Thank you, goodnight. (for now)

Damn. It's over. Very bittersweet. Happy to be going home and reconnecting with friends, family, and the comforts of western civilization. But at the same time I'm sad to see this ride come to an end.

What an amazing 53 days. Funny how that felt like an eternity when the trip first started and this last week I have felt almost rushed to fit in what I wanted. I don't think I would change anything that I did to take time away from anywhere I visited our anything I did (though I would happily add more time to multiple places).

Highlights of the trip would have to begin with seeing Mount Everest. Just thinking about that moment when I walked up to the cockpit and got to see it for the first time...gets a little dusty in here. I had no idea that would impact me like it did. It was just a moment when I stopped and couldn't believe my own life and how lucky I am to get to do things like that. Never before have I had a moment hit me with such power when traveling. Not even close.

Walking the Annapurna circuit was amazing. The variety of landscapes was beyond anything I had expected and hoped for. The scenery was too much to take at times and who can argue with a 150 mile trek? That moment when Nic and I decided "screw it, if we just walk 40 km in the next two days...we can walk this whole damn thing! And faster than most people who don't walk it all!" so much fun. Reaching Thorung La pass and the joy of accomplishment...so fulfilling.

Rediscovering how much I love scuba diving had been fantastic. I have actually doubled my total number of logged dives on this trip. Wish I had time for more. I have to admit that it was more than a little tempting to take up my hosts' offer to stay on Amed and train to be a dive master and eventually instructor. They were not even half joking with the offer and is be lying if I said I didn't think about it for a few hours.

Seeing the milky way every night for the last month never got old. The last few weeks especially the moon had been absent at night and the sky is just amazing. My last night in Amed I actually slept on the beach for a bit after laying  out under the stars, listening to the waves.

The amazing hospitality of the locals has made it so easy to travel here. Sure, Indonesia has some quirks to it and a lot of them see worry people as a walking wallet just waiting to be looted, but on the whole everyone has been incredibly warm and friendly. Almost awkwardly. And I know I wrote about the nickel and diming aspect of Indonesian tourism, but it does have a purpose. It maintains the haggling aspect of the culture while still ensuring that the parks and govt get theirs.

The astonishment when I hiked up a steep part of the trail in Nepal and was greeted by a woman in her 50s listening to Pandora on her galaxy s4 in a remote village in the Himalayas. Still makes me laugh.

I know that I am a laid back person. It has been pointed out to me multiple times by many people. Most interestingly to me...by a lot of people on this trip. Tourists and locals alike. It is actually a close match up between compliments on my tattoos and being told "wow, you are a very relaxed person, how do you do that?" Btw, in Nepal and Indonesia it was the wings tattoos getting the most compliments, in Malaysia it was the cloud. Go figure.

The hash house harrier experience in Ubud. My first run since I left Seattle and I end up with one of my most memorable runs ever. I remember thinking while being led through the rice paddies and river, "wow, this is going to be one hell of a travel story," before forcing myself to stop thinking about after the run and just enjoy and experience what was going on at that moment. I started that run with a huge smile on my face and I ended it laughing my ass off with a bunch of fellow runners.

So many other random moments. I'll likely be remembering many of them in the months and years to come. Just flipping through my travel journal last night brought a lot back already.

Thanks to everyone for reading and dealing with my typos. Predictive text is a nightmare sometimes and typing all of this on a phone has been interesting. I hope it has been fun reading.

I'm looking forward to traveling again as soon as I can, but I very much recognize that this might be the last 30 day plus trip for a while. I'm really glad I took the opportunity to do this.

I want to take a moment and thank my folks too. I am lucky to have the parents I do. One of them is a cautious planner who exhausts all possibilities for mishaps at all times in an attempt to remove them before they happen. A perfectionist who believes perfection is very much attainable every time. The other is much more of the "go for it and it'll work out" school of thought in addition to being the person who helped me learn to ask "why not?" as opposed to "why?"

As with everything in my life, this trip had me recognizing their influences and how the balance between them has made me who I am.

Oh, and happy birthday, dad!

More importantly they have always been the most supportive people they could be. I've taken some leaps of faith in my life, and it definitely helped me to know that my parents have cheered me on every time.

I'll probably put the link to the pictures on this site and email them out after I sort through the 2800 pics on my memory card. Might take me a little while because I've got some breaking bad to catch up on first.

Until next time...which hopefully isn't that far away. 36 countries visited. 4.5 years and 4 countries to get to 40 by 40. I think I can make that happen.

Now I guess it's time to find a job...