Where did we SLEEP?

When you travel AROUND the WORLD, a lot of time is spent on the computer booking hotels and trying to find comfortable, clean, affordable places to sleep. Many people have asked me how we planned it and where did we stay? Well, there are only about a bazillion choices in every city from luxury hotels to B & B's to apartments to youth hostels.  The game is to narrow your choices down by your budget and location, and then just pull the trigger to reserve it. Here's my method:
First, I used www.Tripadvisor.com everytime to get the hotel list started and ideas generated. Once there, you can enter your city. But it will give you everything available (100's of hotels), so you need to slide the budget cursor to fit an acceptable range. For our RTW trip, we aimed for $50-100 per night. Gone are the days of $10 night anywhere, when you used read about Europe "on a shoestring." Ha! No way! Not even Peru or Mongolia has shoestrings anymore.  The cheapest place we stayed at was in Madagascar for $35 nite; in a cute little hut with mosquito nets and no hot water.
Les and I decided that we were too grown up for youth hostels filled with noisy, farting college students and down-the-hall bathrooms. And we weren't rich enough to travel for 4 months like a business traveler and stay at Marriott's for $200-300 per nite. Plus, we really didn't want to be sequestered in "mini-American" capsules with too many comforts and conveniences spoiling our sense of adventure. Then we would miss out on the local culture and flavor of each destination we visited. Which was the whole point of the trip to begin with: MEET THE LOCALS, EXPERIENCE THEIR LIFE!
TripAdvisor then will rank the top hotels, in your budget, and in your city, #1-100, I always picked from one of the top 15. The gist is that ranking comes from other travelers' reviews who just stayed at each hotel. So you can read their honest experiences and decide for yourself. Key phrases that popped out to me were usually about the "friendly, helpful staff" and "great location; next to Metro" and "clean & quiet rooms." If any of those read in the negative, I skipped that hotel. We also opted for smaller Bed & Breakfast homes, so we could meet and learn from the local landlord or owner themselves. This is risky because every room style & expectations will be different, but worth it because invariably we would leave with a great story or memory and several new friends. This skimming, sorting, research process would take us at least 2+ hours on the computer, for each upcoming city.
Here is our RTW Hotels (in chronological order, an asterisk * means I would stay there again!):

Hale Iki in Kona

1. Kona, Hawaii:  *Hale Iki House (on the ocean, www.haleiki.weebly.com, our favorite place on Earth!)
2. Lima, Peru: *Ramada Costa del Sol Airport Hotel (it's literally IN the airport parking lot, very clean and comfy, great for overnite layover to connect onward flights, cocktail & breakfast included)

Hotel Andina in Cusco, Peru

3. Cusco, Peru: *Hotel Terra Andina, www.terraandinahotel.com (met with coca tea, breakfast included, lovely room w/down comforters on beds, great location to explore center of town, cobblestone street) A great tour company www.columbusecuador.com for Machu Pichu.

Arasha in Ecuador

4. Highlands, Ecuador: Arasha Resort, www.arasharesort.com (cool bungalow room, but NOT in the Amazon rainforest as website says, like a Club Med in Mexico, all-inclusive, long drive to get there,)
5. Quito, Ecuador: Hotel Boutique Plaza Sucre, www.hotelplazasucre.com (located in old town Quito, a good spot, but front desk guy was short -as in abrupt, ha! & no breakfast either)

Susie on Millenium Catamaran

6. Galapagos Cruise: *Millenium Catamaran www.millenniumcatamaran.com (only 16 passengers, absolutely the best way to explore islands, the crew was top notch, first class, can go last-minute deal=half-price) Same great tour company www.columbusecuador.com for cruise.

Surf B & B in Peru

7. Lima, Peru: *Hotel Surf Penescal, www.surfpenescal.com (Noa's favorite, owners take you surfing, wife cooks, son Sebastian is cool kid, all inclusive)
8. Sao Paulo, Brazil: Airport Quick Sleep (located IN the airport between terminals, bunk beds with shower rented by hour, just what we needed for 23 hour layover & no Visa, ugh!)

Noa at our Madagascar hut

9. Madagascar: *Hotel Feon ny'la ($35/nite, next to Perinet Reserve, 3hour drive from Tana, no website online, book it via Franckie (your $100/day personal driver/nature guide-he's a must. Email him at ralaiaritiana_franckie@yahoo.fr)
10. Cape Town, South Africa: *Camps Bay Apartments, www.campsbayresort.com (breakfast included, walk 1 block to beach, perfect spot for Table Mtn, Cape & sharks)

Laine's Kruger hideaway

Zebras on our doorstep in Kruger!

Les relaxing at Laine's in Africa

11. Kruger National Park, Crocodile Gate: *Laine Pepper's Home in Marloth Community (the best!)
12. Paris: a funky little apartment, can't remember the name, but way too expensive. A great location in Place d'italie near metro & french market street.
13. Athens, Greece: *Herodion Hotel, www.herodion.gr (two blocks from Acropolis, next to museum, breakfast included, super nice and friendly service)

Santorini Hotel Amelie

14. Santorini, Greece: *Hotel Amelie, www.hotelamelie.gr (breakfast included, 4 block walk to beach, and lovely young couple owns it and attends to everything, very clean & cute)
15. Mykonos, Greece: *Marietta's Apartment, www.mariettas-mykonos.com (right next to famous windmills and cove, tiny alleyways, no breakfast, but nice room, Marietta drives you to/from ferry)

Great for Ephesus, Turkey daytrip

16. Samos, Greece: *Hotel Samos, www.samoshotel.gr/en (breakfast included, located on harbor, next to ferry port for daytrip to Ephesus, Turkey)

Hotel Eleven in Rome - not good

17. Rome, Italy: St. John's B & B, www.stjohnrome.com (breakfast included, great location, walk to Colesseum & metro, graffiti on ugly building exterior but nice once inside, young owner is helpful)
18. Rome Italy: Hotel Eleven B & B, nope, don't bother, noisy & icky

Mena House in Egypt - GREAT!

19. Cairo, Egypt: *Mena House, Oberoi Hotel, www.oberoihotels.com/oberoi_menahouse/index.asp (OMG this is the ONLY place to stay in Cairo, literally next to Great Pyramids, pool/spa, luxury, expensive but SAFE)
20. Bochum, Germany: Our friends Jorg & Gabi's lovely home (the best!)
21. Hong Kong: *Island Pacific Hotel, www.sino-hotels.com/Island_Pacific_Hotel/en/default.aspx (no breakfast, but great views of harbor, nice room and good location to crazy Chinese fish market streets)

Tara Angkor Hotel in Cambodia

22. Siem Reap, Cambodia: *Tara Angkor Hotel, www.taraangkorhotel.com (lovely place, pool/spa, cocktail + giant breakfast buffet included) *Great tour Company: www.aboutasia.com
23. Ulaan Batar, Mongolia: *Bayangol Hotel, www.bayangolhotel.mn (comfy & clean, not fancy, but best in town, it is Mongolia, breakfast included)

Mongolian Ger Tent

24. Mongolia: Ger Camp (Awesome! part of trek package) *Great Tour Company www.tusker.com

Jade Garden Hotel in Beijing

25. Beijing, China: *Jade Garden Hotel, www.jadegardenhotelbeijing.cn (no breakfast, awesome location to walk everywhere, shopping, Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, night market, etc.)
26. Beijing, China: Grand Hyatt Hotel, www.beijing.grand.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels/index.jsp?null (we spoiled ourselves for a night of luxury and tropical pool and workout room and spa...nice place)

There's no place like HOME!

27. Home... the best place of ALL!
Now, even though I gave you all the hotel websites directly, this was part of my research plan... first find a couple good spots on tripadvisor.com, then cross-reference their tips with the actual hotel website for specifics and published rates, then I would go back to tripadvisor.com to actually reserve the room at discounted rates using their compare system with hotels.com, booking.com and agoda.com, etc. Most of the time, these were a lot lower than the direct hotel website. One trick though is that you often have to prepay for the room fully, so if you change your mind, the small print says you don't get a refund. That can hurt. So be sure to know the facts before you click "reserve."
I'm only saying that because I was stupid and booked the wrong month totally in Cape Town, then realized it after they had already charged me $400 on the credit card. Ouch! It took quite a bit of apologies, yelling, calling, and documenting to get our money back. Les wasn't even mad at me. I'm married to a good guy and very lucky indeed.

Buddy-on the plane ready to go!

So GO! Have fun. Explore the World, and stay in one of the places we did. I found out that my grandparents and uncles actually stayed at the Mena House in Cairo back in 1961, 50 years ago! (probably before the infinity pool & spa it has today!) How cool is that?

Mongolia is Magnificent! by Susie

I love "alliterations," so when I say Mongolia is Magnificent, I can also say it was Marvelous and Mysterious and Maybe the coolest stop on our trip around the World. It is a Monster of a country with Millions of Miles of Mountains with plains and rivers and desert strewn all throughout. Mongolia seems Maybe reMote and out of this world, but surprisingly, it is More like the planet we lost long ago.
Okay, I can't think of anyMore M words to continue my alliteration obsession, so now I'll just let my words flow and tell you a little bit about what we experienced and learned on our 3 week trek through Mongolia.
You must admit, it IS a cool word to say...MonGoLia It is also a very cool place to travel, especially with our good friends Eddie & Amy Frank, the Tusker Trail (www.tusker.com) guides extraordinaire. We climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro and went on a four week 4WD across Africa Safari with Eddie back in 1998 (yep, 13 years ago, before Noa was born). Les and Eddie hit it off right away, exchanging old Landcruiser stories. So when he and Amy (my adventure sister) told us about their Mongolia trek, I started planning on how to incorporate it into this RTW trip.  All the other stops and continents really floated around these 3 weeks in Mongolia. Plus, I had to do a lot of convincing to Noa and Les. Although they were keen on trekking in Mongolia, they both weren't too sure about riding a mountain pony for 4 hours a day. Must be a "boy thing" with the horn on the saddle and all that bouncing around; it gave them great fear & trepidation. But, I will say right now, in the end, both Les and Noa were riding like Clint Eastwood and galloping confidently across meadows with wind in their hair and huge smiles on their faces. Me? I was practically giddy with glee and giggling every moment I got to be on and around those shaggy little horses. It was so fun.

Susie with all the Mongolian moms & kids

Susie on Gandolf over frozen rivers

Noa cuddling a baby goat in a family Ger

The Mongolian horse is a small 12-hand high, little creature, with a fluffy forlock (bangs) and a long, long thick tail (which I loved to braid; I am a girl BTW). They come in all colors too: mine was a grouchy gray spotted pinto I named "Gandolf the wizard." Les' horse was a lazy chestnut brown with a golden blond mane, he named him "Gimli the dwarf." and Noa's was a spindly young brown & black bay he named "Cody." Apparently, the Mongolian herdsman don't name their horses, so they were amused by us, and also they may eat the ponies that don't pull their own weight...AAArrrgh! This was a devastating fact for me to hear. As I lamented "Don't eat Horses!" Everyone on our trek kept taunting me at mealtimes... "Gandolf is gonna be dinner!" ...very sad indeed, but a fact of life in the tough culture & climate we were experiencing.

Les' fav shot - Our icy snowy camels

The remote Ger tent satellite dish & solar panels

Back to the beginning, as we flew into Ulaan Batar, the capital city, the first thing you notice is the immense expanse of land in every direction, then you notice the colorful rooftops of the homes -red, blue, orange, green. An interior decorator would say, "the color just POPS" out on the tan gray of the arid fields surrounding the city.  Next, you notice all the giant billboards of mega-companies exclaiming their excellent mining prowess at drilling, hauling & grinding up Mongolia's natural resources.  The capitalizing beast has awakened to the potentials of Mongolia's underground gems, oils, coal & metals just waiting for the taking. We can only hope that there is a safe management system in place to curb to corruption and hoarding of the profits, and protect the future of that beautiful land. Sigh... we see a few Hummers and Lamborghini's downtown and know that someone is certainly not sharing the new wealth.
But, this is the world we are finding nowadays, everywhere. I'll let Les elaborate on that later.
We meet up with Amy and the group -John, Jay, Patti, Patrick, Phyllis, Joanne, and Adeline and quickly realize this is going to be one GREAT expedition. Another pre-dawn flight takes us to the more remote city of Ulgii (pronounced "oolgee," not ugly) where we get to sleep inside a round Ger tent, like the Russian "yurts" you may have seen before.

Typical round Mongolian Ger (yurt) house

Totally portable like a Native American teepee, it's a frame of bent wooden poles covered in layers of yak fur felt & canvas with a little 3 foot tall door. Once inside, you see the bright colors again, that POP, decorating the ceiling and walls are the most beautiful hand-embroidered tapestries. Every ger we visited on our trek had hot pinks, lime greens, reds, yellows, and blues swirling around inside. Three or four twin-size beds line the round walls, with a kitchenette shelf and a big rawhide bag & paddle for churning the yak/goat milk into yogurt & cheese. Then there's a simple wood-burning (sometimes dung-burning) stove in the center of the ger with a chimney pipe to get the smoke out the roof.  It was very comfy, clean and cozy.  One to two whole families would live in this 15 foot diameter space, 4+ children just slept on the floor between. That's a lesson in positive family communication and support- no griping and complaining allowed! The best part about the gers, especially as we got more remote in the wilderness, was the contradiction of ancient living styles (as I just described) and modern amenities. With the addition of a satellite dish & solar panel outside then they had a TV and DVD player inside! It was awesome...here we are sitting inside a ger, a thousand miles from the city, with this tough cute little family, drinking salty yak-milk tea (which tastes like hot Gatorade btw) and holding a fuzzy baby goat in our arms, and they have Will Smith's movie "Hancock" playing on their TV! Noa was chuckling at it all. It was great!
So what next? Well, our group, led by Amy & local expert Dosjan, jumped in three different Landcruisers and made tracks (literally) for 6 hours to the National Park to meet up with Eddie and our horses. It was off-road bouncy and totally fun. We felt like we were in the Baja 3000 race, as each driver tried to beat the other guy to the turn and stay ahead of the dust clouds. Eddie was waiting next to an incredible lake with all our yellow tents set up, a herd of camels and horses at the ready, and big plate of "Eddie Spaghetti" made by the awesome camp cook Alex. He and Noa became fast friends, as Noa often went straight to the source with his high metabolism and hunger pains. Amy made sure to surprise Noa also with pockets of Fruit by the Foot & Gushers. What a treat! He hadn't tasted any of those for 2 months, a favorite familiar food. (You notice that I still throw in a few more of my alliterations for you?)
I told you about our horses already, Gandolf, Gimli & Cody, but did I tell you that we rode in these super soft Australian style saddles? I highly recommend them for long rides. And, did I mention that we are now quite adept at crossing rivers? Wild, rushing rivers of white glacier melt up to your knees! It was awesome! A few times we took off our boots and pulled our knees high to keep our feet dry. There's a reason to do more pilates and yoga -keep those core stomach muscles strong...river crossings on horseback.
Noa really earned his stripes in Mongolia. He became a master tent putter-upper, a speedy horse racer (he borrowed a whip from Karbai-the horse master), and even learned how to surf on top of a camel (he sure missed the waves)! I have to say that never once did Noa complain about the cold weather or strange foods. He carried on long conversations with all the adults and helped out whenever he could. He met the Mongolian local kids with a smile and handed out over 50 little airplane kits to each one as an ambassador of travel. Even when his spindly little horse, Cody, tried to lay down on him when he was still in the saddle 3 times, he just leapt off quick and grinned, a little frustrated, but game for another go. He also became quite the photographer. Watching Phyllis, he took amazing close-up shots of tiny purple flower blossoms in the high mountain meadows, good enough for National Geographic I think. I think we'll keep Noa for a few years more, he's a really good kid.
So, again, what else did we do in Mongolia? The weather was warm 70 degrees, t-shirt time, in the beginning. But as we traveled further north, to the borders of Russia and China, it got colder and wetter. Afternoon rains and snowfall on the mountain pass made us layer up with all our down vests, fleece jackets, sweaters, wet gear and gloves. We were glad to have our zero degree, down sleeping bags at night, but also surprised at how narrow our "mummy" shaped bags seemed to have become since we last used them 10 years ago. It's hard to sleep with your legs zipped tight!

Noa crossing a glacier river on "Cody"

As we camped next to a glacier, sipping hot cocoa, and looking at the snow-capped peaks of Russia on one side, China on another, and Mongolia all around, it just makes life slow down. We were unplugged from technology, wifi, cell phones, blogs, anyone else in the world...and it was okay! It was better than okay. It was really how life is supposed to be lived. IN THE MOMENT and appreciating the beauty of nature and the love in our family. Don't get me wrong, we mostly farted and burped a lot in our tents and shoved stinky socks in the other guy's pillow, but WOW! What an awesome, truly awesome, FAMILY experience and adventure.

Les and the hooded hunting falcon

I highly recommend Mongolia, especially with Tusker, if you have the inclination and the need to unplug for awhile.

Cambodia Thoughts -by Les

...some cool insights & observations about life in Cambodia, coming from Daddy-O shortly.

Cambodia by Noa

We arrived in Siem Reap, Cambodia and met our guide at the hotel and had lemon grass tea which tasted like a lemon lollipop in a drink.  The Tara Angkor hotel had a pool that we swam in every day and the chance of rain everyday was 60 percent.  We even went swimming in 4 thunder storms, but my favorite part was going to the Night Market.  They had EVERYTHING! I got a new green hammock for only a dollar, and a digital sport watch and cool sunglasses for just 2 dollars each, and surprisingly... the watch still works! We went to a lot temples around the famous Angkor Wat (the one from the "Temple of Doom" movie), but my favorite was the Bayon temple, because it had 24 giant faces carved into the rock wall, and if you sat in the window it would look like you're kissing the face.  By the end, we had gone to so many temples, we got, as I say, "templed out". Our guide even let us feed huge Cambodian elephants some bananas.  My dad finally got to see a monkey too, which made him happy, but my mom freaked out when one little baboon started climbing on her leg.  It was funny. Overall Cambodia was great. One more place to check off on our list, but you should definitely add it to your list!  

Three Days in Hong Kong (June 7-10)

Given all of its history under both British and Chinese rule, there are many things of interest to see in Hong Kong.   The only thing that we knew we wanted to do was to visit the Hong Kong Island Paddling club to check out the potential race site for next year’s Crew Club World Champs.   We did some research on- line and ultimately decided to stay on Hong Kong Island.   This island is home to the Chinese culture and also to many ex-pats doing work there.  

Upon arrival in the airport we were surprised to see “Thermal Scanning” booths that all exiting passengers were funneled through.  They were checking for passengers from Europe with signs of fever from the German cucumber e-coli outbreak.   We did notice a few people sweating profusely so it was a little un-nerving.  Many travelers were wearing masks (something we saw often in our tour of Asia).    One nice thing about Hong Kong is the train service from the airport to downtown.  It takes exactly 24 minutes from the airport and is cheaper than a cab.    From the train depot, we lugged out bags to a taxi stand and were taken to our hotel in the heart of HK Island China Town.   Our hotel – The Pacific Island Hotel- was very nice with a friendly staff.  We got a room with a great view looking out at the very busy harbor, with ferries shuttling gamblers over to Macau. 

Upon getting out of the cab our sense of smell was assaulted.   The air was hot and humid and was filled with the aroma of miles of fish markets, raw meat, cooking duck, turtles, frogs,  and just about anything else that could be captured, peeled and eaten.  We spent our first day just walking the streets and staring in wonder at the items for sale in the fish markets.    We had heard in Africa that Hong Kong was the clearing house for the shark fin trade, and tragically, every other store was filled with display cases or piles of shark fins for price tags in the thousands of dollars per kg.  The fins ranged in size from several inches to Noa’s height (which could only have been taken from a Great White or Whale Shark).    We were seeing firsthand the systematic extermination of sharks on this planet as we looked in horror at shop after shop.    Many store owners shooed us away as we looked in, and seemed to know that what they were doing was frowned upon by many parts of the world.  More than once we saw four door luxury cars pull up to shark shops to purchase fins for parties or restaurants.   It is one thing to read about something terrible happening, and it is completely another to see it firsthand (something we have experienced several times on this journey).  

Giant fins in store

just harvested

One of the bright spots of our visit to Hong Kong included a visit to the HKI Paddling Club.  We arrived in the evening just as they were gearing up for a paddle.  Practice for dragon boat and outrigger occurred from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM.  It was a bit late for our tastes but probably prudent for the working ex-pats.  We got to speak with several of the members and tour their facility.   There was a dragon boat festival just the day before, and many of the paddlers were still recovering from the racing and after party.  It seems that there is a dragon boat festival of one sort or another at least once a month. 

 Some of the paddlers recommended a local beach for us to visit on our last day.  We looked it up in the hotel magazine and it was listed as a “surfing” beach, which made Noa pretty excited.  So the next day we set out to make our way to the other side of the island where the clean water and nice beaches were.  Upon arrival at the beach parking lot we were accosted by two tiny Chinese women “renting” umbrellas and chairs.  They had quite a business going since the sand was burning and the sun was hot.  As we were taken to our appointed section of sand, we noticed everyone cavorting about in speedos, and became aware that we were some of the only guys in long board shorts there.   We also noticed that there was no surf at all at "Big Wave Beach!"   We asked a lifeguard where the waves were, and he just laughed and said in broken English “no waves here," and then explained that it was the wrong time of year for waves.    So with a sigh from Noa, we rented a rubber raft and floated around enjoying the sunshine and "a break from traveling," eating Pad Thai noodles and drinking fifty cent beers.   It was a nice way to spend our last day away from the shark fin sellers and the exotic aromas of the city.

At the beach

Tour of Asia

After Germany we decided to begin our tour of Asia in the city where east and west cultures meet, Hong Kong.  After over one hundred years of British rule, It is a perfect blend of western culture and Oriental tradition.  Following Hong Kong we will go through Bangkok to Cambodia, Mongolia, and China.  Write ups on our tour of Asia to follow soon!