T&K Travel the World

Sydney

2009-05-29T16:47:00.000-07:00

April 2 - 7, 2009

Photo: Inside the Sydney Opera House

We took an evening flight from Bangkok and arrived in Sydney the next morning. After checking in we settling in for a much needed nap. We awoke to a pleasant view of Hyde Park and set out for a little exploring in the fall weather, a very welcome change from the overbearing heat of Southeast Asia. It was a bit of a novelty being able to understand the language of everyone around us!

The next day we headed down to the Sydney Opera House. T and K received a really great Christmas gift for a couple sets of tickets to performances at the Opera House (thanks L, J, C and T!). We got to see a performance of Tom Stoppard’s Travesties. It was a great, funny, show and going to a play was something we had not done in a long time. The Opera House is such a beautiful structure. We’ve always seen pictures of it and it was awesome to actually attend a performance in it!

Photo: K near The Rocks

The next evening we enjoyed a performance of Hero in the Making –Young Beethoven in the concert hall of the Opera House. The performance was great and the setting was amazing. That night, we decided to do a little bar-hopping on Oxford Street, which was a lot of fun.

On Saturday, we explored an area of Sydney referred to as The Rocks, which is the area around Australia’s first European Settlement. The Rocks has many restaurants, pubs and small shops and it retains a smaller-scale feel. No doubt the atmosphere is what attracted the constant barrage of weddings (or wedding photographs) that we saw. That evening, we went out on Darlinghurst Road in Kings Cross. The area was teeming with people bar-hopping – kind of a crazy, a bit like going to the Meat Packing District on a Friday night. It was an experience.

Photo: Yayoi Kusam exhibit

On Sunday we made a brief visit to Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art, which was exhibiting Yayoi Kusam: Mirrored Years – we found it to be a little unusual, but entertaining.

Photo: Contortionist in Sydney

Afterwards we took a ferry to Manly, the ride took us past the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House and provided great views of the city from a different perspective. Half an hour later, we arrived in Manly. We made the short walk across town to Manly Beach then grabbed a fish dinner, followed up by a Lamington for dessert, which is one of K’s new favorites. After dessert we walked back to the ferry terminal and grabbed a few VBs at the Manly Wharf Hotel, a popular local bar, which attracted a large and remarkably good looking crowd.

Photo: View of the Sydney Opera House from the ferry

Photos Above: Views from the ferry to Manly

Photo: Sydney Opera House at night

The next day, we took a short bus ride to Bondi Beach. From Bondi Beach we took a beautiful walk from to Coogee Beach. The 6 km walk took us along the coastal cliffs and through a creepy cemetery, but it provided amazing views of the coastline. When we arrived at Coogee Beach a few hours later we decided to grab dinner. Though we chose a nearby sushi place mainly for its byo policy, it turned out to be fantastic sushi. It was really some of the best sushi that either T or K has ever had. If you’re ever in the neighborhood, we highly recommend Takeya.

Photo: Bondi Beach

Photo: Cool pool near Bondi Beach

Photos Above: Walk from Bondi to Coogee Beach

Photos Above: Downtown Sydney

The following day, before our afternoon flight, we walked through town to Darling Harbour, a pleasant pedestrian section of town, and stopped at the Queen Victoria Building on the way back to our hotel. We were sad to leave Sydney, but curious about our next stop, Tasmania.

The blog is still a bit behind. Currently (5/29/09) we are in Cusco, Peru - going to Machu Picchu tomorrow! Will update soon!

Party in Phuket

2009-05-21T16:16:00.000-07:00

March 23-April 1, 2009

We flew from Hanoi back to Bangkok, Thailand. This time we stayed near Khao San Road and ate lots of yummy Pad Thai and drank quite a lot of Cheers Beer (the beer they seemed to be pushing at the moment). We were only back in Bangkok for a couple of days before we flew down to Phuket.

Photo: K on Khao San Road

The only thing we really knew about Phuket was that many parts of it were destroyed in the 2004 tsunami and we were not quite sure what to expect. Everyone seemed to rave about southern Thailand so we had high expectations. We decided to first visit a town called Patong Beach. Patong was absolutely crazy, full of ready to party Aussies, Europeans, and Russians. We were also suprised to discover that it has a fairly large gay community. One would never know it was hit by a tsunami - the buildings and beaches were in perfect condition. We spent a few days there at the beach and soaking up the atmosphere before heading to the much more relaxed Kata Beach.

Photo: Flying into Phuket

Photo: Fish in Patong

Photo: Bars in Patong - Bangla Road

Kata was really hyped by our guidebook and we were looking forward to being there, but were a little let down by the town. It was kind of dirty and full of go go bars - it felt a bit like being in the Soi Cowboy area in Bangkok with girls hooting at us as we walked by almost any bar. The beaches were quite beautiful though and we saw a couple of amazing sunsets.

Photos Above: Kata Beach

Photo: Karon Beach

Photo: At the Phuket airport - "RESERVED FOR MONKS"

Overall our time Phuket was quite relaxing, but we were a bit disappointed in the overall atmosphere of the island and it was boiling hot as well. We flew back to Bangkok and stayed in an airport hotel for a night. The next day we said a sad goodbye to Asia and boarded a flight bound for Sydney, Australia!

Vietnam

2009-05-11T21:09:00.000-07:00

March 10-23, 2009

Photo: Saigon

We left Phnom Penh by bus for Vietnam and arrived in Saigon that afternoon. Saigon has a real energy to it, enhanced by the constant flow of motorbikes that fill its streets. A seemingly impossible number of motorbikes manage to simultaneously share the road (and sidewalk), all making constant adjustments to account for the other traffic and occasional pedestrian. It can be almost hypnotic to watch and quite challenging to take on as a pedestrian when crossing the street, a feat which requires you to take a gigantic leap of faith and put your trust in the scores of oncoming drivers.

Fortunately, we had the help of a local to help us adjust to and appreciate the city. Our friend, Sherry, now lives in Saigon and we were able to meet for dinner our first night in town. Seeing a familiar face was nice after so much time on the road. We last saw Sherry at one of our favorite restaurants in New York shortly before we left on our trip and before Sherry moved to Vietnam, so we had lots of catching up to do.

Photo: Exhibit in the War Remnants Museum

Photo: Reunification Palace

The next day we visited the War Remnants Museum, which included a thought provoking display of photography from photographers who died during their coverage of the war and also a thought provoking reminder of how heavily bias affects how history is represented. Afterwards we walked to and took a guided of tour of the Reunification Palace, the location where the South’s government formally ceded control to the North. It was interesting to see that the “palace” is such a recent building and has very interesting 1960s decor. Afterwards we visited Sherry and the students she teaches. At the end of class, Sherry had her students practice their English by asking us questions. We received a friendly grilling, and were very impressed at just how good their English was for a beginners’ class. After class we had a nice dinner with Sherry and tried delicious Vietnamese rice paper rolls.

Photo: Floating market

Photos Above: Mekong Delta

Photo: Market near the Mekong Delta

The next day we took a trip to the Mekong Delta south of Saigon. Our bus dropped us off alongside the river where we boarded a boat that took us past floating markets. The floating markets are basically individual boats each selling a particular product – mostly produce, but also petrol and some other necessities. It’s hard to imagine what it would be like to do your daily shopping this way! We also visited some shops where we watched coconut candy, rice paper, puffed rice, and other products being made using traditional methods. After a brief stop for lunch, we drifted through the canals and took in views of life on the delta. When we finally returned to shore, we were anxious to return to the comforts of air conditioning. It had been a hot day. That evening, we joined Sherry at a local pho restaurant. Pho is a traditional noodle soup that can be made using various cuts of beef, chicken, tripe, etc. At your table, you are provided with bowls of various types of greens, basil, chilies, limes and a variety of sauces and seasonings, allowing you to make your pho to your liking. It was delicious and a great experience.

Photo: Not an easy street to cross

The following day, we visited the zoo, botanical gardens and the Ho Chi Minh City Museum, all relatively unimpressive, as well as visiting the Jade Emperor Pagoda which has an interesting blend of Buddhist and Confucian iconography. On our walk back we had to cross the busiest street that we had encountered in Saigon. Not only was the street one mass of motorbikes, but the motorbikes were overflowing onto the sidewalk, as well. The locals thought it was funny that we didn’t want to cross the road. Finally one lady just told us to walk into the middle of the street! We did and were lucky to get to the other side of the road unscathed. We then made our way to dinner, at a place recommended by our friend Vi. We allowed the waiter to recommend dishes for us, and we were not disappointed. The food was fantastic. It was a wonderful way to conclude our time in Saigon.

Photo: Old woman in Hoi An

The next day, we took a flight to Hoi An, a wonderfully tranquil town in central Vietnam. Hoi An was not destroyed during the war and remains well preserved, with the older portion of the city having beautiful wooden architecture. Hoi An is a wonderful place to relax. It’s full of restaurants and shops, including more tailors than we’ve ever seen in such a small area. While in Hoi An we became hooked on the Vietnamese spring rolls, which are different than the spring rolls that we had been eating in other Asian countries. The Vietnamese spring rolls having a slightly lighter, crisper outer layer – they’re great. While in Hoi An we were also introduced to bia hoi which is a preservative free, home brewed beer. Bia hoi, not surprisingly is a little bit of a mixed bag, ranging from pretty terrible tasting to very good, but at ten cents per glass, it’s hard to complain too much. We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Hoi An, though it went by too quickly.

Photo: Hoi An

From Hoi An we took a bus to Hue, a town a couple hours north of Hoi An. Hue previously served as the imperial capital of

Vietnam

and has many monuments scattered around the city. Since we were in

Vietnam

we decided there would be no better way to see as many sites as possible than on the back of a motorbike! Neither T nor K has ever been on a motorbike before, but we were surprised how easy it was. Though initially our motor bikes split away from each (the drivers appeared to be racing to the first sight) until T’s driver realized that maybe something was wrong as K’s driver was nowhere in sight. T’s driver took out his cell phone to try to call the other driver, but the phone didn’t work so T and the driver drove back closer to town and waited and waited and waited. Eventually the driver got his phone to work and realized that K’s driver had a flat tire. So T’s driver picked up K and all three of us rode on his motorbike to the Emperor Khai Dinh’s tomb. K’s driver did eventually get his tire fixed so we only had to be squashed on the motorbike for that portion of trip. On the tour we visited the tombs of Emperors Khai Dinh and Tu Duc. Next we visited a beautiful monastery and then Thien Mu Pagoda. We stopped for lunch at Y Thao Garden where we dined on imperial cuisine; Hue’s famous for it. Lunch was delicious and also displayed a certain degree of whimsy about it. We finished our tour at the Imperial Citadel, a huge complex of temples, palaces and halls that served as the seat of the imperial government. Unfortunately, much of it was destroyed during the War and is currently being reconstructed.

Photo: K on the back of a motorbike

Photo: Thien Mu Pagoda

Photo: Spring rolls?!

Photo: Citadel in Hue

From Hue we flew to Hanoi. The change in weather was dramatic. It was much cooler in Hanoi, a very welcome change. We stayed in the old quarter of Hanoi and spent the first couple of days exploring the area, including Hoan Kiem Lake. During the evenings, we stopped off for a few bia hois, served on most corners of the old quarter. The bia hoi in Hanoi was definitely a step above that in Hoi An. For a change of pace, we attended a water puppet performance at the Thang Long Water Puppet Theater. During the performance, the puppeteers stand in the water while hidden behind a curtain. They guide a wide variety of wooden puppets around their stage which consists of a pool of somewhat murky water, all set to traditional music. After the performance, we then tried some young rice flavor ice-cream, which was delicious. The following day, we headed to the Ho Chi Minh Museum and received a guided tour, which provided an interesting account of Ho Chi Minh’s life prior to and including the war. We could tell our guide became somewhat uncomfortable talking about the war in front of us – he was evidently worried that he might offend us. Afterwards, we visited the One Pillar Pagoda and the imposing structure that is Ho Chi Minh’s mausoleum. We then wandered over to the Ho Tay (West Lake) area and walked along the waterfront before returning back to the old quarter for dinner. We dined on traditional northern Vietnamese fare, including catfish rolls, that was accompanied by a wide variety of rice wine (xeo) that was surprisingly good. Although we were sad to leave Hanoi, we were excited to head back to Bangkok and then to southern

Thailand

.

Photo: Ho Chi Minh's mausolesum

Photo: Presidential Palace

Photo: Hanoi

Photo: Ho Tay

Photo: Pho

Photo: Typical billboard in Vietnam

Photo: Water Puppet Theater - These people generally were behind the curtain

Since the blog is a bit behind schedule, we want to give a quick update. After Vietnam we went back to Thailand (Bangkok and Phuket), then down to Australia for a few weeks and are currently in New Zealand. All were amazing and we plan to blog about them soon. Today we are in the charming town of Wellington. We will be here for a couple more days before flying to Peru!

Cambodia

2009-04-12T08:33:00.000-07:00

March 2-9, 2009

We took our last Lao Airlines flight from Pakse to Siem Reap, Cambodia. Siem Reap is a very cute town. The streets are lined with restaurants and bars. We were a little surprised at how nice the city is considering how difficult it is to get there!

Photo: View from the back of a tuk tuk in the Angkor Temple Complex

Photos Above: Pre Rup

The main attractions, of course, are the Temples of Angkor. Upon arrival we explored the town, found some random person to do our laundry and then hired a tuk tuk to take us to the Temple complex. We bought a three day pass so that we could enter and leave the complex as many times as we liked over a three day period. That first evening we hiked up to Pre Rup and watched the sun set. It was a little disappointing – apparently every guide book tells people to visit this exact site to see the sunset and every tour group goes as well. So there were probably a thousand people all trying to watch the sunset and standing on the ruins! It was a bit cloudy as well, but we are still glad we made the trek up to see the famous sunset.

Photos Above: Bayon

Over the following few days we explored the different temples. It really is quite amazing how well preserved some of them are, while others are just crumbling ruins. We really only had the tolerance to do about a half day of temple seeing in the huge complex every day because the weather was unbearably hot. The highlights of the temple complex for us were Bayon, (a temple with many faces staring out at visitors), Ta Prohm, and of course the famous Angkor Wat.

Photos Above: Bayon

Photo: K in front of the Terrace of the Elephants

Photo: Preah Palilay

Photos: Phimeanakas

Photos Above: Angkor Wat

Photo: K in Siem Reap

Photos Above: Ta Prohm

Photos Above: Angkor Wat

Photo: Fish foot massage

Photos Above: Preah Khan

After our time was over in Siem Reap we took the bus down to Phnom Phen. The city also had many restaurants and we stayed near the river. Phnom Phen, though set in a beautiful location, had a very depressing vibe about it. We could not eat at any outdoor restaurant without being constantly harassed for money by all sorts of sad looking people. Many were children or did not have limbs. Though, one funny thing did happen while we were eating outside. A boy came to our table and was selling books. T just took a look at what he was selling – nothing seemed too interesting so he said no thank you to the boy. The boy said “why did you look at my books if you were not going to buy?!” T replied that he just wanted to see if there were any interesting books, but that he was not interested in what the boy was selling. To this the boy replied “Fuck you!” and stormed off!

Photo Elephant in Phnom Phen

Photo: Tuel Sleng Genocide Museum

While in Phnom Phen we visited the Tuel Sleng Genocide Museum (aka S-21), a school turned into a prison and used by the Khmer Rouge for torture and detention that generally was followed by execution during Cambodia’s recent civil war. It was an incredibly sad place to visit, with the photos of many of those killed staring back at us in the converted school rooms. The museum is well done, but it is very disturbing to believe that this mass genocide only occurred about 30 years ago….

Photo: Royal Palace - Phnom Phen

Photo: K in Phnom Phen

Photo: National Museum of Cambodia

We could not bring ourselves to visit the “killing fields” – though every tuk tuk driver offered to take us there. We only spent a few days in Phnom Phen. Though a very eye opening place to visit, we were not sad to leave Phnom Phen for Ho Chi Minh City,

Vietnam

Vientiane and 4000 islands - Laos

2009-03-20T06:57:00.000-07:00

February 19 - March 2, 2009

The distances between cities in Southeast Asia don’t look very far on a map, but the roads in this part of the world can be in quite terrible shape so we took yet another flight on Lao Airlines between Luang Prabang and Vientiane – the flight was only about 50 minutes – the bus ride would have been 14 hours!

Photos Above: Sunset over the Mekong River

Vientiane is the capital of

Laos

. The “backpacker” section of town was quite cute, with some very good restaurants in town. The river was also lined with what looked like almost identical cafes, one after another…the food at these smaller restaurants never looked quite up to par so we generally just stopped by the riverfront cafes to have a Beer Lao and watch the sunset over the Mekong River.

Photo: Patuxay

While in Vientiane we hired a tuk tuk driver to take us to see Pha That Luang, considered by many to be the most important monument in Lao. The giant golden stupa was beautiful and we stayed at the site as long as we could, but the 95 degree heat and humidity cut short what may have otherwise been a longer visit.

Photos Above: Pha That Luang

Our second stop of the day was the Buddha Park about 25 kilometers out of town. We rode the whole way in the back of the tuk tuk, which strangely started to feel normal after spending so much time in SE Asia! The Buddha park was pretty impressive and contained hundreds of Buddhist and Hindu statues. While we were there two monks approached us and wanted to practice their English. This has happened quite often as we travel the world (for instance in Chiang Mai a police officer stopped us – we had absolutely no idea what we might be in trouble for and it took about 5 minutes for us to realize he just wanted to practice his English skills!)….We had a nice chat with the monks. Apparently in Laos, it is quite common for young men to become monks for a couple of years, even while studying another field. Many monks decide to continue as monks as they get older but many return to what we might consider more “regular” types of jobs – for instance one of the monks was studying to be a lawyer.

Photos Above: Buddha Park

After a few days we’d had enough of Vientiane and wanted to fly down to Siem Reap,

Cambodia

. We went to a travel agent, but the only Lao Airlines flight was full for about a week. He suggested we take an overnight bus to a town called Pakse and try to catch a flight from there. We took his suggestion and the following evening were on a bus, complete with actual BEDS! Not that the beds were all that comfortable, but both T and K had a better sleep that night than we would have had if sitting in a seat.

Photo: Champsak Palace Hotel

After the 10 hour ride we checked ourselves into the Champsak Palace Hotel. This is by far the nicest hotel in Pakse. In fact, it was really the only nice thing about Pakse (the town was rather dirty and boring)….sadly we could not get a flight out of Pakse for almost another week! Having decided after only a few hours that we could not spend another night in Pakse unless absolutely necessary we booked a ticket to an area of Laos called 4000 Islands (Si Phan Don).

Photos: Sunset views of Pakse from the Champsak Palace Hotel

We initially were reluctant to go to 4000 Islands. Many people seemed to like it, but Don Det, the most popular island, does not have any electricity (though every guesthouse and restaurant on the whole island runs a generator from 6-10pm) and it was almost 100 degrees outside and quite humid….however, once we got on the bus it appeared that everyone on the bus was going to Don Det so we took the plunge and went along with it. Don Det was quite a pleasant surprise and a very interesting experience. We took a bus to a boat which took us to this remote island and then walked around looking at rooms, many of which cost 30000 to 60000 Kip per night (this is equivalent to about $4-7/night).

Photo: Boat ride on the Mekong to Don Det

Photo: Our hammocks and view at "Mama's" guesthouse

Photo: Sunset on the beach - Don Det

Photos Above: Don Khon

Everything on the island was quite basic and we took one of the more expensive ($7/night) rooms with a private bathroom, mosquito net, and two hammocks overlooking the river. The guesthouse is run by a woman who insisted we call her “Mama” - she took care of us and made sure we were happy enough and her husband “Papa” fixed one of our hammocks when it fell down. For the next few days we took it easy on the island, ate (pretty remarkable food considering the island does not have electricity), relaxed, and hung out with fellow travelers – it was really generally too hot to do much during the day, though one day we rented bikes and rode them over to the next island Don Khon (Don Det and Don Khon are connected by a bridge). The ride was nice and we had a fun time riding bikes and hanging out at the waterfalls on Don Khon.

Photos Above: Waterfalls on Don Khon

Photos Above: Don Khon

Photo: Our guesthouse on Don Det

Photos Above: On the boat from Don Det to Don Khong

After about 4 days on the island we hired a boat to take us on the two hour ride down the Mekong to Don Khong the only island with electricty (and much missed air conditioning). We spent a night there and wished we had a couple more days as it had a relaxing, yet different (slightly nicer) vibe than the backpacker hangout of Don Det.

Photo: View from our guesthouse on Don Khong

Photo: K after breakfast on Don Khong

We booked a bus ticket back to Pakse (had to spend one more night so we could catch our flight the next day) and the travel agent booked us on a “VIP” bus.... This bus certainly would not make any VIP happy – they packed a bus meant for 12 people with about 18…..everyone was extremely cranky about the situation and we all gave the guy who shoved us into this bus (for a 3 hour long ride back) a nasty look as he smiled and waved us off……On the way back to Pakse we encountered a huge rainstorm and the bus had to stop for about a half hour as it was raining so hard! It was not the best way to end our time in Laos, but overall we had a great time in the country. The people were generally very relaxed and friendly, the food good, and the scenery beautiful. We left Pakse the next day bound for Siem Reap, Cambodia and the great Temples of Angkor.

Photo: View from our middle seat on the VIP bus

Photo: Rain storm on the way to Pakse

From Thailand to Laos

2009-03-16T04:45:00.000-07:00

February 8-19, 2009

Photo: Bear made of rice in Chiang Mai

We arrived in Chiang Mai on Sunday, which is normally a fairly dull day to arrive in any city. Chiang Mai was a pleasant exception, as each Sunday they have the Sunday walking street. A large central street is closed to traffic and converted into a seemingly endless market that also branches off and spills over to small side streets, creating one of the more impressive markets that we’ve seen. Despite the many creative handicrafts, our only purchases were culinary. We tried sweet sticky rice that was wrapped in sugar cane and a drink with a sweet black jelly-like substance in it. We managed to resist trying the crickets and silkworms!

Photo: Sunday Walking Street in Chiang Mai

Photos Above: For sale at the Sunday Walking Street

The next morning, we went on a tour of the city that took us to many of the city’s beautiful temples. The temples were quite ornate and beautiful. In and around the temples we observed many monks dressed in bright orange robes.

Photos Above: Temples of Chiang Mai

We were inspired by all the great food we'd been eating so decided to sign up for a cooking class. The Siam Rice Cooking School picked us up for class early the next morning. Our first top was the market where they taught us about and purchased the different ingredients we would be using that day.

Photo: T cooked this chicken in coconut milk soup and Pad Thai

Photo: Some in our class were more skilled at carrot carving than others...

We prepared fried spring rolls (surprisingly easy) and Pad Thai (more difficult than it looks), as well as tom yam soup and chicken in coconut milk soup to start out. T and K each added copious amounts of fresh green chili to their food. We then took a break to eat our creations which turned out, to our relief, to be quite good – the soups were quite spicy. After our first two courses we prepared green papaya salad and glass noodle salad as well as basil chicken and cashew nut chicken, all of which turned out great (though the basil chicken was a bit too sweet and syrupy tasting)! We took a welcome break to try our hand at carving garnishes out of carrots. Our leaves and flowers won’t win any artistic awards, but we still have all of our fingers and a new appreciation for carrot carving!!

Photo: K making curry paste

Next we prepared our curries, one green and one red. It gave us a whole new appreciation for curry. We prepared each curry from scratch, no pre-made curried pastes for us! We never realized how many ingredients go into a curry, all finely chopped and then laboriously crushed using a mortar and pestle, it was actually a lot of work. At the urging of our instructors we added a shocking amount of green chili. After finishing the curry paste, we prepared the curries. Upon adding the curry paste, a cloud of spiciness engulfed us and we had to deeply inhale some fresh air before finishing our dishes. The final product was delicious. Still incredibly spicy, but tempered by the addition of creamy coconut milk. Our final courses were desserts of sticky rice and pumpkin in coconut cream. They also turned out quite nicely and provided a sweet end to the whole experience.

Photo: T's red curry with chicken

The next day, we left Chiang Mai to fly to Luang Prabang, Laos aboard Lao Airlines, whose slogan, “You’re Safe with Us” created the opposite of the desired effect. As our prop plane touched down, we let out a small sigh of relief. Any stress from the flight instantly melted away as we entered Luang Prabang, one of the most charming towns we’ve visited with a beautiful location on the Mekong River. The slightly faded French colonial architecture provided a relaxing atmosphere. We were also quite impressed with local food, which benefited from the area’s French influence. Baguettes and crepe stands were everywhere, sometimes taking on a decided Laos influence as well, with creations like crepes with pandan custard and tropical fruit.

Photo: Luang Prabang night market

Photo: Main street in Luang Prabang

One evening we climbed to the top of Mount Phousi and enjoyed a wonderful view of the sun setting over the Mekong and the town below. Afterwards, we enjoyed some of the better pizza we’ve had in Asia along with Beer Lao, which is surprisingly good.

Photos Above: Views from Mount Phousi

Photo: T in front of the night market - Luang Prabang

Photo: Street stalls selling food in Luang Prabang

Photo: Boats on the Mekong River - Luang Prabang

Photo: K in front of a typical house in Luang Prabang

Photo: Many motorbikes in Luang Prabang

The next day we visited Kuang Si Falls, a series of beautiful waterfalls in a pleasant park area. We really enjoyed hanging out in Luang Prabang and could have easily spent a month there, but it was time to move on to Vientiane.

Photos Below: Tat Kuang Si Waterfall

Mumbai and Bangkok

2009-02-18T07:55:00.000-08:00

January 28-February 8, 2009

We departed from the Abu Dhabi airport from a section of the terminal with an especially “ambitious” design. It felt a little like being inside a giant green reptile. We left the modernity of Abu Dhabi for the chaos of Mumbai, a mix of cultures and architectural styles, much of it in need of a renovation. Our drive from the airport took us by some of Mumbai’s slums which house a majority of the city’s population before arriving in the Churchgate section of town where we would spend our first couple of nights. We took the opportunity to explore the surrounding area and reacquaint ourselves with some of our favorite Indian foods – we were having some withdrawal after a month away! We walked across town (it’s very narrow as it’s a peninsula which resulted from connecting several islands together) to see Gateway of India and the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower, currently under renovation after the recent terrorist attacks. From the Taj Mahal Hotel, we walked into Colaba, a section of town which contains many guesthouses, cafes and shops and whose tree-lined streets and colonial architecture offered a charming decaying grandeur. We decided to make this our home for the next few days.

Photo: Abu Dhabi Airport

Photo: Streets of Mumbai

Photo: Gateway of India

Photos Below: Indian media does not follow road sign instructions - they spent a half hour discussing rumors of a potential Baby Obama

Photos Above: Taj Mahal Palace

We enjoyed simply hanging out for a couple days. We did some shopping, watched another Bollywood film, Luck By Chance, and enjoyed some great Indian and western food. We also walked along Chowpatty beach from which we could see downtown Mumbai in the background. After a nice drive through the neighborhood of Malabar Hill, we briefly visited Baganga Tank and next explored Dhobi Ghat, an area where huge amounts of laundry is handwashed and line dried. Mumbai is not a city full of typical tourist type activities, so the rest of our time here was just spent enjoying the city. Mumbai has a wonderful energy to it; it’s packed to capacity with people who seem on the go. It reminded us of New York in many ways and we felt very comfortable in the city. We new we’d miss Mumbai, but were also excited to be heading to Bangkok.

Photo: View from Gateway of India

Photo: Chowpatty

Photo: Road signs in Mumbai

Neither one of us was quite prepared for just how developed Bangkok is. We stayed just off of Sukhumvit Road, which is lined with a large number of large modern shopping malls. We’re both big fans of Thai food, so we went to a nice dinner our first night in town, and the food did not disappoint. On the way back from dinner we walked through the strip of neon-signed bars known as Soi Cowboy, though decided to take a pass on getting a drink at any of them, as the bars were veritable meat markets. Our second day we headed to Khao San Road to sample a little bit of the backpacker scene and street food for which the area is famous. It was remarkable how many western travelers were in the area – not that we thought we were the only ones traveling in Thailand – but it was still somewhat of a shock. We spent the evening on Khao San Road enjoying the ambiance and cheap Pad Thai.

Photo: Soi Cowboy

Photo: Khao San Road

Photo: Pad Thai for sale on Khao San Road

Photo: T liked the Pad Thai

Photo: Khao San Road at night

The next day we relaxed and visited a section of town specifically known for its street food. The food, especially the mango with sticky rice was fantastic. The following day, we visited the Chatuchak Weekend Market, an enormous outdoor market. After walking around the market for a couple of hours, we had literally just scratched the surface.

Photos Above: Food from the Soi 38 Night Market

Photos Above: Chatuchak Weekend Market

Photo: View from the Bangkok Skytrain platform

We enjoyed our time in Bangkok, but decided it was time to head north to Chiang Mai and that we will explore more of the city when we return later in our trip.

Photo: Flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai - almost empty!

Skiing in the UAE

2009-02-11T04:17:00.000-08:00

UAE - January 21-28, 2009

We’ve decided to fast forward the blog since it is about two months in arrears. We loved our time in India and plan to post about it once the blog is current. Here is a quick rundown of our activities since the last blog post - After leaving Agra we visited Jaipur and Delhi before boarding a train to the beautiful desert town of Jaisalmer. We spent a couple of weeks in Rajasthan and after Jaisalmer we took a train to Jodhpur and a private car to Udaipur (the city with the famous Lake Palace). We flew from Udipur to the south of India visiting Kochi, Alleppey, and Goa. The south was beautiful and felt very different than northern India. The cows on the beach were really something to see….

Photos: Cow on the beach in Goa

On December 22 we flew from Goa back home to the States. We had a connection in Mumbai and the flight from Mumbai to Newark alone was 16 hours….we spent the holidays with our families and it was great to see everyone, even if we were jet-lagged for much of our time at home (T is sorry for sleeping through XMas dinner!). After Christmas we flew down to Cancun, Mexico and spent a couple weeks relaxing before T’s sister’s wedding on the Mayan Riviera of Mexico. The wedding was at a beautiful resort and the ceremony took place right by the water on a beautiful day. We left Mexico bound for California and spent a very fun week in San Diego and West Hollywood catching up with some of our oldest and dearest friends.

Photo: View from our hotel room in Cancun

After a wonderful week in California (during which our friends Tara and Noey managed to get us tickets to Boyz II Men (did you see them on the Grammys?), Brendan and J.P. hosted their first dinner party in their beautiful new home for us, and Alison and Jo-Ann flew all the way from Birmingham, Michigan to see us) we had a very long journey from LAX to Dubai, United Arab Emirates….this is where we pick up.

Photos Below: Ski Dubai

We arrived in the UAE after two connections from LAX and were quite exhausted by the time we checked into our hotel. This was great though because the flight actually arrived at 7pm so we quickly fell asleep. We awoke early the next morning for a delicious breakfast in our hotel (Dubai is known for its buffets) and then went to Mall of the Emirates. Mall of the Emirates is quite nice and we did a bit of shopping before trying something we’d always wanted to do….indoor skiing! We’d read all about Ski Dubai when it opened and even watched a documentary about its construction on the Discovery Channel so were very interested to see what all the fuss was about. Included in the admission price was a coat, ski pants, ski boots, skis and 2 hours of skiing. They claim to have 5 different runs, but honestly, they really only had about 2 true runs (each of about 400m). It was actually very cold on the ski slopes and the snow halfway decent! We had a lot of fun skiing all the runs (except the snowboarder jump run) and would have been sad to leave except for the fact that our hands were freezing cold because we didn’t have any gloves!

Photos Above: Ski Dubai

Photo: K at Mall of the Emirates

The following day we decided to do one of those Big Red Bus tours around Dubai – it was actually quite nice because Dubai does not have a mass transit system in place (yet) so one really has to take a taxi everywhere and some of the sights are quite far apart. The tour really gave us a sense of the massive building project that is Dubai – a huge percentage of the worlds construction cranes are currently in Dubai and the city looks like a giant construction zone! We had a chance to see most of the major sites including the Burj Al Arab Hotel (supposedly the only seven star hotel in the world), Burj Dubai (tallest building in the world), the Dubai Mall (supposedly the largest mall in the world sprawling over 12 million square feet), Ski Dubai, The Palm Jumeirah (artificial islands in the shape of a palm tree), the Dubai Museum and the Old Souk. Another fascinating project they are constructing is called The World Islands (artificial islands creating an outline that looks like a global map).

Photos Above: Burj Al Arab Hotel

Photo: Atlantis, The Palm

Photos Above: Burj Al Arab Hotel

Photo: Construction on Palm Jumeriah

One thing that really surprised us about Dubai was the number of foreigners living there; 90% of the residents are foreign! Walking around one of the malls one might think he or she was in New York, it is amazingly diverse, yet still under the strict rule of the Al Maktoum dynasty. Though it didn’t seem to be as conservative as we thought it might be, internet access and the media are strictly censored.

Photo: Dubai

Photo: Burj Dubai

Photo: Old Souk in Dubai

Photo: Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai

Photo: Our unique hotel room at the Al Manzil Hotel

We spent our third and fourth days in Dubai shopping at the Dubai Mall and WaFi. We have never seen a city with so many malls…

Photo: K at the Dubai Mall

Photos Below: Burj Dubai

Photo: T on the Big Red Bus

Photo: Dubai Creek

On our fifth day in the UAE we took a bus from Dubai to Abu Dhabi. Abu Dhabi also appears to be a construction zone, but it does not yet have the same attractions as Dubai (but was quite a bit more expensive than Dubai, probably because there are far fewer hotels in Abu Dhabi than Dubai and most cater to business travelers). Again we spent some time at the various malls including Marina Mall. We passed by the Emirates Palace Hotel and spent a bit of time walking the Corniche.

Photo: Abu Dhabi

Abu Dhabi before flying back to India. This time to Mumbai….Overall we are very happy we had a chance to make a quick visit to the UAE – a very impressive place overall. Unfortunately it is lacking many of the freedoms found in the West, though many are willing to give up those freedoms temporarily for tax free earnings in the UAE!

Agra and the Taj Mahal

2009-01-23T23:11:00.000-08:00

November 23, 2008

Photo: The Taj Mahal

Photo: This porter carried BOTH of our suitcases on his head at the Varanasi train station!

After an overnight train ride we arrived in Agra. We were a bit exhausted so took a shower and relaxed a bit at the hotel before heading off to the Taj Mahal. After waiting for about an hour in a VERY long line we discovered a side entrance to the famous monument and got in right away. It was just as amazing as we’d expected and we took about a zillion pictures, only a fraction of which we have posted below
.

Photo: Line to get into the Taj Mahal

Photo: The Great Gate - Gateway to the Taj Mahal

Photos Below: The Taj Mahal

Photo: Taj Mahal Mosque

Photo: Visitors waiting in line to get inside the Taj Mahal

Photos Below: Taj Mahal

Photo: The Great Gate (Darwazi-i-rauza)

The following morning we woke up before sunrise to visit the beautiful Agra Fort. Because it was so early in the morning we basically had the entire fort to ourselves. From the fort we watched the sun rise over the Taj Mahal….it was a great way to start the day! Later that day we boarded a bus bound for Bharatpur.

Photo: Agra Fort before sunrise

Photos Above: Views of the Taj Mahal from Agra Fort

Photos Below: Agra Fort

Varanasi

2009-01-14T16:30:00.000-08:00

November 20-22, 2008

Photo: Boy selling floating candles at the ghats in Varanasi

India was quite a shock. We thought we would be more prepared after spending a few weeks in Nepal, but upon arrival it was quite apparent that India was quite a bit more chaotic than Nepal. There appeared to be no traffic rules, garbage was all over the sides of the road, and people traveling in all sorts of vehicles and bicycles provided a steady stream of near accidents. Upon arrival in Varanasi (after a very long drive) our bus actually hit a guy on a motor bike! Lucky for the guy on the motor bike the bus only ran over the motor bike and his life was spared, but it was quite an introduction to India.

Photo: K buying bananas after arriving in India

Photo: View from the bus

Photo: The Ganges River

We had a great dinner at our somewhat isolated hotel and then awoke early the next morning, before sunrise, to go down to the ghats. Varanasi is the spiritual heart of India. It sits on the banks of the Ganges River and thousands of pilgrims bathe themselves at the ghats. Unfortunately, the river is also very polluted.

Photos Above: The ghats

Photo: Merchant on the Ganges

We took a boat down the Ganges and watched as the fog lifted and revealed many people cleansing themselves in the river, believing that water from the Ganges cleanses away all sins. Because Varanasi is such a sacred city many people come here right before death, believing that dying in Varanasi ends the cycle of death and rebirth. For those who cannot afford to make it to Varanasi, they often have their ashes scattered in the river. It was both fascinating and sad to see cremations, carried out by family members of the deceased, taking place on the banks of the river.

Photo: The Ganges River

Photo: Streets of Varanasi

Photo: Community in Varanasi

Photo: Silk weaver

Photo: K and T at Ramanger Fort

The following evening we took a boat back to the ghats and were able to witness some of the nightly rituals performed in front of hundreds of people. Afterwards we had to walk through the incredibly chaotic streets of Varanasi. We were quite paranoid as we knew from experience that traffic would not stop for us and were almost run over a few times before making our way back to the hotel.

Photo: Musical entertainment on our night cruise

Photos Above: Nightly rituals at the ghats

Photo: Streets of Varanasi

Video: Chaotic Varanasi

The following day we took a tour of the city via auto rickshaw. This was our first auto rickshaw ride, and quite an experience. Our driver took us all over the city to visit certain temples and we also had a chance to go see Banaras Hindu University, which was quite calm and a nice change from the overwhelming chaos of the city (at least up until T was mobbed by a group of very inquisitive school children visiting the university).

Photo: View from the back of the auto rickshaw

Photo: K at Banaras Hindu University (our auto rickshaw behind him)

Photo: T at Banaras Hindu University

Photo: Vishwanath Temple

Photo: Raised-relief map of India in the Bharat Mata Temple

After our tour we were off to the train station. We boarded an overnight train headed for Agra, home of the Taj Mahal.

Three Weeks in Nepal

2009-01-08T23:42:00.000-08:00

November 1-November 20, 2008

Photo: Crossing the Sino-Nepal Friendship Bridge from China into Nepal

The drive to Kathmandu was beautiful. Nepal is so green and warm compared to China and we enjoyed the dramatic change in temperature!

Photos Above: Drive to Kathmandu

Chaotic Kathmandu was quite a shock after leaving serene China. The whole city had very little order, with motor bikes, rickshaws, cars and people all attempting to make their way down the narrow streets. We stayed in Thamel, the tourist section of Kathmandu. Thamel was also quite a shock after leaving China as it was full of westerners and had all types of different restaurants and bars. While we were there we had everything from Middle Eastern to Mexican cusine – and most of it was quite good! Apparently, Thamel is also the place to go if you want knockoff North Face gear!

Photo: Street in Kathmandu

One of our first tasks in Kathmandu was to get our Indian Visa. It seemed easy enough we thought, India is right next door to Nepal and we assumed that many people get the Indian Visa from Nepal and therefore the process would be quite smooth….oh how wrong we were.

Photo: Strings of Marigolds sold in the market in Kathmandu

Photo: Streets of Kathmandu

Photo: Durbar Square in Kathmandu

If anyone else out there plans to get an Indian visa in Nepal, we urge you to reconsider….apparently the Indian Embassy only lets in 60 people a day, so people start lining up at the embassy between 5 and 7am. After waiting in line for a couple of hours they let us into the embassy just so we could take a number and wait another hour for the employees to show up…..after they showed up we had to wait another couple of hours simply so we could fill out a “telex form” with our name and address and hand it to one of the guys at the embassy window…..”come back in 2 days” he told us. Great, so we had to repeat the process 2 days later, but this time we had to fill out a longer form and pay a fee…..after 10 hours at the embassy we thought we’d finally have the visa, but the man at the window told us to “come back this afternoon between 4 and 6” to pick up the visa. We arrived at about 4:30, but they were not finished with any of the visas and made us wait 2 more hours, along with 60 other people before finally calling out our names and handing over the completed visas. We spent about 12 hours at the Indian embassy over the course of two days, but in the end we got the visas and were quite happy to be finished with the process.

Photo: View from a restaurant in Kathmandu

Photo: We were very happy to see Obama win while we were in Kathmandu!

During the time we were awake and not at the Indian embassy we also made it to Swayambhunath (aka the Monkey Temple). The temple comlex is quite a hike up a large staircase and, as the name suggests, is full of monkeys. It was a fun sight to see, though we were a bit afraid of the monkeys!

Photo: We climbed these steps to get to the Monkey Temple

Photo: View of Kathmandu from the Monkey Temple

Photo: Monkey Temple

After a few days of soaking up the atmosphere in Kathmandu we decided to take the bus to Pokhara. We bought tickets from what was supposed the be the “luxury” bus line, even the name “Golden Travels” sounded, well, about as nice as a bus company could get in Nepal so we were slightly disappointed when the bus turned out to be about 50 years old with no leg room and seats in front of us which reclined almost fully into our laps….the ride was quite beautiful though and we managed to get some sleep after our 7am departure.

Photos Above: Drive to Pokhara

Pokhara turned out to be a cute little town, on a beautiful lake surrounded by snow capped mountains. We spent our time there enjoying some of the great food in town, boating on the lake (T and K trying to steer a canoe was quite a funny sight to the locals) and we also took a hike up to the World Peace Pagoda

Photos Below: Pokhara

One of our favorite places was a steak house (yes, really steak!) called Everest Steak House – we must have gone 3 times over the course of a week. They served great huge cuts of fillet – it honestly rivaled some of the steak meals we’ve had in NYC, but at less than ¼ the price! Really we loved Pokhara and it was a great place to come for a week to relax after the chaos of Kathmandu.

Photo: Cows in the street in Pokhara - a common sight

Photo: K in the canoe in Pokhara

Photos Above: Phewa Lake

Photo: K on the hike to the World Peace Pagoda

Photo: Dinner at Everest Steak House - not exactly a light meal

We took the Golden Travels bus back to Kathmandu where we saw some interesting sights we’d missed the first time we were there. One morning we visited Pashupatinath Temple, the most famous Hindu temple in the country, located on the banks of the holy Bagmati River. The temple was very interesting to see – there were Hindu holy men (sadhus) meditating and pilgrims bathing. However, it was also somewhat disturbing as we saw funeral pyres burning on the ghats. These were actual cremations and the funerals were held outside before they cremated the body. Neither one of us had ever seen anything like this, and we left deep in thought about the fleeting nature of life…..

Photo: For sale in Kathmandu

Photos Above: Pashupatinath Temple

We also had a chance to visit the Bodhnath, one of the biggest Buddhist shrines in the world. It was quite amazing and surrounded by shops and restaurants. The street surrounding the stupa appeared to be the cleanest in Nepal!

Photos Above: Bodhnath Stupa

The following day we got back on a bus, this time en route for Chitwan National Park. Unfortunately we had a completely insane person on our bus who first claimed the bus was on fire (it wasn’t) and then threatened to kill a lady on our bus! We will not go into the disturbing details of this man’s rant, but it was enough to freak us out. Luckily we had to change buses halfway through the trip and the crazy man got on a different bus.

Photo: Twin elephants at the elephant sanctuary near Chitwan National Park

We arrived at the village of Sauhara on the Terai, settled in and then had a nice dinner with our new friends Carolyn, Michael and Taryn. We all decided to go on a “jungle safari” the hotel arranged for us the following day. We took a great canoe ride in a canoe make out of a hollowed out tree and saw some interesting birds, including the Kingfisher. The hotel made promises that during the jungle safari we would wee many wild animals and maybe even a tiger so we were quite disappointed when the most exciting things we saw were some red bugs and some monkeys after hours of trekking through the hot jungle!

Photo: K and T in Chitwan National Park

That afternoon we took an elephant ride – we actually rode on the top of of an Indian Elephant! It was a pretty neat experience, and riding an elephant was a much easier way to get through the jungle than dodging the brush! During the ride we saw a couple Indian Rhinos. The ride was definitely the highlight of Chitwan.

Photo: T and K with our elephant

Photo: Indian Rhinos

The following day we took a long ride out to the border town of Sonauli. On the way we stopped at Lumbini, the birthplace of Prince Siddharta Gautama - founder of the Buddhism. After a tour of the actual building where the Prince was born we were off to Sonauli. We have nothing good to say about Sonauli….it was full of dust, dirty and the food was awful! It is kind of a depressing town, but we spent the night there before riding rickshaws to the Indian border.

Photos: Birthplace of Buddha

Once at the Indian border we had quite a problem. Upon arrival in Nepal we were issued a 15 day visa. We pointed out to the immigration agent that we needed a longer visa because we were going to be in Nepal for more than 15 days. He told us there would be no problem and we would just have to pay $2/day for every day we overstayed the visa. Apparently this is not true at all. We spent about an hour sorting the whole thing out and after quite an ordeal finding a copy center near the border and making sure we had enough money we paid $45 each for a visa “extension” (which took up another FULL page in our passports!). They did let us out of the country though (phew) and we arrived in the country we’d been quite nervous about visiting….Welcome to India…..

Photo: Indian Border

Tibet - Monasteries and Mount Everest

2008-12-10T02:25:00.000-08:00

October 27-November 1, 2008

Photo: Mt. Everest

We left Lhasa for Gyantse, on what was supposed to be a beautiful drive, winding through some high mountain passes and around mountain lakes. Unfortunately, the weather was cold, cloudy and snowing, so instead of beautiful mountain passes, we had a somewhat nerve-wracking, snowy drive. We arrived in Gyantse to yet more snowfall – it turned out to be a record Tibetan snowfall. When we checked into our hotel, we noticed that it felt a bit chilly. We later learned that the hotel was choosing not to use its heat because “heat is expensive,” so we checked into an alternate hotel (evidently we’re quite fussy). Basic necessities addressed, we explored the town which left quite a bit to be desired – the first restaurant we ate at also was not using heat – what is it with this town!? The next day, we explored both the Pelkor Chode Monastery which was quite beautiful and climbed to the top of the fort located on a large hill in the town, which afforded great views of the surrounding area.

Photos Above: Views of the fort in Gyantse

Photo: Gyantse

Photo: This Place Danger

Photo: Pelkor Chode Monastery

After a surprisingly good lunch at a Szechuan restaurant, we eagerly left Gyantse for Shigatse, a much larger town a couple hours away.

Photos Above: Gyantse

Photo: T's lunch in Gyantse

In Shigatse, we visited Tashilhunpo, a huge monastery complex containing a twenty-six meter high, gold-plated statue of the future Buddha. We’ve started to become accustomed to the constant smell of yak butter – as all of the monasteries burn yak butter as the fuel for their candles. It has a heavy aroma that you really don’t forget. It’s not entirely unpleasant, but definitely makes an impression. We then walked around the kora, a path lined with prayer wheels that surrounds the monastery. The views from the kora were fantastic and the sunshine and clear skies were a very welcome change from Gyantse.

Photo: Tashilhunpo

Photos Below: Kora walk at Tashilhunpo

We left Shigatse for the small town of Sakya. After a quick visit to Sakya Monastery, we set out to explore the town. We were now in small-town Tibet and off of the tourist circuit. We walked the length of the town, stopping in a local internet café (lots of monks playing on-line video games – slightly surreal), through a local nightlife area (a surprising number of bars for such a small town) and past a local school (the Tibetan kids made us feel like quasi celebrities). After dinner we took a walk to enjoy the view of the stars, then decided to explore the local nightlife. We briefly visited a dance club, though quickly left as everyone else there was staring at us, not in a bad way, just in a way that made us feel incredibly self conscious! We then ended the night at a Tibetan karaoke bar with a decidedly more relaxed feel. We had a great time in Sakya, but were still anxious to leave, as our next stop was Everest Base Camp!

Photos Above: The drive to Sakya

Photos Above: The drive to Everest Base Camp

We were excited to go to Everest base camp, but also a little nervous. Although we had both done alright with the altitude, Everest base camp is over 5000m high and we would be spending some time there. The drive there was truly amazing. We wanted to pull over every 5 minutes to take pictures of the varied and stunning landscape. Still a couple hours away from base camp, we pulled over at one of the higher places along the drive. We then had a short hike to the crest of a hill which offered us our first great views of Mount Everest. It was spectacular. The peaks of the Himalayas were lined up before us on a perfectly clear day. It was amazing to take in and we could have spent all day there, but we had to tear ourselves away as we wanted to get to base camp while we still had daylight. The rest of the drive was equally, if not more beautiful. Then we arrived. We climbed a small hill, which was surprisingly tiring at this altitude, it really gave us a lot more respect for those who have climbed Everest. At the top of the small hill, we had a completely unobstructed view of Everest. After taking a copious amount of pictures – we really couldn’t taking way too many photos, we relaxed and took it all in. The immensity and beauty of the mountain are inspiring. It was hard to believe that we were really there and not seeing the image on a postcard or in a documentary. It’s an image that we’ll always remember.

Photos Above: Everest Base Camp

We next descended to Nyalam via the Friendship Highway, a small town on the border of Tibet and Nepal. The drive was a constant descent from the high altitude of Tibet and offered great views, but was probably the most dangerous and scary road we’ve ever been on. The road was unpaved in most sections, almost always lacked guardrails, was subject to landslides, and was on the edge of a cliff that dropped off several hundred feet. Despite being a large truck transport route between Nepal and China, the road was not always wide enough to accommodate two-way traffic. We were extremely relieved when the drive was over. After a night in Nyalam, we completed the drive to the Chinese border. At the border we passed through customs and crossed the ravine on foot via the Friendship Bridge. We were sad to be leaving China, but happy to arrive in Nepal.

Photos Above: The drive to Nepal

Photos Above: Nyalam

Beautiful Tibet

2008-12-01T00:20:00.000-08:00

October 24-26, 2008

Photo: Potala Palace

After a long sleep we had a chance to see the beautiful city of Lhasa. Lhasa sits at almost 3,700 meters above sea level and the Tibetan center of town was much more picturesque than we’d expected and also much cleaner! We walked through the center of Tibetan Lhasa (many Han immigrants have migrated to Lhasa recently) and stopped at the Jokhang Temple. The Johang Temple is the spiritual heart of Tibet and many religious pilgrims travel long distances by foot in the extreme Tibetan weather so that they can visit this sacred place.

Photo: Potala Palace at night

Photo: Johang Temple

Photo: Religious pilgrims at Johang Temple

Photo: View from atop the Johang Temple

Photo: T and K at Johang Temple

Photo: T at Johang Temple

After our tour of the temple we explored the small streets filled with markets and T and K visited a couple lesser known monasteries. We also had the chance to sample some of the staples of the Tibetan diet that would constitute our meals over the next week – yak meat, yak dumplings (momo), yak butter, yak butter tea and tsampa, a mixture of barley flour and yak butter tea. Yak really plays a large role in the Tibetan diet. Fortunately for us, tourist restaurants also provided some more familiar options, as there really is a limit to the amount of yak one can eat.

Photo: Streets of Lhasa

Photo: Prayer wheels in Lhasa

Photo: Yak Butter

The following day we visited first visited the amazing Potala Palace. The Palace dominates the Lhasa skyline and can be seen from all over the city. We hiked up the long staircase and a guide gave us a nice tour of the Palace.

Photo: Potala Palace

Photo: View of Lhasa from the Potala Palace

That afternoon we drove out to Ganden Monastery. Ganden Monastery was closed after the riots in Tibet preceding the Olympics and only reopened to the public the day before we arrived. The drive out to Ganden was beautiful and we traversed a winding uphill mountain road all the way up to 4,750 meters. The monastery sits at the top of a mountain with a commanding view of the surrounding countryside. After a brief tour of the monastery, during which we were blessed with the shoes of a former dalai lama (the monk blessed K by flogging his back with the shoes with surprising force – maybe he thought K needed extra blessings), we took the low kora around the monastery, it was a bit of a hike, but we were rewarded with spectacular views of the Tibetan landscape – these monks really know how to pick great locations!

Photos Above: Ganden Monastery

Photo: T on the low kora

Photo: Bridge on the way back to Lhasa

Photo: Namtso

We had one final day in Lhasa and decided to take the long trip out to Namtso, the highest salt water lake in the world, about 5 hours away from Lhasa. The drive, though long, was worth it as it wound through spectacular scenery including many snow capped mountain peaks. Namtso is a beautifully clear blue lake surrounded on all sides by snowy mountains. At 4,718 meters above sea level it was our highest destination yet. Religious pilgrims also trek out to Namtso, and we passed a number of them on the drive out – they looked cold . . . . After a couple of hours we made the long drive back to Lhasa, passing over a 5,186 meter pass on the way back.

Photos Below: Prayer Flags at Namtso

Photos Below: More pictures of Namtso

The following day we left Lhasa, but hope to return to this beautiful city one day.

Photo: T at Namtso

Terror in India

2008-11-27T05:30:00.000-08:00

Just a quick update to let everyone know we are doing just fine. We've been in India for a little over a week and our original flight was scheduled to leave Mumbai today, November 27 for Bangkok- talk about bad timing! Fortunately we changed that flight about a week ago and are currently safe and sound (though a bit shaken by the whole situation) in Delhi. We spent last night in Jaipur, far from where the attacks occurred. We are going to stick with our new plan and stay in India until we go back to the States for Christmas. We realize that we are way behind with respect to this blog and plan to post an update soon!

Journey into Tibet

2008-11-10T07:07:00.000-08:00

October 19-23, 2008

Photo: Tibetan Plateau at sunrise

We left Shanghai and returned to now familiar Beijing. Well, it was familiar except for the pollution problem! We noticed almost immediately upon return that the air was thick with smog making it more difficult to breathe and drastically reducing visibility. Apparently the Chinese government really did make an effort to clean up the pollution during the Olympics!

Photo: One of our favorite markets in Beijing

We came back to Beijing because we wanted to take the train across China into Tibet. China imposes a number of restrictions on travelers in Tibet. To get there we had to have a permit and be in a “group” – so we joined up with our group, consisting of two other people and our tour leader. Since the tour started in Beijing we visited some of the major sites we’d seen the last time we were in Beijing, including the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, and the Great Wall. However, though we went back to the Great Wall we visited Mutianyu, a different section of the wall (complete with cable cars and a slide!) which was a bit further away from Beijing than the Badaling section.

Photos Below: Mutianyu section of the Great Wall

While in Beijing we also had a chance to visit the Sanlitun Bar Street area, full of small bars and restaurants and we took in a Tibetan cultural show – K even got dragged into the Tibetan conga line!

Photo: K on Sanlitun Bar Street

Photo: K at the Forbidden City

After a couple of days in Beijing we left the relative comfort of our hotel room for the six bunk sleeper car we were to call our home for the next 48 hours. Though the bathrooms were pretty dirty and the dining car was usually closed, the train ride went by surprisingly quickly. The stunning backdrop made up for the somewhat cramped quarters and lack of showers. The train from Beijing to Lhasa is actually quite new, only opening in July 2006.

Photo: Engineers switched to a special high altitude engine on the second day

Photos Above: Views from the train journey (click to enlarge)

Photo: Our home for two days!

Photo: View from the train

Photo: K in the dining car

Photo: K on the train

The train ascends the Tibetan plateau and as it gets higher it releases oxygen so that the effective altitude is reduced for passengers. Well, reduced until we got off the train in Lhasa. Lhasa has an elevation of 3,650 meters (12,000 feet) and we certainly felt the effects of altitude at first. K and T occasionally felt short of breath and got headaches until we adjusted. Tibet is beautiful and we will post more pictures of our trip soon.

Photo: T at the train station in Lhasa...2 days without a shower!

Return to China

2008-10-27T18:33:00.000-07:00

October 14-19, 2008

Photo: Shanghai

We left Kuala Lumpur for a return trip to China. Our visa allows us to enter China twice and we thought the weather would be much nicer at this time of the year than during the Olympics. This time we flew into the huge metropolis of Shanghai. We took the Shanghai Maglev Train from the airport to the center of town. The Maglev runs at speeds up to 268 miles/hour and we arrived in the center of Shanghai in about 8 minutes.

Photo: On the Maglev Train

Photo: We loved the lights in Shanghai

Photo: Dinner at Crystal Jade

Our hotel was in the center of the city and we took the first night to explore and do a bit of shopping. The first thing we noticed was that there are FAR more homeless people/beggars in Shanghai than we saw in Beijing during the Olympics. Some of them were quite aggressive and one ran down the street screeching at K! Also, the city felt much more pedestrian friendly than Beijing. Beijing is broken up by huge roads, and though Shanghai has many large roads, we didn't see anything on the scale of the roads in Beijing.

Photo: Nanjing Road

Photo: K in Shanghai (JW Marriott in the background)

Photo: Hmmm.....

We spent five nights in Shanghai and had a great time sampling the local cuisine (well, we also consumed quite a few Subway sandwiches as we've been deprived for months) and great nightlife. People in Shanghai seemed more cosmopolitan and were far more into fashion than most of the people we saw in Beijing. We also spent some time exploring the Bund, shopping on Nanjing Road and spent a day at Yuyuan Garden. We were evens suckered into spending 100yuan so we could go through a "tourist tunnel" to the Pudong district on the other side of the river. The tourist tunnel is billed as the China's only tourist tunnel – and in our opinion hopefully the last! It was a tunnel basically full of Christmas lights, it was pretty cheesy but we had a good time.

Photos Above: Oriental Pearl Tower

In Shanghai we finally found a durian. The durian was quite delicious and didn't smell as bad as everyone told us. We ate it in the shadow of the Orient Pearl Tower before returning (via the tourist tunnel) to the other side of the river.

Photo: Durian

Photo: K in the Old City

Photo: Yuyuan Garden

Photo: Nanjing Road

Overall we were thoroughly impressed with Shanghai and had a great time. The skyline is really beautiful and the city has a great energetic buzz. In many ways, it reminded us of being in New York. We wish we'd had more time to explore, but we needed to get back to Beijing so we could catch our train to Lhasa, Tibet.

Photo: T and the Shanghai (Pudong) skyline at night

Singapore and Kuala Lumpur

2008-10-21T13:00:00.000-07:00

Singapore: October 7-11
Kuala Lumpur: October 11-14

Photo: Petronas Towers

T&K left the pleasant island atmosphere of Bali for the modernity of Singapore. We arrived in Singapore and sailed through immigration in what was record time – literally no line! Singapore has a reputation as clean, modern and efficient and it met these expectations. With good public transport, inexpensive flights, internet everywhere and all signs in English it was one of the easiest cities we've visited. We stayed just outside the neighborhood of Little India which comes to life at night and provides a wealth of wonderful restaurants serving a variety of Indian food, which served as a staple of our diet throughout our stay.

Photo: Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles

Photo: Singapore skyline

Our first full day we visited the Central Area of Singapore. We enjoyed the modern skyline of Singapore and explored the waterfront along the Singapore River which is packed with restaurants and bars. We were shocked at the price of beer. It's rare that we long for New York prices, but the prices were an unwelcome change from Bali. As the workday ended, many officeworkers emerged and downtown Singapore felt less sterile and more like a busting city. Outside one skyscraper a mass outdoor aerobics session was underway, which appeared to be open to the public. It was humorous to imagine the same thing occurring outside of our workplaces. Well maybe not as hard to imagine for T as just outside of his office lies the circus that is Times Square. Afterwards, we browsed some of the shops in the nearby area and commenced our search for durian. We had heard a lot about durian fruit of which people almost always have strong opinions. It's noted for a fragrance that many find offputting, though an equal number swear by the taste of the fruit. Sadly, we couldn't find it anywhere!

Photos Above: Modern Singapore

Photo: Singapore River

The next day we shopped along Orchard Road with its incredible stretch of retail and reveled in the wide selection of nearly anything one could want, quite a contrast to the small towns of Bali. Later we strolled through the Singapore Botanic Gardens, including its noted orchid garden. The orchid garden was immense, beautiful and educational (who knew that vanilla comes from a type of orchid). The amount of effort that must go into maintaining the orchid garden alone must be astronomical.

Photo: Orchard Road

Photos Above: The Singapore Botanic Gardens

Photos Above: The National Orchid Garden

On our last full day in Singapore we set out for the Raffles Hotel, Singapore's most famous hotel and the place where the Singapore Sling was invented. The colonial style hotel provides a sharp contrast to the modern skyscrapers of the city. Afterwards we wanderer through Chijmes, a converted abbey that now houses restaurants and lounges, before returning to Little India for one last delicious feast.

Photos Above: Raffles Hotel

Photo: Chijmes

The next morning we left Singapore for Kuala Lumpur. The different neighborhoods of Kuala Lumpur displayed remarkable incongruity. We visited the ultramodern downtown (with a many malls, bars, and luxury shops), Chinatown (a nearby somewhat run-down area close to many historic sites), and the clean but old colonial part of the city.

Photo: Our favorite mall in KL

On our first full day we set off for the Petronas Towers, which at 1483 feet dominate Kuala Lumpur's skyline. The towers are impressive to see in person. We spent the day shopping at the mall inside the Petronas Towers and at an electronics mall in search of a new camera for T.

Photos Above: Petronas Towers

The next we went to the KL Tower, the fifth tallest tower in the world. The KL Tower is surrounded by a park that is a section of preserved rainforest. We did not realize we'd have to climb what seemed like a thousand steps in the hot and humid weather in order to get to the KL tower, but the views were worth the climb. Afterwards we rushed back to the electronics mall to buy a camera we'd seen the day before. Unfortunately we got caught in a huge thunderstorm and arrived at the mall soaking wet! We did get a great new Panasonic Lumix though and are quite happy with the purchase. Early the next morning we set off for the airport and arrived in Shanghai, China.

Photo: KL Tower

Photo: Views from the KL Tower

Photo: Colonial section of KL

Photo: Sultan Abdul Samad Building

We’re currently back in Beijing, but are leaving tonight for a 48 hour train ride across the into Tibet. We may not have internet access for a while, but will update again when we can.

Escape to Bali

2008-10-12T23:18:00.000-07:00

September 12 - October 7, 2008

Photo: Sunset at Seminyak Beach

The stock market crashed today. Or maybe yesterday. I can’t be sure. Perhaps it’s the 12 hour time difference, but I don’t think so – I think it’s Bali, which has a wonderful way of making the rest of the world seem very distant, including any stresses. To say Bali is relaxing doesn’t really communicate what it’s like; it has to be experienced.

Photos: Surfers at Kuta Beach

We began our trip to Bali, Indonesia in the town of Kuta. Kuta is probably the most developed tourist area on the island, full of restaurants, bars and knock-off Dolce & Gabana stores – not just stores that carry knock off goods, but actually have signs indicating the name of the store is Dolce & Gabbana (we saw at least 3 and we only explored part of the town). It’s full of young Aussies out for a good time. Our hotel was located away from the main entertainment area of town, which was nice as it provided a more relaxed vibe and was a great introduction to accommodation in Bali. Bali hotels have at least two wonderful customs, a welcome drink upon arrival and inclusion of a full breakfast each morning of your stay, almost always offering, in addition to a main course, fresh fruit and Balinese coffee. Balinese coffee is deliciously thick as the coffee grounds are not filtered, but instead remain in the coffee. We had a great time in Kuta, including checking out some of the local tourist bars and clubs, trying arrack (a local Indonesian liquor) and Bintang (the local beer), but after a few days of partying with Australians the time came to see some more of Bali.

Photo: K and T at a Kuta bar

We continued north along the coast to Seminyak, just a short trip away– we could literally have taken a long walk on the beach to travel between the two. Despite its close proximity, Seminyak has a very different feel from Kuta. In place of all-you-can drink bars, it has relaxed lounges, instead of Aussies looking to party, it’s more couples and friends looking for relaxation and instead of fake D&G stores the main road is filled with boutiques (well, there was one fake D&G store). We only intended to stay in Seminyak for a couple of days, but the Bali inertia had set in, and we kept extending our stay, finally spending about a week there.

Photo: Seminyak Beach

Next, we set out for Yea Gangga beach, about an hour north of Seminyak and much less developed. Besides our small hotel and another hotel a short distance down the beach there was little commercial development in the area. We enjoyed the relaxation of the place and had an early dinner on a deck overlooking the ocean. We also saw the first of several bats we would see on the island, which was slightly creepy at first until we got used to seeing it swoop through the space illuminated by an overhead light, decimating the local insect population. It was fascinating to watch it clear out an entire swarm of bugs over the course of a few minutes – well, maybe not fascinating, but as mentioned there really was not a whole lot of nightlife in Yea Gangga. After one night of Yea Gangga we returned to Seminyak. We had wanted to get off the beaten path, but perhaps we went farther off the beaten path than we intended. Yeh Gangga was peaceful, but a little remote – people were washing their cows in water from the ocean a ways down the beach.

Photo: Yeh Gangga Beach

We intended to stay in Yea Gangga Beach for at least a couple of nights. Unfortunately, the first night we were there T got very sick with a fever of 103 degrees! We stayed the night but checked out the next day and had to head back to Seminyak because that area has the best expat hospitals. Though far more expensive than what locals normally pay, we needed assurance T would get better. After a huge dose of antibiotics T began to feel better, but we stayed in Semanyak to recover. It was a good thing we stayed because soon after T started to feel better K got extremely sick with a high fever and also had to go to the hospital! Again, a dose of antibiotics was the key to his cure. Being sick in a foreign country is probably one of the scariest things that can happen while traveling. We never missed home quite like when we were quite sick and finding quality medical care is not always easy. We were lucky to be only two hours away from a good hospital when T initially got sick.

Photo: We spent a lot of time at this hospital

After we both finally recovered, we left Seminyak and decided to head to the center of the island to peaceful city of Ubud.

Photo: View from our bungalow in Ubud

Photo: View of rice paddies from our resort in Ubud

The drive to Ubud was beautiful. We passed through a variety of scenery including terraced rice paddies and lush tropical vegetation. Ubud is a center for much of the traditional craft works of Bali, including wood carving and stone cutting, in addition to being a center of the modern Bali arts scene. It’s more traditional and less focused on nightlife than other areas of Bali that we visited. We mostly relaxed, explored the town, and enjoyed the great local restaurants. We also tried brem, another locally produced liquor, which it fermented from rice. There’s nothing good to say about brem and we hope you never have to drink it.

Photo: Rice paddies at our resort in Ubud

While in Ubud, we visited the Ubud Monkey Forest, which is, well, filled with monkeys. Lots of monkeys. Monkeys that are NOT afraid of tourists. Within a few minutes of entering the park, we saw a monkey remove a bad of chips from a tourist’s bag, run with it to the trees and tear it open for a monkey group binge. Only partially deterred, we explored more of the park, only to have our own monkey encounter. A monkey saw K’s bottled water and it seemed to catch his attention. K quickly moved away from the monkey and kept walking. The monkey refocused its attention on T – also with bottled water. As the monkey rapidly pursued T he decided the only way out of the situation was to abandon his water. The monkey’s victory was complete, and he opened the water bottle and celebrated with a drink!

Photo: Monkey Forest - so many monkeys!

Photo: T with a baby monkey

Photo: Monkey examining the water bottle he stole from T

Photos Above: Rice paddies on the way to Lovina

We left Ubud for Lovina Beach, a collection of small villages on the north coast of Bali. The drive to Lovina, was slow and winding, as we drove around the volcanoes of Bali. We could feel the temperature drop dramatically as we climbed in elevation along the volcano and through the clouds trapped on its slopes. As we descended, we could feel the return of the heat, in fact as we reached Lovina, it was hotter and drier than in Ubud. Lovina is wonderful – it was the Goldilocks of Bali for us, the perfect balance between the extremes of Kuta and Yeh Gangga – just the right blend of conveniences, with several good restaurants and nice accommodation, while maintaining a relaxed atmosphere that didn’t seem overdeveloped. We enjoyed several great meals (including Jasmine Kitchen, a fantastic Thai restaurant, which we shamelessly ate at three nights in a row), took some pleasant walks along the black sand beaches (unfortunately the sand is very hot in the sun) and completely relaxed. While in Lovina we also discovered a beautiful chess board at our hotel restaurant and played quite a few games.

Photos Above: Lovina Beach

K also took T out Damai, one of the nicest restaurants in Bali for his birthday on September 29. We had a fantastic 6 course tasting menu (which included three desserts each!!). It was quite reasonable compared to what a similar meal in NYC would cost, but seemed like a fortune after most of the meals we’d been consuming (an average meal in Bali cost about $3USD!). After spending five days in Lovina, we reluctantly moved on to Candi Dasa on the east coast of Bali.

Photo: Just two of our many desserts at Damai

If the drive to Lovina had impressed us, it had not prepared us for the breathtaking scenery of the last portion of our drive to Candi Dasa, which progressed in under an hour from desert to volcano to palm forest to terraced rice paddies, all within a short distance from the coastline. After arriving, we worried that we had made a mistake in leaving Lovina, as Candi Dasa did not possess quite as much initial charm as Lovina. Despite our initial hesitations, we greatly enjoyed Candi Dasa. We found some truly great spots to relax, along with a couple of very good restaurants for such a small town. Parts of the coastline afforded spectacular views of nearby islands with a pleasant and near constant breeze. It was the perfect end of our trip to Bali with the emphasis entirely on relaxation.

Photo: View from our bungalow in Candi Dasa

Photo: K at Vincent's in Candi Dasa

Photo: Chess game at Vincent's

We left Candi Dasa for the airport in sheer disbelief that three weeks had gone by while we enjoyed Bali. We really don’t know where the time went. We had a wonderful time in Bali and loved the local people. The Balinese were always smiling and incredibly friendly – we’ve never encountered what appears to be such a happy group of people. We can’t wait to return one day (we’re crossing our fingers that the stock market goes up!)…though next time we hope to avoid the hospital!

Photo: Aquaria - our favorite restaurant in Candi Dasa - we ate here three times!

After Bali we flew to Singapore and spent a few days there. We flew out of Singapore yesterday and are now in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We visited the Petronas Towers today. Having a great time and will update soon.

Photo: View of the lagoon in Candi Dasa

Shopping in Hong Kong and Gambling in Macau

2008-09-23T00:26:00.000-07:00

Photo: View of Hong Kong from Victoria Peak

We left China and flew back to Hong Kong. Somehow as we were checking in for our Dragonair flight to Hong Kong, the computer randomly gave us free access to the airport lounge. It was a nice way to end the trip sipping wine and eating chocolate! Unfortunately, once we arrived in Hong Kong our hotel informed us that it had lost our reservations. We made the reservations through Travelocity, and we’ve had the worst time with customer service at Travelocity. It was a bit of a hassle, but at least the hotel upgraded us to a nice suite with two bathrooms.

Photo: K in the Dragonair airport lounge in Beijing

After we arrived in Hong Kong, K picked up his custom made suit. It looked very nice and so he decided to have a custom tuxedo made as well.

Photo: K's new suit

Shortly after arrival in Hong Kong, we decided to check out Macau because we’d heard so much about it. It is touted as the Asian Las Vegas so decided to see what all the hype was about. To get to Macau from Hong Kong Island one needs to board a hydrofoil for a 45 minute trip to Macau. Macau, like Hong Kong, is a Special Administrative Region of China, meaning they have their own laws and government apart from mainland China so we needed to go through customs. After we got through customs, we took the shuttle to our hotel and then had some time to explore.

Photo: Hydrofoil to Macau

Photo: Arrival in Macau

Photo: K in front of the Wynn

Macau is clearly going through a transformative process. Many areas of the city still feel sort of dirty and dilapidated. The older casinos are filled with smoke and lack slot machines. However, the new casinos are quite amazing and judging by the number of construction projects there will soon be many more casinos in Macau! We spent quite a lot of time at the Wynn (and lost quite a lot of money in the process!). The Wynn was quite nice, with a number of restaurants and a large casino floor. We also spent some time at the MGM Grand – the gaming area is nice, but not quite as nice as the Wynn (though parts of the non-gaming area are very impressive), and StarWorld, a beautiful hotel, but with a surprisingly small casino. In addition we stopped by the Casino Lisboa and the Grand Lisboa, both pretty impressive from the outside, but lacking some of the extravagance of the newer hotel/casinos.

Photo: T at the MGM Grand

Photo: MGM Grand

Photo: The Grand Lisboa

The following day we took a taxi to the adjacent island to see the Venetian. The Venetian was built at a cost of $2.4 billion USD, and quite honestly, the Venetian is the most spectacular hotel and casino we’ve seen in our lives. It is far more extravagant than any hotel in Las Vegas and absolutely enormous (it the third largest building in the world with more floor space than four Empire State Buildings and the casino is more than three times the size of the largest casino in Las Vegas). The area around the Venetian is also being developed quickly and there are signs for new casinos and hotels around every corner.

Photo: Exterior of the Venetian

Photo: Shopping mall inside the Venetian

Photo: Construction all around the Venetian

Photos Above: Inside the Venetian

We won back a little of the money we’d lost at the Venetian on a Wheel of Fortune game. Satisfied with our winnings we left soon after.

Photo: The winning ticket

Back in Hong Kong we were able to go up to Victoria Peak for a beautiful view of the skyline. We also visited Stanley Market and took a boat tour of a community of house/fishing boats. It was strange to see how many people live on fishing boats in the middle of modern Hong Kong. However, the government is trying to relocate the fishermen so that it can fill the area to create more land for condos and office buildings.

Photo: People live and fish on these boats

Photo: View of Hong Kong from Victoria Peak

We also went out to the restaurant and bar filled area of Soho. Soho was really cute and full of expats. Our favorite thing about Soho though was not the bars or restaurants, but the escalators we took to get there! Hong Kong actually has a series of escalators in the middle of the city called the Central-Mid-Level Escalators. These escalators transport people up and down the hills of the city, to and from work. Many people live up in the hills and the escalators go all the way down to the financial center of the city. We’ve never seen anything like it before!

Photos Above: T and K on the Escalators

Our final days in Hong Kong we spent shopping, along with an excursion to Lantau Island, home of the Tian Tan Buddha (the largest outdoor, seated, bronze Buddha in the world). To get to the Buddha we took an amazing cable car ride on Ngong Ping Cable Car. This is by far the longest and most impressive cable car ride we’ve ever taken stretching 5.7 km each way. Once we arrived at the top we walked though the small town set up for tourists (including a Starbucks) and walked up the long set of stairs and into the Buddha itself. The exhibit inside the Buddha was interesting, but admittedly, we didn’t really understand exactly what was on exhibit except for some paintings created using blood?!….regardless, it was cool to go inside the giant Buddha and we even received free water and ice cream included in the price of our admission ticket!

Photos Above: Views from the Ngong Ping Cable Car

Photo: Big Buddha

Photo: T in front of the Big Buddha

Photo: K on Lantau Island

Overall we had a great time in Hong Kong again. We may return once again to do some shopping for upcoming travel. On our final day in Hong Kong we made the quick decision to abandon our plans to travel to Malaysia and booked a one way ticket to Bali on AirAsia. Having a wonderful time relaxing here in Bali and will update the blog soon.

Beijing - Ancient and Modern

2008-09-15T03:35:00.000-07:00

Photo: Chairman Mao's portrait greets visitors at the Forbidden City

We decided to stay in Beijing an extra week because the Olympic venues were just about the only thing we’d really seen in the 10 preceding days. In addition we wanted to get a feel for the city post Olympics and maybe venture off the well manicured path China had paved for our Olympic experience. However, after the Olympics many of the same restrictions were in place with respect to pollution and traffic in preperation for the Paralympics.

Photo: Tiananmen Square

Our first stop was Tiananmen Square. When we think of Tiananmen Square, sadly the first thing that comes to mind is the massacre of the pro-democracy protesters in 1989. The huge plaza today is a huge tourist attraction for most visitors. An Olympic athlete happened to be in the square at the same time we were there. The Chinese are not shy with the camera – first one person noticed her, then another and another until the lady was swarmed with Chinese tourists taking pictures of her! As we walked around the square a girl approached us and asked if she could take a picture with us – this is pretty common in Beijing, but then another person asked….and then another…and another….we literally had to run away from the photographers because we were afraid we might be posing with Chinese tourists all day!

Photo: K in Tiananmen Square

The next day we went to the Forbidden City….well we attempted to go until we were stopped by a “professor of Art” at a “local university” – he convinced us to go to his shop to take a look at the paintings by “professors” and “students” – when we didn’t want to buy anything he claimed that the shop was going to close and a truck was going to pick up the paintings because it was only a temporary exhibit. He also claimed all the money raised from the sale of paintings was going to his students to fund a trip to New York – ha! We think at this point we’re pretty savvy travelers, but this student/professor scam fooled us….on top of it all he gave us the wrong directions to the Forbidden City! Of course he was out at the same place the next day – when he saw us he looked away and clearly tried to hide!

Photo: Houhai Lake in Beijing

We did eventually make it to the Forbidden City. It is a pretty amazing place. It is the largest surviving palace complex in the world and consists of 980 buildings. We were there for a few hours, but it closed before we could see the whole complex.

Photos Above: The Forbidden City

The following day we ventured out to the Badaling section of the Great Wall, stopping at the site of the Ming Tombs along the way. We hiked along this section of the Great Wall to its local summit – and as far as the path would allow us. The steps were generally large and uneven, not many people made it to the top, but we were determined - very tiring in the summer heat, but also very satisfying. The Great Wall was interesting to see, but even in person it’s hard to appreciate the scale of it, since you can only see one very small section of the whole. Strangely the Great Wall was actually much smaller than we'd expected. It’s certainly narrower than we expected, with some sections being less than a couple meters wide. We’re looking forward to seeing a different section of the Great Wall on our trip back to China in October to see whether it changes our perspective.

Photos Above: The Great Wall of China

Photo: View from a tower on the Great Wall

During the week we visited a number of other interesting sites including the Temple of Heaven, the Pearl Market, Summer Palace, Lama Temple (an active Buddhist temple), and Beihai Park.

Photo: K outside the Temple of Heaven

Photo: Temple of Heaven

Photo: Prayer wheel at the Lama Temple

In addition to the historic sites, we also explored the 798 Art District. The 798 art district consists of the many, many galleries and studios along with cafes, restaurants and shops that occupy what were once military factories on the outskirts of Beijing. It was really interesting to be able to explore part of Beijing’s local art scene and to experience the contrast to the other parts of Beijing we saw which alternated between historic (traditional) and modern (but in a manner that seemed at times to be self-consciously conforming to Western standards of modern). Being in the 798 art district had a very different feel from the rest of the city, unexpected and unique. We had a great time visiting a bunch of galleries.

Photo: Cafe in the 798 Art District

Photo: Creepy exhibit in the 798 Art District

Photo: T inside a piece of art

Photo: We enjoyed these green tea smoothies

On the drive out to the 798 Art District we passed by many of Beijing's newest skyscrapers. Below see some of our favorites. T took these photos from the window of a taxi....

We had a couple of interesting food experiences. First we attempted to go to a noodle restaurant our TimeOut guidebook recommended. We searched the street for the restaurant, and finally realized that the name of the restaurant was only in Chinese – we walked in and discovered that the menu was also only in Chinese! We took a gamble and pointed to a couple of Chinese dishes in a blowsup of a newspaper article they had on the wall and were pleasantly surprised! For about $3USD (for two meals) we enjoyed a wonderful meal of spicy noodles and beef noodles….the atmosphere left something to be desired, but the food was fantastic!

Photo: The noodles were fantastic

Though we thought TimeOut should have at least MENTIONED the lack of English sign or menu, we were so thoroughly pleased with the food that we decided to try another recommendation…this time for Peking Duck. TimeOut recommended a restaurant located deep within a hutong. We set out to find the place but without much luck because the hutong streets were small, dark, and confusing. However, after a few attempts making elaborate gestures at Chinese locals, trying to indicate Peking Duck restaurant (this is not easy) we found the place. Thinking we were adventurous and had found some kind of hidden gem, we were disappointed to see the place was full of westerners and the prices were just about as expensive as the most famous Peking Duck restaurant in Beijing! Again, the atmosphere was pretty bad, but the food was quite delicious and we had a fun time just finding the place.

Photo: Peking Duck

Photo: Ice Cream Mooncake - this one was green tea ice cream covered in white chocolate

Overall we had a wonderful time in Beijing. It was incredible to be in what felt like the center of the world during the Olympics. The city was clean and new and the people very friendly. The country has a sense of anticipation for the future that is hard to express. People seem hopeful and happy at how far the country has come in such a short period of time.

Photos Above: Summer Palace

Photo: Beihai Park

After Beijing we flew back to Hong Kong and spent about a week there. Our plan was to go to Malaysia, but after looking at the terrible weather conditions we changed our plans and booked a flight to the the beautiful Indonesian island of Bali! We’re currently in Bali (have been here for three days) and having a wonderful time. Also, we have some exciting news! It looks like we will be back in the States for Christmas. T's sister is getting married in Mexico in early January so we thought we'd fly back for Christmas before going to Mexico and then the plan is to come back to Asia after the wedding. We miss our friends and families and are looking forward to seeing you in January!!

Photo: T outside the Forbidden City

Hong Kong - Welcome to Asia

2008-08-29T00:21:00.000-07:00

Photo: View of Hong Kong Island from the Star Ferry

After a nearly 14 hour flight we arrived in Hong Kong on August 9. Hong Kong seemed huge and modern compared to South Africa. The city has quite beautiful surroundings, including green hills with steep slopes. We chose to stay on Hong Kong Island, near Times Square. It was a nice introduction to Asia as most people speak English and the culture shock was managable as the city feels quite western. T and K traveled to Japan while we were in law school and think that Hong Kong has a similar feel to Tokyo with huge skyscrapers dominating the city and a very dense population.

Photo: K in front of Victoria Harbor

Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China. This means Hong Kong has many of its own laws, seperate from those of mainland China - it even has its own currency. We didn't need a Chinese visa to get into Hong Kong, but needed one to go from Hong Kong to Beijing.

Photo: Equestrian Olympic events were held in Hong Kong

We slept, relaxed and read books quite a bit while in Hong Kong - adjusting to the time difference from South Africa proved difficult. We also took the opportunity to do some shopping. Over the course of 5.5 months some of our clothes were showing the wear and tear of travel and we managed to lose 90% of our socks....Hong Kong gave us a chance to replenish our supply of socks. The city is a bit broken up by large roads, but has addressed the problem with an extensive series of tunnels and bridges. Many of these tunnels have shops, leading to the impression that the city is connected by one giant mall. We were able to walk all over the city using these mall tunnels! This was nice because the weather was quite warm and humid.

Photo: View of Hong Kong Island from the Star Ferry

Photo: K at IFC Mall

Besides shopping we did take some time to explore the city. We figured out how to take the Star Ferry across Victoria Harbor from Hong Kong Island to Kowloon. We took the ferry across the harbor at night and took in the stunning views of the city.

Photo: T and K tried this pastry with egg yolk in the middle

Photo: T at Kowloon

Hong Kong has a beautiful and well developed subway system (called MTR). The system is very inexpensive and puts the NYC system to shame. All the stations were air conditioned, electronic signs indicated how long until the next train arrived, the trains never stopped between stations and every train was clean and felt new. They also have a great system called "Airport Express" - we used Airport Express to check our bags bound for Beijing in the center of Hong Kong before hopping on the Airport Express Train en route to the airport. It was so nice not to have to deal with our bags at the airport.

Photos Above: Views of Hong Kong Island

We enjoyed our time in Hong Kong so much we plan to go back for another 5 days or so before we leave for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We are still in Beijing and having a great time. We've extended our time in China until at least next week and may stay even longer (though our Chinese visa expires after 30 days). Will update soon!

Photo: Hong Kong skyline

Saying Goodbye to South Africa

2008-08-28T08:08:00.000-07:00

Photo: View of Franschhoek from the mountains

We’re still in Beijing and have been busy here exploring the city after the Olympics and visiting the numerous interesting sites, but want to finish up our trip to South Africa before we forget what we did.

Photo: The drive to Franschhoek

After leaving the cramped quarters of the train in Mossel Bay, we took a long, but beautiful drive to Franschhoek. Along the way we passed rainbows, had some beautiful views of Franschhoek from the winding mountain roads, and encountered a family of baboons along the road. Franschhoek is a cute little town filled with gourmet restaurants and encircled by mountains and vineyards. The town clings proudly, perhaps a little too proudly, to its Huguenot heritage - nearly all the guesthouses and vineyards assuming French names. The Huguenots were responsible for the introduction of vineyards to the region. We didn’t book any accommodation in advance, and therefore had to drive around for a couple hours once we arrived as every hotel and guest house seemed to be booked. We finally stumbled upon an inviting cottage. The cottage had a private pond and was surrounded by orchards. We spent the afternoon wine tasting at Mont Rochelle. That night we spoiled ourselves and ate at Monneaux, one of the best restaurants in town – we indulged in porcini mushroom risotto with truffle oil, spring rolls, duck confit, lamb shank, flourless chocolate cake and, of course, a local cabernet. After dinner we relaxed around our fireplace at the cottage.

Photo: View of Franschhoek from our drive

Photo: Rainbow during our visit to Mont Rochelle

Photo: Our cottage in Franschhoek

The following day we woke up and headed to Boschendal for some wine tasting. We each ordered a tasting and it was more than enough (see our tasting below)! We let the wine digest for a while and then drove to the nearby town of Stellenbosch. Stellenbosch is a bit larger town, also famous for its surrounding vineyards. We arrived on the last day of the Stellenbosch Wine Festival and so decided to check it out. Almost every vineyard in South Africa was represented at the festival. Upon arrival we received a wine glass and proceeded to have many samples of wine from the various booths…..everyone in attendance seemed to be having a good (maybe too good?) time…including us…

Photo: Tasting at Boschendal

We only stayed in Stellenbosch for a day and then drove along the coast to charming waterfront village of Simon’s Town where we explored Boulders Beach (famous for its African Penguins), had lunch (some of the best tomato soup we’ve ever had at a restaurant called The Meeting Place) and set off for Cape Point. Along our way, we encountered a family of baboons in the road forcing traffic to come to a halt. The baboons, however, had much more mayhem in mind, running up to the car in front of us and snatching a bag out of the open car window – we’ve never seen anything like it and felt really bad for the owner of the purse! At Cape Point we saw the famous lighthouse, the Cape of Good Hope, more baboons, and took in the breathtaking surroundings before heading back to Simon’s town for the evening.

Photo: Boulders Beach

Photo: Our favorite signs at Boulders Beach

Photo: Penguins at Boulders Beach

Photo: Bamboons stole these items from a car

Photo: K at Cape Point

Photo: More baboons at Cape Point

Photo: T and K at the Cape of Good Hope

Photo: K at the lighthouse

Though we’d already been to Cape Town, there were still a number of things we wanted to see before leaving South Africa. We stayed in de Waterkant Village again and booked our third cottage there! This one was an agreeable two bed, two bath cottage decorated in a fairly classic (Pottery Barn-ish) style. It was nice to have such a large space again.

Photo: View from the Table Mountain cable car

During our first visit to Cape Town the cable car to the top of Table Mountain was closed, this time it was open and we were able to go up to the top. The cable car actually rotates in a circle as it lifts you to the top. We were lucky the day was clear and the views were incredible. Once we reached the top of Table Mountain we explored part of the very large park on its summit and took in the varied outstanding views from the different sides of Table Mountain. As the typical afternoon clouds started to roll in, providing the “tablecloth” to Table Mountain, we descended back to town before returning home to make another home-cooked meal, something of a rarity for us on the trip.

Photo: View from the cable car at Table Mountain

Photo: K at the top of Table Mountain

Photos Above: Views from Table Mountain

We also had a chance to take the ferry out to Robben Island, just off the coast of Cape Town. Robben Island is where the Apartheid government kept its political prisoners (including Nelson Mandela). We had an informative and very moving tour of the island and the prison (the prison tour was given by a former prisoner – only former prisoners are allowed to be guides in the prison). We also learned a great deal about what life was like on the island. Our guide actually continues to live on the island and his next door neighbor was a former guard in the prison. The country clearly still has a lot of healing to do, but it really does seem to be trying to move in the right direction.

Photos Above: Views of Table Mountain from the ferry to Robben Island

Photo: Nelson Mandela's prison cell

Photo: View of Cape Town and Table Mountain from Robben Island

While in Cape Town we also did a bit of shopping downtown at the Pan Africa Market on Long Street, cooked some great dinners in our huge kitchen and simply soaked up the atmosphere of this beautiful town.

Unfortunately, our time in Africa came to an end. We were sad to leave South Africa and it is probably the most beautiful country we’ve visited on this trip and for the month we stayed the weather was almost perfect. Though it has a number of problems, the government appears to be doing its best to solve the poverty and crime issues and to try to integrate the different segments of society. We are sure we’ll be back again.

Photo: The V&A Waterfront

The day of our departure we woke up at about 5am, went to the airport and, after a bit of confusion returning the rental car and a short layover in Johannesburg (which must have the most confusing airport ever), we boarded our Cathay Pacific flight bound for Hong Kong.

One World - One Dream

2008-08-24T05:14:00.000-07:00

Photo: Statue at the Olympic Green

We’ve had an amazing time over the past 10 days here in Beijing. The Olympics were a spectacular success (as the media repeats over and over and over again here – at the same rate we hear about how China won more gold metals than the United States and how it is the envy of the world) - and we are so happy to have had the opportunity to be here during this historic time. Security was very tight, the subways crowded, and hotels expensive, but things flowed much more smoothly for the most part than we expected and almost everyone here has been very friendly and helpful. The weather has also been much better than we expected. We’re not sure if the good weather was luck or whether we can attribute it to anti-cloud cannons and rocket launchers.

Photo: Water Polo

Videos: Rhytmic Gymastics

Photo: Rhythmic Gymnastics

Photos Above: Men's Decathlon

We were also so happy to have our friend Rachel here. Believe it or not it has been about 4 months since we’ve seen anyone that we know! We had a great time and some wonderful meals with her family (including spectacular dumplings, surprisingly good beef tendon and delicious hotpot) – we also experienced a bit of the Beijing nightlife together. One of our favorite experiences was the night we went out for a hotpot meal. Basically the waitstaff brings out trays of food (in this case, including lamb, beef, fishballs, squidballs, shrimpballs, tripe, blood, tofu, bokchoy, greens and noodles) and you dip the food in a pot of boiling broth (either spicy, medium spicy, or not spicy – T went for spicy and it was great)! The noodles were “hand pulled” in an artistic fashion (see video below). The food, including the blood which kind of tastes like gravy in a more solid form, was fantastic and the company a pleasure. All was made even more fun because Rachel and her mom taught us the Chinese toasts of “ganbei,” which roughly translates to “bottoms up,” and “suiyi,” which means “as you wish” (i.e. one likely just takes a sip). Unfortunately for our table, “ganbei” is far easier for T and K to pronounce. A fun night was had by all.

Photos Above: Hotpot dinner

Video: We loved this noodle guy

The city has clearly been transformed. Modern architecture, good restaurants, honest taxi drivers and very little noticeable pollution apparently are all new developments here! The volunteers were quite amazing as well – there were about 40,000 of them and they were super helpful – many of the young people here speak English. Sadly for the volunteers many of them never had a chance to even see the Games, or the Olympic Green as they were not offered any tickets to events or even the ability to see the Olympic Green (if they were stationed outside of it).

Video: The volunteers were helpful, but a bit creepy...

Photo: We ate this....it really was self-heating.....

Photo: We went a bit crazy at the Superstore (and paid a cover fee to get in)...

Photo: Exhibit in Tiananmen Square

On August 23 we saw Argentina’s soccer team (football team to the rest of the world) win gold at the Bird’s Nest. Afterwards we braved the Olympic Superstore – and spent quite a lot of money there! We’ve decided to stay in Beijing for about another week as we’ve been so busy going to the Olympic Games we haven’t had a chance to see any of the traditional attractions here. Will update soon!

Photo: Subway crowd on the way to the Olympic Green - insane!

Photo: In the Bird's Nest

Photos Above: Gold Metal Soccer match and metal ceremony

Photos Above: Views from the Bird's Nest

Beijing - Olympics

2008-08-20T08:49:00.001-07:00

We've been in Beijing since August 10 - though we still have a number of updates with respect to South Africa and Hong Kong we thought we'd post some pictures of our time here at the Olympics. We've had events every day and feel very lucky as many tickets are selling here on the black market for 10 to 20x their face value.

Video: GREAT weightlifting video - our favorite

The games are absolutely amazing, as is the city - everything seems to be new. The entire city looks like it was built within the past 10 years. Clearly China has put a tremendous amount of effort into the games and we are extremely impressed. China built hotels, subway lines, and the Olympic Green (huge and beautiful) as well as office buildings and apartment buildings. The experience is absolutely incredible - everyone is EXTREMELY nice to us - many offer us their seats on the subway and many people want their picture with us! Surprisingly we have seen very few foreigners here. The entire city has Olympic Fever (basically it is all they talk about on the English news channel and signs are everywhere). We have 12 events here and have had a great time with our friend Rachel and her family (thank you Rachel for two WONDERFUL events!). Cabs are a great deal - a 20 minute ride only costs about $4USD - try to get that in NYC! The games and the city are very impressive and we doubt anyone will ever host an Olympics even close to this scale again. We'll write more about our time here soon - posted some pictures below.

Photo: Track and field - All USA metal winners

Photos Above: 110 M Hurdle

Photo: K at the Bird's Nest

Photos Above: Bird's Nest

Photo: Beijing 2008!!

Photos Above: Bird's Nest

Photos Above: Today - Beach Volleyball

Photo: Today - Kayak/Canoeing

Photo: Basketball venue

Photos Above: Trampoline Gymnastics

Photo: Water Cube

Photo: Beijing Dream Girls

Garden Route - South Africa

2008-08-06T09:26:00.000-07:00

Photo: Jeffreys Bay

After reluctantly saying goodbye to the safari lodge we returned to Port Elizabeth (where we paid for everything with cash after K’s credit card incident) and rented a car (and actually won some money at the casino!). We originally intended just to drive west along the Garden Route to return to Cape Town, but our newfound sense of freedom upon finally having a car inspired us to go east, appropriately enough to Kenton-on-Sea, a small, “Sunshine Coast” beach town on some truly remarkable coastline. The drive took us through both beautiful countryside and absolute poverty in small towns like Alexandria. After a relaxing evening at a B & B (that strangely enough didn’t serve us breakfast) and some good pizza at a seaside restaurant, we decided to start our trip along the Garden Route . . . but we weren’t quite ready to give up on safari, so we took a detour to Addo Elephant National Park.

Photo: The Boardwalk - where K's CC # was stolen and we won some $$

Photo: Kenton-on-Sea.....kind of scary for K....

Photo: T at Kenton-on-Sea

We arrived at Addo Elephant National Park around 1pm. Now during our earlier safari, the game drives were always very early in the morning or late in the afternoon, and though we thought at the time the safari schedule might have been cruelly designed to test T & K’s ability to wake up early (doubly cruel by providing open bar in the evenings), maybe there was something to it after all. We saw very few animals. …Well, we saw quite a few warthogs, but they started to lose their charm, as well as a couple of ostrich and a sleeping lion. When one goes to Addo Elephant National Park and doesn’t see any elephants, one does start to feel a little bit let-down. As late afternoon was approaching and we still needed to find a hotel, we decided to loop through one final area of the park before leaving the park. Thank goodness we did as we saw an elephant in the distance. After driving towards him, we stumbled upon another couple of elephants drinking at a watering hole. After seeing these elephants, we felt that the trip was somewhat saved and decided to call it a day. Then on our way out, we saw a very large group of elephants, up close. After watching them at a watering hole, we decided that it was really time to leave since the park was closing fairly soon. On our drive out, we saw many additional animals, including bushbuck and kudu. Just before we left the park, we saw a couple black-backed jackals, which was exciting as we had not seen any during our previous safari. So it turns out the safari lodge was right, you really should do your game drives either early in the morning or late in the afternoon. We called the day a success, leaving just as the park closed and then decided to head to Jeffreys Bay.

Video: Addo Elephants

Photos Below: Addo Elephant National Park

Jeffreys Bay is a charming surf town on the Sunshine Coast, particularly known for surf friendly waves. It was also our introduction to the world of unofficial parking attendants. These parking attendants “watch” your car for you. No really – they insist that they will watch your car for you and you give them some nominal amount of money when you return to the car - some crazy hybrid between panhandling, guilt and a shakedown – it’s just a bizarre experience, and something we’ve never encountered outside of South Africa.

Photo: K at Jefferys Bay

After arriving in Jefferys Bay we went to a surprisingly good Mexican restaurant – K gave them extra points for not only making their guacamole without tomatoes but also expressing surprise and a little bemusement that anyone would think that tomatoes would be in guac (for those that don’t know K hates tomatoes)…. The next day we took in the beach, bought our first gasoline in South Africa (or for the last 8 months for that matter) – wow it was expensive at 10.50R/liter – and left Jeffrey’s Bay for Storms River, a tiny little town in a particularly mountainous and leafy part of the Eastern Cape. Storms River is really a two or three street town, at most, and you could easily see the entire town in 15 minutes. In Storms River we relaxed in the peaceful setting and enjoyed a delicious dinner (more bobotie for K and for T a chicken pie/pastry type dish). The next morning we drove to the Bloukrans Bridge.

Photo: Drive to Storms River

Photo: Our accommodation in Storms River

The Bloukrans Bridge which runs over the Bloukrans River is the highest single span bridge in the world, and more relevantly is the highest commercially operated bungee jump in the world, at 216 meters over the Bloukrans River. K decided that this was definitely the place to take his first bungee jump (T decided this was definitely the place to take a video of K taking his first bungee jump)…. K was a little nervous when he walked out on the catwalk with the other jumpers, and unfortunately was to go last in his group. Watching the other people only made it a little scarier. When K’s turn came, it was remarkably easy to jump . . . and then came the falling. First couple of seconds – you’re thinking this is just like a really fun roller coaster, no big deal. Next couple of seconds – oh my gosh, this is not at all like a roller coaster, you just keeping going faster. Final second or two, it starts to feel a little more normal – then the bungee cord starts to reel you in. The cord slowing you down works quite smoothly, and before you know it you’re headed back up and then back down, bouncing. It was a great experience – and K wanted to jump again, but that will have to wait for another time, as T and K wanted to go to Plettenberg Bay.

Photo: K before the bungee

Video: The jump!

Photos above: K's bungee jump (can you see him?)

On the way to Plettenburg bay we stopped by Monkeyland and Birds of Eden - really cool places and much nicer bird watching than our previous bird "sanctuary"....however T was stalked by parrots and then attacked by parakeets.....

Photos Above: MonkeyLand and Birds of Eden

Of all the towns we visited in South Africa, Plettenberg Bay is one of our favorites. The coastline and views from the surrounding hills are striking. Our first evening we ate at Steers, a South African fast food chain with surprising good grilled chicken, and wished that they would come to the U.S., then tried some South African beer and cider while playing air hockey in a bar. It was obviously a night of high culture. The next day we had a delicious brunch, which was actually a traditional English breakfast (eggs, bacon, grilled tomato, grilled onions, mushrooms and toast) – which is served in many restaurants in South Africa. Sometimes T and K felt that the South Africans act more stereotypically British than the British.

Photos Above: Our whale and dolphin boat ride

After brunch we went on a whale and dolphin watching boat ride. We watched right whales mating, or at least what looked like mating or courting, as they rubbed against each other, then hundreds of dolphins swimming by and jumping up through the waves. It was all against a backdrop of sunshine and beautiful coast. Not a bad way to spend an afternoon. To take us back to shore, the captain simply pointed the boat to the shore, accelerated hard, and let the boat run aground and slide up the sand. Sounds a little scary, but was a very smooth ride. The following day we drove to the nearby Robberg Peninsula and hiked out onto the peninsula. We selected the hike of moderate difficulty and moderate distance as we did not arrive until mid-afternoon. The views were breathtaking from the peninsula, with the hike reached a large secluded beach on which we were the only people for much of the time. We hated to leave, but realized we needed to before it either got dark or the tide came in further, as much of the path ran along the rocky coastline. On our hike back we were very glad we had selected only the “moderately” difficult hike as we scrambled over a section of the path consisting only of costal rocks, at times uneven, angled and fairly close to the rather steep drops into the rough ocean below. We were relieved when the challenging section of the hike was over and we could return to simply enjoying the breathtaking scenery. After leaving the penninsula we drove to the beautiful little town of Knysna.

Photos Above: Our Hike on Robberg Peninsula

In Knysna we visited the famous Knysna Heads - spectacular views! In Knysna T bought some much needed sneakers (after the air pockets in his previous pair "popped" in Morocco and continued to make awkward sounds....)...

Photo: View from the Knysna Heads

From Knysna we left the coast and headed towards the inland city of Oudtshoorn and nearby Cango Caves. The drive to Oudtshoorn was very scenic and relaxing, with it finally starting to feel normal to K to drive on the left side of the road. In Oudtshoorn, we managed to rent a three bedroom cottage for the night at a pittance, in large part thanks to K’s recent read of the book “Everything is Negotiable,” - that provided us with charming accommodation for the night. The next day we set out for the Cango Caves, which were formed by the erosion of limestone over thousands of years and are one of the worlds largest cave systems. The Cango Caves contain amazing stalactite and stalagmite formations which were interesting to see. Our pictures don’t really do justice to what a remarkable place it is. We left the Caves and drove to an ostrich farm (Oudtshoorhn is the ostrich capital of the world...) - We were shown the different types of ostrich, were taught what to do if attacked by ostriches (apparently you lie on the ground, face down and cover your head with your hands), were given an ostrich anatomy lesson and watched an ostrich race with jockeys – the ostriches are really fast. We left the ostrich farm for Mossel Bay.

Photo: On the road to Cango Caves

Photos Above: Cango Caves

Video: On the ostrich farm

Photo: Male (your right) and female (your left)

Photo: Ostrich eggs can withstand a lot of weight

On our way to Mossel Bay, K picked up some biltong, which is basically South African jerky, but much more widely eaten than in the U.S. T was not a fan, but K should probably admit that he secretly enjoyed it more than he let on. In Mossel Bay we stayed in an old railroad train because, well, how often does one get the chance to stay in a hotel that is a converted train? It also didn’t hurt that the train was “parked?” on the beach and had fantastic views. The train consisted of sleeper cars, so provided cute, but tiny rooms. Mossel Bay didn’t seem as interesting to us as many of the other towns, so the next morning we set out for Franschoek in the winelands areas of South Africa.

Photo: Drive to Mossel Bay

Photo: Mossel Bay

Photo: T on the train

So where are we now? We're a bit behind in updating the blog, but we are currently in Hong Kong (very long flight from South Africa)! Great city (though very humid!). We're leaving for Beijing and the Olympic Games on Thursday. Will update soon!!