I expected poor roads, hot days, car issues, team disagreements, dirt, hunger, and communication challenges. But there was one thing I didn’t expect – Kazakhstan. The 9th largest country in the world has knocked me off my feet…my smelly, hot , dirty mongol rally feet. The environments and unfortunately road conditions in Kazakhstan change wildly […]
By the time this post goes live, I’m hoping that I will be close to entering Mongolia. I feel (and hope) it’s at this point I can breath a small sigh of relief. As we’ve traveled through Europe and Central Asia, I’ve been slightly on edge because driving a car through these parts of the world as […]
The best thing about camping on the Mongol Rally is peeing in the desert under the stars. It’s bliss. And it’s certainly better than Kazakhstan gas station bathrooms where you have to plug your nose and try to wipe the disgusting memory from your mind before it scars you for life! I’m not much […]
One of the hardest things about the Mongol Rally is that we are speeding through countries in a car. This means that we really don’t have much time to get out and meet locals or dig into culture which really pains me. In fact – we encounter most cultural/local interaction at gas stations – […]
There really only one reason travelers stop at the dusty town of Tissa in Sri Lanka, and that’s to see leopards. So it was no surprise when we rolled into town on a local bus that we were bombarded by locals trying to sell us safari tours to see the leopards. We had already organized […]
There are times in travel when you just have to ‘go with it’. You don’t really understand what’s going on around you or why and no one can really give you any answers due to the language barrier. Heck, sometimes the locals don’t even know why something is done the way it is! So those […]
Footprints seem to mark the beginning of life for humans. We are born, and soon our little foot is being dipped in ink and imprinted on our birth certificates – marking our ‘official’ beginning. In Sri Lanka the birth of the main religions also came to life with a footprint – a sacred footprint. However […]
The crouching lion was still as a stone and surrounded by the jungle below. I approached it cautiously, wiping the sleep out of my eyes wondering what I had gotten myself into so early in the morning. I proceeded as the clouds overhead darted by the sun making the whole scene ahead of me change […]
I remember being in the locomotive peering out over the tracks from my high vantage point. My hand was on the lever and the train was moving slowly forward. Cars disregarded the flashing crossbucks when they saw how slow I was going and crossed the tracks anyway. I looked at my instructor and said, “Don’t […]
I’m going to huff and puff and blow your temple down! This is the story of 2 little tourists, 1 tuk tuk driver, and 3 temples; one made of wood, one made of brick, and one made of stone. Once upon a time there were two little tourists…ok – we aren’t that little…but […]
