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Austin Scharf Joined: May 30th 2008
Logged in: August 5th 2009
Logged in: August 5th 2009
Travel Blog Posts
Betley Group, Summer '08
Herein begins my journal about Boston! I'll try to update when I travel as well. The move from San Diego to Boston (which I did with Jaime) was a bit of a whirlwind. I'd miscommunicated with the Harvard Chemistry Department, and realized that I was supposed to be on campus a week before I thought. As a result, we cut out drive a day short, and I flew from Indiana to Boston as soon as I could. Regardless, Jaime and I had a grand old time on our trip. She'd planned an excellent route, with overnight stops in rural Utah (at the oldest functional bed & breakfast in the state); Boulder, CO; and Kansas City, Kansas, where much of her extended family lives. On the drive, we passed through a number of national parks, including Zion ... read more
Sand-boarding
My apologies for not updating sooner... the world became a very hectic place on my return to the US. Hopefully this entry will bring some (brief) closure to my trip. I DO plan to keep this blog operational, as a pseudo-journal and as a way to keep in touch with many of you that I don't see regularly. The majority of my time in Fiji was spent on a bus tour - much like the one I did in New Zealand - around the perimeter of the main island. Over the course of about 3.5 days, I ~went sand-boarding down a 45-degree dune ~drank kava (which tastes like tingly mud) with lots of local villagers ~climbed a remote mountain - and saw a (dead) 8-inch millipede! ~went long-boating down the longest river in Fiji ~snorkeled off ... read more
Not a standard entry, but... Things I miss: real hot sauce (not "sweet chili sauce"); ketchup; proper pizza crust; seasonings; bathtubs; dressers; speaking pedestrian crossing signs ("Walk sign is on across University..."); free internet; IPA; gay people; recliners; my cell phone (seriously!); Bloody Marys; my car; fantasy/sci-fi books; 2-ply quilted toilet paper; thick pillows; card games; intellectual conversations about things I'm familiar with; the letter "r"; double quotation marks (as opposed to apostrophes); clean underwear; references to religion; people I know; powerful showers; crispy bacon; purple nitrile gloves; having a debit card; knowing my way around; Ebonics; the luxury of reading while shitting; maple trees & syrup; "color" without a "u"; Food Network; doing something constructive/productive; Neosporin and Lotrimin AF; being able to pinch a zit in a privat... read more
Geysers at Te Puia
I've had quite a few exciting things happen over the last several days. After the rather unpleasant incident at the bar in Rotorua with the homophobes, I went to bed. We woke up early the next morning and went to another park nearby called Te Puia; it's a natural geothermal reserve, and we saw geysers & bubbling mud pools, then sat on 110-degree rocks, which would serve as excellent substitutes for heating pads if they weren't so hard and lumpy. Also in the park, we saw a couple of kiwi birds - the national icon of New Zealand - though they were in captivity and no photos were permitted. The second half of our time in the park was another "Maori cultural experience," much like the previous one we'd gotten to participate in. This time, however, ... read more
I had a really unpleasant experience this evening. Tonight was the only night our entire tour group agreed to go out for drinks after our "adventures" for the day were completed, so we all went to the backpacker bar next to our hostel. Despite the bad music, the expensive drinks, and the rather dead crowd, we were managing to have a good time. Eventually, we dispersed to mingle with some people we'd met earlier; I ended up chatting for a good bit of time with a couple of Mennonite guys from Pennsylvania who are working on a nearby dairy farm for a few months. We knew a few of the same people at Goshen College! Fancy that! Eventually I met a few New Zealanders and was talking to them for a while. They seemed quite friendly, ... read more
Karangahake Gorge
The last two days I've spent in Rotorua, "The Geothermal Capital of New Zealand," named such because the town lies in a sulfur-smelling volcanic crater with geysers and hot springs everywhere. It's a larger town, but is almost entirely full of backpackers, because there are so many things to do here: white-water rafting, relaxing in hot springs, swimming in the nearby Lake Rotorua, skydiving, bungee-jumping, watching sheep-shearing demonstrations (seriously), etc. Yesterday, the group I'm traveling with (from the Kiwi Experience bus tour) took the afternoon off; I did some laundry and took a nap. Later in the evening, we were taken to Tamaki Village, a Maori cultural center. At Tamaki, we participated in a traditional "welcoming ceremony," which involved scantily clad men dancing and waving spears, bulging their eyes, and sticking their tongues out at us, ... read more
Auckland, New Zealand
Last night I was reminded why I haven't stayed in many dorm-style hostels on this trip. Throughout the night, my seven roommates kept coming and going, stumbling in (most of them were drunk, I'm sure), clattering about, and occasionally turning lights on (in the middle of the night, mind you). On top of that, the fire alarm in our room kept going off at random intervals, despite the complete lack of fire. I don't think I slept more than 20 minutes at a time the entire night! Got up this morning, had a bit of breakfast and coffee, and somehow nearly missed my bus for the Kiwi Experience - the "adventure trip" I booked for 6 of the 8 days I'm in New Zealand. I had to run (laden with a 45 lb backpack) a long ... read more
AFL
The last several days in Melbourne were grand fun! The day after my last entry, Gary, Rachel, Gary's sister Kelly, and I went to an Australian Rule Football game between the Melbourne Demons (who we were rooting for) and the West Coast Eagles. It was a great time, despite the frigid temperatures. It rained on and off throughout the game, and was a tad on the brisk side, but we managed to have a great time nonetheless. It was only the third time Melbourne had won all season! Afterward, Gary, Rachel, and I went to try to see the view from atop Eureka Tower, but again the weather was prohibitive; we didn't want to spend the $30/person to see bunch of fog from the top of a tall building. So we took pictures OF the building, ... read more
St. Paul's Cathedral
It's been ages since I last made an entry! I suppose nothing terribly exciting has happened in that time, which may explain things. The first several days in Melbourne were good, but stressful. I had run out of money, so was having to borrow from my Aussie friends until I could arrange to get some from the States. That turned out to be no big deal, but it also meant I couldn't do anything very interesting, like eat or drink much :-P During that time, though, I got to catch up quite a bit with my good friend Pauly, with whom I was staying. That was excellent; not only is he someone that gets me pretty well, he's a really good listener and counselor, which was something I needed badly during the stresses of those days. ... read more
Skyline(?)
How lovely it is to be in familiar surroundings again! After my last entry, I found a tour bus around Dubai and actually got to see a few sights, which was good, since I'd seen almost nothing of the city up to that point. The pictures attached here are entirely from that bus tour. Among the sights was the soon-to-be-completed tallest building in the world, the oldest structure in Dubai - which dates from the early 18th century, the Dubai Port - the largest man-made port in the world, and various and sundry interesting buildings. The trip from Dubai to Melbourne was long, and - you guessed it - not all went as planned. The first two legs of the journey (Dubai to Chennai, India, then onward to Bangkok) went relatively well, though I had a ... read more
