Photo Credit: tarotastic A couple of years ago, while riding my bicycle down Burma's Irrawaddy valley, I somehow managed to destroy my khaki trousers. These were the only pair of pants I had with me at the time, so I stopped off in a town called Pakkoku and -- faced with no other realistic clothing...

Cost/day: $28 per day per person What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? There are many interesting and strange things to see on Bali, but if I had to pick just one it would be the statues you come across in seemingly random places. Describe a typical day: Our morning routine stays the same wherever...

VANISHING TALES FROM ANCIENT TRAILS by James Dorsey, 2014, Vagabundo Magazine Publishing. Buy on Amazon . When I first found his writing on celebrated travel webzine Perceptive Travel, there was one thing that made me an instant James Dorsey’s fan . It was the amount of literary adrenaline he was able to inject straight into...

Not too long ago my friend and I went to Nepal during our 8 month round the world trip. It was a last minute stop-over (escape) during our three weeks in India, and we were pleasantly surprised with how beautiful and easy it was compared to the chaos we were experiencing in India. We were...

Cost/day: $25 per person What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? It was strange watching fisherman on the river covered from head to toe, including a sort of ski mask, in scorching heat. Describe a typical day: Work and homeschool in the early morning, as always. Breakfast would be at our guesthouse. We spent a...

As part of some tips for successful travel and freelance writing, I decided to interview Joe Henley . He is a Canadian freelance writer and death metal singer for Taiwanese band Revilement who has spent the past few years living in Taiwan, and will released his debut novel, “Sons of the Republic” , on American...

Not too long ago my friend and I went to Nepal during our 8 month round the world trip. It was a last minute stop-over (escape) during our three weeks in India, and we were pleasantly surprised with how beautiful and easy it was compared to the chaos we were experiencing in India. We were...

I have recently decided that wander-lusters come in many varieties- many more than I had thought. You know, we like to find our commonalities so it is comfortable to believe that a traveler is a traveler is a traveler is a traveler. But one man's treasure is another one's trash. That is true for the...

The air is unbreathable, hot, and terribly humid. The air conditioner perched at the top of the wall at my right is just an empty plastic shell that reminds me that there could be some extra comfort, if someone had cared to replace the wiring. Instead, rivulets of sweat pour down my forehead and temples,...

(Camping in Siberia) Earlier this year, I rode a Ural motorcycle and sidecar through Siberia, up 1800km of ice roads and ending in the Arctic Circle. It was one hell of a journey which taught me how to survive in extreme sub-zero temperatures. More importantly, it expanded my limits and showed me what I was...

Cost/day: $30/day per person What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? A stroll through the Luang Prabang morning market brought something different to my senses every time. One morning, I saw a woman with a pile of chickens on the ground for sale. I thought the chickens were dead, but one of them started to...

We spent a couple of weeks researching Sulawesi and found very little information for independent travel on the island. Then, I lucked into Dodo Mursalim’s contact details on a TripAdvisor forum. Dodo turned out to be a gold mine of information and he bent over backwards to help us do Sulawesi our way. He rented...

Cost/day: $20 per person. What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? Both strange and incredibly, incredibly sad was seeing the many uses of empty US cluster-bomb shells. Laos was shelled continually by US planes during the Vietnam War. Injuries and deaths are still occurring to this day due to unexploded ordinances from these bombs, mostly...

(The family we met in Siberia - one of the most memorable nights of the entire trip.) Last week, I heard that a friend of mine had been in a serious motorcycle accident in Bali. A serious accident - broken ribs, fractured pelvis, collapsed lung. He wrote about the experience - about his injuries, about...

While this is my story, I'm sharing it because we all have family and those that we love. When we least expect it, tragedies happen and the skills that we hone while traveling can be invaluable in getting us through. Camping in Siberia en route to the Arctic Circle (-43C) Truth is - this year...

Cost/day: $20-25 per person What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? There is a type of vehicle in Luang Namtha that I have not seen anywhere else in Laos or Southeast Asia. The locals call it a tec-tec , which I’m assuming is onomatopoeic because that is the sound the extremely loud, water-cooled engine makes....

Image credit I am 15 minutes into my hike down the muddy little stream when a tree carving captures my attention. Sticky with sap and arcing brown across the bark, it seems to have been made recently. I drop to my haunches and run my fingers over the design. After three days of living on...

Cost/day: $50-55/day What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately? Without question it is Wat Rong Kuhn, otherwise known as the White Wat . I read plenty about this wat, designed by Thai artist Chalermchai Kositpipat, and even saw dozens of pictures. Words and pictures alone did not prepare me for the grandeur, beauty and strangeness...

Sometimes I wonder if modern travel writing still has anything fresh to say, and I can't really find a satisfactory answer. This question became much more pressing after I discovered an American publisher who reprints old travel writing gems from early 20 th century’s Asia. I’m talking about DatAsia press , based in Florida. They...

Perhaps the evenings are what captivate me the most, when the heart of the island basks in the falling light. People hurry home from work on their motorbikes, picking up food from the market on their way. No tourists can be seen, save by the hostels and Western style bars, but they are few surrounding...