Qantas is heavily promoting their “Aussie AirPass” starting from US$1099 for a return flight from North America including 3 domestic flights!
I’ve been tracking best fares since I lived in New Zealand. This is an insanely good deal.
(there must be some kind of catch)
Details – Quantas Aussie AirPass
Perhaps the LAST update to this, by far the most visited post on RickMcCharles.com:
location of Guoliang – Google Maps
If you use Google Earth software, a link to the location can be found on this page.
Aside from the location links, George Novak also found a 2003 travelogue posted on a Chinese website:
… there are two ways to get to the village. One is to climb the Tianti, a stairway cut into the rocky mountain, while another is to travel through the Guoliang Tunnel.
We chose the tunnel. Sitting by the elderly driver I was lucky to hear the story about the tunnel.
Before 1972, the path chiseled into the rock used to be the only access linking the village with the outside world. Then the villagers decided to dig a tunnel through the rocky cliff.
Led by Shen Mingxin, head of the village, they sold goats and herbs to buy hammers and steel tools. Thirteen strong villagers began the project.
It took them five years to finish the 1,200-metre-long tunnel which is about 5 meters high and 4 meters wide. Some of the villagers even gave their lives to it. On May 1, 1977, the tunnel was opened to traffic.
When I was mulling over what the tunnel looked like, the van started a very steep ascent.
I looked up and could not move my eyes away – it was so beautiful!
Natural Charms Soothe City Stress
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Nov 4, 2006
LoriMc found conclusive evidence:
The Light at the End of the Guoliang Tunnel – China Tourism magazine
More photos of the region on Jongo.com
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Not Bolivia, Peru, Taiwan nor Sichuan province in China.
How can it be so difficult to locate this amazing road?
LoriMc commented on this blog post, pointing to a flickr set including this image:
It appears this road is in Taihang Mountains of China. I ASSuME this because the photographer called his set Taihang – gorge hiking.
Not conclusive, but the best evidence so far. Thanks LoriMc!
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updated post from Nov. 3rd
Mystery solved (I think).
Overnight many including Warren Long discovered that these "Bolivian" road photos were actually taken in Sichuan province, China. These are the cliff roads of the Tibetan plateau, off-limits to tourists when I was hiking there in 1997.
At that time only military vehicles were allowed.
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original post from Nov. 2nd
Thousands of websites are tagging this the Stremnaya Road in Bolivia — the “road of death”.
I doubt that is correct. Locals have denied it on the Bolivia Web blog.
Sounds to me like people are confusing these photos with “the world’s most dangerous road” in Bolivia. I’ve been there. This photo was not taken there.
It’s not Cañon del Pato in Peru as some suggested. I’ve been there too and I’m pretty sure these photos were not taken on that road.
I expect it is in the Andes … somewhere.
Leave a comment if you solve the mystery.
George checked out the Central Cross-Island Highway (Chungheng) linking the east and west coasts of Taiwan. The highway cuts through some of its most rugged land, including the famous marble Toroko Gorge. <
Harbun in Northern China has an ice sculpture festival every year. Check out the pics:
Another terrific IMAX movie I recommend:
For 114 days, a team of explorers led by Pasquale Scaturro and Gordon Brown faced nearly insurmountable challenges as they made their way 3,260 miles down the Blue Nile and Nile river, traversing three countries in some of the world’s remotest regions. Deadly crocodiles and hippos, the world’s most dangerous whitewater rapids, gunfire from bandits, malaria, and temperatures topping 120°F are just some of the obstacles they faced. See their quest to become the first in history to run the Blue Nile and Nile from source to sea.
A gymnastics coach I know is off to New Zealand for a working holiday. I hooked her up with my former club in Christchurch.
Working holidays — or Gap Years — are a great idea but most people believe it impossible for them.
A new Canadian magazine called Verge has a mandate to help you find a way to go.
So you want to go abroad? Thinking about staying a while, doing something different, stepping outside your comfort zone? Want to make a difference? You’ve come to the right place.
Whether you are considering volunteering in a community, studying overseas, working your way around the world, or pushing your adrenaline limits – we have links to lots of ideas for you.
Questions? Want to know more about your possible destinations? Head to our “Ask an Expert” page. If you need advice, then let us know.
Verge Magazine – Resource Centre
(via Gadling)
Wow!
This is by far the best translation of the magazine experience to the internet I’ve seen.
Click the corner of the page and it rolls over. But with some interactivity.
Latitudes makes other on-line magazines look dull.
Lusciously photographed Latitudes Magazine has got a new issue out today and I take seriously my responsibility to let others know about this superb travel magazine. I hardly ever hear other people talking about Latitudes, and that is a shame. It is a lovely magazine with an Internet version that crackles with color and impresses with clever hidden “easter eggs” inside each online issue. … in Windows you can actually download a full, bursting version of the magazine to your laptop so as to carry and read when wireless and on the road.
This month’s issue features jaw-dropping images from Amsterdam, Thailand, Los Roques (“An Eden in the Caribbean”), Slovenia and more. I’d link to the specific stories, but the whole thing is in Flash (one of the format’s drawbacks) and there’s no bookmarking function. But look at it this way: now you’ll have to browse the magazine yourself and to savor all the wonderful visual surprises inside.
Luscious Latitudes Magazine – Gadling
In Vegas I heard the rumours that Prince would be a opening a club in Las Vegas. I’m an off-and-on fan who once grooved at his club in Minneapolis, Glam Slam.
The official announcement was made in late October 2006 and opened on November 10, 2006 with Prince performing. It’s on 4 days a week (Wedensday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday).
I’m sure you will click through to buy your tickets online – $125 / person
The only time I got hit badly for a bribe was at the Caracas airport in Venezuela.
It was blatant. Systematic. Though I pride myself on avoiding these encounters, I paid up that time — US$12 or so I could make a connection. Irked was I, but happily I bumped into a friend and we spent the last of his Venezuelan money in the bar.
Other times I have paid baksheesh, of course, but it was part of the normal course of business in those countries.
We “negotiated” a Park pass in Peru I recall. It was a fee that gringos normally did not pay.
In any case, Haiti is the bottom of the barrel. Finland the least corrupt.
Check the full list — CPI table / CPI 2006 / in focus / news room / home – Transparency International
Hungary is another of the dental vacation destinations. Too far away for me, i reckon.
After 10 days in this small border town, Carothers had much to smile about.
She had visited Budapest and Vienna, sampled some of Hungary’s most popular wines and enjoyed people-watching in neighborhood cafes. When she returned home to suburban Washington, D.C., she brought gifts for friends and a few souvenirs of her own, including eight new crowns.
A trip to the dentist may not be everybody’s idea of a vacation, but it paid off for Carothers. Literally. The tab for her dental work came to $2,900 — about a quarter of the $11,150 she estimates she would have paid had she gone to a preferred dentist in her employer’s insurance plan. In all, she spent just under $4,300 on dental care and travel, including a $45-a-night hotel room and last-minute airfare at a pricey $899.
USATODAY.com – The inciDENTAL tourist
ET, Gregi and I went to Haines in the summer. And loved it.
A highlight was the Bald Eagle Museum.
Wish I was there now …
Over 3,000 eagles gather along a four-mile stretch of the Chilkat River north of Haines, Alaska each fall to feed on a late run of salmon. This wildlife spectacle is the largest gathering of eagles in the world. Warm water upwellings in the river keep this stretch of the Chilkat River ice-free providing access to the fish when food supplies are exhausted elsewhere. Eagles flock from as far away as Washington State for the abundant feast. Starting in late October, eagles by the hundreds can be seen along the sand bars and in cottonwood trees in the Alaska Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve.
more Eagle photos on flickr – Doug Lloyd
(via Gadling)
Rick McCharles 