Travel

Travel update

Dear Reader, you have probably lost track of where we are now.  I don’t blame you–I can barely keep up.  I’m so busy keeping up with myself that I can hardly remember other people’s plans.  You know, whenever you meet a good friend, they expect you to remember their own plans, and you spend a few moments trying to recall every scrap of information they told you about their intentions.  Anyway, we are now in Idaho again staying with my parents.  We stayed in Seattle for about six days.  The visit was much too short.  We wish we had been able to stay a couple more days, but then we would have had to shorten our visit with my parents.  We will stay in Idaho for the remainder of the month except for a short visit to family in Montana.  By early March, we will be back in Washington, D.C. for four months.  Korea now seems so long ago.  People said it would be like a dream–good or bad depending on your prespective.  It’s definitely starting to fade into memory, and Paraguay is starting to loom larger.

Days and nights all around

One of the unpleasant side effects of long-term travel to multiple destinations is the affect travel has on one’s biological clock.  While most often referred to in the context of pregnancy, the biological clock also governs one’s ability to manage sleep.  Traveling over multiple time zones in a short period of time messes this up, leaving one’s body wondering whether a given moment is morning, noon, afternoon, or night.  I am writing this at 5:40 a.m.  I should not be writing right now; I should be in bed sleeping, getting ready for another day of fun-filled vacation.  Instead, I cannot sleep, because I have so hopelessly confused my body as to what time it is at a given moment. 
 
Over two weeks ago, we left Korea and headed to Hawai’i, a difference of -19 hours.  Noon on Sunday in Korea is 7 p.m. on Saturday in Hawai’i.  A couple days ago, we arrived in Seattle, entering the Pacific Standard Time Zone.  We two hours ahead of Hawai’i and 17 hours behind Korea.  We will stay on Pacific Time until early March, when we fly to the Eastern Time Zone and move to Virginia, three hours ahead of Seattle and 14 hours behind Korea.  Someone once told me that it takes one day for each hour of time difference to fully recover from time zone changes.  That may or may not be true, but when you move from one place to -19 hours for two weeks, then -17 hours for another weeks, then finally -14 hours one month later, it can be a bit brutal convincing your body to get with the program.  I don’t think I will fully adjust to the time change in Seattle, but I’m positive that we will recover from the time change in Idaho when we arrive on Monday.  So with that, I’ll trudge off to bed again and try to get a couple hours’ sleep.  Good night!

The “wow” factor

I have an unscientific way to measure satisfaction with a travel destination that I call the "wow" factor.  What’s the "wow" factor?  It’s how many times you say "wow" during a given trip at a given location.  Kaua’i Island thus far has elicited more "wow"’s from us than any other destination we have been to since we traveled to Egypt in early 2002.  The island is absolutely fabulous, and we haven’t even seen the two most famous natural attractions, Waimea Canyon and the Na Pali Coast.  We’ll see those tomorrow and Saturday.  Today we headed north up the coast to Princeville and the end of Highway 56.  The scenery was breathtaking.  While I am still partial to the Big Island, I am growing more and more impressed with this island.  It is well deserving of the name "The Garden Island."  I will post some photos in the next few days.  Suffice it to say, I/we said "wow" at least a couple dozen times in the span of two hours.  The lush foliage and dramatic landscape is quite a sight to behold. 
 
We may yet develop "Yet another" syndrome, a condition where you are no longer impressed with what was once impressive.  For example, in Egypt, we developed "yet another 5,000 artifact" syndrome, and on Maui Island, we fell victim to "yet another pretty waterfall" syndrome.  I doubt we will experience this feeling on Kaua’i Island.  We won’t be here long enough, and the scenery yet to come is legendary for being some of the most beautiful and dramatic in the world.  Just watch "Jurassic Park" or "King Kong" for a peak of what is to come.