It’s official. I’m old. With the passing of my thirty fourth birthday, I have the looming spectre of hitting thirty five, and no longer being able to classify myself as “early thirties”.

Still, you know, this getting old lark isn’t all bad. This year, for example, I celebrated my birthday (many thanks for all the kind wishes via facebook by the way – will get round to replying to you all, honest guv’nor) in Bagan, the famed “Plain of the Thousand Temples” in northern Myanmar. (No, I didn’t count them, but yes there were certainly lots of temples; must have been at least a few hundred even if the thousands bit is maybe on the optimistic side.)

And rather nice it was too. The temples at Bagan are old and beautiful, but quite different from a number of the other temples we’ve seen en-route (of which there have been a few!!), mainly due to the sheer number of them. There’s just too many to even try to look around in any detail, and in any event, to do so would sort of miss the point – the spectacle here is in the multitudes of vaguely gothicky styled temples fading away over the plains, particularly spectacular in the soft light of early mornings and late afternoons. The guidebook even tells you not to bother sightseeing in the main part of the day, when it’s just too hot to keep one’s sense of humour. Plus which, we had splurged and booked ourselves onto a sunrise balloon ride over the temples (we’ll post separately on this but it was AWESOME!!), so we knew that we’d get to see the vast majority of the temples, if only from the air.

Result? The perfect excuse for a perfect day. Get up, leisurely breakfast, then spend a couple of hours strolling round some of the closer temples to our (extremely nice – yep, this is where the flashpacking hit) hotel. We actually really enjoyed being able to go into a few of the temples (which often have fairly spectacular murals inside, or amazing Buddha statues) and get a sense as to what they’re all about, but after a few hours we were ready to retire poolside. A happy few hours drinking cocktails, then my relaxation was rudely interrupted by the need to pootle off to get a lovely massage. Add a horse and cart trip to see the sunset from the roof of one of the temples and a lovely dinner in the hotel, and you’ve got the makings of a really not half bad day. If only I’d been able to teleport a few dozen friends and family to join us in the festivities, it would have been absolutely perfect!

I’ve no idea where we’ll be this time next year, which is a little scary but rather exciting too. Still, something tells me that I’ll probably be celebrating the next birthday somewhere rather closer to home!

Well, everyone asks. In fact, it is just about the only thing that many people ask – what was your favourite of all the many places you have seen on your trip around the world?

Well, we have a few. Depending on who is asking, we sometimes give different places so we can add some healthy variety to the tall tales we tell. In truth though, it will be hard to beat the side of the gas crater in Darvaza where Lucy agreed to marry me.

It’s not my best video, or my best edit (or indeed my best Prodigy remix), but it gives half an idea of the grandeur of the place. The government is drilling for gas in the region to try to extinguish the crater as they think that an industrial accident still burning after 50 years is bad for the image of modern, thrusting Turkmenistan. Life is short – go while you still can.

There should be a word specifically to describe those far-flung destinations which sound utterly, hair-raisingly epic, but in reality entirely fail to live up to expectation. Timbuktu, apparently is such a one (not much there and it’s pretty rough). Samarkand came pretty close, before finally scraping through (on points) due to its numerous and fabulous architectural sites (which slightly outnumber the numerous and hideous Soviet concrete monstrosities around town). For James and I, Mandalay is the newest addition to this sought after category. We’ll name it the “meh” category, which will be obvious to the Americans – for any Brits out there, “meh” is to an American what “bouff” is to a Frenchman. Utterly, depressingly unworth any vocalization of an opinion.

I mean, Mandalay sounds all romantic, doesn’t it? Visions of Singapore slings at sunset (pith helmets compulsory), the sun on the lazily winding Ayerwaddy river, friendly natives smiling as they walk by balancing bananas on their heads. It SHOULD be colonial Asia at its very best.

What it is, however, is concrete. Lots and lots of it – admittedly made into some reasonably modern and attractive buildings compared with Chinese standards, but basically reminiscent of a suburb in Nowheresville, IforgetitState. The reason most people come here is to visit some extremely scenic villages nearby which have temples ago-go and you can go round by horse and cart for added authenticity. Unfortunately, the pollution in Mandalay is so bad that James (who you may remember had a bit of a cold post our latest floor sleeping experience), had his first bad bout of asthma in the eight years we’ve been together and needed a day in bed to recover.

That being said, we did find some nice bits and bobs; we had a great trishaw ride round town, to a really lovely monastery where a jolly nice monk showed us around whilst explaining his cunning plan to learn English, become an entrepreneur and get rich (and he was a proper monk too, been there 7 or 8 years or so. What’s the Buddhist world coming to?!). Then we went to see the obligatory Mahamani Buddha. Yet another entirely misshapen golden blob caused by enthusiastic application of gold leaf – meh. Then we had some rather fine sundowners on the roof of a far more expensive hotel than ours, overlooking the Ayerwaddy. So all in all, really not too horrific an experience.

But still, any city that makes James ill has to expect my wrath. Mandalay, we were glad to leave you. Your have been officially consigned to the “meh”-heap.

[* Or Myanmar-ese Days for those who don’t wish to be accused of lingering colonialism….]

We’ve been on the road now for over 6 months and, I’ve got to confess, we’re getting a bit tired.  Still LOVING the travelling gig, but every now and again we do sort of start to wish that a giant magic fairy would appear and create our next few weeks itinerary for us.  Preferably an itinerary involving lots of uber-luxe hotels for ridiculously cheap prices, plenty of adventure and a large dollop of cool factor thrown in for good measure.  And most definitively, no sleeping on floors.

As it is, however, I am that fairy.  And this fairy willed pretty strongly coming into Burma that we were due for a bit more of a relaxed time than we’ve chosen to take on most of our travels.  Some high living, fine dining, and maybe even throw in a cocktail or two (I blame the influence of my Mum and Dad, and all those gin and tonics we had in Cambodia.  Medicinal don’cha know).  And definitively no sleeping on floors.  All this to be achieved, however, with no dialing down of the patented James & Lucy adventure-o-meter.

I’m a bad fairy.

Day one had us in perfectly civilised fashion gawking at the Shwedegon Paya, the most famous religious monument in Burma.  And mighty fine it was too, big and gold and gleaming, although frankly less gold and gleaming than somehow I’d envisaged (though James mocks me for this statement, with some fairness given the fairly high levels of goldness and gleamingness on display.  But the damn thing is entirely gold leafed or plated, and I just thought that would make it more densely gold than it was.  My bad).  We’d show you photos but we’d left the SD card in the laptop… oops. Day two had us in a little town up near Inle Lake, cosied up watching Skyfall on Burmese DVD.  So far, so good.

Day three we started our 2 day hike up to Inle Lake.  The hike itself was a nice pretty hike, but this is where I ran into my big failure.  Yep, we slept on the floor.  And, amazingly, for a country that averages 30 deg C or more during daytime, it was FREEZING at night (cold enough to frost).  And as usual, insufficient bedding, blah, blah.  All of which gave James a bad cold / asthma attack and left me slightly fearful he may not ever speak to me again….

Fortunately, Inle saved me.  Not only is the lake gorgeous and the ethnic fishing style picturesque (they row with their legs.  See piccies – I still haven’t worked out exactly how or indeed why they do this but sure looks good), but we were staying in a pretty kick-ass hotel, made up of bungalows on stilts built out over the water.  AND we managed to wangle an upgrade (I looked so desolate at our initial room having hard twin beds they took pity on us. Result!).  We had a lovely lazy couple of days messing round on boats and James has consequently just about forgiven me for the floor disaster, despite the fact that we didn’t manage to see the famous jumping cats of the Jumping Cat Monastery (I really don’t make this stuff up) actually jump, and also despite the fact that the Lake’s famous golden Buddha turned out to be a big golden blob due to slightly over-enthusiastic application of gold leaf.

I think the rum sours helped.

Now if I can only find some fine dining, I’ll be right back on track…..Although this is Burma, not necessarily the world’s great culinary epicenter.

Arrgggh.  Being an itinerary fairy’s tough!

Angkor Wat is pretty darn cool. Lots of temples, all very old and very magnificent, AND you get to indulge all your Lara Croft fantasies when you visit (amazing the numbers of tourists sporting little shorts, crop tops and a bloody great gun strapped to the thigh. Not such a good look on a middle aged man with a belly…..). So magnificent is it, in fact, that it’s one of our designated “so-good-its-worth-going-back-to” round the world sites – I’ve been there before, 10 years ago or such. We were also a little cheeky, sneaking in a side trip to Angkor Wat from Bangkok, where we had to go to get our visas for Myanmar / Burma without actually visiting the rest of Cambodia. We did think about the Killing Fields, which is an incredible but devastating place to visit – but decided that maybe it’s not a place to go twice in a lifetime less the post trauma counseling fees get too costly…..

And as James has mentioned, even better, we managed to coincide the trip with the time my Mum and Dad were there, without even mangling the itinerary too much. Hurrah!!

For those who haven’t been to Angkor, the main thing to note is that it’s MASSIVE. The most well known temple of the complex, Angkor Wat, is apparently the largest religious building in existence – and it’s one of several hundred of the damn things dotted around several square miles of pristine jungle (well, now pristine – it went through a period of slightly less than pristineness post Khmer Rouge, when the whole area was landmined. Added a bit of adventure to the temple hopping). They sell 3 day tickets and you kind of need that to get your way around a half decent selection of the major sites.

The other thing to note is that it’s hot as hell, almost always above 30 Celsius. And that you go stomping up and down all these steep staircases (the temples are primarily built along the Hindu mountain-temple model, so they’re very tall) in said heat which gets quite quickly quite knackering. It’s surprisingly hard work for…well, a holiday. It calls for a strategy involving intense prioritization of the best temples, and plenty of time out for a decent lunch and a refreshing coconut or two.

With this in mind, we designed our campaign. Day 1, an onslaught of the slightly lesser known temples: Ta Prohm (actually quite well known this one – it’s the Tomb Raider temple, the one with all the trees growing round, through and out of it), a sneak by Pre Rup to check out the lions, whistle past the water temple of Neak Pean before spending some time at Preah Khan (amazing – an almost matrix like structure of interweaving corridors and halls, all near deserted and there to be explored) before heading to Angkor Wat itself for sundown. Day 2: visiting the 2 most spectacular sites of Angkor Wat (you’ll know it if you see it) and the Bagan (James’ favourite, a quite spooky temple covered with giant stone smiley Buddhas). Day 3: an hour’s tuk-tuk ride out into the countryside (which was brilliant! Rice paddies a go-go) to Banteay Srei, a tiny outlying temple famous for the delicacy of its carving (of which there is LOTS). Angkor Wat lay defeated before us.

Favourite day? For me, probably day 1. The lesser known temples are usually very quiet and there’s precious few restrictions on where you wander, so you get to go exploring through these amazing ancient sites at will. Makes you feel a bit like an old time archaeologist, discovering the place for the first time. Despite the fact that this wasn’t actually the first time. And hopefully, not the last.

From Kathmandu to Kyoto (via Hong Kong), within the space of 3 days.

Kyoto is just a little more refined than Kathmandu. Views are aesthetic; traffic controlled; traders polite; and toilets heated.

Our brains nearly melted.

Japan was actually a late addition to our itinerary – we went there on holiday a few years ago and absolutely loved it, but at least in the first itineration decided against re-visiting (we’ve basically not gone anywhere on this trip that we have both been to before). However, when we changed the itinerary a bit to fit in with leaving later in the year than we had planned, we had to knock some time off some of our earlier countries just due to weather etc. considerations, so we ended up with a “spare” 10 days which we thought could be filled rather nicely with a trip to see the fall foliage in Japan. Now I’ve spent quite some time over the past few years in the States trying to go fall foliage viewing (or “leaf peeping” as it’s rather brilliantly known over there) and have had little to no success – picture the two of us, having driven five hours up into Vermont, standing by a sorry looking faintly pink turning maple tree and frantically trying to persuade ourselves that this is what we’re here to see. No matter though – we love Japan anyway, and in particular we LOVE the food here, so we were extremely excited about it all, and had spent many a happy evening in slightly less sophisticated parts of the world booking our ryokans and salivating at the thought of all that raw fish (or indeed any fish – we’d been landlocked for so long we’d started to forget that you can eat finny things).

Did we see any foliage? OHHHHHHH YES. Finally we got our payday and boy was it worth waiting for. This being Japan, rather than the great displays of thousands of maples in the forest that you get in North America, maples are displayed individually against a background of lesser trees, usually in a famed garden or temple. People come to admire the specific trees – there’s special viewing points and any number of folk taking close up photos of particularly pretty foliage. There’s probably at least a dozen haikus being composed any time you visit a decent maple spot this time of year. Fortunately, having been to Japan last time at the cherry blossom time of year, we know the trick to being able to enjoy all this – get up early, be at the more famous sites at opening time and leave before the tour buses arrive. That way you get your lovely Zen experience, have a happy witter about the ephemerality of all things and compose your haiku without being elbowed out of the way by frail looking Japanese grannies posing for photos (cue cheesy grin and peace sign – we’re not sure why this is the pose de rigeur, but trust me, it is). AND then you get to feel all smug over your lunch time soba.

We had a wonderful couple of days in Kyoto: day one was a rainy day so quietish with a nice stroll in the covered market; day 2 we made up for it, visiting Ginka-kuji (which was a favourite from last time and managed to perhaps be even nicer this time with a gorgeous maple display), then a wander down the Philosopher’s Path stopping at Honen-in (quiet and lovely), Eikan-do (MAPLES!!!!), Nanzen-ji (least favourite) – all before lunch! James then retired hurt (ok, I may have been a little over ambitious), leaving me to head to another few temples in the afternoon, before joining him for a spectacular kai-seki dinner.

Day three unfortunately, James got sick – not sure if this was a reaction to the kai-seki the night before, or a delayed reaction to Hong Kong festivities, but anyway, it kept us both out of action for the next 36 hours or so – and allowed our hotel to rape and pillage us by charging rack rate for an additional night (to add insult, the hotel we should have been at has a 100% payment same day cancellation policy. Ouch. Definitely a contender for our most expensive day on our trip to date). He’s absolutely fine now though and rather excited about the extreme weight loss that he may well have experienced!

All of which left me feeling a little sad….I love Kyoto and we did have a wonderful time there, but there’s definitely some regret at having left the town on a slightly sour note; and without having seen quite a few of the more spectacular sights at this (absolutely beautiful) time of year.

Perfect excuse to come back here again maybe?

One of the other intended highlights of our trip was a visit to Everest Base Camp – the Tibetan version thereof, that is, which can be reached by 4×4, as opposed to the one on the Nepalese side of the border, which you have to hike into….for about 7 days. Of course, this was all a bit blasé for James anyway, since the last time he saw Everest (from the Nepal side – very inferior views I’m told), he was on top of it. Wearing a parachute. Difficult to top that one really, but I figured Tibetan EBC may be worth a go. Of course in the end we couldn’t go anyway. The Chinese – wait for it – cancelled our permits. Admittedly, this one we’d known about before (a whole 2 days before!!) we actually arrived in Tibet so it wasn’t quite such a kick in the teeth as the hiking debacle. But still.

Our guide did however tell us that we could get great views of Everest from the Friendship Highway – there being a convenient little viewing spot complete with toilet.

I was sceptical.

Not least given the mention of the toilet. Now I pride myself on being a wizened veteran of a traveler, unfazed by some of the more “rustic” models of toilet that the Asian world in particular likes to spring on one from time of time. I’ve developed thighs of steel in an effort to cope with the squat model – a far more intensive workout than anything a personal trainer can come up with. I can hover at will and am never without a personal supply of paper, wet wipes and hand sanitiser. I’ve become adept at going without breathing for…well, however long it takes.

The Tibetan toilets, however, are disgusting. Some of this is just a generic sort of over-reaching that we’ve noticed along our trip; the sort of mindset that decides that it would be cool to put a porcelain squat toilet on top of that short drop toilet that’s been put in place specifically because there’s no available water source (let me tell you something about porcelain when there’s no running water. It’s sticky. ‘Nuff said.). In other places, like the hotel we stayed at for our last night, a more serious problem had set in. The bucket of water supplied to wash away any…..issues….had frozen solid. As had said issues, carefully lined up as they were to sit horizontally across the drain hole. Three in a row in the gents’ apparently, which makes a first for me in seeing James go green.

Anyway, I digress.

The loo at Everest gets a special exemption. Sure it’s filthy and stinky, but it has perhaps the most kickass view in the world, and I find I can forgive a lot for that.

Besides which: I had altitude dehydration 😉

[Before you get too excited, no actual mayhem involved whatsoever. But hey, why let that spoil a great title?]

So, as James may have mentioned between rants in our last post re forced changes to our Tibet plans, we set off from Lhasa with much fanfare, five of us plus enough goodies to feed / shelter a small army (is that we got turned back??) in a landcruiser. First stop was intended to be our hard core hike, hence all the gear. Given as that was ultimately not to be, our second stop was at the roadside to drop off our cook plus all the camping supplies and five days worth of food, all of which he then duly took straight back to Lhasa. Hey ho.

So as you can imagine, the shape of our Tibetan roadtrip changed somewhat. Whilst we’d envisaged a pretty rugged trip with lots of hiking and a few cultural stops along the way to give us some variety, the trip as it ended up was pretty heavy on the cultural stuff; although with some fantastic natural scenery along the way and some scary high passes to keep things interesting. The basic shape of the days was: get up (not too early – it’s COLD in Tibet this time of year!!), drive a bit, stop at a stunning monastery, look round for a while, head up to a pass and get your breath taken away (literally – all the passes are 5,000m plus so not too much breathing up here), drive a bit more, stop for the night, have a huge bowl of tasty curry as a reward for all that culture-spotting and head for bed. Not a bad life as it happens.

The actual route took us south from Lhasa, via Samye, Gyantse and Shigatse monasteries, past a number of breathtaking high altitude lakes, and down the Friendship Highway (with pauses for spectacular views of Everest – see separate post) to the border to Nepal, from whence we headed to Kathmandu. The monasteries were spectacular; I’ve already written about the complexities of Tibetan monasteries, so for this post just enjoy the pretty piccies (not so many of the interiors I’m afraid as it’s very rare that photos are allowed inside). The only weird thing was that most of these monasteries, which look pretty amazing to us, are now apparently pretty shabby compared to past glories – the Cultural Revolution hit these places pretty hard, either partially / wholly destroying the buildings or at the very least allowing all the really good bling to be nicked.  Favourite part? Doing the kora (a pilgrimage route, typically lined with hundreds of prayer wheels, which takes you all the way round the monastery), in Shigatse.  The city of Shigatse is a big Chinese affair, recently built from large boring slabs of concrete, but the monastery and surrounding kora are beautiful, peaceful, and very Tibetan feeling – which about sums up a lot of Tibet in fact.  Plus by then we had acclimatised so we got to feel smug at our ability to cope with the altitude!

The scenery is also incredible – very high and very barren, definitely falling on the impressive rather than pretty side of beautiful particularly at this time of year as winter sets in.  I really wouldn’t want to be a nomadic farmer out here – even the yaks looked cold and they are far FAR hairier than James or I even after 5 months travelling.

Jury’s still out for us on whether we’d recommend people to go to Tibet or not given all the associated issues.  But hopefully the travel porn photos below provide the positive side of the argument – enjoy!!

• Countries visited: five (all five of them with a “Stan” in their name, if you include the world-famous “Chinastan”). We also visited Turkistan, but that’s only a town and – technically – cheating. All of the above are generously referred to as “Trashcanistan” by my loving father. Hi Dad!
• Number of fat bottomed sheep slaughtered in the name of mutton kebabs: we have discussed this at length, and we think the correct term is “flocks”. This may also fall under some of the more interesting ancient indigenous counting systems that go “one, two, three, many”
• Number of dreams James has had featuring strangely erotic dancing fat-bottomed sheep: none. Or so he says. Lucy isn’t sure she believes this.
• Antibiotic pills popped to counteract aforementioned mutton: 26 (or 13 grams). Although we have issues with the US medical system and overprescription in general, it played a blinder this time
• Run-ins with the police: only one. On the Tashkent metro, and aforementioned Copper was disappointingly friendly. What was all this we had heard about a police state?
• Illicit currency deals: too many to count, although notably including one involving two sweet old ladies masquerading as government officials from the Tashkent Ministry of Culture and Antiquities. No, really
• Number of mosques / new shades of blue discovered. Both of these are completely numberless; the architecture was incredible, and incredibly old. Isn’t it strange how many facets of the infinite we are touching on here? We blame the beer
• Natural disaster zones visited: one – Darvaza gas crater (as we didn’t get to what is left of the Aral Sea). We have been travelling to some pretty extraordinary places, but this truly, truly takes the biscuit. Go see it while you can. It may be James’s new favourite place (see engagement below)
• Animals harmed during the course of this production: hmmm. Definitely one (the fox). Not sure if we should count all the sheep. Did we mention the mutton?
• Pots of extraordinary home-made jam consumed in antique jewel-like breakfast rooms: so many, so good, so glad we both underwent the diarrhea diet afterwards (otherwise known as the India diet, but James isn’t going there again in a hurry)
• Miles travelled: a truly epic 3,000+. From Ashgabat in Turkmenistan to Jiayuguan and the end of the Great Wall of China(stan)
• It’s not a statistic as such (OK, so we are cheating, it’s not a statistic at all) but to witness the changes in cultures, faces, foods and landscape as you make a long overland journey through a global cultural melting pot with such an extraordinary ancient and modern history has been incredibly affecting and a real privilege. The only thing that remains constant is the sheep. Did we mention the mutton?
• Number of long-standing dreams captured: one. Lucy has dreamed of coming to the Silk Road for nearly twenty years. Oh, and getting engaged here wasn’t half bad either

Guys, it has been utterly amazing. Again.

We had a cunning plan to bridge our Silk Road epic into our trip to Tibet.

We’d go overland. Couldn’t be far, right?

We wanted to do the full Silk Road experience – not just in the Stans, but heading into China, and onto the official beginning of civilization (as these things were measured at the time) as denoted by the end of the Great Wall of China, in Jiayuguan. A mere 1,500 miles from Kashgar, with 2 notable sights to see along the way, the first being some ooh, 1,350 miles from Kashgar. All before then travelling a further 500 miles to Xining, whence to board our 1,100 mile train journey into Tibet. So 3,100 miles in total. Or to put it another way, a slightly greater distance than crossing the United States. All to be done in a little under 2 weeks so that we could connect to our Tibet trip.

Reader, we cheated. We shamelessly flew the 1,350 miles from Kashgar to Dunhuang (via the charming city of Urumqi – don’t miss it) instead of just manning up and taking a simple 32 hour train journey. And boy, were we glad we did.

You see, in case it’s not clear from the above this is a region not overly blessed with a great concentration of tourist sights. Or indeed tourists. Whilst Uzbekistan proffers 3 or 4 world class, stunning architectural sites for each 3-4 hour journey you take, Western China has 3 or 4 kind of quite cool sights for each 3 or 4 DAYS journey you take. The hotels are drab, the food uninviting, and we’ve not seen a white person since we got here. Which also means that we’re a vast source of local entertainment and get stared at everywhere we go (we’ve started to stare back. Surprisingly good fun, actually).

All in all, it’s been pretty hard core.

Still, the remaining Silk Road sights themselves were pretty cool, and what this crazy trip has given us is a chance to really witness the immense changes – topographical, environmental, cultural and anthropological – which take place along the Silk Road. It’s been kind of fascinating to watch the progression of faces from vaguely Slavic in Turkmenistan all the way through to the Chinese Muslims. Plus that ever important index, the availability of wine: from none whatsoever in Turkmenistan and most of Uzbekistan, to Georgian (surprisingly good) in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, to Chinese (we’ve had 2: one ok, one awful. Jury’s out) in China. A region of true diversity.

The first stop after Kashgar was Dunhuang, famous for 2 sights. One is the Mogao caves, a set of caves filled with Buddhist artwork dating from the 13^th century and older, although frequently defaced by later Muslim traders who came along the Silk Road and couldn’t bear this evidence of believers of another faith. It’s an absolutely stunning sight and all the more remarkable after 3 weeks of Islamic art, but unfortunately we’ve no pictures – photos aren’t allowed as apparently 13th century wall paintings don’t take too kindly to the flash. The other main sight is the sand dunes, which were pretty awesome (as seen from the roof of our hotel – climbing a 1,000m sand dune filed us both with absolute horror).

Next stop, Jiayuguan and the end of the Great Wall, which was pretty epic, and provided a rather nice sense of completion.

We’re a bit sad still, because we’ve really loved parts of the Silk Road, and the Chinese segment didn’t quite live up to the rest of the route. But it’s been an amazing part of the journey. And the journey continues.

Next stop: Tibetan Buddhism!