Category: Travel (Page 3 of 4)

James and I are back at home now but I wanted to share some more photos of our trip in Malta and fill you in on what we’ve been up to the last two weeks.

We left Darren and Julie’s Gozo farmhouse and took the ferry to Malta for a road trip.

Thursday, October 11

There is all sorts of fantastic architecture on Gozo and Malta. It seems like there was a bulk sale on domes at some point, but regardless they are spectacular. The most spectacular being the Rotunda in Xewkija, which we passed on our way to the ferry.

The Rotunda is the Parish Church of St John the Baptist and was built between 1951 and 1971. The 75 metre dome is higher than St. Paul’s Cathedral in London and the nave can seat 4000 people. It was pretty quite the afternoon we were there, but beautiful sunlight was coming in through the windows.

The rest of our trip to Valletta was fairly uneventful. James drove and I navigated. Again, it’s all left driving, which means the window washers were going every time we tried to signal a turn. Pretty funny. We did get lost a couple of times, but you can drive the full length of the island in a hour so getting lost doesn’t actually waste a lot of time.

I found that although there are road signs, they are not to be trusted. You best bet driving in Malta is to have a general sense of the direction you’d like to go and just carry on in that direction regardless of the signs.

Our first night in Valletta we had dinner at a Chinese food restaurant called the Blue Room. It was pretty exciting to eat out somewhere and not see the staples of pasta and pizza.

Friday, October 12

Today was our morning to visit St. John’s Co-Cathedral but the cruise ships were in town and the place was a zoo. We decided to go to the archeology museum instead and it was a wise choice. There was a Caravaggio exhibit on and the paintings were absolute masterpieces. Caravaggio was on Malta for a number of years so some of the paintings on display were painted in Malta. We watched a short video and then wandered around the gallery.

His paintings are phenomenal–like looking at a photograph.

After that we had a quick tour around the Fine Arts museum then were off to meet Darren and his friend Alex Grech at Cafe Cordina at 3 pm. Alex is an interesting guy, and perhaps will be the one to start Barcamp Malta–conversations are in the works.

That night we say the play Doubt, which was an ok way to spend the evening.

Saturday, October 13

For a 13th, this was our lucky day. I was interested in visiting the Hypogeum, which is an underground temple over 5,000 years old. Tickets must be bought months in advance but there is a noon tour for last minute guests. The only way to get tickets is to go for 8 am the day before and cross your fingers.

The Hypogeum is a UNESCO World Heritage site and is protected by all sorts of rules. One being that only 70 people can visit per day.

Well it was our lucky day. As I was waiting to hear whether we’d be able to get tickets for Sunday, a tour guide came in and she had two extra tickets she was trying to refund. I bought the tickets from her and James and I were able to go on the 2 pm tour that afternoon.

We went back to Valletta and toured St. John’s Co-Cathedral, which I think is one of my favourite Maltese sites, then went on the tour of the Hypogeum, which was very cool. They carved the temple out of the limestone.

That evening was the semi-final for the Rugby World Cup–England vs. France. James spent a couple of hours trying to find a bar that was showing the game. Rugby is not really a well-observed sport in Malta. In the end, lucky 13, we found The Pub, an English pub in Valletta that was showing the game. The bartender was even wearing his English jersey. It was an excellent time.

The weather took a turn though and we had a loud thunderstorm. It sounded like the Germans were bombing the place again.

Sunday, October 14

Today we were off to Marsaxlokk, a well-known fishing village. Being Sunday it was also the weekly fish market. We stopped first at Peter’s Pool for a picnic lunch. We were hoping to go swimming but the winds were unruly.

Marsaxlokk has a number of little wooden fishing boats in the bay, and it’s definitely a picturesque little place.

We had dinner at Matthew’s Pub. I had a creamy chicken and mushroom dish, very yummy.

Monday, October 15

A day for toodling. The weather hadn’t improved much but we did find the Blue Grotto, which is stunning, and a Wied-il close by–nice little inlets that are great for swimming.

We had a nice bob around in the water then headed for Mdina and the Point de Vue Guesthouse.

Mdina is a fortified city. Medina is Arabic for “walled city”. Historically it was the favoured residence of the Maltese aristocracy. There are a lot of interested door knockers here. I took a photo of every one we came across.

Mdina is where we ate one of our favourite meals. Il Gattopardo, Italian for “the leopard”, is a charming cafe. I had a great hot chocolate, which was needed since it was howling winds outside. The meals are Greek inspired and James and I had a prosciutto salad with rocket, tomato, olives and parma ham, and lemon-coconut dahl with pita. The dahl was spectacular.

We had another nice meal at the Point de Vue Guesthouse that evening.

Tuesday, October 16

Today was our day to spend money. We drove up to Mosta to see the dome there. Had some lunch. Then carried on to Golden Bay and the 5-star Radisson hotel. The beach at Golden Bay is golden and lovely. We had a short swim because the weather was crappy. And with just enough sunlight I managed to read a few pages on the beach, pretending that it was a lovely summer afternoon.

The bed at the Radisson was worth the $300 CDN we spent. It was big and fluffy and everything that beds in Maltese budget hotels are not.

Wednesday, October 17

Winds gusting to 60-70 km per hour pushed us to the ferry and back to Gozo. I’m really happy that we decided to return to Gozo before flying home because Darren and Julie’s farmhouse was so quiet and welcoming I could have cried. It was wonderful to be back on sleepy Gozo and driving routes that we knew well.

Our road trip was fun, but I think some of the best sites are on Gozo, not the more touristy and busy Malta.

The winds had knocked out the electricity so we spent most of the evening trying to get the lights back on. We made dinner on the gas stove by the luminescence of Julie’s bicycle light.

Thursday, October 18

It was a full house at Darren and Julie’s. Julie returned from Rome the night before with two new house guests in tow–Allan and Jen. We caught up with Julie and basically hung around relaxing.

I took Allan and Jen up to Ta’Pinu and the stations of the cross at sunset. Then we settled in for dinner and early sleeping.

Friday, October 19

Another stormy day on Gozo. James and I decided to race out to San Blas in the morning for a swim at our favourite spot. The light was really interesting and made the sand glow. There was a dark line along the horizon that steadily got closer and closer. At the last possible minute we decided to flee back uphill to the car. It’s a fun little goat path that you have to take down to San Blas so the idea of mounting it in the rain was not pleasant.

We made it back to the car and back to Gharb just in time to grab Julie and speed off to Freespirit Spa for our weekly massage and facial.

Martin gave me one of my top three massages of all time. In fact he’s sitting in spot 1 and 2. Afterwards Monica gave me a facial. I’ve never had one before so it was a new experience. I’m definitely interested in trying that again.

Darren returned from Toronto today and we had a great dinner with everyone at Salvina, the local luxury dining establishment. I had the duck and it was excellent.

Saturday, October 20

This was a lazy day and our last on Gozo. I wandered around Gharb for a while, packed and then went with Julie and her friends to Dwejra. I’d gone before with Darren but we didn’t actually get to the Azure Window and the Blue Hole, which are supposed to be stunning. I’m really glad I decided to go–it was a last minute decision and definitely worth the experience. We walked around the shore with breaking waves around us. Stunning.

Late afternoon James and I made our way to the ferry, which was backed up with tourists so we had to wait one sailing.

The bus to Valletta was long and sort of boring, there was some good people watching.

The highlight, of course, was getting back to Valletta and The Pub, where we watch the final in the Rugby World Cup. South Africa was our favourite to win, but we didn’t want to get kicked out of the only pub showing the game so we verbally cheered for England.

One good sleep in Hotel Castille then we were off to Luqa airport at 6:30 am.

Here’s a quick summary of what we’ve been up to in Gozo.

Wednesday, October 3

We arrived in Malta from an Air Malta flight–the slowest check-in staff ever at the Gatwick airport. The flight was about 3 hours. Then Julie had hired a driver for us, who picked us up at the airport and drove us to the ferry terminal. His name was George.

We passed by Takai, which is where Bob Sherrett landed during the war. During WWII, Malta took “quite a pasting”, they were bombed 154 consecutive days and nights, compared to the London Blitz, which was 54 days of bombing. The entire population of Malta received the George Cross, Britain’s highest award for civilian bravery.

The ferry ride was about 25 minutes and Darren, Julie and their friend Gwendolyn met us on the Gozo side. Gwen drove in Japan for 6 months so she was our fearless left-side driver.

It was about 9 or 10 at night so after a quick refresher we made our way to Rangers, which is the local pub and supporter of the Gharb Rangers football team. I had a Mexicana personal pizza, some wine and a great time.

Thursday, Oct 4

First day on Malta. Thankfully Gwendolyn had been around Gozo for a couple of days and Julie is a perfect travel guide. We were whisked off to San Blas Bay for an early morning of snorkeling. You want to get there early and leave before the tourists arrive. Damn tourists.

San Blas is gorgeous. You park on the top of a cliff and wind your way down the road to the ocean. It was a bit steep but definitely worth it. The sand is a great saffron colour. The snorkeling was good. We saw coral and jelly fish, white bream (little silver fish with a black spot on their tail), two-band bream (silver fish with black stripes), ornate wrasse (funky coloured fish), little black guys with a split tail fin and other scrubby fish. It was really a great swim.

Then we climbed back up the hill to the jeep. Returned home to Gharb, jumped into the icy back garden pool then had a rest.

Later we went into Victoria and had a coffee at Belusa Cafe, bought some sweeties (honey circle, almond cookies) and returned home. For dinner, Gwendolyn made an orzo salad that was delicious and we had some chicken sausages.

October 5

Gwendolyn, James and I got up early so we could meet a fellow in Mgarr Harbour at 8:15 am. He was to take us across to Comino. We had no gas and had to figure out how the road side gas pump worked. It was quite the process, especially since we were in a hurry.

We made it to Mgarr with minutes to spare. Joseph met us, he runs the boat trip. His boat is Francesca 1 and his other boat is used to pick up garbage from tourists in Blue Lagoon, which is where we were going.

Seconds into the trip, Joseph said to me, “here you drive”. Ok, Gwen does left. I do boats.

Blue Lagoon is an incredibly blue bay off Comino. The swimming is excellent. We saw even more fish than in San Blas, more jelly fish too though. I think this swim has been my favourite of the trip so far. We swam across the bay to a little cave and pond. Jumped from the rocks. I saw an eel. It was a bit creepy but also very cool. It was slithering between some rocks. James later hunted him out.

The boat trip also included a quick trip to some of the caves on Comino. There is one cave that if you go in a small boat to the very back, you’ll find a small beach. From that beach you can climb right up to the fort buit by the Knights of St. John.

We walked up to the Comino Hotel, had a coffee, then wandered back to the bay. In that short time, it went from secluded paradise to cheesy tourist trap. There were people and umbrellas everywhere. There was also an ice cream truck so we had a Magnum ice cream. Mine was called a Temptation and it came in a gold foil box. Very yummy.

Later in the day we stopped in Victoria, then went on to Xlendi for an evening swim. Xlendi is a touristy spot, but nice in the evening. We had a good swim. Gwendolyn dove off the rocks. I filmed it. Then we had dinner at Churchill’s Restaurant. I had pasta and James had the Lampuki, a dolphin fish. It comes with head and tail. Yummy.

October 6

First stop of the day: Wied il-Ghasri. A little inlet where you climb down the rocks, make your way into the water and paddle about. There was great snorkeling here too. The water was fresh. This is the day Gwen–with a great fear of jelly fish–got stung. It was quite the welt.

We stopped at the salt flats on our way there.

Later we went silver shopping in Victoria. The best spot is near the Citadel. There are two families on Gozo who make silver filigree. There is a knight done all in silver that I took a photo of. He’s about a foot tall and very detailed. I bought a little ring and some earrings as my Maltese souvenir.

That night we had 10 people total for Thanksgiving Dinner. James made a turkey, Gwen made gravy, I made peach crisp, Julie made sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes and Darren made the table settings and floor lighting–required so no one fell in the pool.

Catherine, Martin and Colin from Canada came. Michael and Paul from Britain were in attendance. And our household crew. It was a grand time.

Sunday, October 7

Today we dropped off Julie and Gwen at the ferry terminal. They were on their way to Rome to cooking school. James and I had originally planned to go to Rome, but we decided to travel around Malta longer instead. We’ve spent most of our time on Gozo.

James and I trekked over to the Ta’Cenc cliffs–difficult to find, I think Julie has tried twice. James and I were fortunate to find them. The view is spectacular. We had a light lunch at the hotel, wandered down the road in search of the dolmen, a flat rock supported by 3 stones, then went in search of the cliffs. There was some overland adventuring to be had.

This was my first day driving on the left. God help us. But I did just fine.

Monday, October 8

Another full day of driving. James, Darren and I visited the tombs at Santa Lucija and Kercem–basically a rock mound with a hole in the ground. Then it was back to Victoria where we swapped the jeep for a little red Kia. It’s a tin box on wheels. Not that the jeep was any better but it did feel rather indestructible.

In Victoria I went into St. George’s Basilica. It was beautiful and ornate inside so I stayed for the mass just so I’d get a good chance to look around. In the right side is a separate chamber with a statue of Jesus. Just before that is a statue of St. George standing on a slayed dragon. There gold mosaic tiles all around and it’s really something.

Tuesday, October 9

Yahoo, spa day. Darren made us appointments for a massage with Martin at Freespirit Spa, which is run by Martin (British) and Monica (Gozian). They met in Australia and then started their business here. It’s an oasis in the dry, sandy, limestone land of Gozo. It smelled wonderful. I had a massage with Martin, whose going to pull together an aromatherapy roll for me next time. Then I hung out and talked about make-up with Monica. I discovered Dermatologica, which is all natural products, no chemicals. So I bought a cleanse, toner, moisturizer and sun screen. Pretty expensive in Maltese lira ($1 CDN is equal to $3 MTL) but it’s worth the smooth feeling on my skin, especially the sun screen. I think our Ombrell was doing a number on my face. That and the mosquito bites. I have about 20 of them, mostly on my face, which is the only thing exposed at night. They’ve even bitten both eyelids.

In the afternoon James and I went to the Ggantija Temples, which are the largest of the megalithic temples found on Malta. The walls are 6-7 metres high and the two temples together are over 40 metres. As far as mounds of rocks go, these are fairly interesting. There were erected over 5000 years ago. Structurally it looks like a clover leaf from above. There are circular chambers.

After that we went to Ramla Bay, known for reddish sand, had a swim in the large waves, shared a cherry ice cream cone and made our way back to home.

Wednesday, October 10
This morning Darren, James and I went to Dwejra Bay. It was James’s turn to drive.

Dwejra Bay is also spectacular. There is the Azure Window, which is an arch in the limestone cliffs, and the Blue Hole, which is a chimney hole down into the ocean, it’s a favourite spot for divers.

We swam in front of Fungus Rock, which was heralded for its medicinal properties centuries ago. And later tonight we’ll venture back to swim through the Azure Window.

Oct 11
We’re off to Valletta today. Malta here we come.

James and I left Vancouver at 6:10 pm on October 1. We spent the next night outside of Gatwick at Gable End Guest House, which is run by Mary and Joseph, who are quite lovely. We wandered around the village, had dinner at the Six Bells Pub and then retired for the evening after a couple of pints. On October 3 we made our way back to the airport and on to the Air Malta flight to Malta to visit Darren and Julie.

Julie kindly organized a driver to take us from the airport to the ferry terminal and then they met us on the other side, which is Gozo.

Malta comprises three islands: Malta, Gozo and Comino. Darren and Julie live on Gozo, which has about 30,000 people. The big island of Malta is 400,000.

Today was our first full day here and it’s been marvellous. We got up early and left the house around 8:30 am so that we could make our way to San Blas Bay, which is a great swimming hole.

Gwendolyn, who is visiting Darren and Julie, was our driver. She is a demon at the wheel–a safe, confidence-inspiring demon. She drove for 6 months in Japan, which means she can drive left, stick shift and curse in English and Japanese.

San Blas is accessible by foot along a very steep cliff. We navigated our way down hill, had a lovely swim and then trudged back uphill. We had a short stop in Victoria (or Rabat in Malti), where we bought almond cookies, had a coffee, and collected some fruit for our meal.

I did spend most of the afternoon working at the computer, but it was damn hot out so it was nice to tap about inside.

Here’s a random selection of photos.

www.flickr.com So Misguided’s Malta 2007 photoset

Like anything, salmon are interesting if you think about them.

As I mentioned in a previous post, James and I followed the route of the sockeye salmon from the Pacific Ocean, along the Fraser River, up the Thompson River and all the way to the Adams River where the salmon mate, spawn and die.

I started the trip knowing very little about salmon. I assumed I’d learn a lot more. And I was hoping to capture some mental images of these incredible red fish, and some digital and film images of the same fish for the Pacific Salmon Foundation and their THINK SALMON campaign. (I have no idea why THINK SALMON is in all caps, but I’ve been told this is the style so for now THINK SALMON, ALL CAPS, I’m yelling it out, hooray!)

To the point, the story I was hoping to tell was not the earnest story of how these small creatures make their way across vast spans of the continent to find their way back to their birth place to start the process again. Sounded boring, but that’s the story people like to tell. The story of this great struggle. How they come over 400 km to procreate almost exactly in the spot where they were born. How water temperatures, pollution, human development, natural predators all conspire against the mighty salmon. Yes, okay, that’s interesting, but why? The why is the story I hoped to tell.

So why are salmon interesting? As I say, like anything, salmon are interesting if you think about them.

I picked up hundreds of little salmon facts this weekend. Some of them I’ll remember, most I’ll need reminding of at a later date. The big picture is what I will remember.

The word “salmon” in some native languages means “sacred life.”

Our basic instinct as humans is to protect ourselves, to protect our homes and to protect those smaller than us.

We value the idealism of children. Their enthusiasm to recycle, to protect the planet, and to believe that they can change the world. We reinforce this at every step of their lives, until they leave home and set out on their own and get jaded and pessimistic about life, work, down payments, growing old, basically until they become us, adults.

Some where along the line the enthusiasm wears off. We still believe it’s important to save the planet, but we think we can pay other people to do that, or the government will fund something, or global warming doesn’t exist, scientists just want to scare us. Saving the world is hard. I don’t have time. It’s costs money. Money I don’t have. It requires too much effort. If things were wrong there would be more panic.

Even among the politicans and activists who spoke at the salmon festival this weekend, you could see in their eyes or hear in their voices these niggling thoughts.

But I think salmon are interesting for this very reason. They allow us to hold two contradictory thoughts simultaneously: salmon are good and should be protected, and I can’t do anything to protect them.

Salmon have a pretty short life cycle, 1-4 years. We can easily imagine a year in the life of salmon. We can identify with their struggles. They’re sleek and colourful and powerful. They’re tasty. We can see them up close in the wild. We can have fun catching them. We can buy them frozen in the store. What I’m saying is that there are lots of “on ramps” here. Lots of ways for us to identify with salmon, lots of ways to start having the conversation about the bigger picture, what salmon tell us about the health of our part of the world.

From salmon stocks we can tell water temperatures, water health (how much silt, how many nutrients in the soil), and water levels.

Water is what sustains us on Earth.

Salmon are interesting because when we start to understand salmon we understand how delicate they are, how development along river banks destroys their world. Without large numbers of salmon coming back to spawn and then die, their bodies can’t decompose and enrich the soil. The trees on the banks can’t survive. The birds have no where to nest. The insects and smaller plants don’t have the nutrients to grow. Smaller fish can’t survive without the insects and plants. Bears lose a source of food. Suddenly we’re moving quickly up the food chain and the life sustaining elements on the bottom rungs are rotten or gone.

Sacred life.

When we have an experience that shows us how incredible and awesome the world is, it become very difficult to ignore our role.

Salmon are interesting because they remind us:

1) Not to put poison in our source of food, and
2) Not to piss up river and think it’s not going to affect us later downstream.

It’s tough being an adult.

Try thinking like a kid but with the knowledge of an adult. THINK SALMON

I started out this weekend as a travelling companion to James. James was going up to Adams River to the “Salute to the Salmon” festival. He needed help with the video camera and photos and driving and the “doing” of stuff.

I don’t fish for salmon, I can’t eat salmon due to an allergy, I basically like where salmon live. Nice river banks. Rushing water, little quite pools.

The sockeye salmon return in big numbers every four years. This is a big year. I was excited about seeing new things and generally hanging out. I had minimal expectations that it would be fun–more work than fun, I thought. I also assumed that the salmon would be cool and I’d probably meet some interesting people. All generally fitting into the “good times” category.

Little did I know that by the end of today I would be a total salmon geek.

Sockeye salmon are incredible. They travel 405 km from the Pacific Ocean, along the Fraser River to the Thompson River and then up to Adams River. It’s a long journey. Once they’re here, they joustle for a mate, spawn and die. The salmon are single-minded in this regard. Mate, spawn, die. It doesn’t matter that you’re standing on the river bank with a camera. It doesn’t matter if your dog is right there. It’s like they’ve put up the do not disturb sign but have no time to tell you to beat it.

Sockeye salmon turn a vibrant red colour. I’ve seen this in photos but to see the sockeye up close if awing. Their bodies are bright red and their heads are green. It is the strangest thing. The males develop these long teeth too so that they can fight off other males. The males also get really ugly. They have a huge hump. Hello ladies.

The female sockeye uses her tail to dig a hole for the eggs. It’s pretty crazy the way they manoeuve their bodies to create a little scoop with their tails. I learned that the males have spots on the tail and that the females are more white because they’ve scrapped off the scales digging the hole for the eggs.

When they lay the eggs, there’s about 4,000 eggs and maybe 1 or 2 make it back as mature salmon. These are really bad odds, and one of the reasons why so many people are drawn to these fish. It’s an incredibly hard journey. Human activity is hard on the salmon and we have a responsibility to think about our impact. Or so a 5 year old told me today.

That was one of the stunning parts of the whole journey. I started out knowing very little, and I quickly realized that there are a lot of very passionate salmon people, many of them under the age of 10. They’re taught about salmon in school and soak it up like sponges.

I saw a wolf, an owl, a garter snake, salmon–alive and dead, and I met lots of people–all very friendly.

I hope to share their stories soon on the THINK SALMON website. I have 60 minutes of tape–people telling their salmon stories, what they like about the salmon, why they came to Adams River, what it means to them, why they think it’s important to share.

No doubt I’ll have another salmon story of my own to tell tomorrow.

Just catching up on the news:

Yahoo launches podcast site (Washington Post). http://www.podcasts.yahoo.com

Bible group spreads word by SMS (cnn.com). The Bible Society in Australia launched a SMS translation of Bible verses: “In da Bginnin God cre8d da heavens & da earth.” The word of God dispensed via cell phones, oh dear.
http://www.biblesociety.com.au/smsbible/

Oct. 29, Business Blogging 101 seminar in Seattle: Business Blogging 101 is a full-day workshop for those new to blogging. Get up and running with an effective weblog strategy. Cost is $195.00 and includes lunch and continental breakfast. Great speakers: Molly E. Holzschlag, Robert Scoble, DL Byron, Buzz Bruggeman and Steve Broback. http://www.blogbusinesssummit.com/seminars/

Yahoo! Last night James and I returned from Greece and Turkey. James’ brother picked us up at the airport and delivered us to his house for turkey dinner. That was awesome, even though I was ready to fall asleep after the first sip of wine, ok, it was even before the wine. We woke at 5 am, caught the 6 am airport shuttle, got on the 9 am flight to London, then the 3:30 pm flight to Vancouver. And after a full 22 hours we were back in Vancouver.

Quick trip review:
London was amazing and I cannot believe how many things we saw in 3 days, it was an unbelievable time. Then we went off to Greece and took the ferry to Santorini island for some R&R. Again we had fabulous dinners and some Santorini white wine. James and I scootered across the island. Scooter buddies. We went to a red sand beach, a black sand one, and a white sand beach. These are pebbly beaches rather than soft sand.

We practically missed our flight from Athens to Leros. The train was delayed 2x and we got to the airport 15 minutes before the flight. The agent told us we couldn’t get on the flight but we begged. Eventually she let us go with our bag, which we had to drag to the passenger gate and then beg security to push it through the scanner. That was no small feat! In the end we made the plane and I was thrilled it was Greece and not Canada. I doubt we would have had any luck getting on a Canadian flight 15 min. before departure.

In Leros we met up with a bunch of other couples for our sailing trip. Two weeks sailing from Greece to Turkey. It was so incredible. Greek food was fresh and lovely and cheap. The islands were beautiful and then Turkey was even better. The food was better tasting and the landscape was brilliant, lots of red rock and cliffs.

After the sailing trip we had 8 days beating around Turkey. We took minibuses and coaches to Ephesus, where the ruins of an ancient city exist. That was really cool–3,000 year old rocks set in amazing cliff faces. I was wishing I had a geologist friend along to explain the land formations.

We flew to Istanbul for our final 4 days and the night we arrived was the first day of Ramadan. Around the Blue Mosque were all sorts of street vendors and every night there was a market with sausage and corn, kebabs, donars, cotton candy, twirl candy, dates and almonds. I loved it.

I still can’t believe how much we did in 5 weeks, now I feel like I can barely think about going back to work and regular life.

James and I arrived in Istanbul yesterday at sundown, the exact time that Muslims were finishing the first day of Ramadan.

Ramadan is celebrated in the 9th month of the Muslim calendar, which means it occurs at a different time each year. It is believed that the Holy Quran was sent down from heaven and the Fast of Ramadan lasts an entire month. During this time Muslims cannot eat or drink during daylight. At the end of the fast there is prayer then a big meal. They get up before sunlight, about 4 am, to eat again then sleep and go to work. Lots of people complain of headaches but I’m not sure if that is from the fast or because they cannot smoke.

Istanbul is the perfect place to be at the moment. Every night there is a festival and food vendors around the Blue Mosque. We had popcorn and dates and almonds yesterday, and today we had a traditional dessert made of milk and walnuts and cranberries. I had a spicy sausage and James had a donar plus more popcorn. I’d like to have a twirl candy tomorrow. It looks ghastly sweet and I drank pomegranet juice tonight so I was not up for any more sweetness. The festival lasts all month so I think I can guess what we are doing for the next couple of days.

Dolmush is the phonetic pronunciation for the mini-buses that ferry people across the great land of Turkey. James and I arrived at the bus stop at 8 am, then we took a coach to Aydin. We are staying at Jimmy’s Place in Selcuk. The c has a cidilla, which means the town is pronounced Sell-chuck.

The hostel seems pretty fun and we have a nice room and I’m hoping that the shower pummels me with water tomorrow morning. Showering from a garden hose has gotten a little tiresome.

We went to the Ephesus Museum today, then climbed the hill to St. John’s Basillica, built in 58 AD. The ruins here are incredible. Tomorrow we visit Ephesus, which is the largest ancient city still, kind of, intact. (I don’t know if that is true.)

At 6 pm we leave for Istanbul, the final leg of our trip.

Ok not Dodge but Marmaris. James and I originally planned to go to Rhodes from Marmaris but now we are going to Epheseus and we do not know how to get there. Marmaris is a busy tourist trap that we must flee. I do not know if we will have to pay for both nights here or not, we are trying to leave 1 day earlier. It is all complicated and my least favourite part of travelling. That and not being able to find the apostrophe key. No conjunctions until we leave Turkey.

Just in: shift 2 is apostrophe. Excellent.

James and I left Keci Buku today. Our boatmates left at 5:30 this morning and the sky was chucking down the rain. That is when we found the sky light leaked. About 8 L of water collected in tupperware. It was quite the party. Thankfully the rain stopped and we left around 11 am.

The rest of the itinerary is in the air. We are going to have to trust the crazy carpet salesman who has a friend in Selcuk with a hostel. Sounds dodgey, but we’re getting out of Dodge.