Georgeville in Winter, or, Carrie learning to be a Canadian

We've spent the last few days up in Georgeville getting a taste of winter after the long summer of India, Bali, Hawaii ...  Its kind of nice to have some cold air again!  Next up: a quick trip to Dallas, then the start of a drive back towards Jackson.

Carrie working on her Canadian credentials with the skates and maple leaf mittens!

Thanks to Phil, the pond is in great skating condition this year

Nice ice!

Trying to remember how to hold a hockey stick

For those who spent time here for the wedding, a view of the pink house in the winter

Trip Recommendations!

Many have asked ... and here they are, our recommendations for an amazing trip around the world ... (or at least a trip to the four countries we visited!)

Kenya

Nairobi:

·     Visit Children of Kibera Office & Red Rose School – stick around and volunteer if you have time (it will have a lasting impact - both on the kids and on you)

·     Have a coffee or dessert at one of the many Java House locations (order the chocolate chip cookie milkshake)

·     Eat at one of the many yummy Kilimani restaurants and sit in the lush backyards: Cedars (Lebanese), Osteria (Italian), Habesha (Ethiopian)

·     If you are staying awhile and working in Kilimani or Kibera, Leon Villas is a great apt complex with furnished apartments for a long term stay

To escape the big city:

·     Go on safari to El Karama, a private game reserve, and enjoy the eco-friendly rooms, friendly owners, night game drives, safari walks, and lack of crowds

·     Take a day trip to hike in the Ngong Hills

Lamu Island (once it’s safe again):

·     Stay at Stopover Guest House on Lamu Island (the Shela location is best) – book directly from the owner (Hamid) and enjoy chats with the guest house manager (Swali)

·     Have a Tusker (or two) on the floating bar between Lamu and Manda Isalnds

·     Take a sunset Dhow Trip in Lamu

New Zealand

Overall:

·     Buy a Van – we bought in Auckland and sold in Christchurch – you can get a far better deal if you do the opposite

·     Drink Speights Gold Medal Ale

·     Eat all the Tim Tams you can – they really do taste better in NZ

·     Eat Hokey Pokey ice cream

·     Drink a Flat White at a local coffee shop

·     NZ doesn’t believe in free wi-fi – however, you CAN find it at a local library and at McDonalds

·     Catch a rugby game if you can (especially if it’s the All Blacks) – at a minimum watch an All Blacks game at a local pub

North Island:

·     Stay at Little Earth in Whangarei – we didn’t explore the area much, but seems like a fun area

·     Do a multi-day canoe trip on the Wanganui River – we did the three day, which includes the prettiest section of the river

·     Head out on the Coromandel Peninsula - Hot Water Beach, Cathedral Cove, etc.

South Island:

·     Stay at Global Village on the west coast (Greymouth) – they have free kayak and bike rentals, a fantastic kitchen, and overall amazing spot

·     Overnight boat trip in Milford Sound - unbelievably gorgeous

·     Backpack to Welcome Flat (just south of Fox Glacier) – amazing hike, gorgeous peaks, and well-deserved hot springs at the hut

·     Take the Speights Brewery Tour in Dunedin simply for the last half hour (all you can drink beer)

·     Take a do-it-yourself  wine tour by bike in Marlborough – just make sure you don’t buy too many bottles of wine, because the bike ride home can be long with a heavy bag

·     Go to the theater pub in Wanaka – it really doesn’t matter what movie you see, the freshly baked cookies at intermission make up for the movie selection

·     Go to the hole-in-the-wall Fish & Chips in Akaroa – one order is enough to feed 2+ people

India

Overall:

·     Take train rides – use the shortest ride to sit in Sleeper Class or Second Sitting for the experience (and oh, it will be an experience!) and use the long trips to enjoy Tier 2 AC

·     Seek out recommendations for good restaurants – there are a lot of mediocre restaurants with so-so food – but the good restaurants have excellent food

·     In holy cities don’t expect to find beer … unless it’s in a paperbag under the table or served in a tea pot

Delhi:

·     Defense Colony – eat at Sagar (order the Masala Dosa) & Mocha (order a milkshake - they are all good)

·     Stay at K One One (or anywhere near Defense Colony or on the Metro line)

·     Go to the Ghandi Smriti Museum

·     Before or after touring the Mosque / Red Fort, eat at Haldiram’s (order the Raj Kochori)

Rishikesh:

·     Spend a night in Haridwar (on your way there or back) and go to the evening puja

·     Eat at Swiss Cottage (order the brown bread with peanut butter, muesli, ginger lemon honey tea, and homemade green pasta)

·     Take a cooking class at Lalita’s (learn how to make Malai Kofta)

·     Take a lot of yoga classes

Udaipur:

·     Stay at Udai Niwas – friendly staff, negotiable rates, and fantastic rooftop restaurant

·     Take a cooking class from Shashi (across the street from Udai Niwas) – she has an amazing life story and is just fantastic

·     Take a rickshaw tour of the city from Doulat (ask for him at Udai Niwas)

·     Eat dinner at Ambrai on lake level overlooking the Lake Palace and City Palace

Mumbai

·     Eat Britannia (order the berry pulao)

·     Take the commuter train and spend the extra dollar on First Class (and do not go during rush hour!)

·     Walk along the Queen’s Necklace (Mumbai’s West Side Highway equivalent) and eat custard apple ice cream at Bachelor's (it’s a little shack on the opposite side of the beach – just ask a local)

Kovalam

·     Go on a houseboat day trip on the backwaters (no need to stay overnight)

·     Go to Kanyakamari (the southern tip of India and confluence of three seas)

·     Eat dessert (at least) at the Turtle on the Beach Resort (order the Banana Split)

Bali / Lombok

Kuta (Bali) / Legian

·     Don’t go to Kuta (Bali) – if you want to learn to surf, stay north in Legian (or just learn in Balangan)

·     Eat dinner at Ultimo (just north in Seminyak) – any pasta dish is amazing and order a strawberry daiquiri

Balangan

·     Amazing, rustic surf / beach spot

·     Stay at Balangan Sea View - we stayed in the rooms, we heard mixed reviews about the bungalows

·     Go to Ulu Watu Temple for the Sunset Kecak Dance (Fire Dance)

Kuta (Lombok)

·     Stay in the Surfer’s Inn for a low-key, nice place and make friends near the pool to go surfing with the next day

·     Eat dinner (or multiple dinners if you can!) at Warung Bule (order the mahi mahi or tuna) - best meal in months

·     Eat lunch at Ashtari (order the coconut shake)

·     Hike up the rock outcrop just east of the Novotel at sunset with some Bintangs (just ask around for the sunset point)

Gili Trawangan

·     Potentially very busy and crowded during peak season – but in the off-season it was awesome

·     Stay at Pesona – the welcome drink is worth it (Pina Coladas are amazing and so are the Iced Coffees), the pool is fantastic, and the people that run it are super nice

·     Eat dinner at The Beach House Restaurant (pick out your fresh fish and watch them grill it)

·     Run, walk, or bike around the island – but do so early in the morning before it gets too hot

·     Go to Sunset Bar for sunset (duh) – it’s a 10-15 minute walk from Pesona

Candidasa / Amed / Tulamben

·     Dive at the Liberty Wreck – Yes Dive in Candidasa were good outfitters, but there are a bunch closer to the wreck

Ubud

·     Stay at Gusti’s on Kajeng – shop around for a good room, some are a little more musty than others

·     Eat at Savannah Moon on Kajeng (order the Avocado Milkshake and Feta Pizza) – the people that run it are super sweet

·     If you are looking for some comfort food, head to West Side Café and order the fresh, homemade lemonade and a breakfast burrito

·     Do any of the rice paddy walks (there are a couple listed in Lonely Planet) – if you do the Campuan Ridge Walk, head to the restaurant at the top of the ridge, with three little thatched roof huts in a lily pond (the ice cold lassis are delicious)

·     Do the bike trip from Kintamani back to Ubud with Bali Eco Tours

·     Rent a scooter and head north taking as many backroads as possible

·     Get the Salted Caramel gelato from Gelato Secrets

·     Eat dinner at Casa Luna (order pumpkin raviolis) & save room for dessert!

The aftermath.

Explosion of stuff, and a Carrie.

Back in the good ol' US of A

Three flights. Two sunrises and sunsets in the same day (figure that one out). A 42 hour long six-month anniversary (another brain teaser for you). And here we are, happily in Kona, relaxing, eating home cooked food, and trying to figure out what to do with our lives (open to ideas).

Pete's a monkey. What are you?

Dec 18th Sunrise number two in Honolulu.

A rainbow to greet us in Hawaii. Must be a sign of good things to come.

Biking, Downhill.

The whole tribe (minus Louis & Tony who left monday evening) took a day-long bike tour from Kintamani back to Ubud.  Kintamani is the town at the top of the volcano, so the bike tour is literally a gentle downhill ride for about 25 km. We stopped at lots of sights along the way, picking up tidbits on Balinese culture, architecture, religion, rice farming techniques, coffee, and wood carving traditions. Not to mention, taking in the great scenery. 

Terraced rice paddies

Lake in the crater at the top of the volcano

Coffee tasting (no, we didn't taste the Luwak coffee, though we did see the little beasts. Look it up if you don't know what it is)

Inspecting the rice planting

Riding through one of the little country lanes in the middle of the rice fields

Candidasa

After a fun couple days with Besty & Blanchie in Legian and Balangan, we headed to Candidasa to meet up with the rest of the clan (Michael, Sophia, Louis, & Tony). This past weekend included a snorkeling trip to a white sand beach just north of town, a diving trip to the USS Liberty ship wreck off the coast of Bali, a lot of time spent on beaches and swimming, and many meals where we talked and talked ... and ate way too much!

Snorkeling at the white sand beach, just north of Candidasa

The crew eating a fish feast on the white sand beach

Preparing for our dive trip

Sophia, Betsy, & Pete

One of our many yummy dinners - Blanchie and the duck

Our hotel lobby - Blanchie made a friend!

We headed to Ubud this afternoon where we'll spend our last four days - then we head home to the States. It hasn't hit us that our trip is coming to an end ... but then again, our trip ends in Hawaii (so life isn't too bad)!

And the tribe arrives ....

Mom and Blanchie arrived a couple days ago.  Mike, Sophia, Louis and Tony arrive late tonight ....  We are all headed up to Candidasa for the next handful of days.  Only one week until Carrie and I fly back to the US ... so sad!

Kekak fire dance at Ulu watu

We had to get at least one surf photo!

Carrie back on the board!

Diving, Drinks, & Dinner in Gili T(rawangan)

This Friday we island hopped over to Gili Trawangan, or Gili T as it's known to the locals and the tourists who can't pronounce it. :) Gili T is one of three, tiny "Gili Islands" off the northwest coast of Lombok. For an idea of just how tiny - you can easily walk around Gili T in an hour and a half (or run in ~45 minutes) ... and Gili T is the biggest of the three Gilis.

For a visual of our island hopping in the past week, see the map below:

(From Bali, we went to Kuta, Lombok, a surf town on the southern coast. From Lombok, we hopped over to Gili T, a tropical paradise). 

Today we headed out for an afternoon dive to Shark Point. Unfortunately, we didn't see any reef shark, but we did see sea turtle, octopus, eel, sting ray, lobster, and loads of brightly colored fish (the needle fish always make me laugh - they are so funny looking) & gorgeous coral.

Pete & me on the dive boat

Our dive boat

After a fantastic dive, we headed to Sunset Bar for sunset (surprise!) Despite the cloudy sunset, it was absolutely stunning and quite possibly the most beautiful place I've ever been to. To the east, you could see a storm brewing over the dramatic mountains of Lombok. In the distance to the west, you could just see the highest peak of Bali peeking through the clouds. Not surprisingly, we took loads of pictures ...

Random boat on shore with Lombok in the background

Bintang is to Indonesia as Tusker is to Kenya as Kingfisher is to India (the ubiquitous beer)

Life is rough

Even after sunset we couldn't stop snapping pictures

So dinner in Gili T goes as such:

1) Find the restaurant that has the freshest looking fish and the best looking salad bar
2) Pick out the piece of fish that looks best and tell the guy behind the counter
3) Find a table on the beach and order a large, ice cold Bintang (beer)
4) Load up on the freshest salads while your fish is being grilled
5) Magically your fish appears - grilled to perfection and with an amazing garlic-butter sauce
6) Walk off the huge meal you just consumed
7) Make sure you walk long enough to make room for gelato from Gili Gelato

Tough decision ...

Kuta take two. (Kuta-Lombok, that is)

There is something pretty damn cool about taking a boat out to a surf break. Its kind of like going heli skiing. The only difference is, that when it comes to surfing, I can do the equivalent of 'snow plow' at best. But it still feels pretty neat.

After our recuperation time in Ubud, and our scooter trip to Lovina, we decided to check out Lombok, and island just to the east of Bali.  Lombok is far less visited, less developed, and beautiful.  Kuta-Lombok is a sleepy little fishing town on the south coast, now mostly a sleepy little surf town. 

We caught a cheap, 30 minute, flight from Bali to Lombok and rolled into Kuta monday evening.

Getting to the only mellow break near Kuta (there are a number of world class breaks, but only one that is beginner friendly) involved riding our scooter 10 minutes down a bumpy rural road, past the rice and tobacco fields, through herds of cows, along the edge of a big turquoise bay, to the even smaller fishing town of Gerepuk.  There, we rented boards from the one surf shop, and hired a boatman to take us the 5-10 minutes out to the break.  The boatmen would anchor just next to the break, and wait 2-3 hours for us to tire ourselves out, then bring us back to shore (not surprisingly it turns out, most of the boatmen are awesome surfers, so we are really paying for them to go out surfing as well - not a bad job).

Thankfully a friendly couple from Colorado took us under their wing and showed us the ropes to figure all of this out, and gave me a bunch of surf lessons to boot.

Three days of surfing later, my arms feel like they are going to fall off, I'm sunburnt on 80% of my body, but I actually feel like I at least have an idea of what I'm doing on a surfboard, and for better or worse, might be addicted.

After a less than stellar experience in Kuta-Bali, our 4 days in Kuta-Lombok were a breath of fresh air. We met great folks, had good food, roared around the countryside on our scooter ('roar' might not be the most accurate descriptor of the sound made by a scooter, but it seems more dramatic than 'putt-putted around'), surfed, lounged by the pool drinking beer, watched the sunset from rocky outcrops, and generally had a grand ol' time.

View of the Kuta-Lombok area from a nearby hill. Lots of beaches, and not much else there. 

We never took our camera out surfing, so I stole this photo of the fishing boats that take you out to the break from a travel site. They would pile 3-4 boards onto a boat, and off we would go. http://www.cnngo.com/explorations/none/lombok-kuta-indonesias-other-kuta-832163 

I stole this photo too.  Its taken from where the boats would anchor, just to the side of the break.

Scooting Around Bali

While we were in Ubud, we were looking at a map and decided it would be fun to go up and over the mountains to the northern coast of Bali. After renting a scooter and packing a small messenger bag with toothbrushes and bathing suits – we were off!

We headed north into the mountains where the temperature started to drop and we realized we were pretty much in the clouds. It was a welcomed feeling, as we had been sweating in the morning sun as we left Ubud. We passed through many small villages and towns with Balinese people going about their daily routines. It was a pleasant sight to see villages that hadn’t been commercialized for tourists and were real, Bali towns. Once we were outside the towns, we were again immersed in fields and fields of rice paddies, this time terraced because of the slope of the mountains. After about two hours, we arrived in the small, lakeside mountain town of Bedugul, where we visited a temple set right on the lake. When we arrived, a ceremony was just beginning as they paraded through the temple grounds.

Us & the temple

After a quick tour of the grounds and a bite to eat, we were off again. As we continued north, the road began to follow the rim of the crater of the volcano. We could see Lake Buyan down the slope to the left, and fields of rice paddies down the slope to the right.

Pete & Lake Buyan

We took the scenic route from Lake Buyan to the northern coast, which meant scooting through the gorgeous, picturesque town of Munduk and driving along a narrow, VERY steep, road to Banjar.

This picture does not do the road justice - it was VERY steep in parts!

We eventually made it to the coastal town of Lovina, where we stayed the night. In our one night there, we were lucky enough to catch a beautiful sunset and an equally stunning sunrise. (I went on a boat ride at the crack of dawn to see dolphins – Pete opted to sleep in to fight off stomach ailments).

Sunset in Lovina

Another picture of sunset

This little guy ran by our table at dinner

Sunrise in Lovina

Dolphins!

After my boat ride and some breakfast, we hopped back on our scooter and headed south over another volcano to Kintamani. We weren’t as lucky with the rain (or lack there of!) on the second day, and had to pull over at a little roadside stand with an awning when the rain changed from a drizzle to sheets of rain. We waited it out with a Balinese family and when we could see a break in the rain, we went for it. Let’s just say the hot sun in Ubud was very welcomed as we rolled back into town!

And we made it back safely!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Our thanksgiving bird - crispy duck, indonesian style

Carrie and her faux-drink. Antibiotics and alcohol don't mix well.

Dig in! (Not the green bean casserole look-alike as a side)

Like most years, we have a lot to be thankful for.

We are thankful for each other. Through quitting our jobs, two cross-country drives, wedding planning, and lots of ups and downs in the past 6 months of travel, we have enjoyed each others companionship, laughed a lot, created tons of memories, put up with each other’s tired or hunger induced moods, taken care of each other when we’ve been sick, and made the entire world feel like home.

We are thankful for our families. For being so supportive and encouraging of everything we have ever done, for not questioning our decision to quit our jobs and travel, for inspiring us to always want to climb the next hill, or explore around the next corner.

We are thankful for the amazing collection of friends we have, new and old, scattered around the world.  The things you work on, are passionate about, pursue as hobbies, think and talk about, never cease to amaze and inspire us.

We are thankful for the warm hospitality we have been shown the world over – places to stay, home-cooked meals, friendly advice, and warm smiles.

We are thankful to have been able to put ourselves in a position to take a year off and explore.

We are thankful to have been born into a world of opportunity, where hard work and luck can go a long ways. We’ve met many folks along the way that will never have the same opportunities, no matter how hard they work, solely on the basis of where they were born.

Its hard to know what the future holds, and we look forward to many more adventures, and much more to be thankful about next year, and in the years to come, but for today, we are thankful for the incredible love and support that we have been lucky enough to received to date.

On the mend, pressing ‘reset’ on Bali

Things are looking up. We escaped Kuta, a found a charming, quiet room to rent in Ubud, set in a lush garden overlooking a tree-filled ravine. My stomach is cooperating for the most part, Carrie’s leg is healing nicely. Things have improved over last week! Maybe Bali isn't so bad after all :)

Parts of Ubud are congested, and overly touristy (Eat, Pray, Love hasn’t helped in that department), but it is still a charming place. Stepping away from the couple busy streets puts you in the midst of rice paddies, lush vegetation, and beautiful scenery.  Plus, the advantage of it being a tourist magnet means that there are tons of great restaurants!

A little guy guarding the entrance of the Sacred Monkey Forest

Folks at work in the rice paddies

A short walk from town leads to beautiful ridgelines

Not a bad place to stop for a rest and a drink while out on a walk in the hot sun