Morning Memo from Mekong River

We are riding on a wooden boat with a relatively quiet motor. The mild breeze kicking up from the river and the boat’s gentle rocking are restful. We just finished drinking cocoanut milk through straws punched into coconuts with the tops lopped off.  Our boat has just pulled away from the landing in Ben Tre, Vietnam. We have completed the last leg of a long scavenge that required us to leave the hotel at 5:00 this morning. We took a taxi ride of 3.5 hours to Can Tho to see the Cai Rang morning floating market. 

Our driver spoke zero English and relied sporadically (but not quite often enough in our opinions) on calling someone on his cell phone for directions. We almost didn’t get to the market on time because he waited a long time stuck going the wrong way in a torrent of oncoming moped traffic.  With the aid of his life line, he managed to find the unobvious parking lot for access to the river boat. 

We boarded the wooden river boat just before 8:30 and merged into the busy waterway.  Farmers sell produce to buyers who float up alongside them.  We saw watermelons being handed out from little windows in the hull and pineapples being tossed in the air from one vessel to another. 

A boat selling produce is recognizable by the stick rising into the air from its bow.  The pole is a sign of what’s for sale. The farmer ties a sample on and dangles it in the air for visibility, sort of like a billboard. Sometimes with items like tomatoes, they are suspended in a small net sack. As we wove our way among the sellers’ boats, watermelons, pumpkins, onions, carrots, turnips and tomatoes swayed above the crowd of boats. 

The boats are primitive, some appearing to be handmade, with motors cobbled together. 

Some farmers live on their boats with their families. We saw hammocks; sometimes with little kids playing in them. An old woman squatted over a large pot, wringing clothes she lifted from the green river water. 

We watched all of this through the morning sun sparkling on the water. 

It was a good thing we arrived before 9:00, because the boats started to pull away at once, like a signal had been given that it was time to go.  I was so grateful we got there in time to have had this extraordinary experience. 

First Day of Scavenging, Take Two

My last post about the day of scavenging in Vancouver didn’t do justice. Here is the schedule of the day that Sally and I organized for ourselves, scavenging around Vancouver, collecting points. 

1. All teams met with Bill and Pamela Chalmers at 9:00 a.m. where we received our books of scavenges —- the list of activities, each with a point value. For Vancouver only, just to get us acclimated, we can use our smart phones for maps and research. Sally and I sat in the hotel for a few minutes and planned our strategy. We walked out of the hotel at 10:00 and could scavenge until  8:00 p.m., when we had to meet in the hotel lobby.
2. From our hotel, the Fairmont Vancouver on Georgia Street, we walked down to the waterfront and boarded the Seabus for about a 15 minute ride to Lonsdale Quay. At the ferry station, we changed onto a bus toward Grouse Mountain. 
3. We got off at the Capilano Suspension Bridge and walked across the shaky span over a deep chasm.
4. We stopped in the coffee shop and asked three of the young women working there,”Who is the most famous Vancouverite”. They giggled a lot and settled on Seth Rogan.
5. We caught the Grouse Mountain bus again and continued on to the base. At that point, it was raining hard. We bought tram tickets and boarded the aerial tram to the summit. On the way up, the rain changed to snow.(gorgeous by the way)
6. We rented snowshoes in the rental shop, walked around for a few minutes, fell, and handed them back in. 
7. We descended by aerial tram and bus.  At the Seabus terminal we stopped for ethnic food. We chose a Little Tokyo shop for miso and sushi with black rice. 
8. After the Seabus returned us to downtown Vancouver, we watched the Fly Over Canada movie, a Disneyesque large screen experience from a large chair that tilts and wiggles. 
9. We took a taxi to Wreck Beach, a remote beach near the campus of University of British Columbia.  You have to descend a gazillion steps to get there. Worse yet, you have to climb back up. At the end of the day my step tracker repaired 35 flights of steps and 10 miles. The scavenge was to do as the locals do on this nudist beach. Sally volunteered! Even though a couple of people milled around on the beach, we found a cove where nobody could see us. In the misty rain, she posed for a picture with nothing but her scarf flying like a flag from her neck. I’m so impressed! And because Vancouver doesn’t count in the scoring, nobody else gets to see the photo.
10. The taxi had waited for us on that isolated road and took us to the Museum of Anthropology.
11. Next was the Botanical Gardens for two scavenges. The Japanese Cherry Blossom Festival offered lots of demonstrations, food and music to enjoy. Second was a hedge maze.  It was not easy, but we got out in 7 minutes. 
12. We took a bus back to central Vancouver and found the world’s oldest steam powered clock.
13. We found the $999 boots for sale
14. At Chambar, we did a mandatory food scavenge, eating mussels and local beer.
15. We stopped in a liquor store and compared prices on a product whose price we know at home (Gray Goose, thank you google)
16. Sally composed the haiku 

Notes from a Sardine Can

I am on a twelve hour flight. In economy. I was assigned to a dreaded four-pack in the center of the cabin. My assigned seat was on the aisle. That’s where I like to be so that I can stretch my legs out. And I don’t have to bother anyone when I want to get up. 

When I make my own plane reservations, I work the seat selection, trying for exit rows and longer leg room. But on the Global Scavenger Hunt, I didn’t get to choose my seat and I opted out of paying the upcharge for business class.

I’m not gonna lie. It was pretty miserable.  The leg room was so short that my knee caps pressed against the seat in front of me.  But shortly after takeoff, Sally strolled through the cabin and reported on an empty window seat in the exit row. The open area. With legroom as big as my bathroom at home. Nirvana. 

I had to pay a $200 supplement.  Gladly! I stretched my legs out all the way, put on the eyeshade and neck turtle and drifted off.

Sally stayed in the back but her legs are shorter and she got my old seat to spread into. 

We should land in Taipei within the hour and catch a connection to Saigon.  

Snowshoes and Really Expensive Shoes

Today we scavenged in Vancouver. We will leave tonight on a redeye.

One of the highlights was snowshoeing.

We rode the aerial tram to the top of Grouse Mountain and transitioned from rain at the bottom to the top, where it was snowing like crazy. There is a ski shop a few steps away from the top of the tram, where we could rent snowshoes. We exited the shop and snapped our feet into the snowshoes. Two seconds after hamming it up for a photo, lifting our legs like chorus dancers, we fell down in a heap.

We went to the John Fluevog shoe store on a mission. We had to find the most expensive shoes and explain why they were so expensive. A very helpful salesman pointed them out right away. It was a pair of women’s boots that look like a bronze finish, with black lines like the lead on stained glass.  $999, Canadian—so not quite as expensive as U.S. dollars.  The reason for the cost is that a special machine had to be made to produce the acrylic heel.

Another scavenge was to visit the British Columbia Museum of Anthropology. And spend at least one hour in it. A few minutes after we arrived, the fire alarm blared. The staff were among the first to run out. We trotted out with everyone else from the building. Within moments, a security guy told the crowd assembled outside, shivering in the rain, that it was probably just another faulty smoke detector and this happens frequently. Moments later, a fire engine pulled up. We stood outside for about 40 minutes in clear sight of the alarm panel, watching the firemen and security people trying multiple combinations of buttons, trying to get the alarm to stop. Eventually, we were invited back inside. We put in our hour but definitely did not get an hour’s worth of anthropology. Although....we did take advantage of the cafe. We bought three different beers and did the taste test scavenge, comparing and contrasting.

Next up is to get to the Vancouver airport for a 2:00 a.m. departure to Taipei and then on to Saigon. 

Itching to go!

The Global Scavenger Hunt started today .... sort of. We will stay in Vancouver tonight. The trip leader, Bill Chalmers, oriented our group of ten teams to the rules. We will meet tomorrow morning and go off to somewhere; who knows where?

While waiting for the trip to begin, this morning, Sally and I walked to the Aquabus pier at the end of Georgia Street and rode the whoppingly short three minute ferry to Granville Island. The small island just off of Vancouver hosts a busting farmers’ market and stalls of artisanal foods. We discovered Cinnamon Records, which are pastries the size and shape of LP records. Like the best part of a crunchy, slightly burnt crust you can imagine, the record snaps into pieces when you bend it. Great way to get the day humming.

We strolled in and out of some extremely talented craftspeople’s workshops and dropped some Canadian dollars on yummy handmade felted wool scarves at Funk Shui.

From there, we took the Aquabus to the tip of the sea wall leading into Stanley Park, Vancouver’s answer to New York’s Central Park. Except that Stanley is a sanctuary for egrets’ nests. I never saw so many nests on one tree.

All we know about where we are going is that in 48 hours, we will be in a country with a low malaria risk, in case we want to start taking malaria pills. Sally and I decided that at least for now, our malaria pills stay in the bottles.

Going Gaga over Google

Making my way out to Vancouver for the Global Scavenger Hunt, I detoured to San Francisco to visit with my son Gordon.

I checked out his office at google’s headquarters in Mountain View, about 35 minutes south of the airport.

Its acres of low rise buildings and tree lined paths suggest a college campus or a resort complex. The resort feeling comes from the sandpit volleyball court in front of the main corporate headquarters.

I arrived before lunch, while the food trucks were setting up. On my way toward his building, I passed a chocolatier unpacking its goodies next to a taco truck. We took our brunch in an indoor restaurant with the decor of a rustic hunting lodge. I had the asparagus tomato frittata and he had a yogurt fruit thing. Food is free for google employees and guest (i.e. me).

We walked around and he pointed out things along the way. Like a van that provides haircuts.

And the unmarked white buses which transport google employees for free every day for the hour-plus commute from San Francisco.

Google’s main headquarters is in Building 40. It was the first building in the then new complex. Lore has it that rather than call it building #1, the designation of building #40 sounded much more established.

We picked up a couple of free bicycles that are scattered all around the sprawling campus and rode them back to his office.

Sure beats working in a windowless cubicle. And many, many other places, too. 

Packing for Everything Everywhere -- in a Carry On

I am about to begin the Global Scavenger Hunt. It's a competition where ten teams of two will travel together around the world. Along the way, we will gather points for figuring things out, connecting culturally, experiencing way-way-way off the beaten path adventures. 

It's hard to describe, so I'll defer to blurbs from others.

Travel journalist Peter Greenberg said, "Unlike the Amazing Race, this challenge is more about your ability to connect with cultures than speed."

Outside Magazine said, “One of the 50 Most Amazing Trips in the World…consider your heroic tales of one of the most outrageous trips in the world…”

The Wall Street Journal calls it "adventure for the travel-savvy who want something different."

How do you pack for this thing? All we know is that we meet in Vancouver and we are going around the world. It will be hot. It will be cold. We will do messy stuff like hiking, maybe involving mud. We will do fancy stuff, perhaps a ballet or cocktails in a rooftop lounge.

All in a carryon bag. I  have profound respect for the genius who invented packing cubes.

I'm packed and ready to go. With the Global Scavenger Hunt luggage tag and the "Not Worth Taking" one that my world traveler mom used to thwart temptation. It worked.

I am hoping that this cold that's coming on will come off by tomorrow morning. Flight crew people swear by Airborne. I'm in. Took it and packed it.