By Conor
There are old ladies walking around the streets of Chiang Mai selling the freedom of small birds.
The ladies have round straw baskets, each containing three birds. When I see this, I cannot resist setting them free.
They chirp excitedly when I open the basket, and they fly away. I wish I could set all the birds, but it costs too much.
(Note: Buddhists believe that showing kindness to small animals brings good karma.)
2 years ago • 0 notesBy Conor
When we arrived in Australia for the first time, it was sort of a relief. People spoke English, the weather was nice, and we were in a nice house.
But after a while I started having a recurring dream. In the dream I was back home, except I felt sad, sad that I wasn’t traveling any more.
After a while in Australia, I started getting bored. Every day we walked to the beach, swam, watched TV, and then slept.
I longed to be somewhere more exotic. Somewhere where people didn’t speak our language, somewhere that elephants could roam the streets, somewhere different.
When I heard the news that we where going to Thailand next I was overjoyed. I couldn’t wait to go. I knew I would miss the comforts of Australia, but I wanted adventure.
I guess you could say I wasn’t home sick, but travel sick.
By Caroline
We got to the hotel in Wollogong, south of Sydney, at about 3 pm. We watched an episode of the Simpsons and then went for a walk to find a place for dinner.
When we returned to the room after dinner a man from the front desk reminded us that this hotel had very sensitive fire alarms. He said even steam from the shower would set it off. He told us to be careful while showering and to be sure to close the door tight.
We nodded and headed upstairs.
I was really tired because we had been on the road for about three weeks and that always tires me out no matter how much sleep I get. I fell into a wonderful sleep. I was so warm and cozy. The bed was comfortable and I had three pillows all to myself.
But before long I was awakened by a loud beeping. I woke up and groaned. I thought it was a car alarm going off — but it kept going. Soon the whole family was awake.
Someone started banging on the door and my dad answered in his underwear (I felt bad for the man on the other side of the door). The man told us that the fire alarm was going off and we had to evacuate. I yelled “BUT IT’S 3 AM!!”
Apparently this didn’t matter so we walked down the fire escape stairs. (I always have the urge to this do when there is no fire just to see if an alarm actually will go off like the door says it will.)
We stood outside in the freezing cold in just our pajamas waiting for the fire engine (Thank god my dad remembered to put on some pants.) Most people looked cranky but one large Japanese tour group looked like they were having the time of their lives.
Finally the fire truck came. If I had a chance of falling back to sleep before it was totally gone now. The sirens were so loud and the flashing lights made me cover my eyes.
The firemen seemed bored and unconcerned. I guess they are used to false alarms from this hotel. They quickly checked too see if an actual fire caused the alarm to go off. After about ten minutes they said there was no fire and we could go back to bed.
This left me with a question… Who takes a shower at 3 am?
3 years ago • NotesHere is the video of our Agrodome Adventures (and more things we did in Rotorua).
—Conor
3 years ago • 0 notesBy Conor
After leaving Auckland,New Zealand. We drove to a town called Rotorua. It is famous for its geothermal springs…and its Agrodome Adventures.
Agrodome is a company that lets people do extreme sports such as Zorbing.
Zorbing is a sport where you climb inside a giant plastic ball and you roll down a hill!
Caroline and I went in one together. We did a Zorb with water inside the ball!
So we sloshed around inside instead of going upsidedown.
Out of all the Agrodome Adventures, Zorbing was my personal favorite.
Up next was the Shweeb.The Shweeb is the first human, pedal powered, monorail.
First you get inside a small capsule attached to the monorail,inside the capsule their is a seat and pedals. You sit down and pedal through the monorail track!
Finally came the Free Fall Extreme. The Free Fall Extreme is a big sky dive simulator.
First you haft to put on a sky dive suit and goggles,then you lie on a giant fan facing up,and then the fan goes up and you float!!!
Agrodome Adventures are awesome!!!!!
By Caroline and Conor
It’s been a while since we’ve posted, but we are working to catch up! New Zealand was great. We drove all over the country and saw some amazing scenery.
New Zealand is a country made up of three main islands: The North Island, The South Island and Stewart Island. We went to the North and South Islands.
We started in Auckland, which is the biggest city (but not the capital). It is on the North Island. Here are some pictures.
By Conor
On our way to New Zealand, our family went on two different but similar flights.
FLIGHT ONE. The first flight we went on was 12 hours and with LAN Chile, this flight was from Santiago, Chile to L.A.
Once in our seats we saw our personal entertainment system, which had games, music, movies, and TV shows. You could start the program or movie any time you wanted so it was pretty fun, they also had a wide selection of movies and TV shows.
The meals on this plane were not so great. They only served us two meals and nothing in between, and to top it off the food wasnít good and I barely ate any of it.
FLIGHT TWO. The second flight we went on was also 12 hours but with Qantas, this flight was from L.A. to Auckland, New Zealand.
When we found our seats we also found our entertainment systems, which, once turned on were not so great. This was because you couldn’t watch the movies or TV shows when ever you wanted to, they started and ended at the same time all over the plane, so sometimes I would click on a movie and it would start half way through! Also they only had six movies an 3 TV shows you could watch.
But, the service on this plane was great. First we had a great dinner, then a while later they gave us a snack, and a while later gave us another snack! In the morning they gave us a hot breakfast including hot chocolate, and 3 hours before the end of our flight they gave us hot towels.
3 years ago • NotesBy Caroline
I’d rather be in a semi-coma than ride in semi-cama. Let me explain.
When you buy a bus ticket in Argentina you get three levels of service: Semi-cama is the lowest, cama is in the middle, and full-cama or first-class is the highest.
The first bus ride we went on was full-cama. This was probably a bad idea considering we got used to the service. When we got on we were served olives on a stick, which seemed pretty fancy to me. Afterward the waiter came around and gave us ice cold sodas and offered whiskey to my parents.
Our personal TV’s turned on and music started playing. Soon we were served cheese and a roll and later came trays with our dinner - breaded steak, a mixture of potatoes peas and carrots, a roll, and for dessert a cupcake.
After dinner wine was served to the adults and a movie began to play. Halfway through the movie our waiter brought champagne around and little pieces of candy. After the movie Conor and I reclined our seats which went all the way back like a real bed. There were walls in between each row and a curtain between each seat.
Our waiter walked around and collected our trash. He even tucked Conor and me into bed with the provided blankets and pillow.
I slept pretty soundly considering the whole night there was a thunderstorm outside.
We were woken at 7 and given breakfast which was a roll with butter, some yogurt, orange juice, and a toasted medialuna with ham and cheese. We arrived shortly after breakfast.
Our next ride was a lot less luxurious.
There were no full-cama buses heading to Salta, our next destination. We booked four semi-cama seats.
When we boarded the bus I knew things were going to be bad. First of all it smelled like coffee mixed with peanuts. We were going to be on this bus for 23 hours so I knew the smell was going to get on my nerves. Second, our seats barely tilted back. How would we sleep. Third, there was barely any leg room. These were just the things I noticed when we first got on the bus.
Right after we started moving they served us lunch (this was at 11 am). Lunch was a small ham sandwich and 5 pieces of NASTY hard candy. Then the movie started playing. There were no audio jacks so there was no way to hear the movies in English. You had to decipher the Spanish subtitles. Twenty-three hours with no chance of being distracted by movies! I thought, this is gonna be a long ride.
Conor and I just listened to our Ipods and read a little for ten and a half hours. Finally at 9:30 we got dinner - a cold slab of gray rotting chicken, a dry roll that made me gag, and a biscuit thing for dessert. I didn’t eat any of it. Good thing we brought snacks.
That night I probably slept one hour total. The rest of the time I listened to my Ipod. No breakfast was served on this ride and we got off the bus at ten o’clock in the morning feeling cranky and a little faint from lack of food.
My dad said: “They should have served the whiskey on this ride.”
For me its full-cama or no-cama.
