http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Drinkthewater/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Drinkthewater en-us Fri, 11 Dec 2009 10:26:18 +0000 Fri, 11 Dec 2009 10:26:18 +0000 This blog covers the period Nov 8142009.Irsquom getting to know a few of the studentsrsquo names now. Six four girls and two boys out of the 38 are called ldquoStanzinrdquo which should help but doesnrsquot. Their photos are also all hung up in the kitchen but I only discovered this fact this week and some arenrsquot easily recognisable from their photos. Therersquos a few http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Jammu-and-Kashmir/Leh/blog-453816.html Irsquod been wanting to do some volunteer work for a while but itrsquos hard to find places that arenrsquot dodgy or donrsquot expect you to pay them a fortune for the privilege of working for them. Irsquod heard about an NGOschool called SECMOL near Leh and emailed them before I went to Leh last time the blogs two and three blogs ago. Their webpage said that they sometimes take http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Jammu-and-Kashmir/Leh/blog-453069.html To explain the rather contrived title Irsquoll skip to the end. This morning 11109 which will be discussed in the next blog when I arrived into Leh the first thing i noticed was that the sky was blue. Also the sun was bright. Why would this surprise me I hear you ask Well good question. The answer is that itrsquos because Irsquod spent the previous ten days or so in Delhi. http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/National-Capital-Territory/Delhi/blog-451586.html Probably because Irsquod come from Manali which is about 2000 metres above sea level and come over the higher passes the altitude in Leh didnrsquot affect me too much. Leh is at 3500 metres. I still found that Irsquod get a bit out of breath and times when Irsquod suddenly feel a bit like I hadnrsquot been breathing enough. Other people also reported weird dreams which I also had http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Jammu-and-Kashmir/Leh/blog-451558.html As well as obviously the time to write this blog and prune out the photos I just spent about twoandahalf hours trying to upload the photos and save the text but every time Travelblog ate half of the comments and put the photos out of order. Then it ate my whole blog. So the photos are all out of order you can probably work out where they should go it should be Delhi gt Road to Manal http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Himachal-Pradesh/Manali/blog-448583.html This blog is late because I had a problem with my camera and couldnrsquot get the photos off it until now. There should be another one or two soon. It relates to the days 29092009 4102009. As you might notice most of it was written about three weeks ago.As well as all the jungles and temples waterfalls and mountains beaches and rivers elephants lions and tigers that you see on th http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Tamil-Nadu/blog-447719.html So we arrived at Maduraim a city of about 1.2 million people with much more of a ldquobig cityrdquo feel than Trichy and more popular on the tourist trail inasmuch as anything in Tamil Nadu is on the tourist trail. This city is famous for its massive temple the Sri Meenakshi temple. By now you might have guessed that Tamil Nadu is famous for its impressive stone temples sometimes in t http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Tamil-Nadu/Madurai/blog-442967.html This blog covers the time approximately Sep 11 15.So in the last blog I left off in the train from Mumbai to Chennai. I think I mentioned most of it already but one thing I forgot to mention is some of the beggars. I donrsquot know if it was because I travelled sleeper class the cheapest class where you still get somewhere to lie down because on the other train rides later I never saw http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Tamil-Nadu/Tiruchirappalli/blog-441967.html Irsquove decided to give up on the missing weeks in my blog. I might write up about them later but without the Guidebooks any more or Internet access itrsquos even hard for me to remember exactly where I went in an orderly way. Anyway rather than constantly trying to catch up Irsquove decided to post this current one and maybe later go back over the four weeks that are missing.I arri http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Maharashtra/Mumbai/blog-435654.html The ferry from Aqaba to Nuweiba in Egyptrsquos Sinai peninsula is supposed to take an hour. On top of this you need to allow considerable time to work out where to actually go. You have to get a taxi out to the ferry terminal then go into a rundown building that from the outside looks pretty deserted to buy your ticket then go downstairs to a room thatrsquos again from the outside look http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Egypt/Sinai/Dahab/blog-435592.html Since Irsquom still way behind with my blogs I thought Irsquod pump out another one. This one will be short because I didnrsquot do much of anything interesting but I thought my habit of sticking to a blog entry for approximately each week was working out pretty well except for the previous two entries obviously. So this relates to the period July 2026.After the archaeology survey I http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Jordan/South/Petra/blog-429550.html weeks 2 3 4I guess yoursquove noticed Irsquove gotten a bit behind in my blog. Itrsquos now nearly three weeks since the archaeology survey finished. Irsquod written parts of it as it was happening but some of it Irsquove written a few days ago. I wasnrsquot sure what to write so Irsquoll just put up what I have now. I donrsquot have many photos from the actual survey beca http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Jordan/South/blog-426033.html Indiana Jones never seemed to spend much time scrubbing toilets. I donrsquot think he ever even had the pleasure of a roommate who smokes in a room in which you canrsquot open the windows although itrsquos probably fair to say that he didnrsquot have Internet access either. I mention Indiana Jones for much the same reasons that I mentioned Borat in the blog about Kazakhstan yoursquo http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Jordan/South/blog-415671.html Once upon a time in a land far far away a young Jewish fundamentalist was heading up to Damascus to kill other Jews for not believing in their God in the right way. Everybody needs a hobby. While on the way there he was suddenly struck blind by a bright light from God himself and heard a voice telling him that he had it all wrong. He was so impressed by this that when he got his sight back http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Syria/South/Damascus/blog-415139.html If you want a country has nice scenery diverse cultures and beautiful scenery and is easy to get around while not being as expensive as Europe or Australia you should all go to Turkey. I think I was lucky to be there in MayJune as itrsquos been nice weather bordering on the hot but the more outoftheway places have not yet been overrun by German or Russian sunseekers. Itrsquos n http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/Mediterranean/Antakya/blog-409056.html Turkey is a nice place for a holiday. Of course I try to avoid ldquonicerdquo places but itrsquos a nice change for a bit. Itrsquos easy to travel in at the moment it has lovely weather the people are friendly and in the tourist areas everyone speaks English and probably German and a few other languages. Reading the maps and guidebooks feels strange to me because you canrsquot hel http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/Marmara/Istanbul/blog-405312.html So I failed in my attempt to get from East Timor to Jordan without flying. I was so close in fact I was even in Europe. The city of Oral in far northwest Kazakhstan is west of the Ural river and so is considered part of Europe. In Russian itrsquos ldquoUralskrdquo but in English itrsquos usually called after the Kazakh ldquoOralrdquo. I went as far as Oral but I was hoping t http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/Oral/blog-401671.html In an effort to avoid my normal boring titles I was going to title my blog ldquoKazakhstan is nicerdquo and then after a few days I was going to title it ldquoKazakhstan has a veneer of nicenessrdquo but I was already sick of people making the Borat references so I decided not to reference that film at all and instead go with the title from the Beatles song which got stuck in my head. http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-401650.html I was pleasantly surprised that the train journey only took about 40 hours rather than the 44 I was expecting. This time I had a ldquohard sleeperrdquo with a middle bunk in the hard sleeper compartments they cram the bunks in three deep. So the train ride from Beijing to Urumqi was much more comfortable than the one from Guilin to Beijing had been. Still the beds were very small almo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Xinjiang/Urumqi/blog-400411.html Irsquom a bit rushed today so hopefully I donrsquot miss any of the bits. Irsquod already written the first part about Dongyue temple so that should be OK. Irsquom leaving for Almaty tomorrow Monday so not sure how often Irsquoll have Internet access after this. I uploaded more photos but Travelblog is still buggy and I don't have time to do it again ... there were a about two http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/blog-397693.html