UK , August 2010: friends and family. Cheryl Scott-Smith’s wedding. Having all three of our girls plus Kate’s boyfriend Nick, there-wonderful.
Southern France: 1st week of Sept. with the girls and Nick.
Malta for 2 weeks with the Frommels and the Scott-Smiths.
Greece for a month: Mykonos, Naxos, Santorini, Crete, Delphi, Peloponnese, Athens.
Qatar (Doha) for a 6 hrs. taxi ride during a stopover.
Egypt for a month: Cairo for five days where we just hung with the locals and walked the city. Then a public bus across the Sinai to Dahab and 4 nights in the Hotel Jasmine on the Gulf of Aqaba arguing with Tito, Momo and Mimo (all really called Mohammed) about music and also Egyptian politics. On across Israel to Aqaba in Jordan where we joined the tour that we would stay with for visits to Wadi Rum and Petra and then back to Egypt, still with the tour group, for the Pyramids and a seven day boat trip up and down the Nile. Dawn over the Nile from a Hot Air balloon with the Valley of the Kings below us.
India for six weeks: Bangalore to stay with our friends Ramesh and Lakshmi and their children. Flights down to Kerala for a stay on a rice boat and at a resort and then up to Goa to stay at Jessica’s place on the beach. Joined our second tour group in Delhi for a 16 day tour of northern India and all the main sites-Taj Mahal; Jaipur and Agra Fort; Rajastan Tiger Reserve; Amaritsa: Pakistan Border; Sikh Golden Temple (best of the lot); McLeod Ganj (Dalai Lama’s residence in exile); Shimla (Last of the Raj).
Vietnam for a week. Hanoi, Ha Long Bay, bicycling through rice paddies in Nimb Bimh, Hoi An. Inspirational communist messages over city loudspeakers.
Cambodia five days in Siem Reap. Angkor Wat temple. Persuading the hotel owner to talk politics. Sarah joins us for Christmas and Cambodia and Thailand.
Thailand. Koh Phi Phi, Koh Samui, Bangkok. Christmas Eve on the beach at “Marie’s Place-A Bar Sometimes”.
Australia. Summer down under and beaching it in New South Wales. Staying with our friends Harry and Barbara and visits from other California friends Wendy and Rick and Ernie. Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef and Rainforest tours. Along the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide and sheep shearing with Brownie and Beck. Visiting with our friends Chris and Lioni and looking at kangaroos over the fence. Sydney. The fantastic Australian wildlife.
New Zealand. Two weeks and 3,000km in a camper van all around the south island. Lots of hikes and simply wonderful scenerary.
Fiji. Just three days buy very good.
Tribulations experienced and calamities avoided:
We spent October in Egypt and missed the Revolution; in early December we spent a day on a boat in Ha Long Bay, Vietnam not long before a similar boat to ours sank very quickly drowning eight tourists; we spent January and February in Australia untouched by and not too far south of the Queensland floods; our flight, booked last July, into Christchurch, New Zealand got us there on schedule but only a week after the Earthquake. We avoid Greek Union strikes.
Entering Israel from Egypt a 10’ high plate glass door fell off its hinges and crashed and shattered on the marble floor moments before we were to go through it. Christine narrowly missed some broken bones in Malta after slipping on our room’s wet tiled floor after we left a window open during a rainstorm. I get an ear infection from the Australian surf but a Dr. ($70) and some antibiotics ($35) fix it. A visit to an Indian Dr. and hospital for some blood work to allay some fears sets my mind at rest. $11. The Dr. asks if I would like more work done-“perhaps a stress EKG and other heart tests?” He recognizes that he can save me money if I need such work done and he’s merchandising the hospital’s services. The local newspaper laments the lack of a more aggressive marketing campaign for their new and state of the art hospital which was built to attract medical tourism.
My laptop hard drive crashed in December and one week before its warranty expired, it was fixed by Lenovo while I was in Australia at no charge. Only a small loss of data since I had brought an external HD with me and backed up frequently. The laptop was essential and allowed me to stay on top of all of our personal stuff while travelling and also allowed Christine and I to Skype the girls and other people frequently.
I have carried a wallet with US$5 and some cancelled credit cards in case I get mugged-I didn’t need to use it. I wear out three of my four T-Shirts and lose the other one by the time I reach Bangalore but my good friend Ramesh gives me three of his.
32 flights are more or less on time, no lost suitcases.
We feel lucky.
To our surprise very few insect problems to test our two month course of Malaria tablets. Malta was the worst with both mosquitoes and flies, some sand flies in New Zealand but otherwise OK.
Last Thoughts on the eight month trip:
Yes we would but not for such a long time. Not for another eight months but at no point did we want to come home earlier than our planned return-there was always the next stop to look forward to. We missed the girls too much especially over Christmas. Eight months this first time was OK and we are happy with what we planned and did. We are some surprised that it all went so well. We have the travel bug though and are already planning possible 2-4 month trips to various places.
Air fares and insurance came close to US$20,000 and the two tours (Egypt and India) together cost about US$10,000. We had never taken tours before and still prefer to make our own way but for both Egypt and India they were worthwhile. Everything else we tried to do on a budget. We didn’t want to get back and have to regard this as a trip of a lifetime that couldn’t be repeated due to cost.
We missed our music and wished that we had brought some iPod speakers, perhaps some movie DVDs. The Kindle was an essential piece of luggage.
Back in the USofAIt’s raining and cold and I have to get some gas ($4.12/gallon now) and air in one of the car tires and so I head out to the local gas station. Their air compressor is broken and as I complain to the owner another customer comes over to offer some help. Mike’s old broken down small Chevy has an electric air pump in the trunk and Mike comes out in the rain with me to help me get enough air into the tire for me to get to a repair place. Mike looks about 35, a little chubby but a kind face. A few years ago Mike was a stocker at a local supermarket “and just about did everything that needed doing there” for $25/hour. Then two different supermarket chains closed 19 stores in Northern California and laid off all of their staff. Mike figured he had to re-invent himself (he’s married with two small kids) and so he went and got his commercial trucker’s licenses including hazardous materials etc. Starting at the bottom of the ladder he did seasonal trucking (fertilizer to farmers in the spring, their hay in the fall, propane gas to houses in the winter etc) for a few years ($15/hour) but got laid off when the financial crisis hit in 2008 (only 3 years’ experience compared to other more experienced truckers). Now he’s washing dishes at $10/hour (California minimum wage is $8.50/hr.).
Our local café offers a breakfast of ham, eggs and toast at $4.99 and all you can drink coffee for $1.99. The trees are in blossom.
END OF BLOG
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