It must be a disease.......... This niece of mine tops her entire generation when it comes to shopping. Her eyes would flit from stall to stall, her legs would carry her darting from store to store, her pockets were eternally wanting for replenishment. From Istanbul through Kusadaci through Denizli through Cappadocia through Ankara, it has been an endless journey of shopping for the best turquiose set of jewelry, or the best evil eye bracelet and keychain, or the best leather shoes or shirt for Shelly. I do shop too, but I'm not exactly a big fan of shopping till you [View Full Entry]

---

---

"You've been traveling for a while haven't you?" one of the girls I took the ferry from Dar es Salaam to Zanzibar with asked me. "Oh, I'm used to it... I've had plenty of training in SE Asia, especially Indonesia" I told her after a little incident that went something like this: We get out of the taxi at the dock. "No thank you. Please don't touch my bag. I am not paying you to carry it. I will carry it myself," I said while pushing away 8 agressive men trying to attack my backpack. "There is only 1 boat today," [View Full Entry]

---

---

Israel is a special place in the world; there are so many ways to travel it. You can be religious of various faiths and pilgrimage. You can change your religion to Jewish and go on a free ‘birthright’ tour around the country. You can even go humanitarian and travel it on a political motive. But I chose in most part to be ignorant and wondered can you travel Israel and feel normal? As an on and off backpacker for over 6 years I have met backpacking Israeli’s and met other backpackers who have met backpacking Israeli’s. The overall assumption is that [View Full Entry]

---

---

Where were those darn elephant seals hiding??! 45mins of bumping and skidding along the cliff top at Punta Ninfas in our poor little silver hire car, stopping to peer gingerly over the edge whilst trying not to be swept over by the wind and we were still none the wiser. OK so you might argue that a seal is a seal and I'd already seen plenty in Antarctica, but those weren't Elephant seals, the largest of seals with their distinctive noses. Here at Punta Ninfas, some 90 km southwest of Puerto Madryn, they were apparently (almost!!) guaranteed to be found, but [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 810 (18.06.09) to Day 814 (22.06.09) We left El Tunco early and after several chicken buses and a couple of cycle taxis across an easy border crossing back into Guatemala, we eventually reached Antigua. We'd started our Central American journey here a few weeks ago and it was nice to complete the circle and return to somewhere familiar. The journey had taken us all day so all we really had energy for was to grab a quick bite to eat and make the most of some 2 for 1 cocktails at a local bar. It's amazing how much a fresh [View Full Entry]

---

---

It started raining as I sat on the sofa in the lodge waiting for my group to leave. It wasn’t just any rain either, it was a torrential downpour reminiscent of the rainy season and I wasn’t really all that happy to see it. As I sat and talked to the three tourists that would be making the journey up river with me, my mind wandered to my lonely backpack, the one that I had left leaning up against a tree near the river. I thought of all of my dry clothes and my electronics and my extra books and I [View Full Entry]

---

---

There was a break in the weather and it looked good for traveling, so we set sail for Antigua- the yachting capital of the world. On our first day of the trip we decided to stop in Dehais, a small anchorage on the north end of Guadeloupe, to rest for the night. Then we awoke at dawn the next day and continued our journey. We arrived in the southern end of Antigua by late afternoon and had to decide where to anchor, either Fallmouth Harbour or English Harbour. These two harbors sit side by side and are separated only by a [View Full Entry]

---

---

Bikes. Everywhere. Amsterdam will be remembered for the bicycles… Except that unlike in Italy, these ones are not noisy Vespas that go hurtling past, rather, they are of the pedal variety. They are literally everywhere, chained to anything that’s solid, ranging from fences to trees to benches to rubbish bins. Apparently, tens of thousands of them get stolen each year, which is surprising given that there appears to be three for every resident. And if they aren’t chained to something solid, they will end up in the canals as a drunken late night joke. Thousands are [View Full Entry]

---

---