longhaulers

gata loops and lahoul valley

beautiful lahoul valley.

Well…back in the USofA. Im glad i did that last post in India before we left. It’s so easy not to deal with trip stuff now that we are back.. we’re in such a different headspace now… it’s definately nice to be back in a comfortable and clean place, but it’s like “now what?” We are selling jewelry that we bought back from India at a Sat. swap-meet in front of a surf shop, I picked up some temporary work in a cabinet shop and sonja’s gardening, I’m trying to organize a mural that’s to be painted in a school near Seattle…etc..we’re starting to feel a bit gypsyish. life is not nearly as exciting as it was for the last 6 months, I’d say it’s almost more difficult to adjust to a slow pace from a fast pace then vice versa, but we’ve still got a lot to look forward to. There’s talk of leaving with Holly and Mike as they cycle from Seattle to San Francisco… so we’ll see.

anyway, here are some photos from the last month or so of our cycle trip in the Himalayas..in no particular order (get a hold of me if you want to see the full slideshow)..

a little landslide action.

yes, this is the road.

the amazing morey plains

sonja cranking up kinnaur valley

ki gompa, spiti valley

descent into kashmir

rainshadow riding

floating veggie market, srinagar, kashmir

back in dirty delhi

goodbye! thanks for reading!

 We’ve got about 5 hours before we head to the airport, so this trip is over!!! we spent the morning stuffing 6 months of accumulated purchases and junk into our bags and packing down the cycles. It’s near to impossible to get a bike box in Delhi so we focused on making our bikes into small tight packages..with the hope that baggage handlers recognize the bikes as bikes and handle them with care.

To recap the last two weeks as we made our way from Leh to Delhi: [read on]

Here we are in Leh, Ladakh. I was waiting to do a blog post when we got back to Delhi, but that's still two weeks away and it's better to do these things when the memories are still fresh (even ... [Continue reading this entry]

After nearly 5 months of travel and eating every meal at some form of restaurant, we've got a pretty good feel of what's out there. most backpacker places have the same menus, often with spelling errors that make for a ... [Continue reading this entry]

It's such a nice feeling to wake up in the morning and think that all you have to do today is go for a walk in the mountains. That's how we've been feeling for the last two weeks as we've ... [Continue reading this entry]

Kathmandu is really quite crazy actually. it's much busier and more polluted than I expected, but when are one's preconceptions ever correct? There also seems to be more social ills, such as homelessness, alcoholism, and the most disturbing sight of ... [Continue reading this entry]

some pics. we've just returned from a trek to Annapurna base camp in the Nepalese Himalaya. The trek was quite strenuous, but rewarding. Lots of up and down through incredibly steep river valleys carved out by glaciers. we were slowed down ... [Continue reading this entry]

It's amazing where you can end up while travelling on spontaneity and last minute decesion making...it's also amazing how fast the time here is going. it feels like i updated this blog a few days ago, but i think it's been more like ... [Continue reading this entry]

We feel lucky to have escaped Gorkana...it feels as if we were sucked into a timeless vortex of sand, waves, palms, food and the best little hut in India. after a week passed we reluctantly forced ourselves to leave....but the ... [Continue reading this entry]

We're about ready to say that our cycling in south India is over. We are in the most relaxing destination of Gorkana (cow's ear) as of now..and plan to stay a while. We found a great little hut that's a ... [Continue reading this entry]

We set out well before dawn from our dingy hotel room, which, located on a busy intersection next to the bus station, had meant sleeping with earplugs in an attempt to muffle the noise of ... [Continue reading this entry]

In Tamil Nadu, with topography comparable to a pancake, we pedaled for 1000km in only one or two gears - it would have been quite possible to do ... [Continue reading this entry]

well, here we are...still kicking! there was a bit of a problem where i couldn't log into the blog site to update, but all appears to be good now. speaking of delays...we got a bit delayed there in mamallapuram, after i ... [Continue reading this entry]