Blue Dot Explore

*Wow, a bit longer blog than usual. A LOT has happened in the last month and there were at least 3 stories that warranted sharing (Himba Love, A Busted Truck, and The Sand Road). The next couple of months should be a lot slower as we stay in one spot for prolonged periods of time. August 4, 2023, Spitzkoppe Rock Arch, Namibia This next leg of our trip would take a very different direction from what we have experienced so far.  It was decided that we would visit the rest of our Sub-Suharan Africa destinations via a camper truck. I was more prone to sign up for a tour to take me to see the dunes (the only thing I really knew about Namibia), but once Johnny started researching, he decided to take on the task of planning out a 6244 km trip (3880 miles) to take us across multiple borders (and that's not counting driving in the parks). No simple task. Equipped with a rooftop tent, it's a common way to explore this part of the world, the main difference being that most people plan it ...

July 17, 2023. The Otter Trail in Tsitsikamma National Park With Rachel still joining for a couple more weeks, we left Tanzania, headed to South Africa. This was a very special destination for me and Rachel, as it is where we had discussed having our girl's trip for our 40th birthdays. Life has other plans and, although our trip was not what we originally envisioned, it represented a promise made to a dear friend that we would look at the big skies of Africa together. Country #10 started with a quick stopover in Johannesburg and some very cold temperatures, including getting to experience the first snow the city has seen in over a decade. It even made  international coverage .  We stayed in the Maboneng area and had an afternoon out in the Melville neighborhood, but it was so cold it was difficult to explore much of the city. We did visit two art museums and the Apartide Museum. I really enjoyed the Apartide museum, but it was a lot to take in as it was yet another exampl...

  July 1, 2023, Serengeti, Tanzania The transition from SE Asia to Africa was a big one for several reasons. The first was the change in seasons. Going from 6 months of the dry season in Asia (the rainy season was just starting as we left), coming into winter in Tanzania required a whole wardrobe changeover. These puffy jackets and long sleeves we had been lugging around for the past half a year were finally coming in handy! There is also a totally new type of cuisine for me to learn to navigate with my Celiac Disease. And not to mention a different set of cultural norms and safety know-how that come with a new continent.  Johnny arrived in Africa on his birthday, June 28, but I wouldn't see him until later that evening given the necessary re-bookings due to "Visa-gate". After an overnight layover in Mumbai and another all-day stopover in Nairobi, we were reunited near Ashura, in the town of Moshi at the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro.  A starting point for many people hiking th...

Wow. 6 months. 6 months of living a dream. I have moments where I have to (figuratively) pinch myself to check that it's true. Don't get me wrong, not every aspect is dream-like, like when you show up at your budget hotel to find that the "mattress" is a piece of fabric-covered plywood. Or the hours and hours spent on an overnight bus, really regretting sleeping through that last bathroom stop. Or how it seems that none of the global population has ever heard of headphones and insists on playing a partial song clip on repeat, at full blast, from the seat next to you (why do so many of these have to do with buses?). But overall, I think Johnny said it best a few weeks ago when we were standing at a mountain outlook. He said something along the lines of "I've lived a whole lifetime in the last few months". Quitting our jobs and using a big chunk of our savings was obviously a big decision, but it feels like the right one and I would make it again and again...

June 19, 2023. Hoi An Night Market on the Thu Bon River. Lanterns are placed in the river with a wish. Trying to get this post off quick since we're about to head to the Sub-Saharan Africa portion of our trip and we'll be traveling with friends, so I don't anticipate having much computer time. I wanted to get something off about the rest of our time in Vietnam because I know when I look back a month from now to write it up, I won't remember anything, so here is part 2 of my favorite country so far, Vietnam. Flying back into Vietnam after Laos was a breeze (no visa issues this time) and our first stop of Vietnam, round 2, would be the beach town of Da Nang. Initially, we hadn't planned to make it a stayover, but after hearing about the beaches we decided to park it there for a couple nights and ended up loving it. We were there on the weekend so we were able to catch the Dragon Bridge fire show and found a night market for our dinners. They had incredible seafood spr...