Epilogue

At this point, I wish I had thought of some nickname for my readers other than, well, "readers". Because then I could have started this, my capping entry for this one-year excursion, with something like, "Hey there, Loonies, it's been a fun ride, hasn't it?" But I can't, so let's move on from here. This is my blog's epilogue (epiblog?), and I can guarantee you right now, it is not going to follow any logical narrative path. It is somewhat stream-of-consciousness, and will just jump from topic-to-topic of what I want to note. It'll be fun. And it'll put a bit of a capper on the whole trip, I hope. So let's dive in!

Entry #076: Saturday, April 19, 2014 (Torrance, CA)

Alright, here we are: the final normal narrative entry! Don't worry; I'm not going to stop here! Truth be told, I'd hate to close this out on such a dull note. I might be posting another entry about my re-acclimating to life in the US (if that turns out to be a thing), and I'll definitely be posting a retrospective entry, giving my overall impressions of the trip, plus some interesting factoids (seriously, try to guess the total word count of this blog). But let's not focus on the future, let's focus on the past! What happened in the last few days of my trip? Uhhh....not much. But let's check out what that "not much" entails!

Entry #075: Monday, April 14, 2014 (Guayaquil, Ecuador)

Back in Guayaquil, well past my one-year anniversary, a few days from returning back to the United States, and lemme tell ya, folks, it's been a bit of an emotional roller coaster for me, inasmuch as I can feel emotion. I'll explain more within the entry, but needless to say, there's been a veritable hodgepodge of feels. So let's look into what brought about said feels in the last few days, as this may be my last entry before my days will be filled with photo uploading and other computer-planning thingamajigs, which make for terribly dull narratives. So let's hop to it!

Entry #070: Friday, March 28, 2014 (Guayaquil, Ecuador)

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.

Entry #068: Tuesday, March 18, 2014 (Cusco, Peru)

Hey now, I'm back from four days without Internet, and what's the first thing I do when I get it back? I write a blog entry for you, of course! Can't you see how much I love you all? "But Andrew," you may be asking, "Why didn't you have Internet for four days?" Well, you may remember that I mentioned I was going to be going on the Inca Trail. I, um...yeah. That's pretty much it. I was on the Inca Trail, hence no Internet. But hey, let's read about it right now!

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 #058: Wednesday, February 5, 2014 (Auckland, New Zealand)

Wow, can you believe it's already February? I kinda can, but it's still pretty trippy. At this moment, I only have about two-and-a-half months left on my trip, and a scant few days in New Zealand. And now I'm in Auckland, the unquestionably largest city in the country, and my plans are...very unexciting. 'Cause that's how I roll: when I'm about to leave a country, I like to slow down and not do as much. But that's not to say the last several days have been uninteresting! Well, the last couple have, but there's plenty to talk about before that! So let's do it to it!

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 #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 047: Tuesday, December 17, 2013 (Christchurch, New Zealand)

Well, I'm in my new home...for the next seven weeks, at least. Yes, I won't have to deal with boarding airplanes until sometime in February (at which point I'll have a 41-hour flight). Hurray! Instead, I'll just be getting on bus after bus after bus. But I haven't noted where I am yet, have I? ...I'm in New Zealand. There. No major adventures yet, but I should have the opportunities to see some cool things while I'm here. It's funny, my mom sent me a email saying how it's been my dream to visit New Zealand. At this point, I'm not sure if I really have any dreams or aspirations; not the way other people do, at least. I just do things. But brief psychological musings aside, I have always had an real interest in visiting New Zealand, even before it was Middle Earth. Now, allow me to take off my hipster glasses and let's talk about the last couple days.

Entry #044: Tuesday, December 3, 2013 (Sydney, Australia)

Ah, Sydney. It seems like just a week ago I arrived. In fact, it was eight days, and I'm just about ready to head on to new and different places...in Australia, still...but it's been quite eventful, has it not? And the time I spent in the Blue Mountains, don't you remember when...oh, wait, I haven't talked about that part yet, have I? Well, as it turns out, that just happened, so let's have a look. I'll give you a spoiler: I probably should have died! But before I go on, I will quickly note that today, for maybe the sixth time on this trip, I have been told (in various ways) that I have an almost quintessential American accent. So keep that in mind: my voice is representing you and everything your nation stands for. (Unless you're not from the US. In which case, um, ignore that last sentence.)

Entry #042: Thursday, November 21, 2013 (Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam)

Today marks a big page turn in my trip. Well, "today" meaning "the last couple days and the next couple days in addition to today." There's the turn in that I'm now done with the three-week cycling tour, the turn that my mom is making her way back to the States, and the turn that I will soon be leaving Asia for a new continent. So, lots of stuff! In fact, it makes me somewhat glad that, economic center of the country aside, Ho Chi Minh City/Saigon is actually a fairly boring place, with few attractions, as it allows me plenty of decompression time. So let's use that time and take a look at what's been happenin'.

Entry #041: Thursday, November 14, 2013 (Takéo, Cambodia)

Well, it's my last night in Cambodia. What can I say? Well, plenty, apparently, as here's a full entry about the last couple days. And hey, ain't it kinda nifty that this only came out a few days after the last one? Maybe i should try that more often. *Cough* Anyway, it's been a wild swing of highs and lows these last couple days for Mother and Son Schnorr. So let's not waste any time in the preamble. I'll give you a spoiler though: there's going to be a lot of cycling mentioned. Shhh....

Entry #040: Saturday, November 9, 2013 (Sihanoukville, Cambodia)

So, I'm starting out a new planned trip, cycling through Southeast Asia with my mother. Well, I don't know if "starting" will be the appropriate word by the time this posts. I'll be honest, I've been putting off writing this entry - just haven't really been in the mood. If you remember my discussion earlier about "Plan to Do", "Do", and "Review What's Been Done", I have definitely been in the planning state of mind. So that's definitely part of it. Or maybe the last enormous entry has drained me a bit. Whatevs. The fact is, I started writing this on the first day of the cycling trip; you'll probably figure out when it was posted by the end of it. [EDIT: As of me posting this, it's now Day 12 of the trip, more than halfway through the entire thing, meaning that "starting" couldn't be less appropriate. In fact, I should have just changed this opening paragraph.]

I know, I know, I'm rambling. I'll get on with it.

Entry #039: Thursday, October 24, 2013 (Bangkok, Thailand)

Hey there! It's been a while. Not that I've been lazy! At least, no more than usual. No, it's because I was in the Himalayas without a PC. Yeah, I know I said I'd put up a "gone fishin'" interlude post but...that never happened. (*Cough.*) If you're wondering about my Everest Base Camp blog/podcast "spectacular" (and I don't use those quotation marks lightly), that'll be up shortly; the audio (all 7+[!] hours of it) is all uploaded online; I just need to get the post organized. And once it's up, this entire paragraph will be rendered obsolete!

Speaking about obsolescence, how about me? Hey, remember that I was in Singapore? Of course not, because that just happened. I was planning on writing from Singapore (being, like Hong Kong, one of those places that just needs a single name, no "City, Country" format required), but as I'll explain in a bit more detail later, I have three options of things to do on this trip - planning to do things, doing things, and reviewing things I've done (either by writing or sorting through photos). My time in Singapore was mainly spent on the first two. But why take my word for it? Let's get into the haps for what happened since I left Kathmandu!

Entry #033: Saturday, September 7, 2013 (Cape Town, South Africa)

Another week finished, and now I'm almost done with my time in Cape Town and, indeed, South Africa. Not quite there yet, so I'll hold off on my reflections about this leg of my trip, but man does it feel accomplished. They say you can do everything in Cape Town, and it feels like I have, many things in an impromptu fashion. It's been great, and hopefully will be capped off well. But let's get into what's been going on the last few days, shall we?

Entry #027: Saturday, August 3, 2013 (Pidwa Wilderness Reserve, South Africa)

Wow, has it been nearly a week already? Time can seriously fly around here. Though to be honest, the main reason I haven't had any updates in all this time is because I've been doing updates in another way - posting pictures to my Facebook account. Now, this may seem like the worst excuse, but keep in mind, we're not talking a couple pictures - we're talking upwards of over a thousand when all is said and done. And then take into consideration that it's a slow upload speed here, and then take into consideration the fact that I need to (or at the very least, should) write captions for each of them, and then take into consideration the fact that sometimes Facebook messes up, forcing me to start over, and you have yourself a slow-going process. It ends up just exhausting me, making blogging seem less desirable.

But enough with excuses, let's cover some of the stuff that happened this week. (Oh, and I think I'll be posting links to all my photo albums up once I've gotten the first couple South Africa ones done. Though you could always just follow me on Facebook to keep up to date on it.)

Entry #025: Wednesday, July 24, 2013 (Pidwa Wilderness Reserve, South Africa)

You want to know where the most annoying place to get a splinter is? Well, I don't know for sure, but I'd wager one of the top contender is just on the top knuckle of one of your index fingers. I would know, as I have one right now, and every slight movement with that finger is an annoyance, even after digging out most of the wood. I'm telling you this because...um...

Anyway, this weekend went...differently than I had anticipated. Not in a bad way necessarily, although I don't know if I'd call our activities adventures or misadventures. I'll tell you one thing, though - I've been involved with vehicle incidents three times in as many days. But we'll get to that.

Entry #004: Saturday, April 13, 2012 (Tetouan, Morocco)

So, I had a bit of a hiccup in programming, and it's been an interesting couple days as a result.

Shortly after my last blog post, I was contacting my Couchsurfing host in Martil, Morocco (it's a beach town), and jut confirming our meet-up. My host then wrote back to me saying that he wasn't going to be in town until the 14th. In fact, he had told me about this earlier, but I misunderstood. Add to that the fact that it was because his father was sick, and I couldn't be angry. I could, however, be a bit concerned.