TravelStream™ news feed for member msprague on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/msprague en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sun, 30 Aug 2009 20:30:26 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251419953/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251419953/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251419953/tpod.html Sun, 30 Aug 2009 20:30:26 -0400 Tunisia 2004

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Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Today is the day! We're out the door and on our way to Tunisia in a few hours. Last minute jitters and we have to run and change the memory cards for Rebeca's camera. Things just didn't go quite the way they were supposed with the Olympus. The local branch of my bank now is convinced I'm a drug dealer. Three deposits of large amounts in $20 denominations. And another one today.
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Bizerte, Tunisia

Text about Bizerte will go here.
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Tunis, Tunisia

Tunis was nice, we got scammed for 6 dinar on the first day out on the streets. Carthage was great. Lots of ruins and you could walk pretty much wherever you pleased. Lots of cats, almost no dogs. Sidi Bou Said was nice as well. Too many Italian tourists at the Bardo to enjoy it properly. The first louage trip was a breeze and only cost us 7 dinar to travel 52 km. Seen a lot of mosques. We,re in Bizerte today and off to Tabarka tomorrow. Here is a sample sentence, guess which keys on the Tunisian keyboards are changed: the auick brozn fox ju,ped over the lwy dog:. Oh, did I mention its hot hot hot and sunny here all the time?
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Tozeur, Tunisia

Five or six days of not really feeling well at all is hopefully coming to an end. Whatever I got/ate in Sousse pretty much dehydrated me and not drinking nearly enough water didn,t help. I was in pretty rough shape by the time we got to Tozeur. Rebeca got the hotel to get a doctor and he prescribed a bunch of things to rehydrate me back to some sort of normal. I still feel like crap but at least on the getting better end. We did the best thing yesterday. We booked a trip to go out into the desert and see the Ong Jemal (the neck of the camel). It,s not bad, getting there is fun. We drove offroad through the desert on a rough track, stopped to see a herd of camels, then a quick stop to look at the rocks. Then he took us over some wicked steep drops and some huge dunes, you haven,t really offroaded until you do it in the Sahara, then perched us on top of another high dune and directly below us on a flat space of desert sat Mos Espa. We went down into the set and got to wander around and take photos, I have quite a few. After that we drove to the top of another dune and watched the sun go down looking out towards Algieria. Very cool! Remember to drink lots of water! Oh ya, the Lonely Planet recommendation for top end in Tozeur, at least the one we picked, sucks. And we now know what the Survivor contestants feel like when the food cravings start. Ask me how many people I would kill right now to have a bowl of oatmeal, go ahead, ask me!
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Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

What to say about Sousse? Well, it,s the stop on our trip where I got a nasty case of Tunisia leaky bum from what we think was an omelette. I was out of the game for most of yesterday. Today we took a louage to El Jem to see the collesium. It is most impressive. We got up early and were on the road by about 7am to beat the hordes of package tourists but all the way there we saw busload after busload headed in the same direction. It was a combo of Russian/Polish/Spanish/Italian this time. We should have sat on the steps for 40 minutes then went in, they all left at about the same time. Anyway, you can see it from miles off and it does nothing but gain in stature as you get closer. After El Jem we went up the road to Mahdia to look at another bunch of ruins that once circled the city, a fortress, and one of the large gates into the old city. We took a louage back to Sousse. Tomorrow we,re going to try out the Tunisian railways and go to Sfax. We,ll be there for a day and then into the desert. Only a couple more weeks and you can oogle my photos! Anyone get a postcard yet?
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251420401/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251420401/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/4/1251420401/tpod.html Thu, 27 Aug 2009 20:49:07 -0400 Tunisia 2004

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El Kef, Kef, Tunisia

The louage trip to Le Kef was uneventful, the driver seemed to have a bit more time to spare and as such decided to keep all four wheels on the road. The road out of Tabarka is mountainous with lots of switchbacks so slow was comforting for a change. Le Kef was a quiet place with the main attraction seeming to be closed. The Kasbah, sits up on the hill top and looks out onto the most beautiful valley you could imagine. When we arrived it seems the caretaker was either away or off at prayers because the doors were barred and there was no getting in. We walked around the narrow streets, took some photos of the town, mosque, valley. We stopped for lunch one day in the best restaurant. The place was full of smoking, drinking, loud-talking men. It was quite amusing. We ate our lunch, thanked the server and left. We should have taken photos. We took a day trip to Dougga to see the ruins. The casual tourist goes to Carthage and misses the amazing site at Dougga. There are 12 hectares exposed withanother 40 to be uncovered. Words do not describe this place. I hope my photos can adequately show the site. We took a ricketey bus to Kairouan the next day. We stayed in the 5 star La Kasbah Hotel. Oh ya!!! We took a guided tour of the Great Mosque and the other sites around the city. We wrestled our way through the medina several times and bought a carpet, more theatre than anything else. It was fun. We got hassled a lot by shop keepers, Kairouan is a stop for tourists from Sousse so they thought we were French, no, Dutch, no, German, no, Spanish, no, English, ah, yes, English, welcome, welcome!! If they saw the Canadian flag on Rebecas pack they assumed Quebecois and that of course we were from Montreal. It,s all fun. Today we took another louage to Sousse. We,ll be here for three days with side trips to El Jem, Mahdia, and Monastir. Postcards are enroute for those of you who I have current addresses for. Wait for the photos, this place is amazing....I wonder why more Canucks don,t travel here?
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Tabarka, Tunisia

We've been in Tabarka for the past couple of days and tomorrow we head South to Le Kef. From there we'll be exploring the kasbah and local surroundings in Le Kef and taking a day to travel and see the ruins in Dougga. It's going to be a bit tricky, the louages don't travel to these places but near them and we sure don't want to be hauling heavy rucks around the ruins. After Dougga we'd like to check out Maktar, more ruins, before heading to Kerouain. Tabarka has been good. I'm burned again, as usual, not enough sunscreen and too many dips in the Med. We chatted with a few of the local people today. Very friendly and very curious to ask where we are from and what we think of Tunisia. Tabarka has a great Genoese fortress up on a hill on a small island next to the harbour. Unfortunately, the military still uses the fort so we couldn't go up to it and if we did we wouldn't have been allowed to take photos. Oh well. I'm taking lots of photos but can't upload 'em so you'll have to wait.
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Hong Kong, China

We arrived back in Hong Kong ready to go.....shopping!!! We had checked our packs through to Toronto when we boarded for Hong Kong so all we had to deal with was our small packs and the goodies we might pick up.We found some food after taking care of our hotel and then went up the road, Nathan Road, to the Temple Street night market to shop for bootleg watches. It's a shopping bonanza filled with clothing, watches, toys, electronics, handbags, watches, watches and more watches. We wpent a few hundred more dollars and then headed back to the hotel. The next morning we were up early and out to look for some food then decided to take in one last tourist event using a booklet we found when we touched down at the airport the day before. The book was a series of self-guided walking tours. We decided, based on time, that we would be best served by doing the tour that started up the street from us. It helped that we were already familiar with the area. We started at the Yuen Po Street bird garden. We got there by riding the MRT to Prince Edward Station then followed a man with a bird cage up onto the street. We lost him at street level but after walking up the street a bit more saw another and crossed over to find the alleyway that makes up the garden. Dozens of men with song birds in small cages hanging from the trees chatted and compared. There were also dozens of vendors selling everything from cages to birds to bags of live crickets. We walked from there down the flower market and back up Tung Choi Street past the gold fish market. There are shops with dozens of little plastic water/fish filled baggies hanging from racks. From there we continued down the Tung Choi looking for the ladies market which unfortunately didn't open until noon, we'd be on our way by then. We crossed over to Shanghai Street and then down to the jade market where we tried our luck at getting a bargain. An Aussie stopped to tell us to "bargain hard". He purchased two cat's eyes for $22 when the vendor had started at $70 each. Good deal! After that we strolled by another temple then headed back to the hotel to gather our gear and head for one last trip across Victoria Harbour on the Star Ferry. Before we crossed we stopped at a small shop by the terminal and had some mango treats. Mango is a favoured fruit in all of the places we visited and is very tasty. We crossed the harbour and after checking in climbed aboard the Airport Express and off we went. Our adventure was almost over. We were sad to see Hong Kong behind us. Arriving at the airport we took one last gasp at the shops (can't get enough of that Hong Kong dollar) and hopped in line to clear customs/security. They passed my pack through twice. Do you suppose it had anything to do with the bundle of "copy" watches? Once through we grabbed some food and a mocha frappacino and settled in to wait for our flight to Toronto. The flight was delayed slightly while the luggage of a no show was removed from the plane and up up and away. An uneventful flight filled with movies we had already watched two and three times and we touched down in Anchorage...one last time for INS to grab Canadians off the plane and send them to Syria or Botswana or Bora Bora. No terrorists on this flight so we were allowed to leave and a few hours later we were touching down in wet, rainy Toronto. We picked up our packs and made our way to domestic departures. A quick flight to Ottawa and a cab ride and we were home. Total distance flown: 45605km (28339 miles).
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/3/1035403544/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/3/1035403544/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/msprague/3/1035403544/tpod.html Mon, 03 Aug 2009 20:15:13 -0400 Asia 2002

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Cairns, Queensland, Australia

Cairns is just like Darwin but maybe a bit smaller. There seemed to be a few more customs folks and they had a dog checking bags for controlled farm products but everyone is super friendly and just as helpful. After we sorted out our gear and collected a new passport stamp we bought tickets for the shuttle then piled on and rode the few kilometers into town. Our room wasn't ready when arrived since it was early so we wandered around the town looking things over and getting an idea of where stuff is at. There are dozens of bars and restaurants to cater to the tourists and a good assortment of places marked with Japanese signage to cater to the many Japanese tourists here. Our hotel, the Coral Tree Inn, sits between two hostels and is equipped with everything you might need, in particular a salt water pool! It's fantastic! We ate at a mediocre restaurant then looked at a few of the souvenir shops then back to the hotel. We bought a bottle of wine and walked across the park in front of the hotel to buy some drinks. The same park that the Lonely Planet guide warns you to stay out of after dark. On the way back we heard strange noises coming from one of the large trees, it sounded like a squealing baby, followed by a large bat swooping out of the leaves and away into the night sky. I've heard the lorikeets but haven't yet seen them and haven't seen any of the big black parrots or the cockatoos. I managed to pick up a cold, of all the silly places to get one. I guess that's to be expected given all the air travel we've had in the past few days.The day before yesterday we took a cruise to Green Island. We rode on the Reef Rocket, a catamaran type boat. It's about 25km out from Cairns and is very nice. The water is a brownish colour in towards the harbour then turns to a nice turquoise blue and finally a deep blue as you get out to deep water. It returns to turquoise blue as you approach the island and the reef. The island itself, Green Island, isn't very large but has a resort on it and all the associated facilities to support tourists. We were scheduled for a ride on the glass bottom boat but opted to go for a swim first. It was wonderful! The water was warm and perfect for a dip. The beach is coral sand and is soft and white and the number of people was fairly small and nicely dispersed. I stayed in the water while Rebeca stretched out and sun bathed on the beach. At 11:30 we ran to the Big Cat to make our glass bottom boat ride but they needed to switch the boat around due to strong winds from the north. We loaded on the boat and went out onto the reef to look at fish and stuff. The reef itself looks pretty grey and has a lot of coral sediment on it but the fish are magnificent and we got to see one or two large Grey turtles. We went from there back onto the Reef Rocket and back to Cairns. At Cairns we boarded the bus to take us to the Skyrail terminal. The Skyrail is a "ski lift" type system hooked up that runs from the terminal, 6 or 7 kilometers from Cairns, up over the bush covered hills to a small town called Kuranda. The ride is scary but amazing and you can see for miles in all directions. On the way there you see the second largest money maker for Queensland growing in all of the fields, sugar cane. The export all of it. Once to Kuranda you get to experience a sleepy town set to cater to tourists alone it appears. We looked in some shops, bought some goods and made our way back to the train station. We rode the Kuranda train back to Cairns. It's an interesting journey through twisting winding track through at least a dozen tunnels and over several hair raising bridges and cliffs. At one point it passes the Barron River gorge which drops down far below. Australia is in the midst of a drought so very little water is moving through the valley. It's dammed near the top for power generating. We rode the train back into Cairns. The next day we spent the day shopping and sitting in the pool. We had barramundi that night for dinner. Wonderful fish! The next day we were gone, back on a plane. This time we were off to Hong Kong via Brisbane. The bush fires all through Australia are bad and you could see the fires and smoke from the air. The sky is filled with smoke.
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Taipei, Taiwan

We were up early and headed out to take care of the tickets and travel authority for Australia. That taken care of, we're on our way to Australia, we went to the post office and mailed some post cards then made a feeble attempt to get to the National Mosque. The streets of Malaysia just aren't made for pedestrians. We made it to within probably a few hundred feet then were presented with more roads, more cars, more concrete walls, and not enough time. We'll have to catch it on the next trip. We met up with Tim at KL Sentral and said our good byes and then we were onto the express and off to the airport.We arrived late last night and almost immediately got a good impression of Taiwan. The people are friendly and helpful. We were helped by a young woman who stepped forward while we tried to sort out our bus transport to the city from CKS International Airport. We took the bus to the Lai Lai Sheraton then hopped in a taxi who drove us around the corner to the lane where the hostel is. We walked in and took the lift to the sixth floor. We thought we had booked a private room but they had none available so we slept in the dorm room. It wasn't that bad but not what we'd asked for. The bathroom just didn't make it. Rebeca asked about the private room this morning but it was still not available. So, we crossed the road and got a room at the Sheraton. If you can't spoil yourself while on vacation when can you? The next morning we gulped down McMuffins and then walked up the road to the CKS Memorial and the National Theatre and National Concert Hall. It's absolutely amazing! In the memorial hall are posted two guards who, with three others, perform a changing of the guard ceremony. It's very impressive. They're very good. We then walked down the road, looked at the Presidential Palace and the 2-28 Peace Park. After that we walked to the Mitsukoshi Department Store and after some confusion found our way to the 46th floor observation deck (the Topview Taipei Observatory) and looked out over Taipei under clear sunny skies. The elevator operators are young ladies dressed in pink suits as are the guides for the observation deck. It's all very cute and very much what you might expect to see. We went out on the MRT to see the Confucious Temple and another, the Paoan Temple, nearby. After that we walked back to the MRT station and bought a dinner of sushi and came back to the hotel. We ate then went up to do some shopping. I bought two hard drive cages, I'll still need the rack, and a 128mb compact flash card for my Visor! Rebeca bought herself an optical mouse. The shopping arcade is something else with multiple floors of small computer gear shops. It's great. As with all of the other places there is room to bargain.There are 7-11's on every street corner in Taipei. The crossing signals at each corner are a small green animated man with a count down timer to tell you how many seconds you have to safely cross. The most popular mode of transport is scooter. There are hundreds and all types and are driven by all kinds of people. We rode the MRT out to the National Museum once again with the aid of a young lady who approached us while we tried to sort what kind of day pass we would buy. She studies in Buffalo and was pleased to hear we were from Canada. Sorted out and on our way we travelled to the closest MRT station then took a bus to the museum. It's a very large and elaborate complex complete with gardens and a large statue of CKS standing in front. It's a large collection of assorted vessels and artwork. The place was crawling with school children. After touring the museum and making a couple of purchases we stopped and ate at the museum restaurant. My chopstick handling skills have much improved. After lunch we walked back to the station then decided to try and find the market in the north west of the city. No way, the streets aren't quite as well marked as we're used to so we wandered around a bit then headed for the Martyr's Shrine. We got to see the changing of the guard but the grounds are in the middle of some major construction so we didn't get inside. Taxi back to the hotel. Tonight we went downtown and ate at a buffet. They have a bunch of different dishes available and you pick four to go with some steamed rice. Another chopstick practise session. It was pretty good. The ladies working at the place wouldn't let us leave until we had finished our meal. We headed to the markets again. This time the noise was deafening. Music and hawkers selling the same old stuff. We're off to Hong Kong tomorrow and then Australia, arriving early Sunday morning. Our laundry was done here yesterday. It only cost us about $3200 or something like that. It was expensive but worth it.Our last day in Taipei, well, not even that. We packed our gear the night before and got up and ready at a leisurely pace. We both have enjoyed Taipei quite a bit. As we were checking out a guy from Calgary approached us and said hello. We piled into the bus and jumped into the solid traffic to CKS International for our flight to Hong Kong. We were there most of the day and should have gone into Hong Kong instead of sitting at the airport.
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