I woke up Monday (August 5th) around 3pm after having gone to bed around 6:30am after the final night of dancing, hanging out at the beach and getting freshly baked croissants and a huge macaroon dessert pictured below (in that order). I still had no idea where I’m going next and where I’m going to sleep that night.

A huge macaroon with raspberries. So delicious!

I had made new friends at the west coast swing dance camp in the past 10 days. One of them was Zac. He is about my age and was born in USA, but has lived in France for the past 9 years. We instantly connected and could talk about anything and everything. Since I didn’t really have set plans for what to do right after the camp, other than that I need to get to Cardiff by Friday passing through Paris. So me and Zac decided to hang out for couple more days.

For a split second I was wondering whether I should commit spending two days together with somebody I barely know. However, desire for adventure and learning was stronger. Besides, I can always bail if I don’t like something.

Zac came by and we started brainstorming of where could we go. He had a car so road-trip it is. Me armored with Google Maps and Google Search, he with a Blackberry texting friends who live in the area. I started with looking for hikes in the Pyrenees since its relatively close to Montpelier and I have been to the other big mountain ranges in France. Also Zac mentioned that in the nine years he has been in France he hasn’t been on a hike. But his car is full of camping gear! Can’t explain that! Seems that the French look at camping just as another type of accommodation. One could stay at a hotel or just go camping. In my mind from experiences in the USA camping sites always have trails leading to them, but in France they also could be standalone. For example, in La Grande Motte there was a camping site in the middle of city with four spots. There were no forests or hikes next to it that I could see in the map.

One thing lead to another and I looked up in Wikipedia for the list of highest mountains in the Pyrenees. Mount Aneto at 11,168 feet (3,404 m). Hmmm, I need a reference point. How does that compare to the highest peak in the Sierras in California (not that I have climbed it)? That would be Mount Whitney at 14,505 feet (4,421 m). Ooh, ok, not too bad. I noticed that Zac looked concerned. I assured him:

“Its not that I need to climb any of these mountains, its just that there usually are good hikes at the base.”

He replied visibly relieved:

“Oh, good.”

Zac mentioned there are lots of castles in south of France. Yes! That’s exactly what I want to see. I remember how years earlier a French friend of mine took me on a tour to three French castles near Claremont-Ferrand and I loved it!

The plan was the following. The first stop will be Carrcasonne (a big castle not to miss), then some other castles south of there, then finish the loop in Toulouse, which is home for Zac and from where I can take train to Paris.

I just quickly checked some hotels in Carcassonne, looked like there was plenty of availability, so we were good to go.

We finally left Le Grande Motte at around 9pm and arrived at Carcassonne really late. The first hotel I looked at and that we stopped at had a signed that they are booked full. Ok. Next! I had no internet and I’m glad I saved some options offline on my laptop. Found the address of the second choice hotel and was able to find it on Google Maps on my phone. Remember I don’t have internet on the phone, but we were able to get to the place with cached Google Maps. I love technology! I was navigating and took some wrong turns because resolution wasn’t high and there were many one way streets, but eventually we got there. It was past midnight and nobody was at the reception. But it had a machine where you can reserve a night and it spits out a key. How cool!

I didn’t sleep well. My stomach was acting up and made couple runs to the bathroom (Well, not really runs, just get up and open bathroom doors, the room was so small!). I guess the smoked salmon sandwich that I picked up at a gas station on the way to Carcassonne wasn’t a good choice.

In the morning, first stop was Carcassone castle.

This is the model of the castle. The area in the middle is not empty it contains a small medieval village.

I just love the views:

By the time we explored and ate it was already 3pm. Definitely longer than I expected, but we don’t have to rush anywhere either. That’s the benefit of not planning every detail.

The next castle is D’Arques. In general choosing which castles to visit was pretty random, the ones with more information won. Here for exampel, Zac’s friend said there is a lake nearby it.

The castle wasn’t nearly as impressive as Carcassonne castle, but interesting nonetheless. It is standing by itself middle of nowhere. You wonder (at least I do), how many people can fit in there and how tightly people used to live in medieval times.

Years ago, visiting other castles and just talking about history I thought to myself that it would be really cool to live in a castle. However, this one probably would not fit the bill as it is a bit too small for big fancy parties. This is the whole space of one floor:

The views however are awesome:

And I could totally see myself sitting there and looking out the window to the expansive views.

Next, couple wrong turns later, we found the lake. So much green!

“Where are we going to stay tonight?” Zac asked.

We hadn’t thought that far. It really depended how far along we would had gotten in our route. Zac suggested camping here. I liked the idea! That meant I didn’t have to think and didn’t have to move from my nap on the grass. Plus then I can wake up with the view of the lake and go for a swim in the morning. Sounds fantastic! And so we did.

The nature had one surprise for us.

I had never seen such big hail drops!

In a brochure I picked up at at the hotel the previous night I saw that there is a Red Train with picturesque ride. So for the next morning the plan was to get somewhere with cell phone reception and call them up asking what times the train departs. We did that and it left us with couple of hours of time in which we decided to explore the castle of Peyrepertuse nearby.

In the meantime we also wanted to find a boulangerie, but no such luck. On our way we drove through many small towns ..

.. some just didn’t have a boulangerie (at least not on the main road), some didn’t work on Wednesdays and some close at noon.

The drive was absolutely gorgeous.

Castle of Peyrepertuse is built on top of a mountain. Finally I get to see one of those castles that majestically stand above all else.

You can barely tell its a castle. It blends so well with the rocks!

The pictures can’t do the justice to the expansive views, but here it goes anyways.

Here is a video:

It was getting nearer when we should leave to catch the red train, but the castle was so amazing and we happened to have stumbled on a Medieval festival that we decided to just stay there and explore.

A falcon!

The castle itself:

Look how steep the rock wall is!

Look, the castle takes up the whole clif!

I love expansive spaces like this! I could sit there for hours!

After the castle we drove down to the village below and explored the medieval market.

After exploring the medieval festival and eating we took the scenic route to Toulouse (ie. avoiding highway). I was the navigator and we made some wrong turns, but it was for the better! Because of it we saw the most breathtaking views in the whole trip.

We made to to Toulouse and then I took night train to Paris.

Also, for these two days we were navigating with the help of cached Google Maps with no internet connection. I’m really impressed.

This road-trip definitely expanded my comfort zone. I like to plan so not knowing where to stay the night is unusual for me. It provided another example to my belief that taking wrong turns usually comes out for the better. And only good things can come out from saying yes to an adventure.

I have committed writing this blog regularly, so even though I haven’t had time yet to write up about my recent adventures, I have to post something.. as boring or short it might be.. First, have to get into the habit of writing, after that I can work on improving the quality.

Finally access to internet 🙂 I was starting to get a bit antsy 🙂

After spending roughly a week at home in Latvia, last Friday I headed out to Le Grande Motte (near Montpelier in France). I had two hour layover in Charles De Gaule airport in Paris and again it was barely enough time to make my connection. This time we got held up in the walkway between the two terminals because there was an unattended suitcase and a bomb threat. We waited for a good half an hour while authorities checked it out. At one point we heard a sharp whistle and somebody screamed “Cover your ears!”. We did, but thankfully, nothing happened. Pretty soon after they let us go through. That experience was a bit scary.

I’m in Le Grande Motte for Sea, Sun & Swing West Coast Swing dance camp. Its absolutely A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! Lots of super good and fun dancing, weather is fantastic, and I’m sharing apartment with 5 other very fun people. We are laughing and cracking up jokes all the time. The schedule looks like this. We get up a bit before noon, have breakfast all together at home. Then head out to dance classes which are from 1pm to 4:30pm. Straight to the beach a short walk away after that. Go home, take a shower (takes a while for 6 people). Sometime between 8pm and 10pm we are ready to head out for dinner.

Now, if there is a group 6 or more people and a street full of various restaurants, how do you make a decision as a group where to go? Alma (my roommate from Sweden) had a fantastic idea: “How about the 4th [restaurant] on the right?” Problem solved! We indeed counted down four restaurants and went into the fourth one and it was a great choice! The food was delicious and the atmosphere was great! We repeated this the other nights as well on different streets, “1st on the left”, “5th on the right” and there hasn’t been a disappointment.

After dinner (which turns out always to take about two hours) we go dancing and dance away till 3am. Eventually get to bed and repeat. Not bad at all 🙂 Plus the sleep schedule is sustainable compared to just weekend long west coast swing events. At those we dance all night, get maybe four hours of sleep and if lucky get a nap in the afternoon.

After two weeks, it is starting to feel less like a vacation because there is no thinking or stress about what’s going to happen after coming back from vacation. There are no obligations. Its a freeing feeling and I’m using this opportunity to practice living in the now and really listen to myself and hear what is it that I really want to do at any moment. Not what I should do, not what I’m supposed to do, but just what I want to do right at that moment. I think this will be useful for me to grow as a person because I have a tendency to live in the future (always have goals and dreams about future). Before this trip I didn’t think that this would be one of the things I would get out of this trip.

Another thing I have realized because of experiences since the start of the trip is that I don’t always listen to my intuition and how I feel. I’m very logical and analytic and I approach pretty much everything in my life that way. Usually when I have some strong feelings or intuition I try to brush it away with logic or come up with reasons to explain it. I have decided that I will use this trip as an opportunity to learn how to listen to myself better.

I’m here till Monday. After that I don’t have clear plans yet but probably by next Friday (Aug 8th) I will be in UK.

July 31, 2013 @ Le Grande Motte in France.

It has been a week since I left home in San Francisco to go on a three month long trip. The first stop was Latvia where my home is, that is where I grew up and where my parents are (it is still weird to call two places home).

It feels similar to previous times when I visited home in Latvia, except it is warmer now as I usually go home for Christmas instead of summer time. As usual, I’m mostly filling all my time with  meeting up with my family and friends on and off the dance floor. One week is still not enough to meet all the people I want to meet. The good thing is I will be back for longer later! I feel incredibly grateful that it is possible to continue with friendships where we left off the previous time.

A lot of people ask me whether I’m traveling by myself. Yes I am, but that doesn’t mean that I’m alone. I’m around people [I know or about to meet] all the time, I’m not even counting strangers. In fact, only Wednesday, a week later, was the first time when I was by myself, and it lasted just 4 hours. I went to my favorite beach in Latvia (Baltā kāpa).

Me being a data geek.. 🙂 in the past week I have averaged meeting in person 2.1 people per day that I know and 2.7 new people that I had a substantial conversation.

Some more stats. 🙂 I have traveled:

• 6474 miles/ 10418.9 km by plane.
• 68.3 miles / 110 km by train
• 160+ miles / 258 km by car/bus (only counting trips longer than 10 km).

July 24, 2013 @ home in Latvia

I walked up to my seat 73A and said:

“Hey guys, I have the window seat”.

An older gentleman sitting at the aisle seat replied:

“Sure, you may have it.”

The overhead bins were full and my backpack didn’t quit fit so I flipped it vertically to lie on its narrow side. That did the trick. The gentleman said:

“Wow, you must have studied geometry.”

To which I smiled and replied: “In fact, yes, I have.”

And that started conversation between me and him and his college aged son sitting in the middle seat. They were on their way from San Francisco to Budapest for a family vacation. One of the things we talked about were books and I was pleasantly surprised that they both have read or knew about the same books. Steven (the older gentleman) is very funny. He said his goal in life is every single day to make somebody laugh at least once. He definitely overachieved his goal for the day on that flight.

After 10 hours we landed in Frankfurt at 10:45am and I had 9 hour layover in Frankfurt in front of me till my flight to Riga at 8:20pm. So I asked them whether I can hang out with them while they were waiting of couple hours for their flight to Budapest. They happily agreed. As we were making our way from concourse Z to their gate in concourse A (Frankfurt airport is huge! But no… there aren’t concourses all the way from A to Z.) Steven stopped by gate A56 which apparently was their original gate and confirmed with the lady working at the gate that gate A7 is indeed the new gate for their flight to Budapest. She said:

“Oh, that’s what it is? Now I know and can announce the gate change!”

And so she did. We continued walking along the walkway and soon the lady from the gate passed us. As she passed us Steven made another joke and she said:

“You know, Germans have a saying that if you see somebody or run into them three times then you have get coffee together or something.”

After more jokes and people watching Steven and his son departed to Budapest. I made my way back to a lounge area that we passed by.

This time connecting to the airport internet was not as dumb as last year. You provide an email address and voila 30 minutes of free internet. Just half a year ago when I was in Frankfurt airport you had to provide a cell phone number and then you would get access code as a text which you had to enter in the page. Well, I wanted to get the internet in the first place because my cell didn’t work abroad..

Before departing San Francisco I posted on Facebook that I will be in Frankfurt for 9 hours. Maybe by a lucky coincidence there would be somebody who also has a long layover.

And indeed there was. A friend of mine sent me a message saying that his friend Alexander has a long wait till his flight to Bogota. I found the Departure schedule and there is a single flight (luckily) to Bogota which is at 2:30pm from gate C14.

Also I find out from another friend that there is an “Stranded At An Airport, Tango Meet-Up” group. Fascinating! I immediately sing up, but I can’t post immediately because I guess first somebody has to approve my membership.

I made my way over to concourse C via skytrain. As I’m sitting in the skytrain and I make an extended eye contact with the person sitting across from me. He stares back at me and then smiles. I analyze to myself what just happened and I realized that I had kept the eye contact longer than usually, most likely because I’m just so tired that moving my eyes to something else requires an effort. (Plus it probably didn’t hurt that he was a cute guy in his twenties or thirties. 😉 )

I get out and make my way over to Gate C14 (did I say that Frankfurt airport is big?). Along the way I convince three different officials that even though my boarding pass says B11 I want to go to C14 to meet up with a friend while I’m waiting for my flight. I didn’t think this is possible, but I guess you never know if you don’t ask.

I arrive at C14 and its full of people, there is no way I will find Alexander. So I just sit down and look around. I notice the guy from the skytrain is sitting at the small cafe at the gate. He looks like somebody who could be from Bogota.

Pretty soon a guy sitting next to me starts conversation with me. We had a great conversation about traveling. Steffen from Dresden is on his way to Peru to climb mountains and travel for 3 months. What is even more fascinating is that after school (or while still in school?) he spent 2 years travelling in South America and after that he took another year off. During his travels he learned a lot about life and people. It opened his mind and he saw a culture where people are more relaxed, chill and enjoy life even with having very little. As opposed to Germans for whom its all about work, work, work, and punctuality. When he was looking at a map to find a hotel people would help him out and invite him to stay at their guest room in their home. He said:

“Traveling is very safe. It is more dangerous to cross a street in Germany than traveling”.

After he came back he had no problem finding a job because he is a mechanical engineer and there is always need for them. He spent 5 years working hard and now is taking three months off to travel.

Even though I didn’t meet my friends friend Alexander it was well worth coming to gate C14 and having the conversation with Steffen. After Steffen boarded I headed back to the concourse B where my flight would be later in the evening. I was getting hungry at this point.

As I was walking back the guy from the skytrain appears in front of me, we made an eye contact. For a split moment there is this awkward hesitation of do we keep going or start talking. Talking wins and we start a conversation. It turns out that he also has a long layover! He is waiting for a 10pm flight to Buenos Aires (which is the next flight at gate C14). And whats even more random, he is a professional Tango dancer returning from his three month tour around Europe. This is surreal! I remember about the Tango facebook group that my friend told me about, he hadn’t heard about it. I say that I was on my way to find food and ask if he wants to join me. He had just eaten but he joins me anyways.

The lady from the gate A56 was right, the third time is a charm and you get coffee together.

We eat, drink (me coffee, he beer), talk about dancing among other things. And then we dance.

We go the hallway next to the gate C14 (away from the cafe in the gate which plays music not suitable for Tango). He puts some music on his iPod, gives me one earbud and keeps the second. In salsa or west coast swing this would never work. Even though I’m not a Tango dancer I’m able to somewhat follow and not make a complete ass of myself. I’m sure it was entertaining for passer-bys to see two people dance in silence. We go some compliments! 🙂 He gave me some tips and by the fourth dance it was much better. What a great re-introduction to Tango! Now I want to learn how to dance Tango well and visit the Tango capital of the world – Buenos Aires.

We hung out till about 6:30pm (when I started to make may way back to terminal B for my flight to Riga.) He had a lot of fun on his three month tour around Europe teaching Tango, but he said he can’t wait to be back in Buenos Aires where Tango dancing is still the best in the world. That’s where it all started. When in Buenos Aires he dances every night till 6am. They know how to party! In San Francisco most things close at 2am!

At my gate B11 I saw there are some tables that have plugs in them. Most were busy but there was one bigger table where just one person was sitting. I came up and asked whether he minds if I share the table; he didn’t. Another great conversation ensued, but details of that story will have to be told some other time.

In summary, this was absolutely the best layover ever.

Contrast this with just half a year ago when I had the exact same flight from San Francisco to Riga and the same 9 hour layover in Frankfurt. The whole time I spent alone and interacted with maybe one person – the waitress at a restaurant whose phone number I used to get the confirmation code to sign up for free internet.

In the past couple of months I have been practicing starting conversations with strangers. It is still uncomfortable, but after a day like this I have the motivation to keep practicing. Before I would have just pointed at my window seat and from the context the person sitting in aisle seat would have understood to get up and let me in. Now I confidently and loudly say that its my seat. Its just one sentence but what a difference it makes!

Plus I got another confirmation that sharing publicly what you are up to (declaring on FB that I have 9h layover) leads to great adventures.

July 19th @ home in Mārupe, Latvia

P.S. I’m still learning how to do this blogging thing and how to write, so any feedback about anything is very welcome. Either in the comments or at dianajzk at the google’s mail service 🙂

I still barely can believe that I’m actually about to take off. The initial idea bud for this was months and months away and it seemed absolutely crazy and a stupid thing to do.

Now I believe its exactly what I absolutely have to do in order to improve my life and career.

Often before big events or conferences I ask myself, what I hope to get out of this? For this trip it is to spend quality time with my family and friends. Improve my communication and writing skills which will help me to get to the next level as a software engineer. Get into habit of starting and – most importantly – finishing things. Improving my dancing skills, having fun dancing in different cities. Meeting new interesting people, have deep, thoughtful conversations about meaning and purpose of life. 🙂 Plus I expect the unexpected (as I learned from Dārta).

Just the preparation for this trip already has changed me, mostly opening up my mind to new possibilities. So I’m sure the trip itself will change me as well.

July 17, 2013 @ SFO airport, International terminal, gate 101.

One week left till the take off. My todo list just keeps growing. However, I do stuff in the order of priority (or so I hope), so if I don’t get to something, its probably gonna be ok (for example, one can get travel insurance after starting the trip).

• A purse – its made of cloth so it can be folded and it packs small. This is mostly so that I can go to a bar and feel like a normal person 🙂
• Platypus water bottle  – it’s super handy that it packs small when empty
• hiking shoes – I’m glad I got hiking shoes with good grip instead of walking shoes. In Portland we went for a hike and climbing rocks and side trails it was very useful to have a good grip.
• dry compression sack – works awesome! Can really compress already rolled clothes. The only downside is that unpacking and packing takes longer than using packing cubes.
• notebook – for moments when planes take off and land and electronics can’t be used and when batteries are dead.

• Belkin travel surge protector – It was indispensable last weekend when sharing a hotel room with 3 other roommates. However when traveling I don’t think I will share hotel room with people that much as I will be staying either with friends or at hostels. Plus I won’t have that much electronics on my own with me (laptop, camera battery charger, phone, kindle) and they most likely won’t be needed to be charged at the same time.
• pairs of socks – I took 6 pairs of socks with me, but I used just one pair of socks, leaving some behind.
• some toiletries.

When I stop and think about it I can’t believe I’m leaving in already two weeks! Otherwise I’m very busy with finishing work stuff and preparing for the trip. 


Yesterday I finally bought a plane ticket to Riga. After scouring many websites, I got it for $909.04 from STA Travel. It is a youth fare for people under 26. Lucky me! Flying out with Lufthansa SFO to FRA on early morning of 17th, 9 hour layover in FRA and then landing at RIX late at night on  July 18th. The same fare on United/SAS costed $2300. The next best alternative was $1007. Some cheap fares showed up for $786 on skyscanner.com, but I wasn’t able to buy them through hop2.com. Looked pretty shady website, but thought it is worth a try. After entering all the information and clicking book, the ticket price changed to ~$4k. If it is too good to be true, it probably is!


As for preparing for the trip, I scoured through lots of packing lists and now have some sort of idea what I should pack. Learned about new things and gadgets, like compression sacks, sleeping bag liners, solid shampoo. Got bunch of that stuff on REI and Amazon. Will see how much of this will make into my backpack.


Since the last update I have found time to get all immunizations done. Plus I went to dentist and got annual physical. Yey for me! So happy was able to find my old immunization passport from Latvia, otherwise I would not have had any idea for what I have immunizations and for what I don’t have. 


Next:

• Pack my backpack.
• Find sublet for my room.
• Figure out what to do with insurance, though I can buy it once I’m on the road as well.
• Might be useful to get international drivers license.
• Get passport photos.
• Finish setting up a blog.
• Pack up my apartment.

July 3rd, 2013 @ home in San Francsico