Angkor

By Jason

There are two Angkors:  the temple, Angkor Wat, and the city, Angkor.  Around 1200, when London was only 50,000 people, the city of Angkor was 1 million people.

Khmer kings in Cambodia had the city of Angkor built, including Angkor Wat, Bayon and Ta Prohm.  They took many years and thousands of people worked on them.  In the temples, there are a lot of carvings, and the carvings are very detailed and perfect.

Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat is the most special temple in the city of Angkor, and it is also the world's largest religious building.  Suryavarman II had Angkor Wat built.

Jason's drawing of Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat

Monkeys battling demons (which the monkeys defeat) at Angkor Wat.  The demon king, which you can't see here, has ten heads.  

One of the towers at Angkor Wat.

Bayon

Bayon is about 800 years old.  Bayon is a Buddhist temple, and Jayavarman VII built Bayon.  There were 54 towers, and each tower had four faces.  If you add up all the faces, you would get 216 faces.  The faces look like Avalokiteshvara, a Buddhist god.  They also look like Jayavarman VII.  There are a lot of bats in the tall towers.

Jason's drawing of Bayon

Jason, at Bayon.

All of the towers at Bayon.

Close-up of a face on one of the towers, at Bayon.

Ta Prohm

Ta Prohm is also known as the Tomb Raider temple.Ta Prohm is diffrent from the other temples becuse the trees conquered the temple and you can't see most of the temple.  Ta Prohm is about 800 years old.  Jayavarman VII built Ta Prohm for his mother.

Jason's drawing of Ta Prohm

The trees conquering Ta Prohm

Vietnam - Video post

By Jamie

Here's a 4 minute video blog post about our time in Vietnam.

Box Turtles

By Jason

We visited a turtle rescue center in Cuc Phuong National Park, Vietnam.  The turtle rescue center helps turtles that are captured from the illegal wildlife trade.  They also try to preserve species that are endangered.  A woman named Sarah gave us a tour and we saw turtles and she taught us about them.  We saw a turtle that was a baby box turtle.  There are many kinds of box turtles in the world.  Box turtles are found in Asia and North America, but there are different species in the two continents.

Sarah Wahl gave us a tour of the turtle rescue center

A young box turtle

There is a hinge on the under side of a box turtle that allows them to close their shell all the way.  When box turtles get scared they close the bottom of the shell.

Under side of a box turtle - look for the hinge, it is just above the thumb and goes straight across the shell

We visited another turtle center in Cambodia on the way to a homestay near Kratie.  I got to hold a box turtle there.

Me holding a baby box turtle in Cambodia

Turtles are really cool but it's not always a good idea to have them as a pet, because they live a really long time.  Some turtles live 50-100 years.  And it's not a good idea to re-release turtles into the wild, because they may have diseases and they may not be found in the area where you live.  There's one species of turtle that is very very bad.  It's called the Red Slider.  It's from the United States and is not native to Vietnam.  It's been released into the wild when people got tired of having it as a pet.  But it eats anything and everything, including other turtles.

Red slider

Here's a good site for more information on box turtles:
http://www.boxturtlesite.info

   

Monkey Mia - dolphins!!!!

By Jamie

Monkey Mia is one of the places we stayed at in Australia.  When we got to Monkey Mia, the first thing we did was to swim in the ocean!  The next day we went to the dolphin interaction area and went to three feedings.  We even got to feed fish to the dolphins.  The dolphin I fed was named Nikki.

4 dolphins swimming close to us

Dolphin close-up

Me feeding Nikki

It was awesome!  Dolphins are my favorite animals.

During the dolphin feedings we also saw a venomous sea snake.  It came right up to the shore in very shallow water.

Sea snake

We had a car with a pop-up roof-top tent.  It was actually built to fit 5 people, so we fit in well.  We really liked the tent!

At Monkey Mia we also went on a boat tour.  On the tour we saw turtles, dugongs, and dolphins.  There were two dolphins that were racing the boat!  You can see them in the video below.  We also saw two manta rays and fish.  On the front of the boat they had nets that you could sit on.  At one point on the tour, off the back of the boat they put a different net that touches the water when you sit in it.  The boat moves its normal speed and the water splashes you in the net.

Dugong (related to a manatee)

Dugong close-up

Me on the front net

Us on the boom net...

The boat's moving!

Vietnamese New Year

By Jason and Mama

Jamie and Jason have learned about Chinese New Year at Peter Hobart, and we wondered how the New Year is celebrated here in Vietnam.

Vietnamese New Year is called Tet, and it’s celebrated on the same day as Chinese New Year.  Tet is in January or February, depending on the lunar calendar (which is based on movements of the moon).  This year, Tet is on January 31.

Decorating a street for Tet

Making a New Year sign for a building

New Year’s is the most important celebration of the year here in Vietnam.  Did you know that the Vietnamese don’t celebrate birthdays on the day they are born?  Instead, when Vietnamese children are born, they are considered 1 year old.  They turn two on New Year's Day, regardless of when they were actually born.  Everyone celebrates their birthday on the same day!

We wondered if there would be parades or festivities in major cities, like Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City (which used to be called Saigon).  But although there are some parades, New Year’s in the cities is quieter than we expected.  Instead, many people go home to their families, many of whom live in the countryside.

We’ve seen lots of people preparing for the New Year – workers hanging decorations over the streets, for example.  Many buildings and businesses have signs reading “Chúc Mừng Năm Mới” – or Happy New Year!  People prepare by cleaning their homes, decorating with kumquat trees and yellow flowers, and perhaps buying a new outfit for the celebrations.

Yellow flowers for sale in Cai Rang floating market

Kumquat trees for sale in the park

Kumquat tree on a motorcycle (with 2 people!)

Kumquat tree on a truck

Red and yellow decorations are everywhere!  According to one local person we met, red signifies happiness and yellow signifies luck for the year to come.

New Year decoration store

Many Vietnamese families believe in "kitchen spirits" that protect their family.  The week before Tet, they send these spirits on a journey to visit the Jade Emperor in heaven.  On Tet, they celebrate with noisy drums, gongs and fireworks to scare evil spirits away and welcome back the lucky ones.

Like Chinese families do for Chinese New Year, Vietnamese parents give their kids red envelopes with lucky money called li xi.  Families also believe that the first visitor of the new year will help determine their luck for the coming year.  They try to have a successful, lucky person be their first visitor.

Vietnamese red envelope
Courtesy of Phan Ba at vi.wiki

Happy New Year, everyone!!!

Stromatolites - an ancient form of life

By Jamie

Stromatolites are limestone rock formations that live in the ocean, made by a kind of bacteria called cyanobacteria. These cyanobacteria were one of the first life forms on earth. They have existed for 3 1/2 billion years. Stromatolites also produce oxygen. If there weren't stromatolites we probably wouldn't be living as they produced oxygen that allowed life to evolve. They were the major life form on earth for more than 2 billion years! Living stromatolites are only found in Western Australia and the Bahamas. They were so cool!

Stromatolites in Shark Bay, Western Australia

Us looking at the stromatolites

Close-up of stromatolites

Galapagos Penguins

By Jason

I really wanted to see Galapagos Penguins.  They were the main reason I wanted to come to the Galapagos.

Galapagos Penguins only live in the Galapagos.  They are a little bit bigger than 1 ½ feet and they weigh about 5 ½ pounds.  They are very small.  Also, they are the second smallest species of penguin.

Galapagos penguins are the only penguins that go north of the equator.

Behavior

The penguins stay in the Galapagos.  They eat small fish and sometimes crustaceans.  They eat during the day and go on land at night.

Population

There are only 1,500 Galapagos penguins.  They are endangered.  They are the rarest species of penguins in the world even rarer than Yellow-eyed Penguins which live in New Zealand.  The New Zealand penguins are still pretty rare.

The number of Galapagos penguins can be hurt by El Niño because their food goes farther underwater or farther away.  My sister Jamie wrote about El Niño in her post about sea lions.

Breeding

Galapagos penguins mate for life and probably don’t divorce.  They breed every other year and lay one or two eggs.  The eggs take 38-40 days to hatch with both parents helping out.

Sea Lions

By Jamie

We saw a lot of sea lions and some fur seals while we were in The Galapagos.  I like them because they look so cute and they come sooo close to you!  Most animals in the Galapagos aren’t scared of humans because humans only started coming to the Galapagos about 500 years ago.

The first picture shows a sea lion that visited us on our boat.

The next picture is from Isla Genovesa (Isla means island in Spanish).

Male sea lions can weigh up to 550 pounds.  Females are smaller.  They can be about 5 to 8 feet long.  They’re related to California sea lions, but Galapagos sea lions are a little bit smaller.

Breeding

Males compete to get and keep a territory.  The territory is for breeding with a harem.  A harem means a lot of females, typically between 5 and 25.  Males keep their territory for only a few months because it takes a lot of energy and they can’t eat while defending a territory.

They breed from May to January.  Females have a single pup each year.  The mothers nurse for 11 months.

The population of sea lions ranges between 20,000 and 50,000.  One of the big threats to them is El Niño.  El Niño is a warming of the surface of the Pacific Ocean.

El Niño hurts the sea lions because the fish they eat move further underwater to avoid the surface because it is too warm for them.  It takes a lot of energy for the sea lions to go far underwater.

El Niño happens about every two to seven years.  But these El Niño events are usually weak.  Major El Niño events happened about 30-40 years apart until 1972.  Since then they have happened about every 10 years apart.  People think that it is happening more frequently now because of climate change.

A sea lion was playing with us while we were snorkeling.  It came two feet away!  It was sooo cool!

The Incas

By Jamie and Jason

The Incas began in Cusco, Peru, and eventually their empire stretched all the way up and down the western coast of South America.  The Incas also had emperors who they believed were gods.  The Inca emperors were called Sapa Incas.  It means the only Inca.  Here are some of the emperors:

• Manco Capac
• Pachacuti
• Tupac Inca
• Huayna Capac
• Huascar
• Atahualpa

The most important Inca gods were:

• Inti the sun god
• Viracocha – creator of the world

The Inca empire lasted about 100 years in the 1400s and 1500s.  The Spanish came and conquered the Incas.

The Incas spoke Quechua (sounds like KAY-CHWA).

How the Incas built structures
The Incas built roads that stretched 15,000 miles all the way from Colombia to Chile and Argentina.  They also built structures for worshipping their gods and other structures that they lived in.  The Incas built the structures by using small stones to carve other stones for the walls.  Between the stones there was NO mortar!  They fit the stones together so you can’t even fit a needle in the middle.  This kind of wall was only used for special and important places.

Inca road near Machu Picchu

The Incas also built another kind of wall.  This wall used mud as mortar.  They built the walls, windows, and doors, slanted in so the structures would be strong in earthquakes.  When an earthquake happened both kinds of their walls didn’t fall down because they were so sturdy.

Jamie's drawing of the two different kinds of Inca walls

A perfect Inca wall at Quricancha (where Incas worshipped the sun god)

Jamie in front of another kind of Inca wall (less perfect)

Jason in front of a similar wall

Chaskis
Here is some information on chaskis or Inca messengers.  Chaskis are like people telephones.  Chaskis ran over the roads and told other chaskis the message.  They could get a message 250 miles in a day.  Remember, the Incas had 15,000 miles of cobblestone roads.  Only important people were allowed to use the roads.

Machu Picchu
Machu Picchu is an Inca site.  It is high in the mountains.  The people that lived there were Inca priests and important people.  The emperors went to Machu Picchu every year to worship the Inca gods and maybe for a vacation.

Jamie's drawing of Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu

Jason's drawing of the Puma Stone at Machu Picchu

The real Puma Stone

Here are the animals that we saw at Machu Picchu:

• Chinchillas
• Llamas
• Lizard

Chinchillas

Our Gammo (Grandmother) with a llama

Pre-Inca
The Inca empire was not the first civilization in South America.  There were many earlier civilizations, including the Moche and Chimu.

Jason's drawing of Moche and Chimu pottery

The End