are at the window as i speak - scary

The high pass to Tibetan Border and tigers leaping

2004-10-25T14:17:00.000-07:00

Headed north from Dali (chinese) tourist central to Lijiang (chinese) tourist central. Another undoutedly pretty town, but pretty much remade and filled with souvenir shops but with the impressive back drop of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (jesus they know how to name things round here!). An afternoon was enough to get a flavour of the place and book bus tickets for an early morning exit to the start of the Tigar Leaping Gorge Trek (I refer you to the naming comment made one sentence earlier).Tigar Leaping Gorge is a 2000m deap gouge cut but the young yangzee, along the side of which runs the ancient tea horse trail (part of the silk road) at around 500m above the river. The trek along the length of the gorge takes a day, covering 23km up to a height of 2600m through beautiful pine woodlands and small Tibetan and Naxi villages. I (sensibly) had decided to tackle this distance, altitude and climb with the assistence of a 25kg pack. about 3 hours in at the steepest part of the climb rest stops were about every 10m, locals kept offering me a horse but i refused resolutely remembering the harrison family moto (no joke - 'success through endurance' - so true). The scenery was breathtaking but as i have the assistance of photos today i won't try to clumsily describe it... After an evening spent at the end hitched a ride the next morn back along the 'closed' lower road to the start. Why closed? well that must be something to do with the multitude of landslides our car had to dodge around. I mean, they only covered one lane generally and only were every 100m or so, so hardly needed a closed road, right? wrong. About half way down the gorge we reached a landslip that had enveloped the entire road. 6m high and 20 deep, massive boulders the size of several cars and tons of scree created quite an obsticle. Now we knew what had caused the huge crashing noise we had heard the previous day. The only way past was on foot. Blood was pumping somewhat as i scrambled over, under my feet the rocks slip away and fell to the river 50 m below and from above small stones pitter pattered on my head making me fear another fall was imminent. Once on the otherside i ran the next section until clear of the over hang...phe, still alive.... which was lucky as it meant i got to enjoy the beautiful bus ride to Zhongdian through a plateau of tibetan villages, yaks and large hay stacks drying on enormous trestles.Once at Zhongdian it seemed at first i'd arrive at a bomb site, relentless construction meant the bus station was part of a huge building site. The building boom also meant that the Loney Planet map was completely wrong so it took half an hour of wandering and asking bemused non english speaking locals where the hell i was. Eventually someone pointed us in the right direction and half and hour later we were in the old town. We explored the old town which was still in a fairly origional state, but the building and polishing up had started, so in a year or two it will be another Dali/Lijaing style tourist trap. Zhongdian also boasts a fairly impressive monestry perched on a small hillock in the centre of a valley north of the town. On the top of the hillock the temple sits and around clustered on the hill sides are the monks small residences. They wander about in dark red robes the young ones playfully mucking around and on mobiles whilst the older march stoically, eyeing the tourists.Leaving Zhongdian on an early bus a 6 hour trip took us over a 5000m pass to the town of Dequin. The pass rose firstly a blasted moonscape rift with cut by the mekong and then up through autumnal alpine forest to the snow line and then down again to Dequin. Dequin sits just 10 miles from the Tibetan border but unfortuneately there is no (legal) way for foreigners to cross here. So after a day exploring the area we headed back here to Lijiang and tommorow will be heading to Chengu in China's center.

into China

2004-10-19T14:04:00.000-07:00

Heading north from hanoi via overnight train and bus i reached the hill station of Sapa in northwestern vietnam. Sapa sits at about 2000m amid tall peak and terraced mountain side In the valleys below runs a river and all around are the villages of the 'minority groups'. Vietnam has 50 different minority groups that live in the mountains, some of them numbering up to a million in population. Around Sapa are the Hmong, Den and Kin h groups. Each having a different dress code. I and a couple of aussies treked out around the valley and thru various villages populated with small people selling handicraft, waterbuffalo and plenty of pigs chickens etc. Every so often a loud crack will reverberate around the hills as one of the tribesmen fires his flintlock musket (i'm not joking) at some unfortunate creature/tourist.Everyday the women of the villages walk for miles up the hill to Sapa to sell their handicraft to the tourists. It is incredibly well made and ridiculously cheap, around 5 quid for an intricately hand woven bed spread. You have to watch the ancient ladies though (some of which look well past 100) as they whip out handfulls of opium quicker than the eye to push on unsuspecting sightseers.My trip into China was a 26 hour epic, minibus and motorbike to border, sleeperbus to Kunming and minibus and local bus to Dali. Left Sapa on sunday afternoon aboard mini bus for the border, only of course in a final piece of vietnamese treachery (don't get me started on vienamese trachery) it didn' take us to the border, only to a tour office where suprise to suprise waited a bunch of bikers to whisk us to the border at further cost. Got to the border shaken from several near misses and red eyed from the dust and marched imperiously past the lines of money changers who declaired that we couldn't change our dong (vietnamese currency) in china. Yeah right i though, more lies. Only today was a day for small miracles, they were telling the truth, admittedly purely out of self interest but still, its a start. Once on the chinese side a tour of the banks confirmed this, they didn't want to touch the dong. Oh dear. A helpful english speaker managed to 'find' us a money changer (ie his mate) a shifty looking fellow with a case full of cash. This bloke proceeded to offeer me a rate of 3000 dong per yuan, the real one being 1950. the joker. once negotiated to a more reasonalble (although still criminal) 2050 i hope aboard the sleeper bus to kunming.A network of metal cages down each side and the centre held up bunks and unwashed bed cloths on two levels down the length of the bus. In a concession to safey, spherical metal knobs were placed on the end of each metal beam - reassuring to know in a crash that you wil be bludgeoned to death and not impaled. I thinking i was smart (naturally) spotted a 4 bed width bunk at the back and wasted no time in claiming this as my territory. Spreading myself liberally over all the space making it clear that no one wanted to share this zone. And strangely (i thought) no one did....ominous..... half an hour later i knew why. Everytime the bus hit a bump, (every 30 second or so) i in my end of pendullem position was thrown a foot into the air and decended with a crunch. It was going to be a long night. 12 hours on the sleep deprevation bus and i was in kunming. A Huge sprawl of concrete and people. 5 minutes was enough time to know i had to leave, and as my travel mates were heading to Dali i decided to join them.Minibus next, after a quick noodle soup breakfast. Once we cleared Kunming and its almost endless industrial suburbs we hit the main road. Pity no one had seen fit to finish it yet. The next 8 hours where largely spent on a four lane motorway with no surface, just a 50 foot wide gravel drive. Some helpful soal had placed seemingly at random, large rocks which served as lane markers only they snaked all over the road, our driver picking which ever route seeming to have less traffic in (oncoming or not). An army of vertual slave labour worked on the whole length of the road, filling in holes, digging out mountain sides and shifting dirt in pails slung across their shoulders. On each side peasents brought in the harvent, filling the fields with sheaves of rice all cut by sickle wide hats bobbing in the sun. The road carves through red sandstone mountains of central yunnan, the valleys are fields of rice and on the hill sides are a multitude of walled villages. Each a closely huddled collection of around 20 houses with crumbling red stone walls and grey tiled rooves. Although the villages are small they are rarely more than 500m from the next one, which sort of explain chinas huge population (admitedly its a bit more complecated than that).Arrived in Dali, an Ancient and now very much touristerfied city of cobbled streets and stone houses. Backed by towering mountains and fronted by a lake it is very picturesque, although the rampant development that is going on around it means that the picture perfect image is strictly illusion. It is however such a relief from vietnam, gone are the hassles the people are very friendly and its possible to just sit back and relax.

halong, hanoi and other photos

2004-10-13T14:03:00.000-07:00

Needing some space from city life whilst i await my china visa I headed out to Halong bay, a(nother) world heritage site about 100km east of Hanoi. The bay is full of thousands of limestone islands that penetrate, spike like (or dragon spine like if your a local) from the south china sea. Between the islands small villages float, houses shops, fish farms etc built on wooden platforms suspended on plastic drums. The locals came out to great our boat selling fruits of the tree and of the sea, their tubs full of live crabs, squids, octopuses etcetc. On our way to Cat Ba island, where i would be spending a couple of nights, we stopped at an obligatory tourist site, some huge caves. These were no doubt impressive, huge stalagtites up to 100 foot high in a series of massive dome like caverns. The locals had unfortunately seen fit to create a 'mystic' feel believing that lighting the area with a variety of red, green and blue lights would add atmosphere. Unfortunately it left them looking more like a set that was too tacky for the origional flash gordon movie.Cat Ba island is largely free from development so enjoyed a pleasent (if not particularly challenging) trek across it. We climbed to the top of one of its peaks. The rock is unbelievably sharp, the water having worn it into a series of razor sharp ridges. Unfortunely the plonkers who had come along in their flip flops didn't get what they deserved, but i'm sure they will someday..... That evening i did my bit for international relations and got drawn into some kind of bizarre drinking game with some locals. They couldn't speak any english and of course by vietnamese isn't too hot, but in the end i worked out it consistered of saying 'yo!' (cheers) to someone, and then pointing to the point on the glass to which you must consume. So less game, more competition. Arrived back in hanoi on monday evening, got back to hotel to see the entire reception in wraps, and the place covered with dust. Thought at first that the whole think was a big scam to nick by bag (that i left there) but quickly realised that maybe buying a hotel then abandoning it to make off with a bag mostly filled with dirty laundry slightly silly. And no, the americans hadn't been back, it was just 'maintainence'.... Spent the day yesterday preparing for china, and then experienced the local art form in the eve.... Vietnamese water puppetry... basically puppets in a big pool of water (originally it was done it rice paddies) that are moved etc by poles that run under the water so you can't see them. This was accompanied by a band playing traditional intruments. Actually was fairly enjoyable, although slightly kitsch.Well thats about all, i'm off to get a sleeper train to sapa, near the chinese border.

Decisions Decisions

2004-10-08T14:01:00.000-07:00

so, i'm feeling better than last time, my mid travel crisis is over and for once i've made a big decision. Have been growing increasingly frustrated with the beaten track since getting into Vietnam which definitely is an indication to get off it. So that's what i'm doing. Instead of my previous plan to head up the coast of china, i've decided to ditch Hong Kong et al and to head northwest from Hanoi into Chinas deep dark centre before with the eventual target of Tibet, hopefully by bus over a 5000+ meter pass. Its gonna be chilly. To this end i'm getting a 2 month china visa and canceling my flights out of HK, now its India by land or nothing....I left Hoi An on Wednesday afternoon, fleeing its markets, tailors, tourists and multitudes of bothersome: 'sir sir! where u going?' (ignore this icily) 'sir sir! where u from' (resist urge to point out that since you arn't interested in buying tiger balm your origins are hardly relevant and keep walking)'sir sir! later then?' (never agree to anything 'later', unless you have a penchant for being a stalker victim) The road north to Hue snaked up into the mountains that run right up to the coast, up a couple of thousand meters into the pine layer and then zig-zagged down the other side onto the floodplains sandwiched between mountain and sea. After an hour long journey, checkered with paddy fields to the left and salt pan patchwork to the right I reached Hue, the ancient capital of Vietnam. It was that evening I realised that i'd far rather be marching around the Himalayers in the middle of winter than sipping cocktails in Shanghai - i knew i dragged my walking boots halfway round the earth for a reason.The next day i explored the ruins of the ancient city, a smaller version of the forbidden city in Beijing, the purple city was a collection of palaces and pavillions in a walled moated compound. Although i tried to get into the spirit of the place my mind was already wandering the wide open spaces of central asia. Last night i caught an overnight coach into Hanoi. Once i got used to the constant swerving,to dodge in and out of the oncoming traffic, and the Vietnamese obsession with proving that the dopler effect really does exist, i must have enjoyed a good 2 hours sleep (out of 16). The sunrose this morning as a huge red ball sending light streaming over my shoulder through the back window. The prarie like rice plains of the red river delta stretched out to the right, the fields seemed endless, fading into hazy and orange sunlit mist. Hanoi is far more full of communist imagery than its southern comrade Saigon. The old town, rather than the grand boulevards of Saigon, is maze of sundappled avenues. The trees on each side of the street merge into a single canopy 12-15 foot from the ground creating a tunnel like effect. Vietnamese flags, a yellow star on red field, hang from flats and shops at regular intevals.I spent today sorting out a visa, which will take a few days to come through, and getting my boots fixed by a friendly street cobler. This leaves me with a few days to kill before i can head north to Sapa and into China, so will take in Halong bay and what will be my last glimpse of the ocean for some months.

Return to the East Coast

2004-10-05T14:12:00.000-07:00

The east coast of Vietnam feels rather like the east coast of oz, a succession of beaches and bars interspersed with hoards of tourists, so my time in Vietnam can not yet be described as inspiring, which rightly does not bode well for this entry. Spent 3 days in Saigon, had my first bout of sickness since England so spent the day confined to quarters. The landlady, after I had mimed my general distress to explain why I wasn’t moving more than a couple of feet from a toilet, took pity and brought me mugs of steaming ginger tea to revive my health. I visited various sites around the city, the most moving being the ‘war remenanents museum’ or to translate the Vietnamese literally ‘the American war crimes museum’ charming name, and chilling contents. Clearly there was an element of propaganda involved in the displays but the countless photos of children deformed by agent orange didn’t fail to make me leave feeling sickened by what was done to ‘defend’ the west. Also on the agenda were the cu chi tunnels, some of the hundreds of miles of tiny tunnels down which the VC crawled during the war. Couldn’t resist the temptation to fire an AK47 when offered for a fee (under the auspices of research clearly). It was loud; I missed the target 5 times out of 5 that’s about it.Leaving Saigon I headed north stopping at a small fishing village/resort called mui ne which failed to capture the imagination, although seeing the boatmen paddle around in their hemispherical bamboo coracles was interesting. Nha Trang was next, another sun sea sand place, unfortunately somewhat blighted by the rain, although partly redeemed by the 10p a pint beer. A boat trip featured, during which the crew pulled out a full drum kit, electric guitar and radio mike and proceeded to sing wild kareokee whilst prancing around the decks much to the bemusement of the westerners present. Now at Hoi An and undoubtedly pretty old town which being a world heritage site 3 times over is crawling with holiday makers and touts, cafes and art shops. Pretty nice for shopping but not quite so good when on a budget and unable to carry any purchases.Hmmmm this entry was even worse than I suspected it would be. Things aren’t all bad though; plenty of good company has led to plenty of good evenings, late nights and unproductive days.

S S S S Saigon Saigon

2004-09-25T14:13:00.000-07:00

haha, now in saigon, sorry, thats ho chi minh city, (renamed to increase employment in the signpost sector). Have spent last few days in phnom penh waiting for my vietnam visa to become valid, so took the opportunity to brush up on my pool and pint lifting skills.This morning i quit the madness of cambodia for the uplands of organisation which is vietnam. A 2 hour coach ride (that could rather dispointingly be called, comfortable and uneventful) deposited us at the border. I think i may have made some disparaging comment on Loas style communist buerocracy when i was there (if not i should have), however, i was being unfair, the vietnamese have inefficiency undoubtably mastered. Now in SE asia it always takes at least 4 people to accomplish any task. In most places this means 1 doing the work, 2 watching and 1 in charge, only in vietnam have they altered this time honored method (due to the necessity to maintain the appearance of communist equality) by dividing the same job into 4 parts and having making sure that all 4 people can participate. The result of this is that is takes a full hour to get from the start of passport control to the end. Let me explain the work flow process:Join queuereach front - person number one hands you formleave queue fill in formjoin queue (the same one)reach front hand in passport and formperson 2 checks photo page, passes to person 3person 3 checks visa page, passes to person 4person 4 enters detail into computer passes to person 2person 2 hands back passport to youcongrats you now have made it to customshand form and passport to person 5give bags to person 6retrieve stamped form from person 5 and bags from 6go to person 7recieve stickerand then to person 8 for final checkyou have now lost an hour of your life oh i forgot to mention person 0, the one who checks your passport before you get to passport control......Anyway, Saigon seems nice - have only been here a couple of hours, am staying at a guesthouse that consists of someones spare room, its quite nice actually, 4 floors up. My entrance was celebrated by a torrential downpour and rolling thunder, the sounds of the storm mingling with the ceaseless chorus of the motorbike horns. Dinner was noodle soup with minced pork tail kebabs on a half foot high plastic stool, down a side alley, the 2 foot width between my back and the opposite wall offering no obstical to the scooters buzzing past. OK thats about all 4 now, no photos sorry!
none of them received a standing ovation

Vientianne to Angkor

2004-09-19T14:20:00.000-07:00

Okies, trousers have just fallen down in interent café…. Slightly humiliating…. (alright slight exaggeration I grant but still). Well where am I indeed? Cambodia – its been a week here (about, I lose track) and still not dead/mugged etc, so things looking good. Left Vientianne after about a day, a fairly uninspiring city, although to be fair I didn’t give it much of a chance. Caught an early morning local bus to Pakse in southern loas, a journey that reaches new and indescribable heights of discomfort – definitely one for the ‘Masochists Guide to Laos 2004’. Still suffering serious coccyx injuries from the trip south from Luang Prabang, spending 16 hours on another solid seat fastened (loosely) to broken suspension maybe was asking for trouble. Spirits where pretty low after 9 hours, but the first sunset we’ve seen in about a month (due to monsoon) came as good portent and lifted them. Reaching Pakse at 1 am checked into hostel, slept and left first thing in the morn – so much for pakse.Our target was a ruined Khmer city at Champansak. Piled into the back of a minivan bus, surrounded by locals and half a market full of fresh(ish) produce. Pineapples below, long beans in face and legs by chin we proceeded. Once at hostel we hired bikes and set off for the city….. You’d think I’d be pretty safe with a pushbike, no engine to break, no problem…. Nope. After about 11 km my tire exploded. After some communication with locals, ie me pointing at flat tire and looking generally unhappy, them grinning and pointing, I trudged back up the road to find a repair man. I walked… and walked… everytime I was sure I must have gone too far (was told 100m… hahaha, distance like time is a meaningless concept in loas) a helpful local pointed further up the road. Some old rubber, glue and an upside down iron restored my bike, off to the city!The ruined temple is a complex around a mile long and half a mile wide built at the foot of, and then in a series of terraces, up the side of, a mountain. Ancient stone steps, worn from a millennia of foot steps, led steeply between tangled over hanging trees to a Wat with a commanding view over the Mekong valley and its rice paddies. Not being too heavily polluted with tourists the place still had quite a mystical feel, at the time it was undoubtedly the best temples we had visited.The next day we caught a locals boat down the river from Champansak to Don Khong in Si Phan Don (4000 islands). The boat, a long teak affair, low tin roofed and carpeted with bamboo mats, serviced numerous small villages scattered along the rivers bank, bringing people and supplies. About 4 hours and several thunder storms later we arrived in a downpour. Slip sliding along, over laden with packs and unsteady in flip flops a lorry ride took us across the rural island through its farming communities to the main village, where we caught a further (smaller, less stable) boat to Don Det – a more remote and beautiful island. No breakdown with this boat, just a stop after about half an hour to bail it out as it was sinking…..Don Det, although fairly firmly established on the backpackers circuit isn’t too crowded, in fact there doesn’t seem to be many tourists there, although this is probably as it is the low season given the number of guest houses. After some fairly hectic weeks it was time to kick back and relax for a few days. We spent 4 days largely immobile in hammocks, surveying the Mekong, reading and being waited on by the family that run the place (Mama, the crazy hostess, possesses little English but many black toothed grins). The pace of life on the island is slow to non existent, some locals fish on the river banks, while others tend to the rice and water buffalo. Palm trees sprout amid the paddies and wooden stilt houses whilst time stands still, merely an observer.Onto Cambodia, through the unofficial official border. It used to be unofficial but you could use it providing you provide the unofficial officials with an offering. Now the border is official, but the previously unofficial officials got so used to growing fat on offerings that they now demand them unofficially even in their new official capacity. So in English 2$ (if you are lucky, ie twice the size of the intimidated official in question) per person each side bribe, and you’re through. 2 speed boat rides later, many dollars lighter and a minor case of tinnitus and you’re in Kratie. A small dusty town on the Mekong. Crumbling colonial buildings press up against a scrum of stilt houses webbed with low flying power cables. The home of the Mekong river dolphins, we took our very first (of many) moto rides along a 15km ‘road’ to the spot where they hang out. Taking a boat out, took about an hour to find them and grab some photos, although given the muddy state of the river we were unable to view them in their full glory….Once back from the dolphins, (it was a 6 o’clock start) had a couple of minutes to pick up our bags and board the boat to Kampon Chang, where we could get a connecting mini bus to Phnom Penh. Our last boat trip down the Mekong down which we have traveled many miles (Johannes’ official estimate being 800 km in total) felt a touch nostalgic. We sat on the roof and watched the villages drift past, the fisherman and kids playing, our view only being temporarily disrupted by a shower causing us to pull a large tarpaulin over us.The minibus ride down to the capital was anything but relaxing; a crushed and crazed dash on every side of the road, death never further than an inch away. For a few minutes the drivers were playing tag with another bus in a sequence disturbingly reminiscent of the film ‘Duel’ (you know the spielburg one with a car and the big truck). One of the locals tried to communicate in words and gestures what this was all about to me, which I translated as, they (the other bus) want us to pull over so they can rob us. Don’t think this was the case though as once we ‘got away’ the drivers played the same game with another van, so I guess it was some kind of Cambodian joke that foreigners don’t get.They say that human life is cheap in Cambodia and they were right, recklessness is the norm. Its quite refreshing in a way to have to take responsibility for your life every minute of the day, however the laws of statistics being what they are its probably not to great in the long run. Phnom Penh is the personification of this reckless abandon. Nowhere is this as chillingly portrayed as at S21 a school that was transformed into a school/interrogation centre in the days of the Khmer Rouge. In its abandoned classrooms, metal beds on which the victims were tortured, stand in rooms bare except for the photos on the walls depicting the harrowing scene that greeted those that ‘discovered’ this place. Other rooms are filled with mug shots of the detainees taken when they were admitted and paintings graphically recreate the more gruesome events, seen through the eyes of one of the few survivors – an artist.Phnom Penh is undoubtedly an exciting city, sitting on the back of a motorbike, carving your way through the streets confirms this. Just one block away from the immaculate riverside restaurants and silver roofed palace, streets are of dirt and dust, shanties hide in the shadow of concrete monoliths. This is a city of transition and flux.On our first night in town it was time sample its famous nightlife. The marathon evening began in the guesthouse where we joined up with a few others for a few G&Ts whilst the sunset over the lake our guest house sits on. At about 1am we ventured out, riding motos in convoy through the streets, will pulled up outside the infamous ‘Heart of Darkness’. The Lonely planet will lead you to believe this is the most ‘wild west’ club in all Phnom Penh and advises you to ‘get out of the way’ of anyone who looks mean (to avoid getting shot). In reality of course, the prospect of getting shot is something few travelers can resists, so you are in more danger of a stiletto heel through your foot on the dance floor than one in your gut. Not that I’m claiming this isn’t the den of iniquity its made out to be, being full of rich westerners and Khmer its replete with the SE Asian retinue of the rich – prostitutes and lots of them. Having every part of you squeezed and pinched 50% of the time is a little disconcerting, especially when 75% of the time its by a man.After Phnom Penh we head to the beach at Sihanoukville, which was a bit rubbish, so we left after one evening and traveled up to Kampot, from which we explore the Bokor hill station – a resort for the rich and famous, perched at 1000m that was abandoned in the early 60s. At the top of a 40km road that has largely been washed away (as has not been repaired in the early 60’s) this ghost town resides, swathed in the mists of clouds and time. Walking through its casino with its ballrooms and balconies you can imagine the scene of colonial decadence.I write now from Siem Reap, just outside the temples of Angkor Wat. We spent yesterday exploring from dawn til dusk just some of the hundreds of temples that lie in the jungle here. Its impossible to describe these monuments in anyway that will do them justice, but lets just say whilst exploring ‘jungle temple’ (slightly easier than the local pronounciation) its tumble down blocks and columns being slowly consumed by the forest I had the irresistible urge to whistle ‘da da-da daaaaaaa, da da daaaaaaa, da da-da daaaaaaa, da da-da da da’. Ok clearly my inspiration is starting to flag, so that’s gonna have to be all for now. Tomorrow we are heading back to Phnom Penh and onto Vietnam! PS Don’t worry Mum, its really not that dangerous – artist’s license you know!

The Mighty Mekong and other irre(l/v)e(v/r)ent stories

2004-09-03T14:18:00.000-07:00

OK, take 2. One second power cut just destroyed my last attempt at this journal, only just restrained myself from throttling the cafe owner. Right, summoning zen calm for the second attempt....After a couple of days in Chang Mai learning how to cook pad thai, green curry and numerous other taste bud blasting thai dishes to headed north to the Loas border. A packed mini van ride took us through the flat rice paddies of thailand toward the towering mountains bordering the Mekong on a road that disintegrated gradually as Loas approaced. We spent a night at the border and rose early the next morning to tackle Loas. Breathing deeply the fresh air (a novelty after any trip to thailand) we passed under the 'gateway to indochina' and up to the banks of the Mekong. On the opposite bank, accross 300m of muddy mighty mekong, the Loas town of Huay Xai jutted haphazardly through the trees.Stepping on to one of the longtail canoes - an aquired art with a 50 poundback whilst wearing flip flops that transform any surface to ice when even within sight of water - settled back to enjoy the river we'd come to know so well in the next couple of days. Having journeyed all of around 3 meters toward Loas, the inevitable nigel engine curse struck again leaving us drifting and strandard. Eventually we got to other side, just a bid of mid river boat swapping involved.Huay Xai was fairly typically of Loas, everything in a quaintly delapedated state. Ramshakle wood and corregatediron structures pressing up against mould gathering colonial villas and shophouses. At the border I changed a coupld of thousand Thai Baht (30 quid) into Kip. Recieved for my troubles several one inch wads of 5000 Kip notes - about half a million. Felt deep sympathy for the poor chap next to me who changed 450 dollars into kip and had to hire a wheel barrow to remove his cash. There are only two routes out of Huay Xai, by 4x4 pickup or boat. We opted for the 2 day 'slow boat' to Luang Prabang as opposed to the semi suicidal fast boat (of death), wimping out of the 19 hour on the back of a pickup option.... How many humans can you fit into an oversized motor canoe? No, not the first line of the greatest joke in Loas, but the subject of several serious minded university couses here. Answer - always more. After an hour of suffering, crushed into our wooden bench seats (they were still packing the boat at this point), Jo(hannes) and I had the genius idea of grabbing the pew with a view, so bailed out of the window and climbed up onto the hot tin roof. All would have worked out wonderfully but for the intervention of an over zelous policeman, who wasn't so much concerned that we might die, more that if we are going to die we should do it in the proper way and place - ie suffercation/DVT down below. You gotta love communist bureaucracies. inevitably, once we got back below all seats were gone, so had to make do with a lovely spot in the engine room. Hmmmm only 7 hours to go, think zen think zen..... Really, engine rooms are ok - the ear splitting din isn't great and don't think about why they have put buddist offerings on the engine casing, but once they had bothered to attached the exhaust (hose)pipe and had the decency to point it out of the window its all fairly sellubrious... In actual fact after about 20 minutes one of the crew, who was sitting in the small kitchen behind the hundreds of backpacks piled at the back of the boat, invited us to join him. So dived over everyones luggage and had a great seat on the kitchen floor and could hang our legs off of its balcony.For the next 2 days we travelled slowing down the Mekong. The terrain became incresingly dramatic as we neared Luang Prabang, the mountains on each side of the river becoming loftier and craggier, shrowded perpetually in the low lying monsoon cloud. On each side of the river small villages on stilts are planted into the hill sides, surrounded by brown rice fields, which can grow on the steep sided slopes. In and between these small isolated settlements villagers row their long canoes and bamboo rafts, men fish by casting nets into the river and the children play, diving into the water from riverbank and tree.Luang Prabang is claimed by some (and i'm not arguing) to be the nicest town in SE asia. The oldest part of town nestles on a thin peninsular at the convergence of the Mekong and one of its tributories and consists of numerous temples squeezed between French colonial buildings. A great place just to relax, eat and read. The town also has an impressive night market, where the local villagers bring their handicrafts to sell. A continuous pile of hand woven silk hangings, paper lanterns, umbrellas and silverware fills the main street, illuminated by a thousand light bulbs. Although we spent 3 days there only spent one day out of the town - visiting a local cave full of 5000 buddha images, largely just enjoyed the town and the decent coffee.Vang Vieng a small (backpacker centric) town 7 hours backside murdering local bus ride south was next. The road wound up into the mountains, following ridge lines though hill top villages sitting in the cloud layer. Its along this road where rebels attacked public buses last year. Don't worry - still alive. The scenery around Vang Vieng is simply stunning. Lush green paddi terraces divided up by their dikes and water filled ditches stretch across the valley floors. This fertile scene houses rural villages and is walled in from the world by the sheer sided limestone karst formations that make up the dramatic backdrop. Jo and I hired bikes for the day and taking a canoe to the riverside that has no motorvehicles spent the day riding around the countryside. No one can deny the people of Loas are a friendly lot but can milk the tourist of their cash with the best of them. At a bridge crossing a ten foot wide stream some entreprenurial villages had set up base. Having tacked a sign to the bridge announcing that cyclists must pay 4000 kip to cross they conducted robinhood inspired daylight/highway robbery. We haggled them down to 2500 kip (everything is negotiable) and carried on. We were heading to one of the caves but the road became increasingly flooded as we proceeded. By the end I was wading pushing the bike, Jo struggled on the bike. Having come a km down an impassable road were stunned to find a fully manned ticket office at the end of it (ie a hut +man + wife) demanding another 5000 kip each to look at the cave. They really must have been inundated with tourists here (2 tickets had been told before ) but somehow this enterprise could support a total of 5 workers (work in the loosest sense, well the SE asian sense ie sitting in one place doing nothing for a protracted period of time).We left Vang Vieng yesterday and reached Vientianne. Just stopping here to get cambodian visas and will beheading south tommorow. Ok thats all folks...

The road north

2004-08-22T14:19:00.000-07:00

Out of that sweaty melting pot of bangkok in search of some culture, at least that was the plan.... First stop Ayunthaya, one of the origional capitals of Thailand. Turned up at Bangkok train station early one morning and purchased my first ever 3rd class train ticket - unfortunately this did not mean a seat on the roof. The ticket lady, incredulous that a foreigner would travel in 3rd class, explained that 'you may not even get a seat' - clearly she knows nothing about British transportation.... The journey was brief, in theorectical time at least, about an hour and a half north of Bangkok. Experienced time was stretched however through the application of pain from a seat clearly designed by a chiroprachtor.Ayunthaya has an impressive number of venerable and crumbling wats (temples) in various styles reflecting the changes of influence through the years. This is also true of its buddha statues who pulls off an incredible posture shift from lying to sitting to walking over the almost instantaneous space of 3 centuries, makes Linford look slow...Sukuthai was 6 hours bus ride north, and an even older capital. Again sporting many a temple. Have probably seen more religous buildings in the space of those 3 days than the rest of my life combined.After our historical/cultural studies it was definately time to get get muddy and sweaty again. No, not mud wrestling but a trek into the hills surrounding the northern city of Chang Mai to see the local hill tribes. The hill tribes of Thailand (of which there are several) have lived in Thailand for hundreds of years but are not racially Thai, as the Thais stuck to the rivers and valleys of the country. Although the government is trying to modernise their lives they are still suprisingly unaffected by the modern Thailand. Mostly they still survive through subsistance farming, their villages and surrounding rainforest supplying all that they need to live. Our guide had grown up in one of the villages and still spent half of his time there with his family so was able to give a real insite into their lives. The trek itself was not of the heroic nature of our Malaysian adventures having been organised with sensible people in mind, but still had the timeless themes of dripping sweat, mud, biting insects and bathing in waterfalls. The thing is, when you wash your clothes in rivers the water may LOOK clean, but somehow when your T-shirt dries you can suddenly mould it into solid sculptures.The final day of the trek included and elephant ride and a ride down the river on bamboo raft..... Oh i couldn't wait to get on that elephant, always saw myself as a bit of a hanibal, unfortunately couldn't quite make it to northern italy in an hour. Elephant riding is definately a participation sport. Don't spend too long lining up the perfect photo, cos you'll be rolling off the back. Seated on your wobbly vehicle, bereft of aircon (except the muddy water which your steed intermitantly distributes over itself and yourself through its trunk) you can tackle 45 degree inclines with ease, just watch those low flying branches. Saying goodbye to nellie, next stop was to tackle a river on bamboo raft. Hardly whitewater stuff i felt the need to improve our journey and that of our other companions/guides with a few sea shanties. My rendition of 'what shall we do with the drunken sailor' brought cries of 'encore' from other rafts but unfortueatly was unable to persuade anyone to join me in a round of 'row row your boat'..... kill joys..... Back in Chang Mai the 'bohemian' northern city of thailand. Went to see some Thai boxing, a fairly brutal spectical. The fights are accompanied by the crazed sounds of a 3 piece band, drums and guy on snake charmer style pipe. The boxers almost move in time to their increasingly frantic melodies. The locals pressed up against one side of ring shout and wave arms as the fight gets more intense, offering new odds and urging on their bet.I'll be passing the next few days in more sedate fashion, stocking up on books in preperation for Laos and doing a 3 day thai cooking course. Tis all for now......

Into Thailand

2004-08-12T14:05:00.000-07:00

Thailand.... well its not Malaysia.... ok so not particularly informative I grant you but important. Leaving Penang at silly o'clock ( 8.30) we jumped into a mini bus heading north. Though i was sad to leave Malaysia and penang particularly was really looking forward to cracking into a new country.... Our first destination was a city in southern thailand but upon arrival it all looked rather uninspiring, so baring in mind our lack of time (only a month in thailand) and that it was only 11.30 am, made an executive (ie with no real consideration) decision to press on. Having heard good things about the beaches around Krabi, a couple of hours north on the west coast, jumped aboad another mini bus and sat.... in a jam... for about an hour, with an increasingly obnoxious bunch of aussies moaning about pretty much everything - no room for bags/feet/legs/air (ok so they had a point there). 4 hours later we make it to krabi town, a jumping off point to the beaches on a secluded peninsular several miles away. The area is characterised by its dramatic lime stone out crops that jut monolith like into the sky line. A mecca for rock climbers we were looking forward to pitting our skills (and lack thereof) against hard stone.... ok, starting to sound like the plot of a jerry bruchheimer movie... so yeah, ran down to quey to pick up a long tail boat to the beach, there being no road access. The boatmen, in usual asian style, were running a cartel outfit, ie accross the board pricing for farang (white people) of 70 baht, no matter who you ask. The aussie, also heading in out direction, signed up members to the 'i frankly haven't got a clue what i'm doing' school of haggling said '30' then wouldn't budge until it came clear to them what we and the boat guys knew, it was getting dark and frankly we didn't have an option but get there asap. So paying our 70 (one pound) off we chugged. The engines on the longtail boats look like reclaimed car engines, sitting ontop of the boats tiller with a log shaft pertruding backwards out of it into the water, (getting the feeling this is a 'thousand words and still no one will get the picture' situation) lets just say, they haven't got outboards.As we drew near to the beach, it became pretty obvious that this area is probably the most stunning i've seen since NZ at least. Long beaches, blue sea and shear cliffs dripping with out crops and stalagtites rising vertically hundreds of meters. For those of you who haven't got found to finding paradise, i think i may have gone and done it for you.The beach we stayed at was almost deserted, as it is low season. We signed up for a day of rock climbing tuition which i was really looking foward too..... First up, a 25 meter cliff... after showing us how to use the ropes to stop the guy on the cliff falling to his death, the intructer says, 'up you go then'. Well, not quite like that obviously as he was thai, but words to that effect. Johannes was went first, blitzing up the cliff... i thought, well damn it, gonna have to try and beat that time. A mistake.... by the 10m mark severe muscle pain... in the last couple of meters, fingers and tendons under wrists very unhappy. Hands shaking, i just managed to hold on to reach the top, but the damage was done. By the lunch time (a couple of climbs later) could barely grip my sandwich and had to abort the afternoon. Seriously good fun and challenging though, our last climb of 30m i fell a couple of times to be caught and left dangling 75 ft above the ground. View from top was fantastic though. In all spent 3 full days in the area, did some looking around the near by islands as well and just relaxing....on Tuesday we where going to head east to Ko Pan Nang, the back packer beach island extrordinaire, however, just before going to bus station changed our minds as have spent far to long on beaches. Instead jumped on an overnight bus t bangkok, in search of adventures of a more cultured nature....Bangkok, yes its smelly, dirty, busy, full of hawkers, con men, and everyone wants your money, by fair means or foul. To be fair though, i rather like it. The city feels so alive, a neverending hive of actvity. Plus you are never more than 5 meters from fantastic (and fantastically cheap) food. The Khao San road is exactly like you imagined it, full of back packers and people selling every variety of tat under the sun. The streets buzz witht he noise of the infamous 'tuk tuk' - a motorised rik shaw with a 2 stroke engine which makes a 'tuk tuk' noise. Everywhere you go, the drivers ask 'where you go?' always seeming to assume you want to be somewhere else.Today i have to give a special mention to the queen. No not ours, but the local queen, whose birthday it is. This coincides with the locals mothers day and is a national holiday. This evening large parade was held and firework display. After taking in the national museum, or some of it, and seeing the parade, feeling very culured. Ok am aware starting to talk rubbish, so going to go now. Its late, and been a long day. Tommorow shall be finding out 'whats a wat?' before heading north on saturday....

Kota Bahru to Penang

2004-08-04T14:07:00.000-07:00

Can this be true? back so soon? well yes. One last message from malaysia before i enter the land of the Thais. Kota Bahru is a major city in north eastern malaysia. Being the most Muslim state in the country the city itself is fairly sober in nature. Night life consisting mainly of stalls selling dress making materials and religious texts. In this enviroment it only seemed fittin to seek more experiences of a cultural nature. To this end your correspondant visited the Malaysian cultural centre in town.The event hosted by a rather camp multi lingual guy consisted of demonstration of drumming on 110 kg drums, shadow boxing martial arts and traditional malay games. Naturally when the show became interactive i couldn't help myself but keep the British end up by participating fully. Although my drum banging resulted largely in painful palms, the show case display of shadow boxing i produced (shadowing one of the locals) pracitcally brought the house down. See me in action below....Leaving Kota Bahru we headed east across the country to the Island of Penang off of the east coast. A major jumping off point into thailand penang was the first british colony in SE asia and like its successors melaca and singapore it is a mixture of malay, indian and chinese culures. The town itself has a great vibe to it. Incredibly relaxing compared to the east coast. Hawker stalls line streets full of shopfront homes serving no end of needs. The food here is reason enough to come, the tandoori chicken i had last night was possibly the best ever, and i've tried alot! Today, after dim sum breakfast and perusing the paper for a couple of hours, i took in one of the local buddist temples - the largest in malaysia. A caccophany of shape and colour, the temple sits on a hill side over looking Georgetown (the capital of the island). errr thats about all for now.

Sweating in the jungle, chilling on the beach

2004-08-01T14:16:00.000-07:00

End of radio silence.... after a couple of weeks in fairly internet free zones i'm back in the big city..... First of all, let me say hello to our new readers from Germany, who (for the benefit of the ignorant brits - no thanks to me...) are tuning in to see the journey of my erstwhile (and long suffering) travelling companion Johannes. Have recieved several complaints (via johannes) that he isn't getting enough of a mention (well none in fact). Have decided to rectify this with, not only mention but a topless photo for all the ladies back at home to coo over (ahem...). Johannes and I (notice correct english grammer here, none of this 'me and johannes' stuff here - important now i'm practically a full time english teacher...) seperated in darwin and met up again in KL just prior to going to the highlands. OK, think we've got that all cleared up....So on with the story.... Got back into KL from highlands in the middle of a tropical monsoon. Thunder like bombs going off around us. Taxi drivers sensing their opportunity sprang from every doorway offering ride using their special 'monsoon' pricing structure, where the cost of a ride rises exponentially with the rate of cm/rain/sec. Laughing these off we waded back to our hostel, desperate not to break our backs slippering on the ice rink like tiles underfoot.From KL it should have been a straight bus ride to the jetty at Jerantut where the boat to the naman negara national park leaves from. Nothing in simple in this world however. Firstly we ended up at the wrong bus station. Then there were no tickets for the bus we wanted so were forced to use a variety of local buses to wind our way to jerantut. Yes yes, i hear all the hard core travellers saying, 'but local buses are so great, so much more character!'. Very true my friends, however when you are 6'2" spending 3 hours on a seat hard enough to cut diamonds with about enough leg room to squeeze your little tow between the seat and the one in front you may reconsider... Anyways, amerged at jerantut with 20 mins to get to jetty (20km away). Running up to a taxi driver frantic negotiations occured, so much so the poor man confused himself - TAXI DRIVER - boat quey? 30 ringgit. NIGEL [laughing derisively] - thats far too much, i'll give you 20TAXI DRIVER - okok, 18 ringgitNIGEL [confused] - eerrrrr okJOHANNES [enjoying mention] - wow, dig the haggling (paraphrased, lost in translation...)Leaping from the taxi, rushed to the boat office, packs back bouncing, flip flops flapping. Boats unsuprisingly were in no real hurry. A seamingly self styled sultan (all this alliteration really isn't intensional) sat behing the desk. Twiddling his ludicrously coiffered and dyed hair between fingers teaming with domed rings he signed our documents. This signiture cannot be compared to. An elaborate pattern of sweeps and tails, quite seriously taking over a minute from start to finish.ANYway, moving on... The boat ride into the taman negara is a 3 hour ride in long canoe (1.5 m wide 12m long ish) The taman negara is an ancient rain forest that has remained intact in its current state for the last 130 million years. Unsuprisingly it is considered one of malaysia's top attractions containing all kinds of wildlife including tigers, elephants etc.You would think by this time i couldn't go on about this one journey anymore, well sorry.... The boat ride was one of the most amazing experiences i've had. travelling up the river, each bank covered in towering forest, occationally broken my a native village or two, it feels like travelling back in time. In fact i was relating my feelings on the subject to Johannes on the boat, stating that "Travelling by open boat is so much better than by coach, you really feel part of the environment". Two seconds later the bow wave from a passing vessel sweeps over the right side of the canoe soaking me and my bag to the bone. Johannes took several minutes to recover from his laughing fit.About an hour into our journey, the nigel engine jinx raised its ugly head. Seeking to break one engine in every country i visit, it struck at the out board of the canoe. Miles from anywhere, the motor cut. We look round at the driver 'you can fix it right?' Driver replies 'anyone got a mobile?' Great... someone did, but no reception.... i was secretly pleased at the prospect of this adventure, stuck in the jungle, we'd have to make bivies of something - just like some 'boys own' adventure! How exciting! Unfortunely a boat coming back the other way saved us. We loaded our bags and selves onto the other craft and continued on our way. The unfortunate boat man was left to paddle back down stream with a plank...So at last i've actually reached somewhere. Our time in the rain forest was spent hiking, and hiking and sweating. On our first day we explored the canopy by way of .5 km suspended walkway, trying to avoid the 2cm long killer ants that infested the hand rails. Ants are a bit of a theme here, little ants, normal ants, massive killer ants, they are everywhere. To the ants, the forest is like some kind of huge metropolis. Using the tree roots that reach out across the forest floor they create highways and intersections. 8 lanes wide with traffic backed up for miles, the ants stream along these roots (or should i say routes) like cars in a city viewed from the top of a skyscraper.The forest also has a number of caves, filled with bats - but unfortunately no raiders of the lost ark style boulder traps (tried and failed to contain my disapointment). Expecting so be able to walk through said caves i strode in with bag camera etc etc. About 2 meters later had a nasty shock. Firstly, the undeniable stink of bat feces, secondly the several hundred pairs of eyes staring at me and thirdly the realisation that i would be forced to crawl through the cave, hands and knees in the feces, face in the furry faces - nice.Johannes had the crazy notion that several days hiking in the jungle would be nice, perhaps coupled with a night in a hide with no facilities etc etc.... Donning our packs and 6 litres of water each - this is sweaty work, we set off. The trek to the hide was 11 km through rough forest. Under trees, over trees, caught in barbed vines through rivers and side stepping leaches. Leaches are everywhere, the little blood suckers jump onto your feet and creep up your boots. Once they start to suck, there is no stopping the bleeding for hours as they fill the wound with anti-coagulant. The forest is so humid, the sweat streams from every pore. By the halfway point i was able to wring (i'm estimating now, lets be clear) half a mugful from my tea shirt... A wask in a dirty forest stream was like a huge bubble bath for luxury. Didn't see any animals in hide due to 8 other intrepid travellers who had the same idea as us and the combined noise..... After leaving the taman negara we journeyed up the east coast, visiting kuala terengganu and then onto the perhentian islands, which lie off of the north east corner of Malaysia.The islands are a marine reserve and a centre for diving. Between lying on the beach etc I did 3 dives around the island seeing such wonders as blue spotted rays, black tip sharks, giant moray eels, giant baracuddas and yes folks, one or two nemos....(read several million). Today we left the islands heading north and have just reached Kota Bahru.Thats all for now. Sorry for rushing the ending but was starting to bore even myself!!!

Cameron Highlands

2004-07-16T13:57:00.000-07:00

So the Cameron highlands, thats a very malaysian sounding name? well no, its not. Those great name imperialists the Brits have been at it again spreading names in the interests of growing the ubiqitous drink of empire - tea. Leaving KL was a bit of a relief, not because i disliked it, on the contrary, i found it grew on me over the days. However the pollution also grew on my lungs and the heat on my pores so twas time to get to a more civilised environment.The bus to the highlands was more of a local affair than the ones i had been previously accostomed to. Perfect! i thought, local buses will surely lead to entertaining stories of how we had to bump start it, or how i had to save a wedding by stepping in as last minute best man due to a spot of cholera. But no, no such romanticized tales, more like being stuck for 5 hours in a small refrigirator on a rollercoaster. The road to the highlands was predictably precarious, steep drops, oncoming trucks etc etc. Lining the road were shanty villages of the local hill tribes. The tribes people were engaged in their traditional persuits of selling durians to passing motorists. I mean, what is it with these fruit! They seem to be an euDURing obsession (try to control laughter). A single durian on the high street of tanah rata can be smelt at either end, such is the pungency of its odur. In fact, along with smoking and drinking, durians are banned on public transport in singpore! This is not only because they present a serious hazard to the nostrils but also as these large spikey skinned fruit have a nasty habit of impailing people when dropped/thrown. Ok, so i should probably say something about the highlands itself. Tanah Rata is the 'capital' of the region and is where i stayed. Tanah Rata is an odd blend of malaysian style shops/restuarants and mock tudor black beams on white clad apartments. Activities in the area translate as hiking through rainforest and trying not to get lost and sampling the local tea. Rainforest walking was wet, spongy and dirty. The forest also possesses slightly confusing signposting whose singular purpose seems to be to keep the local guides in a job. Climbed the highest peak in the area for views of forest and mountains and wandered through numerous tea plantations. The endless neat rows of tea bushes reminded me of hampton court maze, only on a massive and time consuming scale. Also visited tea making factory, with machinary dating back 80 years. Its quite amazing how little has change in that time. The fact that everything down to the picking is still done by hand on huge estates shows how little these people are paid. Each estate has a small village for the workers, repleat with school and temple.Each afternoon the heavens opened, a timely reminder that this is the monsoon season. The streets are instantly awash in up to a foot of water. The pavements here are also paved in a type of tile that turns instantly to ice rink viscosity as soon as they are touched by water - making walking in flip flops totally deadly.

Kuala Lumper

2004-07-11T14:07:00.000-07:00

KL (get it) as an example of industrialisation through architecture. Take one old developing world city, build a whole bunch of towering towers in the middle and call it developed.I stepped off of the bus yesterday from Malaka into a melee of people crammed into the bus terminal. Feeling (and being) conspicuous, i shoved my way through the throng, my ever heavier packs on back and chest. Deciding that the best way to tackle the monsoon like (i say 'like', but this is the real thing) conditions outside would be to walk through it i waved off the shouting taxi drivers. Lonely planet in hand, open on the map page(quickly becoming soaked)i set off in the general direction of a hostel. 30 minutes later, for reasons i naturally bare no responsibility, i was still standing in the rain trying to find a street name that matched one on my map. Frustrated but refusing to ask for help (male pride, moi?) i eventually located myself on the wrong side of the map. I mean, how is anyone supposed to triangulate their postion through this smog?Spent most of the afternoon perfecting my haggling skills. With absolutely no intension of buying anything i frustrated endless store holders trying to sell me mont blanc pens for 10 quid and rolexs for 14. Well - its all good banter. Today i set off ludicrously early to get tickets to go up the petronas towers. Arriving at 8.45 i managed to secure a ticket for 1.45. Towers very impressive although you can only go to the bridge on the 41st floor for the view.

Melaka

2004-07-09T14:09:00.000-07:00

Asia, its big and its a daunting. My hostel is a large, old, colonial style affair. Wooden floor boards underneath, high ceilings and whiring fans above. The one paperless toilet and not totally hygenic smelling shower reminders why it cost 1 pound a night. Now i know this is real travelling.I was woken this morning by the strains of a brass band playing auld lang syne whilst parading around the streets below holding up chinese banners. I guess that makes in Chinese new year.... Venturing out of my hostel into the street the town is abuzz with activity. The crumbling shop fronts hold 1001 vendors, standing in front of an ecelctic mixture of goods, piled randomly around them. Motorbikes and scooters screach by, practically brushing your arms. I am, as yet, totally unable to fathom the traffic laws, the danger coming simulanteously from almost any direction. Crossing the street here being some kind of olympic event, some local made the peace sign at me whilst coming within an inch of running me down. Malaka itself has been a trading town from the 15th century, first as a sultanate and then under a succession of european powers - portugese, dutch and british - underwhich its importance dimished. With the trade came a mixture of cultures, leaving a strong indian and chinese presence. Not suprisingly much of the interest here is historical, the old town being littered with portugese buildings and the remains of a fort. So have spent time exporing the town and museums.Well, starting to get my head round this asia place but i think it'll be a week or so before really at home..

Singapore

2004-07-05T14:15:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone, since my last entry i have just relaxed in darwin for a few days enjoying the sun. Then flew back to sydney, where i spent of couple of days before catching a flight to singapore on the 30th.Singapore, is pretty much exactly how i'd imagined it - like its namesake noodle dish - stick everything in the same tub, chuck in some chilli and expect it to work. Hindu temples, huddle next to mosques, chinese temples and churches. Grand colonial style with modern high rise. Its really amazingly easy just to while away hours sitting by the river sipping ice tea and taking it all in. This is also perhaps the most capitalist, consumer driven places i've seen. Have only been conned into buying one thing so far (funky big zoom lense for camera) but almost came out of shop repleat with tailor made suit, shirts etc managed to drag myself away, after serious internal battles. The salesmen really have perfected the hurt look and i have a starving family to feed routine. The locals wandering down orchard road - the main shopping street wearing more designer gear than can really be healthy. I have been recieving no end of strange looks shambling around in ancient, grubby combats which now are torn in 5 places and generally look like i've been out hunting the viet cong. Have been also to the zoo here which is the best i've ever seen by miles. I feel like i've seen practically every type of animal ever now. How polar bears and comodo dragons both can live in the same enviroment (not togeather obviously) astounds me. Actually, its just the wonder of air conditioning but still. Air con is the only thing that makes life for humans possible round here aswell. The average journey anywhere, just consisting of a series of small sprints between conditioned enviroments. Even the zoo is littered with air-conned glass boxes at regular intervals so as to allow visitors to get their oxygen fix. Being a cultured type i've also sampled the local museums and art gallerys which are both of quality - far better than anything in Oz in this respect. Of course the great and amazingly cheap food also deserves a mention, my friend Cher from MS s'pore introduced me to some flavours that i really didn't know existed - what the hell is a duriam anyway??

Diving into the Outback

2004-06-23T14:02:00.000-07:00

At last, the drought is over, i can hear the collective sigh of relief from here.... Gonna be a bit of a marathon session this, so your going to have to forgive my ramblings.I'll pick up the story in Cairns - my last week on the east coast *sob* Well quite a relief actually to start to make a break from backpacker central. In my constant quest for self improvement (yes, it IS possible) i decided to learn to dive as should have plenty of opportunity to do more in indochina. Also, you can't come all this way and not dive on the great barrier reef. The course consisted of 2 days class and pool training, then four dives on the reef itself practicing skills and swimming about.Diving is pretty easy really, once you get the hang of breathing underwater and equalizing the pressure. For the uninitiated this isn't an early 90's dance act but the process of holding your nose, whilst blowing it, trying not to burst blood vessels/pass out. Kitted out in the wetsuits, tanks BCD, snorkel and grenade-esque weights i felt ready to leap into a bond movie. Unfortunately my self belief wasn't sufficient to convince the instructors that, REALLY i should be allowed a spear gun. ahh well, just have to look the fishies. Swimming along weightless at 14 m with only slight paranoia about shark attacks and being stung my some deadly sea creatures of the deep is an increadible feeling. Gliding over the reef, next to the fishes i saw a couple of stings rays and turtles, although the visibility was not too good, due to rain on the surface. Anyways, having passed all the tests i'm now fully qualified to get myself into watery danger all over the world!For the next leg of my journey I was joined my a couple of crazy german guys (Johannes and Christien - sorry bout spelling guys) and their beautiful, yellow, 1980, 4.1 litre, straight 6, ford falcon beast. Having had the misfortune to meet me at Cape Trib, they became convinced that their trib to Alice and Darwin would be greatly improved my presence (ie i could contribute toward fuel). Hitting the road one Saturday evening, our backpacker mobile piled high with bags and camping gear we began the 5554.4 km odyssey to Darwin.My first night under canvas (since fraser) was spent at 700m near the top of Wallaman falls - the highest waterfall in Austrailia, in what is laughably referred to as a three 'man' tent. From the tent design however, which i think can be traced to the mid 13th century, it is concievable that 'man' was an appropriate term at conception. Viewing the falls the next morning (having arrived at 10pm) we were greated with an awesome sight. Water plunging 300m down a sheer cliff into a pool below. Unable to daudle as we were on a tight scedule, we were on out way again by 9amThe next couple of days were characterised by arrow straight roads, flanked by pylons and the railroad. The roadways are scattered with dead kangeroos and cattle - night driving in these parts it particularly hazardous, now i understand bull bars! (although perhaps not in putney) The road kill means that carrion birds thrive by the road side - mostly crows, but alway some huge eagles. On our way to Uluru (ayres rock) we took in the the Devils Marbles (a collection of moderately sized red rocks) and the Olgas (a collection of huge red rocks) before reaching our destination (one humungous red rock).It was very easy (and typical) of me to be blase (thats blah-zay) about Uluru on my first viewing, sunset, in the 'sunset viewing area'. Around us folks from the tour buses and the caravan brigade popping open a chardonnay to witness the sunset - keeping a distance from the smelly backpackers, can't blame them here showers were a distant memory by this point, having been replaced by bush camps and bushes. My impression was, yeah, its a big rock that i've seen pictures of like this 100 times. However, the next day, doing the walk around the base the rock almost became alive. The surface forms thousands of images and shapes, one moment the skin of a huge beast, the next like some creation of Gaudi in its shape and form. It was easy to see how the aborigines saw stories of ancestors and battles scarred into the surface of this monolith. Next stop, Kings Canyon, a mere 300 km from Uluru. This system of canyons is formed from a region that was origionally desert. The crests on the plateau section betray this past, being petrified sand dunes. Between the dunes a dramatic series of canyons have formed both large and small, sheltering beautiful creeks and a huge variety of plant life. One ravine is named the 'garden of eden' with its brook, lined with palms and culminating in a large circular plunge pool enclosed by vertical cliff faces.Leaving KC at about 5.30 we had to put in some miles before finding a camp spot. Driving along quite merrily, stero playing road trip classics the engine cut..... We rolled to a stop. A series of words indicating severe displeasure followed (bother didn't feature too strongly). Miles from anywhere, my first thought was, 'well we got a tent'. Having forgotten to feed the beast with sufficient oil garnish it requires for its petrol the engine had siezed. Lucky for us, after pouring in a good measure of the black stuff it started again - ah they don't make em like they used too! Pulling up for fuel an hour later and to check the oil situation at a road house in the middle of nowhere (bit of a theme round here) i went in looking for someone to turn the pump on. A roadhouse is a staunch bastion of aussieness - handle bar moustaches, terrible mullets, rugby league on the telly and jugs of beer. Whilst the owner show me a delightful set of piccys of tourists' cars after hitting the local cattle, his wife happily filled our car. Avoiding death and following a quick pit stop in Alice for new tires we reached the West MacDonald ranges, a RANGE of mountains to the WEST of Alice. Quite a beautiful area but wasn't as good as we had expected. According to the local literature, its 'somewhere where the residents of Alice Springs can go to get away from it all' It was certainly news to me that Alice is where 'it is all at' - obviously i don't know the rat race when i see it. Another day on the road and we reached Katherine gorge. We took a walk to 'butterfly gorge' (katherine gorge, consisting of a series of 14 gorges or something). This gorge was noted for its butterflys (gasp) and its deep water. The perfect venue for the European base jumping championships (results below). On the way back i trod on a rather large bright yellow snake. Inevitably this sent me running and screaming, frantically checking my legs for puncture wounds. 10 mins later was feeling rather pround that had survived brush with death. Wasn't pleased to find out (later) it was a harmless tree snake.The culmination of our trip was at the Kakadu, reputed to be the finest of Australia's national parks. The region in famed for the diversity of its habitats, dry stoney plateau, gum forest, monsoon forest and wetlands. Having planned to spend 4 days in the park we took the first day slowly. Driving up to Gunlom falls, along an unsealed track, viewing the plunge pool at the base (inhabited by 'unagressive' freshwater crocs - we didn't test the aggressiveness). A steep climb to the top revealed a series of beautiful rock pools not mentioned in the guide books (presumably to keep them quiet) where we spent the day lounging and swimming. A well deserved break after 5500 km driving in just over a week.The next morning we set off to the next part of the park but then disaster struck. The poor old falcon stopped, dead, having done 5554.4 km since cairns. This time there was no resusitating it, a piston have broken from the crank shaft (or something, we all know i know nothing about cars). I and Johannus (the unhappy car owner)began the long trudge to a pay phone. Now i know how hitch hikers feel when you drive past them. It seemed the appropriate time for me to begin a rendition of 'always look on the bright side of life' for which i recieved (a deserved) punch. There was nothing for it, the car was abondoned at the local garage along with piles of kit, they gave us nothing for it - a nice little earner for them which didn't do much for Johannus' mood. We then got the first coach to Darwin. Thus ends the tale.

Cape Tribulation

2004-06-05T13:57:00.000-07:00

There was this traveller who turned up in oz a few years ago. Some guy called chef or something. Anyway, he bumped into this cape (litterally) which set off an upsetting chain of events, holes in ships, trapped in rivers etc etc so he decided to call it Cape Tribulation. In honour of this history my trip to cape 'trib' began at 7.15 on tuesday with its own mini modern day tribulation, when i sleepily checked my watch (having not long returned from the notorious 'woolshed'). To my dismay, what my watch told me was i only had 10 mins to shower, dress and pack before my bus turned up. Its amazing what you can do in a short space of time, running round a hostel, half dressed, soaking wet and shouting at the bus driver that i was indeed awake and raring to go.The journey led up the winding captain cook highway out of cairns, firstly through countless sugar cane fields and then into the dense rain forest of north queensland. Crossing the Daintree river we were bundled out of the bus to enjoy a 'crocodile' cruise. Grasping my bottle of water and in dire need of a full english cooked breke i gingerly stepped onto the boat. Unfortunely due to the rain and wind etc, the crocs being sensible creatures were happily keeping snug nowhere near the river bank and well out of site. For the first half hour we saw nothing but trees but then just coming back to the jetty we saw a large male croc in full view. I was highly suspicious of this uncroc like behaviour and suspected that this is the blow up plastic croc the tour operators place on the bank for these kind of days. In order to prove me wrong the thing started moving its head from side to side menacingly so it must have been at least partly mechanical.Cape Tribulation juts out into the coral sea and is flanked on each side by pristine white beaches, which in turn are backed by rainforest which grows right up to and onto the beach. Stewn across the sand are the bizarre patterns created by sand crabs which burrow down throwing out small pellets over the beach. Between the beach and the sea dead coral reef stands proud of the water, creating a hard, porous and almost lava like promonade along the waters edge. I was staying in a cabin next to the beach and spent my time just exploring the area on foot. On the second day I walked to a water hole in one of the creeks a couple of km into the forest where I swam and jumped from an outcrop into the pool below.

Sailing, Snorkeling and Magnetism

2004-05-28T14:14:00.000-07:00

Another 18 hour coach ride north from Rainbow beach consisting of 2 tacky films and disturbed window knocking head sleep I reach Airlie beach and 6.30 am. Airlie is the jumping off point for sailing the whitsundays and by 7.30 am i had completely explored this extensive one street town - a collection of hostels, bars, hostel-bars, cafes and cafe-bars. Life in Airlie revolves around the sun, (inspired by Galileo) consisting pretty much of get up, go to the lagoon, lie in sun. After a day or two of Airlie life i wandered along to the mariner to find the boat that i was booked onto. 'Otella' was an ex around Australia race winner, a mono hull with 14 passengers and 2 crew. During our trip we took in Whitehaven beach, a beautifull network of sandbars, submerged by crystal blue waters. I also had my first experience of snorkeling on one of the reefs surrounding the islands. Coral and fish of every colour imaginable surrounded me, slightly disconcerting at first. When one fish 'bit' me i started flapping around until i worked out that my thumb was still where it should be. The variation of colour and shape of coral was facinating; jagged spires, large flakes, waving tenticals, clam like mouths in an array of blues, yellows purples and reds. One evening i tried my hand at fishing off of the side of the boat. I can safely say this was not my forte, catching precicely nothing. Got a couple of nibbles on the line but nothing wanted to bite. For my next stop i couldn't resist the attraction of magnetic island (see what i did there)... Thus called as captain cooks compass went a bit wobbly when he sailed past it. In fact, it isn't magnetic at all but is incredibly beautiful and chilled out. I've just been exploring various secluded (often destered) beaches around the island and last night climbed up to an old WW II fort positioned at the top to view the sun coming down. At one point i wandered face first into a very large and scary looking spiders house. Having heard so much about the deadly properties of our 8 legged friends in these parts, this sent me scampering backwards in fear for my life. It took me about 5 minutes to pluck up the courage to walk under the thing as was convinced it had positioned itself to strike... On the way down from the forts I saw my first kuala. The evening being their most active time of day it was engaged in the taxing process of chewing.

sand sand sand sand

2004-05-19T14:14:00.000-07:00

ahhhh the famous fraser island the worlds larget sand pit and the toys to match. After leaving brisbane i spent a couple of days just chillin and reading before setting off to Fraser. Although this is shamelessly a tourist must do, its simply something that you must do. Fraser island is the worlds largest sand island and is covered in eucalyptus and rainforest as well as a number of unbeliveably clear fresh water lakes. At my hostel we were organised into groups of 9 to 11 and kitted out with camping stuff and a toyota land cruiser (of african cival war fame, only without the heavy machine guns). After a safety and rules briefing, DO NOT approach dingos (whoops), DO NOT drive excessively fast through streams and washouts (whoops), DO NOT lose or break camping gear (whoops and whoops) etc we piled in and set off. The first day we planed to make it up to the top of the island for sunset as this is the best time for seeing sharks feeding, which basically involves a 90 mile drive up the beach, which is the islands main road. however, after an hour of pottering along we thought it might be nice to take a 'scenic' drive to one of the less visited lakes. The scenic route required the 4x4 being put at 45 degree angles both length ways and side ways through dense rainforest, somehow we avoided rolling the thing and reach the lake relatively unscathed. It was deserted just surrounded by the forest. After swimming etc it was back on our way. by now we were hours behing schedual and by the time we made it back to the beach to continue north it was already 3.05 (DO NOT drive on the beach after 3.00 pm). A dash up the beach followed, stopping for photos at a ship wreck sunk into the sand and then on. With the sea slowly but surely closing the road on our right as the tide rolled in we were forced to pull in and camp some 7km short of our objective. We made camp, i let the others fiddle with the tents whilst i prepared the most important thing, a bit fire!2nd day began at 5, (as we had decided to get up for dawn at the previous days objective) i duely decided my head was in no state and turned off alarm. Mistaking the Dingos raiding our rubbish for sounds of human activity i managed to drag myself up at 5.30. Back in the 4x4 by 5.45 (having decided to break camp later) we drove throught the soft sand (as sea still high) up to Indian head. Sun rise was a couple of minutes after we got there but unfortuneatly i didn't see any sharks just a few rays (shark spotting requires focused attension on the sea, something i found myself unable to pull off....). so yeah, after that walked to the 'champagne pools' where the sea crashes into rock pools to create a bubbling effect and then back south. Spent a good deal of time getting lost in the rainforest that afternoon (when i was driving thus relying on others navigation!!). Believe me, trying to 3 point turn a 15 foot 4x4 in a road 8 foot wide in sand 3 foot deep ain't easy. On the last day we made it to the more famous lakes. Lake Wabby is a deep, steep sided affair at with people pencil rolling down the dunes into the lake. Lake Mckenzie is an amazingly blue lake, the combination of totally crystal clear frest water and the clear blue sky. Having been instructed to leave the lake for the last ferry off by 1.00 pm at the latest we set off at 1.20 and made the two hour drive in 1 hour 5 minutes. There few things more fun that being propelled upwards from your seat into the roof of a land cruiser, craking your head then falling down to meet your seat just as the vehical hits another bump. Luckly med students were on hand to deal with the multiple compression fractures, slipped disks etc etc. Don't have many pictures of island unfortunely as left my camera on then accidentally used it as pillow on first night wearing out the battery, so this is going to have to be a 'minds eye' entry.

Byron to Brisbane

2004-05-12T13:56:00.000-07:00

Hi all!!! firstly, thanks everyone who posted/emailed happy b-day, it was indeed a good one.I reached Byron Bay on the 6th after leaving the blue mountains. Byron is my new favourite place, (for the last month anyway). Its basically a smallish town with two maaaaaaaasive beaches, onwhich i've been a resident for the last week. I'd like to go into all the cultural details of the area and explain some the horizon broadening, mental epiphanies (spelling suggestions on message board most welcome) i've experienced over the last week but sadly there weren't any. My life has pretty much consisted of beach to bar ping pong, (my intellectual side feels most ashamed). Byron bay was named by captain cook, the guy who named practically everywhere round here. Between the two beaches lies a rocky outcrop with a large (and impressively bright at night) lighthouse. From next to the lighthouse,you can look down into the waters below and see dolphins, turtles and sting rays swimming around what is the most easterly point of austrailia. In a mad turn of activity one day, myself and a couple of guys took bikes and rode around the coast to broken head nature reserve. This was an obvious misadventure from the point of conception and inevitably on the way back the chain on my bike broke. I was stranded at a junction and left to contemplate traffic whilst waiting an hour and a half for a pickup. Some spectacular nights out occured in Byron but somehow they all seemed to end in the same place, a particularly cheesy club named 'cheeky monkeys' The place has no dance floor, prefering tables for this purpose, greatly increasing the chances of breaking ones neck or being hit by bottles hurled across the room by some big drunkards flailing limbs. By the 9th everyone was pretty worn out but we still managed a day trip to nimbin. I had to drive unfortunately because i'm now 25. This new age of responsiblility is becoming a burden already. Nimbin is austrailia's answer to amsterdam, a hippy colony consisting of one street where the use and distribution of 'canabis based products' is ignored. If technicoloured buildings, unwashed stumbling locals and being offered 'special cookies' by people old enough to be your grandparents is your bag then this is definately the place to go. We drove back, accompanied by giggling, mime bands and animal noises, making it to byron in time to see an amazing sunset over the town.Travelling north on Monday I reached Surfers Paradise. How any city can retain any self respect with this name i have no idea and duely 'Surfers' fails. The golden beach without end, flanked by highrise builings makes this look like miami, whilst retaining the feel and ambiance of blackpool with sun. We braved the beach for an hour in a sand storm but were almost buried alive.The next day heading north again i reached brisbane, from which i write. I have to say its a jolly nice place having a good collection of victorian buildings, parks and river.

Nigel in the land of OZ

2004-05-05T14:11:00.000-07:00

Ahhh in the land of constant sun, at last i can work on my tan! got to sydney on friday (today is apparently wednesday) after a quick (3 hour) flight from Auckland. Booked my place at a hostel in town from the airport and 2 minutes later was approached by some guys with think russian accents offering me a lift. I was convinced the thing was a scam but after interrorgating them for half an hour was convinced that in actual fact they HAD been sent to collect me.Got into kings cross which is the seedy, backpackery end of sydney. I kinda liked it, its got character (if a somewhat disreputable one). I was suprised by the number of oldish buildings in sydney, having expected it to be pretty much like NZ in that way. Sydney does, unfortunely, like london, have the unpleasent habit of consuming your money when you're not looking, so after a couple of days taking in the usual sights and an exspensive night down at darling habour i was off. Katoomba in oz terms is almost considered a suburb of sydney, the fact that its 2 hours away by train in a national park is of little coincidence. Its up in the blue mountains, a really stunning area and rated as one of the top 44 things to do in oz by rough guide, (why 44 i ask, these guide books are crazy). The name come from the blue haze that sits in the forested valleys, apparently something to do with evaporating gum tree gum, or something.... The area was once a hugh plateau, but over time deep and steep sided valleys have formed. The town itself is nearly all art deco in style, decked out in retro colours and packed out with 2nd hand clothes shops. Went for a long walk yesterday through the 'bush' (look at me, fully conversent in local terminology). The forest is just full of bird life most of which has something to say for itself. I saw a liar bird, which at the time i thought was a pheasent or something but was later told by a local what it was and that its pretty rare. Its apparently called that because it can immitate any other type of birds song, being the cover band of the avion world (i know, appalling pun but couldn't resist). Took the 'steepest railway in the world' out of the valley not being able to face the million steps back up and fed some parrots. This will make more sense when i put the pictures up.

Leaving NZ speechless and sailing into sunset

2004-04-29T14:08:00.000-07:00

Wow! what a long title now can i write up to it? Sorry for my slackness as of late, i have been up north in the land before email. Ok, its been so long i struggle to remember myself. Rotorua; the evening after my last entry I went to a Maori feast evening in a village that been reconstructed to appear as it was before the evil english came on the scene (Pfield people, think butser ancient farm). The feast is called a Hangi (i have no idea of the spelling). Pronounced HANG GEE (thats GEE as in GEEzer). Which roughly translates into english as 'all you can eat roast dinner' always good when the taste of meat is just a distant memory. Naturally, I employed full Harrison all you can eat tatics (don't be conned into eating the potatoes/veg, stick strictly to meat), the object of which is an attempt to bankcrupt the party that was foolish enough to challenge one to eat more than a fixed cost of food. There was of course a cultural element to all this, with guys in traditional dress doing traditional things like the haka, swinging pom poms and twiddling sticks, all of which was pretty impressive. (Let me reitterate AS MUCH MEAT AS YOU CAN EAT!) yummyAlso in Rotorua I sampled the delights of a hot bath, naturally after a month and a half.... They've got loads of hot springs which are fed into spa pools, so we spent an afternoon sitting in one. This leaves you smelling beautifully of sulphur, meaning i could practically pass as a local. Next up was Auckland where i spent a couple of days before heading up to the bay of islands. Auckland is what they affectionatly call a big city in these parts, housing about a third of the whole population of NZ. Its built on a number of volcanic hills and around a harbour and does make available some of the defining elements of civilization (ie a copy of the economist). There is a volcanic island in the harbour called rangitoto which i wandered up, this is well worth it, as it gives great views over the whole area.Then i hopped on a bus and headed up to Piahia in the bay of islands. The bay of islands was where Cook first landed in NZ, and is a very nice spot, what an amazing sense of direction that fellow had! The first night there I was out with a bunchof guys i met on the bus, one of whom had his guitar with him, so he banged out some classics in the bar, accompanied my enthusiastic (if perhaps not always tuneful) attempt to remember the words. This voice damage was compounded the next night with kareoke, (personally i blame everything on andy williams and wet wet wet) me and matt scooping 2nd prize, this having nothing to do with the highly partisan screaming coming from our supporters. A birthday bash the next day and by friday the only sound i could make was a slightly self pitying wimpering noise, i suspect much to the relief of the local musical community. In all i spent about 5 days exploring the local area, going all the way north to cape reinga where '2 oceans meet' (1 of only 3 places in the world, see photo below...) This included sand boarding, where you walk up MASSIVE sand dunes and then dive down head first on a modified boogie board, and also 90 mile beach. I also spent 2 days learning to sail a yaucht which was great fun - next plan, sail around the world! I'm sure there is more but starting to experience writers block...Oh, there have been requests for a photo with me in it (hold on, there is method in this madness) to prove that i'm not just downloading them. Its a lovely one of me and a tree. This is my last day in NZ so in my next installment i'll be in sunny sydney!

Whales Tails and Two Crossings

2004-04-15T14:21:00.000-07:00

Well, its been sometime since i left QT, can't remember when exactly, losing track of time these days. My Journey up north has really been pretty quick, so seem to have spent much on the last 'however long its been' on the coach. Before leaving the South Island however i did spend a day on the Kaikoura Peninsular.The I have filed a complaint with the relevent authorities invoking the trade description act with reference to the activity of 'whale watching'. This should in due course be renamed 'whale tail watching' as this is really what its all about. On most days you see and average of 3 whaletails as the mamal in question dives to catch lunch (or was it elevenses?). As you see the tail for about 3 seconds each dive it works out about $10 a second for tail viewing. Its actually pretty good, the Kaikoura Peninsular stretches out towards a deep sea trench which is only a couple of km offshore, but is over 1 km deep, because of this it is one of the only places you can see sperm whales so close to land. Also on the trip we saw a pod of around 200 dolphins swimming and jumping togeather aswell as a few wandering albatross (the biggest kind, wingspan up to 4m). All this has an amazing snow covered mountain backdrop. It was then time to leave the south island, so jumping on a ferry from Picton we cruised on over to Wellington. We had a stunning day on the boat, clear blue skies and the Marlborough sounds were bustling with sail boats. Yesterday I did the Tongariro crossing, this is described as NZ's greatest day walk. Its 17 km in all (which meant a 5am start, after going to bed at 4am this can be a little hard to bare) and journeys past several volcanic peaks and through a number of craters (some of which are visibly active). Again the weather was perfect, some god or other clearly taking my early hours jiggling in the holy cow bar to be a sun dance or something. The landscape of the crossing is almost martian, with sulphorous fumes hanging in the air and ice cystals sheltering from the sun behind each boulder. The whole landscape of this area was remade only around 100 years ago, the ash and frozen laza around you look and feel like they are from a newly born world. At the highest point, through the steam rising from the rocks, you can clearly see both east and west sides of NZ. Past the Emerald lakes (don't dive in they are full of arsenic), a quick zig zig down the mountain, through beach forest and I was are at the car park. Time for a nap....

Understanding Tramping is

2004-04-08T14:20:00.000-07:00

Ha ha, thought you'd got rid of me, well 'fraid not, although this is the last message from QT that i'll be doing as i'm leaving tommorow (plaintive sob). Have spent the past week tramping over the routeburn, cruising on Milford and partying in QT. The Routeburn is an ancient (well old) path (route) following a stream (burn) from one side of a bunch of mountains to another. Spent a day getting my gear togeather, ie pots, pans, freeze dried food (yum) alot of chocolate (yum (without irony)) and far too many apples (why? they are HEAVY!) and wet weather stuff. The forecast was for rain and unseasonably cold weather - so perfect timing for a Harrison..... Setting out from Glenorchy in the poring rain on friday morning with a heavy pack and a mountain range in front of me that i would presently be climbing it struck me that maybe this wasn't my finest idea. Well, i was wrong, the walk was spectacular. The first day was spent winding through beach forest, and up the valley side to hut perching on stilts at 1000m. Just to clarify for you pedants out there - No, the stilts where only about 4m high the other 996m comprised mountain.... The forest was full of a multitude of gushing streams that had to be crossed by way of ropebridges that make the millenium bridge seem set in stone. On the 2nd day it was an early start to beat the worst of the weather so fired off a couple of photos and head up the mountain. Climbing to 1200m ish I reached the snow line and a mountain lake hemmed in on all sides by snow capped peaks. Then the decent began along precipitous mountain side. With rain growing heavier and being taunted by mountain parrots, we were glad to spy our hut nestling in a valley below my lake Mckenzie, set in forest on all sides. On the 3rd day the weather was glorious, blue skies and more amazing scenery - i think the photos do more justice to it than my words + running out of time b4 internet place closes....Amazingly we also had a good day for Milford sound. Doing a boat trip in the morning (the best time apparently) we had a great view of the fjord. During the cruise we were joined by a pod(?) of dolphins so yours truly (in an attempt to bring the real story to his readers) hung over the side of the boat taking pictures from about 1m away. That evening I was back in Queenstown. Since then I have been hangin out with Fi mostly, out on the town, jet boating and out walking/driving the area.

burning cars and frozen forests

2004-03-30T13:56:00.000-08:00

Today is day three of our road trip. 'Our' being myself and cat who had the misfortune of being sat next to me on the coach when i said 'lets hire a car and drive places'.... places of course being nice ideas in my head but slightly incorpreal in character. Anyway Sunday we picked up the car and were on our way. Not having driven for two years speeding along NZ's twisty roads was practically and ends in itself to me. About half an hour later whilst stopping on the basis of 'ahhh thats a nice view' we got out of the car to be slightly disturbed by billowing and acrid fumes from under the bonnet...oh dear... Opening it up we found the oil cap resting neatly beside the hole it was intended to cover, and an oil spillage covering the engine that Shell would have been proud of. Oil was burning off on the hot bits (notice slight lack of manly engine knowledge) and creating the smoke, so a t-shirt was sacrifced to redeem the situation. The evening we stayed in Invercargill, a place which would make the description 'grey' sound like a complement. The streets were dead, not a sole to be seen, just the occasional clapped out motor rattling down the street like some laterday tumbleweed. The next day we set off to explore the Caitlins. This is a beautiful area at the soutern tip of NZ. Rolling hill meets forest meets golden beaches and azure seas. Driving unsurfaced roads dodging pot holes all day also makes driving entertaining. We took a wander to a waterfall and by the sea to a fossilized forest - a prehistoric rainforest petrified into the rocks. The area is also full of wildlife, I had a close incounter with an elephant seal which i mistook for a lump of drift wood, until i noticed it was furry had a face and moved.

of all the bars in all the world....

2004-03-27T14:12:00.000-08:00

Queenstown; (native) population 5000, backpackers beds 15000 all of them full. You can imagine what a night out round here is like. Its definately got a small town feel with that everyone knows everyone 'charm' (aside from the 15000 who barely know who they are, let alone anyone else). Just the place to prove how small the world is.... My first night here I walked into the bar to see my cousin Fi serving behind it, I didn't even know she was in NZ - fairly typical disorganisation on my part i grant. That kicked off a night of partying and in which another amazing stroke of 'luck' saw me win the bar's competition that evening.... Have really just been chilling out over the past couple of days, organising some trips south next week and a 'tramp' on the routeburn track. In way of training, Fi and I set off up Ben Lomond yesterday - the local mountain, standing 1740m high. The day started beautifully, warm, blue skies etc etc. We trudged along stoping every few metres for photos and snacks, it didn't last. We saw the storm approaching but decided being English we knew a thing or two about wet weather and against the urging of those retreating off of the mountain continued on our way. Half an hour later, about 20 minutes short of the summit, we were huddling behing a boulder with horizontal rain driving past us. Soaked through and with the clouds decending around us we decided that discretion was the better part of valour and turned back. So no dramatic panoramas from the top i'm afraid, although we were rewarded with a intensely vivid rainbow across QT for our struggles.

A pain in the leg

2004-03-23T13:52:00.000-08:00

Well I have to say the Franz Josef glacier is definately a highpoint thus far. The Glacier descends from a hight of 2000m to 250m into temperate rain forest - one of only 3 in the world that flow straight into a forest. I took a full day hike to the glacier and up to 750m at the point where the glacier falls through a narrow gorge to forest level. The glacier is named after the then emperor of Austro-Hungary Franz Josef as apparently it reminded the explorer of his long white flowing beard. Following this logic, the NZ government are planning to rename it the 'Gandalf Glacier' in a shameless attempt to further cash in on Lord of the Rings.... The walk to the Glacier was done in torrential rain - I have spent several years labouring under the foolish assumption that the term 'rain forest' was a forest where it rained alot. I now discover it is in fact a 'forest of rain' with the greenery purely incidental. The gorge was truely atmospheric with clounds clinging to the wooded slopes, waterfalls tumbling down the cliff faces on each side and mists rising from the river. The ice of the glacier is almost sky blue and from the top it looks like water from a bursting dam has been frozen in time as it exploded down the valley. We spent time exploring the crevaces and ice caves before heading back - every limb aching and every article of clothing totally soaked. My god the shower felt good.

So this is what awake is like

2004-03-20T14:16:00.000-08:00

At last i'm feeling like i can function again - which is a relief. Booked myself onto a kiwi experience bus on thursday and spent the rest of the day doing organisational type stuff preparing to leave christchurch. Felt seriously bad yesterday, my bus was leaving at 7 in the morning but combination of jetlag and a serious case of over sleeping anxiety meant i woke up at 3am and couldn't get back to sleep... uurrrggghh. Well I made it onto the bus anyway. We cut across the Southern Alps to the west coast. The land scape goes through a transformation of english looking farmland to scottish highland to alpine forest to rain forest in about 2 hours driving. Its pretty incredible so much diversity is in such a small place. Once we had crossed to the west coast we joined up with a bigger bus and made our way south. We stopped for the night at 'the poo pub'. This is basically a collection of shacks and a bar run by the this old bearded NZ guy who literally has not left the place for several hundred years. Anyway we had a 'beach party' there in the evening and a big steak meal. I was feeling pretty bad so wasn't really up to the antics - starting to feel old already..... Anyways, today we carried on down the coast stopping at a couple of places - a museum showing men jumping out of helicopers to catch deer and a gold panning/paintball place. Needless to say i am currently peppered with bruises. Tommorow i'll be climbing the glacier here so looking forward to that! Still no photos i know - should be able to sort them out when i get to queenstown in a few days.

Joys of Jetlag

2004-03-18T14:06:00.000-08:00

Still in daze, I had to just ask guy next to me what day of the week it is. Apparently thursday... The first thing that hit me when stepping out of the international terminal in Auckland (transfering to domestic flight) was the new country smell. In NZ this was of a sweet pollon - nectar to my nose after basking in my own sweat for the last 26 hours. Arrived in christchurch yesterday at about 8.30am Wednesday morning. Had to kill time before checking into a hostel, so set off into town. Christchurch seems pretty small, practically empty at 9.00 in the morning - I guess like provincial towns the world over. Found my way to the museum and botanical gardens in the morning before going to Cathedral square to listen to 'the Wizard'. For those who don't know the 'the Wizard' is an old guy with a big beard and gandalf suit who turns up outside the cathedral here every day (without fail) at 1 pm with a step ladder and a bugle and delivers a rant. His two hour speach mainly consisted of misogenistic, contradictory, post modernist psudo socialogical claptrap. It was all i could do to remain seated and stop myself arguing against his grossly misinformed (ie not mine) opinions. Quite interesting though and kept me entertained for 2 hours. After that I checked in I had a snooze and went to the bar with a German guy who was in my dorm. Being St Paddy's day there was a band playing such Irish classics as 'i would walk 500 miles' and 'american pie' Had some fabulously expensive guiness before going to bed about 10. Sorry about lack of photo's didn't bring camera, I'll get some soon.

Packin

2004-03-05T14:12:00.000-08:00

Ahhh, the endless joys of organising numerous objects into square containers. I'm almost tempted to chuck everything back on the floor just to have another go... I sit here gazing out of the window at the timeless river of human kind that is the south circular; each individual neatly packed into their own little box, albeit one with such extravagancies as wheels, internal combustion engines etc. I think i'm going to miss the flexing glass in the window as the artics rumble by and the mini commuter train induced earthquakes, packed with people on the way to work where they'll try to think outside the box.