So there I am, a year ago today, sweaty, sand is in every single possible crevice of my body, the cake I bought completely melting all over the makeshift table, and yet the moment is precisely right as twenty-four backpackers serenade me with the Happy Birthday song in six different languages.
We were all on a three day camping/driving/sandy adventure of Fraser Island, Australia (more on that tomorrow) and as my luck would have it I was hitting the quarter of a century mark. Birthdays on the road are a …

Images of Christmas traditionally evoke thoughts of a toasty log cabin with a flickering fire and cup of hot chocolate all while the snow quietly falls outside. Perhaps there’s even a twinkling Christmas tree nestled in the corner. Well, that’s not the case in Florida -it was 82 F here last week (about 60 F now)– but, you know, at least it is winter here!
Last year I found myself in the Southern Hemisphere for Christmas – Australia to be more exact. The sun was baking down outside and it was, …

The Nepali New Year dawned bright and early our third week in Pharping and Amrit invited all of us volunteers staying at the guesthouse to celebrate the New Year with his family up a nearby hill. Both of the monasteries were closed for New Year festivities; so, without the invitation from Amrit we would have been just four lost souls living in a fishbowl…wait…ack…rather four decidedly white people wandering on the periphery of the familial festivities of the New Year.
Instead, Amrit, Carna, and a team of his Nepali family members …

Amrit is just about one of my favorite people who I met in Nepal. He’s 23 and just has one of the most optimistic and happy dispositions on the planet. Amrit’s uncle, Barbajaun owns Family Guesthouse  (and just about everything in Pharping) and Amrit lives at the guesthouse and acts as the “den-mom” of sorts for all of the volunteers living at the guesthouse through VSSN. Our first days in Pharping will forever be shaped in my memory by Amrit’s joyfulness. Although we had some problems with VSSN, Amrit’s …

Happy Easter! As a quick status update to everyone, although I’m still posting about my adventures in India, my RTW trip has me in….Nepal! I’m actually in my volunteer program and teaching English to monks at a monastery about an hour outside of Kathmandu.  There are two other volunteers at the guesthouse here and we all decided to have our own private little holiday celebrations since Easter is very much a non-event on this side of the world.
Laurel, a volunteer working at the local hospital, came home with six …

Happy New Year!  So, the question on many minds: How were the fireworks over Sydney Harbor?  Well, your guess is as good as mine!  I actually didn’t make it that far down the coast in time to do the big celebration – plus, it was recommended that I skip it since I am still traveling solo (my best friend didn’t end up making here for the holidays) and the city would be soooo overcrowded and pricey (finding accommodations was becoming a nightmare!).  With that in mind I took some …

Merry Christmas to everyone back in the States!! Christmas ended for me  about 20 minutes ago…but for you guys the day is just beginning as I write so I figured this is the perfect time to update everyone on my sailing adventures. I have been quite busy over the past couple of weeks with one tour after another. And, not wanting to spend the holidays alone or at a hostel, I booked myself on a sailing trip through the Whitsunday Islands – they’re spectacular!
This video won’t even remotely …

Just wanted to give everyone a quick update – I am currently in the very center of Australia, the Red Center, as they call it and will embark in just a few short hours on a three day camping/hiking adventure in the Australian outback – that means I wont be posting.  Had to let everyone know just in case Nikita and Lisandra are serious about their threats to call the embassy!
Also, I have a stats page now up on the nav-bar…you can stalk me just a bit from here…find out …