The clearest, calmest water ever!

While mainland Honduras doesn't attract a ton of visitors compared to its Central American neighbors, the Bay Islands are most definitely a destination. There are several islands off the Caribbean Coast of Honduras that make up the Bay Islands, but the most well known are Roatán and Útila, and as I quickly discovered, diving is the main attraction here. Located near the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef (the second largest barrier reef in the world after Australia's Great Barrier Reef!), it's no wonder people come from all over the place to dive here.

So I found a free flight using frequent flier miles (Delta and United each had one for 35,000 RT!), decided to stay in a bungalow near the nicest beach in Roatán and dug up my PADI ID. I mentioned to my mom that I was headed to somewhere that had a stretch of sand, and she immediately wanted in, so off we were!

Sunset Over West Bay

I am generally not a huge fan of the Caribbean-- something about it just screams cheesy, lazy  package tourists, and all-inclusive resorts with no soul-- but I enjoyed a visit to Little Corn Island (off the coast of Nicaragua) a few years ago, so I thought perhaps I would not be disappointed in the Bay Islands. My mom and I were immediately relieved when we arrived and saw how casual West Bay was. Despite having a couple higher end hotels, the place just has an incredibly easy-going attitude, the beaches are not private or roped off, and tourists and locals alike play soccer on the sand, take strolls up and down the 1-mile stretch of beach, and spend the afternoon snorkeling until 4 p.m. hits and it's time to enjoy happy hour rum punch!

Enjoying a Walk on the Beach

Our evenings were spent first watching the sunset, and then deciding what seafood we wanted to feast on. We met another awesome mother-daughter duo, Linda and Sara, who were staying at our bungalows and celebrating Linda's 60th. We immediately hit it off, and spent many evenings having dinner, trying out all the run concoctions, and singing karaoke in the nearby town of West End.

Linda and Heide Having a Laugh

Our one day trip was to Cayos Cochinos, a nearby archipelago that is inhabited by a small community of garifunas, who've lived there for hundreds of years. Most of the islands are uninhabited, a few are privately owned, and all seem like the perfect location for a season of Survivor. We spent the day snorkeling,  eating a home-cooked seafood lunch, and diving.

One of the Cayos Cochinos

Speaking of diving, let's not forget the whole point of this trip: spending as much time underwater as possible. And that's exactly what I did. I dove twice a day, and the diving really was excellent. The main attraction is a plethora of colorful fish (think angelfish, parrotfish, etc.), but I saw hawksbill turtles on almost every dive, and encountered some huge lobsters, green morays, and eagle rays a few times as well.  The massive corals and sponges were beautiful, and just as interesting to observe than the critters. It's hard to explain why us divers strap on heavy equipment and shell out a bunch of cash to spend 45 minutes  breathing underwater, but to me it's one of the most relaxing and exciting things at the same time. It really is a whole different planet down there, one that is simultaneously awe-inspiring and gorgeous to look at. For those of you who have always  been too scared to try it, I have one thing to say: my 70-year-old mom tried diving and LOVED it. She picked it up really quickly and had the time of her life. So what are you waiting for?

Don't be too jealous of this hair!

View the photo gallery for this post: Roatán, Honduras

Wind Farms Near Palm Springs

So we found ourselves in a rental car driving from LAX to Palm Springs (about 120 miles), where the scenery goes from smog, bumper-to-bumper traffic, and In-N-Out signs set high above the highway interchanges to wind farms and desolate mountain ranges (don't worry, we definitely stopped to eat Animal Style burgers well before 11 am). I'd been out to this area four times before for the Coachella Valley Music Festival, but I'd never actually been to Palm Springs on any of those trips. We had opted for a Don Draper-esque rental house over staying at the infamous Ace Hotel, and did not regret that decision one bit. The house was spacious, simply but elegantly furnished, and retained its 1950s kitchen with original stove (but luckily not original blender).

Backyard at Dusk

The backyard was the real highlight though: wide, with a pool that actually went deeper than 3 feet (us city folk don't usually get to dunk our heads in any of those rooftop condo 'pools'), and multiple citrus trees, providing us unlimited fresh grapefruit and orange juice for our jalapeno margaritas, as well as a few of the MOST DELICIOUS TANGERINES I HAVE EVER TASTED. When the sun began to set and the temperature dropped, there was a hot tub from which we had a perfect view of the San Jacinto Mountains that border Palm Springs to the west.

The Bride-To-Be Fetching Grapefruits

The town's population is an interesting mix. There are of course retirees (as in any area that's warm and sprinkled with citrus trees and golf courses), as well as a healthy older gay population that seems to flock there from LA on the weekends to enjoy some fresher air and quiet. The main drag, Palm Canyon Drive, is a mecca for mid-century mod aficionados and design geeks. If money was no object, I'd easily be able to furnish my entire house from a 5-block stretch of home stores. Palm Springs' good taste in home furnishings was confirmed when we happened to walk by a store selling my father's Solair Chair, a colorful plastic backyard piece that he and his business partner designed in Montreal in the early 70s. The chair is popular in the US and Canada, but I'd never actually seen it in a store (it's mostly sold in Quebec and New England), and coming across it left me with an overwhelming sense of pride and happiness.

Stumbling Across My Dad's Solair Chairs

Just an hour away is the otherworldly Joshua Tree National Park, with its classic desert landscape, including plenty of the eponymous trees, mountains, and crazy rock formations (and some amazing climbing opportunities). We did an easy 7 mile hike in the northern part of the park, which was a great way to see the varying landscape of this area.

Joshua Tree National Park Panorama

Chris and Amy with a Joshua Tree

Back to the reason we had flown across the country: to celebrate Chris' final weeks as a bachelorette, and celebrate we did! We consumed copious amounts of homemade guacamole by the pool, grabbed a grapefruit off the tree whenever we needed a snack, ate some delicious dinners, including some of the yummiest pizza I've ever had in the US, and plotted how we could stay in our beautiful backyard forever. Oh and did I mention the date milkshakes? Life changing. Palm Springs' nightlife isn't exactly going to surpass NYC's or LA's anytime soon, but we found a townie karaoke bar and a divey seafood spot where oyster shooters are the star on the menu-- and let's be honest, does anyone really need more than that? It's no surprise the town was filled with bachelorette parties; it's the perfect place to relax, enjoy the California sun, and pretend that it's totally natural to have a swimming pool and green lawn in the middle of a desert! We'll be back for those delicious tangerines, and it's not going to be pretty for that poor tree. Thank you Chris, for giving us an excellent excuse to experience Palm Springs!

Group Shot at Birba

Click here to view the entire photo gallery for this post

Pro Tips:

• Get a date shake and one of the many fruit orchards, such as Hadley's
• Eat the amazing pizza at Birba, and don't skip dessert!
• Get oyster shooters and fish tacos at Shanghai Red's
• Have brunch at King's Highway, next to the Ace Hotel
• Palm Springs is about a 2.5 hour drive from LAX, which is often cheaper to fly into than PSP
• Rental houses can be found on vrbo,com and many other sites, or stay at the Ace if you want a 24-hour hipster pool party (you can also buy a day pass to the pool there)

Postcard Barrel on Post Office Bay, Floreana Island

Floreana was one of the islands we visited in July 2011, so we had written and addressed a few postcards to family, and once we landed on the island, we placed them in the barrel, hoping for the best. I had read a short story once by an American woman who took one of these postcards from the barrel addressed to someone near Venice, Italy, because she was going to be  there later that year. She recounted her experience venturing to a small town outside of Venice just to deliver the postcard. She tracked the addressee down, who turned out to be a friendly little Italian nonna. The postcard deliverer was instantly welcomed like an old friend, invited for a home-cooked meal with the whole family, and ended up spending the rest of her vacation with her newfound Italian friends as they showed her around their region and fed her delicious foods. I pictured an American East Coaster, on vacation in the Galapagos, landing on Floreana Island and taking one of our postcards. He or she would knock on grandma and grandpa's door in Manhattan, be invited in for coffee, and become Grandma Myra's instant new best friend. They'd talk for hours and find out that they had much in common; perhaps it would turn out their lives had crossed paths before. I wanted our postcards to bring people together, to create a memorable story, and to be a happy reminder for us and those who happened to take them home that day in Post Office Bay.

Over a year went by, and much like the stamped postcards that we had mailed home from 'real' post offices, I had given up hope of them ever arriving to their destinations. Then, in December, we got an email from Nick's dad, Dan: Arrived today via USPS. Postcard is dated 7/28/2011.  It arrived in an envelope postmarked 12/4/12 from San Francisco.  Not delivered by hand as hoped for, but it did arrive.  A pleasant reminder for all of us. 

Our postcard never  set off some magical series of events resulting in cultural exchange or lifelong friendship, but sometimes, it's just nice to get a handwritten piece of  mail from loved ones who were thinking of you far away and long ago, isn't it? A few of our Galapagos postcards are still out there, sitting in an old barrel 600 miles off the west coast of South America, or perhaps being carried around in someone's purse, just waiting to be delivered to a warm household with a kettle of tea ready on the stove.

Music is something universal; in every city, town, and village in every country we visited we heard rhythms spilling out of restaurants, cafes, and bars; being played by buskers on streetcorners, from passing cars and in bus stations. And yet everywhere it's a little different. Sure, we heard lots of Black Eyed Peas and Jennifer Lopez (in our unscientific analysis, her On The Floor is the most popular song in the world), but when we found the opportunity to get away from this type of generic and mass-marketed music, we were rewarded with some unique, regional sounds that we would never have been exposed to otherwise.

As much as we love all the photos we took while abroad, and cherish the few small souvenirs we brought back with us, our favorite music from the trip is undoubtedly better at bringing us right back to the time and place where we heard it. So here are our seven favorite songs that we discovered on our trip, along with a memory attached to each:

(Note that if you're reading this in an email, you probably won't be able to listen to the songs. Read the post on the blog for the full experience.)

Cosmic Sidewalks by Les Mentettes

While we were pretending to be locals in Buenos Aires, Argentina, we decided that a natural thing to do would be to search out some live music, like we would at home. We scoured the local arts papers and blogs, put together a list of interesting-sounding acts, researched them, and ended up seeing a fantastic concert by Les Mentettes (also, listen / download / buy more of their music from the Les Mentettes bandcamp). We loved the dynamic performance by the 30-person pop-soul orchestra enough to buy a cd, which ended up providing a soundtrack for our South African road trip.

Cosmic Sidewalks

Nyandolo by Ayub Ogada

One of the most serene and relaxing locations we visited introduced us to one of the prettiest and most serene songs we heard all year. Sitting around in Shane's candlelit living room at Terra Khaya in the Amathole Mountains of South Africa, reading or playing cards, and listening to soft sounds emanating from an iPod dock running off a solar-charged battery, we were struck by this song's beauty and sparsity.

Nyandolo

Mfan' Omncane by Dorothy Masuka

While we slowed down our pace and spent a few days feeling at home with our lovely hosts on the wild coast of South Africa, we heard lots of music local to the Transkei, local to South Africa, and from the rest of Africa. My favorite was this gem of African jazz by a Zimbabwean-born singer who emigrated to South Africa and sang many songs--including this one--in a Kwazulu dialect. If you listen closely, you can hear her making the several different types of clicks present in Kwazulu and Xhosa words.

Mfan' Omncane

Tonight You Belong To Me by Eddie Vedder

We walked into a small store selling local crafts on a sidestreet in Blantyre, Malawi. While we were browsing through the paintings, clothes, gifts, and other wares, a stereo played softly. At one point a song came on with a duet sung softly over what I thought was a kalimba (the omnipresent African thumb piano). I was struck by the duo's honest and playful delivery, and asked the clerk for the name of the artist, expecting some local singer, only to learn it was a cut off Eddie Vedder's album of ukelele songs.

I credit the experience for letting me hear the song without any prejudgment of what to expect; I probably would never have given the offbeat concept album a chance otherwise.

Tonight You Belong To Me

Hene Hene by ???

In India, the two-hour jeep ride from the train station at Siliguri up into the mountains to the hill station of Darjeeling wasn't all roses: our driver got into an accident before leaving the parking lot, then proceeded to get in a fight with the driver of the car he hit, and to drive way too fast and make incredibly aggressive passes on the tiny winding roads with sheer cliffs below us. I vomited from motion sickness before the end of it.

But something good did come out of it: we shared the back of the jeep with Vince and Dida from Oregon, traveling like we were. We spent a lot of time with them over the few days we spent in Darjeeling, walking through the hills and tea plantations, and slurping up delicious Tibetan soups. In one conversation, Dida told us that she was a Polynesian dancer and was a bit distraught because she had lost to the depths of her iPod the hula music she practiced with while traveling. I agreed to take a look at it, and was able to save the songs, and in the process of copying them back to her device, ended up with a copy of them on our computer.

Listening to these songs--that I've labelled Hula for Dida--brings me right back to those frigid mornings and piping hot cups of delicious tea.

Hene Hene

Yehjo Halka Saroor Hae by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan

Here's another case of hearing music taken out of context: I've been aware of Pakistan's most famous musician (and Jeff Buckley's "Elvis") for a while, but never much appreciated him until we stumbled upon what may be India's warmest and cosiest hotel, in Varanasi. We spent a lot of time in our hotel's top-floor cafe, resting, gobbling up delicious Korean comfort food, and listening to consistently great, varied, and relaxing music.

Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's powerful voice and hypnotic instrumentals made a great backdrop to an afternoon of bibimbap and blogging.

Yehjo Halka Saroor Hae

I Love Rock and Roll Music by Koreana Hong

Finally, this song came on while we were eating Korean barbecue with my dad in Kathmandu, and we all instantly loved it. In my dad's words, "If Kill Bill had taken place in Seoul instead of Japan, this is the song the band would have been playing in the restaurant scene."

I couldn't find the full song online anywhere without speaking Korean, so this one-minute sample will have to do.

I Love Rock and Roll Music

One of Our Many Cramped Local Minibus Rides in Mozambique

Traveling as an American comes with a lot of baggage (pun 100% intended!); I often felt as though we were starting in the hole whenever we interacted with others just because of what's printed on our birth certificates, and that we needed to dig ourselves out by being the most polite, friendly, and humble travelers  in order to be considered somewhat decent human beings, on par with fellow travelers from Europe, Asia, or Australia. The question of what it's like to travel in relatively remote and very poor places as an American is something that was on the forefront of our minds all the time, although surprisingly, it hasn't been a common question asked in the months since we've returned to the US from our travels. I'm currently reading The Lunatic Express, by DC native Carl Hoffman, who  spent several months traveling around the world on some of the worst and most dangerous buses, trains, and ferries so that he could write about the experience.  I came across the following passage from a chapter where Hoffman takes a local Indonesian ferry, and I think did a perfect job  of describing what it is like to  interact with people who have preconceived notions of  Americans, to let go of your own fears and prejudices, and try not only to connect with people you meet, but to trust them and realize that the vast of majority of the time, you will be rewarded, not punished, for putting your faith in strangers.

...the more I gave myself to the world, the more I made myself vulnerable by putting myself completely at the the disposal of people and situations in which I had no control, the more people took care of me, looked out for me. At first I had thought they were taking pity on me. But over the days and weeks ahead I started to understand something else, something that had been sinking in gradually over the months. Being white American conferred on me an automatic status. I represented power. Affluence. Vast numbers of the world were poor, watched American television and films, listened to American music, but had no real contact with westerners, and if they did it was often as chambermaids, taxi drivers, waiters-- none ever sat down in their slums or ate their food. [The] question -- why wasn't I flying?-- said much. It was a question I heard over and over again. Why wasn't I in first class?Why wasn't I on an express bus? Why wasn't I anywhere but here? My fellow travelers were right: I could have been flying. I could have been traveling in first class, in an air-conditioned cabin with a soft mattress and stewards. In silence and stillness. That I wasn't was like a gift to them, a mysterious one they couldn't fully understand but that they appreciated in a way I would never have imagined. And the more I shed my American reserves, phobias, disgusts, the more they embraced me. In the weeks ahead I would accelerate what had started gradually over the miles. I would do whatever my fellow travelers and hosts did. If they drank the tap water of Mumbai and Kolkata and Bangladesh, so would I. If they bought tea from the streetcorner vendor, so would I. If they ate with their fingers, even if I was given utensils, I ate with my fingers. Doing so prompted an outpouring of generosity and curiosity that never ceased to amaze me; it opened the door, made people take me in. That I shared their food, their discomfort, their danger, fascinated them and validated them in a powerful way. And as Lena waved away the cushion man and Mrs. Nova insisted I share her food, I realized I was in good hands, surrounded by women with eagle eyes. I could relax; murder or robbery was the last thing I had to worry about.

For Americans used to a certain level of comfort, cleanliness, personal space, and quiet while traveling, it takes  more effort, and a determined willingness to come out of your comfort zone in order to experience transport "as the locals do", but it's also one of the only ways to really experience a country and its people as they go about their every day lives. Some of the memories I most cherish now (but didn't quite cherish then!) are the crazy, hot, beyond crowded, and endless bus rides we took through Eastern Africa, for they provided a window into local life that we would never have seen otherwise, and I think we were also able to give the people we shared those rides with a positive impression of Americans, an impression that ultimately may have taken them by surprise. It is these sort of exchanges that make certain types of travel worth every day spent with a sore behind, dusty clothes, and aching back.

Buying Fruit and Corn Out of the Bus in Western Tanzania

Peeling Carrots for Thanksgiving-- Zomba Plateau, Malawi (2011)

This year's holiday was quite different from Thanksgiving 2011: we spent the day in a warm house, surrounded by family, wearing our slippers, sipping wine and cooking together. We ate more kinds of food in one sitting than most people in this world eat in a year. We consumed until our bellies hurt, we laughed until our sides hurt, we drank until we knew our heads would hurt the next day.  How wonderful, I thought: to be surrounded by family; to feel comfortable in your own skin; to genuinely enjoy the company of those you're with. To feel that you could be anywhere, and it wouldn't really matter, as long as you were with people you love. There is nothing that I could be more thankful for. I know how lucky we were to spend a year away from home, exploring the unknown, and how rewarding that year on the road was and still continues to be. But I also know how fortunate we are to have a home (multiple homes, actually!) to come back to, where each day spent with those you love is an exploration of yourself and those around you; where each day, simply being wherever you are is a rewarding experience in itself.

Family-- Thanksgiving 2012

We've now been home for almost five months, and one of the first things everyone still asks us is how the transition back to our lives in DC has been. The short answer is that it was surprisingly easy. We've settled in well; the transition was actually quite a bit smoother than we thought or feared it would be. But the trip has made a profound impact on the way we see the world and our place in it.

Ecuadorean Man with Sheep

It turns out--unsurprisingly--that all the things that make us Americans rich and comfortable are really easy to get used to. Every day we're presented with an effortless solution to even the most trivial of problems, but when we compare the excess and wastefulness of this lifestyle to those of the huge range of people we met on our trip, it forces us toward a better understanding of our place near the top of the world's economic ladder, and with that comes an extreme thankfulness and humility for what we have.

Xhosa Woman Making a Broom

On the trip we met all kinds of people, from Western travelers like ourselves ,to locals working in restaurants and hotels that had never left their hometown, to poor subsistence farmers living hand-to-mouth, and on down to people so poverty-stricken, dejected, and abused that it was hard to even identify them as humans. We visited small villages where if you only have one thing, you're considered rich: if you have a pot, you can make money by selling some food on the streets of your town; if you have a shovel, you can make money by digging ditches; if you have a small screwdriver you can fix watches and eyeglasses from your stoop. Some of the people we met that had the least were some of the happiest and most hardworking people we came across, and these memories remind us that none of the things that have the potential to make us truly happy can be seen, touched, or bought; none of the things that have the potential to give our lives fulfillment are material things.

Smiles in the Howrah Flower Market, Kolkata, India

Coming back to our own lives, these memories and the lessons we learned from the people we met encourage us to view the things around us in a new light. They force us to consider the things we need to be happy, and what we have the potential (even the responsibility) to do to make the world a better place than it was when we got here. Perhaps more than making us hopeful for the future and our contribution to it, these memories make our relationship with our country, our city, and even our apartment a complicated one, and maybe this is the most important lesson we learned on the trip: to look at things critically, to consider our place in all the systems in which we participate, from the hyperlocal to the global. We're trying our best to take the opportunities given to us by chance and make the most of them. If we're looking at the world differently, and trying to think deeply to consider our place in it, we're also trying to find ways to put the conclusions drawn from such considerations into action. While we've always been aware of these things, we're trying more than ever to pay more attention to what we eat, to our waste, to trying to find extra ways to be (globally) responsible: taking that extra second to consider our options when we need to buy something: do we really need it? Which option uses the least packaging? Can we get one that was made locally?

Palaung Woman near Hsipaw, Myanmar

Sometimes I miss being a traveler, the freedom of waking up every day and deciding where to go and what to do. I miss the feeling of awe and splendor, the total jaw-dropping beauty of what's around every curve in the road, waking up after an overnight bus ride to see the fascinating place we've wound up in. Part of making the transition back to lives as upper-middle class Americans is keeping that sense of adventurousness: finding things in our own city, in our own neighborhood, in our own home to look at in a new way; to be excited by them in a new way. I've come to look at each day as an opportunity to learn something new or see something I've never noticed before, and to carry that sense of adventure through the journey of each day.

Us with Macchapuchhre, Himalayas, Nepal

The Road Ahead...

Otto Wagner Apartment Building in Vienna

My cousins and aunt greeted us with the usual abundance of food, prosecco (Aperol Spritzer anyone?!), and entertaining stories about generations past. We were also lucky enough to get a special visit from our friend Chip, who is off on his own RTW trip now, and whose itinerary  overlapped with ours in Vienna.  The language barrier didn't get in the way of us Stirlings showing him how we eat!

Marillenknödel (Apricot Dumplings)

We spent time wandering around downtown Vienna, which I find to be sophisticated and modern while retaining a bit of old-world elegance-- the perfect combination. Its streets are lined with cafes serving some of the best coffee and pastries you'll ever try, lots of green space, great shops, and plenty of museums for all tastes. For those in the mood, there are castles too!

Summer Lounging in the MuseumsQuartier

Another thing I love about Vienna is  that it sits right on the Danube River, and the city takes full advantage of its position in the summer. Summers are short there but the temperatures are warm, the days are quite long, and the water is the place to be. The riverfront is dotted with beaches of all kinds where you can swim, rent boats, and picnic on the grass. Open-air beer gardens become the place to meet your friends, and since we happened to be there during the Euro Cup, we got to watch the Italy v. England game on a huge outdoor screen right on the water. Our visit also coincided with the largest annual free music festival in Europe, the Danube Island Festival. The large island is taken over by 3 million visitors and dozens of stages covering over 6 km of the island's length. We got to see a DJ I've never seen but have always wanted to--Peter Kruder of Kruder & Dorfmeister fame--with my cousin Sara.

Tante Senta, My Mom, My Cousin Sara and Me at Cafe Leopold Havelka

After what felt like way too short a time, it was time for Nick and I to say our goodbyes and start our journey home.  I made a last minute decision to have Sara chop my hair off (she's a professional)-- something I had wanted to do all year -- about 30 minutes before we had to leave for the airport! With less hair on my head but more chocolate in my bag, we headed off to Amsterdam, where we spent our final 15 hours before heading back home to Washington, DC.

Rowhouses on Canal in Amsterdam

Knowing that it was the last night of an exactly-year-long adventure of a lifetime was a surreal feeling. We talked about how it felt, and whether we should even be thinking of this night as any different or more meaningful than any other day of our trip. We both agreed that these few hours needn't be some monumental, defining moment of our trip-- how could they be, just because they were the last? Months before this night, I had envisioned it with a bit of dread, but also with the expectation that we'd be spending it revisiting all of our favorite memories of the year, on some kind of marathon walk down memory lane. In fact, we weren't even ready to attempt to wrap our heads around all the beautiful, emotional, challenging, and inspiring experiences that we are lucky enough to call the last 12 months of our lives. So we did what we always do-- we wandered the small backstreets, stopped to take photos of anything that caught our eye, tried the local specialties (salty licorice!), and paused every once in a while to remind ourselves: this is an adventure, just like any other day of our lives. It is neither the first nor the last. It is beautiful, it is ordinary, and we are lucky to be here, at this moment, with each other, and part of this world.

Us in Amsterdam-- Our Last Photo of the Trip!

Click here to view the photo gallery for this post (Austria)

Click here to view the photo gallery for this post (Netherlands)