Now, for those into tallies, I have something for you. 368 days, five continents, three oceans, 18 countries, 12 states, 55,295 miles (give or take a few!), one van, and six pairs of shoes later I‘ve returned home to Portland, Oregon, USA. I flew on 18 flights to get here. I traveled by bus, train, elephant, camel, subway, taxi, trolley, tuk tuk, rickshaw, and rode in one “Vanette of Power.” I went by motorbike, motorboat, long-tailed boat, short-tailed boat, felucca, kayak, bicycle and sometimes of course on foot. I drove 8392 miles back and forth across the United States in my trusty Honda Civic, accompanied by my even trustier black Labrador.
Among the highlights of my trip, I stood on the peaks of Northern New Zealand without my pants on, hiked the highest summit in Indo-China, and attended a Lao wedding! I walked the 116 degree deserts of Egypt in the middle of June, cursing my lack of foresight and overall poor planning, but I also hiked and swam the cliff-side coasts of the Italian Riviera at the perfect time of year. I rode a bicycle in the predawn hours to the temples at Angkor Wat and I was standing atop Mt. Sinai in Egypt when I caught my most enchanting sunrise. I had a magical bus ride into the north of Laos, guided by a thousand fireflies and the midnight moon. I rode a motorbike through the mountains of northern Thailand on my way to see Chang Mai. I walked among 2000 year old trees in the Kauri Forest and got lost in the jungles of Malaysia (twice!). I swam the chilly October rivers of Sedona with my dog on lazy afternoons. I silently noted my 30th birthday passing in the company of strangers, in Northern Vietnam, and I wouldn’t have had it any other way! I hiked through the Grand Canyon, from rim to rim. I learned the Arabic numbers and Thank You and Hello in about a dozen languages and then I promptly forgot it all upon exiting each country. For the better part of a year I lost complete track of what day it was and I hardly ever knew the time. I went to the movies and sampled the ice cream throughout the world. That was good! I discovered my favorite restaurant on the island of Koh Lanta, but I also had an exceptionally noteworthy piece of lasagna in Monterosso al Mare!
Not that it was all Thai iced teas and botanical gardens! There were those moments less than stellar… I got bed bugs. Twice. There were fire ants AND sand flies. I got leeches in my shoes. I chipped my tooth, got two foot infections, three bouts of incapacitating stomach illnesses, lost one toenail, passed out on a kayak (most probably as a result of heatstroke), and fell off of two motorbikes on separate occasions, once consequently but unremarkably visiting a Vietnamese hospital. I had a run-in with a pickpocket on a train in Italy and I was stopped and questioned by the Egyptian police. Monkeys bullied me into giving over my loaf of bread and I was scammed trying to walk across the border from Thailand into Cambodia. Unsurprisingly my luggage took an independent detour on it’s way back across the Atlantic and England gave me one hell of a time coming into Heathrow once it was all said and done! I also got a sunburn in New Zealand once.
All things considered though, it was a truly grand adventure! I like to think I tried nearly everything arrived upon and looked beyond each bend. I ate the buffalo, the bugs, the lizards, the frogs and the fish. I only said no to dog meat! I was trekking, kayaking, swimming, camping, hitch-hiking, snorkeling, surfing, canyoning, scuba diving, ice climbing, rock climbing, zip-lining, abseiling and jumping off of the cliffs of the world. In fact, for better or for worse, the only opportunities passed upon were smoking opium with a local hill tribe, having a snake killed in order to drink it’s blood and eat it‘s heart, shooting an AK-47, and marrying the tailor’s daughter in Hoi An! And should the suits I had made hold up, I may reconsider that last decision...
