We have just docked at Petropavlovsk after sailing from Sakhalin Island. Here are some photos. Joe

  Eastern Russia                                                           April 20, 2016 Just a few hours heading north in the Pacific Ocean and you go from relatively mild early Spring weather in Japan to sub-zero snow in Russia! We visited Korsakov on Monday, on the island of Sakhalin, about halfway between Japan and Russia in this area of the world. This […]

now this gal shows my level of athletic prowess! Rodin’s Burghers of Calais – one view (there are 57 castings of this sculpture in existence)    

Hello Everyone…Leaving Japan Decent Internet access has returned now that we have left Japanese waters. We still don’t know exactly what the problem was. Anyway, leaving that aside, we lucked out again, this time missing by about 2 days the earthquakes that struck southern Japan. We have lots of photos from Japan, including shots taken […]

Japan                                                              Friday, April 15, 2016 Our last stop in Korea was Busan (aka Pusan), on the southeast coast, and we enjoyed a long day seeing various sights, including some beautiful beaches. We visited a Buddhist temple perched high on a cliff (lots of steps to get to the top, but well worth the climb) overlooking […]

Hello everybody We can do some posts like this–but we can’t upload photos– apparently because the Peoples Republic of China is blocking certain types of Wi-Fi uploads. So it may be a while before we get out of their range. Later comrades 🙂 Joe

Hi Everybody We will have limited internet bandwidth until after April 17 because of local regulations with respect to Wi-Fi, so it may be a while until we can post photos. Joe

Seoul and Jeju Island, South Korea             Friday April 8, 2016   8pm We spent yesterday in Seoul and today in Jeju Island, South Korea. In each place, guides emphasized that Korea is different from China and from Japan. Koreans are descendants of Mongolians, not Chinese clans. Koreans appreciate things on a smaller scale than the way […]

We are in (South) Korea for 3 days. Here are some photos from Seoul. Joe