"WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"

In Jogya, short for Yogyakarta , it always starts with a big, friendly smile and then, "Hello, where are you going?". These are the words of the famous Indonesian becak drivers. We fell in love with these poor, gentle souls that stand out side of the hotels and line every street desperately vying for your business. They will take you anywhere, any time, no matter how far, for a meager 25,000 rupiah, a whopping $2.50. Shortly after arriving at the hotel Mike couldn't take it anymore and hired us a becak. Off we went to the Sultan's Palace, Water Palace, bird market, and the silver factories, which are a couple of miles outside the city , where it got a little hilly. On more than one occasion we looked back to find our driver off the bike pushing us in the becak up the hill. These guys are unbelievable! We were hooked. Over the next five days we became friends with every driver on our street spreading the business around as much as we could.

Our Top Three in Java
3. Prambanan Temples- These 9th century Hindu Temples, found in ruins, went through a hundred year restoration only to be knocked down again by the earthquake in 2005 and are now partially restored. Our guide, the foremost expert on these temples, he wrote the book, couldn't resist pointing out all the sexual innuendos carved into the stone base. He felt the women back then were quite aggressive. Check out the photos , do you see anything?
2. Four hour bicycle tour on the outskirts of Jogya through traditional Javanese villages- Our twenty-three year old university student guide took us all over the place. We were put to work in the rice fields, planting rice (which we're sure they replanted when we left), harvesting the rice, quite a challenge when done by hand and even making bricks from mud, which I must say Mike was pretty good at. If the elevator business doesn't survive we know he has a back up career here in Indonesia. Under a big shady tree we took a break, ate a homemade traditional snack and talked in depth about the people, economics, religion and culture of Indonesia. Loved it!!!
And here it is, number 1...
BOROBUDUR , one of the 7 Wonders of the World WOW! We got up at 4 a.m., that's right, because one of our travel experts, Dukie (Marcia) said it was a must to be there for the sunrise. The morning began with a little hitch when our taxi driver showed up 30 minutes late. After seeing the frowns on our faces he proceeded to finish getting dressed while driving, raced through the streets and turned an hour into forty minutes. Needless to say we ran with camera in hand, in the dark, up the not so well marked footpath, not to mention the plus or minus 250 steps to the top where the sun was just beginning to rise. We sat in awe with fifty of our closest friends. (Mike thinks that's funny, I don't get it). Absolutely breathtaking! Dukie and Gerri, thanks! Just for a little info, this Buddhist temple was built sometime between 750 and 850 A.D. from two million blocks of stone. The name in Sanskrit means " Buddhist Monastery on the Hill". The amazing part is that it was buried under layers of volcanic ash and not discovered until 1815.
To close, our 6 day stay in Jogyakarta, Indonesia, a place that Mike still cannot pronounce correctly was extraordinary.

One gigantic hug-filled shout out to Hannah and Jess who we love and miss everyday and of course our angel who is with us always.

Surprise, Surprise

"A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving"

Lao-Tzu

It's amazing what a chance encounter can do to ones travel plans. While sitting on the beach in
Ko Samui, Mike met a British family and got to talking, big surprise, and by the end was convinced that the best beaches & snorkeling were in Malaysia. Although not on the route we decided to take a detour.... and boy are we glad we did.
- Kuala Lumpur, otherwise known as KL, is a very diverse, modern, spacious city. There is an excellent mix of new and old including the Petronas Towers (tallest twin towers in the world), world class shopping (Carin was devastated, no room left in the backpack), great public transportation, Chinatown & Little India with vendors and giant woks lining the streets, a bombardment of aromas, all surrounding a giant open air market.
- Melaka, the capital of Malaysia a port city settled by everybody and their uncle including the Portuguese, Dutch, British, Chinese and Indonesians. One side of the river is Euro and the other Asian. You know where we went for the food.
- Palua Redang, WOW!!!!!! This is fantasy island. We snorkeled with the turtles, sharks and moray eels plus a plethora of coral and a million tropical fish. It was like jumping into a salt water aquarium. There were fish everywhere. The white sandy beaches weren't too bad either.

Not only does this lovely country have great beaches and sights it also has kind and helpful people. In K.L. there was Jenny and Nicole, our sweet travel agents, that we "employed" while waiting out a torrential rain storm. Not only did they answer a million questions about the islands, they offered to come in on Saturday morning so we could get the tickets. The trishaw driver in Melaka pedaled Mike and I around the old city, no easy task in 98 degrees and 99% humidity. He was amazing with his historical knowledge of the city which he loved sharing and his offers to "take a picture" at every sight. Great guide if you're ever in Melaka. Then there was the nineteen year old bartender who gave us a glass of freshly squeezed watermelon juice and offered us the key to his room after listening to our sad hotel story. How sweet is that! Our last encounter was in a small town close to the airport. We went looking for something to eat around 7:30 at night and stumbled across a little Malay restaurant where there was no English, written or spoken. That's where we met the "Roti Nazi-no roti for you!" A small Malay man with an attitude, scowling at the waitresses, while whipping up the best roti (flat bread similar to naan) ever. Only when we offered to take his picture and conveyed how "delicious " the roti was did he break out into a big smile. Turned out to be a real sweetheart. P.S. we went back for breakfast.

Just a few shout outs....
* Congrats to Grandma Sue and the Gilady/Street family on the arrival of not so little baby Owen.
* Lisa & Dave so sorry to hear about Angie. You were fortunate to have each other for a brief, but sweet period of time.
* Jennifer & Alice, we took a meditation class from a Buddhist monk in Bangkok and had a little lesson in walking and sitting meditation. See you both in India (Feb/March). Let us know the exact dates.
* Ed, our most loyal blogger keep the comments coming. Let Nicole know the universal sign works in Asia too. P.S. No one has asked me about my soccer skills yet.
* Marcia, I'm still lugging around the 10 lbs of product. I feel it's doing a great job styling my frizz. This could be the start of something big, literally.
* To everyone else we love hearing from you.

KO SAMUI

We decided to do it the way the rest of the 20 something year old back packers do and travel at night by taxi, foot, bus and catamaran to our next destination, Ko Samui. 15 hours later and just a little worse for the wear we arrived at this lovely small island in the south China Sea. The Free House (luxury bungalow, ha, ha) has been our home away from home for the past 6 days. Samui is a crazy place where they drive on "the wrong side" of the road and motor scooters rule! We did the unthinkable and rented a jeep (which drove more like a tank) to maximize our beach hopping ability. Just imagine the steering wheel and manual shift opposite from what we're used to, motor scooters passing on both sides and bicycle carts everywhere, and then throw in a few pot holes and very narrow streets to boost up the excitement. Oh yeah I forgot to mention our maiden voyage was at night. Needless to say we had a blast. Not sure about all the locals we scared to death along the way. We found an open air market in the town of Lamai. It was a bit intimidating but irresistible, so throwing caution to the wind we dove right in sampling the local fare. Fresh grilled fish, grilled chicken, rice and banana wrapped in banana leaves and the most delicious Thai spring rolls. The rest of the days were spent going from amazing beach to amazing beach, listening to all the Euro's (mostly French) and of course eating. Even had the Thai version of a Margarita pizza (still waiting to see if that was a good idea although Carin has a bit of the Bangkok belly). Otherwise all is well from the Small Travelers. We love the comments so keep them coming.

BIG BUDDAH

Bangkok is all about the Buddha, the people and the food. We started off going to visit the Grand Palace when we were immediately struck by the heat and humidity along with the smells and the food vendors scurrying about setting up for the day. Of course we had no idea where we were going but with Carin and her guide book in tow and no knowledge of the language we were ready. It wasn't long before a little, elderly Thai woman saw us staring at the map and offered to help with directions . The exchange went something like this. "where you going, see Big Buddha? We told her we wanted to go to the Grand Palace and she replied, "Palace closed 1:30pm Queens birthday (pointing north on the map), see big Buddha". After 10 minutes of her trying to persuade us (which Mike bought into hook, line and sinker) to see Big Buddha we remembered reading about the numerous scammers and tallied on until we ran into "Ar-may". I am Ar-may, you know Ar-may, (pointing to his uniform), where are you going?" and also wanted us to see Big Buddha. Eventually we realized his name was not Ar-may but he was in the army therefore we should believe him. Scammer! We did find the Palace which was open all day. Scamming is an absolute art form here and very well polished. Needless to say we did not see Big Buddha but were amazed by the Emerald Buddha, The Feathered Buddha and the tremendous Reclining Buddha.The rest of the day was spent sampling the street foods and trying to cross the streets with out getting run over. Aside from our "new friends", the people are kind, helpful and very smiley. We leave Bangkok tonight for Ko Samui.

TEETH, TEARS, THAILAND

What you may ask do these three words have in common besides the fact that they all start in "T". A week before departure Carin had a filling replaced hence the "Teeth". The day before departure Carin found out she needed an emergency root canal hence the "Tears". Numb mouth and all we arrived in Bangkok as scheduled hence "Thailand". After 25 hours of travel we arrived at our hotel and decided to take a short nap which lasted for 12 hours. Didn't see much on day 1.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step"
- Lao Tzu

ROUTE

DENVER * THAILAND * INDONESIA * AUSTRALIA * NEW ZEALAND * VIETNAM * CAMBODIA * INDIA * NEPAL * JORDAN * EGYPT * SOUTH AFRICA * MOROCCO * HOME

PHOTO GALLERY

To view photos click on the post you want to view (ie Big Buddha or Ko Samui) in the main section and this will link you directly to flickr where you can view photos or slide show.

Note: Clicking on post in archive will not take you to pictures.

Enjoy.

ABOUT US

What statrted as a dream became a topic of discussion and turned into a reality. On August 3rd with little more than a handful of clothes in our packs and our angel by our side, we will leave family and friends behind to experience the world as it is. There will be laughter, there will definitely be tears but this is our journey ... every moment of it.

Mike & Carin