Barry Backpacks Around the World

After going to the police station, I decided to wait until Monday to extend my visa. Unlike last time in Guilin, I was told I would actually have to get a new visa which will cost me another $100 (instead of about $20). I don’t believe this is correct, but I decided to wait until Monday to get the most time out of the new visa. This meant that I had about four days to kill. I had originally thought about going to Emei Shan (a 3100 meter Buddhist mountain). I decided against doing this for two reasons. Read the rest of this entry »

On Wednesday I was dropped off at the main Beijing train station by Chen. I found the waiting area for the train and, well, waited. When it was time for the train to board, everyone in the room decided to conduct an experiment. The idea was to see just how many people could be squeezed through a single turnstile simultaneously. At times it seemed that some fundamental laws of the universe were being broken and different objects were actually coexisting in the same space. No matter what class I travel, it seems that all the Chinese people are scared of missing the train and all want to be first in line. The train staff seem to take some pleasure in only opening one entry point making the situation worse. It’s sort of like going to WalMart, which for some reason has thirty check out lanes but they never open more than two. Read the rest of this entry »

(Dichotomy – a division into two mutually exclusive or contradictory groups. Not a medical procedure that involves sticking cameras into various bodily orifices. That just wouldn’t make sense now would it.)

This past week has shown me that China is definitely a country in the process of trying to reinvent itself. As the title suggests, China is a lesson in extremes with wealth and lots of shiny children, people, and buildings coexisting side by side with the exact opposite. This is usually within sight of one another. I got my first lesson as I made my way to the Guilin train station about which I will tell you in due course. Read the rest of this entry »

On Wednesday evening, I caught the ferry from Hong Kong to Nansha which is an industrial suburb of Guangzhou. The trip went by quickly as the ferry was relatively new and fast. On the trip I met a Canadian named Terry (the only other foreigner on board). He was just moving to Guangzhou to take a computer science teaching position in Clifford Estates where I was going. He was married to a Chinese lady and they were going to live in Clifford Estates. Upon arrival in Nansha, I swiftly moved through immigration and then into the line for the metal detector. The metal detector seemed to go off as everyone went through including me yet the guards never checked anyone. After clearing customs, Terry and I caught the bus for Clifford Estates. The bus driver never sold me a ticket. Upon exiting the bus at Clifford Estates, a guard wanted my non existent ticket. After much finger pointing, in Chinese which I didn’t understand, and English which they didn’t understand, I had to go back to the bus driver and buy a ticket for 15 yuan (7.5 yuan = 1 US dollar). I was then met by Kemble who was to be my host in Guangzhou. Kemble and his wife Zallari are an Indian couple who are friends of a friend. They currently work in China in the jewelry industry. After meeting Kemble, we walked through Clifford Estates to his apartment. Clifford Estates is a very large planned suburb of Guangzhou built by a developer named Clifford. (Lots of things there are named after Clifford). After meeting Zallari and dropping off my bags, we went to eat at a Thai restuarant. After eating, we went to watch Zallari take salsa lessons. It was sort of surreal to spend my first night in China watching a group of Chinese and Indian people learn to salsa. I must say they are good as this was the intermediate class. My last action of the night was to call Terry and arrange to go sightseeing with him as we had discussed on the bus trip. Kemble and his wife were working. Read the rest of this entry »

My trip and arrival in Hong Kong was quite an exciting one. I boarded a Thai Airways flight in Perth for a seven hour flight to Bangkok. I sat next to an Englishman going on a business trip to Mongolia. We talked as the Thai Airways attendants proceeded to liquor us up. Before dinner (which we ordered from menus) I managed to put down two vodka drinks. During dinner which I believe was chicken tarragon I imbided on more vodka and wine. If this wasn’t enough, the flight attendants came through the cabin shortly after dinner providing passengers with a nice port. As this was an international flight, it was all free (or should I say I paid for it in my ticket). Finally the alcohol tray quit coming around and I was able to sleep. I arrived in Bangkok around 10:00 pm for my 10 hour layover. Much to my surprise, all the airport businesses were open and would remain open the entire night. In my wanderings, I came across a massage parlor that gave a 45 minute full body Thai massage for 500 baht (33 bath = 1 US dollar). This is expensive by Thai standards, but absurdly cheap by Australian standards. I had seen advertisements for Thai massages on the plane and was enticed. I couldn’t think of a better way to introduce myself to Asian culture. I was shown into a room and given a pair of cotton pajamas to put on. I then laid down on a mattress and was soon joined by a tiny Asian lady. The massage started out normally enough but soon turned into a contortionist act as she pushed my limbs into various unnatural positions and making my joints pop in places that I didn’t know that I had joints. She also used all four limbs massaging my back with her hands while using her feet on my legs. (Thank goodness she was small.) After this was over, I found a sofa in a lounge to try to get some sleep on. I boarded my flight at 8:00 am and arrived in Hong Kong around noon. During the flight, I was sitting next to an Indian lady (married to a German) who lived in Hong Kong. When I told her where I was staying she looked horrified and told me that she never goes in that area by herself. This of course didn’t give me high hopes about my accomodation choice. She also gave me her number to call her if I got in trouble. Read the rest of this entry »

Today is my last full day in Australia. Tomorrow I have an overnight (I have to sleep in the Bangkok airport) to Hong Kong. I am both nervous and excited at the prospect. China is regarded by some as one of the most difficult Asian countries to travel in. They are probably the least Anglicanized I guess you could say. You will find less people speaking English here than in many other Asian countries. I can’t form an opinion yet as I have not been to Asia before. I have booked a room at the Kowloon New Hostel in Hong Kong so now I only have to figure out how to get there. I originally thought I would be done with hostels once I got to Asia, but I soon found out that room prices in the bustling cities of China rival those in the western world. It appears I will have another month or so of hostels. I know it will get cheaper though as I have found hotels in Nepal that have single rooms for about $5.00 a night. Read the rest of this entry »

As it turns out I could rent a car with just my international driving permit (even though it clearly stated it wasn’t valid without a driver’s license. I didn’t point that out though.) On Sunday I finally had luck finding a travel companion in the form of a 21 year old German (they really are everywhere) girl named Jasmine. She had put a notice up on the board in the hostel and needed to be in Perth by July 31 for her flight home. We met and after several phone calls decided to rent a car for nine days from Europcar. As stated above they were willing to rent me the car without my US driver’s liscense. We ended up with a very nice new Hyundai Tuscon that needed to be delivered back to Perth so they waved the one way drop off fee. The “car” looked like it had been birthed from an amorous encounter between a hatchback car and an SUV so I am not exactly sure what to call it. Read the rest of this entry »

The comments have been pretty slow lately. Hopefully I didn’t offend any of my female readers with my last post. I did have fun with the all girl group, but I was being honest when I said it took a long time to make a decision. Enough of that though, on with the trip.

After spending one night in the new hostel, I was picked up by Paul in his Toyota 4WD. Paul was going to work in Derby as a pilot and had decided to take the Gibb River Road to get there. We headed out from Kununnura and was soon on a dirt road. Non-paved roads in Australia are normally just hard packed, very red, dirt instead of gravel. The terrain was what I had come to expect in this part of Australia, namely small stunted trees, large termite mounds, and large red rocky hills in the distance. The sky was a bit cloudy but no rain was immenent. I haven’t seen rain in nearly a month. The road was surprisingly well maintained and we were able to maintain speeds of between 80 and 100 km/hr for most of the trip. The first major river crossing was the Pentecost River. This river dwarfed any crossing that I had done while 4WDing to date. The water came up nearly to the doors of the SUV which was pretty high off the ground. Later after crossing the river, we turned off to view one of the gorges that line the road. I forget the name of the gorge, but the road there was nothing if not exciting. At one point the vehicle had to clamber over some pretty high rocks. It came slamming down on the other side bending one of the bash plates. We stopped for the night at the campround for Manning Gorge. Upon stopping we found that we had a flat (most people get at least one flat tire from sharp rocks while traveling the road) which we had to get repaired the next day. For the second time in Australia, I set up my tent and then went and had a “refreshing” cold water shower. Since we had no source of hot water, my supper that night consisted of a sandwich that I had bought earlier, power bars, and apples. Paul subsisted off of crackers and cheese. Read the rest of this entry »

I spent the morning of my last day in Darwin trying to figure out a way to get to Broome. Since I had no luck finding a traveling companion, I finally decided to take the Greyhound Bus to Kununurra and hook up with a tour already in progress going to Broome. I decided to forgo travel on the Gibb River Road as 4WD rentals and tours are just too expensive for that trip. I spent the afternoon at the Darwin museum with some of the last remaining people from my tour group. One of the main attractions at the museum was Sweetheart. He is a very large stuffed crocodile that died during an attempt to transport him in the 70’s. Sweetheart apparently had a bad habit of attacking boats. Read the rest of this entry »

My tour is now officially finished and I am sitting in Darwin contemplating how to get to Broome. I met with my group that I was leaving one last time for supper before going to bed for my early morning departure. My room, that was empty when I left, was now occupied by two Canadians. One of whom snored all night preventing me from getting a decent night sleep. I woke up at 4:30 am, got ready to leave, and went down to wait for my pickup. The bus finally arrived an hour later than it was supposed to. I was one of the last people to be picked up so I was relegated to a seat in the very back of the bus. This bus was very different from the one used to get to Alice Springs. The seats were all high which gave good neck support, but impeded conversation. The group was also much bigger consisting of 22 people which nearly filled the bus. We had a female tour guide/driver. The trip over the next three days mostly took place on the bus with a few stops in between. Read the rest of this entry »