We have had an incredible time in Costa Rica. Any of you who have been working during this time may not want to read on. Despite the price hike and major westernisation compared to the rest of Central America, the tourism is much better developed and as such many beautiful places are suddenly so much more accessible. We spent the Easter holidays in Monteverde national park, one of Costa Rica´s most famous areas in mountainous cloud forest. We were lucky enough to hitch a ride with a local tour operator, from the main road where the bus dropped us, to Santa Elena, the town closest to Monteverde. It was a beautiful winding trip up into the mountains, dry pastoral country at the bottom to dense green cloud forest and a view of the ocean at the very top. From a steamy few weeks in Nicaragua we were pleased to have to put jumpers on in the late afternoon in the cloud forest. The backpackers was lovely and we made a few good friends in the communal kitchen cooking up creative dishes to salsa music.
Excitement of Monteverde included;
- getting personal with the iguanas and nonvenomous snakes in the local serpentrium
- hanging out in the butterfly garden
- hiking through the Monteverde reserve, seeing toucans, howler monkeys, and fabulous forest. oh, and yet another waterfall...
- spotting 6 different species fo hummingbird in the hummingbird garden whilst sipping a latte
- having a coati (Racoon like critter) try to steal our lunch in the hummingbird garden because Natalia emptied tuna juice onto the leaves
- ziplining through primary cloud forest
- spotting a Quetzal (beautiful green and red bird with long long tail fethers) whilst standing on a zipline platform
- scooting out on the zipline with the guide holding me so I could get better photos of the Quetzal
- climbing a large cylindrical parasitic fig tree which had long killed its host and hollowed out, and watching the sun set behind the town from up high
- enjoying a cup of tea at sunrise back in the fig tree, 15m up, complete with bird book and binoculars (Nerds!).
After the Easter celebrations were over and the buses were running again, we moved on to Arenal Volcano, the most active in all of central America. As we crossed the nearby lake to get to the town, Arenal loomed on the horizon with steam rising off the sides where lava flows down to the bottom of the volcano almost every day. Funny to be so nonchalant about camping next toor to a rumbling lava giant. Unfortunately we didn´t get to see it at night as it clouded over and rained all night. However it was certainly a strong presence in the town, visible from everywhere including our hostel hammocks!
Next stop was Tortuguero, on the east coast of Costa Rica, a place described as ¨Venice in the jungle¨as it is based in a series of canals, with a thin strip of land for the village against the beach of the carribean ocean. It's famous for being a turtle nesting beach but we were going there in the off season, and mainly wanted to see a different kind of rainforest (with the obvious bonus of animal spotting whilst sitting leisurely in a canoe). When we got there though, we were told that the Leatherback turtles are nesting at the moment. Holy flip!! I have worked with 3 other species of sea turtle (I think there are 6 or 7 in the world) and Leatherbacks are the largest and most endangered. We spent the first 2 nights walking along the beaches avoiding the guides who would have made us pay $15. On the 3rd night we reluctantly paid the guide (who could take us further up the beach without fear of being mugged) and it paid off, we watched a 500kg, 160cm long old girl lay her eggs and return to the ocean. Magic.
We saw a huge amount of other stuff in Tortuguero either from a canoe or on foot. I caught 2 snakes in 2 days, much to Natalia's disgust afterwards when we found out they were both somewhat venomous. But I was careful! Check the photos for iguanas, basilisks, turtles, plenty of birds, spider monkeys... etc.
Natalia flew out of the city of San Jose the day before me. Very sad to see her go, we have had such a great time together and we (perhaps surprisingly) got along brilliantly and worked well together almost 24/7. She's off to New York and I'm off to London. Back to english speaking shiny expensive cities! My first dose of city life was sitting on the plane from LA to London for 10 hours next to a model and her model boyfriend going to london for a "shoot". They were Sooo LA. She told me what was going on in Vogue magazine and Who is Beautiful and Who is Not.
I'm currently hanging out in sunny and beautiful (yes really) London with a family I met in Thailand who have very kindly offered to put me up for a few nights. I just saw a fox in their backyard. They are getting ready for a big 50th party and want me to try all their cooking for the party. This is something I can help with. Unfortunately I don't feel I can truly repay the favour to them! I only got in this morning, which should have been midnight in LA but am powering on until at least 8.30pm before I go to bed. If this post doesn't make sense, that is why. Later this week I am catching up with a girl I met in Hiroshima who works for the London Police. I hoped she worked in Sun Hill but she crushed my hopes and said it doesn't exist.
Only a few more days until reality comes crashing down on me... see you all then....
20 April 2009
13 April 2009
Birdwatching, volcanoes, waterfalls and surfing
Time for some reflection on an action packed couple of weeks working our way through Central America. After leaving the mother's nest in Guatemala we sped through to a large inland lake called Lake Yojoa (pronounced yo-hoa) in the centre of Honduras where we stayed for a few days at a microbrewery just outside a really small town. I enjoyed sampling the brewer's selection of beers, Natalia was battling some stomach bug which got angry when she had beer so she missed out. We both were very excited that the whole place was on filtered water so we could drink out of the TAP!! It was a very cosy place to be based for checking out the lake and nearby waterfall. We met up with two Honduran-Americans who were also on holiday and showed us around. We all had a great evening with an expat american family who ran a pizza place (cunningly disguised with a sign outside saying Sandwich Bar) and were thrilled to let me taste their entire range of home pickled jalapenos. The two Honduran girls ended up inviting us to stay at their place in one of the big cities in Honduras. It was a really kind offer and would have been great to experience their lifestyle - the family owns a big "sewing factory" (aka sweatshop) and sounds like they would have looked after us pretty well with drivers and maids etc - but it's really out of our way and we are keen to keep heading south.
On Lake Yojoa itself we had an amazing morning birdwatching with one of the most eccentric people I have ever met, a skinny old English man with a white plaited beard and a variety of baggy camoflauge clothing. He took us out on a boat (complete with boatman to row for us!) and we got to be very professional with binoculars and photography in a very leisurely way. Saw probably 40 species of birds, the highlight being a pair of Toucans, and quite a few basilisk lizards basking on rocks. This was our first truly nature-based bit of tourism and it inspired me a lot. This is why I'm here, not to see dusty cities, beggars and rubbish filled verges.
From here we skipped quickly through the rest of Honduras with a few epic days on chicken buses. One notable moment was on a particularly long and sweaty ride where a drunk local was being way too friendly with Natalia and I. He ignored our demands to leave him alone until the locals on the bus stood up for us and kicked him off the bus at the next stop, minus his bags, telling him to "leave the gringo chicas alone, they don't like you!" We crossed the border into Nicaragua, staying in a small town called Esteli. At first appearance it seemed like another dusty town with a 6am church siren but over the couple of days we were there we noticed a bit of an alternative undercurrent that we hadn't seen before. There were leatherworkers, herbal remedy places and restaurants with organic foods and coffee. I think it would be a pretty interesting place to spend more time in.
We were totally unprepared for Granada, on the edge of Lake Nicaragua. It's a very old city which was built by the Spanish as a port (the lake is BIG) and centre for the surrounding wealthy gold and silver mines and prosperous agriculture due to the volcanic soils. Consequently it's granduer seems completely out of place from anything else we had seen, with beautiful colonial style buildings, with tiled floors, high ceilings and grand entrances. We spent a lot of time peering in doorways and admiring the garden courtyards within almost every building. Almost everybody has a rockingchair in Granada too as it's very warm, and there seemed to be "rockingchair hour" just on sunset when people appeared from nowhere to recline on their verhandas and enjoy the breeze.
We booked ourselves on a night tour to Volcano Mombacho, a "sleeping" volcano quite close to Granada. It was fairly expensive and we were seriously considering not going, but it turned out to be an amazing experience. Tourism in Nicaragua is not very developed, especially nature based tourism, so we were really unsure about what we were going to get. They picked us up in the morning and we drove to the top of the volcano, where there's a biological research station (although we couldn't actually figure out what, if any, research went on). We did a 4 hour hike around the 3 craters at the top of the volcano. It was very steep but phenomenally beautiful, the craters have been long inactive and the cloud forest is thick and sprawls between them. After a quick nap and some dinner we went out again at night with a guide. It turned out that the 2 of us were the only ones booked on the night tour so we had the place to ourselves, with 2 rangers, a caretaker and a cook staying upthere to look after us!! Major excitment on the night walk was seeing salamanders, red eyed green tree frog (eeeep) and ... a two-toed sloth!!! We nearly wet our pants with excitement and I think the guide thought we were a bit nuts. But hopefully he appreciated our enthusiasm. Neither of us slept very well after so much excitement but we got up before sunrise and walked another trail through the mist to listen for birds. We ended up at a lookout where we could sometimes make out Granada through the mist and partook in some early morning cloud forest yoga on a volcano in the clouds. Ahh.
Down the volcano and onto a ferry which took us to Omotepe, an island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua made of two massive volcanes. Omotepe is a strange place, it's a destination that every traveller we passed told us was unmissable, but apart from the ferry landing it was a very un-touristy place. It's mostly farmland, with no central town, just small villages dotted around the volcanoes and joined by the worst roads I have ever seen. Even the DEC fire dozers make a better track through the bush. Being the intelligent chicas we are, we rented bikes from our hostel and attempted to ride around the island. This ended with us being sunburnt, tired, and frustrated with sore arses. We gave up and swam in the creek instead. We were not unhappy to leave, although sunsets with volcano silhouettes were quite spectacular, the lake "beaches" everyone had raved about did not impress us picky Aussies much! Coconut palms were not enough to counter the black sand and grey water!
Last stop in Nicaragua was my designated surf stop at San Juan Del Sur. It's a small town just south of Playa Maderas, one of the best surf beaches in the world. The town was really cute, and there was a certain hum on the streets as people were arriving in droves for Semana Santa (Easter week) celebrations. There was a real difference in the travellers here, generally they were there to stay and surf rather than moving from place to place sightseeing. We fitted in at this hostel more than anywhere else we had stayed, the surfer guys embracing us as family from the moment we walked in the door. Everyone chipped in each night for a massive cookup by a couple of the guys who had worked as chefs on oil rigs. Awesome! Just hanging out with them was a nice change from the "where have you been, where are you going" conversations. They were our designated body guards on the streets (there is a lot of crime over easter) and we all had a fun night out on the town in the bars along the beach. Some of us may have had a little too much fun and had trouble scraping ourselves out of the hammock to go for a surf at Playa Maderas the following day... but got there eventually. It was a really nice beach with long rolling waves like Denmark and scenic limestone islets jutting out of the water to the north of the surf area. I hired a board and had a bit of fun being beaten around by the water (as usual) before settling on the sand to watch the sun set over the water. I hadn't realised how much I have missed that! We were sad to leave the guys at the hostel, would have loved to just hang there for a few weeks. But onward to Costa Rica, preparing ourselves for prices to double and American tourists shouting at people in English... but it's worth it if we get to see more sloths!!
08 April 2009
sloths, waterfalls, rainbows, volcanoes and hammocks
Hi all,
Some new photos up - Honduras and Nicaragua. Highlight was seeing a SLOTH!!
We are crossing the border to Costa Rica tomorrow.
Also Natalia's uploaded some pictures here if you are bored with mine!
http://picasaweb.google.com/natalia.hywill write more soon :)
xx
24 March 2009
all the ducks are swimming in the water
Finally, greetings from Guatemala! Internet access has been a little difficult to get hold of as you might imagine in a 3rd world country.
But first, a summary of my last few days in Japan! I spent my time between Kyoto, Hiroshima and Tokyo. Kyoto had such a nice feel to it, I would definitely recommend it as a travel base for anyone heading to Japan as it's so central, with lots of lovely sights nearby as day trips. I saw the massive bronze buddha in the largest wooden building in the world, experienced the Hiroshima Peace Museum in all its g(l)ory and went through many beautiful shrines and temples. I enjoyed laughing at the Magic the Gathering players in Kyoto and dragged 13 of them out for a night on the town including Karaoke in a proper karaoke bar. Then I headed up to the mountains of Takayama, back to the snow, to a village which had been reconstructed from very old buildings around the place. It was just gorgeous, especially when the snow just started thumping down and I needed an umbrella to keep it out of my eyes. Magical! Finally I spent a couple of days in Tokyo to see the Cosplay people (unfortunately not may were out because it was RAINING... wusses), Ghibli Museum (OMG totoro, hannah!!) and the Tsukiji fish markets. The latter was an amazing experience - only recently reopened after bad behaviour from tourists - walking through a huge warehouse where most creatures from the sea are for sale. Of course the big attraction is the tuna auctions, I can't believe so many huge fish can be pulled out of the ocean every day in a sustainable fashion. I guess it's not.
Japan was lovely, I feel like I really need to go back and see some more of it. The Japanese have an uncanny ability of creating places of quiet serenity in a country of busy chaos and flashing lights. Despite seeing lots of wonderful places - amazing temples, Hiroshima peace museum, beautiful gardens and towns - I felt quite lonely travelling by myself (as those of you who recieved a tearful phone call from me already know). So I was very pleased to meet up with Natalia and her boyfriend Andrew at the Tokyo airport. I even shed a little tear when we saw each other (cue Chariots of Fire)... soppy, I know.
We had a jetlagged 11 hour changeover in LA (so I can officially say I've been to the US ;) which involved leaving our bags at the Hilton - not that we were staying there, just that we figured they had to be nice to us - and catching a bus to Manhattan Beach. We just vegged out at cafes, watched the sun set when we felt it should be rising, visited Victoria's Secret and bought some fancy new jocks (ohhh yeah). I was amazed at the sugary accents everyone had there... quite hilarious when you realise they are not putting it on. Ohh my Gawwwd, and I was like, ohh, and he was like... you know? :P Then finally on to Guatemala around midnight on a much smaller airline where everyone clapped when we touched down!
From Guatemala city we headed to Antigua which is a tourist hub, but much safer, cleaner and more pleasant than the city itself. The general rule seems to be to spend as little time in Guatemala city as possible, and I am happy to agree with that. Antigua is a world heritage listed town so has a lot of restrictions on new buildings, signposting and upkeep of old buildings. Consequently it's very picturesque, with cobbled streets, pieces of old churches, archways and a towering volcano to the south of the town. Even the McDonalds is tasteful (hard to believe I know) with a lovely back courtyard and view of the volcano... plus Ronald McDonald. We met up with Natalia's mum Mahiya and spent a night at one of the hostels. I'm pretty sure I could see the southern cross above the volcano that night. In the morning we checked out the colourful markets and walked to a lookout before catching a shuttle to Lake Atitlan, a few hours away. The roads are all very winding and slightly concerning coming around blind corners up and down super steep volcanic mountains with buses blowing black smoke, utes full of people, chickens, fabric, and overtaking slow tuk-tuks. Quite a change from leisurely rides in streamlined shinkansens...
Mahiya has built a house in San Juan, a small village at Lake Atitlan, about 10 minutes tuk-tuk ride from San Pedro, the most well known village on the lake. The villages around the lake seem to be a haven for gringos escaping from something in their lives. It is not uncommon to ask a bartender "how long have you lived here?" and have them reply "oh, 2 years I think? or maybe 3...". The pace of the town is very slow and relaxed for the gringos residing here, the locals are slightly richer then elsewhere due to tourism but they still struggle against considerable poverty. The lake has amazingly dramatic scenery, it's a huge 35km by 8km, surrounded by volcanoes. I struggled with the amount of rubbish all through the streets and floating on the edges of the lake, and the open sewerage flowing straight from the towns into the water. It's definitely not safe to drink, even for locals, and I'm hesitant to swim in it after hearing tales of people getting seriously ill from weird and wonderful parasites/bacteria. All the drinking water is trucked in, such a shame that a massive resource as unlimited fresh water is so polluted and only able to be used for washing and gardening.
The 3 of us enrolled in the spanish school for the week, one on one lessons each morning for 4 hours. After the first lesson my brain was just about fried as the teacher only spoke to me in spanish and had translations only for words in her photocopied lesson book. It was so exhausting trying to get my head around it at first but by the last day she was chatting away to me about a kidnapping that had happened recently, and how she wants to find an english speaking boyfriend. I couldn't respond intelligently but felt proud to understand what the flip was going on. I managed to communicate a few things to her, about my job in the desert in Australia, where we were travelling, and how Natalia had been driving the porcelain bus (vomiting) the previous day from eating something dodgy.
Natalia and I spent one day with Mahiya's old ladies' group from the very poor village of San Pablo. The social club is one of the projects Mahiya has set up to help the local community. We took the ladies on a boat across the lake for lunch and sightseeing at another village. For most of them it was the first time they had ever been on a bus, let alone a boat and they were pretty thrilled/terrified at the experience. They had all dressed to the nines for the occasion and looked amazing with their brightly coloured traditional garb and leathery old faces. Not to mention the fact that they were all only about 4 foot tall, even Natalia towered above them. It was a heartwarming day, despite the lack of verbal communication between us we managed to forge some kind of bond. I was their Photographer for the day and they got very posessive and cross with American tourists who tried to take their pictures instead of me. We took them out to lunch and every single one of them stored at least half of it in their aprons or handbags for later on. We gave them 10 Quetzales (about $2) to buy things at the food markets and they whizzed around like demons, collecting mangoes, peanuts, coconut etc at a very efficient rate. I had an emotional moment when they all gave money to a beggar despite having only the 10Q we had given them and being desperately poor themselves (with leftovers in their handbags for goodness sakes).
The following week I left Natalia and Andrew at the lake to have some "alone time" (unfortunately they spent most of it with gastro which is perhaps not as romantic as they had hoped). I headed up to Tikal, which on the map is about 250km, by road it's 500km and on a bus takes ELEVEN HOURS. Unbelievable. It required a changeover in Guatemala City which I was not pleased about (not helped by the zombie movie they were playing on the bus) but I emerged at Flores (the town close to Tikal) with all my posessions at 10pm. Here I met up with Jo and Pete - girls I know through the Grad recruit progam back home. It was lovely to see familiar faces and catch up with their travels of the last few months. They were part of a tour group so headed off in the morning but we will catch them again next week back at the lake.
The following day I visited Tikal, the large Mayan ruins of a city inhabited for about 1000 years, mysteriously abandoned ~900AD and rediscovered in the 1800s. The ruins were quite impressive and the history is very mysterious and worth further reading. I was very excited to see some proper jungle (it's within a national park) complete with coatis, spider monkeys, capibara-esque critters, toucans and vultures perched artistically atop stone ruins....! The other excitement of the day was a large american lady falling off one of the stone walls and breaking both her legs. Fortunately there was a doctor present, he turned out to be the aussie guy staying at the same hostel as me and travelling with his daughter. I got to know them both in the following few days as we shared bus trips, beers and vegemite! From Flores we headed south, stopping at Lanquin which is a town in a limestone valley, famous for caves and the waterfalls of Semuc Champey. I went with a group to the water caves near Semuc Champey where everyone goes in in bathers carrying a candle. It was very cool to swim and clamber through a cave by candlelight although i did cringe at the wax we dripped everywhere and used my (much less romantic) headtorch instead! I enjoyed clambering up the big waterfall in the cave by rope, with my candle between my teeth, Indiana Jones style. All the other girls went up the ladder... pshhh. In the afternoon we all chilled out at the pools of Semuc Champey. The water is so blue from the limestone, in a jungle filled valley. Very majestic. I toughed out the clamber up to the lookout and choose to blame my shortness of breath on altitude.
I'm back at the lake again now with Natalia, Andrew and Mahiya. We spent the weekend at a "festival of consciousness" at a nearby village, a hardcore hippy gathering. It was pretty hilarious, with workshops of varying quality and punctuality! Some of the workshops we attended were Capoira dancing (just like Tekken, Paul!!), macrame, shiatsu massage, henna body art, meditation, yoga etc etc. Unfortunately I couldnt attend all the events as they were run simultaneously and missed Lucid Dreaming : Entering Parallel Dimensions of Ourselves and Spiritual Meditation for Planetary Ascention. Damn. We have a couple more days here at the lake until Andrew flies out and Natalia and I head out into the real world without the western comforts of Mum's house! It will be entertaining for sure.
phew! consider yourselves updated!
Well I miss you all and a few of the comforts of home! Like drinking from a tap. Touch wood I haven't been sick yet but both Natalia and Andrew have had swift evacuations from both ends going on. I have to give some credit to Mum for allowing me to eat dirt for the first few (I wont say how many) years of my life.
I hope you are all doing well :) Send me emailz! I love it!
xx judy
07 March 2009
new photos
I know I´m behind on the writing but there are plenty of new photos up!
http://picasaweb.google.com/judy.dunlop/TravelPhotosJapan
http://picasaweb.google.com/judy.dunlop/TravelPhotosJapan
22 February 2009
shinkansen goodness
Greetings from Kyoto. Paul has requested that I sign the protocol while I'm here, not sure it works that way but I will do my best.
My time in the snow was great - had some awesome skiing days and a couple where the snow was not so good (due to unfortunate bouts of rain) but I was happy to have some quiet days to rest my legs. I had lots of fun at the backpackers as it was a very social place with the bar downstairs being the hotspot of the local area.
Miscellaneous observations from snow time;
Awesome!
- skiing on fresh snow
- clear days where you could see the whole mountain range
- sitting on a heated toilet seat halfway up a mountain when you are feeling a little bit cold
- skiing on fresh snow again
- listening to spanish lessons while skiing down slopes in Japan
- not being able to understand any announcements or signposts around the place
- $1 a glass Chu Hi night
- playing the Djembe with a Japanese African drumming crew
- Shinkansens (Bullet trains)
Less awesome
- Japan's idea of bread is terrible terrible sweet soft white bread that I'm sure turns to glue for your insides
- Japan's idea of coffee is hideous condensed milky stuff... even when it looks like it comes out of a big machine it's still press button rubbish
- Dont know if this is awesome of not, but the number of Japanese girls with heavy makeup under their snowboarding goggles, I even saw a bunch with false eyelashes! dedicated.
- Rain on fresh snow :(
- My half brothers' capacity to stink out a room with farts
Kyoto a town where you can't walk anywhere without falling over a shrine or temple of some sort so I did a fair bit of that today. Wandered around with another girl who showed me through the Geisha district, Gion. Lots of little wooden buildings and tiny streets, and we even saw 2 geishas in training who were kind enough to let me take their picture. We wandered through this group of temples and were blessed or cleansed or made wishes in one way or another many times over. The area is full of cherry trees and you can see how spectacular it would be if they were flowering... but I imagine fairly manic with tourists too.
In the arvo I particularly wanted to see this one shrine out of town that was full of Buddha statues that are all a bit offbeat... pulling faces or hiding behind trees etc. But because we had spent a while in Gion and on the train, it was closed when we got there. Damn! So we trekked back to the bus stop, but on the way saw a little buddha face on the hill. I dont know wheut there it was a back entrance or what but there were rows and rows of all these statues! Happily took photos of them with their little mossy heads... they looked great.
Spending tomorrow in Kyoto then heading to Hiroshima in the evening for a few days (loving this shinkansen stuff). I have informed Dad that I will be staying with him before I fly out so will see how far i get in this next week before heading back to Tokyo.
out
My time in the snow was great - had some awesome skiing days and a couple where the snow was not so good (due to unfortunate bouts of rain) but I was happy to have some quiet days to rest my legs. I had lots of fun at the backpackers as it was a very social place with the bar downstairs being the hotspot of the local area.
Miscellaneous observations from snow time;
Awesome!
- skiing on fresh snow
- clear days where you could see the whole mountain range
- sitting on a heated toilet seat halfway up a mountain when you are feeling a little bit cold
- skiing on fresh snow again
- listening to spanish lessons while skiing down slopes in Japan
- not being able to understand any announcements or signposts around the place
- $1 a glass Chu Hi night
- playing the Djembe with a Japanese African drumming crew
- Shinkansens (Bullet trains)
Less awesome
- Japan's idea of bread is terrible terrible sweet soft white bread that I'm sure turns to glue for your insides
- Japan's idea of coffee is hideous condensed milky stuff... even when it looks like it comes out of a big machine it's still press button rubbish
- Dont know if this is awesome of not, but the number of Japanese girls with heavy makeup under their snowboarding goggles, I even saw a bunch with false eyelashes! dedicated.
- Rain on fresh snow :(
- My half brothers' capacity to stink out a room with farts
Kyoto a town where you can't walk anywhere without falling over a shrine or temple of some sort so I did a fair bit of that today. Wandered around with another girl who showed me through the Geisha district, Gion. Lots of little wooden buildings and tiny streets, and we even saw 2 geishas in training who were kind enough to let me take their picture. We wandered through this group of temples and were blessed or cleansed or made wishes in one way or another many times over. The area is full of cherry trees and you can see how spectacular it would be if they were flowering... but I imagine fairly manic with tourists too.
In the arvo I particularly wanted to see this one shrine out of town that was full of Buddha statues that are all a bit offbeat... pulling faces or hiding behind trees etc. But because we had spent a while in Gion and on the train, it was closed when we got there. Damn! So we trekked back to the bus stop, but on the way saw a little buddha face on the hill. I dont know wheut there it was a back entrance or what but there were rows and rows of all these statues! Happily took photos of them with their little mossy heads... they looked great.
Spending tomorrow in Kyoto then heading to Hiroshima in the evening for a few days (loving this shinkansen stuff). I have informed Dad that I will be staying with him before I fly out so will see how far i get in this next week before heading back to Tokyo.
out
15 February 2009
50 year storm
Hey all.
I'm sitting inside at our hostel with my legs under the heated table (I still can't get over what great inventions these are) while it RAINS outside. Very upsetting - we've had more than 30 mls in the last few days and it's really taking a toll on the snow. However the forecast is for a stack of snow over the next week (up to 2m in the next 5 days), and temp dropping to -20 at some point. I'm not sure what I will do. There are only so many layers of thermals I can fit under my Buzz Lightyear ski suit. It is so fashionable by the way - white suit with tight legs and waist, with big puffy purple and green manly shoulders. All I need is a clear spherical helmet and I surely will be going to Infinity and Beyond!
The 3 boys and Dad are playing cards which is a nice change from the boys constantly fighting. It's quite overwhelming being thrown together as a family. The brothers (aged 16 to 20) have had some very bizarre moments where I have just looked at them and had to walk away. One was this morning when they were allegedly getting ready to go skiing (I was left in charge of buying their ski passes so had to wait for them before I could go out) and I opened the bedroom door to find the 3 of them in underpants hitting each other with a snow shovel. Each morning is punctuated with a farting competition. They spend a considerable amount of time farting on each other's heads or having slap fights where the first to flinch loses. Apparently these are normal behaviours for teenage boys.
I've had 2 very magical experiences in the last week up here. One was the night I posted the last update, when it was snowing quite hard and I went for a night ski. It was snowing so hard I had to dust myself off after being on the chair lift, and wipe my (Nat's awesome) goggles so I could see. It was just wonderful skiing down, the snow was so soft and heavy it created a very eerie silence all around me. Adding to the moment was a lightning storm overhead which illuminated the skifield and all the snowflakes around me. Truly awesome.
The second magical experience was my very first Onsen. I headed down with a bunch of guys from the backpackers who are seasoned in this kind of thing on cold days with sore skiing muscles. I even managed to get the protocols right (the guys went to a separate onsen so I was on my own in the ladies) after communicating by charades with a Japanese lady who didn't speak any english. She was just getting out so I had the place to myself - it was wonderful sitting outside in such hot water, against rocks that got colder as they were further out of the water, and eventually covered in snow. I just sat there watching the steam and meditating, and sticking the odd limb out into the snow when I got too hot. Following my hour's soak I had a kind of onsen euphoria which is similar to chilli euphoria and thai massage euphoria and involves being very vague for a few hours :)
The skiing has been very very cool up until today when the snow was really suffering from the rain. But it's such an experience being in mountains here compared to Australia. At the snow fields I have been to in NSW there were only 4 ski lifts each with a few different trails. Here you need to go up 3 lifts to get to the top of the mountain, where the weather and snow can be completely different to down the bottom. Each lift has a whole bunch of runs, and if you go up to the top of one you can jump across to the next skifield. It's wonderful having a good half hour or run to go down before you need to hop on the chairs again. And the views are just spectacular! There's one beginners run which casually zigzags down the side of the mountain into a valley. I have taken so many photos along that run which I can hopefully stitch into a panorama when I get home.
I should mention too that I'm almost sick of Australians! We almost outnumber the Japanese people here. It's insane to have travelled so far to be asking people where abouts they are from in Aus. It's fun to be able to chat to people in the bars but sort of missing the point of being in another country. Also there's a fair bit of similarity between snowboarders and surfers... you get the odd one who's hit his head on the ice a few too many times and is pretty hilarious to talk to. I had one conversation that went like this;
Guy: "So, are you a snowboarder or skiier?"
Me: "Oh, I ski"
"woah. So you like some fully sick powder, eh?"
"um, I guess so!"
"or, are you more into some fully sick carving down the mountain, eh?"
"haha, yep, that's good too"
"oh yeah, so some fully sick powder and some fully sick carving. Just, like, going really fast and stuff, hey."
"something like that!"
We also visited Matsumoto castle the other day. It's one of the few remaining wooden castles which hasn't burned down and been rebuilt at some point in Japan's history. There are some massive beams in there from huge trees circa 1500s - none of those left in Japan's forests these days!
Well good times ahead with the snow forecast. Hopefully we get snowed in with a 50 year storm. If not I shall revel in spraying snow on annoying snowboarders who take up the entire track by going slow and horizontal, or blocking up the lift exits with their constant boot clipping on and off and on and off... ;)
hope you are all doing well. send me an email with all the goss!
judy xx
I'm sitting inside at our hostel with my legs under the heated table (I still can't get over what great inventions these are) while it RAINS outside. Very upsetting - we've had more than 30 mls in the last few days and it's really taking a toll on the snow. However the forecast is for a stack of snow over the next week (up to 2m in the next 5 days), and temp dropping to -20 at some point. I'm not sure what I will do. There are only so many layers of thermals I can fit under my Buzz Lightyear ski suit. It is so fashionable by the way - white suit with tight legs and waist, with big puffy purple and green manly shoulders. All I need is a clear spherical helmet and I surely will be going to Infinity and Beyond!
The 3 boys and Dad are playing cards which is a nice change from the boys constantly fighting. It's quite overwhelming being thrown together as a family. The brothers (aged 16 to 20) have had some very bizarre moments where I have just looked at them and had to walk away. One was this morning when they were allegedly getting ready to go skiing (I was left in charge of buying their ski passes so had to wait for them before I could go out) and I opened the bedroom door to find the 3 of them in underpants hitting each other with a snow shovel. Each morning is punctuated with a farting competition. They spend a considerable amount of time farting on each other's heads or having slap fights where the first to flinch loses. Apparently these are normal behaviours for teenage boys.
I've had 2 very magical experiences in the last week up here. One was the night I posted the last update, when it was snowing quite hard and I went for a night ski. It was snowing so hard I had to dust myself off after being on the chair lift, and wipe my (Nat's awesome) goggles so I could see. It was just wonderful skiing down, the snow was so soft and heavy it created a very eerie silence all around me. Adding to the moment was a lightning storm overhead which illuminated the skifield and all the snowflakes around me. Truly awesome.
The second magical experience was my very first Onsen. I headed down with a bunch of guys from the backpackers who are seasoned in this kind of thing on cold days with sore skiing muscles. I even managed to get the protocols right (the guys went to a separate onsen so I was on my own in the ladies) after communicating by charades with a Japanese lady who didn't speak any english. She was just getting out so I had the place to myself - it was wonderful sitting outside in such hot water, against rocks that got colder as they were further out of the water, and eventually covered in snow. I just sat there watching the steam and meditating, and sticking the odd limb out into the snow when I got too hot. Following my hour's soak I had a kind of onsen euphoria which is similar to chilli euphoria and thai massage euphoria and involves being very vague for a few hours :)
The skiing has been very very cool up until today when the snow was really suffering from the rain. But it's such an experience being in mountains here compared to Australia. At the snow fields I have been to in NSW there were only 4 ski lifts each with a few different trails. Here you need to go up 3 lifts to get to the top of the mountain, where the weather and snow can be completely different to down the bottom. Each lift has a whole bunch of runs, and if you go up to the top of one you can jump across to the next skifield. It's wonderful having a good half hour or run to go down before you need to hop on the chairs again. And the views are just spectacular! There's one beginners run which casually zigzags down the side of the mountain into a valley. I have taken so many photos along that run which I can hopefully stitch into a panorama when I get home.
I should mention too that I'm almost sick of Australians! We almost outnumber the Japanese people here. It's insane to have travelled so far to be asking people where abouts they are from in Aus. It's fun to be able to chat to people in the bars but sort of missing the point of being in another country. Also there's a fair bit of similarity between snowboarders and surfers... you get the odd one who's hit his head on the ice a few too many times and is pretty hilarious to talk to. I had one conversation that went like this;
Guy: "So, are you a snowboarder or skiier?"
Me: "Oh, I ski"
"woah. So you like some fully sick powder, eh?"
"um, I guess so!"
"or, are you more into some fully sick carving down the mountain, eh?"
"haha, yep, that's good too"
"oh yeah, so some fully sick powder and some fully sick carving. Just, like, going really fast and stuff, hey."
"something like that!"
We also visited Matsumoto castle the other day. It's one of the few remaining wooden castles which hasn't burned down and been rebuilt at some point in Japan's history. There are some massive beams in there from huge trees circa 1500s - none of those left in Japan's forests these days!
Well good times ahead with the snow forecast. Hopefully we get snowed in with a 50 year storm. If not I shall revel in spraying snow on annoying snowboarders who take up the entire track by going slow and horizontal, or blocking up the lift exits with their constant boot clipping on and off and on and off... ;)
hope you are all doing well. send me an email with all the goss!
judy xx
11 February 2009
snow dance
So in true backpacker style, I got picked up at the Tokyo airport in an Aston Martin, stopped in at Dad's house to repack and pick up my 3 half-brothers, then hopped on the bullet train to Nagano then on to the ski resort we are staying in :D We managed to get a quick ski in on Tuesday arvo, I am so pleased that I actually remember how to ski, reasonably well if I don't say so myself! Bill is a decent snowboarder so we head out together. Some of the runs are massive, it's fantastic, they take about half an hour to get down even though you're going FAST :)
The place we are staying is more of a backpackers, but that is happy for me as there are heaps of people here my age, most are Aussies and Kiwis funnily enough! There is a bar downstairs with a pretty good social scene, lots of theme nights (tonight is Sake for 100Y, tomorrow is Ladies Night for all 3 of us, haha). They have the most brilliant invention here - a low coffee table with a sort of doona tablecloth, and are HEATED underneath. so everyone sits on the floor with their legs under the doona... just wonderful. Dad is torturing all the poor backpackers who exist on 2 min noodles by cooking up bacon for breakfast and having an 8kg slab of Wagyu beef in the fridge (really)!!
And the most exciting thing is that it's SNOWING right now... I need to go out and dance in it and take photos (same rules apply when it rains at Lorna Glen)
later!!
09 February 2009
Thaipusam
Uploaded some more photos the other day and thought I should just write a bit about the last few which are of the Thaipusam Indian festival which happens each year. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaipusam ) There's a big Indian community in Singapore and the backpackers I'm staying in is right in the heart of it. So when one guy in our dorm had such bad sleep apnea that 4 of us could not sleep, we headed out onto the streets to check out the procession of people going from one temple to the other, carrying their "burdens" for the gods. These ranged from large pots of milk to big getups with hundreds of long pins sticking out of their flesh, or hooks in their backs attached to ropes pulling carts.
We followed the procession back to the first temple where the preparation (mutilation) was going on. It was so intense... people having their cheeks, tongues, lips pierced with long metal rods, and having the elaborate skewer canopies put on and pinned to their flesh. The part I didnt understand is why the canopies had shoulder cushions... surely when you have 100 pins in your body, some mild discomfort of weight on your shoulders is not a concern! Some of the men collapsed in a trace-like state... probably partly to do with the fact that they fast for 3 days beforehand. We stayed, watching in shock, until 5am, by which time our snorer had stopped but I was not that inclined to sleep anyway.
We followed the procession back to the first temple where the preparation (mutilation) was going on. It was so intense... people having their cheeks, tongues, lips pierced with long metal rods, and having the elaborate skewer canopies put on and pinned to their flesh. The part I didnt understand is why the canopies had shoulder cushions... surely when you have 100 pins in your body, some mild discomfort of weight on your shoulders is not a concern! Some of the men collapsed in a trace-like state... probably partly to do with the fact that they fast for 3 days beforehand. We stayed, watching in shock, until 5am, by which time our snorer had stopped but I was not that inclined to sleep anyway.
06 February 2009
Island Hopper
Hey all,
Had a rough first couple of days in Phuket. I discovered it's not really my kind of place and was made worse by being on my own for the first time. The bus dropped us at Patong Beach at about 9.30pm ... if you read anything about Phuket it will say not to go to Patong. Prostitues and fat white men everywhere, drunk tourists, rubbish, pollution, flashing lights, heaps of traffic, and expensive to boot. Everyone tries to rip you off in one way or another. Patong's idea of entertainment is having people fight each other or do things with ping pong balls. So I got out of there ASAP. Perhaps it would be good if you booked a resort and just hung out at the beach + got massaged, but trying to navigate through ladyboys with 2 backpacks at night was not my idea of fun.
I went across to the other side of phuket, to the town where it's mostly locals. Not very scenic but they did have a very cheap backpacker's with friendly travelers who could help me plan my next few days. I ended up island hopping to Phi Phi, a very touristy place (but a lot of fun) where The Beach was filmed. I partied till the wee hours on the "pamphlet trail" - each bar has free drinks for a designated time so if you have good organisation you can hop from one to the next and pay nothing. Dancing on the beach with free alcohol and fire twirlers is always a good thing (except if you decide to jump a flaming skipping rope...). Next I hopped to Ko Lanta, a very sleepy island with cute bamboo huts for accomodation. I met up with an Aussie girl who came with me to Lanta and we stayed in places on the beach made of sticks. Travelling with 2 is so much easier, and we did some cool stuff including a day boat tour (during which i got shamefully burnt, yes mum, I know...) and a PIRATE CAVE omg. We also hired a moped which we burned around in. She is into photography too which was cool, so we could both stop at every nice lookout and not annoy each other!!
I've just ferried back to the mainland again and am staying in a town famous for it's caves, and the random rock standing out of the sea which was apparently in a james bond movie. I have half a day tomorrow to do something cool, like paddle through a cave or be boated around to see some stuff. Then off to Phuket airport and back to Singapore. I'll be quite happy to leave the touters who harass you at every opportunity and try to rip you off, but at least I have had a taste of this area and can figure out what I'd like to do if I came back. Apart from eat Tom Yum (which has been very good).
Back to Singapore tomorrow, I am looking forward to staying in a backpacker's on Dunlop st in Little India, the suburb full of indian restaurants (can you believe it)!! And this time next week I will be freezing my nuts off instead of sweating in a singlet - at least it should cure the sunburn!
j
Had a rough first couple of days in Phuket. I discovered it's not really my kind of place and was made worse by being on my own for the first time. The bus dropped us at Patong Beach at about 9.30pm ... if you read anything about Phuket it will say not to go to Patong. Prostitues and fat white men everywhere, drunk tourists, rubbish, pollution, flashing lights, heaps of traffic, and expensive to boot. Everyone tries to rip you off in one way or another. Patong's idea of entertainment is having people fight each other or do things with ping pong balls. So I got out of there ASAP. Perhaps it would be good if you booked a resort and just hung out at the beach + got massaged, but trying to navigate through ladyboys with 2 backpacks at night was not my idea of fun.
I went across to the other side of phuket, to the town where it's mostly locals. Not very scenic but they did have a very cheap backpacker's with friendly travelers who could help me plan my next few days. I ended up island hopping to Phi Phi, a very touristy place (but a lot of fun) where The Beach was filmed. I partied till the wee hours on the "pamphlet trail" - each bar has free drinks for a designated time so if you have good organisation you can hop from one to the next and pay nothing. Dancing on the beach with free alcohol and fire twirlers is always a good thing (except if you decide to jump a flaming skipping rope...). Next I hopped to Ko Lanta, a very sleepy island with cute bamboo huts for accomodation. I met up with an Aussie girl who came with me to Lanta and we stayed in places on the beach made of sticks. Travelling with 2 is so much easier, and we did some cool stuff including a day boat tour (during which i got shamefully burnt, yes mum, I know...) and a PIRATE CAVE omg. We also hired a moped which we burned around in. She is into photography too which was cool, so we could both stop at every nice lookout and not annoy each other!!
I've just ferried back to the mainland again and am staying in a town famous for it's caves, and the random rock standing out of the sea which was apparently in a james bond movie. I have half a day tomorrow to do something cool, like paddle through a cave or be boated around to see some stuff. Then off to Phuket airport and back to Singapore. I'll be quite happy to leave the touters who harass you at every opportunity and try to rip you off, but at least I have had a taste of this area and can figure out what I'd like to do if I came back. Apart from eat Tom Yum (which has been very good).
Back to Singapore tomorrow, I am looking forward to staying in a backpacker's on Dunlop st in Little India, the suburb full of indian restaurants (can you believe it)!! And this time next week I will be freezing my nuts off instead of sweating in a singlet - at least it should cure the sunburn!
j
30 January 2009
Caged Animals
Craziness to report.
Firstly the opression of Singapore. Natalia has tried to explain to me in the past few years how much she has broken out of the mould of Singapore (admittedly she is zany by most people's standards) but I didn't really get it until now. As she tells me, people are Singapore's resources, rather than farming or mining etc, so the way the government manages those resources is Control and strong discouragement (read capital punishment!) of independence or disobedience. It's everywhere you go - apartment blocks all painted the same, railings along the footpath to prevent you crossing the road except at designated places, voiceovers at the train station telling you to hold the handrail on the escalator, signs saying No Waiting, No Loitering, No Standing, No Smoking, No Running or Playing, even signs that have a picture of someone getting shot by an army man for No Entry.... and so on. Even after being here a few days I was feeling a bit constrained and needing to rebel in some small way.
It all culminated in a very very surreal moment at the Zouk nightclub on Mambo night this week. Mambo night is where they play very bad pop music remixed for clubs and everybody dances along by miming each word of every song. It is very very bizarre because there are dancing platforms full of people all dressed the same, guys and girls separated, all doing the exact same dance moves for the whole song. They have such specific gestures for each word, it's like another language. For instance the mime for Dancing Queen is boogie with pointed fingers, then putting a crown on your own head. No moving of feet or wiggling to the beat permitted. "I just died in your arms tonight" involves a hanging gesture! Right. So my surreal moment was when everybody was miming along like a pile of drag queens to "It's My Life" by bon jovi and Natalia and I tried to get up on one of these platforms for a dance. A security guard suddenly appeared next to us and informed us that only 3 people could be on this platform at a time, and I looked around and saw all these people who looked the same and dressed the same, all doing the same mime gestures to a song about paving your own path, independence, doing things your own way.... argh. It was just too much!! Luckily, after a while, one of the other girls got down and Natalia and I could both get up and do free style dancing with our shakers, wiggling our butts like crazy things! What a moment of rebellion! We expected one of the many security guards lining the walls to drag us down at any second...
I checked out the Singapore Zoo and night safari yesterday. Fantastic! I was very excited about endearing critters such as pygmy hippos, otters, tapirs, guanacos, badgers, pangolins.... eeeeeep!! Also, I saw a SLOTH omg... and made friends with some Giant Flying Squirrels which are possibly the most hilarious critters I have ever seen. I will have to tell my boss that we need some at Lorna Glen. No photos of them as it was too dark, unfortunately.
Today Natalia and I went to one of 2 of Singapore's reserves. She didn't even know it existed so it was particularly exciting. We saw some huuuge water monitors in the mangroves, Varanus salvator. About the size of a big perentie. There was much excitement and attempts to catch them.
Also I booked a very cheap flight to Phuket for the next week. Despite what I said above, Singapore is nice, and clean, and easy to navigate... but there's not a whole heap to do (and also i picked up a 2nd hand thailand lonely planet book for $4 :)!! how exciting. I might have to leave some of my crap behind at a backpackers or something though. No need for thermals and ski goggles in Phuket!!
aight
:)
27 January 2009
Chinese New Year
Hey Peeps,
Criticism of lack of posts noted. In my defense, the only internet I have had the last few days has been in the "member's lounge" of the flash hotel we stayed at in KL, under the watchful eyes of hotel staff who ejected me fairly quickly due to scruffy appearance and cheese thievery.
So in my time in KL I went to many many shops and noticed that all the clothes were designed for people much smaller (and more feminine) than myself. But that's ok, as the weak dollar has made things not that much cheaper there anyway. At first I was intimidated by the street sellers hassling me to buy/eat/look etc but by the end I had fun bantering with them... "a pink watch? what do you take me for, a little girl? Ha!" they they would scramble to find something else and I'd dash off. I swanned around in our very luxurious hotel and managed to sneak into the 'members lounge' a few times to use internet and eat nibblies (free cheese!!) that they always had out. I visited the KL bird park which was good but not amazing - birds were good but the place they were in was not quite up to our high animal facility sort of standards. Went on the monorail, walked and walked, watched a Chinese NY lion dance, had taxi drivers try to rip me off until you call their bluff, all the usual tourist things.
Before Australia day I scoped out a whole bunch of places that might serve as potentials for pub celebrations. This was challenging due to the fact that it was chinese new year public holidays and everything was closed, and also the bars tended to serve as places where small women with padded bras picked up old fat white men or places where people went for quiet and expensive drinks. Not so much music and free flowing cheap beer. Nonetheless I wore my Australian flag for 2 days straight trying to find other aussies to celebrate with and only came across TWO, can you believe it. But they were there for work and staying out of town so no luck. We ended up just having wine in our hotel room (insert complaints about overeating here) and tiger beers on a humid and food filled street with people everywhere... lovely :) Of course we covered ourselves in AU flag tattoos, flag sarong and took our shakers out with us. Ended the night with some poor sods massaging our feet for a few bucks at 2am. Somehow that didn't sit right with me but apparently it's the done thing.
Today on the way home I was honorary whitey at Natalia's grandma's lunch... second whitey ever to be invited there after Natalia's mum. Not even long term boyfriends have been there. Big responsibility! Fortunately I can pretend to be charming and apparently my name is easy to pronounce. Also the universal language of food appreciation goes down well and is something I am good at :)
Traffic was absolutely mad on the way back in to Singapore, all 4 lanes of the 1km bridge were crawling to the passport checks, not helped by buses which squoze (thanks, Karl P) through the emergency lanes almost wiping off car mirrors. eeeek!
Next few days I will be in Singapore checking a few things out, Natalia's here till Sun, then I might try to spend a few days in Bangkok before Japan (there's only so much to see in Singapore).
Hope you all had lovely Australia Days,
Judy xx
Photos here; http://picasaweb.google.com/judy.dunlop/TravelPhotosJanuary?feat=directlink
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