Soon, however, I was on a plane to Rome on a quest for a perfect plate of pasta. Italy was absolutely overwhelming with good food and historic sites to see. In Rome I visited many Roman ruins including the Coliseum and Forum, as well as the Vatican. Seeing St. Peters Basilica, climbing into the duomo with it's grand views of Rome, and touring the Sistine Chapel were experiences I will never forget. I spent a lot of time wandering around Rome and checking out its many other sites, plus enjoying a wide representation of cuisine from all over the country. From Rome I headed up to the hill town of Sienna, then on to Firenze (Florence...dunno how we ever got Florence from Firenze). Sienna and its central plaza were beautiful and gothic with numerous cathedrals, and Florence was simply overwhelming. So many museums and cathedrals to see! Highlights included seeing Michelangelo's David, Dusk and Dawn, Night and Day, plus Botteceli's Birth of Venus along with his Primavera. It was humbling to stand in front of such works that up until that point I had only read about in books for my entire life. The city is soaked in so much history (not the least of which was the extended influence of the Medicis) and lore. The food was more hearty here, being up in the Tuscany region with its fine wines. After Florence I zipped over to Venice to see that famous city of canals. Once again I was overwhelmed with history, museums and cathedrals, not the least of which was San Marcos where I finally got to see those confounding spandrels I read about in Darwin's Dangerous Idea earlier in the trip. I toured both on foot and in boats on the canals all through the city, sometimes just wandering aimlessly through the narrow back streets. After Florence it was back to Rome where I caught a plane up to Ireland. Italy was a whirlwind tour and I absolutely must return someday and spend more measured time there. If anything, Italy was even more overwhelming at the sheer quantity of amazing sites -- entire hordes of what would normally be considered national treasures are relegated to second-class status because of the limited nature of the human attention span. I could spend years in Italy and still feel like I'd missed most of it. With barely two weeks of Italy under my belt, I was off to Ireland.

Ireland was fantastic. After landing in Dublin I immediately headed over to the west coast and based myself in Galway. I finally had my proper pint of Guinness to celebrate the end of my trip and found many enthusiastic and friendly people with whom to chat while enjoying a pint. For the record, a "real Guinness" in Ireland is very slightly sweeter than our versions at home -- beyond that I thought they tasted pretty similar, which is to say fantastic. Along the way to Galway I met up with a local squeezebox player who plays sessions in the Galway pubs. There are tons of pubs in Galway and sessions in just about every one, every night. Soon enough I found myself with a scattering of new friends, most of whom were session players. One unexpected result of hanging out with my new friends was attending a wonderful performance of their world famous local choir as they performed all sorts of a cappella renditions of baroque music and songs with influences from all over the world -- including mambazo. A bunch of Irish choir singers singing and dancing mambazo was the last thing I expected to see there. I took a day trip out to the Aran Islands and visited the ancient stone fort of Dun Aengus, a ring fortification dating from the 8th century perched on vertical cliffs mercilessly pounded by the Atlantic. From Galway I rented a car for a couple of days and lost myself in the countryside of Claire; along the way I saw the impressive Cliffs of Moehr, the craggy hills of the Burren with its megalithic tombs and forts, and the gorgeous coast of the Connemara with its interior of lakes, bogs, and tea-colored mossy streams. Eventually I wound back up into Dublin where I toured the various impressive sites, including the magnificent and well-presented Book of Kells and its 1200 year old illuminated vellum pages. While in Dublin I dropped in on the font of so much joy in the world, the Guiness Brewery. I toured the gorgeous green Wicklow area south of Dublin, both the coastal regions and the Glendalough valley nestled up in the mountains with its wooded and peaty trails. I cannot say enough about Ireland. Suffice to say that I loved it, identified deeply with it, and must someday return for lengthy exploration of that resonate place.

Frome Dublin I flew to London where I visited for two days with my friends Derren and Lucy whom I had met down in Indonesia. They had finished their own trip by that time so I dropped in. They were magnificent hosts and the visit was a relaxing prelude to returning home.

Eventually I boarded that plane home, though, which took me back to the U.S. about one year and two weeks after I left. The return has been overwhelming in some respects as even the most familiar of things currently enjoy a renewed aura for me. I'm sure with time this will pass, but thus far, in addition to being with Susan again, it has been a nonstop sequence of seeing old friends, visiting favorite restaurants, and simply absorbing the atmosphere of familiar haunts. None of it has quite soaked in yet.

This quick summary of the end of my trip, like the Interlude, is woefully inadequate in detail. Someday I hope to flesh out the descriptions more fully.

So what about the world and the trip? Do I have any profound observations or lessons? Of course I do; I'm sure I'll still be coming up with them for the rest of my life. I will forever be thankful that I was able to take such a trip and for the support and understanding of my friends and family, especially Susan. But for now, I'll leave you with these shatteringly profound observations:

The world is big.

Okay, well that one seems obvious, but our planet really is enormous. You might think a year is big as well, but not once you try and apply it to travel around the world. You start off wanting to go everywhere and end up realizing that you have barely scratched the surface once you are forced to dispense with plans for visiting most of the world. Perception of time is an interesting side effect with regards to the size of a year. Since I was constantly busy, it seems like only yesterday that I left -- that memory is so vivid, as is most other memories along the way. So vivid, in fact, that if I sit down and think about it I can remember every single place I slept, every night of the year. That sort of fine granularity is incredible, but normally unavailable to us since when we stay in one place we tend to stack similar memories on top of one another, in the same slot, so to speak. So time flew, but I have this fine granularity of the memories that makes that same short year seem larger than any other in my life. Large as it may seem, though, it is still tiny when you try and wrap it around the whole world. Which leads us to:

The world is indeed round.

You might think that this is obvious merely because it is what you have been told all your life. Well, as a little game to myself, I decided to assume I did not know this and try and observe facts that would allow me to deduce this on my own. First off, based on my compass and other determining factors, I traveled roughly westward the whole year and ended up in the same spot. Ahah, the world is not flat! I traveled around in a circle, the world must be round! Well, not necessarily. The world could be a big cone, with the North Pole at the apex, and I could have merely traveled around a section of that cone. Well, well, well. I dispensed with the conical theory based on two things: first, though I never precisely derived the apparent distance, the horizon always appeared roughly the same distance away, and more importantly, the same distance away in all directions. So unless I was always on some bulging blemish on the cone then I must have been on something roughly spherical. More important in my conclusion, however, were observations of the stars.

Right off the bat I noticed one thing when I stepped off the plane in New Zealand, and even more so further down in Tasmania: All of the familiar constellations appeared upside down relative to their "normal" positions on the horizon. (I came up with a joke about how the Big Dipper, part of Ursa Major, looked upside down relative to the horizon: You know, I came up with several theories as to why the Big Dipper looks upside down here in the southern hemisphere, but none of them held water. Ba-dum-dump.) Take Orion, for example, the mighty hunter drawing his bow. Down in the deep down under, he appears to be standing on his head as he arcs over the horizon during the night, as opposed to up here where he appears to stand upright. As I gradually moved further north, Orion appeared to rotate relative to the horizon, and right on the equator he appears to be lying down sideways during his nightly arc. On a cone you would never see this since there is no curved topography to traverse as you move from the base to the apex. Hence I was moving over a curved surface of some sort as I headed north. Now it is still possible, since I never personally visited the poles, that we are on some sort of spherically bulging cylinder with truncated flat surfaces on the northern and southern extremities (think of a sphere with the 'ends' sawed off). I'll have to disprove that notion at a later date -- for now, I am satisfied with a sphere as a working model; failing a visit to the poles I'm sure I can deduce the completed sphere with a series of gravimetric measurements or some other indirect method.

Now there are perhaps those of you out there than might actually call me on the limited nature of my model. Nay, you might say, simplistic assumptions such as a mere sphere in three dimensions are completely inadequate topologies for explaining how we move through spacetime! Well, I do admit that the spherical model is only a convenient frame of reference for describing our daily motions. Those of you who want to discuss the finer points of how we are actually burrowing through a spiraling four-dimensional lifeline, the projection of which looks nothing like a sphere in three dimensions, are welcome to buy me a beer and settle in for a satisfying and chewy discussion.

It is wonderful to be home.

Matt

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Europe is beer heaven. There were so many brands and varieties to choose from that I really had no time for a lengthy analysis of them all. Alas, though, in Spain and Italy I focused more on the wines. As previously mentioned, I had my genuine pint of Guiness in Ireland, just slightly sweeter than our own pints. I also wandered around the hallowed buildings of Shangrila, yes indeed, the Guiness Brewery itself in Dublin. Rejoice! I must say, upon my return however, that I was launched into ectasy to be given a Sierra Nevada Celebration ale by Susan when I returned. Cascade Hops! How I missed it; Cascade Hops are something America can truly offer to the rest of the beer world.

From Hat Yai I took a bus up the peculiar appendix of Southern Thailand over to Krabi on the western coast. Krabi is a popular tourist destination, one of the launching points along with Phang Nga and Phuket for the peculiar densely vegetated limestonen islands that pepper the waters of the region. These islands are Hollywood favorites, popping up in such movies as The Beach and the Bond classic The Man With the Golden Gun. Here there is a choice -- there are many islands and a variety of tours, so Leonardo fans must launch from Krabi and Connery fans launch from either Phuket or Phang-Nga. The choice was simple for me. After a day of relaxing I hopped onto a bus to Phang-Nga with visions of women painted gold dancing in my head, along with midgets and men with three nipples.

Road travel through this section of Thailand yields a preview of the amazing islands to come. Up from the green flats rise improbable limestone outcrops and pillars, amazing formations encrusted with lush green vegetation and revealing dramatically hued rock faces colored with broad swaths of yellows, oranges, grays, whites, and black stains. These same formations, remnants of limestone mountains, extend out into Phang-Nga Bay where the shoreline crust has subsided below sea level.

The town of Phang-Nga is pretty low key without too many tourists. Undoubtedly this is due to the influence of the tourist vortex of nearby Phuket, the beaches and bars of which provide the center of one of the largest tourist scenes in Thailand. Not being in much of a beach or party mood, I assiduously avoided Phuket, preferring instead to wander around the decidedly local scene of Phang-Nga. Here I arranged for a full day boat tour of the nearby islands of the bay, secretly harboring an ardent desire to glimpse Khao Phing Kan Island and the pillar of Tapu Island, which together have perhaps evermore been dubbed "James Bond Island."

Early the next morning I was off in a jeep, down to the bay. Together with several other pilgrims from around the world we boarded a long-tail boat with an upswept prow. The wooden boat, like all the fishing boats of the region, was powered from behind with an exposed truck engine that drove a propeller mounted on a ten-foot long axle jutting out from the boat. By vectoring this pole the boatman could steer the boat, always launching a rooster-tail of frothy spray up from way behind the boat. (I eagerly thought I remembered James Bond being assaulted by one of these propellers, but I couldn't quite remember? Had he? I guiltily suppressed such blatant Hollywood-based reflections.)

We launched into the river delta, an enormous maze of narrow channels passing through mangrove islands. It was low tide -- the thousands of mangrove roots looked like frozen earthen pom-poms of fireworks descending from a vibrant green sky. We slowly worked through these channels, observing fishermen along the way and villagers wading near the shores with long nets, gathering shrimp. The villages were usually up on stilts, half over the water and half on the shore. Eventually the mangroves gave way as the estuary spread out into the dotted expanse of Phang-Nga Bay, where the bounty of bizarre islands awaited.

The islands, like the formations on the mainland, also sported dense vegetation on the tops and bursting out of every nook and cranny, along with the same beautiful hues of oranges, grays, and blacks on the limestone. Unlike the shorebound formations, however, those of the islands featured amazing caves and erosive formations from the timeless efforts of the sea -- undercut overhangs, with stalactites and other features that made the rock appear to be melting and dripping like slag. There were narrow pillars of rock jutting up out of the sea, often more narrow at the base than at the top, capped with a miniature jungle. We explored hidden bays, entering narrow gaps in an island, which then opened up to reveal enclosed bays with their own beaches and caves. Some caves were large enough to enter with the whole boat, sometimes featuring beaches within the caves. We disembarked a couple of times and explored caves on foot -- one of these caves in particular opened up into a completely enclosed oasis in the middle of an island, surrounded on all sides by cliffs and jungle. All of the caves had impressive formations of stalactites, stalagmites, frozen cascading waterfalls, and dripping columns sometimes thirty or forty feet high.

At one point, in one of the enclosed, hidden bays (Koh Hong), we noted a rainstorm out to sea and approaching fast. We took the boat into a cave for shelter, a cave which opened with low entrances both into the hidden bay as well as out to sea, away from the island. The cave had a high ceiling, perhaps thirty feet high, with a small hole that opened to the sky above. From this hole a brilliant shaft of light descended into the cave, lighting the walls and interior to some degree. Once the heavy rain hit, you could see the raindrops falling through this hole and down the pillar of light. Mesmerizing.

The rain did not last long. We soon continued our exploration of the islands. Up until this point we had been pretty successful in avoiding the hordes of tourists that spill out of Phuket for similar, but larger-scale, tours. This soon changed as we visited a so-called "traditional Muslim fishing village" completely on stilts over the water. Well, there was a detectable village there, somewhere, but the boats dump you off on a dock that only connects to restaurants and souvenir shops -- there was no access to the actual village, at least by walking. What a tourist trap. We didn't stay long. Soon we were back on the water, headed for the famous James Bond Island, secret headquarters of the villain Scaramanga.

Talk about a travesty of tourism. JBI is a nightmare, spilling over with boats and tourists trying to elbow past some twenty hawker stalls and a smelly public toilet. Everyone wants a piece of that island; I was no exception. I put forth a mighty struggle to put my mental filters in place and admire the island beneath the distractions. It is a beautiful place, a small beach curving around a tiny bay. In this bay lies the mighty pillar of Tapu Island, one of the striking columns, which I described earlier. In The Man With the Golden Gun, it is from this small island outcrop which the secret phallic weapon is to be launched. It is by far the best view, since by gazing out into the bay you put the mayhem of tourism behind you.

I was simultaneously thrilled and disgusted. I mean, I suppose I expected as much, but it never ceases to shock me when I'm faced with major tourist circuses. What is it about movie spots that so captivate the world? It's not just us, there were many tourists from all over Asia and Europe, all fascinated with Scaramanga's Lair. I finally decided that it must have something to do with the psychology of humanity that deals with mythology, gods, and heroes. These days we don't seem to have a mystical mythology to help define our world, so I think all that extra energy is spent constructing a new, superfluous mythology through the medium of mass media, movies in particular. Unlike in the old days, where it was unlikely that you would personally visit a famous rock in Hades or some other famous fulcrum of mythology, these days our new mythology leaps right out of the tale into our reality. We can actually visit the abodes of our heroes! Or so it seems. At the very least, it feeds the appetite for set lore -- I myself have confessed to such many times, just on this trip alone. You see it happening with Phi Phi Le Island, made famous in The Beach. Over in Cambodia, Ankor Wat received a big boost recently by appearing in Tomb Raider. And the double-edged sword of tourism has the unfortunate tendency to ruin that which it covets. Technically, JBI is part of a national park -- not that you could tell, except for a sad little neglected sign near the concrete fixtures of the public toilet that state all the rules for protecting the environment by low-impact best practices. The buck wins, especially in the Third World.

So it was with cursory reflection and a dash of shame that I excitedly and enthusiastically took photos of myself with Tapu in the background and a shit-eating grin on my face. James Bond Island! Look! I'm on Scaramanga's secret fortress! Whoo-hoo! Very cool.

We soon headed back to the mangrove estuary, changed now due to high tide. Along the way we noted some 3000 year old petroglyphs on some of the undercut walls of one limestone island, as well as another enormous cave through which we boated and watched swallows darting around hundreds of feet above our heads along the roof of the cave.

After Phang-Nga I hopped on a bus over to the west coast and boarded a northbound night train for fabled Bangkok with the intention of securing onward visas for several other countries on my itinerary. Visa acquisition can be a time-consuming process, so I ended up staying in Bangkok for longer than I initially planned.

Bangkok is urban chaos. It is a thriving, modern city on top of terrible traffic and pollution coursing through temples, markets, shopping districts, slums, canals, bazaars, and skyscrapers. Just about anything can be found in Bangkok, cultural endeavors, cultural boondoggles, and delights both high and low. I proceeded directly to the latest tourist ghetto along Kao San Road where there were so many travelers plying the streets it barely feels like you are in Thailand due to all the catering to Western tastes. It was early in the morning; hiding from the growing heat I ensconced myself in a coffee shop and watched the various bohemians and freaks from the Asian travel circuit wander up and down Kao San. Priceless entertainment for any serious people-watcher. As for my part, I started watching pirated movies in the restaurants after taking a couple of long walks around the areas surrounding Kao San, where the Thais still go about their business and day-to-day life in their neighborhoods.

That night I got a more proper introduction to the flip-side of how locals interact with tourists -- after a significant disagreement with a "female" pickpocket, during which I forcibly reacquired my wallet, I was rudely introduced to two flying shoes from the thief in question, earning a lump on the back of the head and a scary, evil-looking black eye.

Rather embarrassed and demoralized by my encounter with the welcoming committee, I initiated my visa quest and promptly started haunting the various shopping districts which featured airconditioning (ahhh! modern invention which we take for granted), net access, and modern theaters.

Eventually trouble came to town. Chris Tarr, of Chris and Than travel fame, dropped down from Chang Mai in the north. In no time flat we hooked up at a café on Kao San and caught up on all the times. Chris looked good, lean and tan; travel had treated him well. Together we began terrorizing Bangkok.

We hit several of the pubs and bars in the area, usually hanging out with some of the local acquaintances of the highly sociable Chris. Along with his friend Kay we went to visit the sprawling and vibrant weekend market on the north side of the town, bemused by the multitude of offerings: clothing, food, pet fish, turtles, pet animals such as dogs, cats, squirrels, just about anything and everything. I think I was most fascinated with the fish in the multitude of aquariums, a variety of exotic fish with which I was completely unfamiliar. We wandered randomly about the city as well, just exploring streets.

Here's the thing with streets in big cities in Thailand. You get these strange clustering of merchant regions, where nearly every shop on a particular street offers the exact same things. So you might have a street where every shop sells the same spices, or every shop sells images of the Buddha, or every shop is a textile shop, perhaps one street with linen and another with silks. Well, in Bangkok at least, this gets taken to extremes and has some peculiar manifestations. There is no such thing as a "one stop shop" sort of mentality there. It's all about the districts. So, for example, we saw streets crammed only with shops that dealt exclusively in marching band paraphernalia and trophies. One street where Chris was looking for a guitar had dozens of shops that all dealt in guitars, keyboards, drums, sewing machines, and power tools. Every third or fourth shop would be a shop that dealt only with army surplus gear and camping supplies, sort of an "overlapping" district where the specialty shops interleave with one another. How do such bizarre combinations of goods come to be in these shops? I mean, why doesn't one of these guitar / keyboard / drum / sewing machine / power tool shops someday add, say, toasters to its line of products? Simple. Nobody would buy them, because they'd be on that street to buy a guitar, keyboard, drum, sewing machine, or a power tool. If they wanted a toaster they'd go over to the egg-beater, computer, toaster, and theatrical makeup street. Jeez, get with the program!

Actually, I have a theory as to how it happens. I think it's a rapid crystallization process that occurs once a new product hits the market for the first time. Simultaneously, several of these specialty shops on different streets might all start offering the brand new widget, say digital barometers, and at some point the shopping hordes will settle on a particular shop on a particular street as the source of digital barometers. At that point, all of that shop's neighbors must begin stocking digital barometers or they simply cannot compete in what is now also the digital barometer district -- in order to effectively compete they must look identical to the dozens of shops up and down the street around them. See?

I rubbed elbows with these shopping hordes -- with products scattered all over the city, there's a lot of transport going on. There are several methods: taxis, tuk-tuks, buses, rapid transit rail, and boats. I mastered them all.

Taxis, the most expensive option, are pretty self explanatory. Generally I avoided these unless I wanted to avoid the hassle of the other modes of transport.

The mass transit train was a wonderful way to get around as well, assuming you were lucky enough that the currently limited deployment covers the area of interest -- generally I would use this in combination with one of the other options.

Buses are by far the most popular, and cheapest, ways of getting around. You can forget it, as a tourist, unless you are armed with a bus map that details the route numbers all over the city -- it is rarely a straight shot to where you want to go and often involves switching buses at the appropriate moments. They are sort of chaotic scenes, buses, with people piling on and off while the bus rarely stops moving completely at stops. There is a keen-eyed ticket elf that patrols each bus, who somehow tracks who has and has not paid in the churning crowd of passengers -- not only that, they know how far each person has paid to go, since the price varies according to distance. The ticket elves all carry this hollow, metal cylinder around a foot long and maybe two inches wide. In this cylinder are the coils of tickets (depending on distance) that are dispensed to customers, as well as a chamber in which the cash is stashed. They walk around shaking that metal cylinder at people, making the change rattle. Everyone eventually gets a visit from the elf, loudly shaking that cylinder -- feed the cylinder! Must feed the cylinder!

That boats are a transit option might seem surprising. Bangkok is crisscrossed with all sorts of canals, once being termed the "Venice of Southeast Asia", though these canals are not used for transport as much as they once were. A few of the canals, plus the main river, still use boats for transport. I hopped on one of these canal boats once when I stumbled across one, judging by my bus map that it must lead to the general vicinity of my destination. Standing on the dock of the narrow canal, I was somewhat intimidated when this long, roaringly loud boat ominously came speeding around a bend up to the dock, causing all sorts of wakes and barely stopping as people clamber aboard, sitting perhaps four abreast on wooden slats that cross horizontally down in the hull of the boat. Once people are more or less aboard, they raise sheets of plastic along each side to keep the murk of the canal from splashing on the passengers as the boat careens through and around all sorts of sharp-edged obstacles in the canal, which varies from perhaps thirty feet wide to a harrowing seven feet wide in some places. The variable width of the canal and the various obstacles encountered in no way affect the breakneck speed of the boat. Soon enough, a sub-variety of the ticket elf comes rattling one of those metal cylinders for payment (feed it! must feed it!), somehow navigating over benches or shuffling around the outside edge of the boat as it zig-zags through the canal. My attention was divided between anxoiusly judging the competence of the insane driver and worrying that the ticket elf would get flung overboard. At one point, on queue, the struts supporting the roof all folded backwards, lowering the roof so all the passengers had to duck way down in their seats as the boat, never missing a beat, zoomed under an arched bridge with perhaps four feet of total clearance above the water and maybe a mere foot above our ducked heads. Once the bridge was cleared the roof popped right back up and all the passengers sat back up in their seats nonchalantly. Since the plastic sheet splash-guards were raised along the sides, I only caught fleeting glimpses of landmarks; finally, on a guess and a lark, I judged that I must be close to my destination. As the boat slowed, never completely stopping, next to a dock I stumbled out and climbed up the stairs from the canal on unsteady legs. Much to my relief, I had guessed correctly and was right on the money. For a random experiment, that boat ride was much more than I'd bargained for.

Last, but not possibly least of the transit options, are the ubiquitous tuk-tuk drivers. There are seemingly thousands of these crazy sons of bitches terrorizing the city. A tuk-tuk, named after the noise the LP-powered engine makes, is a three-wheeled contraption, decked out with brightly colored vinyl and chrome, where the driver sits astride up front, legs to either side of the seat with a small windshield. The roof stretches back to the rear, where two, maybe three if everyone is small, people can sit side by side over the rear axle, which sports two wheels. These things aren't slow, gentle, pliant beasts of the roads. They zoom back and forth through traffic, typically outpacing cars and taxis, as the drivers alternate stomping on the gas and the brakes in a whirlwind path, somtimes even taking you to your destination. Actually taking passengers to requested destinations only seems to be a side hobby for these guys. Seemingly every tuk-tuk driver out there will insist on offering to take you to the best (naturally) places for women, drugs, or any thing else that even vaguely seems like it might be on the black market. They almost seem puzzled and hurt when they finally realize that you merely wish to pay them to take your requested destination. Naturally, extracting the right fare from these guys is a compulsory and extended bargaining ritual. As obnoxious as these guys are, you can't help but love their surreal and ridiculous presence on the streets. Someday I want to get a Bangkok tuk-tuk just for grins. I have since seen all sorts of three-wheeled auto-rickshaws, but the Bangkok tuk-tuks easily take the cake.

While adventuring in Bangkok, Chris and I had contacted Than's cousin Owen, who has been living in Bangkok for some three years. Furthering our adventures and aiming to see Bangkok in all of its glory, both sublime and sordid, we met Owen for beers and convinced him to take us on the Red Light Tour. Bangkok, as you may well know, is famous for its sex industry, though not so much these days as in the past. We checked out strip clubs in several areas, some more favored by expats and others more favored by tourists. On the expat side of things we visited the more relaxed Soi Cowboy, Nana Plaza, and perhaps the most amusingly named Clinton Plaza. At the end of the night we finally visited the famed Patpong district -- this last is where you find most of the tourist trade and outlandish sex acts (not as in coitus) that you might have heard exist in Bangkok. Despite the nature of our excursion, it was a pretty tame night overall.

Thailand is perhaps more famed for it's boxing. I had been wanting to see a Thai boxing match for a long time. Later in the week Chris and I met up with Owen again and attended a night of boxing. There were eight or so matches in the arena that night, of which we saw five. As you enter the arena, after having bought your ticket, you are handed a bit of cash in order to encourage betting! Each match begins with a prolonged period of jangly music where each boxer, always one in red shorts and the other in blue, sort of dance and stretch around the ring, kneeling, hopping, praying, and going through some sort of traditional (for luck) ritual for several minutes. Soon, the music continuing all throughout, the match starts and for the first two rounds of the five round match there is boxing but not too much really going on in the stands. Thai boxing involves strikes with the hands, plus blows with the legs, especially with the knees to the ribs in close quarters. After the second round ends, the crowd goes nuts, frantically waving and signaling with their hands to a cadre of bookies who ply the walkway in front of the stands, taking and noting bets, tracking the odds. This activity only intensifies during the third and fourth rounds, with loud oohs and aahs coming from the observers as one boxer scores a hit on the other. The noise from the crowd seems to die down a bit in the fifth round as people are resigned to their fates -- unless it is a particularly close match and everyone is yelling. I never could figure out the system of hand signals, even though we had someone attempt to explain it to us. The boxing was fascinating, though to be sure I was at least as fascinated watching the crowds in the stands.

Eventually my visit to Bangkok began to wind down. My visas had been acquired and Chris moved on, headed down to Malaysia and onward to Australia and New Zealand. On one of the last nights there, I had an unexpected surprise. Following a random shout of my name near Kao San, I was delighted to find my Australian friends Leon and Laura whom I had met all the way back in Bellingen, Australia, playing didgeridoos around a fire one night. It was great to see them as we talked long into the night.

My plans had changed. I had stayed longer in Bangkok than originally planned, plus I had decided to go overland through Cambodia on the way to Vietnam, since I had heard so many good things about it. In order to accommodate these plans I abandoned my plans to travel in the north of Thailand, trekking among the hill tribes. Perhaps someday I will.

Despite my rude introduction, I enjoyed Bangkok immensely. A vibrant city, no doubt with a vibrant future. Now I just have to go back and listen more carefully to that "One Night in Bangkok" song from the Chess soundtrack and see if it now has additional resonance for me.

I finally boarded a bus one morning. Despite a small delay incurred by running over a guy on a motorcycle at the end of Kao San road as he tried to cut on the inside of the bus as we were turning a corner (he was okay, just mildly scraped, the crazy nut) we were soon off through the rice fields of Thailand, on our way to the mysteries of Cambodia. A chaotic place, this border is one of the few land borders in the world where lefthand roads directly connect to righthand roads. Not that it matters -- since lanes are fairly arbitrary in practice, in both countries, formal rules are largely insignificant and the border crossing is a dusty, swarming cacaphony of freight trucks, pickups, rickshaws, donkeys, shuffling pedestrians, and maimed beggars.

Cambodia, there I was.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Thailand is, along with most of Southeast Asia, predictably dominated by lagers of dubious quality, typically too sweet and too often revealing the twang of nasty preservatives such as formaldehyde. Beer Chang is perhaps the cheapest option; more palatably is Singh, which strives to present itself as more of a premium beer. And of course there are the ever present Tiger, San Miguel, etc. But miracles never cease! Much to my delight, I found examples of dark lagers in Thailand. In particular, in Southern Thailand, I discovered Black Tiger dark lager -- steeling myself for a cloyingly sweet sugar bomb, I insouciantly sipped the beer, hoping by chance to sneak up on a decent flavor. Success! The lager was crisp, with a perfect roasty balance, distinctly lacking all of the terrible hallmarks of most Asian lagers! Wonderful. Later, in Bangkok, I encountered Black Beer, by the same brewery -- it, too, was pretty good but edged more into that sweet zone which I so despise. So here's to Black Tiger, the first acceptable lager I have encountered in all of Asia.

Till next time, where I will detail adventures in Indochina,
Matt

So. I've got a lot of updating and writing to do -- and I intend to, if for no other reason than my own recollections in the far flung future. Below you will find a brief summary of where I've been, which should give a good indication of the size of the task. In the meantime, since these updates are no longer relevant, in the temporal sense, I will disable the Toadfriends mailing list that has been notifying you of these updates. Instead, if you are interested in relics of my past, you can check the site from time to time and find the updates. I will still employ the mailing list for general notifications, but there will not be many of them because I only have a little over a month left to travel! Inconceivable, really.

Actually, I have already completed the Thailand writeup; in fact, I had completed it, for the most part, when I was still in India prior to meeting up with Susan in Istanbul. What with the dillies and dallies, the update sat on my home mail server. Now it is entombed on that same computer due to some sort of hardware failure, but I plan on having access to it soon. So check back for the Thailand update in a few days.

So, oh so briefly: From Malaysia I ventured into southern Thailand in order to check out the amazing technicolor limestone formations that comprise the islands off of the west coast -- these same, lush islands have been featured in movies such as The Man With the Golden Gun and, more recently, The Beach. From souther Thailand I zipped up to Bangkok to deal with visa issues and rendezvous with fellow world stomper Chris Tarr. Together, along with Than's cousin Owen, we painted the nights of Bangkok in a frenetic burst of big city exploration including city sights, Thai Boxing, the so called "red light" tour, and night life amongst some of the most friendly people I've ever met in a big city (with at least one significant exception).

Due to bureaucratic entanglements with visa acquisition, I was in Bangkok longer than I planned, so I had to skip northern Thailand. From BKK I hopped on a bus over to Cambodia. I was stunned and awed by the crown jewel of Cambodia, the temples of Angkor Wat. I was disturbed and morbidly fascinated with the modern legacy of Pol Pot, the site of the "killing fields" where so many families brutally perished and their remains can be seen to this day.

From Cambodia it was overland to Vietnam, starting with Saigon (Ho Chi Min City). Hopping onto the tourist track that the government has encouraged, I worked my way gradually northward, reflective on the ghosts of war, the war which they, perhaps not surprisingly, refer to as the "American War" from their point of view. The people were extremely friendly and the food was nothing short of spectacular -- so many fresh herbs in everything! I checked out some of the war remnants, in particular the VC tunnels where I duck-walked to some of the labrynthine corridors in the scarred and blasted land. I particularly enjoyed the highlands around Da Lat, which provided a welcome respite from the crushing heat and humidity that is more or less inescapable all throughout Indochina. Beaches and ruins, particularly those of the Cham empire who were depicted so vividly in the friezes of Ankgor Wat in their battles with the Kmer. Eventually I made it to Hanoi itself, a far more laid back and less frenetic place than Saigon, but nevertheless choked with the same incessant horns and crazy traffic.

From Hanoi I had another brief stayover in Bangkok, Thailand, before embarking on an altogether different and unforgettable experience, brief as my glimpse was: India. Starting in Calcutta I worked my way up into the highlands towards the wonderful tea capitol of Darjeeling. After lining up the various permits, I headed up into the still restricted province of Sikkim to bounce around and trek a bit between the villages of the Indian Himalayas, where the people are more Nepalese and Tibetan in nature than "Indian." The mountains in this region are nothing short of spectacular. Being the tail end of the rainy season, however, I cannot say the same of the hungry and prodigious leeches. After several days in Sikkim I returned to Darjeeling.

I was in Darjeeling on September 11th; when I found out what had happened I was shocked, sickened, frightened, and felt very, very alone. I'm still dealing with the events of that day, as I'm sure we all are. The locals, for their part, were extremely sympathetic and concerned -- this goes for just about everywhere I showed up, but diminishing with time. This was fortunate for me, because after that day I did not see many American travelers until Turkey.

From Darjeeling I headed straight into Nepal. After taking advantages of the conveniences of Katmandu I headed up into the mountains and spent ten days trekking on the Jomsom trail. Trekking in the Himalayas was amazing, if short -- I need to come back some day and do a full month or so of trekking. The terrain is rugged, but the experience is more posh than pure wilderness trekking due the preponderance of tea houses and lodging all along the way -- the locals live in those mountains and use those trails every day, so providing for trekkers is a natural opportunity. The terrain is magnificent, from the lush lower elevations all the way up to the dry dessert climate of the Tibetan plateau. At one of the higher points I collected a few ammonite fossils from a river bed, proof positive that those mighty peaks were once on the bottom of a sea.

From the mountains I headed down into the lowlands, on the fringe of the Gangetic Plain. Here I stayed for a couple of days in a wildlife camp where I attempted to spot Bengal tigers, wild elephants, and rhinos. Of these I only spotted the rhinos, but heard elephants crashing through the forests and a lion chuffing in his sleep.

I then dropped back into India and headed out in the far flung west of Rajastan. Here I took a camel safari through the dessert dunes, inescapably aware of my proximity to Pakistan while the U.S. was pressuring their government for cooperation in future military action in Afghanistan. Rajastan was an amazing province. The lowlands of India are an absolute assault on the senses, a study of extremes. On the one hand you have some of the most divine and exuberant foods, colors, and architectural constructs, absolutely divine qualities which leave the senses humming. On the other hand you have some of the most depressing evidence of poverty and abject filth you could ever fear encountering. There is not much in between. This disparity recurs throughout all levels of Indian society and culture.

At long last, it was up to Delhi where I hopped on a plane to Istanbul in order to rendezvous with Susan. Turkey, strange as it may seem, felt like home for me after my adventures in so many countries of Asia. Turkey is an interesting fusion of western modernism and Muslim tradition. We had a wonderful time hopping around the country, inspecting seaside communities, the gleaming white mountain formation of the travertine pools, the incredible "fairy chimneys" and underground cities of Cappadocia (where we lived like Trogdolytes (or as Susan would have it, cave fairies) in rooms carved out of rock towers), ancient ruins including Troy itself, and the delights of Istanbul.

Due to the aftermath of sentiment resulting from September 11th, we figured it would be prudent to alter our original plan of traveling overland from Istanbul through Syria and Jordan down to Cairo. From Turkey we hopped on a bus and headed into the mystery of Bulgaria -- Bulgaria? Who the hell goes to Bulgaria? What's there? We didn't know, but it was on a map so we went to find out. There's plenty in Bulgaria, still actively defining (or rediscovering) itself after emerging from under the Iron Curtain. We saw many lovely villages, inspected the curious architecture from Bulgarian Revival days, visited wineries, monasteries, and beautiful Orthodox churches, walked in the countryside amidst the bursting colors of Fall and grand vistas, and helped ourselves to cheap beer of excellent quality -- something that had been sorely lacking for me all through Asia (quality, that is).

From Bulgaria we dropped down into Greece, thereby completing our circuit of the old land of Thrace, components of which reside in Turkey, Bulgaria, and Greece. We were floored by the monasteries of Meteora, perched precariously as they are on the tops of enormous rock column formations. We hopscotched down to the Cyclades islands, beginning with beautiful Santorini which is the partial caldera and cinder cone of an enormous volcano peeking above the waves. Naxos, Paros, and Siros were next. We were well out of tourist season, so many times we had the places to ourselves, other than locals. We celebrated Thanksgiving in Naxos. Highlights of these islands included sampling local wines and olives, plus exploring the ancient marble mines and quarries of Paros.

From the islands we headed to the southern appendix of Greece, Peloponnese. We started of by visiting Kalamata, epicenter of one of the most fantastic olive delights on the planet -- though I must say that having toured Turkey and Greece my appreciation for the sheer variety and tasty quality of olives has shot through the stratosphere. It was harvesting season. In addition to the Kalamata olives themselves, olives intended for oil production are grown here as well. We stormed one olive oil facility and the workers, amused at our interest, were kind enough to explain the workings in broken English -- all the while we both had fresh, unfiltered olive oil straight from the spout on a big hunk of bread, dripping down our chin and forearms. We rented a car and enjoyed a drive through the countryside, inspecting castles and ruins from the days of the Venetians. Circling back north on the west coast, we headed out to the island of Kefolonia, part of the Ionian islands. Next door to Ithaki this island was part of the domain of our famed adventurer Odysseus; more recently it has featured in Captain Corelli's Mandolin. The highlight of that visit was another drive around the staggering countryside, some of which reminded me of Hwy 1 in California, winding along cliffside roads and dropping in on gorgeous beaches with imposing surf. Heading back into Peloponnese, we took a slight detour on the north coast in order to ride the rack-and-cog narrow gauge train up the vertiginous walls of Vouraikos Canyon. Continuing, we stopped at Corinth to inspect the ancient ruins and sheer walls of the Corinth Canal, which connects the Agean and Ionian seas.

Finally, we were in Athens, city on the move in its massive efforts to prepare for the 2004 Olympics. Here we made the pilgrimage up the Acropolis to pay homage to the Parthenon, as well as down to the gorgeous Sounion cape to admire the Temple of Poseidon. The weather was cold, but the ruins were nevertheless spectacular. We also rendezvoused with Ninos, family friend of Susan's, who showered us with spectacular hospitality and fed us well.

Wrapping up the visit to Greece, we hopped on a flight to Cairo in order to pick up the trail of our original tickets. We only had a few days in this ancient land, but we made the best of it by visiting the astonishing and eccentric archaeological museum (King Tut! Yes! Plus the mummy exhibition including Ramses II) and the breathtaking pyramids of Giza, Dahshur, and Saqquara. Due to the decline in tourism to the Muslim countries of northern Africa, we once again enjoyed relative calm and privacy in our explorations of these most touristed wonders of the ancient world. Unfortunately, pollution from Cairo obscured our views for the first part of the morning (the pollution can be quite shocking, even worse than Delhi), it eventually cleared up. All together we witnessed the three great pyramids of Giza (and the sphinx), the step pyramid of Zoser (eldest of all the great pyramids), and the so-called Bent Pyramid and Red Pyramid at Dahshur. This last is every bit as spectacular as the Great Pyramid of Giza (ten meters shorter!) and it was this pyramid in which we scampered some 65 meters down into the innermost chambers for a taste of what it might be like as a claustrophobic mummy.

Sadly, Susan flew home after Cairo, after an absolutely fantastic trip shared together. As for me, I continued on to Morocco. The main attraction in Morocco is the people and their activities -- primarily the medinas and bazaars whose labrynthine corridors you can wander endlessly without seeing the same thing twice. Like Egypt, however, Morocco was still celebrating the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which put a stint on most activities -- primarily eating during the day. A bit homesick and with Ramadan cramping my style, I didn't linger long in Morocco though it is an incredible place to which I would like to return and explore properly. Nevertheless, I explored Casablanca, Féz, and Tangier (of Interzone and Naked Lunch fame), my explorations consisting mostly of wandering around in the medinas, constantly reminding myself to lift my lower jaw which was constantly agape at the crush of people and offerings for sale.

From Tangier I hopped on a ferry and crossed the Straits of Gilbratar to Spain, braving Scylla and Charybda. Spain, wonderful colorful Spain, here I type.

I plan on spending Christmas in Seville, but will try to see Barcelona and San Sebastián (where I hear tell they've got some crazy festival in early January where the whole town dresses up and runs around berserk) before continuing to Madrid. From there I will fly to Rome and spend a couple of quick weeks in Italy, followed by a rapid visit of Ireland where I will finally get my true Guinness before heading home.

And there, in a nutshell, you have it. As you can see, my work is cut out for me because I have only scratched at the surface, here. It is difficult for me to gloss over so much detail and richness, but I suppose it's a larger crime to leave everyone wondering what the hell I've been up to and where I am.

So -- look for the Thailand update soon; hopefully from time to time I will finish my more detailed descriptions of the places I've mentioned above. I'll be home soon and look forward to seeing everyone again.

Tah tah,
Matt

Upon my arrival I immediately called upon my friend Jen Doran who has been working in Singapore for the last several years. Jen has a very nice high rise apartment overlooking a broad swath of the city where numerous construction cranes crouch atop buildings that will soon join their neighbors in the sky. Nearby are parks, theaters, shopping centers, restaurants, and all the perks one might expect in a modern city, especially along my favorite haunt of Orchard Road.

I don't think I ever fully appreciated the term 'unwound' until I arrived in Singapore. When I arrived I found oh-so lovely aircon, water I could drink from the taps, modern cinemas, great food of wide variety, and great company with Jen and her friends. No, perhaps 'unwound' is not quite the right term. More like 'exploded', like when you cut the tightly wound rubber bands beneath the rind of a golf ball. I got to Singapore and relaxed so hard I came to a dead stop. Jen, ever the kind and generous host, kept trying to stir me up and go see the sights, but she was hard pressed to dislodge me from my comfort-induced comatose sprawl on the couch bathed in cool, blessedly cool, aircon. Jen might have thought her friend was a stone gargoyle if it weren't for my occasional eyeblink.

Venture forth I eventually did, of course, but mostly to cinemas, restaurants, and any other air-conditioned biosphere in which I could comfortably ensconce myself while hiding from the humidity and mean rays of the sun. Mostly these stops were in between many of my "official" errands such as trips to the post office and stores for resupplies. During these "official" trips I somehow managed to see Shrek, Tomb Raider, and Pearl Harbor, the first movies I'd seen in months in a real theater rather than a pirated version on a cramped television in a bar. Shrek I found enormously funny and well done, Tomb Raider was satisfying in a roller coaster, eye candy kind of way since I was already a fan of both the game and Angelina Jolie, and Pearl Harbor was decent with some fantastically rendered battle scenes in the middle of a pretty sticky Hollywood Bermuda love triangle. The beautiful displays of Angkor Wat in Tomb Raider were particularly interesting, since I had already started thinking about visiting Cambodia -- the vivid cinemaphotography further inspired my plans. During one of my sedentary moments Jen and I rented Duets, with Gwennyth Paltrow and Huey Lewis. The movie was excellent, with more depth and dimension than I ever expected.

Despite my lump-like state, Jen did manage to show me around the town a bit. We investigated several outstanding eateries, including a set of hawker stalls where I was introduced to the tasty dish descriptively named "Chile Stingray," tasty white flesh we plucked straight from the flanks in a well-balanced sauce. These hawker stall areas are interesting places, the stalls surround general-seating tables. Your eventual meal is comprised of items from several different stalls; it eventually becomes clear that the various vendors keep meticulous track of who got what from where when it comes time to pay the bill. We enjoyed some awesome Indian food on the banks of the Singapore River; later we visited Arab Street in the Muslim quarter where I was thrilled to be introduced to the Indian Muslim dish murtabak, a sort of egg and flour pancake folded over with tasty lamb (or other delectables), onions and other seasonings. From that point on I was always on the lookout for murtabak and further along in Malaysia I enjoyed numerous examples, some fine and some bland, of that interesting dish. I think the one in Singapore was probably the best, though. For the first time in I don't know how many months I had a fantastic hamburger and fresh IPA at a brew pub (joy!) called Brewerks. Yes, the tasty food issue is well addressed in Singapore.

The nightlife was entertaining as well. A number of times we ended up out with Jen's friends and colleagues in various bars and had a great time joshing and socializing. One night I was amazed to see a very talented local band belting out some hard-edged blues, a treat for my ears. Despite one late night encounter with a vituperative and pugilistic "Buddhist" religious fanatic, the Singapore nightlife was favorable.

Most of the economic boom in Singapore was the result of programs placed by Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew after Singapore achieved independence from Britain. In so doing they gained control over the strong trading and merchant economy the British built. With that to build on, Mr. Lee strengthened the economy further even though the government was rather strict. Mr. Lee handed over his office to new blood in 1990, though he still maintains the title of "Special Minister" and as far as I can tell still has a lot of influence over the government. The reason I bring all this up is that Mr. Lee's house (mansion?) is only a couple of blocks away from Jen's apartment and we walked by it several times. Out in front there are always two stoic guards. The guards are supposed to be Tibetan Gurkhas, a warrior class that gained Western renown during battles with the British during some Indian territorial disputes. The British were so impressed with their prowess that they began recruiting them into the British army. These Gurkha regiments still exist today. I'm not sure if it was their reputation or the automatic rifles they carried, but I always felt a little uneasy when walking by the Gurkha guards.

I ended up staying nearly a week in Singapore, partly due to my enjoying myself, and partly due to train schedules. Leave I did, eventually, grateful for Jen's hospitality and hopeful that I did not overstay my welcome. I hopped on a train straight for Kuala Lumpur, capitol of Malaysia, where I was scheduled to rendezvous with Than, on his way down from Thailand. Than, of course, was in the final phase of his own trip around the world with Chris and I had not seen him for ten or eleven months. Somewhere in Indochina Chris and Than parted ways so Than could wrap up his trip and head to grad school. So out of aircon comfort I emerged, hopped on the train, and set off to find Than.

The train ride was fairly uneventful. It was obvious that Malaysia had not prospered to the same extent as Singapore based on the condition of the towns I passed through, despite the fact that Malaysia has prospered far more than, say, Indonesia. I was shocked to see how much of the country was covered, I mean covered, with plantations of palm trees which are the source of palm oil. This appears to be a major segment of the agricultural-based segment of Malaysian economy; in the wake of logging, it is also the major reason behind the massive deforestation of the incredible jungle rainforest that used to cover the peninsula and Borneo.

In KL things are different, for it is a modern city on the move, buildings rising all around, though certainly not as squeaky clean as Singapore. I arrived and wandered around a bit before meeting up with Than. It was great to see Than; he had lost weight in his travels but appeared to be in good health. We dropped off our bags in our hovel and headed out immediately to catch up over beers. Relatively speaking, beer can be expensive in predominately Muslim Malaysia, but Than and I were enjoying the boon of a beer fund, a gift from Susan to Than and myself. The beer fund came with strings attatched, however -- I had to pass along a kiss from Susan to Than, on the lips. He squirmed a little, but I got him -- later he told Susan "Thanks for the kiss, but I wish you'd shaved first." With outstanding obligations summarily dispensed with, we talked well into the night, catching up on the times at the Reggae Bar in Chinatown.

Since we had a couple of days before our flight to Malaysian Borneo, we wandered around KL a bit. Mostly this was confined to Chinatown and vicinity, sniffing out tasty eating establishments. At one point we ventured up into Little India, which didn't really seem like a Little India, but was indeed heavily populated with Indians. On a lark we decided to go see a movie in this neighborhood, a movie that appeared to be some sort of action movie based on the imagery (we couldn't read the language) on the promotional posters. The movie was called (inexplicably in English) Citizen. Than later pointed out that it was a fine example of a formula "Tamilwood" flick from the Tamil Nadu region of India, heavily inspired by the "Hindi Films", or "Masala Movies", of the Mumbai region (i.e., "Bollywood"), as opposed to the art films that originally appeared in the Bengal region. The formula, as such, is bizarre. I have since seen a few more of its kind, but they seem to have several commonalties: a swashbuckling hero who simultaneously maintains some sort of underdog status and the ability to cry, elaborate fight scenes, some sort of social commentary, family bonding, a woman with pursuit and romance, and musical song and dance numbers. This last bit is the confounding one to Western eyes. It's not like what you would expect in, say, a musical. It's more like musical interludes, like a music video, sometimes woven meaningfully into the surrounding plot, but more often than not jarringly injected into the normal flow of the tale. Sometimes the entire wardrobes and set locations change for these gaudy musical interludes, which invariably seem like musical mating dances between the hero and the love interest who alternate pursuit with coy rejection, depending on who is singing at the time. The music is often pretty catchy stuff. These musical interludes are actually the core, the focus, of the movie around which everything else hangs. The fights are violent, and as in the case of Citizen, sometimes downright supernatural thanks to the use of wire work and instantaneous wardrobe changes. In between there is intrigue, dramatic emotional speeches, vindication, punctuated throughout with smoldering, manly gazes from the hero's lowered brow towards the love interest (who, by the way, does not have to have anything to do with the plot that produces all of the fights and conflict). There are also jarring transitions of genre in the movies, often going from comedy to romance to action to drama back to comedy, all in the same movie, but okay since it's really the musical numbers that are important. All in all, quite entertaining stuff but I'm not sure I could take a steady diet of it. I have heard that the key to enjoying the escapist Hindi films is to watch them on their own terms without any expectations based on Western cinematic tastes.

Than and I hopped on a jet plane to Kota Kinabalu in Sabah, Malaysia, on Borneo. Here Malaysia is comprised of the states of Sabah and more southerly Sarawak, both of which wrap around the tiny two pieces of the country of Brunei (nyah, nyah, we got all the oy-ell!). To the south is Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo. We had a primary goal to climb Mt. Kinabalu, the highest mountain between the mighty Himalayas and Irian Jaya. After fueling up on some fantastic Chinese food and grabbing a few supplies, we teamed up with an English guy named Mark and hopped on a bus to the base of the mountain where we lodged for the night.

The next morning we joined up with two Czech girls, three Danish women, and our "guide." We set off up the mountain itself under a steady drizzle of cold rain. Through much of this ascent we passed through lush rain forest which gradually changed the higher we went from tropical into temperate rain forest. From time to time the vegetation would thin out on a ridge and we could be be visited with swift winds which rapidly chilled the sweat and rain we accumulated on the way up. These winds were our first taste of why the region is known as "Land Beneath the Winds". We caught occasional glimpses of the craggy granite humps and spires above us whenever the clouds opened up. Eventually, after five hours or so, we made it to the park-maintained lodge from where we would head to the peak early the next morning. It was pretty chilly up in the lodge, except inside the heated dorm rooms, but the main dining area had large windows with some nice views of clouds rushing past the slopes in the wind, occasionally, but not often, offering glimpses down the the mountain. The mountain, weather permitting is fairly approachable and not very technical. For this reason it is popular; I'd say there were nearly 100 people in the lodge that night with hopes of making it to the top the next day. Weather was not on our side, though. It was cold and grim that night and looked no better when we arose around 2 a.m. for breakfast.

Many people braved the cold, wet, windy weather anyway, to their credit. I know I wasn't exactly feeling enthusiastic about conditions, and I know Than wasn't either since he was sporting a lot of cotton and not much synthetic or wool. We joined the pilgrimage, though, and Mark, Than, and myself eventually managed to separate ourselves from the initial horde. The beginning was not so bad. It was chilly and rainy, but not so windy since we were on the lee of a major ridge. When we crested that ridge, however, things became miserable. Most of the horde stopped to warm up at a hut on the way up, after which they turned back. We continued trudging across the exposed granite faces, many times tugging on a rope that marked the trail so we would not wander off the dark slopes. The wind was howling and the rain seemed near horizontal. It was an irritating sort of cold that seeped into us, because it wasn't like the ambient temperature was freezing, but rather the wet and wind was still managing to unceasingly suck the heat out of us. All of our hands were numb, beyond feeling. All three of us suffered battery failures in our flashlights -- Mark had no replacements so he had to stumble along between Than and myself, relying on charity light. Than had a light bulb fail -- in a MacGyveresque moment we actually got to use that little spare bulb stashed in the back end of a mag light...bonus! At one point I had the bright idea of trying to capture our misery on film, but soon discovered that the cold had killed my camera battery as well. We were on the verge of turning back, and would have had my failed flashlight turned out to be a problem other than dead batteries. In those conditions we were not willing to rely on a single light. Still, we kept going and the wind only got stronger. Eventually things started to lighten up a bit as the sun began to consider rising. At one point, soon after sheltering in the lee of a large granite boulder, we encountered a couple of people on the way back down who gave us the encouraging word that we were not far from the peak. In a renewed burst of energy we climbed up to the final section where we boulder hopped to the top. Than and I took rapid turns hopping up onto the tallest boulder, from where in the howling wind we could see all of about twenty feet due to the rushing clouds, even though it was now light. Than and I nearly immediately began descending. Mark, on a quest for a view and whom I'd been encouraging with the possibility of the clouds breaking before we got to the top (but not really believing it myself), was sort of looking around slightly confused and wondering whether we could shelter behind a boulder and wait for the clouds to break. Ahh! Regretfully, I informed him that there wasn't a chance in hell that the clouds were going to break and that he would have to familiarize himself with simply getting to the top as being a sufficient reward unto itself.

We got our reward. Mt. Kinabalu, 4101 m (13,455 feet), granite edifice cloaked in loud winds, rain and clouds. I was pleased, under the circumstances. We scurried back down the mountain to the lodge, marveling at how much longer it seemed on the way down (no doubt due our being even more cold than on the way up). Our reward was enhanced once we returned to the lodge, for it turned out that of the 100 or so people that tried that morning, only around eight, including us, actually persisted and made it to the top where their grand view of boulders twenty feet away awaited in that cold wind. This weather was not very typical for the mountain; normally grand views are to be found when the sun rises. It was our lot, though, and I feel like we made the best of it. Find your challenges where you can, I say.

When we got back to the lodge we ate some hot foods and dove back into bed for a rest and a nap. Later that day we descended, remarkably, without encountering any more rain. Part way down the mountain our "guide", in a very guide-like action, pointed out a pitcher plant to us. The slopes of Kinabalu are famous for the abundance of exotic plants, including several species of pitcher plants (one of the largest of these ever found on Kinabalu had a dead rat in it!). It was the first time I'd ever seen such a thing in the wild. Just before this amazing feat of guiding, I had been snacking on some chocolate-covered almonds and had proffered one to our guide. I sort of guiltily amused myself by speculating whether or not I should say "good guide" and offer him another treat in the hopes that we would get more sights pointed out to us. Heh heh. Well, we did pretty well on our own. Once we were below the clouds there were some fantastic views of the valleys below the mountain, which we dutifully admired.

After leaving the mountain we hopped on a bus to Ranau, from where we caught a ride to Poring Hot Springs. Along the way, somewhat irritatingly, the clouds completely dissipated from around Mt. Kinabalu and offered us clear views of all the spectacular granite features of the peak...I think we were being mocked. Poring is a popular weekend getaway for the Malays, a pretty area whose main attraction is hot baths fed by sulfur hot springs. The baths were built by the Japanese during WWII and offer both hot and cold feeds (from a nearby stream) directly into each bath. The hot springs were wonderful for our aching bones that had been battered, chilled, and abused on the slopes of the mountain. That night I slept extremely well.

Most of the next day we spent relaxing. Since we were feeling pretty sore, eventually we set off to inspect some of the other sights in the park in order to stretch our legs. The first of these was the "canopy walk," a network of suspended walkways that cuts back and forth high up in the trees of some of the surrounding virgin rainforest. I didn't exactly know what to expect when I heard about this, but it was astonishing. The walkways, built like thin suspension bridges maybe a foot wide on the walkway with surrounding side nets and ropes, were sometimes 40 m (135 feet) above the forest floor. I was nearly paralyzed with vertigo in some places. Eventually I pointed this out to Than and Mark, telling them that it was strange that no matter how hard I tried to steady myself I still felt disoriented as though I were moving around. Than pointed out that it wasn't my imagination, that up high in the trees we were no doubt moving to and fro along with the treetops in the breeze. A very useful observation, since once it was pointed out to me my mind could grasp the physical explanation and I immediately felt better and more steady on my feet. Part of the original struggle was that I thought it was my imagination. Nevertheless, staring straight down over 130 feet of tree trunk is a bewildering perspective.

After the canopy walk we set out in search of a couple of waterfalls that were rumored to be up on the surrounding slopes. Our legs were barking at such rude treatment so soon after Mt. Kinabalu, but with the exertion came some relief as our muscles loosened up (I can't say the same for the knees, however). First was a small but pretty waterfall, soon followed by some caves that were really gaps formed in the crevices of a pile of enormous boulders. There in the lush rainforest these green boulders lay, and we amused ourselves by climbing around in them for a while. They also serve as a home for a small bat colony, a few members of which we disturbed in our explorations.

We still had not made it to the main waterfalls and were beginning to wonder whether we would have enough daylight to actually make it to the falls and back. I was the only one with a flashlight and its battery life was dubious after the mountain. Mark turned back at this point, mostly because of fatigue I think, but also because he had no interest in walking back through the rainforest at night. Than and I kept going, setting for ourselves a deadline where we felt we could make it back while still light. We promptly ignored the deadline, of course, because we kept getting tempted by what seemed to be good waterfall terrain "just around the corner or over the rise." Alas, after eschewing one turnoff in favor of trying to bag the higher, but rumored to be more impressive, waterfall, we did not make it. Eventually we had to admit that there was no time left and we headed back down the mountain. We decided at that point, in light of the less-than-desirable conditions of Mt. Kinabalu that we made the best of, that we weren't in actuality going for a waterfall, but rather a beautiful walk through pristine rainforest. So after retroactively redefining our goal, we had a dazzlingly successful hike, making it back to the springs on the cusp of darkness.

Along the way I noticed an itch and discovered that I'd picked up a tiger leech on my abdomen, an interesting dark brown sort of leech with jagged yellow patterns rising on its sides. They are one of the few species of leech that, not only do you feel, but slightly hurt when they commence their grizzly feeding. Rather than strike at the ankles like most leeches, tiger leeches like to hang out on vegetation about waist level and hitch a ride from there. Since I had no leach removal kit (salt) I left my friend on until we finished descending. While Than was preparing a couple of the baths with hot spring water I detoured to the nearby restaurant to borrow some salt. The leech, by now, had grown quite fat. I gleefully doused him with salt and he plopped onto the ground where I buried him in a pile of the stuff. Pointing out the pile of salt covering the leach, I said to Than something along the lines of how it was fair to say the leech was suffering from a salty battering.

We spent a couple of nights there in Poring. I have to say, there appear to be two sorts of nights. "Big bug" nights, and "small bug" nights. The first night we were there we saw an astonishing array of enormous bugs, most of which were the flying variety. Beetles, with and without elaborate horns, buzzed around like alien hovercraft, frenetic wings supporting bodies that were as big, if not bigger, than an average humming bird. There were huge, exotic fat wasp-like things that looked like they could sting, one of which commenced to do to the hapless table cloth after we had trapped it beneath an upturned glass. Perhaps most interestingly was a huge relative of the cicada. Built exactly like our cicadas, except around five inches long with bright colorations of green, red, yellow, and black. This was an entertaining night for the naturalist in me. Mysteriously, though, the next night was strictly a "small bug" night. I didn't see a single oversized bug that night, but there were swarms of smaller bugs flying all around. Little moths, fly-like things, normal-sized praying mantises, as well as some sort of winged ants or termites who might have been relocating their colony or sending out a new generation of queens to fend for themselves in the lush, bountiful but unforgiving rainforest.

From Poring Than and I parted ways with Mark and headed to Sepilok. Here we visited the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center. In an increasingly rare reserve of virgin rain forest, the center is a gathering spot for orangutans forced out of their habitat or orphaned by the encroachment of the ever-expanding palm oil plantations. When they get the baby orangutans they hand feed them and eventually put them with foster brothers and sisters during their rearing. Over time, they reacquaint the orangutans with the jungle in stages, taking them out to platforms set in the reserve. As they mature they go to farther and farther platforms until finally they are left at the farthest area. Here there are daily feedings, but the orangutans are free to come and go as they will. Some come back on a regular basis, some come back only sporadically. Oftentimes female orangutans that were raised at the center will come back with their babies for a quick bite and to show off their progeny. It is these feedings that also generate funds for the center by offering tourists the chance to see the primates in action.

We set out to see a morning feeding. To get to the platform you head out on a long boardwalk through the jungle. This walk offers some fine views of the surrounding trees and it eventually widens into an area where there are a few benches and wider spaces for standing. Near this area is a feeding platform set away from the boardwalk, and there are a series of ropes strung between trees leading to the feeding platform. We immediately spotted a couple of orangutans lazing around in the trees, no doubt waiting on their food. Also prevalent in the tree tops were big sleeping nests which orangutans build every night out of sticks, a woven platform of sorts in which they lounge at night. Eventually a ranger appears on the feeding platform with some bowls of milk and a bunch of bananas. The orangutans come from all over to get the goods. The youngest ones cling to their mothers all along, sometimes venturing out on their own but not for very long. The slightly older ones are more adventurous, but are still terrified of the largest menace around feeding time: the greedy macaques. The macaques are ever-present on the periphery, nicking bananas whenever they can. Sometimes it's just scraps, others it's the direct result of intimidating the smaller orangutans and stealing the food. They give a wide berth to the larger orangutans, who seem to barely notice the pesky scavengers.

The orangutans are amazing to watch. They are so human-like in many of their mannerisms that it can be disquieting. On the other hand, they regularly perform such graceful maneuvers while brachiating with those long arms from tree to tree and along those ropes, using their legs as often as arms, you can't help but notice how different they are. It was always endlessly amusing to me when one of the little ones would hang upside down with his feet, or one foot and one hand, and sort of idly look around, seemingly without a care in the world. They do, of course, have cares in the world. The macaques are not discouraged because it is part of the rehabilitation, learning how to deal with such things. There was one sad moment when a young orangutan was right below me on the edge of the boardwalk. She got shanghaied by a group of marauding macaques after she had darted away from the platform with a bundle of bananas for a little private feast. The macaques swiped the bananas and she started crying, like wailing, nearly human sounding but not quite. She continued the whining keen the whole time she scampered back to the platform in the hopes of getting more bananas. Unfortunately, at that point there were no more bananas so she had to content herself with finishing off a bowl of milk.

There were lots of tourists watching all of this. So many that it was sort of uncomfortable, but I think it was nevertheless worth it. Seeing those orangutans was one of my favorite bits of Malaysia; once you start watching them you hardly notice anyone around you anyway.

That night at our guest house, Than and I were invited to a birthday party of one of the long-term residents. Sepilok is host to researchers of all sorts, including a research center dedicated to entomology. The research centers, aside from the researchers themselves, also attract graduate students of all sorts. This crew was a group of such students and volunteers. They mostly were working the entomology angle, but some were soil specialists. As a group they were very interesting, certainly not they typical sort of crew you meet on the road. Over shots of homemade rice brew we had many interesting conversations about life, dirt, bugs, schools, and the tropics.

The next day Than and I set off for a "jungle camp," a featured attraction in the area, an activity that purports to give the traveler a real sense of what it's like to camp out in the deep jungle and spot native wildlife. We were going with long-time operator "Uncle Tan" who was one of the first to set up such excursions in the area. "Uncle Tan" is a real guy, an older round-bellied gregarious fellow who loves to talk. In town, at least, he delights in cramming you full of food as well. Uncle Tan has stories, many many stories, all of which he will eventually tell you, sometimes multiple times. They're not bad stories, they're actually pretty interesting, but there is also this sense of how he seems to toot his own horn. Anyway, Uncle Tan likes to characterize himself as a bit of an unconventional environmental activist; most of the stories typically involve this theme. When we met him he was apparently recovering from his second heart attack, so lately he has not been personally supervising the jungle camp itself. The camp is advertised as a bare-bones experience, out in the thick of it, and it is.

We headed out in a bus to a village on the bank of the Kinabatangan river, largest river in Sabah (second largest in Malaysia), which winds its way through a huge flood plain and forms numerous oxbow lakes which teem with jungle and wildlife. At the river we hopped into a boat and enjoyed late afternoon wildlife spottings along the banks as we cruised towards the camp. There is a lot of critters along the banks of the river. In part this is due to how much of the river is the only bits of jungle left, strips of jungle left over from the palm oil plantations. The wildlife gets pushed closer and more densely around the river. Along the way we spotted macaques, many varieties of hornbill, and perhaps most remarkably man sightings of troupes of endangered proboscis monkeys. The potbellied proboscis monkeys, males in particular, have these huge, dangling, bulbous, semi prehensile noses that are really quite improbable looking. Perhaps predictably, it is because of these protuberances that the monkeys are hunted an eaten because they are rumored to enhance the virility of he who consumes the monkey. This, combined with severe loss of habitat, are the two primary reasons the proboscis monkey is endangered, despite their being a protected species. All in all, it was a quite pleasant boat ride.

The camp was indeed basic, consisting of little more than a set of open-walled shacks with some sleeping pads and tattered mosquito netting. The camp is operated by a group of young guys who may or may not be various relations of Uncle Tan. It's hard to say. There were around fifteen or twenty guests staying there with us. Theoretically, guests are entertained by going on 'safari' walks and boat rides, all aiming to spot wildlife. In reality, especially with that many people stomping around, the walks are sort of noisy and any wildlife with any sense of self-preservation has long since vanished by the time people stomp into the vicinity. For this reason, Than and I avoided these walks and ventured out on our own a couple of times. Other than some monitor lizards, birds, and butterflies, we weren't much more successful. At night, though, we at least got to spot some curious beasts around the camp. First, the huge and comical looking bearded pigs. These look like big hogs, but with generous, bristly sideburns and jowl hair covering their faces. More rare, we saw a Malay civet nosing around, a sleek looking critter with round ears and marbled with white and black splotches. While lazing around camp we saw all sorts of insects and, delightfully, a couple of pygmy squirrels, no larger than my thumb, darting around on the trees, rumored to be one of the smallest mammals on Earth.

Unfortunately the camp was suffering a bit from lack of oversight, mismanagement, laziness, or all of the above. Things just weren't "together". There were no actual "guides" while we were there, who were supposed to lead the walks, things such as water were not provided as promised, there was typically not enough food, and the whole camp simply lacked any sense of order or anyone being in control of things. The situation was just sort of sad because it gave me a sense of Uncle Tan having completely lost his edge and his enterprise going to hell in a hand basket. He has plenty of competition, now, so the situation will either improve or Uncle Tan will fade.

Despite the operational glitches, I enjoyed myself, especially the occasional wildlife spottings and socializing with the other campers. We did manage to get another boat trip up the river, largely similar to the trip out but at dawn rather than dusk. We saw more examples of some of the wildlife I noted, as well as some impressive crocodile sightings. Than and I departed the camp that same day, passing by our friend Mark (from the mountain) who was on his way in. Later we heard from Mark that there was a big argument amongst the camp staff and the cook quit, and the one guide who returned from vacation as we were leaving was also considering quitting because of poor pay. C'mon, Uncle Tan.

All things I read about the area indicate that the wildlife we actually saw is a tiny slice of what actually exists. I personally talked to other people who spotted orangutans. There are persistent reports of rare elephants, rhinos, and otters. It's a bird watchers paradise -- I soon found myself envious of the binoculars some of the birders had brought out to the camp. Than and I returned to Uncle Tan's headquarters intending to impart all the problems his setup seemed to be suffering from, but as soon as we arrived he stuffed us full of so much tasty food and good stories that it took all the wind out of our sails. I think he's good at that. We decided to leave the complaints to a couple of ornery Australians we knew would be returning the next day from the camp.

So we left and headed back towards Mt. Kinabalu to a village that rests in the shadow of the mountain, where we stayed at a comfortable enough guest house run by, of all people, a redneck from Jackson County, Florida, who had gone native in a big way about eleven years earlier and was currently raising a family. The next day we embarked on a long series of bus rides, from Ranau to Tambunan to Keningau to Tenom. The most remarkable aspect of these rides was the countryside through which we passed -- for once, it appeared to be some large expanses of jungle (perhaps secondary, though, post-logging) rather than endless palm oil plantations or rubber trees.

Tenom was a relaxing town. Than and I splurged on a room with aircon and promptly headed out for some food and exploration. The next day we had to kill some time before catching our train north, so we headed to the Tenom Agricultural Center and Orchid Center for a few hours. This is a huge complex where they carry out all sorts of agricultural research and development in the region. The publicly visible portion of this takes the form of landscaped acreage distributed around large ponds. The gardens tended to be ornamental in nature and in many cases the gardens were dedicated to a specific species of plant. For example, there were gardens that specialized in beaugenvillas, lilies, hibiscus, cacti, and perhaps my favorite, carnivorous plants. All were well done. The cacti garden was a bit surprising, in the middle of the tropics, but the representative plants were diverse and apparently healthy. The carnivorous plant garden heavily featured pitcher plants, many species of which were found right there in the region, especially on the slopes of Mt. Kinabalu, as I mentioned earlier. Other plants on display with predilections for proteins included sundews, bladderworts, and venus flytraps. The ponds in between all of these gardens were interesting since many of them were filled with enormous lily pads around four feet wide. Each pad had an upturned lip around the border around two inches high. I saw no frogs on the beasts, but they seemed capable of supporting some monstrous frogs.

Orchids were the real specialty of the center. There were two Orchid centers, one for native species and one for hybrids. Unfortunately, the orchid centers were closed when we were there. Apparently visitations are by appointment only. No matter. Than and I at least managed to sneak into the native orchid center. Lushly landscaped around a moat with all sorts of overhanging green canopies, this center was nothing if not verdant. However, there were hardly any blooming orchids to be found. I don't know if it was out of season or what, but there just weren't too many in bloom. The ones we did find, however, were beautiful in that orchid kind of way. I don't know about you, but when I look at orchids I vacillate between admiring a pretty flower and suspecting it is the visage of some sort of alien organism. Orchids just seem so creature-like with eyes and expressions, sometimes, rather than just a flower.

We then hopped on the train back to Kota Kinabalu. Two trains, actually, with a change in Beaufort. The first leg of this journey is well known for its views of the jungle as it travels down a valley in between jungle-encrusted mountains. These days the jungle is perhaps not as lush as it once was, since a decade or so ago a big fire swept through the region. You can still see the bleached trunks of the old primary growth jutting up through the new, surprisingly established, greenery along the way. The river had several sections with some tasty looking rapids in it, making Than and I wish we had kayaked down. Most of these observations were from the back of an open, flatbed railcar since we were chased out of the first windowless car by a constant plume of diesel exhaust.

About midway to Beaufort the train stopped and we all had to hike about half a mile up the tracks to wait for another train. The reason for this was a derailment of another train from a couple of weeks earlier. The derailment occurred on a bridge over a shallow ravine, where we could see the engine mostly fallen off the bridge, near-vertically rammed into the ground at the bottom of the ravine. The back of the locomotive was resting up on the bridge, mostly sheared off of the rear wheel transom. The bridge itself was quite damaged and the tracks were extremely warped and twisted. There were large earth-movers on the scene, constructing an enormous earthen ramp from the top of the valley down to the ravine, presumably so they could eventually bring some cranes down to drag the heavily damaged locomotive out. The locals claimed it was the first such derailment to ever have happened on those mountain tracks, but I have to wonder considering the rough ride we had up to Beaufort. After sweating in the heat for over an hour, we caught the companion train. We then switched to a larger train in Beaufort and had a long, uneventful ride back to KK, where we promptly descended back on our favorite Chinese restaurant beneath Ang's Hotel.

The next day we flew back to KL for a rendezvous with old friends. In the bar below the quaint Coliseum hotel (nearby the theatre where Than and I saw the Hindi flick) we met up with Rich Garfield, Sid Jones, and Jen Doran, fresh up from Singapore. What a crew. That night was packed solid with catching-up, shooting the shit, drinking, eating fine Indian food, and stomping about KL. Than and I opted to crash on the floor of the posh abode of our friends that night, crusty backpackers enjoying the patronage of our gainfully employed friends.

The next day we rode out to Mersing, on the east coast, and caught the last ferry of the day out to Pulau Tioman, one of several tropical island getaways off of the Malaysian coast. The ferry was an extremely rough hour-long ride on a catamaran that left me a little woozy. The calm of the island village of Kampung Salang was a welcome relief.

The funny thing about these islands, full of slopes and jungle and surrounded by beautiful beaches, is the zone in between the beach and the jungle. Often times there are tidal creeks that drift lazily down from the foliage, without much native current at all. What current they have is easily overwhelmed by the actions of the tide, alternating between flowing outward and drifting back inward. The further inland these creeks go, the less dramatic the influence of the tide, and therefore the more stagnate the water gets. Our hotel was surrounded by such a creek. It was not ugly, not at all, nicely landscaped and clean. There was just this limp water surrounding the place, with a correspondingly limp aroma clinging to the air around it. I found the creek to be quite fascinating, because there was always something going on. The creek was host to some two dozen huge three or four foot monitor lizards that would lazily patrol the water with their heads held up above the surface (unlike a crocodile). Most of the time they would just patrol, but several other times I saw two lizards engaged in amorous synchronized swimming, sort of twisted side-by-side with heads up pointing in the same direction. In addition to the lizards there were numerous needle fish and mudskippers. Yes, there was always something going on in that creek.

Of course we did not spend most of our time hanging out by the creek. We spent it on the beaches and in the ocean. The first day we took a snorkeling trip out to some nearby satellite islands and rock formations. It was some choice snorkeling. Critters abounded, critters such as blue-spotted stingrays, sea cucumbers, anemones and clown fish, turtles, and perhaps most surprisingly, schools of young and juvenile cuttlefish. The green sea turtles were a pleasant sight. I saw at least two, one perhaps four feet in diameter whose shell had been nicked by a boat propeller, and one younger one around three feet in diameter. I dove down to get a closer look at the younger turtle and we just started spiraling around one another. Upside down I spiraled perhaps four or five revolutions around the turtle and it around me, as though we were tracing out a double helix. The turtle was inspecting me the whole time; at one point I reached out and touched his shell. Eventually, I ran out of breath and had to break away and surface from that wonderful experience. Rich saw the tail end of this episode and later accused me of "scaring away the turtles." Fie on he sayeth I!

We spent a lot of time merely relaxing and doing a lot of reading and book-swapping. Jen and Rich took it upon themselves to hike over the top of the island one day, and later that same day Than, Sid, and I hiked through the jungle over a nearby headland to a picturesque and deserted beach on Monkey Bay. The whole crew, except for Sid and myself who tagged along for snorkeling, went scuba diving one day as well. Nights were mostly spent, perhaps predictably, inspecting the fine offerings of the handful of area restaurants and bars.

All too soon, however, it was time to move along. The buds had run out of vacation time and it was time for Than to head South and for me to head North. It was a fantastic, lazy visit, just like vacation should be. Our friends with jobs were extremely generous with us poor backpackers, and it was much appreciated. I certainly feel indebted to their kindness.

After mumbling our goodbyes early the next morning, I headed back to the mainland and caught long bus ride north to Kota Bahru. In the heat and dust, I straightened my backpack and walked two or so miles and through various checkpoints while the sun blazed above. After passing through these checkpoints, abodes were suddenly more dilapidated and I could no longer read any signs, as they were in a strange script I'd never seen before.

I was in Thailand.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Tiger tiger, burning bright. All through the region, Tiger beer reigns supreme, though it is not anything special, yet another SE Asian lager. There is ubiquitous San Miguel, YASEAL, from the Phillipines, as well as Stellar Artois, imported from Belgium which is not half bad. That last aside, all are unremarkable pilsners.

Till next time, where this kind hand will detail adventures in Indochina,
Matt

One of my favorites: "Why does everyone always overgeneralize?"

"He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD."
-- Deuteronomy 23:1

The metric system is the tool of the devil!! I get forty rods to the hogshead, and that's the way I likes it!!

Someone had to put all that chaos there!
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I love vegetarians -- some of my favorite foods are vegetarians.

"Today's forecast calls for sprinkles of genius with a chance of doom!"
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The truth does not set you free, it just makes everyone irritable.

Which is worse: Ignorance or Apathy? Who knows? Who cares?

It's pretty funny, actually. It all started when I thought that inflammable was the opposite of flammable...

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Error: Cannot find file REALITY.SYS - Universe halted, please reboot!
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It's sad to live in a world where knowing how to program your VCR actually lowers your social status...
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Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this post are not necessarily mine, as I've not yet had my medication today.
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When I have to develop under Windows, I spend long, frustrating days where mis-handling of a pointer causes BSOD, not a core dump.
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"Linux is a beautiful thing, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and we're geeks.

Be nice to your friends. If it weren't for them, you'd be a complete stranger.
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5.72 MOhms across my tongue... should i be concerned?
-- MrResistor

"Why does everyone always overgeneralize?"
-- p3d0

If at first you don't succeed, try a shorter bungee.
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Any attempt to brew coffee with a teapot should result in the error code "418 I'm a teapot". The resulting entity body MAY be short and stout. [RFC 2324]
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The Internet interprets advertising as damage and routes around it.
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There are two kinds of people in this world -- Those who divide people into two groups and those who don't.
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The Christian Right is Neither
-- cbuskirk (cbuskirk@yahoo.com

Inertia's what makes the world go 'round.
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If you are angry with someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes... then you'll be a mile away from them, and you'll have their shoes.
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Fruit flies like bananas...Time flies like the wind...
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Who is General Failure, and why is he reading my hard drive?
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"'Tis some script kidd3z," I muttered, "tapping at my server port--Only this, and nothing more."
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The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
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-o-"Warning: You are logged into reality as root..."-o-
-- Munky_v2email_me@www.dialug.org)

There are three types of people in the world; those who can count, and those who can't.
-- Uruks2mdalle@titan.vcu.edu)

All generalizations are false.
-- The_Messengerkmfms.com@drew)

A theory: Women do not, snore, burp, sweat or fart. Therefore, they must bitch, or they will explode.
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Why is it that it's a penny for your thoughts, but you have to put your two cents in? Somebody's makin a penny.
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I've lost my faith in nihilism.
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Being a geek means never having to ask, "Paper or plastic?"
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"Ah yes, the Tomahawk Cruise missle... the rich country's car bomb."
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The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them.
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There is nothing more odious to me than an expensive church.
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A friend of mine has a barcode on his arm. He rings up as a $.35 pack of JuicyFruit.
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Preserve Wildlife -- Pickle a squirrel today!
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You know lately I've been thinking recently about the sig system. I really think that 120 characters seems a bit restr
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"Don't anthropomorphize computers. They hate that."
-- poiu

5 out of 4 People have problems with fractions.
-- fjordboy noneofyourbeeswax@noneofyourbeeswax.com

Never miss a good chance to shut up.
-- Aleatoricrsanders@webzone.net

Give me ambiguity or give me something else
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The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.
-- Hunter S. Thompson

If at first you don't succeed, it is quite certain you will give up skydiving.

Sponsored by: Chork Lite - Because having an active lifestyle doesn't mean you have to give up jellied meat.
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I'm in search of myself. If you found me before I arrive, please have me wait.
-- jsse

"Time's fun when you're having flies."
-- Kermit the Frog

...A no smoking section in a resturant is like having a no peeing section in a swimming pool...
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Swearing is the crutch of inarticulate mother fuckers.
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If Bill Gates had a nickel for every time Windows crashed... ..oh wait, he does.
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That's it!
Matt

Labuan Bajo, Flores, seemed like a pinnacle of western comforts compared to the relative scarcity in the rest of Flores. This trend continued all the way to Bali -- everywhere more and more comforts that I had previously taken for granted were available. This was instructive, moving up this ramp of western comforts, as I headed towards the more touristed islands, because when I encountered tourists heading in the other direction it was obvious that they were seeing our shared surroundings with different eyes -- the eyes of comforts deprived, rather than the eyes of comforts, normally taken for granted, reinstated. Along with the increased numbers of comforts and tourists came more frequent annoyances, such as hawkers. It was not long before I longed for the days of mere "Hello Mister" irritation I found in Flores. Though the "hello mister" cult abruptly ended off the western shore of Flores, other Indonesian peculiarities remained. For instance, the greetings and comparisons: throughout all of the islands thus far I was commonly greeted with "Hey Long Hair" (in Flores, of course, this was only during the rare circumstance of some greeting other than "hello mister"). I think due primarily to the long hair I was typically compared to Antonio Banderas, Lorenzo Lamas (shudder), or, due to the Indonesian preoccupation with all things football (soccer, second only to badminton), Italian football star and super-defender Fabio Cannavaro. The Antonio reference is not a new one for me, nor is the general Italian reference. I am generally assumed to be Italian unless I have my Tilly hat on and people assume Australian, and in Indonesia they seemed to hone the reference further with the Cannavaro association. But Lamas? Ugh. It seems clear that the Indonesians are struggling to find someone as good looking and modest as I am in their comparisons.

Another interesting feature was the response variety when I told the Indonesians my place of origin. My statement in that regard was usually split about half and half between Texas and Alabama just to see what sort of response I would get for each one. More often than not, when I said Texas, I would get "Hah hah! Texas Fried Chicken!" accompanied by an incredibly excited look on their face. I'd just smile and nod, assuming that they were confused with KFC, which is by far the most common fast food restaurant in SE Asia. As it turns out, up in Denpesar, Bali, (and other cities) there is a similar chain called Texas Fried Chicken. Fancy that. Their responses to the Alabama answer usually involve references to the song "Sweet Home Alabama", which has apparently achieved thorough world-wide fame -- the various members of Lynyrd Skynyrd probably had no idea at the time that it would be so widespread. To be fair, occasionally the responses to Alabama would include references to Forest Gump, but these were more often encountered when dealing with fellow travelers rather than locals -- and more often earning a grimace from me rather than a grin in response to the appraising look that usually followed their summoning of that particular cultural icon. Most would not fully appreciate the reference when I sometimes added with my best slow-Hanks "My momma always said that boy was a travelin' fool."

From Labuan Bajo I hopped on a boat that was to take in many of the sites between Flores and Lombok over the course of a four-day trip. There were seven other tourists on board, companions for the next four days on the boat where we would eat together and sleep on the deck -- punctuated by periodic stops for snorkeling or island excursions. The first stop was nearby Rinca, sister island and dragon habitat of Komodo. The dragons are mostly limited to these two islands, though they do make temporary and periodic forays over to neighboring islands. In the course of the trip we stopped at both islands, each of which are part of a national park set up to allow visitors sightings of the famed reptilian beasts. The setups are similar: the boat pulls up to a small dock where the passengers disembark, run a gauntlet of locals selling carved wooden dragon figurines, and stand in line while everyone fills out ludicrous amounts of personal information in the guest register. (This is where you would normally pay the park fee, good for both islands, but this was included in the boat trip for me.) There is a complex of huts where visitors can lodge for the night if they so choose; around these huts are some enormous lizards, sunning, slowly strolling, and giving the impression of being well-fed. I imagine these dragons around the complex generally are fed regularly from kitchen scraps, presumably, just to ensure that people do have a dragon sighting when they land on the island. After waiting interminably for the registration process, everyone departs on a safari walk led by one of the park rangers, on a two or three mile loop. Though the days are long gone (due to tourist outcry I believe) when regular scheduled feedings of a live goat to the dragons in a large earthen pit used to astonish stunned groups of tourists, there is still a steady population of dragons on the islands and plenty of opportunities for sightings.

A Komodo dragon sighting is a vivid experience. You can tell yourself that they are a huge lizard before seeing one, and have some familiarity with that abstract concept, but when you finally come face to face with one you can't help but redundantly and helplessly say "Damn, that's huge." The largest ones I saw, perhaps four or five I saw of this calibre, were over ten feet long and around three or four feet wide across the belly. They immediately invoked a fight or flight response in me, perhaps appealing to my ancient embedded reptilian brain deep within my skull, momentarily interrupting its steady administration of glands and heart rate. The feeling was only momentary, because I quickly noticed that these enormous lizards do not move very much -- at least not while they are sunning themselves. There is no doubt that they are aware and watching, despite the black reptilian eyes, because the head will slowly turn as the lizard keeps tabs on its surroundings. The eyes are open most of the time, but every now and then they will blink. Not a quick blink, but a slow, considered blink of constant and deliberate velocity that merely adds to that aura of them knowing you are there. The dragons are so big it makes you wonder if they can actually move, but they can indeed. Occasionally one would nimbly heft that bulk and casually, but slowly, execute that sinuous lizard-stroll where each fore leg is synchronized with the opposite hind leg as the body alternately arcs back and forth.

Apparently they can be quite fast, but not for great distances. When embattled they are quite adept at using their tail as a arcing whip-like club. The younger dragons, which look like a fairly typical monitor lizard, stay in the trees because their older, ground dwelling, relatives consider them just another snack. Even the mid-sized lizards have to be careful of being devoured -- I saw several missing lengths of tail, apparently sacrificed while fleeing a hungry cousin.

Also on the island are wild pigs, water buffalo, macaque monkeys, and all sorts of birds. All of these are preyed upon by the dragons, though only in scavenger mode for the larger animals. Both walks involved sections of thick jungle and dried streambeds, after which we would ascend into the surrounding grassy hills where we could gaze across the beautiful hills and canopy to the ocean below. I did see some wild pigs and plenty of macaques, but no water buffalo. I saw a megapode, the squatty black, orange-legged bird that digs out large earthen nests five or six feet in diameter, covered with rotting vegetation. This rotting vegetation generates enough heat to incubate the eggs. Dragons like these nests also because they can dig up some free snacks -- and occasionally leave eggs of their own. Another bird I spotted was a Green Imperial Pigeon which looks like an enormous green dove. The jungle on these islands is teeming with life; the Komodo dragons are a healthy and well-adapted piece of the tapestry.

Other excursions from the boat included several excellent snorkeling opportunities in the areas within the Komodo sea and off the north coast of Sumbawa. Some day I would like to return and properly visit Sumbawa, but I merely saw if from the sea on this trip. At night, after dinner, I would usually hang around up on the bow of the boat, stretched out under the absolutely brilliant stars, visible from horizon to horizon, sharing sips of arak and conversation with some of the other passengers.

One day after sunrise and breakfast we put in at Pulau Satonda, an island off the north coast of Sumbawa. Formed volcanically, the island is a big caldera surrounding a picturesque inland lake. The lake is not visible from the water or on the beach, but a small walk over a shorter portion of the caldera lip reveals the lake. Along the way I took a side trail to a viewpoint. At the viewpoint was a mostly decayed structure of some sort, an old shed or perhaps a roof over a picnic table at one point. As I was inspecting the structure I came face to face with an eerie reptilian head, green with orange spots, about the size of a goose egg. After a shocked double-take and realization that this was not a snake, I realized that I had finally spotted what had been a great mystery to me up until that point: a real gecko lizard. All of Indonesia is teeming with smaller 'geckos' (called onomatopoeically chuk chuks by the locals) that run rampant inside and out, feasting on mosquitoes and other insects. Though slightly different, these are similar to the geckos we see in America (in Texas, anyway) never more than about four inches longs. Strictly nocturnal, the real geckos are always heard but rarely seen -- and far larger. They sound like some sort of peculiar mellow-voiced bird at night and I had spent considerable time trying to spot one in the foliage. Then I randomly came face to face with one, in the morning, most unexpectedly on that small island. Bag another for the lizard watcher.

There were some fairly long and protracted moments on the boat where the diesel engines seemed to chug endlessly with no apparent destination in sight. These moments were spent reading, napping, chatting, or eating. We did get into some mischief from time to time -- one moment in particular stands out. Most of us were up on the bow for some breeze and sun, but one young Canadian was zonked out on the deck under the canopy. We noticed that he had to be in the midst of a wonderful dream, because he was pitching a pup tent big as you please. The obligatory snickering and mocking ensued, during which I urged his travel companion to fetch our sleeping friend's camera from his pack. With his own camera we thoroughly documented the scene, replaced the camera, and never mentioned the incident to him. I still wonder what expressions crossed his face as he flipped through that pile of photos -- or better yet, his family if he sent the film home.

The boat trip ended at Labuhan Lombok, on the east coast of Lombok. Disembarking was a bit chaotic since we had to walk with packs over about four other boats and narrow planks in order to get to the docks. At the docks awaited clusters of touts, bemo drivers, coup-counting ass grabbers, and various wharfside lowlifes. We forced our way through this crowd, alert for pickpockets (which is why I noticed and castigated the ass grabbers for targeting some of the women with us), and chartered a bus across the island. The highway along which we rode was more developed and populated than most of what I had seen on Flores -- the difference in wealth was obvious from the start. The feel is different as well; for one thing, cidomos ply the streets, these two-wheeled pony carts. The ponies are always gaily adorned with head dresses of colorful struts and tassels, even if the ponies themselves always seem pretty frothed. So observing the markets and bustling street activities, we rolled on through Mataram and eventually Sengiggi. Some of us were continuing on to Bali from Mataram, and some were headed to the Gili Islands by way of Sengiggi. I was intending to bag Ganung Rinjani, the tallest mountain and polestar of Lombok, which had been taunting me, visible above the clouds all the way from Sarawak. I headed to Sengiggi, one of the larger tourist havens on Lombok (along with the Gili Islands), in order to finalize my mountain plans.

Touts and hawkers tend to move in herds in Indonesia. By natural instinct they swarm from all over Indonesia towards tourist loci and remain there until dislodged by governmental fiat. Kuta, in Bali, used to be one of the worst areas until the government put the kibosh on hawking on the beach. The Gili Islands, I was to gratefully find out later, had similar laws passed. Sengiggi has no such shield and seems to be one of the areas where the hawkers have fled. I showed up in the relative off season in an area where the hawkers are hungry anyway due to the drop in tourist trade resulting from some armed holdups in 2000 along the Rinjani trekking circuit (the locals formed posses to apprehend the perpetrators, and now regularly patrol the area making it quite safe, but the damage to the tourist trade had already been done). I hardly ever had a moment of peace in what would otherwise be quite lovely Sengiggi due to the constant hassle of the touts and hawkers; it engendered a distinct atmosphere of unfriendliness in an area where nobody local says hello unless they have an angle. This is a shame (though I hear India and parts of Africa can be at least as bad or far worse in this regard). I lingered in Sengiggi for a few days, awaiting some like-minded companions with whom I could share the cost of a Rinjani trek. Eventually I teamed up with John, a young teacher from Norway. I was glad to leave Sengiggi and thrilled to be headed towards Ganung Rinjani.

We arose early with our "guide" for a sunrise ride up the coast to Senaru, a village on the slopes of Rinjani, in order to register at the ranger's office and pick up our porters. The first day was a hike up to the crater rim; the first part was over grassy meadows covering the undulating remains of old ash and mud flows from prior eruptions of the volcano. The last segment of the hike was very steep; after about eight hours of hiking we were up in the chill, amongst clouds that obscured whatever contents the sunset might have revealed in the crater itself. Along the way I determined that our "guide" did not know too much about the mountain we were on -- not only that, he was in terrible shape, at odds with the natural state of most Indonesians I'd met. This contrasts mightily with the porters -- we had two porters pacing us the whole way, carrying most of our supplies, and who knew perfectly well where they were and where they were going. Each porter had a stout bamboo pole with two bundles (one on each end), slung over one shoulder; each porter carried around sixty or seventy pounds this way and had no problem keeping up with us -- and they did it all in flip-flops while chain smoking cigarettes. Unbelievable. At the end of each day they would unload everything, set up tents, cook meals (even at lunch this involved building a fire), and pack it up afterwards.

We arose early the next morning at 3 a.m. for a shot at the sunrise on the peak. John opted out, claiming vertigo (Vertigo? On a mountain trek? Yeah -- attempted therapy, I think) and this was probably wise if the claims of vertigo were true. We followed the narrow crater rim up towards the peak for around three hours, in the cold and dark -- or at least, I did. I quickly outpaced my "guide" who ended up turning around at some point and going back to sleep down at camp. I caught up to another group and we slogged up the loose talus, moving slowly due to the altitude. Eventually we made it, exhausted and cold, just in time for an incredible sunrise that slowly revealed other nearby volcanoes, rugged terrain, beaches, seas, and neighboring islands. Rinjani is 3726 meters (12,216 feet), our hike having taken us from 1000 meters at the village. From its summit we could clearly see the highest peaks on both Bali and Sumbawa, west and east. Rinjani itself is amazing -- the crater is enormous and contains a large lake. In the center of this lake a new cinder cone is forming, a perfect conical mountain within the lake within the mountain. The play of shadows across all of this volcanic terrain was beautiful as the sun rose, and I rapidly finished the roll of film in my camera. With shivering hands I dug out my spare roll of film only to discover that the extra roll had already been used -- amateur mistake! I had no ego shot up on that wonderful peak and no more film! Nor did the three other people on the peak with me. A Canadian friend named Sean was kind enough to take a shot of me on the peak, crater and cinder cone in the background, and send a print home for me -- and for once, apparently, a traveler actually followed through on such a promise because the picture arrived. In exchange I will send a couple of my Indonesian money-shots that really capture (hopefully) some aspect of the country to Sean. Coming down from the peak was a blast -- like a pro skier in fresh powder, I leaped and jogged side-to-side down most of what was slow and exhausting talus on the way up. Once back at camp I entertained myself by feeding and socializing with a tribe of macaques that no doubt foraged for scraps on a regular basis around the heavily-used campsite.

After breakfast and a couple of glances at my sheepish guide, we set off into the crater itself, down to the shores of the lake. Here we found an itinerate community of fishermen who filter up from surrounding villages on fishing expeditions. Someone at some point stocked the lake with perch and carp -- the fish have thrived. Nearby where we stopped there was also a set of hot springs gurgling up from the interior of the volcano. I spent the rest of the day alternating between soaking in the hot springs and trying my hand at perch-jerking in the lake with a borrowed cane pole and tapioca as bait. The hot springs were surrounded by steep, green hills through which clouds from below streamed in the breeze and on which families of macaque monkeys prowled and caroused. To one side was the cold runoff from the lake, and to the other were the hot sulfur pools of the spring. One could easily flop between temperature extremes whilst admiring the surreal scenery. We feasted on fish that night (though I only caught some small perch, our porters were more successful). Yes. I ate carp. And it's true what they say, carp is very bony with tiny Y-shaped bones no matter how large the cut of meat, which tastes okay. I also ate fried carp eggs -- surprisingly they weren't that bad, tasting like cornbread sort of -- the texture, though, is sort of crumbly like twice-baked cornbread that has dried out a bit.

The next day we made the arduous climb up the opposite rim of the crater for more fantastic views of the surroundings, early enough so that the daily cloud cover was still at bay. The descent was pretty, but long, around eight hours. The landscape was different than the initial ascent, featuring lush and virgin rainforest full of monkeys and wonderful floral and fruity scents wafting through the trees from unidentified and mysterious jungle plants. What was that? A cure for cancer I just smelled? Nah, probably not, but such was the directions my mind wandered during the descent which eventually ended up in the fields and buildings of another slash-and-burn agricultural village, outside the confines of the national park. In this village, on the opposite side of the mountain, John and I caught our ride to the northwest coast and the famed Gili Islands.

We landed on Gili Trawangan, the largest of the three islands known redundantly as the "Gili Islands", which properly translated means "Island Islands", which on second thought might actually make sense considering that the Gilis are satellites of Lombok, which is itself an island. The Gilis are one of the few tourist hubs on Lombok, and they are little slices of paradise. Since hawking is disallowed on the islands and they are mostly populated by tourists, I had the distinct feeling of being in the Land of the Lotus Eaters. John and I split a bungalow and mellowed out. Lazy days of beaches, less lazy nights of excellent food and bar scenes. You can get a full red snapper over a foot long split and grilled before your eyes for around three bucks -- expensive by Indonesian standards, but well worth it to tourists such as myself. The bar scene was reminiscent of Kuta -- movies on big screen TV, unless you happen to be the bar where the roving nightly party resides. The roving party involves the thump-thump music and "Bali" boys trying to hit on Western women. For me, I think I was enjoying the access to a variety of foods most of all. There is plenty of scuba opportunities off of the islands but I did not take advantage of the diving since I was saving for Bali.

There was one disturbing incident while on the islands. One night I attended a beach laid-back party. The beach was quite comfortable that night and I ended up staying late, chatting with a friend from the boat over from Flores. Late that night, perhaps around 3 a.m., we began to see steady bursts of light on the far horizon. At first I thought it was lightning, but quickly realized that the consistent-sized spherical bursts of light were actually bombs or mortars going off in an attack on some far-away city. After an initial bout of anxiety when I thought I was facing west (which would indicate Jakarta, Bali seeming unlikely) I realized that I was facing east. Across Sumbawa, across Flores, across West Timor,I was witnessing an assault on some city in East Timor. The attack lasted for at least three hours as I stayed on the beach, morbidly fascinated. When the sun rose at dawn the skys were clear, except for an enormous dark plume of smoke rising from a city in flames. The smoke cloud rose high into the air, sheared off at the top by high atmospheric winds. The entire cloud took on a brilliant pink hue as the sun continued to rise. I went to sleep soon thereafter, and when I woke I immediatly hit the internet, searching all of the news sites for incidents in East Timor or thereabouts -- not a single reference, anywhere. I suppose that cities getting destroyed by bombs in East Timor simply is no longer newsworthy.

After several, mostly languid, days on Gili Trawangan I set into motion and caught the ferry to Bali (parting ways with John, who zipped up to Lovina) in order to check out potential diving sites and scoping out the towns so I would have my bearings once Susan arrived. After several days I ended up in Ubud, from where I based myself in order to pick up Susan from the airport in Denpasar.

After a bit of nervous anticipation I picked up Susan from the airport for a well-received and happy reunion; back in Ubud we spent the rest of the night (and much of the visit, for that matter) catching up on all that has transpired. Ubud is a pleasant town, center of the so-called "cultural" tourism in Bali where they focus more on traditional dance, handicrafts, and traditional shopping; this, opposed to the more typical Kuta-style party-hard surfer dude form of tourism. For a few days we checked out Ubud, shopping and haggling for jewelry mostly, interspersed with enjoying some of the fine dining that can be found in the town. We visited the Monkey Forest, a nearby area of jungle surrounding two small temples and full of hundreds of hyper and rapacious macaque monkeys. The monkeys are revered, if not quite worshiped, in this forest and form some part of the focus of two temples. They are a little too pampered, I think -- one hint of foodstuffs on your person and the scene rapidly transforms from serene monkey forest to some twisted scene from The Birds where the persistent, cute monkeys suddenly take on a more ominous and creepy attitude, meanacingly demonstrating that they know exactly where the snacks are hidden. Unfortunately these were not the delightful and entertaining sort of macaques I encountered up on Rinjani; I fear Susan might have acquired a low opinion of macaques after that. Monkeys aside, the forest was very beautiful and we hiked down several trails down into the lush gullies where streams gurgled through well-worn rock crevasses down amongst the roots, loam, and foliage.

The second night in Ubud we checked out one of the traditional Balinese dance performances, one of the more popular ones about Barong and Rangda. It's a pretty straightforward good vs. evil story involving kings and soldiers being manipulated by the good, but mischievous, Barong, and the evil witch-lady-monster Rangda. The Barong is played by two people and looks like a shaggy dragon/lion combination. The dance was very eye-catching, particularly the part where the minions of Rangda, a group of masked women, let loose their routine. I kept watching the drummer, though. Some of the rhythms he was pounding out on his double-headed drum were amazing; the rest of the jangly but melodic music was provided by a sizeable gamelan orchestra.

Bali is famous for their 'Balinese Smoked Duck' (plucked from the many duck parades that ply the surrounding rice paddies) which we feasted on later that night. I had enjoyed a particular local restaurant before (as it turns out, with Derrin and Lucy from Komodo diving, the boat ride, and on Gili Trawangan) and had been hankering for some of that luscious smoked duck, on their recommendation. The restaurants that offer the dish typically request that you order it twenty-four hours in advance since they smoke it for twelve hours. That duck was succulent and fantastic, and our toes only curled further when we tried out black rice pudding for dessert. I'd never seen black rice, before -- the uncooked grains are black, or dark purple anyway -- but this concoction is wonderful. It's cooked in coconut cream and has a texture not unlike porridge, served sweet. Ah!

After more shopping, eating, and wandering around in Ubud we headed out to the coastal town of Padangbai -- the same port town in which I landed off of the ferry from Lombok. Padangbai, despite being a port town, is relatively quiet despite numerous nearby attractions. It is primarily a fishing village centered around a small curved beach onto which the local and colorful fishing boats are pulled each day. There are two rocky headlands surrounding this small bay; on either side of the headlands are small, secluded white sand beaches where the few tourists in town tend to congregate for catching rays. These beaches have warungs (food shanties) set up on the beach and sell simple food and drink to the beachcombers. We immediately headed for one of these beaches for some sunning. Outside of these white sand coves, at least to the south, the beaches dramatically turn into long, black sand beaches. We visited one of these black sand beaches for a while; the problem with black sand beaches, as neat as they are, is that they get hot and are not very suitable for lolling about. That day we had walked to the black beach along the road, but decided to try and skirt the coastal headland to get back to the white beach cove from the day before. This was a great call; along the way we walked across and studied some amazing lava flows and tubes. Based on the radial pattern of some of the formations, Susan said that the flows probably formed beneath water where lava will blossom out into large alternating cracking and expanding polyps. There were other striking mineral formations in the black lava, white veins of some sort that varied in width and heterogeneity based on how quickly the fresh lava cooled during formation. In all of this there were obvious lava tubes and, more visibly, blowholes and surging exhaust vents from waves crashing under the formations and our feet. It was an extremely interesting walk, though hot, and we made it finally back to the white beach for more sunning.

One of the main points in going to Padangbai, other than the beaches, was that it could also be used as a base of operations for diving excursions over by Ahmed. We signed up with Gecko, the local dive honchos, for a trip the next morning out to the U.S.S. Liberty, a cargo vessel sunk by the Japanese right off of the coast of Bali during WWII. The beach near the wreck is formed of smooth, fist-sized black stones that gurgle and click as each wave gently rolls in. Directly from this beach we headed out to the wreck itself, which begins a mere sixty yards off shore. This was Susan's first dive since she was certified; our dive master was taking things very easy and did a wonderful job. Along the way we fed some bananas to the fish in an amazing display of frenzy and greed that nearly reminded me of Monkey Forest. The Liberty was a pretty big cargo ship; the divable portion is the stern, which from only around twenty feet deep stretches down beyond 150 feet. We only went down to around eighty-five feet along the eerie remains. There is lots of topography to explore on the wreck which serves as host to all sorts of fish and reef life; we gave it a good look even though it's a big enough wreck to require at least two dives for full exploration. After the dive we had lunch and did a nearby wall dive with even more reef life. We followed a bluewater traverse out to the wall itself, and in the wide blue we saw schools of jackfish and tuna cruising -- indicated mostly by the simultaneous darting burst every fish in the vicinity performed each time one of these predatory schools came near. The wall was a healthy wall with diverse life -- Susan was particularly jubilant to see a beautiful moray eel. Both dives went off without a hitch, a wonderful outing for us both. That night we fraternized with the jocular Bob, owner of the dive shop, who was kind enough to invite us to a local (and I mean local) favorite restaurant where we dined on some absolutely incredibly succulent marinated beef roast -- maddeningly enough the name of the dish escapes me, though I still have sweet dreams about the flavor.

After Padangbai we headed back to Ubud so that we could hook up with a local acquaintance, Pico, whom I had initially met my first time through Ubud. I drafted Pico into taking Susan and I of a quick tour of some of the volcanoes, temples, and rice paddies of the central mountainous region of Bali. Between the two volcanoes Ganung Batur and Ganung Abong is a truly monstrous crater partly filled with a huge crescent lake. Down through this crater we drove, agog at calamities that must have once been, and out along the rim. We toured an enormous temple at the base of Abong, an impressive multi-level example of the Balinese temple (but unfortunately very touristy and infested with self-described and deceiving local "guardians" who refuse to call themselves "guides who foist their unwanted services on you because you don't know what to expect and then berate you when your 'voluntary' contribution is not as much as what they were hoping for"). Afterwards we had an enjoyable drive through the countryside of the region, spying on rice paddies and scenic vistas before returning to Ubud.

We then set out to Sanur, another beach scene in southern Bali. It's a very different atmosphere from, say, Kuta. The crowd here seems a bit more tame, older but not old, gaudy in dress (probably Australian), and certainly borrowing from the cruise-ship mentality. Sanur itself is pleasant enough, with plenty of good deals on resorts and beach lodgings. A long beach walk stretches down the length of the town, providing seaside dining and bands of questionable skills. Most of the time in Sanur we spent lazing about, doing nothing in particular but enjoying ourselves. The Sanur surf is curious; a significant reef lies about a half a mile off the coast which keeps the waves pretty calm. During the broad tidal flux, the area of water between shore and this reef becomes a shallow pond, stranding boats in the sand close to shore. One night we darted across to the west side of the peninsula for the famed seaside dining and sunsets of Jimbaran. The day was overcast, so the sunset was not as spectacular as one might hope, but the seafood was top notch. After selecting our two fat snapper from the ice we sat down at a table out on the sand of the beach. The grilled snapper was presented to us with an impressive spread of accoutrements on which we stuffed ourselves. It was hands down some of the best red snapper I've ever had.

The next day or so was very mellow, no doubt the impending end of Susan's vacation weighing heavily on both of our minds. We were both very sad when I dropped her off at the airport later that evening. It was a wonderful and enjoyable visit, the end of which left me wobbling.

I had one more day before my flight to Singapore. I headed back to where I started in Indonesia, Kuta. It was very strange returning there; for one thing, tourist season had started to pick up and it was far, far more crowded than when I first arrived there. In addition, after two months I felt old-hat at the whole Indonesian thing. Kuta seemed less interesting, fake, and familiar all at once. I watched a movie in one of the bars (Snatch, very good, extremely entertaining), and headed out to the airport the next day. Unfortunately I had made a miscalculation and had stayed 61 days rather than 60 days as was allowed on my visa: as a most rude 'thank you' for staying and spending money in their country, the immigration official was kind enough to bilk me for twenty U.S. dollars -- a very expensive day in Indonesia to be sure. I was in a mood to raise holy hell since I knew this troll was not charging me the official fine, if any, but I swallowed my bile, forked over the dough, concentrated on all the wonderful experiences I'd had in Indonesia, and hopped on a plane to Singapore.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Things slightly improve in Lombok and Bali, as opposed to Flores. The everpresent Bintang, the only option in Flores, is of course still well represented in isles west. In addition there is the questionable cheap and too sweet lager Bali Hai. But in a blinding burst of twilight in this beer-forsaken part of the world, there is the somewhat functional lager Anker. Perhaps I have gone through withdrawal and my taster is unduly influenced by lack of quality -- perhaps this is why I found Anker somewhat appealing. But Susan, whose taster has not been ravaged like mine, seemed to agree that Anker was a somewhat functional lager, at best, and the lesser of three evils, at worst.

Editor's note: Yes, the timeliness of my postings has suffered, lately, but it is mostly due to steady encounters with friends or lack of an affordable net drop. Fear not.

Till next time, where I will describe adventuring in Singapore and Malaysia, brachiating from friend to friend.

Matt

When I arrived in Bali, I experienced an immediate sense of having "gone third world", however, this was nothing compared to Flores. Bali has an extremely well developed tourist infrastructure. Even though it was not high season, there were plenty of other tourists in the area. I went to Kuta, famous as a tourist beach nexus, full of surfers, sightseers, revelers, and most of all, hawkers. Like the famous rave beach scenes of Thailand, it is now fashionable in the backpacker circuit to speak disparagingly of Kuta and its excesses. Nevertheless, most travelers end up passing through Kuta at least for a while, because -- well, its Kuta. That's what you do. So I spent a few days in Kuta, formulating a game plan for the rest of my visit to Indonesia. These days were mostly spent wandering around the shops and the beach or sitting in the numerous bars and restaurants watching movies. This last is one of the more common activities in Kuta, especially in the evenings, sitting around watching movies on big screen TV whilst enjoying a meal and a beer (or several). The movies in question are very recent pirated versions of the current offerings from Hollywood, mostly in the action and comedy genres. For a change of pace you can sit in Tubes bar and watch surfing carnage on big screen TV. For live entertainment, you can usually find bands playing reggae or rock music, Indonesian style, or you can sit in the numerous clubs and watch the Bali Boys (or Kuta Cowboys, as they're sometimes called) dance in the vicinity of Western women. For the truly motivated, you can actually get up and dance, but this requires energy that has often been baked away by sun and beer.

One of my immediate projects was to get my hands on some Balinese fruit, of which there is ample variety that most Westerners have never seen. A couple of my favorites were the manggis (or mangosteen) and the salak. The manggis has a thick red rind, more pointed on one end, that tears easily as you twist it apart to reveal soft white segments of fruit that look like big fat grub worms. Popping them into your mouth is something of an epiphany, for they are sweet and floral, and I just don't have any sort of fruit analogy for the flavor. They are extremely tasty. The salak is a different sort of experience. It has a thin brown peel that looks like snakeskin. Peeling this off with your fingers reveals several white segments, but firm, like a soft nut. These segments, the largest one or two of which have a pit in the middle, have the texture of a water chestnut, but taste like a cross between an apple and a pineapple. Mmmm.

So I made the decision to fly to my easternmost destination and work my way back to Bali -- in this way I could avoid getting stranded by unreliable travel schedules and end up missing my rendezvous in Bali with Susan. Off I went, casually correlating islands outside of my plane window with those on my map, wondering what I would find in Flores.

Flores could not be more different than Bali (particularly tourist havens like Kuta). For one thing, it lies on the other side of the Wallace Line, the imaginary dividing line between Asian and Australian flora and fauna in the Malay Archipelego. West of this line, the flora and fauna are very much like those found in Asia, whereas east of this line the plants and critters are more related to those found in Australia. The line passes between Bali and Lombok. The weather in the eastern islands is hot and dry as a result of the blast of winds they receive from Australia.

Furthermore, Flores is very poor economically. This volcanic island supports itself primarily through agriculture, fishing, handcrafts and small scale mining. Without the tourist trade to support it, however, it has been fully exposed to the economic troubles that have ravaged most of Indonesia. It is very diverse culturally, with five distinct linguistic and cultural regions separated by the rugged volcanic terrain as you head east and west. Animism still runs strong and deep with the people; even though technically they are about 50% Christian and 50% Muslim in Flores, these religions are welded onto the old animistic beliefs in many areas. In colonial days Flores was controlled by the Portuguese, and then by the Dutch, right up until Indonesia declared independence after WWII. Four years later the Dutch were convinced by the rest of the world to recognize that independence.

So I landed in Maumere, feeling pretty disoriented, and situated myself in a simple hotel. I spent a couple of days taking care of bank business and simply absorbing the vibe of the place. My first impression was that Maumere was sort of beat down, dusty, and ratty, even correcting for the third world norm. For the largest city on Flores, it seemed like it should be just a bit nicer, and I eventually found out why this is so. In 1992 an earthquake of magnitude 7.8 hit just 35 km (21.7 miles) off of the coast of Flores where Maumere was situated. The earthquake itself leveled nearly 90% of the buildings in Maumere. To add insult to injury, a series of tsunamis soon followed. The waves were reported to be as high as 25 meters (80 feet) with an eventual run-up of 20 meters (65.6 feet). Maumere was, for the most part, completely destroyed. The buildings there today are rather hastily constructed concrete boxes -- functional, but uninspiring.

In Bali (and Lombok) tourists are usually under a constant barrage from hawkers selling anything and everything (Transport? Transport? Hello friend. Transport? Hello? Excuse me. Transport? Hello?). In Flores, thankfully, this constant annoyance from hawkers is mitigated to nonexistent, mostly because it hasn't occurred to them (to be fair, this is more directly due to the fact that there are hardly any tourists). Instead, there is the more benign annoyance of honestly curious locals wanting to hone their English skills. By far the most prevalent symptom of this is a constant hail of "Hello Mister!" (regardless of your sex) from nearly everyone you pass on the street. Most, especially younger kids, expect a response -- a wave, a hello, something. If they don't get it they will get louder and more persistent in their friendly greeting, saying it over and over. With a group of children this can be downright unbearable, because a simple hello to the whole group will not suffice -- if one child gets a response, then each child will expect their own response, and the cacophony of "hello misters" will not die down until you either acknowledge each one with a wave or hello or eventually get out of earshot. Once they get a response, for their collection I guess, they beam with a broad smile and run off laughing -- if your lucky and they don't decide to try again. Sometimes, depending on the region, you might get "hello miss" instead of mister, or even "hello mistess" with some of the more confused younger children. Every now and then someone will try out a bit of slang they're overheard, and say something like "hi guys" even if you are walking alone. The adults will say "hello mister", also, but then proceed to practice their English -- of which they usually know about three or four phrases. These 'conversations', like a script, would invariably consist of "Hello mister", "What is your name", and "Where are you going?" This last one can be particularly irritating, because they really are just being friendly and the typical Western reaction is along the lines of "none of your damn business." Since they don't know that the question is sort of personal, my typical responses that were bound to confound and mystify, were "hither and yon" or, more simply, "this way". Traveling in this region requires extra energy to constantly deal with the curious locals while staying serene. Their curiosity and persistence can be sort of charming at first, but after a month of traveling and going through the ritual hundreds of times a day, it can wear pretty thin. Towards the end of the Flores trip I had to repeat the mantra "they are only being polite" constantly when walking down streets and grinding my teeth with a smile.

There are scads of motorcycles in Indonesia, and many times these conversation rituals would take place with someone who pulls up on a motorcycle. One of these times I was shocked when a man broke the script and started asking articulate questions about how I was enjoying Flores, etc. As it turns out, he is an English teacher and was excited that I was a native speaker of American English (Americans are pretty few and far between in Indonesia, especially throughout East Nusa Tenggara). He wanted to know if I would come "interact" with his English students so they could hear the real thing. This sounded interesting enough, so in a diplomatic mood I agreed. Later that day he picked me up, and perched on the back of his motorcycle, weaving in and out of kamakaze traffic, we headed off to the classroom. I think it was private lessons, because the classroom was off to the side of a local house, and there were only six students, maybe 14 years old or so. I was envisioning sitting off to the side while they had their lesson, occasionally stepping in to clarify or answer questions. Instead, we assembled in the classroom and the teacher handed me a dry-erase marker and said "Okay, you may start", after which he sat off to the side, silent. I stood there regarding the six silent students in front of me and the dry erase board, and delivered my first bit of genuine American English to my eager pupils: "Uh..." It turned out okay, though. After scratching my head a bit, I introduced myself, learned their names, asked about their hobbies, and drew a map of North America on the board and talked about various bits and pieces of American geography, sights, and bits they might have heard about. Before I knew it, around two hours had passed and class was over. Though it wasn't quite what I expected, it was a good experience over all.

I did not travel to any of the nearby seaside 'resorts' near Maumere, nor did I travel any further east into the smaller islands between Flores and Timor where traditional fishermen still hunt whales with harpoons out of small boats. After my brief stay, I instead headed west to the mountain village of Moni, thereby obtaining my first taste of public transport on Flores. As a tourist, there are essentially two ways of getting around the island short of bringing your own wheels: hiring a car and driver, or taking the public buses. You can hire the car and driver (fairly cheap by Western standards, but extremely costly by Flores standards) which will take you to the various major sites across the island in a few days, but in doing so you miss taking your time and getting a real feeling for local life. I opted for the buses, but was not sure what to expect. Along with a German friend I met in town, we hopped on the bus to Moni.

For short distances, such as within towns and between villages, people usually take little mini-buses called bemos. For more remote villages, many times it is a big Mitsubishi diesel truck, sort of a big flatbed with a roof and wooden slats forming rows of benches from front to back. But on the major routes there are public buses that are designed to sit about thirty people, but more typically transport more like fifty very crowded people, sitting in aisles, laps, hanging on the sides and back, and sitting on the roof along with all luggage, produce, pigs, goats, chickens, buckets of fish, and anything else that looks like it could conceivably fit on the bus. The buses are hot, the suspension is terrible, and the roads are invariably full of pits and damage from the last wet season. Whether it is a bemo or bus, there is an ear-splitting stereo turned up as loudly as possible, and always a couple of bus jockeys that ride along with the driver, taking care of securing luggage on the roof and collecting fares. The bus jockeys always hang outside the open side door (this door opens like on a school bus) or ride on the roof, and are in incredible shape. Indonesians in general are very lean and fit, and after one look at the bulging veins on the forearms of the jockeys you might assume they are rock climbers. They might as well be, because even when the bus is going full speed through slapping vegetation and bouncing potholes, the bus jockeys can be seen scrambling up and down from the roof of the bus, on the back, and back and forth through the side door. They aren't alone -- the locals have no problems engaging in this sort of bus wrangling, either. If the bus is full (and here I mean full by Indonesian standards, which is at least double what a typical Westerner would assume is full) then the locals scramble onto the top or hang off of the back. Usually there are a group of roof riders up there anyway, that simply prefer it to the stuffy inner compartment which is crammed full of sweaty people, clucking chickens, and the occasional weak stomach emptying its contents into a bag or onto a backpack. The locals are nonplussed by all of this -- they are cordial and friendly throughout such a trip, and I never once saw anyone get angry. At the same time, they don't seem very proactive in solving or informing people of problems. One ride in particular there was a load of fish on top, in buckets full of bloody gut water. One of the buckets kept sloshing on every bump and the resulting runoff would pour down the opening for the side door -- there are always at least four people standing and hanging from that door. One by one, people would realize that fish guts were pouring down their necks under their shirts, and would swiftly relocate either somewhere in the crowded bus or up on the roof. New people would hop on the bus, and seeing that the coveted door space was available would repeat the process -- nobody would warn them. Eventually some bright spark had the astonishing notion of closing the door, but this was only because when the door space was unoccupied the fish juice tended to get sucked in onto everyone else by the draft.

So I arrived in Moni, a charming little mountain village that was thankfully more cool than the lower coastal towns. Indonesia is hot and very humid, especially in between the wet and dry seasons. Villages and towns in Flores share many characteristics. The roads are not always paved, and other than the main street are usually either dirt or merely a path. Goats are mostly staked for grazing all over either side of the byways, but sometimes run around loose. Chickens are everywhere, almost always running rampant. How they sort out the ownership or even find their individual animals is beyond me. An hour-long non-ceasing chorus of roosters crowing greets you every dawn. There are lush gardens and trees in every available space, which rapidly diminish to scrub or bamboo outside of the village. Open air drainage ditches follow all main roads, and this includes all sorts of waste, although human waste is often deposited into septic tanks. Most things that can burn are burned outside individual dwellings for disposal. Villages and towns don't exactly stink, but the smell of rotting or burning vegetation is ever present. In general, despite swept dirt floors and dusty or muddy appearances in the streets, the towns and villages are very clean, and it is never difficult to tell the difference between an aqueduct (for say, bathing or the source of boiled drinking water) and a drainage ditch. In towns and larger villages, it is just as likely to encounter spotless floors surfaced with large, white tiles. Packed dirt floors aren't really dirty since they are swept several times a day. There are abundant geckos crawling over all walls and ceilings, particularly around lights. Geckos are good; besides being cool lizards, they eat mosquitoes.

Moni, an overgrown village but not quite a town, is the gateway to what is perhaps the most popular tourist destination in Flores: Kelimutu, a volcano with a triple crater and as many colorful lakes within each crater. Each crater has a lake, all of which have a habit of changing colors over the years. Currently there is a bright turquoise lake, a deep rusty red brown lake, and a black lake. The typical thing to do is get up early, take a truck ride up to the lakes, and watch the sunrise. This is exactly what I did, despite the fact that the truck driver seems to have a monopoly on the practice and overcharges. The sunrise was spectacular, revealing the rugged terrain of Flores and gradually illuminating the crater lakes. Of the lakes, the turquoise one is by far the most beautiful. I stayed behind when the truck returned so I could hike around the rim of the lakes and up to the summit of the volcano. Afterwards I walked several miles down the mountain through some of the local villages, back to Moni.

The other main attractions here are traditional dance and the surrounding villages where a distinct form of ikat weaving is produced. Ikat is a fascinating weaving technique where the threads of the warp (not weft) are tie-dyed before they are arranged in the loom and woven. Each area of Flores has its own style of this weaving, represented by the colors and patterns employed. These days the hand woven sarongs take over a month to produce, and you can see women working the looms in the villages you visit. As it turns out, the ikat from the Ende/Moni region is what I liked best -- eventually, I picked up a sarong that was produced in this region.

One night in Moni I watched the local dance performance which showcases some of the traditional dance forms for the area. The dances were mostly characterizations about the various acts of dealing with the harvest and warfare. I found myself particularly interested in the music. Very rhythmic, but sort of jangly in a chaotic way at the same time with bells, drums, and gongs. One dance I found particularly impressive involved two dancers and four people operating long bamboo poles. Each bamboo handler would have the end of a pole in each hand, the other ends held by their partner. The poles were then arranged in a cross pattern (+). To the music all the poles would bang on the ground, twice touching together lengthwise and twice about a foot apart. While one set of poles was together, the other set was apart. In this arrangement, the two dancers performed an intricate, rotating stomp dance in and out of the gaps in the poles. The cadence increased to such a tempo that I completely lost track of whose feet were where at any given moment, and they somehow managed to evade the poles. Impressive coordination.

Later that night I bumped into a Belgian friend whom I had met walking down from Kelimutu. He was hamming it up with some locals in the middle of the dirt road, so I stopped and chatted. Turns out they were drinking arak, the distilled version of tuak, or cidery-tasting palm wine from the sap of certain types of palm trees. Arak is different no matter where you have it, and in this case it was pretty tasty either straight or mixed with 7-Up. A couple of other friends showed up, and eventually we all piled into the bungalow of one of the locals where we sat around on the floor listening to music and drinking arak. The locals did not speak to much English, but a good time was had by all. It was sort of surreal, sitting around and talking in broken English and Indonesian listening to a bizarre combination of Bob Marley and some terrible Best of Kenney Rodgers compilation. Kenney Rodgers did some horrid covers back in the late 70's where he must have been trying to break into the pop market. The locals thought it was fantastic; even though I am a bit of Kenney Rodgers fan I could certainly do without this phase of his career. Musically speaking, most all of Indonesia loves reggae and Bob Marley in particular. Beyond that, especially in the bemos and buses, you see rampant evidence of fandom for Brittany Spears and Shaniah Twain -- whether it is blasting through the speakers or plastered on the walls in the form of posters.

My lodgings in Moni were very basic -- just a room, a bed with mosquito net, and a mandi. The mandi is everywhere in Indonesia, and is just a squat-style toilet (sometimes a Western-style toilet), a big basin of water, and a scoop for the water. The water is used to wash waste down the toilet (even if it's Western-style, which can be irritating), as well as for bathing nearby. The mandi is designed for splashing around, with a floor drain, so you stand there and scoop water out of the basin onto yourself for a bath. In mountain towns such as Moni this can be very cold water; I think it takes a bit more will power to dump ice cold water over yourself as opposed to step forward into an ice cold shower. In the lower elevations the water is much warmer. There was a deck out front overlooking a green valley, where I spent plenty of time reading. Most everywhere in Indonesia includes breakfast with the cost of the room, and this is usually something simple like fried bananas or a banana pancake. This place also offered buffet-style dinners of spicy Indonesian fare: lots of rice, sauteed vegetables, potatoes in various forms, fried bits of chicken, and fish (seafood is always overcooked, whether grilled or fried). It doesn't bust new ground in world cuisine, but it's pretty good, especially when prepared at a home. At restaurants (rumah makans, or warungs on the street) the fare tends more towards Javanese or Chinese styles.

So after Moni I came down out of the mountains to Ende for a night, mainly to try and use the extremely slow internet connection I had heard was in the local post office. Ende is a larger town, and I spent some time wandering around the foodstuffs and markets. It was one of the first towns I encountered where the mosque blared out the periodic call to prayer for the area Muslims. After Ende I headed up to another mountain town by the name of Bajawa. Bajawa is in the Ngada region of Flores, and is well known for its area villages, volcanoes, and hot springs. While in Moni my German friend had told me about a guide in the area named Philipus who spoke English well and was a very informative fellow. I bumped into Philipus almost immediately at my chosen hotel, which is really not such a coincidence since hotels are where guides look for clients. I lined up a tour of some area villages for the next day.

We visited four villages in the area, plus one megalith site where one of the villages used to be. The villages of the Ngada all have a distinct layout, comprised of opposing rows of bamboo and thatch-roofed huts on either side of a broad courtyard -- the number of these huts depends on the number of clans in the village, and is a set number. In the courtyard are stone altars that serve as meeting places and for sacrificial ceremonies that almost always involve one or more animals (buffalo, pigs) getting their throats cut. Also in this courtyard are sets of totem poles (topped with a thatched conical roof) and miniature huts. There is one pole and hut for the male and female aspects of their traditions. The huts on either side, that people live in, have a distinct roof that begins like a normal roof and then turns into a steeper, tall roof, which in turn is topped by either a little house (birdhouse sized) or a man holding a spear. The shape of these roofs are due to the fact that each hut has a 'spirit house' room in the middle -- a house in a house -- with a fireplace, bed, decorations, etc. The spirit house has a tiny opening and a very high roof, and this is where the Ngada believe their ancestors live. The spirit houses are very well tended, and also tend to have little shrines with portraits of Jesus near the doorway. By making it a holy place as well, conflicts with the tenets of Christianity can apparently be avoided. There is no doubt that they believe the spirits of their ancestors live in these houses, though. If a particular person was bad, or evil, breaking the various codes of conduct the Ngada have, then it is believed they will forever wander around the village, lost. People claim that sometimes they will see a cat change into a monkey, for example, and this is a spirit wandering around restless because they were denied entry into the peaceful confines of the spirit house.

The Ngada are an interesting sort. They are matrilineal and matriarchal, so the power rests in the hands of the women, and all property and inheritance goes through the female lines. In this, they are unique on Flores. Men join the clan of their wives, and can have more than one wife (I don't know what clan they are if different wives are in different clans). Women can marry more than once, but never more than one man at the same time. However, only women can end a marriage in divorce. When they do this, the women keep the kids and all property. There is also a class system involved that dictates who can marry who and what class the children will be, but it is cyclical and complex. Interestingly, my guide Philip married a woman from outside of the Ngada region, from a patrilineal people up north. As a result, since neither of them will inherit anything from their parents, they have had to strike out on their own and build new lives from scratch (Philip did, however, have to pay the expensive bride price of two buffaloes and four or five pigs, a way of ensuring that prospective husbands can indeed provide for themselves and their family).

So in these villages I met with several of the village leaders (women) and some of the wise women. With some of the wise women I sat and chewed betel nut, quite popular in Flores, especially with the older generation. Betel nut is wrapped in a spicy green leaf, along with lime from ground up coral, and the whole mixture turns bright red and sort of tingles on the gums. It's supposed to give you a bit of a pick-me-up, but I didn't really notice anything. Many of the old folks will tell you it's for the teeth, despite having very few, and I finally figured out that it helps ease gum pain. Numerous old folks, women in particular, can be seen everywhere, chewing away with bright red teeth and finger tips. Personally, I liked the spiciness of the leaf, but the mixture was sort of bland like chewing on bark. Betel nut is often used in greeting when you visit the head of a village, and it's considered very impolite if you refuse any that is offered (you don't have to chew it, just accept it). Likewise, many of the villages expect an offering from you, but as a westerner these days its usually okay to offer cigarettes or a small donation to the village head.

Some of the villages we visited were over 800 years old, and that was measuring from the time they moved from older sites up on hills. We visited one of these sites, or megaliths. Back in the old days they used to make the altars with huge slabs of stones, huge platforms surrounded by vertical slabs of rock as tall as a man. Some of these were simply too heavy to move to the new locations, so were left at the old site (one presumes that they forgot how they moved them in the first place). The old sites are often still used on special occasions, but in general the 'newer' villages do not have altars that are as big and elaborate. As I said earlier, the number of huts in the village is limited by the number of clans. When the population grows too large, they move to a new place outside of the village. They are always part of that clan, however, and return to the original hut for special festivals, gatherings, ceremonies, and celebrations.

At one point during the day, Philip took me to the head of a valley near the base of massive Garung Inerie, near his home village of Langa, where there was an astonishing view. On the left was the towering, perfect cone of Inerie, 2245 meters (7400 ft) high, and on the left was the craggy, plush green peaks and plummets of Langa Hill. In these volcanic regions the rock and formations are often quite new and have not had a chance to erode significantly. So the hills are very steep, but also very green as the jungle covers every available surface. Looking at this hill on the right, and the descending valley to the sea below, I was struck by how crazy the hills looked. It really reminded me of the hills that Dr. Seuss used in illustrating his books, all very improbable looking.

As we were walking back through a bamboo forest, I had a funny conversation with Philip. He made an observation about how smart the area monkeys were. He noted how when you were hunting them, carrying a gun, that they were extremely difficult to spot, but when you were just strolling along, not hunting, then they were just everywhere. I looked at him and said "Hunting monkeys? You mean, to eat?" to which he responded "Yes, of course!" Looking perplexed, I said "What does monkey taste like???" He stood there and thought a moment, then said "Sort of like dog." I'm sure my jaw dropped, and I said "Dog? I've never had dog! What does dog taste like?" After a longer pause, Philip said "Hmmmm, maybe like horse?" At this point I gave up. I said "Oh..." and nodded sagely as if that answered my question. On a related point, these days you don't see too many dogs on Flores. There used to be tons, four or five per home, and as Philip noted above they were also a popular food item. But a few years ago there was a huge rabies epidemic in the dogs, and they were mostly killed to stop the rabies. On a not-so-related point, cats are quite common, but they all have bobbed or mangled tails -- this is deliberately done to all cats, for good luck.

The next day I roped three other tourists (two Swiss, one English) into going with Phillip and myself up to Garung Inelike, an area volcano that last erupted in January 2001. No other guides were taking people up this volcano, but I had heard through my German friend in Moni that Phillip was taking people. We were the fourth (tourist) group to go up since its eruption, and the first that was able to get down into the crater since the mud had dried out enough in the sun. Inelike is 1700 meters high (5600 feet) with its own crater lakes. There is no trail to the top, so Philip's guidance was well appreciated. The hike is rugged and steep, and we were feeling pretty good about getting to the top until we noticed some local girls from the village had caught up to us -- in bare feet. Ah well, that put us in our place. The crater was impressive, though not as big as Kelimutu -- evidence of the last eruption was abundant. Everything was gray and ashen; any trees left standing were mere skeletons coated with the same brush. The lakes were a brilliant rusty red-orange (like Kelimutu these have been changing colors, from blue-green to golden yellow, to red), and smells of sulfur abounded. We scrambled down into the crater, closer to the lakes, and had a good look into the chasm from which the last eruption emerged.

Afterwards we visited some nearby hot springs that were simply wonderful. These sulfur springs gurgle up at an impressive rate, and after swirling in a large pool descend with rapids into a cool stream about fifty yards below. At this junction there are smooth rocks with deep furrows in them where you can flop around and find the perfect temperature you need. I have been swimming under rapids before, but I must say this is the first time I've been swimming in rapids that feel like hot bathwater. Overhead were lush palms and banyan trees, and the whole scene was incredibly relaxing. Afterwards we wrapped up the day with a visit to an evening market, bustling with people selling all sorts of produce, fish, animals, and crafts.

During all of this Philip had invited me to come stay at his place if I was interested in getting a taste for what its like to live the local life. I agreed, and the next day I headed out to Langa village. There is a traditional Langa village, but Philip lives in one of the areas where people move when the original village gets too crowded. So where he lived was more modern than the traditional villages, but still very basic. He was in the process of rebuilding his house, and only about half of it was complete. It was dirt floors and a basic bed, and upstairs (more like up a ramp) there was an area without walls that he was in the process of closing up. It was sort of nice without the walls, though, because I could see the nearby perfect towering cone of Garung Ineria and pick up a pleasant breeze from down the valley. Outside the main structure he had an outdoor mandi (woven reed walls) and a simple outdoor kitchen with a cooking fire. Living with him was his wife, and visiting were two sisters and two nephews. Day to day life was very pleasant at Philip's place. I stayed for five days, eating all meals there. We would eat in the kitchen, squatting around the cooking fire, and the food was just awesome. There was lots of rice, of course, along with vegetables from their garden (carrots, cucumbers, and numerous others that I couldn't identify). Typically the vegetables were boiled and served as a wonderfully tasty soup made from squeezed coconut shavings (santan) and spiced up with these deadly little red chili peppers that grow all over Flores. There was usually fried eggs, and lots of fish. Fish of a variety of smallish sizes, from finger-sized to maybe six inches long, invariably cooked whole. The little fish were actually quite tasty, the bones being small enough to just chew up. The larger ones took a little work (especially avoiding the guts), but were always tasty after having been grilled over coconut husks. Sometimes there were other treats, such as little triangular sweet cornmeal delights wrapped in banana leaves (though you don't eat the leaves). Things were always liberally spiced with peppers, onions, and garlic, ground up on a stone mortar and pestle. They fed me extremely well, and in between meals I snacked on fruits from the variety of fruit trees that could be found about the place. I read a lot sitting upstairs, and would occasionally go out and play ball with the "hello misters" that lived in the village. The nearby church was holding choir and dance sessions for the kids, and I could usually either hear drifting bits of song or music from the dance practices.

Indonesian children are world-class criers, and Philip's nephews were top of their class. They would usually enjoy about four or five good crying sessions each day -- this is probably because the older (around three or so) is still adjusting to having a baby brother around and doesn't like having his mother's attention divided. At any rate, I would occasionally take hikes to keep myself busy. One day I decided to tackle Garung Inerie, the huge perfect cone that looms over the whole area. Walking from Philip's house I took the road around the base to the point where Philip said I could find the trail. It was overgrown, but I eventually had a local farmer point out a way up through some wild meadows where I would intersect the trail. Trails in Indonesia are usually straight up the mountain, with no switchbacks. This one was just that -- straight up, measuring from the road just over 3700 feet of ascent to the peak at 7400 feet. The last bit was a loose layer talus over hard volcanic mud. Once your feet started sliding on the stuff it was like trying to walk on marbles. I eventually managed to scramble to the crater rim and to the peak, where someone had placed a big cross made of metal pipes. The crater had no lake, but sulfur deposits abounded and I was above the clouds looking out to the sea on one side and down past Langa and Bajawa on the other. The clouds eventually obscured everything, as they tend to do every afternoon on this peak, so I climbed down in a thin fog. It was a hell of a climb, and I was exhausted.

On another day I set out to explore Langa Hill, the crazy Dr. Seuss formations. It's an easy climb above Langa village, and they keep much of their cows and horses up on the hills to graze. The animals are usually staked in a particular area, so they don't just wander around aimlessly. Up on the hills there are three prominent crosses. Phillip told me that every Easter hundreds of villagers would have a procession up the mountain, with one lucky volunteer playing the role of Jesus. He would walk up the hill with a big cross strapped on his back with a crown of thorns, fake blood and all. The villagers are wailing the whole way, and they make it up to the hill for the sunrise and a service. The views from the hills are beautiful, and you can see down past Aimere to the sea. The hills get progressively higher and steeper, and I was climbing one after another. Eventually I started up one on a ridge about three feet wide, with steep drops of hundreds of feet on either side. Even though the drops were tussocky and covered with grass, I was overcome with vertigo and decided to leave that particular hill. The grass was slick with morning dew, and I didn't want to play the role of Jack.

Other excursions from Langa included a trip to a major market, where I bought the ikat from the Ende region. Phillip's neighbor owns one of the big Mitsubishi trucks that take people to the more inaccessible villages. We were visiting this neighbor after I had returned from Langa Hill, and relaxing while watching Enter the Ninja on video. The neighbor invited us along for one of the daily runs out to Aimere and smaller villages up the coast (the same coast I was admiring from on top of the hill). We went along, and I have to say those wooden slats they use for benches just aren't designed for tall people. I was wedged in, the truck was crowded, but I managed to see quite a bit of wonderful scenery along the way. In some of the smaller coastal villages we visited with some of Phillips friends and relatives, and enjoyed dinner with his aunt. The drive back was at night, and less crowded, punctuated only by when we pulled over, removed several of the slats from the back and loaded two methane-laden cows into the back of the truck for the trip back to Langa. The moon was full and the slopes of Inerie were clearly visible as we wound around the roads.

From my numerous talks with Philip, I also gathered how large of a role folklore plays in Ngada society. Even Philip, a relatively comopolitan guy for the locals, was still very superstitious. Every night he would throw salt (or onion) into the coals of the cooking fire where they would start crackling. This was to protect the house from evil spirits during the night. Caterwauling cats in heat were bad omens, and either salt or coals from the cooking fire must be thrown at them. His grandmother taught him that when drinking from a glass, always take the first drink with a finger under the base of the glass -- this will cancel any black magic that has been cast on the drink. When traveling long distances at night, on foot, he carries a nail like his grandmother taught him. This is so if you see a girl under the full moon under a banana tree, and you know it's a spirit, you must walk around without crossing the moonbeams and stick the nail into the shadow of the spirit's head. Otherwise the spirit will haunt you for a while -- this could be with either good or bad consequences, but it's generally not worth the risk. In fact the locals have a tale about another one of the villagers, quite wealthy and the owner of several bemos, a tale about how he obtained his wealth. They say he encountered one of these spirits (with no nail, presumably) and the spirit started visiting him in dreams. In the first encounter, the spirit asked if he wanted money. He said no. In the second dream encounter, the spirit asked if he wanted animals. He said no. In the third visit she asked if he wanted a key. He said yes. The next day he awoke to find the key, but he didn't know what to do with it. After a couple of weeks he had another dream where the spirit told him that only when there was a full moon and he was alone, he could take the key to the totem pole and unlock the carved ox head at the base of the pole and gold would come out. The catch was that if he did so he could never marry, or he would die. So the guy kept getting his gold out of the totem, and therefore could afford the bemos, but to this day he is really unhappy and unmarried. There are so many of these sort of beliefs, but all in all I'm not convinced that they are any more superstitions that people you would find in the rural Southern U.S.

My visit with Philipus and his family was relaxing, but I eventually moved along. I headed up to the north coast to the fishing village of Riung, perched in a muddy tidal flat on the coast near Seventeen Islands Marine Park (actually more like 24 islands), where there are fine beaches and snorkeling. The village is pretty basic and has been hit pretty hard by the lack of tourism. I stayed up in the tidal flats where fishermen live in homes up on stilts so that the shallow tide rolls in right under the houses. From my perch on the deck of my haunt, I could observe the flats and the pier heading out into the water. I saw mbou, large monitor lizards related to the Komodo dragons but smaller and more colorful, strolling across the flats. One morning I saw a troupe of monkeys tentatively exploring and approaching the houses. They were no doubt trying to swipe food, but someone scared them off. One day I went on a very hot hike in the surrounding hills, waiting on more tourists to show up so I could share the cost of chartering a snorkel boat. Eventually I went snorkeling after a couple of Canadians showed up and we joined forces, and there was abundant coral life throughout the islands. We visited a fruit bat colony on another island (where there also lives a hermit monk who plants trees in his own reforestation project) and had lunch on a white sand beach on another small island. Later that night I had dinner with the guide's family at his house and had another session with arak. While staying in Riung, I fell into the habit of walking out to the end of the pier to watch the sunsets. The boats are very simple affairs here, long slender jobs with bamboo outriggers on either side -- that's if you are relatively well off, a net fisherman. Many fisherman just have simple dugout canoes with a single outrigger from within which they ply their trade. I had made friends, using broken English and Indonesian, with one of the local fisherman. Abdurachman invited me to go fishing with him; I was assuming this would be night fishing, since that's when most of the other boats headed out, but since the moon was full this was no longer considered a good time for night fishing. Instead we headed out one morning in his tiny dugout canoe (along with his daughter of eight or nine years) for some simple hook and line fishing by the first island. Literally just a spool of line, using my hands, we bottom fished for several hours until the tide started coming in. Abdurachman would paddle around (and the canoe floated fine, despite my reservations) and would eventually ease up to a spot using landmarks on the island and say "Yeeeesssss..." and I would drop the line. I caught about five smallish fish (in that part of the islands they don't get very big), which they seemed to think was an excellent job. Local fisherman were amazed and delighted when they cruised by in their boats and saw a huge westerner hunched over a fishing line in a boat, earnestly trying to coax fish to the surface. I gave the fish to the locals once we returned. Despite the limited nature of the endeavor, it was very satisfying.

After Riung I had a very long day of bus rides, back to Bajawa and on to Ruteng, starting at around six in the morning and arriving around eleven at night (four hour wait in Bajawa). I didn't stay long in Ruteng, but did take a bemo out to a local village where from a hilltop vantage point you can see the spider fields, which are rice paddies arranged in a radial shape that makes them look like big spider webs. Each segment of the fields is passed down from generation to generation; it truly is a striking site, looking down over the valley of fields with mountains behind. And on from Riung I went to Labuan Bajo on the west coast. A larger fishing village on a large bay with maybe fifty fishing boats and periodic ferries, the place is not all that big but it seemed relatively luxurious compared to my other stops in Flores. Tourists are more frequent here since it is the main entry point from the boats that come from further west, on Komodo tours and scuba trips. I stayed in a bungalow up on a hill, overlooking the bay and sunsets.

While here I walked out to Batu Cermin, a network of limestone escarpments and caves a few miles away from the town. It is a big limestone ridge formation that rises up from the ground and is split periodically through its width. In these splits are wonderful cliffs and caves, encrusted with banyan trees. I clambored through a few of the caves and saw some impressive stalagmite and stalagtite formations, along with a couple of healthy bat colonies. It reminded me a lot of some of the caves in northern Alabama, which isn't surprising considering the limestone. I spent several hours just stomping around in the bush and exploring the area.

Afterwards I headed out to the nearby tiny island of Soreya where Gardena, my place of residence, had some additional bungalows and a restaurant. There was nobody else on the island except for the few hanging out in the bungalows. We could snorkel right off of the white sand beach into the bay, where there were amazing coral formations and reef life, including turtles, black tip sharks, and much to my delight, cuttlefish. Cuttlefish are an extremely intelligent cephalopod, relative of the squid and octopus. They float around, over a foot long, sort of looking like a big fat squid, but with highly intelligent looking eyes. They unfurl their tentacles into coral, foraging for tidbits, and exhibit rapid color changes whenever something startles them or they drift into a new environment. When I saw them there was a group of three, two of which seemed to be courting one another. Diving down with them, they would face you and examine you thoughtfully while exhibiting an astonishing display of color changes. They can move backwards using their skirt-like fin, forwards, sideways, and when they want to can be extremely swift. Wonderful to see them. If you are ever walking along the beach and see things that look like emery boards, they are probably cuttlefish bones and can also be seen in canary cages for beak sharpening. While on the island I also met a crazy bloke from Australia who had bought one of the small local fishing boats (not a dugout canoe, but larger -- still simple, though, with two bamboo outriggers) and retrofitted it. He was sailing around the area, spearfishing and generally being a survivalist. We sat around the campfire swapping tales a couple of nights, and for a while I was considering sailing over to Lombok with him. The trip would nominally have taken two weeks, so I eventually decided not to since I wanted to bag Garung Rinjani on Lombok and did not want to end up being late for my rendezvous with Susan in Bali. It would have been fun, though, hopping from beach to beach, island to island, fishing and visiting the fishing villages.

While on the island I met a British couple who were interested in diving in the area. When we returned to Labuan Bajo we signed up for a dive trip over towards Komodo. A two tank dive, the first was off a rock called Batu Balong where you have to dive at slack tide, otherwise the currents can be too swift. An astonishing dive with amazing visibility, there was a reef slope on one side and deeper open water on the other. I spotted five black tip sharks, a couple of moray eels, and a beautiful large lion fish. The next dive was a drift dive over the more shallow and less steep reefs next to Tatawa Besar. Once again, the health and diversity of the reef life in this area was amazing, and I spotted two more morays, two more lionfish, some queen triggers, a scorpion fish, and of course many anemones and clown fish. As usual, I was a bit of an air pig.

So after some fine meals back in Labuan Bajo, I signed up for a four day boat tour to Lombok. Along the way I was set to visit both Rinca and Komodo, home of the dragons. The next day I was off, cruising the Komodo Sea.

Random hah: Derren, ala the British couple I went diving with, had an amusing tale to tell about a visit he once made with some mates in the Southeastern U.S. You have to imagine the accents, here, and perhaps it's only funny if you have lived in Alabama. But for some obscure reason (a friend had antique business up in Georgia) they were passing through Montgomery, AL, after a stint down at Panama City Beach. Without fail, locals always expressed astonishment and amazement at Derren's accent, like that of Hugh Grant. So at a convenience store in Montgomery, the clerk's jaw dropped at his accent as she exclaimed "Where are you frum?" He said jauntily "Well, I'm from England, down here for a bit of vacation." To this she exclaimed "In MUNTGUMRY???? You should FAHR yer travel agent!"

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Another distressing chapter in the Almanac. In Flores you have exactly one choice for beer: Bintang pilsner in a large bottle. It's not too bad, especially when you have no other choice, but I fear my penchant for variety in beer is suffering mightily.

Backpack acquiring character: one healthy dose of fish gut juice, one bit of vomit from a sick passenger, one helping of hog sweat, and copius dirt and dust.

Lament: While on the dive boat I read a book by Douglas Adams called Last Chance to See... where he describes several expeditions with a naturalist on a mission to spot several endangered animals around the world. It's a great read, full of the typical wry wit and sarcasm that you are no doubt familiar with if you have read The Hitchiker's Guide or Dirk Gently books. About a week later I discovered that Douglas Adams recently died of a heart attack while working out in a gym at the age of 47. His books made a huge impression on me when I was younger, and he will be missed. So long, and thanks for all the books.

Till next time, when I will have tales to tell of Komodo, Lombok, and Bali,
Matt

The copper sphere gave off pale, shifting glints as it was struck by the last rays of the sun that came through the great stained-glass windows. Were its tip to graze, as it had in the past, a layer of damp sand spread on the floor of the choir, each swing would make a light furrow, and the furrows, changing direction imperceptibly, would widen to form a breach, a groove with radial symmetry -- like the outline of a mandala or penticulum, a star, a mystic rose. No, more a tale recorded on an expanse of desert, in tracks left by countless caravans of nomads, a story of slow, millennial migrations, like those of the people of Atlantis when they left the continent of Mu and roamed, stubbornly, compactly, from Tasmania to Greenland, from Capricorn to Cancer, from Prince Edward Island to the Svalbards. The tip retraced, narrated anew in compressed time what they had done between one ice age and another, and perhaps were doing still, those couriers of the Masters. Perhaps the tip grazed Agarttha, the center of the world, as it journeyed from Samoa to Novaya Zemlya. And I sensed that a single pattern united Avalon, beyond the north wind, to the southern desert where lies the enigma of Ayer's Rock.

Excerpt from Foucalt's Pendulum, by Umberto Eco.

Ever since reading this passage, I have wanted to visit Ayer's Rock, or Uluru as the Aboriginals call it. The land on which it resides is owned by the Aboriginals, and jointly managed with the Australian parks service. There is a 'resort' area near the rock where the many many pilgrims stay for their visit to the rock. Unfortunately there is a bit of a monopoly in this regard, and prices can be high. Dissenters are free to take their business to any of the other establishments hundreds of miles away. If it weren't for modern bitumen roads and a small airport, Ayer's would be a difficult destination to say the least.

As it turned out, this normally parched land had just experienced several days of rain before I arrived. As a result, what would normally have been a landscape of deep reds and light browns (hence the 'red centre') was now exploading with life, producing a wonderful contrast of green flora against the red soil and rocks. For the most part, the surrounding land is very flat. Then, out of nowhere, the monstrous Ayer's Rock juts up out of the earth. It's called a rock because that is what it is -- a single piece of rock, feldspar-rich sandstone to be precise. From ground level it is around 2.2 miles long, 5.6 miles in circumference, and 1141 feet high. I say from ground level because they say at least half of the rock is beneath the surface. I spent a few hours walking around the base of the thing.

Uluru is a very sacred place to the tribes in the area. All along the base there are areas of rock art and ceremonial sites. The rock itself is a beautiful orange/red with sweeping slopes, furrows, and pockets from wind and water erosion. Just about every feature on the rock has some role in the Aboriginal stories from the Dreamtime. Some of these areas of the rock you aren't supposed to photograph because they are so important, so integral, to the surrounding environment that the Aboriginals find the notion of lifting the image out of its context abhorrent.

There are great big boulders and sheets that have fallen from the rock, forming all sorts of caves and boulder fields. The rock has many ledges, beneath which you can see fused columns and formations resulting from the slow, but relentless, motion of water. At several places around the rock there are more or less permanent waterholes where rain collects on the rock and falls in cascading multi-stage waterfalls. Surrounding these pools are usually groves of trees that whisper in the breeze, very peaceful. The red, sweeping features of the rock reminded me very much of the petrified sand dunes you see near Moab, Utah, although on a more grand scale. Although there is a very steep climb to the top of the rock, the Aboriginals prefer that you do not climb since it tramples the paths of some of their ancestors of ceremony. (Actually, I think it also has to do with the fact that if you die while climbing, the whole tribe goes through a big mourning period since they feel somewhat responsible). I chose to respect their wishes in this regard, and contented myself with the base walk.

There were all sorts of lizards and bugs along the walk, but one in particular I found fascinating. There is a type of beetle in the area that does what any sensible beetle would do when threatened: stands on its head. I have no idea why, but whenever you mess with them they lean down and put their abdomen up in the air. There are other beetles in the area that will loudly emit noxious vapors when disturbed (these I encountered sometimes at night around the campsite), so maybe these beetles somehow pretend that they have a nasty payload. Amusing, at any rate.

On the way back to camp we caught a lizard on the side of the road known as a 'thorny devil'. These lizards look remarkably similar to the horny toads of the U.S., and share similar traits. Covered in spines, they stay pretty low to the ground with their tails swooping straight up into the air. In this position they snap up passing ants, up to three thousand in a single feed. On the back of their neck they have a lump of fat that is supposed to be a decoy head in case a predator goes after them. They are just so similar to the horny toad that I wonder if they are actually related or if it is a great example of parallel evolution, where similar environments produce similar adaptations.

One morning I arose very early and joined hundreds of other pilgrims to watch the sunrise on the rock. Watching the sunsets and sunrises are very popular activities here. The sunsets are spectacular; long after the sun has gone below the horizon a purple nimbus hovers above the opposite horizon. Right on the horizon is a deep blue. As you look higher, the blue shifts to a magenta color where the sun's rays are still passing through the upper atmosphere. For sunrise, the effect happens in reverse. Once the sun crests the horizon, the entire eastward face of the rock glows a deep earthy red and rapidly brightens. It is truly a beautiful sight so long as you can tolerate the neighboring nimrods who insist on using flash photography for pictures of a dark mountain.

There is another group of rocks in the region called the Olgas. I visited these as well, but they are not a single rock. The Olgas are these big rounded hills composed of an aggregate sandstone. Rounded granite and gneiss stones, from pebble to basketball sized, are cemented together into rock that looks like huge chunks of red peanut brittle. I spent several hours walking around, up canyons, over surrounding flatlands, and down rubble-strewn slopes. The views were wonderful; with all of the green from the recent rain, the rounded rock hills looked like huge red whales breaching in a green sea. During the walk I encountered a four foot long goanna. I managed to get pretty close to the long-necked critter, and could have caught him. In spite of my keen observations of the Crocodile Hunter handling goannas, I chose not to see what this specimen's claws and mouth were capable of doing to my forearms. I contented myself with catching and releasing a couple of smaller skinks and lizards along the way.

In between the Ayer's Rock region and Alice Springs there is an area known as King's Canyon, on the McDonnell Ranges. Anyone who has seen Priscilla, Queen of the Desert would find the canyon familiar since a few scenes were filmed here. The area is crisscrossed with thousands of perpendicular fault lines, like a big grid. As water eroded around each square of this grid, the rocks became rounded humps. Seen all together, these humps look like lost cities of some sort; in the Aboriginal stories they are the 'cat men'. The area is composed of two types of sandstone, underneath which is a layer of shale. The shale holds water in the porous sandstone. In some areas the rock eroded so deeply that it penetrated this water table, producing oasis in the middle of the desert; many of these hidden pools of water are permanent and whole ecosystems depend on them. King's Canyon was formed from water flowing through these layers. The head of the canyon is walled in with enormous sandstone cliffs. Near the head, where the cliffs join, is a beautiful, deep oasis.

Interestingly, the sandstone at King's Canyon is actually white, like the white sand beaches from which it was formed. The red colors come from dust that blows over from the iron-laden rocks of Ayer's Rock and the Olgas. If you break the red sandstone open at King's Canyon, it is a pale white inside. With weathering and dark algae, the cliffs and rocks sport a lively interplay of reds, blacks, grey, and white.

After that I was off to Alice Springs. The land rolls on and on, punctuated by occasional cattle stations separated by hundreds of miles. All throughout were sightings of wild horses, camels, and kangaroos. The camels are left over from the Ghan shipping route between Darwin and Adelaide. Some of this route was by an extremely unreliable narrow gauge railroad (due to the floodplains), some sections were by road trains, and other segments were serviced by camel trains run by Afghanis. The Ghan railway was eventually rebuilt (still incomplete) in standard gauge, above the floodplain, but one of the noteable last appearances of the old railroad was in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. Anyway, some of the camels escaped and now Australia sports a very healthy population of wild camels. These camels are highly regarded back in the desert countries from which they came because of their disease-free status and genetic diversity. The history of the Ghan route is rich and fascinating. (And yes, I saw some modern-day road trains -- semi trucks pulling three or four trailers.)

From Alice Springs I flew straight to Darwin, from desert to tropics. After the arid air, the humidity was suffocating. It felt like home. I immediately set out on a four-wheel drive tour of Kakadu National Park. This region is tropical, with wet and dry seasons. I arrived at the tail end of the wet season, in what the Aboriginals call the 'knock 'em down' season since the more powerful afternoon storms flatten the spear grass. Although it can be very dry, during the wet season the area is composed of huge wetlands, flooded rivers and billabongs (parts of the river system that are connected during the wet season, but isolated like ponds or lakes during the dry). The difference in water levels can be up to a dozen feet from one season to another. As it turns out, the first Crocodile Dundee was filmed in Kakadu National park. If you recall, at one point he was walking along dry land and pointed up to the remains of his boat, lodged up in a tree. That's one of the areas through which I passed, except the water was there. It really can rise and fall that much.

So before entering Kakadu proper, we inspected some of the area wetlands and went on a crocodile cruise. We piled into a big flat bottomed boat and motored up the Adelaide River, looking for wild crocodiles. We found several, and the guide coaxed a couple of them near the boat with tasty scraps of chicken and fish on a long pole. The crocs were leaping out of the water after these morsels. Seeing the crocs in their natural habitat was well worthwhile, and I gained a new appreciation for the grace of these predators.

Most 4WD vehicles in Australia are real beasts, decked out with all the bells and whistles including snorkels. I had been wondering about the snorkels, and I soon found out why. During the wet season, many of the roads in the NT have floodways rather than bridges. A floodway is an area of the road where water is expected to flood right over the road. Packed into our 4WD, hoss trailer in tow, we crossed over several floodways in the park. In some cases water was shooting up over the whole vehicle as we crossed floodways up to three and four feet deep with water. Meanwhile, our two guides are telling stories about how if the water gets too forceful and starts pushing the truck off the road you have to open the doors to flood the inside of the vehicle -- this adds enough weight to keep the truck on the road as you cross. No thanks. Thankfully we did not attempt to drive through any crazy water like that.

Instead, we reached one point where the road up ahead was under about seven feet of water. So we did the sensible thing and took a boat to another truck. This was an informative boat ride through the billabong system of the Magela River. The aboriginal captain told us all about the flora and fauna of the region, as well as the various uses of some spears he had in the boat. They have these particular barbed spears called 'punishment spears', and aptly named they are. Under Aboriginal law (at least in the Arnheim region) if you commit a crime you get stabbed with a punishment spear. The region of your body that gets stabbed is determined by the nature of the crime -- it could be an ankle, thigh, arm, shoulder, etc. For something particularly bad, such as murder, the spot might be the middle of your chest. So this nasty barbed spear gets jabbed clean through the chosen spot, and then yanked back out, along with whatever tendons and meat it encountered along the way. Then you are left on your own somewhere out in the wilderness so that you have to make your own way back (assuming you haven't been exiled). Here's the catch: If you run away from the punishment or try to avoid it, then one of your relatives such as your brother will have to take the spear treatment. This spear treatment is still practiced to this day; as you can imagine, crime rates in the Aboriginal communities are extremely low.

After the boat tour we headed up to a beautiful escarpment above the wetlands called Ubirr. There was a preponderance of Aboriginal rock art here. Layers upon layers of art, some of which depicts ancient (and now extinct) animals. Each bit of art tells a tale, a bit of the life of the artist. Mostly the art was of regional animals, but some was of ancestral beings from the Dreamtime. We climbed up these cliffs for an amazing view over the wetlands, looking into Arnheim land (Aboriginal owned). This escarpment also made an appearance in Crocodile Dundee. Down in the billabongs, thousands of birds were feeding, and on the horizon storms loomed as the sun set.

We stayed at a small hostel of sorts that first night, shared only by a bunch of baramundi fisherman. Baramundi are these huge fish that populate the area rivers, and seem to be the primary object of lust for regional sportsmen. That night I shared all sorts of fish stories with a couple of colorful blokes named Pete and Ratsack.

The next couple of days we visited more rock art sites and swam beneath many beautiful waterfalls. The days were pretty hot, and those swims were nice. All through the region there are termite mounds, and there are a particular variety called 'cathedral termites', for good reason. One cathedral termite mound must have been over twenty feet high. The mounds are waterproof and smokeproof, and do just fine when the floods and fires sweep through. (The Aboriginals deliberately start brush fires every year; some species require the fire in order to survive, and the periodic burning prevents larger, hotter, fires from breaking out). In addition to termites, there are all sorts of ants in the region. One that you see everywhere is called a green-tail ant. It's about the size of the black or red ants you see back in the States. The head and thorax are brownish-red, and the abdomen is pale green. Their abdomens are full of folic acid, which they use to build nests out of leaves (the leaves are folded and fused together). The guides told us that the folic acid tastes a bit like a lime, so we occupied ourselves for a while by plucking ants off of a tree and eating their butts. Okay, so I only tried one. It did indeed taste like a lime.

That night we were treated to some Australian tucker. We had crocodile, water buffalo burgers, and kangaroo steaks. The crocodile was really like a mix of fish and chicken, with the texture of pork. Tasty, but sort of tough. The buffalo burger was great -- so much more flavor than what I am accustomed to in a burger. The kangaroo steak was phenomenal. Absolutely lean, very tender, and no gaminess whatsoever. I felt a little guilty about eating a kangaroo, but dang that roo was good.

After Kakadu I headed back to Darwin. There is a movie out called Yolngu Boy about three Aboriginal adolescents from Arnheim land near Kakadu. It is a really great movie that does a fine job of illustrating the duality of Aboriginal life in modern society. The photography is outstanding, and offers many views of the escarpments and billabongs I've just described. If you can get your hands on it, see this movie.

At this point, my budget for Australia was about tapped. I hung low in Darwin, walking around and reading books. I walked down to the wharf precinct (for some reason I love wharfs). That particular day, the U.S.S. Boxer was docking for fuel and resupply, on the way to East Timor to assist in humanitarian efforts. The Boxer is some sort of huge amphibious assault ship, with a flight deck and about 1000 crew aboard. I had never seen a ship like that dock, so that was pretty much my entertainment for the day. There is a lot of war history in Darwin, since it was repeatedly bombed by the Japanese during WWII. There is a beautiful park alongside the harbor (called the Esplanade) with all sorts of war memorials. I visited the WWII oil tunnels -- big, huge tanks hacked straight out of the rock (without the use of explosives) for storing oil during the war. No longer used, you can now walk around in the tunnels and view a gallery of photographs from the war days. Other than that, I shopped around for some gear, rounded out my immunizations, and relaxed in the swimming pool. The Hash House Harriers are in town, that esteemed group of drinking, jogging scoundrels. I have had several encounters with these guys in my life; this one seems to be some sort of international gathering here in Darwin for the Easter weekend. In fact, as I was typing this I saw someone running by the window playing a trumpet, followed by several dozen naked people running, hooting, and hollering. Go Harriers!

Now I am off to Indonesia. Some day I would like to return to Australia and see all that I know I missed. I would like to see the Kimberly, visit the huge state of Western Australia, see the Great Ocean Road, dive with whale sharks off the coast of WA, see the Great Australian Bight, fully explore the north coast, dive the Great Barrier Reef, and rent an expedition vehicle for a more thorough exploration of the great Outback.

Random Hah: While in Alice Springs I was talking with an Irish bloke who had an amusing tale to tell. When he was visiting Vietnam his camera was stolen; rather than buy a new camera he found some disposable cameras, garish ones with Micky Mouse and Donald Duck plastered on the cases. So he headed into Cambodia with these cameras, where he took pictures of the truly grim killing fields. Eventually he had this film developed, and apparently the cameras were designed for children. For there, across every shot of the sombre killing fields was a happy little Micky Mouse or Donald Duck.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: Not too much to report in the Northern Territory. The same major Australian brands are prevalent, and they drink a LOT of it around here. Darwin is famed for it's annual Beer Can Regatta in the harbor, where all participating boats are constructed out of beer cans. Now that's a boat race!

Till next time, from somewhere in Indonesia,
Matt

So after a couple of days I caught a bus service that would eventually take me nearly to the trailhead of the Overland Track, a famous walk nestled in the Cradle Mountain/Lake St. Clair National Parks. Before embarking on the trek, I took a detour out to the remote west coast of Tasmania. First I stopped in Queenstown, a town that sprung up to support an old strip mining operation. After seeing the wild beauty of the temperate rain forested region along the way, the desolation surrounding Queenstown was shocking; the signs of mining were everywhere in the surrounding countryside. The town itself surprised me by exhibiting a quaint kind of charm, somewhat similar to what you see in the old mining towns of Colorado. These days they are banking their future on the tourist trade, and are positioning themselves both as a monument and an admonishing reminder of the impact of strip mining. It was while I was in this town that my birthday rolled over Georgia, the state of my birth.

Onward to the coast from Queenstown was the tiny town of Strahan. In one of the most inaccessible places in Tasmania, this town is the only safe anchorage on the west coast, in the Macquarie Harbor. The town was a shipping port for the timber harvested from huon pines and the ore shipped over from Queensland on the Abt Railway. The railway is currently being restored for the tourism industry, and its claim to fame is slopes so steep that it required a specially designed center rail, toothed so that a cog on the engine could help the train negotiate slopes that would otherwise have been too steep with a full load (Abt is the surname of the designer). These days the town relies on fishing and tourism to keep the economy alive.

I signed up for one of the harbor cruises which seem to be one of the major activities in the town. The cruise in a large catamaran was well worth it. Macquarie Harbor is the second largest harbor in Australia, but its only access to the ocean is through Hell's Gates, a narrow passage approximately fifty yards wide. The marvelous layered rocks that meet the ocean here sport shades of yellow, orange, and brown. These colors contrast nicely with the white lighthouses perched at various strategic locations near Hell's Gates. Ironically, the name of the entrance comes not from navigational angst, but rather from convicts destined for the Sarah Island convict settlement: The narrow mouth of this bay was their first sight of their new home, from which most knew they would never return. Most of them were sent to Sarah Island because they were considered incorrigible due to transgressions committed while at other convict settlements. Back then this area was extremely remote, but in order to effect a successful escape, which some did, a boat was required. Sarah Island itself is tiny; we disembarked to personally inspect the ruins of the old settlement and hear tales of intrigue involving escapes and the bustling shipyard that convict labor produced. The history of the settlement was absolutely fascinating.

After Sarah Island, the cruise took us by some fish farms that raised what they call 'ocean trout'. These are rainbow trout that have been raised in the brackish waters of the Macquarie. Rainbow trout apparently taste different when raised in this environment, hence the new name. The pens are huge circular floats with netting suspended from them. Divers periodically maintain the pens, as damage can be caused from many sources, chief of which would be seals. I imagine those seals must feel like a kid in a candy store when they see those huge concentrations of tasty fish.

We then proceded up the Gordon River and its abundant temperate rain forest, source of the tannins that give the whole harbor its brown tea color. It was up in these forests that the magnificent huon pines were logged for the ships produced on Sarah Island. The story of this logging is a typical one: amazing trees of ancient age, decimated by overharvesting. Some stands of pine do remain, and efforts are underway to restore them, but the results will only be seen far in the future if fires do not clear the way for the encroachment of eucalyptus.

After Strahan I hopped back on the bus, headed for the Overland Track. The Cradle Mountain/Lake St. Clair National Parks are a small region of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. This World Heritage site qualifies for an astonishing seven out of ten qualifiers for WH status. Most WH sites qualify for only one or two of these. Tassies love their wilderness; national parks abound. This particular WH area covers nearly 20% of Tasmania, a generous allotment indeed. I was focused on the Overland Track in the northern region, a trail around fifty miles long that connects Cradle Mountain to Lake St. Clair. Despite being one of the more popular walks in Australia, the terrain is absolutely spectacular -- any regrets over bumping into other trekkers are quickly lost in the beauty of the walk. The rugged peaks and cliffs in the area are fascinating to study. Most of the rock consists of imposing vertical columns that resulted from dolerite intrusions into a sandstone base; this sandstone subsequently weathered away, leaving behind the awe-inspiring pillars of rock. The most significant displays of this rock I found around Cradle Mountain and Pine Valley. The Cradle Mountain vicinity was the most rugged portion of the hike, and included gorgeous views of Cradle Lake and Dove Lake, nestled in their craggy heights. Further south, on what is actually a detour from the Overland Track itself, is Pine Valley. From a base camp in the rain forest I climbed the Acropolis, an amazing outcrop of dolerite. It is aptly named, as the columns look as though they could be the ruined pillars of buildings constructed by some ancient, giant race.

The track traverses several biomes, including the craggy peaks, alpine moors flush with button grass, and dense rain forests. The weather is extremely unpredictable; for two and a half days of my seven day journey I was blasted with icy winds full of hail, sleet, and snow, and the rest of the time was clear and sunny. One of these stormy days was when I climbed Pelion Gap, hoping to make a side trip to Mt. Osso, the highest mountain in Tasmania. Although the pass itself is not too difficult, on this day it was roaring with wind and sleet, and Mt. Osso was chaste the whole day, cloaked in clouds and never revealing her face. I opted to forego the mountain and planned instead to take in Pine Valley and the Acropolis, harboring hopes for clearer weather. The weather did clear (the next day, even) and the Acropolis satisfied my yen for scrambling up huge edifices; in fact, the day was spectacular and I could finally see Mt. Osso from the top.

On an amusing note, I later met up with some crazy blokes from Western Australia who chose to summit Mt. Osso the same day I cleared the pass. They had never seen snow before, and knowing full well that they could not see a damn thing from the peak, they scrambled to the top of Mt. Osso just so they could see snow. See snow they did, over knee deep in the late summer. They were flush with excitement over the experience, and I couldn't help but enjoy the snow vicariously.

The track features abundant wildlife as well, some of which is seen nowhere else in the world but Tasmania. There are Tasmanian devils, stout little marsupial beasts with crushing jaws. It's because of these scavengers that you never see any animal remains, not even bones, because the devils eat it all. There are wombats, tank-like burrowing marsupials that have a curious aspect: they have cube-shaped scat and are fond of leaving thoughtful piles of it on the trail as territorial markers. There are wallabies and pademelons, smaller versions of the kangaroo. There are quolls, little spotted predator marsupials that are also known as 'tiger cats'. Of these, I saw lots of wallabies and pademelons. I briefly spotted a quoll, and only on the bus did I see a wombat lumbering along. Most of the marsupials tend to be nocturnal, so happenstance encounters are rare. There are many more varieties of these mammals, and many unmentioned.

Tasmania only has three varieties of snake, all of which are venomous and deadly without treatment. It was a while before I belatedly figured out that Ozzie bushwalkers wear gators on their boots not for snow, like we do in the U.S., but to protect their legs from startled snakes. I had no gators, so I was always on the alert for snakes. They are not particularly aggressive, and only bite if they feel threatened in such situations as getting stepped on or pestered. I was excited because I managed to spot three tiger snakes along the trail, beautiful glossy black specimens. The first one was by far the largest, about as big around as my forearm. During that day I made three side trips to see waterfalls in one of the rain forest sections (the Kia Ora to Windy Ridge segment). The waterfalls themselves were beautiful. The largest, Hartnett Falls, has a trail leading down to the base of the falls that winds through some tight scrub just below the knee. That particular day was one of the first sunny days after the snow and sleet, so my eyes were out like a crab's looking for snakes sunning themselves. On my way back up this trail my eyes snapped onto this huge tiger snake in front of me, adjacent to the trail in a small clearing. Absolutely gorgeous, this snake slowly adjusted itself to get a better look at me, and after satisfying itself that I did not represent a threat, slowly moved off into the tight scrub -- unfortunately further up and closer to the trail in front of me, hidden under the scrub. No thanks. I found some thinner portions of the scrub and bypassed that section of the trail. Really, though, it's the younger snakes that tend to be more aggressive -- they understandably worry more about becoming a meal due to their smaller size. Nevertheless, something primal in us remains that responds to snakes. Despite my awe at the beauty of this snake, and my rational knowledge of how to deal with snakes, the hackles on the back of my neck stood straight up and adrenaline raced through my system when I was the object of this ones calm scrutiny. I eventually saw two more of the beasties, and each sighting was a treat.

The end of the track was dominated by Lake St. Clair, the deepest lake in all of Australia. This large lake was the result of three glaciers converging and gouging out an enormous scar that eventually filled in to become the lake. The rain forests along this region are more dominated by huge tree ferns, in a type of environment that lends itself to expectations of dinosaurs tramping out of the flora. Like New Zealand, there are an abundance of ancient plants that date back to prehistoric times on the Gondwana super-continent. The path is relatively flat along the shore of the lake, and was a fantastic cap on my seven day hike. Conveniently enough, the hike ended on St. Patrick's Day.

Back in Hobart I treated myself to a large steak and proceeded to locate a rowdy Irish Pub in order to enjoy some Guinness and hear some live Celtic music. The next day I wandered around Hobart on a more thorough exploration than I had opportunity for when I arrived in Tasmania. After exploring shops and restaurants, I wandered into a park where there was a 'No G.E.' festival in progress. The 'G.E.' stands for Genetically Engineered foods. The festival was populated by fairly standard issue earth first types, and I had a jolly time eating organic fruit, sitting in the grass, listening to live protest music (lots of tribal influence, of course), and observing the characters in attendance.

Since I had a few more days in Tasmania, I decided to take the plunge and rent my own wheels for some exploration. I hired a car, and adjusted surprisingly well to driving on the left. My experience thus far as a pedestrian and cyclist had given me a head start on 'thinking left'. However, what I found most difficult was staying in the middle of the lane! The steering wheel is on the right hand side of the car, and I had a tendency to drift to where I would normally be in the lane if I were on the left hand side of the car. Reversing the traffic rules was pretty easy; constantly correcting my sense of center was exhausting.

The first place I went was to the Cadbury chocolate factory, with visions of chocolate easter eggs dancing in my head. The tour was informative and interesting -- this factory is one of many Cadbury factories (the largest in the Southern Hemisphere), but unfortunately was not where the eggs are made. Ouch! I was very impressed with the mixing machines, these huge vats with churning apparatus that looks like part of a locomotive assembly. Each batch has to be mixed about eight hours before it heads off to be shaped and molded. I dutifully inspected each stage of the process, but kept getting elbowed out of the way by little old ladies whenever free samples were offered. Don't mess with chocophiles.

After Cadbury I toured the countryside, deliberately taking small roads. Most places in Tassie, if they have roads, are accessible within a day of driving. The countryside is beautiful -- rolling green hills, pastureland, and forest -- I was very much reminded of the hills of England, or dare I say, Ireland. I did have an amusing encounter in the little town of Deloraine involving a Harley gang. I had briefly inspected the main street shops and was sitting in a pastry shop having a coffee. Outside the window, I was observing a leatherclad biker gang called the Ulysses Club (Motto: Grow Old Disgracefully). This gang was fairly typical: middle aged, vaguely surly, unable to completely shake the impression that they all had well paying day jobs. In particular I was watching two of them named Beast and Braveheart (these names I divined from the various patches on their leather goods). Beast was a big fellah with a wild black beard, and Braveheart was tall and lanky. There were about five others, and their ladies. Eventually Beast comes sauntering in and sits with his lady in an adjacent table. After a while, Braveheart knocked on the window and gesticulated some inside joke to Beast, and they both laughed, after which Braveheart returned to observing the street traffic. Beast noticed me idly watching, and said in a friendly way "Don't smile at that one, mate, or he'll be on ya." I laughed, and said "Yeah, he looks pretty vicious." At this point, Beast and his lady looked at each other and laughed, then he told me meaningfully "I didn't mean that way." After a brief pause, I got the gist and laughed "Ah!" Beast smiled and said with a nod "You got me now, mate..." Braveheart, unaware of the joke that had been made at his expense, continued to idly watch the traffic outside the window as we laughed.

My eventual goal was up on the north coast of the island, and I detoured to a little town called Mole Creek because I had heard there was a leatherwood honey factory there. Upon reaching the town, nestled in gorgeous rolling hills, I discovered that the factory would be extracting honey the next day, the "first time in a fortnight" as the lady told me (fortnight, or two weeks, is not considered an archaic term in Oz). So I continued along to the north coast, and worked my way west to the Nut. The Nut, or Circular Head as it is known officially, is a huge outcrop that juts out into the Bass Strait, connected to the main island by a narrow isthmus. The formation is the 12.5 million year old remnants of volcanic activity and forms the base on which Port Stanley resides. This was the first headquarters of the Van Diemen Land Company, which was charged by England to develop the island back in colonial days. The small town still serves as a port, mostly for fishermen, these days. Early the next morning I climbed up the Nut and explored the views of the Bass Strait and surrounding countryside. There were great views of the port, and plenty of lore regarding the history of the region and the number of shipwrecks from the early days.

After climbing the Nut I began to head back to Mole Creek so I could check out the honey factory. Along the way I stopped at Fossil Bluff in the small town of Wynard. This obscure area was the site where they found the oldest marsupial fossil in all of Australia. The bluff was comprised of three layers, all clearly visible where the bluff faced the pounding waves. The bottom layer is dark claystone produced from the tillite left behind when a glacier dumped its contents directly into the sea around 500 million years ago. The middle layer, the thickest, is colorful layers of sandstone deposited from an inland sea some 22 million years ago. This sandstone is chocka blocka full of shells and evidence of marine life back in those days; it also happens to be the layer where the marsupial fossils were found. The topmost layer is basalt deposited from the volcanic activity over by the Nut around 13 million years ago. The bluff is most easily accessed at low tide, but with some scrambling and a careful eye out for rogue waves, I was able to explore a large portion. The surface of the sandstone was amazing; easily eroded by waves, it looked as though someone had attacked those colorful bands of rock with a giant ice cream scoop.

After the bluff I stopped at a cheese factory. Up until this point I had not been very impressed with the available types of cheese in Australia. Gladly, this factory had plenty of delicious variety, including a credible feta. In fact, all of the cheese in Tasmania seemed better than the rest of Oz. After the cheese I made it back to Mole Creek, where the honey extraction was going strong. They were nice enough to give me a personal tour of the place, and each employee described their job to me. I had no idea this was how you extract honey, at least on a commercial basis. First, the bee hives in those little white houses have these rectangular wooden slats in them which form a frame for the honeycomb. These slats are warmed and excess wax is removed from them, including a scraping that takes the caps off the cells of honey. Then the slats are radially placed in a big centrifuge, which whirls around and slings the honey free of the comb. The honey gets pumped away for packaging, and the slats go back into the hives where the bees reuse the now empty honeycombs. Leatherwood honey, this factory's specialty, is a delicacy only made in Tassie. Leatherwood trees are one of those varieties left over from prehistoric times, and they are found nowhere else in the world. The honey is light amber in color, and to me at least, had delicious notes of jasmine and lavender in the flavor. The manager gave me the contact information for their U.S. distributer, and I look forward to making a mead from this tasty honey. After the honey factory I decided to head over to the East Coast in hopes of seeing the famous Wineglass Bay. Along the way I stopped at another cheese factory and a couple of wineries (one of which had an olive grove as well). I drove through rain and more gorgeous national forests to the little town of Swansea on Oyster Bay.

Swansea was very quiet when I arrived. I took an evening stroll along the beaches of Oyster Bay, admiring the waves and scenery, despite the drizzle. I was nearly alone in the hostel, except for two older Australian ladies who were touring Tasmania. I chatted with them most of the night, and one conversation of note involved the railway hobby of one of their husbands. Apparently they travel to rail enthusiast conventions all over the world. One example was when the famous locomotive The Flying Scotsman came to tour in Australia -- competition was fierce, but they got tickets and rode around on this train with a couple thousand like-minded enthusiasts for three weeks, thrilled at the opportunity. At other times they travel around to various rail conventions, which have several notable characteristics:

• Whichever hotel is closest to the (depot, rail station, rail museum), no matter how trashy or nice, is the hotel where the attendants stay.
  
• If the hotel is actually adjacent to the (depot, rail station, rail museum), this is a bonus.
  
• If you can look out the window and see trains, this is a bonus.
  
• If there are no shops nearby to keep wives occupied on credit cards, this is an extreme bonus.
  
• If there are workshops, bonus.
  
• If there is a buffet, bonus.

• The trainspotters. This variety endeavors to spot numbers of trains, much like bird watching but with more complexity (the same number at as many stations as possible, the frequency of certain numbers, or similar games with time periods such as spotting numbers within three months, etc).
  
• Those that record 'track talk'. This variety dangles microphones outside of trains in motion, as close to the track as they are allowed, in order to record the sound of a particular train on the tracks for their archives. Nobody present is allowed to speak, cough, fart, make any noise whatsoever when these recording sessions are in progress. Serious business here, folks.
  
• Those that record 'stack talk'. Similar to the track talkers, this variety records the sound of the engine exhaust as it belches forth from the stacks. The rules pertaining to recording sessions apply as well.
  
• The restorationists. This more understandable variety was the hobby of the husband in question. They are extremely interested in the process of taking an abandoned hulk of metal and restoring it as a functional locomotive. Sometimes they specialize, say on boilers.
  

The next day was extremely foggy and overcast, but I headed out to Wineglass Bay as planned, in Freycinet National Park. This area is full of huge bluffs and peaks comprised of strikingly pink granite. Hiking over the pass to the bay I passed through huge boulder fields and could see the surrounding cliffs even though the wider views were obscured by fog. When I approached the bay, I descended below the fog and found a beautiful sight: Wineglass Bay, spectacular, rolling waves on coarse sand about the consistency of petrified cous-cous and slightly pink due to the surrounding granite. I spent a couple of hours on the bay, relaxing. Despite the overcast day, it was well worth it.

Afterwards I headed back towards Hobart, stopping at a couple more wineries along the way. I wanted to reach a place in New Norfolk called the Oast House. Supposedly there was a hops museum there, and I was excited to see such a thing. Unfortunately, it was closed, though it was a beautiful old house to see. Back to Hobart I went, for my last night in Tasmania. The local theater was showing Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?, so I checked it out and was highly impressed. It's a wonderful interpretation of Homer's The Odyssey, and Clooney was fantastic in a comedic role. It was interesting to note that the implied dieties responsible for the deus ex machina that tormented Odysseus (or in this case they gave Clooney the Roman name Ulysses) were reversed in this case: water (Poseidon) was his saviour, and fire (technically Hephaestus, but I think they had Hades in mind) his constant torment. And in a delicious twist, the wonderful soundtrack features the main song, a blues/bluegrass summary of the plight of Odysseus...Brilliant! I mean, if anyone gots the blues, you know Odysseus gots them.

So I returned to Melbourne and lingered for a few days. Melbourne is a wonderful cosmopolitan city that really likes its food. Good, tasty, great food. I wandered around, reading, eating, relaxing and juggling in parks, and visiting museums. At the Melbourne Museum, I was mostly impressed with the blue whale skeleton they had prepared from a large carcass that washed up on the beach. The process of cleaning the bones was impressive enough, but standing under the skeleton you get an overpowering sense of how enormous these creatures are. While in Melbourne, I arranged to meet up with Paul Fenwick, a fellow programmer responsible for the Finance::Quote module that complements my Finance::QuoteHist module. He and I had adjacent articles in The Perl Journal, and together our articles were featured on the cover of that magazine. He, his girlfriend, and I met for beers followed by Indian food. Later on I got to inspect their house, where they grow all sorts of things in their garden and maintain a great variety of fruit trees in the back yard. It was a great night of conversation, and even though I'd never actually seen him before it was nice to see a familiar face.

Then I was off to the great Northern Territory the next day. Stay tuned for more on that land of extremes.

Random Hah: Seen on a sticker plastered on the inside door of a bathroom stall while sitting and contemplating: "Toilet Camera is for Experimental Purposes Only".

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Digest: Tasmania has two of its own breweries that comprise the most commonly seen beer in the state. The other mainstream brands from Australia are represented, but the Tasmanians seem to prefer their own brands. In the southern part of the island, they prefer ales and lagers from the Cascade Brewery (nothing to do with American Cascade Hops). In the northern region they seem to prefer similar offerings from Boags Brewery. Both have similar offerings, and are servicable. I did not encounter any boutique breweries, but they might be there.

Till next time,
Matt

I spent a couple of days exploring Brisbane, which is a nice city that still seems to be finding an identity. The river that winds through is the centerpiece, and a fine way to get around town on the ferries. I suppose I should have realized this beforehand, but the east coast of Australia is full of fruit bats, even in the cities. Walking around at night, you could see flying foxes with three-foot wingspans carousing in trees above your head at restaurants. I thought this was great; they remind me of those huge bats in the second Indiana Jones movie that get caught up in Kate Capshaw's hair. I digress. At this point I really had no idea of where I'd like to stop between Brisbane and Melbourne (other than Sydney). So with a shrug I decided to take the Oz Experience bus down to Sydney, at least. This is one of those psuedo-tourist bus trips that take you to some pretty obscure places along the way, allowing you to hop on and off any time you like. As with the similar services in New Zealand, it's not a bad way to get around if you can handle actually being on the bus in between stops.

The first area we passed through is known as the Gold Coast, and features beautiful beaches with white sand (I hear north of Brisbane, up towards Cairns, has spectacular and popular beaches, but I did not venture up that way). The Gold Coast, unfortunately, is very commercialized with an economy very much aimed towards holiday vacationers. With tacky tourist shops everywhere and McRestaurants on every corner, I could have sworn I was on the Gulf Coast of Florida (sans rednecks). Nevertheless, the beaches are indeed beautiful, which explains the popularity of the place. I did not linger.

From there we ventured up into the mountains towards a fascinating little place called Nimbin. This little town was the epicenter of the 1973 Aquarius Festival; it had already been a center of counterculture before the festival, but many of the people that attended the 1973 festival never left. The town itself is very small, with perhaps a few hundred residents. The surrounding hills, on the other hand, host several thousand alternative types that enjoy the free, back to the earth lifestyle. You can find everything from individualists to co-ops to communes in these hills. With their enlightened views on social dogmatism and personal responsibility, there is also a preponderance of drugs (mostly marijuana) in the community. The existing drug laws of Australia are largely unenforced in this region. Though from time to time you might see examples of more problematic drug use (such as heroin), for the most part the populace is extremely friendly, laid-back, and get along quite well without governmental interference. This is a good thing, because if the government decided to interfere it would involve the forcible removal and incarceration of thousands of people lodged up in the surrounding mountains.

The vegetation in this region is rainforest, unless it has been cleared for farming macadamia nuts, coffee, or marijuana. I was thrilled once I found out that the rivers and creeks in the region harbor duck-billed platypus. Despite a couple of scouting missions, I never saw one of these critters in the wild. They are nocturnal, and unless you head out in the middle of the night with a flashlight, the only potential viewing times are at dusk and dawn. Ah well.

I only spent one night in Nimbin, where I went to the local theatre located in a converted cheese factory. Here I saw a really great Indian film called "The Terrorist". Following the activities of a hard-core terrorist, the tale concerns itself with the affirmation of life. The cinemaphotography is brilliant; apparently, it was the directors first film and he completed filming in only 14 days. I don't know if it will hit the independent circuit in the states, but if it does, check it out.

After Nimbin, we headed back out of the mountains to another popular beach area, Byron Bay. Despite its popularity, Byron Bay is heavily influenced by the surrounding counterculture in the mountains. They have no fast food restaurants and overt commercialism in the area, despite plenty of places vying for tourist dollars. The beaches are beautiful and liberated. Still not much in a beach mood, however, I did not linger here either. I headed back up into the mountains to fabulous little alternative town called Bellingen.

Bellingen is still in the fold of the alternative lifestylers of the region, but tends to harbor more artists and craftsmen. It's a beautiful little town, surrounded mostly by ranches in the hills. One claim to fame for the town is that it's the home town of David Helfgott, the riddling musical genius portrayed in the movie Shine. The hostel was very comfortable, and I decided to hang out for a couple of days. The next day I headed out to Bundagen, one of the nearby co-ops, with some of the folks from the hostel. Greg, one of the managers at the hostel, has befriended this community and frequently takes these trips. The main attraction is a beautiful private beach with fantastic surf. The co-op itself is a collection of alternative types that sort of live their lives doing their own thing. It's nothing like a commune; it's more like what you get when a bunch of Aquarians decide to put together a neighborhood association. They have a bunch of rules and meetings, but certainly not the sort you would ever see in suburbia. Anyway, we were there for the beach, and the Bundagens are not very big on swimwear. When in Rome, I say. Despite a warm rain, I spent most of the day naked body surfing in the waves, having a fantastic time; we pretty much had the beach to ourselves. Afterwards we had some vegetarian pizza up at the weekly BBQ and market, mingling with the locals (no, it's not a nudist colony, that's just on the beach). They are very nice folks who seem well content.

Back in Bellingen I paid a visit to a local didgeridoo shop. This guy actually runs most of his business on the internet (http://www.heartdidg.com) and has chosen Bellingen as his headquarters. He has some of the best made and beautiful didges I've ever seen. I signed up for a lesson the next day; that night I spent around a fire at the hostel playing drums and didgeridoos that they keep around the premises.

I should say that sunsets are amazing at Bellingen. Nearby in the river is an "island" (more like a big embankment) that hosts a colony of nearly 40,000 fruit bats. Every sunset they head out for their nightly feed, and stream out overhead, away from the setting sun, until it is too dark to see them. Wonderful sight, that. During the night, the bats can also create quite a racket up in the surrounding foliage as they scramble around for dominance, food, or both. Also, I was particularly fascinated with the chickens they had running around at the hostel. They are Chinese Silkies, and are these amazingly fluffy, almost furry looking, chickens. I was always catching sight of the Chooks, as they call them, and chased a couple of them down periodically just to get my hands on them. If I ever own any chickens, I will require a few Chooks.

The next day I hired a bike and set out for the nearby town of Glennifer, which I had heard had some sweet swimming holes on the interestingly named Never Never Creek. Along the way I made a detour and hiked out onto the island that hosts the fruit bat colony. During the day the colony, forty thousand strong, roosts in the rain forest there. Stepping through the ever-present guano, I was surrounded by the ever present chattering of the flying foxes. They look so intelligent, looking quizzically at you as you pass underneath; they really do look like foxes in the face. During this walk, I also stumbled across a five-foot long goanna lizard (monitor) slithering up one of the trees. I got as close as I could and observed his progress for a while; I don't know if goannas go after fruit bats or not, but the bats up in the tree were making far more noise than normal, and never let up. The goanna eventually stopped on a branch and I never saw him move again before I gave up and left. I'm not sure if he was sunning himself or if he was hoping the fruit bats would forget he was there; little chance of the latter, based on the noise.

So I continued my ride out to Glennifer and found Never Never Creek. This was a very refreshing little river that had some gorgeous swimming holes. One of the holes had a big rope swing on one bank that I used with vigor. The water was surprisingly chilly considering the hot day, but the chill rounded out the heat well. After I returned, I took my didge lesson with Tynon, the proprieter of the shop I mentioned earlier. He taught me a few tricks that I had not stumbled upon already, and I ended up walking out of the shop with a brand new didge in the tune of C. It's lightweight and has a sweet sound, so I figure I will travel with it for a while at least.

I hopped back on the bus the next day, and ended up at a really insane place, the Dag Sheep Station. This place is a fully functional cattle and sheep ranch that also caters to travelers passing through. The ranch hands are a riot, Australian style cowboys full of humor, piss and wind. Some of the older shearers looked like they had been on the job for a while, wiry and sporting permanently hunched shoulders. I got to see them working the sheep with their dogs, which were underfoot everywhere. It seemed like every person that worked on the station had about two or three well trained shepherds (I forget what they called them, but they are a cross between Australian shepherds and dingoes). Afterwards I checked out the shearing shed where I got to hop into the fray and try my hand at shearing a sheep. This was just plain fascinating. They drag these sheep around like sacks of grain, flinging them to and fro, and the sheep just sort of stare off vacantly during the whole thing. I think you have to present yourself as a predator of authority to elicit that kind of behavior from a sheep, because if you are like me and hesitate a little when handling a sheep, they kick around quite a bit. Anyway, I got the hang of it and sheared some of the less delicate portions of a sheep. As it turns out, a 'dag' is basically the dingleberries that form around sheep butts. At some point in the season, the sheep get a 'bikini cut' which clears away the wool around their face and backside; this turns out to be important since flies can nest in the shit-encrusted nether regions and cause all sorts of complications that will end up killing a sheep. Well, those of us that were observing the shearing became very familiar with the dags since when the shearers noticed us watching they started throwing dags at us whenever they became available ("Here ya go, a little something to take home, Mate!").

They tend to party pretty hard at the Dag. That night we had a fantastic ranch-style roast lamb slowly cooked in cast iron pots, followed by many beers at the bar. At some point I had a go with Curly, the bucking sheep. Well, it's not really a sheep. It's a barrel suspended from the ceiling by four ropes; each rope has someone yanking on it, doing their best to dislodge you from Curly. I lasted something like three or four seconds; not too bad, but not spectacular.

After the Dag I continued down the coast to Sydney. Sydney is every bit as beautiful as everyone says it is. The harbor bridge and opera house are truly impressive. I spent most of the day wandering around down on the harbor, trying to come up with ways of photographing the opera house that millions of other photographers had not already tried. I stayed in an area known as King's Cross, an interesting mix of upscale trendy restaurants and clubs along with sailors from the nearby naval base, streetwalkers and strip joints, and popular bars. The next couple of days I explored bits of the city, including the Sydney Aquarium. The displays were very good, including some "oceanariums" that involve submerged tunnels in the tanks. These were nice, but not as nice as Kelly Tarlton's over in Auckland, NZ.

Sydney marks the point where the east coast starts to become the south coast of Australia. Heading out of Sydney, my bus made what was supposed to be a brief stop at a wildlife refuge and beach called Pebbly Beach. Here I got to get my hands on some wild kangaroos, and with the help of some sunflower seeds got some of the native parrots and other birds to land on my arms. The beach itself was pretty and I got in some body surfing (with a suit, this time). Unfortunately, so did our bus driver, and the waves at some point dispensed with the bus keys that he had forgotten in his swimtrunks. We eventually managed to get a locksmith out to the bus with the help of a forest ranger, and he replaced the ignition. I spent the time playing didgeridoo and juggling amongst the kangaroos. Once we were on our way we arrived that night at Canberra, the specially built national Capitol of Australia. It's a pretty interesting city, geopolitically set up in a similar fashion as the D.C. in the States. Unlike D.C., there are hardly any people in this city. It is very nice, though, and I took in some great views of the place, but eschewed sitting in on a parliamentary session since from what I could gather from glances at the television, these sessions mostly involve heavy ranting. Even worse than our own politicians, if you ask me.

The next day we headed up into the Snowy Mountains, following the fabled Snowy River. These mountains are very pretty, but not as craggy as I expected. They have been weathered down quite a bit; you do get some elevation, but not necessarily extreme slopes. The Snowy River became the site for a huge hydroelectric project, and has lost much of its magnificence since there are around fifty damns clogging it up. Once up on the plateau above the mountains, I stayed at a farmstay called Karoonga Park, near Gelantipy. Here I immediately hopped on a horse for a ride through the countryside, since they had nearby stables. Everyone snickered at my horseriding skills, but I showed them. Along the way we came across a heard of about fifty wild horses, with a magnificent stallion leading them with a wild temperament nobody had seen before. We proceeded to round up these wild horses, and were doing quite well until the stallion led the herd straight down about a sixty degree slope towards one of the surrounding rivers. Nobody could believe it, as most horses would never attempt such a thing. All of the other riders balked at pursuing the horses, except for me. I took my horse straight down that slope after that stallion. For three days I chased them, and I'm sure most of the people back Karoonga wondered where I went. Their questions were answered when I triumphantly returned with all fifty horses, including the magnificent, but now cowed, stallion.

Oh. Wait a minute, that wasn't me, that was the Man from Snowy River. In my case, I bumbled around on a horse named Jack, who knew quite well that I was not fully in control, and had a penchant for nipping the hind quarters of nearby horses. We did go up and down some steep gullies, but nothing like in the movie. It was a great time, though; it was the first time I'd been on a horse since I was just a kid. I thought I did pretty well, but I'm sure the ranch hands were secretly laughing at the Yank on Jack.

Karoonga Park is a family-run operation, and they treated me very well. I had a big meal that night that reminded me of Thanksgiving; something like five courses of pure comfort food. That night I hopped into a trailer behind a tractor with some other visitors and went looking for nocturnal wildlife such as wombats. Unfortunately a huge storm blew in while we were out and we did not see any wildlife. The intermittent glimpses of the surrounding countryside with each flash of heat lightning were very beautiful, though. Eventually, one of the family collected us in a covered bus to take us back to the lodge. Along the way he crossed a couple of cattle pastures, and in one we saw some calves nearby the herd, except for one who was alone by the fence, up in the headlights. This whole family that runs the place is very quiet spoken, and only because I was up next to him, I heard the driver mutter "That one was born for dyin'..." Then we moved on. Harsh life on the farm, I guess. I felt bad for the little feller, though.

After Karoonga, we briefly stopped at a winery near Lakes Entrance. While here, I heard rumors that you could rent cruisers and explore the surrounding lakes (which are saltwater lakes, separated from the ocean by an overgrown sandbar). I knew that a couple of people were hopping off at Lakes Entrance, and at the time I was talking to a guy named Adam from Dallas. I convinced Adam that it would be a good idea to rent a cruiser if we could collect enough people. I convinced the two that were already staying, two girls from England, and with that Adam and I hopped off the bus to stay as well. We rented the Mason Bay, a cruiser that berthed four and sported an upstairs deck and skipper controls as well. With four people this ended up being pretty affordable. This was by far the largest boat I had ever driven.

Speaking of large boats, the night before I had an interesting conversation with a fisherman who worked charterboats in the area. Frank was in town for maritime school, upgrading his commercial status. To even get in the school you must log something like 900 days worth of time on a commercial rig, and once you graduate the school and complete your oral examinations, you are entitled to run commercial trips on a large boat out to a goodly distance from the shore of countries (the details escape me, but it would allow him to run clear up to Japan, but 50 km shy of running a trip to New Zealand). Anyway, we were shooting the shit about seafaring, fishing, and what was involved with the courses he was taking. Frank had heard a compelling new theory regarding the Bermuda Triangle. In these maritime courses, they teach you why it's a bad idea to try and force an anchor when it becomes caught on an undersea gas pipeline. If you force it, you are likely to rupture the pipeline, creating a huge bubble zone of rising gas. Physics being physics and all, a boat cannot float on air or a diffuse enough combination of gas and water. You can immediately sink your ship in such a bubble stream. So goes the new theory regarding the Bermuda Triangle -- they now suspect that ships might have been lost in natural gas eruptions from the seafloor. These can be spotted, but apparently they are difficult to distinguish between the bubbles that rise up from the junction of cold currents with warm currents (a rise in temperature (or a fall in pressure)) will shock gas out of solution in a liquid. So captains likely assumed thermal junctions and sailed their ships right into a gas bubble eruption. Kerplunk! Of course, this does not account for the airplanes or radio anomalies, but it sounded quite plausible to me. Frank was full of tales, and the evening was well spent.

Full of maritime lore, we departed the next morning on the Mason Bay and had a fantastic time. The first thing we did was explore the Bunga Arm, which is a long channel nearest the ocean. It's pretty remote, and once beached you can hop over the dunes to Ninety Mile Beach. Down on the beach you can look as far as the eye can see in both directions and see absolutely nothing except for empty beach and big waves. The boat had a fully equipped kitchen, and the first night I cooked up a nice red sauce pasta (with lots of garlic, which sort of ruffled the Brits I think). At night the stars were about as brilliant as I have ever seen. Not only could you see the Milky Way, but you could also see the dark splotches that obscure the stars. Right about sunset, I also caught site of a four-foot long freshwater eel maneuvering nearby the boat (apparently freshwater eels can withstand salt water). The next day we explored more of the lakes, and camped at another section near Ninety Mile beach. For dinner that night we grilled some fresh fish we had picked up at a nearby wharf. This trip was well worth the detour. I came away from it with one certainty: I very much want to own a boat someday.

When we picked up the bus again, we ended up doing the winery tour again. Bonus. The next destination was Philip Island, a popular vacation spot for denizens of the Melbourne region. I hopped off the bus here to wait out the horde that had descended on Melbourne for their Grand Prix. All hotels and hostels were booked and inflated. I bided my time by hiring a bike on the island and touring much of the hilly ranch country, including a nice winery. The south coast of the island has big surf and is very popular with the surfing community. Though I did no surfing, I did hang out on the beaches, soaking up the sounds of crashing waves. After a couple of days, the Grand Prix was over and I darted into Melbourne. Tomorrow I catch a flight down to Tasmania where I hope to get in another bushwalk; when I return, I will spend more time in the Melbourne area before heading up to the Northern Territory. I am going to see if I can fit the Ocean Road drive into my schedule, as it is supposed to be fantastic, but if I do it will cut into my time near Darwin. Time will tell.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: The beer scene in Oz is distressingly similar to that of the States, though as far as I can tell they don't have anything resembling Prohibition to blame for the emergence of mega breweries. Though the brands are different, the tune is the same: Lots of McPilsner, but with a few light ales. I have sullenly settled on Victoria Bitter as my McBeer of choice. To be fair, however, I have not spent much time seeking out craft breweries yet. Down in Tasmania they have the Cascade brewery; I look forward to inspecting their product.

Random hah: While on the Dag Sheep Station, the cowboy showing off his dogs for us was riding his horse bareback, drinking a beer the whole time he was whistling instructions to the dogs. Show off.

Till next time from somewhere in Oz,
Matt

Rotorua, in the North Island, is a popular tourist destination centered around a hotbed of geothermal activity featuring boiling mud pits, geysers, volcanoes, and scents of sulphur drifting on the breeze. In this respect, it reminded me of a more urbanized version of Yellowstone. Locals sometimes refer to it as "Roto-Vegas" due to the industry response to the regular influx of tourists such as myself.

Earlier in my trip I had read a headline about a rogue geyser erupting in a town to the south. This geyser turned out to be one of the small geysers in the middle of a city park in the middle of Rotorua. As I rolled into town, noticing the ever-present smell of sulphur in the air, I saw the effects of the eruption. In the process of blowing scalding mud and steam high into the air, it had withered and killed all of the trees and vegetation within about 150 feet surrounding the geyser. Most of the pathways in the park come much closer than this to the geologic curiosity, but at the time of the eruption nobody was nearby. Most people would assume that this sort of event would be a cause for concern for locals that live on top of such hotbeds -- not so in Rotorua. The locals were excited and proud of the local charms their village had to offer. I never found out whether they were going to leave the white, withered husks of the trees and bushes in the park for posterity, or if they were going to plant new ones.

To put the event in proper perspective, it really was pretty small. Most of the region has volcanic features, and there are many lakes that are actual craters or the result of subsidence following a major eruption. The nearby adrenaline capital of Taupo sits on the shore of the largest lake in NZ, the entirety of which is a single volcanic crater from an eruption that was rumoured to have darkened the skies of China a few thousand years ago.

I was only staying for a short while in Rotorua, since I wanted to get to the South Island fairly quickly. The next day I rented a mountain bike from a local ice cream shop (don't ask) and took myself on a tour of the place. All throughout New Zealand there are huge forests managed by Fletcher Challenge, in cooperation with the forest service. One of these forests is near Rotorua, and has a wide variety of trees normally found in the U.S., including California redwoods. Fletcher maintains mountain bike trails in this forest, and they are world class. I had a wonderful time pounding on the trails, even though it served as a stark reminder that I was considerably out of biking shape. Hitting a nice mountain bike trail, for those of you who partake in such things, is a great way to feel right at home while travelling. Best of all, these trails were dedicated to mountain bikes; I even saw signs indicating "no horses"...not that I have anything personal against equestrians, but it is ironic since the tables are typically turned.

After riding the trails, I took to the highways and rode out to one of the regional geothermal attractions, Hell's Gate. It's a fascinating area full of bubbling and boiling mud pits, sulphur ponds, and steam vents. Many of the seething ponds were dark grey in color due to high concentrations of graphite in solution; for this reason they were actually hotter than the boiling point of water, typically 107 to 109 degrees Celcius (224 to 228 F). There is a local Maori legend about a woman who was driven to suicide by an abusive and neglectful husband. She chose to leap into one of these pools to end her suffering. Many of the towns and features of the area bear words used in her mother's lament upon discovering her daughter's fate (the lament itself was something along the lines of "Here my daughters broken remains will lie forever"). Gazing into these pools, I felt like it was an odd way to choose to end one's suffering, sort of like ending the pain of a hammer strike to the thumb with a boulder strike to the chest.

So after that fine day of bike riding, I hopped back on the bus and continued to Wellington on the south end of the North Island. I missed an incredible amount of sights along the way, but time waits for no traveller. Wellington is a beautiful city, nestled on the hills surrounding the bay. It reminded me a bit of San Francisco. I did the urban thing while waiting for the ferry to the South Island; caught a neauvo Celtic band, wandered in the lush botanical gardens, caught a movie ("Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", which was great), and went on a scenic hike up Mt. Victoria for sweeping views of the surrounding city.

The ferry ride to the South Island goes from Wellington to Picton, a small port and fishing village which only gets active whenever a ferry unloads. The ride is very scenic since it travels through much of the Marlborough Sounds on the way. Costal tracks and sea kayaking seem to be the most popular activities in this region, especially further west in and around Abel Tasman National Park. Unfortunately, none of the sea kayaking outfits will do solo rentals due to insurance concerns. None of the other scheduled trips fit in with my schedule, and I did not want to fool with buying a used kayak and selling it later. The sounds in the region are wonderful for kayaking, however, with all sorts of inlets and beaches to explore. Many of the hostels and getaways are only accessible by boat, and water taxis abound. Since it did not seem like I was going kayaking, I did the next best thing and went fishing instead. I got a spot on one of the local charters, and spent the day catching blue cod, red sea perch, and the pesky dog fish -- a small shark that tends to eat anything on a hook. That night I ate well, cooking up a portion of the days catch at the hostel.

The hostel where I stayed in Picton warrants special mentioning. It's called The Juggler's Rest, and is run by professional jugglers. I stayed there for two nights and loved it. Buskers come and go constantly, and each night is like a mini-carnival in the courtyard, with people practicing juggling, fire-breathing, and diablo hurling. I immediately picked up several new tricks with my juggling skills, and for the first time got to try my hands on some juggling pins. It was such a friendly, odd and quirky atmosphere; I felt right at home. Down the street I found a family that makes juggling balls, and bought five for my travels. Perhaps when I am through I will be able to handle all five.

So after Piction I caught a ride to Nelson, the regional gateway for all things outdoors on the northwest coast of the South Island (including Abel Tasman, etc). Here I began gathering supplies for a back country trek up in the Nelson Lakes region, a region that offers some alpine segments in the mountains (other treks in the region are typically coastal in nature). While doing so, I caught word from one of the guys managing the hostel that there was a full-moon drumming and fire dancing event up on the beach the next night. I lingered for an extra day, finishing my preparations (and due to a boat under repair, missed out on another activity in which I wanted to partake: shark diving, where they lower you down in a shark cage in the middle of a bunch of sharks in a feeding frenzy -- ah well, next time).

The night of the full moon, about eight of us borrowed bikes from the hostel and rode down to the beach for the drumming. It was a beautiful night, and I got to sit in with a drum for a while. The drummers were not particularly skilled, but there were some competent fire dancers about. All together, it added up to a great evening, especially since I had not had a chance to drum in a long while. Afterwards I went with several of the guys into town for some mischief in the local taverns. Our crowd included a crazy Kiwi, two musically competent Germans, a Japanese truck driver, and myself. A fun night overall, even though I had to get up early the next day to catch a ride to St. Arnaud.

St. Arnaud is a tiny town near the trailheads of tramps around Lakes Rotoiti and Rotoroa. These lakes were formed by glaciers that gouged out the valleys and subsequently retreated. After storing some gear at the local hostel, I headed off onto the trails for five days. The hike was very beautiful, and included both wooded and alpine regions. The woods in the region tend to be birch forests, with over eight species of birch represented. An interesting thing about these forests is that they support a black fungus that grows on many of the trees in lower elevations. This fungus does not kill the trees, and it produces a honeydew that birds used to feed on. I say used to, because in this region now there are wasps (which look like yellowjackets to me) that feast on the honeydew. They infiltrated New Zealand in a shipment of engine parts, and have displaced local bird life in some regions. There are no predators to feed on the wasps, so in woods that have them, they are everywhere and the forest hums with their presence. Anyway, the black fungus produces this honeydew, and as a result, when you walk through the woods you keep catching strong wafts of what really smells like mead (honey wine, to you non homebrewers out there). Mmmmm!

In the higher elevations, up in the alpine regions, there were spectacular views of mountains and valleys, and plenty of rugged hiking across ridges and scree fields. Some of the ascents and descents were absolutely brutal, going straight up and down sans switchbacks. One ascent in particular, from Sabine hut to Angelus hut, rose over 900 meters within 4 km. (This works out to about 3000 feet over 2.5 miles). Grunt work indeed, but well worth the reward of sweeping vistas.

Though they were not much of a problem in the higher elevations, down by the lakes there were tons of sandflies. These little bastards are relentless, and though they do not hurt when they bite, the bites themselves itch like hell. I compare the itch to the type of itch you might get from poison ivy. It only gets worse when you scratch it. In the lower elevations, at least, I was grateful for the well developed hut system on the track since they provide some roomy protection from sandflies during the day (sandflies retire at night). The huts provide basic shelter and cisterns of rainwater; unless you are seeking solitude, there are many interesting characters to meet in them as well.

So after five days I emerged back into St. Arnaud. (On the last day I hiked out with an Irish guy that also spends part of the summer as a raft guide on the Arkansas River in Colorado -- small world, huh?). That night in the hostel I met up with an English fellow named John whom I had run across in one of the huts on the tramp. John works part time as a hut warden on many of the tracks in NZ, although he was off duty when I met him. We went to the only restaurant in town and treated ourselves to a steak dinner; after five days in the bush, it was fantastic. I suspect it was pretty good even without that advantage.

The next day I rode with John to Christchurch. I had a plane to catch on the 15th, and even though I had royally missed most of the South Island I decided to stick to my schedule and come back to the South Island another day. John has a guide friend who had told him about some unmarked hot springs along the way. In NZ, hot springs are fairly common, but usually have commercial "thermal resorts" associated with them. These hot springs were right on the bank of the Boyle River, along an unmarked trail that the locals tend to keep to themselves. They were very nice to my sore muscles, and the refreshing splash in the cold river afterwards was fantastic.

Once we were in Christchurch, John took me to meet this tramping guide friend of his. As it turns out, all over NZ you see pamphlets for guided tramping tours. John's friend Malcom turned out to be one of the owners and operators of this company. Not surprisingly, he was very knowledgeable about the various tracks in NZ. Malcom lived in a small town just outside of Christchurch called Lytlleton. It's a hilly port town, and very pretty. I mention it because it was the town that the outdoor scenes for the movie "The Frighteners" was filmed, and once it was pointed out to me it was immediately recognizable.

That night Christchurch was having a huge outdoor Valentines dance, and we all showed up for the live samba music. The dance was in a pretty part of downtown Christchurch, with a creek winding through it. The park was decked out with Valentine decorations, the people of the city were actually dancing (how refreshing), and gondolas cruised the waterway. All in all, it was entirely too romantic for John and myself, who didn't have dates. So we eventually wandered off to some of the nearby pubs and wrapped up the evening in a pub called The Bog.

The next day I reluctantly caught my flight to Brisbane, Australia. There was so much of New Zealand that I missed, but I have a feeling I could spend an entire year just in NZ and still have that feeling. I will definitely have to come back to NZ and explore it properly, with more time.

I got but a taste, and NZ is finger licking good.

Excerpt from the Beer Lover's Almanac: There is hope yet. The South Island in New Zealand has done much to redeem my earlier estimation of the NZ beer scene. There are many more regional and micro breweries in the south. In particular, Mac's brewery puts out some good product (such as the Black Mac dark malt). In Nelson I found a tiny boutique brewery that was little more than an overgrown homebrewing operation that only sold its beer from the shop. I talked with the owner and brewer for a while about the art and state of brewing in NZ. Micros are on the upswing, as is homebrewing. His beer was tasty, and I took a few of the browns and stouts along to the full moon drumming session. Nelson is the region where most NZ hops are grown, and I have yet to figure out the characteristics of all the local varieties. In general, though, Kiwis prefer their beers on the maltier side rather than the hoppy side.

Random hah: A local man was recently arrested for performing a haka, or Maori war dance, on an unsuspecting Asian tourist who lit up a cigarette nearby. The war dance involves a lot of leaps and facial contortions, and serves as thoroughly intimidating way of unnerving one's enemies. The All Blacks, the NZ rugby team, have made it a tradition to perform the haka before each game. It is actually illegal to perform the haka on unsuspecting tourists in NZ. It is unknown whether the tourist realized the outburst was due to the cigarette.

Till next time from somewhere in Oz,
Matt

Since the economy is geared towards backpackers here, there are lots of buses and shuttles that cater towards people that aren't interested in traveling the straight line between A and B, but rather a meandering route where you can hop on an off whenever you want. These are pretty affordable (though not as cheap as hitching), and if you can stand being on a pseudo-touristy bus for a while are a pretty good way to get around. So it was one of these type of buses that I chose for my basic transportation along a broad loop through the Northland.

There are many gorgeous beaches in New Zealand, and they are not very crowded at all. One of the more popular destinations on the east coast is up in the Bay of Islands, where many people choose the city of Paihia as a base of operations for exploring the area. While in Paihia I took a long hike one day up through the native bush along a ridge overlooking the bay. The flora in New Zealand is truly unique, with a large number of the species existing nowhere else in the world. The going theory is that New Zealand split very early off of the supercontinent Gondwanaland very early in the process of the breakup that eventually formed the continents we know today. As a result, many species evolved on their own, isolated from the rest of the world for millions of years -- so not only are there species that exist nowhere else, there are also varieties that have remained virtually unchanged since the days of the dinosaurs. New Zealand did not have many dinosaurs, except for a smallish dog-sized variety, so to this day there are prehistoric plants that have been found as fossils on other continents -- the same plants that the dinos munched on.

So the hike was lush and beautiful. One thing that I was surprised to find was a preponderance of cicadas down here. They certainly make a different noise than I am accustomed to, but they are everywhere. The forests are teeming with insect and bird life around here. I came out of the bush in a little town called Opua, where the ferry runs across to Russell Island. If you have studied any NZ history, this island is where much of the lawlessness and piracy happened during British colonization. From there I took a nice coastal walk back to Paihia; this was a track cut out of the bank up the hill that offered great views of the bay. All together it took most of the day to complete.

The next day signed up to sail on a yacht to explore the islands in the bay, of which there are seven main islands and over a hundred smaller ones. The bay is spectacular, and its reputation is well earned. I got to steer the yacht for a while under full sail, so I was allowed a brief fantasy of owning my own boat and calling the ocean my own. One of the highlights of the trip was stomping around on Roberton Island, the very place Captain Cook first touched down in NZ (and was promptly greeted by a bunch of agitated Maori). In general, the Maori influence is very strong in the north island of NZ, and they are still a very active part of everyday life in NZ.

After Paihia I was off to Opononi. This is a tiny little town on the south side of Hokianga Bay. Nestled on the west coast, this is a very laid back, underdeveloped and quiet paradise. After the hustle of Paihia it was a welcome rest. Opononi's claim to fame was the appearance of "Opo" the friendly dolphin back in the mid-fifties. Opo was quite popular, and was truly friendly -- he would swim up to bathers and let them pet him and play games with him. Opo was popular, and eventually thousands of people were traveling to Opononi to see the friendly dolphin. Unfortunately, Opo died soon thereafter. Most of the locals believe that it was the activities of illegal dynamite fishermen that killed the dolphin. Some people darkly whisper that it might not have been an accident, because apparently there were some elements in the town that resented the sudden popularity of their quiet little paradise. Opo is buried in front of the war memorial in town, and is still revered to this day.

I took a day walk up to the South Head, the southern point at the mouth of the bay where it opens into the Tasman Sea. In many ways this area reminded me of the northern coast of California, except the rocks that the waves crash against are volcanic in nature. The North Head is made of huge sand dunes, another major difference. I worked my way down to the beach and lingered for a long time, as I never seem to tire of the sound of crashing waves. The confluence at the mouth of the bay was very turbulent and serves as a nice reminder of what water in motion can do. This is not somewhere I would ever want to swim.

The next day, I went across the bay with a Danish couple from my hostel to partake in one of the regional activities: dune surfing. Dune surfing is common all throughout the extreme northern regions, but this bit of dune was special. Unlike most dunes, this one ended directly in the water of the bay. So after flying down about 150 feet of sand on a modified boogie board, you shoot out about thirty yards across the water of the bay. Great fun. Before commencing the dune surfing, my Danish acquaintance Martin and I hiked up behind the larger dunes to find some wonderful wind worn sandstone formations that lead into a deeper costal canyon. The sandstone was soft, and was clearly the result of sand dunes in the process of petrification. In many ways it reminded me of what the slickrock hills around Moab, Utah, must have looked like at some point in their history. That night, the Swiss fellow who owns the hostel in Opononi made a wonderful fondue along with some homemade dipping bread. I'd never really had fondue before, but I have no trouble imagining that this was pretty tasty as far as fondue goes.

At this point I was beginning to notice the effects of the NZ sun. I had been using sunscreen on my walks and water activities, but nevertheless the sun was working its way through. The ozone layer is thinner down here, so make no mistake about it: The NZ sun will bite you.

My bus was not running the next day, so I hopped aboard a smaller van that my Danish friends were taking. The van was driven by a local man, and on the way to Dargaville we stopped in some of the kauri forests along the way. The kauri trees grow to enormous sizes, and some are more than 2000 years old. The Europeans absolutely decimated the kauri forests when they arrived, and there are very few stands left. There are numerous restoration efforts underway, but the trees grow slowly -- the results will not appear until long after our generation is gone. The bits of kauri forest that remain are fantastic, and are treasure troves of native NZ flora.

Many of the beaches in the area are driveable as well, so on the last bit to Dargaville we drove along the Rapiro Ocean Beach (100 km long or so) to Baylys Beach. Along the way the driver stopped and showed us some interesting layers in the sandstone of the banks along the shore. There are at least three distinct layers that represent fallen kaori forests well on their way to becoming coal deposits. Each black layer represented a kauri forest that was leveled by a volcanic eruption. The lowestlayer was over fifty million years old, and you could still see bits of root, bark, and kauri gum in the deposits.

So I arrived in Dargaville. Though far larger than Opononi, Dargaville is very much a small town with an economy based on the surrounding farms. It is next to a large silty river that reminds me of a smaller version of the Mississippi. This river is driven by the tides twice a day, back and forth, so never gets much chance to discharge silt into the ocean. The tides are significant, as I noticed when poking around near the shoreline -- drops of about 8 feet or so seem common. The few boats in the town endure this stoically, settling gently down into the mud each time the tide recedes. As I was studying these boats I noticed a plain looking building with a couple of gents having beers on the back porch. I could see tables in the building, but it was otherwise empty. I found my way up to the deck overlooking the river and introduced myself. The building is a clubhouse for one of the local boating clubs. It seems like everyone is into sailing in NZ, and Dargaville is no exception. They just completed their own regatta that very day in celebration of the Auckland anniversary. They were great guys; there was Wayne who managed the club bar; Nod, who managed a local dairy farm; Allen, who runs a local jet boat operation; and Jimmie, an interesting fellow and deaf handyman. We got along great. After a couple of beers I had entered into an arrangement with Nod to go check out the dairy farm in the morning.

The next morning I show up at Nod's place a bit before 7 a.m. Nod lives in a place with a great view above a tire shop near the boat club. They start milking on the farm (about 400 cows) around 4 a.m., but normally don't finish until around 7:30. Nod and I hop into his car to head to the farm, along with his little Yorkshire terrier who travels to the farm with him every day. Unfortunately, they had finished milking early that day and were in the process of cleaning up. "Darn," I'm thinking, I really wanted to see those cows getting milked so I could get a bit of that farm experience. No worries -- Nod explained all the equipment to me, and the process really is interesting. It was about this time that I looked down to find myself ankle deep in cow shit. "Ahhhhhhh!" I said, after a deeply vigorous inhalation, "Now we're Serious." Nod and I got on the four wheeler and moved one of the herds to another pasture. After this we checked out the rest of the farm and I helped taken in a section of temporary fence they use to partition the grazing areas. I was happy because I was getting to see the farm and drive the four wheeler around. I think Nod was a bit embarrassed that we had missed the milking, but I had a fantastic time.

It bears mentioning that my Danish friends thought I was daft. They both have worked on dairy farms, and the notion that someone might want to go visit one for fun seemed odd to them. I'm sure they got a good laugh about it, especially after they took a look at me when I returned.

Later on that day I visited the maritime museum in Dargaville, which has a very impressive display of various shipwrecks they have pulled off of the Rapiro Ocean Beach (the same beach I drove down earlier). One of the more impressive items is a pre-European Maori war canoe, which they used to carve out of a single kaori tree. It is the only example of a pre-European canoe of its kind known to exist. Another interesting artifact in front of the museum is the main masts from the Rainbow Warrior, the Greenpeace ship that was sunk in the Auckland harbor by French operatives in 1985.

On the walk back from the museum, I heard my name called. I looked up into a building to see Wayne, from the night before, waving his eyebrows suggestively whilst panamiming the universal sign for cow milking with both hands. I had to regretfully inform him that we missed the milking, but had a great time on the farm nevertheless.

So I caught my regular bus out of Dargaville and sit in Auckland once again. It is overwhelmingly evident that I have not granted myself enough time to properly explore this country. I'm set to pay a brief visit to Rotorua tomorrow to pay homage to the volcanoes, after which I'm off to Wellington and the south island. There I hope to get at least a couple of back country treks under my belt, and finally do some sea kayaking.

Excerpt from the Beer Lovers Almanac: New Zealand seems to be dominated by two major breweries. Microbreweries exist here and there, but they are not often found in the local taverns for some reason. Speights puts out some decent malty ales, and Red Lion does a decent pilsner, but so far my favorite has been Monteiths Original ("Highly Hopped", European style).

Random Hah: I saw a pumping truck that looked like it was designed to service portable toilets, and proudly displayed on the license plate was "SHTMEN".

That's all for now, so fare well until I wrap up the south island.

Matt

I have also added the flight deck section, which will show the major segments of my scheduled flights, updated daily so as to reflect cancellations and routing changes.

In the spirit of travelling, I have swapped out the quotes database for the time being so that it will serve up quotes I found to be particularly fitting for the travel mood.

I am excited, apprehensive, thrilled, and scared, all at once. I can't wait.

Matt

And the best is:

"There was one exact moment, in fact, when I knew for sure that Al Gore would Never be President of the United States, no matter what the experts were saying -- and that was when the whole Bush family suddenly appeared on TV and openly scoffed at the idea of Gore winning Florida. It was Nonsense, said the Candidate, Utter nonsense. ... Anybody who believed Bush had lost Florida was a Fool. The Media, all of them, were Liars & Dunces or treacherous whores trying to sabotage his victory."

Here's the URL: http://espn.go.com/page2/s/thompson/

As Election Day comes and goes-and now Election Week, too-the country hangs in limbo, caught between two mediocre candidates, wondering whether we'll spend the next four years in a state of left- or right-wing boredom and political gridlock. Before Election Day, I swore I'd never condone the use of the phrase 'battleground state' again in political discourse, and now I've expanded that linguistic sanction to include 'butterfly ballot,' 'recount,' and 'too close to call.' The campaign that lasted forever, yet told us nothing worthwhile about the candidates, has become the election that lasted forever. But what has it told us about our democracy?

We are a country-if not a world-of people afraid to raise a stink, scared to cause a ruckus and look different (or stupid), and I'm sure the individual voters in Palm Beach county became more vocal only as they understood that others had made the same mistake as they did. Few Americans like to rock the boat, and most of us will eat our tuna fish sandwiches on wheat, even if we ordered rye, rather than send it back to the kitchen and cause problems. And I'm sure that many voters in that now-infamous county left their polling places, having been denied a chance to revote (if indeed they did ask for a replacement ballot, which it appears that some of them did), thinking that they might have screwed up, but that their vote didn't mean that much anyway. And now, like the baseball manager who waits until after a game to lodge a protest with the umpire, their complaints carry less weight.

Let me be clear that I am not faulting these voters for complaining too late-some of them did apparently did complain on Election Day that they were afraid they'd mismarked their ballots, and they said they were denied a replacement ballot. If this is true, it is the worst kind of voter fraud, the kind that masks itself as bureaucratic indifference, the placid face behind the government desk that tells us, sorry, the form's filled out wrong and we'll have to come back next week. It is infuriating to encounter this kind of petty-mindedness at a government agency, where it usually means a further hassle and a delay in processing whatever application we failed to fill out correctly. But in the context of an election, this kind of response is criminal-voters anywhere should be given the chance to cast a correct ballot, no matter how many times he or she takes to cast that ballot. One person, one vote does not refer to the number of ballots we are issued.

But even if these stories of being denied an opportunity to revote aren't true, or if the number of people who were denied another ballot is too small to make a difference, I don't see the harm in a revote. It may be unprecedented in American presidential history, but what about this surreal election process has had precedent? We are dealing with a unique situation in our history, a situation which has no precedent that I've heard of-an unprecedented election, as well as an as-yet un-Presidented election-but we are so afraid to strike out on our own, to do something different. If we allow a revote, and only to those voters who actually voted on November 7, what has been harmed?

Over and over, I've heard the commentators point out the obvious, that these voters know the results in the rest of the country, and that they therefore understand the gravity of their vote. In a way, the presidential election has narrowed to this one county, and that weight is somehow supposed to affect the minds of the voters. But would it do so? Let's break it down:

Clearly, Bush voters are going to vote for Bush and Gore voters are going to vote for Gore, assuming that they mark their new ballots correctly. What voter in his or her right mind would support a different candidate in this hypothetical revote? Clearly, none. So the majority of the vote will probably be unaffected. Instead, fringe voters might be drawn into the two-party fray; they might change their vote from Nader, Buchanan, or any of the other minor-party candidates to a Bush or Gore vote. The Bush campaign has acknowledged that a revote would have the effect of electing Gore, on the basis of this kind of fringe-candidate reconsideration. The Gore campaign, so far as I know, has said nothing on this case, for much the same reason.

This is the sticky wicket, the situation that troubles most commentators considering the potential for a revote. In some ways, it's not much different than West Coast voters, who often know the winners and losers in a presidential campaign, and change their votes as a result (if they don't abandon voting entirely). But this has not stopped the media from predicting the results of elections. Far from it, in this election, last-minute voters in the Florida panhandle could have known the first Florida prediction-that of a Gore victory-before they cast their votes, because they're in a different time zone than the rest of the state. (I've lived near to the Florida panhandle, a.k.a. the Redneck Riviera, and I imagine that their time zone is actually about ten years behind the rest of the state, but that's a different story entirely).

Voters continue to allow their votes to be affected by information that appears closer to the election. Here in Oregon, where some voters waited until the last possible minute before marking their ballots, Nader voters were clearly waiting for nationwide results before making their decision. On the other side of the information gap are voters like me; I sent in my ballot days after it arrived, two weeks before the election, with no knowledge of any national outcomes or last-minute revelations like Bush's drunk-driving conviction. I'm sure others did the same, and absentee voters nationwide may have sent their ballots in earlier, too. Overseas voters aren't even privy to the same kind of inundative coverage we get here in the States, and surely have less (and differently biased) information than the rest of us. Does that make Oregon last-minute votes worth more or less than mail-in or absentee ballots? Clearly, it doesn't.

Beyond such minute psychological considerations, there is a larger aspect to this fear of a revote. It seems to me that everyone's worried that these Florida voters will vote knowing that their votes will make a significant difference in the outcome of the election. Wait a minute-isn't that what we're all supposed to do? Shouldn't we always cast our ballots in the hope that our candidate will win, and with the confidence that our ballot may be the one in a billion that pushes him or her over the top? Why is this such a fearsome prospect? In this era of electoral indifference, why are we denying this one county the opportunity to case votes that actually matter? Maybe we should do this every election: choose a pivotal county at random, and allow them to vote a week later, with a clear view of the difference their ballot will make. It's like a lottery for a chance to see democracy at work, to cast a ballot with full knowledge of its weight and import, rather than blithely tossing a piece of paper at an election official, lacking any kind of confidence that your vote will make a difference.

We are denying these Palm Beach county voters, in a sense, the ultimate democratic dream, to cast the deciding ballots in an election, knowing full well that they are making a huge decision. Far from being a nightmare, we should allow them this privilege, and then remember it next time we cast our own ballots. For, of course, the election has only come down to Florida and to Palm Beach county by an accident of chance. Who knows how many voters in other states could have swung the election towards one candidate or another by voting differently, or by voting at all? If these few Florida voters hold the election in their hands, it is only because of a coincidence of electoral college mathematics, poor ballot design, and the result of the six million ballots cast across the country. Their ballots are not worth more or less than the rest of ours; they only appear to be, they simply seem to be as important as they really are. And what, in the name of America and democracy, is wrong with that?]]>