Final Travel Blog 4-28 thru 4-30

4-28-10

on this fine day brian took the morning off so he could take me to taroko gorge. this is something i had to see and do before i had officially completed my taiwanese experience. we got up early, which made me quite sad, however we got on the scoots quick and made our way to taroko. this made me excited and i woke up more and became oh so happy. The weather was very nice when we got up. nice sunny and warm. as we rode on the scooters wr drove through the taiwanese graveyards on the way to taroko. the graveyards are soo wierd. i don't exactly understand the thoughts behind these graves, but they look like little toy cities. all kinds of graves that are small houses. they have one mini door and all kinds of pretty colors. they are actually really cool to see. anyways we continued on to taroko and it started to sprinkle once we hit the hill to go up taroko gorge. we suited up with our rain gear and pushed on. we started up the hill and were doing just fine. after we had gone for about 30 minutes up we had our first stop. we stopped at a memorial for the taroko gorge road. the road connects the east side to the west side of taiwan. it was a mjor undertaking when it was built. the memorial was for the people who passed away durring the creation of this road... there were three beatuful temple type things along the hillside. one has a waterfall going through it and into the river in the gorge. it was a sight to see. very pretty and super unique. we continued on and within 5 minutes we were taking off the rain gear and sweaters because it was so hot. our next stop was one where we got to go on a walk. we walked up somewhere in the gorge on a small path that was through small caves and tube/barrels of rock. you could see the river flowing through the gorge from the path and it was very nice. on the path you had to wear hard hats. someone was walking the path in the past and hit on the head by falling rock. the hard hats were cool. it made me feel like a construction worker! we continued our walk until we had gotten to the end. we walked back and got on the bikes for more adventures. we rode for a bit and stopped at a lookout point. we looked out and it wasn't too exciting so we got back on the bikes and practiced doing wheelies. brian had some very nice wheelies, while i had some nice ones as well. Again we continued on our journey. we got to a spot where there was a suspension bridge over a river and a sweet lookout point. brian parked his bike and i romped the scooter up onto the bridge. i gunned the scooter on the middle of the bridge for fun and the tire started spinning. i lost traction and did a burnout right towards going off the bridge. luckily the scooter stopped before me and it were flying down into the rocky riverbed. brian and i crossed the bridge and i found out that the bridge was so wet and slippery i could hold the front brake on the scooter and gun the scooter. this made the tire spin and i stayed in place. the tire got spinning so fast it started smoking. i looked at the wet bridge where i did burnouts, they were now dry because they got so hot from burnouts. we finished our exploring on the lookout spot and headed out. while i was riding over the bridge on the scooter brian thought it would be oh so funny to jump up and down and shake the bridge on me. it scared the poop out of me! we continued on up the gorge to some spot i think was called the curtain waterfall or something like that. we found the path opened, there is usually a gate so you need to hike, but we were able to ride the bikes! the path was super sketchy. right on the side of a cliff and it was sooooo muddy and slippery. i took one mini spill and got my shoes muddy. so sad! we made it ot the curtain and it was cool. its a cave/tunnel that has a waterfall coming out of the rocks above your head in the tunnel. so you walk into this pitch black cave and start feeling your way through until you can see the light coming from the other side. at that point you can start feeling the waterfall raining down on you. alittle further in and you are in the gnarliest shower you've ever had. we played in the waterfall and had our eyes adjust to the darkness. once our eyes were adjusted we made it through the tunnel without a problem. next spot we headed to was the natural hot springs. we got there and they were closed off. we knew this prior to going. i guess they have been closed for a LONG time. you get to a rock tunnel and there is a gate with a pretty small space over the top. you climb over this fence and squeeze between the fence and the rock roof to continue. once we both made it over the fence we went down the slippery wooden stair path to the springs. we made it the springs and got in. the springs were in the river. the river flowed and coming out of the rocks beside the river was the sulfery hot hot water! people had created little pools with rocks so the hot water would flow in the pools, and the cold water from the river would stay out. some spots were cold and others were hot. we decided part of the pools was too cold because the water was flowing in from the river. we created a dam and rerouted the water awy from our pools of hot water. we did this for about an hour and did a pretty good job. our dam looked great! we got back in the pools of hot water and couldn't tell the difference, but the dam was still very nice! I decided i would try to go down a "slide" in the river. basically it was a rapid spot. it was smooth rock that was right in the middle of the river. it was pretty small so i decided it was going to be quite nice. i slide down the slide. at the bottom it sucked me under water and churned me around for a while. while being churned it slammed my booty right into a huge rock. it hurt real bad. shortly after i was released from the churning water. i was about 10 yards down the river. i came up and brian was laughing. i came up laughing, but in pain from a bruised booty. brian found a much nice softer slide. he tried it and i followd shortly after. this slide was from a marbled rock into a nice pool of water. it was great. the river water was cold so we got into the pools again to warm up for the hike back to the bikes. we got back to the bikes and slowly made our way back down the gorge to get some lunch. we made it back and ate some lunch. i then ran all kinds of erands i needed to do to pack up and get ready for my journey back to the states. brian went to work for the eve. we met up in the eve for some cruizn around the st. markets. we didn't do too much other than walk around. that was it for the day.

4-29-10
today the crew got together for lunch at country mothers for some good eats. after a meal we decided to go to tingben. i believe its a national park type of thing. its pretty much a river coming down from the mountains. we traveled up until we got to a sweet pool in the river. this was our destination. willie, brian, charlie, john and i changed into our boardies and walked down the path. to the water. willie was sick so he didn't get in the water, but the rest of us gingerly got in because the water is COLD! brian crawled over the rocks to the cliffside to jump off into the river. i attempted this same rocky path only to slip into the water. i decided to swim the rest of the way to the cliff. john also swam over. the 3 of us climbed up the cliffside to do some sweet stunts into the river. it was pretty high up, im not good at estimating height, but i was scrd. me john and brian all jumped off at the same time. it was a wonderful jump. no one bonked into eachother in the air or the water! the water very cold when you hop in. it wasn't cold enough to take your breath away, but it was chilly. charlie was being a baby boo hoo eyes and wouldnt get in the water with us. the 3 of us climbed up for the rock jump again and hollered at charlie until he FINALLY came up to jump with us. we all 4 jumped off the rock jump and again perfect success! we got out jumping out of the water shortly after because the others needed to be getting to work soon. we drove back and i was going to do some more things to tie up loose ends in taiwan. well i got to chuckles shot. hes the mechanic to get a tune up on the white scooter. thanks to brian and iwllie for letting me use the beast. anyways i get the tune up and no wallet. shit!!! it must have fallen out in tungben when i changed from boardies back into my shorts. its a solid hour drive to get there and it started POURING rain. i didn't have rain gear so i just charged it. by the time i made it to tungben i was soaking wet. i did however find my wallet sitting in the plants right where i changed. it was a great relief. i went back paid chuckles and did some other erands. after finishing up erands brian and willie got off work and we went to visit our taiwanese families, tims family and johns family. we visited had some food and said our goodbyes. the familes in taiwan that i grew close to i will never forget. they are the kindest most giving amazing people i have ever met. i will miss them very much. after saying goodbyes we headed back to the house ot have some goodbye drinks. we chatted drank for a bit and then sacked out. what a great final day in taiwan.

4-30-10

its time to leave taiwan. i had alot of travel time planned to get back to the states. it started out in the morning saying goodbye to willie and brian for letting me stay at the house nad being the most incredible hosts i've ever had. these 2 guys really took me in and taiwan and made my trip what it was. without them the trip would have been totally different i wouldn't have had as much fun. im forever in debt to these guys for what they did. thanks a bunch guys! anyways charlie and i drove to the train station with my gear to start my travel. i got on a 2 hour train to get to taipei. after ariving tapie i took a short 15 minute walk to the bus station where i caught an hour bus ride to the airport. 2 hours in the airport waiting for my flight. 12 hours on the flight home. pops picked me up at LAX and s 2 hour drive to the house in esco. IM FINALLY HOME!!! dinner was an epic carne asada burrito from pacific taco and a classic budwieser. I have mixed emotions about being home. im so glad to see the family and have the wonderul amenities of the us, but i miss the travling lifestyle. either way im back home and its good to be home. this will conclude my blog of this adventure. i can't wait until my next adventure!

4-14 thru 4-27

well another mega update because i've been busy doing activities. heres the status i'll go from oldest activities to newest activities. i will begin with the 14th.

4-14-10
today brian and i decided to go out to this lake somewhere in the hills of taiwan. im not exactly sure what it was called, but it was a beautiful lake. i was pretty stoked on just cruizn slow so i got to see the landscape alot. it was incredibly green and beautiful. there were people working in rice fields wearing awesome rice hats, there were crazy dogs yelling and chasing me, and it was a wonderful drive overall. we got to the lake and the weather was warm and nice. the reason we went to the lake was so we oculd ride on the paddle boats. the paddle boats are the boats that have bicycle style pedals and you peddle really fast which turns a paddle thing in the back and this is how you move. each paddle boat is a different animal or creature. they had frogs, dragons, turtles, swans, of course paddla pandas. we chose the panda bear paddle boat and hopped in and started paddling around the lake. you sit towards the front of these boats so with me and brian in them we weighed it down pretty good in the front. that made our paddle in the back not sit to deep in the water. this in turn made it so the paddle didn't push us much and we had peddle super hard the whole time to move so we we working like crazy to get nowhere. we made it from one side of the lake to the other and decided to beach the panda yatch and go ashore. we played with a caterpillar that was black and yellow. we released him and got back on the panda. we paddled back and tried to jump the boat over some wakes that the speed boats were making. it didn't work at all. we rode the panda bear backwards for a while because our legs were tired from peddling forward. we docked and walked around the small town. we got some papaya smoothies and continued our walk. these taiwanese people came up to us and wanted to take a picture with us. the guys told us the girls thought we were handsome! awesome. so we did a pic with just the gals, then just the guys, then everyone. so silly! so we headed back to the scooters for the ride home. on the way home we saw a street market we stopped by. it was a gnarly one. they had full chickens there, all kinds of animal brains, and other animal parts. i kept asking everyone what the food was and what part it was. very interesting. we rode back home and brian left for work. i hung out until dinner time. we ate somewhere i don't remember, then we went shopping for a bit and i got some sweet jeans. then we headed to tim's house becuse we needed him to help us plan our journey to green island. he set us up with the hotel and ferry ride. tim is a legend, he's like family to us he helps us with everything and really cares for us. after letting us know he had set up green island he fed us tons of food. he owns a small street shop. we ate some gnarly stuff that tasted great! chicken butt, some intestine, fried coagulated pigs blood in rice, and some other random stuff. sounds nasty, but its local food and its good. after this we headed on home.

4-16
the eve of friday the 16th we got on the road me, brian, and brett. brett is a friend we had met in indo who brian convinced to stop over in taiwan for a few days to hang out. anyways we rented him a scooter and i borrowed dan's old scooter because the white scooter couldn't handle the trip to green island. anyways we left about 7 or 8 in the eve. we had to do a stop over at a surf stop because i had borrowed brians phone to get in touch with another buddy to surf. well when we got back from surfing the phone was gone. i looked all day and couldn't find it. the only thing we could think of was that it was in the sand somewhere. we raced around in the deep sand and i dipped the scooter once. we went to that exact spot at dark and what do you know the phone was sitting on the sand. what a relief! anyways he got on our journey. the plan is to stop over at our friends house near the ferry to sleep and then surf in the morning. we got to our buddies house after getting lost at about 1 AM. we went in and instantly sacked out. everyone on their own couch. i didn't sleep to well because there were dogs constantly having barking competitions outside the house.

4-17-10
we got up at about 5AM to hit the surf. we looked at a few spots and decided on donghueo. surf was super fun. i would compare the wave to lower trestles. it was really nice. waves were pumping i got a few barrels and some other waves that were just long workable faces. we all had a blast here, but we were super tired. after surfing we gave our boards to "bebe" to hold for us until we got back from green island. shes one of the local surfer chicks. we got on the scoots and raced to the ferry. we got there with about 5 minutes until the ferry left. we grabbed tickets and ran onto the ferry. the ride was about a half hour and it was pretty rough. brian has a track record of getting sea sick so i was kinda worried about him. i sacked out most of the ride and brian made it thro just fine. i think brett was feeling a little sick, but not like brian. it was funny when we got off the boat brian told me and brett to look at the back of all the seats around us. we did and every single one had a barf bag full of barf. i laughed so hard and we felt bad for the guy who had to clean everything up. anyways we got off the boat and met up with a guy named paul. he had lived in the states and went to school there so his english was perfect. he lead us to get scooters and also to our room. we took a short nap in the room and got on to doing stuff. we cruized all around and looks for places to snorkle. we stopped at our first stop and got off the scooters to walk around. we found abandoned buildings that were built from coral, stone, and cement. they were really cool. we continued on to this big cave. after the cave we walked around in the tide pools. you had to be super careful on this tide pools because it was all lava rock. it had super sharp sketchy rock all over so we had to be careful. we found some tide pools with all kinds of critters in them. i found one that had a big eel in it. he swam around and kept peeking his head out of the water and showing his teeth. he had big blue eyes and was really cool. he swam into another pool and the crabs came running out of the water it was funny. we left the cave and tide pools and this is when we found the legendary "race track"... the race track we made was just a circle track in the dirt. there were jumps, sand, and dirt to race around in. we rode laps in this for hours, jumping the rental scooters, doing donuts, and racing through the sand. we had a BLAST!!! after that we headed to the actual diving spot. i remembered something on the w y to the dive spot that if you turn the key on a car or bike or scooter while moving and turn it back on it will backfire. i learned this in mexico. anyways we figured out how to do it and rode around the island scaring people and dogs with the loud backfire. brians scooter worked best and i cried laughing so hard at people getting scared and popping the bikes! we made it to our destination and walked to the water. we had to go through some gnarly sharp plans but it was ok. we walked part way out to the water on the rock reef again and found a pool that was deep enough to swim in. so we hopped in. we saw all kinds of fishes and corals. we even found some lobster. we tried to capture them, but the swam back in their little lobster holes out of our reach. we kept swimming and made it to the end of the pool. we hopped into the ocean and were blown away with how clear the water was. you could see for a solid 30-40 meters and the water was sooooo blue and clear. we swam all around and played with all kinds of fish. brian found a sweet spot with tons of clown fish aka nemos. we swam by them and played with their enenemies. they looked kinda agro and mean so we didn't play with them too long. we got kinda cold after a while and headed in. we decided we should ride around the island. we did that and sotpped at random spots to look at things. we found a cave that had some random worship stuff in it, some goats i petted, and some sweet lookout spots. we got some food at the local sushi place. we got sashimi and it was darn good. we stopped at the room for another rest stop and headed back out with plans of snorkeling exploring and having some drinks. we started our journey around the island again. we had to stop at the race track again. we were there doing stunts for house again. we left as tour groups started to frequent the spot. they were all walking on the dirt while we were jumping our rental scooters, shooting sand way up in the air, and crashing them. we didn't want to get arrested or in trouble so we left shortly after. we backfired more people and found a really cool lookout spot. you could see the coast of the island and it was beautiful we stopped in there for some beers and continued on our journey. we lapped the island and decided since it was getting dark it would be ok to go race the scoots again. we did and had a blast. then we sat on the beach watching the sunset and just chilling. we relaxed until after dark. we all talked about the food we missed, some of our surf sessions on our journeys, and that we all kinda missed home. it was cool. after that we ran back to the store to get some snacks and a beer for our next adventure. we were going to go to the hot springs here. we had tickets to go that came with our hotel package. we drove to the springs, and on the way we stopped at the light house on the island. it was closed so we couldn't go in it or near it. we were sad. on the way back to the main road i saw a boy with fireworks. i asked him where he got them and he told me. we got a mega pack of bottle rockets and some other fireworks. we did a few messing around and then we all headed to the springs. we got there after driving slow in the rain. there i was told that this was 1 of 3 hot springs in the world that was a natural salt water hot spring. it was super hot water and really fun. there were different levels of heat in different springs. there was waterfalls that landed on your back as a massage. it was really relaxing and we all needed it after a day full of adventures. brian ended up dropping the bottle rockets somewhere we have no clue where. i had a few more in my scooter so we did those and then went to bed.

4-18-10
we got up at about 8 or so and got on the scooters for some more water activities. i tried to convince the boys to stop off at the race track, but we didn't think we had enough time and getting in the water to snorkle was deffinately a priority. we got to a spot brian told us was the best spot he had seen here at green island. we got in the water and he was deffinately right. i have never seen clearer water than that spot in green island. it was like being in a freshwater pool you could see everything and there were fish everywhere! we started off by seeing all kinds of unique fish, some looks like they had faces of whales, some were the classic rainbow wrass, and quite a few puffer fish. we kept trying to catch the puffer fish until brian finally caught one. he brought it up from the depths and we all got a chance to hold it and play with it. once they are puffed up they are so slow they can't escape unless you let them.we let him go and did some more snorkeling. it was incredible water super fun. we found holes in the reef you could swim into that turned into under water caves. you swim through them until you get to an opening somewhere in the coral to get out. we found awesome caves like this. some so long you thought you wouldn't be able to make it out in one breath and some you swam into and out of easily. some of them had some good current pulling you back so you'd think you could make it through no problem and then the current pulled you back. the technique was to grab reef and pull yourself through. either way it was beautiful, and very exciting. i didn't wear my wetsuit top and got knocked into the reef many times in the underwater tunnels. i had a bunch of little scratches from the reef, but it was so fun it was worth it for sure. we got out of the water finally and had to rush back grab our stuff and get on the ferry back to the main land. we got to the mainland met up with friends and decided to surf, but not before we went to play with some wild monkeys. me brett and our buddy casey headed to the spot thta had the monkeys. we brought some fruit we had to feed them. casey fed them fruit by hand. i decided a long time ago monkeys scare the shit out of me so i did not partake in the hand feeding. prior experiences of wild monkeys jumping on my back, stealing my hat, and showing their teeth at me was enough of an experience for me. i threw them food from a distance. we finished with our food and then went to surf. again we caught some damn near perfect swell. we scored tons of waves until we were sooo tired we were ready to pass out. we all packed on the scooters for a nice somewhat rainy drive home. it took us forever and we had to wear our rain gear, but we made it home and sacked out for the night.

4-19-10
this day was kind of a WASTE because it was just traveling. nothing too fun, but still exciting so i'll write a short bit about it. i woke up late, i was supposed to call my pops, blew it and didn't, i got to my train at the perfect time. made it to the airport and flew for like 2 hours to okinawa japan. got off the plane and the time was an hour different so it was dark. i had to get money from an atm to ride on the train. no atm anywhere so i caught a cab who drove me to an atm. then took me to my hostel. i got in chatted with some other hostel friends and sacked out. pretty uneventful day. made some plans to go to an island off of the coast of japan called tokashiki island the next day. i stayed in a "pravate room" this night, that means it wasn't 10 bunk beds in 1 room. it was only one and i was alone. yay.

4-20-10
woke up early so we could journey to tokashiki island. the crew was me, my new german friend claudia, my mixed canadian azn friend gerald, and finally a new japanese friend names julienne. we all met at the hostel and decided to journey together! we hopped on the early fairy to the island. i didn't have enough money so like a loser i had to borrow some for the ferry ticket. my bank only let me take out 10,000 yen per day aka 100 bucks. and japan is expensive. i had run out by the 2nd day and atms were super hard to come by that took a usa atm card. anyways i borrowed some money and we got on the dang ol ferry. gerald felt super sick and i thought he was gonna spew and i was sitting by him. he didn't spew and we all made it to tokashiki island in about 30 minutes. we got off the boat and looked for our bus to one of the beaches. a man approached us and told us that he would give us a ride in the taxi for less than the bus. we hopped on the taxi and headed to our beach destination. we got there and we were all so hungry we had to stop to eat. we stopped in at a little supermarket 7/11 type of place and got some food. i got some fruit and bread. yeah for breakfast! after breaky we headed down to the beach. the water was crystal clear, blue, and not another person on the beach. we were AMPED. me and julienne got super excited and grabbed our gear and headed out for a snorkel. the others lagged behind. we snorkled for about an hour then saw that claudia was maker her way towards us. we went to h er and she snorkled with us as well. the fish were really cool and agressive! we had butterfly fish swarm all over us. they thought we had food. we would rub our fingers together when we saw them and they would instantly swim to us. i had a school of about 30 fish swimming by me at one point. i tried to escape, but they followed me. they even got so brave as to bite my fingers! they didn't hurt at all. so i kept pretending i had food and they kept biting my fingers. it was a really cool and fun experience! we all had a blast in the water and we decided to re up on the sunscreen and then explore a little. we walked aorund the beach and found a really cool lookout spot up on a cliff so you could see the whole beach we were staying at it was really a sight to see. you could see the dark areas in the water where the coral reef was at and the white white sand underwater the bright green trees all around the beach and the pearl white sand. it was an incredibly beautiful spot. i was stoked to be there. we next went to a local eatery for some lunch. we had the okinawa special which is a noodle soup with pork. we also had a small bit of sashimi. it was a pretty solid lunch i must say. after lunch we headed back to the beach for a snorkel. we got in the water and tried a new spot. we found out that we were not supposed to be ther because of boat traffic so we swam to the safe zone. this time the water was murkey on tap because of the water temp. the surface temp was at least 10 degrees warmer than the water that was about 4 feet deep. this made it murkey on the top. it was harder to see the fish and coral clearly unless you dove down and held your breath. i did that the whole time and had a blast doing that and seeing all kinds of fish. the group snorkled until we were too tired to snorkle more. we next headed to another beach on tokashiki to see more fish and do more snorkeling. this beach however, didn't have much coral and there weren't too many fish. we went on a short walk together then i went to sleep on this covered area while the rest of the group explored. i gathered that they didn't do too much so i was ok with the nap i took. after napping our taxi came again and we took the taxi to the ferry. the ride home was super nice and smooth. i hung out with a bunch of japanese people about the same age as me on the ferry. we did yoga and hung out and chatted the whole way home. it was very fun. once home we unpacked and headed to the city for some food. we went from place to place looking for some good eats. we never found anything perfect. we finally settled on a place. i walked in and walked out. it was too expensive and the portions were too small for my taste so i went to the good ol american mcdonals. i spent half as much and got twice as much food. i was stoked. after that we walked home on the big tourist st. we saw all kinds of things. the one thing that stuck in my mind was alcohol bottles with cobras in the bottles. it was scary i don't think i would ever drink something like that. after exploring eating and looking at crazy snake drinks we went to bed. i had a busy day of travel with plans to travel north and i needed my rest. i slept in the hostel with the dorm style rooms so i slept in a room with 4 other people in bunck beds. it was cool but one old man kept walking in and out of the room and decided to be super loud and wake up early. he was a rascal and he made me angry by waking me up!

4-21-10
On this day we got up and got ready to go out on adventures pretty late. we were all a little sunburnt from the adventures the day prior and it really took it out of us. anyways we got up did some walking to get some food. i decided i really wanted to see something called the japanese naval underground. it was an underground bunker with tunnels all over that the japanese used in okinawa durring ww2. we took a taxi to the place and it was cheap because we all split the cost. we arrived and it was kind of interesting you walk in and then start going down these stair deeper and deeper until you get down deep enough to feel the temperature get colder. it was crazy to read that the whole tunnel was dug out by pick axes. you could see all the pick axe markings on the wall, it was nutty!!! we continued on and i got to learn about hte japanese side of ww2. it was crazy to read some of the horror stories. one room in particular that was very interesting was a room that had mostly plaster like walls with all kinds of wholes in it. the room was one of the rooms that was like a "captains room" so it was for the higher ups in the navy. anyways the inscription on the wall said "wall rittled with hand grenade - when commited suiside". That was a very intense thing to read. that kind put the war into a better perspective for me. after that we kinda just cruized in and around the tunnels until there was no more tunnel to explore. we left theh tunnels and attempted to score another taxi. all taxis were taken so we started hoofing it to find a bus station. we got down a big hill and found a supermarket to get some food. we then ate and as we finished a taxi rolls up. we hopped in and made it back to the hostel. After arriving at the hostel i quickly packed up because i was going to a city to the north called nago. it was away from the city and was near the okinawa aquarium which is supposed to be one of, if not hte best aquarium in the world! so i got on the tram, then got on a bus for 3 hours and got off at my stop in nago. i didn't really have directions to my next hostel so i started hoofing to where i thought it was at. i made it about 3 miles trying to ask people where it was until i finally found someone who would help. thank you kfc japanese man for drawing me a map. the sad part was i had walked about 3 miles in the wrong direction with a heavy ass backpack full of stuff! dang. i walked back and it sprinkled off and on until i got to the hostel. i dropped my stuff on my bed and walked to the deck where there were hammocks hung overlooking the beach. i rested snoozed and regained my strength with some snacks. i decided it was time to explore so i walked onto the beach which is about 10 yards from the door to my hostel. It was literallr right on the beach. so i walked up and down the beach collecting shells and skipping rocks. the beach was really cool, there was very little sand, you walked on broken coral almost the whole time. After walking a while i got back to the hostel at dark and decided to hit the sack. i heard alot of noise outside my room so i got up and joined the festivities. i met some german women who were bikers, they were also obviosly lesbos. so the biker dykes from germany and i sat and ate sushi and relaxed. they had beer too so i joined in on a beer as well. after that one of the locals came out with some sort of chinese 3 string guitar and started playing and singing. we all got up and danced for a while. after dancing he brought out another guitar and he and i played for everyone. it was a blast! at the point it was getting past midnight so i hit the sack to prep for my big day at the aquarium.

4-22-10
i woke up and got dressed quick to get to the bus station for the aquarium. i caught my bus and got to the drop point shortly after. i could either catch another bus, walk, or catch a taxi the rest of the way. i thought it was close so i decided to walk. I also missed the bus so... well i walked lost for about an hour before making it to the aquarium. i got in and was instantly in awe of the place. each room had a theme with the fish. deep reef, shallow reef, open water, deep open water, ect. i walked from room to room being so stoked! i finally got to the main room. it was a huge room it looked like a movie theatre, it had seating for hundreds of people and where a movie screen is usually at was the mega tank. it had whale sharks, tuna, giant sharks, dorado, jacks, and everything else you could think of. i sat and watched for about an hour an a half or more before i got up to walk up to the tank. i walked up and i could really tell how giant the fish were. the whale sharkes were giant. about the size of a semi truck! and there were at least 5 or 6 of them in the tank swimming around, that kinda puts how big the tank was into perspective. it was awesome. around the aquarium there were different viewing spots of this tank. you could be in a mini tube looking up at the fish. there was a half circle that let you see the whole tank by distorting the view. it was awesome. i saw a dolphin show after and it was nothing too exciting, if you've been to sea world you've seen it before. next i watched a video on the seas surrounding okinawa island. it was interesting to see how much the people here relied on the ocean. next i went ot the shark tank that had some of the most bizzare sharks in it. they were flat like manta rays, but had teeth coming out every direction from their faces. it was cool. i then walked through the whole aquarium again and spent another 2 hours looking at everything again. at that point i decided it was time to hit the road so i started my walk back to the bus stop. mind you it's about 5 mile walk each way. i walked and came upon a place called the tropical dream something. it was a bunch of green houses holding all kinds of flowers fruits and the local plants. i walked through it and it was soooooo beautiful. i walked into the first greenhouse which was just orchids. they were EVERYWHERE and soooo pretty. the scent when i walked in was overwhelming and so sweet it was amazing. the next room i walked into wa sa fruit room and the sweet citrusee smell was enough to make me sooo hungry i wanted to start plucking fruit from trees to eat. i didn't and moved on. it went like this for about 20 more greenhouses. each one different from the next and sooooo pretty. God's creation is so amazing, I was just in awe of it when i was at the greenhouse place. i left that and got on my walk home. i walked to the bus stop caught a ride and then made it to the hostel. i chilled for a while and then it was time for dinner. i saw a sign for mcdonalds and i was in the mood for a phat burger so i walked 2 miles each way to get me some food. it was wonderful food i was content, full, and ready for some sleep so i hopped in bed and sacked out.

4-23-10
well im in nago still and im just about out of cash so i need to find myself an atm machine that actually takes a visa card. i asked the hostel owners where the nearest one was at. they drew out how i could get their on a map so i was set. they even let me borrow a bike. it started to rain as soon as i got on the bike, but i needed some cash so i could get out and do some activities. i got to the post office, which is where the usa atms are located. this one didn't have an atm so the people drew on my map to get to the bank. i rode the bike in the rain to the bank. i got there and they didn't have atm machines either so they sent me to another bank. that bank didn't have us atms either so that bank sent me to the city office. i got to the city office and they drew on my map how to get to another post office. i got to the post office soacking wet and kinda agro that i couldn't get any cash. this was the last one in town and because i didn't have money i couldn't even pay someone to drive me to an atm so this one had to have it. i walked in and bam atm right there. i slide the card in enter my code and try to get money. 3 times it says it wont work. so im freaking out thinking the cc company put a stop on my card for being used in a bunhc of other countries. i try one last time on the atm machin next to the one i had been trying. first try and yes im in luck i get some cash. by that time it was about 1 in the afternoon, i was soaking wet and hungry! i walked across the st to the convenience store and got a yogurt drink and a muffin for breakfast. i then hopped on my bike and was in good spirits. food and cash and im on top of the world. i get back to the hostel and drop the bike off change into dry clothes and get on the road again. im going to go to the nago pinapple plant. i caught a cab and walked into the pinapple park... it was basically a place where they grew pinapples. back in the day before dole started dominating the industry with the hawaiian pinapple this place was a big deal. now its not such a big deal, but it was really cool. first thing i did was ride in a pinapple car. it was a golf cart with a pinapple on top. it took me on a short ride throgh the park. it had speakers and spoke in english about the pinapple factory. it was pretty sweet. i got off the pinapple car and started my walk through the pinapple factory. first stop was the winery. all you can drink pinapple wine. i dabbled in there for a while and had myself a hefty amount of wine and continued my walk. through the rest of the pinapple park there were venders everywhere with free samples of everything. it was like costco with 10 times more samples and samples in big quantities. i tried everything from pinapple cake, to pinapple chocolate. it was awesome. at the end you get to eat all you can eat pinapples so i partook in that until i was full. then i decided i wanted to do the whole thing over again. i did more pinapple carting, more pinapple wine, more pinapple coockies, ect. i left feeling so full i didn't want to eat the rest of the day. it was wonderful. i went back to the hostel did some reading and then sacked out for the eve.

4-24-10
my final day in japan i didn't have too much planned. i had to make it back to the airport, pick up my stuff i left at the first hostel, and do some beach walking. so i got up and lounged around in my room, did some readin, watched a movie on my ipod and then got up for a walk. i walked ont he beach right in front of the hostel for a few hours. the water was so clear and blue, the weather was nice, and i had time to kill. i combed the beach for sweet shells and some sweet coral. it was so relaxing and nice. i then walked back ot the hostel and took a short nap on the hammock. i listened to the small waves crashing on the beach and the wind chimes. it instantly put me to sleep. i woke up a while later and it was time for me to get on the bus. i grabbed my stuff said goodbye to the hostel staff and hoofed it to the bus station. i got on my bus and rode back to naha. i relaxed on the streets of naha for a while. i found a spot that looked like a nice spot to eat sat down and pulled the little food i had from my bag and ate lunch. after lunch i grabbed my stuff from the hostel and took the metro to the airport. i walked into the airport and my sandal broke! i had my board bag and my backpack full of stuff, but sadly i didn't bring shoes and my damn sandal broke. i talked to the man at the airport who was doing customs stuff and i scored some duct tape. i taped up the sandal and was ready to get on the plane. i got on the plane and rode back to taiwan. once i arrived in taiwan i caught a bus to the train station then hopped on the train to hualien. once at hualen i called brian to pick me up. this is about 1 am. he picked me up and we dropped my stuff off at the house and headed to surfer kens lounge. we hung out at the bar till about 4am and headed in for the night. we got home and insta sacked out. i didn't wake up til about noon. what a great sleep.

4-25-10
today we had planned on doing a bbq with tim and john our tiawanese parents. we met up with them at a beach in ji-ci. the surf was looking ok so we got in the water right away. me, willie, brian, and dan got some fun waves. my 1st two waves were little barrels, but i couldn't make it out of them sadly. we continued surfing until it was time to eat. we came in and ate TONS of food with the group. we had about 10 people at the bbq. it was wonderful to eat taiwanese bbq food. after the bbq i took tim out in the water. he's not a very good swimmer, in fact he can barely swim so it was a very interesting experience. we went boogie boarding for about a half hour. i pushed him onto a couple of waves. some he caught great and some he had some nice wipe outs on. the bottom was all rocks so when you wipe out it scratches your belly pretty well and tim had a nice pink belly. next i took john out in the water. john is also not much of a swimmer, but we got him on some sweet waves and he did great. after catching waves with tim and john i went in a had some more food. i took a short nap/rest and then the surf crew got in the water again. we scored some more waves. it wasn't as good as it was earlier in the day, but we still had some fun. it started looking like rain so we started packing up to get home. it started raining while we were on the road. i didn't want to get soaking wet with all my clothes on so i wore my boardshorts and my wetsuit top home. it kept me warm, but not so dry. we got back to the house all wet from rain and tim invited us to go out to dinner with them later that eve. we cleaned up and met tim for some dinner. we ate at a fish resteraunt and it was darn good. we ate all kinds of things. i didn't know what most were, but it was darn good and i didn't care what it was. we ate our fill and then walked over to giraffe park. the whole crew played arcade games for the next hour and by that time it was getting late and we all were tired from so many activities. we headed for home and a good nights rest.

4-26-10
I didn't do much in the morning on this day. i kinda just chilled. i had fresh mango and an apple for breakfast while sitting on the balcony at brians house. the weather was hot, the sun was shining, and the birds were singing their songs. it was a wonderful way to relax and wake up. after sitting for a while i headed to school to meet brian and willie to do some fun activities. brian told me to bring my boardies so we could get in the water somewhere. so i brought em and we headed out. we stopped in for lunch at an indonesian warung. in thought we could get som classy indo food here in taiwan. the food wasn't much like the food in indo, but it was good so i was happy about that. we ate and while eating the movie the patriot was on. we saw all the good parts finished our food and decided what we would do the rest of the day. willie is kinda sick so it was just brian and i for this adventure. we went up the road a while until we got to a river. we were almost out of gas once we got there and we still had to make it back to the main road. we didn't worry about it changed and got into the river. this river is very famous from what i understand because it has natural jade in it all over. we combed the river looking for jade and capturing little critters. we caught a mini frog, a crab, and thats about it. we found all kinds of jade it was awesome. while climing up the river slipping and sliding off rocks the whole time. once we got far enough up we decided we had better get back to the bikes and head back, because we might both run out of gas and have to walk a ways. we needed to conserve time so we headed back. on the way back we found some small pools to jump into. we found one that was maybe 4 or 5 feet deep and got to do a pretty solid jump into it. we both hit bottom on our first jump and our feet went into the stickiest nastiest mud ever. we decided we could do better jumps into the pool so we did it again and this time we did much better jumps. we continued our way back down the riverbed to the bikes. at the mouth of the river there was a group of tiawanese tourists looking for some jade as well. we saw 2 epic wipe outs. one person flew up into the air and landed right on their back in the water. we were dying laughing. the other persons wipe out wasn't as good, but still funny. we got on the bikes and limped out way to the closest gas station. we made it just fine, filled up, and headed for home. brian went to work and i cleaned up. i was supposed to pick up johns daughter to go skateboarding with. i went to johns house and chatted with the family and Bernie, john's daughter, and i hopped on my scooter and went to the skatepark. it was kinda rainy so the ramps were too slipery to really ride, but we worked on ollies together for about an hour. Bernie has really good footwork for a little girl and by the end of the skate sesh she could do somewhat of an ollie. i was super impressed as its the first thing you really need to learn, but its super hard to learn as well. well once we decided it was time to stop sweating in the mild rain we headed back. john and his family invited me to have dinner with them so i ate with the family at their house. it was a super good dinner. johns wife tiffany is an incredible cook. we ate until i could eat no more. then john went back to work and tim came in to eat on his break. so i ate again so i wouldn't be rude in not eating with tim. i was so stuffed i could pop. after eating we said our goodbyes and i headed back home for some much needed sleep.

4-27-10
i woke up late today and started taking care of things i needed to do. i finally unpacked from japan. i did some laundry, finally shaved my beard off, and took a nice hot shower. i then went to school to visit willie and brian. willie is still a little sick so he left work and went straight home. I decided i would play with the kids for a while so me and the children played in their little cars and raced around having a good ol' time. after getting the kids all wild it was time to leave. we left and headed to lunch. every tuesday tim and his wife amy take the crew out to lunch. this time we were taking them out. so me dan and brian were taking tim and amy out for lunch. we went to a resteraunt called the 2nd floor. which is a super classy sandwich shop. we got there and they were booked full of reservations till about 2. we decided we wouldn't wait 3 hours to get food so we went to another resteraunt. this was an indian/taiwanese resteraunt. we went in and had curry meals. it was so darn good. i ate chicken curry. i loved it and was stuffed. we all had a good lunch and parted ways. me and brian went to see dan's new house. he got a sweet pad overlooking the ocean on the 10th floor/top of an apartment building. its an epic place! we finished checking it out and went back home. now its about 3 pm and we're resting and relaxing. not sure what this evenings plans are yet, but im sure we will have some fun adventure. thanks for reading everyone. i miss you all!

4-7-10 to 4-13-10

4-7-10
today willie swardo and i went on a hike in the smaller of the 2 gorges to go and catch some shrimp. we rushed to the fishing store to get a net for me. we got there and i got a big ol' net perfect for catching some shrimps. on the ride to the gorge we passed through a bunch of beautiful areas. we drive on a one lane road for quite a while going up the hill. it's lush greenery all over on both sides. it's a pretty amazing sight. on the way there we ride over a bridge that goes over a small river. on top of the bridge is all kinds of sticky nasty muck. i was going through it and tried to turn on the scooter. sadly the tire just skid sideways. i slammed the brakes and continued to skid. i didn't wipe out but i put my foot on the ground and bam, a big splash of green muck all over the lower half of my body. oh well just more clothes ruined on my travels... So onto our hike. we got on this little path and started jogging because my guides had to be back to teach later on in the day. our first stop was for a giant spider. his web was awesome and he was just enormous! i captured him in my net, but i think he may have lost his life in the capture. he was mostly black with some really cool yellows as well. i released him into the forest again and he didn't move... Anyways we continued on our trail to the sacred shrimp fishing grounds. we hiked through all kinds of cool stuff. along a river bed, through the trees, and finally across the river a few time. when we finally arrived at he fishing hole we were all ready for a swim. a small waterfall leads into this pool that is big enough to swim in and play. here is where the shrimp were hiding. we hopped in and the water was pretty cold. im glad we all had wetsuit tops or actual wetsuits to keep us warm. we started swimming around and the water is beautiful, clear, and actuall blue! I saw tons of fish in the water, but nothing very big. there looked to be some sort of mini trout in the water as well as asian sucker fish. we fished for about an hour each catching quite a few shrimp. we saved them in a bag until the end. we thought if we caught enough we could bring them home for a meal!!! we only caught about 10 keepers, but plenty more that we'd thrown back. in the end brian caught a shrimp that put all the other shrimp to shame. i mean this thing was a monster! we documented the shrimp and then let them all go back into the watering hole. after that we hiked back to the bikes and headed for home!

4-9-10
Today brian and i went out to hit the surf. the first spot we checked was the river mouth. it looked pretty darn good. some solid lefts and rights. there was a nice peak as well. the weather wasn't too good. no rain, but it looked like it should have been raining. anyways we made our way onto the rocky beach with the scooter and moto. i got stuck multiple times in the rocks, but brian made it pretty far. we parked the bikes and got into the water. the water felt so good. the air was cold, but the water kept you nice and warm. it waas a very interesting wave. the peak moved all over the place and you had to be in the right place at the right time to score a good wave. i got about 3 rights and a left before the coast guards walked out onto the beach. we saw them from about a half mile down the beach and brian told me they were going to kick us out for sure. once they were straight outside of us they got on their mega phone and started using the alarm function and waving us in. we each waited until we caught a good wave in so the coasties waited for about 10-15 minutes for us. we came in and asked them what the problem was. they told us it was a very dangerous spot and that many taiwanese had died there. i couldn't see any danger in the water so i replied that we were great swimmers and the surf was not big enough to worry about at all. they again said how dangerous it was. we didn't want trouble so we headed to our rides to leave. one of the coast guards was taking photos of the whole thing and documenting everything so i figured i should get a photo with them so i pulled out the camera and asked to get a photo with them. they told me i couldn't have one for some reason. So the session was cut short and we decided to hit another spot. before leaving the river mouth we did donuts and burnouts in the sand on the bikes. i created a bunch of figure 8s on the scooter and then did a wee little jump. we headed to the dump to check the surf there. on the way we saw a dog that had green paint on its face. after firther inspection it looked like someone painted war paint on the dogs face. i took a photo and we moved onto the dump. the surf kinda sucked at the dump so brian took me to a fishing wharf to get some food. we looked at all the fish they'd caught and it was really interesting. i can't believe the people here eat sunfish! so bizzare! Anyways we stopped in and got some fresh tuna and salmon sashimi. it was sooo tender and good. fresh sashimi rocks! we headed to the house and prepared for a wonderful friday evening. We got our rain gear and went out to dinner. i don't remember where we ate, but my belly has fully recovered and is used to the taiwan food so i'd imagine we ate some local delights. after eating we headed to surfer ken's bar. surfer ken is our friend in taiwan. he's a surfer in his heart and loves the water. he's a good friend and he has a bar! we went to the bar and played darts, hung out, and had some drinks. We left the bar for some late night mcdonalds and headed back to the house for some sleep to prepare for more activities to come!

4-10-10
Today we went to a place called ji ci. I had broken the throttle on the white scooter a few days ago on the way home from surfing. brian and i were surfing at 2 bridges. we got out and headed towards home. brian needed to hurry so he wasn't late for teaching, so he took the lead and started booking hard. i kept up until bam something happened. the scooter was still on but i couldn't get it to move. i figured it out pretty quick that the throttle cable snapped so i hollered at brian, but he was long gone. i instantly started fiddling with the bike hoping i snapped the cable at the top so i could just hand pull the cable to get moving. didn't turn out that way. i knew brian was in a hurry so i started pushing the scooter home. what do you know it starts pouring rain too! thats ok i have my wetsuit top and boardies on. i keep pushing hoping brian would come back and get me. after a while i hear his bike heading back, but before he got to me i heard it go back the other way. dang so close! well i pulled the bike over put all my stuff in the scooter and grab my board. im gonna hitchhike back or end up walking home. as i finally get my stuff tucked in the scooter i hear brian. he picked me up and everything turned out ok.

so back on point, but me and the crew were seperated from the beginning, because i had to get the scooter fixed. me and chuckles the mechanic got the scooter and he rigged me up a new throttle cable really quick. so i got on the road about an hour later than the other boys. i got to take it slow and sight see on my journey to ci ji. I began in hualien and got on the coastal rd. which is light our highway 1. it runs right along the beach almost the whole coast of taiwan. the day was sunny hot and beautiful. perfect for a long ride. The beginning of the journey i was able to take in how awesome the terrain of taiwan is. on the ocean side of the road is a beautiful blue ocean with some sandy beaches and some rocky. on the other side of the road are these huge mountains sometimes going up so high you cant see the top through the fog. the mountains are bright green and you can't see a spot without tons of trees. anyways i continued on my journey to ci ji and to get there you pass through a more mountainy town away from the coast. here was just as beautiful as the coast. tons of greenery and it was awesome. i finally made it through the hills and made it to ji ci. swardfish and willie had told me to meet them at some bungalo thing near the beach. i met there and found our good buddy casey furtado who we all knew through loma. casey and i were both under the impession that the guys were to meet us there. we called em up and they were just down the beach. so me and casey went to meet them. we met up with brian willie and another friend charlie. willie left to go play basketball so it was just the 4 of us. we got in the water for a surf. the water was again nice and warm, and there was very little wind today. this made for clean surf, but not too big. brian and i played on like 5 waves together. we party waved as much as we possibly could. one wave he jumped off his board and grabbed on to me. it was pretty funny. after about a 2 hour sesh we got out. brian knew of a sweet cave just up the road so we headed there. we parked our bikes on the side of the road and followed a river through someones land. there was what i would call a taiwan bull in the field we crossed. he was roped there so we weren't worried, but he sure did give us the mean face! we continued on climbed some rocky structures and made it to the mouth of the waterfall. you can go right which is a cave that you have to swim into or swim left to the waterfall. we'd heard rumor of the right cave being infested with bats so we decided to give it a look. we got to the mouth and all heard bats. that was enough for us we headed left to the waterfall. we climbed on up and made it to the waterfall. it fell from pretty high up so staying under it didn't hurt, but it wasn't super nice. we climbed back out and the bat cave looked pretty interesting again. i gave charlie the camera and he was the chosen one to check out the cave. the rest of us grabbed some bat sticks to beat off the bats when the came out. charlie entered the darkness and started flashing shots. a few bats came out and we all screamed and ran like hell! this made me decide that i don't like bats or monkeys. they both scare me. we got on the road home and made quick work of the terrain back home. on the way home we stopped at a night market for some good eats. we first got a bunch of fireworks to play with. we got these roman candle like things that shoot into the air and then exlpode like a normal 4th of july rocket. we did those for a while and headed into the market. there was all kinds of smells and things to see. we got some food, i have no idea what it was but it was kinda like a tortilla but thick rolled up and a bunch of meat in it. kinda like a taco, but deffinately not! it was great. i saw some soft serve ice cream so i got that for desert. then we cruized around the night market playing games and people watching. i played a ton of the grabber game. its the claw that grabs stuffed toys. only here in taiwan you can grab sweet toys and watches and jewelry ect. my goal is to someday get gary the snail from spongebob squarepants. we walked around more and saw all kinds of silly things. 3 games that really stuck out were
1st: a game where you have a beer mug and you are supposed to slide it down a "bar" and have it hang over the end but not fall off. almost like a shuffleboard game you would play in a bar. no one played it because it was too much and you could never win.
2nd: this game was basically for kids. i don't know that you could win or loose. there is a basin with tons of wee goldfish in it. the object is to net goldfish and put them in a cup. so kids grab a net and go crazy trying to get fish in their net and then put it in their cup. it was so funny watching the little tykes getting fishies!
3rd: this was my favorite game. much like the fish game this game involved a basin of water and animals. this game involves little turtles! so there are at least 100 little turtles swimming in a basin. each one has a rubberband around its belly which held a paperclip to its back. now the participants had a stick about a foot long with a fishing line and hook attached to it. the hook was covered in rubber so it wasn't sharp at all. the object of this game is to capture the turtle by the paperclip on its back with your hook and put it in another cup. im not sure that you win anything. maybe just the joy you captured a turtle or something. i didn't see prizes, but it was the silliest thing ever! so after the night market we headed back home to wash up for more activities. we headed to a dance club called crazy bar. now dancing isn't really my thing and it never really will be. however here in taiwan i went with a good attitude to have fun. we all danced together and had a blast! it was funny because all the local people were soooo small. i was towering over every girl i danced with. it was hilarious! we had a good time and headed home for some much needed sleep after a busy day of activities!

4-11-10
another big day. we slept in pretty late because we were all tired from doing so much the day before. today was a big day of hiking. in the golden canyon. our goal was to hike from the bottom to the top where the waterfalls were. im not sure of distance, but our total hike time was at least 6 hours. it was sooooo fun. anyways the hike began with me, willie, sward, casey, and charlie. we got on the trail and instantly discovered some sweet critters. There are these mega snails that cruiz around everywhere. there shells come to a point at the end and their shells don't crush like ours. they are very hard and strong. they actually work for protecting the snail. anyways they are all over the place. we continued on through this small trail barely wide enough to walk on which lead for about a half hour. it was so pretty. the land here is sooooo green its unbelievable. the next critter we found was a worm. it was on the trail and it was huge. i've never seen a worm so big it was like a small snake! it must have been well over a foot long and girthy too. we picked him up and played with him for a bit then sent him on his way. we continued on and finally made it to the river walking session. we jumped off this structure that is used to flow the water into town. it was a low jump but jumping off stuff into the water is always fun! the rest of the walk was in a river bed. we crossed the river countless times and found countless spots to do fun things. the next thing we came upon is an awesome rock that has a sweet pool below it. we all swam to it and did stunts off it a few times. shortly after casey decided he had gone far enough and needed to hike back. he had a long drive back south to where he lives so he didn't have enough time to finish the trail. we said our goodbyes and trecked on. the next notable spot was mini waterfall that was known as the waterslide. i went first and it went pretty slow. i bounced my booty off a bunch of rocks and kinda got my ass kicked. next it was time for brian and willie. they did a tandem movfe down the slide. i laughed super hard when they went. it was so silly seeing their expressions as they bounced down the natural waterslide. finally charlie went and his was deffinately the funniest. he came screaming down to the bottom where he booty bounced into the air off the bottom hidden rock. it looked pretty painful, but he was in good spirits. we all had a chuckle and hit the trail again. we continued through the riverbed and saw all kinds of pretty spots. we saw aborigional homes so far from society it was awesome. it made me think how fun it would be to camp up there and live off the land for a week or so. i think it would be a blast and what a good way to sit meditate and really experience the beauty of Gods creation. This trip has truly been a blessing for me and i thank God for giving me this opportunity! as we continued on the trail everyones belly started yelling. we finally stopped for the food we'd packed. we had lunch boxes. basically rice, vegi, some strange meat, some seaweed, and some tofu in a little box. You also get some other meat thing which i can say seemed like chicken fried steak? not sure. it was good and filling. brian decided to feed some of the fish in the river so he threw some rice in the river. then he threw a mini handfull of rice at me and a full on food fight began. we battled until all the food ended up in the river or stuck to us. brian had vegis and rice stuck to his back, i had some rice in my hair, charlie did as well, and willie had a ton of wet sticky rice stuck to his back. the rice stuck to us until we had to do the next river crossing it was super funny. we went on hiking and the next event was a small pool we stopped at. the rocky ledge overhang was dripping drops of water into this pool of water that had a beautiful blue hue to it. it was so blue it was almost flourescent. there were fish swimming around in it too. it was a really cool spot. After that spot we found what we were looking for. rocky ledge leading to the waterfall. we started our climb up and made it ot the first pool. that was the easy part. at the first pool we found a mega frog. he was one of the bigger ones we had caught so far. this one was particularly easy to catch. i wondered why, and when i picked him up i figured it out. he only had 3 legs. 2 front and one back. i wondered how he'd gotten so big with such a disadvantage. we decided he got giant because he ate his own leg. mmmmm frog legs! well before the first pool we did pushups and jumping jacks to warm up because the water is cold! we got warm and hopped into the water. the heat we had just created was instantly sapped and we rushed to the first waterfall to climb up. brian went first, then willie, it was my turn next. i got about half way up and willie reached his hand for me. i thought to myself it was like a movie i was either going down or going to make that reach and grab his hand only to be rescued to safety. i was bold and made that reach to grab his hand. sadly it slipped out and i wiped out down the waterfall. i crashed into charlie who was below me and we both went down into the water. sorry charlie. no one was hurt but it was deffinately funny. i let charlie go next for a go on it. he went and made it most of the way up. he was inches from making it up. he straightened out to stand up and ended up leaping back down to the pool below the waterfall. It was my turn again, i made it up this time without a problem. then it was charlie who did the same. made it up with no issues. then another short swim to the next waterfall. this one was quite a bit taller than the last, but it had better ledges for climbing. it was sketchy dont get me wrong, but it was alot nice than the last falls. we all climbed up and made it to the main fall. there is no way you could climb this one. we played in the waterfall and the small pool for a while and headed back down the treaturous falls again to the safety of the riverbed. it was a little scary on the journey down as you are climbing backwards down a waterfall. it wasn't a problem tho. we made it to semi dryish land and started journeying back home. we journied for a while longer and played a game. we set up a bunch of rocks stacked up like hippies do at the beach and started a firing range. we threw rocks at our stacked rocks until they were all knocked down. it took us at least an hour of throwing rocks at our rocks. it was super fun. we said it was like a game our parents once played as children. something like kick the can. a simple game that had no real winner, but was fun because you are with good friends in a wonderful place. as we continued on down the river we saw the most amazing birds EVER. i've never seen such a bright color that was natural. it was incredible. you know the black bird with the blue feathers that does a crazy dance on the planet earth previews? well this bird was like that, but with the most incredible orange i have ever seen. it looks like if it were dark out the bird would have glowed. it was intense. the black colors mixed with the orange made it soo bright it was hard to miss against the greens of the surrounding forrest. next we saw a yellow brid that was the same style but yellow it was amazing. as we continued down the river we stopped at an abo (aborigional) home. we walked into their little tent and saw spit from beatle-nut which is their version of chewing tobacco but very different. from what i undetsand beattle nut is a nut wrapped in a mint leaf with some sort of white chemical in the mint leaf that reacts with the nut and gives you a buzz. you spit it out and for some reason its red. even though the seed is white and green and the leaf is also green. either way it was all over the place in the abo home. we took a photo to document and continued on. next we found some freshwater crabs. we played with them for a while. they weren't so fun as they were so fast they escaped instantly. the river had lots of their motls. their molt is what crustations do when they grow. basically like a snake shedding its skin and growing bigger. so we dontinued down the river bed. next we found some mini frogs. they were so small they could sit on your pinky and it was a perfect sitting spot for them. we each caught one and played with it until we were bored with them. we arrived at the rock we had jumped off earlier and some of the bolder crew decided it was a great place to skinny dip and do mega nudie jumps off the rock. it was a very interesting experience to say the least. after jumping off rocks again we found a pool with hundreds of small tadpoles in it. willie grabbed a handfull of them and we petted them like puppies. we let em go and didn't hurt a single one. we love all critters! we had made it back to the forest part again where we leave the rocky river bed and head into the forrest again when we found a bright green praying mantis. we played with it for a while and really pissed it off. it was swinging its little hacksaw arms at us and we laughed at it because we knew it couldn't hurt us. we all held it and played with it. we let it go and then we found another one. we searched our brains to remember what they ate for food and decided that we had learned in grade school that they ate eachother. we caught one and looked for the one we had caught earlier to see a battle to the death. we couldn't find the first one so we let the 2nd one go to live and fight another day. at the stair to the forrest area we split up. brian and willie thought the riverbed path was easier and faster whereas charlie and i thought the terrain through the forrest was easier. brian and willie made it back to the bikes faster, but im convinced they worked harder than we did. they said they saw monkeys on the way back and im glad i didn't see them as im scared of them from my experiences with them in indonesia. we got on the bikes and headed home to the house. we got home and one of willie and swardos tiawanese friends had just gotten to our house. Henry is his name. we hung out at the house for a bit and then got ready for dinner. today was johns birthday, another one of the homies, so we had decided we were going out for dinner to celebrate. we went to this place where you cook your own meat. we ate and ate and ate and ate until we were about to burst. we had every kind of meat from every animal there ever was it was awesome. for desert we broke into the ice cream. everything was all you can eat so we had tons of food and tons of ice cream. we decided that when we go to that resteraunt we deffinately made them loose money... not so awesome for them, but awesome for us. we ate like pigs and enjoyed it. after that we were all so tired we were in bed by 10ish.

4-12-10
today everyone had long days at work so i was kinda on my own to find fun things to do. i slept in till about 10 then got on skype and chatted with pops. glad to hear he's doing pretty well thats been one of my prayers is that hed be getting along just fine without me causing a ruckas at the house. we chatted and finalized the plans for hawaii as well as east cape later on in the summer. stoked for both. they are going to be AWESOME!!! so i went out and decided that today i was gonna score some surf. i went to the spots i knew and ended up surfing the 2 bridges. i really wanted to surf the river bed. sometimes the water is pushing so fast from the river it makes an endless barreling right. not good for surfing, but i may be able to ride a barrel in the same spot for about 5 minutes... i need to catch it on the right tide, swell, and river water power before i leave taiwan for sure!!! so again this spot wasnt working so i went to 2 bridges. the wind was whipping but its was totally offshore. the waves were solid chest high waves with some that were even bigger. i got there and bronzed on the beach for about an hour before deciding to finally get in the water. it was a good choice to hit the water. i for sure scored. i had a few waves im pretty sure i got nice clean barrels on. its so hard to tell though because the lip was completely blowing off the wave. for example if you duck dive under a wave. the wind blew so much of the lip off that it felt like it was raining when you came up and you couldn't see a darn thing. either way i had a few lefts and a few rights that were super fun waves. there wasn't a ton of power on the waves, but you could ride forever. it was awesome. i had my fun with the waves and decided to get out. i didn't wanna head back home yet so i got on the road south. i drove south for about an hour stopping and going as i pleased. i took pictures of the landscape and all kinds of interesting buildings. after cruizing for a while i found a street that headed down towards the ocean. it was blocked off so you weren't allowed to go down, but being adventurous i found a way down and checked it out. i found out pretty quickly why it was blocked off. it was an old road that had collapsed into the ocean in many spots... i found my way through it all and drove for a while. i got kinda sketched out after i saw tons of holes in the road. i thought to myself man it sure would suck to have the cement collapse under me. i had better head back, so i did just that. i rode back up the main road, but wasn't done with my mini adventure yet. i continued on to another small road and decided to go on it. it headed away from the ocean so it went out into the hillside. i rode it and saw all kinds of amazing flowers and plants. there was a section where the whole hillside had pinks, whites, and red flowers. you know the type that have the small green seed pods on them that pop and shoot seeds everywhere? well they naturally grow in taiwan and there were whole hillsides of them. gosh the flowers were breathtaking. it was great to see. i also saw somme other pretty small white flowers. they reminded me of my grandmas house in san marcos. their whole backyard was full of these flowers. rumor has it that if you put the pedals on a hook you could catch yourself a handful of blue gill there... i also saw some really cool red hibiscus flowers. they were bright red, but when you looked at them in the sunlight you could see through them. the last flower i saw was an orange and red flower. not sure what it was or what to compare it too. it had a ball of flowers that were close together that looked like a single flower from a distance. when you got close you could see they were a bunch of flowers. they alternated colors from orange to red in a cirular pattern. the innter ones were red, then orange, then red, ect. the bigger ones had more alternating patterns where as the smaller ones had less. they were really cool and i enjoyed my time out and exploring. i got on the road home which wa sabout an hour drive. on the way i chilled drove slow and enjoyed the scenery. i went through the usual tunnel home at a slow speed. usually the tunnel is the spot to go fast. no wind resistance and its downhill. i enjoyed the cool dark air in the tunnel. when i came out of the tunnel i was going slow and just cruizn when a dog jumps out from no where and startes chasing me and barking its head off. it scared the krap out of me so i BOOKED it on the scooter and quickly gained distance from him. He was a stupid dog and he scared me so i wished bad things upon him. i figure survival of the fittest will soon come into play and he'll jump out in front of a car and get bonked good. i came back to the house and swardo had a long day at work so i only saw him shortly. i talked with willie for a while and decided i needed some good old american quizine. pizza hut it was. the food here in taiwan is ok don't get me wrong, its just nothing compared to the good food from the states. i miss my carne asada burritos, and my 5 dollar pizzas, and my real fast food. i went to pizza hut and put my order in as best as i could. i don't speak chinese, but it went well. i had about a half hour to kill before my pizza was done so i went to check the surf again. i checked and it was no good, but i found a sweet dirt trail along side the ocean so i rode on it for about a mile. it reminded me of racing around in my truck. another thing i miss is my loud music and driving in my nice comfortable truck.i got my pizza came home and had a good ol pizza and beer. i took a short nap after that and headed to school to meet willie, brian, and john for some dinner. we went to the night market. we got some fruit drinks which we do all the time. fresh mango and fresh pineapple blended up and put into a cup for me. mmmmmm fruit drink is soooooo good any fruit mix and its all fresh fruit. no milk no icea cream just fruit. its so darn good! anyways we got some fruit drink and then headed deeper into the night market for some food. we found a place that serves "coffin cakes". coffin cakes are thick pieces of bread with w small u shape cut out of the bread so you can put stuff inside it. i got kung pao chicken in mine. the stick the kung pao in the bread and then deep fry the whole thing. it's darn good. after having dinner we went to the grabber machin area and i tried my luck at getting a gary the snail. i had one so good and it almost fell into the win area. it landed just shy and broke my heart. i will get him someday though. i bought some freshly squeezed orange juice from the smoothie lady and we all headed home for an early night again.

4-13-10
Today wasn't a very eventful day, but its been great so far. i slept in until 11 am. i guess i've been pooped lately. i got up brushed my teeth and cleaned up for the day. i met the guys at school so we could head out for lunch. on tuesday we go out for lunch with tim. he's brian and willies father in taiwan pretty much. he takes care of them and whenever they need anything he's the go to guy. we had sushi with him which was incredible. we ate soooo much we all felt like we were going to burst. After a wonderful lunch brian and i headed out to check out the local fish stores. the first one i had found already when i got lost one day and decided to go in and check it out anyways. it didn't have too many awesome fish, but it had cheap tanks. i've almost convinced brian to get a fish tank and rejoing social aquarium in taiwan. we'll see what happens tho. they did have baby frontosas. they are cute with a little bit of baby blue and white and black stripes. they are the same type as the fish i have named brian, after swardo as well as my old frontosa names spot. both super cool unique fish. we headed to another store which had a weenie dog guarding she store. the dog was pissed at us and showed us her teeth. we walked by and she was pissed. the owner called her over and she mellowed out. i wanted to pet her so bad but she gave me mean face. i'd rather have my fingers... we looked at the fish and they had awesome fish. in their huge display tank they had enormous fresh water sting rays, huge arowanas, and a big beautiful peacock bass that had to weight at least 10lbs. it was sooooo cool. we played with the fish and headed home. we took wee little naps and brian had to leave again to get back to teaching. willie and i had some errands to run so he did his and then we met up to do mine. we needed detergent at the house, some soap, batteries and some other random stuff. we rode to the carrefour store which is the supermarket here. i got some strawberry oreos , it was a shot in the dark, but they turned out awesome. i had some tonight. i also got a taiwan dark beer. it was really good. it wasn't very dark in color but the flavor was awesome and dark. i very much enjoyed it. i also got some gum and bread for sandwiches. on the way out we saw some of their jets taking off across the street from the military airport. the jets are sooo cool and loud and fast. it was really fun to watch and hear. after that we headed back to the house. on the way home we stopped at a fruit market and saw all kinds of local fruits and bought a few as well. i got some mangos, apples, and bananas. there were all kinds of fruits i didn't know what they were, so i stayed away from them, but some seemed really interesting. i will have to go back and get more for sure. i came home and willie went to work and i decided i would do some reading. i am still reading the screwtape letters by c.s. lewis. its an interesting book and deffinately keeping my attention. i read for a while and then began typing this novel... now its time to go get dinner with the crew. hope you all enjoy my writing and my adventures. Miss you all too!!!

4-6-10

so i've been majorly lagging in the blog posting stuff so this will be a long one with lots of fun things.

3-26-10
this day in indonesia we went surfing out in green bowl. the surf was pretty good. its a journey to get to the water. you stop above the cove there and walk about 400 steps down to the beach. its quite the journey down as the steps are huge! really tall steps so when you walk down its great, but after being in the water for a few hours catching waves going up sucks! well a few of us surfed and scored some great waves. after surfing we hung out and relaxed. after we got our energy back we went to pandang padang for some snorkeling fun. we went out and around the corner where there was surf and found an epic corral reef. it was beautiful. there were tons of fish to play with and they weren't to scared of us either. looking back at land you really realize just how grren and lush everything in indonesia is. its an incredibly green and beautiful place. we got tired of snorkeling went our seperate ways to clean up for more evening activities. After cleaning up Will, Julia, and I went to go see the fire dance at the padang padang temple. its a super interesting event. i would compare it to a play where people chant and make music to the play. I don't know the play or really what it meant, but there was a white monkey, a red monkey, some princesses and a few fat mean faced people who had scary pig masks on. it was a super wierd event. the chant the people do is very eerie, but soothing. The play was bacially incredible. An hour of fun for about 5 bucks. After the "fire dance" we met up with the rest of the crew for dinner at 3D warung. we ate a wonderful meal of nasi goreing and mei goreing (rice with fried egg on top and noodles with fried egg. both had veggies chicken in them too.) That made for a great meal and end to the day.

3-27-10
today we got up pretty early and did a trip to gungung payung which is about an hour scooter ride away. It takes the swells pretty good and is usually pretty good sized. we had been there before and hoped it would be good to us again. Most of indonesia is a cliff then water below so you walk a ton of stair to get down to the beach. on the way down to the beach if you look off the cliff you see green squares in the water. those are seaweed gardens. the indo people farm seaweed in the shallows for food. its so interesting. the structure of the water is interesting too. from the sandy beach you start your paddle out in perfectly calm clear water, you have to watch out for the seaweed gardens because they are made with fence materials and rebar. once you have paddled pretty far out you get to the reef where its super shallow and you stand up and walk. after walking for a while it gets deeper again and you can start swimming out to catch waves. Anyways we had a solid crew of people out surfing this day. me, swardo, will, and mad mike. mad mike origionally showed us this spot. hes my south african friend who is an indo guru hes been many times and knows everything about it. we scored near perfect rights for hours and hours, until we were all too tired to surf anymore. then we walked to the stairs which kicked my butt. i took like 5 breaks coming up the stairs. after getting to the top we went and got food at the warung thats right at the top of the stairs. i had a small snack or noodles and egg. after snacking we headed to another real food place somewhere where i don't know where it was. it was a super local place will and julia had found a day or so earlier. they raved about it so we all went there. i have no clue what most of the food was, but it was darn good. one stand out item was these peanuts with an awesome sugary glaze that had mini fried guppies in it. they were so good and unique! food there for all of us was like 7 bucks. it's like a buffet too it was awesome. After eating we went our seperate ways. me and swardo went back to our room and relaxed for a bit then met up with some people he'd met from cape cod. we went to their hotel that had a great pool that overlooked part of uluwatu beach. it was beutiful and after soaking in a pool for a while i finally felt clean. For dinner we went to 3d warung again to see brian off for his final day in indo. we had a glorious meal... we wanted to celebrate swardo leaving so we got ice cream at this resteraunt on the way home. it was a bitchen day!

3-28-10
so this day was a neat day as well. i got a new roomate, eddie who was my neighbor before, we'd also surfed together and hung out too. so the two of us got in touch with will and julia and decided we would head off to gungung payung for good waves. we headed down the main road in uluwatu to find it blocked off because of a fire! gnarly! the ice cream place we ate at the night before burnt down. so we turned around and were headed the back way to get to the surf. we saw 2 girls erin and molly we had seen earlier walking on the street and we asked them if they wanted to join us for some awesome beach activites. they said yes so the 6 of us were on the way to the surf spot. we got to the spot and the surf was smaller, but still awesome looking. we left the girls on the beach and will eddie and i paddles out. the surf had some really fun rights, but most were pretty fast and it was hard to make it out of them. either way the tide got super low and it got a little sketchy and we were getting tired so we got out. we hung around on the beach together and jumped around in the water until we were too hot and hungry to hang around anymore. we climbed the stairs back to the scooters and headed for food. we went from place to place and everything we wanted was closed or one person wasn't interested in the food. finally we found a hole in the wall place and sat down to eat some food. we finished up eating and everyone parted ways for nap time and to get ready to snorkle!!! we met up at padang padang to do some snorkeling. will and julia were late, but me eddie erin and molly met up and hung out for short time on the beach before me and eddie hopped into the water to snorkle. we saw all kinds of great sea critters in the water. one fish fell in love with my flipper and followed me around everywhere. he was an awesome colored fish with blues, yellows, blacks, and greens! Julie met us out in the water to snorkle some. we found yellow black and white angel fish and one fish that was blue orange and yellow and even some wild nemo like fish! It was getting closer to the evening and we wanted to catch the sunset at uluwatu so we got out of the water and boogied down to uluwatu. we watched the sunset together and had some bin tang beers! Once it got dark we left uluwatu and headed to our favorite evening eater 3d warung for some more bin tangs and some dinner. After dinner we dropped the girls off at their place and will julia eddie and i figured out a little more about our journey for the next day.

3-29-10
i got up at about 8 and eddie went out to check the surf and i went to the internet cafe to catch up with friends and family. i went to my spot. JIWA JUICE and got a smoothie for breakfast. the internet was super slow there so i went to another internet place called SWELL. mad mike had reccomended it to me earlier. i got there and what do you know mad mike was hanging out there! he told me that eddie had called him and was looking for me so i boogied back to our hotel and met eddie. will and julia were there too and we decided to get on the road to a surf spot called keramas. I packed a backpack because we would be gone for a few days and we hit the road. we stopped in the mega tourist/swapmeet/store for some food, and to buy some random things. this is where bartering skills come in super handy. i bartered for all kinds of random things i wanted. i got some sweet shades and watches. fake of course, but who can tell. yay for gold blinging rolex!!! i scored it for 5 bucks! anyways kuta is super fun. its like TJ of indonesia. Not dirty like tj, but tons of shops on the sides of buildings and everyone wants to barter. if you get into a purchase battle with someone another guy will walk behind you and block the doorway so you cant leave until you buy the item you are bartering for. indo people are small so if i didn't get the price i wanted i simply moved the small indo man out of my way and walked out. other places you would look into their little shop and if you didn't see something you wanted the owner would come up to you and try to convince you that you get a great deal for something random and if you kept denying you he'd try to sell you drugs, or sex. so you go to store and hear "cheap sunglasses for you, i make good deal" ME:"no thanks" "how about (and he would do a smoking action or snorting) ME:"no thanks" and the final one which is the best thing they said was "banana massage?" i died laughing every time they said it. "banana massage, banana massage?" i declined the banana massage as well as the drugs :). After shopping in kuta we headed to our final destination of keramas. it took forever because will and julia drive like old people. also they like to take pics of everything so they drive like old people who need to take pics of everything. needless to say it took wayyyy to long to get there. we got there about 4ish and found a place to stay. we threw our stuff in the room and headed to the surf spot. we got there and there was maybe 2 or 3 others out. super stoked because we heard it gets really crowded. we got in and surfed until the full moon was up and was lighting the waves. not exactly sure what time it was when we got out, but the sun had been gone for a long time. After surf we needed to find some good food. we met some people who had been at the hotel we were at for a while and they told us where to find food. we went and had some food. mmm duck liver skewers, fish cakes, and all kinds of tofus and chicken! it was a glorious meal! after that we headed to bed and set the alarms for dawn patrol surf at just before 6.

3-30-10
We ended up hitting the snooz a few times and didn't get up until 630ish. we walked to the surf and got in at keramas. we were stoked again because there were only a few heads out. little did we know but there was a kamikaze of people that were on their way to ride with us. we had about a half hour that was totally packed and we all got some good waves. we'd heard by word of mouth that north was another good wave. we saw another guy surfing and decided to go for the long paddle. we paddled for a while and saw that he was getting these perfect barrels that had a super thick lip on them. me and will were amping. we got over there and it was the 1 guy me and will for about 2 hours. finally eddie paddled over from keramas to join in on the fun. we all got such perfect barrels it was awesome. we had some people from holand paddle out and it was fun with them too, however they had no etiquette and were paddling around you when you had the right away for the wave and then they were paddle battling for everything. those rotten people. its ok will snaked one guy so good that i laughed out loud in the water. the wave started to die a little and we went in so we could travel further to UBUD. a more traditional artsy town. we hit the road and were going through the greenest most beautiful landscape ever! there were huge fields of rice that were so green it was blinding. there were palm trees everywhere and the land was sooo lush and green. i've never seen such green landscape ever. we traveled through the rice fields for a few hours njoying the scenery until we were hungry for lunch. we found a fine eatery and had the usual rice and egg. we moved on to UBUD. we got there parked and it reminded me of kuta but much nicer. alot of art here. people had tons of carvings, sculptures, and paintings so it was really interesting to see their art. They also had their usual fake watches, hats, glasses, and other random items. we continued on through ubud and were told about the "monkey forest" now im not too stoked on monkeys after having one jump on my back and trying to steal my hat, but i heard the monkeys were not the type to jump on people. we got there and it was super pretty. there were banyan trees all over a few temples to explore and monkeys everywhere. they were mellow monkeys, you could walk right up and stand next to them and they didn't care at all. i wasn't bold enough to pet one as i didn't want to risk a monkey bite and rabies. they were really cool. i still dont' trust monkeys, but it was a wonderful experience. we finished our travel through the monkey forrest and went back into town to a place will and julia had heard about calle budha bali. we got there and sat down for a meal. i had an avacado shake which i've fallen in love with. here they eat them as fruits not vegis. in other words they add milk and ice cream and make it sweet where as we add salt and other veggis and make it not sweet. anyways avacado shakes are AWESOME! the service at budha bali sucked, but it was ok because we got stuck in a monsoon. the rain cam pouring down and we got thunder for about 45 minutes. after that it cleared up and we got on the road back home to the hotel. i stopped in at the hotel picked up my stuff and made the solo journey back to uluwatu because i was leaving in the next day. i raced through the streets of bali like a madman. i made it home in about an hour. i maxed out the scooter at about 105 km/hr which is just over 60 m/hr. i kicked ass and made it home just after dark. i went out for my final dinner at a place id been to a few times called yeye's pizza. i had my last bin tang and some awesome indonesian food. after i headed home and packed up everything so i could leave without any issues the next day.

3-31-10
Today began my journey to taiwan. i got up early and headed to uluwatu for some breakfast and a surf check. surf looked like storm surf and big, but not very good. only 2 dudes out so i knew it was a good day to be leaving. i ate and headed to the photo man to get all the pictures he'd taken of me. i bartered for a while with him, but was in no mood to waste time on bartering for an hour so he won and i lost this one at bartering. i had my photos and headed back to the hotel to set up a ride to the airport. i got my ride set up and needed to hit the bank to get money for my stay at jaya homestay in uluwatu. for 10 days with a scooter and 10 nights of housing and a few beers and waters it cost me 120 bucks. what a steal! i went to the bank and pulled out cash and decided i wanted these sweet paitings id seen in kuta and headed that way. i had to book because kuta is an hour away and i needed to be back to catch my ride to the airport. i booked to kuta and searched everywhere for the paintings, but no one had them. i got another watch and a pair of shades because i broke a pair already, and headed back to the hotel. i booked again and made it home in record time. On the way back i booked around this corner and took this car on the inside. the drive pinched me off between a curb and her car and she bonked me pretty solid. i thought my surf rack had broken off my scooter, but all was good. i didn't fall and she was ok in her car. i rushed home and what do you know. she was my ride to the airport. how awesome is that? well i packed everything in her car and headed to the airport. she sucked at driving and bonked her mirror on another car so i didn't feel so bad that we had crashed. i made it to the airport and waited for my flight. the flight was incredible. no one was on it so i sat in the front spots with as much leg room as i wanted with no one around me. i put all the armrests down and sacked out the long way for a while too! that was my best flight ever. i landed in taipei and found my way to someone who spoke english. i got a bus ticket to the train station that i needed to catch. the bus ride was nice. i got to the train station and it took me about an hour to get a ticket because the train station was huge and i don't speak mandrin chinese... i got my ticket and all that was left to hoalien was the slow train. great a 4 hour train ride. the train sucked i couldn't see anything outside. there were tons of open seats, but some man decided to sit next to me and squish me. then he sacked out by me and i was pissed. i nudged him and woke up a bunch tho so i felt good inside even tho i was so over traveling. i arrived in hualien at about 3am and called brian to pick me up. he and willie showed up and drove me and my luggage home on 2 motorcycles. and i slept for what seemed like an eternity.

4-1-10
we cruized aound the town and i got to see a little bit of taiwan. i didn't do too much this day as i was tired and slept most of the day away. i did get some good food and surfed. just a mini sesh at this spot called 2 bridges. the surf wasn't great, but the water here feels so nice and refreshing. i loved it. brian had an early session teaching at school and willie had a late one so willie and i went skateboarding at this skatepark for a few hours and man its hard to skate when its hot and muggy out. i did some sweet stunts and willie did some sweet stunts. We decided to leave because i ripped my jeans on a fall. not before i jumped the scooter off a skate ramp a few times for the locals. these 2 girls were laughing their heads off. we headed to town for some snacks. we had these dough balls filled with some sort of meat and smoothies. both were satisfying to the max. then willie dropped me off at home and headed to school and gave me directions to meet him there after for dinner. i left early with plenty of time, but what do you know i got lost. i made it to school and we had some dinner. dinner was at a fancy resteraunt, but was very cheap. it was right up my alley. we went home and planned our journey to kenting which is the souther tip of taiwan.

4-2-10
today we rented me a scooter because the one swardo and willie have is super ghetto and couldn't make the journey to kenting. i rented a scooter and got a sick helmet for the journey. my backpack started to rip so i got a new backpack as well. i went to school and visited brian and willie. the kids they teach are so small, but deffinately cute and fun. i pushed them around for a while at play time in these sweet mini cars. after that we headed home to relax.

4-3-10
today we headed to kenting. we stopped off at this bed in breakfast place for a bbq with surfer ken. we all drank and bbqed and had a wonderful time. we sacked out in this sweet room with the ocean waves crashing right outside the window. it was awesome. we got up early to get on the road and finish the drive to kenting. we said our goodbyes and got on the road. the stay there was free and so was the food and bbq. the people here are super kind and hospitable. we got on the road and drove for hours and hours throught mountains as well as a costal road much like the highway 1. it was a great journey, but after driving on a scooter for 6 hours my butt hurt and i was ready to walk! we got to kenting where we were supposed to go to a concert called spring scream. it was expensive and we couldn't find a way to sneak in so we passed on that. we needed a place to camp so we cruized around looking for a campsite or some flat land away from everywhere. first spot we found was a graveyard. we looked around and i said heck no no way thats too creepy. then we found an open field in the middle of nowhere and we didn't like it either. finally we ended up at an actual campsite. it was close to everything and fun. we set up camp and hit the city. we walked around kenting which is like a giant party. its the wierdest most fun place ever. i tried all kinds of interesting food and talked to all kinds of random people. i went home early about 1 and hit the sack.

4-4-10
got up and i had eaton something that really upset my belly. i think the stinky tofu did me in and gave me a belly ache and bad poops. either way we still had fun things to do. we went and snokled this awesome reef in kenting. it was so clear and pretty. there weren't a ton of fish like indo, but the fish here were prettier. we swam and played for a while until we decided we wanted to jump off the jumping rock. we climbed up this gnarly rock and sat for about an hour chatting and then we jumped off. im not a good judge of height, but it scared me to jump. after swimming we planned on heading to visit a friend named tim, he lives in taiwan and is like the taiwan dad. he knows everything, speaks english, and taked care of the crew. i felt to crappy to go so we headed back to the tent. we went out to eat at smokey joes the local "western" eatery. i felt poopy and headed back to the tent to sleep while everyone else went for some more fun times in kenting.

4-5-10
today we packed up and got on the road home. we left at about noon and drove forever. we stopped halfway home for some surf with a buddy we went to school with who is also teaching out here. the surf was fun but again not super powerful. it started raining while we were surfing which was cool. we got out and continued home. we drove in the rain until after dark which sucked so much! dark, rainy, and a scooter full of gear that i'd been sitting on for the past 6 hours was not fun. so now i've travel the whole coastline of taiwan though! i've been from the northern tip of taiepe to the very south at kenting. once we got home we were pooped, but needed some food. brian and i went out, returned the scooter and got food. we ate and sacked out.

4-6-10
finally we are cuaght up with the correct dates. i got up early and talked to my dad and bro. they are doing well so i am stoked on that. after that i met willie and swardo at school for their lunch break. we went out with tim to this place that we couldn't even order at because it was all chinese. it was great food. dough filled with meat, these tortilla like fries, and some other stuff. it was good, but my stumach is still sick and im not handling food well at all. tomorrow im sticking to a strict rice diet until im back on track! we ate and decided we needed to do activities until brian and willie needed to be back at school again. me and sward went out and checked out the coastline. he took me to all these really cool pretty lookout points. we were gonna swim, but it was a little windy and i didn't want to be cold and brian didn't want to be salty when he went to teach. we drove around and then i tried to drive the scooter on the sand. it doesn't work i instantly got it stuck. thats ok tho we got it out and headed back home. brian had the long evening session where as willie didn't so willie took me out to a temple. it was the most intricate temple i had ever seen it was like a house from candyland. everything was painted all crazy colors. there was dragons, and phoenix, and all kinda of wierd gods or whatever. it was really fun to walk around in. then we went to another one, but sadly it was closed. it was on university ground so we walked the university to all these sweet ponds. they had coyfish in the ponds and awesome huge catfish. the coolest thing was to see they had cichlids in the ponds as well. (i have a cichlid fish tank at home) we explored for a while then headed out to look for a fish store to see all the cool tiawanese fish. we couldn't find it so we just got smoothies instead. willie left for school and i headed back towards home. well i got lost for about an hour in the middle of taiwan. i backtracked and found out where i needed to go to get home. it started raining on the way home, but i missed the big rains. im no supposed to be meeting the guys for dinner, but its raining so i think im going to pass on dinner and sack out. gnight to all and thanks for reading the novel i wrote today. hahaha.