Krasnoyarsk we spent a month in Krasnoyarsk in 2008. The loud speakers seem funny at first and then become very annoying. Nice town, though. Most people there are a little intimidated by Americans, which we obviously were. i could understand and read Russian by the time we left although I could only speak a few words. WE stayed at the Hotel Krasnoyarsk and then walked all over the place. We visited a few towns close by as well. Would love to go back someday and perhaps take the train maybe back to Moscow, which is also a beautiful city..
ok here it is: this is offically my favourite photo of the trip. i love a good bench photo! its an artform! and i love how you have captured the modern sleek looking bench against the history of the street (and who doesnt love a witty stencil!)
every one of those buildings in st petersburg/moscow looked like it was either from disneyland or edible!
oh are you going to miss lenin being everywhere?
and what about the reaction of the fam when you arrive out of nowhere??? where are the details madeleine - how else is hannah going to get her blog to tv series child!!!
when you have a chance can you put all your lenin photos in an album on the fb and then we can vote on which is the most impressive!
im also love the outside window decorations - the attention to detail!
get your blog nazi on mado! and dont think you are going to stop your blogging once you start uni - im starting a petition to keep you going (im pretty sure i can get three signatures at least!)
all im saying is you should have filmed yourself getting your masterchef on in the train and made a little cooking show and posted it!!! it would have been fantastic and probably also made people stare even more!
i ll come with you to russia in the winter and we can finally go ice swimming! it cant be any colder than the riverland right now!
have you been seeing a lot of cabbage in russia? arent russians suppose to be crazy about cabbage? i cant get this image out of my head of this sock and sandal wearing family photo with a random mado in it smiling away - hilarious
this town Krasnoyarsk sounds a lot like loxton in the riverland: lights up even though its not xmas and tacky bad music playing from loud speakers
i really like the chapel on the hill photo! and shut up you english speaking celebrity!
oh your tent photo looks so cute - but i do believe that yellow tents photograph better! what an epic entry. i think i laughed the hardest at this entry: somewhere between the russians taking 40minutes in the toilet and your friend walking with a spear because he was afraid of bears, i couldnt breathe i was laughing so hard! have you been practicing any bear hangs? i cant believe that the water wasnt that cold? i havent been swimming in ages..... im such a whitey at the moment its out of control!
haha trotting camels with dreadlocks - thats what the riverland needs to bring in the tourists! mado how about that time that i went on that camel wine tasting tour with maria and couldnt sit down for the next 2 days!!!! bloody camels
im also starting to think that you have split dairy personalities - there is one mado who never thinks about dairy anymore and this other dairy lover lurking in the background.
also on the vegan news front - have you heard that felicity has just about given up honey!!!!!
I have been on camels before, once in Broome too but I didn't remember it ever being so painful! Tourist camels don't usually trott right? Your right though, they are rediculous things. Mine had extreme dreadlocks. I think you'd be ok. I was loving the milk again but as soon as I went back to the city it was as if all the dairy eating never happened and I didn't have a single craving! and I was pretty obsessed with milk and cheese before I went vegan
I was sold on Mongolia in the first paragraph Oh goat herding, I wouldn't have been able to get that song from the Sound of Music out of me head, yodel-ay ee-oo. I can't believe you have never been on a camel. They are hilarious looking animals, my brother cried the whole time we were on one in Broome. There is one that I drive past on the way into town here in Katherine, cracks me up every time. I don't know if I would go well in Mongolia, even though it sounds amazing, only because of the whole milk thing. It was one of the hardest things to let go for me when becoming vegan (my brother and I would drink 2 litres of the stuff between us a day as kids).
Far out your moving so fast I'm not keeping up Im still in Mongolia wowza! So I keep opening your blogs and not getting around to reading them because I'm lazy but I always look at the photos first and they look incredible...I love the blue windows in Tomsk. When I was in Singapore and India I took so many photos of window it was silly. I may just have a window fetish...hmmmmm.!!!!! O.K. I'm going to read all your other blogs and not be lazy. Even though I've been staring at a computer screen all day. (I started my job as a receptionist today with an insurance company). sad face.
I'm not even sure the first two families living in the gers were nomadic. I always tried to ask but this sentence was too complex and my hand signals sucked so I never managed to get them to understand when I asked questions about that. Yeah, I was the only one on it and the hostel 'arranges' it by taking you to the bus stop and making sure you get on the bus and calling the first family so they know your coming. They told me that they take alot of comission for regular tours but for the ger-to-ger all my money goes to the families I stayed with. I'm not sure thats true, they must take abit for themselves? And yeah, UB was big on vego/vegan but I wonder where all the veges come from/ Probably on the train from China.
ohhh i cant believe you got met off the train - thats lovely. and a ger disco party wowsers - party ger. so you were the only one on this ger to ger trip? after all that worry about the dairy culture in mongolia turns out your a natural at it - congrats. ahahahah the kids threw a rock and it hit you in the face. oh no. last week at drama one of the boys was concentrating so hard he bit his lip and it started bleeding, he thought he was going to die, i told him to toughen up and ignored his wimpering! its interesting with the third family - i wonder how long they had lived in a house and and that they seemed to be establishing garden suggests they are not as nomadic as they used to be? did you get any indication why that might be? so the tour was organised by the hostel that you stayed at? i wonder how much the families got for you staying with them. such great photos of the gers. im very jealous you got to see a ger before me!
and multiple vegan resturants in ulaan baatar - amazing
i pretty much think you were born for overnight sleeping buses mado! whereas i on the other hand would not cope with my extreme sleeping style! boy oh boy it always so sad when you visit some place and see why it has become so popular because it is so naturally beautiful but has been completely destroyed by wasteful humans... grrrrr. yeah i can understand not being into caves - they are creepy and i always imagine aliens/dormant alien viruses being in them! (way too much xfles for me here!) but i did enjoy the magic cave reference!
What story about Laura and bread?? I never heard that one! I feel bad blatently taking photos of locals so most of the time I try and do it the sneaky way
Actually the Cambodian drag queens made such convincing females it was hard to call it tacky. It was more fun looking at all the gay Khmers loosing it over them! Khmer New Year is the Buddhist new year so also celebrated in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam. A big 3 (or 10) day holiday, family time, abit like Christmas. The knife from New Zealand was long gone - it got taken from me at the airport once when I forgot it was in my hand luggage. This was a brand new authentic one I got for Christmas. I have met some Hmong people - details in the next 2 entries. But the ones here in Sapa are just annoying - follow you round all day saying 'you buy something from me'
the likeness of your blogging style to jane eyre so me and felicity are reading (well felicity is listneing to audio book while tomato picking) jane eyre and have both decided that your blogging style is the modern day equivalent of jane eyre's narration! (this means you are going to become a penguin classic!) the part that clinched it for me was you laying in your room thinking you were going to die from malaria! very jane eyre-ish!
i am loving the 'waterfall' comments! and who really cares about seeing waterfalls when you can see those amazingly cute handmade bridges! and excuse me who is the sexy boy on the mekong dolphin spotting boat!!!! im also enjoying the creepy photos from your window of unsuspecting locals! im glad you are loving laos so much but be careful (this warning might be too late) remember the story with laura and the bread...!!!!
ohhhhh vegetarian friends! i love fish sauce free meals! thats amazing that you found resturant with half the menu labelled vegan. and then you got to see cambodian drag queens i am soooo jealous - i bet it was hilariously tacky!
all im saying isnt why havent you posted the photo of you as a khmer bride!!! hey have you met any hmong people yet? or you didnt get north enough?
what happens on khmer new year? im sorry about your bag - i think im saddest to hear about the loss of your swiss army knief - it was so good to us for so many camping trips!
and enough photos with monkeys mado!!! you are out of control!
yeah I bought one in Darwin which was stupid coz there is nowhere to go camping in SE Asia (duh) and its big an heavy. So any excuse to use it and I will - I saw you could camp at this national park to I was sold!...$2 is a pretty good comeback for Aussie bananas. Yesterday I got the cheapest deal ever - 25 cents for 15 bananas (admittedly theyre small but still)! They are always so ripe though as soon as they go into my bag they are one big smooshy mess
Wondering about internet service
I last heard from my daughter on April 8,2011 she was in Bali headed for the Gili Islands next day. She is backpacking and usually emails about every 3 days, she knows I worry about her. Is the internet service that bad in the Gili Islands? Trying not to panic in Florida. Thankyou, Colleen Evans...Naturallycolleen@yahoo.com
the berri public library is not ready for your blog posts. everytime me or felicity come here to read them one of us ends up snorting coz we are laughing so hard and then we get the 'shush' look from the librarians! out of control - that tomb raider shot with the head torch needs to be printed and put on our fridge is all im saying!
so did you buy a tent? and what inspired this camping trip idea. its funny that half the country seems underwater but there wasnt much water in the waterfalls! all im saying is where are the photos of the thai tourists at the camping park? and killer monkeys trying to pounch on your smooshy bananas out of control! i stockpiled the bananas when i was back in radders on the weekend coz they were $2 a kilo at the markets (the week before apparently they had been $15 a kilo) and then when i caught the bus back to berri the next day they were so nice and ripe/rotting/squashed that i had to double bag htem and still didnt dare upzip my bag in case of suffocating the rest of the bus!
stacy
non-member comment
Krasnoyarsk
we spent a month in Krasnoyarsk in 2008. The loud speakers seem funny at first and then become very annoying. Nice town, though. Most people there are a little intimidated by Americans, which we obviously were. i could understand and read Russian by the time we left although I could only speak a few words. WE stayed at the Hotel Krasnoyarsk and then walked all over the place. We visited a few towns close by as well. Would love to go back someday and perhaps take the train maybe back to Moscow, which is also a beautiful city..