World Tour

11/1-6

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:59:00 GMT

November 1-6

We eaten a lot of great meals while we've been in NZ and while at Ian and Louise's. When we were in Aukland that first week I got addicted to kebabs either lamb or falafal with yogurt and sweet chili sauce. I've eaten more meat in the last two weeks than I've eaten all year! Ian's parents have a farm and we had some of their cows. Jon and I went to a potluck after a meeting for a conservation group Ian and Louise area part of to protect the Thames coastline where we had steak and sausages,salads and Ian's tastey pancakes with Feijoa jelly and butter on them. Oh and the amount of butter we've eaten - whoa. Thank goodness we're either biking or working on the house, otherwise I wouldn't be fitting into my clothes (again) and it would be like France all over again! The mussle chowder Ian made last week is unforgetable and there's talk that he's going to make mussel fritters before leave (here's hoping). We had a really good beef stew that Louise made last night with veggies and bread and butter. Kiwi's are in season and are really good, we usually have them with our morning or afternoon tea or lunch. We've been having muesli and Weetbix for breakfast or (my favorite) porridge with dried dates, broken up banana chips and plain yogurt on top along with tea and toast with peanut butter. The porridge is the best - we're totally addicted. We've also become addicted to Vegemite. Yep it's true. Served on toast with butter you just put a scraping on top for the salty/yeasty/tastey goodness. Love it.
We were in Hamilton the other day sorting out citizenship issues for Louise and Jon and I checked out an internet café. We met for lunch at an Indian restaurant and it was really really good. Jon and I don't have much experience with Indian food so we watched as Ian nogotiated his order and then followed suit. I had goat meat in a tastey sauce. I've never had goat before. It was good, tender but with little bones which were slightly annoying but didn't take away from the overall goat tasting experience. We also got a samosa which was good but then again, it was deep friend, so of course it was going to be good. Jon and I looked like the ultimate tourists with the world's largest bumbag - they'r not called Fannypacks here like they do back in the states since fanny meanes 'vagina' in New Zealand as well as England. We walked into this coffee shop which was a little hoity toity but he guy behind the counter - I think he was one of the owners because the elderly woman behind the register wouldn't have anything to do with us and was more interested in the nicely dressed couple that didn't end up buying anything. Anywho, this man, who was beautiful and was obviously of Maori decent asked if we wanted coffee or something to drink. Well, since we asked...
I looked at the drink menu and just had to ask about a few drinks that I wasn't familiar with:
Short/long black and short/long white
All the other espresso/coffee drinks I recognized.
A Short Black is a shot of espresso. A Long Black is, essentially an Americano. A short and long white is a shot of espresso with steamed milk but without the foam as with a latte. You learn something new everyday.
Well, it turns out that we got the mussel fritters made by both Ian and Louise. We had the most amazing 16 days. I can only hope to remember half the things we learned while there.
On our last full day off we got a ride from Ian to Coromandel which is farther north along the penninsula since he was substituting at the elementary there that day. We left with the boys at 10 minutes to 0800 in the pickup with the bikes and boys in the back while I rode with Ian in the front. It was proving to be a beautiful sunny day albeit windy but so what else is new. We parted ways with Ian in the school parking lot and after unfolding our bikes we promptly began riding on the wrong side of the rode. We hadn't gotten 10 meters when the fact was pointed out to us by another of the school faculty. That was a little embarassing. Funny how we'd been so used to riding on the other side of the road and yet it's so obviously engrained to ride on the "right" side of the road, meaning the right lane, we did it without thinking. Sheesh.
Coromandel is really very quaint, a small town that isn't completely touristy and everyone knows just about everyone else. Nice cafes, a good selection of art galleries and not too many kitschy gift shops, a good selection of bakeries. Dark clouds were threatening, the wind had picked up and it was pretty chilly outside. This wasn't really the ideal weather for riding and we had some serious hills to climb on the way back home.
We had looked at our budget and had had a serious reality check about our spending habits. Now that we were at our final destination/country, how long we would be able to stay was directly related to how much money we had alloted which is really how it was from the beginning we just kind of slacked off on minding the budget for the last, oh four months or so. Now that we had established an exact budget, which was thoroughly depressing, we were determined to stick to it which meant only need to have purchases, not nice to have. This made me a little cranky and I told Jon this who was not too sympathetic, and why should he be really, the budget simply was what it was...
We walked our bikes up and down the main street of town which didn't take too long since there is only one intersection but a suprising number of bakeries and cafes considering the size of the town. It was getting cold and so we decided to take shelter in a café and share a seafood pie. It was tastey and I got to have a coffee after all. We spent two or three hours there. Long enough for Ian to join us during his lunch hour from school which was a nice surprise for all of us. Jon and I were in deep discussion about the lay out for our cabin when he joined us and we were able to bounce ideas off of him which was really helpful. Earlier, a man asked us if we were building our home and we explained that we were just designing it and he gave us his business card. We went onto explain that we, unfortunately, were not building in the area to which he left us with a bit of advice on where to place the hot water heater.
It did shower a bit while we were in the café and by early afternoon it was time to start heading back. The clouds still looked a bit ominous but we had to get home sometime. Ian had asked what he should do if he saw us on the way home. We told him to just keep on going and we would meet him at home so now I was really really hoping it wouldn't rain!
We had been warned about the hills on the Coromandel Penninsula and not a single person lied to us. There were some doozies on the way back home and that didn't even include the 2.67km to get from the main road to the house which had some serious hills of its own. Luckily the sun was out and the scenery was spectacular and for every steep hill there was an equally steep downhill which was gratifying. But it was the getting up the hills. There wasn't much shoulder to speak of but there wasn't much traffic either and by this time we were about as unphased by closely passing vehicles as we are likely to get. Oh, my gosh. The bikes were great - I was dying and as always Jon just kind of cruised along (how does he DO that and still manage to eat as much Nutella as he does?!). I've found that certain words really help expel that last little bit of air from the lungs in order to take as deep, albeit fast and still relatively shallow, breath when at maximum exertion. Words and phrases like: "Gawd this is steep/endless"
Or
"F*%k!"
And/or
"This S*%ks."
Said on a regular basis while pedalling up these killer hills seemed to help and so I'm sure I'll be using them frequently throughout the trip. We'll see how it goes.
We made it all the way to the mailboxes at the end of the road before Ian caught up with us and we walked the rest of the way to the house as our cool down. It was Friday evening and there was still work to be done. The little lambies had to get their tails docked and the mails had to get testicles rubberbanded - and we got to be a part of it!
Ian and Louise said we could opt out but hey, when was the likelihood that we would ever be able to have such a hands on experience like this again? OK, pretty likely since we were in New Zealand but just in case.
Now, I really didn't know what was involved in docking tails and Louise and Ian said the lambs weren't really traumatized but for maybe the first hour or so after the event. All I could picture was little lambs running around with a bloody little stump of a tail which made me a little hesitant.
First things first though - we had to round them up. The lambs and sheep have free reign over a pretty large part of the 32 acres of land. We teamed up and to be quite honest I don't know how the four of them do it by themselves (not that Jon and I are experts but it seems like the more people the better). Ian went "...the right way round" which is a phrase that always kind of confused me when I heard it in the past but now, I totally understand what it means. Lou and I teamed up with Connell and came from the road side, climbing over the fence while Jon and Jordan when straight down the middle, meeting up with Ian to go down to the valley, back up again on the other side and then funnelling them all through to the teeny tiny paddock Ian had fashioned the day before. Before long we were all either clapping or holding our arms up doing our best to impresonate a fence to herd the sheep into the paddock. It worked and seemed only too easy which Lou assured us that sometimes one can end up chasing sheep and lamb all around the fields. Once penned in there was one tiny little lamb who was able to escape by squeezing through the fencing. I was safely on the outside with the camera, recording for posterity while Jon was in the thick of it. He was the closest so it was his job to grab that little lamby who became the first volunteer to have it's tail docked.

Oh. Is that all?
All that happens is that rubberbands are but at the end and after a week or so the tail just falls off. This was much less traumatizing to watch than I thought and was a little relieved. The lamb on the other hand was a little vocal about having it's tail wrapped in a rubberband. Once she was set free her little contrite bleats were pretty cute and she kept giving Jon the evil eye. Unfortunately, not all of the lambs were that small and those little guys are strong but once they were in the assumed position they looked rather resigned to their fate. Since all of the sheep were herded to together is a super small area, poor Connell had the not so envious job of picking out the lambs amongst the sardine packed herd, lift them over the gate to Jon while Jon grabbed them, pulled them over to the other side without letting them escape, grabbed hold of the legs and unceremoniously plopped them on the platform for Ian to apply the rubberbands. The poor things, both the lambs and the humans. Once that job was done we left the herd in the paddock as the next day they would be sheared - another New Zealand experience for us to put under out belts.
Well the Shearer couldn't make it on Saturday so we spent the day liming the side of the house and getting our things organized to leave on Monday.
Sunday was crazy busy as ian and Lou were expecting guests for lunch and the shearer who would undoubtedly arrive at lunch time. We had to round up the sheep again as we had let them loose the day before since the shearing wasn't going to happen. Luckily, it was just as easy as the day before. We tried to tidy up the house as make it as child-safe as possible which is hard to do when you're in the middle of building your home but we did the best we could. Jon worked on a rack for my bike that would allow for carrying more weight while I started packing the trailer. The Shearer was doing the neighbors sheep first and by lunch time and just before the guests arrived it was time to shear Ian and Lou's sheep. The Shearer was a great hulking massive guy. You'd have to be to man handle these sheep. I was, once again, safely on the non-sheep side of the fence taking pictures while Ian had Jon in the thick of it. Jon had to grab the sheep around the front chest, but not the neck - didn't want them to choke, they tend to get more agitated when that happens, then grab the front legs while lifting them up, back and onto their rumps, dragging them to the platform to be sheared
Well, at least that's what it looks like what they were doing. Things were going fairly smoothely until we were down to about four of five, the sheep knew what was up, they were looking at those on the other side of the fence, their naked herdmates. At one point Jon had leaned over to pick up a sheep and another sheep took this as it's opportunity to use Jon's back as a stepping stone to get over the fence!
That took Jon by surprise.
Those hooves looked sharp.
Jon almost fell over which also would have been gross and I think this occurred to him has he contorted his body every which way in order to avoid hitting the ground.
Ian said he'd never seen a sheep do that before.
Poor Jon, he was visibely uncomfortable but denied any real pain. How could he admit to being in pain in front of a sheep farmer and hulking sheep shearer?!
Ian and Jon took turns getting the remaining sheep.
We had a fabulous lunch with Ian and Louise's friends. Polenta, Pumpkin soup, pesto on rustic toasted bread, salad from the garden, marinaded tofu and veggies and homemade muffins just to name a few of the delicious dishes. It was a real feast!
Shortly after lunch Ian and Louise were off to one of the their many meetings. Jon and I still had organizing to do in order to leave the next day.
We had this great plan: we would sleep in a little bit and Lou would drive us to the end of the road where we would unload our trailer and bikes and start off on our journey. Well, Lou got an early morning call to substitute teach so we were left to our own devices to pack up and head out. We said our final goodbyes to Ian and then Lou and suddenly, we were alone. We slowly packed up, with some reluctance but also in anticipation of the continuation of our journey. The sun was out and shining brightly. Just as we were getting ready to leave we heard a car pull up into the drive. It was the plumber who was expected the next day. We had been hearing about Lou's plan for the first bath she would take once the solar water heater was hooked up and what trouble they had with getting a plumber out to their house - hot water was a long time coming. Luckily Jon had helped Ian build the stand for the hot water tank and knew where and what needed to be done. At one point Ian had shown me his every expanding file of owner's manuals in his file cabinet (I told him we had a similar one of our own back home) which came in handy since the plumber needed to refer to the solar heater manual - I knew just where to look! Initially the plumber was reluctant to do the work but there was no way we were going to let him go after hearing how much Lou was looking forward to a hot bath and what little was actually needed to be done to make it happen so we did what we could to help and waited around until the plumber finished what he needed to do. We waited and waited. Finally, Jon came up to me and said we should just go as the plumber, Peter, had told him it would still be another several hours of work before he was finished and would require a return trip the next day. Satified that we had done all we could we set off down the dirt road riding down the steep hills and pushing the bikes up hill - it was a good warmup. By the time we reached the end of the road we were ready to really start pedalling. Jon was recovering from exerting his knee too much on a previous ride so we took it really slow for the first ten kilometers. After that first ten we swapped bikes. It was the first time I had pulled a trailer with a bike and it felt strange
"It's like it's tugging on the back of the bike." - S
"Well, yeah, that's exactly what it's doing." - J
It didn't take long to get used to and before I knew it we were flying along the flat but curvy roads into Thames to stop at the Pack and Save grocery to pick up some supplies before continueing on to Paeroa where we would camp for the night.
Once we got into town it was determined that we would need a seat cushion for my bike seat if this trip was going to continue so I went to the bike shop and picked one out before buying groceries. An hour later we were finally ready to leave. It was early afternoon and starting to get a little overcast as we pedalled out of town. The wind started picking up but we were happy to be on the road again. The scenery was green and lush, traffic was ok, there was a pretty good shoulder going out of town. There were lots of sheep, lambs, cows and calves - Ian had assured us that we would see many more during the course of our trip. We were passed by a truck with a dead cow in the back. I could see the rigor -mortised leg swaying back and forth as the truck rounded the corner. That was interesting.
What was great about Paeroa was that the camping was free, what wasn't great was that there were no showers. We sat around in the grass for a little while, the sun had popped out again but before long some really dark clouds started moving in - fast.
We got the tent up as quickly as we could. It's still new to us so we're still a little slow to assemble it. What was great though was that once it was up I was able to wheel the trailer right into the porch area while Jon folded up the bikes and tucked them into the porch area too. Both bikes, the trailer, Jon and myself were all under cover when the rain really started to come down - you couldn't do that with a recumbent bike and our old tent! We were able to have the back of the trailer open in order to finish unpacking, get our dinner as well as maps and books to plan the next day - the equipment is working out great.

10/24-31

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:58:00 GMT

October 24-31

Where has the time gone? The days have been just flying by. The weather has been mostly windy with gusts of rain here and there, chilly at night but when the sun comes out it really beats down on you. I went for a jog one day and after twentyfive minutes in the sun I was sporting tan lines.
Building your own house is hard work. Being in another country helping to build someone else's house is also hard work. We've got muscles now and are eating big meals to keep us moving. Thank goodness we continued to work out while we were in Thailand and Korea - it's made a difference. We've learned a ton from Ian and Louise and have asked about a million questions and have been provided with so much good information and sage advice from people who have "been there" its been an on going workshop for the last, nearly, two weeks. The main structure of their strawbale house is built and we're helping with the bits and pieces needed to be done before rendering the outside. I think we came at a good time since it's the bits and pieces that can be trickiest.
Experiences we've had so far:
Assisted in a workshop on how to build a strawbale wall on our second day with Ian and Louise. We got to see what the meaning of creating something as a reflection of who you are. The home owner, Eric, is a great hulking Dutch man and his house is massive with lots of character on a great view. After the workshop we went to Collin and Gwyneth's an incredibly active couple whose action do not belie their age. They have a quaint home just big enough for the two of them, no more, no less, it's warm, inviting which says a lot since we were there on a windy, rainy day.
Ian and Jon went and picked mussels one day when there was a low tide. You should have seen the size of these things! The shells were huge and the mussels themselves were at least as big as my thumb! Ian made this incredible mussel chowder. It was really good. I mean, really really good.
We've had some really rainy days here, along with strong winds, our little caravan would be rockin' and you could here the rain pounding on the roof! Perched atop a hill with a view of the Firth of Thames, the sunsets have been incredible and when the sky is clear and the moon is out the valley is lit up with it's glow and the tree on the hill looks spooky. There's about a million stars out, bright and clear - Jon saw a shooting star the other night.
There's no ozone covering New Zealand so sunblock is a must.
We worked extra hours last week in order to get an entire day off which we spent in Thames collecting our bicycle trailer - thank you Marsha and Jim! We left at mid morning and it took about an hour to get there - 25 kilometers. Boy, we were missing our recumbents. My ass was so sore by the time we got to town - it should get better once I build up a "callus" back there! The bikes did perform well so we were pleased.
We put our bike trailor together on the sidewalk outside the post office and I ended up taking a piece to a bike store a couple blocks away since I forgot to bring a needed tool with us. It made sense to bring just the piece of the trailer that needed to be worked on rather then schlep the whole thing to the store. I got a couple of odd looks but the staff was very helpful.
The town of Thames is very quaint. They have a sidewalk market on the weekends but by the time we got the trailer together and had some lunch, they were closing up for the day and since it was the weekend in a small town, the stores were nearly all closed. There was a bike shop that was near the Pak and Save grocery store we needed to stop at before heading home so we spent a nice chunk of change there picking up rearview mirrors, water bottle and Jon had one of the mechanics fix something on his bike. While that was going on I went and bought a latte. It had been a while since I had had one and it was lovely. We did accomplish what we needed to - the trailer - so we were happy with that. We had a list of groceries that Ian and Louise asked us to pick up from town which would be a good test for our us and the trailer:
Bread
Milk
Bannanas and another fruit
Tin of tomatoes
Biscuits
Chocolate
Weet bix
It's funny because you don't realize how many different ways tomatoes can be tinned until you're buying them for someone else! Same goes for milk - they didn't appear to carry the same brand that fits perfectly in Ian and Louise's fridge door and did they get whole or trim? I think I recall seeing both, but was that on purpose? Do they care that much? Is one type of milk for tea and another for cereal? I started to feel the pressure and got a variety of both the tinned tomatoes and the milk, hoping that something would be better then nothing!
Jon and I made dinner one night as the obligatory wwoofing duty. We made quaesadillas with onion, leek, meat and cheese on homemade flour tortillas which were super easy to make. Because Ian and family are living in their garage until the house is build, kitchen facilities are limited, which wer're not used to, nor are we used to cooking for six, in addition to the fact that we haven't really cooked for months - dinner took forever but everyone seemed to enjoy them. Cheese makes everything taste good!
New Zealand is beautiful. The Coromandel Penninsula really reminds me of home. Riding along the beach there's a stretch of road that could have been taken from my home town and placed right here. The area is everything that people from the Pacific Northwest love about where they live with but with more exotic vegetation. I had to admit to Ian and Louise that their home is the longest we've stayed anywhere since leaving on our trip, that fact combined with the similiarities have made me homesick.
Jon had found a kindred spirit in Ian as a fellow golfer. They have discussed the pros and cons of putting in a Tee Box over looking their hidden valley, Ian has taken Jon to the course where he is a member and played a round, this week they just went to hit some balls after Ian returned home from substituting at Coromandel. When they left yesterday I was in the Caravan when Ian passed by and said goodbye to me. I thought he had to go somewhere before he and Jon left to go hit some balls but as he drove away I looked after him and there was Jon, all buckled into his seat looking straight ahead, too excited to even say goodbye to his wife before going to go hit some golfballs. Of course he left me no choice but to give him a hard time about it when they got home.
While they were gone I cozied up to the River Cottage Cookbook inside the warm and toasty caravan. It's a great cookbook with a lot of information I found helpful especially the part about veggies, herbs and fruit growing. I've also been reading Build Your Own Earth Oven. I am so going to build my own earth oven.
There are a great variety of birds here. I never really got into birds but you can't help but notice them. The first day that Jon and I were here we were walking to the paddock to do our first day of work when out of the bushes flew these two gorgeous parrots - at least that's what they looked like with the green, yellow and splash of bright red coloring. Sure enough that's what they are "blown in from Australia" according to Lou. I'd never seen anything like it that wasn't inside a cage in someone's home or at the pet store and there they were, flying around without a care in the world. The chirping, twittering, and calls of the birds are also interesting. I swear there is a bird out here that sounds just like an alarm clock I used to have - so annoying at daybreak when the birds start talking. Apparently there's a bird out there that sounds just like Lou and Ian's telephone. We haven't spotted any Kiwi's yet but Ian and Louise are part of the Kiwi Conservation group and there area a couple of traps set out to round up the little critters that they check regularly (nothing yet) but they've said that they can hear their calls at night so they're around.
We're surrounded by sheep, rams, and lambs and at various times of the day you'll hear the little lambs calling out for their mothers plaintively, it's pitiful but cute. I was watching some sheep in the hillside this afternoon - I really must not have had anything better to do - and I have to wonder about the mind of a sheep, why it goes from one patch of grass to another when they both look identical to me. Not being a coniseur of grass I may not be able to appreciate the subtleties that go into choosing which patch of grass to nibble on - I'm sure there's a method to their madness.
The sun is setting and I can hear a bull from a neighboring property verbally marking his territory - he's been going on and on for the last couple of days. Ian and Jon and Using the circular saw to build something in the courtyard, it sounds like Lou is in the kitchen making dinner. The air is clean and fresh. Maybe I notice the birds here because I have the time to, because there's nothing else to do except take in what is here and compared to where we came from - that isn't much and yet there is so much to see and do right on this 32 acre plot of land and then there are the things you can come back to every day - like this sunset- and the moon tonight which will be even more full and since it's clear outside it'll be even brighter, lighting up the valley below us into this incredible other environment. Without all the trappings of city and surburban life I've been able to find pleasure in much simpler things, the birds, the plants, the weather, a shady spot overlooking the valley, watching sheep graze, reading a book, a nice meal, a good cup of tea or coffee, nice conversation, walking hand in hand with my husband after skinny dipping in the river. People will say 'this is the life' and it's 'living the dream' but what it really is is just stripping your life down to only what you need, first finding out just what it is that qualifies as 'only what you need' and I'm learning that it can be different for everyone but I think it's about stripping away rather than adding to what you have. The simpler life has become while on this trip - the more enjoyable it's been.

10/20

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:57:00 GMT

October 20 - Friday

It was nice sleeping in our new tent. It'll take some getting used to but it's really reassuring to have the bikes in the porch so we know they're safe - especially since we don't have a window that we can just peek out of to see if they're ok. It was overcast but thankfull, not raining as we broke camp. Our neighbors walked back with cups of espresso, bright and cheery. I'm sure the espressoes were close to $7 US dollars. The thought of buying an espresso has left me feeling guilty for the money it would cost and bitter that I have such a tight budget now but thoughtful about just what it is and how I want the rest of my travelling experience to be like.
As we walked away, pushing our bikes up the massive hill out of the campgrounds, I shared this thought with Jon who listened but wasn't too sympathetic - maybe it's because he's not a coffee drinker.
I hate fact that I have to worry about buying an espresso. I was never extravagant with my money when we were back home and so far on this trip we haven't been totally denying ourselves of the little things.
My pack was really heavy.
We chatted with our caffinated neighbors as we packed up. They had a decent set up but now that I'm wiser to the ways of bicycle touring I could see some changes that could be made to their gear: like they full size road atlas they were looking at the night before, and the full size sleeping pad that I know fits end to end in that tent.
Also, they really need to learn how to secure their tent fly - it was not taut and had it rained overnight, their gear would have been drenched. Luckily for me, I am married to Jon who is totally on top of all the right gear and how best to set up our equipment - it makes a world of difference. He would not have stood for the fly flopping around like theirs was and now, neither will I even though I tease Jon about his anal-ness about "making sure it's taut" when we set up the tent. I know that our trip would have been a lot less enjoyable if Jon wasn't as vigilant about our gear and how we used it as he was/is - I'm really grateful for that. Looking at our neighbor's gear I also reminded myself that they were only touring for two months and since they were in NZ which has everything a tour-er could need - except bike trailers that fit folding bikes.
We walked all the way to Broadway which didn't take as long as I thought it would, caught a train into town which was super easy. When we got to the train station we headed toward the ticket agent who would sell us our bus tickets. On the way there were people handing out free samples of yogurt. I had fallen a little behind Jon and watched as he approached the gals giving away the food.
They gave him 8 containers of yogurt! We're talking full size, 99% fat free, 50% of your daily intake of calcium per container - size containers! This was great, we were also getting hungry. First things first - buy bus tickets to Thames.
We didn't know it was a long weekend so the 1:15 bus was full and the next wasn't until 1800. This totally sucked and I was wondering if we shouldn't wait one more day and take an early bus the next morning.
No. Jon had decided we would be on the evening bus and I didn't argue. To be honest I was so ready to leave Auckland and feel like we were actually making some progress on this trip! I waited outside with all our gear eating a yogurt watching people go by.
Boy, did we have a lot of time to kill. Next stop: post office to mail stuff home that we didn't need. We could also wire the rest of the money we owed to Speedmatrix in Singapore while we were at the Post Office which was super convenient.
It was around noon at this point.

10/23

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:57:00 GMT

October 23 - Monday

It was bright and sunny just a few moments ago but now it's dark, completely overcast and, I think, it's hailing. THe sheep have left the field below, for shelter, no doubt and our little caravan is swaying a bit from the wind that had picked up. We'll be testing the latest patch job done by Ian toady after we returned from the morning workshop and stop by a friend's place to show Jon and I a different cob build house.
We were up bright and early at 0700 - ish, the earliest we've had to get up in quite some time - it wasn't that bad. We were going to a morning workshop at nearby friends house who would be putting up a strawbale wall (demonstrated by Ian and Louise) while the owner, Eric, would demonstrate who to put up a cob wall. Since Ian and Louise were putting on one of the demonstrations we had to get to Eric's early which allowed Jon and I the chance to get a good look around and take pictures before anyone else arrived. We also got to meet their cat who is very sweet but likes to claw you when curled up on your lap, as Jordan explained. There were quite a few people who showed up and they all seemed very enthusiastic to learn. It was nice to be amongst people with similar interests as it's been difficult to find anyone to have a real conversation with about alternative building methods back home in the states. Eric's house is massive and way bigger than Jon and I would build for ourselves but his place was really inspiring with it's glass bottles windows, entryway with a cob bench and area for plants, suspended laundry line to airdry clothes, pantry with the pipe leading to the outside for cool air circulation, and cob oven in the shape of a dragon with bamboo roof, just to name a few stand out features.
As the workshop started to wind down, one of the participants pulled out his guitar and started to play, I didn't catch the name but I did hear that it was eastern European and had a beautiful mother of pearl inlay in a floral design. We left and stopped by Collin and Gwenyth's earth built home. It's on a much smaller scale and is finished. It's has an earthen floor, lots of wood, warm earthtone colors and tree trunks incorporated into the structure of the house. They have a galley kitchen with a woodburning fireplace and gas ranges. The kitchen counter/bar is one complete piece of wood and is beautiful. They appear to be building an earth made hot tub in the backyard and cob oven in the front. They have a large patio and the doors to the house open out to the patio making the house look larger. There are no hallways, which is a feature Jon likes and the bathroom, and bedroom door open up off a small indention to the main room. There is a window separting the bedroom from the livingroom allowing more light to pass through to the bedroom. Louise, Jon and I agreed that the house had great accoustics, was warm and inviting, it was a gathering place.
We all agreed that we wanted to just hang out for the rest of the day. Jon and I took a shower, did some laundry, caught up on computer work and correspondence and will probably call it an early night. It's Labor Day today - a three day weekend for the boys so it's back to school for them tomorrow and we may actually start on Ian and Louise's house tomorrow!

10/16

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:55:00 GMT

October 16 - Monday
Auckland, NZ

It was like we were back home in Seattle. The weather was completely overcast there was no hope of the sun breaking through these thick gray clouds. I was up and paid for "one more night" at the guest house - surely we would be getting our packs today. The airline had emailed Jon their contigency plan if the packs were not recovered - we didn't want to consider this as I explained to the guesthouse owner while my card was run. We had spent all evening walking from one cash machine to the next trying to get some NZ dollars with each and every machine denying us access to our account. This was annoying, frustrating and just a little upsetting. Thankfully, it ran okay through the machine - I think the guesthouse owner was giving me the eye when I handed him my card. Then he told me that the bags should be delivered before 1100 and that the airline had called him early in the morning! Great! Our bags were found, they were being delivered as we spoke. I hurried back downstairs to tell Jon the good news.
What a relief. Now all we had to do was get the bike trailer situation figured out.
The packs arrived shortly after I found out about their delivery. We did a quick inventory and everything was there including my much needed fleece jacket which I put on immediately.
We spent most of the day working on the bikes and journals. We've been quite entertained by the construction workers next door who are building a contemporary house with a view of the houses on the otherside of the very small valley we're perched on. They've been listening to American pop/top 40 and rock. They're all these huge Maori and Samoan guys and to hear them singing along to these bubblegum songs is pretty amusing (they're awful). We can hear them talking and laughing at different times of the day - it's nice and pretty darned comical at times.
By the afternoon we were ready to get out of the house. We had also been using the free internet and the place seems to empty out by 1000 so we took advantage of it.
It was still pouring outside but we needed lunch so we walked up to Parnell and went to get a kebab. They didn't take cards so we crossed our fingers, held our breath and tried the cash machine next door in a vain hope that for some reason the card would work today while it didn't last night.
It worked!!!
Don't know why, don't know how, didn't really care at the time because we were really hungry.
We had our lunch, sat and looked out at the rain for a while and then decided to walk around the neighborhood and look at the shops. It was very quaint. Lots of boutiques. We stopped at a little asian grocery store for some fruit. They had the freeze dried fruit I had while in Thailand and I was tempted to buy some - that was good stuff with jackfruit, pineapple bits, tamarind, sweet potato (ok, that's a vegetable but you get the idea) and other tastey things that I ate but didn't recognize. We stopped at a coffee shop which had organic coffee and other gluten free, sugar free types of foods. They had a selection of baked goods and then some bulk items packaged to take home along the wall. I was looking at the bulk items and realized that it was all the same item: carrot oat cookies. The barista asked if we wanted anything other than the cappucino I had ordered.
"I think I probably should try a Carrot Oat cookie" - S
"They're our most popular item. I can get one for you right out of the over."
I actually would have preferred a cookie that had had time to cool as, it seems to me, they're much more flavorful than a cookie right out of the oven but, oh well.
The cookie was good, hearty, not sweet but there was just something about it that made you want to eat more. Not necessarily worthy of being the only bulk item for sale but good. The coffee was also good. We sat the bar lining the front window and watched the rain come down, the traffic go by and the kids waiting to catch the bus at the stop outside the shop. We could have been anywhere, it was the typical suburban picture but here we are, in New Zealand. It's a little unreal, which I think I've said more than once during the course of this trip and it's always been true!
We walked back in the rain and spent the rest of the evening researching and planning, killing time until a trailer was delivered or we came up with some other alternative plan for traveling with all of our gear.

10/17

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:55:00 GMT

October 17 - Tuesday
Auckland, NZ

A beautiful sunny, albeit windy day. We were going to take our bikes for their first real ride today. Jon and I were both itching to go riding and had missed pedalling while we were in Asia. Tortured with the bikes sitting in front of us in our room waiting to be ridden I couldn't ride since it's against the law to ride without a helmet and ours was with our lost luggage and the last thing we needed was a fine.
We had some errands to do first and decided to 'split up' to get things done. Jon rode up to one of the bike stores to get a pump, some tail lights and a little bag for under the saddle while I called Mary and Jenn, and reposted our Wwoofing write up to let hosts know we had made it to town. I had to leave Mary a voice mail but was able to get through to Jenn, we had a wonderful, conversation - it was good to hear her voice as she had been pretty sick and I had been quite worried and it turned out - rightly so - but she's on the mend which is great! We both agreed it was good to hear each other's voice.
Jon came home, we tried to contact some wwoofing hosts before leaving on our bike ride.
I had gotten a bike map of south Auckland at the I-site while at the airport so we had a route all ready to ride on that would take us along the coast of the many bays of Auckland.

10/15

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:54:00 GMT

October 15 - Sunday
Auckland

Still no word about our bags so we paid for another night. The "breakfast" that came with our accomodation fee consisted of bread, butter, and vegemite. I tried vegemite while at Rory's house in England - he totally loves the stuff and I had tried just a taste once before while working night shift as a nurse (one does all sorts of strange things while working night shift!) and I just don't think this is a product that I can enjoy. There is all you can drink instant coffee, tea and sugar which I am trying to make the most of but now we know it's not worth getting up during the designated breakfast times.
Jon had found the infamous Adventure cycles and it was really close by so we walked and it turned out to be someone's home. Bruce is currently working out of his garage and we had a long discussion of trailer options and accessories for the bikes - and we pumped up the tires of the bike we had walked up to his store. We still couldn't ride the bike since we didn't have our helmets. Sigh.
We made arrangements to stay in contact with Bruce as he would call his supplier to find out our options on Monday. Back at the guesthouse we emailed and continued to plan so we would be ready whenever our bags were returned - if they were returned.
Later in the afternoon we got word that our bag was spotted in Sydney with no luggage tag - it had been ripped off and since we had not attached a ticket with an address of where we could be located they just kept the bag. Lesson learned although we had no idea where we would be staying while in NZ and we certainly didn't want the bags to be sent back to our address in the States but I guess we could have left a contact number at least - now we know. Jon had to list off the contents of the bag to verify that they were indeed ours before they would put it on a plane for NZ.
Things were looking up and the weather outside was improving from occasional showers and blustery winds to just blustery winds so we decided to go out and get some groceries at Foodtown using our new discount cards. I need facial cleanser and moisturizer and I forgot to get shower soap because I was too absorbed the day before with what type of hair shampoo and conditioner to buy. I specifically mention these items as my complexion has really been effected by the climate changes we've gone through on this trip. While we were in Italy and France biking I could use the facial cleanser with the microbeats that exfoliated everyday because by the end of the day my face was so dirty and sweaty it needed it. We both used facial moisturizer with SPF 30 in it so that was taken care of. While in the UK I used a foaming cleanser not long before we left when the temperature dropped and/or when we were in Scotland and Wales with the occasional moisturizer. In Thailand with all the humidity I just used a regular cleanser with microbeats as it was so humid and my face got so sweaty and initially our skin loved the humidity but toward the end of our stay my skin rebelled, probably because my cleanser was too abrasive and so I've had more breakouts on my skin in the past few weeks than I have had in the last five years. In Korea it was warm and humid but on a lesser scale then Thailand so my skin continued freaking out. The air pollution didn't help and my sensitive skin really started to react. Now we're in NZ and it's Spring weather. We're wearing long sleeves, hats, pants, fleece and turn the heater on at night.
"So what kind of skin do you have?" - J
"I have oily skin and dry skin, it's combination skin but it's also sensitive so, espcially in the winter, it can get really dry and flakey and then when you kiss me or rub your face on me when you're all stubbley it get's even more dry and irritated. It's tricky." - S
Jon seemed to find my complexion challenges amusing and laughed heartily which made me laugh too as I realized I would not be getting any sympathy from him. So I stood in front of the wall of facial cleansers and moisturizers trying to figure out what to get. I wanted a cleanser that wasn't too drying - that would moisturize, but not too much as it would than make the oily parts even more oily but then it would likely not make the dry spots less dry and I certainly couldn't expect complete moisturizing from a cleanser which is why I also needed a moisturizer that was light so as not to make the oily parts clogged or oiler but moisturizing enough to take care of the dry parts. A moisturizing cleanser is a complete contradiction - this I know. What happens is that one ends up buying a cleanser that strips away layers of skin cells and then seals what moisture is left in there with the moisturizer. Then, if you're like me, and sweat and the slightest increase in heart rate, it makes your face all slimey making you wipe your face, if you're able to or it dries making the whole situation even more dry from the salt in the sweat.
While I've gone on and on about this topic I actually could go, well, on and on some more - but I'll stop there.
There is a big Hindu (I think)holiday coming up this month and it may have been this weekend so there was a festival set up near the port with all sorts of Indian food booths and native crafts. There was lots of tradition Indian clothing which is so beautiful and colorful and we watched some dancers performing on a stage. We were certainly the minorities but it didn't matter. After a while we walked around downtown Aukland. We wanted to get some more cash but our debit cards were not working in any of the cash machines - this sucked as we couldn't call our bank until late, late Monday or Tuesday as they are not open on weekends. It was getting late, and cold so we headed back to the lodge a good 30 minute walk away. We had a little snack before hitting the sack. Hopefully, we will be getting our bag tomorrow and have more firm plans on a trailer.

10/14

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:53:00 GMT

October 14 - Saturday
Auckland, New Zealand

We slept in until noon.
I have a vague recollection of vacuuming in the hall outside our door and someone using an electric saw at the construction site next door.
"Whoa, it's really late." - J
I've never known either one of us to sleep in so long. We needed it though. After showers we were outta there and on our way to find camping gear and bike gear.
We had a lead on a bike store from the information site gal at the airport and got directions from the lodge owner and there was a outdoor store on the way there. We stopped at the outdoor store, got some supplies and asked about any other bike or outdoor stores in the area - they were pretty helpful. The first bike store we went to: Bike Barn was not at all helpful when we asked about bike trailers so we decided not to spend a dime in their store getting the rest of our supplies. The guy all but guffawed when I asked about bike trailers - the loser.
We also wanted to activate the cellphone and stopped by the Vodaphone store nearby. Turns out they're the only carriers in the NZ but for some reason couldn't 'unlock' Jon's phone to put a new sim card in to make it useable in NZ. The guy did recommend a phone store in the city center that might be able to 'break into it' and told us where to go. We thanked him for his help and were on our way. We found a couple more outdoor stores and got some necessities. There was a bike store somewhere nearby and I followed Jon down one street, between some buildings, into an alley and Voila! There it was! They had one bike trailer but it was already sold. We explained our situation and he said he would call his supplier on Monday and could have a trailer in town by mid to late this coming week. Sounded good to us so we continued on with a brief stop for coffee. We headed for the city center about the cellphones. It was a bit of a walk but we agreed that we needed the exercise and since it wasn't raining it was quite pleasant outside.
We just happened upon another bike shop: Penny Farthing and the guy behind the counter didn't carry trailers but recommended an outdoor store that was "down the hill, over the motorway, up a hill, turn right and directly across from the gas station". Hmmmm, okay.
We actually found the place. Having the name of the store painted in bright yellow lettering the size of the side of the building helped. They were just closing for the day and we explained that we were only looking for a bike trailer. The staff was really nice at R&R sports which is like a Big 5 store back home - but better. And while they did carry the occasional bike trailer they didn't have any in stock but might be able to help us if we came back during store hours the next day. We thanked hime and continued on our way, through the seedier side of town looking for Queen street. We stopped at a book store and bought a book on camping bike touring in the North Island before continueing into the city. Turns out that the phone store we had been referred to was run by Koreans. Jon handed over his phone and they said they would know within an hour if they could unlock his phone so we left the phone and looked around, got another kebab (falafal for us both this time) before returning to Cool Phone near the IMAX theater and not too far from where my friend Robyn and I stayed when we were in Auckland in 2003.
They were able to get the phone unlocked so we paid for the service and I thanked the guy in Korean which he seemed to get a kick out of. We had one more bike store to find and only a street name to go by - no street number. Since it was the road we would have taken back to the lodge anyway we took the long way covering as much of the road as possible with no luck. We did find the grocery store we were too tired to go to the night before and stopped there. They had some sales going on but we weren't a "club card member" so couldn't partake. Jon suggested we apply for this discount card since we would be in the country for a while so as we were checking out I asked if we could apply for the card and the cashier said we could but they were currently out of cards. She did say that there were stores all over the North and South Island. We stopped by the costomer service desk and inquired about the discount card. The manager asked if we were tourists "just visiting" and gave us a tourists discount cards! We were pretty pleased with ourselves as we walked out of the store with our groceries! The rest of the night was spent contacting wwoof hosts, and general internet stuff before hitting the sack. No word about our luggage so we decided to stay a third night at the lodge and not sleep in so late tomorrow.

10/13

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:52:00 GMT

October 13 - Friday
Auckland, New Zealand

Oh my god. I have never been so glad to be somewhere. Finally, we are at our destination. Five countries, five time zones, two different airlines and several foil-wrapped meals later, we're here.
But not all of our luggage made it.
I guess it was one country, one plane trip too many over the course of four days. We watched bag after bag move by along the conveyer belt. There were a variety of backpacks that rode by and a variety of owners who picked them up!
After watching the empty baggage carousel go by for a few minutes to assure ourselves that we hadn't missed anything we went to make a claim.
We weren't sure where we were going to stay and the guy told Jon it could be a matter of hours or a matter of days before there was a recovery - if there was a recovery. We'll admit that during the course of this trip we've had really good luck when it comes to our luggage, other then the incident in the Loire Valley.
Since we had time to kill we went upstairs to the information center and found out about local accomodation. We got a quote for $65 dollars at a backpackers lodge which seemed pretty high for what they were (or weren't) offering. We got a bed with linens, towels, shared kitchen, showers, bathroom, free internet and breakfast. There was an internet pay station nearby so we did a little searching of our own and found the rates to be about the same in the area so we went with the place recommended by the info site staff member. We had both been pushing luggage carts around. One with the bikes on it and one with all our carry on luggage. Jon wanted to put the bikes together and get rid of the boxes and packaging so we went outside where there was a bicycle assembly area. Looks like biking in NZ is every bit as popular as we had heard given that the airport already had a designated area set up. I had seen another bike box near ours at the luggage pick up area. It was overcast and blustery outside. People were still wearing fleece while others were in shorts, flipflops and t-shirts. It's definitely that time of year that isn't quite summer but the weather was for sunny than dreary making the wardrobe decision-making tricky at best.
Once the bikes were set up it was back inside to warm up - we weren't used to this kind of weather - hadn't experienced it since Europe and everything since then has been hot and humid. Jon checked for our lost bag one more time with no results so we decided to grab a shuttle and head to our home for the night.
It was about a 45 minute drive to our place and I could barely keep my eyes open. Actually, I didn't keep my eyes open and at some point realized there was no point in trying. It was all I could do to keep my mouth from hanging open and my head from bobbing against the back of the seat. No one was home when we got to our guest house but we picked up the phone posted outside the office with a direct dial to the owner who said they would be there in about 15-20 minutes and in the mean time to wait in the "TV room". All the doors were locked.
We waited outside until a very boisterous Irish man pulled in and unloaded his own groceries, welcomed us and let us inside. Now I could have sworn that the many I talked to on the phone had an Indian accent and while I was really tired I don't think I was so tired I would mistake an Irish accent for an Indian accent but there he was, as Irish as could be, so we followed him inside and sat in the TV room.
Turns out the Irishman was also a guest who just seemed very familiar with the place and shortly after we sat down the real owner, who is Indian, popped his head in and got us settled. Super nice guy, could definitely spend a little more on the décor of his place given the prices he's charging but what can you do? We asked about a local grocery store, decided it was too far given the fact that we were walking dead and decided to walk out to the main road and "stop at the first place we see" - J. Sounded like a good plan to me so out we went.
The lodge is situated in the Parnell district which reminds us of Queen Anne Hill but with a lot more room for parking and walking than the overcrowded trendy Seattle neightborhood. We found the indian restaurant whose menu we saw posted at the guesthouse and ordered dinner. Vegetarian kebab for me and falafal kebab for Jon. It felt like it took forever to prepare but I'm sure it was just my jetlag through off all perception of time and space. The kebab is eaten much like a Taco Del Mar burrito and just as messy. Apparently there must by a short supply of napkins in New Zealand because we were given the alotted one napkin and that was it. There was no dispenser offering more and the staff seemed to disappear into the kitchen after serving us. We muttled through and enjoyed the food. It was fresh and that was something we hadn't had in several days or airplane food!
Jon had spotted the local ice creamery so we stopped by on the way home. Jon had his chocolate and tiramisu with chocolate sauce - he obviously needed a fix and I got a scoop of the chocolate.
We sat and talked about our game plan for the next day and generally zoned out on our ice cream before heading home.
We were in bed before ten o'clock, maybe even before that, it's kind of a blur...

10/12

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:47:00 GMT

October 12 - Thursday
Singapore
Auckland, New Zealand

We slept in a bit. Check out time wasn't until noon and we were in that room until the last minute still trying to shave off a little more weight from our luggage. The bike boxes said they were about 17kgs that didn't leave us much at all in the way of our third bag to check.
"Aren't you allowed one carry-on bag and a purse?" - J
"Yeah." - S
The tops of our backpacks could convert to a fanny pack if you took the waist belt off and switched the straps around - so that's what we did. They were big which was good and we were so overpacking those carry on bags and now the fannypacks as well - everything was just bulging at the seams.
I strapped the worlds largest fanny pack on:
"Look, if I turn the pack around you'll see what I look like if I was nine months pregnant." - S
My shirt wouldn't even stretch over the pack.
"Can we look anymore like a tourist? This is awful." - S
Jon had swung his fannypack jauntily over his shoulder but mine was just too heavy leaving no choice but to strap it around my waist.
We had a couple hours to kill before we were picked up for the airport so we walked around the food stalls again going directly to the pancake, sugar, peanut, corn lady and getting two to carry around. Then we went to another counter and had some mushroom steamed dumplings with "ketchup"/brown sauce stuff and sweet chili sauce which were really tastey. We walked around the outdoor market across the street. There were many boothes selling saris. They were so colorful, ornate and just plain beautiful. I wanted to look at them longer and would have if the booth owners weren't going for the hard sell. Up and down the aisles. It was mid day and the heat was on - and the humidity. With about an hour before pick up we headed back to our hotel and the air conditioned lobby and read the paper, chatted and planned before our cab driver arrived.
Boy did we get an earful about living in Singapore, how expensive it is, the fines and jail times for breaking the law. The driver pointed out that the removeable plant pots dividing the highway can be taken away in case of emergency and the freeway can be used as an alternate landing strip. We also learned about the housing market and some of the differences between Malaysians and Chinese, what women look for in a potential husband, the cost of schooling for kids and on and on...
Singapore has a nice airport. We went right up to the check in counter and held our breath. First went the bike boxes which turned out to weigh ovedr 18kgs each leaving us less than 2kgs for our backpacks, hiking poles, sleeping bags and bike helmets. This was starting to look expensive as each pound over was suppose to cost an additional $25 but we had heard that if you checked in early the overage was more likely to be over looked as opposed to closer to departure when they're keeping a closer eye on total weight for the flight.
Our total came to just over 49kgs which is nine kgs over the limit but we were lucky in that we weren't charged extra. Yeah!
With a huge sigh of relief we wheeled away our bulging carry on bags. We had several hours to kill and made the usual rounds of duty free stores and gift shops, scoped out the restaurants as we would be needing dinner some time before the flight. We stopped for coffee and soy ice cream for Jon, did some people watching and stared at the security guards who, I must say have the lame-est hats we'd would know - we've seen more than our share of armed guards at major airport and train terminals! They're the same type of hat as the Canadian Mounties only they're set at this really 'jaunty' angle which makes it very difficult to take these guys seriously despite their large semi-automatic weapon held across their chest, handgun holstered at their hip and large 10-12 inch blade dagger strapped to their belt.
They had a gym in the airport which Jon checked out. Ten bucks to use with shower - we figured it was worth it and we had the time. It was closed. We decided to to a little brisk walking to help pass the time. As we walked we passed a free electronic foot massager, stopped and turned around, parked our cart, took off our shoes and fired up the machine. It was not on a timer so we could have sat there forever.
"This is cool. It kinda hurts but it also feels good." - S
"They have them for sale in the duty free store near immigration." - J
"Oh yeah? How much?" - S
"I don't know, let's go check it out." - J
We did because we had time. $644 - I would seriously consider buying this. Our feet felt really good afterwards.
Finally, it was time to board the plane to go to Sydney which would take around seven hours. We were flying Qantas and immediately was not impressed. The seats were obivously (even) closer together than other economy flights we've been on the pillows looked used which of course they are but it was like they hadn't even tried to refresh them from the last long haul flight, merely putting them in the designated preflight position in the chair. It was going to be a long flight.
No really, it was. I sat in the middle of three seats. Jon on my right and a woman our age at the window. We got buckled in and ready for take off.
The movies were nearly the same as the last few flights we'd taken in recent days and weeks. I didn't have the attention span to do much reading or writing, the bathroom smelled like pee and they ran out of the menu selection for the first meal. Air travel was really starting to get old. A little travel weary I ate my pasta which was perfectly fine and simply used another bathroom that didn't smell.
Are we there yet?
Well, kind of.
We had about a two hour layover in Sydney. Just long enough to completely wake you up but not long enough to get comfortable again or nap. It was around 0600, Aussi time, the sun was shining brightly, it was going to be a nice day.
Our plane was late in arriving and had a delayed departure because of toilet issues.
I hadn't eaten the last meal on the long haul flight. It was a lemon shortbread cookie, orange juice (I drank that) and a greasy pastry donut thing plopped onto my tray and handed over to me by the flight attendant. Jon ate a few bites. Needless to say we were really hungry by the time we got on the last leg of our journey and felt like total crap because there hadn't been a good night's sleep in our lives for several days.
Finally, finally we got to Auckland, New Zealand. I've been waiting to come back to this country since I left from my last visit three years ago! Even better was the fact that I wouldn't have to get on another plane for months! It was all I could do not to start pushing people up the aisle and out the door!

10/11

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:46:00 GMT

October 11 - Wednesday
Hong Kong International Airport
Bangkok's new International Airport
Singapore

Our flight out of Hong Kong left around 0900. We were up and heading for our gate around 0700. I hurt everywhere and from the looks of Jon's face - he didn't sleep so good either. On the hand, I'd never slept in an airport before - now I can say I have.
Now I can say that I will, if at all possible, avoid the experience in the future. Jon keeps bringing up the idea of flying home from NZ either first or business class and let me tell you right now it would be worth every penny. It's like a 12-14 flight home. If ever there was a flight to upgrade on - it would be that one. This thought was confirmed while we were killing time in Bangkok's new airport waiting to clean, have new passengers board and then leave for Singapore. They didn't want us to leave as the layover was only for about an hour. Jon went and looked at business and first class.
"Go check it out." - J
I really didn't want to as I think it would make me depressed as I sat back with the rest of the sardines in economy class but we had time so I went up and looked.
We passed by business class as we boarded and those seats looked really roomy with an armrest you wouldn't have to elbow wrestle your husband for but first class was pretty amazing. I still don't think I would pay to fly first but Jon is going to see how many frequent flyer miles he has left to see if it's enough for an upgrade. I'm praying.
The flight from Bangkok to Singapore was just a few hours and we arrived in Singapore in the early/mid afternoon. We had found a place to stay and reserved a room so that was all squared away.
"I could so go for a piece of gum right now." - S
"No." - J
"Fine." - S
We wanted to hightail it to the hotel so Jon could contact the bike guy for delivery. We were feeling pretty rough around the edges and I didn't argue about the cost.
Holy freak it was like we never left Thailand! Hot and humid - how did we live in this for three weeks? Singapore has beautiful trees, the vegetation is lush and tropical - very very pretty and every bit as clean as they're reputed to be. It was hazy from the fires from India so we didn't get the real picture of all that it could be as we headed toward the Malay village which was near our hotel. Our driver explained that there was some holiday coming up which was why the streets were decorated and they would be lit up at night - sounded interesting. As I looked out the window I could see that we were entering a muslim community, all the women had the tradition garb on that is so beautiful. Our hotel was located right at a busy intersection and we could look out our hotel window on the 4th floor and have a good look around.
Air conditioning is good. We had to go outside and cross a breezeway to another building where our room was.
"Even the tiles are sweating." - J
How can people live in this kind of weather? Why would people live in this kind of weather? No really, I want to know why?
The good news is that we were right next door to a bunch of food stalls (hawkers) and across the street from an outdoor market. The bad news was that we felt like total crap.
That shower felt so good. The shower head was only as high as the nape of my neck and I kept hitting the back of my head on it but I didn't care.
We had a couple hours to kill before meeting with the bike guy so we went looking for food.
The food stalls were amazing. I could have stood there and people watched for hours. I didn't know what (over) half of that stuff was. Some popluar items were the fruit juices, beef, chicken, lamb, fish burgers with mayo and some kind of brown sauce on a bun sometimes wrapped in a fried egg. There was some other ground meat and veggie wrapped in a crepe envelope. There were big circular flat cooking surfaces piles with cooked meats, the edges lined with hoagie or hamburger buns ready to be filled with the seasoned meat and topped with mayo and brown sauce. Full fat mayo is very popular in Asia. There were these cast iron molds that I passed by while someone was making what looked like a crepe and sprinkled sugar and nuts. There were several of these stalls and after a while I decided that is what I wanted. Turns out that it about as think as a pancake, similar texture and sprinkled with granulated sugar, some kind of ground nuts (I'm almost positive it's peanuts) and a small amount of sweet corn or maybe creamed corn. Once all that stuff is in the whole thing is folded in half awaiting purchase. Once you indicate that you want one and one is definitely a meal the thing is cut into fourths and wrapped in brown paper so when you stop later to eat it the pancake part has taken on a chewier consistency since it has kind of steamed itself in the brown paper. In any event - it's really tastey.
Back in our room we reinventoried our items and threw away more of our stuff in anticipation of the luggage weigh-in at the airport tomorrow. I think I have an idea of how wrestlers feel.
I think we were able to drop a couple kilos.
We had a few minutes be decided to go to the lobby to meet the bike dealer. Turns out that he was exiting the elevator as we were getting ready to enter it!
With the help of the luggage trolly and a hotel staff member we all headed toward our room. Knowing that there was no way we would all fit into our room with two big bike boxes we kept everything out in the hallway as Allen from Speetmatrix went over our order with us, took out one of the bikes. Everything seemed in order and we were also able to pick up a few accessories that he thought we might need too. All the while the hotel staff member silently looked on - he probably doesn't get too many transactions like this in his hotel hallways! It was a cash exchange so the whole thing may have looked a little shadey for someone just walking past but we were pretty pleased and were excited to ride our new bikes. Allen was really helpful, totally professional and had an obvious love for cycling.
Once we parted ways with Allen and got our boxes we were able to breathe a sigh of relief. One hurdle passed, now we just had to make it through check in without have to pay any overage fees. This definitely didn't effect our sleep. With the black out curtains closed we went right to sleep. Our flight didn't leave until close to 2000 the next day. Why do we keep getting these awful flight times? OK, the first was the return flight bought with Jon's frequent flyer miles so we were kind of at the mercy of black out dates but we got crappy times going to NZ because we bought our tickets so close to our departure date. The price you pay (literally) for having a 'flexible' schedule!

10/10

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:45:00 GMT

October 10 - Tuesday
Seoul, South Korea
Hong Kong International Airport

We spent the morning doing last minute research on the internet, downsizing as much as possible to fit as much as possible in the carry on bags and as little as possible in the backpacks we would check in trying to prepare for picking up two bikes in Singapore and avoiding paying more for excess baggage. It was going to be tight.
One more shower before check out - it was going to be awhile before our next shower and we spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with my parents and relaxing in their room. My parents were generous enough to pay for our stay which we can't thank them enough for - that was really nice. It was so nice to see my immediate family and my extended family, my mom's friends and to visit Korea again but it was time to move on. It's a good time to go because I'm leaving while still wanting more.
Jon's thoughts about Korea:
"Well, I liked the people - they were all very nice, they were very warm, liked the atmosphere, it was fairly clean and organized, great subway system. I liked the food - I'm finally getting used to the spiciness of the kimchee."
We took a taxi after checking out at the base gates one last time on the way to the bus station. 13000 won to ride to the airport in a fancy bus that ran every 5 minutes. Before we knew our bags were being loaded and we were saying our goodbyes.
I think we both snoozed off on the way to the airport. Once there the driver unloaded our bags and completely ripped off the handle of our Mickey and Minnie Mouse bag - we just had to make it last until we got to NZ. We had packed the duct tape so that it would be handy but we didn't think we would be needing quite so soon. We checked out backpacks in and hoped that no one questioned our carry on bags as I strained under the weight of trying to carry my bag until we found a cart. Incheon is a nice airport, they provide slippers for you to walk the ten paces through the security screener that are really comfortable and squishy - Jon wants a pair. The slippers go into a nearby sterilizing cabinet after they've been used but I was still glad to be wearing the "protective" barrier of my cotton sock. We did our usual round of all the duty free and boutique stores, gift shops and eateries trying to pass the time until our flight left just before 2000 heading to Hong Kong.
The flight was under four hours and we flew on Cathay Pacific. The flight was uneventful - so was the food and the movies were the same as they were two weeks ago.
We got to Hong Kong not long after 2200 and we were hungry. We still needed $200 US dollars to pay for the bikes so we went to the money exchange counter since we had, once again, had issues with our debit card. I had called the service center right after we disembarked from the plane but the operator said there was nothing wrong with the card. Sure enough we had no problem at the exchange counter - whatever. We had some soup and started looking for the lounge/sleeping area in the airport which was gates and gates away from the food court. On the way there we stopped by the free internet counter. At that time of the night there was no line which was great. I as getting really tired and we still had about a walk ahead of us with our million pound carry on bags.
By the time we got to the lounge area there was only one lounging chair left which Jon insisted I take while he curled up on the floor next to me. Each of had a carry on bag to be in charge of as we tried to get some shuteye while listening to muzak.
I slept off and on. At one point asking Jon if he wanted to trade - I was more than ready to. Yep, the floor was looking a lot more comfortable than that lounge chair - surely Scholiosis had set in by now. Jon laid down in the chair and almost immediately changed his mind.
Darn.
Back to the uncomfortable chair. I tried something different and curled up into the fetal position with my head pointed toward the foot of the chair. There, this was ever-so-slightly more comfortable. I actually did sleep for a while in this position.

10/8

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:44:00 GMT

October 8 - Sunday
Seoul

We had the best brunch in the mezzanine level of the hotel this morning.
I had waffles with actual, honest to goodness imitation maple syrup. It was really good.
The entire spread was pretty impressive with salads, omlette bar, sushi bar, hot tables, a dessert bar, a pasta bar and various meats with someone cutting them for you, a bread counter with toaster. It was excellent. We lingered so as not to leave totally bloated and feeling bad. Dad shared some stories on his time in the military just before he retired from the army and the subsequent jobs he had as a civilian.
What a life.
After brunch we headed back up stairs and Jon was able to call his parents and sister before we left for Itaewan shopping district which is just up the hill from gate ten of the base. I wanted to go back with mom to this one pottery shop where she/we are somehow related to the owners. I had gone there with Jon by ourselves earlier int he week but the owner wasn't working so I didn't think I could get the Korean hookup (AKA a discount) with some southeast asian guy working behind the counter. This shop is packed, standing room only and even though it's in one of the most touristy spots for shopping and the rest of the area kind of turns me off this place has the best selection of pottery I seen in Seoul. I would gladly take one of everything in this shop.
We were lucky because the owner was there and he's actually the one who creates every piece they sell. He's very talented and has a website worth checking out:
www.koryoceramics.co.kr
Mom and dad arrived after a while and she chatted it up with the guy as we looked around. Dad and Jon were standing outside - there wasn't enough room for all of us in there. Jon spotted some pieces he liked and the owner stated that the vases were his latest creation. They really caught Jon's eye - he has good taste especially when it comes to any kind of art so when he expressed admiration for the work on these new vases we agreed they were worth purchases. 200000 won for three vases - such a deal. You'll all have to come over some time to see them - they're very dramatic and Jon said they would fetch from four to five hundred dollars back home which would mean we never would have purchased them otherwise. Mom and I found a few more things and before long all four of us had something to take back to the base before heading to the subway station to go to Anyang for the last get together with the family before Jon and I left.
Back to the subway station in Namyeong and before long we were disembarking at Anyang and walking the short distance to my uncles. I always end up having to walk way faster than I want to throught that neighborhood. There are so many things to look at and see and watch! In the early evening the young people were coming out to enjoy the evening. The food carts were out and were surrounded by people eating dinner. Barbeque chicken on a stick, giant corn dogs, dried squid, dried fish, tempura of all sorts, hot dogs on a stick, deep fried this and that on a stick, fruit on a stick, pizza on a stick, soft ice cream cones sold by the centimeter. Everything was mobile or presented in such a way that it could be eaten while standing up at the booth along the side walk. The koreans have taken the kebab concept to a whole new, and practical level - I love it.
Like the other times we walked down the back streets of this neighborhood, we stuck out like a sore thumb.
"Hi. Hello."
The kids playing in the streets would always say hello to us as we walked down the alleyway. There aren't too many foreigners in Anyang, certainly not in the neighborhoods away from the shopping buildings.
We went to my uncles where my cousin and her husband and family were already there and sat around and chatted for a while. My baby nephew. Songjun, knawed on a Nutter Butter, rubbed it all over his face, his shirt,the floor - I think he liked it. My other little cousin Jiunsure surprised me when she read the alphabet from one of the books Mary gave her -if was great and so cute the way she would pronounce the letters in her small person voice and korean accent. If always been used to listening to adults talking in Korean it's been interesting on this trip to actually notice the little kids talkingin korean - it's pretty darned cute. Before long we headed out to eat. I held Songjun as we paraded down the road. He's a big boy and I don't have "mother arms" as my mom calls them which would allow me to carry this little/big boy around like he was light as a feather like his mom does. Because I don't have "mother arms" Hyongmo, my cousin's husband, stopped me before long and took his little/big boy and U-jin rubbed my bicep. I was pretty pitiful. I guess I'll stick to carrying luggage, it can also be unweildy but at least I don't have to worry about changing diapers!
We ate at a korean buffet not far from the train station. It was really good, something for everyone. The kimchee was good, the coup was good. They had deep fried squid which is a family favorite. They even had forks (my parents usually carry around a fork - for dad - with them when travelling in Korea)! Samchun, Hyongmo, Jon and I shared a couple shots of Soju which is customary when dining out.
After dinner we walked out to the crosswalk where we would part ways. I don't know when we'll be returning to Korea and I'll so miss seeing my little neice and nephew growing up and enjoy the company of my cousins and uncle. My mom and I were talking the other day about how lucky we were to have such a wonderful family in Korea - just really good, down to earth, well meaning people. We're so fortunate to be a part of their lives. I'll miss them a lot.

10/1

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:43:00 GMT

October 1 - Sunday
Seoul

I braced myself against the idea of another long day. My uncle wanted to take us to some island that he though we would enjoy that was north of Seoul so we trooped out again and met him, my cousin and her two kids at the Anyang station. We travelled south in order to travel north but it was a system that seemed to be working. What made today different was that an old school friend on my uncle's was coming along and acting as navigator/pace car for the trip. Apparently my uncle's friend has family up north too and so he and his wife were joining us for the afternoon before going to visit her family who had a farm somewhere near the coast.
This was reassuring since we were following someone very familiar with the area. Because of the holiday weekend traffic was backed up and we found ourselves nearly parked on this two lane road going no where fast. Turns out there was road construction and once we finally passed it it was smoothe sailing. First stop was another lookout to North Korea. In order to get to the parking area at the lookout we had to check in at the Korean Marine entry gate. By this time we were all ready for a pit stop so we got out of the van to have a stretch. Parked on the side of the road along a shrubby hillside we just kind of stood around. My little neice decided to venture out into the shrubs and soon found herself doing a face plant and rolling a little down hill.
"Jon! Get her!" - S
Jon happened to be standing nearest Ji-un and took one big step into the shrubbery and picked her up and placed her upright with the rest of us before she realized what had happened. My cousin thanked Jon - that was a little scary, she could have kept rolling and rolling.
Onward to the lookout. We parked the van and after a trip to the toilets we started the short steep downhill walk before the longer super steep uphill climb. I was a little worried about my dad making it up there but he did it without any problems other than the shortness of breath which we were all suffering from! Spotting the venting machine, Ji-un, of course, needed hydrating that could only come from a coin - operated machine, just like her Eemo Sue and was soon happing with can in hand.
It was a little clearer today than yesterday and we were a little closer to North Korea than yesterday. There was a village across the river and Jon put his 500 won coin in the binocular machine and had a look. We had heard that the North Koreans had a fake village but this one appeared to be real with people of all ages, shapes and sizes present. There was also the lookouts which Jon said were manned but I didn't get a chance to see. My Uncle was walking by and he had a look too. His father was kidnapped by the North Koreans during the Korean War not to be heard from again.
After the viewing of North Korea we all headed back to the van. We were going to this island that wasn't far away. After a few minutes we were there. I guess it's just a pleasant place with things to do, beaches, bike rentals, etc. A nice place to go to get away from the city for the weekend. We stopped at a temple and wandered around. Not many caucasians here so there wasn't much in english but the artifacts were interesting. We also had a good view of the neighboring rice fields that were near harvesting time. They were a yellow-gold color, a nice contrast against the green of the surrounding trees. It was slightly overcast outside but warm, probably just the smog overcast.
We had snacks of giant asian pears - nearly the size of my nephews head. They are so good and in season along with a variety of cookie and cracker snacks. That being done we all loaded into the van again. My uncle's friend invited us to his in-laws farm for dinner which sounded really cool. It was early afternoon and after snacks we thought we would be more than ready for a good old fashioned korean feast. We travelled along the coast which was beautiful and like any other coastal area with the same array of shops and food joints. On we drove, and on, and on, and on...
This was turning into quite the epic journey and no one really knew where we were going, only who we were following. Finally we stopped but it didn't look like a farm, more of a meeting hall but after two hours of mindless riding we were ready to get out for a stretch.
Turns out we were only making a stop to pick up some fresh shrimp for the night's feast.
When I say fresh, I mean caught in a net from a collecting pool, dumped into a cooler with a lid slammed and taped down securely to keep the jumping shrimp from escaping. These puppies were big - I was getting hungry and the sun was starting to set.
"Are we almost there yet?" - S
As adults who are all accostumed to driving or being in charge of direction we were all getting a little antsy and the carefree, let's just go with it attitude was getting a little hard to keep up. We had been in the car a long time and knew we still had a drive and subway ride to go.
We were assured we were almost there and that would have to be enough. Once we had the shrimp we headed back to the main road from which we came and then made another stop and a fruit stand. Concord grapes are in season and the sellers came up to the couple we were travelling with and there was lots of greetings and bows exchanged as my uncle and mom were introduced. I could see why as the woman at theh stand and the wife of my uncle's friend were obviously related. Turns out they're sisters and we left with a box and sack fulls of grapes! The smell was amazing, it was sweet and tart and you could just tell from the smell that those grapes were going to be yummy. The skin is a little tough and there are seeds which in my book makes this a high maintenance fruit. It turns out that most people spit out the skin but I eat it because I like the texture and tartness of it along with the sweetness of the grape meat. So tastey. Half an hour later we pulled into the driveway of the "farm". After watching my uncle's friend pull into the driveway and pass through this sprayer that completely hosed down his car as he pulled into park we all wondered aloud what this was all about - some way of really keeping one's car clean every time they came home from a day's driving? As we pulled forward there were shouts of, "Roll up the windows!!!" from through the van. Luckily we did, turns out that the cars are sprayed down with a disinfectant to protect the farm animals from any cooties that might be brought in from the cars. Hmmm, I wonder how effective this really is.
The farm was amazing. A perfect example of using every available inch of the space you have. There were dairy cows and vegetable gardens. After a brief tour we were shown the house which was the first actual, honest to goodnes, free standing house I had been to in Korea. It was square in shape with a little open courtyard in the middle that was where clothes were drying and someone had their bonsai garden collection which, by the way, was amazing. I can imagine how therapeutic it would be after a long day working on the farm, to come home and just immerse yourself in such an incredible hobby. Lining the courtyard was a walkway where you could walk from different parts of the house from the outside, the masterbedroom, living room and I think another living space. The kitchen and eating area were at one side of the square, since meals are taken at a low table and people sit on the floor, furniture is pretty simple. Table's were brought outside since it was a nice night and we bbq'd pork and cooked the shrimp on a bed of salt. The side dishes started coming out of the kitchen and there was a great variety of kimchee. The smell of the bbq, kimchee and fresh rice surrounded by family and new friends - it was really something special. I ate a ton. There was no sign of the rest of the family, they would show up later after the cows had been milked and put in for the night. The mother of the house who was easily in her eighties was sitting on the floor of the eating area when I poked my head in to see what was going on. She had eaten already with her son, daughter-in-law and husband and was now shelling the most pretty matte black beans, I have no idea what kinds of beans they were but the pods had dried and there was a bucket full to be shelled that she was working on with my mom so I decided to join in. My cousin soon joined us while my sister sat outside minding my neice and nephew. After a cup of the super sugary creamy instant coffee that is the staple of Korean homes it was time to go home.
Not really having any earthly clue of just where we were at this point - north, south, east, west - it was really anybody's guess. We all just mindlessly piled into the van - again.
The ride home wasn't so bad. There is a definite advantage to driving late at night, less traffic. And yet, we still found outselves in a back up on a two lane road. At one point we were able to take a side road with only a little 4x4ing in the borrowed company van but it was for a good cause - after about half a mile we had passed the backed up traffic to the hoots, hollers, and clapping of myself and fellow passengers, much to the amusement of my uncle who was driving. It was clear sailing back to Anyang and it was to my uncle's friends' credit that he stopped at the first subway stop once leaving the highway so we could get out and head home.
Wearily we road home on the subway in silence. What an amazingly long day - even longer than yesterday. On the other hand, what an amazing day, even better than the day before. My cousin was clearly exhausted but it was so wonderful to spend two whole days with her and my neice and nephew so we could all get to know each other a little better.
I asked my mom what was on the agenda for tomorrow knowing that her answer wasn't going to be something along the lines of, "Why, nothing, jut kick back with a book and relax." . No, we were do to meet with one of her buddies to go to a museum and lunch. At least we would be able to sleep in - a little...

9/29

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:42:00 GMT

September 29 - Friday
Seoul

It felt really good to be in Korea again - more than I thought it would. It was also good to see my parents and sister but strangely, for that first day in town, I felt more homesick being around them than I had when we were separated.
We all slept in and left by late morning to meet my mom's girlfriends for lunch. I was pretty excited because the last time I saw them we went to this korean restaurant that you knew only a local would go to as it was down an alleyway one would never even think to go down in search of some place to eat. I could only imagine that we would be going to someplace equally as cool as last time. Unfortunately, we were taken to a VIPS, yep, the same franchise that is virtually phased out back home is thriving in South Korea. The buffet is pretty popular but the gals ordered lobster, steak and wine for us as well.
There was a variety of salads, soup, pasta, a selection of kimchees but all in all it was pretty westernized or maybe I should describe it as the asian take on a western restaurant. All in all the food was good. Mom chatted it up with her friends and they were off in their own world while Mary, dad, Jon and I talked between trips to the buffet. Before long we were parting ways, Jon had an appointment with the tailor for his suit fitting and then we would go to Anyang and meet my uncle and cousin to watch their neighborhood Harvest Festival celebration concert.
While we waited for Jon's suit to be brought to the shop from some mysterious storage area (from the pix you can see that there is no extra space for storage in the main shop) I wandered around the endless stalls and boothes. Caught up in everything I was looking at, by the time I returned to Jon's fitting we was already finished - I missed the whole thing.
That sucked. I was really mad at myself for missing that. Jon has so been looking forward to having a suit custom made - god knows how much it would cost to have something like this done back home. He seemed pleased with the progress of the suit.
With that settled, we headed to the hotel to rest a bit before heading south again to Anyang. My dad decided to get some rest and stay at the hotel - a good idea given how much we had been doing and the plans we had talked about yesterday with the family re: what we would be doing over the weekend.
We went to Anyang market since we had a little time to kill before meeting my uncle. Mom had some agenda and I like that neighborhood market. We bought some socks which, for some reason, is turning into a tradition whenever someone goes there. What can I say - they're a good deal, good quality and the black socks stay black after multiple washings! We were also on the hunt for Hotaks - a totally addicting snack made of a sweet dough with brown sugar, sometimes nut bits, and raisins and fried in some oil, they're shaped like a pancake. I fell in love with them on my last trip and have found it suprisingly hard to find them amongst the street vendors. At last my mom started simply asking around and we finally found them on the end of a street. Freshly made the melted brown sugar is nuclear hot but the outside is crispy and chewy. We had dessert before dinner.
We called my uncle and he picked us up on the way to the harvest festival at my cousins neighborhood which wasn't too far from where he lived. Hazards lights are used often in Korea and rarely is there an actual hazard. People usually put their hazard lights on when they are parked illegally - which is what my uncle did while my mom hopped out and bought a bunch of mondoo to go. Mondoo is like a wonton but the chewy kind not the deep fried kind, often filled with a veggie or ground pork and veggie filling served with a soy sauce mix on the side. My mom used to make these by hand and it was really tedious and time consuming, the chore of making up a batch of mondoo would not hold my attention for very long when I was a kid but I sure did enjoy the end result!
We met my cousins and her family in the neighborhood square where an stage was set up and performances were already underway. It was an ampitheater type of setting and Jon, Mary and I sat on the front steps while the other adults sat in the lawn chairs. Being in the suburbs caucasians weren't commen and we stuck out like a sore thumb. When the announcer took the stage after we arrived we talked and gestured in our direction and smiled before going on with the introduction to the next performance. I kind of looked around and it seemed like people were looking at us but I couldn't really tell.
I turned to Mary who was on my right, "Were we suppose to know what he was saying? Was he talking to us?" - S
"I think he was talking about someone behind us." - M
I looked around for my mom but she was off to one side talking with someone. When she returned she stuck her head between Mary and I and said that the MC had said that he noticed that there were some tourists in the audience and wanted to welcome us and that he wished he could speak english for you.
As the evening progressed we saw traditional fan dances, heard traditional songs, and drumming. There was a small but growing group of toddlers who would take to the area before the stage to dance along to the music with the elderly man who was shakin' his groove thang right along with them.
There was one prestigious dance troupe that performed who only performed for this festival in this neighborhood - it was a big deal. After a couple of their performances my mom told us that my cousin-in-law had arranged for us to have our picture taken with the troupe. Before the last performance the MC announced that everyone could come up for a group picture at the end of the show - so we did - Crazy Man and all. After the pictures were taken the MC asked Jon what he thought of the show and introduced his wife to both of us - she was one of the singers. They seemed pleased that we enjoyed the show.
Another late night. My uncle wanted to go out for chicken and beer but we talked him out of it as we were all bushed and were getting together the next day anyway. We really had to twist his arm to get him to let us go - he wanted to spend time with us. We said our goodbyes to my cousin and her family and my uncle dropped us off at the subway station. We trudged back to the hotel, chilled for a little while before passing out, knowing that the next day we would be going north near the border to visit my great grandmother's gravesite.

9/28

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:41:00 GMT

September 28 - Thursday
Seoul

We were up bright and early. Jon, Mary and I were sharing a room across the hall from mom and dad. Mary was able to get a laptop computer for our room. Mom had the day planned, she had some things to accomplish while in korea and today we were going to check one of those tasks off her list. We walked to a nearby subway station. At a major intersection mom pointed to some high rises and said that her junior high school used to be right there - we were in her hood.
There was noticeabley fewer people on the sidewalks as we walked to the subway, fewer people, fewer stalls, a lot more elbow room. I'd say it was like a breath of fresh air after Bangkok but Seoul has its own air pollution problem that shrouds the city in a haze. It not as bad as the Black Lung inducing air quality of Bangkok but it's not exactly alpine fresh.
We bought rechargeable subway cards and waited for our train. We got disembarked somewhere in Seoul - couldn't take you back there if I had to and promptly got all turned around. We walked down the sidewalk for a while and passed by, what turned out to be a veterinary clinic. It occupied two store fronts. The first that I passed held the cages where I saw one cat and the second was what I can only think to term as the 'procedure area' because there was a man sewing up an unconscious dog who was belly up on the procedure table unconscious from what I can only assume was the sedation - or she was dead.
"Look! He's sewing up a dog in there!" - S
"I'm not looking" - Mary
It was pretty unreal, rather theatrical, I could have stayed and watched some more.
Mom finally asked for directions. Turns out we were super close and merely had to cross the street. Now, when I think of Buddhist temple, I think of the temple that Jon and I got married in - that was not the kind of temple we visited. It made sense though that a temple in the city occupy a business building. They were in the process of painting it on the outside and making it their own.
My mom had asked for an audience with one of the monks who turns out to be the brother of one of my attendants at my wedding. He was very gracious and asked us to join him for snacks and coffee. He was on a tight schedule but encouraged us to join the everyone downstairs for lunch. Like any other buddhist temple - there's food. Non of us were hungry but there was no way we could say no - actually, we tried but that just isn't an acceptable answer when it comes to eating when in Korea. So we had veggies, really good kimchee, rice with curry sauce on top. It was good. All plates had to be cleaned in order to show respect and appreciation.
We rolled out of there - so full.
We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the Damdaemun market eventually making our way to the cloth market. This place was amazing: floors and stall after stall of fabric, buttons, notions. Literally floor to ceiling, there was more than one could take in at one time. You could spend days going through there. Jon found a tailor and got fitted for a suit. He's been waiting to get this suit made and with my mom translating he was getting measured and picking out fabrics like he had suits tailor made on a regular basis! We made plans to meet again the next day for a fitting. We caught a cab back to the base gate and walked back to the hotel. We were all pretty tired and still had plans to visit my uncle and cousins in Anyang later that evening.
After a little rest we headed back to the train station. It takes about 30 to 40 minutes. Once of the subway, dad lead the way to my uncles like he did it everyday.
Left at the restaurant with the dancing squids in front, left at the end of the pedestrian walkway, right at the nursery, left at the 365 store and you're nearly there! We walked down the back alley where the kids played in the evening. There were no front or backyards to play in, certainly not enough room in anyone's home to play - that left the streets. We stuck out like a sore thumb and got lots of stares in this suburb of the city.
Walking up to my uncle's third floor walk up it felt like I hadn't been years since I had last seen his place.
We took our shoes off in the foyer and I followed mom inside. It was sooooo good to see my uncle and cousins and for the first time: my 'neice and nephew' who are actually my cousins twice removed (I think) but they call me, aunt (Eemo) and Jon, Uncle (Eemoboo). I the last time I had seen my cousin Yu-jin, she was about 7 months pregnant with Ji-un who is now an absolutely adoreable three year old and we became good buddies really quick. My baby nephew, Songjun, is 10 months old and is the most well behave baby and I'm not just saying that because I'm biased. Yu-jin had made a great dinner for us and we sat around the low table and feasted on the simple, yet flavorful meal of potato, bulgolgi meat, toasted seaweed, kimchee and of course - rice.
There was concord grapes after dinner. These are the biggest concord grapes I've ever seen. Too bad they have seeds. They're in season right now and you can smell them in the markets before you even reach the stall where they're being sold.
It was such a great night and we were all so tired by the time we started back to the subway station. It was so good to see my extended family and have Jon meet them too. I knew my time with them was limited so I savored every moment. My cousin Yu-jin invited us back the next night to her neighborhood which was a harvest festival performance. This was just what I was hoping to experience while we were visiting. I knew that there were several festivals in the fall in Korea so I was excited and knew it would be another late night. While Jon, Mary and I had all agreed on adopting the travel philosophy of not packing as many activities into one day or one trip like it was the last time we would be visiting some place. Mom, on the other hand, was unstoppable. With her little power naps on the subway she was a woman on the go. We were having a hard time keeping up with her!
We parted ways with the plan to meet up again tomorrow evening. We trudged back to our rooms and hit the sack. Tomottow we would be able to sleep in a little with no plans until lunch time.

9/27

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:40:00 GMT

Septeber 27, Wednesday
Seoul

What a whirlwind! I'm doubley glad we kicked back and took it easy in Thailand because we've been going virtually nonstop since we arrived in Korea at 0455 last Tuesday morning. I had slept most of the way from Hong Kong to Seoul and there wasn't much of a welcoming committee at the airport for anyone when we arrived and passed through customs. We took an airport limosine bus to the gate so the army base where we met my dad and got Jon and I checked in after showing passports. We took a taxi up to Dragon Hill Lodge which will be our home away from home while we're in Seoul. DHL is my dad's favorite place to stay and I can see why. The beds are comfortable, there's a nice gym, a variety of restaurants, cash machine, all the convieniences of home under nearly one roof. What we're having to get used to is that while on base we use US dollars and then switch to Korean Won once we step off base.
We pretty much passed out for a few hours after we arrived (love those blackout curtains) before getting a bite to eat and walking to the Korean National Museum which is next door to the base. The museum is massive and while we were awake Jon and I still had the long-airplane-flight-blahs and everyone else still had jetlag so we kind of plodded through the museum, didn't see even half of it, took a little caffeine, kiwi drink break before finishing up, stopping by the gift shop and heading back to the base. As always, dad got a lot of attention for the Korean kids, everyone always says hi to him, turns out the same thing happened with Jon. The girls say hi and then giggle but the guys would ask Jon for the time since he has that massive Suunto watch.
We had planned to go to Anyang where my uncle and cousins live which is southwest of Seoul but we all just felt crappy so we called them and made a date for the next night.
We would be sharing a room with Mary who had also gotten a computer for our room which is cool. Like when she visited us in London we would alternate nights between good bed and hideaway/bad bed. It's a system that works for us.
It's been great to see my parents and sister. They brought a picture or our cats - they've gotten so big! They're like full grown cats!
We had dinner in the one of the restaurants in the hotel and then back up to our rooms. It didn't take long to pull out the hide-a-bed and I was asleep about two seconds after getting under the covers. Tomorrow we would see my uncle and cousins in the evening after he gets off work and during the day we'll go to Dongdaemun market.

9/20

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:39:00 GMT

September 20 - Wednesday

It's interesting how the US has all of these legal standards/codes that must be met and maintain by businesses. For example medical facilities, restaurants/food service areas and building and construction. The buildings across the road from us are undergoing heavy reconstruction. This morning I was looking out our gabled window and was reminded of how different our two countries are. Back home these guys would likely be in long pants, hard hats, steel toed boots and wearing eye protection. Instead, what I'm observing are guys in tank tops and shorts, not hard hats,eye protection and they're wearing wafer thin flip flops but looking like they would be just as comfortable walking around barefoot. I wonder what the injury rate is in this country compared with back home. I also don't hear as much electrical tools being used. I don't here the familiar sound of the air compressor for the nail gun, I don't think there is as much technology in the tools being used in this project. Perhaps the simplicity of tools while making the job take longer, keep the number of injuries lower? Who knows.
I watched the street begin to wake up as the street vendors began setting up their stalls. At the end of street where there is a T intersection I watched the Buddhist monks walking back to their wat (it's just up the road) with their large urns to collect offerings - yes, they too were barefoot.

9/24

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:38:00 GMT

September 24 - Sunday
Karon Beach, Phuket

Our last full day at the beach. I'm at a coffee shop looking out over the Andaman Sea. It looks like we'll be seeing some more of monsoon season today. The horizon is dark with cloads, the horizon starts as a very dark line and as it comes in closer to the shore the water becomes a progressively lighter green. It's a bit sunnier here on the shoreline (for now) and so the water is that beautiful, tropical green that we'll never see in the pacific northwest and the sand is the color of light brown sugar or maybe more the color of a single tall latte made with whole milk. The sunsets here have been amazingly beautiful I haven't taken any pictures of them as this is when Jon and I have been exercising and the only time of the day when it's cool enough to do so while still being able to see on the beach. It's typically dark by the time we head back to our guest house. I think we've been in many sunset pictures taken by tourists on the beach. We try to avoid them but on a nice evening people are going picture crazy and we're bobbing an weaving which makes for a more interesting workout but at the end of the run I'm a little less tolerant. Running on the beach is not nearly as sexy it they make it look on tv or the movies. Unless you're on the hardpan it's friggin' hard. When you are on the hardpan you have to watch out for the incoming waves and the little translucent crabs running every which way under your feet. Then there's the humidity and heat. I'm always glad at the end of the run and am always a little cranky at the beginning. The gal standing in front of the restaurant we pass by on our way back from our run (she's the hostess/person trying to talk you off the sidewalk and into the restaurant) fanned us with her menu the first time she saw us pass by - not even trying to talk us into going into the restaurant. By the time we return, we're both pretty sweaty - like, drenched. The subsequent times we've passed she's always been very nice - knowing we weren't going into her place because we had just finished exercising but always saying hello and commenting on the heat. One of the tailors we pass by told Jon he had a nice body. Another time we passed by another tailor and he was going into he schpiel of telling us to "have a look" and "good deals" and then we really looked at us in our post workout state
"We have cold water"
Jon and I laughed at that but kept on walking. Those tailors are unstoppable.
Tuesday was the day on the Coup and we were clueless. Actually, if we had thought about it I guess we might have thought something was up when we turned on the tv and all of the Thai tv stations had the exact same person broadcasting. Maybe that should have been a red flag for us. I made some passing comment on the fact that maybe that was an important person on tv or that he must have something important to say.
Ignorance was bliss. What better place to be ignorant than on a beach in Thailand.
We do realize that we're lucky that it's been so peaceful and don't plan to linger in Bangkok any longer than necessary and have heeded all warnings about not gathering near government buildings - not that we even know where those buildings are and would two people in one spot be considered a gathering?
We rented a moped on Wednesday from a bar near our guesthouse. It wasn't as nice as the one we had rented a couple times in Kata Beach but it looked like it would do the job. We headed north. The road here is all newly replaced since the tsunami. Karon beach is still recovering and has rebuild some pretty fancy resorts across the street from the beach but there is still a big stretch that has not been developed and looks out of place amidst all the luxury of the surrounding buildings.
We as we road along the road hugging the coastline we passed dozens of alters set up facing out to the sea some had toppled over others had simpley fallen apart from being out in the elements for so long. It was hard not to be effected.
We rode into Patong Beach and I must say that I was really turned off. This beautiful beach is just way too touristy. The traffic, the number of people the stalls, traffic, hotels, guesthouses, etc were just too much. I think it made us both cranky. We stopped briefly and bought a swimsuit for Jon and some gifts for family in Korea. We walked a ways along the sidewalk and I'll admit I had a moment of weakness and talked Jon into going into a Starbuck.
It's almost October and they actually had the Pumpkin Spice latte for sale in Patong. Now, normally I would consider the whole idea of going into a Starbucks at all let alone ordering a seasonal drink - it would go against my entire travel philosophy besides drinking a pumpkin spice latte while on a sunny, tropical beach is just wrong on so many levels.
BUT,
My rationale is that: first of all, I'm a little homesick and season sick (I miss the fall), I am going to pull the PMS card because I can and the pumpkin spice latte is the only flavored coffee drink I like and am willing to spend the ever-rising Starbuck's coffee prices for.
What would have made it perfect is if I would have had it in a to go cup walking around outside in the fall weather proabably to meet my sister for some kind of shopping or walking around the mall, or meeting a friend in the evening. Pam Dodds, our friend we stayed with while in England asked if I liked coffee and I told her that not only did I like coffee. I liked everything about coffee: the taste, the smell, the utensils, the sounds, the whole culture around coffee.
In Europe people would stop for tea (usually) or a coffee. It's something you take a time out for. When we were at Adriennes in Twyinning we had tea or coffee in the afternoon and a nice chat. It makes one stop, slow down a bit and recharge rather than just putting you nose down, blinders up and plow through the rest of the day. Tea is probably even better for this because you have to wait for it to steep. In asia, the power drinks like the Red Bull drinks we have back home have been around a lot longer than Red Bull. It's go, go, go. It's a different culture, I think it has to be. There's just so many people and it just strikes me as being so so (so) hard to break even, let alone get ahead in that culture. When I've visited places like Seoul and now Bangkok I just get this vibe of work, work, work.   It's intense. We're really very lucky to be able to live in the US. We have it pretty easy back home.
Anywho, back to our day with the moped. We didn't linger long in Patong but continued north to Kamala beach which was about 5kilometers away. It's closer in size to Kata beach, a little bit rockier but even quieter. This beach community still has a lot of recovery work to do and I imagine it will be at least another year before they're back up to anything close to what they were making before the tsunami. What they've done since then though was put in a beautiful lighted walk along the entire beach the cement equivalent of a boardwalk. What it means for us was that it was really quiet and prices were super good for accomodations. We were thinking of spending our last few nights at another beach. We found a great spot right on the beach with breakfast for 700 baht.
We tooled around town and took a side road and actually saw some ox (water buffalo?) in a field. They were beautiful and looked like a picture from National Geographic with the tropical vegetation and haze of the mid day humidity surrounding the field. There is a tsunami monument in Kamala beach. There was a couple of small signs for the monument but it wasn't heavily advertised. We had seen the sign as we road into town and thought we had missed it until just before leaving town.
What it is exactly is the mass grave site of the tsunami victims. It's an area surrounded by ta cement wall that you can look down into from the road as you drive by. Inside is a few trees and small markers scattered over the undulations of the ground. This wasn't the perfectly manicured, geometrically correctly cemetary we saw at the beaches of Normandy where the graves are a tribute to those who fought so bravely and made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.
What we saw was the results of the needing to bury the dead after tragedy and completely unexpected loss of life in order to prevent disease and further death. The fact that it isn't perfectly manicured but rather undulating where the dirt was pushed in and filled the mass grave, it is not perfect but rather messy looking compared to what we in the US know as any kind of burial site. The markers which are no more than a foot high are leaning every which way and in no particular order. Nothing is perfectly aligned, in fact nothing is perfect about it at all. I think this mass grave visually captures the events of what happened on December 26, 2004, it's messy, and chaotic, there's no order, rhyme or reason to it. It's a very powerful site. It's imperfection makes it all the more compelling.
It was getting on in the day so we decided to head back to Karon beach. As we got into Patong beach we decided to bypass the beach traffic and head straight through town. We were almost out of town when we got a flat tire. Great.
I couldn't even tell until Jon told me. We pulled over, I got off the bike and it was pretty flat. We had pulled into an area with a bunch of market stalls. There was a security guy watching us from across the market. I looked out to the road in hopes of seeing something resembling a place that could change a tire. The security guard pointed out to the road, I looked again and didn't see anything and then just started walking out to the sidewalk and looked down the road - nothing. Jon joined me and we walked a little bit - what else could we do? Not fifty yards away was a bike rental/garage. Jon went and got the bike and showed the man at the garage what we needed. He said he could fix the tire.
"How much?" - S
That was the big question.
"150 baht"
"ok" - like we had a choice but thank goodness it wasn't crazy expensive.
I went back and thanked the security guy and we sat and waited for the tube to be replaced in the tire. As we road out of town, still about 7 kilometers from Karon beach we both agreed how TOTALLY lucky we were that he had the flat where we did! We were able to enjoy the rest of the ride back. I was ready to get off the bike. My butt was getting sore and the foot rests were not comfortable causing me to want to shift my feet around which Jon didn't like as the driver of the bike. I sat and watched our shadow run over the hillside as we road back into Karon beach. As we reached to the bottom of the hill and entrance into town we were pulled over by the police. They were stopping everyone going into and out of town, checking driver's license's. We had ours but they were tucked away in our waist pouch so it took a while to get them out, I had to get off the bike, Jon had to pull completely off the road while placed under close scrutiny when he finally showed his license. He's due to renew his license so it's not the most recent picture.
We passed muster and made it the last quarter mile to our guesthouse without incident!
We went for a run on the beach before riding into Kata Beach ot the restaurant we frequented while we were staying there. As we road to the restaurant we passed another eatery that had a baby elephant with a handler outside. The elephant looked totally sweet. Jon had pulled over and we looked on from across the street. We didn't go up to it and I was pretty turned off.
"That baby should be with it's mama somewhere in the jungle, not on the sidewalk with a chain around it's neck." - S
As we walked up to the restaurant the hostess recognized us and gave us a warm greeting. We had actually seen her at a bar at Karon beach. Apparently she also tutors a young boy in English once a week and her friend owns the bar. She had waved us down our second day there say that she had seen us the day before and tried to wave to us but we didn't see her - she had recognized Jon. She told us that she tutors and is helping set up another restaurant there on Karon beach not far from where we were staying but it wouldn't be open for a while yet which is why she was still working at the restaurant in Kata Beach. We had a wonderful dinner and on our way out the hostess said that the next time we came to visit we should go to her new place at Karon beach.
We road back to Karon beach without incident and turned in the moped, not telling the owner about the flat tire, and I personally was glad to be rid of it. The rest of the week was spent watching the Ryder Cup starting in the afternoon, exercising in the evening and watching more of the Ryder Cup at night. We've been watching the Thai sports channel so we don't know much about what they're saying during the commentary but are actually quite enjoying it. Jon likes it better than the major stations back home that would be covering the Cup, no commercials and the Ooos and Aahhs of the guys doing the commentary are pretty comical. Saying the phrase Double Dog Leg with a Thai accent is quite the tongue twister! I guess there isn't a Thai translation for that or many other golf terms, according to Jon.
I was able to get some fresh pineapple yesterday. After two days without. One day the stand wasn't open at all, the second day was a Buddhist holiday and they gave all their pineapple to the temple. The second day I had gone wandering around looking for some place selling pineapple - because yes it's just that tastey, or bananas, or any produce and was really having trouble finding any. I passed by the temple and there we a woman helping a customer, she was selling corn on the cob. I looked good but I was on the hunt for pineapple or bananas so I kept on walking. I didn't get farther before deciding that this was silly and started heading back. I came closer to the corn girl and decided to get some. I love corn so I walked up to her cart. The she and the man she was with seemed a little surprised that I had come up to her and when I pointed to her covered pot and indicated that I wanted two she quickly got up and lifted the lid asking which type I wanted (yellow or white). I went with the yellow - I looked prettier. She dipped it in (I think) water to cool it down (I think) before putting them in a plastic bag. I think it was only like 10 baht. I walked back to the guesthouse and happily showed Jon what I found. I was proud of myself for getting the corn knowing that I wouldn't have even known to get it if the woman hadn't been helping someone else and I could see inside the pot.
The corn was really good. I love corn.
That will be one thing I'll miss - the fresh produce.

9/19

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:37:00 GMT

September 19 - Tuesday

"Is today Tuesday?" - S
"Hang on." - J as he checks the day feature on his watch.
"Yep. Tuesday. I can't believe it." - J

We're losing track again. We moved residences today after two nights at the Green Island Guesthouse. They're in the middle of expansion and have only one television channel, no remote control in the room. This is unacceptable. Funny how just a couple months ago we were thrilled with a flush toilet and free hot showers and a place to lay our tent that had a little cushion to it! It's a little embarassing actually. As we were packing our things the power went out.
"Time to go." - J
It's a scorcher today. I was out before 0800 and was dripping by the time I got back to the room. We have tinted windows and blackout curtains but you could feel the heat beating through the window and working against the a/c. We had turned in some laundry to do and while Jon waited for that to be brought out to us I walked around the block looking for another place to stay. The criteria has changed a bit:
Private shower with hot water
Fridge in room
A/c
Television that has a sports channel that will cover the Ryder Cup this weekend.
TV remote control
We're in the Karon Beach Inn which I had scouted out a couple days ago but we went for the other place for 100 Baht less.
We've spent most of the rest of the day trying to stay cool by going and checking our email, picking up staples at the mini mart and laying around in our underwear with the a/c turned up while watching movies on cinemax or HBO. We haven't been terribley productive. I'm finding the heat a little uninspiring. Our room is a lot better so that's good and the desk clerk is really sweet. We were going to exercise this morning but decided not to since it was so freaking hot this morning. We'll go out tonight and exercise like we did a couple nights ago.
Internet is cheaper at this beach but I've been forced to go to the chain coffee shop for writing.
I'm just across from the beach and am hoping that by the time I get ready to go it will be cool enough to exercise.
We do have a new ritual now of going to a stall about a block away for fruit every day. A woman will cut and prep a pineapple, pomello for you and half a bunch of minibananas all for 70 baht! It's fun to watch. The pomello is like a pale grapefruit but not nearly as tart, the pineapple is much sweeter and no tartness at all like the one back home. We go through a pineapple a day and the bananas are about three to four inches long, are a little more yellow and have a stronger banana taste. It's all really good. My new favorite is a cracker with creamy peanutbutter and sliced bananas. Yumm-o.
We went to Phuket town yesterday and that place was pretty urban, dreary and a bit of a downer. We did have some good pizza and talked and did some shopping. The big thing we learned yesterday was not to tell the tuk tuk driver where we wanted to go unless we had a map to point exactly where it was we wanted to go. For example Jon told the guy we wanted to go to the city center and we were taken to the Central mall which turned out fine - in the end. There was a bit of confusion for a while and we eventually just decided to got to the mall which was nice, they had a grocery store there too. We caught a cab to some other markets and just kind of wandered around until we were starved, ate some dinner and met our driver in the designated spot for him to take us back to our guesthouse.
One thing I won't miss is the aggressiveness of the tuk tuk/taxi drivers and the guys outside the tailored clothing stores. I can certainly appreciate the need to make money but it get old fast and I'm very glad that I'm not the one trying to sell tailored suits to tourists. In fact, I am extremely glad that I have the life that I do and can go home to the US and find a job probably pretty easily that will earn a wage where I won't have to have to worry about where the next dollar will come from or where that dollar will be spent, never mind saving any of it. We know and remind ourselves often of how lucky we are. I read the the local newspaper that there was a happiness poll taken recently and, apparently this happens on a regular basis, the people of Thailand are survey about their level of happiness. In Bangkok it was almost perfectly split 50-50 whereas in northern Thailand which is where most of the poverty is in the country, they had the highest rating for happiness. The article alluded to the possibility that the people of the north were in a make-due-with-what-you-have belief which was reflected in the higher happiness rating.
As we were riding the tuk tuk to Phuket Town yesterday we past rubber tree farms. I've never seen a rubber tree before and am not sure exactly how they work but I took a picture anyway!
The other thing I won't miss is the bartering for nearly everything. I mean really, when it's all said and done it's only the difference of a couple bucks and there's been many times when I couldn't care less because I know we were getting such a deal or that we wouldn't be able to get a similar item at home but - it's the thing to do.
I saw a little kitty curled up in a chair that had been turned upside down and stacked onto a table outside a restaurant. It looked all cozy and comfy - I had to take a picture. When I went to turn around and continue my walk to the shore I nearly fell over this white dog with the sweetest, happyiest face just looking up at me expectantly. I assumed he wanted me to take his picture - so I did and he proceeded to follow me to the end of the street. I stopped at the end of the street to jaywalk to the other side
So did the dog.
"Shoo, go on now." - S
I performed what I thought was the universal sign pointing him in the right direction: pointed finger with sweeping arm going from dog to direction we came from.
I didn't work.
We crossed the street together.
As we got farther from where we met up I started to get a little worried. With all the time we spent together if this continued I would feel an obligation to make sure he got home safely. I mean we crossed a busy Thai street together - that definitely shows a certain level of commitment.
Well, I tried the fake out and stood looking in the window of the Kodak shop which had tsunami pics posted in the window. After what seemed like a long enough time I turned to continue down the sidewalk to the shoreline.
There he was, ahead of me know, leading the way, looking over his shoulder every so often to make sure I was keeping up.
We rounded the corner and there were three other dogs nearby and this proved to be distraction enough for the little guy and I was able to continue on my way unescorted. I didn't see the dog on my way back but I also didn't see him run over in the street either so that's good.
We talk a lot about all the things we want to do when we get home or what we want to do with building our house or new things we want to try, start again, continue, etc. The list seems long and I'm not sure how we'll every find the time to get to our evergrowing interests - and we haven't even finished the trip yet. I honestly can't believe it's been almost four months since we left. It feels like so much longer, so much has happened. Other than the obvious I miss the Pacific Northwest weather, the fall weather will be starting soon if it hasn't already. Fall is my favorite season, the weather, the colors, the clothes. I don't think I'm cut out for tropical living - there's just too much sweating involved but if I could just keep the curliness in my hair - that would be good. I do miss wearing real clothes - we both do and have had whole conversations about it. Maybe it's just wearing something other than the three pairs of shorts, two sports bras and four tops that I'm wanting...I can't even remember what kind of clothes I have at home anymore. We got rid of so much stuff before we left. I told Jon that I'm going for a full on makeover when we get home - my wardrobe has been running more on the unisex side and I haven't worn makeup in a really long time.
Our bicycle tan lines have blended and we now have the usual bathing suit tan lines. The tan parfait on my arms is gone. We're not burning anymore like we did when we first came to Europe - thank goodness. Now people are thinking I'm part Thai (I so don't look Thai) and Jon is more Spanish now. Most of the travellers are retired people or couples in their later thirties and up.
We placed our writeup about who we are and what we're looking for while WWOOFing (Willing Workers of Organic Farms) in New Zealand: www.wwoof.co.nz
And we've gotten some really cool responses. One was from a dairy farm north of Aukland, the owner is a meat inspector another place has a farm with animals but is also a horseback riding and river kayaking biz - just to name a few of its activities, a few others. They all sound really exciting and we're even more excited to know that we are welcome to go to these places - granted it's free labor but for four hours of work - I'm not sure who is getting the better deal! We're psyched and are trying to get organized to make a trail to all these farms that have emailed us. Our only problem is running out of time. Right now, it's like we're in slow motion. I know that things will be going by at warp speed once we land in NZ.

Gallery: Heading south from Picton, NZ (on the south island)

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 09:35:00 GMT

Gallery: Wwoofing it up in Te Mata. 20km north of Thames

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 08:17:00 GMT

Gallery: Auckland, NZ

the_nomads — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 08:07:00 GMT

Gallery: Cemetary where my great grandmother is buried

the_nomads — Wed, 4 Oct 2006 11:08:00 GMT

World Tour

Gallery: Weekend in Korea

the_nomads — Wed, 4 Oct 2006 11:03:00 GMT

World Tour