Segovia: Snow and Meat in Old Castile

After a week in Madrid we hopped on the high speed train for the half hour trip up to Segovia. Rather than do a quick day trip and back to Madrid, as most do, we decided to book 2 nights there, to do our site-seeing (and meal-taking) at a more leisurely pace, and get the feel of living behind the old walls of the city for a couple days.  

It was cold when we left Madrid, but we were very surprised to arrive in Segovia and find it snowing! The kids were very excited to see it, and spent lots of time catching snowflakes on their tongue, and even making a snowball. 

The reception at the hotel was the least friendly of our entire trip so far - and that's saying something. (Several places in China come to mind, along with our late arrival at the dump we stayed at in Perth.) I said "Hola" and was given a long look up and down before the nice man condescended to reply with "Hola" and then turn his back on me to continue on with whatever he was doing.  But we did eventually get checked in, and got some small measure of revenge later when he wad forced to come and fix the safe in our room, due to the presence of his manager at the reception desk when I informed him of the problem.

We had a few other incidents like this in Segovia - unfriendly bartenders, etc - though most people were pleasant and/or professional. Maybe they just get burned out on tourists, or maybe the cold weather had everybody down. 

But not us.  We had arrived in time for lunch (at 2pm) and we intended to make the most of it.  A place called Restaurante Jose y Maria had come highly recommended, and we found it just off the Plaza Mayor. The food is Castillian and the specialties are Corderito Asado and Cochinillo Asado, respectively roast baby lamb and roast suckling pig.  But first we were brought a small dish to tide us over - tripa. We did our best with it and even had E and D take a bite, though we didn't exactly tell them what it was. We ordered our standard vino tinto, and they wisely brought us a whole bottle. We also ordered an ensalada verde - we make a point of ordering this with every meal as the Spanish cuisine is otherwise fairly light on vegetables - and a roast vegetable plate, which was delicious. And we opted for the corderito. Most of the other diners opted for the cochinillo, and we got to watch the show. They come out splayed over big clay dishes, hooves splayed, snout high, ears wrinkled and crispy, and a slight smile - it looked as though they were flying, perhaps from this world into the next. The professional waiters then serve it up, using a plate to cut the cochinillo into about 6 servings - cutting it up with a plate demonstrates that it is cooked just right. The corderito had less fanfare, but was unbelievably good - better even than the cochinillo (which we had the next day). The wine was delicious, the corderito exquisite and, not wanting the meal to end, we kept ordering things - dessert, Porto, coffee, until finally there was no choice but to leave, 2+ hours later.

In high spirits we stumbled across the plaza mayor and into the cold, vast, and somber Catedral. It was begun in the early 1500s and is considered the last major gothic cathedral, in all of Europe I think. We saw gruesome relics - bone shards from obscure saints, and countless paintings and alterpieces, some dating back to the 12th century. 

The next day we had our cafe, churros y chocolate, y tortilla espanola, then set out for the roman aqueduct. It spans 9 miles and was still used to bring water to the city up until about 100 yrs ago. At the entrance to the old city it crosses a gorge, and rises to a height of about 100 feet, above a structure of two levels of arches, constructed of giant granite blocks, assembled with no mortar, no cement. It has to be one of the most amazing roman-built structures still in existence in the world, though there is apparently some disagreement about whether it was in fact built in the 1st century AD by the Romans. There are no records in existence of its construction, and some claimed that it was actually built 1000s of years before the Romans, though the best explanation I heard is that it was built by the devil. Apparently there was a woman who toiled every day to carry water the long distance from it's source to her husband. The devil appeared one day during her long journey and asked how he could be of assistance. The woman struck a bargain with him: her soul, but only if he could build her something to transport the water to her front door, and have it done before the call of the first rooster the next morning. The devil and his minions toiled all night, and had but one last stone to place when they heard the first rooster the next morning. The devil left, humiliated, the woman kept her soul, and the town of Segovia gained an aqueduct.

We tried a different restaurant for lunch, and had the cochinillo this time, and the fanfare was even greater as, after delivering a speech and then chopping up the cochinillo with the plate the chef yelled "Buen Provecho!" and raised his arms into the air, letting the plate crash to the floor behind him as he did so.

After lunch we went to the Alcazar, the restored castle/fortress at the edge of the walled city. Like the one in Toledo, it was built on the foundation of an old roman fortress. It's an extremely iconic, Disney-esque castle to behold from the exterior, but much of that is owed to 18th and 19th century restorations and additions. But because of those it was extremely well preserved and really neat to walk around. After having seen the royal palace in Madrid it was really interesting to see how a previous generation of kings would have lived. Big heavy wooden dining table and chairs, and thrones in the throne room. Ornate decorations on the ceilings, and religious paintings everywhere, including one of St James "the moorslayer" with bloody moors' heads rolling around at his horse's feet.

On our way back to our hotel we wandered through the old narrow streets, bundled up in all of our warm clothes and hats and gloves, catching snowflakes on our tongues, and enjoying immensely this corner of old, old Spain. And now we are on another train, speeding south to a warmer, and possibly even older corner of Spain. Next stop: Cordoba.

The First Days of Winter

I am so woefully behind on my blog entries! I‘ll just start where we are and then can try to fill in the older stuff.

We finally arrived in Madrid about a week ago after traveling 30 hours from New Zealand – almost half way around the world (the longitude of New Zealand is about 174 E and that of Spain is 4 W). It was long but not as bad as we thought it would be. We have been flying on all sorts of cheap airlines where you have to pay extra for everything. For this trip with flew with Emirates and felt like kings when we actually got food and drinks, free movies and pillows and blankets!

Our first day here was the hardest – we were so tired. After checking into our hotel we decided that the best thing we could do was to walk around in the sun and try to stay awake as long as we could. The weather was beautiful when we arrived, just like a sunny Southern California winter day. We walked up to the Plaza Mayor and sat outside to snack on some tapas. All of us were tired but David was the most tired and we had to keep poking him to keep him awake.

Slowly we adjusted to not just the time difference, but Spanish time. We are eating lunch at 3pm and having a snack at 9pm. We went out one night for tapeo – going from one tapas bar to another. The kids were not as excited about it as we were, but they tolerated it for the chorizo.

Tapas y vino

It has been a change from New Zealand, where it felt like we were going to see nature like mountains and beaches, we are now back in the big city and seeing cultural and history sight seeing. The Prado was spectacular, particularly the Goyas. David was not a fan Goya and in fact refused to look at or listen to the audio guide about “Saturn Devouring His Children” because it was too scary. Hieronymus Bosch’s “Garden of Earthly Delights” was also cool to see in person because you can appreciate all of the freaky detail. We actually found that all of the freaky stuff seemed a little less strange after we saw much of the other art depicting the judgment day from the same era such as people with animal heads and winged demon creatures. While the kids liked seeing all of the art, they really enjoyed visiting the Royal Palace and seeing the opulence of the 18^th century.

We also had the chance to see Picasso’s “Guernica” at the Reina Sofia Museum. It was incredible to see it in person – it is so huge – 11 feet high and nearly 26 feet long. There was a series of photographs that illustrated how Picasso developed the painting including features that were later replaced or removed in the final painting. The collection of Dali paintings were also amazing, not so much because they were his most famous, but because they reflected so many different periods in his work, not just his surrealist works.

One day we took the train out to Toledo. It was a great contrast to Madrid. While Madrid feels very European, it doesn’t’ feel particularly Spanish. It looks more like Paris, which is not surprising since it was built in the mid-1500s by kings originally hailing from France. Toledo, on the other hand, feels very Spanish with wrought iron, red tile roofs, and narrow, winding cobblestone streets. We had fun trying to navigate the streets and make our way to the cathedral and the Santo Tome chapel to see the El Greco.

We had been really looking forward to visiting the Alcazar in Toledo – a castle built on the site of a Roman fort. It had been heavily bombed in the Spanish civil war when it was under siege and had been recently restored (more like remodeled) and opened. At the entry were the excavated Roman remains, including a well, after this point, we were totally lost in the most

The best view of the Alcazar

tedious military museum ever. To be fair, we were still jet lagged as we were trying our best to find our way around, but it seemed to be a huge place filled with lots of nothing that had long confusing explanations. I think we enjoyed it the most viewing it from the city walls below!

After a few days in Madrid, the warmth of what we took to be an early spring quickly disappeared (we optimistically thought we had managed to avoid winter). While the sun was still mostly out, the temperature went back to normal – around 40 degrees Fahrenheit. Even with all of our clothes on, we were still cold. We finally indulged in a winter shopping spree of more socks and sweaters. This was a big adjustment from months of shorts and flops.

After our week in Madrid, we are ready to go on to explore more Spain. We’re starting off with a few days in Segovia (North of Madrid) and then heading south to hopefully warmer Andalucía (Cordoba, Granada, Ronda, and Sevilla). After that, we haven’t decided anything yet, but are getting tempted to visit Portugal.

Camper Van New Zealand

Lots of people had told us that the best way to see NZ was via camper van (aka motorhome). We thought chilling in Devonport and sailing the Hauraki Gulf were not such bad ways either, but we wanted to see more of the south island and camper van seemed the best way. So we booked a 4 berth motorhome out of Christchurch, and flew down there from Auckland to pick it up. Campervanning is a high-class affair in NZ. The people from Kea picked us up at the airport, served us coffee on a silver platter at the office, gave us tons of helpful information and maps, and showed us around our home on wheels for the next 12 days. I was maybe as nervous taking the helm of that beast as I was of the sailboat - driving a giant motorhome through the cramped parking area, and out onto the wrong (left) side of the street - but I got the hang of it quickly and felt comfortable the rest of trip.

We drove west out of Christchurch and quickly headed up into the mountains, straight into the heart of Rohan and Gondor. We skirted Eisengard and made quickly for the safety of Helms Deep, with Aragon and Legolas serving as forward scouts...

It felt that way anyways, especially when we put Zep 4 on and listened to the Battle of Evermore and the Misty Mountain Hop. The scenery was instantly spectacular: grassy plains dotted with rocky spires, crisscrossed by granite strewn river beds, gushing with turquoise green water, and huge mountains rising up above everything. We stopped for a quick hike and found a limestone cave with a stream that runs for a good 1/2 mile underground. We weren't exactly equipped for that, but we did thoroughly explore the first 10 yards or so. 

We camped at Arthurs Pass that night, beside a river, surrounded by huge mountains. It was cold at night and the wind picked up and blew the motorhome back and forth, but we were snug in our beds. Earlier, before the wind had picked up, we had a visit from a large, greenish parrot-like bird called a Kea, the name sake of our camper van rental company. Keas are extremely intelligent and curious, and this one came right up to us, inspected various socks and things we had laid out, and generally hung around waiting for us to give him food, which we knew better than to do.

Day 2, after a late start, brought us to the beautifully-named Greymouth, on the west coast. We stayed at a holiday park on a beautiful beach. We had to share it with lots of other campers, unlike the night before when we had our riverside spot all to ourselves, and we learned that the benefits of power, playgrounds, and showers are outweighed by the benefits of having a beautiful spot all to yourself. 

Day 3 we drove down the coast to near the Franz Joseph glacier, and before we knew it we were climbing into a small helicopter for an up-close tour of the glaciers. Outside of Antarctica, this is the only place glaciers are found so near to the coast and at such low elevation. It's striking setting out from a lush, tropical, fern-covered area, and minutes later being up in the icy, rocky, barren mountaintops. It was my first helicopter ride, which was cool enough in itself, but flying over the glaciers and yet more LOTR settings was incredible. The glaciers were striated and cracked in places, and the pilot told us that some of the crevasses were 100 meters deep. I won't try to describe them any more - the pictures will do them more justice.

Rather than continue down to Queenstown and the Fiordland we decided to turn around and spend the rest of our time exploring the north part of the south island. We had already seen the fiords from the cruiseship, and we wanted to have some time explore the north, do some kayaking, etc. We stayed at a nice lakeside campground that night, and we headed north. We spent the next night in Westport, again at a beautiful stretch of beach, and after stopping to see the seal colony the next morning, and the pancake rocks, we turned inland to cut across to the north coast. We made it to Old Macdonalds Farm, a nice campground on the edge of the Abel Tasman national park, and we settled in for 3 nights there. Most of the park can only be accessed on foot or via boat. We opted for a little of each: we took a water taxi to one beach, hiked a couple hours across to another beach, and spent the afternoon lounging before getting picked up again by the water taxi. The tide was so extreme that the boat had to be towed out about half a mile by a tractor to reach the water when we left, but when we returned that afternoon the water had come all the way back in, and the boat pulled right up to the dock. The next day we took a beautiful kayak ride with our friendly Kiwi guide Brett (who pronounced his name Brit, and I was not sure all day whether it was actually Brit or Brett until I finally asked). We saw the split apple rock and had gourmet coffee freshly prepared on the beach by Brit, I mean Brett. Later he took the kids spelunking and showed us some creepy giant bugs that live inside the caves. Again we slept well that night.

We set off the next day for Nelson, and after spending a good part of the day taking care of business (taxes!) at an Internet cafe we found a funky little campground in the Maitai valley with a great little swimming hole. Unfortunately we couldn't spend too much time there because of the awful little biting flies (a problem to varying degrees throughout NZ). We moved on the next day to Picton, found a nice campground, and spent the next day on a beautiful hike out to "the snout" of a little peninsula that jutted into the Queen Charlotte Sound. This is within the Marlborough Sounds area, a beautiful corner of NZ known especially for it's wine. The view from our hike was spectacular, with bright green islets and peninsulas everywhere jutting into the turquoise water. The landscape is all thick green tropical vegetation, with millions of deafening crickets. David occupied himself by cricket-spotting, and stopped when he got to 60! 

We headed down the spectacular northeast coast of the south island, with seals everywhere. I kept spotting them for miles from the car and finally pulled over at a random spot on the side of the road, got out, and sure enough there were 15 or 20 of them sprawled on the rocks just 20 or so feet below us. After a while we turned inland and made our way to Hanmer Springs. This was more touristy and developed than we had been expecting, and arriving on the weekend didn't help, but we all enjoyed the water slides at the hot springs park, and mommy and daddy had a nice stinky soak in a sulfery pool while the kids did even more water sliding. We made our way back to Christchurch for the last night, dropped the motorhome off early the next morning (with no new dents!) and caught a flight back to Auckland. 

We picked up our rental car and drove out to the Coromandel Peninsula, and we reached the hot water beach at the perfect low tide time. There is thermal activity under the beach, and at low tide you can dig your own hole (or take over someone else's after they've left - my recommended strategy) and soak in your own hot tub on the beach! The thermal activity is extreme, and in parts the sand is actually too hot to sit on, so you have to get it just right. Next to us was a small hole that someone had obviously started digging but gave up on because it was too hot, and every few minutes someone would walk by and step in it and let out a quick painful "Youch!" before jumping out and moving on.

We stayed at a friendly B&B nearby for our last 2 nights in NZ. The next day we ran some errands and had some lunch, and then found out that Christchurch, where we had been only 24 hours earlier, had been hit by yet another earthquake. They had had a 7.1, I think, about 6 months prior, and luckily no loss of life in that one, though still fairly extensive damage. But this one was quickly proving to be a different story, and as the details emerged we were shocked and saddened by the destruction and loss of life. And at the same time we were grateful that we had left when we did, though I couldn't help but think how LA is overdue for another major quake, and wonder whether we are any better prepared than Christchurch was.

We enjoyed our time in NZ immensely and were sad to leave, though excited to begin the final, European phase of our year of traveling, and especially excited to begin it in Spain!

Sydney Sights and Manly

We arrived in Sydney after sleeping about an hour on the red-eye from Perth. The sun was just rising over the clouds as we began our descent into the airport. We got all of our stuff and got a cab to take us to our apartment in Manly, a town across the harbor from Sydney. On our way we drove straight through the city – past the Opera House and across theSydney Bridge – and got our sightseeing in for the day.

It is different than Western Australia. It is humid and more lush and tropical. There are people everywhere – we were getting used to towns of 200 and Perth wasn’t even that big. I guess it isn’t surprising when the whole population of Sydney (about 4.3 million) is nearly double that of the whole state of Western Australia.

When we arrived in Manly, we still had a few hours to kill before we could get into the apartment. We decided the best way to stay awake would be to hunt for nearby geocaches. Our first wasn’t too difficult but it was on a pier in a pretty busy place so we just had to keep looking out for muggles (non-geocachers). The second was more challenging. Dylan’s phone died so we couldn’t use the GPS anymore and just knew that it was near a bench on this little peninsula….that went on with tons of benches for about a half-mile. We searched in trees, under rocks and in dead logs but had no luck. I was a little freaked out because we noticed that there were spiders everywhere. After reading Bill Bryson’s book, In a Sunburnt Country, I was pretty sure that every living creature in Australia was poisonous and wanted to kill me. A few days later we found out that in our sleep-deprived state we had actually been looking on the wrong peninsula all together!

We have been spending most of our time at the beach. Manly is located on a narrow peninsula, one side of which faces the Sydney harbor and the other side faces the Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately the ocean side has been plagued with blue bottle jellyfish pretty much since we arrived so not much surfing, but the harbor side is great for swimming. There are clear, blobby jellyfish on the harbor side too, but they are apparently harmless ones (according to the aquarium). You end up paddling right through them when you are out swimming – SO squishy. I still jump every time I touch one. It also kind of distracts you from the prospect of sharks.

There is also lots of hiking and open space nearby. We have hiked and searched for geocaches on the whole North Point peninsula, winding through arid eucalyptus and lush tropical palms and vine. It is beautiful and the thought of all of the deadly snakes, spiders, and lizards keeps you on your toes. We saw several huge monitor lizards both in the bush and right along the sidewalk!

We have gone over to Sydney a few times on the ferry. It takes about a half-hour and is a beautiful tour of the harbor, going right by the opera house and just in front of the Sydney Bridge. We have visited all of the places necessary

to highlight the deadly creatures of Australia – the aquarium and the wild animal center.

At the aquarium they had a huge exhibit on jellyfish. They are a pretty big deal here. The most notorious (and deadly) one is the box jellyfish. They are found up north of here, around the Great Barrier Reef. Summer is the big season for them and they are the main reason we are not venturing north. They also had a huge shark exhibit that included a gigantic tank filled with sharks, fish, rays and turtles with clear tunnels running underneath so you could feel submerged with them. The sharks would glide just a foot over your head!

The other dangerous animal in the north is the saltwater crocodile. There are only about 1-2 attacks per year here but I think it is the stealthy, speedy, deadly nature of the attacks that are so scary. There was one at the wild animal center. It didn’t move anything but it’s eyes as we watched it and it was still scary. The one we saw was only about 15 feet long but he was considered a small one.

The kids were especially excited to see the kangaroos and the koalas. We were lucky to see a koala actually moving! Koalas apparently have very small brains – partly as a result of eating very toxic plants and needing to use all their energy to process these plants. There were five or six other koalas in the enclosure and none of them moved at all.

We had planned to go to the zoo but it started raining as we pulled into Sydney so we opted for the Maritime museum which was right at the pier. It ended up being a great detour. We got to tour a naval battleship, a naval submarine and a replica of Captain Cook’s boat, the Endeavour. Both the battleship and the submarine have been maintained as they were while they were in use so each was like a time warp back to the 1960s. The submarine was especially interesting as my cousin had been on one when he was in the navy. I can’t imagine how he did it – weeks at a time in that small space underwater. I get claustrophobic on Captain Nemo’s Submarine – that deathtrap they call a ride – at Disneyland.

Since we will soon be heading off to New Zealand and are both starting to read a book about Captain Cook, the tour of the Endeavour was especially interesting. Like the naval ship and sub, they had all of the original furnishings on the boat. We got to see the galley, the hammocks where the crew slept, the officers’ quarters, and the rooms where Joseph Banks (the rich naturalist) and his entourage stayed. They had volunteers in each section of the boat to explain the details, which was especially great for the kiddies. The boat is still taken out for special excursions, with one starting in April to circumnavigate Australia for a year (www.endeavourvoyages.com.au). You live and work on the boat, performing the tasks of crew. We are already scheming how to get back!

A big part of our time in Manly has also been getting our next travel plans in order. Researching and booking our next move always ends up taking up more time than one might think. It is a good problem to have but just not something that we had quite anticipated at the outset of the trip. Until now, the longest trip we’ve had to book was for two weeks and that was all in one place! After a few more days here, we’ll head off on a cruise to New Zealand that will take us through Melbourne, Tasmania, the Fjordlands (in NZ), Dunedin, Christchurch, Tauranga and finally, Auckland.

New Year's resolutions

Words of wisdom from the Harvey Dickson Country Music Center in Boyup Brook, Western Australia.

Margaret River Holidays

Our two weeks in Margaret River have been amazing - a perfect combination of relaxing and lazing around and also plenty of outdoor activities (hiking, surfing, canoeing and swimming). Everything is nearby and everyone is so friendly and helpful. The only problem is that now we feel like we could spend a few more easy weeks here except everything is filled up for the summer holidays. All of the kids will be on their summer holidays until February but apparently around Christmas and New Year’s are the busiest.

One of the first things we did was have a belated Thanksgiving dinner – actually we had a whole Thanksgiving day where we cooked, watched a movie, and remembered everything and everyone for whom we were thankful. It was pretty easy to find everything we needed – the one confusing thing was the turkey. They have the turkey by sizes, size 32, 34, 36, 38, etc., not by weight. I am sure that somewhere there is a Rosetta stone to translate the sizes but there was nothing helpful on the wrapper. I figured if we just cooked it until we could pull a leg off, it would probably be good enough. It was and we had just enough leftovers to be sick of turkey after a few days.

There are loads of hiking trails around Margaret River to explore. We took one through a eucalyptus forest and where an old train line had run. Along the trail, in a dead fallen tree was supposed to be a geocache. We hadn’t done any geocaching since we had been with Erica in Hong Kong and we still had a little surfboard key ring that we needed to drop off.

This was easily the toughest geocache yet. The GPS on Dylan’s phone didn’t work well because we had weak reception and then eventually died! All we knew was that when it died we had been about 200 feet away from it and that it was in a dead tree. We walked up and down the section of trail we thought it might be, crashing through brush to various dead trees all the while slightly freaked out by the prospect of deadly spiders and snakes. Finally, as we were about to give up, we decided to try an upright dead tree (rather than one lying on the ground) and… bull’s eye! We were pretty excited and would have stayed to read the logbook longer except that we were quickly being chomped by bugs of all sorts. We learned a whole new respect for navigating through the Australia bush – it is wild!

As a family Christmas present, we signed the whole family up for a three-day surf lesson. Emma and David have been on the surfboards before but haven’t really had a formal lesson. Also, up until we went to Hawaii, neither of them were particularly excited about getting washed around in the waves and didn’t like getting saltwater in their mouths or eyes.

After going to the surf shop to get kitted up (Aussie for getting your gear on), we met instructor, Jarrod, at Red Gate beach. The beach was absolutely beautiful with powdery white sands and clear turquoise water. The waves were pretty small. Jarrod took the kids and got started with them and Dylan and I played in the small surf and watched the lesson. We were so glad we didn’t try to teach them – they listened to everything Jarrod said, did it without any complaining and had a great time. It was also so fun to watch them get excited about catching the waves.

Jarrod invited us to come down the beach early the next day as he was going to be teaching a bunch of kids in a holiday camp. He thought it might be fun for Emma and David to join in the fun. It was madness! There were about 25 kids with their surfboards all in the water at once with about five instructors racing from one to the other.

Dylan and I were on the standup boards that day, so we paddled away from the chaos out to the quieter water. The wind had picked up and as soon as I stood up on the board I was blown nearly out of the bay. It was no comfort when Dylan yelled out to remind me that the next land was Antarctica over 1,000 miles away. I managed to get back in and was feeling pretty good on the board until we started trying catch a wave. I kept running right off the end of the board as soon as the wave started pushing it, which I am sure was entertaining to watch.

I never ended up catching a wave, but I got some good practice. Dylan rode a few and made it look easy. By the end of the three days, Emma caught a few waves on her own and rode them all the way into the beach. David could catch them but once he stood up he’d be so excited he’d jump off the board!

There is a beautiful river that runs through Margaret River to the ocean (big surprise). We took a guided canoe trip up it to learn about local history (aboriginal and settlers), the natural history, to eat Australia wild food (kangaroo, emu, grub hummus, berries and seeds), to explore caves and to swim in the river. Our guide was a big friendly Aussie guy who cracked jokes left and right throughout his stories and clearly really enjoyed what he did.

One of the highlights was paddling through the paper trees on Boonaloongar Island in the middle of the river. This island, also called Sorry Island, was a sacred place for the aborigines. Apparently they would come to the island to unload all of the mistakes they had made or things they were sorry for. They would hug one of the paper trees, the trees would absorb all of the mistakes and they would be unburdened. The water in the river would rise and the trees would be submerged and the water would “wash” all of the mistakes away into the ocean. Needless to say, we all took turns hugging and unloading.

Another highlight was exploring the limestone caves about the river. Huge rooms went back into the stone and had been lived in for an extended period of time by shipwreck survivors in the early 1900’s. There was graffiti on the cave walls with dates of 1920 and 1913 written by the survivors. There was also a tunnel that went back through the cave and came out near the entrance. Dylan, Emma and David explored the tunnel (the diameter ranged between 2-3 feet) while I waited with the camera at the end. I was glad I did. It was pitch black and probably would have taken about 3 minutes but took closer to 5-6 minutes waiting for the others to make it through. Too claustrophobic!! The kids loved it and did it twice.

Christmas was a huge success. Santa found us and managed to fit down the chimney of the wood-burning stove. The kids played with toys, ate Christmas cookies and read books for most of the day. We took a little break and went down to the beach for a Christmas swim. The currents at the first beach we went to were too strong and started pulling the kids out almost as soon as we got in. We were all a little spooked so we moved on to another where it was much more mellow. It was a great Christmas celebration - Happy Holidays to all!

Rice Bubbles and Budgie Smugglers*

We arrived in Perth after almost exactly five months in Asia (almost 1/12 of David’s life!). On the plane here it was strange to think we wouldn’t be getting off in another Asian country but in one with more familiar elements. Our first couple days were filled with culture shock going from Asian to Western but also trying to sort out the cultural differences between American and Australian/English ways. Everyone is so friendly and helpful but is frustrating when you know they are speaking English to you and you still can’t understand them!

The first biggest thing we noticed was how empty it seems here. Perth is the largest city in Western Australia (WA) with a booming population of 1.5 million (WA itself has only 2.2 of the total population of 21 million). Compared to the huge crowded cities we have been in (Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Bangkok), where hundreds of people are around 24/7, it seems like a ghost town! We were staying in the main downtown area which is busy during the day but completely clears out around 6pm as everyone heads back to the suburbs (kind of like downtown LA). Even during the day, we still have been walking down streets and been the only ones on the whole street.

As a treat for David especially, we decided to take a trip the Perth Mint, which is touted as a great tourist attraction (there isn’t THAT much in Perth). The Mint was founded in 1899 by the British to refine the gold discovered in WA during the 1890’s and send it back to the motherland. They don’t mint regularly circulated coins anymore, but they do still make all sorts of commemorative coins (apparently the Japanese love them – they had special Hello Kitty ones) and the silver medals for the Sydney Olympic Games. The big highlight of the Mint tour was watching them melt, pour and mould a 25-pound solid gold brick. You could also try to pick up a 25-pound gold brick that was housed in a big plexi-glass box. David was in seventh heaven.

There were also examples of gold bars from around the world. There was millions of dollars worth of gold with what seemed like relatively little security. I don’t know why I do it, but I started scheming how you could knock the place over. I would never do anything like that, but I seem to always gravitate to scheming it. I was just feeling guilty for my scheming when Dylan pointed out how it seemed an easy place for someone to rob. I felt so much better that it wasn’t just me!

As a treat for all of us, we decided to take a ferry down the Swan River and over to Rottnest Island. The island is about 10 miles off shore and is Dutch for “rat nest” island. There are these creatures called quokkas that are found all over the island and look a lot like HUGE rats. They are actually much cuter. Aside from looking for quokkas, which isn’t too challenging, we spent the day at a beautiful white sand beach. We tried some snorkeling but there wasn’t much to see where we were and the water was unexpectedly cold! We were feeling very spoiled from our Indonesian adventure. We still had fun splashing around.

After a few days in Perth, we finally got our bearings together and headed down the coast to Margaret River. We were really looking forward to it, not only because there is great wine and really good surfing, but also because we rented a vacation house for two weeks for Christmas! We have been staying in hotels and eating out since we were in Japan. Cooking our own food, doing our laundry and hanging out in the backyard all sound really good.

On our way out of Perth we stopped in Fremantle, a port town just across the river from Perth. While we wanted to go to Fremantle for it’s pretty downtown with Victorian buildings and the fish and chips shops on the harbor, we really wanted to see the statue of it’s most famous resident…. Bon Scott. I am sure there are a few non-Australian hard-core AC/DC fans that would have known this was his hometown, but we only found out when we arrived in Perth.

We stopped to have some fish and chips on the harbor before seeking out the statue when we looked just across the street and saw it there. I don’t know if the statue was life-size, but he sure looked small. It was funny to watch all sorts of people stopping to take their picture with the statue. The best were these two older Italian couples. I had to wonder if they knew who he was or just figured he must be someone important if there was a statue of him and might as well take a picture with it. Apparently they also offer a special Bon Scott tour of Fremantle, which we would have done if we had time, that included his boyhood home, his school, the jail where he was incarcerated, and his grave.

A few hours after leaving Fremantle and being in the car for the first time in five months, we headed southwest and arrived in at our hotel in Bunbury. We had decided to spend the night here because it was home to the Dolphin Discover Centre that offers boat trips out to swim with wild dolphins. The town is on a protected bay and a river runs into the bay. The dolphins come in the bay to feed, rest and play.

The early the next morning we headed over to the Centre. They suited us up with wetsuits (Emma and David each wore two) and snorkel gear and then loaded us up on a small pontoon boat. There were about ten other people onboard with us. We saw the dolphins swimming all around and our guide, a marine biologist, talked to us about their behavior and identified a few of the dolphins. When we saw 5-6 playing in the water, they stopped the boat and we quietly slipped into the water. Our guide told us not to swim towards the dolphins, as that would scare them, but to make them interested in us by singing and duck-diving down underwater. We did this for about a half-hour and while they circled nearby, they never got very close.

We got back the boat to warm up and head towards another spot when they came back. Our guide told us we could quickly and quietly get back in the water. Most people were still warming up (including David wrapped in blankets) so Dylan, Emma and I got back in. I saw a dorsal fin in the distance but figured it was pretty far off when all of a sudden I was face-to-face with a dolphin!! He came within a foot of me, just checking me out. Emma and Dylan were right behind me and also got a close-up view too. I had an underwater camera but I think I was too dazzled to even get my wits about me enough to take a picture. As quickly as he appeared, he was gone, but it made the whole excursion worth it.

After the dolphin experience we got back on the road and headed south for Margaret River and our house. The drive was beautiful and took us from dry desert scrub to rolling fields, vineyards and huge eucalyptus forests. We were a little nervous about the house at first, but it has ended up being all that we were hoping. It has nice big kitchen and living room area with huge windows that look out into the yard, which is filled with tall eucalyptus trees. The town is nearby and consists of about three blocks of shops and restaurants.

There are about 70 wineries in the Margaret River area. We have made it to two so far. They are particularly famous for their cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay. We haven’t had any cabs we were crazy about but had a very good chardonnay, Evoi 2008 reserve Margaret River chardonnay (in case you can track it down at home).

The chardonnay was enjoyed last night with our belated Thanksgiving dinner. We put together quite a feast with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and green beans. We even set the whole day aside to pretend it was Thanksgiving and spent the day hanging out around the house - Dylan played his guitar, David played chess and Emma made Christmas ornaments. We were all very thankful for our special meal together and thankful that next year we’ll get to have Thanksgiving with our family and friends.

Emma and David have been working very hard to get the house ready for Christmas. We made a cardboard tree and have decorated it with candy canes and origami balloons and cranes. We are gearing up for Christmas cookies and even have most of the presents wrapped – I am more on the ball here for Christmas than I ever have been at home when I am furiously wrapping all my presents on Christmas eve!

*Rice Bubbles=Rice Krispies, Budgie Smugglers=Togs=Bathers=Swimsuit

Beijing adventures

Beijing is almost nothing like I remember! While there are small alleys and traditional neighborhoods that detour off from the main, wide boulevards, there are with huge modern apartment buildings and malls everywhere. When we were here, I remember that I needed as sweater because it was cold. We had one option – the government friendship store – where to buy it. Now there are clothing stores (including fancy ones like Gucci and Prada) all over the place, car dealerships and fast-food restaurants galore.

We celebrated our arrival with a big Peking duck feast. In fact, we decided to make it our goal to find the best Peking duck in Beijing while we were here. We managed to eat duck for three of the five nights we were here – all different presentations and all delicious. We probably ate more duck here than the kids have eaten in their whole lives!

Our first day out was rainy and cold. We bundled up and headed out for the Forbidden City. It was huge and impressive and definitely consistent with everything we had read about it. We went through building after building and the complex just went on and on. When we were up on the higher buildings it seemed all we could see in the distance were more of the iconic peaked yellow roofs of the palace buildings. While we weren’t quite up on all of our Chinese dynasties, we had recently watched “The Last Emperor,” which was filmed at the Forbidden City and was about the last Qing emperor whose reign ended in 1911 when he was just a boy. It made it even more exciting to recognize the different parts of the palace from the movie and give them little more context, as the whole complex is giant and a little overwhelming.

One night we arranged to go to a Chinese acrobat show. We weren’t really sure whether we had truly arranged it or not as the concierge didn’t speak English very well but he assured us there were tickets waiting for us at the theater. He wrote the name and address of the theater on a card for us to give to the taxi driver who took us to the other side of town (past Tiananmen square) and dropped us in front of one of several acrobat theaters on a small square and directed us to walk down a small alley. We did as we were told (actually were pantomimed to do) and ended it making it to our seats.

The theater was nearly empty when the show started – only about 15 seats filled out of about 100. Despite this, all of the acrobats put on an amazing show and seemed to be really enjoying themselves. The show consisted of about 10 different acts from contortionists to jugglers to girls hanging from wires. All four of us were ooing, aahing and clapping for each act until our hands were sore. Dylan managed to click a few pictures before we were told it was not allowed. Emma and David both now want to be Chinese acrobats.

We had our first Geocaching experience at the Temple of Heaven – it was a blast. I didn’t know anything about it until we met some people on the Great Wall who were really into it. It is basically a treasure hunt using GPS to find the location. When you find the location you log your information and if the cache is large enough, you can leave a little treasure behind. It is a great thing to do with the kids especially. Our school theme this year is navigation and they have learned about latitude and longitude so they can understand how the GPS works to help us find our location.

The cache we found was located right outside of the Temple of Heaven in the fork of a tree. It was hard to be quiet or subtle as we weaved through the trees counting down the distance to the cache on the GPS. This was a very popular cache as we were the fourth group to find it that day! We added our name to the list, GeoGarlands, and then quickly put it back in it’s hiding place and went on our way to the Temple of Heaven. The temple was beautiful but was a little overshadowed from the excitement of our geocache adventure. The kids were already begging to find another.

The afternoon before we left for Xian, we headed for the back lakes area, a part of Beijing located northwest of the Forbidden City. It was very different than the other parts of Beijing we had been in where we had been surrounded by skyscrapers and big busy streets. This area has a few small lakes surrounded by walking paths and bridges. All around the lakes were small restaurants and bars that would have been great in warmer weather. We watched the sun go down and the moon rise as we walked around the lake.

We were surprised to be sad to be leaving Beijing. We hadn’t planned on spending more than about a week here as we thought it would just be crowded and polluted and that week would be more than enough. After a few days however, it had really grown on us. It just felt like a very exciting place to be – it had a energy to it – kind of like Washington DC, where you realize you are in the heart of everything.

The cold weather has certainly been a change for us – it is freezing compared to where we have been – in the low 40s. We are wearing everything warm that we own and are seriously rethinking our plan to spend winter in Europe…Australia and New Zealand might be more our speed.

Hiking and Sleeping on the Great Wall

We had packed up, cleared out of the room and breakfasted all by 8am, and Gary and Lara were waiting for us, on time, in the lobby. It was Gary's (the owner) day off, so Lara, a recent Tourism grad from university in her home province of Sichuan, would be our guide. We learned that ours would be a private group (just the four of us and the guide) which suited us fine. We piled into the van and the driver headed north. Lara decided we should stop and see the Bird's Nest (olympic stadium) on the way out of town rather than the way back, as she knew we would be tired the next day. She was right.

The Bird's Nest was very cool to see in person, much bigger than we realized from seeing it on TV. We didn't get to go inside, but it was still neat to see it, as well as the Water Cube where Michael Phelps made history. 

It was very cold in Beijing, and since arriving we had been a little apprehensive about hiking and sleeping on the Great Wall. As far as we understood, we would sleep in one of the many watchtowers which dotted the wall. We would have sleeping bags and mats provided, and we would be inside a room with a roof above us, but with no heat or fires. The website had mentioned something about a nearby hotel which was used as a backup in the event of inclement weather, and I think we were secretly hoping for that - we could have the best of both worlds: hiking on the wall all day, and sleeping in a bed in a heated room all night! But Lara soon dispelled us of that notion; she had led a group the previous weekend, which had been just as cold, and they slept in the tower, and it was cold (she didn't sugarcoat that) but they survived. So at least we could now resign ourselves to our fate and get on with enjoying it.

We drove for about 2 hours to our starting point, while I napped in the back of the van most of the way. And then, on the outskirts of a small village, we stopped suddenly, the doors opened, and a warmly dressed woman in a red wool jacket climbed in. We were told nothing about who this person was or why we had stopped to pick her up. We had become accustomed to this in China: it was partly due to language challenges, but also partly cultural, but we often felt that we were on a "need to know basis".  It seems that you are often expected to follow along, with no questions asked or instructions offered, and anything you need to know will be made clear when and if you need to know it. This happens at restaurants, hotels, museums, and even private tour groups. 

We exited the main rode and drove along a smaller road for another 15 minutes or so, with some dialogue between the driver and the woman we had picked up. We had our first glimpses of the wall, with towers perched on hill crests stretching off to the distance. Then we stopped abruptly, all eyes turned to look at us, and Lara (who spoke decent English) asked if we wanted to do a 6-hour hike or 4-hour hike. All the information we'd been given said that we would do a 6-hour hike on day 1, it was what we had signed up for, so Wendy and I looked at each other and replied "6-hour hike" in unison. This having been decided, we then made a U-turn, and drove for 15 minutes back the way we had just come. No questions asked, no explanations offered, though at some point towards the end of the hike the next day I managed to glean from Lara that the normal "6-hour hike" usually only takes about 4 hours, so we actually ended up doing a few miles more than planned...which was fine with us.

Back on the main road we stopped outside a toll station to make a last public bathroom break before starting out. Walking back across the road, under a cold and gray sky, on the desolate outskirts of a small village somewhere in northern China, with a dozen or so locals milling about, waiting for a bus, staring at us (something else we have become accustomed to in China) I had a lonely, apprehensive feeling. WTF were we doing here? Lara finally introduced the woman to us as "a local farmer" (and she was thereafter referred to by the children as "The Farmer") and explained that she would be accompanying us on the first leg of the hike because "it could be dangerous" without her. No questions as to what exactly this meant, no explanation offered. This didn't help to put my mind at ease.

Back in the van, we drove into the village, and turned onto a small lane. Walking down the lane was the most iconic old Chinese man I've seen here, hunched over his walking stick, wearing his blue-gray Chinese-pajamas suit, chin jutting and lips sucked in over his toothless gums. He didn't seem to notice us driving past.

And then we stopped, got out of the van, put on our backpacks, and headed out. The driver would meet us at our destination. We walked up into the hills above the village, and quickly passed a number of dilapidated old brick buildings, which Lara told us was an old army barracks. We hiked up and up and we could see the wall above us, snaking along the ridge as far as we could see, demarcating our trail. And then we reached it. It was very deteriorated where we started out and we had to follow a trail next to it for a while, but soon we were able to scramble up and begin walking along the top of the wall. 

The hike was amazing. One vista after another opened up, each more amazing than the last, with always the wall snaking out along the ridge top as far as we could see behind us and ahead of us. The kids were in heaven, and though we ended up hiking over 8 miles that day (seeing only a handful of other people the entire time) they never tired or complained. The wall was unrestored, but in most places it was in good enough condition for us to walk along the top of it. One area was impassable and we had to divert down a trail into a narrow valley, and hike back up another valley to rejoin it. The valleys were all farmed, mostly with corn, which had been recently harvested. We saw old people working in the fields, and we were struck by how things had probably changed very little in that valley over the last few millennia or so. There were piles of corn stalks everywhere, all of which had been gathered by hand, some of which had been partially burned for reasons I'm not sure, and the smell of burnt corn combined with that of the tilled red earth. 

At one point later we passed an abandoned farm house, and we couldn't resist going in to take a peek. It was a low-slung mud-walled dwelling set against one side of a very narrow valley. Just like Wang Lung's original house in The Good Earth, which Wendy and I had both just read, it consisted of three rooms: the main room, which was about 10 ft x 10 ft, with a brick-walled stove, and nothing else, and one bedroom off to each side, each smaller than the main room, each with a 3 ft or so high adobe platform which was the bed. The grass-thatched roof hung low, and was blackened from years of smoke. The walls were papered with newspapers, as had been the wood-latticed "windows". The floors were hardened dirt. There was a wooden outhouse and a rock-lined well outside. And that's about it. It was truly amazing to step into this ordinary peasant's home, and to imagine that not too many years ago an entire family would have lived and worked here, and to think that most Chinese people have lived in homes just like this for millennia, and many still do. 

On the last segment of that day we reached a fully restored section of the wall. The unrestored section had been very cool, but it was amazing to walk on this restored section and see how the wall would have looked when originally constructed hundreds of years ago. The towers were also restored, and David and Emma had fun running around them, climbing to the second level on the two story ones, and playing hide and seek between the pillars. In one of these towers we encountered a group of 4 Chinese, each armed with an enormous and expensive looking camera, and they pounced on Emma and David and proceeded to pose and photograph them for 20 minutes! At one point David was getting tired of it, and I snuck away with him to play Mongol-invader fighting in another part of the tower, leaving Emma to handle the photoshoot (she seemed to be enjoying it). A couple minutes later two of the women found us, literally shoved me aside, and began snapping away at David again. I've never seen anything like it. It literally went on for 20 minutes, and the four of them must have each taken several hundred photos of our children! The man gave me his card, which Lara said indicated that he was a professional photographer. I'm supposed to email him to get copies of the pictures, but I haven't yet.

Finally we were done, and we walked down into a small village and we were seated (outdoors) and quickly offered tea and beer. Once we stopped hiking it became very cold, so Wendy and I bundled up with everything we had, but Emma and David had already started playing with a few of the local children, so they didn't get cold at all (David was sweaty!). Another tour group joined us for dinner, and we had a great time getting to know all of them. There were two families from Australia, one with two boys and one with two girls, so Emma and David had a great time playing with all of them. It was surreal to be sitting out on the main street of this tiny village, illuminated by a single bulb hanging on a wire behind our table, eating the (mainly vegetarian) local feast which had been prepared for us, shivering as we drank our ice cold beers (which, by the way, the locals thought was crazy, as they prefer their beer hot!), but it wasn't the lonely, apprehensive feeling I'd had in the morning, it was the good kind of surreal. An old man shuffled up and sat down in a small room behind us to slurp his bowl of noodles. I took a small video of him as he posed for what he apparently thought was a photograph. He was very nice and complimented us on our children and then shuffled back off.

We made our way back up to the wall, and along to the tower where we would sleep. We were given two sleeping bags and two mats apiece, and managed to stay plenty warm and relatively comfortable during the night. Because our group was smaller (and our guide more assertive) we slept in the small wooden room which had been built on top of the tower, which was fully sealed off, while the larger group slept one floor below us, in the actual tower, which had windows open to the elements. They survived as well, though a few who slept under the windows got a bit wet when it rained during the night, and one guy had a rude awakening in the early morning hours when something scurried across his chest! 

We were all up early the next day, with hot coffee and cold cereal to revive us, and in good spirits all around after surviving our night on the wall. We only hiked a few miles that morning, but with some very steep up and down sections of the wall. It was very foggy and dramatic looking back down a steep section we had just summited, or looking up at the next one to come. Emma and David spent the whole morning walking and talking with their new friends, as did Wendy and I. Finally we came to the end of our hike, bought a celebratory beer from a vendor on the wall, took some group photos, and headed back to the van for more napping on the way back to Beijing.

Overnight Train to Beijing

We are on the train from Hong Kong to Beijing. The same landscape has been whizzing by since I woke up this morning to see the sun rising out of the haze over the fields. Tracks of open fields, mostly fallow, lined with tall, sparse trees that are occasionally interrupted by unknown, sprawling towns and sliced up by elevated, concrete roadways. There are big, tall , modern apartment buildings with piles of rubble around mixed with what look like abandoned Mao-era government buildings. On the outskirts of the towns are the old town remnants – one story brick compounds with flared Chinese roofs that look like they have been around since before Mao. They look just like something out of “The Good Earth”. Rice and ears of corn are spread out on tarps along the side of the roads, drying in the sun (just like in Bali).

Outside looks more like what I thought China was going to look like. On the train yesterday afternoon we kept wondering when we had passed from Hong Kong to the Mainland. The Chinese woman on the intercom system did not give us any indication - at least not in English. The first thing we noticed before we arrived at Guangzhou station, where we knew we were in mainland, was that cars were driving on the right side of the road and the drivers were back on the left side of the car.

I wish I could remember more of what China looked like when I came with my dad 30 years ago. I remember 1-2 story brick and cinderblock buildings, everyone being dressed in their grey, dark blue, or olive Mao suits, and bicycles everywhere. I remember seeing the occasional old lady hobbling along the sideway with her tiny bound feet (I am sure none of them are alive anymore). We were here in April, I think, and I remember that it was mostly cold and dreary every place we went (Guangzhou, Gulin, Beijing, Shanghai). It is cloudy out now and I am sure the coolness will be a pleasant change for us.

Golden Week in Hong Kong

We arrived in Hong Kong from Bali via Singapore just in time for the huge fireworks display for National Day to kick off Golden week. There are two Golden weeks celebrations in China where people travel home from big cities or as we discovered, travel to Hong Kong to shop! We were lucky enough to be able to watch the fireworks over Victoria Harbor from our hotel on Hong Kong Island. Seeing the harbor lit up on both sides from all of the high-rise buildings almost dwarfed the fireworks!

We have adventured out to find some famous Hong Kong dim sum. We found a place inside one of the big high-rises. It was a little intimidating as we were the only foreigners in the restaurant until we realized that it wasn’t really that different than venturing into a dim sum restaurant in Monterey Park! The only real confusion was trying to get some soy sauce (we didn’t know the word in Cantonese) and “soy sauce” seemed to translate as vinegar…

Other meals have been a little more challenging – with vague menus or descriptions that are only slightly more useful than just staring at the Chinese characters (eight delights with XO sauce). We have been trying to try something new each meal – something we would not be likely to order. Shredded jellyfish was our first challenge (I was holding a grudge against them every since snorkeling in Indonesia). It wasn’t much – more like really stiff Jell-O with sesame oil – we probably don’t need to get again. Another meal it was stir-fried eel. We actually weren’t that sure about it, but the “helpful” waitress wouldn’t really let us NOT order it. It came in a sizzling hot stone bowl, cut into delicate fillets and stir-fried with green onions and ginger…and yes, it was delicious! We also tried something called “mantis” prawns that ended up coming looking just like 2-inch lobster tails. I think they were actually langoustines. Hairy crabs are the big delicacy here. We haven’t tried that yet but are working our way up to it!

We have been getting to know our way around Hong Kong Island and Kowloon little by little. We took the Star Ferry across Victoria Harbor to Kowloon and wove our way through the crazy Chinese shoppers. People were actually lined up to get in to the Chanel and Prada shops! We found our way through the crowd to end up at Kowloon Park to let the kids run around and check out the bird aviary.

Another day, we took a double-decker hop-on, hop-off bus around town. We toured all through Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. We were blown away by the number of huge, high-rise buildings and how many people we saw in the streets. Singapore is also very densely populated, with most people living in apartments, but you never felt crowded. Here in Hong Kong, you are very aware of how many people are around. The parks are all full of people playing tennis, basketball, doing tai chi and just hanging out and the streets and metro are almost always full.

Yesterday, for a change of pace from Kowloon and Hong Kong Island, we took a ferryboat ride out to Lantau, one of the hundreds of outlying islands. It was so small and sweet! There was a small waterfront area with delicious seafood restaurants and pedestrian paths with almost no one around. We took a bus up to the top of the island where the largest outdoor Buddha is seated (he is 34 meters tall!). There were lots of people here, but still fewer than Hong Kong! It was drizzly and foggy, so Buddha looked very mysterious peering down on us through the wispy clouds.

For all of its modern and Western ways, Hong Kong is still very traditional. In the newspaper there was a story about people in the new territories being able to sue the government for public projects that impact the feng shui of their communities. In addition to this, the government has a fund to pay for the requisite rituals to be conducted before starting on new projects to appease the proper deities. We also heard about fortunetellers that you could go to (who many locals go to) to put curses on your enemies. Apparently there is a relationship between how long the curse lasts and how much it costs – you can chose for just a day or two or for eternity if you are a big spender!

We are really enjoying Hong Kong so far and still have much more to explore. We will be here for another week and then head off to Mainland China. We’ll spend a about a week in Beijing, a few days in Xian to see the terra cotta warriors, and then a few weeks to Shanghai (including the Expo before it closes!).

Cruising the Eastern Indonesian Islands

After Singapore we spent 4 amazing weeks in Indonesia, the first 3 in Bali and the 4th on a cruise through the islands east of Bali. Wendy is going to post about Bali, but below is my (admittedly lengthy) account of the cruise.

Also, we've reactivated an old Flickr account which we'll use to post photos going forward (it's a little cumbersome adding them one by one to the blog). We have a lot more photos to upload, but here's a start:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/garlandpix/

After 3 great weeks in Bali we signed up to join a small boat cruise through some of the eastern Indonesian islands. After some confusion over where exactly in the harbor the boat was moored, we finally found it and boarded on the morning of the 22nd. The boat is called Ombak Putih, which means white wave in Indonesian. It's a beautiful wooden ship, painted white with blue trim and huge blue sails (when they were somewhat infrequently raised) and a bow that sweeps upward in a seaworthy arc. We met our fellow cruisers, about 20 of us in all, who hailed from Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Australia, and America, all very friendly and we were happy to see two other small children in the group. We were welcomed on board with cold towels and fresh juice from the friendly and smiling crew, an auspicious beginning to our week. We motored east out of the harbor and settled into conversation with our fellow passengers for the next week.

After a very good lunch (another very auspicious sign) we disembarked in a small harbor in eastern Bali where we boarded awaiting cars and drove to a small Bali Aga village. The Bali Aga are the original inhabitants of Bali prior to mass migration from Java, and there are a number of villages where there culture and traditional ways are still preserved. They have been able to preserve their villages through strict rules regarding marriage: if you marry outside of the village you must leave the village. In this way the ownership of their land has remained in the village for hundreds of years. However, with only 600 or so people in the village we saw, intermarriage has caused some challenges genetically. Brothers and sisters do not marry, but first cousins do. But, if you marry outside of the village and are later divorced you can return to the village, with your children, and the gene pool is freshened somewhat in this way. The village we saw is also noted for double-ikat weaving, and incredibly complicated weaving process that I will not even begin to attempt to explain, as I don't understand it in the least. Maybe Wendy can take a crack at it in another posting...

After the Bali Aga village we drove to a temple, known colloquially as the Bat Temple because it fronts a teeming Bat Cave. There was a ceremony going on when we arrived, but everyone very friendly and welcoming and they ushered us around the worshippers to the mouth of the bat cave. Thousands upon thousands of large fruit bats, all hanging upside down, squeaking, flapping wings to find a better spot, guano-ing and stinking, and posing for endless pictures. An incredible sight, not for the squeamish or bat-phobic, and just one example of the teeming abundance of life in all forms that we encountered all over Bali.

Then back to the boat and motoring overnight east to Lombok island. In between Bali and Lombok lies the Wallace line, which roughly delineates Asia from Australia in terms of flora and fauna. West of the line all is lush, green, tropical, and teeming with bats and lizards and snakes and leeches (all of which we encountered first hand in Bali). East of the line the climate becomes drier, the vegetation becomes drier and more Australian - eucalyptus trees, more scrub, etc. The difference was noticeable in eastern Lombok, though we did still see lots of rice paddies and greenery. But the further east we went the more apparent it became, and we actually saw pampas grass and cactuses on some of the eastern islands.

We took a bus from the port in Lombok and headed to our first village where we were to see a traditional dancing performance. We exited the bus and were immediately overwhelmed by our greeting. A full gamelan (orchestra) broke into loud, clangy and drummy song in the middle of the street, and two villagers stood waiting to administer a flower lei greeting to two of us. Wendy and I were selected by our guide as it was the day of our anniversary so we proceeded to greet them, received our leis, and led the procession in a slow march down the street. Children and villagers gathered on all sides, the gamelan banged away, and 22 or so westerners marched down the street accompanies by several hundred Indonesians, with Wendy and I at the helm. Nobody had told us to expect this when we got off the bus!

We turned down an alley and entered a medium-sized courtyard, fully covered with a large cross-thatched awning that filtered the bright sunlight into a blanket of thousands of small diamond shapes that lay over everything. The westerners sat, the villagers and children poured in all around, tea was offered and drunk, and the gamelan clanged away. We were treated to several interesting dances, culminating in a ritualized stick fight dance between two men who were selected. They had large bamboo sticks, and rectangular wooden shields stretched with dried cow hide. They made a loud band when struck by one of the bamboo poles. The combatants each had a coach (who had selected them) and there was a referee. All was ritualized, all knew their parts well, and the actual fighting was continually interspersed with dancing, including the two combatants dancing together. But, ritualized though it was, it was still a fight between two testosterone-fueled men, and in between the dancing they did whale on each other with the bamboo sticks, with both men emerging with large welts on their backs and sides. There was a rumor that one of the men was later taken to the hospital, but I don't know if this is true. Finally the westerners were invited up to dance with the locals, and after a few thousand more photos were taken we marched back to the bus, waving and smiling, and entirely overwhelmed by this, the first of three villages we were to visit that day!

Next we visited a village known for pottery making, and the reception was significantly more low key. We watched the traditional pottery-making process, Emma and David were invited to help, and more photos were taken.

Then we went to a village known for weaving. The weaving was beautiful and I'm sure would be much more interesting to me if I had the slightest comprehension of how the process works. But to witness the weaving we wove ourselves through the narrow streets of this village, glimpsing into courtyards and returning the many friendly smiles that were offered. Our presence was noted more and more until we had a dozen or so local children following us around, smiling, saying "hello mister", high-fiving, mugging for photos, and herding younger siblings along. I said hello to one small boy standing with his sister. He boisterously yelled back something not understood by me, and his sister clapped her hand on his mouth and looked at me red-cheeked and bug-eyed. After a nice lunch at our guide's home in the village, and after Wendy bought a nice woven sarong, we found our way back to the bus and back to the ship.

After the amazing but overwhelming day in Lombok we had a nice down-time day of swimming and snorkeling on day 3. In the morning we visited Moyo island, which is known for an ultra-exclusive resort that caters to the rich and famous of the world, of the likes of Princess Diana, Mick Jagger, and a parade of Saudi royalty. But we steered clear of them and anchored off a beautiful, deserted, white sand beach. The water was littered with jellyfish which made us very nervous for snorkling. Our cruise director, Peter Dieman, a very talented Dutch artist who has resided in Bali for years, calmly plucked a jellyfish from the water with his palm flat. We thought perhaps he was immune to them, but he calmly said (everything Peter did was done calmly) "I have it's back". So apparently you can hold a jellyfish on its back in the flat of your hand without being stung, but none of us tried.

Despite the jellyfish the temptation to snorkel was too strong, and some of us waded in carefully. I spent as much time looking up and at the water around me as I did looking down, but I managed to avoid being stung. The snorkling was amazing, as was all of the snorkeling we did on the trip, with an incredible variety of coral such that I've never seen before. We saw amazing, bright tropical fish, and more exotic sea-life including moray eel, a sea-snake, giant purple sea-stars, bright blue-lipped clams, all "clamming up" as we passed by, and two large lion fish. But the coral itself was the star, more alive and unspoiled, and in more variety of colors and shapes than I've ever seen.

In the afternoon we visited tiny Satonda island, a small crater with a lake in the middle that was once fresh-water but is now brackish after being swept by a massive tidal wave in 1815 after the volcano on nearby Sumbawa island erupted in the largest volcanic explosion in recorded history, far larger than Krakatoa. The volcano lost 1200 meters of its 4000 in height and spewed 24 cubic kilometers of lava and debris into the air. Tens of thousands died instantly, hundreds of thousands more in the famines that followed, and world-wide weather was affected so that in Europe it was known as the year with no summer, and even Napoleon's troops were slowed as a result.

And on Satonda island we saw our first monkeys of the voyage!

The morning of day 4 found us in the harbor of Bima, in eastern Sumbawa. We watched the morning trading at the harbor, fisherman selling their catch to dozens of head-scarved women, all yelling at once. Mountains of bananas being unloaded onto the docks. And load after load of cement bags crane-lifted from the cargo holds of wooden ships like ours, and settled into the backs of trucks by men with rags over their mouths and cement dust covering their bodies. We loaded the bus and drove a few blocks to the market. We wandered threw the market, ducking under low-slung tarpaulins and stepping carefully over muddy puddles, and returning the smiles and greetings of stall after stall of what seemed to be the friendliest and happiest people on Earth. Every imaginable product and produce was for sale, but no one bothered to try to sell us anything. They were genuinely happy to see us, as we were them, but the stars were Emma and David, who had their legs grabbed, their noses plucked, and their cheeks pinched so many times they were sore when we finally stumbled back to the bus. It was just a half hour meander through a market in a small port town on an island most of us had ever heard of before, but it had quite an effect on us, as though our faith in humanity had been restored. I wished naively that Bima could always remain as it was then.

Then we went to a small village in the mountains above Bima where we were treated to more traditional dancing. Three women performed a dance which represented the various stages of planting and harvesting and processing in wet rice farming. Then, more ritualized combat, this time of the head-butting variety! Again there was a referee, and again the two men danced together while the band played, but then one lowered down, elbow on knee, head front, eyes down, while the other danced and waited for the referee's signal. It came, he charged, and foreheads collided with a loud thud directly in front of us. But both men, seemingly unfazed, immediately resumed dancing and eventually they traded places and thudded again, and then we were done, said our thank you's and goodbyes, waved to more friendly people, high-fived more children, and re-boarded our bus.

Day 5 found us anchored off of Komodo island, one of only two islands which contain the dragon population. We set off early, bought our tickets, and fell in line behind our guide for the walk, who carried a very large fork-pronged stick. We were surprised to learn that, in addition to the terrible dragons, the island was also home to vipers, pythons, and spitting cobras! Wow, dangerous place. Unfortunately we didn't get to see any snakes, but 15 minutes or so into our walk we came upon our first dragon. Like most of the dragons we saw that day and the next this one didn't do much, other than lay on it's belly with it's arms and legs splayed out, 5 long razor-sharp claws on each. There were 30 or so of us humans around it, within 10 feet or so, but the dragons are basically indifferent to humans. They have no natural predators when fully grown. (They do however eat each other and eat their young. Baby dragons, after hatching, will immediately climb up a tree and live in trees for the first few years of their life, eating bugs and lizards. Adult dragons are too heavy too climb trees, but even their own mothers will eat them on the ground.) Nor have they been targeted by humans: their loose skin is not good for clothing, and their meat is not good for eating. So they don't care much about us, but we were still wary. We were warned that, even when they are splayed out and look half-asleep they can jump up in an instant, and they can run faster than humans. Their tiny lizard brains operate on instinct, and when their forked tongues pick up an interesting smell they react, as we learned the next day...

On the evening of the fifth day we were treated by our amazing crew to a BBQ on the beach, a tiny spit of beach on a small island somewhere between Komodo and Rinca. We sat on bamboo mats on the sand and ate grilled fish, calamari, and kabobs by candle light, washed down by white wine. Emma and David borrowed flashlights and discovered that the small bait fish in the water were attracted to the light. Then they discovered that if Emma held the light in one spot and David bent down with hands poised he could reach down and scoop up a fish with his bare hands! After catching a few and throwing them back they found a half coconut, filled it with water, and began to populate it with fish. They were up to 5 or 6 fish in the coconut by the time we had to leave, all of whom we're set free, to the kids chagrin, though one or two hadn't taken too well to their new home and were floating a bit...

We woke up on day 6 in a small, swampy inlet of Rinca island. Peter had told us that Rinca was even better than Komodo island for seeing the dragons. We had only seen 4 dragons on Komodo, two of which were camped outside of the lodge having been attracted by the smell. A family of monkeys was playing in the mangrove near us as we set foot on the island. Two minutes later Peter was proved right. We were walking across a large dry river bed, heading towards the visitors center - we hadn't even bought our tickets or got our guides yet! - when to our left we spotted a large dragon, not laying down but purposefully walking towards us, head high and tongue actively flicking. We were out in the open, with nowhere to hide, and no guides with large forked sticks to protect us. Peter quickly rushed us along to the safety of the visitors center. We saw 15-20 more dragons on our walk that day, as well as the scant remains of a buffalo carcass that our guide told us had been devoured only 3 days earlier by 40-50 dragons! We also saw a wild boar, lots of buffalo, and megapods, which are basically a kind of wild chicken, but with a very cool name. At one point we were paused watching some megapods when two dragons came over a ridge towards us, tongues flicking. Our guide then noticed that one of us was bleeding from a small cut on his leg. The guide quickly cleaned off the blood and applied a local balm to it to mask the smell. If the dragons had picked up the smell of his blood they wouldn't have thought, they would have just reacted, but the guide seemed to have masked the smell just in time.

We had another fantastic beach and snorkeling session on our last afternoon, and then our last dinner on deck under the stars. We arrived in Labuan Bajo, Flores island the next morning, and caught our flight back to Bali. It was a great week of visiting villages, snorkling, seeing dragons, and getting to know our delightful fellow passengers, whom we hope to keep in touch with. We flew back to Singapore the next day, and as I type we are hurling through the air towards Hong Kong!