South West USA: Trails and trials

Oof, tough decision. Do I fill you folks in on what happened between Sedona and Durango, or do I tell you about yesterday's weirdness? I fear that the Grand Canyon is going to lose out on this one. Could I appease the gods of continuity by making a summary?

Here it comes!

After we left Sedona and the stunningly beautiful Oak Creek Canyon we drove up north to the Grand Canyon. We arrived at the South rim just as the last rays of daylight hit the rocks. The sun sets so much earlier here than in Holland at this time of year, since it is much more south, so we are constantly aware that we need to be at a certain point at a certain time if we're going to enjoy the views. In case of the Grand Canyon, that is totally worth it.
The hotel was not very good, the restaurant was not good at all. (It was The Grand.)

The day after that was a full one indeed. It was our longest drive of the whole vacation, over 400 miles, and packed with activities on the way. The Grand Canyon was neat of course but we (the man and me) have been in that area several times but never managed to see Antelope Canyon... We tried last time but there was danger of flash floods so we couldn't go in. This time we did. That meant getting into the back of a jeep with Henry the Navajo guide, a bumpy ride through soft sand, and waiting for other people to satisfy their photo urges. Because Antelope Canyon is really a photographer's dream. Gods how I missed my wonderful camera!

But! No time to ponder!

The trip to Antelope Canyon took us more time than expected, meaning that we had to make our way to Durango in only the afternoon. It was a looong drive. Coming up to Colorado (driving through New Mexico, our third state on the trip not counting the Detroit transfer...) we ran into the most dramatic rainstorm yet. It was amazing. The rain came down like a heavy curtain, making it almost impossible to see the road. Luckily it got better as we came into Durango and could look for our hotel in peace. We found it: a beautiful place where we got _the last two rooms_. We had decided the night before to book in advance anyway, because it seemed online that Durango was pretty full. It was. But it was great fun – as you could read in my previous entry.

Leaving Durango. The road down from the Rockies into Utah is beautiful. There is no other word. You pass through so many different landscapes, it is mindboggling. The space! THE SPACE!

*Let me tell you something about space. Coming from a person who was born in Haarlem and moved to Amsterdam about 20 kilometres down the road. A person who travels between Holland's two main cities. A person who has cycled around the 'quieter' bits of the Netherlands. Here it is: _anyone who says that the Netherlands has empty, quiet, peaceful spots too... IS LYING._ There is no emptiness over there, not like here. Illustration of 'space' in SW USA: from Capitol Reef you can see for 285 kilometres into the distance. That would mean that I would see Germany from my house...*

We did a novel thing on the way: we took the ferry across Lake Powell. That was nice. Up to that point, everything was peachy. From that point something went wrong. We tried to go over the pass in the south of Capitol Reef NP. This was marked as having unpaved roads with a bit of shallow water to go through (our Aspen had enough clearance for that!) and steep switchbacks. Okay, no problem. Except that we encountered extremely bad weather just as we reached the first peak. First hard rain was falling, then hailstones started hammering our windows. We had stopped the car at this point because it was really not safe to drive, and we couldn't see an inch in front of us. The storm rocked our (heavy and heavily packed!) car back and forth like a cheap shed. Since we didn't know the state of the switchbacks in front of us and the red dirt around us was quickly turning into mud streams, we decided to turn around and head back the way we came. The road was flooded more deeply now, but more risky were the mudstreams across the road here and there. We made it back to the main road and continued down to Hanksville. It was a strange experience up there, especially since about twenty minutes later we were driving down the plains in bright sunlight. Summer was back, the winter storm a thing of the past.

In the evening we arrived in Torry after a beautiful drive through Capitol Reef. The hotel had only two rooms left but they weren't finished yet. So we had to wait. The restaurant had no tables (!) so we had to wait. We ordered drinks but there were no glasses left (!!) so we had to wait. The silverware was in the dishwasher (!!!) so we had to wait. The waitress offered us some bread but it was still in the oven (!!!!) so we had to wait. Did we have to wait long for dinner? Yah: !!!!!

And now we are in Zion Canyon. I will tell you more about the trip here, with visits to Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon, later. Probably. We hit a new state today: Utah. And it feels SO GOOD to be in Zion Canyon again.

South West USA: From canyons to mountains

So far so good. Maybe I should do a bit of travel updating to let you know where we are now, at this moment. After Sedona we drove to Grand Canyon, and after that past Antelope Canyon (Page) all the way to the Rockies. We are now in Durango, Colorado. This is the land that is shown in pictures and movies about the Wild West. This is where the film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was shot. Durango is an old mining town with nineteenth-century buildings, like the saloon, and nice little shops that are not part of a chain.

Of course a lot of it is touristy but not all and some quaint little gems can be found. For example yesterday I walked into a tiny little bookshop. The proprietors (a past-their-middle-age couple who looked like they had a full life, so to speak) were sitting outside on a bench. The lady told me “go on in, there's three rooms in there!” in an accent I had so far heard chiefly from Cletus of the Simpsons. (I could be wrong but that's what it sounds like to eurotrash like me.) There were three rooms in there, small ones packed to the ceiling with second hand books: romance novels, classics, childrens books from the fifties, how-to books about everything from fixing lawnmowers to finding spiritual enlightenment, science fiction and gardening. And pretty much everything else, in varying states of use, wear and tear, with beautiful old binding or cheap paperbacks for $2.95 (Much Ado about Nothing).

I had wandered into this shop as my man was checking out the bike shop across the road. Durango was the location this weekend of the mountainbike race called Singlespeed World Championship (SSWC). Singlespeed is a highly specific subculture of mountainbiking which is quite a subculture in itself. It means that the bike have no gears... Everywhere around town there are bikes, bikes, bikes. Most of them pretty expensive ones with the gears torn off. Many bikes have extraordinarily large tires to tackle the obstacles on the way, tyres up to 29 inches and we even saw a 36''.

The mountainbiking culture includes rowdy drunkenness, witnessed by us upon arrival in Durango on Thursday evening. The hangover (for them, not for us!) was Friday morning, registration for the race on Friday afternoon, the party (for them, not for us!) on Friday evening. The race was on Saturday. I have no idea who won. I believe you're not supposed to take it very seriously anyway.

Our Saturday consisted of a train ride on the historical Durango-Silverton line, up the mountains. We had booked it in advance and the views were indeed quite stunning. Especially my father enjoyed the trip very much. It was something else.

From here we will leave in the direction of Zion Canyon. I will keep you updated, of course. I obviously also have other tales to tell: my last entry left us in Sedona so I owe you a bit of travel log. I promise to write it for you. After all, you can't just skip the Grand Canyon, can you? You can't. So I will be back. But now I need to sleep: we leave tomorrow at 7:30 – and I am not much of a morning person. :)

South West USA: Emptiness and full days

I love the desert. I can't put it any other way. If it weren't for the spiders living there, I'd adore it even more. We drove from San Diego past LA to Joshua Tree National Park and there is something very soothing about leaving the hubbub of cities behind and meeting nothing but boulders, sand, cacti and the occassional crawling insect beyond the stretches of civilization. In my Japan Diaries I reported about the cultivated emptiness of the Zen Buddhist temples – this is a natural void that is extremely good for my soul.

We each have our own aims in this trip. For my parents it is very much a vacation of a lifetime. It is something they would not have done on their own, at least not in this way, and each corner or turning holds new surprises for them. They also have their little things to do along the way. One of them is making a picture of one of those immense trucks on the US highways, for a neighbour who loves trucks. This means that we all have our eyes peeled for big shiny trucks all the time. It's like a group hobby.

My own aims, apart from just having a good time and generally soothing my soul, include taking pictures with the Dread Pirate and Jack Sparro, as well as gathering material for the blog. This is easily done since the whole point of the blog is to tell what my experiences are. However, I have encountered a slight snag. Let me elaborate a little.

This blog is written in English for a reason: many of my readership reads English. This is because many of my readers are, not to put too fine a point to it, Americans and therefore the very people I meet here every day. And while my Japan tales were a lot about the funny cultural stuff I encountered along the way... _You see the challenge ahead?_ It is just strange to write about weirdness of people when I know those very people will read them. (And probably comment, knowing y'all.) Besides, while a lot of it _is_ weird to me (sorry folks), it seems a little arrogant to write them out like this to you. Then again, us Dutchies are not exactly weird-free either, and I would be more than willing to admit that. I'll probably start. So I'm taking all this (weak argumentation) as a reason to take some liberties. Hope you will forgive me, and that you know I don't mean to dis anything or anyone. It's just that, well, you folks are funny. Keep this in mind, 'kay? 'Kay.

Having said that...
(After all, this is the country of disclaimers. "Careful! Beverage may be hot!" I hope so, I ordered hot tea.)
Having said this...

We slept in Blythe, CA, which is a remarkably unremarkable town and drove on to Sedona, AZ, which is a stunningly gorgeous place. It was our intention to drive right ahead the next day, after our night in Hotel Matterhorn (yes, really, Matterhorn), but we decided to offer my mum and dad a helicopter ride over the area. This was a bit of a 'thing' because on Tuesday evening, in the saloon restaurant, my mother declared that she would never ever ride one of those things. Ever. Yet on Wednesday morning, after a bit of private deliberation, we cheerfully invited them anyway. My father's eyes instantly started to shine, and although the guy and me really tried and tried we couldn't stop ourselves from being enthusiastic either. It was sheer peer pressure. Hah!

We did the helicopter ride. My mother sat in front. She loved it. My father said 'Incredible!' about fifteen times. We loved it, flying over the red rocks, sweeping over the vast planes and diving prodding into the little canyons.

The rest of the day included an Oak Creek Canyon hike of about four hours (it was supposed to be two and a half but we accidentally walked way past the end of the trail) and a long drive through beautiful country to Grand Canyon. We arrived just as the last rays of sun were on the canyon rims. It was a wonderful day.

South West USA: Starting the adventures

Well, here we are! In the South West of the USA: me, my guy and my parents. So far it has been a wonderful trip. The fact that I have had very little opportunity so far to write is indicative of how busy we have been. Travelling with a larger group (i.e. 4 instead of 2) is of course less flexible and means that everything takes a little longer than usual. So less time on the internets!

But: to keep you updated! We started the vacation with a very long travel day of course. The flight was eight hours to Detroit and then another four to LA. We had only an hour and a half for transfer on Detroit and I had been a little nervous about that because sometimes it takes ages to get through customs to the US. And we were flying on 9/11... Luckily this time everything went very smoothly. The Homeland Security people were practically waiting for us to go through (not like the endless lines we have had before) and the suitcase were picked up and dropped off again very quickly too. We are on American soil.

Once in LA we picked up the (huge!) car at the airport. I'm sure any Americans (this includes Canada) reading this will not be very impressed with the size of the car but for Dutch standards it's enormous. (For the fans: it's a Chrysler Aspen.) It is also comfortable which is how we like it. And so we ended up in San Diego, after a loooong day: we travelled with the sun so September 11^th 2009 held an extra nine hours for us.

You would think this would inspire us to take it easy once arrived. Yeah... kind of. We fell into our beds that night for sure but woke up very early of course and arrived at San Diego Zoo at nine, just as it opened. San Diego Zoo is the best in the world I have seen so far. We all loved it. And just our luck: as we passed by the gazelles and giraffes (in one pen), we noticed that one of the gazelles was about to give birth. We stood there for an hour and a half and only left when the newborn little one could almost stand up on its wobbly legs. Amazing.

When you need to relax, spending an entire day walking around an enormous zoo can only do so much. We were absolutely knackered on Saturday night. Needless to say we hit the sack pretty early again.

Relaxing is very easy, however, on an early-morning sunbathing terrace by the Hotel del Coronado by San Diego Bay. Cup of coffee, some muffins, lounge chairs... Life can be really good sometimes. We spent the rest of the day playing in the ocean (with dolphins about 50 yards away from us!), visiting the Old Town (where my father picked up some tobacco) and going to electronics stores. You see, I had forgotten to bring the charger for my photo camera. Yeah: stupid! We went to every conceivable store: nada. They probably don't carry the same type of batteries here as in Europe, even within the same camera brand (Panasonic). Since nowadays I can hardly live a day without my camera, we decided in the end to buy a new one. A shock-proof one so my man can take it with him when he goes biking.

This means that you should all have no fear: the Dread Pirate's blog as well as Jack Sparro's adventures are visually recorded and will be updated! (Check them out on http://dreadpirategavroche.blogspot.com and http://crittertravels.blogspot.com.)

We left San Diego for the desert on the third day of our vacation. (Fourth if you count getting there.) I will dedicate a separate entry to going inland, meeting the desert, and hitting red rock country. For now, since the jetlag is still there in my veins: goodnight!

Pictures will be uploaded in due course. Of course the new camera (Olympus) has a different type of memory card, a kind that does not fit into the computer… yada yada yada, blah blah blah. Why these things are not standardized, I really don’t know. Stupid…

South West USA - Prelude

WARNING! SAPPY ENTRY!
(I solemnly promise any further entries will be less sappy.)

My parents' neighbour is going to take care of the little birds while we are away. I have neighbours I will ask to take care of the mail and the plants but I don't want to burden them with the daily care for the little critters. My parents' neighbours are retired and they really don't mind.

And so today my father came with his car to pick them up. We took the water and seeds out, the sand was already out, then we put a cloth over the cage against the wind and rolled it out into the elevator. The budgies don't like the cloth over the cage, it often gets them in a panic. They were a bit quiet at first, in the car on the way over they started to chat a bit again. That was reassuring, I didn't want them to freak out too much.

Once at my parents' home they were put right in front of the kitchen window. I refilled the seeds, gave them some water, put the sand back in the bottom drawer, and even gave them some extra gierst (foxtail millet). The green one (the girl called Aagje) immediately hopped onto my arm again and started biting me, as she usually does. She's not really hostile, just.. um.. snappy. Blue Mr. Koekepeertje (you'd understand if you saw him - and were Dutch) is not so brave, he stays away.

And now I am home again, and they are in my parents' kitchen, and my house is so empty all of a sudden! It's incredible. We've had the birds not even for a year yet but I'm already so attached to them. I am so used to hearing them do their little things and make their little noises. And big noises, BIG noises too.

They are loud. They make a mess. You can't cuddle them or take them for a walk outside. They don't like being petted. They don't come running to your door when you come home. They wake you up at the first light of dawn. Besides that all they do is make noise and mess, and sit on your arm or head and mess up your hair.

I miss my budgies. Already.

Me and my hobbies...

Just to let you know I run two more blogs, but extremely silly ones. They both have to do with the extremely silly hobby of hosting little (inanimate!) creatures from people I know across the world, and showing them around. Likewise, these people host some of my little ones. It is not unlike the well-known travelling garden gnome, as featured in the film Amelie, except with captions. :)

Check them out:

http://dreadpirategavroche.blogspot.com/

http://crittertravels.blogspot.com/

Behalve deze blog heb ik er nog twee, maar een beetje vreemde. Ze gaan beide over mijn rare hobby om kleine figuurtjes op bezoek te krijgen van mensen die ik ken uit andere landen. Ik laat die figuurtjes mijn wereld zien. Tegelijkertijd hebben anderen mijn grappige figuurtjes op bezoek, ongeveer zoals de reizende tuinkabouter in de film Amelie. Maar dan met onderschriften. :)

Japan Diaries, part IV: Tokyo! (3)

I did not do a lot of specific sightseeing in Tokyo. Most of the time I simply wandered around the streets, taking in areas like fancy Ginza and geeky Akihabara. I used the underground extensively, to get around but also to do some people watching.

The underground system is large, well-kept, clean and (of course) punctual. Rush hour is frantic with people navigating their way through complex underground stations in streams. Sometimes one walks on the left, sometimes on the right. Sometimes one needs a ticket to reach the platform, sometimes one is already through without noticing. I deliberately travelled the underground during rush hour to find out what that was like. It was busy. The biggest challenge: finding the right exit of the station. Some have over twenty exits.

Picture right: During rush hour there are special ladies-only cars on the underground. Apparently men who like to feel up skirts during busy hours are a real nuisance.

I enjoyed Tokyo very much. Although I still felt very much like a stranger, it was a good transition from total immersion in all-Japanese society to a more open, cosmopolitan way of life. Tokyo is the only place where I have seen African-American people, and westerners who looked like they were at home in that place. I was not an oddity at all, until I bought and wore a plastic raincoat in a city where umbrellas are the height in fashion. Oh well. I guess I have a knack for being an oddity everywhere.

I was already getting late when we headed out for our final evening meal in Japan. We were already in a trendy neighbourhood and just as we were checking out the pictures on a restaurant menu we saw a small group of young hip Japanese climb the stairs in front of us. Naturally we followed them to the restaurant. Once upstairs in the grill restaurant we took off our shoes at the door once more (they were put neatly into a cupboard) and we were placed at the bar by a grinning young waiter. It was a small place with only a few booths and seats at the bar. The waiting boy left us with the customary hot hand towels and left.

Our golden rule so far: do as the Japanese do. The Japanese were not doing anything except chat and sip their drinks, and maybe admire the apparently stunningly handsome and attractive trio of staff: waiting boy, grill master, and salad guy. We didn’t see the attraction but hey, who are we? We had seen better samples on the way and besides, we were hungry. The menu only provided us with new samples of kanji (characters) to decipher. Until waiter boy kneeled at our seats (we were sitting with our legs sunken into the floor under the bar) and ‘explained’ the menu to us by pointing at the various sections and saying “rice”, “noodles”, “salad” and while pointing at the bar “grill”. We had already explored the refrigerated bar in which small skewers were awaiting their fate. Ah. We ordered some random rice (S managed to get yet another dish with raw egg) and salad and struck out to get us some grill-stuffs. Point, nod, smile, arigato. (Sound familiar?) We complimented the waiter on his excellent English which was received with a broad grin.

And then, after two weeks of travelling in Japan, we finally had our first sake! It was served in a small glass standing in a small wooden box. The sake was poured at the table into the small glass until it overflowed into the box. Try drinking that without spilling! But it was good stuff, we enjoyed it. And afterwards we went home, to our friends’ lovely apartment, for our final night in the land of the rising sun. With a promise to come back someday.

(Picture below: traditional Japanese sweets at a tea house in Kueno Park, Tokyo. It includes seaweed jelly, red bean mush and fish-soy paste. It looks marvellous - let's leave it at that.)