My weekend was supposed to be spent checking out the aspen on Bates Mountain, looking for carvings made by the Basque shepherds from the early 20th century. As such things go, the route to the mountain -- somewhat remote in Central Nevada -- was more than my 14-year old Volvo could comfortable accommodate. It was deeply rutted, and filled with the color and fine grain of the antagonist of Robert Heinlein's scifi classic The Moon is a Harsh Mistress: moon dust. But instead of causing my moon rover to overheat, given its consistency and traction capacity of slick mud, it made progress more challenging than I wanted. Getting stuck wasn't on the agenda.

I found a place to pull over as the sun set, and made camp. I was reasonably confident I could retrace to pavement easily enough. Plans were about to change.

I spent most of the night thinking of a friend who’s going through some real challenges that are only compounded by Covid-19. I wish I could help more than buying some groceries, but I hope that little bit buoys things a bit for them. 
The rest of the time I spent planning alternative activities. I decided to visit some places I’d seen on the way out to Austin: Cold Springs and Earthquake Fault. 

Cold Springs is host to a Pony Express stop, a stagecoach stop, and an early telegraph station. They are all separated, so I turned it into a run (10K with some reasonable climbing), and got my exercise as well.

​The earthquake fault was less fun. I was followed up the dirt road by OHVs sporting rednecks with beer and Trumpistan flags. I took a couple of photos and left and continued my way west.

 On a whim, I decided to stop at Sand Mountain. I did the nature walk around another Pony Express station while I was in the area. The sand mountain itself would be interesting to play on, but I didn't want to get run over.

When I got back to the car... a flat. Swell. This was the second one (the first wasn't my car) in a couple of months on dirt roads. <Sigh> I got out the spare and jack and lug wrench... 

Typically, no biggie, but a combination of super tight lugs after getting brakes done earlier in the week and a short-handled lug wrench with a rounded socket, meant I could only manage two of the five lug nuts. Apparently I’m gifted with foresight, since I bought AAA a month ago. Spotty cell service meant a juggle getting the truck out there, but it happened, and eventually I was on my way, riding on the baby spare. I made it to the tire shop before closing and they had me back on the road in about an hour. I’m buying a new, and better, lug wrench tomorrow.

As I started discussing in the last post, in approximately one year, I plan to chuck it all and head into the figurative sunset: retire and bail on where I am living. Not that Northern Nevada is a bad place to live - au contraire, mon frere! - it's a great place if one is disposed to outdoor activities as I am. No, I am leaving because of too many ghosts. As I said, my preference is to go internationally with minimal belongings attached. That's the dream. The reality may differ due to something you may have heard of - a pandemic.

If things have not settled enough for me to jet off, my Plan B is to load a few things in my 2006 Volvo wagon and hit the road in the USA. I've done it a few times - camping on the side of a road, or in a campground - so I don't see why I can't continue the practice. The difference would be that I wouldn't have a home base - I'd just keep on moving. What things I don't take with me and I want to keep, I'll put into storage here. I will maintain an official residence here via a friend's physical address and a PO Box, too, for tax purposes (no state income tax on my pension).

I figure a schedule of two nights on the road, and one in a place with a shower and a bed. Rinse and repeat. The car has a lot of miles left on it, and sleeping in the back isn't a problem for one. Seeing as I'm a solo adventurer now and in the foreseeable future, I think it'll all work out fine. The freedom of letting the wind blow me wherever is almost daunting in its breadth. I mean, how many people actually have the freedom, and willingness to just...go? Anywhere, at any time?

​I will have that freedom. What I do with it remains to be seen.

The countdown has begun to Slang's Worldwide Walkabout. What is that, you may ask? (A generous assumption regarding readership here.) Well, my plan is to take off on a semi-permanent basis September of 2021 and...just take off. Go where the whim leads me, or the wind, or the tide, or the call of a siren song. I will no longer have an anchor, or even a tether attaching me to where I am currently, so why stay? My loin-fruit are both launched and will be either in college or in the working world at that point, and I will be retiring from my job.  There is nothing compelling enough for me to stay to counteract the weight of the ghosts that haunt me here. Ghosts of things that have died -- relationships, hopes, loves; ghosts of what was, and what will never be.

I will be shaking the dust of this town from my metaphorical boots. Metaphorical, because I don't own any, and certainly wouldn't be packing them along if I did -- too heavy and bulky. Only shoes going along with me are running shoes and flip flops.

The questions that remain are exactly when to take off, and where to go. Much of that second question is wrapped up in things I cannot control - mostly to do with the situation regarding Covid-19 and how the government at the time is handling it. I'm not sure it could do worse than it is now, but hey, set a bar low enough, and the tangerine nightmare in the White House will find a way to go lower. As things stand now, many countries won't even accept a US citizen to enter their country. My, how far we have fallen. I can only hope for a change in administration, the development and distribution of a viable vaccine, or both.

My current choices of a first landing point are either Panama (I did like it there), or New Zealand. I like the Panama option as an initial landing point because of its proximity to the rest of the Americas to the south for further hops, and some familiarity. New Zealand is enticing for its being New Zealand, and its proximity to Southeast Asia and Australia. I have time to consider, and who knows if either country will welcome me. Well, not me specifically -- since I am awesome -- but a person coming from a contaminated, quarantined, and (rightly so) ostracized country.

So that's the plan: a carry on bag and my passport: travel light and flexibly and, if necessary, fast. Anything else I own (a car, some furniture, the rest of my clothing and kitchen gadgets) I will either sell or put in storage. With the Internet the way it is now, and banking electronic, I can be gone as long as I want. I can pop back to comply with visa requirements and see my kids, though, every couple of months.

What to do if I can't escape this shithole? That's in the next episode.

I realized I hadn't posted since the speculative one regarding my shoulder. As the ones (maybe even fives of you!) reading these discovered last post, my shoulder was causing me grief and pain and sleepless nights, so I decided to get it checked out. The MRI showed a conclusive tear in the subscapularis attachment. On the bright side, it was a partial tear, on the more grim side, the doc referred to it as "hanging by a thread". 

I could last as long as a year before needing surgical repair, or NOW! I chose the "now" option. I understand the process will suck in the extreme, in that I will be completely sidelined for at least 6 weeks from running (4-6 in a sling), and it will take longer than that to get back to full range of painless motion. Waiting to fix it seems stupid, so I am heading in for the repair on the day after Christmas.

Here's hoping the doctor doesn't celebrate too much.

Over the course of the last couple of months I've noticed significant pain when moving my right arm in certain ways; movements to the rear and up resulted in pretty significant pain (okay, I'm a man, so I'll call it excruciating, whereas a woman would call it mild).

Thinking back, I think I first noticed it in mid-September and probably attributed it to getting old, and muscle pain and it'll probably go away if I ignored it. Unfortunately, over the successive couple of months, it hasn't improved, and even might be getting worse. Just before leaving on the Central European Adventure, I decided to do some self diagnosis, with the help of the Internet. After searching through sites with my symptom descriptions, and eliminating the ever-present Cancer! self diagnosis, I arrived at a torn rotator cuff. 

Huh.

I scheduled a visit to an orthopedist and off I went to Europe. Sure enough, pain and mobility issues never abated the entire time, despite liberal application of analgesic malted beverages to my internal digestive system. The day after I returned, I went to the ortho, and after X-Rays, he told me my shoulder looked good - no arthritis and no issues with the skeletal structure. After moving it about a bit, he also eliminated "frozen shoulder" and determined the likely culprit as (drum roll) a torn rotator cuff. He explained that the only, ONLY, fix for this was surgical. There is no schedule of PT that will fix it. Once torn, a repair is needed.

Swell.

He scheduled an MRI to confirm. I've had that (on this past Saturday) and am now in limbo waiting to see the doctor to review the MRI. My appointment is next Monday; I think the Thanksgiving holidays delayed it a bit, since they like to do the follow up within a few days. I'm not terribly optimistic about the diagnosis, and I must confess it's putting a bit of a damper on my festivities -- such as they are anyway. Seems I'm either destined for surgery and 4-6 weeks of sling-wearing plus 4-6 months of rehab, or what? I don't know what other option there is.

Just thinking about trying to dress myself and tie my shoes with one hand for a month or more... Ugh.

I think I'll drink.

The process of heading back to the USA and my job has begun, and will finish in about 42 hours (as of when I started this) when I land in Reno. I’m in Václav Havel airport, it’s misty, foggy and chill. That seems to be a perfect end to a good trip. Though I’ve only been away for seventeen days, it seems like I’ve been gone much longer. Maybe it’s the number of different places I’ve stayed, and the number of different cultures I’ve seen - four countries and significantly different cultures. Vienna was the most western and familiar, Budapest and Prague both were a little more different in different ways - likely as the result of being on the other side of the Iron Curtain for a time, and Istanbul was the most foreign.
At any rate, back to the US I go, whether or not I am ready - or willing.

Some takeaways:
1. Smoking is quite prevalent everywhere I went - I think Istanbul was the worst.
2. People were cautiously friendly in general. I did get some direct looks now and again, but I’ll attribute that to my rugged good looks, rather than being an obvious stranger in a strange land.
3. Food everywhere was relatively inexpensive, and tasty. Vienna was the most expensive, Budapest the least. For beer, though Prague definitely was the best place. Even in the airport lounge, a beer is only $2.50.
4. Kebabs are everywhere in Istanbul, Budapest and Prague. Universally good, and inexpensive - especially in Budapest: $2.00 for enough for a meal stuffed in a pita.
5. Budapest tram and subway are easy to do, and cheap. I didn’t try it anywhere else.
6. Flying in Europe is so painless compared to the USA. Ten access points to scan your boarding pass, and you’re in. No one or two TSA agents scrutinizing your ID and boarding pass. Shoes? They stay on your feet. Pull out big electronics? Sure, but they go in the same bin as your carry-on, and coat. The longest it ever took to get through security was maybe 10 minutes.
7. RyanAir is certainly low cost, no frills. You walk out in the rain and climb the stairs to get on. And storage is a free-for-all. While I wasn’t looking, someone else stuffed a bag under the seat in front of me. Ballsy.
8. Europe is “pay to pee,” which is different. Public restrooms are not free.
9. Top sheets are not a thing. I stayed in six different places, and none had one. Bottom sheet and a single-wide duvet. On a double bed, there were two single-wide duvets.
10. Traveling with Spencer was better than traveling alone, and traveling alone was better than not traveling at all.
​
It’s time to go, so I must ask myself, of the places I’ve just been, do I want to return?
Istanbul: maybe
Budapest: nah - I was there long enough
Vienna: sure
Prague: definitely. I’d like to get more comfortable and do some exploring outside the city as well.

Sbohem Praha.

I spent the day walking in my Hungoshoes around Prague. Shoes started to hurt after eight hours, but Prague was still delivering. It is a remarkably photogenic city, with inexpensive food (really like the chimney cakes!) and downright cheap beer. There are so many museums, it would take a much longer trip than I have available to visit. Some notable ones I skipped were the Apple Museum (of computers), the Sex Machines Museum, and the Instruments of Torture Museum.

The food on this trip has been varied and good. Although the wild boar burger I had last night was a bit gamey for my taste, overall, I’ve enjoyed my culinary experiences in all four countries visited on this trip (Hungary, Turkey, Austria, Czech Republic). My trip is winding down; I leave tomorrow to return to Budapest to catch my flight home on Sunday. I’ve definitely experienced ups and downs this time around, but overall, a really good trip.

Did I mention Prague was photogenic? Well here it is - ineffectively captured by me on an aging iPhone.

Video of the Astronomical Clock striking the hour. Pretty cool.

Panorama vid of the Old Town Square. Figures there’d be a freakin’ Starbucks.

I don’t remember where exactly this narrow history of the Republic was, but I thought it was really cool. It’s to the south of the clock, though.

I needed a bit of an uplift after such a display, and some communing with fellow humans can do that for me. I decided spontaneously as I passed by the visitor’s center for the Parliament building, to do the touristy thing and pay for a tour. That is one impressive structure! It’s huge, and in it’s construction a few of the facts I retained (and a joke) from the guide were:
​1. 40 kilos of gold leaf are used in the ceilings.
2. It’s 96 meters tall - the same as the spire at St. Stephen’s Cathedral - representing the equality of church and state.
3. No buildings in Budapest can be taller.
4. There are 366 spires on the building. The first 365 representing the number of days in the year, and the last, on the dome, representing leap year’s additional day.
5. There are two kinds of people in Budapest - the ones who live on the Buda side of the Danube, and those who want to live on the Buda side of the Danube.

To end the day, the man-cub and I went to a Laotian-Thai restaurant. It had gobs of positive reviews, and the negative ones I read all were about the curry being too spicy. Yeah, it wasn’t. I needed to add the heat. It was all quite good though. Two thumbs up from the both of us.

I said goodbye to the kid after dinner. I’m heading to Prague later today, and he goes to Berlin on Thursday. He doesn’t return until Sunday after I depart for the States. I don’t know if it affected him, but I got sad. On a bright note, I’ll see him in a two months when he returns to the States himself, and has a gap-week before classes start again. It sure was good to see and travel with him.

And now, a few closing photographs.

Yesterday and today I spent walking around in the city. Yesterday with the Man-Cub, and today, as he was back in class, solo. Yesterday was foggy and colder, today was rain, rain, and occasionally a bit more rain. It worked well as the backdrop for visiting some potentially depressing places: Gellert Hill, Margit-sziget (Margaret Island) and the Hungarian National Cemetery. The island is rather large (over a mile long!), and was at various times a leper colony, the site of 12th century religious buildings, and fierce battles in World War II.

Walking the city streets with an alternating overcast or raining sky, I felt the oppression of the Hungarian people. These folks have been trodden upon by so many cultures so many times. Genghis, the Romans, the Turks, the Nazis, the Soviets... Sheesh. They couldn’t buy a vowel, nor catch a break. It was especially poignant to me when the man-cub pointed out chips and pocks in the stonework of the buildings and told me they were the result of bullets. Afterward, I saw them in many places. Horrifying.

Due to the weather, I didn’t see anyone else while I was in the cemetery, and while on the island, people were really sparse as well. Maybe the time alone contributed to my feelings of melancholy. I fought it off yesterday with some beer and BBQ with the man-cub and his roommate. Good beer, good food, good kids. Today, after traipsing about for 10 miles in the rain, I splurged and got an hour long massage. It was $21 well worth spending. I feel a little better about the world now, but I may be getting too old for these. Feels a bit weird getting a massage from someone that young.

Tonight will be goulash and a few beers. My ABB has an espresso machine I’ve figured out, and there is coffee available. It’ll be a good morning with the pastries I bought for tomorrow.

Anyway, here are what anyone comes here for: the photos.

After the whirlwind 44-hour (yes I miscalculated in a previous post. It’s fixed now.) on the ground visit to Vienna, Spencer and I headed back to Budapest on the bus. I must say it’s an easy way to get around, and as comfortable as a plane. For anything under 5 hours, I’d consider it first, since a 5-hour bus trip is probably equal to the time it would take to fly, given the time before and after and getting to and from the airports.

Of course, before leaving we had to try some chocolate from the place with the wall. It was a really good, pretty expensive, and unconventional breakfast. We compensated with $3 bratwursts in a roll from a street vendor for lunch.