June 02, 2006
Oaxaca City
After three weeks in Salem sorting through 40 years of junk...one pile for St. Vincent de Paul, one pile for the dump, one pile to sell at the Assistance...Read this update
May 04, 2006
HI Sukhumvit Hostel
Just so you don't think I drowned in the Sangkren waters of Thailand, I spent the next few days in a great new 38 bed hostel called HI Sukhumvit in...Read this update
April 02, 2006
Luang Prabang Lao
The last time I was here was in 2002. There are few changes and not as many tourists as I expected but then this is the off season. I'm...Read this update
March 29, 2006
Thai Cooking School
At the Smile Guesthouse I attend cooking school. A Dutch couple and a German girl and I each have our own "station" with a wok sitting on a gas burner....Read this update
March 25, 2006
Breakfast at Smile Guesthouse
I have changed hotels. I am now at the brand new Bau-Tong Lodge with free WiFi that is down little soi 3 off Loi Kroh...for half the cost of the...Read this update
March 04, 2006
Chiang Mai
Flew from Koh Samui on Bangkok Air (the only airline off the island because Bangkok Air built the airport) and then on to Chiang Mai on budget Air Asia....Read this update
February 25, 2006
International Night
We're back on Samui and I have rented a brand new furnished one bedroom house for $12.00 a night at "Solitude Resort" on a mountainside about a mile from Doug...Read this update
January 23, 2006
A Light In The South
Visitors, to the south of Thailand, including foreigners, will soon have an opportunity to experience muslim life in a village in the province of Yala. A "Widower's Village" is being...Read this update
November 04, 2005
"Taxation Without Representation"
Taking a fast sleek train, we are visiting our country's capitol city for a few days. "Taxation Without Representation" is written at the bottom of D.C. license plates here in...Read this update
April 01, 2005
Familiar Old Quarter Hanoi
I had to check out of Thailand...thought my visa was 90 days that I got in Kunming in December but it was only 60 days. So at the end of...Read this update
December 13, 2004
Jinghong
While I was in Guizou Province, Bob headed off for Putuashan Island and then circled back to Shanghai via Hangzhou...then flew to Jinghong to meet me at the Banna...Read this update
December 10, 2004
Camellia Hotel In Kunming
Was really fun to spend time in the Camellia Hotel compound in Kunming, familiar from our 2002 visit to China, and fraternize with all the Western travelers and trade...Read this update
October 15, 2004
Far East Youth Hostel
The last time I was in China it was freezing cold in January 2003. The weather is fantastic this October day in 2004. After slogging it out across Russia...Read this update
October 05, 2004
Life in a Mongolian Ger
Terelgj National Park, an hour by car outside of Ulaan Baatar, is a spectacular valley surrounded by high eroded rock formations, pine covered mountains and steppes carpeted with sheep,...Read this update
September 25, 2004
Five Hours to Olkhon Island
The next morning we are picked up at our homestay in Irkutsk by a sullen driver who drives us five hours over pot-holes, through the taiga and across a...Read this update
August 31, 2004
An Ancestral Village
We take local electric trains three hours north from Warsaw to Ostroda where we book into the Park Hotel on a lovely lake that caters to German-speaking tourists many...Read this update
August 24, 2004
Krakow
We are out of the unusually hot and humid Czech Republic. After an all night train we are in cool Krakow Poland. We accept an offer by a young...Read this update
January 08, 2003
Zhangziajie
Bob and I said goodbye to Jana who would leave later in the day on a train to Shanghai and then home from Hong Kong. The next day we...Read this update
December 31, 2002
New Years in Chengdu
The sleeper train from Kunming to Chengdu takes about 18 hours and passes through more than 200 tunnels. It took 10 years to build the railroad...mostly by political prisoners...and...Read this update
December 28, 2002
Ruili
Coming down out of the mountains we were happy to see Ruili lying in the green lush valley below...a larger city than I thought...a Chinese/Burma border town with a...Read this update
December 24, 2002
Xmas At Re Hai Hot Springs
We went to Re Hai Hot Springs..a short half-hour bus ride from Tengchong. The Asian and European continental shift also resulted in over 80 crystalline hot springs...grand Boiling Hot...Read this update
December 21, 2002
Volcanos in Tengchong
A young Chinese woman on the bus had struck up a conversation in English...telling us about the sights around Tengchong. We thought that maybe we could pay her to...Read this update
December 19, 2002
Domestic Fight in Baoshan
The Lonely Planet description for finding Huacheng Binguan was difficult...the hotel name was the same but the street was different...two Dutch travellers sitting in the lobby with their backpacks...Read this update
December 16, 2002
Conversation With Roland
Had a final dinner at familiar and cozy Sekura's Cafe in Old Town Lijiang...splurging on Western food...sharing our beer with Roland, a 30 year old economics teacher in a...Read this update
December 10, 2002
Echo & Li...Competitors
Monday Dec 9 2002 In Old Town Lijiang, we are woken up by a knock at the hotel door at 8am. Two couples from Taiwan were on their way...Read this update
December 08, 2002
The Wonderful Naxi People
Once in Lijiang, we dumped our luggage at the Shangira Hotel (Y80 or about $10 for a double) that was recommended by Echo. I suspect she was getting a...Read this update
December 05, 2002
Jade Dragon Snow Mountain
Bob took a flight south to Mangshi and then on by bus to Ruili near the Burma border. Jana and I left Kunming on a Yunnan Airlines flight to...Read this update
December 03, 2002
End of the Burma Road
Sunday Dec 1-3 2002 Arrived at Kunming from Guilin after 23 hours on the train. We had gained considerable elevation throughout the night. We took a taxi to the...Read this update
November 23, 2002
Adoptions
In Guangshou we moved to Shamian Dao Island and stayed in the Shamian Hotel...right across the street from the White Swan Hotel where Communist dignitaries used to stay. Of...Read this update
Posted by laughingnomad at 12:40 PM |
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November 22, 2002
To Guangzhou
Friday November 22 2002 Hong Kong to Guangshou Across the street to noodle shop for breakfast. Sat with woman who worked as a buyer for a British department store...Read this update
November 20, 2002
Hong Kong
Wednesday November 20 2002 We flew to Hong Kong from Bangkok on China Airways at 3pm...a one hour time change. We noticed the metal spoon and fork that came...Read this update
Lovely Lao
My favorite country so far...the people are sweet but very natural and direct. Flew from Siem Reap Cambodia to Vientiane, the Capital of Lao. The “s” was added by...Read this update
October 25, 2002
Siem Reap
My original plan was to take a boat up the Mekong River in Cambodia to the Lao border and then on up through Laos but I kept hearing reports...Read this update
October 24, 2002
Cambodia Today
Pol Pot, the architect of one of the most brutal and radical revolutions that had its origins in Beijing China, was never brought to international justice. He died in...Read this update
September 25, 2002
Hanoi
September 24 2002 Bob left Hanoi right away on the train for Sapa near the Chinese border to do some trekking among the colorful minority villages and then to...Read this update
August 29, 2002
Kalaw...British Hill Station
In a monsoon rainstorm we climbed off the train in this cool wooded hill station built during the British occupation. The locals laughed (with me) at my little paper...Read this update
August 28, 2002
Taunggyi...Last Frontier
At dinner one night in Inle, Bob was considering taking the offer of the waiter to lead him on a trek into the mountains until he told us that...Read this update
August 18, 2002
Poverty, Government Greed and Human Sweetness
August 18, 2002 Rangoon (renamed Yangon) We took Thai Air to Rangoon. Bob left his Lonely Planet Guidebook Burma (renamed Myanmar by the military junta) on the plane and...Read this update
July 22, 2002
Jaipur
July 22-26 The next day we discover we are the only guests in the Hotel Meghniwas and we have breakfast in the quiet restaurant downstairs. The night before Bob had...Read this update
July 21, 2002
Udaipur
July 18-21 To make it easy on ourselves we left at 4am for a one-hour flight north to Udaipur in the state of Rajasthan. When the taxi pulled out we...Read this update
July 18, 2002
Bombay Renamed Mumbai
July 13-18, 2002 India forces you to look beneath the surface of things...there is more here than your eyes see...a midnight ride into the city from the airport in the...Read this update
June 25, 2002
Table Mountain & District 6
The geographical configuration of the city of Cape Town at the foot of Table Mountain is as beautiful as everyone has said it is. We took the cable car...Read this update
June 17, 2002
Bo Kaap or Cape Malay Quarter
The next day we take a minibus for 3 rand each (10 rand to a dollar) to look for an apartment. The buses are many and frequent with no schedule-you...Read this update
June 16, 2002
Cape Town!
June 15, 16, 2002 James make an unbelievable maneuver with the truck into the Lions Head Lodge & Backpacker Compound around a corner and in between parked cars on...Read this update
June 14, 2002
Citrusdal and The Baths
June 14, 2002 My birthday The Baths is a health spa about 16 km from Citrusdal in a pretty wooded gorge. It is a long weekend in South Africa;...Read this update
June 02, 2002
Ombinda Country Lodge
Sunday June 2, 2002 near Outjo Yesterday the truck broke a spring so we stopped in the Afrikaner town of Outjo to find a mechanic and pick up some...Read this update
May 15, 2002
Pleasuring In Zanzibar
We spent evenings on the deck of the Mercury Bar watching the sun set over the Indian Ocean full of fishing boats and beautiful lean bodies swimming in the...Read this update
May 14, 2002
Overland To Dar es Salaam
Virtually no cars on the road; only trucks and buses and a few vans. The people seem like they don't see many overlanders; some-mostly women and little children wave-sometimes...Read this update
May 01, 2002
Nairobi...First Impressions
On April 30, 2002, the plane from Cairo landed in Nairobi Kenya to music from "Out of Africa" (groan) and a horrific monsoon-season rainstorm. A taxi ride to the downtown...Read this update
April 21, 2002
Cairo
On April 21, 2002 while waiting for our flight from Athens to Cairo, we visited briefly with a gentleman sitting next to us who was on his way to...Read this update
April 12, 2002
Santorini & Sifnos
As the ferry approached the island through the caldera you see a red-brown black and pumice grey terraced cliff face that looms hundreds of feet above the water with...Read this update
April 09, 2002
Athens
Landed in Eletherios Venizelo airport and everyone clapped as is often the custom around much of the world. Took a one hour bus ride from the airport to Monastiraki...Read this update
April 08, 2002
Rome
"Italy will return to the splendors of Rome, said the major. I don't like Rome, I said. It is hot and full of fleas. You don't like Rome? Yes, I...Read this update
April 07, 2002
Last Night In Florence
April 24, 2002 On the last day in Florence our room was booked by someone else and we had to move a few doors up the street to the Hotel...Read this update
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March 30, 2002
Nice
From Avignon we took a train southeast to Nice on the Mediterranean and stayed there in a virtual apartment in the Hotel Constadt a block from the water. Spent...Read this update
Posted by laughingnomad at 06:07 AM |
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March 25, 2002
Barri Gotic Barcelona
In Barcelona we stayed in the Lower Barri Gotic area at Hotel Peninsular at Carrer Sant Pau, 34. Two single beds; sink; window opens into central court; very clean and...Read this update
March 21, 2002
The Atlas Mountains
We took an excursion trip south and east past incredible green terraced fields and old Berber kasbahs (ancient Moroccan self-contained communities made out of the rust colored mud of...Read this update
March 20, 2002
Pink & Tent-like Marrakech
There is no chance of an American avoiding his/her cultural filters in a country like Morocco-just as I suspected! “Lets Go” travel guide describes Marrakech as a “city of immense...Read this update
March 10, 2002
Lagos, Portugal
Bob was hell-bent on going to Lagos, a resort area on the south coast of Portugal thinking it would be a nice break from the cold wind and one...Read this update
March 09, 2002
Lisbon
Roosters are symbols of Portuguese culture so we felt that it was appropriate that after staying one night in a boring part of Lisbon, Portugal in a hotel room...Read this update
February 17, 2002
Hip Notting Hill
We didn't realize that our neighborhood was "hip" until we were sitting in our hotel/bar in Notting Hill a couple days ago and I noticed a newspaper clipping pinned up...Read this update
September 30, 1995
A Dacha In Samarkand
After coming off the Kyrgyzstan trek, Peter, our trip leader, had arranged for us to go to Samarkand in Uzbekistan before continuing on up to Tashkent for the flight...Read this update