"Seattle Times" Posts my Travel Photo: APPLE'S EVERYWHERE!--September 2014

You can see this travel photo of mine posted on Sunday, September 28th, NW Travelers Section of the "Seattle Times" newspaper.  It is featured as one of the "Top 10 Shots" in their Summer Vacation Photo Contest.

It is captioned: APPLE IS EVERWHERE: Richard Hunt, of Seattle, shot this photo in southern China.  "While waiting for the train in Nanning, I spotted this little boy with this iconic Apple logo shaved on his head.  His mother posed him for the shot."

Back in 2009, they also published this picture of women dancing in Lingshed, Ladakh Region of India.  In this dance, they were honoring my homestay host, Skama.  She is ladened with scores of white katas as a sign of respect and honor for her role as a host of us and as a foster parent to many children.

Although she and her husband, Skansen, are childless, over the years they have been foster parents to other children who have either lost their parents or their parents live in a faraway village without a school to attend so they stay with them during school.

In 2008, I traveled with Crooked Trails to Lingshed.  This is a Seattle women-owned tour company that creates sustainable travel experiences.  To learn more about them and Ladakh tours they have, go to http://crookedtrails.org

This was a trek of six days that took us over 4 mountain passes of over 15,000 feet to Lingshed at over 12,000 feet where we enjoyed home stays and an unexpected festival.  They have no electricity, no internet, no roads closer than a four-day trek, nor running water inside the homes, and composting toilets inside the homes.

Here is a picture of me with our guide, Lobsang, at the top of one of the passes.  She was returning to her home village after an absence of over two years.  They welcomed her like a rock star.

During our trek and stay in Lingshed, the temperatures ranged from 40 degrees to 90 degrees F.  However, in the winter the rivers freeze over and temperatures drop to 40 below F or C.

Here I am dressed in Skansen's fancy festival clothes in between him and his wife, Skama.  We are at their home where they hosted me for five days.  While there, our small group of six travelers helped build an addition to a neighbor's home by making mud, forming it into bricks, and then laying the bricks up and around the door and a couple of window frames.  Plus, we participated in three days of festivals where they even had me lead in one of the men's dances with lots of Chang both before and after my dance.

Here are some of the scenery we passed through on our way back to the road.

Luckily, horses carried our packs.

Coming down from one of the four 15,000 ft. passes.

We took this shortcut that the horsemen could not travel.

This bridge was the no-go for the horses, but just fine for us.