A Blog About Things We Do

(places and topics list)

Category: Travel

  • Sykes Hot Spring Hike with Birthday Girl Lindsay

    Sykes Hot Spring Hike with Birthday Girl Lindsay

    I can barely walk today – today is Monday. Last night we returned home from Sykes hot springs, where Lindsay and I completed (yaaa!!!) a 2 day, 20 mile hike. This is my second (Lindsay’s first) hike-in backpacking trip (the first being much shorter, only a few miles, into Joshua Tree), and for whatever reason we decided that it would be a good idea to start our backpacking experience together with a trail rated “difficult.” See everytrail.com for details if you don’t believe me.

    NOTE FROM THE FAR FUTURE: This screenshot is missing, but it was a screenshot of the hiking on everytrail. Which I think is now alltrail? Either way, it was a difficult trail.

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  • Mini Colombia Backpacking Trip

    Mini Colombia Backpacking Trip

    Bogota Panorama

    Lindsay and I went to Colombia in June. There we met Kyle, Sean (Lindsay’s brothers) as well as our dear friend Corie Brown.

    I’m a bit late describing this trip, but it was one of the bigger trips of the year (actually, travel wise it is the biggest in the last two years) so I wanted to at least mention it.

    I took 5 days of vacation, making a 9 day trip. Lindsay had two full weeks, as did Kyle and Sean.

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  • A sort of so long

    Ultra quick post, because Lindsay wanted me to post something:

    We MAY be leaving tomorrow (Sunday). Actually we MAY have left today, but as we are flying standby we are never sure for sure. Tomorrow morning’s flights are looking better then today’s though, so we’ll see!

    We’ve been in Bangkok for about 10 days now, just hanging out. It’s been nice, and I think we’re going to miss Bangkok, as well as the rest of SE Asia of course.

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  • how i met vi.

    a few days ago, while paroosing the second-hand book shop, i happened across a compilation of short stories by Paul Auster. well, not actually, “by” paul auster (which is too bad, because i love that man) but rather by 183 americans who decided to write NPR with a small anecdote about their lives to be read on NPR’s This American Life (which just so happens to be my very favorite of all NPR programs). naturally, without any hesitation, i bought it.

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  • Thanksgiving with prostitutes

    Thanksgiving with prostitutes

    I realize this blog may have a mixed audience so I’ll leave out the graphic depictions, but long story short Lindsay, Biggi, and I had Thanksgiving dinner at a bar/brothel tonight. It was actually a really high class place and the food was great, but it was certainly the first Thanksgiving dinner I’VE ever had that was served by somebody whom I could “hire” for “something that was NOT serving food.”k

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  • Lindsay walks stairs and looks to be in pain.

    Lindsay walks stairs and looks to be in pain.

    Lindsay ran the marathon and finished it, so that’s good. Jake, hope you enjoy this one. The drink in her hand is actually a new drink here that tastes like grapefruit but has no sugar or something, and it’s really good, unlike those other fruit flavored water drinks, which are not good.

    Note from the far future: I have no idea what this post was all about.

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  • we’re terrible bloggers.

    we’re terrible bloggers.

    so another picture post will have to suffice.
    here’s what we’ve been up to (well, some highlights, anyway) since our last blog:

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  • It’s been a long time…

    It’s been a long time…

    It’s been a long time since we posted anything, and this is not really anything worth writing home about (I think there’s a joke there somewhere), but I figured I’d at least share a picture I enjoy. It’s just a very quick version of what I hope will eventually be something I print out on a wall to remind me of what’s important in life. Lots of photoshop will be needed, but I’m convinced this photo has potential. It’s (as you may see if you read the description) a photo of a place that Lindsay and I stopped at often in Vang Vien Viang (spelling?) to have a water and a coke (total cost: ~80 cents) and look at the incredible rice fields… The photo truly does not do the place justice, the small shack you see was actually somebodies small house that they sold drinks from out front, and it was on a 30 or 40 foot cliff… so when seated on the mat yuo see in the front, you were sort of suspended over top of these beautiful fields… sort of like when Simba was held up in the lion king, same sort of feeling I would imagine.

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  • noise.

    ask yourself this question: what would you do if everything you heard…every radio, loud speaker, cell phone ring, supposed-to-be-entertainment-on-long-bus-rides “music videos,” EVERYTHING, besides the noise of incessant honking or rain patter, sounded like the beginning to “hopelessly devoted to you” on the Grease soundtrack?

    (need a quick reminder? here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJpyG3PXoKw)

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  • a picture supplement (and slight addition) to kev’s previous (ridiculously long) post.

    a picture supplement (and slight addition) to kev’s previous (ridiculously long) post.

    pictured below: tri’s family, waterpark, ridiculous traffic, snails, housing, ice coffee.

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  • “Ho Chi Minh City” or “Kevin Types 3523 Words On An iPod Touch Then Is So Sick Of It He Doesn’t Check For Typing Mistakes”

    “Ho Chi Minh City” or “Kevin Types 3523 Words On An iPod Touch Then Is So Sick Of It He Doesn’t Check For Typing Mistakes”

    It’s been far too long since our last blog post, and a lot has happened. As I type this Lindsay and I are once again on a bus, once again leaving a place we’ve had the pleasure of calling home the past 13 days.

    13 days ago we left the Kingdom of Cambodia and entered Vietnam and passed through imigration without (much) issue. Lindsay’s passport and VN Visa somehow ended up being stamped for entry on the third, as apposed to the second which was when we actually were entering Vietnam so we had to pay an extra 10 USD to get in. After passing through imivration we had a humorous customs experience. Everybody was supposed to pass their bags through a metal detector but lots of people just walked right past the inspection station. The gaurds were somewhat more adiment with Lindsay and I so we put our luggage through, but not before taking out a large bag that contained my film and other electronic gear. The guards didn’t even bother looking through the stuff I took out, so the moral of the story was to make sure you take out your bombs, guns, and drugs before giving your bags over for customs inspection. Maybe you had to be there to enjoy the humor of the situation.

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  • imma klutz (and other stories).

    imma klutz (and other stories).

    well, cambodia is everything we hoped it would be and more. as i’m sure my previous posts made clear, the first few weeks were somewhat trying, but since we’ve been in Siem Reap, things have been nothing short of awesome. kev and i both just finished up our first week of volunteering, which we both found to be extremely fulfilling (for lack of a better, less cheesy word). kev worked at a place called TrailBlazers, which builds really simple water filters for people in remote villages allowing them to have access to clean water. just to give you an idea…inside of a 2ft high, rectangular cement box, was the filtration media, which consists of a layer of gravel, a layer of course sand, and a layer of fine sand. there is a plastic diffuser plate above the water level to avoid disturbing a “bio-layer,” which holds key bacteria essential for removing biological pathogens and parasites found in the water. he woke up early every day and went and scrubbed out giant plastic containers, sifted sand and rock, and then washed the sand for the filters. it was quite a “grassroots” organization, but the work they were doing was quite incredible. with the most meager of supplies they were able to send these $45 filters off to villages for free, thanks to volunteers and a little hard (if not monotonous) work.

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