Cleatus the West Virginian

Places

Thailand

2 trips · 44 entries · 2011, 2024

China 17 Mar – 9 Apr 2011

  1. 17 Mar So It Begins... Day 1 of my sabbatical! I've been waiting for this day for the last 7 years.
  2. 28 Mar An Awesome Way to Leave China Another day on our own and Hong Kong is a great way to end our trip in China.
  3. 28 Mar Chongqing and the Deluxe River Cruise (Oxymoron) 3/21/11 Woke up ass early at 530 to make a 9 flight since traffic is stupid in Beijing.
  4. 28 Mar Doing Our Part to Destroy Culture 3/25/11 Woke up at the ass crack of dawn to catch a flight to Guilin. I like to wake up early and travel because I sleep the…
  5. 28 Mar Hangover #1 and I'm on a Damn Ship 3/23/11 I woke up feeling good which was surprising since we drank a bottle of vodka, beer, and sweet bubbly wine.
  6. 28 Mar Hong Kong- The Land of Google & FB 3/17/11 Yes we have arrived! God bless this little special economic zone!
  7. 28 Mar No Google in China- WTF? 3/18/11 The dates of these blogs are messed up since I wasn't able to access the blog for two weeks. I’m a new person.
  8. 28 Mar Road Trip From Hell 3/24/11 We got off the boat today, but not until we stopped by the 3 Gorges Dam- the largest… Back on the bus for an hour ride…
  9. 28 Mar Snowy Jade Cave BS 3/22/11 Fill in info about the snowy Jade cave excursion. Back to the ship for lunch and then we sailed.
  10. 28 Mar The Great Wall in Heals & a Skirt 3/20/11 Woke up, swam, ate a ton at breakfast then headed with the group to the Great Wall.
  11. 28 Mar The Yellow Ones are Good for Eating 3/26/11 Woke up to a good breakfast and headed to another boat trip! We weren’t going to go with the group but we read the…
  12. 29 Mar I'm Not an American We made it to Thailand and this place isn't as warm and humid as Andy made it sound.
  13. 30 Mar Puffer Fish & Fire Ants The weather decided to give us a break today but not let us off the island.
  14. 7 Apr Fearing Death and Other Good Times at the Backpacker Bungalows 3/31/11 Woke up in Phi Phi and headed for the ferry to get off the island.
  15. 9 Apr And Then There Was One Backpack 4/2/11 Woke up at 630 so I could try to get online to talk to Harriet.
  16. 9 Apr Bangkok is an Awesome City 4/4/11 Up at the ass crack of dawn and Andy is bargaining for a taxi ride to the airport.
  17. 9 Apr Homeward Bound Sitting Next to the Devil Child 4/5/11 Up early as hell again and headed to Hong Kong. We had an 8 hour layover so we left the airport and took the super easy…
  18. 9 Apr Second Hangover and I'm in a Crowded Bus 4/1/11 Woke up at 830 to catch the first longtail back to Ao Nang. We had to wait a bit for enough people to show up so the…
  19. 9 Apr The Russian Mafia Doesn't Respect Sea Turtles 4/3/11 Today we did 3 dives before we left early afternoon. The morning dive was nice way to wake up.

K2 Pakistan / SE Asia 29 Jul – 11 Sep 2024

  1. 29 Jul So we have a plan.. I had my sabbatical coming up the following summer. I was looking at Google maps trying to determine where we should…
  2. 2 Aug See you in Islamabad (اسلام آباد)! I went into the office Wednesday to wrap everything up. Full day of meetings and new work thoughts popped in my head…
  3. 3 Aug Welcome to Pakistan 🇵🇰 We landed in Dubai after a 12-hour flight from Newark. The flight upgrade completely changed my perspective on long…
  4. 4 Aug A flight u-turn in Skardu valley, a stomach virus, and kittens I woke up naturally at 2 which wasn’t an issue since we set the alarm to catch the 6am flight to Skardu.
  5. 6 Aug Relaxing in Scardu before we set off We woke up at 5 to watch the sunrise. It was too cloudy to get the colors but beautiful nonetheless .
  6. 12 Aug Crumbling roads (Askole 10k) Woke up at 3am today. I guess all that napping didn’t help me much.
  7. Day 1 · 18 Aug Day 1 Turning 50 in the Karakorum We decided to not get our sleeping bags out last night because it wasn’t actually that cold.
  8. Day 2 · 18 Aug Day 2 … and then there were two Today was a hard day in multiple ways. We woke up at five feeling good, and we packed our bags tight as possible to fit…
  9. Day 3 · 18 Aug Day 3 First encounter with Baltoro We woke up at 5 AM to pack our bags and eat breakfast before our big day.
  10. Day 4 · 18 Aug Day 4 Hope and relaxation I did not wake up the way I was hoping to. I had a mild headache, and I was still nauseous.
  11. Day 5 · 18 Aug Day 5 Pakistani flat We woke up at 4:30 as the Germans next to us decided it was time for everyone to wake up as well.
  12. Day 6 · 18 Aug Day 6 The breathtaking Concordia! We got started at six on the trail. It’s supposed to be an easy day mostly flat, it actually was flatish this time.
  13. Day 7 · 18 Aug Day 7 Intense rest day We woke up early and packed our day packed pretty light in anticipation for the long 12 hour day hike to K2 base camp.
  14. Day 8 · 18 Aug Day 8 Glacial Highway We were up early today because we have a big day ahead of us and we want to get as much rest as possible at Ali Camp.
  15. Day 9 · 18 Aug Day 9 Gondogoro La (GG La)! Up at 11 for our 11:30 PM departure. The entire camp was bustling with nervous energy and people probably didn’t get…
  16. Day 10 · 19 Aug Day 10 The beautiful Hushe valley We were up early again because we went to bed at seven and we’ve been waking up early every day to get an early start…
  17. Day 11 · 20 Aug Day 11 End of our Karakoram GG La trek This was our last day hiking and truly the easiest day as we only had 5 miles to go with only 1200 feet mostly down…
  18. 23 Aug Last days in Pakistan Travel days move pretty slow around here. We took a jeep from Kanday Valley back to Skardu.
  19. 25 Aug Bangkok and a Singapore layover After a short 4.5-hour redeye flight from lslamabad, we landed in Bangkok.
  20. 28 Aug Kota Kinbalu and Sandakan- our entry to Borneo We had an easy, almost three-hour flight from Singapore to Malaysia.
  21. 31 Aug Kinabatangan River- first jungle journey The tour company picked us up at noon for our three-hour journey to the resort.
  22. 3 Sep Seeing all there is on the Kinabatangan River Today we kicked off our five-day, four-night jungle tour, and this time we upgraded to premium rooms!
  23. 6 Sep Danum Valley- the land of untouched nature (incl leeches) After leaving the Kinabatangan River, we took a 2.5-hour van ride to a small town called Latah Datum, where we…
  24. 7 Sep The beginning of our Seoul eating adventure Our trip to Seoul started off with a little bit of excitement at the airport.
  25. 11 Sep Last days in Seoul and our vacation We kicked off one of our final days in Seoul with lunch at Vatios Tacos (a must try recipe from Andy’s friend), where…