You know one of the things I really love about Central Asia? The tradition of hospitality. I was just walking down the street in Istaravshan having a wander at the end of a transit day, and asked these dudes whether the left turn or right turn down their street lead […]
Travel Words
Hohhot (R)
Hohhot was, in my experience, a dreadful city. Not much to do, nowhere decent to stay on the cheap, and really difficult to understand public transit system. My one really positive memory from Hohhot was the 5 Tower Temple, which looks so stunningly NOT Chinese-Buddhist that I had to hang […]
Checking out Chengde (R)
Chengde, as the seat of the Summer Retreat of the Manchu emperors, has a lot of history going for it. There are Buddhist temples around town in each of the styles that was prevalent at the time the Emperors there ruled, to show their unity with and understanding of their […]
Road Trip: Tajikistan and the Tunnel of Death (R)
I’ve been on any number of dodgy jeep/van/bus rides in my life, but nowhere in the world have these trips made me fear for my life twice in as many weeks. Tajikistan, then, deserves some sort of medal for the accomplishment. The mountain road from Istaravshan to Penjikent starts out […]
Rockin’ the Inaka. (R)
My JET-set fraternity-brother Matt lived for a while in what could perhaps best be described as the outskirts of the fringes of the suburbs of a city (Sendai) you had never heard of until the recent environmental disasters. The name of Matt’s town, as far as I can remember, was […]
Kulikalon Camping (R)
You know that feeling when sometimes you just need to get away? Leave cities and civilizations behind and jsut get out into nature? I was having one of those days about a week into Tajikistan. So I stayed here, for three nights. Climbing unfortunately snowy mountain passes during the day […]
Hey there! I'm Stephen, this is my travel blog, and that's me in the poofy hat.
I'm a photographer / writer traveling since 2008, and I've been doing my best to visit amazing places.
My current focus is Central Asia, because for a hiking and camping enthusiast it's as good as it gets.