Category Archives: Countries
The Nepalese Truck-Stop Diet – 6kg in 8 days!!
PLEASE BE AWARE, THAT THIS IS NOT A SERIOUS DIET , It is a tongue in cheek take on a personal experience!.
Below is my step by step guide to my Nepalese Curry Diet. To achieve the same results as I did, you need to follow these instructions precisely, as even seemingly unnecessary steps, such as step 2, are critical in achieving noticeable results -
Before the "diet"
1.Arrive in Kathmandu
2. Eat Doggy Chicken Curry at a truck-stop cafe. I know, everyone says don’t eat it, but you need to show your travel companions how cool you are, l even though you know it looks “sus”.
3. Find cheap hotel in Pokhara, and proceed to spend next 24 hours completely emptying contents of your stomach, both intestines and bowels. Make sure you sweat profusely the whole time. Don’t leave the room, in-fact spend the entire time either in your bed, or on the bathroom floor.
4. Wait until the stomach craps stop, then prepare to head off on 8 day Annapurna Base camp trek. Don’t eat before you go, as you cannot stomach anything.
5. Walk approximately 170km, continually ascending and descending hills and valleys, to you reach a maximum height of 4130m above see level. Stop for water and soft-drinks regularly, but completely loose your appetite. Find the only food you could even contemplate eating is soup (luckily Nepalese garlic soup is sensational), which you eat twice a day.
After the "Diet", 8 days later
6. Finally leave the path a Phedi, and taxi back top Pokhara. Go to dinner in town and (finally) devour a steak (buffalo, not cow). Weigh yourself to find you have dropped 6kg…EASY!!!
It should be noted, the Annapurna Base camp trek is still one of the most amazing experiences I have embarked on, and, in addition, apart from the truck-stop snack, I would gladly repeat the entire experience at the drop of a hat. Kathmandu is a must see city on any adventures list, and Pokhara is a wonderful town to spend a week or more. I still long for the Garlic Soup sometimes, as it was truly wonderful, and obviously nourishing!
REMINDER – THIS IS NOT A REAL DIET
Is Bali a good base for the Long Term Traveler?
Hey long term travelers,
why don’t travel bloggers choose to spend long term stints in Bali? It seam to me to be almost the perfect location for digital nomads, yet most of the travel bloggers and other long term travelers I read about, seam to choose Thailand as their base in South East Asia. In addition, Columbia in South America also seams to be one of the big locations.
But why not Bali?
Surf's Up!
I think it has so much going for it that should be absolutely perfect from Travel Bloggers, and I have chosen to act as a “Travel Blogger Recruitment Officer” and am offering the following reasons why YOU should consider BALI!
For example -
- Temperature - Bali is year round tropical paradise. Maximum temps are always around 30 degrees Celsius, (maybe up to 33 in the hottest time of year), and overnight minimums (away from the mountains) are 25 or more. This is serious “summer all year” stuff!
- Costs – everything is ridiculously cheap in Bali. With an exchange rate at close to 10,000 Indonesian Rupiah to the US dollar, the product for your dollar is great, weather you are American, English, European, Australian or just about anywhere else (except NZ, of course!). eat for 2 -3 dollars on the cheap, or $10 in a cheaper restaurant, beer for $1 a litre, motorbike rental for a few dollars a day, etc
- Accommodation – a great rage of accommodation, both long term and short term. Many cheaper hotel offer good monthly rates, and there is plenty of quality accommodation in villas for longer term. Short term, hotel rooms are available from $20 per night and less.
- Good Internet - Free Internet is available at cafes and restaurants everywhere,and most hotels and villas have good speed wireless networks.
Bintang and Wifi - what else do you need?
- Socialisation – there is plenty of nightlife, plenty of expats, and there should be plenty of bloggers (but I don’t think there is?).
- Friendly locals – Balinese love tourists, and are natural friendly people. They enjoy long term visitors, who will usually be culturally more sensitive than yobbos in 6 day booze-fests.
- Variety – Its a small island, but it has many different facets. Kuta is busy and commercial, the other beaches are much quieter, the North is Volcanic and quite, the mountains are cool and “arty”. And then there are the other islands easily accessible from Bali, including Lombok, Java, Lembongan, and thousands more not much further away.
- Travel hub – good access to the rest of Indonesia, South east Asia and the world. Garuda, the national airline, is now flying back to Europe, and considered one of the most improved airlines in the world, and Air Asia use Bali as a hub in the region, giving access to dozens of exotic locations.
So, I would love to hear why or why not, long term travelers would choose to live here, at least for a few months. Travel Bloggers in particular. Its my plan, just not quite sure when yet!
Tipping Hotel Staff in Bali?
Tipping… oh my god, what a confusing, hard to understand concept.
Yes, you guessed it, I am AUSTRALIAN!!
And we just have no clue how, when or who we should tip when we are in countries where tipping is standard practice, considering we would virtually never tip at home.
So, I am not a complete idiot, and I realise I need to tip the porter who brings my bags to my room, as well as the waiter or waitress who serves my meal, but who else? Where do you draw the line? I don’t know!
So these are my dilemmas. I am going to list a series of scenarios I faced while in Bali last week, and weather or not I should have tipped the people involved.
- Breakfast we delivered to my villa, it was included in the cost of thew room, so I didn’t pay at the time, But should I have tipped the kitchen staff who delivered?
- We had a spa day. 3 hours, with a series of services from different staff. Should we have tipped each person?
- Our Villa complex had a small reception crew, who we regularly spoke to us, we asked them to call us taxis, confirm flights etc. Should we have tipped them, and would you have to tip all half a dozen of the staff.
Should we have tipped?
I just never know, so if in doubt, I don’t tip! I think the Balinese are probably understanding of this, as so many Australians visit, but I’m sure they would love to train us better!
Mmmm. I must be feeling guilty, because the hospitality at the Astana Kunti Villas was absolutely sensational. Consider them if you are looking at visiting Seminyak, Bali. http://www.bali-seminyak-villas.com/villas/astanakunti/index.html
Himalayan Trekking when your over 40, do you need to going a group tour?
Last year, we visited Nepal, as part of our 3 month Asia tour, with the express intention of doing a trek of some description. We did limited forward planning in regard to which trek we would be taking, or how we would take it, but we did make sure we did a reasonable amount of fitness and trekking training. I am going to talk about trek fitness preparation in a following post, but this post I want to discuss whether or not potential travelers need to organise a trek from their home country, in advance? In particular, with reference to potential travelers who is not a young, carefree backpackers, but instead the 40+ year old traveler?
Short Answer – NO
Although I believe there is considerable pressure from travel agents and tour companies that a home country organised group tour, probably with a group leader from home, as well as a large local team, is the only way for a middle aged traveler to safely walk the Himalaya, in my opinion, this is not necessarily the ONLY option.
A quite momement!
I am not saying there is not going to be some benefits of being on a group trek, with a dozen or more similarly aged, same nationality hikers as yourself. However, there is also some major advantages of going it alone, getting to Kathmandu, finding a guide and/or porter and walking with them. For the over 40 year old in particular, some of the major advantages of an locally organised, independent trek are -
- Great ability in interact with your guide and/or porter
- With guides help, get a better interaction with locals
- Trek at your pace
- Amend your plans if you require
- Stay in Tea-houses instead of tent camps.
- All your expenditure goes to the Nepalese, and more of it goes to the people of the region you walk through
- In general, get a more “genuine” experience.
The second challenge, if you are considering the possibility of “going alone” on your trek, is that question that you find hard to get a convincing answer while in tour planning stage -
HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO ORGANISE YOUR OWN TREK?
Short Answer – NOT DIFFICULT
Honestly, with a little research to know what trek you are considering taking, it is genuinely not difficult to organise all the details once you get to Nepal. There are travel agents and trekking companies in all parts of Kathmandu, as there is in the towns where the major treks depart from – Pokhara and Lukla.
Himalaya Hinterland
We organised a local Pokhara based guide, a porter from Kathmandu, a hotel in Pokhara, bus tickets from Kathmandu to Pokhara, all from a Kathmandu Travel Agent, and all of this cost about 1/10th (probably much less than that), of the cost of a trek organised and paid for in UK, USA or Australia. An example of our costs were
- Guide – $15.00 per day
- Porter – $10.00 per day
- Pre Trek Accommodation in Pokhara – $20.00 per night
- Bus from Kathmandu to Pokhara – $12.00
- Accommodation in tea houses on trek – $5.00 per night
- Meals while on trek – around $15.00 per day
So, in a nutshell – CONSIDER THIS OPTION
We genuinely believe this is the original way to trek the Himalaya. It is not impossible, and being over 40 is not an issue. While trekking, we met independent trekkers up to 70 years of age, and these people where all going to get to Annapurna Base camp, at 4100m above sea level. And that is a once n a lifetime experience at any age!!
Today’s Photo – Songkran festival, Pattaya, Thailand
A truck load of “ghosts” revelling in Pattaya, during the Songkran Festival, 2010
Today’s Photo – Jonkers St, Chinatown, Malacca, Malaysia
Jonker’s St, Malaca, Malaysia. Getting ready for chinese new year
Today’ Photo – Australia Day Fireworks, Perth Water, Perth
Lotto Skyworks at Australia Day, Swan River Foreshore, January 26, 2010
