Trans -Africa begins!

My Trans-Africa adventure is off to a start! The flight from Luton airport to Gibraltar was a short two and a half hours. As soon as the plane landed I met up with the other Oasis group members and we boarded the truck that will be my home for the next 40 weeks!





As soon as we got to camp, we set up our beds for the night! Ah, I am so happy to finally have my own bed! Now, it might not look like much to you but I am super happy to have it!


Here are the tents we are using. They have excellent mosquito netting sewn into them and are nice and roomy!





Even though we landed in Gibraltar, our campsite was just across the border in Spain! We stayed here for two nights, just long enough to see the big rock of Gibraltar, the monkeys and the very cool airport runway that has a road going through it!









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Camels and Elephants!

From Jaisalmer we went out into the desert for a camel ride! In Southern India we spent a lot of time in Tiger reserves, looking for wild tigers and elephants! We didn't see any tigers but we have seen tons of elephants. Some of them were wild and some of the were tame!

Rice

In India, the farmers grow a lot of rice! In the province of Kerala we stayed one the backwaters. This region known for it's rice farming and is sometimes referred to as the "rice bowl" of India. Most of the rice in India is still picked by hand! We had an opportunity to wander around the rice fields and even encountered some rice drying on the road! Here are some photos of rural India!

Chocolate and Spice!

In India, people cook with a lot of spice and the food always has excellent flavor! In South India we went to visit a spice garden to see the kinds of spices that are grown for export and use in the kitchen! We went to Abraham's garden and then, his wife cooked us an authentic Indian meal. Of course, we ate it with our hands because that is the way it is done in India!

Ever wonder where your chocolate comes from? Well, according to Abraham It comes from his back yard! Chocolate actually comes from cocoa tree! That's right, your Cadbury chocolate bar starts off growing on a tree! Let's look at it.

Inside that big fruit is our chocolate! The pod contains 20 to 60 seeds, usually called "beans", embedded in a white pulp. The pulp ( like on an orange) actually tasted quite good! But the cocoa powder used for chocolate is inside the bean.

We found all sorts of other delights in this garden as well, like cinnamon and peppers, coffee trees, ginger, durian fruits.... As we were walking through the garden I decided to chew on a cinnamon leaf!

Tea Plantation

In Coonoor, in the southern hilltop region of India we visited a tea plantation to learn how tea is grown and harvested. This region of India is famous for it's tea and it is exported all over the world. Do you have Indian tea in your cupboard? Here is a quick look at how things are done!

The tea grows in huge fields with a few trees that help with the water levels in the soil. The crop is picked 34 times a year, by HAND. Here, we saw the ladies in the fields picking the tea leaves.

The tea leaves are then set out on big tables with industrial fans under them. The tea is left like this for 10 hours to dry out. then it is drpped through a hole in the floor and goes through a crushing machine in the basement, when it comes out it is soft.

Next, the leaves go through a series of heating and cooling. When they are heated the color changes from green to brown. Then the brown leaves are roasted over coal. In the end they come out of the roaster looking more like the tea in our tea bags!

Now the tea is ready to be bagged for sale!

The Taj Mahal.

Marvy and I made a visit to the Taj Mahal! What a beautiful building. Nothing can really prepare you for how amazing this place is! Did you know, the pillars on the sides of the building a build at a slight angle? They are specifically designed so that if an earthquake hits, they will fall away from the building! Now that, is what I call beginning with the end in mind!

The last picture shows the amazing flowers that are on the inside of the building. All of the flowers are made of different semi-precious stones, like lapis lazuli and then inlayed into the marble. it all fits together like a puzzle!

Marvy in India -Castles and forts

India as you may know is a huge country like Canada. Just like we have provinces India has many different states (about 28). Before the 28 states of India became one country, each area had it's own King! The King was called the Mahārāja and he and his family ruled over the people living in the area. The various Mahārāja's all lived in castles and built forts to protect their Kingdoms! Imagine a whole country FULL of old castles! Well, Marvy and I saw tons of really amazing things! This first picture is in Jaisalmer, doesn't it look like a sandcastle? The very cool thing about this fort is that people still live inside it! The streets and alleyways inside the main wall are full of little shops and small homes!

In Jodhpur, the Mehrangarh Fort was simply overwhelming! When I was up close to it, it was so big I couldn't even get Marvy in the picture! You can see us way down in the town square with the fort above us on the hill. they sometimes call Jodhpur the "blue city" because from the fort you can see all the houses in the old part of town are painted blue! The blue dye used helps keep the Mosquitos away!

in Udaipur the castles were overwhelming! The most famous one is in the middle of a lake and is now a very expensive hotel. All along the Banks of the river are other Palaces.

In Jaipur we visited the The amber fort. It was gigantic way up on a hill wi other forts behind it! This city also had a palace and other amazing buildings!

This fort even had a secret tunnel in it that connects it to the other forts nearby!

The Castle we saw in Mysore in southern India was by far my favorite. It had a huge room that was all open on one side to the outside!

Marvy in China

Hello Everyone! As you know, Marvy Mountain and I have been traveling through Asia together for the last 4 months. We spent one month in China where we saw, the great wall, Panda bears, and the terra-cotta soldiers as well as huge cities like Beijing and Shanghai. We even went for a bike ride in the countryside!

While in China we visited the great wall. This was a really exciting day and something I had been looking forward to for a very long time! Did you know the Great Wall of China was built over 2000 years ago ? Did you know, the wall is over 6000km long and SO BIG you can see it space? The Great Wall was originally built over 2000 years ago, as a way to keep China safe from foreign invaders! There are many watch towers built into the wall where soldiers could keep watch.

It is estimated that there are 1500 wild pandas left in 3 provinces of China. Pandas don't hibernate and are active in the winter. At the Panda Sanctuary, they stay in the air conditioning in the summer. In the wild they live at high altitudes in the summer (2000-3000 meters) and travel lower in the winter to 800-1000m.

Panda's can be almost 2 meters tall, but new babies are only 100 grams,pink, and blind. From, 0-2 months they drink milk. At 4 months they learn to walk and at 6 months they eat bamboo. There are 160 in captivity and they are considered to be a Chinese national treasure. There is a 1 million dollar fee to rent a bear from the Chinese government. This is why very few Pandas live in Zoos around the world.

Imagine digging in your back yard one day, and finding a huge, ancient soldier, made completely out of clay over 2000 years ago! Well, such a discovery may not be very likely in good old Red Deer but that is exactly what happened to a farmer in China! Once all the digging was over 6000 life-size terra-cotta soldiers were uncovered! Some of the statues they found are kneeling with weapons ready to shoot. Some have mustaches and armor. They also found terracotta horses, spears, and chariots - all life-size, all made out of clay! The coolest part is, every soldier in the army is different, no two are alike. Here is a glimpse of the terra-cotta army in Xi'An.

What is really interesting, is that the digging is still happening! The archeologists are working hard to repair the damage done by years of being under a farmers field!

In Yangshuo, we went for a rural bike ride! We went through lots of rice fields and along a beautiful river!