PANAMA CITY

Our wonderful two week stay at Buz and Cheri's house came to an end, and Nick, Izzy, Zany and I headed to Panama City for a few nights before catching our flights back to the states. Our friend Stuart was nice enough to put us up and show us around, and it was quite a change of pace compared to the quiet countryside where we had just spent the last couple of weeks. Panama City's modern skyline is growing at an alarming rate, with construction cranes everywhere, and high rises popping up all a long the water. We spent the evening in Casco Viejo, the city's historic Spanish colonial district, where old dilapidated buildings are being fixed up and turned into trendy restaurants and art galleries. It was quite charming, and I wish I'd had more time to explore. But I had to head home. And now I'm back in San Francisco, trying to look for a job and figure out my life. I wish I could do this kind of stuff for a living... but doesn't everyone!

A ROCKY ROAD

Getting to and from Buz and Cheri's house is quite a trek! When they first bought the property they could only access their land by driving down the beach at low tide. Now there's a road, but it's still kind of a rugged drive. I don't really see them getting too many neighbors anytime soon. On the way back from surfing one day we came across a truck full of guys who got stuck in a ditch on a steep hill. Buz to the rescue!

TUNA FISHING

The other day we got up early and went fishing for tuna. Here's a little video about our adventure...

OYSTERS

You can see the ocean from Buz and Cheri's house, and it's a quick walk to the beach. On our first morning Buz took us down to the sea at low tide to pluck some oysters off the rocks...

PANAMA

A week ago I decided to join my friends Nick, Izzy and Zany on a trip to Panama. It was a last minute decision, and by the following night I was on a plane to Panama City! Buz and Cheri, some family friends of Nick and Zany, moved to Panama a few years ago and built a house on the Pacific coast about an hour outside of the town of Pedasi. It took us almost 24 hours to get here, but the journey was well worth it. Buz and Cheri are putting us up during our two week stay and they have been wonderful hosts. Their home is amazing, and it's completely off the grid! The dirt road that leads to their house is steep and muddy, and it didn't even exist when they bought the property in 2003. I took the photo in the upper left from an opposing hill. The main house is on the right, and the guesthouse, where we're all staying, is down on the left. It's a wonderful space, with red tile floors and big doors that open up to let in the ocean breeze. The picture on the bottom left is of the little power house out back. The solar panels on top provide the house with all the energy they need, and directly below that, 75 feet underground, is a well that supplies their home with all the clean and pure water you could ask for. Staying with Buz and Cheri is great, and Panama is awesome!

SO LONG, AFRICA!

I’m in Johannesburg now, and this evening I catch my flight back to the states. My journey has come to an end! Last December in Bangkok, before ending my nine-month stint in Southeast Asia, I wrote a similar blog post, except this time it’s not 4 AM and I’m sober. But looking back on my trip over the last four months - starting in Ecuador with Grace and Heidi, then heading off to South Africa to meet my sister for the World Cup, up to Namibia with Phil and Jonah, and everywhere else in between - I’ve once again realized that my journey has really been shaped by the people that I’ve shared it with. I’ve had the chance to travel with some great friends over the last few months, and I’ve also had the chance to make some great friends along the way. And all the wonderful things I have done and seen wouldn't have been the same if it weren't for my friends. Thanks!
And so now I’m heading home! I gotta find me a job. Perhaps I can find some way to keep this blog interesting after my travels have ended, I guess we’ll see. Either way, I hope that people have enjoyed it. I know my mom has, she’s the only one who ever comments on things. And thanks to all those who have been a part of it with me! It’s been fun. Until next time…

WINDHOEK

After a long weekend in Swakopmund I crammed into a local minibus for the three hour ride back to Windhoek. My flight back to Johannesburg didn’t depart until the following evening so I had a day to hang out and explore the city. I was at a café in Zoo Park when I heard the sound of drumming and singing, and after my meal I walked across the park to see what was happening. On the lawn facing Independence Avenue a group of people dressed in traditional clothing had started a song and dance to promote an upcoming arts and culture festival. The sidewalk facing them became crowded, passersby stopped to watch, and those enjoying an afternoon in the park gathered around to see the show. It was a great performance. But what I thought was really interesting was the group of Himba women that strolled over from the nearby market and plopped down on the grass to watch. The Himba, who live mainly in the north, are some of the most traditional people in Namibia, maybe in all of Africa. And there they were watching a cultural performance in the park. They weren’t dressed for any particular occasion, just wearing what they always wear, which isn’t much from the waist up, except for their necklaces. The Himba coat their skin in a red paste called otjize, which is made from butter fat, ash, and ochre. And use the same paste to cover their long, braided hair, creating what looks like shiny red dreadlocks. They find this look to be beautiful, and I must say, something about it is very stunning, their complexions are immaculate. Anyways, they didn’t need to perform any song and dance to promote their culture. Meanwhile I just sat there and thought about how cool Africa was. Africa. I’ve been here for three months and have only seen a very small part of it. There’s so much more out there! But that’s what traveling does - the more I see, the more I realize that there’s more to discover…

SWAKOPMUND

Back to Namibia! The bus from Livingstone to Windhoek was another long journey, and the day we arrived Laura and Rhea caught their flights back home to Canada. They were great travel buddies, I was sad to see them go. I decided to head to the coast for a few days, to Swakopmund. Swakopmund is a quiet little coastal town surrounded by desert. One day I walked along the beach, crossed the highway, and entered the sand dunes just south of town, where the desert meets the sea. It was beautiful. My African journey is coming to an end, and what better than a lonesome hike through the desert to reflect on my travels...

MOSI-AO-TUNYA NATIONAL PARK

Exploring Victoria Falls from the Zambia side in Mosi-ao-Tunya National Park was incredible. We arrived mid afternoon and pretty much covered every square inch of the park. As the sun sank low in the sky we hiked back up to the Eastern Cataract, which provides an amazing view of the falls, and watched the sun go down. The park stayed open late that evening in the event of the full moon and the monthly appearance of the lunar rainbow. We stayed and watched as the moon came up and the metallic moonbow appeared over the falls, it was amazing. I tried to take a picture of it, but to no avail. The next day we packed our bags and left Victoria Falls...

BABOONS

The next day we decided to check out Victoria Falls from the Zambian side in Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park. Mosi-ao-Tunya means 'The Smoke That Thunders'! There were tons of baboons in the park. Here's a little video of a few encounters that we had...

RAINBOWS

Victoria Falls spits out rainbows left and right! All that mist from the water crashing into the gorge, and the hot African sun... it's really cool.

ZIMBABWE

Victoria Falls is huge, and since it's split between Zimbabwe and Zambia, we decided to head across the border into Zimbabwe for a day and check out Victoria Falls National Park. After a stroll along the Zambezi River we entered the park, it was awesome. The falls are amazing! Here's a little video of our adventure...

ZAMBEZI RIVER CRUISE

After some good times in Cape Town, I took off with Laura and Rhea for Victoria Falls. And after a long couple of days on the bus we arrived in Livingstone, Zambia. Victoria Falls is split between Zimbabwe and Zambia, so we decided to use Livingstone as our base and spend a few days exploring the area. On our second evening we took a sunset boat cruise on the Zambezi, just above the falls, where the river is wide and calm. It was a great evening, with a delicious BBQ and an open bar, hippos and crocodiles swimming in the river, and an amazing sunset. There were a couple of families on the boat, and a handful of kids running around, who almost provided as much entertainment with their commentary on the animals, as the animals themselves. After the boat cruise ended and we arrived back on land, we hung out at a riverside bar and danced late into the night with our new friends. Here's a little video of the boat cruise...

LION'S HEAD

It's rainy today here in Cape Town. But yesterday was the perfect day for a hike! Laura, Rhea, and Maria wanted to climb Table Mountain, but since I had already hiked it, I set out to conquer Lion's Head. And after Lion's Head I set out to meet them on Table Mountain...

CAPE PENINSULA

After a week of hanging out around Jeffreys Bay, I went back to Cape Town to meet up with Laura and Rhea. They had just recently finished their research in Tsumkwe, Namibia and came down to Cape Town with a couple of friends, Maria and Roshina. The day after we all met up we took a tour of the Cape Peninsula. Cape Town is amazing! I think it may be one of my favorite cities in the world, and this day trip totally reaffirmed that. We started our morning with a drive through wine country - wine and cheese and crackers for breakfast! After that we took off for the peninsula, stopping in Simon's Town for lunch and to see some penguins. Then we drove to the Cape of Good Hope, the most southwestern point on the African continent, where the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean meet. The picture on the left is of the Cape Point lighthouse, and the picture on the right is of the Cape of Good Hope. The ostrich in the picture next to us must have been the most southwestern ostrich on the African continent at the time...

JEFFREYS BAY

After a week in Cape Town I took off up the coast to meet some friends in Jeffreys Bay. It was a long ten hour bus ride, but man alive was it beautiful! The drive took us along the Garden Route, one of South Africa's most beautiful coast lines. Ten hours on a bus... I wish I could have spent ten days getting there! My friend Fungai, who I hung out with in Swaziland, has a house on the beach in Jeffreys Bay. His friends Luke and Refilwe were there, along with our friend Sheela. The five of us had a great time that weekend, zip-lining, horseback riding on the beach, and just hanging out. Everybody had jobs to go back to after the weekend ended, so they all left. I decided to stick around Jeffreys Bay for a few more days and ended up finding a nice little guesthouse perched up on a hill overlooking the beach at the end of town. Jeffreys Bay is a one of the biggest surf spots in Africa, if not the world! The pictures of the guys surfing were taken at Supertubes - Jeffreys Bay's world renowned surf spot!

ROBBEN ISLAND

I went to visit Robben Island one day - the Alcatraz of Cape Town, and the former prison that held South Africa's political prisoners during apartheid. I caught the ferry mid morning and the ride out gave way to great views of Cape Town and Table Mountain. After a short bus tour around the island, we entered the prison grounds and met our tour guide who was also an ex-political prisoner. One of the cell blocks was full of prison cells where former prisoners had come back and left a memento and a story about their experience on Robben Island. We had about ten minutes to explore this section of the prison before being quickly ushered over and past Nelson Mandela's old cell (middle picture on the top). The tour was a little too quick for my liking. I could have spent a lot more time exploring the grounds and reading about all of the prisoner's experiences. But it was worth it. Such a recent and tragic history, and how amazing to be told by someone who was there to experience it. Wow.

TABLE MOUNTAIN

Cape Town has the amazing backdrop of Table Mountain. It's beautiful. I decided to climb to the top one day. Here's a little video.

THE CASTLE OF GOOD HOPE

The Castle of Good Hope is the oldest building in South Africa and was built by the Dutch East India Company around the mid 1600s. I decided to check it out one afternoon, it was pretty cool. Here are a few pictures I took while I was there.

SHARKS

After Swaziland, I spent a couple of days in Johannesburg, and then caught a train down to Cape Town where I met up with Sheela and her friend Klaus. The next day we went diving with great white sharks! Well, in a cage. My camera batteries died after a few minutes, but I was still able to capture a few clips from up on top of the boat. Being in the water with those things, man alive, I almost shit my wetsuit...

SWAZILAND

After Etosha National Park we left Namibia and took off for Johannesburg. And soon after that Phil and Jonah left to fly back home. Originally I had planned on heading straight to Cape Town when I got back to South Africa, but instead decided to join some friends on a weekend road trip to Swaziland. Sheela, Fungai, and Dan are all here from Harvard Business School working on summer internships, and the four of us left Joburg on a Friday evening and hit the road to Mbabane. We met our friend Jed when we got there, and his friend Paul put us up for the weekend. Friends of friends of friends! On Saturday Paul took us out to visit one of his friends, a chief, who is also the ambassador to Kuwait. Paul had just given a cow to the chief as a gift, and we were all invited out to partake in an afternoon celebration. The trip out to the chiefdom was beautiful; the two-hour drive on dirt roads took us up and over mountains, through valleys, and past small villages. It was a great tour of rural Swaziland. As soon as we arrived, the chief was quick to invite us into his home for some drinks. The picture on the bottom left is of Jed drinking homemade fermented sorghum liquor out of a big black gourd. It was tasty! And outside there was a group of young guys who were in charge of slaughtering a goat for the feast – they were excited to pose for a photo. We actually didn’t stay too long since Paul was having a barbeque back at his place, but it was a fun afternoon, and an overall great weekend in Swaziland.

ETOSHA ANIMALS

I know I already posted a video of our adventures in Etosha National Park, but here's a little collage of some of the animals we saw. Amazing!

ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK

After a couple of amazing weeks in Tsumkwe, Phil and Jonah and I took off for an adventure in Etosha National Park. What an awesome place. Right in the middle of the park is the Etosha Pan, a huge flat desert that fills up with water for a few days a year during the rainy season. Here’s a video…

BARAKA VILLAGE SCHOOL

One day we took a little day trip out to a village school for San children. There are a handful of these village schools around Tsumkwe that help prepare San children for the primary school in town. My favorite part of the visit was playing soccer with the students during their break. It was girls versus boys, and after the boys went up a few goals, Jonah and I joined the girl’s team and helped even the score a little bit…

TSUMKWE SOCCER

Not only did Phil and Jonah and I get a teaching gig at the high school, but we were also recruited to help coach the soccer team. The team doesn’t really play many matches, maybe a couple every year, but in a few weeks they were going to be competing in a huge national tournament sponsored by Coca Cola. The soccer field was rough, and a few of the guys played barefoot. Some played in socks or slippers, and some shared one of their shoes with a friend. Here’s a little video...

TSUMKWE SECONDARY SCHOOL

Phil is a teacher and will soon be starting a doctorate program in the fall. And I taught English last year in Thailand. After Phil walked into Tsumkwe Secondary School to see if he could interview some teachers about the local school system, he walked out with a weeklong job for us teaching 11th and 12th grade English. Jonah helped out too. Sadly, they didn’t have any fulltime teachers filling those positions. The classrooms were in bad shape, broken windows, crumbling concrete floors, and walls that were worn and scuffed. The school itself was shit, but the students were wonderful! Making it to the 11th and 12th grade is quite a challenge in that part of the world, so the students were all very dedicated and serious about their schoolwork. The teachers and students were very thankful that we were there, and we were very happy to be able to help.

BOTSWANA

The border of Botswana is fifty kilometers east of Tsumkwe, and the town of Dobe is just five kilometers past that. Phil spent some time there eleven years ago with his mother helping her conduct research, so we decided to go back and check it out. On the way out of town we saw our friend Steve who was a translator for Laura and Rhea during their interviews. He decided to join us last minute. Having Steve along was great. Without him we wouldn’t have been able to sit down and chat with the villagers. I have to say, I’m pretty bad at learning languages, but having lived in Southeast Asia for a while I guess I’ve kind of gained an ear for tonal languages. But man, these click languages! Now that’s something else! I love the way they sound. Anyways, here’s a video of our day trip to Botswana…

SHEBEEN

A shebeen is an unlicensed drinking establishment. There are quite a few scattered around Tsumkwe, which isn’t actually a good thing for the community. A few can be found right off the main road; they play loud music, sell big bottles of beer, and may even have a TV or a pool table. Then there are the ones that are a little more off the beaten path, off the grid and out in the bush. These don’t sell bottled beer, but instead make and sell their own concoctions. One afternoon Phil, Jonah, Lucah, and I (all sons of anthropologists) went out to get a taste of something local. We found a dark shebeen, lit only by a small candle, and came out with a bottle of something… well, not too tasty, but it didn’t kill us…

BRAAI

The word for barbeque here is ‘braai’, and in celebration of the World Cup final we decided to have one. Just our luck, word around town had it that there had been a cow slaughtered that morning. Here’s a little video about the making of our tasty feast.

SEVEN

Here are some more pictures that I took one afternoon while I was out on some interviews with Laura and Rhea. The name of the village in this picture is Seven. It’s made up of twelve government built houses and the families that live here were some of the wealthiest families interviewed.

RESEARCH IN TSUMKWE

Laura and Rhea just graduated from the University of Toronto and came to Tsumkwe to conduct research with Richard Lee. Every day they wandered around to different villages and talked to people about everything from food to health to income. They did about three or four interviews a day, and occasionally I would tag along. Here are a few pictures from the first interview I went to. The family was very poor. The picture on the bottom left is of the little cluster of makeshift tents where they lived. They were made of sticks and blankets and tarps, with no water or electricity, and they slept on thin mats with blankets on the dirt. Here I am in a café typing on my laptop and drinking a beer.

IVORY

Emma is a veterinarian from Toronto. She came to Africa for the World Cup and decided to do some volunteer work and research while she was here. One day I decided to tag along with her on a visit to the Department of Environment and Tourism. The guy in charge of the branch in Tsumkwe is this rugged dude named Drieze. What a character. He’s a tall and confident, broad-shouldered guy, who wore khaki shorts that were almost too short, and hiking boots that came up to just below his calves. With his army green jacket, scruffy face, dirty blonde hair, and tan skin, he was like a Crocodile Dundee of the Kalahari. A day at the office for him may involve such a task as taking down a ravaging elephant that has just rampaged a village. He had some stories to tell and I felt like he had Discovery Channel written all over him. After hanging out in his office for a bit he took us out back to this green shed where they kept their ivory. The outside of the shed was lined with the skulls from animals that had died of natural causes, and locked up inside they kept the elephant tusks. There weren’t very many at the time, I guess they had just emptied it out, but apparently it gets waist high. And considering the ivory goes for 2,000 American dollars per kilogram, that shed can become quite a treasure chest. White gold! I picked up one of the tusks, it was a heavy 78.5 pounds, and it wasn’t even that big. In the back corner of the shed – you can see it in the picture - I noticed that there was a toilet built into the concrete. Apparently the Department of Environment and Tourism has the authority to practice a little bit of law enforcement when it comes to poaching, and the ivory shed used to act as a holding cell for those that broke the law. I’m not going to go into detail about the torture tactics that he said they used, but let’s just say that it re-enforced my image of him as the Kalahari Dundee. I was too scared to take a picture of him. Just kidding, but not really…

HEALING DANCE

One night as we were sitting around the campfire we heard the sound of singing off in the distance. Richard thought it sounded like a traditional healing dance, so we ventured off into the bush to see what we could find. The song and dance took place around a very dim fire and we gathered around for a while to observe. We only stayed for a half hour or so, but the healing dance carried on late into the night. It was really dark out, so this is more like a song recording with a video introduction…

THE SAN

The San make up a small percentage of Southern Africa’s diverse ethnic groups. With only about 100,000 left, most of them live in Namibia and Botswana with the town of Tsumkwe falling somewhere in the middle. They have been the focus of Richard Lee’s research since the 1960s; however, most of the world was exposed to the San, or Bushmen, when the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy came out in the early 80s. They’re not the same loincloth-wearing people that were portrayed in the film, but they still hold onto a lot of the hunter-gatherer culture that came to define them. Unfortunately they remain rather marginalized and poor, struggling to find a place in modern African society.

TSUMKWE

At the end of June I left South Africa and the World Cup to go on a trip to Namibia with my friend Phil and his brother Jonah. After a couple of nights in Windhoek, where we rendezvoused with the anthropologist Richard Lee and a group of researchers, we hit the road north towards Tsumkwe and the Kalahari Desert. Tsumkwe is a small town in northeastern Namibia about fifty kilometers from the border of Botswana, and has been the hub from which Richard Lee has been conducting his research over the last few decades. It was an eight hour drive from Windhoek with the last 250 kilometers being on a dirt road, and I'm pretty sure that the one paved intersection in 'town' was the only one for hundreds of kilometers in each direction. Tsumkwe's electricity comes from a generator that runs from 5 AM to 10 PM, and also cuts off for a few hours in between lunch and dinner. It gets really dark after the power cuts out at night, but man alive is the star gazing amazing - no light pollution! It's a very small town, surrounded by a lot of desert, but it didn't take me long to realize that there were a lot of things to do....

USA vs. ALGERIA

Here's a little video of the USA vs. Algeria match. Holy shit was it amazing! It may not seem like it in the video, but the game was extremely tense. At half time we found out that England was beating Slovenia and that if we couldn't pull off a victory we would be eliminated from the World Cup! We had a lot of chances in the second half, and even had a goal called back on a crappy offsides call, but we just couldn't seem to score. Regulation time expired and four minutes of injury time were added on, and with only seconds left on the clock Landon Donovan put one in the back of the net! The stadium erupted! Our section was especially rowdy, with beer spraying all about and people falling over the seats! It was one of the most joyous moments of my life. I cried. But don't tell anyone... Next up is Ghana!

USA vs. SLOVENIA

What a match! This was a real fun game with a 2 - 2 comeback tie against Slovenia. I captured the third US goal on video, but for reasons unknown to anyone on the entire planet, the ref called it back! Luckily England also tied against Algeria later that night, giving us high hopes for an advancement to the next round! The stadium was really loud, so I'm sorry if the audio kind of stinks...

SPAIN vs. SWITZERLAND IN DURBAN

We took a long day trip to Durban to watch Spain versus Switzerland. It was nice to get out of Joburg, even if it was only for a day. The drive down was beautiful and when we arrived we were greeted with the much warmer coastal climate of Durban! Durban was great, unlike Joburg the city is very walkable. After lunch we walked down to the beach and strolled along the water to the stadium. The new Moses Mabhida Stadium is awesome! The game was a shocker with the favored team Spain losing 1 - 0 despite dominating the play and having an all-star lineup. I think I'll try and get back to Durban again at some point, it seemed like a cool place.

USA vs. ENGLAND

The US kicked off the World Cup with an exciting 1 -1 draw against England! US fans were psyched! England fans were bummed. Here's a video of us having fun at the game...

JUNE 11th

We made it back to Johannesburg from our road trip in one piece, and on Friday June 11th I parted ways with my friends and met my sister, Lindsey, Reg, and Ben at the airport. It was also the first day of the World Cup! That night we went to Nelson Mandela Square to get some dinner. Both games ended in a draw that day, so there were no victories to celebrate, but the atmosphere was still jubilant, people just wanted to party and share their national pride. Here's a little video...

MOZAMBIQUE

After a couple of days in Kruger National Park we headed east into Mozambique. We didn't have a solid plan, and no guide books to direct us, only suggestions from other travelers on where to go. Maputo is the capital city and it sits on a harbor in the southern tip of Mozambique. We thought we'd drive there and then head north up the coast in search of some beautiful beaches that we'd heard about through word of mouth. Crossing the border into Mozambique reminded me of crossing into Cambodia from Thailand, or even like going into Tijuana from San Diego, the change was drastic and there was a blatant increase in poverty.

The drive to Maputo was nice and easy, but once we reached the city things started to get a little hectic, and being a group of foreigners in a rental car from South Africa didn't help. On a crowded and slow moving road just outside of the city we got pulled over by the police for no apparent reason. Once we stopped the van an officer came over to the passenger seat window where I was sitting, and before we knew it the vehicle was surrounded by six or seven men armed with AK-47s. The officer started asking us what we were doing and where we were going, and after poking his head in the window he noticed that a few of the guys in the back weren't wearing seat belts. He demanded that we pay him 300 rand each - that's a lot of money in Mozambique - while meanwhile a truck passed by with about fifteen people crammed into the bed. If there is a seatbelt law in Mozambique it's obviously not enforced. The officer threatened to take us into the station if we didn't pay, and he seemed nervous as we scrambled to collect our money. We ended up talked him down from three hundred rand each to 1,000 rand altogether, paid up, and took off down the road. That wasn't the last time we were bribed by the police.
We had heard about this beach town a little north of Maputo, but after being stopped by the police and getting lost for a bit, we didn't arrive until after dark. The roads turned into sand as we drove towards the coast, and the roadside lighting was sparse and dim. After almost getting stuck a few times and realizing that we would need a four wheel drive vehicle to go any further, we decided to head back to Maputo for the night.

Once we got back to the city we found a place to eat and then went out to look for a hostel that we had heard about. On the way we got stopped by the police for the second time, another six or seven guys armed with AK-47s. This time we were all wearing seat belts and there was nothing they could pin on us, but they still wanted our money. They tried to tell us that Carlos was drunk, which he wasn't, and after explaining to them that their buddies took most of our money earlier that day, we quickly ended the conversation and took off for the hostel. We were all drained when we finally got to the hostel and very put off by our first day in Mozambique. That night we got drunk.

The next day we took a stroll around town and then drove along the coast outside of Maputo for a little ways. We stopped at a beach for a while, that's where I took the pictures above, and then jumped back into the van to head back to South Africa. It was a short visit, but we had had enough. And anyways, the World Cup was only a few days away...

SAFARI

Here's a little video of some stuff we saw in Kruger National Park...

KRUGER NATIONAL PARK

We spent a couple of days in Kruger National Park, it was amazing. Here's a picture of just a few of the animals we saw. Rhinos, giraffes, lions, zebras, hyenas, impalas, monkeys, buffalos, pretty much everything except for elephants. But I saw enough of those in Thailand last year...

ON THE ROAD

Here's a little glimpse of what our road trip was like. Good times...

ROAD TRIP

My sister and friends weren't getting into Johannesburg for another week after I arrived, so I was going to be on my own for a little while. I hadn't really figured out where I was going to stay when I got off the plane, and things were already starting to fill up for the World Cup, but luckily I was able to find a fun and festive hostel to stay in called Brown Sugar Backpackers. The crowd was very international and I ended up hanging out with these three Chilean guys and couple of Mexicans. Originally I had planned to head down to Cape Town until my sister arrived, but instead I decided to join my new friends on a road trip for a few days. After two nights at Brown Sugar we rented a van and headed east towards Kruger National Park. It was me, three Chileans, two Mexicans, and an Italian. The World Cup didn't start for another five or six days, but my new group of friends didn't hesitate to take every opportunity they could to flaunt their national pride. The car ride was full of chanting, horn honking and flag waving. And no one left the car with out their flag draped over their shoulders. Here's a picture I took on our second day after we got pulled over for speeding, the police totally busted us with a radar gun. But after the Chileans offered the police officers one of their flags, and after we posed for a few pictures, the cops let us off for for free and even shared a few laughs with us. Good times...

SOUTH AFRICA

It's been almost three weeks since I left Ecuador. Now I'm in South Africa, and this place is buzzing with World Cup fever! I arrived in Johannesburg on June 4th and was excited to find out that the USA was going to be playing a free pre-tournament friendly against Australia the next day. It was a good game for the US, and even though they rested a few of their starters they were still able to pull off a 3 - 1 victory. David Beckham was there to watch the match and for a while he was getting more attention then the game itself. It was a great first day in South Africa!

QUITO

I parted ways with my friends in Vilcabamba. Heidi, Grace, Jesse, Mary and Cassie all took off for Peru, and I caught a bus up north to Quito. It's a good thing I had some cool weather clothes along with me because Quito is rather chilly. It's only fifteen miles from the equator, but at 9,300 feet above sea level it remains pretty temperate. I explored the old town and found some hills to climb where I could get a good view of the city. I wanted to take more pictures but a nice young dude warned me to be careful while walking around with my camera, so I stuck it in my bag. I guess petty theft is pretty common in Quito. It was a short stay, and now I sit in the airport waiting to catch a flight to New York. But only for a night, and then it's off to South Africa for the World Cup!

VILCABAMBA

After a few days in Cuenca we took off for Vilcabamba with Jesse and his two cousins Mary and Cassie. Vilcabamba is a small village in southern Ecuador nestled up in the mountains in what is known as the Valley of Longevity. Supposedly the people of Vilcabamba have a longer than average lifespan that they credit to their laid back and healthy lifestyle. I guess I did see a few really old looking dudes hanging around. And one of them even hollered at the girls I was with, funny.
The six of us went for a hike one day up to these peaks overlooking the valley. Here's a video of our adventure...

IT'S A SMALL WORLD

If you go back to October and November of last year on my blog there are few posts that involve some adventures in southeast Asia with this guy named Jesse. Nick and Charlie and I first bumped into him at a waterfall outside of Pai, Thailand and he ended up joining us on a little motorbike tour of northeastern Thailand. A month later we crossed paths again in Vang Vieng, Laos where we ended up hanging out for a few days. And now, in Cuenca, Ecuador, the adventures continue. Grace and Heidi and I were snacking on some empanadas in a little cafe on our street when Jesse came walking by. Totally unplanned and unexpected. It's a small world...

CUENCA

Heidi and Grace and I left the Galapagos Islands about a week ago, flew back to mainland Ecuador, and caught a bus up into the mountains to the old Spanish colonial town of Cuenca. Our journey to Cuenca made me realize how geographically diverse Ecuador is, we started our day on tropical islands and ended it in the cool and temperate Andes mountains. The old part of Cuenca is really charming, the three of us found a guesthouse with a little second floor balcony that looked down onto an old cobblestone street. During our few days there we explored the city, went to a museum or two, and hiked up into the surrounding hills where we found sweeping views of the city.

THE PUERTO AYORA FISH MARKET

Here's a little video I made about the fish market in Puerto Ayora.

ISLA ISABELA

Isla Isabela is the largest island in the Galapagos. I decided to go there for a few days and hang out in the little town of Puerto Villamil. Puerto Villamil is the largest town on the island, and maybe the third largest in the Galapagos, but that doesn't say much. The streets are made of hard-packed sand and many of the buildings are only half finished or abandoned. Heavy surf crashes the beach that lines the town and a light mist often rolls off of the ocean and into the village. I checked out the town when I arrived, which didn't take long, and then explored the coast and some nearby lagoons, where I came across some pink flamingos! In the afternoon I found some hammocks by the beach and enjoyed my book with a few cold beers. Island life is good...

MARINE IGUANAS

One of my favorite creatures on the Galapagos Islands are the Marine Iguanas. One day I came across this little beach that had the biggest marine iguanas I had ever seen. There were a bunch them, some big ol' lazy guys hanging out on the sand. The spikes on their backs were tall and they zigzagged down their backs all the way to their tails. They were like little fat dragons. On the next beach over as I was making my way towards a flock of blue-footed boobies, I noticed a sign stuck in the ground that was warning people to stay off of the sand because it was a marine iguana egg hatching area. And when I walked down to the rocks close by I noticed that there were tons of little baby marine iguanas perched on the rocks. They were tiny compared to the ones I had seen on the previous beach. The spikes on their backs were only tiny little bumps. The two little guys in the picture on the right, could've fit on the front leg of the guy on the bottom left. Cool.

TORTOISE STYLE

There are tons of tortoises on the Galapagos Islands. Well, not as many as there used to be due to the introduction of goats, cats, rats and other creatures that either eat their food or eat the tortoise babies. But with the help of breeding centers, efforts are being made to help the tortoise population grow and remain stable. However, you don't have to go to a breeding center to see the tortoises, you know, like, doing it. Here's a little video I put together. The first part is of some wild tortoises that we came across in the forest. There was this big guy rummaging around snacking on passion fruits, they were really tasty, I had a few myself. Well the passion fruits must have ignited some passion in him because when a little female came scurrying by he decided to take action...

TRAVEL BUDDIES

Here are a few photos we took at Tortuga Bay. Me, Grace, and Heidi - this one goes out to Dana Cheit!

TORTUGA BAY

Some say this beach is one of the best in South America. It's beautiful. After a piping hot forty minute walk from town we arrived to find it mostly deserted. There's a main beach that's full of heavy surf, but if you walk down the beach, past some mangroves, and around a little peninsula full of marine iguanas and cacti, there's a quiet bay with calm water and little trees that provide shade from the sun. It was an ideal beach day...

LAS GRIETAS

Heidi and Grace and I took a little hike one day to a swimming hole called Las Grietas about forty minutes outside of Puerto Ayora, here's a short video that I made about our little adventure...

GALAPAGOS WILDLIFE

I discovered early on here in Ecuador that you don't have to look very hard to find interesting wildlife, and it's even easier in the Galapagos Islands. Here are a few pictures of some of the creatures I've stumbled across. The orange and yellow land iguana in the bottom left was in a little wildlife reserve, but bright red crabs like the one in the middle picture are all over the rocks along the water, and the marine iguanas are everywhere too. The marine iguanas are cool. They totally blend in with the volcanic rocks that they hang out on, but you can also see them on the beach, and even lying sprawled out on the docks in town. They like to hang out in big groups, all lying on each other, facing the same direction, and pointing their little faces up towards the sky.

OLD AND HUNGRY

Here's a little video I took while hanging out with some tortoises...

TORTOISES

After a few days on Isla San Cristobal we hopped on a boat to Isla Santa Cruz and the town of Puerto Ayora. On our first day we went to the Charles Darwin Research Station and hung out with some tortoises. I just turned thirty a few days ago, but hanging out with these ancient creatures made me feel like a baby. In tortoise years I'm still in diapers...

PUERTO CHINO

A nice drive across Isla San Cristobal took us to Puerto Chino, a beautiful beach with white sand and turquoise blue water. By the time we got there some dark clouds had rolled in to shield us from the equatorial sun, and after a refreshing swim in the ocean we fled the scene after being attacked by a barrage of vicious horseflies. Some of the nature in the Galapagos isn't that cool...

TREE HOUSE

Heidi and Grace and I took off one day to explore Isla San Cristobal, and outside of a little town in the highlands we came across a tree house built up in the branches of a ceibo tree. The tree was huge, and the shack could sleep two people, had a mini kitchen, and a tiny bathroom. We could have stayed there for fifteen bucks a night each, but it would have been a tight squeeze for the three of us. The picture in the middle is of Grace scaling the trunk of the tree! And the picture on the right is of a fireman's pole that must have been around thirty feet tall. Yikes!

SEA LIONS

Puerto Baquerizo Moreno has more sea lions than people hanging out around the boardwalk along the harbor. I'm not exaggerating. They're everywhere, sprawled out on the sidewalks, napping on the park benches, barking and playing with each other on the little beach, and splashing about in the water below the docks. They're pretty cute animals, but man alive do they smell...

PUERTO BAQUERIZO MORENO

Grace and Heidi and I left the mainland last Tuesday and flew out to the Galapagos Islands. Our first stop was the town of Puerto Baquerizo Moreno on Isla San Cristobal. It's the second largest town in the Galapagos Islands, but that doesn't really say much. It's pretty small. We stayed right on the harbor in a cheap little hotel and spent a few days exploring the island and checking out the wildlife...

MONTAÑITA

Grace and Heidi and I decided to head out to the small coastal town of Montañita for a day or two before our trip to the Galapagos. Grace spent some time in Ecuador about eight years ago, and was excited to return to the small beach town that she had once visited. But how things had changed! The town wasn't as small as it used to be. In the large city of Guayaquil there was barely a gringo in sight, but this was not the case in Montañita. Don't get me wrong. The place was awesome, but it was almost one of those spots that I would categorize as a "generic world beach." There were many qualities that were unique to Ecuador, like the guys selling ceviche on the beach, but there were times when I felt like I could have been back on Phuket in Thailand, with a mishmash of young international travelers looking for a good beach party. We stayed for a night, enjoyed the beach, and then took off for the Galapagos Islands...

SOMETHING SPECIAL

Grace and Heidi arrived last Friday night, and on Saturday we set out to find a local travel agency to figure out a trip to the Galapagos Islands. The first place we stopped was a place called Centro Viajero, a small travel agency run by a man named Douglas Chang and his trusty sidekick Fernando. Fernando was quick to offer us some cold beers as we discussed possible itineraries, and we ended up hanging out, laughing a lot, and making a new friend. After talking about travel plans for an hour or two we headed back to Douglas's apartment around the corner for some more beers and a light dinner. Fernando's wife arrived soon after and they announced that they were planning on heading back to Fernando's hometown for the night, a small village called Pedro Carbo about an hour or so outside of Guayaquil. And then he invited us to all come along. And before we knew it we were in a minivan heading out of the city, picking up friends along the way, and Douglas Chang and I were in the back seat sharing a bottle of scotch called Something Special. What an appropriate name. Whatever was blended into that Something Special ended up helping me acquire the nickname "Gringo Loco" that night...

We arrived in Pedro Carbo and went to Fernando's home, a humble concrete block house on a dirt road. We were greeted by a mob of little kids, nephews and nieces, and Fernando's two year old son Benjamin. The kids all piled into the minivan and we drove into the little town for a delicious chicken and rice dinner. After the meal we dropped the kids off and went out to the discotec. On the way we stopped at a little carnival that had been set up in the street, ate some candy apples, and went for a ride on a sketchy make-shift ferris wheel. The discotec was fun, and apparently the DJ called me out for being the gringo with the crazy dance moves. (How embarrassing.) We didn't end up making it back to our guesthouse in Guayaquil until the wee hours of the morning. What a night...

There was a point earlier on in the evening when Grace and Heidi and I wondered whether we should go along with our new friends, hop into a van, and head out to an unknown village on the outskirts of Guayaquil. We had only been in the country for a short time, and we didn't really know too much about our surroundings, but we decided to trust these people, and it ended up being a night that I will never forget. Fernando and Douglas shared with us a little slice of life in Ecuador that we would have otherwise never experienced, it was something special...

PARQUE BOLIVAR

Right in downtown Guayaquil there's a little city park the size of one city block called Parque Bolivar. It's a nice little park with some gardens, a statue or two, a handful of old banyan trees, and a bunch of huge green iguanas. There are tons of them, lying on the sidewalks and hanging out in trees. I'm not sure how they got there, but I'm guessing it would be pretty hard for them to leave being that the park is surrounded on all four sides by a bustling city. They seem content, though, and don't seem to mind sharing the park with people. The locals don't seem to pay much attention to them either, casually stepping over them as they walk on the sidewalks. One man saw me snapping photos and in what seemed to be an attempt to impress me, grabbed one of them and picked it up by its tail. The guy was holding his arm straight out and the iguana`s front legs were still touching the ground. He looked at me and chuckled, and then let go after he was scolded by a nearby policeman. This was the first time that I discovered that you don't have to go into the wild to find wildlife in Ecuador...

LAS PEÑAS

I've been in Ecuador for over a week now, and it's been awesome so far. I arrived in Guayaquil last Thursday and had a day to explore before my friends Heidi and Grace arrived. Heidi and Grace are friends of mine from San Francisco and have just set out to spend six months exploring South America.
Guayaquil is the largest city in Ecuador, and it may not be the most popular destination for tourists and travelers, but I actually found it to be a pretty cool place. It sits along the massive Rio Guayas, and in the last ten years the city has invested a lot of time and money in rebuilding the riverfront, now called Malecon 2000. The promenade is full of shops and restaurants, gardens and playgrounds, and it collects a nice breeze off of the river. It's a wonderful place to hang out for people of all ages.

Heading north along the waterfront I ended up in Las Peñas, an old historic slum that wraps around a hill with a lighthouse perched on top. Like the Malecon 2000, Las Peñas has undergone a major renovation in the last ten years. However, only the buildings along the the steep, stair-filled path leading up to the lighthouse have gotten the makeover. The walkway is quite charming. It`s full of brightly colored cafes, bars, gift shops, and homes, but as soon as you wander off the main path the transition is drastic and in the blink of an eye the alleyway reverts back to the old dark and dirty shantytown. The picture on the left was taken from the Malecon 2000 looking up at Las Peñas, and from that perspective you can kind of see how the buildings on the right side of the hill have a bright candy-coating, and how the buildings on the left are still grey and untouched.

Once I got up to the top of the hill I climbed up to the top of the lighthouse where I was met with sweeping views of city and a much needed breeze. I always enjoy finding a good vantage point in a new city to help me gain an understanding of where I am.

ECUADOR

Last time I updated this blog it was in December of last year and I was in Bangkok. I left Southeast Asia and returned home for the holidays thinking I would hunker down in the new year and find me a job back in San Francisco. However, it didn't take me long to realize that I still needed to get out and see a little more of the world... well, that and the fact that the job market right now is just a little bit intimidating. I figured that I'm not going to be able to do this kind of stuff forever, so for now I guess I'll just have to put off making any big life decisions until the fall. So after a few wonderful months full of family and friends, I jumped on a plane to South America. And here I am. Ecuador!