Blogs from North America - page 8677

. Today we are starting our long trek south (again), first stop Victoria! We continue to have fabulous weather and this morning was no exception - the sky was blue with hardly a cloud, it warmed up pretty quickly and we didn’t have to wear coats! To give you an idea, the people in the cabin next door left with running shorts on… We are just hoping that by making this comment we aren’t jinxing the rest of the trip! Statistics Starting Destination: Ucluelet, British Columbia, Canada Ending Destination: Victoria, British Columbia, Canada Ending Destination GPS: N: 48° 25.295’ W: 123° 22.388’ Elev: 36’ (at the dock, due to technical difficulties) Miles Driven: 255.6 Distance Walked: 3.8 km (2.4 miles) Stairs Climbed: 250 The First Enigma img=http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/9471/webalbionshipxc9.... read more

Ok thats right ive booked my ticket and im off to Aus on Oct 17th :D Im a bit scared im making the wrong choice, even though everyone and their mother tells me they would go in a heart beat. :S Not sure how long im going to be there this time.. first three months i will be up north doing harvest work :S wish me luck because i know i will need it! *will toughin me up anyways :P* will keep posting :D If i dont see some of you before i go then im sorry but its all kinda sudden and ive been trying to get everything together :D Countdown to downunder round 2 begins...... read more

After that mad 300 dollar night (not even one free bottle of champers), we went to a brilliant village called Calistoga. There was a tasting festival on and we just sat on the grass, imbibing excellent white wines and listening to a live dixie jazz style band of old codgers giving their instruments what for. The place we stayed was maybe the best bit - The Calistoga Inn is an old French design they said, all wood panelling and creaky floorboards. I felt like Huckleberry Finn. Here they had an interesting looking book on one of the shelves....something like "A painstaking work of breathtaking genius"; I read quite some pages, but didnt want to swap it with the books I had brought myself. In Calistoga we had the most exquisite meal of our lives at some ... read more

So today is Monday. Its snowing and Im a damn ice cube. This is exactly why I hate Colorado. The state just doesnt give me a break! LOL! Anyways, got in yesterday morning at around 1100 on the Medevac from Scott AFB, IL... That was the longest short flight ever. It would normally take around 1 hour but it took about 2.5 hours because its the slow C130! Oh and the climate sucked too! It was very very very cold at first then it turned into hell then hell froze over for about an hour then hell opened its damn doors again and finally froze over for one last time! We landed and I didnt even realize it! I was very upset when I got off the plane to find out how friggin cold it was/is ... read more

Well, 15 more days and we’re off. It’s been a long time coming, but it really hasn’t set in that I’m going yet. It’s starting to though. The excitement; the anticipation; the realization that I’m leaving home for an undetermined amount of time. I even had my first pang of fear the other day - God I’ve missed that! What’s that? What am I talking about, oh humble readers (all 3 of you)? My first backpacking trip in over 5 years, that’s what! Thankfully, the wait is almost over. In 15 short days, Rob and I will be embarking on a kick-ass journey through South Korea, Japan, Thailand (and hopefully through Cambodia), Malaysia, Singapore, and New Zealand. Oh, for anyone who doesn't know me, my name is Tom Haarman, and as you can see, I'm about ... read more