The Peterson Pack on the Move

In Asia we were on the move, spending only one to four nights in each city or town. Tre said our lifestyle was,  "If it's time to take out the trash, it's time to go." When we arrived in Europe, we scheduled some time to slow down and spend some in one place. We planned to work toward finishing home school for 4th quarter and figure out logistics for the next couple of months. Girdwood friends, Rachel and Ariana, met us in Dubrovnik and it was so fun to have some familiar companions outside of our immediate family for a week. After a few days in Dubrovnik, we headed south to Kotor, Montenegro where we had rented an apartment for a whole two weeks. Rachel and Ariana joined us there for the first few days and we had an amazing time exploring the walled city of Kotor and the surrounding mountains. Quillian finished her math program (Tre had finished a few countries ago) and they both got started on final assignments. But the internet was very slow and unreliable and our ...

We've recently been exploring Croatia, Montenegro, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, and we've found that it's hard to go anywhere in the Balkans without running into some mention of Yugoslavia , whether an ancient city, submarine tunnel, or Montenegro's political system. But what exactly is, or should I say was , this Yugoslavia? While many of my prior history lessons have been long winded things that took many hours of research, (Hah, did you really think that I could create anything short? Don't worry, you've still got a lot of scrolling to do.) I decided to let someone else do the talking for a change. Just kidding...our current Airbnb has very poor internet so research was hard. Luckily, we had the fifth edition Rick Steves Snapshot guide to Dubrovnik on us, which featured a history of the region. The vast majority of the information in this post is paraphrased from this book. So...Tada! Before I get to explaining what Yugoslavia actually was, I have to first give yo...

My family and I visited Dubrovnik and Kotor. I will tell you about Dubrovnik. On the plane leaving Sri Lanka, my mom realized that our tickets transferring us from Paris to Dubrovnik were for May… but at the time it was early April. So, we had to quickly rebook new tickets while waiting for our luggage in the Paris airport. Luckily, it was much easer booking new tickets in France than it would have been in Vietnam.  If any of you guys want to fly from Paris to Dubrovnik this May, we have 4 free tickets available.  When we landed in Dubrovnik, we took a taxi to the gate of old town.  It felt like a very posh car after spending so much time in the small, broken down tuk tuks of Sri Lanka.  We didn’t drive into Old Town with the car because no motor vehicles are allowed in Old Town Dubrovnik.  This was great and felt very calm after the busy streets of Sri Lanka. When we parked, we were right in front of a gelato shop and it was torture to walk past.  As we wa...

***Disclaimer: Shout out to my fellow middle schoolers (and almost 9th graders) back home! This is meant to be read only by those of you who can appreciate some sarcasm. I mean no offense by poking fun at you and our entire town.*** To our dearest friends back home in Alaska, I hope this letter finds you in the best of health. We send you greetings from far and wide, where the sun sets upon Adriatic shores and the people are far more stylish than you. We have had many unimaginable experiences, from being blessed by a buddhist monk to the smell of durian on public transport to the painful sensation of an acid burn from an Ayervadic oil massage. But, as the Croatians frown at us for mispronouncing their language, I am reminded of home, where Mr. Hickox's glare can make even the bravest seventh grader stop leaning back in their chair and pretend to pay attention. Truly, we do miss the comforts of home: the freezing rain, the scent of dead salmon on the riverbanks, and   the ever-...

In many of my previous blog posts I have attempted to create a comprehensive history or scientific outline through hours of research and writing. But, as one can imagine, that is extremely tiring, and I feel that we have strayed from our initial idea of a "travel blog." So I have decided to follow the wise words of the one Rachel Barber, and just write about some of our funny stories. Ignore the fact that my parents have told me to do this same thing countless times—it didn't sound as smart coming from them. So I'm going to go all  the way back to Vietnam. There, surrounded by people the same height as Quill, she and I were both "baby." And they sure loved their babies!  Everywhere we went, people would cross the street to ask if they could get their picture taken with Quill. All the little old ladies just wanted to cuddle her and pinch her cheeks. They absolutely loved her—the cutest possible girl in the eyes of the Vietnamese, with her pale skin, blond hai...

We arrived in Dubrovnik, Croatia after about 36 hours of travel from Mrissa, Sri Lanka. Our journey started just before dawn in a Sri Lankan train station and ended just after sunset the following day in the walled city of Dubrovnik. What a magic trick to be able to move between such dramatically different places on Earth in such a short time! The flight into Dubrovnik at sunset while looking down on the ancient city, the mountains, and the ocean was one of the most beautiful sights I have seen. The Uber driver in his leather jacket, driving his black Mercedes with leather interior felt worlds away from the tuk-tuks and makeshift taxis of Sri Lanka (where the mini-van seats are sometimes not even attached to the floor of the vehicle).The driver dropped us off at the gate through the wall because cars cannot drive into the walled city. We loaded our backpacks onto our backs and strolled into another world, feeling like we were in a storybook adventure series.  Carrying our luggage o...

                                                                                                                                                chapter 5                                                                                           Early the next morning I woke everybody up. I told  the girls to all wear headdresses and sprinkle fern seeds in their feathers. I told the boys to...

We drove in an old broken down van from Ella to Udawalawe. On the end of the drive we saw four elephants from the road. We walked up to the first one we saw and noticed other tourists feeding it bananas through the electric fence. Feeding wild animals is very bad. We thought one of the tourists was going to get zapped by the fence but unfortunately, it didn't happen. The next morning we woke up very early, at 5:00 am. We got into an elevated pickup truck bed to go on a safari. We drove into Udawalawe National Park. At first we saw storks, jungle fowl, hawk eagles, serpent eagles, kingfishers, peacocks, hornbills, fly catchers, and bee-eaters, which are all birds. The jungle fowl looks like a small rooster with a big beautiful crest. It is the national bird of Sri Lanka. The flycatcher, kingfisher, and bee-eater are brightly colored tropical birds. The flycatcher is blue. The kingfisher is also blue. The bee-eater is green. We also saw several crocodiles basking in the sun at a mudd...

   Towering over  the Sri Lankan jungle, a massive plateau juts out of the otherwise flat landscape. Originally a lava plug from a long gone volcano, this imposing rock has become an integral part of Sri Lankan history.      Sigiriya, which is Sinhalese for Lion Rock, has been through many stages throughout history. It has gone from a monastery older than Jesus to the impenetrable fortress of a usurper king, back again to a monastery before being mysteriously abandoned and consumed by the jungle.  It was an absolutely amazing place to visit, even if it did mean dragging ourselves up steep staircases in one- hundred degree heat.      This ancient monolith seems to draw one toward s it, and  it has been gathering people for thousands of years.  There is evidence that the caves and outcroppings around Sigiriya  have been used as shelters by Buddhist monks and ascetics since the 3rd century BCE, and archeological studies have...