http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/ScottMcD/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from ScottMcD en-us Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:13:50 +0000 Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:13:50 +0000 Well as per usual itrsquos taken me awhile to post this blog in this case though I knew this would be the final one and it was actually a little difficult for me to come to terms with this fact as I really didnrsquot want the trip to end. Also I left the SD card with all my photos in the Bodrum Hilton and just got them backHaving started back in Shanghai in May it took me ten months to m http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-of-Good-Hope/blog-398506.html Namibia named after the oldest geological desert in the world the Namib Desert lies just north of South Africa. It was and Administered area of SA until 1988 when it won independence. We spent 8 days touring the south and Skeleton Coast of the country. The shoreline draws it name from the numerous bleached whale and seal bones that can be found on the beach. The coast is also notorious for s http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Namibia/blog-398503.html For the holidays Stephanie flew out from Hong Kong and met me in Johannesburg where we spent a couple of days touring the city before headed to Simbambili private reserve on boarder of Kruger national park for a few days of safari. Simbambili is famous for its leopards and we saw plenty http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/blog-398499.html After Tunisia I flew down to Tanzania for a two week safari with National Geographic. The journey started just west of Mt Kilimanjaro in the town of Arusha. We then toured through the famous Ngorongoro Crater. This 3 million year old crater is a World Heritage Site and represents the largest unbroken ancient caldera in the world. It is often referred to as ldquoAfricarsquos Garden of Edenr http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Tanzania/blog-398490.html After my brief stop over in Europe I headed to Tunisia to visit the ancient city of Carthage. According to Roman legend Carthage was founded by Queen Dido in 814BC. For those you up on your Virgil you may remember her as the queen who gave refuge to Aeneas and his men upon their recent escape following the fall of Troy. Aeneas and Dido fell in love but alas the god Mercury reminded Aeneas that h http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Tunisia/blog-398404.html Next I headed to Sierra Leone where my foundation cerescf.org is founding a school improvement program being run by LemonAid www.lemonaidfund.org . LemonAid was created 10 years ago by Nancy Peddle and has done tremendous work in SL. Nancy is a unflagging woman with an upbeat attitude and nearly limitless patiencehellipand itrsquos patience thatrsquos needed in abundance to survive in http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Sierra-Leone/Freetown/blog-352158.html In late October I headed over to Morocco to do a 10 day Mt biking trip with Saddle Skedaddle through the Atlas mountains. I flew into Casablanca from Milan a couple of days earlier and figured I do a little exploring around. I had this naive kind of romantic or exotic Humphrey Bogart Lauran Bacall expectation for Casablanca but quickly discovered it to be pretty much just a big and dare I say http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Morocco/blog-352143.html Irsquove come to the realization Irsquom really not a very good blogger. After all the whole idea behind bloging is to produce quick relevant little personal insights or observations and I think the expected thought to online blog publication time standard is essentially ldquorealtimerdquo. Irsquom sitting Arusha Tanzania as write this right now and Irsquom afraid the last two sent http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/France/Corsica/blog-352128.html After Italy I backtracked to Greece and did a 5 day mt. biking trip around mount Olympus which is in the Macedonian area of northern Greece. The trip itinerary promised lots of sunshine and warm clear dayshelliplets just say I happy I brought my rain gear along. Joining me on trip was a great group of four guys from the UK and Ireland. After the ldquoicerdquo biking I went to Athens for a http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Greece/blog-336862.html Sun wine blue seas wine rolling hills of green and wine. Other than the time Bruno screwed up hotel our reservation in Chamonix a couple of years back the town was totally booked up and we had to drive to Italy for the night to sleep this was my first real trip to Italy and I love it. Irsquom ready to start taking Italian lessons and buy a whole new wardrobe of super tight clothesI arr http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/blog-336680.html Photos from Troy Izmir and Bergama http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/blog-336665.html I spent three weeks touring through Turkey from the 24th of August in to the first two weeks of Ramadan staring Sept 2nd this year and then flew to Rome Turkey is a beautiful country and the people are incredibly friendly even after they find out yoursquore American. It's widely report in the media that Turkish people really donrsquot like America. In June 2007 the Pew Research Center p http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/blog-336613.html Germany After two months of Kazakhstan Russia Ukraine and Georgia I had finally arrived in the organized splendor that is Berlin. A city where everything is in it's place the maps are to scale and the taxis have meters. It seems most of eastern Europe has not yet discovered the taxi meter thus every taxi ride is proceeded by a negotiating process which I'm pretty sure I lost every time. http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/blog-336593.html Okay I realize I haven't made a new posting for some time now but in my defense there has been much travel and when you can only type ten words per minute that's five words for each finger I use you need to be sedentary for period and have internet access in order to spit these things outI am in Milan Italy now. Since my last post I have been to in order of visit Germany Turkey Italy Gr http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/blog-336585.html Ok so I spent a few days in Georgia and much to my disappoint I didnrsquot see any Russian tanks. There was actually a big map in the lobby of my hotel which supposedly showed the location of the Russian tanks but getting therehellipwell letrsquos just say I think the Georgians are little opportunistic. I stayed in Tbilisi the Georgian capital and other than the big board with all the pin http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Georgia/Tbilisi-District/blog-317386.html Irsquom in Kiev now which btw is a very cool city After leaving Kazakhstan I headed to Moscow and then Saint Petersburg before arriving here. Moscow is a beautiful city filled with striking architecture striking people and striking prices for everything. It must rate second only to Hong Kong in terms of Ferrarirsquos per square inch of road surfacehellipthe Russianrsquos are rich rig http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Russia/blog-314628.html Irsquom in Astana now which is the new capital of Kazakhstan. I arrived here via Almaty which is where I originally started and ended my biking trip and which had been the historical capital of Kazakhstanhellipat least for the last few hundred years anyways. To know why I believe this is important or even mention it letrsquos start with a quick Kazak history lesson.Kazakhstan was largely j http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kyrgyzstan/blog-314625.html Well I finally finished my mt. biking trip through Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and while it was a very tough trip it was one of the best trips Irsquove ever done. I really had a great time I hadnrsquot biked much in the past couple of years so I was not in biking shape at all and the first 5 days were really hard on me as they were all long hard rides that allowed no time for recovery. Lucki http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/blog-313658.html After a few days in Mongolia here are a few of my initial discoveriesThe Mongolian diet The seasons are strong in Mongolia latitude wise think North Dakota the summers are hot and the winters are icy cold. In the winter the Mongolians eat almost nothing but meat and starting in the spring in order to cleanse the stomach they believe they eat almost nothing but milk products. Irsquove vi http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Mongolia/blog-305169.html I arrived in Almaty Kazakhstan two days ago. Yesterday my bike mule aka Jim Wilson flew in with my bike and tomorrow we start off on 12 days of mt. biking from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan and back again. I t promises to be beautiful but grueling ride as we climb over 12K foot passes.I will write and tell you all about it when I get back to Almaty on the 11th http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/blog-305156.html