carlinho

yesterday i went to the shooting range in phnom penh and shot an AK47. it was really loud and felt so powerful, especially when i flipped the switch to "fully automatic" and unloaded 3/4 of my magazine into the target. unfortunately it was just a dude on a piece of paper with a bullseye on his chest; i was hoping we would be able to mangle an old refridgerator, or at least shoot out the windows of some old cars. nevertheless, it was the best $30 US i ever spent, and i kept my paper target to show people when i get home. when you roll up there they give you a menu with different guns and prices on it, ranging from a light handgun for $10 US to some seriously heavy artillery for about $100 ... read more

finally in cambodia, after a week long struggle to get our cambodian visas. we are in siam reap; it is a city in the north of the country, and the main tourist area is well lit up and definitely westernized. after ordering our cambodian visas in pak se, a town in southern Lao, our passports were to be transported up to vientiane to be stamped by the cambodian embassy there. after taking a night bus to pak se, and then arranging for this to happen, we caught a tuktuk to the bus terminal and found out that there was another 4 hour ride awaiting us on the back of what is essentially a modifified dump truck, with chickens in the seating area with us, as well as pigs in bags tied onto the back. it was ... read more

right now i'm in vang vieng, Laos. its really amazing here, the whole town is surrounded by huge mountains that are covered in jungle. there is a river near by that we went tubing down yesterday, and then again today....on the side of the river you can roll up and buy big "beerlaos" for about $1 cdn, and then climb a high tree and use these zip lines to zip down to the river! we took a bus ride through those mountains from luang prabang, it was about 7 hours through winding roads covered with potholes, so it wasnt the most comfortable ride.. this place is so cheap, even more so than thailand..... just so you can get an idea about it, we pay $1 per night each for our guest house, and each meal is ... read more

today we took a bus from chaing mai to chaing rai which took about 4 hours.. then we moved onto this place a little closer to the Laos border right on the mekong river in the north of thailand. tomorrow we have to get up early to catch a ride to the slow boat that takes us down the mekong itself, for about 2 days as we pass into Laos. i think we have to stop along the way to sleep for one night at a village on the river somewhere, but if everything goes as planned we should be in vientiane, the capital of laos in about 3 days!... read more

just got back from a crazy 3 day jungle adventure in the northern thailand province of Pia.... it was awesome, we hiked lots everyday through this thick thick rain forest type jungle, and each day arrived at a hill tribes village where we slept in bamboo huts. they made massive pots of thai food (including a maggot that i ate!), curry etc, every night and lunch, and all we did every night was sit in these huge circles (about 20 people including the villagers) and drink thai whiskey and sample the local herb! on the second day we rode elephants, i sat on its neck and it was kinda freaky because the elephant was getting irratated i think, because i was always adjusting my position so it tried to hit me off with a branch that ... read more

my friend jay had to do a visa run to cambodia yesterday (your visa expires after 30 days and you have to hop across the border and back to renew it) so tim and i had day by ourselves travelling down south... we figured that we wanted to get some beach and sun, and without going too far, pattaya seemed like the closest place where we could go, and jason would meet us there the following day (we basically just wanted to get outta bangkok). tim and i bought a bus ticket to pattaya for about 6 bucks each, it was a 2 hour journey, and we got off with our packs on our backs and decided to walk down to the beach, which was a few couple km away. when we got down to the ... read more

... finally arrived in bangkok after flying from faro portugal to london england, then to dubai, united arab emirates, and finally bangkok. met up with friends tim and jason in bangkok airport, thank god because i wouldnt have had any clue about where to go...the road system here is insane. its like there are no rules at all, and people drive cars and motorcycles like they own the road, swerving around all the other traffic trying to shave a couple of minutes off their travel time. traffic is horrendous most of the time, constantly backed up on all major routes through the city. took a bus to khao san road, the main backpacking area in this place. it is a road about a km long lined absolutely jam packed with shops, and little street carts that ... read more

leaving portugal today after spending 2 months in sagres.... worked in bubble lounge and met some really cool ppl!! zeni, tomas, teresa, lorna, ricardo, had a really good time working with u ppl, gonna miss nights spent in bubbles after we closed, smoking cashimbo and drinking whiskey sours. learned how to surf and had some quality time with my sisters. moving on to thailand now, excited but sad to leave friends behind... miss ya FC! hopefully will be back to see everyone again before i have to head back to canada...... read more