And here I am in Ecuador. My 22nd country, if you count every country where I gave my passport to a migrations officer. And my last country. It's a little bittersweet being here, but I really am starting to hear the siren song of home in my ears. So I'm just going to keep on keeping on. But before I talk about this hot and humid country, we need to finish up my time in Peru. And also talk about my bus ride between the two countries. It was a 28-hour bus ride. That's a long bus ride. Anyhoo, let's get on it.
Showing posts with label Hostels. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hostels. Show all posts
Entry #069: Sunday, March 23, 2014 (Lima, Peru)
Hola from Lima, my last stop in Peru. It's been...well, fairly uneventful the last few days. That's partially because I was just in transit, and partially because I haven't had much motivation these part few days. This lack of motivation might be due either to a kind of travel version of senioritis, or it can be due to the fact that I've come down with a cold (thanks to the fact that my tent-mate on the Inca trail had a cold), and I don't have Emergen-C to fight it. I've also been sleeping a lot more and have had a general sense of lethargy, so I'll just chalk it up to the latter possibility. And truth be told, all the coughing I've been doing hasn't contributed to my writing spirit, so let's get to this.
Entry #063: Thursday, February 27, 2014 (Santiago, Chile)
Before I begin, I gotta level with ya, folks. I'm again in one of those moods where I get no pleasure in the prospect of writing, where it's just another burden that I have to deal with. It's been a while since the last one of those, no? But, of course, this blog is for my own personal record benefit, as well as for the benefit of the Chinese phishing websites that Google Analytics says makes up two-thirds of my audience. So still I write. I'm not going to say "I'm gonna go qucikly through everything", because every time I do that, it's a 10,000-word entry, but still, I apologize if the quality here isn't up to whatever usual standards I might have. Anyhoo, moving along.
Entry #061: Tuesday, February 18, 2014 (Mendoza, Argentina)
You have no idea how much I want to make a Simpsons/McBain reference now that I'm here in the city of Mendoza. Really, I do. Still, I'm gonna keep a stiff upper lip and resist the temptation. Still, it's hard to believe two things. First, I'm almost done with my time in Argentina. Admittedly, that's gonna happen a lot while I'm in each South American country, so I'll get used to it. Second, as of today, I have exactly two months before my flight home. But now's not the time to contemplate my triumphant, rose-raining return to American shores, but rather the last couple of days, and the things happening therein. It includes cream sauces, I promise!
Entry #058: Wednesday, February 5, 2014 (Auckland, New Zealand)
Entry #057: Friday, January 31, 2014 (Tauranga, New Zealand)
With this being the end of January, and the fact that I only have three more bus trips scheduled, it is really starting to sink in that my time in New Zealand is coming to a close. That's the weird thing about staying in one country longer, I guess. Some may say it was too long - others may say it was too short - but after giving it some real thought, I've decided that like everything else, it's exactly what it needed to be. On a less philosophical note, I did some cool stuff the past few days! Let's have a look at them!
Entry #056: Tuesday, January 28, 2014 (Rotorua, New Zealand)
All said, I could probably wait a few days longer before publishing a new entry, because one of the main crux of the last few days is that I wasn't really doing too much. But truth be told, I'd rather have more, shorter entries (at least, in equal proportion to the leviathans I occasionally write). And also, that's not to say nothing happened in the past few days. I talked with a lot of folks, for one! Also, there are some things interesting because they didn't happen, but I won't spoil the surprise...
Entry #055: Saturday, January 25, 2014 (Taupo, New Zealand)
So what a difference a few days (and a couple hundred kilometers) make. I've gone from a fairly dull place, staying in a really uncomfortable hostel, to being in a pretty laid-back-yet-happenin' place, in a hostel that's quite comfortable. I've gone from rednecks getting stoned off their asses to tastings of honey-based alcohols. I've gone from walking for hours to...walking for hours. Huh. Actually, yeah, walking for hours has apparently become that thing that I do, so much so that I've now added a new tag for these entries for it. (Not that I'm going to retroactively tag all the old posts; that would require actual work.)
Entry #054: Monday, January 20, 2014 (Hastings, New Zealand)
Well, if you're reading this, that means I survived my time
in that overcrowded hostel. Well, I survived even if you're not reading it. So
that's good, although it wasn't guaranteed, especially with how weak the walls
were to prevailing winds (more on that later). But now I can't dwell in that
past, because I'm now in a new hostel, in a new town. I've been in both for
less than two hours, so I don't have too much to say about them, but there are
some interesting aspects so far. So let's get started!
Entry #053: Thursday, January 16, 2014 (Wellington, New Zealand)
One island down, one to go! Well, technically there's the Cook Islands, but those are legally their own country. But yeah, I am now on the North Island, so maybe we'll be getting slightly more summer-like weather here than I've been having for the past month. Maybe? Hopefully? In any case, the last few days haven't been necessarily the most action packed (in fact, two of them were almost exclusively dedicated to travel), but that doesn't mean they haven't been interesting? Or does it? Maybe you'll have to read through to see. I've forgotten, that's for sure.
Entry #052: Saturday, January 11, 2014 (Fox Glacier Village, New Zealand)
So, I'm just a little under halfway through my time in New Zealand, and what do I have to show for it? Well, a lot of panorama photos, for one thing. It's really good for that. But also a lot of internal musings about the nature of adventure and how it applies to my own journeys. But we'll get into that later, because first we gotta talk about my traveling into Glacier Country, and before that, my inability to eat burger. What a scoop!
Entry #051: Tuesday, January 7, 2014 (Te Anau, New Zealand)
Hey there, how's your new year been? I hope 2014 has been everything you've been hoping for! Me?
I've had no particular hopes or dreams for 2014; I'm just taking it as it
comes. And so far it's been pretty good, I can't deny. I've had some good opportunities
to meet and hang out with some people I legit enjoyed spending time with, and
have been able to go to some of the more dramatic natural areas of New Zealand.
Plus, I was given pounds of free meat! But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's
go back and see how this first week of 2014 has gone.
Entry #050: Tuesday, December 31, 2013 (Queenstown, New Zealand)
Well, it's the last day of 2013, and, by complete
coincidence, I have reached my 50th blog entry. To be perfectly honest, when I
look back on my naming/numbering scheme for the blog, I'm not sure why I saw
fit to put the "0" in my post numbers. The idea was, of course, that
I would be covered in case I get up to 100 post and beyond, but that wouldn't
have been very realistic; considering my trip is a year long (well, officially
a year and ten days), I'd have to make an entry once every 3 to four days. Ad admirable
goal, and maybe one I originally thought I could do, but a generally
unattainable one. I guess, like everything else, it's a learning experience.
But back to this entry itself. Were my last days of 2013 the most exciting ones
ever? ...Nah, not really, but they were pretty good.
Entry #049: Friday, December 26, 2013 (Omarama, New Zealand)
Hey all, hope you had a wonderful Christmas, filled with good times and smiling friends and families. If you're hoping to here this smug guy say he felt homesick on that day, well I'm sorry, but I'm too smug for that. Actually, there's a couple reasons why I didn't really feel any homesickness on Christmas. First, despite knowing it was Christmas, I have never been able to really get into Christmas "mode", and so it never really registered in that way. Second, I was actually having a pretty good time. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Here's what the haps have been, not only on Christmas, but the days surrounding it as well. Wow, what a scoop!
Entry #048: Sunday, December 22, 2013 (Christchurch, New Zealand)
Coming to the end of Week One in New Zealand, and I still haven't caught any hobbits. They're tricky little buggers, I tell ya. But I have seen plenty of sheep, prompting me to maybe think that they're hobbits in disguise. In any case, I actually didn't think I'd be in Christchurch as of the posting time of this entry; I thought I'd be at my next locale, Lake Tekapo. But wait to you hear the wacky reason why (actually, it's just that I didn't pay attention to my own bookings). But what really happened in the past few days is I saw a lot of pretty views, walked a good 45 miles or so, had a hostel-induced crisis of faith, and had a really bad allergy flare-up. Hot dog! Let's go in for a closer look!
Entry 045: Wednesday, December 11, 2013 (Cairns, Australia)
Well, I'm currently in Cairns, my last stop in Oz. You might think I came straight here from Sydney, but you'd be wrong. Dead wrong. In fact, I had a whole little adventure in the outback, based in the central city of Alice Springs. It's just as well I didn't post from Alice Springs proper, because that town is kinda dull. The things I did in the Red Center (aka the dry, arid parts of the outback), though, were quite exciting. I ate a live bug, for one thing. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Entry #043: Friday, November 29, 2013 (Sydney, Australia)
G'day! My, has it been a week already since my last entry? Time sure does fly when you're also flying (and walking, and doing other stuff, I suppose). In case my shoehorned salutation didn't clue you in (or the title for the entry, for that matter) I have now reached my fifth continent, Oceania, beginning with Australia, aka "The Sunburned Country". I now have a better appreciation for that moniker, but let's not get ahead of ourselves! We still have some plenty to talk about in Vietnam and in the air before any talk of Vegemite is relevant. So let's get to it!
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