The results were way better than I expected, so now I think I may do a series (if you’d like to contribute a story, there’s info at the end of the post). 

Here’s my first instalment of super entertaining, super short travel stories. Enjoy!

The Hilarious ‘Hot’ Seat

When traveling through Bolivia I signed up for a 3-day 4×4 tour through the Soleli Desert to visit the Uyuni Salt Flats. The truck was full, so I sat in the front seat beside our driver, who spoke only Spanish. Although it was cold outside, the sun made it unbearably hot inside the truck.

Sweating, I looked over at the driver and said, “Estoy caliente (I’m hot).”

Instead of turning on the air conditioning, the driver looked at me in horror and confusion. I repeated myself, unsure of why he was acting so strange and would not turn on the A/C.

After a few uncomfortable moments a bilingual passenger in the back spoke up. “I think you’re trying to tell him you’re hot, but you just told him you’re horny…twice.”

The rest of that 8-hour car ride was pretty awkward.

By Jessie Festa of Jessie on a Journey and Epicure & Culture

Inches From Disaster

A sunset cruise on the Zambezi River was to be one highlight of my stay at Victoria Falls. The small boat holding 6 people was almost full as I gamely darted across the narrow wooden gangplank.

Suddenly, the boards broke under my feet.

I shouted for rescue while my fellow passengers remained frozen with shock. About to take a dunking, I was pulled to safety at the last second.

Only after I was safely on board did I see that I would have fallen in the water right where the fishermen had been throwing bait to waiting group of enthusiastic crocodiles.

By Elizabeth Avery of Solo Trekker 4 U

Good Vibrations Gone Awry

After about 10 days of driving and flying my right shoulder and neck hurt badly. I was dreading the final leg home. As I stood at the gate at the Philadelphia airport I noticed a small booth selling spa items. Among them was a small massager. I thought that the massager would help to work out the tension in my shoulder and neck and used it on the flight (totally oblivious to the curiosity of the gentleman sitting next to me).

After the flight I forgot about the massager. Several days later, I was checking out of the hotel room early in the morning before a conference. As I rushed out of the hotel room my carry-on bag started to vibrate. The elevator dinged and I decided it was better to get to catch it than to worry about the noise in my bag. What I had not anticipated was the stares I’d receive from the other people in the elevator as I pretended not to notice my vibrating luggage.

Susan Fitzell, M. Ed. of SusanFitzell.com

This Is What Happens When You Talk To Strangers

My friend and I were finishing a two-week trip to the USA and we’d just flown from Las Vegas to Los Angeles, where we were to catch our flight home the following morning. While collecting our luggage we struck up a conversation with the man who’d sat in front of us during the flight. When we told him that we’d be spending our last night in the States at an airport motel eating take-out, he invited us to dinner.

We were both girls in our mid twenties. He was a businessmen, probably just a few years older than us. On our way to his car our new friend made a call. We heard him ask about a room and then giving a credit card number. When he put his phone down, he told us that he’d booked us a room at the Sheraton LAX.

We began wondering if we made the right decision going with him.

I don’t want it too sound negative as we never were really worried or something like that.

We had dinner at a bar in Manhattan beach – which he paid for – and some drinks at another bar afterwards – which he also paid for. He seemed like a great guy, but all night long my friend and I couldn’t help but think that he’d expect something afterward in exchange for all of his kindness.

When he drove us to our hotel (well, actually he let my friend drive because she really liked his jeep) we braced ourselves for the come-on. But, when we got to the lobby we simply thanked him for a wonderful night and said goodbye. That was it. No dirty attempts. No hints of something more.

He just wanted to treat us to a great last night in the USA, and he did.

By Sofie Couwenbergh of Wonderful Wanderings

A Terrifying Border Crossing

In 2006 I was on a study tour in Israel and Palestine and we had been meeting with Palestinian Authority leaders in Ramallah, The West Bank. While our the bus waiting to cross back in to Israel we were told that that Ariel Sharon had a stroke. The border was closing, our bus was stuck in traffic, and we weren’t going to make it back. Our professor told us to get out find the border crossing on our own, on foot, while he stayed with the bus.

Stumbling in the darkness along the bombed-out “wall” while listening to the wail of sirens was pretty scary. When we finally found the border crossing I tried to keep it together watching the teenage Israeli soldiers armed with Galil guns inspect women adorned in full burkas (we had just been told that was a popular suicide bombing outfit).

It was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life.

By Lindsay Lewis-Thomas of The Traveluster

A Real Close Call in Rio

Before traveling solo in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, I had been warned numerous times not to pull out any money or valuables in public. I was cautious during my trip, but one day while waiting for the bus I slipped up and pulled out my wallet to look for some small bills before the bus had arrived.

Bad idea.

A local man with menacing eyes stopped in his tracks, glared at me, and started walking briskly toward me. There was no disguising what he wanted.

There was almost nobody around — just one group of four local women chatting nearby.

I walked quickly into their group, smiling and waving as if I knew them. They spoke only Portuguese and I spoke only English, but they realized the situation and allowed me into their circle.

The experience taught that you should never underestimate people willingness to do you harm, but should also never underestimate their willingness to help.

By Jessie Festa of Jessie on a Journey and Epicure & Culture

Easy Money For Easy Backpackers

One day on my first backpacking trip through Australia I suddenly realized that I was running very low on money. The next day I met a camera man who offered me a job as an extra in a movie. It was only $40 a day, but my options were limited.

After we finished filming he asked if I was interested in some more work. Of course, I said yes, but the next job turned out it ton be in an arty nudist movie.

There was no way was I getting naked for cash.

Then he told me that the pay was $100 an hour.

Ok, so maybe I would get naked for cash.

Two days later me and 4 backpacker buddies spent 5 hours at a naked house party — complete with naked bartenders and fire dancers — drinking mojitos, having a blast, and making an easy $500.

I typed this story on the iPad it helped me to buy.

By Chris Stevens of Backpacker Banter

Shark Encounter Fail

A friend and I were scuba diving about 150km off the Australian coast at Osprey Reef when I spotted an enormous shark coming toward us. My dive buddy was confused by my attempts to mime ‘shark’ underwater and didn’t even see the giant as it swam just metres from his head.

I did, however, manage to snap this photo of my confused friend as the beast swam away.

By Charli Moore of Wanderlusters

Couchsurfing Kindness in Budapest

I relied a lot on Couchsurfing to save money while backpacking through Europe. Halfway through my trip I made plans to stay with a Couchsurfing host in Budapest. I was excited because she had a cat and — missing my own two cats — I was in desperate need of feline company.

A few days before I arrived in Budapest my host emailed me to say that she had to leave the city for a family emergency. She lived alone, so I expected that I’d have to find a new host.

I was floored when she told me that one of her friends would meet me at the station to give me the keys to her house! I had only met this girl online, and we’d only exchanged a few emails, but she trusted me with her house, all her possessions, and her beloved cat.

Her gracious hospitality was the highlight of my trip.

By Aleah Taboclaon of Solitary Wanderer

A Rare Glimpse Into A World Few People See

It started off like any other night in Shibuya, having a few beers at a local watering hole. After a while we struck up conversation with a few Japanese locals. One guy started showing me photos of himself with Hugh Hefner and the bunnies, famous actors, and the guy who owns Orange County Choppers in New York.

Over the new few weeks this guy took me to VIP parties, to clubs (through the back door, never waiting in line), to eat sushi off naked women, and to dine in some of Tokyo’s most amazing restaurants (restaurants that no gaijin — foreigner — would ever have been allowed to enter unescorted).

I didn’t realize he was Yakuza (a member of the biggest and most powerful organized crime circle in Japan), but it was obvious to my Japanese girlfriend the moment she met him.

I probably should have known too, given the fact that people would bow subserviently to him everywhere we went.

By Derek Freal of The Holidaze

Have you had a unique, funny, or moving travel experience that can be summarized in a paragraph or two?

I’d love to hear it!

Use this contact form or email me directly at xpatmatt (at) gmail (dot) com to be included in the next Super Short Travel Stories.

The post Super Short Travel Stories: The Bolivia Makes Me ‘Hot’ Edition appeared first on XpatMatt.

I used to live in Taiwan. That was where I developed a taste for taking on ridiculously difficult challenges with little or no preparation. I had a friend there named Jeremy Taws. He also liked to take on ridiculous physical challenges without considering the consequences.

Jeremy and I would meet at night to go for 20km runs and stop along the way to do pushups and sit-ups. We’d finish around midnight and then go for Chinese food at a local restaurant or get drunk.

Individually, we believed in our ability to do anything we put our minds to. When we got together we talked about epic journeys, like cycling from Hong Kong to Casa Blanca and kayaking from Taiwan to the Philippines.

We also talked about climbing Jade Mountain — which is normally a two-day trip — in a single day. When the opportunity came up, we grabbed it. Physically, we were up to the challenge.

Mentally, however, it would be a different story. Our combined intelligence, as it turned out, would not be sufficient to get us to the summit.

The Jade Mountain (Yushan) Trail

Jade Mountain is a symbol of national pride in Taiwan. Like I mentioned, it’s considered my many to be the tallest peak in East Asia. Not everyone agrees on that because there are all sorts of different ways of measuring mountains and interpretations of what area “East Asia” includes. Argumentative geographic douchebaggery aside, it’s a very popular mountain to climb.

Taiwan is densely populated. It has a population about 2/3 the size of Canada’s in an area smaller than Lake Superior. The trail to the peak of Jade Mountain is possibly the most popular hike in Taiwan — which means there are a lot of people in the country that want to hike the trail each year, and that’s before you factor in peakbaggers coming from Hong Kong, Mainland China, Japan, and Malaysia and the rest of the world.

For safety and environmental reasons, the trail is limited to a certain number of visitors each day. To deal with the excessive demand for hiking permits, the parks department holds a lottery for permits several months in advance.

If you are lucky enough to win the lottery, you’re given a permit for dates that cannot be changed. If the weather is bad, you’re out of luck. If you can’t get the time off of work, too bad. I had twice obtained permits to climb Jade Mountain only to have the trips cancelled because of circumstances.

The hike to the peak is very steep. From trailhead to peak is only 10.9 kilometres, but it climbs nearly 1400m. The vast majority of permits given are for two-day trips, during which one night spent at the Paiyun Lodge in the park. Although it’s possible, relatively few climbers attempt to summit Jade Mountain in one day.

Last fall, however, we learned that the Paiyun Lodge was being renovated, so the park was not issuing two-day permits and, since few people try to climb the mountain in one day, there was no lottery. We would be able to get a one-day permit — and we did.

Preparation

Climbers who attempt one-day ascents of Yushan usually leave the campsite around 3:30 am. The drive from Tainan to the campsite would take about four hours. So, we decided to leave Tainan mid-afternoon on Saturday, arrive around dusk, and try to get a few hours of sleep before starting the climb on Sunday morning.

The trip required little preparation. We both brought tents, sleeping bags, headlamps, and water. On our way out of town we stopped at a large grocery store to buy provisions. I stocked up on fruit and trail mix for the following day.

“Hey, you want a luchbox for dinner?” Jeremy asked me at one point.

“Sure.” I replied.

A lunchbox is a staple of Taiwanese dining. It is a small box that usually include a piece of chicken or pork, a couple of sides of vegetables, and some rice. The quality of lunchboxes varies greatly. Some are healthy delicious packets of nutrition, and some are greasy slabs of soggy nastiness, depending on where you buy them.

The Attempt

We arrived at the campsite near dusk and set up camp. Then it was time for dinner. The lunchboxes that Jeremy had bought were greasy slabs of soggy nastiness — some of the worst I’ve ever seen. I ate a few bits of the chicken before throwing it away. Luckily, I wasn’t very hungry.

Jeremy, however, is not as picky as me. He ate his whole lunchbox and then we climbed into our tents to try and get some sleep.

I woke up around 2 a.m. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep, so I went to the van to read. Jeremy heard me walking around and got up too. Since we were both awake, we decided to get an early start — but not until we had some breakfast. I ate some trail mix and fruit. Jeremy ate another one of those nasty lunchboxes (he had bought three). How he managed to force down that disgusting chicken leg covered in congealed grease is beyond me.

Jeremy is an animal.

We started up the trail at a brisk, but sustainable, pace planning to stop every couple of hours for a short snack break. Jeremy complained that his stomach was upset. I made fun of him for eating so much greasy nastiness. After a while, though, it became clear that the food was having a significant effect on his performance.

Jeremy began walking slower than me, which was definitely not normal for him. Jeremy was usually the one trying to go to fast while I’d try to slow him down.

We arrived at the Paiyun Lodge, just two kilometres short of the peak, around 10am. Jeremy was feeling awful, talking about having chills and stomach pains. We were both also exhausted and starting to slow down. We took a short break.

At the lodge the trail split. One narrow trail ran along the side of the lodge and appeared to dead end behind it. The other started uphill toward the park ranger’s cabin. We started up that trail.

As we traversed a hillside in the dawn, I began to realize that Jeremy was becoming delirious. We’d walk in silence for a while, and then he’d suddenly ask me something like, “Did you hear somebody shout?” or, “Is there somebody up on that ridge?”

Those were things that he possibly could have noticed that I had missed while lost in thought, but I was sure something was wrong when he commented, “Somebody had a good time up here.”

“Why do you say that?”

“The Taiwan Beer can.” He replied, pointing at the ground.

There was no Taiwan Beer can.

“You’re hallucinating, Jeremy.”

“Shit, really?” He squinted and stared at the spot on the ground. “Whoah,” he said, shaking his head.

We were very close to the peak, and there were no sketchy parts on the trail, so we pushed on, but I was concerned. We were on a steep hillside and would likely have to do some scrambling before we reached the summit.

The trail continued to climb and entered a forest. Suddenly, we found ourselves standing in the middle of the forest with nowhere else to go. The trail ended. We could see no ground above us. At the end of the forest was a cliff.

This was not right. I had seen photos of the peak of Jade Mountain. It’s a rocky peak with a 360-degree view (which I had been hoping to photograph).

Then I recalled the sign on the trail near the cabin. I had barely noticed it. It said, “East Peak”. It had not occurred to me that there could be more than one peak. We had climbed the wrong one.

Not that our mistake had saved us any effort. The East Peak is 3869m, which puts it less than 100m lower than the summit at 3952m.

We got all the work, and none of the view. We could hardly see anything. So, after walking around in the forest and a nice long rest, we started down.

Jeremy stopped hallucinating, though his stomach continued to bother him. We passed numerous hikers coming up the trail.

We had been on the trail for nearly twelve hours at that point. Our muscles were overflowing with lactic acid, and every step was uncomfortable. We began complaining.

“I can’t wait ’till this is over.”

“I am NEVER coming back here.”

“Yeah, fuck this place. Lets get home.”

We spent the drive home vowing along never to put ourselves through such an ordeal again.

Back to Normal

The next day Jeremy called me.

“Dude, I can’t believe we didn’t make it to the summit. We have to go back. They didn’t even check our permits. We could totally sneak up in the dark.”

“Well, it’s still a few weeks before the park closes for the winter…”

The post How We Missed the Peak of Jade Mountain by Less Than 100 Meters appeared first on XpatMatt.

I’m talking about the Mongol Rally 2012, a charitable free-for-all rally of ridiculousness from Great Britain to Mongolia organized each year by The Adventurists. The rally is comprised of teams driving themed cars (the stranger the better) across 10,000 miles of mountains and deserts.

There is no set route and back up cars are not allowed. It’s the most gonzo rally on earth.

256 teams participated in this year’s rally, including a couple on their honeymoon wearing their wedding clothes, a car with a bathtub on the roof (the press release did not explain why), a car with a yak on the roof (I think the reason is fairly self-explanatory) and a group of three paraplegics who call themselves The Wheelie Wanderers who took on the rally entirely unsupported.

The weirdness of the rally is unequalled. It also does a lot of good for charity. Since 2004 the rally has raised £2.3 million for charity, including £300,000 this year.

It has also resulted in uncounted fits of laughter and incredulous looks of disbelief.

Here’s this  year’s video, The Ten Most Stupid Ways to Reach Mongolia, which highlights the rally’s silliness.

The post The Ten Most Stupid Ways to Reach Mongolia (Video) appeared first on XpatMatt.

“I had no way of bailing the water out of the kayak, and I was nearly a kilometer from shore.”

I am a master of pushing my luck. I get bored when everything goes right, and a get a strange satisfaction from pushing my little expeditions farther and farther until something finally goes wrong.

When things go really badly, I curse myself for my stupidity and vow never to do it again.

And then I do it again.

It’s kind of like a game.

I’ve been staying in my family’s cabin on Kootenay Lake, a large and sparsely populated lake in the Canadian Rockies. My dad bought a couple of kayaks last year. I’ve wanted to try kayaking for a long time, so, the first chance I got, I took one out for a long paddle.

I followed the shoreline south for about forty minutes, and then came back. It was scenic and peaceful, and much too uneventful.

The next day I paddled down the shore in the other direction to the general store where I bought a drink. I wasn’t wearing a lifejacket because I had planned to stay close to shore, but I wasn’t ready to go home yet, so I decided to paddle across the bay, a distance of about 1.5 km. I didn’t think that it was dangerous to do so. I had swum across the bay several times before. I could do it again if something went wrong.

Besides, the lake was calm and the kayak was sound. What could possibly go wrong?

I paddled across the bay and followed the cliffs along the shore. Then the wind began to pick up and I decided to go home. To get back across the bay to our cabin, I had to paddle diagonally into the wind and waves.  By this time I had been kayaking for over an hour and was getting tired. It was very hard to keep the kayak on course, because it naturally wanted to turn itself into the waves. I was using a lot of energy just trying to keep straight and my strokes were becoming sloppy. Then, one particularly large wave came and I, tired and off-balance, leaned too far over as I reached forward with the paddle. The kayak tipped and I fell in the lake.

My sunglasses fell off. I dove quickly to catch them before they disappeared. Then I flipped the kayak right side up and tried to climb into it, but I couldn’t. There was too much water in it. When I tried to lift myself into it, it would nearly submerge. I had no way of bailing the water out of the kayak, and I was nearly a kilometer from shore.

“Well, I guess I asked for this.” I thought and began swimming towards shore, pushing the waterlogged kayak ahead of me.

It took me almost an hour to get to shore.

After such a mishap, most people would probably wear a life jacket, at least put a bailing can in the kayak so that they could bail out the water if the kayak flipped again.

The next day when I went kayaking again I, of course, did neither.

In fact, I decided to up the ante, and brought my Nikon D80 DSLR camera.  I hung it around my neck and put my father’s semi-waterproof kayaking jacket on over top of it so shield it from splashes.

I kayaked for 30 minutes directly towards the middle of the lake where I shot a 360-degree panorama. It was sunny and the lake was like glass. I turned around and began paddling back.

The weather turned quickly. Clouds moved across the sun and I the wind began howling through the mountain pass behind me. The waves grew quickly and I began to paddle faster.

I was in exactly the same position that I had been in the day before, kayaking diagonally through the waves, except this time the waves were bigger and I had my very expensive DSLR camera around my neck.

And I totally deserved it.

Cursing under each grunt, I paddled as fast as I could. When I was about a half a kilometer from shore, the waves began to whitecap.

Paddle, paddle, “sh*t”.

Paddle, paddle, “sh*t”.

The waves broke on the side of the kayak, splashing into it and onto my kayaking jacket. I didn’t know how waterproof the jacket actually was, and whether or not some of the water was leaking through onto my camera.

Paddle, paddle, “sh*t”.

Paddle, paddle, “sh*t”.

Finally, arms exhausted, I made it to shore. I tore off the kayaking jacket to check my camera.

It was dry.

Whew.

And, it contained this picture, which made it totally worth it.

When I was out there, I also got a good look at a section of the far shore that I hadn’t seen before.  I can’t wait to go and photograph some of the coves over there.

Nelson Vacations

The post Two Incidents Kayaking on Kootenay Lake appeared first on XpatMatt.

No one has been able to find a practical solution to the problem yet, but a few rednecks with a ski boat and and a samurai sword came up with an even better idea. Check it out.

The post Watch it Now! Waterskiing Redneck Eco-Samurais appeared first on XpatMatt.

I had just returned to Canada after living in Taiwan for six years and had snowboarded only once in that time. It was Easter Sunday, and our local hill was closed, so my brother and I were hiking up it to session the snowboard park. A girl was snowboarding down the hill. The sun was shining and the snow was soft. She had a big smile on her face. She carved in a long arc on her heel edge and then slid to a stop ten feet away, and plopped down on her butt in the snow.

“Hi.” She shouted.

“Hi.” We answered.

“How are you?”

“Great.”

“Want some mushrooms?” She offered gaily.

“No thanks. We’re having Easter dinner with the family later.”

“Okee dokee. Suit yourself.”

She stood up, wobbled a moment, and cruised off down the hill.

Having lived abroad for so long I had been going through reverse culture shock. I constantly felt anxious, unaccustomed to being around Canadians, but at that moment I felt like I was home. I was back on the hill with happy, friendly, inebriated people.

That’s what Kootenay ski culture is all about: good people, goodwill, good times, and good intoxicants.

When it comes to sports it’s easy to get caught up trying to tackle more extreme terrain or master impressive tricks and forget why we go to the hill—to have the best time that we can.

I lost the plot the other day, when I went to Lake Louise. I had been given a press pass in exchange for writing about their Bonus Week promotion, during which any person with a season’s pass from any ski hill could ski at Lake Louise for free.  I was so caught up trying to get good pictures for my story that I forgot to chill out and enjoy myself.

Kootenay ski culture was in full effect. The first gondola that we rode up had an empty beer can in it (at 10 am). The second was cloudy with weed smoke from the previous occupants. As we sat in the pleasantly pungent gondola my phone rang. It was Brandon, a friend from high school that I hadn’t seen for years.  We had grown up, and learned to snowboard, together. He had seen on Facebook that I was at the hill. He was on is way to the hill too and would arrive around noon.

I was surprised that Brandon coming snowboarding. Brandon was the kind of guy who would always go for big air—as big as possible no matter what the conditions—and had crushed his heel jumping an especially big gap on an icy day three years earlier. As far as I knew he wasn’t supposed to go snowboarding.

While waiting for Brandon at the lodge I was chatting with a pair of women who had come from Invermere. They both had season’s passes at Panorama, which had gotten them free passes to Lake Louise for the day. When Brandon arrived and they heard him say that he needed to buy a lift ticket, they insisted that he take one of their season’s passes to get a free one.

“It’s OK.” They assured him. “They didn’t even bother to look at it.”

Free pass procured, we headed up the hill. Brandon needed to be gentle with his foot.  On the first run I wanted to go to the snowboard park to take pictures, but Brandon didn’t because he didn’t want to be tempted by the jumps. So, I put my camera away, and we went for a couple of fast cruising runs. After an hour we decided to give his foot a break and go sit on the patio. As part of Bonus Week the lodges on the hill were selling $7 burger and beer combos.

It wasn’t until we took off our boards that it turned into a really good day. It was the first time Brandon and I got to hang out one-on-one in over a decade. We caught up over our burgers and beers in the sunshine and snow. He told me about his business in Calgary and his wife and daughters.  I told him about my life in Taiwan and writing career. We talked about the old days and old friends. When we finished our beers, we bought a couple more. Seeing Brandon made it a better day than any amount of fresh snow could have.

I’ve only been home for one month, but I’ve seen Kootenay ski culture everywhere.  My father told me that I should join his friends for their annual end of season P.P.P.P.P. The acronym stands for powder, pedal, paddle, potluck, piss-up, and puke. In this one-day event this group of fifty- and sixty-something professionals and business owners ski, bike, and canoe, and then eat and drink until they vomit. Well, maybe not everyone barfs, but it’s a nice idea, and it adds an extra ‘p’ to the acronym.  Hearing about this group made me hopeful about the prospects of life after middle age.

My brother, a professional snowboard instructor, recently finished his avalanche safety training. After the final test the students celebrated in the bar at the hill. This is what he said happened: “Out of the corner of my eye I saw this girl move off behind a pole.  It looked like she was taking off her clothes. Suddenly she jumped out from behind the pole naked and started running. Some guys had pushed two of the long wooden tables together. She sprinted at the tables. The guys sloshed two jugs of beer onto the tables as she dove onto them and slid to the end. Then the guys got naked and did it too.”

That’s right. Naked picnic table beersliding. That’s how we roll in the Koots.

Actually, that’s wrong. Allow me to correct myself. In the Kootenays this is how we roll: doublewide in the shape of a cone with frozen fingers on the chairlift.

So, in the end I didn’t get many good pictures on my trip to Lake Louise. But I had a wicked day, and I did get one picture that will always remind me of it. This is it.

I’d like to thank Lake Louise for their Bonus Week promotion, which was undertaken in the  sharing spirit of Kootenay ski culture, and provided the inspiration for this post.

The header photo was provided courtesy of mhaithaca on Flickr.

The post Kootenay Ski Culture appeared first on XpatMatt.

It’s dark, I’m exhausted, I have a ticket for a bus leaving from a city whose name I have forgotten, and I’ve just lost my travelling companion. Welcome to Columbia!

It had all started so well. We’d entered the country via Tulcan Ipiales on the border with Ecuador and took a jam packed rickety old bus north to Cali armed with boundless energy and high spirits following three weeks of sublime surfing in Estero de Platano.

About an hour into Columbia things started to go wrong. First I tried in vain to reach the bottle of water in my backpack. Big mistake. No sooner had I shifted an inch than I felt a sharp digging pain in my ribs otherwise known as bus crush. To say we were packed like sardines doesn’t do that bus justice.  This discomfort would last for several hours.

Next the bus began spluttering. It would move backwards, forwards, jerk, jerk, bounce, bounce, as I peered nervously out into the FARC controlled jungle hoping that the old girl would pull through. Call me unadventurous, but I’ve never been one for being detained by Narco Marxist Guerrillas in the jungle.

Finally, when we pulled into our destination bleary eyed and aching, I made a beeline for the toilets. When I emerged from the washroom, which was a cesspit to end all cesspits, I looked around. Where in the bejesus was Craig?

He’d been there only moments earlier. I’d left him with our bags and a couple of fellow travellers from the bus. They’d seemed nice enough. Surely the Swedish girls hadn’t kidnapped my mate. I’d heard warnings about this kind of women, but I thought they usually came armed with seductive Latin tans, short red dresses, and spiked drinks, not cargo shorts, Scandinavian accents, and baseball caps.

I was relieved to hear my name being called from across the road where Craig was beckoning me to a waiting car. The Swedish girls had made arrangements to stay in a local hotel for the night and asked if we wanted to share a cab and try our luck at the hotel. Why they didn’t tell me this before I went to the toilet, and save me a heart attack, I don’t know. But we would soon be en route to a surf spot we’d heard good things about, so things were looking up.

En route to El Valle

One of my favourite expressions in life is that everything is relative. It is a comfort when things are going wrong and a great leveler when things are going good. So it was with the journey to El Valle.

After spending the night in Cali (in rooms separate from the girls) Craig and I took a coach north to Medellin. Previously home to the notorious drug lord Pablo Escobar, the city has an unwarranted reputation for danger. Whilst we took precautions, we didn’t feel overtly threatened or out of place in the many bars we visited.

That said, we did attract the attention of a couple of particularly beautiful girls in a club called Mangos. It is said that there is more silicone running around Columbia than nearly any other place on Earth, but whether or not that applied to the lovely Diana and Mari I will never know.

In a less than chivalrous moment towards the end of a great night, a drunken Craig asked Mari if there were any ‘conditions’ attached to what we expected to come next. Non-plussed, Mari asked Craig to elaborate. In doing so, Craig ruined our chances to stay in what I imagine would have been the two most comfortable beds in all of Columbia, with the company of two beautiful ladies. No, they were not prostitutes!

Nice going Craig.

Flying to the coast

After the hard road travel of the preceding three days it was nice to take a plane the next morning to Bahia Solano on the Pacific Coast despite having the whisky blues and a nagging annoyance with my companion.

With its sleepy demeanour and the sounds of Vallanato music drifting in the humid fug, the town was quite a contrast to the bustling streets of Cali and Medellin. This peaceful backdrop was juxtaposed, however, by a large garrison of troops stationed there to protect the locals from the FARC. They were reassuring and menacing in equal parts.

Our main goal was to surf in El Valle. We were not particularly bothered about exploring because we would be back in a few days, so we spent the night forgetting about the previous night’s indiscretions over some cold beers and laughs in the local beach bar.

Finally in El Valle

After a backside bruising minibus ride, arriving in El Valle the next morning was like entering the Garden of Eden. The colorful Jungle foliage, the volcanic structures, and black sand beach all made the previous few days of travel totally worth it.

So eager was I to get in the water that I discarded my t-shirt, shorts, flip-flops and bag at Craig’s feet, much to his consternation, and ran headlong into the blue of the Pacific like a man in remission from drug therapy. Passing locals no doubt muttered, “El Gringo es loco” as I flailed my arms in my crazed race to the sea, but I didn’t care. I was home.

Time to get surfing!

We walked along the sea front and looked at the beautiful El Almejal Eco Lodge before settling on the less glamorous, but budget friendly, Hotel Valle ($4 a night). It was clean enough and all we needed was a place to crash at the end of each day, so it suited us fine.

The clerk told us that if we wanted to surf we should walk down the beach until we found a shack with surfboards outside. We did so and met a bunch of guys from Cali who shaped boards and hired them out to the few travellers who ventured there. They told us about all the local breaks, the conditions, and the best times to head out. I was really starting to fall in love with the place—and that was before we even went surfing!

Surf conditions set to stoked

The break was everything we’d been waiting for. It broke and barreled both left and right for a good distance (100m or so) and was fast and powerful. We were both in our element and loving the lack of lineup as we rode wave after wave all the way into the shore with its palm trees and lush greenery. Come dusk I literally had to be pulled out of the water. “Don’t worry.” I consoled myself. “You’ll be back tomorrow.”

The next morning we woke up early paddled out in to an even bigger swell and hit the surf hard. The low barrels were long enough for a decent ride and the short boards we’d hired were ideal for the conditions. We were in our element as we paddled out time and again and the waves continued to grow into more and more impressive sets.

I shanked a few, but these were better than we’d expected. The previous afternoon we’d had to pump the boards towards the end, but not today. My internal choir was singing “Hallelujah, hallelujah, hal-leigh-lu-jah,” as I sat back looking over this idyll.

Once again I was sorry to leave the water, but early nightfall forced us in. We ate a dinner of fresh fish and hot chilli sauce at the hotel and relaxed, looking out over the distant ocean. We had finally surfed El Valle. We would end up staying a week before heading north to the Arrecifes in Tayrona National Park, but for now we were truly in paradise except for one small problemà: the town was dry. Beer delivery had been delayed.

As I said everything is relative, even in paradise.

About The Author, Josh Aggars
Josh writes about beach life, surfing, travel and more. His passion for surfing takes him to amazing places around the World and comes through in his regular articles as he explores all aspects of the sport. He sells flip flops to help fund his travels and supplements that with his surf writing blog.

The post Everything’s Relative on a Surf Trip Through Columbia appeared first on XpatMatt.

I was eating breakfast in the hotel dining room and looking at my map when the hotel manager walked by.

“Where are you going?” He asked.

“Kinabatangan.” I replied.

“You’re driving a car?”

“A motorcycle.”

“Oh.” He replied and looked out the window beside my table. I turned and looked out the window. It was overcast and raining lightly.

“Maybe you should take a bus.” He suggested.

“Why?”

“Rain.” He replied. “It has rained every day for the past two weeks.”

“Is that normal?”

“It is the end of the rainy season.”

When planning to ride a motorcycle across Borneo most people would think it prudent to invest the 25 seconds that it takes to type “Borneo weather” into Google and read the results. Others would go so far as to purchase a guidebook that might contain a sentence like, “It is unadvisable to go on long motorcycle trips during the winter in Borneo because it’s the rainy season.”

I, however, am not what you would call a ‘planner’.

Rain or no rain, I would continue with my trip as planned. I had paid in advance to rent the motorcycle for ten days, and I was already in Kundasang, a village located high on the highway that crosses Mount Kinabalu. I would waste at least a day of my trip, and more than a hundred dollars returning the motorcycle to the capital. Besides, I had been living in Taiwan for seven years and had ridden a motorcycle there all year round, including the rainy season. I had even driven in a few typhoons. How bad could the rain in Borneo be?

A short while later I was driving out of Kundasang and down the mountainside. Soon the rain stopped. A little later the blanket of clouds broke apart and the sun came out. At the base of the mountain I stopped and put on my iPod. The road was lined with lush jungle. It rose and fell over gentle hills and bent in long slow curves. I put on Zepplin IV and zoomed along the jungle highway listening to The Battle of Evermore. It was brilliant!

“Rain?” I thought. “Ha! What did that guy know? This is perfect.”

My naiveté continued for about an hour. Then, the sun suddenly disappeared and was replaced by black clouds. All at once the rain hit me. It was like I had driven into a waterfall. There was so much water running down my visor that I couldn’t see the road clearly enough to continue.

Luckily, a moment later, I saw some blurry lights on the side of the road. I turned off and drove towards them. It was rural roadside store. I got off my bike and hurried under the awning where a teenage Malaysian boy and two young girls were squatting.

Even though I had been wearing a Gore-Tex jacket, I was completely soaked. I pulled the waterproof cover off of my backpack to check on my laptop and camera. They were in a waterproof bag inside my backpack and were still dry.

I took off my dripping jacket and hung it on a nail, and then squatted beside the teenagers and looked out at the rain. They looked at me quizzically.

“Do you speak English?” I asked.

They stared at me blankly.

I asked them in Chinese if they could speak Chinese.

They continued to stare.

We squatted in silence for over an hour watching the rain pour from the sky like a river through a sieve, pounding on the aluminum room with a deafening clatter. Eventually it let up enough that I could drive somewhat safely.

I was soaking wet and was probably going to have to drive for at least another four hours in the rain. I wasn’t excited about this state of affairs, but I also wasn’t altogether surprised. I do this sort of thing more often than one would expect. In a way, I kind of try to get myself into these situations.

Like I said before, I’m not what you would call a ‘planner’. I never carry a guidebook and I rarely visit a country already knowing what I want to do. I like to just show up and ask people: “How do I catch a bus to so and so?” or “Where can I find a cheap hostel?”. Because of this, when I arrive in a new city I often end up wandering around for hours, carrying all my gear, drenched in sweat, looking for looking for a hotel or bus, and drawing strange looks from locals. Basically, I like to make things hard on myself.

If the pleasure I derive from an experience is measured by the absurdity of the situation that I get myself into for no good reason, then my third day in Borneo should have been one of the best days of my life.

Before I left the store I bought a plastic rain suit. It included a baby blue plastic jacket and a pair of baby blue plastic pants that reached to the tops of my ankles. I paid for it and put it on over my wet clothes. Then I put on my jacket and backpack and waved goodbye to the teenagers.

The rain continued steadily. I listened to my iPod for an hour before the rain worked its way into pocket where I had hidden it, at which point the headphones crackled and it died. I drove in silence for another hour before stopping at a gas station to fill up and check my map.

It was 3 pm. It had been about four hours since I left the hotel, and I had been driving in the rain for two of those. From here I would drive out to the end of a peninsula to the port city of Sandakan where I would get a room. That, I estimated, would take about another two hours, which, if correct, meant that I would be taking a hot shower at around 5 pm.

That, however, was not what was about to happen. There was one thing that I had not taken into account: my lack of planning.

I can pinpoint the exact spot where my lack of planning turned what should have simply been an uncomfortable drive into a misadventure of absurd proportions.

At about 4 pm I drove past a pair of monkey statues in the middle of a traffic circle. These monkey statues, I would later learn, are very close to the turnoff to the Sepliok Orangutan Reserve.  The Sepilok Orangutan Reserve is a popular tourist destination, and, since it is inconveniently far from Sandakan, there are several clean, well-equipped hotels and hostels nearby. At 4 pm I was a five-minute drive from clean towels, hot showers, and cold beer. If I had purchased a guidebook or done some research into the area I would have known this.

I, however, am not a ‘planner’. I’m an ‘adventurer’. ‘Adventurers’ , as it turns out, are the class of people that ‘planners’ refer to as ‘morons’.

As continued toward Sandakan I began to understand how severe the rainstorm actually was. It had been raining heavily on and off for more than two weeks, and the peninsula on which I was driving was beginning to flood. The highway was raised about eight feet above the surrounding flats. Along the sides of the highway were groups of stilt houses—houses suspended high off the ground by thin poles to protect them from floods. I could see residents of the stilt houses standing on the front porches with grim looks on their faces, staring at the water as it lapped at their feet. If it continued to rain, and the water rose just a few more inches, their houses would begin to flood. In some places small rivers ran across the highway, several inches deep, and I had to lift my feet as I drove through them.

It began to get dark. The rain continued, as hard as ever. I drove for another hour or more. I thought that I should have arrived in Sandakan by that time, so I stopped at a gas station to ask for directions. The attendant assured me that I was on the right road, so I continued driving.

Occasionally I would I drive past small clusters of buildings that stretched for several kilometers, but never encountered anything that looked like an actual city. I stopped at a convenience store to ask for directions again, and was again assured that I was on the right road. I became confused. Surely I should have arrived by now.

Actually, I had arrived and just didn’t know it. Sandakan is not a normal town with a city center. It’s spread over a large area with several small sections separated by long stretches of interlocking highway that crisscross the peninsula.  So, these people were telling me the truth. I was on the road to Sandakan. In fact, I had driven through several parts of it already.

I continued driving back and forth across the peninsula for another hour in the dark, on the flooded highway, lost in the monsoon. I was tired, wet, cold, and desperate to find a hotel. Then I suddenly realized that I may have an even bigger problem: I was probably almost out of gas.

I continued to drive until I came to another cluster of buildings. I spotted a clean, attractive-looking restaurant and pulled into the parking lot. It was an upscale restaurant by Malaysian standards. I walked in the door. People who had been talking quietly over their meals turned and watched seven hours of rain create a large puddle on the ground at my feet.

My boots made loud squishing sounds as I carried my backpack to a table where I sat down and created a new puddle. I took out my laptop hoping that the restaurant would have WiFi. It did, so I ordered some french fries and set myself to figuring out where I was and where I could find a hostel nearby.

After forty minutes I concluded that the nearest hostel was a few kilometers further down the road that I was on. I memorized the directions, paid for my fries, and left.

At 9 pm I parked my motorcycle in front of a harbor side hostel.  I had been driving in the rain for eight hours. When I got to my room and unpacked my bag, I found that almost everything was wet. My money was wadded together and my passport was dripping. The only things that were dry were my computer and camera in the waterproof bag.

I took a shower, climbed into bed, and fell asleep thinking grim thoughts. What had I gotten myself into? I had come to Borneo in a monsoon. There would be no jungle treks. I would not see any monkeys, orangutans, or elephants. And worst of all, when it was time to return to the capital I’d have to do that hellish drive all over again.

My predictions, though, could not have been more wrong. Things were about to get better—much better.  I would find monkeys and orangutans. I also would receive an email that would lead to one of the best assignments of my journalism career. And best of all, I would end up staying in a hostel that contained several attractive young European ladies and not one other single male.

If you’d like to hear about it, be sure to check back for my next update: Adventures in Malaysian Borneo Part 3: Salvation in Sabah.

Continue to follow my adventure in Adventures in Malaysian Borneo Part 3: Salvation in Sandakan

The post Adventures in Malaysian Borneo Part 2: Lost in a Monsoon appeared first on XpatMatt.

“Don’t drive at night.” The rental agent told me.

“OK.”

It was 4pm. I was in the capital renting a motorcycle that I planned to drive around the perimeter of the state and I was already a day behind schedule. The first thing I planned to do was drive at night. Telling the agent that, however, was not going to get me on the road any faster. So, I listened to his lecture.

“Animals walk on the road at night.” He warned. “And there are a lot of big trucks.

“Very dangerous.” I agreed seriously.

I had been riding motorcycles for nearly seven years in Taiwan where the highways are overcrowded and traffic laws are all but nonexistent. I could handle a bike well, and was pretty good at maneuvering out of tight spots.  I felt that I had good reason to be confident. The agent’s speech was for tourists on vacation who rarely, if ever, rode motorcycles. From the mechanical tone with which he spoke I could tell that he gave the same talk to every renter that came through his shop.

As talented as may I think I am at driving a motorcycle, there is one thing I have long since proven that I truly excel at: ignoring the sensible advice of people who know more than I do.  It’s a bittersweet gift. More often than not it lands me in ridiculous and uncomfortable situations. But every now and again it results in a brilliantly rewarding experience—something that that would not have happened if I’d worried about all the things that could have gone wrong.

This was not going to be one of those times.

An hour later I was weaving between cars on the highway out of Kota Kinabalu. I was going to Kundasang, a village situated at the highest point on the highway that crosses Mount Kinabalu, the tallest mountain in Southeast Asia. Kundasang was only 100km away, but the trip would take me about six hours partly because, as I quickly learned, Malaysians don’t care much for road signs, and also because I would have to climb around 1800m over the last 60km. That is to say, the last 60km of road would have an average 33.3% grade.

Around dusk, after missing a few unmarked turnoffs and backtracking, I arrived at the base of Mount Kinabalu. I had passed the last town before Kundasang forty-five minutes earlier. From here to Kundasang the mountainside would be too steep for any settlements.

The road consisted mainly of switchbacks, which is to say it would ascend several hundred meters in one direction across the face of the mountain before turning nearly 180 degrees, and then climbing in the opposite direction. Zigzagging this way is the only way most vehicles can climb such a steep surface.  However, this makes driving very slow because drivers have to slow to a crawl to round the sharp curves and then try to accelerate uphill on the short straightaway, only to slow down again for the next curve.

It didn’t help that the road was still wet from rain earlier in the day.

Darkness crept across the mountain. The trees along the side of the road became muddy blobs, and the lines on the road grew faint, so I switched on my headlight. It was then that I realized the real reason the agent had warned me not to drive at night: the headlight on my bike was about as bright as a five-dollar flashlight.

I watched the road closely as I fiddled with the light switches. High beams. Low beams. Lights on. Lights off. I tried over and over, but no matter what I tried, the headlight did nothing to illuminate the road. Needless to say, I was less than pleased by this turn of events, but I was not concerned. It was manageable.  I just had to drive slowly, and navigate carefully by the faint white line on the shoulder of the road.

Cars zoomed past me as I crawled up the mountain. At first I tried to follow them, watching their red taillights, but I couldn’t keep up.

“It could be worse.” I thought. “It’ll take a while, but I’ll get there eventually.”

Then I drove into a cloud.

In the grey haze I almost couldn’t see the ground at all. Sometimes I could vaguely make out the white line on the shoulder of the road, but not consistently enough to be sure that at any time I wasn’t about to drive into the ditch, or worse, the oncoming lane. I slowed to nearly a walking pace.

“Nrrrooom.” A car sped by me so closely I could feel the wind off of it on my bare arm. I began to shiver. At sea level the weather had been hot. I had started my journey wearing flip-flops, shorts, and a sleeveless shirt.  As night fell and I rose in elevation the temperature dropped dramatically. I was freezing in the dense wet air, but there was nowhere I could safely stop to take clothes out of my bag. The shoulder of the road was just one or two feet at its widest.

Then, I began to worry. At the pace I was driving crashing into the ditch would not cause much damage. But what if a car came up behind me in the fog and didn’t see me until it was too late? The last one had been very close.

There was no other option open to me, so I continued. After a while I finally drove out of the cloud. Encouraged, I sped up. “Alright!” I thought. “Here we go!”

Then I drove into another cloud.

I tried to calculate how far I had already travelled, and how far I was from Kundasang. Then I calculated how long it would take to cover the distance at the speed I was driving. It would take at least several hours.

I mentally summed up my situation. I was alone in a strange country, freezing cold, riding a motorcycle up the side of the tallest mountain for thousands of miles, at night, in the fog, with no headlights, and there was no end in sight. A lump of discouragement turned over in my stomach.

I’m not sure how long I drove like that. One tends to lose track of time when one is berating oneself for one’s own stupidity.  Eventually, though, salvation arrived.

Salvation comes in many forms. Mine came in the form of an 18-wheeler carrying a cement ball the size of a small house. I heard it growling up the mountain behind me, gears grinding as the driver tried to maintain what little momentum he had. The truck crawled past me, allowing me to see close up the enormous concrete sphere strapped to the bed. It was at least four meters high, perfectly round, and smooth.

After the truck passed me its numerous taillights illuminated the road.  I could drive again! Under the weight of its load the truck was driving only slightly faster than I had been, but at least now I could see the road and didn’t have to worry about getting hit by a car.

I have a second personality trait (in addition to my inability to take advice) that often lands me in ridiculous situations. I am mentally incapable of just leaving well enough alone.

After following the truck for twenty or thirty minutes I became impatient. The truck was too slow. Now that I could see, I wanted to go faster. Cars were passing us every few minutes.  I knew that I couldn’t keep up with a car, but I wanted to get out from behind the truck.

Then a bus came roaring past.  Perfect. “I should be able to keep up with a bus,” I reasoned.

I was wrong.

The bus driver was a maniac, careening around the hairpin corners at speeds that I couldn’t match without risking sliding off the wet road. So, after a short vain effort to keep up with the bus, its taillights dissolved into the fog and I was once again alone in the thick grey.

So, once again I slowed to a walking pace and, eventually, the 18-wheeler caught up to and passed me. This time I stayed behind it until we finally rose above the clouds onto a mountain ridge beneath a glorious bowl of stars the that looked to me to be the size of Christmas lights and a moon the size of an orange. Without the clouds the sky provided more than enough light for me to see, so I zipped past the enormous truck and its enormous cement ball and sped off into the night.

A short while later I arrived in Kundasang and stopped at the first hotel I saw. Shivering and exhausted I checked into a room, took a long hot shower, and climbed into bed. “Well.” I thought. “At least the drive can’t get any worse. The worst must be behind me for sure.”

I need to learn not to think things like that, because the next day things got worse—much worse.

Continue to follow my trip in Adventures in Malaysian Borneo Part 2: Lost in a Monsoon

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