Jordan and the Balkans Wrap-Up

Facts and Figures
Length of Stay: 23 Days
Miles Traveled to Enter: 4,240 by plane from Bangkok
Miles Traveled: 800 by plane + 620 by bus + 300 by train + 160 by boat + 160 by car  = 2,040 total (37,190 since landing in Quito - yes, I realize the website's logo is now wrong)
Places Visited: Amman, Wadi Musa (Petra), Athens, Skopje, Dubrovnik, Split, Hvar.  Also drove through Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro.
Intercity Buses Taken: 3
Trains Taken: 2
Ferries Taken: 1
Flights Taken: 1
Times a Croatian map failed us: 5

Rankings in the full post.

Croatian Walls

Most of our time in Croatia has been spent in old, walled cities and towns.  While with Marcia and Lee, we visited the UNESCO World Heritage Sites of Dubrovnik, Split and Trogir, along with the Walls of Ston.  After they returned to North Carolina, we stayed in Hvar for four days.  No pictures of half naked men here, just alleys, squares, forts and churches.

Go Take a Hike

First of all, let me apologize for the errant "Zs" and "Ys" you will undoubtedly see in this post.  Apparently they are switched on the Croatian keyboard. Silly Croatians.

Anyway!  For the past several days, to console ourselves after my mom and Lee's departure, we have been in repose on the beautiful island of Hvar about an hour off the coast of Split.  With five dazs to kill between leaving my mom and Lee, and before we meet the Bells in Italy, we decided taking it easy and recouping a bit would be a good idea.  (Those of you who have met our fabulous mothers know that one needs a lot of energy reserves to handle such forces of nature.)

Admittedly, Hvar, currently the hottest tourist destination for the rich and trashy, is admittedly not our usual scene.  We have, however, been able to look past the huge yachts and skimpy (or nonexistent) clothing, and have found a jewel of a historic little town set amongst some of the most incredible natural scenery to be found in Croatia.

Krka National Park: How to Ruin a Beautiful Place

1.  Make it overly accessible.
2.  Build large pavilions where restaurants serve overpriced food.
3.  Invite people to swim in the water.

These are the steps Krka National Park has taken to transform itself into a water park.  When I read about the park and its waterfalls and looked at the pictures, they sounded and looked pristine.  Yes, the descriptions stated that people swam at the bottom of the lowest waterfall, but I envisioned something similar to what we saw in Australia: a handful of people but by no means crowded.  Excited by the pictures, Marcia (on her birthday), Lee, Magge and I changed our plans to accommodate the hour and half trip north of Split.  When we arrived, we were very surprised at what we saw.  The park was beyond crowded, with the waterfalls and its surroundings packed with people doing their best to make Krka National Park look like the neighborhood pee-filled pool.  We had planned on taking a swim, but I don't know if we could have found any spare room in the water.  Besides, the bathrooms there charged five Croatian kuna (almost a dollar) entry fee, so the aforementioned pool is probably cleaner.

Guys Gone Wild: Dubrovnik

For many European men, Durbovnik is the Panama City Beach of the Adriatic.  It's a place where they can freely take off the shirts and flaunt what they've got, even if it's not much (or too much).

I tried to get a picture of Magge on one of Dubrovnik's narrow streets, and a sneaky bare-chested European found his way into the frame

A rare occasion of a shirtless specimen accompanied by a female

A slight variation on the no-shirt look, but nearly as popular

This scene at Onofrio's fountain makes me think of the following image:

Happy Birthday, Dad

It's my father's birthday today, rounding out my family's birthdays for the year (Magge can now put down her color pencils for a few months).  Following our post-Communist adventure in Skopje, we're in Dubrovnik, which makes for a much better birthday sign location.  Sorry again, Colin.  See you in ten days, Dad.

Happy Birthday in Croatian on the drawbridge at Pile Gate, on the west wall looking down the street Stradun in old Dubrovnik, and just outside the west wall

Finally Got My Mamma

After spending a couple luxurious months in Southeast Asia, where almost anything can be had for a fraction of the price it costs in the States, the past week in Greece and now Croatia has been a very rude awakening. An hour of internet time in S.E.A. cost us less than a dollar (usually nothing at all because it was free wherever we were staying).  Here we are forced to pay over six dollars an hour.  So, at risk of being killed by husband, I must make my entry very short and sweet - not something that is easy for me.

To be honest, I did not have much time to get excited about seeing my mom and Lee, whom I have missed very much, because Croatia seemed so far away just two weeks ago when I was in Thailand and I knew I still had four countries to go before seeing them.  I could not contain my excitement, however, once we finally arrived in Dubrovnik, exhausted from a terrible night of traveling by bus from Macedonia.  Who would have ever thought transport in South America would seem so luxurious?

Happy Birthday, Colin Redux

My friend Mike, a famous graphic designer, added a little color to my brother Colin's birthday picture and I thought it was worth posting. Colin, now that you got two birthday posts, don't expect anything for Christmas.

Happy Birthday, Colin

The second oldest sibling in my family turns 24 today.  My sister got pictures from an active geyser field in Chile and my youngest brother got pictures from gigantic boulders in New Zealand, but Colin gets pictures from the gray, concrete, formerly Communist city of Skopje.  Sorry, Colin.  It's nothing personal, just bad timing.

Happy Birthday in Macedonian

Train from Greece to Macedonia

We were originally supposed to stay in Greece for nearly a month, but we decided to extend our time in Asia instead and reduced our time in the country to a mere three days.  From there, we were to go to Croatia to meet Magge's mother and stepfather.  On a map, that looks easy.  I figured at worst we could take a ferry.  You can take a ferry from Greece to Italy, and from Italy to Croatia, so the shorter Greece to Croatia distance must have a ferry route?  No.  The easiest way to get from Athens to Dubrovnik is to take a six hour train ride to Thessaloniki, then a three hour train ride that's actually a five hour train ride to Skopje, Macedonia, and then a twelve hour overnight bus to Dubrovnik.  I confess that I hadn't heard of Skopje two weeks ago, and my geography is usually pretty good.  Magge confesses that two weeks ago she didn't know Macedonia was still a country, but I told her to stop admitting that.

The train segment from Thessaloniki to Skopje actually was really nice, despite the lingering smell of smoke (the Balkan peninsula is Europe's ashtray) and no airconditioning.  Here are a handful of pictures from the ride.

We had a good time in Athens, but I don't know if we'll get around to posting anything on our stay there.  At most, we'll post some pictures, but there won't be much that everyone hasn't already seen many times elsewhere.

Petra

I've never had a burning desire to visit the Middle East.  I don't think I can be blamed given the standard treatment the region gets in the mainstream media in the U.S.  However, when we were looking at potential destinations, I was drawn to Petra in Jordan, thanks to Indian Jones and the Last Crusade.  Some research comforted us that Jordan was more than safe for travel, and we slotted one week there between our time in Asia and Europe.  It is one of the best planning decisions we have made.  It can be easy to get jaded after eight months of travel, but no level of road weariness could take away from this ancient city.

Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand Wrap-Up

We had an incredible two months in Southeast Asia (including our two weeks in Malaysia and Singapore), but it was bittersweet because we felt like we didn't do the region justice. Time constraints and our getting sick held us back from digging too much past the typical tourist trails. We'd love to come back to this region again and spend more time. In fact, I think Magge is already scouring job websites, trying to find me employment in Singapore or Bangkok.

Facts and Figures
Length of Stay: 43 Days
Miles Traveled to Enter: 720 by plane from Kuala Lumpur
Miles Traveled: 1,560 by train + 615 by plane + 285 by bus + 100 by boat  = 2,560 total (30,910 since landing in Quito)
Places Visited: Siem Reap (Angkor), Battambang, Phnom Penh, Chau Doc, Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Hanoi, Halong Bay, Bangkok, Koh Tao
Intercity Buses Taken: 2
River Ferries Taken: 1
Night Trains Taken: 3
Flights Taken: 1
Rounds Fired from the "Rambo Gun": 10
Mummified Communists Seen: 1

Rankings in the full post.

Beach Time on Koh Tao

Thailand was supposed to be the centerpiece of our time in Southeast Asia, but the Red Shirts changed that.  Even though we were told by other travelers coming from Thailand that the areas outside of Bangkok were safe, we just did not want to take the risk that the demonstrations and fighting would erupt into a more widespread problem.  Thus, Thailand was taken off the itinerary and we decided to focus on Cambodia and Vietnam.  However, three weeks, two countries and two bouts of dengue fever later, we both decided that we needed some time on a beach, and Thailand had calmed down enough that we opted to get our sand fix there instead of in Vietnam.