Christmas!

Well, Brent and I have survived Christmas 2007! We had our first real experience of trying to spend the holidays with both families - the fiasco that all of my married friends used to to talk about. It was well worth trying to "do it all." We got to visit my family out in Baltimore, Maryland for about 5 days, and then flew out on the 24th to get back here to Oregon to do Christmas morning with Brent's family. The gifts we hauled all over Asia were well worth it. It seemed everyone appreciated a token of our trip, and it was fun to share some of the trip with them in that way.

Good News!

We wanted to announce to all of our faithful blog readers that on November 24th the beauty and romance of Thailand got the better of Brent, and he asked me to marry him... I said yes!

THE END

8 months travelling abroad, to the day. Not bad.

Leah and I board a flight to Seoul, Korea late tonight. We'll have a 9 hour layover, fly to Seattle, and then on to Portland. Wow, it's going to feel great and a little wierd to be home.

We'll try to keep this blog going for a while to keep those interested informed of where we decide to settle and work. Where to settle and work.....that's a BIG unanswered question.

New Member of the Family!

Say hello to Brent's new niece, Dyllyn McCrea Howell.

Congratulations Scott, Alex, and Bodey!!!

Back from Paradise

Wow, Leah and I never had it so good.

Descriptions of our great little bungalow right on the beach, crystal clear water, white sand, snorkeling, and all the curry and fruit you can eat are soon to follow.......

Ok, so I know we haven't written about our Himalayan trek yet, but since it's fresh in my mind, I'll write of our recent time bumming-it in Southern Thailand. Upon our arrival in Bangkok, we immediately set out to find a nice, quiet island off the main tourist track. Many hours of internet later, we decided on Ko Lipe (pronounced "leepay"). It required a 17 hour overnight train ride to Hat Yai near the Malaysian border, a 3 hour minibus drive to the port town of Pak Barra on the west coast, a 3 1/2 hour ferry to just off-shore of the island, and finally a 10 minute longtail boat (the local form of transport) to shore. A bit tired once we arrived to say the least. We were saying to each other the whole way, "I hope this island is worth it". It was. I told Leah in China, when she was trying to talk me into ending our trip in Thailand, that it sounded good to me as long as we found a semi-secluded island with a simple bungalow right off the beach. We found exactly that. In fact, of all the places to stay on the island, we think we found the best spot (for us). See photo above. It turns out there was some developed touristy stuff on the island, but it was on the other side and we didn't have to include ourselves in it unless we wanted to. Perfect.

Our time on the island consisted of waking up before it got really warm, walking to the village to get a great breakfast, buying some fruit for later, walking back to our bungalow and going for a swim, lay around for most of the day (Leah would read about the horrors of Mao on the beach in the shade while I would comb the beach for pretty shells and ponder making jewelry out of them), go get some great curry dish for lunch, a little snorkeling around the corral reef, shower to cool off and eat our fruit we bought earlier, more laying around and messing with shells, watch the beautiful sunset, go out for dinner and get some more great curry, lay in our hammocks on our porch and read, climb under our mosquito net and go to bed. Repeat over and over again. Really rough life.

Some highlights (good and bad) include:

- The food! I love Thai food and perhaps ate more than I should knowing that it will be a rare treat back in the States.

- The snorkeling! Lots of little Nemos and his friends.

- Finding out that I'm allergic to mango! Turns out it makes my lips and face get all itchy and bumpy.

- Meeting our new friends Laurie and Eddy.

- Having absolutely nothing to worry about, while knowing that very soon we will have plenty to worry about.

- Sleeping 10 feet off the beach in our cozy bungalow.

- Spiders the size of your fist (not kidding) in our shower\toilet room! A bit spooky when you need to "go" in the middle of the night.

- Sun burns.

- Making shell jewelry.

- Sand-in-sandals-induced feet sores.

- Fresh fruit.....tiny bananas packed with flavor, watermellon, and Leah cracking into coconuts. Wow, watching her tear into one of those reminds you to stay on her good side.

Recovering in Thailand

20 consecutive days on the trail in the Himalaya can really take it out of ya. What better way to recover than on a beach in Thailand. Decided on the island Ko Lipe off the west coast of southern Thailand. Will be a bit of a chore trying to get there, but hopefully it will be worth it. Supposed to be a bit off the beaten track.

We have purchased our plane tickets back to the good'ole USA. Flying out of Bangkok on December 1.

Kangchenjunga Trekking

Will fill this in soon.....off to Thailand tomorrow! A few photos to hold you over.

I'm now writing this a month after the actual trek. Leah and I have a day to kill here in Bangkok before we fly home tomarrow and we finally have some internet time.

Wow, what a trip. While in Mongolia, when we were near our wits ends, we contemplated whether or not we had it in us to continue on to Nepal for this trek. But, we knew that it was likely to be an experience of a lifetime - an opportunity that will probably never come again. I think we were right about that. Of course, it wasn't all smiles and giggles the whole time, but there's no doubt it was a trip of a lifetime.

For starters, it was quite difficult. We had 20 consecutive days of hiking, without a single rest day. These were long days....many from sun-up to sun-down. The trails are unlike ones in the States. There is huge ups and downs, elevation gain and loss, with very little attention paid to minimizing a hiker's efforts. In addition, the itinerary was VERY ambitious in terms of the distance we needed to cover. The plan was to get to both the south and north base camps of Kachenjunga, a trek described in one guide book to take more like 30 days. Leah and I have done our fair share of hiking in the past and this was definitely not easy.

Just getting to the trailhead was a chore. Originally, we were supposed to fly into a small town near the trailhead, but because of flight cancellations, we ended up having to fly to a town that was much further away. We jumped into a hired jeep for what was supposed to be a 10 hour drive. Instead, we set out on a 24 hour drive from hell! After many hours into the bumpy/slow drive, a leaf spring broke on the jeep. It seemed at first, that was as far as we were going to get that day. But a bus drive by soon after in the opposite direction with no passengers. We negotiated with the bus drive to turn around and continue our drive up into the foot hills. Many hours later (too many to remember), around 11pm, we come upon a broken down truck blocking the road. The rear differential was out on the ground in pieces. Again, I figured that was the end of the line for us for atleast that day. Around 2 in the morning, the truck was up and running and so were we. We continued the slow drive all night until......to be continued.


Very weird having porters to carry all your stuff........to be continued.

Unique Kathmandu!

We made it here a few days ago and have been enjoying the very different bustle of Kathmandu. We have not experienced an Asia like this before. I think the most distict features so far: The nervewracking traffic (the craziest ever), the mingling of Buddhism and Hinduism, and the unbelievable friendliness and generosity of the people. We had a day of sightseeing with Brent's old boss and friend, Jeff. We visited an ancient city, a very large "stupa" and a Hindu cremation site on the river. A bit freaky.....lots of people standing around watching bodies being burned. Monkeys roam freely and the culture here is distinct from the other areas we've been in. We are definitely not in Kansas anymore!

Got very little time to buy a few needed items before leaving tomorrow for our 22-day trek. We will be in the Kachenjunga area of Nepal (far Northeast corner). We are told to expect breathtaking scenery. We saw some of the Himalaya on the plane over, even Everest a little.

Reached the Tibetan Plateau!

We got here about two days ago, and have been getting used to the altitude, and enjoying the sunshine here in Tibet (I think we saw the sun twice since we have been in China). The people here are really nice and definetely have a different culture than the China we observed in Chengdu. We toured the Johkang Temple today (lots of giant buddhas), and shopped around a bit in the market surrounding the temple. Bought some interested Tibetan items. Yesterday we observed the Potala Palace from afar, Wow its big! The Chinese are really cashing in here on the tourism.

Tomorrow morning we fly to Kathmandu, Nepal to meet up with the Americans we will trek with for the next 26 days. We are excited to start the trek, we have been looking forward to it for many months- should be an amazing experience!

QingCheng Mountain

This was our big day-excursion out of the city to see the more natural side of China. As I had mentioned earlier, I have wonderful relatives (Kdell and Cheryl Bagley, from Wyoming) living and teaching in Chengdu so we all went together.

We booked a van and driver through our fantastic guesthouse and left around 8am. The drive was around 2.5 hours toward the west mountains. Funny thing about driving from the city to the mountains; the city air is super smoggy and the air in the mountains is very misty (like the typical misty Chinese scenes we've all seen in movies and pictures). As you make the transition, the air quality never appears to change. Your mind knows one must be smog and the other mist, but they look identical. This also gives the reader some idea of just how smoggy it is here in the city. Leah and I literally have not seen the sun since we arrived even though we've had many "cloudless" days.

The mountain was beautiful. Well, more specifically, the scenery along the trails was beautiful. You can't actually see the mountains around you due to the mist (visibility is around 100 yards).
Lush forest, waterfalls, mystical high mountain temple. Of course, we're still in China, so any beautiful natural attraction is turned into somewhat of a unnatural tourism park. Kdell and I figure we must have climbed over a 7000 stairs. There are cable cars for those who don't want to climb the stairs and people cooking warm snacks along the cement "trail". I don't think there was ever a moment when we were alone, free to take a picture at will without needed to avoid people. Also, you must pay multiple "entrance fees" at check points along the way, each one a bit closer to the top. They know you're not about to turn around and not pay since you've come all that way.

But, to be fair, we were warned and told all this going into it. We had a great time together enjoying some time outside the city. Definitely a highlight of our Chinese experience.

Panda-monium!

We've been told that if you stay in Chengdu, the Panda Breeding Research Center is a MUST SEE! We also heard that Sims Guesthouse (where we are staying) did a good tour, so we signed up on a whim. We left at 7am the next morning (a big change from our usual 9:30 am wake up) and drove about 30 minutes to the Center. This was our first real "tour" on this entire 6 month trip, so we were herded with the other half-asleep western tourists to the back of the center where they were feeding these furry guys.
They were kinda funny looking...mostly because they seemed so coordinated and ambidexterous. They have an apposable pseudo-thumb (sixth digit), so their hand action seems very human-like. They were all kicking back, and seemed unphased by the amount of people flashing pictures. They also exuded an attitude like they knew they ran the place, and had read the many signs that triumphed them as the "National Treasure."

Super cute giant fur balls living the easy life. Very interesting and fun experience. We learned that there are only approximately 1000 wild pandas left in China, found mostly in the west mountains. In all of the movies and info about the center it was never mentioned how or when they would be releasing them to the wild. They ARE doubling the size of the Center by next year. By this it seemed clear they are more interested in the tourist dollar than actually increasing the number of pandas in the wild-That's China!

Biking and Parking

We were either very courageous or just naive, but one day we decided to go for a city bike ride.

Chengdu has great street lanes used only by bikes, mopeds, and angry bus drivers. The only problem is, there are millions of people out using these lanes making them extremely crowded. One must be quite forceful and wide-eyed watching out for those nasty little mopeds (bikes equipped with a small motor and battery) crossing your path when you least expect it. 10 minutes into our bike ride, I was sure we wouldn't make it back to our guesthouse without having some sort of collision with something. I would have bet 100 bucks on it. We ended up biking for 5 hours all the way around this city of 12 million and didn't hit a thing.

We made it to a nice large park were it turns out flying kites is a very serious business. Older men had large spool-wheels holding at least 1000yrds of kite line! Some of their kites were so high you could just barely see them. How they kept them from crossing while sitting so close to one another is a mystery.

Had a great day and have first hand experience getting around Chengdu the way the locals do it.

Sichuan Opera

Leah talked me into this and I'm sure glad she did. Along with going to see the pandas, going to the Sichuan opera is supposed to be a must for tourist in Chengdu. Well, they're right. It's really something. Interesting music, bizarre comedy, girls juggling tables and large vases with their feet! The highlight is supposed to be the "face changing" performance. Men wear masks that are somehow composed of multiple layers on top of each other. As the men dance, they somehow unnoticingly make these mask layers disappear, exposing the next underlayer mask. Still not sure how they did it.

We all had a great time. Check out our videos on Youtube via our blog.

CHINA!

We've made it to Chengdu, China.

Wow, Leah and I stick out like sore thumbs.....very few western faces. We haven't done much yet so there isn't much to write. My first couple Sichuan food experiences have ended in sweat dripping down my face and an upset stomach. Leah has managed to avoid it (so far). We have settled for now in a comfortable guest house known in the international travelling community to be one of the best. Everything we've heard is true....cheap, very comfy, with all the services you'd ever want.

I happen to have some relatives, Kdell and Cheryl Bagley, living here in Chengdu, so we plan to give them a call. We'll hopefully go see some sights together. Leah and I also plan to find a couple short-term teaching gigs while here. We only have a couple weeks, but it sounds like native english speakers can get jobs pretty easily. We'll see.

Nutt'in Like Mutton!!!

Fine dining in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia includes the following:

Mutton Steak
Mutton Soup
Mutton Dumplings
Mutton Kabob
Mutton with Rice
Mutton with Egg
Mutton with Grilled Peppers
Mutton Stroganoff
Mutton Meatballs
and last, but not least, Mutton Head!

I think Leah and I have met our mutton lifetime quota. Yummm yum!

We're too old for this sh?!

Just when we think we can relax in Ulaanbataar for a couple weeks after having slept on the ground for the previous two weeks, we are sadly mistaken. Getting to China, and even worse, getting from China to Kathmandu, Nepal is proving to be very difficult to organize. Things are never as easy as you think they'll be.

The following may sound like complaining, and maybe it is. I go back and forth about writing negative stuff in our blog, considering how lucky we are to be doing this trip, but since this is such a significant part of our travelling experience, I want to describe it.

Yesterday, we got up-close and personal with the beurocratic nightmare that is the Office of Immigration, Naturalization and Foreign Citizens in Ulaanbataar, Mongolia. We found out over the weekend that if an American wants to spend more than 30 days in the country of Mongolia, they must register with this office within 7 days of arrival in the country. Nevermind that all Americans get a free 90 day visa upon arrival and are not told this information! If you happen to find out you need to stay in the country for more than 30 days due to train restrictions exiting the country and China entrance visa restrictions, and did not already registered within the first 7 days, you are in for a treat.

First, you get to enjoy trying to find the place. This may sound insignificant, but since Mongolia does not use addresses to define locations (instead they use the "over by the square, across the street from the red building" system), it makes it very difficult. It makes it especially difficult when the location description given on the government office website is completely wrong!

So you manage to find the right building. Next, after filling out all the forms, making the required photocopies, and submitting everything they tell you to, the whole office leaves for lunch. You wait for an hour in their office for fear that you'll find yourself in the back of a long line. When they return, you are told that you should have done this registration within the first week of arrival. You may say, "but we did not know this, and are only staying 7 extra days (37 of our 90 allowable days!) due to exiting train and China visa restrictions". You are immediately and confidently shown that you should have known about this fine print in the law because it is written on the front door of their office. Ohhhh, of course, you should have somehow known to come to this government office, magically learn how to read cyrillic on the spot (the law is written in cryllic on the door), and realize you better register just in case something unforseen happens and you must stay longer than 30 of you 90 allotted visa days.

You are then told that you should write a letter describing your situation and submit it to the Audit and Revisions Office (an unoccupied window across the room). You pull out a piece of notebook paper and write a respectful short letter asking for leaniancy and to be registered. You wait another 20 minutes for someone to submit the letter to, because these Audit and Revision guys are the fat-cats who run the show and can stay at lunch as long as they like. When the letter is given to one of these fellows, he does not even look at it and tells the translation girl to explain you must pay 100,000 T per tourist (this amounts to about $185 for two). At this point your jaw may hit the floor (ours did). You may also sit down on the floor and cry, or get that deer-in-the-headlights look for an extended period of time.

Once you come to, you weigh your options. Pay this rediculous fine or worry and risk being stopped at the border as you leave the country (in the middle of the night). You may think that paying the fine is the easier, although painful, option. Think again. In trying to pay the damn fine, you are bounced around on command with no forethought from window to window, to neighboring banks, to photocopy machines, and more letter writing. I think the letter writing is the best part. You are handed a photocopy of a letter that some poor sap in a similar situation wrote months ago and are directed via body languange to write your own letter saying the same thing. These fat-cats can't read a word of english so you can write whatever strikes your fancy. This is only another piece of paper these men get paid to push. Oh yah, and when you hand them the letter saying you think their sister is ugly, they won't take it unless you give them a little cash in the process. You also hand over you passport which is lost TWICE on the most unorganized desk you've ever seen. You must watch very carefully every step, because at this point, you know what needs to be done better than the officials themselves. One slip on your part, and the official incorrectly fills out two forms for one person and no form for the other. After you correct the official and show him how to do his job, you have what you need and can finally pay the fine. But not before standing in one more line and fighting off, as you have in every other line you've been in that day, all the people that do not know about the concept of a line.

Lastnight I stayed up until 4AM reading "All Quiet on the Western Front". Wow, we have it good!

Fly Fishing in Mongolia

We arrived in Ulaan-Bataar (the capitol and only "city" in Mongolia) via the Trans-Mongolian train 3 days prior to leaving on our outer Mongolia trip. I found out from the primary trip planner (a girl we met online looking for traveling/cost sharing buddies) that the main goal of the trip was to find good fishing spots! She is researching a fishing guiding business in Mongolia, which I found strange considering she knew nothing about fishing. The opportunity to do some fly fishing while in Mongolia was a great surprise, but very unexpected. I had 2 days to find some fly fishing gear (rod, reel, line, flies) in Ulaan-Bataar, which wasn't easy at all! I did manage to find a "starter kit" (something you'd buy your 10 year son as his first rod/reel). Definitely not what I'm used to but it would have to do. Decent dry flies was another issue entirely. A treble hooked spinner on a hand "reel" (palm-sized piece of flat wood) with heavy monofilament is definitely the gear of choice out here.

3 days into the trip, we made it to a fishing ger camp. The camp guide, an older Mongolian gentlemen who prefered the wooden hand reel with a worm method, was very nice and took a liking to me. Lucky for me, some previous western-world clients of his left him some fly fishing gear as a going away present. He was happy to share some good dry flies with me and I was ready to roll. I caught many small trout and grayling. Not overly colorful/pretty fish. While fishing one stretch, I saw a BIG surface disturbance farther out in the main current. I looked at the Mongolian guide and he said "Taimen" with a smile. Now, before we left on this trip, right after finding out it was going to involve lots of fishing, I did some internet research and found that Mongolia is home to the taimen, the largest salmonid in the world (I guess also found in parts of Siberia). They are known for eating rodents and small birds. The guide handed me a big mouse-fly and motioned for me to give it a try. I threw it out there as far as my "starter kit" rod could handle and drifted the mouse across the current. Wow....it slammed it right away, and snapped my 3 lbs trout tippet in a heart beat. During the excitement of tying on the mouse to my line, I either forgot to think about removing my light tippet or simply didn't think I actually had a chance in the world of catching it and didn't worry about it. The fish didn't like that mouse stuck in his mouth and jumped out of the water multiple times, making it clearly visible what I missed out on fighting and possibly landing.

A great runner up to this fish came a week later when I managed to fool one of the biggest trout I've ever caught. We were in a part of central Mongolia called "the five rivers area", where the confluence of five rivers takes place. This occurs over a stretch of a few miles, and is probably the prettiest spot we camped at. Another fishing ger camp was nearby. Upon our arrival in the area, while setting up camp, a man rode up on a motorcylce (I know now he worked at the camp) and told us we needed special permits to fish. He continued to try to scare us off by saying the police would fine us. Yah, right! What police?! We are in the middle of nowhere and the nearest signs of life are 5000 sheep, goats, and yaks. I went up river to a perfect dry fly fishing spot under some willows. I casted one of my two remaining good flies, given to me by the previously mentioned Mongolian guide a week earlier (he actually gave me three good flies upon my departure but one was snapped off on a rock while teaching a young Mongolian boy to fly cast days earlier). Right as the fly drifted into the spot that looked perfect, a mouth, much bigger than I was accustomed to seeing, came out of the water after my fly. I jerked it right away from him! I threw it back at him multiple times but he wouldn't be fooled. Nothing a fifteen minute wait and a change of fly (my one other decent fly) wouldn't fix. He came back at the same spot and this time I let him take it. I wish I would have measured it up against my rod, but I think it was close to 18". The coloring was red with black spots. Definitely a high point in the trip.

During the two week trip, I'd say we spent about half of it in our rented Russian minivan on the most atrociously bumpy roads imaginable. The other half, Leah and I spent camping, relaxing, and fishing. We had trout dinners multiple evenings. Very tasty. I feel very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to fish here in Mongolia. Definitely, an unexpected fantastic experience. The other fishermen in my family will be happy to know, as it turns out, Leah is quite the natural fly caster. 15 minutes of instruction and she was throwing a tight loop. I better be careful about telling her all my secrets if I want to catch any fish of my own in the future.

Mongolian Adventures

As expected, it's really different here in Mongolia compared to Europe- even the roughest parts of Eastern Europe are far more "developed".

We arrived in UlanBataar a few weeks ago and had a reservation at a guest house about 3 blocks from the city center. We expected it to be more urban than what we may be comfortable with, but thought the services would be better there. We were picked up at the train station and drove down a 5 lane road that passed by many large 30-story buildings and many businesses that gave it a real "city feel" This was Peace Avenue- the main artery of town. Looking around while in the car, it was "rougher" than what we had experienced before, but appeared to be only a few degrees "less developed" than say, Albania. We were then dropped off at the guest house. The hostess showed us around a 40 by 40 square fenced off area with two buildings and a large ger inside. (Gers are traditional Mongolian huts - pretty much Yurts that are easily packed up and moved-perfect for a nomadic culture). The area of town we were in had row after row of these fenced off residences, all packed into one of the many residential areas of town. We were shown into our room, and then shown the facilities which resembled outhouses and a camp shower. I had to use the toilet right away, so I went into the toilet expecting a "turkish toilet"- instead they were pit toilets! 3 blocks from the center of a country's capital center! Then I looked around and realized there was no running water. There was only big barrels of water that I realized later they purchased and had delivered! I can still hardly believe it when I walk back to the room from a metropolitan area and enter the pit toilet! I can only assume that the whole residential area we are in use pit toilets too.

Well a few days after we arrived in Ulaan Bataar, we left on a trip with two girls we had found online that needed a couple more people to share the cost of a trip across Mongolia. We met them the second night we were here to talk about the trip, and that is when Kirst the main organizer said she was using this trip as a research trip for a fly fishing guiding business she was starting here in Mongolia! Brent got increasingly excited that we would be scouting and fishing rivers all over Mongolia. (the fact that she needed to do research and the fact that the trip was not only for fun came back to haunt us later).

As for how and who this trip was organized with, I think we've finally learned our lesson when it comes to traveling with others whom we don't previously know-its best to figure things out on our own. Agendas, budgets and priorities are hard to coordinate with people you meet a few hours before a 2 week trip.

However, as any tourist/traveller finds out when planning a trip through Mongolia, if you wish to see any of the "real" Mongolia (outside of the capitol), you must take part in renting a 4x4 jeep or Russian minivan along with an accompanying driver. This cost around $50/day (not including petrol or feeding the driver!). To make it affordable for budget travelers, you have to find others to join in on the trip. Getting 2 or 4 others really helps with the cost, but then you have the previously mention lesson to contend with. The parts of the trip that involved us needing to be on the same page blew up in our faces. Its really difficult to coordinate with others who travel much differently than we do.

The upcoming conflicts aside...For the time being, BRENT NEEDED A FLY ROD!!! We hunted all over town,...and picked up a true beaut!- (check out the pics) We went grocery shopping and were ready to go! We got picked up the next afternoon in a "russian minivan" ( I could just imagine some Russian soccer mom trying to drive this beast all over Moscow!) It WAS a beast! and our driver was a perfect match with it. Crazy. He drove fast and with wreckless abandon. I dont think my back will ever be the same. There was approximately1 hour of paved road, and then the roads gave way to the finest dust that got kicked up and covered everything. I didnt recognize what was coming out of my nose most days.

After driving for almost two solid days, we finally got to Moron, a town only 400 km from UlanBataar (It takes a long time to get anywhere in Mongolia). We spent a few days there fishing and then headed up to a popular lake Lake Hovsgul, and spent a few nights there, fishing. The girls needed to go up to another area of the country, so we opted to get dropped off at the river we enjoyed fishing so much, and relaxed there for 5 days. In the course of 5 days we were visited by about 10 local Mongolian people. Every day a few people would stop by, and want to see what we were doing. Brent's fly fishing technique was a source of constant curiosity. We ate lots of fish and relaxed with the locals and then returned to Ulan Bataar via a 5 rivers area in which Brent caught a great fish. It felt good to return to Ulan Bataar and settle back in for a couple weeks of relaxation before we head for China!

Train Tales

Well, we made it! After a few hectic and not-so-eventful days in Moscow we prepared to get on the Trans-Mongolian train.

So the day finally came to get on the train....After all of the experience that I have with trains, I was still a bit nervous about getting to the correct train station and to the correct platform, etc. since most of our time in Russia was spent trying to navigate in a country that has nothing written in any other language than Russian, and very few people speak English (or are willing to admit they do) So, totally immersed in a sea of cyrillic writing, we arrived at the train station early that morning to figure out (well in advance) where we would need to be and when. We brought our cyrillic alphabet and figured out we were at the right station, and asked about the platform. So armed with all the info we needed to get on the train at 9:30pm that evening, we went into the downtown area of Moscow to see some of the sights. We walked around the Kremlin, and across Red Square, and saw St Basils, etc. (our attempt to do this the day prior ended in a total downpour and we got stranded in a huge cathedral for hours while Brent had a gastric emergency- ahh, the stories we will tell!!)

Then we made a trip to the grocery store and loaded up with Ramen noodles, and instant oatmeal, and other non-refrigerated items, packed them up and headed for the train station (still a few hours earlier than Brent thought necessary, but he humors me and my nervousness sometimes). As we prepare to board we notice large quantities of clothes and shoes and other items being loaded onto the train by many Mongolian looking people. These were not clothing items a person wears- they were ones that a person sells-large quantities of the same item. Then we enter our 4 berth cabin to witness a couple of Mongolian-looking people shoving 50-60 pairs of shoes into the overhead compartment, and doing it in such haste, we thought they were storing the shoes and leaving the train. But as the train pulls away, the husband makes his bed and settles in for what appeared to be the rest of the ride (the wife left for a time, only to return periodically and torment us with her angry and almost evil demeanor- we're still not sure what we did to piss her off so much). We had another traveler in the cabin with us from the Netherlands, who spoke English well. She is a musician, very talented, and pretty famous in Holland. We enjoyed talking to her about her music, and listening to her very unique and original creations. She was planning to spend three weeks with a nomadic Mongolian family to become inspired for her next album.

The next two days we slept and ate and read and talked. Brent and I tried to draw each other. Looking out the window was enjoyable. Even though the scenery was rather typical and not too spectacular, (lots of forests and communist block towns scattered along the way) the land was green and the landscape changed most every day. Throughout all of this, we were really enjoying the ride, relaxing, eating well, napping, and the rhythm of the train was comforting, somehow.

Periodically, at certain train stops the man in our cabin (and the 30 or so other Mongolian merchants) would start to load up his goods and jump off and start selling his items to the hundreds of Russians that had crowded onto the train platform for cheap clothing and shoes. The bartering and yelling and pushing and shoving made for and entertaining time. A few times the train would start to move, and a seller would finish up their sale just in time to run after the train and throw their items on, and jump on themselves. The man in our cabin left after the 3rd night, with plans to wait at that stop for 10 hours and ride a train back to Moscow that same day. What a life- cant be easy.

We arrived in Ulan Bataar yesterday morning, and had reservations at a nice guest house where we have been resting and preparing for the next adventure.

Mongo-expensive Moscow!

What our modest daily budget would buy in Moscow.

- Sharing floor space with six other travelers, sleeping on the floor of a nice Russian woman's appartment. Very cozy!
- ONE slice of pizza.

Needless to say, we were happy to leave.

4 Months Abroad!

Thought is was worth it's own posting. Today, we are officially entering our 5th month of travel.

St. Petersburg, Russia

We've been in Russia for about 4 days now, and to be honest, still haven't had a chance to relax. This is the hardest country we've been to so far when it comes to difficulty in getting things done, willingness of people to help, and the huge language barrier (cyrillic very difficult to read).

Going to the ticketing office to try to buy our Trans-Mongolian tickets was a real challenge (as we were told it would be). In an earlier post, we mention that we tried to get a Russian travel agency to purchase the tickets for us (the recommended method). After 3 days of faxing, emailing, and stress this didn't work out. So, there we are in the St. Petersburg Central Ticketing Office, just one hour after having rode an overnight train from Riga, Lithuania. Had to share the cabin with three other Russians, one of which wouldn't shut up, and another drunk and spilling beer all over our stuff. Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep. In the ticketing office, the "lines" are long, impossible to know which one to get into. Of course, it's very likely that after waiting 30 minutes waiting to get up to the window, the woman just waves her hands while saying "HeT". Which means, "no, wrong line, go away, you are bothering me". We decide to split up and better of chances of getting to the correct window. Keeping in step with other Russians, I step into a "line" and after a while a Russian soldier/police/guard (couldn't tell) motions to me that I've cut in line. I play dumb, but he persists. All the while, multiple people (mostly older women) are stepping into and out of line where ever the see fit. I go to what I think is the back of the line. A minute later, an older policeman comes up to me and motions for me to follow him. I, of course, hesistate with no idea where he wants to take me, but after many minutes I felt like I had no choice. I walk off with him up some dark stairs, look across the ticketing office, and see that Leah's jaw is dropping to the ground. He leads me upstairs through some construction areas, which is completely empty of people. I'm pretty worried. Well, it turns out, he's graciously leading me to the INTERNATIONAL ticketing window (no way we ever would have found it on our own). Ok, so we found the right window, but are still faced with a unhappy, unfriendly, ticketing women. Thankfully, we have a secret weapon. One day prior, my good bud Leo (back in Portland, Oregon) has provided us with a translated message in Russian stating the ticket that we need (BIG THANKS LEO!). It all worked out and we got our Trans-Mongolian tickets.

The next worry is Russian visa registration. Upon entering Russian, one must "register" his/her visa within 72 hours with some "agency" and pay about 500Roubles ($20). This is a completely mysterious process. We were told that hotels/hostels in which you stay at will do this for you. Ours, of course, does not. It's Thursday evening (our 2nd day in Russia), and the agency our hostel recommends requires a next day processing time (something no one mentioned), and they don't work on weekends. So, that means come Monday we are officially without sufficient "papers". Leah is certain the scary Russians will through us in jail. After lots of running around, we find an agency that processes same-day.

Next worry: getting train tickets to Moscow from St. Petesburg. But not any old tickets....cheap ones that get us into Moscow in time for our Trans-Mongolian train, but not so early that we will spend 72 hours in Moscow which will require us to re-register our visas AGAIN! Without going into all the details again about the Central Ticketing Office, after a few hours of waiting and struggling, we end up getting tickets within the window of time we needed.

It hasn't all been bad and stress (although from reading our blog lately, it seems like it has). We spent 5 hours at the Hermitage Museum the other day. Amazingly huge, with lots of world famous stuff. We've also walked all over looking at the interesting Russian architecture. Saw the funky colorful church with big Russian balls at the top. We have a couple more days, hopefully relaxing now that we have all our tickets, and then we're off Moscow.

Sorry Lithuania and Latvia

We have to apologize for racing through you.

Russia bound!

Sorry for the lack of posts, we've not been good about posting new pics and blog lately since all of our internet time is inevitably trying to sort out logistics. We spent about 5 days in Krakow doing just that, and it seems it never ends.

So, preparations for Russia have been difficult to say the least.
Just getting to Russia without going through Belarus is likely to drive a person mad. Belarus requires a visa. Its expensive, and needs to be arranged in advanced (no purchasing visas at the boarder) Trying to figure out which trains avoid it was tricky.

Not to mention, a few weeks ago, we had thought we had found a good Russian tour company who would buy our tickets from Moscow to Ulaan Bataar for us, but as the days progressed realized the service we expect in the States is NOTHING like the rest of the world, and had to give up hope that they would be able to do it for us. In reading how fast those ticket sell out, we decided getting to Russia ASAP would drastically increase our chances of getting on the train we wanted.

So, we left Krakow and took a train to Warsaw. That seems simple. It was simple. Get on a train at 1:30am and arrive in Warsaw at 6:30am. At 5:00am I wake up to see a few people exiting the train at a stop and start to panic that we have missed our stop. Despite the fact that our stop is in WARSAW- the end of the line. A person thinking clearly would say, "This is not Warsaw because the train has not completely stopped and we are in the middle of a cornfield!"- but no, I was convinced. As I ask people (none of which speak English) I conclude that nevermind that there are cornfields as far as the eye can see, WE ARE IN WARSAW! We need to get off! Brent wakes up to my "we need to get off!!!" grabs his stuff and we jump off the train as it begins to move toward Warsaw. Once we get off and get a clearer picture of the situation its desperately obvious I had made a HUGE mistake. We were in a farming village far removed from civilization. I started to cry. Three men were on the train platform. Brent asked if we were in Warsaw and they all pointed to our train as it disappeared out of sight. We "asked" when the next train may be (they know no english and we know no Polish) they pointed at the train currently sitting there and wrote 7:45 on a piece of paper. I sat on the bench and cried as Brent tried to console me. We would definately miss our 7:23 connection. We sat there for a few minutes trying to figure out what to do. We had spent all our polish currency, since we were leaving Poland that day, and so even if there WAS a train we could not pay for it. All of a sudden the train behind us started to pull away!!! What!?! 7;45?! it was 6:30! I ran after it trying to push a button for the door to open, ...it screeched to a halt. We jumped on. We didnt know how we'd pay for it, or where it was exactly going, but it was taking us away from the cornfield, and thats all I cared about. When the ticket guy came around, I gave him our tickets from Krakow, and he punched it! What luck! So we rode all the way to Warsaw.

However, following in the same theme, the train we were on did not stop at the stop we needed. Bt the time we realized it we were two stops beyond our stop, and with no currency to buy a metro pass, we decided we would try our luck with giving ourselves a free ride back to our stop. We didnt get caught, but had to spend the night in Warsaw. We left the next morning with our original ticket (which could be used the following day!) .

What a fiasco! I am a freak!

So, from Warsaw we went to a tiny town in Lithania called Sestokai and from there to Vilnius, Lithuania. We stayed two nights in Vilnius, and then left for Riga, Latvia and then from Riga to St Petersburg. PHEW! We are tired and spent, but glad we made it here finally. We spent today purchasing our tickets which leave Moscow on the 8th, arriving in Mongolia on the 13th. That should be quite a ride.

Tomorrow- The Hermitage Museum!

Researching Asia in Krakow, Poland

Have been in Krakow for about 6 days now. Found a great hostel with free internet and a really nice big kitchen. So nice to be able to cook a nice meal. Using the free internet to accomplish a bunch of "to-do's" we have concerning the next few months. We are finding out quickly that travel through Russia, Mongolia, Central China, and Tibet is not going to be easy.

Spent a day at Auschwitz/Birkenau. A truly eye-opening, life-changing experience. Hard to contemplate how horrific it all was.

Planning to leave Poland tonight. We've spend 8 days now in Krakow, which is the longest we've stayed in any one place so far. Taking the night train to Vilnius, Lithuania. Spend a day or two there and then on to St. Petersburg, Russia!

Oh, BTW, we made it into print in Germany! Weeks ago, a German journalist interviewed us (very briefly) about our Greece sailing trip as well as how we hooked up with the boat. See link below (helps if you can read German!).
http://www.spiegel.de/reise/fernweh/0,1518,496768,00.html

Saving $ in Slovakia

Continuing north, we decided to lay low in Slovakia. We've been camping in cheesey auto-camp places to save money....an attempt to make up for the huge China visa expense. We are in northern Slovakia, near the Tatras mountains. Beautiful rugged mountains, but have been ruined with too many gondolas, electric trains, and general over-tourism. In fact, in general, Slovakia is a very beautiful country, but it seems the people/government have decided to capitalize on it a bit too much, without any thought to mantaining a "nature" experience. Too bad.

Our budget is back on track and we are now planning our travels to Poland.

Congratulations Jason and Kelly!!!

Chasing the China Visa, Montenegro, Serbia, Hungary

First off, we had done lots of research previous to attempting the application process and felt we shouldn't have a problem. Afterall, we successfully got a Russian visa, and those are supposed to be harder to get.

So, as I mention in the previous blog, we had already tried the China Consulate in Podgorica, Montenegro. No luck. The voice in the intercom said we must be Montenegran citizens.
After Zablak/Durmitor we headed to Belgrade, Serbia, hoping they would do it for non Serbs. Of course, none of this info is online. You must just go to the embassy in person and ask. Forget about trying to call ahead and ask - you'd be lucky if you can figure out how to call across the street, let alone another country. Even if you did discover the secret to using the local phones, the language barrier makes it impossible.

So, after a horrendously long bus ride, we were in Belgrade, Serbia. We head straight to the China Embassy first thing. Amazing how loud and unorganized it was. People shouting and shoving. After waiting "in line" (the Serbs know nothing of the concept of waiting your turn in a line), we were asked by a Chinese Embassy employee, "where is your invitation letter?". What invitation letter?! None of the requirements we've read say anything about an invite letter. Come to find out, they also wanted a copy of an official residency card and proof of employment from the Chinese citizen who is doing the inviting. Wow. We turn to my friend Guang in Portland, who has a brother living in China. Generously, they are willing to help (thanks again Guang). In the meantime, while communicating with Guang (every email/response takes a day) and waiting for his brother's documents, we decide to try our luck with another embassy....this time Budapest, Hungary. Who knows, perhaps each embassy has different requirements. But we can't simply take our time getting there because we've found that embassies only accept visas 3 days/week and we are nearing the end of that week. So, after a night train ride, we are in Budapest, Hungary (same country in which we started the trip over 3 months earlier). We head straight to the China embassy. Long-story-long, we apply (without all the invite stuff), and they accepted our application! The embassy guy charged us an extra fee which he called an "American special treatment charge". He was smiling, and I think may have even winked at me while saying it. We also paid a small fortune to get the visa processed that same day, instead of the typical 6 day waiting period. We were happy to pay it. What a headache and a relief to be finished.

So, now we have both our Russian and Chinese Visas in our passports....all ready for Asia!

Zabjak/Durmitor NP, Montenegro

Been looking forward to writing this blog, cause this area is one of my favorites. I'm a bit late, we were actually in Durmitor starting 7/3/07.

We left Kotor (which was great, highly recommended) and headed to Podogorica (the capitol of Montenegro). Or mission....to find a wedding card for my good friends Jason and Kelly and try to apply for a Chinese visa at the China Consulate. Found a card! Wow they make those things hard to open...all sorts of folds and ribbons. As for the visa, we went straight to the consulate and the woman on the intercom said nope, sorry, can't do that here. Perhaps Belgrade, Serbia.
We considered staying in this town until we looked around and the cheapest hotel we could find was for $45/person....way over our budget.

So, we moved on to Zabjak, a small mountain town just outside of Durmitor National Park. I was there 10 years earlier and loved it and always hoped I'd make it back there some day. The place has changed some over the years....it's definitely more of a tourist destination now. We stayed in a woman's spare room and prepared for our hike into the park. The plan, a 4 day loop deep into the park around Bobotov Tuk (the highes mountain). The only problem, no stove fuel. If you've followed the blog in the past, you know we have a homemade pop-can alcohol stove. In some countries, alcohol is treated like a controlled substance and you can only buy small quantities at a pharmacy. In others, you can buy a big bottle of it over the counter. In Zabjak, neither cases were true. We couldn't find it anywhere! People look at you funny when you ask for a liter of the most flammable liquid they have. I did find kerosene and nail polish remover (acetone), but after doing some trial runs with my pop-can stove, I found that kerosene isn't flammable enough, and acetone is too flammable. Seems like a big hassle to find fuel, but camping just isn't as fun when you can't cook. After two days of looking, we got a tip that the local hospital may have some alcohol. At the hospital, a nice woman gave us a bottle of ethynol (close enough) for free. We were on the trail headed up into the park an hour later.

A few hours up the trail, we ran into the same goat herder I had met years earlier. Pretty weird. His hands are still twice the size of mine. It looked as though his main source of income had changed some over the years. Now, he makes $ by one of the following methods:
1) Scaring backpackers who pass by into staying in one of his guest huts, telling them they will get a ticket if caught camping in a tent (officially, camping is not allowed in the park, but that doesn't stop everyone from doing it).
2) Bringing you milk straight from his goat's tits (warm, good, and gross all at the same time) and yummy homemade cheese made from the same milk. At first you think he's just being kind and welcoming, until his incessant staring as you finish the last piece of cheese tips you off to his true plan.
We said goodbye to the man, 1 euro poorer and scared we were about to get sick from the milk and all the unknown nasty that accompanied it in the mug.

We found that the only other people in the park were Czechs. Now,the thing about Czechs (well, atleast the male anyway) is that they love to get naked and swim in the mountain lakes. The problem with this is, the mountain lakes were not prestine beautiful lakes, but nasty cow-toilet watering holes. This didn't stop the Czechs. Leah and I watched with amazement....Leah especially considering they were butt naked. I think she got a peep show everyday of the trip!

On day 3 we did the mother of all climbs. Close to 1900ft elevation gain in 1.5km! This took close to 3 hours to complete. 3 hours to hike less than 1 mile! If that wasn't tough enough, no water sources were expected for the rest of the day (or the following morning for that matter), so we (Leah mostly) carried 3.5 liters of water up the mountain....a lot of extra weight. We made it, and were greeted by cows at the top....very weird.

Overall, I'd say we had a fantastic time in the park. I took a million photos, which you can see on our Flickr link. The lack of water and the official no camping policy (which made us feel like we had to sneak) was a bit of a pain. I'm happy to report, the pop-can stove ran like a champ!

Breathtaking Montenegro

Here we are in Montenegro. We took a bus to Kotor and were met at the bus station by a man that offered us a room. We are usually more receptive to these types of offers, since they usually have a certain authentic quality to them. This time we wanted to make sure to stay in a place that we liked, since we had seen pictures of Kotor, and knew we would want to spend some time here. On total faith we agreed to go see his room, he said it was a 4 minute walk. He led us through the bus station part of town, and then we started to approach this big wall area. I thought it was a shortcut to his room, since it looked like a fortress, but as we walked I realized that people live and have businesses in this fortress! It was called the old city, and it is completely walled in with huge fortress walls. He led us to a rock house on the inner perimeter that backs up against the mountain. It was a neat room with cooking facilities, and felt really comfortable. We agreed to take it. Turns out it was close to everything we wanted to do in Kotor.

That next morning at 6 am (its much cooler then) we climbed the fortress up to the top. It had breathtaking views of the fijord and the mountains. Absolutely amazing, and with lots of history. The next morning at 7 am we started climbing an old road that supposedly snaked into inner Montenegro. We will never know if thats true since after about 3 hours of hiking, I would not go on. Every 5-10 feet there was a spider web that stretched over the trail with HUGE tiger looking spiders hanging out in the center. I have never considered myself girly or nervous around wildlife, but these freaked me out. Their bodies were the size of two dimes and with their legs they reached ghastly proportions. Brent agreed to humor me, and we decided to hike around to the valley behind the fortress instead and hung out there for the rest of the afternoon- spider free. I picked berries from a tree which were really sweet, a nice treat for later that day. The next days were relaxing and enjoyable, just hanging out in the quaint little town.

Next "not-so-relaxing" item on the agenda- Getting our CHINESE VISAS!