Travel Location: Dargaville,New-Zealand

Travel About: natural-wonder,beach,hiking,hostel,farm,forest,kaihu-farm-hostel

We had a fun weekend up around Dargaville, a town on the west coast of Northland. We stayed at the Kaihu Farm Hostel which Avani loved. There were lots of animals there that she liked, including cows, sheep, two pet kunekune pigs, and a great farm dog, Buster. And since there were chickens there, we had to hear multiple times about how the rooster kicked her cousin, Addie, back in MN in October!

It was great to be back in a hostel again, with the simple amenities, communal atmosphere, and great conversation with other travelers. The hostel had a beautiful track, or hiking trail, through lush bush to a small glow worm dell. “Bush”, if I haven’t said it before, is the most underwhelming name Kiwis have for fantastically gorgeous forest, dense with giant tree ferns, long vines, nikau palms, and conifers.

The water is warm and crystal clear and the beaches are white and sugary soft.

On Friday we headed over to Baylys Beach, which is on the longest stretch of drivable beach in New Zealand – the 100km long Ripiro Ocean Beach. The sand is extremely hard-packed and people drive on it like it’s a highway. The beach overlooks the Tasman Sea, which is beautiful and completely undeveloped. Avani enjoyed it until a rogue wave knocked her off her feet and rolled her about 20 feet up the beach. After the initial scare, she took it well and wanted to do it again (minus the water in her nose).

We spent the first part of Saturday at the Dargaville Field Days, which was very Aggie to say the least. There was not enough good food and fun shopping for us and a little too much agricultural equipment, although the “De-Crap-It” attachment for a truck was interesting.

We went over to Kai Iwi lakes in the afternoon. They are three amazing freshwater lakes that were formed by rainwater filling in inland sand dunes. The water is warm and crystal clear and the beaches are white and sugary soft. Avani had a great time splashing about and not getting knocked about by waves. On Saturday night, we went to Trounson Kauri Park on the recommendation of the hostel owner and got to listen to wild kiwis calling to each other. Even though we didn’t see one, it was still a great treat since these small flightless birds are so rare now.

We spent Sunday hiking in the Waipoua Kauri Forest, the largest remnant of the once extensive kauri forests (now 95% gone due to logging in the 19th century). These are some of the largest trees on the planet and pictures just can’t relay how enormous and beautiful they are. We saw one tree, Te Mahua Ngahere (“Father of the Forest”) that was 53 feet in girth and about 2000 years old, and another, Tane Mahuta (“God of the Forest”) that is the largest kauri tree still living. Avani kept saying “Wow, that’s a big tree”.

Related Travel Entry

• South Island Road Trip
  As some of you already know, I spent the last 2 weeks on a road trip in the South Island. The whole trip, while exhausting, was a total blast and absolutely chalked full of incredible scenery. Here's...
• Milford Track
  It’s been labeled the finest walk in the world – and after completing our five day, 33.5 mile journey, we just might agree.The Milford Track is just one of the many Great Walks here in New Zealand an...
• Christmas with the family
  Set off from Raglan via the Waitomo glow worm caves, very cold and lots of stalactites and stalagmites as well as the glow worms!!!Arrived in Rotorua and Rosie met me, strange to think we hadn't seen ...
• Rotorua
  Man this places stinks! Its a natrual therma thingy! Which means it has lots of holes in the ground full of gases, hot bubbling water and mud.The hostel (hot rocks) I stayed in used to be a old school...
• The Road to Rotorua
  Today began with an 8am departure south via the Southern Motorway through the sprawling suburbs of South Auckland and Manukau City.  We crossed the Bombay Hills, an area known for its light volca...

Travel Location: Iguazu,Argentina

Travel About: park,hiking,travel-tips,getting-there,waterfall

DAY 48 – 20 JANUARY 2008

Well yet another Groundhog Day. We headed out from the hotel for desayno and almost unbelievably found a place that actually served cafe con leche that wasn’t Nescafe. That must be a first here in South America.

The falls are spectacular and you need to see them from Argentina and Brazil to experience the awesome power

We headed to Cordobas main bus terminal and tried to sign up for Murdoch activities but as usual the website is crap and you cant do anything without getting errors.

Scott is progressing well with his bracelet making and is starting to fill up my arm – obviously I am his best friend as he keeps making them for me.

We confirmed accommodation in Iguazu and let them know the eta for manana. Our bus arrived and left about 10 minutes late. The bus wasn’t packed and you could definitely tell the difference between the bus company we took yesterday – very good, and this one – very basic.

The journey was fairly uneventful, except for the really annoying family behind us, who filled their kid up on biscuits and coke and then he went nuts.

The scenery changed to very green with lots of water and from crops to cattle. Had Scott licking his lips.

DAY 49 – 21 JANUARY 2008

We arrived in Puerto Iguazu at 12.10 which was only 20 minutes late. Not bad for a 24 hour bus journey. We got off and walked to our hostel, which was about 10 minutes away. The room is fairly basic, but it was ready so we dropped our stuff off and kept moving and headed back into town to get details on tours, buses etc.

We decided that doing a guided tour of Iguazu is a waste of money so we will be getting up early to catch the local bus. Also saves a huge amount of money. The tourist office advised we need a visa for Brazil, but the local bus driver said we dent, so we are going to give it a go and see what happens at the border when we head to Foz de Iguassu. We have also changed our travel ideas we will head to San Ignacio for the jesuit ruins and then straight to Rosario, a dream destination for me.

We headed to a local restaurant, where Scott had another delicious steak (well he told me, I haven’t yet decided to eat the local dead animals). We also shared a bottle of vino blanco which was really nice, although my wine diet isn’t exactly causing me to lose loads of weight, damn.

We headed to the local Mercado and bought sandwich supplies for the trek in Iguazu tomorrow and went and had a siesta as we are now totally shattered.

Dinner was at an all you can eat Parilla bar and I made sure Scott ate his AUD$8 worth. I also had a huge plate of salad and the customary bottle of vino tinto, this time a Merlot from Mendoza.

We had a slow walk home at about 11pm and everywhere was just starting to crank up. It doesn’t seem to matter how late we go to dinner, we are still earlybirds.

DAY 50 – 22 JANUARY 2008

Well we got up early and caught the local bus to Iguazu which only took about 15-20 minutes. After paying our entrance fee we caught the train to the Garganta del Diablo, which is one of the main falls.

This involved walking for approx 1 km along a metal walkway, similar to Pemberton. The views were pretty spectacular, although as you are on top of the falls you dent really see the whole thing and there is so much mist etc makes taking photos very hard. Tip for anyone coming here, buy a waterproof camera, we have said that throughout our holiday and now it is too late, oh well our next holiday will require one as well.

From there we caught the train back to Estacion Cataratas and did the various hikes to view different falls. These you could view from different levels so it was spectacular to be right at the bottom of one of the falls. We got absolutely drenched, but it is so hot and humid here, it actually felt good.

We walked down to the ferry to get to Isla Grande San Martin but it wasn’t taking passengers, something to do with the high level of the river. So we had a picnic watching the falls and then decided to call it a day and leave the park. We got our tickets stamped so that tomorrow we can come back in for half price, if we cant get into the Brazilian side.

The weather here is 36 degrees with about a zillion percent humidity. My hair is frizzy beyond belief. We had a siesta like everybody else. I left Scott asleep and took a walk into town to have a look at souveniers, but it just seems to be getting hotter and hotter so went back to the hotel.

We headed back out when it was cooler and booked a bus ticket to San Ignacio and a bus ticket from there to Rosario along with some accommodation bookings. I have also booked an apartment in San Telmo in Buenos Aires for our remaining stay.

We went to a restaurant and both had the salad bar much to the amusement of the wait staff who I dent think have ever seen a man eat just salad, but Scott is a tad meated out.

DAY 51 – 23 JANUARY 2008

We headed out to the local bus terminal and got the bus to Foz de Iguassu which is in Brazil. We decided if they wouldn’t let us into Brazil because we didn’t have a visa, then we would just come back and reenter the park again from the Argentinian side. Anyway as luck would have it we entered Argentinian immigration and they stamped our passport. All the passengers piled back on the bus and Scott and I fully expected to stop at the Brazilian checkpoint but no, we drove straight past – so we actually saved some money.

We drove into Foz de Iguassu which is as different as you can imagine from Puerto Iguazu, it is all high rise apartments, restaurants, bars etc. Although our bus driver was intent on training for the F1 championships next year, so we didn’t have that much of a leisurely look around.

We got off at the local bus terminal and found the bus to the actual national park. The buses here have a weird arrangement where you get on the bus pay the conductor (not the bus driver) and then go through a turnstile to get a seat, you then leave the bus from the back door. Again the bus driver was going faster than even I drive, so maybe I should move here as we have never seen a speed camera.

We arrived at the park in one piece, where we paid our entrance fee, luckily they took Argentinian Pesos, as we didn’t have any Brazilian Reals – at this stage I am totally sick of carrying around about 5 currencies. Luckily Scott is a human calculator.

We then bypassed the tour group line and caught the first bus heading out to the falls. We followed the walk which showed the full view of the actual falls on the Argentinian side. The walk took you all along the falls culminating in a walkway that takes you out to the bottom of the falls and another couple of walkways that take you up to the face and top of the falls. All intent on getting you wet.

We think the Argentinian side is better as there is more to do and see and you do have the opportunity to get even closer to the water.

Anyway we had our picnic lunch before completing the journey in reverse back to Puerto Iguazu, again making it through immigration with no problems. I am sure they dent even look and just see the huge amount of stamps we have accumulated and give up trying to find where we have been last.

We headed out for an early dinner and after eventually finding a bank, which we had consistently walked past several times, and is stupidly called Metro which we thought was a supermarket, we topped up our funds and went back to the restaurant we went on the first night as Scott was ready to give the Parilla another go.

Related Travel Entry

• Trelew
  We made it to Trelew and travelled by local bus to Gaiman where we were staying. We checked into the Gwesty Tywi and headed straight out for a ´Welsh tea´ or Te Cymreig. We found a small place aptly ...
• Yosemite National Park (SF part 2)
  For my last adventure in San Francisco, I headed off to Yosemite National Park for a day trip. After a very early start we hit the freeway and were in the park by mid-morning. We headed straight to w...
• Day 8: Moab to Grand Canyon National Park
  Today we got up early and loaded the cars with all of our gear. We went to Denny's in town to get some breakfast since we had a long day of driving ahead of us. We got the atlas out and planned our ...
• Grassington to Linton, Yorkshire Dales
  We threw open the curtains and … it was very, very wet outside. Worse still, our clothes were also very, very wet. Evidently the radiators hadn’t come on over night. In the end we resorted to drying c...
• Bolton Abbey to Grassington, Yorkshire Dales
  After an excellent night’s sleep (it must have been down to my new, improved roommate) we had an enormous full English breakfast courtesy of Angus (as we were all now calling her). We needed the fuel ...

Travel Location: Lares,Peru

Travel About: hiking,trek,off-the-beaten-path

* Because all of the permits to hike the Inca Trail had been used when I booked the trip in August, I had to sign up for an alternate trek, called the Lares Trek. It was a three day, three night, less-traveled trek through beautiful landscape, though it does not lead directly to Machu Picchu. Four of us from the Intrepid trip took this route, the others hiked the Inca Trail.

Day One: Parte Uno: The Llamas Forgot the Forks:

We left early from Ollaytantambo and drive to Huaran, where we began our trek. There were 7 people, including myself, on the trip: Alex and Debbie, a wonderful British couple in their mid-thirties; Wayne, a Canadian guy in his late 50s or early 60s (all three from the original Intrepid trip); Kate, a 25 yr old from Wisconsin who is currently living in Chile; Mike, a 24 yr old from Chicago who was traveling with Kate; and Daniel, a 26 year old from Colorado, who will heretofore be known as ¨Mountain Man.¨

Our guide´s name was Celso. (He entered an Inca Trail race and completed the entire Inca Trail in 5 hours. The fastest was three. It takes most tour groups three days to do it). We also had 4 horsemen and 3 cooks, ranging in age from 16 to 40, making our trek doable. And on the first day we had 13 llamas (on the Inca Trail, there is usually one porter per 1-2 people to carry their bags, but because we weren´t going up steps, the llamas, and later, horses carried our stuff).

Our trek was extremely beautiful, solitary and serene. We basically walked up down and around mountains, stopping to check out the llamas, give local kids toys, and to try to catch our breathes.

Speaking of catching our breath, the altitude difference really took a toll. We only hiked 5 hours the first day, but it was a killer. For the first five minutes after we rested, every time without fail, we´d stand up, start a conversation with the person next to us, and then have to stop talking and gasp for air because it felt like we were walking straight up a hill with legs that had never exercised a day in their lives. Let´s put it this way, we were never so glad to see lunch.

Lunch, and later camp, were like mirage in the desert. We´d come over one mountain pass or another and all of a sudden, there it was: camp- complete with an eating tent with plastic table and chairs, a bathroom tent (a red zip-up tent with hole dug into the ground), basins of hot water, soap and washcloths, boiled drinking water, and a friggin´Thanksgiving day worthy feast of the best food we´d eaten anywhere since our arrival. And just as soon as it came, we´d move on, and camp was gone, like we´d never been there before. The horseman and cooks were nothing short of magic workers. The only thing that was missing was forks, which Celso explained, the llamas had forgotten.

At the end of Day One, after changing into dry clothes, we all collapsed around Alex´s and Debbie´s tent for a thimble of whiskey and chocolates, to celebrate before dinner. That night we froze beneath a full moon. Kate and I had fitful sleeps, but we so excited the next morning, we couldn´t have cared less.

Day Two: Parte Dos: Daniel is the Shithead (four times over):

By far the most challenging day of the trek. We hiked straight up one pass (14, 8500 feet above sea level) straight down the other side, and then straight up, over and down another pass (14,000 feet above sea level), totalling between 9 and 10 hours. The original plan was to camp after the first pass, but it turned out the farmer whose land it was didn´t want us there because another group of trekers had left too much trash behind. So, we had to push on. Of course, it started hailing and people were dropping like flies (except for Daniel, who was practically scaling the mountains), but we did it! That night, we celebrated by playing my new favorite game that Celso called us, Shithead. Maybe in punishment for being so adjusted to the altitude, Daniel lost the game not once, but four times. He was very upset about it.

Day Three: Parte Tres: Cake for Breakfast

We had a much better rest the second night (a combination of pure exhaustion and relatively warmer weather) and woke up to cake for breakfast (g-d bless the cooks!). Since we had done much of Day Three´s hike on Day Two, we had a leisurely walk downhill, back toward civilization, and, after 3-4 hours, ended up in Lares, where we partook in hot springs & lunch.

The rest of the day consisted of transfer back to Ollaytantambo and a train ride to Aguas Calientes, where we slept that night.

Related Travel Entry

• South Island Road Trip
  As some of you already know, I spent the last 2 weeks on a road trip in the South Island. The whole trip, while exhausting, was a total blast and absolutely chalked full of incredible scenery. Here's...
• Escape from Delhi
  Hi everyone. Peter and I have been hanging out here in the mountains for 8 days now, a cool relaxing departure from our mad week in Delhi (no offence to our lovely hosts in Delhi, but it is a demandi...
• Hailuogou Glacier Park and Gongga Shan
  Another early start. We departed Kangding at 6.30 am, heading for Hailuogou Glacier Park via Luding.Luding BridgeAt Hailuogou "the land is trembling and the valley is buzzing". Mao's secret hideout r...
• The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, Peru
  When Jan and I decided to go to South America each of us had a destination in mind that stood out from the rest. For me it was the Amazon. For Jan it was Machu Picchu. I reminded him of this the day b...
• Lima to Pisco, Peru
  The next morning, they were up early for breakfast and then attempted to go back to sleep for a while. They left the hostel with everyone a little after one and after a short ride on a mini bus, they ...

Travel Location: Invercargill,New-Zealand

Travel About: natural-wonder,hiking,road-trip,trek,sailing,climbing,glacier

As some of you already know, I spent the last 2 weeks on a road trip in the South Island. The whole trip, while exhausting, was a total blast and absolutely chalked full of incredible scenery. Here’s a rundown of the trips events:

I flew from Auckland into Christchurch on Feb 7th, met up with some friends and we hit the road early on the morning of the 8th. I drove the whole day (so weird driving on the wrong side of the road at first, but I adapted to the change rather quickly much to the relief of my travel buddies) We headed south to Dunedin, where we crashed at a friends place and then the 5 of us took off the next morning after exploring Dunedin’s botanical gardens. We made a quick stop at Caroline Bay for lunch, picked up our last travel companion at Lake Waihola and then we headed out to the Catlands. They were beautiful. TONS of sheep and green hills everywhere you look. We even encountered some minor cattle confusion when we came speeding around a turn and right there in the middle of the road was a herd of stray cows running toward us. Sooo funny.

Anyway, we visited Nugget Point and Nugget Point lighthouse, (the southern most lighthouse in the WORLD!) and went on several short hikes out to Purakaunui Falls, McLean Falls, and Florence Hill – all so cool. I took 100’s of pics! By this time it was late afternoon (good thing it is summer here and does not get dark until 9) and we made one last stop at Porpoise Bay campground out in the middle of nowhere. It lived up to it’s name. We saw a huge pod of dolphins surfing the waves and leaping out of the water. There were a few people there who were swimming with them and I wished I had my wetsuit so I could have gone out. Unfortunately, the water is too cold at the southern most tip of NZ (it is only a 4 hour charter plane ride to Antarctica from there…burr!) so I was confined to the shore.

That night I stayed in my first hostile in Invercargil and after exploring the town, we retired to bed and got up at the crack of dawn to hit the road to Milford Sound. Milford Sound was incredible. It is known as the 8th wonder of the world and for good reasons. We took a sail boat ride throughout the sound through the towering cliffs and observed the many waterfalls and rugged mountains. We cruised through the sound out into the Tasman sea for a while and then returned to land. If you ever decide to travel to NZ, this is a MUST DO! Don’t miss Milford Sound! You’ll be sorry!

When the day was done, we drove back to Te Anau for the night and stayed at another hostile right on the lake. The next day we drove non stop to Queenstown, which is the adventure capitol of NZ. We rode up the gondola as soon as we arrived and took in the unreal views of Lake Wakatipu and the Remarkable Mountains. At the top of the gondola is a lugeing track (a cement track you race little cars on wheels down – sooooo much fun). I had a great time with that. The next morning we went on this crazy hike in the Ben Lomond forest and a couple of us drove out to the Shotover river and went on the worlds most exciting jetboat ride. The boat weighs 3 tons, operates in 3 inches of water, has an incredible turning radius so you rip into 360’s constantly at no warning, and zooms through the river canyons getting you inches away from the gorge walls. Some people were screaming because it was scary at times, but I thought it was a blast. Overpriced, though. Not a must do, but a good time.

After leaving Queenstown on the 13th we headed to Wanaka and visited Puzzle Place, this trippy little place famous for the illusion rooms and great maze. Then we drove to Haast, stopping for a day hike and rock climbing at Fantail Falls on the way. From Haast we set out for Fow Glacier, one of 3 glaciers in the world surrounded by tropical forrest. When we got into town, we had time before our glacier hike, so we walked the trail around Lake Matheson (one of NZ’s most photographed places). We were blessed enough to make it to the viewing deck where the famous shots of Mount Cook and Mount Tasman are taken for the 5 minutes that the clouds cleared enough to see them. They view was reflected like a perfect mirror in the lake (I’ll put up a photo). It was truly PERFECT timing.

Then it was time to set off on the glacier hike! Fox Glacier was soooo cool. It is huge, and we only got to see a miniscule part of it, but it was great. Tons of fun hiking in those big spiky boots with crampons. I felt like a real explorer. Haha! One of the coolest parts about the glacier is the color of the ice. It is such a weird shade of blue. Very exciting, climbing on a glacier, especially because it is active and you can hear it moving underneath you!

We stayed that night in Greymouth and visited the Pancake rocks in Punakauki the next day, then headed to Kaikoura for whale watching. However, I got sick with the stomach flu and oddly enough (lucky for me, unlucky for my travel mates) the weather was bad so they canceled all whale watching trips for the day. So we all missed out! They opted to go wine tasting while I slept in the car, so not all was lost for them. They had a pretty good time and I ended up having to drive while sick for the rest of the day, seeing as to the ramifications of their fun. But it was still a good time.

We ended up back in Christchurch that day (the 16th, and spent all the next day at Christchurch’s famous flower festival, which was beautiful. Then the morning of the 18th came around and we got back on our plane and headed for Auckland! Fun times though, and I’ll never forget all the incredible sights! Really, I wont because I took 1200 pictures in the 11 days I was down there! But it is good to be back and settled in. I have some much needed catching up on sleep to do, so more later. I’ll have another entry up by the end of the week about international orientation (starts tomorrow) so hopefully I’ll have some stories to tell!

Related Travel Entry

• Milford Track
  We spent day before out trek packing our bags and as we were taking our day packs this was quite an operation(look at photo's to see most of stuff was hanging off back our bag)! On the morning of the...
• Ice Climbing at Fox Glacier
  So, deterred from snowboarding slightly by the lack of snow and pricey lift passes (they're getting a little cheaper as the Kiwi dollar slides but still, more expensive than Whistler for a resort with...
• Hailuogou Glacier Park and Gongga Shan
  Another early start. We departed Kangding at 6.30 am, heading for Hailuogou Glacier Park via Luding.Luding BridgeAt Hailuogou "the land is trembling and the valley is buzzing". Mao's secret hideout r...
• A visit to Dargaville, Baylys Beach, Kai Iwi Lakes & the Waipoua Kauri Forest
  We had a fun weekend up around Dargaville, a town on the west coast of Northland. We stayed at the Kaihu Farm Hostel which Avani loved. There were lots of animals there that she liked, including cows...
• Milford Track
  It’s been labeled the finest walk in the world – and after completing our five day, 33.5 mile journey, we just might agree.The Milford Track is just one of the many Great Walks here in New Zealand an...

Travel Location: Chiloe,Chile

Travel About: big-city,hiking,tour

Leaving Santiago we travelled South to the Pacific Coast town of Pichelmu. There´s not much to this place from a tourist perspective, but the big attraction is the surfing. The largest wave surfed in the world last year, over 10 metres high, was located here at the point break of Los Lobos. Having only dipped my toe at surfing a couple of times previously I decided to chicken out on this one and went in instead at the beach break at Pichelmu which was more like 10cms high! Nice to go in and get wet though. The water here is quite chilly thanks to the Humboldt current flowing north from the Antarctic, making a 5mm wetsuit necessary. We also walked the 5kms along the coast to see Los Lobos, a dramatic headland with its very distinctive cliff face, sea stacks and massive breakers, no wonder, the next landfall from here is Oz !

Heading south from Pichelmu we passed through Pucon, where we were hoping to climb Volcan Villarica, an active volcano which can be climbed as a guided day trip. As we moved south the influence of German settlers became more and more apparent in the architecture and placenames. This fertile area was very under populated, so the Chilean authorities initiated a programme with the German Government to promote settlement by German immigrants in the mid 1800´s (as the environment is very similar to Germany and would be familiar to them). The weather in Pucon was very wet and windy so we continued south to Chiloe Island, where we spent the next few days relaxing and absorbing the relaxed atmosphere of this unique place. Much of Chile had reminded us of Europe, with very western architecture, culture and lifestyle, Chiloe however felt like it had been left behind (the Spanish and German influence here were minimal), maintaining a more traditional, seafaring way of life. We stayed in Castro, the capital, from where we visited a number of small fishing villages dotted around the coast. Houses are all timber built, roofed with corrugated iron and painted in vivid colours. The landscape (and weather!) reminded me of West Cork, very green with low rolling hills and a rugged coastline. The culture here is rich with legends and myths of goblins and witches, most of which don´t make good bedtime reading! The people are warm and friendly and it was nice to experience the buzz of a not too over-commercialised Christmas. We spent Christmas eve with a few German travellers who were staying at our hospidaje (guesthouse). The owner kindly handed over her kitchen for the evening for us to cook a slap up meal which we washed down with some nice Chilean red!

We retraced our steps, heading north from Chiloe, stopping to spend a relaxed Christmas day in Puerto Varas before continuing back to Pucon. The weather had improved by now and the forecast looked settled so we booked our places to climb Villarica the next day. Pucon´s setting, nestled between the Volcano and the large tree bordered Lago Villarica lake is beautiful. Its setting also makes it an ideal base for adventure sports enthusiasts. Everything is on offer in this region from skiing in the winter to mountaineering, white water rafting and mountain biking in the summer. The day of the climb dawned cold with clear blue skies, but there was an ominous looking halo cloud hanging over the summit. The guides felt conditions, though not ideal, were good enough to give it a go. Considering the poor weather for the preceeding weeks and the shakey forecast for the next day, we decided to go for it. A 30 minute minibus ride brought us to the chairlift station which we boarded, bringing us to the snowline. We geared up, strapping on our crampons and helmets before getting a tutorial in the basics of how to walk with crampons and stop a slide with an ice-axe arrest. The climb was slower than we would have liked, joining the snake of other groups heading up the mountain but the panorama opening up before us made it very enjoyable. As we reached 2200m we noticed clouds on the horizon which moved in very quickly, not unusual in Patagonia. By the time we were at 2400m it had closed in completely and we received a radio message from others who were 200m higher telling us they had turned back, as conditions were dangerously icy and the wind had intensified. We also made the decision to turn back, which was disappointing, but at the same time easy to accept as it was the only sensible one. Our weather window had passed and it rained heavily the next day (see, Ireland isn´t the only place where it rains!) so we jumped on a coach, headed across the border to San Martin de Los Andes, Argentina.

Related Travel Entry

• New York by day
  As I had a 'Transfer' arranged to pick me up at Rio de Janerio today, I needed to get a message to the 'Transfer" in Rio de Janeiro to pick me up 24 hours later. So, I got in touch with Kate Murphy w...
• "43 P, Please!"
  After I wrote my last entry, I met up with Carl (from New York City) and we headed to the International Students reception at Falmer Bar in Falmer House. Free drinks and food were served! My kind of ...
• Seattle
  Finally made it...Now then, if you're an avid fan of this travel blog, you'll notice that I seem to have taken a crazy route from Victoria to Seattle. This is not the case. I am not crazy. It is mere...
• Meeting the Carolyne
  It was sad to leave India after only 6 weeks, so much more to see and do there, but our flights had been booked for a while and Japan was calling.From Narita airport we headed into Tokyo on the cheap...
• Happy in Singapore and Bintan, Indonesia
  We spent Chinese New Year Holiday  traveling to Singapore and Bintan Island, Indonesia. We are all primary school teachers and had the week off from school. Singapore is about a 3 and a half hour flig...

Travel Location: Milford-Sound,New-Zealand

Travel About: natural-wonder,hiking

It’s been labeled the finest walk in the world – and after completing our five day, 33.5 mile journey, we just might agree.

The Milford Track is just one of the many Great Walks here in New Zealand and until now we have only committed to day hikes (no camping for us). We hoped this guided walk would give us a great experience in the Fiordland National Park in southeast New Zealand. In this walk, you get to see it all, glacially carved valleys, glacier and alpine views, open prairies and also rainforest – WOW! The best part was that our weather could not have been better. Essentially, the 33 miles are covered over three days with the second of these days being the toughest where you climb to MacKinnon Pass at roughly 3700 feet and then take a decline in the same day down to a level of just 1000 feet. The first and last day was spent transporting us to and from the hiking trail and also taking in a couple of great cruises on Lake Te Anau and Milford Sound. Also, with a guided walk you don’t have to carry your own food just your clothes and you to stay in fairly plush lodges with ensuite rooms, a hot breakfast and three course dinner cooked for you and laundry facilities with great drying rooms to dry out everything that might have gotten soaked. Most importantly, there is a bar with beer and wine that opens at cocktail hour where nibbles and a slide slow detailing the next day’s walk are provided for the group. Now that we’ve been spoiled, we’ll never graduate to independent overnight tracks!

33 miles and heaps of fun ….. oh, and rain

Roughly half the group was from English speaking countries and the other half was Japanese. Some of the Japanese could speak a little English but most could not but everyone made an effort to communicate along the way and had a great time. Our foreign language skills now include two Japanese words – Ohio (good morning) and Konychiwa (hello) – but not sure on the spelling here! The group of walkers was really great and we enjoyed everyone’s company. The oldest guy in our group was 75 which was pretty impressive.

The first three days consisted of sunny blue skies for the most part – and actually a little warm on the first day, but no complaints there. The second day (or first real day of hiking) was mostly flat along a river valley and gave us a good chance to get used to the 15 lb pack on our backs for 10 miles and was a good warm-up. There was even a waterfall fed lake that Scott and a few others braved and took a swim in the freezing cold water. The third day actually went really well and it was easier than we expected. Over the first 2.5 miles you climb about 700 feet but the next 2.5 miles is a bit steeper as you climb 2100 ft to MacKinnon Pass. Then after you reach the top, have some lunch at Pass Hut and take in the beautiful scenery, you have to make the descent down the other side. The descent is very steep, 3000 ft over 3.5 miles, and I was quite worried about my knees but between my walking pole, my Advil and hopefully my fitness, my knees didn’t even ache until we got to the last mile.

Heavy rain was forecasted for the fourth day and a heavy rain it was. This portion of the walk takes you through the rainforest to Milford Sound and on average this area gets up to 30 feet of rain per year. After the first five miles of light rain, the skies poured down on us for the remaining eight miles. Everyone had told us that you want it to rain as the mountains surrounding the valleys turn into endless waterfalls which are really what this region is all about. We couldn’t agree more. We were soaked to the bone, from head to toe – rain gear really served no purpose here when you’re out for 6+ hours in a downpour. None of this really mattered however because every time we looked around us, the waterfalls on the hillsides were stunning and we couldn’t believe the number and the volume of water coming down. Some waterfalls looked like spouts coming out horizontally from the hillsides. We were excited that our waterproof shoes were holding up that is until mile 9 for the day when we came upon a rushing torrent of water crossing the path and dropping off a ledge just to the right of the path. Two of our fellow Japanese walkers had stopped as they were afraid to cross thinking that they would be swept in the current and over the edge. I have been known to be afraid of crossing streams before, so I probably would have sat there with him had it not been for Scott. He just looked at it and thought it’s our only option and walked right in. When he made it safely to the other side, I buckled down and headed across. This was the one time I was so thankful that I brought the walking pole which kept me steady as I crossed. We waved the others through and held out a helping hand on the other side. With that scary moment behind us – I was very relieved. Little did I know that there were maybe 10-20 more water crossings on that last 3-4 miles stretch, but none were as scary as the first one. And it goes without saying that the shoes were filled with a nice pool of water from that point on. Much of the trail along the way had simply become a stream because it was raining so hard. The day was really something and we were glad to have experienced it and were fortunate to see the waterfalls at their absolute best. And we were certainly thankful that the rain came on this last day rather than one day prior where we would have been climbing the pass and coming down on a rocky descent. At least this last walking day was with relatively flat terrain.

Our final day we woke to sunny skies once again to enjoy our cruise along the Milford Sound. It was amazing that all the rain had runoff the mountains surrounding the sound and the majority of the waterfalls had disappeared. The mountains are made of granite and retained none of the rain from the day prior. I guess that explains why the waterfalls are so spectacular during the rain and not after.

Tidbit of the day:

The Dept of Conservation limits the number of new walkers on the trail to 50 guided walkers and 40 independent walkers per day. The trail is one way which is great as you can find yourself walking alone much of the time during the day. The guided hikes have been a business here since the late 1800s which is amazing as it is very remote and all supplies had to be carried in and out by horse. Now much of that is done by helicopter and you could see the pad at each of our lodges. Up until the 1950s when a tunnel was completed, the walk had to be done out and back as there was no road at the end of the trail to get you back to the starting point. According to our lead guide (who has completed 100+ trips), someone has to be choppered out with an injury on one of every three trips. Luckily, no issue for our trip – maybe due to the good weather on the tough day.

Tidbit # 2 of the day:

Milford Sound is a misnomer – it’s actually a fjord as it was carved from glacial action rather than other geological forces. Fjordland here has 14 different fjords (one of which happens to be called Nancy Sound)

Related Travel Entry

• A visit to Dargaville, Baylys Beach, Kai Iwi Lakes & the Waipoua Kauri Forest
  We had a fun weekend up around Dargaville, a town on the west coast of Northland. We stayed at the Kaihu Farm Hostel which Avani loved. There were lots of animals there that she liked, including cows...
• South Island Road Trip
  As some of you already know, I spent the last 2 weeks on a road trip in the South Island. The whole trip, while exhausting, was a total blast and absolutely chalked full of incredible scenery. Here's...
• Milford Track
  We spent day before out trek packing our bags and as we were taking our day packs this was quite an operation(look at photo's to see most of stuff was hanging off back our bag)! On the morning of the...
• Rotorua
  Man this places stinks! Its a natrual therma thingy! Which means it has lots of holes in the ground full of gases, hot bubbling water and mud.The hostel (hot rocks) I stayed in used to be a old school...
• The wettest place on earth
  So you think we have bad weather in the UK? This place has the most rainfall recorded anywhere on the globe. Annual rainfall is measured in metres (about 7 a year) not millimetres! The Soulvan sprang...

Travel Location: McLeod-Ganj-(Upper-Dharamsala),India

Travel About: cultural-immersion,hiking,trek,mountain,camping

Hi everyone. Peter and I have been hanging out here in the mountains for 8 days now, a cool relaxing departure from our mad week in Delhi (no offence to our lovely hosts in Delhi, but it is a demanding city to be in). It took a bone shaking 12-plus hours bus ride to get here but it was worth it. This is the home of the Dalai Lama and a large community of exiled Tibetans. Sometimes we have to remember we are still in India. The town is interesting because of the Tibetan community as well as all the travellers, workers, Indian tourists, beggars, Saddhus and the inevitable cows. The central streets of the small town are narrow and dirty (especially first thing in the morning before they’ve had a chance to get rid of the rotting vegetables and cow shit) and full of cars, buses and motorcycles honking their way through to avoid hitting any pedestrians.

Aside from some bad smells and ugly new hotels being built into the hillsides, this is a beautiful place to be. Lots of walks into the forests to discover Tibetan monasteries and pine groves. Tibetan prayer flags hang everywhere. We spent 4 days walking with a guide, a cook and a porter up into the moutains, camping for 3 nights at about 3300m. Peter walked up to the Indrahar Pass (4300m) to see into the Chambar Valley and the ever increasing Indian Himalaya ranging (we are at the lower end of the mountains).

Highlights of the trek included: listening to the last one-day cricket match between India and Australia, crowded around a campfire with a radio and lots of good natured rivalry between Peter and all the Indians there; camping on the side of a mountain sheltered by rocks while our cook prepared our meals in a small cave/shepherd’s hut; meeting two lovely Swiss women (Liz and Cathy) and just walking in beautiful clean air, with mountains all around. Lowlights were: seeing all the rubbish left behind by a big group of campers at Triund (there seems to be little regard for preserving the pristine nature that attracts people here in the first place); blaring static filled Hindi music on our second morning while we ate breakfast and tried to enjoy the beautiful scenery; the walk back down the mountain – about 2km on rocks – and my suffering knees.

We visted the Tibetan Library and Archives today and were fortunate to be shown inside the Archives where we saw original Tibetan manuscripts of the Buddha’s teachings. While we were there, an old bent-over woman was walking up and down the stacks chanting prayers over all the manuscripts (and clutching a mobile phone in one hand). The Library and Archives are a Tibetan scholar’s paradise with many original manuscripts rescued from monasteries destroyed by the Chinese Government and also many reproductions of books in various foreign languages. Some monks were repainting the outside of the building with colourful and beautiful floral designs – so much nicer than boring concrete facades.

Experience of the day (so far…) – giving money to a begging Saddhu and then being criticised for it not being enough! He then stood there muttering at us – I am now struck with the curse of guilt.

Sorry no pictures yet, will try and work that out soon.

xoxoxo

Related Travel Entry

• Home of the Dalai Lama
  Train to Dharamasala: After 5 days in Rishikesh we were ready for a change. We booked an overnight train ticket to Dharamasala--though the train only went as far as Chucky Banks --or at least thats wh...
• Tibet
  Free Tibet: you see the stickers everywhere (especially living in Santa Cruz), I get a newsletter from the Dalai Lama asking for money and support almost every month (someone sold my name) but until ...
• The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, Peru
  When Jan and I decided to go to South America each of us had a destination in mind that stood out from the rest. For me it was the Amazon. For Jan it was Machu Picchu. I reminded him of this the day b...
• Conference superstar, Ghandi’s nature cure, Brazilian for a week
  Again, it has been way too long since I have written and I have a million stories I would like to share. First of all, the international yoga conference was great. About half of the participants were...
• The ‘Real’ Fiji
  We decided to spend our first week touring Fiji's main island, Viti Levu, with the Feejee Experience (sister company to the good old Kiwi Experience). Aboard the familiar green bus we set about getti...

Travel Location: Portree,United-Kingdom

Travel About: architecture,natural-wonder,art-&-museum,hiking,ruins,scotland,highlands,skye

Today was our first and only full day on the Isle of Skye. The Isle of Skye is part of the Inner Hebrides Islands in western Scotland. We started out on the A855 north out of Portree towards Old Man of Storr. Unfortunately, we couldn’t see this see this famous rock formation because it was covered in clouds. Our next stop was Kilt Rock followed by the Quiraing. We stopped at the hill next to the Quiraing, where Hamish and I hiked up the hill. I later found out the name of the hill was Kilmuir Hill at an elevation of 466 meters. After hiking back down, we drove to Duntulm Castle ruins followed by a brief stop at a Celtic cemetery and Crofting (Thatched farm houses) museum. We lunched in Uig on the northern end of Skye and watched the ferry boat come in from the Hebrides. After lunch, our route took us south on the A87 from Uig to Fairy Glen. After hiking in the Fairy Glen up to the Fairy Castle (a small hill), we headed towards Dunvegan on the A850. We toured Dunvegan Castle and Gardens and learned about the Clan McLeod and the Fairy Flag. Afterward, on our way out we stopped at Fairy Bridge and also drove by Dun Beag Broch. Hamish took a shortcut on B855 back across the island to Portree. Today’s unpredictable Highland weather was actually pretty good despite raining a few times in the morning. Walked = 9.14 miles.

Related Travel Entry

• The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, Peru
  When Jan and I decided to go to South America each of us had a destination in mind that stood out from the rest. For me it was the Amazon. For Jan it was Machu Picchu. I reminded him of this the day b...
• Bolton Abbey, Yorkshire
  Well it didn’t look all that promising this morning. It was grey and overcast but warm, so ideal really for a walk. My brother had decided to head off to the Yorkshire Dales, a beautiful part of the c...
• Historical York by Karsten
  June 30, 2006YorkDo you like history? You will like York!Do you like history? Are you the type of person that likes to know everything about history? Do you like seeing medieval ruins and amazing site...
• Canals are really cool
  It wasn’t a direct train so lots of people came on and off the train during our ride to Venice. There are also two stops in Venice but we only booked it to the first stop. Luckily the train att...
• If I could only get the language down
  London day 2. We started off at the Tower of London. So cool imaging how it was a working castle. The Beefeaters were funny. The crown jewels were incredible. One staff had a 538 carat diamond! I snu...

Travel Location: Seattle,United-States

Travel About: food-&-wine,big-city,hiking,nightlife,market

Finally made it…

Now then, if you’re an avid fan of this travel blog, you’ll notice that I seem to have taken a crazy route from Victoria to Seattle. This is not the case. I am not crazy. It is merely a technical hitch in this software, and I am assured that it is under investigation. So now you can sleep tight. If you’re really interested, the route was as follows:

Scenery and seafood

Ferry from Victoria to Port Angeles, bus from Port Angeles to Sequim, bus from Sequim to Port Townsend, bus from Port Townsend to Poulsbo, bus from Poulsbo to Bainbridge Ferry Terminal, ferry from Bainbridge to Seattle. Yes we could have taken the Clipper, but that was way more exciting and super cheap – the buses came to a total of about $3.50 each, and the ferry only charged in one direction, assuming that everyone who takes it one way will automatically take it back. Luckily they charge westbound. Ha ha, look at us beating the system!

Anyways, I digress, I’m in Seattle remember. Anyways, got off the ferry, and onto another bus to our hotel. Yeah, turns out it’s a motel. Oh well, I’m sure it’ll be lovely. Yes, a smoking room will have to do. Nice. Dumped our bags and hopped quick smart back into town!

On first impressions, downtown Seattle is not that nice. Not that the city itself isn’t nice, it’s fine, but the streets are overrun with homeless people, and an awful lot of begging goes on. It’s quite a sorry sight.

We headed to the world famous Pike Place Market, but it was gone 5, so most places were shut. After a bit of a wander down the pier, Mike decided he was hungry, so it was off to Quiznos, where we sat playing scrabble for an hour (well you can’t play tourist all of the time!). After that, we took the free trolley through town and on to Chinatown.

The thing about some Americans is that it’s often difficult to tell if they’re nuts, or just really friendly. So if a woman walks up to you and asks you what you’re looking for, and you offer half an answer in order to sound polite, and you tell her that you were looking for somewhere to eat (I wasn’t hungry when we went to Quiznos). So she tells you that she knows loads of good places, and if we like she’ll take us. Now is she crazy, and is she gonna take us down a dark alley and do nasty things? Unlikely, it’s about 6.30 in the evening, in broad daylight on a fairly busy street. Or is she just trying to be really friendly, helping out two people who were clearly tourists? In the end we figured she was just being friendly, if a bit odd, but aired on the side of caution, taking her advice on a general direction of good restaurants, and then parting company.

As it turned out, we should have been much more afraid of our waitress. Found a nice little restaurant, and had some dumplings, a few beers, and a very pleasant long chat. Upon paying our bill, we asked the young lady who had served us to point us in the direction of a particular bar, Howl at the Moon. I had been to one (not realising it was a chain bar) in New Orleans, and had had a great night. We showed it to her on our little map of downtown. As far as we could see, it was only a couple of blocks away, but we weren’t 100% sure where the restaurant was located. But like I say, it turns out the waitress was nuts. Either that or she had only arrived in Seattle herself that day, or maybe had never seen a map before. After turning it upside down and the right way around again 4 times, she suddenly declared that it was very very far away. “Really? How long will it take us to walk there?” “30 mins. Maybe 20 if you walk very fast.” Seriously, it was only about 3 blocks away. We thanked the crazy lady and left.

In the end we just called into a dingy little bar on the way home. We got directions for the next day, and had a beer. There were little tickets in a dispenser behind the bar, and Mike’s curiosity got the better of him, and he bought 2. It turns out they were a lottery game, you just peel off a label and see what you get. We got nothing, which was highly disappointing, given the $1000 and $10,000 prizes that had been scratched off as already won. So I decided to give it one more go, and bought another 2. Mike peeled his off – nothing. Imagine my surprise and delight when, on peeling away the label, I found a winning strike through the symbols, just like the bartender had said I needed to win!! I won!! I had actually won on the lottery ticket!! I was rich!!

I won a dollar.

Oh well, I was still very happy with my win. Elated, we headed home.

Next morning, it was up and out early. Hold on now, I’ve not told you why yet. Ok, let’s go back a few days here, to the boats in Vancouver. Remember Clint? Not sure if I mentioned him actually. Well he was another friend of Mike’s from when he was travelling before. Clint’s from Seattle, and had said to Mike to get in touch when he got there. So Mike had done the day we got there, and we had arranged to go hiking. Clint had said we’d be out for an hour or so, so we figured we’d go early, then get back, shower, and go meet the other two (we hadn’t seen them in over 24 hours!!). So like I say, up and out early, and headed to East Point park and ride to meet him. “Hey guys, ready for a day on the mountains?” Oops, I guess Mike misheard the bit about the hour or so… So we picked up a sandwich in Starbucks, met Clint’s wife Sarah, and his friends Pat and Clara, and set off for Rattlesnake trail. It was a great morning, we hiked for about an hour (I guess that’s where they got their wires crossed) up to the top, and were treated to some fabulous views of the Seattle countryside. We spent a while chatting at the top and admiring the landscape, then headed back down. That’s when my legs knew all about the run I had done a couple of days previosly! Man it’s easy to get unfit quickly! We drove on a bit further to a beach, and had a bit of a picnic, which was nice. After that it was back to Clint’s for a few beers, then back to the Motel to meet Rick and Nicky.

We went for a teryaki down the road, then to a pretty dingy bar near our motel. Jumped on a bus downtown, and decided to go with Clint’s advice on the stamps. Basically you paid for a stamp which gave you free entry to a group of bars. We started off in some Rock stylee place, which was pretty empty, so we left and went to the next one, New Orleans, a blues bar (obviously). After that it was on to a more popular dancy place. We had noticed a lot of Redsox fans in town, and there were a group of them in the bar. Given that we were now hardcore fans (we were in Fenway Park, for goodness sake!) I thought I should keep us updated on how the season was going for us. So I got chatting to a group of them (turns out we lost). I was telling one of the guys about our tour of the ground, I swear, he nearly cried when I told him we had gotten field access. I guess we really did luck out that day. Next stop on our list of bars was a Heavy Metal spot, then on to (hurray!) Howl at the Moon. It was just as crazy as I remembered it. The barman was a bit of a loon. One of the lads got a round of shots in, and when I told him I was having Jeagar instead of Tequila, Travis our bartender told me mine was on him, and he did a shot with me! Anyways, we all had a good laugh, and Nicky and I ended up dancing on stage in front of the two grand pianos that are the Howl at the Moon signature. My god I bet we looked good.

Day 3 in Seattle, and it was time to pack up again. We checked out, left our bags in the motel, and headed downtown. We didn’t have a lot of time (we were up a bit late after quite a late night), so we went to Pike Place Market to have a look for these fish. Anyone who worked with me and saw the promotional videos they had on graddie training for – I don’t know what for actually, maybe having fun in the workplace? – will know what I’m talking about. It’s basically a fishmonger, but with a difference, with lots of audience participation and throwing of fish. To be honest we didn’t really see that much cause no one was really buying any fish, but it was nice to see after seeing it on the tele.

Rick decided that he couldn’t walk past all the cafes and restaurants selling clam chowder, so we arranged to meet him down by the pier, and headed off in search of The Crab Pot. It was a kind of novelty restaurant that Pat had told us about, where they pretty much chuck a load of seafood on a piece of waxpaper on your table, give you a wooden board and mallet, and let you at it. I wasn’t particularly happy about smashing up crabs, particularly as I had seen the poor blighters swimming around minutes earlier as I was being shown to my table, but I can assure you it was a much more pleasant seafood experience that the one in Boston!

Fed and watered, we didn’t have much time to do anything else, so after a quick trip to an internet cafe, we headed back to the motel to pick up our bags. Luckily the bus to the airport went from just down the street, so we headed up to catch it. We ended up bombing it down the street cause it was already sitting there, but when we got to the stop the bus woman didn’t open the doors, as it wasn’t due to leave for another 10 mins. So we sat around for a while, until she started up the engine. The silly mare was about to drive off, when we banged on the door. She didn’t look best pleased about that, and when we asked her if we could get on the bus, she none too politely informed us that it went from a stop about 3 miles down the road!! She was actually not going to let us on!! Eventually she did, but we just couldn’t get that smile out of her!! It turns out none of the other customers could either – she even tried to refuse a guy on the bus cause he was 2c short of a $3.50 bus fare. Dizzy bint.

Anyways it turns out I shouldn’t have slagged her off cause our flight to San Fran was delayed by 3 hours. Dammit!

Click here for the Seattle photos

Related Travel Entry

• "43 P, Please!"
  After I wrote my last entry, I met up with Carl (from New York City) and we headed to the International Students reception at Falmer Bar in Falmer House. Free drinks and food were served! My kind of ...
• High Tea at the Burj Al Arab
  My second day in Dubai was lots of fun. It started with another drive through Dubai. This time Ursh and I wanted to check out some of the souks (markets). The traffic here is terrible though, and it t...
• Yunnan Province
  Yunnan Province KUNMING (capital city of 4 million people)Yes we've arrived safely in China, and so far going very well. We left Hanoi last Friday morning, walked about 1km to the Vietnam Airlines bus...
• The American’s are coming, the American’s are coming!
  As you all know, thanksgiving was a little over a week ago and since I could not spend it with my biological family in Texas, Gen and I decided to cross the English Channel and spend Thanksgiving with...
• The Heydenrych’s hit The Big Apple
  Perhaps living in London has acclimatized Shawn and I to big city living because New York isn't quiet as big and busy as I remember it. Don't get me wrong - it's still a buzzing and bustling city but ...

Travel Location: Grand-Canyon,United-States

Travel About: natural-wonder,park,adventure,hiking,national-park,photography,grand-canyon-national-park,eco-tourism,fun,cheap

Today we got up early and loaded the cars with all of our gear. We went to Denny’s in town to get some breakfast since we had a long day of driving ahead of us. We got the atlas out and planned our route until our breakfast came.

After we finished eating we stopped at a gas station to fill up our tanks and get some snacks. I made the unfortunate mistake of not packing any cds and not having a cord for my iPod so I was subjected to the radio in Utah which mainly plays country music or horrible god-talk…….it was terrible. After awhile I just put on my iPod earphones and all and that helped some.

it was nearly sunset and the colors on the canyon were stunning. It brought tears to my eyes!

The drive from Moab to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon took 5 and a half hours. Along the way we passed turn offs for the Monument Valley Tribal Park, Natural Bridges National Monument, the Four Corners Monument. We decided to skip these since some were a considerable distance out of our way and we wanted to get to the Grand Canyon as quickly as possible.

We stopped about half way in Kayenta, Arizona to get some gas and stretch our legs. I called ahead to the Bright Angel hotel to see if they had any openings…they did not! The Bright Angel is one of the cheapest hotels in the Grand Canyon Village and is situated right on the Rim with fantastic views. I was a little disappointed. They referred me to the Maswik Lodge in the village and said that they had plenty of openings.

When we entered the boundary of the Grand Canyon National Park the rangers on duty gave us some maps. Along our drive into the village I could see hints of the canyon and it looked amazing. We stopped along the way at a few of the scenic viewpoints.

At my first glance of the Grand Canyon it was nearly sunset and the colors on the canyon were stunning. It brought tears to my eyes! You can see it effects everyone who sees it for the first time the same way. There were people from all walks of life, just staring in silence with their jaws hanging open. Amazing!

We continued on into the Village. Donna and Lindsay had decided that they wanted to camp. I only had one more full day before I had to fly home so I decided to get a hotel. I said goodnight to the girls and we made plans to go hiking the next day in the park.

I checked into the Maswik Lodge in the village. It ended up being quite a bit more expensive than the Bright Angel Hotel but it was on property so I wasn’t going to complain. I took my suitcase into my hotel room and began the task of repacking everything very neatly so it could get through airport security. While I was repacking I was listening to the hotel’s activity channel on the tv. It gave me a few ideas of things to do the next day.

After I finished packing I went into the main lodge of the hotel and did a little souvenir shopping. I came back to my room, showered, watched some tv and planned out my day in the Grand Canyon.

Things learned on Day 8 out west:

1. Its a long drive from Moab to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. It takes 5 and half hours and there aren’t a lot of gas stations along the way. Keep your tank full.

2. If you have the time visit Monument Valley Tribal Park, Natural Bridges National Monument

3. Monument Valley Tribal Park website http://www.desertusa.com/monvalley/

4. Natural Bridges National Monument website http://www.nps.gov/nabr/

Related Travel Entry

• More beautiful than words can describe
  After leaving Mesa Verde we traveled into the Grand Canyon in Arizona. No pictures a person can take do this natural wonder justice. If you are intending to go to the Canyon make sure you get the...
• World on Fire
  5-11-07   Red Center, AustraliaAh, the Outback mate. Red desert, red rocks, red roos, red (sunburned) locals, red everything. It’s the center of a naturally odd country and certainly doesn’t...
• Rotorua
  Man this places stinks! Its a natrual therma thingy! Which means it has lots of holes in the ground full of gases, hot bubbling water and mud.The hostel (hot rocks) I stayed in used to be a old school...
• Water & Granite
  Tuesday, August 8The next morning we began our 4+ hour drive to Yosemite. With 140 still closed due to a landslide, we took the windy 120 with hairpin turns high above a valley into the park.We pulled...
• A little adventure in the Grand Canyon
  I always thought I'd have some big, grand adventure in the Grand Canyon - rafting down the Colorado River, riding down the switchback trails on a horse or donkey (like they did on the "Brady Bunch"), ...