Madrid, Espana We managed to get back to downtown Madrid and used the computer internet store. Then we headed for the train station to get tickets to Toledo, however, our ticket number was 385 and the number called was 157, it was going to be a wait. So I took off to get tickets for Museo del Prado while Bob waited. When I returned, 40 minutes later, he had only moved up the line 20 to so numbers, well we have other options, so we decided to drive to Toledo, tomorrow. The walk along the Paseo del Prado is a [View Full Entry]

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As we biked along the azure coast of Inishmore (the largest of the Aran islands) off the West Coast of Galway, we basked in the sun’s warm glow and drank in our idyllic surroundings; stone walls interspersed with wildflowers, undulating hills, grey seals languishing on warm rocks, cows lazily grazing in green fields, and the clear blue waters of the Atlantic ocean sparkling like a sea of diamonds. Dave sidled up to me on his bike and we laughed together, held hands, enjoying the (rare) Irish sun and discussed how much we loved being together, and how blessed we were that [View Full Entry]

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"If you see one temple in Chiang Mai, make it Doi Suthep" I was told. So I took the chance to head up to Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep (about 15 km outside Chiang Mai city) with some other Spicythai'ers on the morning of my last full day in Chiang Mai. In 1368 a monk brought a sacred relic he had discovered as the result of a dream to Northern Thailand. The King of the time placed it on the back of a white elephant and said that he would build a temple wherever the elephant stopped. After wandering through the jungle [View Full Entry]

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There is More to This Country. . . Where I come from it takes a good hour and a half driving in excess of the speed limit before you even come to the next piddling little village down the road, and to get to the next “big” place takes another hour or so. Australia is the kind of place where you can drive for several hours on end and only find two places that are signposted enough to be considered worth stopping at. This is the world that I grew up in; this is what I’m used to. Imagine my surprise [View Full Entry]

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Comfy, soft spongy chair, 'ah...' I thought twiddling with the reclining button and getting the angle just right. Santiago sped by and I closed my eyes. Six or seven hours of countryside awaited, there would be plenty of time to look out windows. I felt a gentle prod on my shoulder and looked up. The young man dressed impeccably in a freshly ironed uniform handed me a pair of headphones. I smiled, 'gracias...; and closed my eyes. Moments later he was back, placing an unexpected pillow under my neck. Before we had left the city he returned carrying newspapers. 'El Dia?' [View Full Entry]

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Borders are rarely this significant. Usually the fact that some imaginary line on a map has been crossed does not actually show itself on the ground. The Laos-Vietnam border is different; we went from a steep, almost vertical, climb up through thick jungle to a sudden line of no trees, flat, bare ground and huge excavators eating away more of the hillsides. Suddenly there was a 6 lane road and houses everywhere. These houses were not the bamboo and hardwood huts we were used to, they were tiny concrete boxes, housing large families plus their motos. Now “motos’’ (scooters and motorbikes) [View Full Entry]

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Chile is a country occupying a long narrow strip of land in South America. It’s squeezed between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. The coastline extends for over 2,700 miles and the country is never more than 110 miles in width. Located directly along the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” Chile has around 2,085 volcanoes, 55 of which are active. Its unusual shape and vast length make for a widely varied climate. In the north is the world’s driest desert - the Atacama, while the south is made up of glaciers, fjords, and lakes. The central part of the country is [View Full Entry]

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Uspallarta is both the name of a small village and a remote pass between Mendoza and Santiago Chile. Travelling between Santiago and Mendoza was a joy, beautiful craggy mountains, twisting roads that double back on them selves over and over, looping up the mountain. After arriving in Mendoza - I headed back to the village - spent an afternoon on horseback, taking photos when I could convince the beast to steady enough. Uspallata and the surrounding mountains were considered enough of a double for the Tibetan Himalayas to film Seven Years in Tibet (1997) - in some of the bars there [View Full Entry]

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