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It’s been too far long since we’ve last updated our family travel journal. We’ve already been here in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan for more 6 months and not a single post about what we’ve been up to. I feel bad! But now that things have settled down a bit and since its a new year and all, it’s time to catch up with the Cardozas.
We woke up early and broke camp. We had taken showers the night before, so after packing the bags we were rearing and ready to go. But first, we really wanted freshly baked, French pastries for breakfast—because when on bicycle on holiday, we definitely do not count calories…
We woke up around 7:30am, ate breakfast then loaded up the bikes. (When we stay at hotels we take off all the panniers and either store our bikes in the hotel room or in somewhere provided by the hotel.) As we made our way over towards the ferry, we took our time riding along the pier, soaking up the crisp seaside air and gawking at beautiful 'White Cliffs of Dover.' When we got to the entrance we coincidently ran into another bike tourist from US; it was fun to ride with him and figure out where we were supposed to go.
We woke up pretty early and it looked like we were going to get a good start on the day… until the adventures began.
We broke camp fairly quickly. Packed up the tent, made breakfast, loaded up the bikes, and figured out what we were going to do with the still-damp clothing from last night (more on that later). While we did this, the girls played with the neighboring tent’s kids (a single mom out with her 5 kids). At some point during our packing, Sophie came over with one of the neighbor kids and asked to go to the playground. The playground was about 50 meters away from our tent, but behind some trees and caravans, so we couldn’t see it. It seemed harmless enough, so I said she could.
Every kid has a face. Literally. But some kids have faces they make. The above picture is known as the 'surprised face' and is a Sophie classic.
We booked a stop over in Inchon, South Korea...
Jutting out of the south end of Da Nang are five little mountains. Despite being relatively short, they seem to have a unique prominence, as they protrude out of the coastal plain not much more than 500 meters from the ocean. Surrounding the mountains are buildings--in some places running right up to the edge of the mountains, surrounding them--adding to their strange prominence.
Overlooking Da Nang stands the 72 meter statue of Lady Buddha. Nestled on the side of Monkey Mountain, the white marbled statue is referred to as The Female Buddha, The Goddess of Mercy, The Emotional Rescuer, and The Jewel in The Lotus.
Continuing on our way up to Sa Pa, we stayed a couple days in Da Nang. Super hot, but way beautiful! That was the first time I had been to a beach with palm trees, smooth white sand and beautiful aqua waters. Just like you see out of those tropical paradise calendars. We stayed at The Finger Hotel --giggle, giggle. Why it's called that, I have no idea. I'll leave that up to your own imagination. The staff there were super nice and most spoke Engish very well. Sophie was a fan amongst most of them.
The other day we went to the market here in Sa Pa and bought some Rambutans a.k.a Chom Choms (we like that name better.) Sophie loves them! We decided to do a photo shoot of her expressing deep infactuation with them.
It was the first time I had seen a wild monkey. Ashley and I got off the bus, leaving the comfort of air conditioning behind for the insane heat reflecting off the massive amounts of blacktop surrounding the temple. Strangely, everyone's first thought was, "I need to go to the bathroom." My first thought was, I need to get back on the bus. But maybe that was just me.
