Beauabram’s Travels

After taking in the magnificence of the water fall system of Foz de Iguazu in less than half a day due to a twice broke down 44 hour bus ride from Mendoza to Foz I was tired and ready to cross the border into Brazil, which is what I did the next day, catching a flight all the way north to the Northeast coast of Brazil. Salvador was my final destination, Carnival my target. I was to stay with my friend Phil’s uncle Chris, I was exited and ready to start throwing around my rudimentary Portuguese and party with the locals and tourists alike—some four million in total—in a five day period that can only describe as the most visceral, sleep deprived, dance crazed party-til-7 am, expensive but well worth it experience of my travels, and my young life thus far. But before I can talk about what the hell went down over the 120 hours of Carnival, I have to talk about the setup of the wildest party on earth.

When I awoke on January 24th, I was in Argentina. It was 5 am in the morning, I was still drunk from the night before, I wouldn’t say I had slept but rather had one long wink from when I finally closed my eyes at 4:27 am to when the iphone alarm started blowing up at 5. I was laid out in a 6-man dorm room in Iguazu. At first I was disoriented and confused, dawn was just breaking so it was still relatively dark, my eyes gummed up from a night full of bar smoke and days on end of little to no sleep. I reached for my alarm but instead felt an arm instead. Soft and smooth and about four shades lighter than my own, I remembered quickly the 6 man was sleeping 7. I grinned to myself and said, inwardly for the umpteenth time “I love traveling”. I left my friend gently snoring and grabbed a quick shower and packed my bag in less than 10 minutes—7 months straight on the road will train you how to get your shit together and out the door to catch a cab, cross the border, clear customs and make a 8 am flight, which is exactly what I did, turning as I left the room to get one last mental image of an upturned, lace-adorned posterior still asleep and framed perfectly by the morning light filtering in to the room. “I love traveling”.

Made the flight and a few naps, one connection and an afternoon later I was in Salvador, Bahia. The sun was scorching everything below it when I stepped outside and grabbed a cab for the city. I was exited—It wasn’t that I was just coming to the birthplace of carnival, that I was starting my Brazilian adventures or even that I was going to stay with my friends uncle for the month, the same old feeling of being in a new place was washing over me and taking with it my hangover and my day old doldrums of what I call The Travel Day Blues—I was here, and I was happy. I smiled and got in a cab and told him in my broken Portuguese to take me to Pituba!

Rolling up to Phil’s Uncle’s apartment, I was impressed—he had a nice place, on the 7th floor, and the best part was his view of the ocean not 200 meters away. I thanked the God of Travel for watching over me once again and set my bag down and took everything I owned out and put it into drawers. For the first time since May I was going to be able to live every day without rummaging through a bag, waiting on a communal shower to be available and poop to my heart’s content without worrying about a Goddamn thing. Chris, my host for the next month, is the affable and much traveled uncle of my good friend Phil. He had spent some time in the states so his English is flawless, and after 7 years in Salvador so is his knowledge of the city and her customs. The perfect guide and host for a crazy 5 days of Carnival plus the rest of the month’s adventures. We went out and got dinner that night at a churrascaria—if you’ve never been it is a meat lovers dream. A huge salad and sides bar in the middle of the restaurant, and then milling about are ten some-odd waiters brandishing sticks of grilled chicken, steak, pork and turkey. Its all you can eat and the only decider for the end of the meal is a little placard with two sides, green for “go” and red for “roll me into the car, please”. I ate to my heart’s content, came back and dropped about 3 pounds in his, no, for the next month it was my, nice toilet, and went to sleep, happy and ready for the party to start.

The first two days of Carnival I spent with Marcio, Carol and Gabriela and their friends from Belo Horizonte. I had met them some 3 weeks before in the Milhouse Hostel in Buenos Aires and they had invited me to party with them in Salvador. I of course obliged and bought tickets to the Camarote Savlador for Friday and Saturday night. I would have loved to have gone for more nights, but after buying my tickets for the cool sum of 450$ a night I was forced to make other plans to explore Salvador’s more economic options. See, the setup of Carnival is simple, either you have money or you don’t. Its such a microcosm of Brasil and her dual nature of the haves and have-nots it can make you a little sick and a lot more guilty thinking of the proportions of your ticket to the VIP party vs. the people outside it and their monthly income. But Brasil and her socioeconomic problems will be left out of this entry for another time as I describe to you how fucking bad ass a 500$ party can be. When I dropped my 850$ for my tickets to Friday and Saturday’s party I was given two plastic access cards and a white and blue nylon wife beaters. More expensive pieces of clothing I have never owned so I quickly stuffed them down the front of my pants in fears of being robbed upon leaving the mall and hopped a cab back home. I laid my prizes out in front of me on my bed and after checking my camera was charged, and all was in place, I called my friends who were staying in the action in Barra when the craziness of Carnival was to go down and went to join up with them for Friday night’s loco-times.

There was a group of 22 people staying in an apartment meant for no more than 6, and after making the introductions and kisses hello I walked with the (mostly female) group through the cauldron of Carnival to our destination: Camarote Salvador. Now, as for the set up of Salvador’s Carnival. It is actually pretty simple. In Barra, the neighborhood that surrounds Avenida Oceania which runs parallel to the ocean, houses some 3 million people to watch the Trios Electricos pass down the main road for some 5-6 miles. The trios are tricked out 18 wheelers that have been turned into rolling concert halls, with a stage on the roof complete with dancers, a band and a main act, and usually a crowd of hangers on cheering for it all as well. Surrounding the speaker packed, brightly lit and laser flashing, deafening trucks are anywhere from 500 to 3000 people similarly uniformed in some sponsored wife beater that served as their ID as they dance, drink and run around the truck as it lumbers down Oceania for 6 hours. Behind the main truck is yet another truck outfitted with beer and toilets so the party never stops and the Bloco–the sums of the parts of the trucks, people and music–never has to take a break from the non stop party down the street all night. Now the other part of this process is the Camarote, which is usually a converted bar or stand set up along one or both sides of the main drag for people to congregate and watch the trios pass by from a stationary and elevated standpoint. If you ever want to feel like royalty for a night, pay a lot of money and stand three stories up as you sip your beverage and watch truck after truck of bands, naked painted ladies, hundred of thousands of dancing sweaty people and everything else that goes along with this blur of humanity pass before you all night. As an experience and as a slice of humanity and more specifically Brazilian life, it can’t be beat. Now you don’t have to spend 500$ my dumb ass did- for less than 100$ you can gain access to one of the lesser lights of the second tier camarotes and watch the parade before you. But if you want to party in the best most off the hook VIP Camarote, then do Salvador’s. You might be asking what prey tell does your money get you and I would be glad to tell you. For starters the security is tiptop, which is important when partying in South Americas most dangerous country in its most dangerous city in its most crime filled wild and debacherous time. So, once inside and insulated from the sweaty and ass-grabbing wallet snatching masses, you go upstairs to one of the four levels and, after dropping your jaw and putting it back in place, take in the Brazil’s beautiful and elite five per centers. Considering the people who work the perimeter of each bloco that passes before the camarote make 12$ a and a water bottle a night, one has to wonder who can afford to gain access to something as silly and high class as where I spent my Friday and Saturday night. Well, it’s the beautiful, sometimes surgically augmented, designer jean’d and bourgeoisie contingent of Brazils middle and upper class. Insulated and separate from the grungy, noisy (and incredibly happy I might add) throngs outside, we all partied together without a care in the world, for when you are inside, its all comped. You don’t have to pay for a thing, from waiters wandering around with platters of top shelf alcohol and hors d’oeuvres, to models posing for pictures and giving out free swag, to rows of sushi chefs doling out sashimi to famished partygoers at 3 am, this motherfucker had it all.

There was a dance club pumping electronic and trance beats for those tired to shaking their asses to the live music outside, and if you looked up through the smoke and lasers you would see naked girls swinging by glass swings smiling down upon you like fallen angels blessing every lusty thought on your mind. Which brings me to my first commentary of Carnival, the Brazilian guys and their douche bag tactics in their “approaching” women during the 5-day party. It goes a lil’ something like this. Guy sees girl. Guy walks up to girl. Guy grabs girl and tries his damndest to kiss her face, neck, chest, ass, legs, and toes—whatever. And the silliest part for me was watching this tactic work time after time. In fact, there were rows and rows of men lining the streets dressed in blue and white robes with turbans that said “Filhos de Gandhy” (Gandy’s sons) who would spray the air around them with air freshener and offer blue and white beaded necklaces out for girls as long as they made out with them. This was the business of Carnival, and man, business was good. Most girls were in on the whole morals out the window thing as much as the guys were, so the circle was completed time and time again in front of my shocked American eyes. Maybe I need to lighten up, but it still pissed me off, especially when the girls didn’t want any part of it. But in the end, this actually would work in my favor, as my tactic is more along the lines of approach, say hello, talk, listen, and of course, not physically molest. Unsurprising then how this tact was so well received by so many. But I digress.
So Friday night I danced all night with the Belo Horizonte gang. I Ate tons of sushi and chocolate fondue dipped strawberries and drank top shelf liquor and danced some more and saw Trio after Trio pass by with amazing bands and body painted naked ladies and flashing lights and loud music and hundreds of thousands of millions of people passing before us drinking and laughing and pissing in the streets and fornicating behind trash cans and fighting and puking and all of this humanity close enough to smell but far enough away no to seep into my clothes and set. But the city of Salvador would retain the smells of millions of people doing their worst to it for weeks. Carnival ended February 5th but it wasn’t until weeks later that the odors of the humanity that throbbed and heaved and relieved itself on its streets and back alleys faded. Damn did it stink.

6 am found me curled up on the floor of my friend’s apartment as the 23rd person to be sleeping there, holding a giant stuffed dog as a companion and shielding my eyes from the filtering light from the downstairs window. My sleep was only so brief however, as Chris called at 9 and told me to get home because we had a big barbeque get together to attend called a feijuada. I stepped outside into the glare of the hot yellow Bahian sun and stumbled into a cab home, having stepped over sleeping kids in the street, discarded food and beer cans by the thousands and every manner of refuse and trash you can imagine 3 million people partying their asses off would leave behind the night before. Got home showered and running on 3 hours of sleep went to the barbeque, where I ate and drank and listened to Chris’s father in law expound upon the shortcomings of the USA. I was sitting on this uncomfortable plastic chair nursing a hangover and its accompanying headache, sweating cachaca (Brazilian whiskey) and wearing the biggest blacked out sunglasses I could buy to shield my blood shot sleep deprived eyes. And I had to sit there, and listen to this drunk asshole who looked like Jerry Garcia would have if he was a prick blustering about how imperialistic and terrible my country is and how the whole world has to kneel before it even though it rapes its women land and livestock with one fell swoop. I am of course paraphrasing because while not only intoxicated, his grasp on the English language was worse than my Portuguese, so I had to hear what would roughly sound like the following between chews on my steak and throbs from the big vein in my pounding skull:

“America, it come and make things yes, they are good, but it is BAD, because you take everything and…this word…it is corruption? Yes you corrupt with power and this makes you-hic-drunk with power! And Bush! Fucking Bush and you from Texas? You friend with this maniacs? Buuuuurp”

Something like that. And I smile. And I nod. And after about 20 minutes I ask him if he has ever been to Japan. And he says no. And I ask him if he has ever been to Kenya. No, he had not. Laos? Australia? How about England or Spain or Hungary? No none of those either. What’s the point, he asks. My point is– would you say you like or dislike the country and people of Hungary, having never been there? He said of course not. I said well, neither would I, although I had been to all of these countries, and about 30 others, and I had learned that you couldn’t judge a person, good or bad, from where he is from, only on the strength of his actions alone. He agreed (or maybe he nodded because the words I used were over his head) and then I asked, have you ever BEEN to the USA? He said no. Then I said, Fuck you and your whore of a mother and I took my steak knife and shoved it sideways up his drunken ass and stood over him laughing and pointing as he rolled around the cheap linoleum floor moaning and begging repentance for his ignorance and bad grammar. No, I didn’t. I just nodded and went and took a nasty day after a long night of drinking and eating sushi number twosies and Chris took me home and I slept until I went back out and did the Camarote, the dancing, and the wildin’ out all over again.

That was the weekend. On Sunday I met up with the beautiful Annaloes and her Dutch crew and we bought tickets for a bloco from some hustler off the street and hopped into the cauldron for 6 hours. Wearing bright white and red cut off T shirts that said ama me (Love Me) we followed this huge, louder than jet engine, Trio blasting tunes for the entire night, only pausing to buy beer, pee out said beer, and fight off the advances of every other guy in the 3000 person human mishmash trying to grab some blonde duchies and lick her tonsils. I ran interference, danced, drank, sweated and screamed, jumped up and down and danced some more and at the end of the experience it was the girls who were taking care of me and helping me home, so exhausted, yet completely happy, I was at the end of the night. On the pavement under the camarotes looking up you feel like the proletariat to the bourgeoisie of the Camarote looking down, and passing my camarote from the night before, waving up and smiling at them and their hands full of finely slice sashimi and Crown and cokes, I felt I was living the other half of the Carnival experience, but I had little time to reflect as I was swept up in the wave of people in the bloco making a surge forward against the human ropes that held us in and the street urchins out. Just on the other side of the barriers of the bloco you could see half naked three quarters starving and 100% poor 10 year old kids bending down between onrushing Nikes to pick up crushed beer cans for the 5cents it would fetch. Kids smoking the butts of still smoldering cigarettes and drinking the back wash out of drinks on the side of the road, to catch the glance of one of them while you are partying on the other side of the lines would stop you in your tracks for a minute and make you ask yourself what the fuck were you doing while all this was happening. Then the kid would smile and flick the butt and start dancing and someone would grab you and you would be rushed off again into the swirl and sweat of the bloco. Ah, Brasil.

We—me and the duchies—ended our Carnival as far removed from Barra and its craziness as we could; we went to Salvador’s historic old neighborhood of Pelorhino. Cobble stone streets and old churches and buildings, we hung out in the main square and drank caiprinhas and sat back and watched the parade of costumed and painted dancers and characters shuffle pass as kids danced and played in the streets around us. As family oriented and relaxed as the last 4 days had been crazy and wild, it was a great way to end Carnival. There was one cringe worthy moment for me though, and it came from the most surprising source—other Americans. After having spent all Saturday afternoon listening to some fat drunk prick cuss my country I guess I still had a chip on my shoulder about the whole thing, but my own hypocrisy rose its ugly head when I ran into a group of American college kids drinking and laughing with each other at the table across from us in the plaza. Loud and drunk at about 8 pm, these 19 and 20 year olds were what every TV show and movie try and capture about the American College Experience. The guys all had on faded white hats on backwards with the letters of their frat monogrammed on back, wearing pooka shell necklaces and polo shirts and leering over underfed sorority girls tipsy on two caiprinhas and giggling and demanding from the waiter in English for them to bring them some fucking curly fries. At one point I went over to say hello and talk to my fellow countrymen, mainly out of curiosity as I had spent the last 7 months traveling around the world with Aussies, English, Irish and every other nationality other than those from the states, because when you travel as an American, you are usually the only one in the group. After sauntering over and helping the girl order her French fries, batatas fritas, por favor, I said, to which she replied, what the hell did you say to him…oh cool! I sat down and talked to these oddities for a few minutes until I couldn’t take it anymore. They were on something called a Semester at Sea—a cruise ship full of privileged kids that sailed around the world and stopping in ports of different countries long enough them to get off, get drunk and hook up before being poured back on the next day and escorted somewhere else. Long enough to see a few things and maybe learn how to order a beer one girl told me before a guy who reminded me exactly of a baseball fuck I hated in high school came over and threw her over his shoulder and announced to the table he was going to make Jenni (I don’t know if it was spelled with an ‘i’ but I’m guessing) feel like a woman tonight. I sighed and excused myself and walked back over to the horrified Dutch girls, not two, three years older than the group of American kids, but all with at least one degree and a level of worldliness and sophistication I doubted any of the group of my countrymen would care enough to ever have. And then I said, mainly to myself, fucking Americans. They were loud and drunk and oblivious to the amazing experience and culture around them, and they were exactly what much of the world dislikes about where I am from. And I caught myself, and weighed this against the argument I had had a few days earlier, and against the hundreds of others similar I have been forced to have with narrow-minded people on the road for the last half a year, and I thought about that. A lot. Then I got a beer and said, ladies, this here Texan had the mold broke when they made him, now lets go dance and have fun!

Almost 40 countries, 100s of cities and I have come to the conclusion that people are people. We want the same things, more or less. Love and family and happiness and security. The world over. And for five days in Salvador this all was shown to me in every way possible, from the best parts of people to the worst. One of the best experiences of my life was living those five days with the people I did it with. I kept my head on a swivel, stayed out of trouble and lived and breathed and partied with folks during the best party on the planet.

Oh what a difference a day makes. (Or a month…or a year…)

Yesterday I was sitting in a café on one of the many tree-lined streets of Mendoza, Argentina. The sky was shining and blue, the locals all around happy and busy at their tasks around me as I sat and reflected on my station in life. To the east not a day’s drive lay Chile, a little after that of course the Pacific Ocean, a body of water I had not seen or experienced since my first weeks of my trip lounging and partying on Fiji’s many idyllic islands. Alas. Now I am on a bus, its 12:26 am and I have now officially been apart of this trip since 9:27 pm yesterday, making it one minute short pf 27 hours. I still have another 9 to go and I will be in Porto Iguaçu, on the northeast border of Argentina next to Brazil and Paraguay. As soon as I am done writing this I will try my best to catch a few hours of sleep because tomorrow I have to get my hustle on and see as much as Iguaçu Falls as possible in a day—the day after tomorrow I fly from the Brazilian side of Iguaçu thru Sao Paulo then north all the way to Salvador, Bahia. I mean it’s almost surreal how much traveling I am doing. A year (14 months, actually) is a long ass time to be sure to be on the road, but for most of the time I’m on this bus or that plane rushing, trying to see as much as possible before I have to catch the next ferry of taxi or train and it all starts over again. In no way is this man complaining, it’s just more like a pause to take notice and maybe look forward to a change—which I am going to make so when I touch down in Salvador. For a week I will be going bananas with the rest of the world as we celebrate Carnival, then I will recoup and do regroup—Portuguese classes and regular diet and days on the beautiful beaches of Brazil’s famous northeast coasts. For about a year, since I had this trip planned, I have been looking forward to taking everything I owned out of my bag and just living life for a few weeks or a month. It will be a pleasure and a much needed break for me. All of February I will be doing very little other than eating, learning and practicing my Portuguese, getting in shape and trying to play as much soccer as possible. Then in March I’ll travel and backpack again back down the coast to get to Rio by the end of the month to chill on the beach again and see the sights and sounds—before I fly out to Chile and Easter Islands and then, for April, May, June and July work up through Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia and finally Panama before I fly home. It’s a lot in front of me, but as I keep thinking, it has been a lot behind me as well. I can’t believe its January 26, 2008. One month ago I was in London celebrating Boxing Day, going to soccer games and freezing my boys off in the England winter. Now im in the tropics planning the next 2 months on some of the world’s most beautiful beaches. Two months ago I was in Tokyo partying it up and getting ready to fly to Africa for 3 weeks of safari. The more I write, look at pictures, talk to friends from the road and generally reflect on my life the more I have to stop and think about how all this came about.

One year and 26 days ago my father passed away on New Year’s Day. A couple weeks or so before that my grandmother (his mom) passed while pops was dealing with his terminal cancer, putting the end of his life in order with our house full of friends and family holding each other’s hand and glancing occasionally at the clock that kept counting down. I had talked with dad in one of our many sessions in the garage—him wrapped in blankets smoking, listening to me talk and complain about the smoke. I told him I would use some of the money from his mom’s and his inheritance to see the world for a year like I had wanted to for some while. Dad hadn’t traveled outside of interstate road trips with the family and years ago in the East for the Navy. He disagreed with my decision, thought I should save all the money and work, go to school, something responsible I guess. But the more my travels have gone on, and the more I have thought about and learned about my father, the more I think this was something I had to do. I’m asked almost daily about how I can afford to travel to so many places for so long. I tell people the short answer of a long story. It has gotten easier to say but it well never be easy to just share something like that. I have my dad in ash form in a flask with me that has gone all over the world with me. At sunset in the clear waters of the South Pacific in Fiji I took some of his ashes and spread them in the water and felt some peace about the gesture. I have yet to spread any more of his ashes—I like having him near me and feel comforted by it. Every day I make new friends and every day I say goodbye. I rarely am in a place longer than a few days. Relationships condense and intensify and then im off again. But my dad is always with me in my bag sitting next to me on the plane, the bus, the taxi, the ferry. I loved him every day I was alive and was lucky to be able to spend so much time with him before he died. Every day I think about him and every time I talk to him, even if it’s just a few thoughts in my head looking out at the passing countryside. In six more months I will be home after this adventure and I think a part of my mourning will catch up to me when I enter the house again after having been away for so long. Part of thinks I will want to leave again to work and travel abroad, and this could very well happen. But I look forward to seeing my mom and friends and my dog and all the trappings of home that have been missing for these so many months living out of my bags on the road. But I wouldn’t trade it all in just yet. Not yet.

BBB

Safaris and Sunshine.

Traveling anywhere in the world, from anywhere in the world, doesn’t take more than three days anymore. Even if you are in Outer Mongolia and you wanted to make it to a party in suburban Houston, Texas, it wouldn’t take more than 50 hours of traveling—it would suck, but you can do it with out too much effort in our modern era of long haul flights and pre packaged airline food. Speaking of which, I have logged a lot of miles recently. I have actually lost count of how many flights I have been on since May, but I do know that I have consumed my fair share of meals in a box, have been jostled enough peeing in turbulence that I have realized the importance of dedicating my whole concentration to the act of urination, and, most importantly, if I am hung-over from drinking all night the last place I want to be is in the middle seat in economy trying not to simultaneously puke and shit myself. But I digress. I have traveled a lot, and have covered a whole lot of ground to get here; The Dark Continent, the Cradle of Humanity, the place where such tales of Heart of Darkness and A Far Off Place have occupied my imagination since I was old enough to read and dream of Africa. On November 30th I left Tokyo on a two day journey from Japan, thru London, down to Nairobi and then a quick flight over the mythical Mt. Kilimanjaro to the seaside city of Mombasa. I didn’t sleep but a few quick sleeps here and there, aware that I had broken my streak of no missed flights when I slept/puked my way thru Toko-Incheon the weekend before. Well—I went out drinking in Tokyo before I hit out on the open road in the morning of the 29th, in near freezing conditions ripping thru my light pullover and sapping my remaining strength after a whole night at a club filled with models and foreigners trying to hit on said models. I remembering smiling to myself as my pack dug deeper into my weary shoulders and my head pounded and my sore throat cried out for water as I slumped in my bus seat heading to Narita airport—I was going to Africa. For years I had dreamt of the beaches on the Indian Ocean, the expanse of the grasslands of the game reserves, and of course, the wild animals that I had only experienced when watching documentaries on TV at home, in nice comfortable Texas.

Three weeks later:

I’m on the plane flying back from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. I’m brown from my time on the beaches and sunbathing on Zanzibar Island. I am now halfway through my trip around the world. Africa, a place almost more mythical than real to me for so long is now nothing but another memory. Like Australia. Like Asia. Like, Fiji and Hong Kong, like tubing down the river in Laos and drinking all night in a sandy beach bar in the South Pacific. More and more this trip is becoming past tense—“…Oh when I was in Thailand I drank so many buckets…Yeah man, Cambodia has some cool temples…Tokyo? Yeah I had some sushi…” And now I can say I saw Africa—or at least a little bit of East Africa. I flew into Nairobi 3 weeks ago. It seems like a long time ago, and it seems like no time at all. I left home August 1. Its now almost January. Time flies. I can barely keep up. I make friends and then move on again. I see sun and snow in the same day. This morning I was sweating through my t-shirt in Africa, now as I write this I am flying over the snow tipped Pyrenees Mountains in France, steeling myself for a London winter’s day. I know this entry is scattered but so are my memories. I feel like someone shook the file cabinet of my past out and the folders are all lying on the floor in a random pattern or jumbled memories, images, sounds and faces. Before I can bend down to pick something up from the past I am on another plane writing about another continent. I have 7 months in South America. It’s more than half my trip. I have nothing really planned. Some flights and ideas here and there. But first I am meeting old friends in London. It will be my 4th time in 3.5 years through England’s capital. I’ll see people I have met on this trip. Ill see people I met on trips in the past. Ill most likely meet new people. My life is a revolving door, living out of a bag, flying, driving and sailing across 6 continents. Drink coffee in Africa, have a beer that night in London. Why not? I’m young. I am healthy and open and ready. I still want more, I am not done yet. The lions and the animals of Africa, its people and oceans and bright blue infinite skies and searing sun were like nothing else. I can’t be done with my travels at the end of this one—I have to go back and see more Africa. I have 1 place down and 9 more missed every country I go. And my passport has no more room. I need more pages or maybe a whole new book. I have something like 15 more countries. I can’t stop, I wont try, ill make it back home and there’s no need to be shy.

One.

Arriving into Asia

After Australia, my next continent was that of Asia—a steamy visceral melting pot of many different cultures and countries inexorably tied together by their geographical closeness and their eerie similarities. From Singapore to Vietnam, I spent close to three months traveling around South East Asia, and then on to Hong Kong, Tokyo and South Korea in the north. In Oz you see hints of Asian culture—Chinatowns in the big cities, immigrants and restaurants, but to go to the source is of course, altogether different. I was really exited to get across to Singapore and take a bite out of what Asia has to offer. Now, sitting down and reflecting on the last weeks and months—the parties, the beaches, the food, the people, the places and the memories, I think I can accurately recount my experiences, starting with a city that is also a country and an island, all at the same time—and don’t even THINK about chewing gum when you’re there—Singapore.

Singapore

Leaving Brisbane, Australia and all it’s white people behind, I flew to Singapore on my first stop in Asia. Flying on September 11, my mind was awash with images of steaming bowls of noodles, crammed streets and food stalls, green oceans and smiling locals, Buddhist temples and reverent mornings in the green mountain sides. I always laugh when I am done traveling through a place and thinking back on how I thought it was going to be and how it actually turned out to be. Traveling can really put a firm stamp of reality on any misconceptions or false ideals you might have about other parts of the world. I thought, through whatever influences play on your mind—TV, movies, news stories and general American paranoia and prejudice that Asia would be an amalgamation of these factors, a little bit Full Metal Jacket, a touch of The King and I, maybe a dash of Crouching Tiger. I didn’t think that there would be the multitude of white, pushy tourists milling about from the Western world, or what’s worse, that each country I visited would have sprouted machines of industry and tourism to handle the crowds swarming around its beaches, temples and natural wonders. While some countries were more built up both economically and for the tourism trade, it didn’t matter if you were in small river town in Laos, or on one the glitzy islands of Southern Thailand, there was always a place to check your email, get a beer and watch Scrubs on a TV with other backpackers. That doesn’t mean I didn’t have a ball scooting around Asia, but for someone to think it’s just going to be them and the locals, well, that really never happens. Maybe if you went completely out of your way and into the jungles of Cambodia you could make this happen, but then, how would you check your email, get a beer and watch Scrubs? Exactly.

So, Singapore. There are two things Singaporeans do with their time. Eat and shop. If they’re not eating, they’re shopping, and if they are crunched for time, they do both at once. I was so primed for Asian food I went a little bananas at the plethora of food stalls lining the streets of the city, which is great, because Singapore is divided into three gastronomic/cultural parts. There is Chinatown, Little India and the rest of it; I guess you would call it Shopping Town, an area where if they don’t sell it, you don’t want it. I was walking around with this guy who wanted a very specific remote for his expensive digital camera so he could set it up and take a picture of himself giving the thumbs up in some remote locale. The FIRST store we went into, he said I need a SXC-234 for his FGT-3938 and the guy went, oh yeah, here ya go, that’ll be 20$. The same worked for the food there. Whatever you wanted, you weren’t far away from whatever whetted your appetite. Since I was sleeping in this cool little funky hostel in Little India I had access to all the Indian food you could shake a stick at, which was cool, but I had to learn to either bring the food back to the hostel or stay within sprinting range of a toilet from the restaurant, because as much as I like the curry, it runs through me like a quarter horse at the Kentucky Downs on race day—I had a close call or two but I am proud to say I didn’t –and still haven’t—shit my pants in Singapore (and Asia at large, thank you very much).

But I need to back up a moment and describe my entry into the city.

8-hour flight from Brisbane, unshaven and hat down low, I get on a series of trains from the airport into the city, to my eventual destination, Little India. I was a bit greasy, jamming out to the new 50/JT hit “Ayo” and sitting on my rucksac in the tube stations waiting for my ride into town. I was zoned out keep in mind, so when this small Indian girl approached me I was taken aback when she asked me,

“Do you know Justin Timberlake?”

I looked around and understandably said, “what?” She then launched into this diatribe about her hero, Justin Randall Timberlake, and the influence he’s had on her life, how his music and the love he has for the world has changed her how…blah, blah, blah. Seriously, on and on for 3-4 minutes. Then they got on the train with me. Oh, did I forget to mention her boyfriend was there nodding along the whole time, when she was telling me I am JT to her, I look and, more importantly, FEEL like him, and please please, sir…would you autograph this for me? She pressed a date book in my hand and at this point I had to say “Are you serious? Am I being punked?” But my answer was in her reaction—she was hurt, really hurt that her JT representative from heaven reacted so to her humble requests. Anyways, I signed, ‘BBB—JT loves you’ on a crowded train packed with quizzical Indians wondering what this white kid was up to. Then we get off, and she kisses my hand, tells me she always wants to be a part of my life, and gives me a matching bracelet/necklace set—one for me, one for JT if I ever see him. I still get 8 page emails updating me on every nuance in her life and it just cracks me up. Of course if you know me, you know I have a thing for JT anyways, I mean I got the damn sexyback suit tailored in Hoi An, and all my lady friends say I got a JT strut, so this story always makes me giggle that much more.

Anyways, Singers—shopping, eating, great markets with more fake Rolexes than you could ever believe existed, they have a great phrase for them—“Genuine knockoffs” I love it. 3 days later I was on a bus to Kuala Lumpur, where Asia really kicked off for me…

Queensland.

After the three-week odyssey in Melbourne, I had to move on with my travels. Reluctantly, I packed my bags and divided everything I owned into two piles—one that was to go with me for the next 11 months, and one that I was to send home. See, after less than a month I knew I had brought too much stuff with me. Clothes, moisturizers, hair products, warm weather gear, cold weather gear, tops, bottoms, middles, shoes, shorts—in short I halved everything and put it in my carry on and sent it on a boat home, leaving me with a (still too) heavy backpack and smaller bag for my laptop and various electronics. So, I had my sad goodbyes with Juzzy and the household, and had a last dinner with Cleary, enjoying her kangaroo sirloin salad before I flew to Cairns in the morning.

I had decided since I had spent so much time enjoying Melbourne, and since it had been expensive to boot, I would do a whistle stop tour of Queensland and see as much as possible from Cairns to Brisbane—not my favorite thing to do when seeing the sights but in this case it was my only option if I wanted meaningful time in Asia. I left myself less than two weeks until I flew out of Brisbane to Singapore, and I literally flew down the coast. First thing in Cairns I knew what I had heard on the road in Oz was true—Cairns, while a jump off point to the Great Barrier Reef, is a piece of shit tourist trap. There are three types of business in Cairns vying for your money—tour operators, restaurants and bars, and sometimes if you are lucky you can go to one place and satisfies all three needs in one. And it is filled with drunken English Irish and German folk in between dives or short terms jobs and, bless ‘em, I got tired of the “Oz backpacker scene” real quick. Starting off my trip staying with friends was fantastic but spoiled me for my life on the road, and as I look back on it now I know how good I had it. So, I took one quick island trip to the fringe of The Reef and then booked it Mackay on a little twin prop for my favorite part of my Queensland experience—sailing.

Airlie beach is definitely another tourist trap but I booked a trip as soon as possible upon getting in and spent two days and two nights out in the Whitsunday Islands and it was amazing. Even though we were still in the tail end of the colder months It was still warm enough to go about in shorts and t shirts, even though we dove and snorkeled in wet suits it was still beautiful, especially at night under the stars when we moored in the bays of the some 74 islands that dot the coast off Airlie. The crew, a crazy mix of Aussie, Canadian and English were all young and obviously loved the ocean and their jobs, and with a good group of passengers as well we all had a great time in the water, seeing the pretty coral and fishies, going to the draw droppingly beautiful Whitehaven beach, a 3 km stretch of shifting white sands and turquoise waters, and eating and drinking on the boat at night.

After sailing I was tapped and needed to get to the cheap shores of Asia, so I spent a quick weekend in Brisbane, and with the exception of a nice day out at the Koala Sanctuary where I cuddled koalas, fed kangaroos and watched Aussie sheepdogs in actions, I chilled out and caught a 10 hour flight out of Oz to Singapore to begin my second leg of my trip. All in all Australia was great, but I had too little time, money and patience to fully explore it—I never made it inland, to the Western Coast, or even out of a major city. I think when I return I want to do at least 3-6 months taking my time in the country and I definitely want to return to Melbourne as it is now one of my favorite cities; officially.

There is a big debate raging with fellow travelers on this side of the world—whether the person is coming from or going to Australia the question of which of Oz’s two big cities—Sydney or Melbourne—is cooler is inevitably asked. Having spent enough time in each town, albeit in the low season of the colder winter months, I can firmly, and with conviction of mind, spirit and conscience, state that Melbourne wins hands down, bitches. I think the only comparison for anyone back home would be for those who have spent some time on the west coast of California and trying to describe and pick between LA and San Francisco. LA is big and brassy, sunny and full of glitz, fake titties and fast cars. It has culture but prefers to show off its pretty side and is shameless in its defining itself on its looks over its substance. San Francisco, while blessed with as many natural wonders as LA is a bit more low key, subtle in its charms and clever in its more stylistic approach to being a major city. Sydney and Melly are the same. And with both San Fran and Melbourne, the two just have more to offer me than LA and Sydney. I pushed my ticket back FOUR times in my almost three weeks in the city, I kept trying to leave and Melbourne kept entangling me more and more with her charms—the people, the nightlife and the feel of the city is one that made such an impression that I can say it is one of my favorite cities not just in Oz, in the southern hemisphere but in the world.
Landing in Melbourne after bronzing myself on the lush beaches of Fiji was of course always going to be a bit of a shock—it was 31 degrees in Fiji when I left and pretty young things were playing in the blue green waters of the shallows in very tiny bikinis waving me goodbye. Getting into Melly I was greeted by 14-degree weather, grey skies and the moody weather that Victoria has to offer. Riding the airport shuttle into town I engaged the driver on the sporting venues his town had to offer. He told me I must go to the MCG—the Melbourne Cricket Ground—and watch his Bombers play in an AFL Aussie Rules match. His enthusiasm was infectious and my curiosity would eventually lead me to go and check out the hard-hitting world of Aussie Footy, but back to my arrival.
I got into Melbourne and went to the southern part of town to check into my hostel. A big sprawling place full of a combination of backpackers in a ratio I would find to be the same all over Oz—equal parts English, Irish and German. Guess who were my roommates? An Irishman a German and an Englishman. Weeeeeird. I don’t know if there are any young people left back in W. Europe or if they are all staggering around drinking pitchers in Australia, but I would be curious because it seems to me, especially in Ireland that it has to be nothing but old people and babies. But I’m cool with that, because as I have said before, the Irish are all right by me, those kids know how to party. I became friends with the Irishman in my room—Dave—and chilled out with him for the two nights I stayed in the place before I moved out and into what would be my home in the northern part of the city near Melbourne University, at the casa de Katie, Hugh, Juzzy and _______. How did I manage to finagle accommodations with cool folks in a cool place? Easy. I just had to go to Croatia first.
See back in June when I was messing around in Central and Eastern Europe for the summer I met two girls from Melbourne, Katie and Imogen, in the 800-year old walled city of Dubrovnik. I mentioned I would be coming thru their neck of the woods, and after going out and getting beers with them in Melbourne months later, Katie offered me a place to stay with her and her ridiculous and cool ass roomies. I accepted and it took a while and many many beers and late nights at the casino, to finally get me to get up and get the hell out of Southern Victoria and back on track in my journey through Oz. So, here are the highlights of Melbourne, minus the hung over mornings, the large scale losses at the blackjack with Juzzy, the frequent trips to Qantas Airlines to change my ticket (“Yes ma’m, one more week…again.”) and riding around the tram to and fro from the CBD to get some cheap noodles in Melly’s sweet ass Chinatown.

• The nightlife—Melbourne has without a doubt not only the coolest clubs but also some of the coolest people making up the numbers inside. And the best part? Had I not had very apt city guides I would never have known, as Melbourne’s clubs bars and nighttime hotspots are almost all completely hidden down unmarked back alleys and blank doorway entrances. Which is really a thrilling experience when you go on a pub crawl and step over trash cans in back alleys and dodge stray cats to get to a bar that looks like a 1960’s science lab complete with beakers for shot glasses and hospital gurneys in the bathrooms. One of the best house parties I ever went to was at a friend of one my roomies Hugh in South Yarra (below the river Yarra south of the center of town). It was a disco party so we arrived by cab wearing ridiculous shit and possessing a shit load of spirits and one very large and fluffy afro. I ended up in a sheepskin vest and meeting one Kate Cleary who over the next couple of weeks of hanging out taught me that all of us American’s stereo types about Aussie women—they love to drink and party and are always up for a laugh with Yankees with cool accents—were totally true, thank the lord. I didn’t push my ticket back four times because of Melbourne’s museums, although they were pretty damn cool. But I digress, back to the city’s charms.

• The people—as I have already alluded to, the folks who comprise the city of Melbourne’s population are really pretty extraordinary. It didn’t matter who I was hanging out with, my roomies, or friends of theirs, or of Kate’s or just random people on the street helping me out with directions, I didn’t meet one dick the entire time I was hanging out. Not one. And if I can just pause to expand on that, I can’t recall any dicks in the last two months of travel. Maybe people who I wouldn’t make best man at my wedding, but on the whole, the quality of people who I met traveling have all been really high. Which is great because as they say, it’s not where you are, or what you are doing, but whom you are with.

• The Food—Chinese, Indian, Aussie ( I ate kangaroo my last night and it was fucking delish) I ate very well in my time in Melbourne. Juzzy and me ate at this cool little noodle house probably half a dozen times and sat around drinking their gratis tea and discussing our previous night or our upcoming one, sometimes both. Ah, memories.
Okay. Well, I could go on and on, seeing as I am in a bus traveling all damn day to Bangkok (did I mention I am a month behind my travel writings?) but I think I will leave it for now—Melbourne I will miss you, and I will return.

Aug 7-14

Seven days in Fiji is a lifetime in other places. The days are long and sunny, and the nights are just as long and filled with more memory-making moments than I once thought possible to put in a 24 hour period. I split my time in Fiji between two islands—Beachcomber Island that is just a short ferry ride away from the big island of Nandi’s main port, and Oarsman’s Bay on Nacula, a serene paradise north of Nandi in the far-flung Yasawas. As different as they are unique in their beauty, both islands gave me something to remember as I spent my time swimming in the beautiful waters, lying on the white sand beaches and wishing I didn’t have to leave each morning I awoke one day closer to my departure.
When I arrived into Fiji I flew in on a low fare from Sydney and wasn’t expecting anything VIP—I had booked my rooms at both resorts but I was just a kid with a small bag and a toothbrush, so the treatment I got when I landed with a big BULA! into the airport was just awesome. As soon as I passed through customs a hand came softly on my shoulder as I heard a voice address me from off to my left.
“Mr. Brown, welcome to Fiji. If you would follow me sir to the office, we will get you to where you need to be.” A smiling Fijian man led me to Beachcomber’s airport office where they processed all my paper work and put me in a taxi to the big islands main port where my ferry was waiting for me. As I waited to board the ferry I went to get a water bottle and some supplies for the trip (crackers and alcohol—never know when you need a snack or a drink on the beach). As I wandered around another Fijian man addressed me by name and told me my ferry was waiting for me. I couldn’t help but smile at anyone giving a shit whether I made my boat or not but it was a cool feeling to be treated that way. I rode the ferry out to Beachcomber, basking in the 31 degree, sunny heat of Fiji and thinking about the 15-degree morning I had just spent in chilly Sydney. I smiled big and wide and watched the wake of the pretty blue water behind the ferry as the boat sped onto my first stop.
When I got into Beachcomber it was “Bula!” this and “Bula!” that from all the happy staff of the island, bula is like aloha in Fiji and it loosely translates in to “Hello my friend, I may or may not know you but I live in this beautiful island paradise and our lives, however briefly intertwined in this greeting are good and I hope you remain happy in your remaining days on earth.” Bula—it sounds silly but it gets down right infectious, I was bula this and bula that soon enough too, and as a proud Texan who uses howdy more often than not it didn’t take long for me to fall in with everyone in Fiji’s happy and smiling culture. So I had arrived, after months and months sitting in my classroom at work, literally spinning a globe in my hands and looking at far-flung Fiji and its mythical waters, I was there. I had never been happier after arriving somewhere, having talked and planned for so long, it was a great feeling to stand, my feet in the sand and my heart full, overlooking the prettiest part of the ocean I had ever seen.
I checked in and put my stuff under my bed which was 1 of a 100 in a giant thatched bure, for 55$US a night I had 3 squares of all you can eat Fiji cuisine and a bed with 99 of my newest and bestest friends on the island. Having spent some time traveling through the world’s hostels, I have experienced how open and friendly people are when traveling and living together, but in Fiji it was ten times as open and hospitable. It was as though everyone refused to let even one person not have as amazing a time as they and their friends were having, and not including everyone in the revelelrie would be tantamount to sacrilege. I made friends quickly with a few English kids traveling together, and then after dinner I fell in with my Fiji crew who I would party with for the rest of my first and second trips to the island. A group of English guys and Irish, English, German and Kiwi girls would compromise my group of amigos who I would eat, drink and bula dance with on my time in Beachcomber. For three nights we would eat breakfast early, no matter how hard we went the night previous, and then head to the beach to lie out, snorkel, swim and enjoy the bright and omnipresent South Pacific sun. I got so dark and brown in my week out there, never had the tan lines between my tanned back and my moon-white behind been so pronounced. After three days though I got on the Yasawa flyer ferry and took a four-hour ferry north and west around the main island to get to the isolated and beautiful Yasawas. For months I had been not only spinning the globe in my hands and dreaming of Fiji, but this one place in the Yasawas called Oarsman’s Bay specifically had captured my imagination. I thought the pictures were going to end up being overly flattering, but I was so, so wrong. When I got into the bay that afternoon of my fourth day and took the small skiff into the resort’s shallow waters, I was speechless. The blues and greens of the crystal clear waters were the most beautiful I had ever seen. I remember putting my hand into the water as the boat pulled into the beach and feeling how warm it was, and looking down ten feet to the bottom, how absolutely pure it was. I spent three days and two nights in Nacula, walking along the 3mile long beach and snorkeling with the fish in the coral right off the sand. I became friends with a British couple Robin and Louise who I spent my time with them there, enjoying the beach and taking a trip to dive and swim through the caves on the island, and spending the afternoon in the blue lagoon, a paradise of swaying palms and placid waters, filled with clown fish and multi colored coral just under its surface. We ended up both leaving early to back to Beachcomber to party it up—and it was well worth it. I rejoined my crew there and spent forty-eight hours straight of living it up before, sadly, I had to return home. Sitting on the beach, in my board shorts that were my only clothes for 7 days, watching someone parasail around the island as my friends were all laying under the sun, while beautiful girls ran around the beach playing Frisbee, I was hit with a supreme sense of sadness knowing I was not only returning to the regular traveling life, but also to sweaters and jeans and Australia’s chilly winter. Getting onto that ferry sucked big time, but my sadness was so acute because of the happy and bright contrast to the week I had just had—Fiji was one of the best weeks of my life, hands down. When I go back, it will be for much longer.

G’day and hello to you and yours, world. I am sitting here, watching one of my new Aussie mates cook me dinner at his house in which I have been staying in for nigh a week. I am in Melbourne now, and have just finished pushing my flight back a second time to make it 10 days in this bitching of bitching ass cities. But before I recount to you my 6 days straight of drinking in this town, or my highs and lows at the blackjack table or even my first AFL footy experience, I will start from the beginning—arriving in Sydney.

Aug 3—Got into Sydney Int’l Airport after the longest flight of my still young life, clocking in at around 16 hours. Just getting away from LAX was a real cluster fuck, as my round the world ticket had to be re written—by hand—before I could disembark. Which meant, basically I missed my original flight as I chilled at the AA counter watching this poor schmuck fill out my ticket with all 24 flights with his hand surely cramping up at the end—took over 2 hours. Anyways, got on, slept for half the flight, enjoyed the on-demand movies TV and multiple meals as I made my way over the expansive and deep blue of the Pacific Ocean.

Got in, set my shit down after my shuttle service into King’s Cross where my hostel was, and just had the best weekend after that—drinking, going to The Quay and waterfront, the Opera House, drinking, going to the Opera House for the symphony, drinking, eating at Sydney’s great Chinatown, drinking, 4.5 days of glory it was. Stayed at this great place in King’s Cross called Mate’s Place, people and the management could not have been friendlier and I had a ball and half. But a quick word about King’s Cross—it ain’t a place to take yo momma. Filled to the brim with trannies, sex shops strung out street walkers and thugs are any given hour of night (or day) it is a mind and eye opening experience that I could really only liken to maybe the East Village, NY, NY. But, more I dunno, AUSTRALIAN. Or something. Anyways, I had a great time and then poof, I was off to a place I had been dreaming about for ages, the mythical, the magical, Fiji.

HERE ARE MY OZ PICS, enjoy,

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2011451&l=dabcd&id=57300146
B

Trains, planes and rickshaws

In my travels, I have pretty much taken every mode of transportation available. As I sit here, days away from my biggest, baddest adventure to date, I am reminded of past trips—Central America, Mexico, and East and West Europe—and how I managed to travel in and around the countries there in. So, this entry is a look back on to my favorite, and least favorite, types of moving about.

Planes—This is the most obvious, but shouldn’t be left off, as it is the way I cover my biggest distances. I have not sat down and thought about how many hours and miles I have flown in my life, and I don’t want to. My longest flights to date have been to London and back, at around nine to ten hours—this of course will pale in comparison to my upcoming LAX to Sydney flight, clocking in at around fifteen hours as I traverse the Pacific Ocean. However, this distance will survive only a few short months, as my upcoming, Tokyo to London to Nairobi will surely not only blow the LAX to Sydney record away, but basically just blow, I think its 24 hours of flying out of 28. So, pre packaged meals, cramped bathrooms, fat wheezy flying companions overflowing from their coach seats onto mine, mind numbing hours of TV episodes of Two and a Half Men and movies like The Wedding Date re playing endlessly through the long, usually crying baby filled hours as my ass slowly conforms to the thousands of previous occupant’s butt contours as they flew the same airspace on these gigantic jet propelled aluminum alloy tubes hurtling through the high altitude atmosphere. This is how I get to where I am going, but once I’m there, the options of traveling the shorter distances begin to vary, as have my experiences using them.

Water travel (Boats, ferries, skiffs, kayaks, canoes sailboats, paddle boats, surfboards)

Ah, the allure of the water. Whether the body in question is the sea, a lake, a river or just an underground cenote, water has such a powerful and wonderful draw to us bipedal omnivores. Personally, I cant get enough of it, and try and spend as much time around it and in it as possible, in fact, a little thing I am trying to do in life is to pee in as many bodies of water as possible, which will now warrant its own mini outline;

a) The Pacific (Cali. Nicaragua and Costa Rica)
b) The Gulf of Mexico
c) The Caribbean (Mexico, Belize and Honduras)
d) The Mediterranean
e) The Adriatic
f) The Atlantic
g) South Pacific (Bondi Beach, Sydney)

Anyways, I plan to add to this Waters I’ve Peed In List many times over during the next twelve months, so, rest assured, world, there will be a whole lot more of my pee floating around in the world’s waters—stay tuned.

On the road (Trains, buses, taxis, rented cars)

Traveling within a country takes a bit of patience, getting there is the easy part they say, moving about is a little harder. Of course, the more developed the country, the easier it is to travel around it. Places in Western Europe are a snap—get on a train and take a nap ‘til you get there. But, if you are in, say, Nicaragua, where 40% of the country’s roads aren’t paved, then it becomes an adventure. One such Nica adventure came as me and my old buddy Max were trying to make it from San Juan del Sur, a developed town on the Pacific coast, to Propoyo beach, about 40 miles south west. This of course took 4 hours by via a rickety old yellow school bus (the preferred form of travel in C. America, by the by) and as they call these things chicken buses, it would have only been right to be sitting next to an ancient creased Nica man with a black trash bag full of peeping, little yellow, yes you guessed it, chickens. Classic.

As for the other modes, taxis are always a hair raising experience and it doesn’t matter if you’re taking one back from the Sydney Opera House, or trying to get to the National Airport in Panama City, either way, you are handing you life to a guy who NEVER speaks English and who only occasional follows traffic guidelines, of course, in Sydney there are SEATS in the taxi instead of trash bags over old metal coils, but who is keeping track?

Other Everything from go karts to push carts; from rickshaws to lorries, from elephants to just plain ol’ walking there will always be some form of transport available, efficiency be damned sometimes its just fun to do as the locals do.

Anyways, I am in Sydney now, enjoying the last of my First-world travel until I get to Europe, so the next 4 months or so will provide numerous experiences for me as the world of travel always does. Until that time…..

hello again my fans followers and fellow flyboys and girls, im home- kind of.
i got back from croatia and London on fourth of july, and spent the last couple of weeks cramming in packing supply gathering and farewells in the short span i was home. Im on the road now with Moms watching her snap pics of hummingbirds while i while away the time mapping out my routes thru Oz and SE Asia. I leave for Sydney on August first and will spend a month cruising the barrier reef and beaches there oh-and flying out to Fiji for a week as well, natch. Ill check in again this week, but if anyone has any ideas on S thai or Malaysian beaches ( during fall wet weather) holla at this kid