Saturday, June 30, 2007

Hectic . . .

I was charged by an angry hippo on Wednesday. That was definitely the most hectic thing to happen to me in these pants yet.

I always thought of hippos as comic and slow. Well, they weigh around 700 kilos, and can sprint around 40 km/h. That thing sprinting towards you is scary, seriously fucking scary. We were all just running backwards, kind of glancing back as the hippo got closer, until the guide fired a few shots into the air, and scared the hippo off. The shots spooked a family of warthogs that ran between us and knocked my friend off his feet in their flight. It was good fun.

Thursday I gave the jeans an minor soak (screwing around with oars got thrown in, took my brother with me) while screwing around on the bank of the Nile up by Lake Victoria.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

It's been a long time . . .

I haven't been anywhere with internet access, or mobile service, electricity or hot water for about 10 days. Since the last post, the jeans have seen a little. I won't be able to upload pictures until I hit London or Morocco, but lets see: The jeans have been through London, headed over through Paddington station on the way to a drunken stumble the 17th. On the 18th I hit Kampala, and wandered around downtown by boda-boda (motorscooter with a driver and a passenger, costs 30-70 cents to get most anywhere, drivers often hit cars, it's an adventure). On the 19th, I fell down a waterfall with them on, wandered across some mountains in the Rwenzori range, and headed up to Queen Elizabeth National Park. The 20th we tried to find Chimps, but failed miserably, headed over to Bwindi. The 21st, I went Gorilla tracking, fell off a cliff, and ended up in some weird pseudo-colonial mansion drinking with the staff. Gorilla tracking was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. Seeing the baby gorillas curious about us, trying to figure out what we were was just fantastic. After that, we had, lets see... a few days of game drives, our car broke down in the middle of a park, and we fixed it with duct tape and pliers before the elephants got pissed off. Spent a few days hanging out on some island in the middle of a remote lake drinking beer with backpackers and hearing about what it's like to try to hitchhike through rebel territory in DRC. Done a bunch more, like rafting the nile (had to take the jeans off for that), have a few thousand fantastic pictures.

Jeans are fucking filthy, quite apparent whiskering and vertical falling. Been way too hectic to stick to the same thing in a pocket ever. Jeans got a few semi-soaks in downpours, and one "wash" after I fell off a cliff into gorilla shit. Unfortunately all I had was a pocket knife, some wet-ones and a stream, but gorillas chased me away from the stream after a while. Hit a hostel in town today, so I can finally clean them properly.

Pics to come.

Friday, June 15, 2007

Went to Self Edge

I figured I had to drop by Self Edge, since I didn't know if I'd be back through SF before I sent these jeans on. I met Kiya for the first time, checked out the new F310s (too slim), talked about the jeans, snapped a picture. I'm breaking in my new hiking boots. Those things are fucking hideous.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Still rocking them, still a little tight in the hips for biking. Sorry about the complete lack of updates, I'm moving tomorrow and have been stupid-busy. When I get to SF, I'll snap a few pics to upload, then whenever I find a computer across Africa and Europe, I'll toss some pics on here.

Friday, June 8, 2007

At the early hour of 10 am. They're clearly looser than than they were 50-100 miles of biking ago.

Thursday, June 7, 2007

These will fade fantastically

Well, the good pics won't start til near the end of the month when I get back to a computer after my Safari in Uganda, but for now, I'll just keep clicking shots of whatever. I took a few random detail shots and non-wear shots yesterday. I'll try and get some wear shots tomorrow.

Look at the shape of my bike seat:














Obligatory tag shot:














Also, the buckle:

Tuesday, June 5, 2007

first pics





from theetruscan....
The participants & locations for the 34 group include..

theetruscan - Uganda, Morocco, London, Paris
beardedpotato - Australia / Europe
StuckOnStupid - Toronto, Canada
I_miss_lily - Calgary, Canada
Topvillian
justinbaily21 - VA/SC
Sais - NY
will_i_am - NJ
40ozprophet - philly, PA
Tyro1 - UK
wEstSidE - Virginia / New Jersey
ktouran6923 - Boston, Mass
masuerte - LA, CA