As I write this I'm on the tail end of the flight to Delhi. Fortunately, I largely got over the cold I caught earlier in the week, so I was able to board the plane without being too much under the weather. With the help of a NyQuil and an Abmien, was able to get a good 5 hours sleep early during the 15-hour nonstop flight from Chicago, and I've spent the rest of the time trying to make more detailed plans for the trip. This is what I'm going to try to do, day-by-day:
-arrive in Delhi
-Delhi
-Delhi
-flight to Varanasi
-Varanasi
-morning flight to Khajuraho
-Khajuraho
-get to Agra
-Agra
-head to Jaipur
-Jaipur and Amber fort
-Pushkar and Ajmer
-travel to Jodhpur
-Jodhpur, night train to Jaisalmer
-Jaisalmer, night train back to Jodhpur
-travel to Udaipur
-Udaipur
-fly to Hyderabad
-Hyderabad
-fly back to Delhi, fly home at night
I've actually a couple more days to use on my trip. Those will be flex days I can use wherever, so I don't have to be constantly worrying about keeping to a strict schedule. To do this the flights to Varanasi and Khajuraho will also still have to be available by the time I get to the hotel and can book them (fingers crossed). I also may jumble the order in which I'll do Jodhpur and Udaipur. I'm actually taking the first part of the trip a little slower than I had wanted to, but that's by necessity. My original plan had me getting to Agra and the Taj Mahal a day earlier, but I realized that unfortunately, that would put me there on a Friday (the Taj is an active mosque, so it's closed for everyone by worshippers on Friday).
Hopefully they're going to feed us soon here. There's a 12-hour gap on this flight between dinner and breakfast. I slept for a good chunk of it and ate a Clif bar and some snacks, but still, I'm starving. It's too bad the sun has already gone down. It would be interesting to see what's on the ground. We took a northeasterly route out of Chicago, flying directly over Greenland, across the Arctic Ocean, just barely skimming the top of the Scandinavian countries, and then came down through Russia. We're flying into the sun, so during the short window of daylight all I was able to see was a cloud carpet underneath us or empty Siberian snow cover. According to the flight path information on the entertainment system, we appear to be passing over what I believe is Uzbekistan and northern Afghanistan at moment. If we hold this course, it actually appears like we'll fly right by Kabul in the next 20 minutes. Good times.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011
I'm off to India
Just about to head to the airport. I'm a little rushed as I had a last minute explosion of work today, but should have no problem making it in time. Just double-checking everything I packed, and seeing if I can get some more last-minute planning in. I still don't know exactly where I'm going to go after Delhi, but hopefully with a little more research on the plane and maybe some input from the peeps at the hotel in Delhi I can commit to a plan. At this point it's either a plane Varanasi or straight to Agra via train.
See you on the other side of the planet.
See you on the other side of the planet.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Buenos Aires, San Clemente, Uruguay, and Out
So the show is all wrapped up now. I finished with 9 more days, mostly in Buenos Aires, but with a couple dips into other spots in the area. Buenos Aires was great. It's got tons of great turn of the century architecture, so I was able to amuse myself for a couple days just walking around the neighborhoods and soaking it all up. Other highlights include the food. Everybody talks about the great Argentinean steak, but while that was quite good, I generally preferred the more sophisticated restaurants where you'd get cuisine prepared with a little more flair and panache to the parrilla joints where you pick up a mountainous pile of grilled meat with side salads and bread. The highlight was the 8-course me we got at Pura Tierra on Thursday (thanks for the tip, Audi!). All 8 courses were at least very good, and often excellent, and we were able to get a wine pairing including 4 full glasses. We actually ended up getting more as they were actually refilling our glasses as we emptied them. Due to the quantity of wine consumed, I’m a little foggy on what all the different courses were, but overall it was a fantastic experience, particularly when you consider that this feast cost us a paltry $65 each.
The other big food highlight is the Italian grub. Because there were so many Italian immigrants to Argentina, the Italian food is plentiful, of generally very good quality, and an excellent value just like everything else you put in your stomach there. The highlight here was the house-made black squid-ink seafood pasta I had right before skipping town on Saturday night. And as with any place with serious Italian roots, there’s great gelato. Several times I ended up skipping breakfast so I could have gelato for my first meal of the day.
While there I of course did a lot of your standard BA stuff: went to the Recoleta cemetery, caught a tango show, went to a milonga/tango club, Boca, did some shopping, etc. The tango show we went to was touristy, but really fantastic. Laura, who is somewhat of an authority on such things, said it was by far the best tango performance she had ever seen. The tango club we went to afterwards was also pretty cool, although not being a tango dancer this got old for me pretty quick (social tango dancing isn’t exactly the most exciting spectator sport). Nevertheless, I think it’s obligatory to at least check out a milonga, so I went and watched Laura and all her tango pals dance around in slow circles for a couple hours while I pounded cocktails and empanadas.
While in BA I spent one day doing a day-trip to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay. It’s a neat place, but I’m glad I just did a day-trip instead of spending the night like I had originally planned. You can easily check out all the historic parts of the city in a couple hours. Also, the place really slows down at night and there aren’t very many interesting places to eat at after 4:00 PM. This was particularly aggravating for me as I wanted to get a second nice meal in before catching the ferry back across the delta to Buenos Aires. As a result, I had to settle for a basic parilla place and some blood sausage. Don’t get me wrong, I love blood sausage, but the same thing is available all over Argentina and I was hoping to partake in that reputedly great Uruguayan seafood instead. There was, however, plenty of opportunity to suck down some Uruguayan wine. What I had I was pretty impressed with.
After arriving in Buenos Aires we also took a 2-day trip with Laura’s aunt and uncle to their vacation house in a small beach town called San Clemente a few hours south of BA. Since school had recently started in Argentina, the place had officially hit the off-season and things were pretty slow as a result. It was also a bit more mellow since our buddy Diego wasn’t able to join us, so it was a pretty small crowd. It was nice to relax for a couple days, though. We hit the beach, drove around in her uncle’s ATV, hit the saltwater springs and spa, and got to enjoy her uncle’s fantastic cooking a couple times.
Overall this was a really great trip. I could definitely go back to any of these countries a second time. I think I’d like to do Bolivia, possibly some of Peru, and the northern parts of Chile and Argentina (Atacama desert, Salta, Iguazu) for one trip. I could easily make a trip out of southern Argentina and Chile (Torres del Paine, Tierra del Fuego, Perito Moreno Glacier, Lakes District), as well. There are some spots I’d like to put more due-diligence into Colombia on, too, particularly other areas on the Caribbean coast and some of the archaeological sights in the southwest. Looks like I’ll have plenty of tough decisions to make for next year…
The other big food highlight is the Italian grub. Because there were so many Italian immigrants to Argentina, the Italian food is plentiful, of generally very good quality, and an excellent value just like everything else you put in your stomach there. The highlight here was the house-made black squid-ink seafood pasta I had right before skipping town on Saturday night. And as with any place with serious Italian roots, there’s great gelato. Several times I ended up skipping breakfast so I could have gelato for my first meal of the day.
While there I of course did a lot of your standard BA stuff: went to the Recoleta cemetery, caught a tango show, went to a milonga/tango club, Boca, did some shopping, etc. The tango show we went to was touristy, but really fantastic. Laura, who is somewhat of an authority on such things, said it was by far the best tango performance she had ever seen. The tango club we went to afterwards was also pretty cool, although not being a tango dancer this got old for me pretty quick (social tango dancing isn’t exactly the most exciting spectator sport). Nevertheless, I think it’s obligatory to at least check out a milonga, so I went and watched Laura and all her tango pals dance around in slow circles for a couple hours while I pounded cocktails and empanadas.
While in BA I spent one day doing a day-trip to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay. It’s a neat place, but I’m glad I just did a day-trip instead of spending the night like I had originally planned. You can easily check out all the historic parts of the city in a couple hours. Also, the place really slows down at night and there aren’t very many interesting places to eat at after 4:00 PM. This was particularly aggravating for me as I wanted to get a second nice meal in before catching the ferry back across the delta to Buenos Aires. As a result, I had to settle for a basic parilla place and some blood sausage. Don’t get me wrong, I love blood sausage, but the same thing is available all over Argentina and I was hoping to partake in that reputedly great Uruguayan seafood instead. There was, however, plenty of opportunity to suck down some Uruguayan wine. What I had I was pretty impressed with.
After arriving in Buenos Aires we also took a 2-day trip with Laura’s aunt and uncle to their vacation house in a small beach town called San Clemente a few hours south of BA. Since school had recently started in Argentina, the place had officially hit the off-season and things were pretty slow as a result. It was also a bit more mellow since our buddy Diego wasn’t able to join us, so it was a pretty small crowd. It was nice to relax for a couple days, though. We hit the beach, drove around in her uncle’s ATV, hit the saltwater springs and spa, and got to enjoy her uncle’s fantastic cooking a couple times.
Overall this was a really great trip. I could definitely go back to any of these countries a second time. I think I’d like to do Bolivia, possibly some of Peru, and the northern parts of Chile and Argentina (Atacama desert, Salta, Iguazu) for one trip. I could easily make a trip out of southern Argentina and Chile (Torres del Paine, Tierra del Fuego, Perito Moreno Glacier, Lakes District), as well. There are some spots I’d like to put more due-diligence into Colombia on, too, particularly other areas on the Caribbean coast and some of the archaeological sights in the southwest. Looks like I’ll have plenty of tough decisions to make for next year…
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Córdoba
Córdoba was a cute little town. Based on some feedback Laura passed on from some Argentinean friends, I was a little concerned, but apparently there was nothing to worry about. I really enjoyed the place. It has several of the most beautiful churches I’ve seen outside of Europe, a really atmospheric pedestrian part to the town center, and a very lively and upbeat vibe due to all the young people there for the various universities (do the words “eye candy” mean anything?). While it’s not exactly Paris, it was well worth a one day stop on the way to BA from Mendoza.
It seemed to be a pretty religious town, and because I got there late in the afternoon by the time I set out most of the churches were having services. In some ways this was good as it allowed me to get in and take photos, although I had to be pretty discrete and couldn’t take many. I didn’t want to appear to be the jackass tourist taking photos during mass. I realize that I was, in fact, a jackass tourist taking photos during mass, but at least I didn’t want to advertise the fact, right?
It seemed to be a pretty religious town, and because I got there late in the afternoon by the time I set out most of the churches were having services. In some ways this was good as it allowed me to get in and take photos, although I had to be pretty discrete and couldn’t take many. I didn’t want to appear to be the jackass tourist taking photos during mass. I realize that I was, in fact, a jackass tourist taking photos during mass, but at least I didn’t want to advertise the fact, right?
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Mendoza
Everybody reading this probably already knows what I spent my time doing in Mendoza. I got a jump on the wine tasting my first full day by taking a full-day up-market winery tour in the Lujan de Cuyo wine region with a group of 5 other people I had arranged ahead of time. It was pretty pricey by Argentine standards, but was well worth it. The tour at the first winery was absolutely fabulous, as were the wines (if you can find them in stores in the US, check out the higher-end lines of Bodega Benagas). While definitely not at the same level, the other winery tastings and tours were nice as well, and the lunch we had at the restaurant of one of the wineries was absolutely superb. Of course, the entrée was a perfectly juicy and tender (despite being slightly overcooked) Argentinean steak.
I had planned on doing some more tasting that night, but my palate was still pretty burnt out. Instead I just recouped a bit in my hotel and then hit dinner at a place recommended by the sommelier that led our tour that day. It certainly didn’t disappoint. Both the sweetbreads with a nectarine and torrontes chutney and the grilled pork chop with a blueberry malbec sauce were killer.
In contrast to my high-class testing setup on Monday, on Tuesday I went wine tasting with the riff-raff. There’s a very popular wine tasting bicycle route that a lot of people do in Mendoza. It’s in a town near Mendoza called Maipú which has a bunch of wineries conveniently located along a 10 km stretch of road. You just catch a bus there, rent a bike and get a trail map from any one of a numerous set of bicycle shops, and shove off. Although there are exceptions, the wineries on this route are more of the down-market or mass-market type (or both). The first place I went was a place the sommelier from Monday recommended, and that was a definite winner. It dropped off from there, though. In addition, much of the bike wasn’t particularly scenic (while a lot of Mendoza is stunning with all the vineyards with snow-capped mountains in the background, the city of Maipú isn’t exactly Oakville), and the road wasn’t very good for biking. There was no side path or groomed shoulder to the road, so you either had to ride in the narrow street and trust the cars coming behind you to avoid you, or you had to bike on the ungroomed side of the road which was riddled with rocks the size of softballs. In addition, the road was really lousy and had huge fissures in it. My prostate was killing me after about 20 minutes. As such, I didn’t stick around too long. I tasted at a couple wineries, grabbed some grub at one place, and split. The grub was actually the highlight of the ride. I got it from this really flash winery that would fit right in at Napa which had phenomenally good sandwiches, although the wine there was pretty unimpressive.
Leaving early allowed time for me to hit the big wine bar in downtown Mendoza that evening. I ended up being pretty popular as I brought a rare bottle of wine that the guide of my fancy tour gave me as a gift. I brought it out as I didn’t want to pack it in my luggage on my next several flights, so I was planning on having it with dinner. Instead, we pulled the cork on it at the wine bar and we passed it around amongst the staff for tasting.
After that it was to what was supposedly the best parrilla in town for some traditional Argentinean asado. The grilled meats I got were OK, flavorful but a little too tough, and once again the side salad of tomatoes and onion came out undressed. C’mon man! Undressed salad! WTF! It wasn’t even seasoned! How in the name of Christ can you create a tomato salad without any salt? Unseasoned tomatoes are an abomination unto man, as far as I’m concerned (as is unseasoned anything, for that matter, but particularly tomatoes). This is apparently a situation I’m going to have to adapt to around these parts. Maybe I need to start walking around with my own stash of sea salt and a pepper grinder.
Leaving culinary issues aside, if you want to check out some gorgeous Mendoza scenery you can do so here.
I had planned on doing some more tasting that night, but my palate was still pretty burnt out. Instead I just recouped a bit in my hotel and then hit dinner at a place recommended by the sommelier that led our tour that day. It certainly didn’t disappoint. Both the sweetbreads with a nectarine and torrontes chutney and the grilled pork chop with a blueberry malbec sauce were killer.
In contrast to my high-class testing setup on Monday, on Tuesday I went wine tasting with the riff-raff. There’s a very popular wine tasting bicycle route that a lot of people do in Mendoza. It’s in a town near Mendoza called Maipú which has a bunch of wineries conveniently located along a 10 km stretch of road. You just catch a bus there, rent a bike and get a trail map from any one of a numerous set of bicycle shops, and shove off. Although there are exceptions, the wineries on this route are more of the down-market or mass-market type (or both). The first place I went was a place the sommelier from Monday recommended, and that was a definite winner. It dropped off from there, though. In addition, much of the bike wasn’t particularly scenic (while a lot of Mendoza is stunning with all the vineyards with snow-capped mountains in the background, the city of Maipú isn’t exactly Oakville), and the road wasn’t very good for biking. There was no side path or groomed shoulder to the road, so you either had to ride in the narrow street and trust the cars coming behind you to avoid you, or you had to bike on the ungroomed side of the road which was riddled with rocks the size of softballs. In addition, the road was really lousy and had huge fissures in it. My prostate was killing me after about 20 minutes. As such, I didn’t stick around too long. I tasted at a couple wineries, grabbed some grub at one place, and split. The grub was actually the highlight of the ride. I got it from this really flash winery that would fit right in at Napa which had phenomenally good sandwiches, although the wine there was pretty unimpressive.
Leaving early allowed time for me to hit the big wine bar in downtown Mendoza that evening. I ended up being pretty popular as I brought a rare bottle of wine that the guide of my fancy tour gave me as a gift. I brought it out as I didn’t want to pack it in my luggage on my next several flights, so I was planning on having it with dinner. Instead, we pulled the cork on it at the wine bar and we passed it around amongst the staff for tasting.
After that it was to what was supposedly the best parrilla in town for some traditional Argentinean asado. The grilled meats I got were OK, flavorful but a little too tough, and once again the side salad of tomatoes and onion came out undressed. C’mon man! Undressed salad! WTF! It wasn’t even seasoned! How in the name of Christ can you create a tomato salad without any salt? Unseasoned tomatoes are an abomination unto man, as far as I’m concerned (as is unseasoned anything, for that matter, but particularly tomatoes). This is apparently a situation I’m going to have to adapt to around these parts. Maybe I need to start walking around with my own stash of sea salt and a pepper grinder.
Leaving culinary issues aside, if you want to check out some gorgeous Mendoza scenery you can do so here.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Chile
So I made it in and out of Chile with no incident. My flight from Bogota to Santiago was rescheduled a few days in advance to run an hour later, but aside from that it was right on time. There was apparently a lot of damage to the passenger terminal, so they had set up makeshift facilities for processing everyone. The kept us on the plane for about 15 minutes after we stopped while they removed all out bags and laid them out on the tarmac. We then disembarked the plane, picked our bag off the ground, and followed a set of orange street cones to one of those large while plastic tents where you might have an indoor wedding reception. Inside there they had set up the customs process with processing and baggage screening. After finishing that you just walked out to the airport parking lot where the different rental car and transportation companies were just set up on the sidewalk. You just popped by, waited for your ride, and then headed into the city. Overall, I was pretty impressed with the efficiency of the thing. I've certainly had much bigger hassles at the airport in my day.
In my 2 1/2 days there I never noticed too much damage in either Santiago or Valparaiso. Aside from the airport, I saw two bridge overpasses which had large fissures where the bridge met the land (although both were still open for traffic), one museum whose facade had crumbled a bit, and maybe 4-5 large broken pane glass windows. A few sights were also closed, including the museum with the crumbling facade, one other museum in Viña del Mar, the cable car that takes you to the top of the big hill in Santiago, and another hilltop viewpoint in the city. Aside from these few things, though, it seemed to be pretty much business as usual in the area. All the other museums were open and full of people, the restaurants and cafes were filled with people eating, drinking, and relaxing all weekend, and the night club I went to was packed with people at 3:00 AM. So while the quake obviously is dominating the news and conversation there, everyone seems to be moving on.
The city was really enjoyable. It's a pretty modern city, with lots of older beaux arts and other historical architecture thrown in which gives it a really nice flavor. I spent a full day walking the city center, and another day taking a day trip to Valparaíso. Valpo was really quaint, too, although it didn't pack quite the punch I was expecting. Being a UNESCO World Heritage City, I was expecting something really amazing. It was certainly nice and worth visiting, but I'm glad I didn't plan to spend more time there as it didn't quite live up to the extremely high expectations I had for it.
The food was generally pretty good in Chile, too. After spending 15 days in Colombia I was certainly ready for something different. The grub in Colombia was nice, but I had become thoroughly burnt-out on fried food after my first week (they deep fry damn near everything in that county outside of the really high-end restaurants). So I was really looking forward to some of that fresh Chilean seafood. The place I went on my first night didn’t disappoint. I had a grilled octopus with ratatouille and some kind of egg dough construction, a sautéed sea bass filet with assorted mushrooms and a porcini mushroom broth, and a light banana and mango soup with fresh berries for dessert, all of which were killer. I paired these with a Chilean Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, each of which drank like a bottle of fine Burgundy 3 times their price. If I recall correctly, this grand feast cost me a total of around $45 US.
After this I was figuring I was going to eat like a king every meal of the day the rest of my vacation. Unfortunately, it turns out the place I went to isn’t representative of the food scene as a whole. I went to the Santiago fish market the next morning, during which I hit one of the little mom-and pop stalls around the market for what I was expecting to be the best piece of swordfish I’d ever had. What they brought me smelled pretty bad, and tasted even worse. It took me 10 minutes to wash the nasty taste out of my mouth. They replaced it with something else, which while not rancid like the first item, was still a little underwhelming. I had a similar experience that night for dinner. At this place I ordered a Patagonian deer tenderloin which came out overcooked. I also had a salad with proscuitto which came out undressed and, as far as I could tell, unseasoned. Now, I can cut Colombia some slack from my particular brand of food fascism, but Chile? C’mon man! You’re a developed country! Undressed salad? WTF!!!
That being said, the quality of the food is still quite good, even when prepared without much flair or panache. They grow just about every kind of produce imaginable in Chile, so everything is very fresh. So even when things are prepared very simply, like a sautéed sea bream with (undressed!) avocado salad on the side, it’s still quite good. And you can always get the kind of modern preparation at upscale places, which will cost you just a fraction of what it would back home.
On Sunday I caught my bus to Mendoza. We can chalk this one up as yet another drive that is worth taking simply for the views, regardless of whether you need to get anywhere or not. Chile’s Maipo wine region is right by the city (it’s so close you can take a taxi to some of the wineries), so we passed though that on the way. Central Chile is a desert, so I got some really interesting photos of vineyards with the desert mountains in the background. The portion of the drive right before we got into Argentina was also a stunner. It’s a good thing Laura wasn’t with me, as you have to make about 30 hairpin turns in about 10 minutes for the steep climb right before the border, which given her bus travel issues would have undoubtedly ended with her lunch on the floor.
I also got some nice snaps on the Argentina side. I’ll get everything posted ASAP.
In my 2 1/2 days there I never noticed too much damage in either Santiago or Valparaiso. Aside from the airport, I saw two bridge overpasses which had large fissures where the bridge met the land (although both were still open for traffic), one museum whose facade had crumbled a bit, and maybe 4-5 large broken pane glass windows. A few sights were also closed, including the museum with the crumbling facade, one other museum in Viña del Mar, the cable car that takes you to the top of the big hill in Santiago, and another hilltop viewpoint in the city. Aside from these few things, though, it seemed to be pretty much business as usual in the area. All the other museums were open and full of people, the restaurants and cafes were filled with people eating, drinking, and relaxing all weekend, and the night club I went to was packed with people at 3:00 AM. So while the quake obviously is dominating the news and conversation there, everyone seems to be moving on.
The city was really enjoyable. It's a pretty modern city, with lots of older beaux arts and other historical architecture thrown in which gives it a really nice flavor. I spent a full day walking the city center, and another day taking a day trip to Valparaíso. Valpo was really quaint, too, although it didn't pack quite the punch I was expecting. Being a UNESCO World Heritage City, I was expecting something really amazing. It was certainly nice and worth visiting, but I'm glad I didn't plan to spend more time there as it didn't quite live up to the extremely high expectations I had for it.
The food was generally pretty good in Chile, too. After spending 15 days in Colombia I was certainly ready for something different. The grub in Colombia was nice, but I had become thoroughly burnt-out on fried food after my first week (they deep fry damn near everything in that county outside of the really high-end restaurants). So I was really looking forward to some of that fresh Chilean seafood. The place I went on my first night didn’t disappoint. I had a grilled octopus with ratatouille and some kind of egg dough construction, a sautéed sea bass filet with assorted mushrooms and a porcini mushroom broth, and a light banana and mango soup with fresh berries for dessert, all of which were killer. I paired these with a Chilean Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, each of which drank like a bottle of fine Burgundy 3 times their price. If I recall correctly, this grand feast cost me a total of around $45 US.
After this I was figuring I was going to eat like a king every meal of the day the rest of my vacation. Unfortunately, it turns out the place I went to isn’t representative of the food scene as a whole. I went to the Santiago fish market the next morning, during which I hit one of the little mom-and pop stalls around the market for what I was expecting to be the best piece of swordfish I’d ever had. What they brought me smelled pretty bad, and tasted even worse. It took me 10 minutes to wash the nasty taste out of my mouth. They replaced it with something else, which while not rancid like the first item, was still a little underwhelming. I had a similar experience that night for dinner. At this place I ordered a Patagonian deer tenderloin which came out overcooked. I also had a salad with proscuitto which came out undressed and, as far as I could tell, unseasoned. Now, I can cut Colombia some slack from my particular brand of food fascism, but Chile? C’mon man! You’re a developed country! Undressed salad? WTF!!!
That being said, the quality of the food is still quite good, even when prepared without much flair or panache. They grow just about every kind of produce imaginable in Chile, so everything is very fresh. So even when things are prepared very simply, like a sautéed sea bream with (undressed!) avocado salad on the side, it’s still quite good. And you can always get the kind of modern preparation at upscale places, which will cost you just a fraction of what it would back home.
On Sunday I caught my bus to Mendoza. We can chalk this one up as yet another drive that is worth taking simply for the views, regardless of whether you need to get anywhere or not. Chile’s Maipo wine region is right by the city (it’s so close you can take a taxi to some of the wineries), so we passed though that on the way. Central Chile is a desert, so I got some really interesting photos of vineyards with the desert mountains in the background. The portion of the drive right before we got into Argentina was also a stunner. It’s a good thing Laura wasn’t with me, as you have to make about 30 hairpin turns in about 10 minutes for the steep climb right before the border, which given her bus travel issues would have undoubtedly ended with her lunch on the floor.
I also got some nice snaps on the Argentina side. I’ll get everything posted ASAP.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Salento, Valle de Corcoca, and Bogota
After Medellín I headed to Salento, a small town in the Zona Cafeteria. I was considering plopping down a little extra cash and flying, but I’m really glad I didn’t, as I got in a great conversation with a charming woman that lives in the area and because, much as was the case with Santa Fe, the bus ride there had some really amazing scenery. In Colombia it appears that the bus rides are attractions in themselves.
It just got better from there. Salento is a small town in the region of the country where most of the coffee is produced. It was a puny little town, surrounded by coffee plantations and located nearby the Valle de Corcora. I was only there for one day and two nights. The first thing I did on the day I was there was take a long 6 hr hike in the Valle de Corcora. A lot of the scenery I saw on the hike was almost unbelievably beautiful. Just check out the photos and you’ll see (bear in mind, though, that it still doesn’t look nearly as impressive in the photos as it does in person).
In the afternoon I took a tour of a finca (coffee farm) run by the same British chap that owns the hostel I stayed in. He was a pretty engaging guy and the tour was really fascinating, even for a non-coffee drinker like me. The farm itself was really beautiful, too. I spent a fair amount of time just walking around the finca taking photos after he finished his tour.
One thing that really surprised me was the town itself. I arrived after dark, so I was under the impression that that town was in a valley or otherwise relatively flat area. I was pretty shocked when I woke up the next morning and walked out of my room and saw that the town was perched on the top of a mountain with hillsides and coffee plantations sprawled around it.
The next morning I took a short bus ride to Armenia where I caught my flight to Bogota.
I didn’t have much time in Bogota, and I knew I was going to have to spend a fair amount of time sorting out the deal with Chile, so I headed right out into sightseeing when I got there. Despite not getting in until 3:00, I was able to tick off all the historic sights on the first day. I was also able to catch up with a friend of a friend that happened to be in town for dinner and drinks.
One day two I did a couple other standard tourist things, and then spent a fair amount of time shopping. I won’t say what as I don’t want to spoil the surprise for somebody that I know will be reading this, but let’s just say it was good.
Bogota wasn’t my favorite city to visit, but I think that was partly due to where I was based and had to spend most of my time due to the locations of the tourist sights. Unlike the neighborhood where I stayed in Medellín, the neighborhood I was in was pretty gritty. Unfortunately, due to the short amount of time I had and the Chili mess, I had little time to explore the nicer neighborhoods farther north. I was able to get there for dinner with my pal on night one, though, and from what I saw I was pretty impressed. There were lots of nice restaurants and little cafes, which as I understand it is pretty characteristic of that part of town. I also didn’t have any time to really party at all. I suppose I’ll have to be a little more thorough next time I’m around.
It just got better from there. Salento is a small town in the region of the country where most of the coffee is produced. It was a puny little town, surrounded by coffee plantations and located nearby the Valle de Corcora. I was only there for one day and two nights. The first thing I did on the day I was there was take a long 6 hr hike in the Valle de Corcora. A lot of the scenery I saw on the hike was almost unbelievably beautiful. Just check out the photos and you’ll see (bear in mind, though, that it still doesn’t look nearly as impressive in the photos as it does in person).
In the afternoon I took a tour of a finca (coffee farm) run by the same British chap that owns the hostel I stayed in. He was a pretty engaging guy and the tour was really fascinating, even for a non-coffee drinker like me. The farm itself was really beautiful, too. I spent a fair amount of time just walking around the finca taking photos after he finished his tour.
One thing that really surprised me was the town itself. I arrived after dark, so I was under the impression that that town was in a valley or otherwise relatively flat area. I was pretty shocked when I woke up the next morning and walked out of my room and saw that the town was perched on the top of a mountain with hillsides and coffee plantations sprawled around it.
The next morning I took a short bus ride to Armenia where I caught my flight to Bogota.
I didn’t have much time in Bogota, and I knew I was going to have to spend a fair amount of time sorting out the deal with Chile, so I headed right out into sightseeing when I got there. Despite not getting in until 3:00, I was able to tick off all the historic sights on the first day. I was also able to catch up with a friend of a friend that happened to be in town for dinner and drinks.
One day two I did a couple other standard tourist things, and then spent a fair amount of time shopping. I won’t say what as I don’t want to spoil the surprise for somebody that I know will be reading this, but let’s just say it was good.
Bogota wasn’t my favorite city to visit, but I think that was partly due to where I was based and had to spend most of my time due to the locations of the tourist sights. Unlike the neighborhood where I stayed in Medellín, the neighborhood I was in was pretty gritty. Unfortunately, due to the short amount of time I had and the Chili mess, I had little time to explore the nicer neighborhoods farther north. I was able to get there for dinner with my pal on night one, though, and from what I saw I was pretty impressed. There were lots of nice restaurants and little cafes, which as I understand it is pretty characteristic of that part of town. I also didn’t have any time to really party at all. I suppose I’ll have to be a little more thorough next time I’m around.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Continuing to Chile
As it turns out, my flight tomorrow to Santiago is still going. The airport has had significant damage to its passenger terminal, so they've had to create makeshift facilities and as a result are only operating with 20% of their originally scheduled traffic, but as it turns out my flight is one of the 20% that is going. So for better or for worse, I’m continuing as originally planned.
So long as I can get there, things should be OK. I’ve touched base with the hostel where I’m staying and a friend that happened to also be there this week and it sounds like the things in the places we are going and the basic infrastructure of the city and public transportation systems (with the exception of the airport) are pretty much back to business as usual. Of course the hostel owner might have a biased opinion on this as she doesn’t want to lose any more income streams than she already is as a result of the earthquake. I can always play it by ear, and if I find it’s not appropriate for me to be there once I arrive I can always bump up my plans and catch my bus to Mendoza the very next morning after I arrive (I was told the bus system in Santiago has been fully operational since Monday).
The biggest problem at this point was not being able to meet Laura there as we had planned. She wasn’t as lucky as I, and her flight was canceled. She was able to set up some alternate flights so she can continue the rest of her vacation, but we won’t be meeting in Chile. As a result I had to cancel a day trip with a private driver to a few wineries, Valparaíso, and Viña del Mar. I’m pretty bummed out about it as I was really looking forward to it, but I’m certainly not dwelling on it. In comparison to all the people in the parts of Chile that were hard-hit by the quake and have had their homes destroyed or lost family and friends, messing up my trip itinerary a bit is a rather insignificant issue.
So long as I can get there, things should be OK. I’ve touched base with the hostel where I’m staying and a friend that happened to also be there this week and it sounds like the things in the places we are going and the basic infrastructure of the city and public transportation systems (with the exception of the airport) are pretty much back to business as usual. Of course the hostel owner might have a biased opinion on this as she doesn’t want to lose any more income streams than she already is as a result of the earthquake. I can always play it by ear, and if I find it’s not appropriate for me to be there once I arrive I can always bump up my plans and catch my bus to Mendoza the very next morning after I arrive (I was told the bus system in Santiago has been fully operational since Monday).
The biggest problem at this point was not being able to meet Laura there as we had planned. She wasn’t as lucky as I, and her flight was canceled. She was able to set up some alternate flights so she can continue the rest of her vacation, but we won’t be meeting in Chile. As a result I had to cancel a day trip with a private driver to a few wineries, Valparaíso, and Viña del Mar. I’m pretty bummed out about it as I was really looking forward to it, but I’m certainly not dwelling on it. In comparison to all the people in the parts of Chile that were hard-hit by the quake and have had their homes destroyed or lost family and friends, messing up my trip itinerary a bit is a rather insignificant issue.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Medellín
So after my initial couple hours in Medellín, I got a more balanced perspective on the city. As it turns out, the part of the city I'm staying in, El Poblado, is one of the nicest neighborhoods and isn't particularly representative of the city. You've got a pretty wide range from the upscale neighborhoods the likes of which I was staying in, to more middle-class areas, to grittier parts and some of the slums up in the hills surrounding the city. Overall, I really loved it there, though. It's a stunning place, there's lots of great nightlife, everybody is friendly, and the climate is fantastic. It was definitely a nice change from the sticky, steamy heat of Cali and Cartagena.
I hit most of the tourist highlights on the first day. It was raining on and off, so I didn't make real good progress. In general, the weather wasn't too great when I was there and it was often rainy or overcast. This was a big problem as I really wanted to go paragliding while I was there. With all the mountains surrounding the city and great thermal air currents, Medellín is a major center for this, and you can do it pretty cheap.
On day two I hit the botanical garden in the late morning/early afternoon. After that was the highlight of the city, riding the city’s metro system. Sounds a little boring, but it was an amazing experience. They've got a regular light rail system like larger European cities which is very modern, new, and efficient. There are just two lines, one that runs the length of the valley and a short one that runs perpendicular to it. There’s nothing special about that. The cool part is the two new lines that connect to the rail lines. This is the city’s new MetroCable system which is really just a gondola-style ski lift system which is used to connect the rail system to the neighborhoods way up in the hills. One of these two lines gets up high enough so that my ears popped. I spent the better part of the afternoon riding both lines and up taking photos. I got some fantastic pictures of the city. These probably provide you the best idea of the scope of the city and how it's built into the mountainsides surrounding the river.
At the top of each line I got out and walked around a bit. The top of one of the lines seems to be a new development area where they are constructing a bunch of new condos. However, the other line leads directly to a relatively poor neighborhood, where most of the houses have corrugated metal roofs with bricks laid down on them, apparently to weigh them down and keep them from blowing away. This is pretty typical in Medellín. The nicer neighborhoods are generally down in the valley and the poorest areas are located up in the hills where the accessibility (at least prior to MetroCable) was very poor. Needless to say it isn't the safest place for a lone gringo to go walking around, and as such I kept within a couple blocks of the MetroCable station and was trying to be as inconspicuous as possible with my camera and hence didn't get too many photos. The ones I did get turned out really great, though.
On day three the conditions were finally good enough for paragliding. I say good enough, as they were hardly ideal. On a sunny day the upward thermal drafts allow you to take off from one of the surrounding mountains, at which point in time the currents will catch you and carry you even higher, allowing you to actually land at the same point at which you originally took off. As it was, though, the currents weren't strong enough and as a result we did a slow downward spiral into the city, landing in a field in the valley. This actually worked out better for me, as it meant I didn't have to take a taxi or bus both ways on the long trip up the mountain, and got dropped off within about a mile of the metro system. Aside from the cab driver that hustled me a little on the trip up the mountain, my only complaint would be the landing site. There were horses grazing in the field, and thus we landed in big piles of horse shit. Luckily the only thing that was in contact with the ground was my shoes and the paragliding seat. Because the pilot had to fold up and put away his equipment that landed in the grass, I was a little hesitant to shake his hand when I was done. I did it anyways, but let's just say that I washed my hands very thoroughly before lunch.
In the afternoon I went to a large forest preserve which is connected to the city by another extension to the MetroCable system. The place is largely under construction, so there wasn't too much to see. The cable ride there was probably about the most interesting part. The view when you go over the ridge of the mountain and first see the city beneath you is really breathtaking.
On Saturday I took a day trip to Santa Fe de Antioquia. It's a quaint little colonial town about 1.5 hours from Medellín. It was a cute little place, although it was hotter than Hades there (apparently people from the city go there on the weekend to soak up the heat and sun and go swimming). It was definitely worth going, though, if for no other reason than because it had per capita the highest concentration of Colombian hotties I had yet to see on the trip. There was also some amazing mountain scenery I was able to take in from the bus on the way there. In addition, I met a new friend on the bus. We ended up grabbing dinner that night, and went out for drinks and hit a night club afterward. The two of us polished off an entire bottle of Don Julio at the first bar, and we made pretty good headway into a half bottle of Scotch at the night club, so it ended up being a pretty fun evening. Pretty expensive, but definitely fun.
I hit most of the tourist highlights on the first day. It was raining on and off, so I didn't make real good progress. In general, the weather wasn't too great when I was there and it was often rainy or overcast. This was a big problem as I really wanted to go paragliding while I was there. With all the mountains surrounding the city and great thermal air currents, Medellín is a major center for this, and you can do it pretty cheap.
On day two I hit the botanical garden in the late morning/early afternoon. After that was the highlight of the city, riding the city’s metro system. Sounds a little boring, but it was an amazing experience. They've got a regular light rail system like larger European cities which is very modern, new, and efficient. There are just two lines, one that runs the length of the valley and a short one that runs perpendicular to it. There’s nothing special about that. The cool part is the two new lines that connect to the rail lines. This is the city’s new MetroCable system which is really just a gondola-style ski lift system which is used to connect the rail system to the neighborhoods way up in the hills. One of these two lines gets up high enough so that my ears popped. I spent the better part of the afternoon riding both lines and up taking photos. I got some fantastic pictures of the city. These probably provide you the best idea of the scope of the city and how it's built into the mountainsides surrounding the river.
At the top of each line I got out and walked around a bit. The top of one of the lines seems to be a new development area where they are constructing a bunch of new condos. However, the other line leads directly to a relatively poor neighborhood, where most of the houses have corrugated metal roofs with bricks laid down on them, apparently to weigh them down and keep them from blowing away. This is pretty typical in Medellín. The nicer neighborhoods are generally down in the valley and the poorest areas are located up in the hills where the accessibility (at least prior to MetroCable) was very poor. Needless to say it isn't the safest place for a lone gringo to go walking around, and as such I kept within a couple blocks of the MetroCable station and was trying to be as inconspicuous as possible with my camera and hence didn't get too many photos. The ones I did get turned out really great, though.
On day three the conditions were finally good enough for paragliding. I say good enough, as they were hardly ideal. On a sunny day the upward thermal drafts allow you to take off from one of the surrounding mountains, at which point in time the currents will catch you and carry you even higher, allowing you to actually land at the same point at which you originally took off. As it was, though, the currents weren't strong enough and as a result we did a slow downward spiral into the city, landing in a field in the valley. This actually worked out better for me, as it meant I didn't have to take a taxi or bus both ways on the long trip up the mountain, and got dropped off within about a mile of the metro system. Aside from the cab driver that hustled me a little on the trip up the mountain, my only complaint would be the landing site. There were horses grazing in the field, and thus we landed in big piles of horse shit. Luckily the only thing that was in contact with the ground was my shoes and the paragliding seat. Because the pilot had to fold up and put away his equipment that landed in the grass, I was a little hesitant to shake his hand when I was done. I did it anyways, but let's just say that I washed my hands very thoroughly before lunch.
In the afternoon I went to a large forest preserve which is connected to the city by another extension to the MetroCable system. The place is largely under construction, so there wasn't too much to see. The cable ride there was probably about the most interesting part. The view when you go over the ridge of the mountain and first see the city beneath you is really breathtaking.
On Saturday I took a day trip to Santa Fe de Antioquia. It's a quaint little colonial town about 1.5 hours from Medellín. It was a cute little place, although it was hotter than Hades there (apparently people from the city go there on the weekend to soak up the heat and sun and go swimming). It was definitely worth going, though, if for no other reason than because it had per capita the highest concentration of Colombian hotties I had yet to see on the trip. There was also some amazing mountain scenery I was able to take in from the bus on the way there. In addition, I met a new friend on the bus. We ended up grabbing dinner that night, and went out for drinks and hit a night club afterward. The two of us polished off an entire bottle of Don Julio at the first bar, and we made pretty good headway into a half bottle of Scotch at the night club, so it ended up being a pretty fun evening. Pretty expensive, but definitely fun.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Cartagena and first impressions of Medellín
Cartagena was absolutely killer. The old city is amazing. As usual, you can check out the photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Colombia. I spent a full day and a half just walking around the old city and taking photos. It looks even better at night when they have the city walls and all the churches and squares lit up.
In addition to the ambience, the food situation was pumping on all cylinders there, too. This is where wealthy Colombians go to vacation, so there are tons of upscale and tasty restaurants. The highlights included a traditional turtle stew, some octopus and grouper carpaccios, an obatala beef stew (an traditional costeña dish). Just about everything here is served with coconut rice, which tastes fantastic. They must be putting something else other than just coconut in there as it comes out brown and has the taste of sweet spices like cloves. In addition, many of the restaurants were in 400 year old colonial homes or buildings. They were definitely more expensive than those in Cali, but still a steal by US standards. The fanciest and most expensive meal that I had was at this mod little place that would fit right in on South Beach, where I had the octopus carpaccio, oxtail braised in red wine with potato puree, and a couple glasses of Rioja, which came to a grand total of about $55.
On the first night here I met another new friend. We were eating at the same restaurant and started chatting, after which we hit a couple bars. We were also supposed to catch up for lunch the next day before left, but unfortunately we were unable to connect prior to her flight from Bogota. She's actually a Colombian pop singer. You can check out here music here: http://www.hannalatina.com
On the second full day in town I went to a giant mud volcano (don't ask me about the geology behind this, I have no idea). It's not too hot so you can get right in and swim (wallow) around. It was great fun, although I did somewhat regret my decision to dunk my whole head into it.
After the volcano, I was able to hit the beach for a short while. Beaches bore me a bit, so I didn't stick around too long. Just took a couple photos, went for a swim, got a little workout and stretch in on the sand, and headed out.
I just got into Medellín and am finishing this post while I'm waiting for the hostel to clean up my room. This is a great place--very stylish and upscale. It looks more like a modern upscale boutique hotel than a hostel. From what little I've seen, the city is absolutely amazing, too. The entire city is surrounded by lush green mountains, which you have to drive over when you come in from the airport. The taxi turned a bend at the top of one of the mountains, as which point you're looking straight down at what appeared to be a full kilometer at this huge city of 2.5 million people filled with skyscrapers. My jaw nearly hit the floor of the taxi. What little I've seen inside the city so far looks great, too. The neighborhood I'm in is covered with trees, has several parks with modern sculpture, and is filled with trendy-looking restaurants and boutiques (not to mention a fair number of Colombian hotties I spied walking the streets). I'm pretty glad I had planned to spend 4 full days here, as it appears I won’t have any problems filling the time.
In addition to the ambience, the food situation was pumping on all cylinders there, too. This is where wealthy Colombians go to vacation, so there are tons of upscale and tasty restaurants. The highlights included a traditional turtle stew, some octopus and grouper carpaccios, an obatala beef stew (an traditional costeña dish). Just about everything here is served with coconut rice, which tastes fantastic. They must be putting something else other than just coconut in there as it comes out brown and has the taste of sweet spices like cloves. In addition, many of the restaurants were in 400 year old colonial homes or buildings. They were definitely more expensive than those in Cali, but still a steal by US standards. The fanciest and most expensive meal that I had was at this mod little place that would fit right in on South Beach, where I had the octopus carpaccio, oxtail braised in red wine with potato puree, and a couple glasses of Rioja, which came to a grand total of about $55.
On the first night here I met another new friend. We were eating at the same restaurant and started chatting, after which we hit a couple bars. We were also supposed to catch up for lunch the next day before left, but unfortunately we were unable to connect prior to her flight from Bogota. She's actually a Colombian pop singer. You can check out here music here: http://www.hannalatina.com
On the second full day in town I went to a giant mud volcano (don't ask me about the geology behind this, I have no idea). It's not too hot so you can get right in and swim (wallow) around. It was great fun, although I did somewhat regret my decision to dunk my whole head into it.
After the volcano, I was able to hit the beach for a short while. Beaches bore me a bit, so I didn't stick around too long. Just took a couple photos, went for a swim, got a little workout and stretch in on the sand, and headed out.
I just got into Medellín and am finishing this post while I'm waiting for the hostel to clean up my room. This is a great place--very stylish and upscale. It looks more like a modern upscale boutique hotel than a hostel. From what little I've seen, the city is absolutely amazing, too. The entire city is surrounded by lush green mountains, which you have to drive over when you come in from the airport. The taxi turned a bend at the top of one of the mountains, as which point you're looking straight down at what appeared to be a full kilometer at this huge city of 2.5 million people filled with skyscrapers. My jaw nearly hit the floor of the taxi. What little I've seen inside the city so far looks great, too. The neighborhood I'm in is covered with trees, has several parks with modern sculpture, and is filled with trendy-looking restaurants and boutiques (not to mention a fair number of Colombian hotties I spied walking the streets). I'm pretty glad I had planned to spend 4 full days here, as it appears I won’t have any problems filling the time.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Cali & Popayán
I ended up getting into Cali right on time on Wednesday. By the time I get checked into my hostel and situated, though, it was already 11:00 PM. At that hour on a weekday it's pretty slow in town, and I ended up hitting a dive bar in the neighborhood I was staying in. I ended up meeting a bunch of people, including an American who was taking a 4-month break from her job. After the bar closed we ended up going to a small party at the house of one of they guys there, an artist that makes handicrafts typical of his ethnic group. Apparently he's quite a well-known guy. My Spanish is hardly perfect, but for the life of me I had no idea what he was talking about. My impression is that he was one of these flaky, conceptual artist types, and I got the impression that whatever he was talking about would have been blather even if he was speaking in English.
My American friend that I met there ended up heading to Popayán together the next day. It was a several hour long bus ride with some fabulous mountain scenery on the way. Probably the best part was all the snacks. Up until the point where we got out of the city, whenever the bus stopped in traffic or at a light guys would jump on the bus selling little snacks like raw coconut pieces, fresh fruit, fresh squeezed juice, pastries, etc., and then jump off at the next stop. So you can score all kinds of little treats. It’s kind of like a drive-through, but in reverse.
Popayán was nice, although I wasn't bowled over by it. I got some good photos during sunset, though. You can check them out here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Colombia
We returned from Popayán to Cali the next afternoon. There was plenty of time so that I could grab a couple meals and do some walking around. I never got too much in the way of history or fancy photos, but I knew that was going to be the case before even going there. The appeal of Cali isn’t it's history or architecture, but the nightlife (and reputedly the women, although I didn't see anything special).
This was a Friday night, so it was perfect timing to hit the salsatecas. For everybody reading this that isn't one of my salsa geek friends I'll spare the gory details, but in summary the salsa style is very different there. As such I wasn't up to my usual standard, but I got by just fine. I noticed a fair amount of surprised faces on the ladies I was dancing with. As far as I could tell, they were thinking something along the lines of "Whoa! The tall white guy isn't that great, but he actually knows what the hell he's doing!" (which now that I think of it is probably not too different from what they're thinking at the Latin clubs in Chicago).
I had one more full day in Cali which I spent scarfing street food and milling around. I wouldn't say the food is fantastic, but you can get some really good stuff if you know what to grab. The highlights are all the tropical fruits. They’ve got all kinds of fruits that even a hard-core foodie like myself has never heard of (lulo, anyone?), and they're all fantastic. The overall quality of all the produce here is phenomenal, so you can just get some fresh fruit or fresh-squeezed juice at a little mom-and-pop dive and it tastes live heaven. Food-wise, he best thing I had there was a stew called sancocho with chicken, yuca, and green plantains. It was a very good thing that I liked it, as I had it twice in one day. I had it for lunch when I ordered it not by name but just as the daily special. I then went to dinner later, looked at the menu, and said, “Ah, sancocho, I remember reading about that. I really must try it”. I was mildly annoyed when they brought it out and I realized it was the same thing I had for lunch, but hey, it was good, so I got by OK.
While eating lunch on this day I started chatting with a Colombian gal that lives in Miami. The restaurant I was eating in was her brother’s place, whom she was back visiting for her niece’s confirmation. We ended up catching up later that night and heading out to the clubs, first to a salsa place and then a mixed club. This was nice as I didn’t have to worry about going to some of these places (many of which are a long cab ride outside of the city) by myself. I realized this might not be advisable when I got into one of the cabs alone the night before to be taken to a salsa club in the outskirts and the conversation with the cab driver went something like this (in my half-assed Spanish):
Ryan – “I would like to go to Juanchito, please. Chongó.”
Cabbie – “Where are your friends?”
Ryan – “I’m alone.”
Cabbie – “And you want to go to Chongó by yourself?”
Ryan – “Yes.”
Cabbie – “You sure?”
Ryan – “Yes.”
Cabbie – “Really?”
Ryan – “Um, maybe. Not a good idea?“
Cabbie (now realizing he’s about to lose a fare for a 20-minute ride) – “Oh, never mind. Let’s go.”
However, I felt pretty safe once I got there. You had to get frisked by security in bulletproof vests and walk through a metal detector to get into the club, so what’s to worry about? Anyways, I did feel a little more comfortable going out with a native the next night, so it worked out well.
I’m actually finishing and uploading this post in Cartagena. This place is incredible. I’ll fill in on details in a couple days.
My American friend that I met there ended up heading to Popayán together the next day. It was a several hour long bus ride with some fabulous mountain scenery on the way. Probably the best part was all the snacks. Up until the point where we got out of the city, whenever the bus stopped in traffic or at a light guys would jump on the bus selling little snacks like raw coconut pieces, fresh fruit, fresh squeezed juice, pastries, etc., and then jump off at the next stop. So you can score all kinds of little treats. It’s kind of like a drive-through, but in reverse.
Popayán was nice, although I wasn't bowled over by it. I got some good photos during sunset, though. You can check them out here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Colombia
We returned from Popayán to Cali the next afternoon. There was plenty of time so that I could grab a couple meals and do some walking around. I never got too much in the way of history or fancy photos, but I knew that was going to be the case before even going there. The appeal of Cali isn’t it's history or architecture, but the nightlife (and reputedly the women, although I didn't see anything special).
This was a Friday night, so it was perfect timing to hit the salsatecas. For everybody reading this that isn't one of my salsa geek friends I'll spare the gory details, but in summary the salsa style is very different there. As such I wasn't up to my usual standard, but I got by just fine. I noticed a fair amount of surprised faces on the ladies I was dancing with. As far as I could tell, they were thinking something along the lines of "Whoa! The tall white guy isn't that great, but he actually knows what the hell he's doing!" (which now that I think of it is probably not too different from what they're thinking at the Latin clubs in Chicago).
I had one more full day in Cali which I spent scarfing street food and milling around. I wouldn't say the food is fantastic, but you can get some really good stuff if you know what to grab. The highlights are all the tropical fruits. They’ve got all kinds of fruits that even a hard-core foodie like myself has never heard of (lulo, anyone?), and they're all fantastic. The overall quality of all the produce here is phenomenal, so you can just get some fresh fruit or fresh-squeezed juice at a little mom-and-pop dive and it tastes live heaven. Food-wise, he best thing I had there was a stew called sancocho with chicken, yuca, and green plantains. It was a very good thing that I liked it, as I had it twice in one day. I had it for lunch when I ordered it not by name but just as the daily special. I then went to dinner later, looked at the menu, and said, “Ah, sancocho, I remember reading about that. I really must try it”. I was mildly annoyed when they brought it out and I realized it was the same thing I had for lunch, but hey, it was good, so I got by OK.
While eating lunch on this day I started chatting with a Colombian gal that lives in Miami. The restaurant I was eating in was her brother’s place, whom she was back visiting for her niece’s confirmation. We ended up catching up later that night and heading out to the clubs, first to a salsa place and then a mixed club. This was nice as I didn’t have to worry about going to some of these places (many of which are a long cab ride outside of the city) by myself. I realized this might not be advisable when I got into one of the cabs alone the night before to be taken to a salsa club in the outskirts and the conversation with the cab driver went something like this (in my half-assed Spanish):
Ryan – “I would like to go to Juanchito, please. Chongó.”
Cabbie – “Where are your friends?”
Ryan – “I’m alone.”
Cabbie – “And you want to go to Chongó by yourself?”
Ryan – “Yes.”
Cabbie – “You sure?”
Ryan – “Yes.”
Cabbie – “Really?”
Ryan – “Um, maybe. Not a good idea?“
Cabbie (now realizing he’s about to lose a fare for a 20-minute ride) – “Oh, never mind. Let’s go.”
However, I felt pretty safe once I got there. You had to get frisked by security in bulletproof vests and walk through a metal detector to get into the club, so what’s to worry about? Anyways, I did feel a little more comfortable going out with a native the next night, so it worked out well.
I’m actually finishing and uploading this post in Cartagena. This place is incredible. I’ll fill in on details in a couple days.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Time to suit up folks
Ready for South America. Here's the itinerary by day:
1. Arrive in Cali late
2. Cali
3. Popayán
4. Cali
5. Cartegena
6. Cartegena
7. Cartegena
8. Medellín
9. Medellín
10. Medellín
11. Medellín
12. Salento and the Valle de Cocora
13. Salento and the Valle de Cocora
14. Bogota
15. Bogota
16. Santiago
17. Valparaíso
18. Santiago
19. Mendoza
20. Mendoza, get really drunk
21. Mendoza, get even more drunk
22. Córdoba
23. Buenos Aires
24. Buenos Aires
25. Buenos Aires
26. Buenos Aires
27. Montevideo
28. Colonia
29. San Clemente (Argentinean coast)
30. San Clemente (Argentinean coast)
31. Buenos Aires
32. Buenos Aires, red-eye home
For those of you that are geographically impaired, 1-15 are in Colombia, 16-18 in Chile, 27-28 in Uruguay, and the rest in Argentina.
1. Arrive in Cali late
2. Cali
3. Popayán
4. Cali
5. Cartegena
6. Cartegena
7. Cartegena
8. Medellín
9. Medellín
10. Medellín
11. Medellín
12. Salento and the Valle de Cocora
13. Salento and the Valle de Cocora
14. Bogota
15. Bogota
16. Santiago
17. Valparaíso
18. Santiago
19. Mendoza
20. Mendoza, get really drunk
21. Mendoza, get even more drunk
22. Córdoba
23. Buenos Aires
24. Buenos Aires
25. Buenos Aires
26. Buenos Aires
27. Montevideo
28. Colonia
29. San Clemente (Argentinean coast)
30. San Clemente (Argentinean coast)
31. Buenos Aires
32. Buenos Aires, red-eye home
For those of you that are geographically impaired, 1-15 are in Colombia, 16-18 in Chile, 27-28 in Uruguay, and the rest in Argentina.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Hhhhmmn
OK, one more post. Maybe I need to go to Japan next year. I'm currently sitting in the ANA lounge during my layover on the way home and marveling at just how mechanized, automated, efficient, spotlessly clean, and well, just how damn Japanese the Tokyo Narita airport is. There's a fancy machine for dispensing everything from fresh ground coffee to beer on tap. All the doors are automated. All the escalators slow down when people aren't on them to save energy. And there isn't a single speck of dirt in the entire place. It looks like you could eat off the damn floors here, including the ones in the bathroom. And speaking of the bathrooms, I've never seen so much technology go into a toilette. When I fired up my wifi, there were about 15 wifi networks in range, and every single one of them showed a full 5 bars strength. How is that even possible? Surely one of those hotspots is a ways away. I'm now convinced that Japan is magic.
Anyways, I'm going to go help myself to the sake bar. Later.
Anyways, I'm going to go help myself to the sake bar. Later.
Bangkok and Finish
So I'm done with my five days in Bangkok. It was a blast. I was able to catch up my second night here with a friend of a friend (thanks Disco!) that took me out and showed me the town a bit. He was out of town the next few days so after that I was on my own. In terms of sights there isn't a particularly large amount to see. The Royal Palace, Wat Pho with the huge reclining Buddha (why doesn't that lazy bastard get off his ass anyways?), and a couple other temples and minor sights are about all that's worth seeing as far as specific sights go. After that I just did a lot of wandering around and exploring the different neighborhoods. It does take a while to knock all the sights off, though, as the town is a complete pain in the balls to get around. The sky train and metro system there is great, but unfortunately it doesn't cover the parts of the city where the major tourist attractions are. Go figure. And traffic is a nightmare. There were several occasions where I got into a cab and asked them to take me somewhere and the cabbie told me to get out of the cab because he wasn't even willing to try getting me there. It's a pretty difficult city to navigate by foot, too, and I spent quite a bit of time searching around for the places I was trying to go. Some of this could maybe have been alleviated by catching more tuk-tuks. However, I had sworn off tuk-tuks within 24 hours of arriving in Bangkok, as I quickly became convinced that every tuk-tuk drive the city is a hustler and I grew pretty weary of dealing with all their bullshit.
That being said, the city is really great. It's got a great energy and there's always something going on. It's very modern, too. Well, parts of it are, at least. One of the highlights was hanging out at Bar Vertigo on the roof of the 59-story Banyan Vines hotel. The skyline view there was pretty amazing. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera on me and I only got some half-ass snaps with my cell phone. I also enjoyed the bar as it was one of only about 4 places I’ve been to on this entire trip that had even half-decent service of wine by the glass. I had to pay out the nose for it, though. My single pour of a humble German QbA Riesling cost me a whopping $19 US. Needless to say, I didn’t stick around long enough to require a second drink.
I also went to the famous Damnoen Saduak floating market. Yes, I guess it is more of a tourist attraction than an actual working market any longer, but it still was an interesting stop and I got some great photos. I took a taxi there at 5:30 in the morning so as to beat the crush of tourists in the tour groups, and it allowed me to have the place pretty much to myself and the locals for about an hour or so.
The most interesting thing I did in Bangkok was catch a Thai boxing match. It was pretty fascinating to watch a couple guys do the traditional dance together before the fight and then beat the living hell out of each other 3 minutes later. It was a pretty colorful spectacle. It was also much humbler place than I anticipated. The stadium I went to was the premier fighting arena in the country, so I figured it would be relatively modern and polished. It’s actually pretty small and modest place. I would guess it only seats about 1500 people, has a corrugated metal ceiling, and hardly any permanent seats. It also doesn’t appear to have dressing rooms for the fighters. I stepped out to go to the bathroom, and as I walked to the back arena saw an open area under the stands with the concession stands to the left, the men’s bathroom to the right, and the fighters and the trainers for the next fights sitting or warming up right in the middle with all the spectators milling around them. You could smell all the menthol on the guys when you walked by. The other really entertaining thing was watching the action in the mezzanine and upper tiers of seating in between rounds. These are the areas where most of the locals sit, with well over half the people in the stadium being seated in the upper level. By sit, I actually mean stand as I don’t think there are any seats provided in the upper level and it’s just plain concrete steps. There was a gambling frenzy going on up there in between rounds, particularly on the good fights. You’d see literally hundreds of guys screaming and frantically flashing hand signals to one another between each round. I didn’t see that much passing of actually cash, but you could definitely tell that there was a lot of money changing hands.
Probably the best thing about the boxing stadium was the food outside. I grabbed some of the best chow I’ve had on this vacation from the street vendors right outside the main gate of the arena. The one thing that was particularly good was the black rice which was cooked in a hollow bamboo log. There must have been some kind of sweetener in it since it almost tasted like a dessert. Kick ass. I’ve generally done much better with food here in Bangkok than I did in Chiang Mai, and I’ve had some really great stuff. Yesterday I got this mushroom soup that had wood ear, enoki, shitake, and straw mushrooms in it that absolutely rocked. In the past few days I’ve also gotten some killer phad thai, some roast duck with sweet soy sauce, some of the best grilled chicken I’ve ever had, I a few other things which I really couldn’t identify but tasted great. I’ve done better with the restaurant food, too. On Tuesday I had a stir-fried whole crab with a spicy-sweet sauce which was out of this world. The other restaurant stuff I’ve had has generally been pretty good, if not fantastic.
I also took another cooking course. 5 full days in Bangkok was a little more time then I really needed, even at the leisurely pace I was taking it (I was staying up late and sleeping in a lot) so I filled the last afternoon with another cooking course. The only cooking school which had an opening was a pretty fancy place and was awfully expensive by local standards, but I’m glad I went. I got some good experience and was able to fill some gaps on my knowledge of Thai cooking and learn some knew techniques. The food which we made as this restaurant was really fantastic, as well. This was also one of the few places with a decent wine list, and I was able to try a couple Thai wines which they were pouring by the glass. They weren’t exactly complex or well-balanced, as they were super-rich and jammy, almost tasting like some kind of a dry dessert wine. However, they were nevertheless drinkable and I thought went well with the food.
So that wraps up my trip. I’m actually writing this during my flight from Bangkok to Tokyo. Hopefully I can wrap up this post soon while I’m still coherent. I’ve got a business class flight with free wine, and the ANA flight I’m on has 1 sparkling wine, 2 whites, 2 reds, 2 sakes, 1 Japanese whisky, and a plum wine on offer. Since they’re free and since I’m hoping to sleep all the way from Tokyo to Chicago, I’ll need to try every one of them on this segment. So I’ll be pretty bombed in short order here.
It will be nice to be back home, but I’m definitely going to miss:
- Being able to get a reliably good if not downright phenomenal meal for $2 US
- The coconut shakes
- The cheap massages
That being said, there are a few things which I definitely won’t miss, including:
- The pollution and the dirt
- The incessant heat and humidity
- The difficulty in getting a decent glass of wine, and when you can find it having to pay 2-3 times what you would in the states for something of similar quality
- The appearance that everything going on around me is some sort of scam to separate me from my money.
All said and done, it was a great trip. I haven’t run the numbers yet, but I’ve got the feeling that I’ve blown the budget for the trip pretty badly. I hadn’t really factored in a private driver and tour guide for Siem Reap, 80-km taxi drive to the floating market and back, $450 in custom-tailored clothing, and $180 bucks in cooking classes into my original estimates. I think I really started to fall off the wagon the last few days in Bangkok, as too much free time on my hands equals too much time spent at the spa getting a massage which relatively speaking isn’t as cheap in the big city. It also didn’t help that the garbage Lonely Planet guidebook I was using was reliably low on costs for just about everything, particularly for accommodations where is many cases it was egregiously low. It was still much cheaper than another trip to Europe would have been, though. But I think I’ll hit another continent before I go back to Asia. Maybe I’ll do Central and South America or Europe again next year. We’ll have to see. I definitely wouldn’t mind coming back to Thailand and Vietnam. Laos and Cambodia were great, but I think I’ve covered all the things I was really interested in doing in those countries on this trip. I’d love to be able to do the mountainous north of Vietnam some other time, and I also think a trip to the islands and beaches in Thailand is a must-do at some point.
This will be my last post for this trip. Thanks for checking in. Hope to hear from everybody soon.
Ryan
That being said, the city is really great. It's got a great energy and there's always something going on. It's very modern, too. Well, parts of it are, at least. One of the highlights was hanging out at Bar Vertigo on the roof of the 59-story Banyan Vines hotel. The skyline view there was pretty amazing. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera on me and I only got some half-ass snaps with my cell phone. I also enjoyed the bar as it was one of only about 4 places I’ve been to on this entire trip that had even half-decent service of wine by the glass. I had to pay out the nose for it, though. My single pour of a humble German QbA Riesling cost me a whopping $19 US. Needless to say, I didn’t stick around long enough to require a second drink.
I also went to the famous Damnoen Saduak floating market. Yes, I guess it is more of a tourist attraction than an actual working market any longer, but it still was an interesting stop and I got some great photos. I took a taxi there at 5:30 in the morning so as to beat the crush of tourists in the tour groups, and it allowed me to have the place pretty much to myself and the locals for about an hour or so.
The most interesting thing I did in Bangkok was catch a Thai boxing match. It was pretty fascinating to watch a couple guys do the traditional dance together before the fight and then beat the living hell out of each other 3 minutes later. It was a pretty colorful spectacle. It was also much humbler place than I anticipated. The stadium I went to was the premier fighting arena in the country, so I figured it would be relatively modern and polished. It’s actually pretty small and modest place. I would guess it only seats about 1500 people, has a corrugated metal ceiling, and hardly any permanent seats. It also doesn’t appear to have dressing rooms for the fighters. I stepped out to go to the bathroom, and as I walked to the back arena saw an open area under the stands with the concession stands to the left, the men’s bathroom to the right, and the fighters and the trainers for the next fights sitting or warming up right in the middle with all the spectators milling around them. You could smell all the menthol on the guys when you walked by. The other really entertaining thing was watching the action in the mezzanine and upper tiers of seating in between rounds. These are the areas where most of the locals sit, with well over half the people in the stadium being seated in the upper level. By sit, I actually mean stand as I don’t think there are any seats provided in the upper level and it’s just plain concrete steps. There was a gambling frenzy going on up there in between rounds, particularly on the good fights. You’d see literally hundreds of guys screaming and frantically flashing hand signals to one another between each round. I didn’t see that much passing of actually cash, but you could definitely tell that there was a lot of money changing hands.
Probably the best thing about the boxing stadium was the food outside. I grabbed some of the best chow I’ve had on this vacation from the street vendors right outside the main gate of the arena. The one thing that was particularly good was the black rice which was cooked in a hollow bamboo log. There must have been some kind of sweetener in it since it almost tasted like a dessert. Kick ass. I’ve generally done much better with food here in Bangkok than I did in Chiang Mai, and I’ve had some really great stuff. Yesterday I got this mushroom soup that had wood ear, enoki, shitake, and straw mushrooms in it that absolutely rocked. In the past few days I’ve also gotten some killer phad thai, some roast duck with sweet soy sauce, some of the best grilled chicken I’ve ever had, I a few other things which I really couldn’t identify but tasted great. I’ve done better with the restaurant food, too. On Tuesday I had a stir-fried whole crab with a spicy-sweet sauce which was out of this world. The other restaurant stuff I’ve had has generally been pretty good, if not fantastic.
I also took another cooking course. 5 full days in Bangkok was a little more time then I really needed, even at the leisurely pace I was taking it (I was staying up late and sleeping in a lot) so I filled the last afternoon with another cooking course. The only cooking school which had an opening was a pretty fancy place and was awfully expensive by local standards, but I’m glad I went. I got some good experience and was able to fill some gaps on my knowledge of Thai cooking and learn some knew techniques. The food which we made as this restaurant was really fantastic, as well. This was also one of the few places with a decent wine list, and I was able to try a couple Thai wines which they were pouring by the glass. They weren’t exactly complex or well-balanced, as they were super-rich and jammy, almost tasting like some kind of a dry dessert wine. However, they were nevertheless drinkable and I thought went well with the food.
So that wraps up my trip. I’m actually writing this during my flight from Bangkok to Tokyo. Hopefully I can wrap up this post soon while I’m still coherent. I’ve got a business class flight with free wine, and the ANA flight I’m on has 1 sparkling wine, 2 whites, 2 reds, 2 sakes, 1 Japanese whisky, and a plum wine on offer. Since they’re free and since I’m hoping to sleep all the way from Tokyo to Chicago, I’ll need to try every one of them on this segment. So I’ll be pretty bombed in short order here.
It will be nice to be back home, but I’m definitely going to miss:
- Being able to get a reliably good if not downright phenomenal meal for $2 US
- The coconut shakes
- The cheap massages
That being said, there are a few things which I definitely won’t miss, including:
- The pollution and the dirt
- The incessant heat and humidity
- The difficulty in getting a decent glass of wine, and when you can find it having to pay 2-3 times what you would in the states for something of similar quality
- The appearance that everything going on around me is some sort of scam to separate me from my money.
All said and done, it was a great trip. I haven’t run the numbers yet, but I’ve got the feeling that I’ve blown the budget for the trip pretty badly. I hadn’t really factored in a private driver and tour guide for Siem Reap, 80-km taxi drive to the floating market and back, $450 in custom-tailored clothing, and $180 bucks in cooking classes into my original estimates. I think I really started to fall off the wagon the last few days in Bangkok, as too much free time on my hands equals too much time spent at the spa getting a massage which relatively speaking isn’t as cheap in the big city. It also didn’t help that the garbage Lonely Planet guidebook I was using was reliably low on costs for just about everything, particularly for accommodations where is many cases it was egregiously low. It was still much cheaper than another trip to Europe would have been, though. But I think I’ll hit another continent before I go back to Asia. Maybe I’ll do Central and South America or Europe again next year. We’ll have to see. I definitely wouldn’t mind coming back to Thailand and Vietnam. Laos and Cambodia were great, but I think I’ve covered all the things I was really interested in doing in those countries on this trip. I’d love to be able to do the mountainous north of Vietnam some other time, and I also think a trip to the islands and beaches in Thailand is a must-do at some point.
This will be my last post for this trip. Thanks for checking in. Hope to hear from everybody soon.
Ryan
Monday, March 2, 2009
Chiang Mai and Sukhothai
So I've hit my first couple spots in Thailand. Chiang Mai was pretty cool. After a while, I was getting templed out, but the markets were interesting and there was a really good cooking school that I took a couple of classes as. I also took a long day tour of the Golden Triangle area where Thailand, Lao, and Myanmar all meet. During the tour we stopped at a couple ethnic villages, although that was pretty commercialized. It's obvious that these villages now see tourism as their primary way of living instead of agriculture. A bunch of the villagers were dressed up in their traditional dress as if it was Halloween and when you took a photo of them they'd come up to you and say "5 baht, money, 5 baht". A bunch of the kids came begging for money, too. And of course there were little shops and stands selling tourist trinkets everywhere. This included not just things made in the village, but a lot of items purchased in the Chiang Rai market for re-sell. I'm glad I was able to see some more genuine small ethnic villages in Laos where tourism has not played such a corrupting influence on the daily lives of people there.
Other than that, Chiang Mai is about what you'd expect for Thailand. Lots of prostitues. Lots of massage parlors. I've found it's pretty hard to distinguish between the legit places and the spots where you get what I call the massage-plus treatment. I walked by a place on my second day there that was inside a big fancy high-rise hotel that marketed itself as a spa and also provided facials and body wraps and such, and also charged about double what most places do. So I figured that's a place where you can just get a really good massage (a massage-minus). So I go in, and about two thirds of the way through I'm being asked "Do you want extra special massage?". Hhhhmmmn, let me think about it.
More disturbingly, there are lots of she-males here. On a couple of occasions I'd be thinking to myself "Hey, that's a nice piece of....WHOA HOLD ON A SECOND THAT'S A DUDE!". I’d then go home and take a shower to symbolically cleanse myself of my thought crime.
I ended up getting some bespoke-tailored clothing in Chiang Mai. I was a little leery of custom tailoring after my experience in Hoi An. I was cruising around temples with some ex investment banker from NY I met (this was the 3rd newly unemployed investment banker that is now traveling the world for an extended period that I met on this trip), and we started a conversation with this guy from Singapore. He had flown in with his wife to visit this one particular tailor, which he said he does every 6 months or so. According to this dude, Chiang Mai has supplanted Bangkok as the custom-tailoring capital of Asia. He was the second guy that day that told me to go there, we figured we might as well check it out. We go, and it seems like they really know what they are talking about, so I order up a sport coat. The next day I go back in for my first fitting, and he's got the base of the jacket laid out with no arms and unfinished lapels, and aside from needing just a tad more space in the arm holes it feels perfect. I come back in on day 2 and the thing fits like a glove, and looks great. So I ended up having him put together an overcoat for me, too. I'm pretty happy with how both turned out. I do regret my choice in fabric on the sport coat a little, though. I was hoping I would get something that would be good for both work and casual, but I think it's not going to be that versatile. It will still be a nice item to have, though. I think that's probably the one limitation of the whole process, is that you have to pick your own fabrics and they have pretty standard suit materials on-hand that don’t work as well for casual clothing. If you want just basic stuff, that's fine, but if you want something more fashion-forward I think you'll need to show up with your own cloth.
Sukhothai was pretty nice. The historic park was really interesting. I rented a bike and tooled around for about 4 hours, in which I was able to cover about everything worth seeing. It worked out well as I was able to get an early start, get back to the hotel and clean up, and catch a long bus ride to Bangkok, which I'm on right now (and being subjected to a painfully bad Thai movie, by the way). This will give me just shy of 5 full days in Bangkok before I have to catch my flight home on Saturday night. This is probably 1 more than I need, but I suppose it will give me ample time to explore the night life and give me some incentive to hook up with some other travelers I can party with.
The food has been good here in Thailand, but it hasn't blown my mind. I've actually preferred much of the Thai food that I've had at home. Maybe that means I'm used to more Americanized stuff. Some of the stuff has been a bit hard on my stomach, too. It's not been uncommon for me to have a mild stomach ache after eating at nice restaurants. I think that it's just the ingredients, not the fact that the food has made me ill. Don't get me wrong, that's happened too. I've spent another few days crapping my guts out and I'm on my second Z-pack and box of immodium for this trip. It's the cost of doing business, as far as I'm concerned. As with Vietnam and Laos, all the best stuff I've had has been street food. To skip out on street food would defeat the point of coming here. Sukhothai has a really vibrant night market, so I hit that last night. I got some unidenfitied pork thing with sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves and some stir-fried frog with garlic and pepper. Alas, the frog was not as tasty as the ribbit dished I had in Cambodia, but the pork was pretty good. And dessert was off the hook. I went to this little Thai-style crepe stand where they were making sweet crepes with condensed milk drizzled all over it. Killer.
However, there are definitely some things I won't touch. Since I didn't see the deep-fried hairy spiders that are supposedly so common in Cambodia, Thailand appears to be the winner for wierdest food I've seen. Check out the photo of all the deep-fried worms for sale. Eewww.
Other than that, Chiang Mai is about what you'd expect for Thailand. Lots of prostitues. Lots of massage parlors. I've found it's pretty hard to distinguish between the legit places and the spots where you get what I call the massage-plus treatment. I walked by a place on my second day there that was inside a big fancy high-rise hotel that marketed itself as a spa and also provided facials and body wraps and such, and also charged about double what most places do. So I figured that's a place where you can just get a really good massage (a massage-minus). So I go in, and about two thirds of the way through I'm being asked "Do you want extra special massage?". Hhhhmmmn, let me think about it.
More disturbingly, there are lots of she-males here. On a couple of occasions I'd be thinking to myself "Hey, that's a nice piece of....WHOA HOLD ON A SECOND THAT'S A DUDE!". I’d then go home and take a shower to symbolically cleanse myself of my thought crime.
I ended up getting some bespoke-tailored clothing in Chiang Mai. I was a little leery of custom tailoring after my experience in Hoi An. I was cruising around temples with some ex investment banker from NY I met (this was the 3rd newly unemployed investment banker that is now traveling the world for an extended period that I met on this trip), and we started a conversation with this guy from Singapore. He had flown in with his wife to visit this one particular tailor, which he said he does every 6 months or so. According to this dude, Chiang Mai has supplanted Bangkok as the custom-tailoring capital of Asia. He was the second guy that day that told me to go there, we figured we might as well check it out. We go, and it seems like they really know what they are talking about, so I order up a sport coat. The next day I go back in for my first fitting, and he's got the base of the jacket laid out with no arms and unfinished lapels, and aside from needing just a tad more space in the arm holes it feels perfect. I come back in on day 2 and the thing fits like a glove, and looks great. So I ended up having him put together an overcoat for me, too. I'm pretty happy with how both turned out. I do regret my choice in fabric on the sport coat a little, though. I was hoping I would get something that would be good for both work and casual, but I think it's not going to be that versatile. It will still be a nice item to have, though. I think that's probably the one limitation of the whole process, is that you have to pick your own fabrics and they have pretty standard suit materials on-hand that don’t work as well for casual clothing. If you want just basic stuff, that's fine, but if you want something more fashion-forward I think you'll need to show up with your own cloth.
Sukhothai was pretty nice. The historic park was really interesting. I rented a bike and tooled around for about 4 hours, in which I was able to cover about everything worth seeing. It worked out well as I was able to get an early start, get back to the hotel and clean up, and catch a long bus ride to Bangkok, which I'm on right now (and being subjected to a painfully bad Thai movie, by the way). This will give me just shy of 5 full days in Bangkok before I have to catch my flight home on Saturday night. This is probably 1 more than I need, but I suppose it will give me ample time to explore the night life and give me some incentive to hook up with some other travelers I can party with.
The food has been good here in Thailand, but it hasn't blown my mind. I've actually preferred much of the Thai food that I've had at home. Maybe that means I'm used to more Americanized stuff. Some of the stuff has been a bit hard on my stomach, too. It's not been uncommon for me to have a mild stomach ache after eating at nice restaurants. I think that it's just the ingredients, not the fact that the food has made me ill. Don't get me wrong, that's happened too. I've spent another few days crapping my guts out and I'm on my second Z-pack and box of immodium for this trip. It's the cost of doing business, as far as I'm concerned. As with Vietnam and Laos, all the best stuff I've had has been street food. To skip out on street food would defeat the point of coming here. Sukhothai has a really vibrant night market, so I hit that last night. I got some unidenfitied pork thing with sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves and some stir-fried frog with garlic and pepper. Alas, the frog was not as tasty as the ribbit dished I had in Cambodia, but the pork was pretty good. And dessert was off the hook. I went to this little Thai-style crepe stand where they were making sweet crepes with condensed milk drizzled all over it. Killer.
However, there are definitely some things I won't touch. Since I didn't see the deep-fried hairy spiders that are supposedly so common in Cambodia, Thailand appears to be the winner for wierdest food I've seen. Check out the photo of all the deep-fried worms for sale. Eewww.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Thailand Photos
Thailand Photos are going up here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Thailand
Laos Photos
Pictures are syncing now. You can check out Laos photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Laos
Laos
Laos was pretty cool. I spent a day in Vientiane, which was pretty laid-back. There wasn’t a whole lot to see, but I really liked the vibe there. It was great to finally be in a country where somebody isn’t constantly trying to sell me something. If you walk down a busy street in Vietnam or Cambodia about every 15 seconds somebody will try to sell you something. The constant barrage of “Motobike, motobike, you need ride? Where you going?” and “We have best food, you eat here!” and my personal favorite “You need majuana? You want party? You need lady? I have nice lady for you!” really starts to grate on your nerves after a while. Thankfully, there’s none of that in Laos. Every once in a while a guy will offer you a tuk-tuk ride, but you can politely say “no thanks” and they leave you alone rather than following you down the street thinking that if they annoy you enough that you’ll change your mind.
I actually was considering starting a chain of T-shirt stores in Vietnam and Cambodia. I would only sell one shirt in various colors and sizes. Every thing one of them would say in both English and the local language “If I want a room/ a ride/to eat/to buy something/drugs/to pay for sex, I’ll let you know. Now fuck off!!!”. I’d make a killing.
As you can tell I’ve found Laos to be much more relaxing. And while Vientiane was just a pleasant day stop, Luang Prabang was pretty cool. There’s tons of outdoor stuff to do in the surrounding area, as well. I took a long 7-hour hike the second day we were there, visiting a couple small hill-tribe villages on the way. Those were pretty nice as I feel our stops to the villages weren’t staged at all. I’ve gotten the impression from other travelers that similar village stops in more developed and touristy countries like Thailand can be very staged, even to the point of the villages being completely fake Epcott-esque constructions set up to parade tourists through. So I think doing this stuff in Laos was a good call.
Another day I was here I spent the day (well, supposedly I was going to spend the day, in actuality I spent about 3 hours with another 3 hours of waiting around) riding elephants. I signed up for the more hard-core (and expensive) program where you ride the elephants bare-back instead of sitting in a chair they’re saddled with or using some kind of harness. I also some time learning how to mount and dismount the things and steer them. Finally, I went down with all the professional elephant handlers at this sanctuary to give the elephants a bath in the river, which was a blast. Check out the photos as there are lots of nice shots of me giving my elephant a scrub-down. Given the amount of time I was on the elephants the program was pretty expensive, but well worth it. It was without a doubt one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.
The food in Laos was just decent. The whole 6 days I was here I never had anything in a restaurant which really impressed me that much. However, there is some really great street-food. I had a couple of great meals in the stands set up on the river in Vientiane, and also had some quite good stuff I picked up on the street with all the night-food stalls in Luang Prabang. In particular, all the grilled stuff is really good. They’ve got lots of whole grilled fish, grilled chickens, little grilled birds with the heads and claws and everything, pork ribs, you name it. And it’s all pretty good. However, my luck unfortunately ran out regarding street food during my stay in Luang Prabang. The second night I was here I ended up crapping my guts out all evening after chowing down on some fruit shakes, some unidentifiable meat thing, and some cold sausages that were very tasty but I think had been sitting out a little too long. I suppose that given all the down-market places without running water in the facility that I’ve been eating at it was bound to happen sooner or later.
I’m on my way to Chiang Mai now. Hopefully, I’ll get my pictures uploaded while I sleep tonight. It’s been a week since I’ve been in a hotel with internet access, so I haven’t had much opportunity to synchronize all my photos. There should be a fair amount of places in Thailand with wifi, so hopefully all the Laos pictures will be up soon.
I actually was considering starting a chain of T-shirt stores in Vietnam and Cambodia. I would only sell one shirt in various colors and sizes. Every thing one of them would say in both English and the local language “If I want a room/ a ride/to eat/to buy something/drugs/to pay for sex, I’ll let you know. Now fuck off!!!”. I’d make a killing.
As you can tell I’ve found Laos to be much more relaxing. And while Vientiane was just a pleasant day stop, Luang Prabang was pretty cool. There’s tons of outdoor stuff to do in the surrounding area, as well. I took a long 7-hour hike the second day we were there, visiting a couple small hill-tribe villages on the way. Those were pretty nice as I feel our stops to the villages weren’t staged at all. I’ve gotten the impression from other travelers that similar village stops in more developed and touristy countries like Thailand can be very staged, even to the point of the villages being completely fake Epcott-esque constructions set up to parade tourists through. So I think doing this stuff in Laos was a good call.
Another day I was here I spent the day (well, supposedly I was going to spend the day, in actuality I spent about 3 hours with another 3 hours of waiting around) riding elephants. I signed up for the more hard-core (and expensive) program where you ride the elephants bare-back instead of sitting in a chair they’re saddled with or using some kind of harness. I also some time learning how to mount and dismount the things and steer them. Finally, I went down with all the professional elephant handlers at this sanctuary to give the elephants a bath in the river, which was a blast. Check out the photos as there are lots of nice shots of me giving my elephant a scrub-down. Given the amount of time I was on the elephants the program was pretty expensive, but well worth it. It was without a doubt one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.
The food in Laos was just decent. The whole 6 days I was here I never had anything in a restaurant which really impressed me that much. However, there is some really great street-food. I had a couple of great meals in the stands set up on the river in Vientiane, and also had some quite good stuff I picked up on the street with all the night-food stalls in Luang Prabang. In particular, all the grilled stuff is really good. They’ve got lots of whole grilled fish, grilled chickens, little grilled birds with the heads and claws and everything, pork ribs, you name it. And it’s all pretty good. However, my luck unfortunately ran out regarding street food during my stay in Luang Prabang. The second night I was here I ended up crapping my guts out all evening after chowing down on some fruit shakes, some unidentifiable meat thing, and some cold sausages that were very tasty but I think had been sitting out a little too long. I suppose that given all the down-market places without running water in the facility that I’ve been eating at it was bound to happen sooner or later.
I’m on my way to Chiang Mai now. Hopefully, I’ll get my pictures uploaded while I sleep tonight. It’s been a week since I’ve been in a hotel with internet access, so I haven’t had much opportunity to synchronize all my photos. There should be a fair amount of places in Thailand with wifi, so hopefully all the Laos pictures will be up soon.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Finished with Cambodia
So my time in Cambodia has come and gone. Not including my travel time, I spent a little over a full day in Phnom Penh and 3 and a half days in Siem Reap. The most interesting part of the Phnom Penh was the Royal Palace. I take that back, the most interesting part of Phnom Penh was the fact that it had by far the hottest women I've yet to see on this trip, but after that it was the Royal Palace. The Killing Fields were interesting to see but not all that impactful. They weren't presented with any information that I didn't already know and I didn't have a decent guide to put things into context. It was still definitely worth the trip just to see, though.
All the Angkor temple ruins were pretty fascinating. I hired a private guide and a driver so I could cover as much as possible in the 3 days I had. Even then I thought the guide was holding me back. I can apparently hike a lot faster than he can. Still we got pretty far afield and were able to cover just about everything worth seeing within 50 Km of Siem Reap in the 3 days. I did get gouged a bit by the travel company I arranged this through. When I bought the guide and driver I was given the impression I could extensively customize the tour and wouldn't have to pay that much more to add in additional places. I ended up having to cough up another 70 bucks to see a couple of the things I wanted to that weren't on the standard tour, which pissed me off a bit. The other disadvantage to the private driver was all kids selling souvenirs and other crap converged on me like a swarm of bees when I got out of the car. I can't really blame them. They see a lone guy show up at a temple in a minivan with a driver and a private guide looking like a fucking Maharaja (or Tom Daschle??) and they probably figure (incorrectly) that he's got money to burn.
The Cambodian food is pretty good. It wasn't quite up to Vietnam's standards, but still quite tasty. You can definitely get some wackier stuff there. In the 6 days I was around, I ate some barbequed snake, crocodile, and frogs 3 different times. You can probably tell I liked the frogs. I particularly liked the ribbity soup I had that was filled up with little frog legs, frog bodies, and lemony broth. Yum! They've got tons of seafood. There's a massive lake in the middle of the country that is one of the most productive fresh-water fisheries in the world, so fish is a big part of the diet. It's a good thing, too, since the cows here are so damn skinny.
The one thing I'll be happy to get away from is the dirt. You get expectedly dirty going to the temples, but aside from the ritzy parts right on the river Siem Reap itself is a big dust bowl. And there is trash absolutely EVERYWHERE in Cambodia. I'm not sure if it's because they can't afford proper waste disposal or if it's just a cultural thing, but there was litter all over the place. The people were great and I enjoyed my time, but it will be nice to get somewhere where I don't feel like I need to hose myself down after walking down the street for 20 minutes. I'm on the plane from Siem Reap to Vientiane as I write this, so we'll see if Laos is any better in that regard.
All the Angkor temple ruins were pretty fascinating. I hired a private guide and a driver so I could cover as much as possible in the 3 days I had. Even then I thought the guide was holding me back. I can apparently hike a lot faster than he can. Still we got pretty far afield and were able to cover just about everything worth seeing within 50 Km of Siem Reap in the 3 days. I did get gouged a bit by the travel company I arranged this through. When I bought the guide and driver I was given the impression I could extensively customize the tour and wouldn't have to pay that much more to add in additional places. I ended up having to cough up another 70 bucks to see a couple of the things I wanted to that weren't on the standard tour, which pissed me off a bit. The other disadvantage to the private driver was all kids selling souvenirs and other crap converged on me like a swarm of bees when I got out of the car. I can't really blame them. They see a lone guy show up at a temple in a minivan with a driver and a private guide looking like a fucking Maharaja (or Tom Daschle??) and they probably figure (incorrectly) that he's got money to burn.
The Cambodian food is pretty good. It wasn't quite up to Vietnam's standards, but still quite tasty. You can definitely get some wackier stuff there. In the 6 days I was around, I ate some barbequed snake, crocodile, and frogs 3 different times. You can probably tell I liked the frogs. I particularly liked the ribbity soup I had that was filled up with little frog legs, frog bodies, and lemony broth. Yum! They've got tons of seafood. There's a massive lake in the middle of the country that is one of the most productive fresh-water fisheries in the world, so fish is a big part of the diet. It's a good thing, too, since the cows here are so damn skinny.
The one thing I'll be happy to get away from is the dirt. You get expectedly dirty going to the temples, but aside from the ritzy parts right on the river Siem Reap itself is a big dust bowl. And there is trash absolutely EVERYWHERE in Cambodia. I'm not sure if it's because they can't afford proper waste disposal or if it's just a cultural thing, but there was litter all over the place. The people were great and I enjoyed my time, but it will be nice to get somewhere where I don't feel like I need to hose myself down after walking down the street for 20 minutes. I'm on the plane from Siem Reap to Vientiane as I write this, so we'll see if Laos is any better in that regard.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Cambodia Photos
Hey gang. I've got a new web album where I'm dumping photos from Cambodia. You can access it here: http://picasaweb.google.com/tunafishandgrits/Cambodia
I know that none of the pics I've uploaded have descriptions yet. I've got a long bus from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap tomorrow, and if the road is sufficiently flat to type on my computer while driving I'll try to fill out all the descriptions for botht the Vietnam and Cambodia albums then.
I know that none of the pics I've uploaded have descriptions yet. I've got a long bus from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap tomorrow, and if the road is sufficiently flat to type on my computer while driving I'll try to fill out all the descriptions for botht the Vietnam and Cambodia albums then.
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