Adventuuuuuuuuuuuure!
So, over the last couple of years, I have been getting emails from a place called Koryo Tours. They offer ... well, UNIQUE tour packages. As the name (might) imply to you, its focus is going to North Korea. Certainly not a place that makes me go, "Wow, I'd love to go THERE," there is regardless apparently some interest in going there. That's not their only locale -- I originally signed up for their mailing list, for example, as they have a yearly trip to far eastern Russia to visit an old abandoned town set up for miners in the area during the Soviet area. I thought that would be cool; Carl scoffed it off, of course, and said, "... well it's no Chernobyl."
So in the most recent email they sent this brochure to a trip to, I shit you not, Siberia. From the site:
Tofalaria is considered to be East Siberia’s most isolated territory; within this area there are no roads. We will venture into the last of the untouched Taiga region, famous for its pristine rivers, waterfalls and mysterious caves. Referred to by Valentin Rasputin as the “Country next to Heaven”, Tofalaria is home to Siberia’s smallest ethnic group the ancient nomadic reindeer herders of Asia called “The Tofa” people.
And it SOUNDS interesting -- some kind of Tofa festival is happening during the trip, there's a ride in a tank and a helicopter, and two days of horseback riding. Part of me goes, "Man, look at that adventure! That sounds AWESOME!"
... and I realise this is isolation for two weeks. In Siberia. And twelve hours on a horse? Hell, I've never been on a horse in my life! There's a more logical "are you batshit insane for even considering this??" reaction inside me, certainly.
But still, there's that desire for adventure. ..
So in the most recent email they sent this brochure to a trip to, I shit you not, Siberia. From the site:
Tofalaria is considered to be East Siberia’s most isolated territory; within this area there are no roads. We will venture into the last of the untouched Taiga region, famous for its pristine rivers, waterfalls and mysterious caves. Referred to by Valentin Rasputin as the “Country next to Heaven”, Tofalaria is home to Siberia’s smallest ethnic group the ancient nomadic reindeer herders of Asia called “The Tofa” people.
And it SOUNDS interesting -- some kind of Tofa festival is happening during the trip, there's a ride in a tank and a helicopter, and two days of horseback riding. Part of me goes, "Man, look at that adventure! That sounds AWESOME!"
... and I realise this is isolation for two weeks. In Siberia. And twelve hours on a horse? Hell, I've never been on a horse in my life! There's a more logical "are you batshit insane for even considering this??" reaction inside me, certainly.
But still, there's that desire for adventure. ..