El Salvador, pictures

El Salvador pictures

Click on the above link to see the pictures.

Mom and I spent the first week of my leave in El Salvador. It was great. The weather was hot, 35 degrees C during the day and around 18 or 20 at night.

Well I had to laugh when no sooner had we arrived in the airport do I heard my name being called. Anne that I golf with was in the airport waiting to take our plane home. So we chatted a bit and then I hear another “hello Sarah” and Kenny that trained me a Quaker was also there. Small world. Got to love when you can randomly run into people you know in foreign countries.

We stayed at the only all inclusive resort in El Salvador. It was 650 rooms and spans a huge area. The people were lovely and they must have had at least four staff to each guest. From the airport it was a two hour drive and our flight was delayed two hours going so we got in a midnight and then had a police escort to the resort. Nothing like letting the locals know the tourists are here. The lights were flashing all the way, enough to give you a seizure, safely first. On each excursion there are police that travel with the group. Basically for traffic control, when you are crossing the street they stop all traffic and let the tourists by.

I had a hot stone massage with their volcanic stones on the beach one day, lovely.

The hotel was hosting a conference and was over booked for a night. They were looking for 10 rooms. Mom and I gave up our room for the night and were given a tour of the capital and a night at the five star Radisson hotel in return. It was great. A cool tour of the town, saw some churches, Arch Bishop Romero’s monument, the Botanical Garden’s, got a history lesson, had lunch in the crater of the volcano and saw a museum. It was a nice little side trip. Our meals alone at this place cost a $180 US for the day, at their expense.

Oh the tremor. While we were at the Radisson we were about a kilometer from a volcano and there was a tremor in the middle of the night. It lasted for about 15 seconds and the room was a rocking. No it wasn’t the people next door it was more of a vertical displacement. About ½ of the people in our group felt it.

We went to a local church for mass on Sunday. It was two hours long, in Spanish and an hour sermon, an experience to say the least. We took a cab there and it was interesting. We went with an older couple from Winnipeg. We had to fill out papers to leave the resort and walk out to the main gate and wait for the cab as outsiders are not allowed in. The cabbie was great, spoke English and took us on a tour of the little town and the port.

Got lots of sun had a great time with my mom and I was saying my accommodation will only go down from here.

All the pictures

All the picture albums can be seen at the following link. Sorry you will have to paste it into the toolbar.

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney

I had a fabulous experience.

East Coast of Canada and Pictures

The last two weeks of my trip were spent on the East Coast of Canada with my friend from work, Michelle. We toured around Nova Scotia, PEI, New Brunswick and came home via Maine and New Hampshire.

In Nova Scotia we toured the Keith’s Brewery and in PEI we went to the St. Anne’s church lobster supper and to the Anne of Green Gables musical. We went to these things with my brother Dennis, Carol, Laura, Jack and Carolyn.

In New Brunswick we spent lots of time at Michelle’s grandparent’s cottage. We were put to work while we were there. We bottled lobster. We ended up doing two batches so we “put down” 82 lobsters. They are cooked, then taken out of their shells, cleaned, bottled and boiled again. It was a true maritime experience. We went to the wharf and picked them up also.

Check out the following link for pictures of the East Coast. You will have to paste it into your toolbar.

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/EastCoastOfCanada

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures.

Well a little more on Africa. It is very cold at night. I had this misconception that Africa is hot. Well I went in their winter and some days it is hot during the day and others, not so hot. In the evening it gets mighty cold. One evening it went down to -7 degrees. I was freezing. I lay in my sleeping bag with three pairs of pants, two pairs of socks (should have been three), two t-shirts, three sweaters, a light coat, my sarong as a scarf, toque and mitts. Luckily Christine in Hong Kong gave me her toque and mitts to borrow. Thanks again. Man it was cold at night. I wore them each night. I lay in my sleeping bag hoping to god it would hurry up and be six am. That was the time we were to leave that sight. They knew it was a cold location (a guy the week before got hypothermia) so we were to get up and take down the tents in the morning and get on the road. Usually we have breakfast, but it was too cold and we were going to stop around 9am to have breakfast. It was still freezing at 9am and we became hobos. We lit a garbage can on fire for warmth at our roadside breakfast stop. It was interesting. They did not check to see what was in the can, so there were little explosion going on and off. Then the can actually caught fire on the outside. It turned out to be burning the paint off the outside of the barrel. Needless to say the next town we hit I bought think socks and a wool blanket. These items made the evenings much more enjoyable.

We had some trouble with our truck or trucks. We ended up breaking down six times and having to switch trucks four times in the last few days. It was a big job to unload every single item off of the truck, but we hoped the next truck would be better. We just kept getting teased as the trucks were just borrowed from another group for a day or so and then we would have to carry on with our sh*t one.

We spent the night in the dessert. It was interesting. We broke down at 11 am. We entertained ourselves by playing dessert Olympics. We had the discus, javelin, shot-put and hurdle events. Then we played musical chairs, pass the toilet paper and finally we put a guy on the roof of the truck and made him be the hoop while we took shots at him, dessert basketball.

I went to the sand dunes and went sand boarding in Namibia. I climbed the 100m dune with my piece of wood (my sled) and slid down the dune head first at 76 km/h. They had a radar gun and I was the fastest person to go down. For each step we took up the dune, we slid two steps back. By the time I would reach the top I would have to empty a cup of sand out of each running shoe. We were to wear covered shoes as our feet were our brakes.

We visited a township on the last day and saw how the poor live in Africa. It was interesting. You are either very rich or very poor in Africa. It was interesting. We saw a dorm room for migrant workers. In each room a minimum of two families live in an 8’ x 10’ dirty room. In the township there were dorm rooms, shacks made of left over lumber and steel or proper houses.

I went to Victoria Falls, a waterfall that is 1.7 km wide. The falls are one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It was spectacular. I flew over it in a micro light airplane. The micro light looked like a large kite. The falls are in both Zambia and Zimbabwe. So when I was flying I flew through Zimbabwe.
The animals and scenery were absolutely spectacular in Africa. There is some much to offer there. I feel like this was the animal tour, but I know there is so much more culturally to offer, so I will have to go back.

Check out the following links for African pictures. I separated them into four albums in the hopes it would be quicker for you to up load them. Also included are my Ireland pictures and a couple videos.

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/Africa1Album

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/Africa2Album

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/Africa3Album

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/Africa4Album

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/IrelandAndMyWelcomeHome

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-6874432063335198577

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=2108636978677755654

Ireland

Well some would say I had the gift of the gab before I visited the Blarney Stone, but if I didn’t have it before I should have it now. For those that don’t know by kissing the Stone you are to be filled with Blarney.

The Blarney Castle and house were on beautiful green grounds. It was lovely to check it out and walk around the premises.

While in Ireland I was able to get in a nice twilight game of golf with Louise. It was great.

I visited Cobh, which was the last port of call for the Titanic. It also has a large Cathedral that we also visited. I went to the Cliffs of Moher, it was gorgeous. That was the only day it rained on me and it only rained for half and hour while we were walking around. It has rained everyday this summer in Ireland.

We went to Malahide for dinner with Louise’s brother and his girlfriend. We went to the local pub and for my fellow Fruli drinkers (a nice strawberry beer) they have it on tap and I had a pint of it. In Peterborough you can only get it at one establishment and the bottles are less than 250ml. It is a great appetizer beer.

I went to Galway bay, Limerick, Cork and through most of the south. I tried to pack in a lot in the week. It was fabulous.

Louise my friend lives in Bray which is 40 minutes outside of Dublin. I got to check out her apartment that she bought (condo I guess here). It is a one bedroom apartment that she had to gut and it cost 260 000 Euros, and you thought housing was expensive in Canada.

We went on a tour around Dublin and went to the Guinness factory. The factory is situated on land that is worth 13 billion Euros. So it is expected that the land will be sold. They have a great museum and tour that will probably remain on the site. It was great to check out the factory and production. They make 13 million pints of Guinness a day there.

I had a fabulous time in Ireland. It was so neat coming down on the airplane into Dublin. It looked like one big green patchwork quilt with all the different shades of green and the bushes separating the fields.

I was met at the Toronto airport by the Keating clan with some GREAT artwork. They had made bristol board signs welcoming me home, Jack helped too. Thanks for your warm welcome and great signs.

Home for a week and off to the East Coast with Michelle from work for a couple of weeks.

Alive and well

Hi everyone. I am alive and doing well. Sorry I have not updated the blog in ages, the internet in Africa, is a little hectic and the opportunity to use it almost non existent.

Africa was amazing and we survived. One day we broke down in the dessert and were 150km’s from a town on the right and 220km’s from a town on the left. Needless to say we were stuck there over night and camped at the side of the road. Luckily they had just done the grocery shopping and we had lots to eat. It was an interesting day. We broke down at 11 am and hung out all day in limbo waiting for it to be ‘fixed’ for the 6th time. Did I not mention this was the 6th time to brake down, of I forgot. At 6pm as the sun was setting we sent up our tents and hoped the mechanic could ‘patch’ the truck over night so we could carry on the next day. The mechanic quit at 1am and it was not fixed. At 4:30am we packed up the truck and moved everything, cooking supplies, books, every last thing in the truck to a temporary one and headed down the road. I will continue this story at a later date along with some more.

Just wanted to let you know I am alive and currently in Ireland. I toured around Dublin with my friend Louise yesterday. I am staying with her for the week. We are off on a road trip today and golfing in the afternoon. Tomorrow I will head to Cork and kiss the Blarney stone on the way. Louise will not be joining me as her friend is getting married tomorrow (Thursday). She says it is cheaper for people to get married in the middle of the week, so some do it then.

Keep checking back once I am home. I will update the blog with more stories and of course the photos.

South Africa, Botswana and Zambia

I am loving Africa, it is spectacular. I am doing an Acacia tour for 25 days through, South Africa, Botswana, Zambia and Namibia. We have been through the first three and are looping back tomorrow through Botswana again. We will be in and out of some of the countries. Anyway, it is great. There are 21 people in my group and we travel around on a large truck. It is comfy, way better than I thought it would be. It has tables between some of the seats so we are able to even play cards while driving down the road. Some days we travel 500 km’s. Tomorrow our group splits up and we get new people and carry on to Capetown, the very tip of South Africa and the others go to Nairobi.

It is cool when you have to watch out for elephants and giraffes crossing the road. We see these animals at the side of the road often and stop to check them out.

We have been on game drives, cruises and stayed at many different campsites. The tents are nice and we have mattress pads to sleep on. It is very cold at night and I sleep with 3 sweaters on and two pair of socks and pants some times. In the day it is pleasant and I layer a lot of my clothing.

We saw cheetahs eating an impala (a small antelope) only 4 feet from our jeep that we took on a safari. They had just caught their kill. The national park is not fenced and our vehicle was open so there was no protection from the wild animals that were only 2 – 4 feet from our vehicle. It has been really cool.

We saw a pack of lions and then we saw a male lion, like the one in lion king approaching our vehicle and his lioness. They were about 200m’s away and walked right up and around our vehicle and carried on to where they were going. That was awesome.

We have seen many elephants, rhinos, hippos, giraffes and impalas. The animals are spectacular and we are so close to them. It is hard to imagine they are everywhere. When before this I had only seen some of them in a zoo.

The group of people are great and we went on a booze cruise last night and everyone partied it up. It was well deserved. It was all you can drink for 2 hours. We saw a crocodile, hippos and elephants.

In a couple of hours I am going on a micro light plane (it looks light a large kite) over Victoria Falls, which is similar to Niagara Falls.

Sorry I will have to post the photos at a later date as we do not have internet access very often and when we do it is really slow.