3 Months Traveled - 7 To Go.

It all started one lazy day in Talkeetna. We had just finished breakfast and we were putting together a puzzle of licenseplates of all the U.S. states. As we were looking at the half finished map my Mom said, "hey we should road trip the U.S.A. next summer." After a while Ryan said, "hey lets go around the world!" We thought for a while and then decided that it might workout...............................................................

Departure

5 Oct. 1500hrs(3:00)
One year and three months later, we were at the Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport boarding the Condor Air flight to Frankfurt Germany. From there we missed our first flight to Copenhagen but boarded another flight at 3:00pm to the Copenhagen Lufthasen. So far Denmark has been my favorite place, the feel of Copenhagen, the starry nights in a little southern fishing village, and the fun at Legoland.

Copenhagen

After the fun in Denmark we flew to Beijing and spent a week of getting used to Asian culture. The first three days of 100% pollution and strange food enzymes that made me feel lousy for 72 hours!!

Next on the list was Xi'an which was pretty boring, and when I say it was boring I mean it. Xi'an was always cloudy, the city was really hectic to drive around and it didn't have a good feel. Then we went to Lijiang a "small" town of 300,000 people. You call that small?! Anchorage has 400,000 people and it is the biggest city in Alaska! Even so it was one of my favorite spots in China, and I know exactly why. Han Chinese make up most of the population of China and they are very loud and pushy. In the Yunnan Provence the population is over 50% non-Han people and most of them are Naxi (Na-shi). Naxi people are very nice and polite. Also I saw more Churches in Yunnan than in other parts of China, I thought that was surprising.

Mt. Everest

When we arrived in Tibet we were immediately amazed with the surroundings. There were mountain everywhere kind of like home. Not like home, everywhere you looked there were guards standing with heavy weaponry. We were at the roof of the world and were learning amazing history!! I mean who ever knew that the British invaded Tibet to set up a base to attack China. Or how many 13 year-olds have been at 6000 meters (19300ft) and has seen Mt. Everest all in the same day! Heck 19300 feet is the height of the north peak of Denali!!

South Gobi Mine

When we were done with Tibet we flew to Mongolia. It was awesome. We spent 10 days there. Mongolia is so cool I could live there, especially Ulaanbattar, the Capitol. Seven days after Ulaanbattar my Dad and I flew out to a gold and copper mine in the South Gobi desert. When we arrived I found out that I was the first minor, not miner, to set foot in the mine.(the mine is the fourth largest in the world) I think it is just incredible what we have come on this trip and we are not even halfway through.
As we settled down in Vietnam I realized what we take for granted in Alaska. First, of all we don't have polluted skies like Asia. On this trip we don't have relatives or best friends to see whenever we want. There is no snow or big mountains, excluding Tibet. We have to either steri-pen, boil, or buy bottles of water and can't just drink it whenever we want. We have to be extremely careful of our valuables and loosing family members. A good example of that was one night at our resort in Thailand a drunk guy picked our lock and crawled into our room at 4:30 am. I rolled over in my sleep, cracked my eyes and saw a fully dressed man! I jumped straight up and yelled in a deep voice, "Who are you!!!!?!" He started to back away, scared, but i said, "Stop". He started to mumble and said something about Muai Thai(boxing) and then said sorry and left. It is just that kind of thing that you have to be weary of overseas. We are still surviving and haven't invited disaster yet, so in that perspective we are doing great. I am excited for the next 7 months.

Fishing in Ko Samui