Hangin' in Hernando's Hideaway

This post was written two weeks ago, but is only now getting posted due to a lack of internet access for the last half of our trip. Sorry. The next post, also already written, about Machu Picchu, will hopefully get up tomorrow, only a week late, once I have added the pictures. I still have to write the last post about our Amazon adventures...

All smiles as we arrived in Iguazu.

No the water doesn't go down the drain in the opposite direction here. Mr. Coriolis is spinning in his grave every time someone claims that myth to be true.  And yes, he is spinning in the same darned direction as always. It is cool, however, that we are finally far enough south on our journeys that the switching of the seasons actually matters. It is truly winter here. I've been to New Zealand, but prior to this, nobody else in my family had experienced winter in July.  Bali and Fiji are summer-year-round places and that is as far south as they had ever been.

On the party bus.

I find it appropriate that we now number a baker's dozen, because we have cleaned out every pastry shop within 3 km of our apartment each of the last three mornings and will do so tomorrow morning as well. And that is saying a lot because the pastry shops are more plentiful here than in Paris. But I am getting ahead of myself because although now we are in Buenos Aires (affectionately known by the locals as BA City), this chapter began in Iguacu. So that is where I shall begin.

Cliche, but still too cool not to photograph.

The Hagawiesches met us with the party bus at the airport in Iguacu, Brazil. Including their family of five, we are now a lucky group of thirteen, and will continue to be until the end of this adventure. The first stop was a bird park that was only on the agenda because we believe it provided a big kick-back for our local travel agent. But it was impressive nonetheless. There were more tourists than exotic birds, but we saw at least fifty different species in multitudes, every one. So no complaints there. Then it was a short walk to the entrance to the national park wherein was contained the most astonishing natural phenomenon I've yet encountered.  Seriously.  This place was unbelievable.

The pompadou alone was worthy of inclusion.

We looked up Iguazu falls on the net and discovered that the average volume of water that spills over is a bit less than at Niagara Falls, though the elevation loss for each drop is about three times as great down here. But forget averages. The maximum recorded amount (12 million gallons per second, in June of last year) of water spillage is over five times that of Niagara's maximum. And apparently, according to the park employees, we were there on an extremely high volume day, near absolute maximum. I can't imagine that it is even possible for more water to fall from one river. At one viewing point, called the Devil's Throat, you are surrounded by about 270 degrees of walls of falling water.  No pictures can capture the experience. You need the peripheral vision experience. And you have to feel it and hear it and even smell it on top of simply seeing it. We all got so thoroughly drenched that even after showering and changing clothes nobody felt warm and dry for hours. "Insanely awesome" is the best I can do when trying to describe it. I guess that is why I am limited to blogs and am not writing novels or travel books.

Don't know these guys, but they wouldn't get out of my shot. The water looked more like melted milk chocolate.

Think about that again. Twelve million gallons a second. Sheesh.

Chloe's expression says it all.

We stayed in a crazy hostel that night and ate fried chicken at a local dive on the recommendation of the proprietor. Nothing but chicken hearts to report home. The next day we would take the party bus to the Argentinian side of the falls. Now we were in Iguazu, Argentina rather than Iguacu, Brazil. It was old hat at this point, and we were all harder to impress. But here, the walking trails took you both above and below the falls rather than off to the side. We all had raincoats and we bought throwaway ponchos, but nothing helped. We were drenched again, and once again in awe. We must have taken over a hundred pictures of the dozens of rainbows that were decorating the lower river amongst the mist. Sawweeet!

Today was the day we found the "rainbow connection". Kermit would be proud.

A few of us (Carol, Josh and I, along with Annette and Brian H.) splurged for the optional boat ride into the falls. A better call I have rarely made. The other eight were too tired of getting wet, but if they truly understood what they had missed, they would be dripping with regret instead. The "raft" could take about forty lucky visitors at once and had so much engine power that I was seriously concerned we would get airborne enough to flip the boat. The captain was having fun snaking us up the river catching every eddy and wave head-on.  We made at least five attempts at charging directly into the falls. Everyone was screaming like they were on a rollercoaster and I'm pretty sure even my spleen got wet.  Carol tried to take video footage, but all you can see is water everywhere.  It was, I imagine, much like it would look if you walked into a gas station car wash and starting filming. Only the car wash would need to be dumping millions of gallons per second. The captain would kill the engine and we'd drift out with the current at about thirty mph only for him to gun it again so we could go through yet another rinse cycle.  Even Josh was speechless, and impressing that kid is not easy. Needless to say, we got our money's worth.

One of many videos we took on the boat. None really captured the experience. Sorry if the video doesn't work on the blog.

Out of the park and back over the border to stay another night in our Brazilian hostel, everyone was feeling pretty good about our choice of destinations. But there was one last experience to be had before we left Brazil for good. We were taken in the party bus to a well-loved local churrascaria. This is an all you can eat BBQ place for which Brazil is famous. They had an insanely well stocked salad and pasta bar as well as a crazy good dessert bar.  But the real draw is the meat.  Guys come by every thirty seconds or so wielding giant skewers with one of dozens of different cuts of meat.  There was veal and there were chicken hearts, and there was even a little pig every once in a while, but mostly there was beef. Each cut was introduced with a Portuguese name and a smile. The names meant nothing to any of us, so we just kept nodding our heads with a "why not"? and a shrug. I ate more beef in that meal than I have in the last six months put together. And I don't think I ever had a duplicate slice. Just, wow. I don't think being a vegetarian is an option in South America. For the thirteen of us, that was not an issue. Combine the "tasty meat!" with the boat ride, and Josh may just have trumped his favorite day ever.

One last party bus ride across the border and we were in the local Argentian airport destined for Buenos Aires. The flight was without incident. But we did run into a snafu when Mark got his ATM card eaten by the machine at the airport. And of course it was Sunday, so there was nobody to help. I had a helluva time communicating by phone with the bank employee the next day trying to get the card back. I guess my Spanish is not as up to snuff as I'd hoped. In the end we discovered that the card had been broken by the machine. So I did my best to confirm that they destroyed it thoroughly so that no shady individual could use it. Sadly, good old Bank of America then closed Mark's account entirely. But in the interim, several frustrating and fruitless trips to the bank have made things rough for Mark and Michelle. This all shouldn't have been such a big problem with the rest of us still capable of getting cash. But Mark has this wonderful habit of getting up before everyone else and buying out the breakfast pastry shops that only take cash using up all of our combined cash in the process. The country seems to limit each cardholder to $100 a day withdrawal. Our drug, I mean pastry, habit notwithstanding. We have it all figured out now I think, but little is more stressful than being in a foreign country with no money and useless credit cards. So I'm glad for Mark's sake that things have finally been resolved.

Our new digs (well, one of the thirteen rooms)

Out of the airport and into our new digs for four nights, we felt like we'd hit Shangri-La. This apartment is truly amazing. Five bedrooms and five bathrooms (there are 13 of us after all), a huge living room complete with a pool table (Josh is quickly becoming a shark), an enormous kitchen, a separate second common room and a laundry room all on one super-long single story floor plan. Seriously, with no exaggeration, we are talking 55 meters long, give or take a meter. It takes a helluva long time to get from the kitchen to the kids' bedroom. I'm not truly convinced the bedrooms really are in the Southern hemisphere. OK, now I am using hyperbole, but you get the idea.  All hardwood floors and fifteen foot ceilings with intricate moldings and multiple chandeliers. I haven't asked Carol what we paid for this place. I don't want to know.

Quincy thought the marble stairwell up to apartment was pretty cool too.

So now we are in big bad B.A. city. Many call it the Paris of the South. I can see where that nickname comes from as the architecture is quite similar to Paris and the number of marble statues per square meter here may be higher than any city I've ever been to. But walking around town it feels more like San Francisco to me than Paris. All the little neighborhoods have strikingly similar character to those back home. Part of it reminds me of China Basin (Puerto Madero), then there is the Union Square part (San Nicolas), and the Haight-Ashbury section (La Boca) and the Marina (Recoleta). We loved San Telmo's old town (the Mission) and the hip neighborhood of Palermo (Pacific Heights). The main difference is that San Francisco has all of those hills and Buenos Aires is flat as a pancake. Even the weather is quite comparable. Finding a cab in this city is absolute cake. Apparently there are three times as many cabs per capita as in NYC. I can believe it. We used a public bus once, just so we could say we did. We also only used the subway system once since the cabs were so easy and cheap. Plus the subway never seemed to go where we needed to go. But the kids were tired from walking around town all day, so I volunteered to spare them the thirty block walk home today.

A cool bridge in Puerto Madero

A couple of pics from colorful La Boca. 

A fun story ensues. And when I say "fun" I mean long and tedious to read but mildly amusing for the reader and for the writer as well, now that it is over, but not as I lived it. Should you like to skip it, just skip over the next four paragraphs.

So as I said, I took my two kids and the Allen's two kids home on the subway while the adults decided to walk. First, I made the mistake of entering through the pay-gates with all of the kids before realizing that the only accessible trains were going the wrong direction. In order to go the other way, you have to enter the subway from the other side of the street above. I didn't want to leave and pay again for all five of us. So we decided to ride the train the wrong way for one stop and then transfer at the next station, where the platform is in the middle and transferring is possible. No problem, only it must have been rush hour, because the first train was so full we couldn't board. The second train required a whole lot of pushing and shoving for all of us to get in, which almost didn't happen for Quincy, the youngest member of our party at eight years of age, who was reluctant to board amongst all the bodies. We were almost separated, but I got her on just as the door closed.

We got out as intended at the next station and then boarded a train going the correct direction with little issue. But a local who saw us do this figured we must be lost and so decided to be "helpful". He asked where we were going and eventually recommended we stay on the train for one stop beyond where we originally intended to go, as it would be a shorter walk home. Long story short, it wasn't. But short story long is the only way to make this story worth the telling. We stayed on until the extra stop. We got off and exited the station into a beautiful part of town. The problem was that I wasn't sure where we were exactly as my map had no subway station markings. The train had been dutifully following below one particular avenue for the last five stations, so I figured it had continued to do this and I extrapolated a bit, giving me a perfectly logical starting point from which to walk home.

A pic of a cool tree and a cool kid just to tide you over while I prattle on with this never-ending story.

There are very few street signs in BA-city. I guessed which way we needed to go based on the sun position and proceeded to herd the children home. After three long blocks, we finally encountered a street sign and realized we were now three blocks north of where I thought the station was located. We needed to be going south. It wasn't much past noon, so I didn't trust myself with sun navigation and turned us all around. We walked the three blocks back and passed the entrance to the subway, and then walked another four blocks until we finally found another street sign. Guess what, now we were ten blocks north of where I thought that darned subway station let us out. I had obviously been correct the first time. Remember, we took the subway because the kids were too tired to walk.

I should have trusted my sense of direction more than I trusted a stranger's advice. You see, the westbound train had turned north in between the last two stations, and the exit was actually six blocks north of where I thought it was (and where the darned "helpful" local thought it was, I might add). So now we had walked four blocks farther north than that and were ten blocks farther north than where I thought we were going to start the walk. We turned around again and walked the four blocks south back to the station and then the three blocks we had already walked originally and then three more blocks to get us to where I thought the station was originally. If you are keeping track that is fourteen unnecessary blocks if I had trusted my sense of direction, plus six more blocks that I hadn't anticipated since the station was in the wrong spot.  So those twenty extra blocks added to the twelve I knew we had to get back home, and I had five incredibly unhappy kids ready to stage a revolution. 32 blocks times 5 kids equals 160 extra sighs, 160 extra moans and 160 extra whines. Needless to say, the adults beat us back to the apartment. The kids will never trust me to guide them anywhere. Stupid subway. Stupid "helpful" locals.

They do architecture right down here.

OK, long mildly interesting story over.  Back to business.  Rio is ten times more beautiful than Buenos Aires when it comes to the natural terrain. In fact, Rio's location is pretty much unbeatable. The way the mountains come jutting out of the ocean is pretty darned awesome. But when it comes to man-made beauty, Buenos Aires is where it's at. Buildings in Rio are mostly ugly, with function trumping form every time. The walls are dirty and in bad need of paint jobs and nothing seems well kept-up at all.  The streets are filled with garbage and the sewer smells are omnipresent. But in BA city, none of that is even remotely true. The architecture is varied and fresh and old-school all at once.  The streets are squeaky clean. The air is pleasantly breathable. Everything is kept in tip-top condition. Street art and the hundreds of statues keep it interesting. It is just without any natural beauty at all. They try hard with grassy parks and the occasional impressive tree, but really, there are no natural landmarks to speak of. Even the oceanside real-estate is unimpressive.  We saw no beaches.  Paris need not feel threatened by its Southern cousin. But despite all this, Buenos Aires is still a beautiful metropolis.

Even the cemetaries are upscale.

So we saw the super-posh graveyard that houses Eva Peron and thousands of other VIPs. We checked out the ten story obelisk. We did the National Art Museum and ogled the super-cool budding flower statue that opens and closes due to solar panels as the sun rises and sets. We visited the national cathedral and the president's home, Casa Rosada in the Plaza de Mayo. We did the cool shopping streets of Monserrat and the cooler hip neighborhoods where we could "be seen" rather than simply see. We sampled as much local cuisine as possible and Carol and I even caught a Tango show complete with live orchestra and two over-the-top tango singers. I kept having flashbacks of playing "Hernando's Hideaway" in middle school band. It was the only tango I knew. "I know... a dark... secluded place. A place... where no... one knows your face..." But now I have heard an hour and a half of the stuff. The music was repetitive, but the musicianship was excellent. The dancing was amazing. The costumes were super-cool. The hour was rough.  Everything seems to happen after midnight here. They don't even eat dinner until after 10:00 at most places.  We gringos and gringas had a rough time staying awake. But the culture binge was worth it. My tango evening bookended nicely with the Bossanova night we had in Rio. Now that we are done with both I think I can sum up my opinion of the two most famous cities in South America as follows. If I had to live in one of the cities, I would choose Buenos Aires in a heartbeat. Its prosperous, hip, cosmopolitan feel would make it an easy place to be for years at a time. But if I am only visiting on vacation, and can pick only one spot to be a tourist in, I think I'd do Rio. I couldn't live there. But the landmarks and the terrain and the palpable deviation from other towns I've visited, with all of its idiosyncrasies, made it a must-see.

We were not allowed to take pics during the evening Tango show, but these two had no problems with us taking a pic while they tangoed it up in a La Boca restaurant at lunchtime.

We leave Buenos Aires and our super-cush apartment very early tomorrow morning. If we were natives we would simply still be up from the night before. It seems that super-early wake-ups calls are to be the recurring theme of this vacation. Not what I'd choose, given the choice. But you do what you gotta do when you only have one option. Peru here we come!

Now that is a pretty cool piece of moving art.

Rollin' on the Rio

Dear Mom,

Oops. I mean, Hello readers! (same thing, really)

No more rants. I promise. I've got nothing but smiles to report.  OK, that is a complete lie. Promise rescinded. But we are going to start out positive, dagnabbit!  Since my last post, we got back on the Airporter the very next day at exactly the same time.  We checked in with the same United folks at the airport who seemed to have the same troubles with our tickets as they did the previous day. But we remained optimistic and we retraced all of our steps exactly as the day before.  It was deja vu all over again.  But this time they actually let us board the plane! It took off and we were actually on it!  The Houston layover was a breeze, including the stop in the baggage services department and the subsequent and necessary trek back through security afterwards. The flight to Rio was tailwind all the way.  Our luggage showed up without a hitch and we taxied to our apartment to find the Allens waiting for us with open arms and full beer cans.  Let the vacation begin!

The only issue left from our previous ordeal was that we'd only have a day and a half in Rio, with about six days worth of touring planned. But that was no problem for the dynamic duo of Mark and Carol, our built-in travel agents. So after about 10 minutes of acclimation we were out the door and ready to explore.  But I have typed nearly a double figure number of sentences and haven't bitched, moaned or generically complained yet. "Who is this mystery author?," you ask. Surely it cannot be Steve writing this blog or there would have been a snafu pointed out by now.  Something is afoot at the Circle K. Well, you are correct to assume the worst from me.  I do have a complaint. Totally my fault, but still.  Here comes the sob-story of the post. Break out your tiny violins...

Here's a pic to tide you over while you endure my sob story.

As I always do, I packed a spare contact lens case and solution in my checked luggage, but put my normal case and a small bottle of solution in my carry-on.  This way, if I wanted to close my eyes on the plane, I could remove my contacts and have a place to put them. That was on the first day of not-so-much-flying. But then we came back home and I had to remove the case and solution from my pack when I went to bed for the night.  Guess who forgot to repack those things in his carry-on the next day?  So I slept a bit on the plane with my lenses still in my eyes and then suffered the results for the remaining hours leading up to getting to our apartment. I also fell asleep in the taxi on the way to the apartment as I'd only gotten an hour or two of sleep on the plane.

Air quality was poor, so good long distance shots were tough.

No big deal, right? Well, anyone who wears contact lenses knows that when you wake up with your lenses still in your eyes, said lenses are invariably dried out and stuck to your eyeballs.  Usually this is only a minor inconvenience once you can get them out and your eyes will recover within minutes. This time however, not so much.  I think I scratched my right eye when removing the extremely stubborn lens because for the next eight hours I could not open my eye for the pain.  It was virtually oozing tears and was redder than a Stanford campus stop sign.  It was far closer to hospital-begging-level-pain than it was to minor discomfort and I looked like an idiot crying his eyes out on the beach for the rest of the day.  At one point I was put in charge of watching young Josh frolic in the large waves while the other adults walked the beach (the girls were all sitting on the steps ogling volleyball machismos). This arrangement was fine with me because I wasn't going to enjoy the walk in my condition in any case. But it was difficult for me to keep track of him because I had to constantly blot my oozing eye with a sandy towel and I kept losing him amongst the waves in the process.

Understand that I obviously had no contact lenses in, but I couldn't wear eyeglasses because I needed sunglasses due to the unbelievably bright sunlight not agreeing with my ultra-sensitive eyes. So my vision was pretty darn poor without wearing my regular prescription glasses, and tracking Josh was difficult.  I even tried to wear sunglasses over my prescription glasses, preferring over letting my son drown, the only other option of looking even more the idiot on the beach to all the presumably lovely bikini-clad Brazilian women walking by.  I say "presumably" because I never actually saw anyone on the beach, opening my eyes only long enough to spot Josh and then crying, blotting and protecting against sun and sand for the majority of the time. Thankfully, J-Dawg managed to not drown while I not-watched. I'm sure you expected the story to get worse before it got better based on the build-up. But that's all I've got.  Josh nearly got lost trying to find me amongst the thousand of other lounging tourists, as he had drifted down-current, but he never nearly drowned. Disappointing as a climax for the story, but not really disappointing in terms of J-Dawgs general health, I guess...

Ipanema Beach in the late afternoon.

So that was my Rio beach experience.  Apparently everyone else in our eight person group had a blast.  There was much volleyball happening around us, especially the version that people play without their hands (and are still better than I am with them(mine, not theirs, why would I have their hands?)).  And since we as group are all volleyball fans, that provided an excellent source of entertainment for a least an hour.  The kids loved the warm Atlantic waters and the soft sand.  The adults loved the people watching.  I loved my towel but pined for an eye-patch.  I was attempting to remain pleasant company by enjoying humming Antonio Joao Gilberto's iconic tune to myself as I sat there leaking from the orbit on La Playa Ipanema, but for all I know, the girl from the song walked by and all I could say was AAAAAARGH as she did. Not quite the inflection that is called for in the tune.

One more for good measure, with different lighting. No, Josh didn't drown. He was behind the photographer at this point.

We also walked the Copa Cabana beach, which was a bit closer to our apartment, though not as nice, but humming Barry Manilow couldn't quite keep me as happy as the Bossanova did. Once in Copacabana, Carol was on a quest to find an exotic juice she hadn't tried before and after multiple failures we almost made it home fruitless (see what I did there?), but in the end we did find her some Graviola and Cupuacu. Yum.

My eye was healing slowly and by this morning there was not enough pain left to complain. How sad, I mean wonderful, for me. We had spent the evening trying very hard to stay awake until a reasonable hour, lagged via jet as we were, but we failed miserably and fell asleep early and woke late the next morning much more equipped for whirlwind sightseeing. Mark and Carol (travel agent superheroes, remember?) had booked a local tour where we would catch many of the hot spots, each sweeter than the last.  We saw multiple "Favela" neighborhoods, an eye-opening experience to be sure, punn only slightly intended. We walked a bit in the Parque Nacional da Tijuca, the largest mid-urban rainforest in the world. We high-fived Jesus at the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue in Corcovado. Not certain this should rank as one of the "Seven Wonders of the Modern World" when Angkor Wat doesn't even make the list. But it was pretty sweet. We checked out the old town in Santa Teresa and the party town in Lapa, where we climbed the famous Lapa steps and ate feijoada at a local favorite restaurant.  We took the Swiss-type gondolas up to the summit of Sugar Loaf Mountain to get magnificent views of the city at sunset. The kids got one last dip in the Atlantic back at Ipanema beach.  Not bad for nine hours of daylight.

The Christ the Redeemer Statue was quite impressive. The crowds were crazy.

Again, with the air quality, but still pretty cool.

Now we are back home in our cozy apartment planning tomorrow's trip back to the airport. But I have to mention that Carol and I got one more fantastic Rio experience by catching some live BossaNova music at the bar right next to the bar where the very song I was humming yesterday was written. Without much imagination, that bar was actually named "The Girl From Ipanema Bar". Apparently they don't have live music at the Girl From Ipanema Bar, they just write it there.  So we went next door.  The opening act was so good, I bought his CD. He played many of my favorite Jobim songs including Desafinado, perhaps my all-time favorite.  How nice of my wife to call ahead and make sure the musician played that tune just for me in that random bar that she pretended she hadn't scoped out before-hand.  She even had the forethought to get the tour guide earlier in the day to suggest that particular bar to me. I told you she was a superhero! The featured act was also excellent but we left a little after 11:00 p.m. only a half hour into her set because we had to be up seven hours later to have time to catch our flight and it wasn't a short walk home and darn it, jetlag! I know, I'm a light weight.  At least I am still up typing this silly blog for all three of you...  Mom.

The gondola rides up and down Sugarloaf Mountain were spectacular.

The views from the top were even more so.

Sunset was pretty sweet from up there.

Tomorrow the plane goes wheels up at 7:30 a.m. on our way to Iguazu Falls where we will cross the border to Argentina and then cross back and then cross over one more time, just because we can. Apparently the viewing is better by day on the Argentinian side, but the accommodations at night are better on the Brazilian side.  I am taking Mark's word for it, as the amount of research that I've personally done on the subject has maxed out at none. Next time I write we should have exchanged all of our Reais for Pesos and forgotten all of our "obrigados" in favor of "graciases".  Until then, "Tchau!"

The gang's all here at the Lapa Steps which feature thousands of tiles from all over the world.

We're Back!

Hi everyone. We're back on the road again! Well, sort of. I'm here in my kitchen as I type this. But we had every intention of being halfway to Rio de Janeiro at this very moment. And I think I will blog about the next three weeks of adventure, since I had so much fun doing that on our last big excursion.

So why am I in my kitchen then? I'm glad you asked. But I'm not glad I'm home again. Here's the skinny. But beware, while it is a fascinating story worth your time, it is most definitely a rant...

It all started about a month back when Carol got a cryptic email from Expedia about how our flight itinerary had changed. She called. They politely informed her that our flight to Rio had been rerouted to Sao Paolo.  "Would that be OK?" Uh, no. The two cities are a couple of hundred miles apart! Why would that be OK? So, politely, Carol asked if perhaps we could get a different flight, as a connection from Sao Paolo to Rio seemed out of the question for Expedia.  "Sure, no problem" says the woman from Expedia. They offered one with a 17 hour layover in Mexico City. No deal. "OK, here's one that stops in Denver, then in Miami, then gets to Rio only 14 hours later than your original flight. How would that be?"  NO! says Carol, a little less politely.  Finally, after Carol maintains her cool, but shoots laser beams through her phone to Phoenix, where corporate headquarters for our new favorite travel company resides, the woman gets us a flight on a different airline through Houston with only a three hour layover, and then straight into Rio.  Well done, Carol, once again.  Apparently they only offer the reasonable options if you threaten to get unreasonable with them.  But all is well, we believe, and think very little of it after that.

The big day arrives.  Our friendly neighbor drops us off at the Airporter depot and with little ado the family arrives at SFO before 11:00 a.m. for a 12:45 flight to Houston. We head to the ticket counter. The automatic teller only registers the adult reservations. Apparently there is a problem with the kids' reservation.  Our names pop up, but the kids' names don't.  We calmly wait for a United Airlines representative to help us.  She transfers us to a nice man who seemingly has no problem dealing with these sorts of situations.  Ten minutes later we are back in business, boarding passes in hand, bags checked and gone.  Carol gets to take the express line through security.  The rest of us get to do it the hard way.  The line isn't too bad.  We arrive at the gate with an hour to go before scheduled lift-off.  Carol even gets our seat assignments changed at the gate so that we can sit together as all that was available originally was four scattered seats, since Expedia didn't bother to get us seat assignments when they changed the flight, so we only got them that morning. But things were looking up.  Our seats were now together.  Time to get a burrito before boarding.  Brasilia here we come!

We let everybody board ahead of us.  No reason to choke down the burritos just to sit on the plane for half an hour before take off.  Flight leaves at 12:30.  We approach the gate at 12:10.  Carol's ticket goes through.  My ticket goes through.  Wait, there is a problem with Chloe's ticket.  It doesn't exist.  This is just a boarding pass.  Josh's has the same problem.  "We're sorry, your children cannot board the plane." Say what?!  How could we have been issued boarding passes without a ticket?  The gate counter people type on their computer terminals.  There is nothing they can do.  "We're sorry, but you will have to call Expedia to get this worked out."  But the flight leaves in ten minutes!

The nightmare has only just begun. Expedia won't help us. Our flight leaves without us. Carol is on hold with Expedia.  The United folks tell us that everything is OK. There is another flight to Houston that arrives with enough time for us to catch the Rio flight. It is only half a mile away on the other side of the airport.  It leaves in 90 minutes. That should be sufficient time to get things worked out. "Should be" and reality rarely mesh under these sorts of circumstances, I've found.  Carol is on the phone still.  She begs.  She pleads.  They put her on hold.  She threatens, she chastises.  They put her on hold.  We walk to the new gate with her still on hold.  I call Expedia to complain that Carol has been on hold for over an hour and the next flight is about to leave.  Heads will roll! I get conveniently disconnected.  The new gate employee for United starts to try really hard to get us on the flight.  We offer to pay for new tickets since there are obviously empty seats as we still have a reservation even without tickets.  He can't do it.  Expedia has us locked out somehow.  He gets on the phone with the help desk that only airline employees can access.  Carol is still on the phone, sometimes talking, but mostly on hold.  Nothing gets settled.  The second flight leaves.  There will be no flight to Rio today.

What's more, our luggage is now in Houston without us.  It cannot be sent back to SFO in time for us to pick it up tomorrow and send it on its way again.  It cannot move on internationally without us.  Either we have to fly through Houston to get our bags checked on to Rio, or we can arrive in Rio, and then write up a request for our bags to be sent to us, and they will come within two days.  The problem is that we were only staying three nights in Rio before moving on to other parts of Brazil and South America.  We've lost tonight.  We have only two nights left.  We won't get our bags doing that.

Carol is still on the phone as I type this at 5:45 p.m.  She has either been on hold or talking with them or steaming when they don't call us back after she got disconnected (thrice, now) because now she has to call them back and start the whole discussion again with a new rep.  She lost all of her patience hours ago, but she refuses to let me do the hard work on the phone.  Probably because she knows I will start swearing like a sailor within seconds of asking to be put on hold one more time.

So let us count the problems with this story, shall we?  First Expedia messed up when they changed our original flight (not to forget their complete lack of forthcoming options the first time around when the changes were made - strike one).  They did not reissue the kids tickets.  That is strike two.  Next, they were unwilling to suck it up and tell United they would pay for the seats that we already had reserved and had paid Expedia for, in a timely fashion (twice, as we stood at two different gates, begging and pleading to no avail).  That is strike three and four.  They have had Carol on hold for well over four hours total. Remember this fiasco began at 12:10 when we first learned at the gate that the kids' tickets were not to be found despite the boarding passes in their hot little hands.  Strike five.  But is that it?  No.  What is left of Carol is in the bedroom on the phone still, and it is almost 6:00.  The three times she has been disconnected, nobody bothered to continue working on the problem and nobody bothered to call her back.  They have her phone number.  Heck they have every digit associated with us since birth!  Carol has told them Josh's and Chloe's birthdate over a dozen times at this point!  Strike six? Or is that seven?  Here's the last thing I heard Carol scream into the phone just moments ago:  "NO. NO. NO!  We were not no-shows!  We were at the airport for over four hours today!" I don't think she's making much progress.

And what about United Airlines' part in all of this?  Why is it that two hours before our flight left, when we first discovered that there was a problem with the kids' tickets, did they act as if all was well, and issue us boarding passes.  At that time we theoretically could have called Expedia and actually had time (assuming Expedia reps were both competent and ethically sound, which they are neither) to work things out. United's little oversight made it so that we only discovered the problem 20 minutes before take-off, thereby screwing us for certain.  And why did they take our bags if we had no tickets?  And how do they accept our reservation and issue boarding passes without a ticket in the first place?

What have we lost so far? One of three nights in Rio is gone, along with the money for the house we are renting. Sixty bucks Airporter fees back home and then another sixty bucks back tomorrow, hopefully.  A day of work missed for both of us.  For me it is just wages I would have earned if I worked today and left tomorrow.  But in Carol's case, she had a ton of stuff to do for work that she planned on getting done on the plane, but has done none of since she has been on the phone.  "Get your ass on the phone, and let your wife rest!," you scream.  I know, I keep trying.  She won't have it.  I can't rip the phone from her hands and tell her to take a load off.  She'd skin me alive.

I'm worried we aren't going to be on a plane tomorrow either.  Things aren't progressing in our favor. And our friends are waiting for us in Rio, but they are moving on to our other destinations with or without us.  But I'm even more worried about poor Carol.  She isn't just a trooper.  She's the whole friggin' army brigade.  She'll need more than this vacation to recover from this. Giving up isn't really an option. But she just can't seem to get them to put us on a new set of flights, much less get reparations for all the damage they've done.

Well, rant over. I'll let you know how it turned out. I have to go try to comfort my wife now. She is still on the phone.  It is 6:20.  So that's six hours of hell so far... Wish us luck.

A Post of Positively Palpable Profundity, Perhaps

(This post was written as below.  Nothing new was added.  Somehow, it was lost in the cybersphere, never having made it to the blog, so I am reposting it today Jan 14, 2015.  )

Well, as of today, Sept. 1, 2013, we have officially hit the one-year anniversary of our departure to the great unknown. We got back seven weeks ago, but I decided to give it a little time before I wrote this final blog post, with the hope that a more removed perspective would elicit eloquence.  Everyone wants to know what we learned on this trip, and in what ways we grew as people because of this trip.  Even when looking back after seven weeks of time to digest it all, I can honestly say that I still don’t know the answers to those questions.  But in the process of writing this, hopefully something sage shall surface.  I promise to grow wiser by the end of this writing.

To begin, I want to summarize a little of what we accomplished on paper in those ten months and eleven days.  If Central America counts as part of South America, which it actually does in some people’s eyes (though I am aware that it is usually grouped in with North America) then we hit five continents.  Australia and Antarctica be damned.  Of course, some people also include Australia in the greater continent "Oceania" in which case we hit that continent too, since we went to Bali in Indonesia.  So in a way, the only continent we missed was Antarctica.  It's on my bucket list.

We slept under 79 different roofs (why is it not "rooves" like "hooves"?), and an even 80 if you count our own, since we did have to travel to get back to it.  We actually did go 'round the world, as when we crossed the oceans we were always going west, never east.  We logged over 57,000 miles of travel, equivalent to well more than two full revolutions around the Earth at the equator. 38,000 of those miles were by plane (19 flights in all).

Here is some good fun, read this!  The rest of the miles traveled were by rental car, bus, electric train, steam train, cruise ship, speedboat, water taxi, land taxi, subway, tuk-tuk, foot, bicycle, surfboard, boogie-board, horse, kayak, zipline, elephant, motorbike, cable car, Swiss-Alps-type gondola, Venetian-canals-type gondola, chair-lift, bobsled, funicular, motorized fishing boat, ferry, river raft, rowboat, camel and swimsuit (yes, we floated down the River Kwai at a pretty good clip for a couple of miles with only swimsuits and life jackets to carry us.) 

The Swiss Alps gondola near Gimmelwald.

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Our own personal driver with his tuk-tuk in Siem Reap, Cambodia

Floating down the River Kwai at maybe 15kph

We visited 27 countries, if you include Vatican City and Monaco as countries. I do. We learned how to say “hello, goodbye, please, thank you, yes and no” in 17 official languages.  We bought things using 16 different monetary systems (would have been a whole lot more a decade or two ago, before the culture-squashing Euro came around). I lost one camera, two hats, four pairs of sunglasses, and my wedding ring, not to mention my pride on multiple occasions.  I had one bone broken, one eye infection, and three separate nasty rashes that shall remain unspoken of from here on out. I had two colds, one flu virus and a single digit number, but only barely, of attacks of Montezuma’s revenge, or food poisoning, or water poisoning, or whatever else it was that brought me to intimate terms with the nearest toilet. I gained 15 pounds in Europe alone.  Chloe gained four inches and three shoe sizes.  We all gained invaluable experience with feeling like idiot American tourists for future trips.

This "fridge of glory" pic only represents the parts of Europe that we visited.

So what does that all add up to?  What did we take away from the trip other than our 45 refrigerator magnets and 42 overly lengthy blog posts?  How am I different than I was a year ago today, other than the extra 15 pounds?  Well, I still don’t have the answer, so I’ll let the kids take a shot at this first.  Here is the final summary post from each of them.

Josh (age 10): Bad trip, good trip, yummy food trip.

A lot of people ask me what my favorite parts of the trip were.  But that is a hard question to answer because the trip was so big, how could I just choose one or two things?  Do they mean my favorite country? My favorite thing we did?  My favorite food?  One thing I figured out pretty fast is that I didn’t really like just seeing things on the trip like scenery. I mean it can be cool like the mountains in Switzerland, but I like doing things much more, like those times with waterslides, or zip lines, or the bobsled, or the ropes course.

Riding the bobsled in Slovenia with a view of Lake Bled below

So here are some of the things I really enjoyed doing the most on the trip and why. I thought a place called Arenal in Costa Rica was awesome because there was a hot springs there that had an attached water park.  There were three water slides there that we used. One slide had a shallow slope and boiling hot water at the bottom. One had warm water and a super steep slope that you went over 25 mph going down. There was no line there and I loved going face first down. The last one was also warm and always had a line. That slide was looooooooong and had lots of twists and turns. It was fun and I found a technique for going fast. It was to go on my swimsuit covered knees.

Flying into the nearly 100 degree F waters.

Told ya I was going fast!

Another good time was when we celebrated my birthday in Slovenia where we bobsledded, bungee jumped on a trampoline and did a ropes course with zip lines all in one day.  You can read about that in another blog post called “Ultra Fun Day”.  But there were so many other fun days to choose from, like the day where I rode a camel in Morocco, or those squid fishing days in Thailand, or when we got to play with the elephants in Kanchanaburi, or when we went snorkeling and jelly fish poking in Bali and got to ride on the pontoon of our boat for a while.  As long as we were actually doing stuff instead of just looking at stuff, I was content.

Bungee Boy

Chloe caught four squids in Thailand.

Riding the pontoon during a snorkeling trip in Bali

Not that there weren’t some pretty darn cool things to see like the Cenotes in Mexico, or the temples at Chichinitza, or the waterfalls in Costa Rica, or the Eiffel Tower.  I even loved Lake Como, Italy for the beautiful water.  But even then, the best part was piloting the speedboat on the lake.

They didn't let you climb the temple in Chichinitza (shown here), but they did on the taller ones in Ek Balam!

The cenotes in Mexico are underground lakes that used to be sacred places, and now are just swimming holes.

There were also some things I really didn’t enjoy. I didn’t like the heavy crowds, the bad European weather, or the stinky metros. The worst crowds were in Rome.  It was so packed in the Pantheon that I couldn’t move.  And we went to four times as many museums and castles in Europe as I would have liked.

The craziest moments of the trip were the earthquakes, the flipped kayaks, and the ditch that we got stuck in, all in Costa Rica.  Then there were the seagulls that hit both Chloe’s and my dad’s heads and grabbed their pasties in England.  Or maybe the crazy taxi driver in Bangkok that never got us to where we wanted to go even though he insisted that he could and just kept driving and driving...

Oh and then there was the food. Mmmmmmmmm, that was good food. My favorites were the Italian pizzas and gelatos, the Pad Thai from Thailand, and I think the rack of ribs in Cornwall.  But I certainly didn’t mind the fondue from Switzerland or the casados from Costa Rica either. The chocolate from Belgium was awful good but I think the Swiss chocolate was even better. My dad disagrees about that order. But I never need to eat fish for breakfast ever again like we did in Japan.

Breakfast in Japan (seven kinds of seafood)

Here is a list of more of my favorite things from the trip.

My favorite meal was those ribs and also the stew that my mom got that same meal in Cornwall, England. My favorite dessert was my birthday cake because the frosting was just a mixture of butter and sugar. My favorite apartment that we stayed in was in a town called Lauterbrunnen (pronounced low(rhymes with cow)-ter-broo-nen) in Switzerland because the sofas were comfortable, the place was really big, and it had a good table to play can pong on (ping pong with a net made of cans). My favorite animals were the coatis from Mexico, the camels from Morocco, the elephants from Thailand, and the toucans and monkeys from Costa Rica. 

My favorite thing from a museum was a chess set made in Norway in the 12th century and the pieces were made out of walrus ivory. My favorite big city was Paris because of the Eiffel tower, which I think was the one tourist attraction I enjoyed for more than a few seconds. My favorite non-flying transportation was going from Paris to London in the EuroStar train through the Chunnel because of the cozy seats and the yummy toasted sandwich. My favorite view from our house was looking down from a place in Costa Rica called Baru because of the valley with all the green trees and a couple of waterfalls here and there. 

The view from our porch in Baru, Costa Rica

My favorite airport was the Singapore airport because it had TV, foot massagers, and shiny bathrooms that had a screen asking how good your experience was. It also had a pool and movie theaters that we didn’t use. And last but not least my favorite walk was any one that we got to swim in the waterfalls along the way, because I don’t like to hike, but I do like to get wet.

Hiking trips are fine as long as you can get wet.

When you add it all up I really enjoyed the trip. It’s true. And I also know it was a great experience, but I am still glad to be home.

-Josh

Chloe (age 12): We went to so many exciting places on our trip around the world. A few of my favorites are Samara, Bali, Morocco, and Italy.

In Samara we got to hang out on the beach, play in the waterfalls, and best of all we got to learn how to surf.

Chillin' at home in Samara, pina colada style.

I also loved getting to go to Bali. I loved snorkeling, and saw so many exotic fish in the crystal clear water. But the most fun parts about the snorkeling trip were the little squish jellyfish, and getting to ride on a side bar of the boat. The other thing I loved about Bali was our hotel in Ubud. They had an amazing amount of space with big beds and comfortable pillow chairs. They brought breakfast up to your room every morning, and the food was delicious. I always got a cheese jaffle, a fruit bowl and a smoothie.

Bali snorkeling

Breakfast in Ubud in our room

Next up comes Morocco where we got to ride camels! The orange sand dunes were such a pretty contrast to the blue sky. And the camels were so friendly. It was amazing to get to watch the view go by while you were sitting on a fuzzy camel. The craziest part of the ride was when you got on and off the camels. They would sit down so it would be easier for you to get up, but then they would just get up on their back legs lurching you forwards and then get all the way up. After I managed to stay on while the camel got up, we all set off for our tent in the desert. I decided to name my camel Fuzzel because he’s a fuzzy camel. At the very end of our trip we hiked up a dune and watched the sunset.

The camels were super friendly.  Except dad's, his was aloof  (he's at the top of the pic)

Lastly I loved Italy because of all the beautiful views, the amazing gelato, and all of the famous sights. A few of the best views we had were in Amalfi and Lake Como. Both of which overlooked the water. We also got to see many of the places I had learned about in school, which made it very exciting to see in real life after envisioning them. Some of them were Pisa, Pompeii, Rome, and Venice. Lastly they had amazing gelato in all sorts of flavors. Just to make it better, it was all over the country. I’d say we had some almost every day.

Chloe took this shot of our night gondola ride in Venice

I am so glad that we got to go on all of these wonderful adventures on such an extraordinary trip.

-Chloe

Steve (age 93): OK, well that was fun.  Now it’s time to hear from an adult.  Carol? You got anything?  No, I didn’t think so.  OK, forget the adult perspective.  You’re stuck with mine.  Though I’m still not yet feeling profound.  How about a few lists from me just as I asked the kids to do?  The most frequently asked question is “What was your favorite place on the trip?”  As Josh indicated, that is too broad a question to answer.  So I’ve narrowed things down a bit.  My top three in each category.  Please note: these opinions are solely my own.  You've heard from the kids.  Carol will have her own opinions.

My favorite countries (if I really have to choose):  1. Costa Rica    2. Italy   3. Thailand

Favorite big cities:   1. Barcelona    2. Prague   3. London

Favorite smaller cities:    1. Bruges, Belgium    2. Lucca, Italy    3. Ljubljana, Slovenia

Favorite spots in which I’d vacation again in a heartbeat:  1. Amalfi Coast, Italy   2. Lake Como, Italy               
      3. Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland

Friendliest people:    1. Cambodia    2. Costa Rica   3. Austria

Best natural scenery:   1. Swiss Alps    2. Italian Amalfi Coast    3. Costa Rican Waterfalls                                      Honorable Mention: Skocjanske Caves in Slovenia

Best ruins:   1. Angkor Thom, Cambodia    2. Ek Balam, Mexico    3. Castles of England & Scotland

Best museums: 1. Musee d’Orsay, Paris   2. Van Gogh, Amsterdam  3. Churchill, London

Best food:  1. Thailand    2. Italy    3. France

Biggest surprise (the good kind):  1. Slovenia    2. Cambodia    3. Malacca, Malaysia

Best one-time experiences:  1. Sahara Desert overnight (camels!) in Morocco                                       
      2. Elephant care in Kanchanaburi, Thailand    3. Island hopping in Thailand

Places I’d most likely enjoy living:  1. Samara, Costa Rica    2. Haarlem, the Netherlands                       
      3. Harrogate, England

Best castles: 1. Neuschwanstein, Germany  2. Carcassone, France   3. Alnwick, England

Best chocolate: 1. Belgium    2. Switzerland   3. nobody else deserves to be on this list.

Coolest wild animals:  1. Costa Rican monkeys   2. Thai elephants  3. Mexican coatis

Smarter than the average American

Coatis are so cute that you want to take them home with you

Favorite accommodations: 1. Augill Castle, England   2. Samara Rental House                                      
 3. Hotel in Ubud, Bali  4. Tree-house in Rancho Mastatal, Costa Rica   5. Cozy cottage, Cotswolds

Best churches:  1. Sagrada Familia, Barcelona    2. Notre Dame, Paris   3. St. Peter’s, Vatican City

Best (not in ruins) temples:  1. Japan   2. Thailand   3. Bali

Worst places for breakfast:  1. Japan   2. Japan   3. Japan

OK.  That’s enough listing.  If you didn’t get your question answered, you’ll just have to ask it out loud.

So here is what I learned about traveling.  First, if you speak English, then there is no language barrier anywhere, anymore.  An occasional translation app. might be necessary only if you aren’t near a big city where you can always find someone who speaks English.  So the world is that much smaller.  Plus, with Skype and cell phones and the internet, you never really have to leave home behind when you travel.  Everyone back home can be along for the ride.  You are always able to communicate and so the whole idea of travel is much less scary than it once was.

Second, unless your children are not typical American children, they might not do so well with lots of moving around, and they probably won’t care about seeing the things you want to see.  So you probably shouldn’t bring them along on your trip unless they are old enough to be left with their electronic devices in the hotel room so you can enjoy a nicely alliterative sight-seeing stroll sans the sass.  When we finally gave up on trying to bring a little culture into our children’s lives and just took off and enjoyed the town without them, everything got a lot easier and more fun.  Now that isn’t to say that Chloe and Josh saw nothing but the inside of apartment rentals.  We dragged them on many an adventure.  But when we just wanted to explore a new town, once we didn’t feel compelled to have them in tow, all was much easier.  They saw plenty.  But we got to see even more!

Third, less is more.  But more is more too.  There is no wrong way to do it, but it works best if you do a trip like this in lots of different modes.  We all loved staying put in one place more than moving from place to place every other day.  Even it meant seeing fewer hotspots, we got to really enjoy the ones we saw if we stayed put for a while.  But on the other hand, once you are already there, thousands of miles from home, you will want to see as many new sights as possible.  Who knows when you will get another chance?  And every town has its own character.  Every sight is worth seeing once.  So rather than changing accommodations every other day, establishing a home base and taking day trips is worth the extra driving, especially if it means sticking to a place with a good kitchen. A great example for us was staying in a house in Lucca, Italy for a week, we were able to make day trips to Pisa, Florence, Tuscany, and the Cinque Terre region, without ever having to repack.

Fourth, traveling light is way underrated.  The less stuff you have, the more energy you have.  You can always burn all of those clothes you wore for seventy-three straight days when you get home.  Less is definitely more in this area. 

Fifth, big cities are amazing.  But little towns are better.  This is rather obvious in Costa Rica and in Asia, where most of the big cities are either dumps or simply nightmarishly crowded (Singapore stands out as the exception here).  But even in Europe, where people dream of heading to Paris and Prague, I still think the best parts are the little towns and the countryside.  The smaller the town, the more friendly and accessible are its people.  Being a tourist is one thing.  Being able to relax and communicate with the natives is far superior to that. These smaller towns were where I think we really got the most out of the trip.  The kids were always happier on a farm stay than in a cramped apartment in the city.  Come to think of it, so were Carol and I.  The mood was more relaxed and life felt more like how real people actually live in these other parts of the world.  In the big cities it could often feel like a social studies field trip to points A through Q on a tight schedule, and hence more touristy, less world-traveler-ish.

Our little town in Western Austria where we met the most wonderful people and actually spent quality time with them.

Having dinner cooked for you in a local's home beats any restaurant, any time. 

Our little Italian elf, in whose house we ate the fabulous dinner above, cooked by his daughters. 

Finally, one should never underestimate the power of a treat to get one’s children, or one’s wife as the case may be, to take that extra metro ride to see that one last tourist attraction.  “We can get a gelato right after we see the Trevi Fountain!”  “We can go out for pizza instead of eating in if you come see the Arc de Triomph with me!”  It works almost every time.  The only side effect is that you gain fifteen pounds in a matter of weeks and have to spend months afterward working it back off.  But it is so totally worth it not only because you get to see the fountain or the arch, but more importantly because the ice cream always tastes so good after you've put in that extra effort!

Belgian chocolate was a particularly good motivator.

OK.  Enough travel drivel.  When do we get to dig deep, here?  The real questions people have asked involve what we learned about life, about ourselves, and about humanity.  Surely an odyssey such as this brings great wisdom?  “Let’s have it!”, you demand.  “Where’s the beef?”

One way of answering those questions is to be honest with ourselves about whether we fulfilled our goals for the trip.  Well, we set out with the modest goals of (1) learning a little Spanish, (2) volunteering a bit of our time, (3) becoming closer as a family, and (4) seeing things we couldn’t even begin to imagine before they happened.  So how’d we do?  

(1) We learned very little Spanish, because everyone in Costa Rica seemed to speak English, so falling back on that was just too easy. Even if we asked a question in Spanish, we’d get a reply in English. And they don't even speak Spanish in Barcelona, so no luck there.  Oh well.  We did spend a lot of fun time with "Learn Spanish!" apps.

(2) We never ended up volunteering with any organization because we couldn’t find a program that didn’t also charge us an arm and a leg for doing so. We had time and energy to spare, but no surplus limbs to speak of. It really shouldn't be so hard to volunteer. I know they are trying to make sure you are serious before committing to you, but often they'd ask for thousands of dollars to afford you the opportunity to lend a hand! And since we wanted to remain flexible with our time, the options were slim pickings.  Perhaps on a future trip we will make volunteering a first priority and will arrange the trip ahead of time with that goal in mind.

(3) I think we all feel as though perhaps we were a little too close together as a family, often sharing a single room for days in a row.  Most parents dream of getting to spend more quality time with their family, until they actually get to spend that much time together and then they start counting the days until school starts again.  We saw quite a bit of each other. Mostly that was a good thing. I’m sure we’ll cherish those memories in thirty years or so. But it is really nice to be able to close the door on our offspring every once in a while. That said, I do feel closer to each of my family members than I did before the trip, so "mission accomplished".

(4) Finally, we saw many things that would have been unimaginable if it weren’t for the History Channel and Animal Planet and the National Geographic Channel.  Don’t get me wrong, we were still wowed and inspired enough to blog about them, and photograph them ad nauseum.  And our memories will last a lifetime, but there were few surprises outside of the earthquakes on our first day.  The problem here was not with the trip itself, but rather with our overly lofty expectations.

So we didn’t really meet too many of our specific goals.  But that’s okay, because we accomplished things we hadn’t even set out to accomplish, right?  Absolutely, yes.  

• For example, I overcame my fear of pushy street vendors.  That’s huge, right?  Sadly I only managed to replace it with an entirely more embarrassing fear of the bovine variety (see England post).  
• I learned how to surf, not well, but I can honestly say, "Yes, I surf."  On the other hand, judging from my play yesterday, I completely forgot how to play tennis in the interim.  
• I got through both the seventh and the fourth grade curricula with my kids.  Huge!  In the process I learned that I never, ever want to home-school my children again. Thirty sarcastic, unmotivated teenagers in a lab are a whole lot easier to deal with than my own kin. 
• I checked a whole bunch of places off of my bucket list.  But now that I know how cool some parts of the world are, my list is longer than ever.  
• I got to spend almost every waking hour of over three hundred days with my beloved family. But that meant I had to spend almost every waking hour of over three hundred days with the same three people who probably wanted a break from me even more than the other way around.

Was there nothing I learned or accomplished that comes without a “but”?  I refuse to come to the conclusion that all of this wasn’t worth it! No, that’s definitely NOT the point.  It was absolutely worth it. I don't know if my tone is coming across correctly here.  I'm not trying to convince myself of anything.  I am 100% convinced.  I'm just having a hard time conveying it.  I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. Well, except the home-schooling stuff. I have no regrets regarding this trip. It was epic. It was awesome. It was so mind-bogglingly incredible, that I have no words to describe it. I just don’t feel like I am a new person for having taken it. Sigh. 

OK.  Personal growth occurred, no doubt.  Just not to the levels I'd hoped.  But I still have to get profound or I am doing you, my readers, an injustice.  So I’m not giving up on this post just yet.  Bear with me for just a little bit longer.

What I learned about humanity is worth a paragraph or two.  We were shocked by how much more worldly the average person is in comparison to the average American (say, me, for instance).  Europeans travel internationally about ten times as much as Americans. And they are very well informed.  Heck, not just the Europeans.  One pool guy at a hotel in Bali asked Carol if Arnold Schwarzzeneger turned out to be a better governor than Gray Davis. I’d be willing to bet that over 90% of Californians couldn’t tell you who Gray Davis is. We don’t even know if Indonesia has a king or a president, much less how politics work in Bali.  How the hell is this pool guy up on California politics? He has never left that island! 

I have never bought into the idea of the superiority of America as a nation above all others.  Maybe that was true in the 1950’s.  Maybe.  But I’m dying to know what we’ve got that most central and western European nations don’t, other than bass-ackwards gun laws and health care laws and election rules and so on and so on.  I guess this trip opened up my eyes even a little more as to the reasons other nations do not take Americans very seriously.  We mostly just do not have a clue what it is like outside of our own country.  Preconceived notions are usually ill-conceived.  America definitely does not have the upper-hand when it comes to freedoms and human rights and morality.

I also learned a bit about happiness.  I’ve never been too ambitious as far as wealth goes.  Heck, I chose a teaching career.  But I’m still an American and I still have about fifty times more stuff than I really need.  Costa Rica often wins worldwide for having the “happiest” people on average.  This is determined simply by international surveys asking people to rank how happy they are in a bunch of different ways of asking that one basic question.  What are they so happy about?  Most of them live in what we would call poverty in the U.S.  They have no things to entertain them.  They have very little variety in the foods they eat.  Their wages are so low that they cannot afford to travel.  I’m surprised they can even afford their food.  And yet, they all smile all the time.  They are about as friendly as people come.  They don’t let circumstances affect their mood, rather they impose their good mood on the circumstances, thereby changing their environment.  Four months of living “La Pura Vida” wasn’t enough to transform me into Mr. Sunshine.  But it certainly was a healthy dose!

We also learned something from the people in Cambodia.  I don't know how happy they are as a generalization.  I have no data.  But I do know they were unbelievably friendly.  They would go 1000 miles out of their way for you like it was less than 10 feet.  And talk about living in poverty.  Broken down shacks in shantytowns of dirt and dirty air were all they had.  Still, nothing but smiles and warm welcomes and genuine heartfelt humanity exuded from their beings. Perhaps on some level they knew that we were bringing our money into their economy and so therefore helping them in some abstract way. But there is no way you fake that level of gratefulness and friendliness every day of your life. These people could teach us a lot about what it is to be human.

What else did I learn about myself?  How else am I wiser?  Well, I admit that there was a touch of fear of the unknown when we set out on this journey.  But now that I think on it, perhaps that fear is a part of being alive and taking risks.  No risks, no fear, but also no gain.  So I guess fear can be a good thing.  The mere existence of the fear means that we are moving in new directions.  We did what most people only ever dream of doing.  In a way, that means we overcame our fear.  That’s growth, right?  

Everybody is now asking me where I stand with my career.  It is an honest, good question to which I have no answer at present.  I don’t quite know where I stand.  But I prefer to think that I’m not standing at all.  I like to think I’m moving.  Even now that the trip is over, I’m still in motion.  I don’t know quite where I’m going, but neither did I know that for much of the trip, as we planned most of it on the fly.  And that turned out pretty good, so here’s hoping that approach continues to work.  I am a bit fearful still about where I'll end up, but that is just because I’m not done taking risks.

Another poignant question that gets asked daily is whether I’m happy to be back.  Well, the easy answer is yes, for the sake of sanity, since my children could not go another day without their friends.  But if my family was still game, and if we still had the funds, I think I’d rather still be out there exploring the world.  It is such a big place.  When you highlight the countries that we visited on a map you barely cover five percent of the landmass of the Earth. What's more, of those countries that we did see any part of at all, we probably saw less than 1% of each (well, except Costa Rica; we would only need another year to cover that tiny country).  There is so much more to see that I feel I’ve barely begun.  And seeing is only the half of it.  Experiencing is another thing entirely.  I’m not sure we experienced as much as we’d hoped.  Somebody, maybe Oscar Wilde, maybe Oscar the Grouch, once said something about experience being not just what you’ve seen, but rather being what you do with what you’ve seen.  I’m still working on that.

Well, that's really all I've got.  Socrates, I am not.  I can't even deep think when I'm wearing scuba gear.  But I've done my best to record my thoughts along the way and hopefully it has been worth the read. Perhaps my family and I have inspired you to begin your own adventure sometime soon. Just be sure to blog about it so I can be the one to live vicariously next time!

Our neighbors sure are happy we're back.

Thanks for reading.  Hope you enjoyed the blog as much as I enjoyed creating it.

Adios,

Esteban