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Well, I don't think there is a way to revert my entries, oldest to newest.  HOWEVER...

I have instead linked the first real entry. The link below will take you there, just click . Once you're there, click newer to follow chronologically.
For new, old, or accidental readers....enjoy

ALSO
The links to the travel videos. I appear in them until the end of Thailand:


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Today, last year, was the day I stepped off of my plane from S. Korea and into Philadelphia.  The day I walked back into the life I already knew.

Been a year since I read the words of the giant golden Buddha...

 

Since I trekked the Abel Tasman National Park..

 

Island hopped by boat..



Sped through traffic in a makeshift taxi..


  
A year since my nostrils burned from the smell of open sulfur pools, on the top of a massive volcano..



..And watched the sunrise on a Koh Phangan beach



A year since I reveled in standing near one of my favorite landmarks



..and added my personality to some amazing natural landscapes



A year since I met my self proclaimed wife



And stopped to investigate places that looked enticing..



A year since I met some of the most interesting people in my life



And admired architecture like I've never seen before



A year since the exquisite backpacker dinners




And the nights of living like a VIP



A year since the frigid glaciers..



and the almost heart stopping heat



A year since the highest cavern



..and the smallest dog



On buses..



On longboats...



From the bustling streets..



To the empty roads...




A year since one of the best experiences of my life.

(This goes with, but was never added to the travel journal. Only now with a conclusion do I put it down)

The sun was setting and I had less then 3 hours to get this crying Thai girl to the bus station before she missed her ride and was stuck in Bangkok. Not only that, but it left me with less then 2 hours to pack and get MYSELF to the airport and catch my plane out.

I had one stop to make before I left Thailand. The Onyx Breaker

 I saw it on the way in to my hotel, a small shop, tucked away behind various tourist traps selling shirts and hats that scream "hey look! I'm not from here!!"

When I arrived there was this Thai....princess...would be the best way to describe her. Not in a negative way, she just seemed so....regal. I probably would have married her on the spot with her black and purple semi dreaded hair.....

....She stood over a glass case FULL of some of the most amazing onyx items I've seen.   I don't care much for jewelry but I do love onyx and silver in combination.

Two pieces stood out, a ring and a necklace. "4,000 baht" she said. I was a bit shocked with that, most of the stuff I had seen on the street was going for 500 baht at the maximum. And there was no use trying to work my amateur bartering skills. "No I cannot" she cocked her head with a smile.

Did I really want to spend that much?

Did I want to skip this and go back to the states....maybe never coming back to Thailand again?

I gave it until that night to decide.


Watana's bags in hand, I rush to the Onyx breaker before hailing a taxi and...........NOOOOOOOOOOO. GATES DOWN. SHOP LOCKED UP!!! SURELY I AM FORTUNES FOOL, NOT YOU ROMEO!

By the time I got back from sending Watana off, I had 0 time to waste. I threw my things in my bags, checked out, and ran across the street to the hotel my brother was staying at. We said our goodbyes since he still had 6+ months of travel left, but before I left, I slammed down about 5000 baht. I told him the story and asked him to get them for me in the morning. He said it would be hard....his plane left for Dubai the following morning....early, but he'd try.

With that, I waved and jumped on the bus.


Braving months of travel, and the robbery capital of South America, my brother came home baring gifts.

Not only did he get the ring



He got the necklace



A ring, given to him in Egypt near the pyramids. He knows I think highly of Ra and Scarabs. From what I gather by the ring, its a symbol of protection through Ra/Khepri. Yes....no? Egyptians!?


And a Jaguar talon from the Amazon which I am presently trying to turn into a necklace




I am a happy panda.

Yeee!!

~Lvraving16

Minor note - In the near future I'm going to be reverting this site back to episode 1. That way, if you've missed anything, feel like rereading, or just stopping by for the first time,  my wonderfully horrible ramblings will start all over again. Haw!







Alright.

Here it is.

The official "I'm back"

I've been hiding out for the past week, not quite ready to go through the routine of explaining the whole trip to everyone.

That and I've just been exhausted.  I never expected being a day behind/ahead would effect me so much

But then again, I've also never been outside of the country for 4 months so I suppose thats one of the side effects.

Also I can't relax. I'm still in the "wake up, find new place to stay, lock up, keep bag packed" mind set. Haven't been able to break the routine-less routine yet. Numerous times I've woken up with no idea where I was.

Thought maybe I finally lost my mind, but, no...sadly a false alarm.

I won't go into just how twisted I am mentally and physically, or how much I dread certain things that are back here. I'll keep it happy and say, Wow what fun that was.

4 months of traveling, the countless people I've met, the things I've seen and done, all worth it.




Really long plane rides suck when your flat screen monitor is broken yet everyone else's works.

Summer in New Zealand is not, in October or November. It still gets really cold

You can NOT buy plane tickets alone the way. You need proof of onward travel. Thus my reason for being home so early

Absinthe doesn't make me hallucinate. Just makes me really sick

As dark as the windows are in Auckland Central Backpackers they are not tinted. People CAN see through

Taking an electric fence to the chest hurts. Really bad

High fructose corn syrup really  DOES NOT need to be in everything we eat

After eating toast for pretty much a month straight for breakfast, I realize I still hate it, although mix berry jelly is delicious

Even the shadiest of characters can turn out to be some of the best you'll ever meet.

Gypsies rock

When a cow charges at you....get out of the way

NZ really is full of German tourists

New Zealand girls are beautiful

The Duncan estate is way to big for a handful of people to have.

The night sky of NZ is unlike anything I've ever seen before.

1 bullet won't take down a large possum. 4 will

Kidnapping and hugging a baby sheep is worth hearing the mother scream in the background

Watching a horse get beat till blood is not a fun thing to do

Memorizing 20+ horses by name in a week...is impossible

The Maori people and culture are F---ing awesome.........and the ladies are beautiful :D

Being near David Beckham is a bad idea. Also have reservations well in advance if hes coming to your city and you need a place to stay

Wellington is a great place. Especially when your with a stunningly attractive german girl, and not an overweight, older, rapist in training.

Palace hostel in Nelson, is the greatest hostel ever.

Abel Tasman park is beautiful, but after the third day of trekking, I wanted out.

Tree stump dancing was an underlying theme to my entertainment. But if said stump is halfway in the ocean, the sun is setting, and the temperature is dropping...don't dance in your only warm clothes.

Make sure your rental car has brakes.

Having a needle poked through your nose hurts

Party pills (the legal kind) are terrible. Do not EVER take if your planning on sleeping in the next 10 hours

The owner of Base Nightclub in Christchurch is a damn cool guy, and all business should be given to him.

Sleeping in the rental car wasn't very comfortable.

Tides rise way faster then I had previously thought

Petrified forests aren't like they are in the cartoons. In fact....I was rather disappointed

Feeding the Kea Parrots near Milford sound is a bad idea

Secret local information is the best kind

After the 4th bottle of wine, I should probably drink water for the rest of the night, regardless if its Christmas or not

Israeli girls are beautiful

Don't be alarmed if you walk into Queenstown NZ and the sky is littered with people falling off of things.

My hair stops live music, and makes MC's freestyle about how great it is.

"Gravity is a toy" really is a fitting slogan for Queenstown.

Fergburgers really are one of the few things you need to buy in Queenstown.

You can safely drive 110kph around all of NZ. But 150kph is way more fun

Glaciers are cold and pancake rocks are odd

NZ beaches are full of giant shells and making huge fires in the sand is not illegal

Never trust someone who has an obvious substance abuse problem with your money

You must have to LIVE in Rotorua for years to not notice the constant smell of sulfur

Zorbing is friggin way scarier then it looks!

Parihaka was worth the money, drive, and 3 days.

I should have charged for the 100+ pictures I took with people at the festival

New Zealand, I fear, has made all other trips based around scenery not worth visiting! Do I have plans to return to the NZ?
Yes, I didn't find a Maori wife

I can check off one of my childhood "wants" now that I have been to and seen the Sydney Opera House...even if it was only for 15 hours.

There is wildlife EVERYWHERE in Sydney. In the middle of the city! I can only imagine what its like in the outback

I could be a serious drug smuggler. While going through customs in every country, the guy/girl or line of desks, were to busy gazing at my wonderful crown to actually ask me if I was carrying anything illegal

The King of Thailand is the #1 celebrity out there. Although, by the end of my trip, I think I was pretty much the king of Thailand.

The King has an amazing 30+car/ motorcycle motorcade

Tuk-tuks are dangerously fun. I will definitely miss them, but not the con artists behind the wheel

Hundreds of stray animals walk through the streets/shops as if they were part of the crowd.

If you go for a massage, and you walk into a building, with 50 + girls behind a glass window, sitting on pink fuzzy couches in lingerie...your in the wrong place. Pray you have will power

..Thai girls are beautiful

Bungalows on the beach are soooo nice. Cold showers...not so nice

Muay Thai boxing was very amusing.

Buckets of liquor, Fire, heavy trance music = Full moon party = win

As intriguing as Christmas light lined streets look, all you'll find are bars full of night ladies.

Food poisoning and hangovers don't mix

Climbing 1300 steps is a terrible idea on an empty stomach and in the zenith of the sun

Half the fun of being in a longboat comes from the fact that all of your belongings are on the front of a vessel notorious for flipping over

Trying to go up a steep hill, on a motorbike,  in 3rd gear is a really bad idea. Its even worse when you realize your going backwards, and put it in 4th to try and save yourself from rolling through traffic

The Thai Ladyboys are way too convincing for my liking, although you can't help but enjoy the flamboyantly fakes ones.

I'm going to become a professional jenga player, go back, and have all my drinks paid for

Breaking hearts is so much more fun when your the breaker

Never be an idiot and drop your passport on the ground in a bar where US passports go for large sums of money. (Luckily the bar owner clued me in, and over a drink explained the deal)

A ladydrink is just orange juice at a jacked up price

Having an escort of local girls, led by Watana,  keeps the night ladies away.

Dragonfruit is just as delicious as it looks.

The temples were very impressive even to someone like me

I should have stolen one of those sweet purple blankets they gave me on the flight from Phuket to Chiang Mai

Chiang Mai wasn't my favorite place. Although my hair tipped us off to the festival in Pai

I've never listened to reggae or ska really before this trip, but now I'm all about it.

Tetris ska version is so much better in person

I'm now a huge fan of Zom Ammara, the band with the gorgeous lead singer I posted a vid of a few entries back.

I'm so going to more festivals like this one

The train ride would have been better if our bunk wasn't freezing and smaller then expected

Returning to Bangkok was pretty much the end for me which had me slightly depressed but Watana sat, waiting for me, less then 10 feet away when I stepped out of my taxi

I dunno why but heavily accented English....is hot

I thoroughly enjoyed people who recognized me from my prior time on Khao San.

I can say Hello, Thank you, darling,  I miss you, beautiful, and ladies man in Thai. (You can tell which ones Watana taught me) Almost fluent if you ask me

I'm now addicted to Tiger  Balm and Siang Pure inhalers. mmm

I haven't made a girl cry in a long time. I felt terrible that I had to leave her like that, especially after she went vday shopping for me (bought me some earrings since I lost one at the full moon party and some other...stuff), but there wasn't much I could do. But she has my rings, which makes her my wife according to her. Wife in another country....could be managable...

Leaving Thailand went ok.  The only real hold up I had was the "extra security" to get into the states, which consisted of a girl asking me if I wanted her to braid my hair cause she could "make that shit tight"

Thailand...well....without a doubt I will be going back. Beautifully dirty, polluted, clean, unique landscape, full of a culture I've never been exposed to. So good....

So good...


But here I am now. In cold NJ.





I built a snow man the other day





.....And then filled it with gasoline



it didn't so much blow up....to my disappointment.





So I'm gonna try again tonight :D



Also took a straightener to the fro









~Lv16