When I planned my trip to Japan I wasn’t even really aware of the Japanese holiday called ‘Golden Week‘. I chose my flight dates based both on the approximate best time for my walking pilgrimage and also to be back in time for my daughter’s birthday, but soon after I discovered that Golden Week began the day after I arrived and that there was a couch surfing group that was going on a trip together.

This sounded like a fun introduction to Japan, and would give me an opportunity to meet local Japanese people and practice some Japanese myself.

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I made it to Japan with no mishaps.

A long flight, but almost completely empty! I’ve never seen a plane so empty and the flight attendant I talked to said she hadn’t either except maybe 15 years ago on a New Years eve or something.

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Kyoto was for a long time the Imperial city of Japan, thus it has quite a bit to see and is supposed to be a beautiful place.

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Osaka isn’t as large or have as many things to do as Tokyo, but I’ve heard it’s a very different flavor of city and has it’s own things to offer.

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Tokyo is one of the most densely populated cities in the world. And there is so much to do there. I’m sure I will barely scratch the surface in the few weeks I’m there, but here are a few of the things I am interested in seeing:

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I’m finally taking my dream trip to Japan! I’ve been planning this trip for about 3 years, so it’s a long time coming. And because it’s the place I most want to visit, I made sure to plan to be over there for the maximum time that the standard US Passport instant visa will allow…

Want to know what kind of stuff I’ll be doing over there? Then read on…

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As I sat down to write about my trip to the Galapagos Islands, I began to think how small and ordinary the tales I was about to tell in comparison to the wonder and incredible beauty of the animals I saw.

There is something so amazing about swimming with sea lions, turtles, penguins and iguanas; when you are just a visitor in their environment and they continue right about their business and will approach within inches of you out of curiosity.

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The flight to Cusco was an easy one taking only a little over an hour. But right away I could feel the altitude. Just walking out of the airport felt like I had been running instead of walking at a fast pace. Don’t underestimate how poorly the altitude can make you feel. More »

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Well, actually it was 3 weeks in Peru and 2 weeks in Ecuador, but that makes for a bit of a long title.

I wanted to do very little pre-planning on this trip and just see how things flowed. I had some general plans like seeing Machu Picchu and the Galapagos Islands, but didn’t want to figure out everything in advance and micro-manage my days. So really the only thing I did was have the ticket for my flight in and out of Lima.

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This is my second Burning Man experience and it feels much different than the first time. I don’t know if it is because I have already been exposed to all of the excitement before, if there is just a different energy in the air, or people around seem to be more withdrawn this year. More »

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