With the companionship of a fan whirling overhead, the unwanted second skin of heat that is incessant on tightly hugging every inch of my body, and the sounds of buzzing, chirping, croaking, cock-a-doodle-doing, I am destined to lie in bed; to stare knowingly up at the ceiling, thinking of things I would rather not think. And the things I would rather not think surprise me to no end, because, up until now, I had the impression that it would be easy.

Easy to go home.

But it’s not.  I’m stuck in a game of what-if, caught up in all the scenarios, staring up at a ceiling feeling guilty for not treasuring the day that it’s meant to be, and that so many others wish they could have. So I close my eyes. I try to dumb it down. I try to get to a place where things add up.

When I open my eyes again, they’re not angled towards the sky anymore, but to the ground. To the bed and to me on the bed. Sitting to an upright position, because I have to do something, I slowly begin moving to the direction of my legs. And the weight of the world suddenly begins to crash down hard, again. Though let’s not chalk it up to being a sulky teenager just yet.

Dark hairs line my skin and I flop heavily onto my back. Of course by now I’m way too fed up with all these extremities to second guess the mental wellness that decided hair was something to stress and express about. Lifting my legs,  I examine the fine follicles and this time there’s only a feeling of regarded numbness. So I haven’t shaved in a few days? Who gives a — never mind. I mean, at least I’ve gotten to the point where it’s soft to the touch. And with all these hippie / organic people cruising around in Ubud, I could totally pass it off as being earthy, all natural, and the likes. But no. That’s just plain weird. Who would want that?

Shutting my eyes again, to hopefully get liberated from the annoying situation at hand, I reopen only to come face to face with the ceiling. No matter how long I gaze, wishing for some light at the end of the tunnel, deep down I secretly know that it’s actually very easy.

Easy to shave my legs.

Now, you might be thinking that this is getting to be a very strange blog post. You’re not so sure if you want to keep reading because obviously the author is dealing with some “issues” and maybe this whole year long trip has been too much for her to handle. But, no need to worry… whatever this mind block is that I have got going on can swiftly be taken care of.  All with the swipe of a blade.

And so I find myself paddling into the surf. It’s a Saturday. Surfing day. My legs are smooth and blocked up with sunscreen along with my thoughts of home. Though I’ll always be nervous with anticipation for the big day to come—whether it stems from being reunited with friends and family, loving the trip and not wanting to go home, wanting to go home but curious on how the trip will impact my life onwards—there’s the knowing that with each new growing stubble of hair and each new reflection of Mercer Island, I just have to suck it up. Harsh, I know. Though there’s no other way of dealing with the much-too-near-ending of Project Equator, other than to realize each day that passes is one that will never happen again. Not in the sense that, yeah everyday is like that, but that I’ll have plenty of time sitting in a classroom and not a lot being in Bali on a trip around the world.  The rest can wait.

So shave your legs and start living.

The 12th Man Contingency in Hanoi! GO HAWKS!

Happiest man in Hanoi right now!

Mouni, Kim and the Boys

Kim and Mouni, diehard Hawk Fans, are with us along with lots of other ex-pats from Washington State!

Beer at 7am… Hey, it’s 5pm in Seattle :-)

You could climb, although, if you are like me: a scrawny mzungo who hasn’t ever climbed a coconut tree before in his life, then, like me, you will probably end up flat on your back empty handed.

You could try jabbing it with a long stick. We spent countless hours attempting this and implementing the scientific method, “So poking them with the bare stick didn’t work, but if we tie a knife on the end then maybe…” Try all you want, but those coconut stems are unbelievably durable, I couldn’t even cut them down with a knife!

Spontaneously growing several feet. With my mom’s genes? Yeah right!

Getting someone else to do it. (“The American Way,” according to locals.) After three failed attempts I was desperate. During my brief moment of despondence, I finally found my answer: a local to Tanzania, athletic, and, best of all, the proud owner of a panga (a huge machete.) I instantly came to the conclusion that it was time to call in the big guns. After all, I was American.

“I’ll lift you up” Nayay suggested. “You can take my knife and cut them down.” Why didn’t I think of that? As Nayay boosted me up, I grabbed onto a few branches, which after my prior experience, felt a little bit sketchy. Nayay handed me his monolithic machete with a cheery smile as I clung to the tree for dear life. Grasping a fraying, dead palm frond that served as my sole lifeline in my left hand and a nine inch blade in my right hand, I had a horrific epiphany: If even do manage to cut these coconuts down, they would fall right on my head, possibly knocking me unconscious and sending me eight feet down, only to land on top of Nayay’s malicious machete. And with that drastic image in my mind, I was somehow scurrying down the palm trunk like a monkey that just had tried to eat a hornet’s nest.

“How about you lift me up this time.” Sure, why not? Any idea is a good idea at this point. As Nayai grasped the skinny tree trunk, I supported him as best I could. Once Nayay established reliable hand holds and assumed the best, most stable position possible with my arms wobbling all over the place, Otto handed him the knife. Whack. Whack. Whack. It began to rain diminutive orange coconuts. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. I watched as Nayay took a couple of them to the upper thigh (Ouch!), yet he kept chopping away. Only two left.

He paused. “Uh oh. That kid over there is running to get his parents! Let’s get these last two coconuts and get out of here!”

What? What kid?! Where?

Nayay and the last two coconuts hit the sand with a resounding thump. He grabbed an armful and started sprinting. Both confused and horrified, I followed with one in each hand. Otto was already booking it home. We sprinted for Crazy Mzungos and didn’t look back until we finally reached salvation! Why were we running? Nayay later articulated: a small African boy had been furtively watching us chop the coconuts down, swiftly dodging my, but not Nayai’s gaze. Although the palm trees on the beach were technically public property, understandably, the locals didn’t enjoy us picking away at excess food. In the midst of our coconut heist, the boy ran for his parents. How bad could that of been? I’m guessing pretty bad. However, I was just happy to finally be holding the fruit of my labor!

So what does one do with eight coconuts anyways? The plan was to stuff people’s Christmas presents inside empty coconut shells and leave the unwrapping up to them. It wasn’t that atypical, because my usual wrapping strategy consisted of using as much scotch tape available, leaving a practically impenetrable, disheveled glob of wrapping paper coated in clear, sticky plastic, so both forms of wrapping left the actual gift pretty much inaccessible. Nayay used his panga to shuck them down for me.

Since they were babies, they had a hard, orange outer shell, and were filled with coconut water, not meat. This was fine by me because coconut water is packed with vitamins and electrolytes but extremely low in calories. It is like an organic, way, way healthier version of Gatorade. We cracked those babies open and chugged coconut water until we felt like throwing up, and the ultimate Zanzibar wrapping paper was ready for usage.

For Christmas I gave everyone a haiku because not only are they poetic and deep, but they are extremely fast and easy to write! 11:00pm: I was frantically stuffing haikus into empty coconut shells, through a tiny hole! The entire project was much more laborious than I had predicted, but that’s what I get for “last-minuting” the whole thing. However, it all paid off Christmas morning, as I got to watch my family members helplessly try to open their presents! Comedy gold. Penetration methods ranged from wildly banging the shell against the ground, to slyly pulling the haiku out of the hole I used to put them in, to flat out going hulk mode and pulling the shell apart with bare hands.

During my corybantic quest for coconuts, I observed a reoccurring pattern: even if a task may be daunting, there is always a way to do it, just tap into your inner creativity. As I write this Henry Ford’s wise words echo in my head: “Whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right.”

The first room I went into was room filled with only paintings of doors. You may be thinking that this must be the most boring paintings on planet earth, but they were actually quite stunning. For some bizarre reason these paintings of doors were extremely appealing to my eyes. Each door had a unique feel to it, and we all had our favorite one.

The next room was also all of the same variety, and it was paint buckets. Again, you might be thinking that this might not be the sharpest looking group of paintings, but these paintings had something special. Already stunned, the artist came in to give us the low-down on his paintings. And what he said was he actually painted them on metal canvases to give them a rusty-bucket look.

After exploring a little, Stephane, the artist, led us to his subterranean lair. This room was the most interesting one. It was all paintings of scenes under water. Pretty cool right, but wait there’s more. Stephane actually went scuba diving, deep down under, with a canvas and some oil paints, and painted under water! This was possible because of his oil paintings (oil doesn’t mix with water).

Basement gallery with all the underwater paintings.

Stephane then led us to a screening room were he played a video of him painting underwater. First he would sketch out the scene with the paint straight from the tube. Then he would do the actual painting with a metal trowel so it would give the painting a lot of texture. After that, he would go back to the studio to do some touch ups.

I learned some valuable lessons from Stephane: you can paint anywhere and on anything and even the most boring subjects can make a great masterpiece!

Me next to one of my favorite paintings!

Wescott and I riding Philip in the Sahara

Awesome portrait of Cappuccino and me!

PARENTS NOTE:  We did go back and ride Cappuccino a 2nd time before leaving Essaouira

Trying to describe the Sahara Desert is like trying to photograph the Grand Canyon. No matter how clever, my attempts will never be close to the actual experience! Everyone will need to just block out his/her calendar and head to Morocco sometime in the near future

Two days after arriving in Marrakech, we decided to embark on a 3-day excursion over the Atlas Mountains and into the Sahara. This involves 30+ hours of driving and some cool vista views along the way. It also includes some SUPER CURVY roads that could make most people puke. We were lucky enough to see kasbahs, some beautiful Berber villages and several spectacular rock formations. Morocco is a breathtaking country!!!!

Beautiful Berber village on the way to the Sahara

Kasbah Ait Ben Haddou is where they filmed Gladiator and Lawrence of Arabia

Some of the curvy roads through the Atlas Mountains!

But the pinnacle of the trip was most definitely camel trekking and camping in the Sahara! Armed with our headscarves, cameras, and little else, we saddled up on camels in the town of Merzouga and headed into the Sahara Desert to spend the night.

Us on our camels!

Yve and Tuck on their camel, Alena!

We arrived at our campsite just before nightfall and were able to climb the dunes to watch sunset in the Sahara…epic! Then, we climbed back down the dunes and found shelter in the Berber tents where we had dinner and played the drums with our hosts. It was quite windy as we fell asleep, but the tents, made of dozens of overlapping carpets, kept us very warm!

Jones sporting his cozy headscarf

Our accommodations! When we asked where the bathroom was, the answer was “everywhere!”

At 5 am, we awoke to climb the dunes and watch the sunrise. The winds had died down from the night before, and the dunes were back to perfect, with not a single footstep in sight. Wescott and Otto took advantage of the two snowboards available and used them to create a double sled for the dunes. We headed out of the desert after the sun was up and ate a hot breakfast back in town.

Otto with the snowboard at sunrise!

Wescott making cool shadows on the tents at sunrise!

It was an amazing 3 days but it was a whirlwind. I would have loved to stay longer and spend an extra 2-3 days in the Sahara area hiking around! The dunes are so beautiful and the colors are breathtaking! For those of you who know me well, you know that I am pretty hardcore about sticking with my Leica camera and black and white film. But the Sahara is no place for black and white…it is all about color!!!

Sunrise in the Sahara!

The trip left me yearning for more time in the desert!  Upon our return to Marrakech, I looked into round trip flights back to the Sahara to avoid another 30+ hours in the car.  Alas, it’s just not going to happen  I am adding “A Week In The Sahara Desert” to the itinerary for Around The World 2025 when we will go again

I didn’t want to leave!!!

Tuck and Jones arrive with a wagon to help carry our stuff to the Riad

Everyone was beyond friendly and our home is spectacular, spacious and comes with a cook!  Next day: sensory overload with the spice market and souks offering every item that you never knew you really needed until that moment. Lunch on a rooftop. Walk thru the maze of the old city getting nine of us lost for just a half hour is all part of the experience. Terry even brought RummiKub for the game of the night.

On the rooftop of Cafe des Epices in the heart of the spice market

Turkey, rice stuffing, pumpkin and grape casserole, potato croquettes, beets, turkey stuffed with something amazing… total feast!!

Our new home away from home is a spectacular Riad in the Medina of Marrakech. As a welcoming surprise, the cook and house manager prepared a sumptuous meal of roast turkey with all the trimmings and sides; all with a unique Moroccan flare! Thank you SO MUCH Siham and Raja for such a special dinner and welcome!

One of the most flavorful turkeys ever, done with Moroccan spices, olives, pomegranate, and other unidentified delicacies!

We’re a bit behind in blog posts, so stay tuned for more excitement from Seville, Spain and Lisbon, Portugal!

All The Best,

The Sharples Family

We also found out that the world record was set for the worlds largest wave ever surfed one month ago, and it was on the Portugal coast. Here’s an awesome video of it!

Selecting ham in Spain is like picking out wine…and just as expensive!

In an oak forest that rests on the border of Spain and Portugal free-range pigs can be found eating only acorns as their ailment. This has a very significant impact on the flavor of the meat thus making this type of ham the finest where it is cured for 36 months. Pigs who are pastured and fed a combination of acorns and grains are the next grade down. The last type of ham is one that got fed only grain and is cured for 24 months. Buutt… although these pigs might not know it, they are all wonderfully and cursedly tasty

As the sun sets in yet another magical display and the pigs begin to doze off, a shipment of Iberian ham is about to start its journey across the Atlantic to the United States where it was just recently approved for export in 2005 and was released for sale in 2007. These expensively priced pigs who are now in an acorn dream sleep are just a few of the many who carry on the amazing taste of jamon iberico and give a part of Spain to others (though I suggest you not try to bring some home with you since I hear it’s illegal).

You can even buy ham in a cone like ice cream!