First Quarter Numbers

Izmir, Turkey

I was originally going to call this post "half-time numbers" seeing as how it's been six months of a one year trip. However it looks more like this trip will be 2 years so instead it's going to be first quarter. Here I will post some numbers about my journey thus far. I have kept track of these things in my journal so they should all be acurate.

From June 25/09 - December 25/09:


Intercity Flights Taken: 7
Intercity Busses Taken: 32
Intercity Trains Taken: 12
Intercity Ferries Taken: 6
Cities Cycled Between: 7
Missed Busses/Trains: 2
Taxi's Taken: 9


Times hit on by girls: 7 (subjective :)
Times hit on by guys: 1 (not subjective)
Times fallen in love: 1


Times Couch Surfed: 10
Panic Attacks Had: 2
Times Lost Something: 1
Times I've Been Lost: ??
Times Robbed: 0
Injuries Received: 12
Times Watched TV: 9
Streetshows Watched: 23


Caves Visited: 4 (I'm counting Cappadocia as one so it doesn't skew the numbers)
Castles Visited: 7
Religious Buildings Visited: 25
Cities Visited: 42
Countries Visited: 14

The next step.

Izmir, Turkey



Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you are all having a great holiday season! Thank you all for all the donations to my travelling cause. They really came as a surprise! They have alleviated things quite a bit here and my stress levels have dropped back down!

Also with Christmas comes my 6 month travelling anniversery. I've been gone half a year now. With this day comes two firsts: It's my first Christmas spent away from family, and it's the longest I've ever been outside of Calgary (Well, since I was 3 years old anyway). I wasn't sure what to expect. I wasn't sure if I'd be sad, crushed or quite content. As it turns out, I'm somewhere inbetween. I miss all of you people back home, especially over the last few days. But I have some great friends here that have made things much easier. I guess it just goes to show, no matter where you go, you'll always have friends and family, even if not connected by blood.



Anyway, I realize I haven't been writing on here regularly but as I'm sure you have figured, things have more or less been in a holding pattern the last few months. Now things are starting to get moving again.

Since my money has been running so low lately I have finally accepted a teaching position, although not in China as I first expected. No, I will be teaching in Saudia Arabia. I'm not sure which city yet, as I understand it, it will be one of four. Should be a pretty amazing experience! The pay is good (about 3000 USD/month) and everything but food is paid for. Free accomodations, insurance, travel stipend, etc etc. It means I should be able to bank all of it and have enough money for the rest of this trip!

On a writing front things are going well there too. I have a few more papers interested in looking at my work and they are going over it now. I hope to have another publication or two to announce after the holidays. I will keep you all posted!

I will be spending New Years in Istanbul with Sadife. After that I'm coming back to Izmir for a week or so and then off to Saudi. I plan to post from Istanbul. I'll let you know what New Years is like in Turkey!

Later, all!

Time for an update

Izmir, Turkey

Yeah, I'm still alive. And no, I haven't forgotten about the blog. As alluded to last time I haven't posted in a while 'cause I've been stationary and there hasn't been so much to talk about. Well, I recently made a short jaunt over to Cyprus and thought I would show some photos and talk about the place a bit.

In short: don't go to Cyprus in the off season. Busses stop running, the weather is a a mild 20 degrees (although not so bad for November when one thinks of Canada!), stores close for lunch and don't bother to re-open, and forget trying to do ANYTHING on Sunday.

Nevertheless, there were some highlights. As many of you know Cyprus is divided into two countries, the Turkish north and the Greek south. Nicosia is the last divided capital in the world, placed square in the middle of the border. There is a UN controlled greenline that is still very active and stringent (although quite passable) border checkpoints. Luckily the country is moving steadily towards reunification so the world's last divided capital may not be divided for long.

The UN controlled Green Line

Border checkpoint between North and South Nicosia

Additionally, Nicosia has the biggest comic store I've seen outside North America so that was a plus. I didn't get over to the Roman ruins of Pafos, thanks in large part to the lack of busses, but I did manage to see a good deal of the Turkish north and the land has a lot of natural beauty. Dusty plains lead to green fields, towering mountains, and beautiful blue coastline. There are castles and ports in Girne, ancient churches in Famagusta and everywhere, Greek cathedrals converted to mosques. I don't think the catholics particularly approve but from the outside observer it makes a fantastic sight.

Yours truly in a ruined cathedral, Famagusta



Nicosia's biggest Mosque and former church



Girne harbour

A 3000 year old boat discovered off the coast - now inside Girne Castle

Former cathedral in Famagusta

Interior of the same Mosque

Cyprus also contains what could possibly be the most overrated monestary of all time. It's a four hour drive from the capital through windy backroads and small Turkish villages before finally tıy reach a long white building looking something like a barracks and a crummy tourist market. The end. Enjoy your stay. But it did have a good view:

View a few km down the road from the monastary

Unfortunately I don't have much to say of the Greek side except that their version of Nicosia is a little nicer with a few more conveniences. Limassol is a nice city but again busses are a problem. If you go, rent a car.

As for me, I have some good news to report. As of this Saturday I will be published in the Medicine Hat News. I'm pursuing papers more regularly over the last week and it seems to be paying off. Hopefully soon I'll have some bigger publications to announce.

Also I have a job here with a company called English Life that may or may not be worthwhile. THe pay is poor (although for Turkey it is outstanding. I make twice what my friends do for half the hours), and they want me to sign a one year contract which I will but do not intend to honor... hmm... world traveller... can you say flight risk? Still, they need me as much as I need them so for now it should work out okay. Right now I am thinking I will continue the expedition in another season or two. Gotta re-save some money after europe.

I also still await the near mythological laptop. It's current status is "stranded in Taiwan" with a couple false alarms for sending it. I've wanted to buy a second one in Turkey and sell it later but it's too hard to find a used one here that's reliable and the new ones are expensive as hell. I may be forced to continue with internet cafes for the foreseeable future. If you ever do a world trip and plan to make money while you travel by writing... well... GET A LAPTOP FIRST YOU FUCKING MORON! Little things you learn along the way... :)

Anyway, in the next few weeks I will post again with a special treat for all you engineer types. I have some part way numbers for you. I also plan to post a map of my progress one day. We'll see if I can sort some computer stuff out.

A bonus shot of the view from my balcony at home in Izmir

Surreal Freedom

Izmir, Turkey

Well first off, anyone who isn't sure if they should go to Turkey or not... GO! There is just so much here it's unreal... or surreal you might say. See what I mean? :

They call them Fairy Chimneys. Basically it's like the badlands on steroids. Not normal steroids either, I'm talking genetically superior, hardcore, pro wrestler steroids. In one place you can climb through passages that weave in and out of mountains, crawl through the sewers of ancient underground cities that put the ones contructed in Vietnam during the war to shame, or go out for a night on the town where you can watch Turkish belly dancers while eating and drinking all the local food and booze you're capable of.

Oh not to mention if you head over to the coast you can see some of the most impressive ancient Roman cities in the world. Or maybe you'd rather visit Troy or chill out in a tree house in Olympos. I know it sounds like I'm writing a tourist propoganda piece but damnit Turkey is an amazing country!

I think I managed to travel through it in the most inconvenient way possible as well, going north then south then west then east then west again only to eventually head back up north once more. Anyone ever heard of a circle? Oh well, I will try to actually plan China a little better.

I'm not sure how much I can say about these places without just showing you the pictures so I won't try. Here are some photos of some of the most impressive sites I have ever seen:



The Open Air Museum in Göreme

One of the valleys in the background

One of the fairy chimneys


I climbed to the top of this badboy. Four levels and to get to the top I had to climb up what's in the next pic!

This tunnel is straight up and about 4m long. Oh and it's cut into the roof 3m from the ground. Hard to reach!

Me and my climbing buddy!

Horse stable in the chimney

My hotel in Göreme. Yes. It's a cave.

Trapped in the underground city! Damn inpenetrable grates!

Rockin' out after my escape

A passage in the underground city

Which way is up?? It's like one of those paintings!!! You know.... with the stairs?

Ancient roman city of Ephesus

Ephesus theatre. Huuuuuge.

A different theatre in Pamukkale.

The Tavertines in Pamukkale

A brief stopover in Greece to pose for a photo.

The other thing I wanted to do with this post is fill everyone in. For those not stalking me on facebook, you probably don't know yet that I am planning to stay here in Izmir for a few months. Well at least two anyway until my visa runs out. I think it is not too difficult to renew for another 3 months so chances are I will be here into the new year.

The reason is hinted at in the last post I made. It gets really hard to leave so many amazing people and Izmir has some of the best. Only two or three other places I've been have I felt so comfortable and met so many wonderful people (Riga comes to mind - actually, that may be the only other place that's comparable). And with my money running low and the need for english teachers in Turkey relatively high, I thought why not? In four days I managed to land myself three new best friends and a girlfriend. What's not to like? I'm learning the language at record pace and hope to be able to hold down a conversation in a month or so. Knowing my luck I will probably just have it figured out and will be on my way to China.

The main reason I'm Still in Turkey! Sedef!

So what's the plan while I'm here? Hell if I know. Try to work somewhere, try to sell some travel articles or short stories back home, keep writing in my novel... We'll see. All I ask is that my income goes into the black and I hold steady until I hit up China! The good news is The Toronto Star (biggest paper in Canada) liked an article I wrote for Cappadocia but have already done a similar piece. They said I should submit something else to them so I will. In the mean time I'll send that article around to some of the other papers. See if there are any other takers.

That's it for now. I'll keep you all updated and start loading some of those old photos I keep talking about from Europe once I finally get my computer.

The hardest thing about traveling

Izmir, Turkey

I'm back in Izmir for the second time now. And not for the city, there's really not too much here. It's just a big city with a lot of university students. But the people here. The people here are worth a second visit and many more after.

It's a hard thing to explain, the connection you can make with a place without even realizing it. It's also pretty rare in my traveling experience but Izmir, a place I originally never intended to even go, has created a strong one. And the reason is all because of the people.

Before I left people often asked, "are you scared traveling alone?" "Aren't you worried?" etc etc. The answer was always no. I always said people are people are people. They're the same everywhere. As they say in Vietnam: "same same but different." Turns out I was right. At least for Europe. I've had no problems and have had only excellent experiences.

Someone asked me a few weeks ago (I think it was Jurgita!), "what's the hardest thing about traveling alone?" The answer is meeting others. Not the meeting itself, that's easy. Too easy. I've always been good at creating relationships and now I am even better. But meeting all these wonderful people in different places around the world and then leaving them after only a few short days, now that's hard. Even the leaving wouldn't be so bad if you were coming back, but you're not. Chances are good you'll never see them again. Since this trip started I've added more than 60 people to my facebook account and they're all fantastic. I've met a dozen people that could be best friends. I've even met a few girls that would definitely be keepers if I lived in the same place. Almost all of them I will never see again.

I know never is a long time and anything can happen between now and then. And I'm certain to see some of them. But it's true. The world has gotten smaller but it's just not possible to maintain a close friendship with so many people accross so much space.

Fortunately, there are some good things that come out of it as well. When you know you only have a few days with someone(s) than you make the best of it. You don't waste time because if you do (even though it sounds cliche) you'll never get another chance. It teaches you to let go and enjoy the moment because if you don't, you'll always regret it, even if it's just a coffee at Starbucks.

It's possibly the most important thing I've learned so far and I'll be taking that lesson with me the rest of my life. Unfortunately saying it and explaining it in words doesn't do it justice. All I can say is next time you go traveling, don't stay in secluded hotels and take taxis into the city center to enjoy a nice dinner for you and your traveling companion. Meet people. Meet everyone. Because even if a person is kind of dumb, everyone is smarter than you'd think.

I'll post some more about some of the places I've visited since Fetiye soon.

*

Anyone want to buy my shoes?

Fetiye, Turkey



I finally got pictures to work. I am going to China in a couple weeks so when there I will catch up all the old ones. For now, here are some from Turkey and one from Estonia.


I don't have much to say about Estonia. It seemed very blah after seeing Riga and Klapeida and all these other wonderful places in neighboring countries. However, I did get a chance to shoot a bow. My first shot hit the center of the target! But I couldn't duplicate that unfortunately. I hit the target on at least half my shots though! Here is my epic photo with wrist protector and cape. That's right, I'm wearing a cape.

Shooting a bow in Estonia

I spent a week in Istanbul before coming here to Fetiye and it was a hell of an experience. I mean... Bangkok felt big but Istanbul is HUGE! It has 4 million more people than Bangkok in about the same amount of space. The nicest area is called Taksim and no, it is not the place that has the palace, or the blue mosque, or Aya Sofia. That section is Sultenamhet. Taksim is just one neighbourhood north of Sultenahmet across a stretch of water called the Golden Horn. Taksim is a bit of an amalgamation kind of like Istanbul itself. You can buy stuffed muscles and 'wet hamburgers' (actually really delicious) on the street and if you keep walking you find bars, shops and a tourist haven without all the tourists. There is one street with about 30 small pubs and restaurants where another Canadian told me 'eventually if you sit here long enough you will meet everyone you know on this street.' I think it's not too far from the truth.

Istanbul - Foreground is Taksim, water is The Golden Horn and background is Sultenahmet

Taksim


Looking at Sultenahmet across the Golden Horn

Sultanahmet has some beautiful buildings but is a little too crowded with tourists. And not normal tollerable tourists, but the ones who are holding maps, looking at the sky, wandering in all directions and snapping photos whenever possible. You know, the ones where if you sit in the corner where there is nothing interesting with the hopes of taking a break from them, they all come over to you because they think you're looking at something that's not in their guidebooks... grrr... Still, like I said, the places are beautiful.

The Blue Mosque

Inside the Blue Mosque


Aya Sofia - 1500 year old church turned to Mosque turned to museum

Me at the Palace and the Asian side of the city in the background

So where does the title of this blog come in? Well I was sitting in a park across the street from the tourist zone and a local guy comes up beside me and sits down on the bench. He lights up a cigarette and asks me if I smoke. I say no so he asks me if I want to buy some marijuana. I say no again and we make small talk for a few minutes before he mentions he owns a carpet shop in one of the bazaars. He wants me to go with him to see it and buy a carpet. The next few minutes passed with me trying fruitlessly to explain to this guy that I have no use for a carpet and that I can hardly carry it around on the top of my backpack for the next year while travelling the world. Eventually though he does let it drop and we make some more small talk. I tell him I'm staying with a girl in a neighbourhood called Fulya and he promptly asks if we can have a threesome... 'No,' I say, trying to keep a straight face. 'I don't think that's a good idea.' So he spends the next few minutes talking about the tightness of various bodily orafices and then looks down to notice my shoes. 'Those are nice' he says. I agree, thankful to change the subject. 'Can I have them?' I laugh. 'No, you can't have my shoes.' 'Why not?' 'Because I need them for walking.' He thinks for a minute and says 'Can I buy them?' he sees the look on my face and says 'Okay, I'll give you 30 Liras and my shoes if you give me yours.' I tell him no again. By this point I'm getting tired of new experiences and conversation with the locals so I say I have to go. He asks me for an email address and I get out a pen to give him mine, thinking he'll never write me anyway. 'No,' he says, 'I want an email for some Canadian girls.' I leave.

Fetiye is a beautiful place. Very different from Istanbul. It's on the coast of the Mediteranian next to a small area called Ölüdemiz which translates to 'The Dead Sea.' It's not the same famous one that you have heard of from Jordan but it is a beautiful area. I've been swimming there twice now and today in Butterfly valley, a place only accessible by boat or a long steep clımb down a cliff, I met a Chinese girl from Shanghai. You remember what I said about the universe working out if you put yourself out there enough? Well Shanghai is where I plan to teach in a couple weeks so she has agreed to meet up with me when I arrive and show me around a bit and help me get settled. The universe rocks.

2300 year old Lycian tomb in Fetiye

Butterfly Valley

Ölüdemiz - The Dead Sea

Something to Remember

Istanbul, Turkey

I wrote this in my journal while flying above the black sea feelıng a little sentimental. Thought I'd copy it here:

I want to wrıte about somethıng that I think is important.

Often when hearing about humans and our affect on the earth, we hear about our contribution to global warming, or increased extinction rates, or nuclear power, or water pollution, or the destruction of forests to build cities and farms, or, well, you get the idea. And these are important issues. More than important. And they're not being given as much consideration as they warrent or require and I thınk as a species, in our attempt to increase awareness with all these things and in some meaningful way try to repair the damage we have done, we become focused on the negative. On only the faultsö or what we have taken away from the planet. And maybe this is necessary too ın order to incite change at a faster rate. But I think despite all that, it's occasionally just as important to look at what we've added to the planet, lest we forget our magnificence while remembering only our faults.

Right now I'm sittıng in a plane, in the window seat lookıng out over the northern coast of the black seaç The moon is at half, and the earth is nearly as dark as the sea by which ıt rests, mınus of course for a strıng of a million tiny yellow lights, outlining the coast like fireflys all travelling in a lıne until they bunch up, denser and denser into a cıty. The lights twinkle like stars brought down from the sky, marking the land where humankınd had decided to settle.

Behind me, further back in the airplane, people are clapping rhythmically and laughing, as one teenager plucs at a sort of mini-guitar while others dance in the aisle. They're forced to stop as the plane begins to descend but suddenly there is a greater cheer in the fuselage. Others are laughing and talkıng with more vigor and soul.

These are things we've given the planet. These are things that shouldn't be ignored or overshadowed by the threat of global warmıng, because just as we've created pollution, we've also created lıght. And it's damn beautiful.

2 month anniversery

Tallinn, Estonia

Computer is coming... yay.

I've officially been out here for two months now. (well, two months and a day, I couldn't get to a computer yesterday) and thought I'd write a little post celebrating my anniversery and some of the things I've learned so far, since about two weeks ago it officially became the longest trip of my life.

Ten things I've learned:

1. Just because it's a train or bus, and not a plane, doesn't mean you can arrive to catch it with only one minute to spare.

2. Couchsurfing.org is the best website ever invented. If you travel, use it.

3. Never turn down an invitation to a party, especially if it goes until 8am.

4. No skin, no win - An inside joke that we discovered turned out to be true when watching women's beach volleyball - the team with the least amount of clothing wins every time. Maybe it's air friction slowing everyone else down :) Keep that in mind ladies when you're running late!

5. Friends are the most important thing when traveling - even if they're new ones and you only see them for two days in your life.

6. The government loves to get you to sign shit with deadlines when you're out of the country.

7. If you sneeze it means thank-you in Lithuanian. "ahh choo"

8. "super duper" means "super ass" in Polish - I found out the hard way.

9. The hottest girls in Europe (well, of the countries I've been too) come from Poland (sorry Latvia, you're a close second).

10. I can limbo like a young Hermes. Somehow I won a limbo contest... not really sure how...


and here's a bonus number 11: McDonald's really DOES taste the same everywhere.


See you all from Turkey!

The ol' USSR

Riga, Latvia

Sorry it's been a while since I posted. I think all the trouble I'm having with pictures is discouraging me a bit! I am going to buy a mini laptop that will make it easier (and cheaper) to get online and also let me take care of photos, so once I figure out how to get it, I will have it!

I'm currently in Riga, Latvia, having just traveled through Lithuania and soon I will be off to Estonia. All three baltic countries were formerly in the USSR and it's an interesting place to visit. Things are mostly like western europe but every now and then you see some big communist piece of architecture or an ugly old athletic stadium or something like that and you realize that this place used to be very different.

It's funny, these people have only been independed since 1991 and although there are still problems with crime and poverty and so on, they have come a remarkably long way in a short amount of time. I think the more I travel, the more I am impressed with how resiliant people are. I have only been in Latvia for a couple days so I can't say too much about this country yet, but I spent over a week in Lithuania and visited many of the communist area sites, like the former KGB headquarters and prison (they actually shot people in their own basement), and learned about the gulags and how easy it was to be taken there. For example there's a freedom monument here in Riga. If you put flowers there, or were sympathetic to it in anyway you'd get an all expense paid trip to Siberia. Kind of funny that the government represses something actually called the Freedom Monument. I wonder if the Russians really had any concept of what they were doing, or if they were just following orders and ignoring the rest.

In Lithuania there is a place called the Curonian Spit which is a tiny little strip of land about 1km wide that goes for about 100 km along the baltic cost. It's a bit of a mystery how it formed and on it you can cycle or travel along. There are huge and beautiful sand dunes where from the top you can see the Baltic Sea on one side and the Curonian lagoon on the other. Beyond the dunes it's forested and there is wildlife everywhere. I wish I could get the pictures to work...

As for me, things are going well. I feel like I still have a lot of energy now that I have taken a couple of days off at the beach. However, I got myself a pretty solid sunburn yesterday so I'm going to be sore and itching for a few days. Also, I think that stupid recurring sinus infection that I had in Canada is coming back as my throat has been sore for a while. If it gets worse I will have to go see a Latvian or Estonian doctor and try to score some antibiotics. Damn this thing is frustrating. it just won't go away. I'll probably have to do the same thing again in a few months... Maybe some oldschool chinese medicine dude will know of something that can actually fix it!

After Estonia I am flying to Turkey and I'm really looking forward to it. Still trying to decide when to work teaching english in China but I think I HAVE decided that Shanghai is the place for me. It's the first place in China I have been truly excited about the prospect of living in. Lucky for me it's a big city that should have lots of work.

Anyway, that's it for now. I'm off to do some writing to try and solve my money woes.

Musings

Krakow, Poland

Still having trouble with photos.... Maybe it's Poland's fault?


Coincidence is a funny thing. A few days ago in Prague I ran into a friend from University. We were just walking down the street, I heard her talking, did a double take and went to say hi. We hung out over the evening with some of her friends and she invited me out to Krakow to meet up with her again (that would be later today).

Anyway, it got me thinking about chance. This may not seem like much of a revelation but I've been traveling for a little over a month now and in that time I've met people in film, I've ran into old friends like I described above, I've made probably 20 new friends and had three offers from people to let me crash at their place, all among PLENTY of other things. In my month in Calgary I'm not sure any of those things happened. So what does all this have to do with chance? Well my revelation is that if you put yourself out there enough times, things will eventually work out. The odds say they have to.

Out here, I'm forced to interact with new people and meet others and experience something new every day. Even when I don't want to I still have to go out to eat (or to get food to eat) or whatever. Each time I do that is another opportunity for SOMETHING to happen. And as it turns out, somethings happen quite often when you're out quite often. When you stay in, well... I guess you're missing out. It's kind of renewed my faith in the balance of the universe.

Like I said, not much of a revelation right? I always kind of knew that the more you go out the more things can happen, but I'm not sure I always believed it. If you're like me and you don't wholeheartedly believe it either, try traveling alone. I say alone cause when you're with someone you're not forced to interact nearly as much.

Do it. Even the things that go wrong you won't regret.



And now for the big turn-around.

My other thought today is about Auschwitz. Being in Krakow, I went there the other day and that is really something. Auschwitz itself is a pretty good sized compounds with about 30 barracks style buildings or so, but its sister camp Birkenau where most of the killings took place is humongous. It's about three km away and has hundreds of these buildings, each of which held about 600 people. And those are just the men capable of working, the rest of the people just got gassed.

I went to the camps right off the night train from Prague. I didn't sleep much as the train kind of sucked and i didn't eat anything either since when I arrived in town everything was closed. Well, as it turns out it's quite the experience seeing these camps tired on an empty stomach. I think the emotions are heightened a little more when you're weak and as strange as it sounds, I'd actually recommend not eating or sleeping before going out there. The power of the place is more than enough to keep you walking but after a little while you find your feet are dragging, your head is down and your breathing has slowed.

The style of buildings there is primarily red brick with black roofs and sky-blue wood doors. I have never seen anything more sinister in my life, than red and black buildings with sky-blue doors. It gives an almost ethereal sense, like this sky-blue is an escape from the death all around. I guess in a way (eventually) it almost always was.

I don't know if I have much else to say about it. Obviously it's a hard place to go to but it's also obviously important. Everyone knows what it is and what happened there and at times just standing in some spots are enough to push you to tears. There's a dedication by a giant pit filled with scummy water that says it's the ashes of all the victims burned in the crematorium. There are a half dozen of these pits and each one is just as hard as the one before.

We're not allowed to take pictures inside so I don't have much to show you but I did take two or three that I thought were of pretty powerful monuments and I didn't want to lose the memory of them.

They will be here as soon as possible:

Ode to a Bike

Prague, Czech Republic

An ode to Sasha the bike (Edgar Allan Poe style), may she rest in pieces:

I have abandoned Sasha to live out her final days in a vacant world of rust and insult. Fortunately, I feel but little remorse, for she treated me far worse, and with more contempt, than I treated her. Nevertheless, I can't help but feel is this small consolation enough to grant my conscience surcease of suffering should this dark, unholy act come back to haunt me in the depths of a starry bikeless night? I fear by the time I fully comprehend my actions, it may be too late.

Yes, ladies and Gentlemen, the rumors are true. Sasha has let me down for the last time. I was riding on Sunday night, between Namur and Bastogne in Belgium, taking the short cut through the middle of ass-nowhere. I had climbed about a seven percent incline for five or six km and finally reached the top when I heard an odd clink. I looked down to see my bike chain on the pavement several feet behind me. I stopped, baggied the chain like a piece of toxic dog doo and rode my bike down the other side of the hill and into the tiny town of.... something or other. For some reason there were not many people about, being a sunday at about 8:30 in the evening. I finally found one helpful stranger who spoke a few words of english and said that there was no one around who could fix a bike. I'd have to go to Bastogne for that. Unfortunately for me, Bastogne was 9km away and darkness was beginning to set.

But, driven by a desire to well... not sleep in a ditch, I began walking. My wheel made a strange clink, clink, clink, sound each time it turned and the brake appeared to be locked on ever so slightly which made pushing it up hill for the next 9km not as much fun as you may think. You'll be glad to know however that the animals came from miles around to mock me. An eagle flew with me for about 200 m, a group of deer looked up from their feeding to laugh silently at my inconvenience and cows ran (I didn't even know cows COULD run) to me from across their farms to greet me at the fence and either eye me suspiciously or make taunting groans at me as I passed.

Eventually, I arrived in town at about 11:00 pm. I rented a hotel for far too much money because everything else was closed and the next day I was lucky enough to meet two other cyclists whom I had camped with in Namur. They had a repair kit and with a little effort, they re-linked my chain, discovered my rear wheel wasn't running true because not one, but TWO spokes had snapped, and that one of the teeth on my gear wheel literally had begun to rip off, probably initiating this grand catastrophy. Nonetheless, they helped me get my wheel mostly true, and although I was riding minus two spokes and a middle gear, my bike was once again road-worthy.

I set off to Luxembourg and although I successfully crossed the border, I never quite managed to arrive at Ettelbruck, my destination. About three quarters of the way there (and 12 km out), the gear shifter on my bike litterally ripped itself off and lodged itself in the front gears. At that moment, I think I died a little inside. Still, I didn't particularly want to walk 12 km into town (uphill again) so this time I got a big rock and started randomly hitting the gear shifter with it until it was either fixed (or broken) enough that the chain could rotate once more. I couldn't shift gears mind you and the rear brake had once again permanently locked in place, but my bike was ready to go a final 12 km to its death.

When finally I arrived in Ettelbruck, I considered having a ritual ceremony in which I light the bike on fire, or give it some other form of horrible yet somewhat noble death. Instead, I was too tired from the damn ride in so I felt exile was more appropriate:



Now I take the train.

(Pictures are on their way soon... stupid locked up computers. I'm thinking of getting a tiny tiny little $300 notebook with wifi so I don't have to pay for internet everywhere. Might even break even in the end.)

Ouch Part II

Namur, Belgium

Okay, I think I have a better computer now but still a shitty keyboard... Why oh Why would you change the keys around... Oh well, I've spent a lot of the day online looking for some kick ass jobs for while I'm over here and I'm starting to get better at using this thing.

So, where was I... oh yes, Rotterdam harbor. Zoom in on this bad boy.

The Jolly Roger flying proud

So the nationalists among you will have quickly spotted the Canadian flag; maybe even the UN one folded up in front... But the PIRATE FLAG??? I knew right away that Rotterdam and I would get along just fine...

And of course a little stroll down the harbor found me at the ultimate bachelor pad of all time:

The Cube House

My life will never be complete unless at some point I get to live in a funky-ass cube. Fortunately I can pretend:

The Cube Attic

And just to make sure I had a damn good time in Rotterdam, The North Sea Jazz festival hit town while I was there. At a stiff 80 euros it was tough on the pocket book but I decided to splurge and check it out seeing as how it IS the biggest jazz festival in the world. It was a good decision. I left the camera in lock up so there are no pics to show all you ravenous dogs but I got to see BB King. He might possibly be the smoothest man alive. Even smoother than James Bond.

Anyway, it's getting late and I'm tired of fighting the keyboard so here are a few pics of Amsterdam and Leiden to get you all caught up.

Giant Chess in Ansterdam - serious sport - damn right I played a game.


Amsterdam hotel by night.


Windmill in Leiden.

Until next time everyone!

Ouch

Namur, Belgium

Biking is a full go now and my legs can feel it! I can't believe it's been so long since my last post. Things have been surprisingly busy for a laid back trip. Anyway, here I am; writing from Namur in Belgium.

I was planning to write a big long post to catch everyone up but for some reason not clear to me, the people in this cafe have weirdass keyboards that have changed around the spots for the letters A. Z. Q. W. and M... to say nothing of the punctuation! periods now require shifting so you may not see a lot of them on this post.

so... since The Hague; Ive since been to some place i cant remember, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Brussles, Brugge, and here to Namur; so far I'm not too impressed with Belgium. It's nice, but that seems to be about it; I don't feel a connection with it like I do with other places.

Rotterdam, my last stop in Netherlands was surprisingly nice: Take a look at this photo taken of the flags along the port.

Oh for the love of... people in Europe are so afraid of people actually USING their computers they have tons of features disabled. I am going to go find a NORMAL cafe that has keyboards that actually work and desktops that aren't so locked up you'd think they need a chastity belt... grrrrrr...

Pics from Iceland

Namur, Belgium

I finally got my pictures to work so you can expect more updates with pics now! here are the ones to catch up from iceland. Click on the pic to enlarge

Reykjavik, Iceland


Waterfall on the way to Vik


Me in the windiest day ever trying to stand





The three somethings... can't remember their name. In Vik






Church in Vik

Big ass Geysir

Me closer to big ass geysir

Gullfoss