Last Day in Finikoundas. Good luck finding it on a map!! Anyway, I'll head up to Italy a little early. Going to plan still on Rome by the 10th. After that I'm going to zig to Nice Verona, Venice and then I'm going to zag up to the Lake area and mountain region North of Venice. I'm going to continue back and forth over the French / Italian / ( Read more... )

Pergamon (or, as the locals spell it, Bergama(r)) was probably one of the coolest things I've seen on this trip. I bused from Istanbul to Izmir, bused from Izmir to Bergama ( Read more... )

Istanbul ( Read more... )

Hello ( Read more... )

--Trip Statistics ( Read more... )

Even with locals trying to help Mongolia was a downer. Transportation was a drag. And there were just not enough other travelrs to network resources with (hiring a jeep to remote places is cheaper when split by four...). So I shot my budget to hell for this trip and flew from Ulaanbaatar to ( Read more... )

"San-Ban-No" (Hello) from Mongolia ( Read more... )

crossed a Mongolian pigeon today ( Read more... )

By jeep to the Park and the night spent in my tent. Morning--I rode a Mongolian horse for three hours. It was awesome. The wind was in my face and the horse at a full gallopwith barren hills zooming by. I understood better than ever the appeal of cowboys and the romantic adventures of T.E. Lawrence. My guide shook her head at my speed and ( Read more... )

Off to Terelj National Park. I will be spending many days in the mountains among the ger camps, the wildlife, and the pages of my novels.

Cheers,
Alan