Author Topic: VonBlogenstein  (Read 121129 times)

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Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #195 on: April 08, 2016, 12:14:38 pm »
Also I should apologize for the numerous misspellings and strange word combinations which are a product of typing these up on my phone and its annoying autocorrect.  Hopefully you can get the gist from context.

Offline alumbrada

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #196 on: April 10, 2016, 05:26:22 pm »
This appeared in my facebook feed today: Thailand's Songkran festival shortened due to drought: http://www.westernpacificweather.com/2016/04/10/thailands-songkran-festival-shortened-due-to-drought/

Hopefully it was still a good time in Laos!
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Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #197 on: April 19, 2016, 12:37:59 am »
Laos was an epic good time, and the following is a highly abridged version of events.

Check out the photos here: https://goo.gl/photos/Wyay82WEzGgqQnya8

Got on a boat and floated down the Mekong for two days.  Stopped in Luang Prabang.

Celebrated the Laos New Year (called Pi Mai, not Songkran) for a week straight.

Tubed down the Song River in Vang Vieng.  Not that cool.  Super dirty.

Ended up in Vientiane where we are catching a flight to Hanoi.  Vientiane completely destroyed by the week long celebrations.  Very dirty.  Very stinky.

I'll post a more complete summary at some point.  Last 10 days have been crazy.

Having a blast!

Offline Barra

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #198 on: April 19, 2016, 01:56:17 am »
Kreygasm

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Offline tudose

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #199 on: April 19, 2016, 01:42:29 pm »
awesome! keep the pics coming <3
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Online Dk_madness

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #200 on: April 19, 2016, 02:42:07 pm »
lit sir.... Looks amazing Kreygasm
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Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #201 on: May 01, 2016, 02:13:22 am »

Greetings from Northern Vietnam.

Photos: https://goo.gl/photos/Ms7qXDMg7b1AE8mo7

Hanoi is not for me.  Too many people, all driving scooters, with no sense of pedestrian right-of-way.  They drive the wrong way down one-way streets.  They drive on the sidewalks.  There are no rules.  Crossing the street here is a battle every time.  There's also some pretty serious pollution: air, litter, and noise from all the traffic horns.

The pollution thing in SE Asia is very real.  I haven't seen the sun since I've been here.  Contributing to the air pollution is, I think, that parts of Asia have recently gone through an accelerated period of industrial revolution.  The most prominent cause, however, is large scale burning of land for agricultural purposes.  I haven't seen a lot of burnings yet in Vietnam, but there were many in Laos.  It's very common to see people wearing facemasks -- though we've been told they wear them for protection against the sun as much as protection from the smog.  As for the litter, there doesn't seem to be any infrastructure or education in place to allow the people here to make more responsible decisions.  There's no trash cans, so people just throw their garbage on the ground, or in the river.  It's a shame.  There's some real natural beauty in this part of the world that isn't being cared for.

Many Hanoi locals are rude as well.  Maybe they don't like Westerners?  I don't know.  It'll be interesting to see if there's a change in character as we head south.  A lot of the locals in Old Town are out to scam anything they can off tourists.  I paid about six times the going rate for a haircut, for example, by not asking for the price up front...  It was a sweet looking older lady, and I let my guard down.

The currency here is also bonkers.  $1 equals just over 22,000 Vietnamese Dong.  So much Dong.  Although sometimes there's not enough Dong.  Sometimes shopkeepers simply won't have the correct change, so they'll give you back what they can then supplement with small hard candies.  It's a trip, but a practice we should consider adopting back home, because pennies are useless and candy is yummy.

And they eat dog, that's not a myth.  While I haven't encountered it personally (as far as I know), I've seen the pictures of spit-roasted dogs taken by other travelers.

It's different here.

So after only two nights in Hanoi I was burnt out on the chaos of it all.  The most fun I had in Hanoi was drinking "bia hoi" on the streets with Jake and Spencer.  Bia hoi, as I understand it, is kinda like home brewed beer, but it's sold on the street out of kegerators, and at 30 cents a beer it's all too easy to drink it by the gallon.  So that was a lot of fun, but you can't have too many intensive bia hoi sessions before needing a change of pace.

In hopes of finding some quality chill out time -- and maybe seeing the sun -- I left Hanoi and traveled a few hours east to Halong Bay.  Jake and Spencer also left for the bay but they took it a step further and boated out to Cat Ba Island, where they had a much better Ha Long experience than I.  I didn't join them on Cat Ba because my plan was to cut time in Halong Bay so I could visit Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park before reaching Hoi An.  This plan radically backfired and I ended up wasting two nights stuck in Halong city with nothing to do.

Halong Bay was nice-ish.  I stayed in more the resort side of town, where countless unfinished construction projects block view of the bay.  Developers have big plans for this place.  I think maybe in 5 years Halong Bay will look more like Disneyland.

There's also the problem of the nearby port of Hai Phong dumping loads of human waste and trash into the bay.  Again, a real shame.  So naturally I ate a bunch of delicious seafood.

Before actually visiting Halong Bay, my impression was that I'd very simply be able to rent a kayak and paddle around.  This was not the case.  Accessibility to the bay from Halong City proper is in fact quite limited: there's one man-made beach with a roped off swimming area.  I saw this beach of imported white sand on the night I arrived, but thunderstorms prevented me from visiting it the next day.

The weather cleared on day three and I took an overnight boat tour of the bay where I got to swim amongst the beautiful karst formations.  The tour also included visit to an unimpressive cave on Cat Ba island, a "cooking class" which was nothing more than the rolling of an egg roll, and was supposed to have included kayaking the next morning, but thunderstorms once again messed with the plan.  My enjoyment of the tour was further mitigated by the fact I got upsold the "deluxe" package, which turned out to be identical to the "basic" package.  100% identical.

In all, Halong Bay was fine, I am happy to have seen it, but it was not what I had envisioned for a relaxing beach getaway. No matter though, as my highest of hopes for seclusion still lied with Phong Nha-Ke Bang, a national park home to the world's largest cave.  I like caves.

An overnight sleeper bus -- where essentially everyone gets their own Lazy Boy -- delivered me to Phong Nha on the 25th, the same day Jake and Spencer were flying to Hoi An.  I had originally planned to take a multi-day caving expedition, but because of the wasted time in Halong and because busses heading south only leave Phong Nha at 4am, I had to mix things up -- I couldn't keep the guys waiting for me forever.  Instead I rented a motorbike and took a do-it-myself make-it-up-as-I-went tour of as much of the area I could see in a day, and it was easily one of the best things I've done all trip.  Phong Nha is gorgeous and rural and I had some really zenned out moments riding the mountain roads.  This place was the antithesis of Hanoi.  All I had to dodge here were cows in the roads.

I ziplined into a cave.  I took a mud bath in a cave.  I kayaked a bit on a sleepy river.  And I found a bar in the middle of nowhere called "The Pub With Cold Beer", where the proprietors let you slaughter your own chicken.  Phong Nha was incredible!  Bookmark it.

From Phong Nha I continued south to Hoi An, where I reunited with Jake and Spencer. The guys were good and I was super jealous of the good time they had in Halong, though they definitely missed out on Phong Nha.

In Hoi An we stayed on An Hoi island.  We visited An Bang Beach and the Marble Mountains outside Da Nang.  We played ping pong in Ding Dang.  And we even found a very high quality Mexican food joint run by an ex-pat from California.  Also, I had a suit made, because eventually I have to go to work.

Hoi An is a neat city.  There's a lot to see and do but without the frantic pace of Hanoi.  And the people here are super nice.  Jake and I spent a few nights in a homestay, living upstairs from a family who waited on our every need.  It was actually too much niceness and consideration for my tastes...  For instance, the young boy of the family insisted on rubbing tiger balm on my hurt ankle.  That was weird, but kind, and another nice contrast to Hanoi.

Of course, we can't stay any one place too long...  We still have much ground to cover, and tomorrow we leave for Nha Trang, then Da Lat, then who knows where.

In more broad scope updates: my ankle is slowly returning to 100%; I can't stop eating soup; and I might be pregnant.

Offline Adam_Mon

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #202 on: May 01, 2016, 10:13:42 am »
Looks great! thanks for providing pics,

its on like Động Huyền Không  Kreygasm

Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #203 on: May 08, 2016, 05:32:24 am »
Greetings from Southern Vietnam.

Photos: https://goo.gl/photos/yjYrgJwrBvkLhpr59

From Hoi An, Jake and I took an overnight sleeper bus to Nha Trang.

The word on Nha Trang was that it was more like "Little Moscow" than a Vietnamese city -- a major Russian trading port, apparently -- and accordingly we only scheduled a 7 hour layover en route to Da Lat (not that there's anything wrong with Russians, it's just that we didn't come to Vietnam to eat borscht).  We arrived around 5 am and headed immediately to the beach, where, much to our surprise, we saw everyone in Nha Trang already swimming in the ocean.  The beach was gorgeous, but way too crowded.  Jake and I couldn't figure it out: do they do this every day; or is this a holiday only ritual (between April 30th and May 2nd the Vietnamese celebrate the reunification of North and South); and in any case, why the hell are they getting started at five in the morning?

We continued walking around the city for several hours until our overnight bus trip caught up with us.  Neither of us had slept very well and the nuclear sun was sapping what little energy we had left.  Exhausted, we gave up on seeing more of Nha Trang and returned to the family-run travel agency where we were to catch our onward bus.  Here we made ourselves at home and fell asleep in the backroom kitchen.  I curled up on the backpacks and Jake made a bed from some inner tubes he found stacked in the corner.  Believe it or not the family didn't seem to care and they even offered to feed us some of the gross-looking mystery fish they were having for lunch.  We declined.

Finally the connecting bus arrived and by 5pm we were checking into our Da Lat hostel.  Spencer, who had flown directly from Hoi An to Da Lat, arrived shortly after.

Da Lat is a mountain city close in elevation to Denver which was originally built by the French as a vacation spot.  It's beautiful here, and on average about 20 degrees cooler than any previous place we'd visited -- a nice reprieve from the heat we all enjoyed.

Our first night in Da Lat we ate a nice family style dinner with everyone else staying at the hostel, then marched with a small group across town to watch an English soccer match at a sports pub.  After the match we found a bar called "100 Roofs", which was essentially a five-story labyrinth filled with dead ends and disorienting architecture made by a dedicated artist who might be described as a mix between Escher and Dali -- it was super cool.

The roads in Da Lat were considerably busier than those of Phong-Nha or Hoi An and they're laid out in a most nonsensical and maze-like fashion, putting the scootering skills of Jake and myself to the test.  Spencer refuses to ride his own scooter, but he was brave enough to jump on the back of mine, and together we visited the "Crazy House" (made by the same guy responsible for the 100 Roofs Bar) and rode a gondola over the city.  Later the same day I checked out one of the numerous local waterfall attractions where I rode a manual-style rollercoaster around the park.  Jake, meanwhile, had hitched himself to an impromptu motorbike tour to visit some sites on the outskirts of town.  I can't remember what all he did (though drinking *poop coffee was one activity), but he liked it so much he decided to stay an extra day in Da Lat to do more of the same.  Spencer and I, however, continued south to Mui Ne.

[Rant]
Simply described: Mui Ne is a beach town near the southern tip of Vietnam known for its expansive dunes.  Honestly described:  Mui Ne is a shit hole, covered in trash.  There's two sides to Mui Ne: the city where the locals live, aka the shittiest part of town; and the resort city, aka the less shitty part of town.

The hotel where Spencer and I had reservations was overbooked, and we both received free upgrades to bigger, better rooms.  Unfortunately these rooms were far and away the nicest thing we saw in Mui Ne.  I took a long motorbike ride all around the city and to every major attraction, and although I saw many different beaches, lakes and dunes, my most prominent memory of Mui Ne will always be the trash.  Of course there's trash everywhere across SE Asia -- it's a problem in the developing world -- I just found the trash in Mui Ne particularly disturbing because it is destroying what should be a truly beautiful place.

So much trash.  Burning trash.  Trash on the street.  Trash on the beaches.  Trash in the dunes.  And super trashy locals being way too aggressive with their hustles.

Mui Ne epitomizes what happens when a heavily tourist-driven economy meets a people too poor and too uneducated to give a fuck about the squalor in which they live.  Now obviously, the situation is complex, but I can promise you it's not the tourists directly who have ruined this place; it's the local behaviour mixed with the lack of infrastructure and organization necessary to accommodate everything that tourism brings with it.  I've spoken with several locals who like to imply that Westerners are the litterbugs, but that's a complete lie.  Maybe they've been brainwashed by communist propaganda, I don't know, but they don't seem in touch with the reality of the situation.  The non-touristed areas aren't clean either (you get to see a lot traveling by bus) and in many cases they're worse.
[End Rant]

We spent our last few nights in Vietnam in Saigon (aka Ho Chi Minh City).  Saigon is every bit as crazy as Hanoi, but overall much nicer, in my opinion.  For one, there's trash cans on nearly every street.  There's more people, but also more space, and things operate more smoothly.  We stayed in the heart of the madness, yet I didn't feel the same sense of claustrophobia I felt in Hanoi.  There's also the Viet Cong tunnel network and war mesuems to see.

I kinda liked Saigon and I was ready to leave Vietnam on a high note, but then, on our very last night, my debit card was eaten by a faulty ATM.  The clerks at the store were not helpful in any way and were actually laughing about the situation.  I could have stuck around through the weekend and tried to visit the affiliate branch once it opened on Monday, but that would waste too much time and I had zero confidence I could find someone to help me.  As a result, I left Vietnam with no money and a sour taste in my mouth.  Vietnam and I will not keep in touch.

Onto Cambodia where hopefully the banks will work with me to withdraw some money.  I canceled my card, of course, so I'm not exactly sure how to work this out, but thank goodness I have Jake and Spencer to lean on until I find a solution.

*poop coffee is coffee made from the undigested beans found in the poop of a particular type of weasel

Offline ChrisP

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #204 on: May 18, 2016, 01:22:03 pm »
I am enjoying these Mr. Ross. :)

(PS - you probably know this, but Crap is being handled. A trip like this might be once in a lifetime, but the Crap can go on and on.)
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Offline tudose

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #205 on: May 18, 2016, 01:25:30 pm »
crap stream from vietnam pls
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Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #206 on: May 19, 2016, 03:26:06 am »

Offline ChrisP

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #207 on: May 19, 2016, 01:34:20 pm »
Ross tiddy.  Kreygasm
http://donkeykongblog.blogspot.com

4 Quarters :-* - 800K Avg. Per Qtr. :o - No Restarts 8) - No Proof :'(

7/26/2013   Coin 35,946   710,800   18-1
7/28/2013   Coin 35,947   903,700   22-1
8/16/2013   Coin 35,948   694,100   17-6
8/17/2013   Coin 35,949   893,100   22-1

3,201,700: the $1 World Record?
Member for 11 Years DKJR Killscreener DK Masters - Rank D IGBY 2016 DKF Team Member IGBY 2015 DKF Team Member IGBY 2014 DKF Team Member Blogger Twitch Streamer DK Killscreener CK Killscreener

Offline tudose

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #208 on: May 19, 2016, 01:48:52 pm »
 Kreygasm
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Offline VON

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Re: VonBlogenstein
« Reply #209 on: June 08, 2016, 05:34:49 am »
Photos: https://goo.gl/photos/rFGaWPuQx2b7eVEn6
The trip was a blast and we all made it home alive.

Southern Thailand wasn't as awesome as it could have been, as the rainy season had started in full and many anticipated island/beach activities were stricken from the agenda.  Most disappointing was the total lack of diving -- we could have still gone diving, but visibility was greatly affected by rain and the full moon tides present during our stay.  Still, we made our own fun whenever possible, and the beaches of southern Thailand remained beautiful despite the poor weather conditions.

We used a 9 hour layover in Beijing to visit the Great Wall, which was indeed great, but exhausting, and by the time we finally landed on US shores we were dead to the world.  The trip had been a great success but we were happy to be home, happy to see our families and ecstatic to eat American food.  In our last few weeks we had spent considerable time fantasizing over which delicious meals we would enjoy first... we had grown sick of SE Asian cuisine, and to cap things off I got food poisoning just days before we left.  So in all, the trip was incredible, but we had reached a point where the new and different was no longer new and different, but tedious, and in reaching this point during any long-term traveling it should be taken as a clear indicator it's either time to move on or return home.                                           

-----

Props and Slops

*Best Cities: Bangkok, Luang Prabang, Dalat, Siem Reap.

*Worst Cities: Vientiane, Hanoi, Mui Ne.

*Best Food: Bangkok.

*Worst Food: Laos (yes, the whole country).

*Best Tourist Attraction: Angkor Wat.

*Best Activities: Pi Mai (#1, not close), motorbiking anywhere, bioluminescence on Koh Rong Samloem, caving in Phong Nha.

*Friendliest People: Cambodia.

*Least Friendly People: Vietnam.

-----

Random Stuff

Asian people cut in line.

Spencer misplaced his passport at least three times, and his phone at least once, but always recovered each without incident.

Jake proposed to at least three different women.

There's no good wifi in SE Asia.

When in doubt, assume she's a he.

-----

Now it's time to eat a proper cheeseburger and marathon Game of Thrones, but I'm already planning my next big trip...  It'd been way too long before my last long-term traveling adventure and this trip reminded me why I love it so much.  I can't wait another decade before traveling again.  The world is a big wonderful place, and I want to see it all.