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Published: April 29th 2009
That's all folks
Thank-you for your kind attention and supportive comments. If anybody has any questions, I'll be in the bar.Most things have remained the same, one or two new things to catch up on. I found the maple syrup in the same place as always in the supermarket; but who the hell is Lady Ga-Ga? No such person when I left.
I caught up with Dorothy in Rotterdam who helped provide me with a soft landing and spend my first night back in the UK at Sonia & Mick's place, before picking the car up and driving home to a stack of mail so big it- well, I won't go into it. Banking to be done, screens and screens of emails to answer on my computer at home. My own bed feels fantastic and so does wearing jeans again - 6 & a half months of artificial fibre trousers was starting to get tiresome.
One of the things you won't know if you've been reading this is that one of screens I see when I'm logged into travelblog.org is a hit-counter for each of the entries I've published. I left the UK with about 140 subscribers. During my travels I added people to my list and now I'm finishing my journey with just over 200. Up until Malaysia my hit count was regularly just short of the number of subscribers I had. But whilst in Malaysia I'd picked up recommendations from other bloggers and this led to my posts appearing on the Travelblog home page so everybody could see it, not just those of you that get the emails. With many more people now able to spot my blog, my Kuala Lumpur entry shot up to the top with over 350 hits in about 2 days. It is lovely to be noticed, though I know for sure most people only click on an entry to check the photos then close it again (that's what I mostly do). My
next entry from Vietnam generated over
550 hits. Why so popular? I don't know, but I can see that Vietnam is definitely a hot, or trendy place to be right now. I saw more holiday-makers and backpackers in Vietnam than anywhere else. My Eastern Europe entries have picked up nowhere near the same level of attention despite spending the same number of days on the Travelblog home page. I'm not judging; I'm not disappointed at the low level of interest they got, I'm just making an observation.
Spot Your Name Here
There is one last job to perform before I sign out for the last time - this last bit's for everybody I met out there, not the folks back home in the UK. I need to say "thank-you" to everybody I met along the way and who was kind to me, bought me a beer, gave me a lift, put me up in their house, helped me buy a railway ticket or book accommodation. All these people I met in hostels and hotels, ferries or buses, and some of them I travelled with for a few days. Some of you have become personal friends, despite the short time we spent together.
Since I met so many people, I had no choice but to edit things when writing some of my entries. No doubt some of you may have read my accounts and may have been disappointed to find you were not there. This is the place where I can show that I did not forget you. I carried around a little black notebook for my whole trip - in fact I was carrying several blank notebooks and I gradually filled them all up with random thoughts and ideas; sketch maps of someplace I needed to find with maybe a time I needed to be there; reminders, or sometimes just a clever turn-of-phrase I heard someone use, wishing I'd thought of it. They're also full of your names, telephone numbers and email addresses. In the future I will occasionally be looking through my notebooks again because I don't want to forget any of this. I hope you all stay in touch by one method or another, and if you change your addresses please let me know by hitting the "Private Message" button. I would prefer to think our paths are going to cross again, and would be more than happy if that next time it was on my home turf. I have received many favours, I surely owe a few back.
Boston Joan and Frank the Yank, for coming all the way into Boston airport from out of town to pick me up, when I had expected to have to fluster around the terminal and make my own way by bus.
Canada Miguel and Yoshi in Montreal.
Marie and Paul in St. John's, Newfoundland, who hosted me for 5 days, fed and watered me, all with possibly less than 2-days notice.
PAAMela! whom I met on the plane on the way to St. John's, and who gave up her day to drive me around showing me the sights.
Andrea and Kevin also in St. Johns, for curry, getting me screeched in and a night in Sundance.
Saar and Fay in Toronto, who persuaded me to come to salsa dancing.
Chris and Sara in Calgary for hosting me for 2 days.
Fiera in Vancouver, for giving me her afternoon to drive me around and show me the Chinese community in Richmond, and introducing me to bubble tea.
Helen (and the floating man), who discovered along with me that there is nothing much to do in Winnipeg, but rather a lot to do in Vancouver.
Alaska Cat and James, now living in Fairbanks, who taught me to play Rummy on the Bellingham ferry; I hope you have adjusted to the extreme cold up there and been compensated with the most wonderful displays of Aurorae.
Liz and Richard in Juneau for their company during the Whalefest and putting me up in their home for a night;
Nate and Jo in Juneau, for calling me to say I should see the Mendenhall glacier, it was very thoughtful considering how little time we'd spent talking to each other.
Marty who both gave me a lift out of Juneau when it was far too early in the morning and I was in need of help. And also for putting up with my attempt to explain cricket.
Seattle Miguel, who taught me about connoisseur coffee, in exchange for which I took him whisky tasting.
Japan Penny, with whom I spent my first day in Tokyo helping me break in slowly to a place that I was was apprehensive about.
Christine, for translating and taking me to play Go in Tokyo.
Julien, Mark, Andy and Jules in Tokyo.
Yoshiaki-san and Yuko-san in Oguni for the Christmas party, treating me like a king for 2 days and inviting me into their home to eat with their family.
Miho-san in Kurokawa for showing me how I had been bowing the wrong way all this time.
Naori-san in Kumamoto station.
Yukari-san and Mayumi-san from Hiroshima who took me out for food and dancing and arranged my visit to Oguni and Kurokawa.
Takeshi-san and his wife in Kurokawa Onsen, who couldn't stop laughing at the face I pulled when eating that sour plum at breakfast.
Simon from Switzerland, for explaining finance and the global credit crunch in terms I could understand whilst watching the Christmas Eve fireworks in Beppu.
China My hosts Alison and Piers and of course it was great to meet my new neice Ruby.
Australia Insook from Korea, for music-swapping on the flight from Tokyo.
Ollie in Sydney for drinking company.
Sharon, Mark and their children Ellis, Sean and George.
My very good friend Merryn for wine-tasting, accommodation, travel advice and the use of her car.
Sarah and Pat my hosts in Niurioopta, SA.
Adrian and Amanda my hosts in Adelaide, SA.
Jane, Adam and Evan for giving me a lift across the Nullabor.
Cameron in Perth for hosting me for a week and his friends Jo and Harvey.
Dave and Bridie.
The ex-JPKenny and QCL crowd in Perth for too many beers: Allan, Diane, Allison & Peter; Richard, Mark and Dave.
Malaysia Sharol, once again for driving me around town, taking me out for food and nonstop conversation.
Ranjanee and Mike from the office for food and beers.
Barry and Manda from Daniel's lodge in Tanah Rata and also Alex and Amina who were happy for me to tag along with them to Pulau Pangkor as they seemed to know where the better beaches were. Alex: I hope your leg is better very, very soon.
Ben and Renata whom I kept bumping into in Melaka, Tanah Rata and again in Pulau Pangkor, like some scene from "The Talented Mr. Ripley" or a creepy stalker movie.
Vietnam Tranh Quii Vinh on day-trip to the Caodai temple and Trang Bang.
Hanoi Girl for acting as a tour guide in her own free time.
Quatar Liz and Gary my hosts.
Georgia David the taxi driver for taking me to his friend's place for a feast that saw me being helped out of the room not 2 hours later because, though I tried, I cannot drink like them.
Sam and Therese, the American backpackers I met and with each of whom I wandered around exploring Tbilisi and finding food.
Gyiorgi on the Marshrutka to Akhiltsikhe, who spoke English, gave me directions and briefed me on the current political situation.
The other Gyiorgy in Poti for guiding me around the town and taking me to another feast with his mate Zaza.
Armenia Yuri the taxi driver who took me to a cafe for soorch (at his own expense) followed by his home for dinner and meeting his family.
Artem, who negotiated the taxi for me in Ashtarak.
Vahid who joined me in drinking Ararat brandy in Yerevan.
And not least, Anahit my host, who invited me out for her birthday party.
Ukraine Aleksander and Eugene, and their colleagues Andrei, Alexander, Germann and Nikolayavich.
Nato, Darina and Oksana in Kiev.
Holland Dorothy in Rotterdam for cartoons and the garlic restaurant.
The team at base camp throughout all this was Sonia and Mick who kept keys to my house, checked the mail and kept the car running. My immediate neighbours Lorraine and Michael also kept watch (and dealt with a roof-leak), and finally, Anne a few doors down.
Thanks for reading everybody.
mharleyuk.
Porsche-count (Aberdeen): 16 in 3 days.
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Peter O
non-member comment
Bet your glad your back
Martin, It was a privalige to have been there with you, through the up's and down's and more importantly finding out about places I'll never ever get to. Well done mate, see you in the bar.