Day 1 - Why is this place so empty? - 747 Flight testing in Glasgow,MT

The day started after waking up for a 5:52 AM flight to Palmdale, CA. Definitely not the best morning person especially when I couldnt go to bed until like 1 AM.On the way to Glasgow Montana we stopped in 3 different states and it was a long trip to this place that is only around 900 miles away... (only... that's a straight line distance between Seattle and here so much farther than that).
Stress levels are a little high because I am still thinking on a way to return to Seattle for the JJ concert but I am starting to give up on the idea :(... I wouldnt hurt so much if I wouldnt plan this for about 4 months but will see what happens. Due to the high stress content, then I have a bottomless appetite... it sucks... I feel hungry but dont get anything to satisfy it. It started with a breakfast with chorizo at Palmdale, CA, followed by salted peanuts and honey roasted peanuts in the airplane and fried chicken in Glasgow (ughh).
The airplane from Seattle to Palmdale was awesome: only 7 people total and plenty of space so I got to rest which made the trip way faster. We left Palmdale with around 30 people total and we had to stop at Salt Lake City Utah to refuel. On the way down I saw LAke Tahoe for the first time and we also flew over Las Vegas (way to tease ourselves). I also saw the test airplane from the air parked in Palmdale when we were leaving the site.
So on the way from Utah to Glasgow I kept falling sleep while trying to read my class material but I woke up for the last 30 minutes of the trip to see dessert, a big lake and more dessert. We then landed in a single airstrip and got off the airplane. 90 degrees outside and lots of wind were waiting for us at Marco Regional Airport. After getting the rental cars and after minutes getting lost in the big town of Marco (which is not big btw) we finally found our brick building. The impression I got from the town the first 20 minutes was a lot of empty, destroyed looking buildings... its like stepping in to a resident evil video game scene with no one around. They told us not to try to get in those buildings but to the right of our place there is a whole town completely empty... church and everything.
While trying to Google a creepy story behind the town of MarCo or St. Marie, I ran into some pics from people very excited about this place (Some Pics of the neighbor town of St Marie, MT). I dont understand if my fellow blogger was being sarcastic because he caught the essence of the emptiness of this place in his pics and the irony that there are 182 people in the town and 1,035 buildings... go figure why these buildings are not being destroyed but if you ever come by here, it just looks like a nuclear bomb felt and I am now waiting for some people from the Hills Have Eyes to come and get us (that is not even funny... no one will ever know what happened cuz its so damn in the middle of nowhere :( . I am scared as hell to look to the right and see something moving because I dont expect nothing to be moving in that area... but my adventurous spirit will test the limits and go for a jog in the "closed" area tomorrow morning. Wish me luck and hopefully I dont crap in my pants....
Never seen something like this even in Panama. We have dirty looking buildings but people are always around... this is just unique. I got some pics of the town and the place where we staying which btw also has a creepy basement just like the one in Psycho ...
Somehow the place is actually so tranquil that you can probably relax on it but will see once the 747 arrives to see what happens... til then I will leave you with some previews...

Look who is a travel agent now?

So a while ago I decided to get together with a selective group of people to share what me and my friend Stan have found about Nepal and the Gokyo Ri Trek. I failed to get ready in time to have this meeting so like always I had to rush last hour to create a presentation and after almost 6 hours and lots of rereading and picture finding I had something to show to the others. My "selective" group of people got extended somehow to 12 and keeps growing. Hopefully the Annapurna cafe, which is the location of this so called informational meeting, doesn't have any problems accommodating us with a laptop and talking about Nepal like we are from there.

Making this powerpoint was actually very exciting. I realized I really enjoy this planning thing but at the same I get really nervous thinking about leading big groups. Maybe this will be a good practice for my dream of one day opening my own hostel. 

I cannot stop getting freaked out about hiking at these high altitudes and I dont know why. As I searched for pics I got to read about 5 other blogs and just gives me chills... weird. But on the other hand I saw that REI is promoting a trek similar to ours and has it as experience level 3-4 which is not that bad. It should be totally normal if I read at my coworkers blog that people in her trip never hiked before... COTMF's!

 I think the most exciting thing about making this is that I cannot wait a year from now to look at this and see what actually happened from what we initially planned. Its going to be hilarious.

Nepal 2011

View more presentations from jlara07.

Starting a blog's life

I never saw myself creating a blog but seem like a good idea to keep track of past experiences and to plan for future traveling.
Lately I have been looking a lot into going to Nepal in 2011. I dont know how this trip will go but sure I am excited just to think about it but also scared of the physical and mental requirements to trek in the highest mountains of the world... We are thinking about discarding the Everest Base Camp trip and now we are focusing on finding details about the Gokyo Ri trek. More details to come... for now I will continue to read Lonely Planet and obtain the most important details.
I'm also debating in writing this blog in Spanish... I will decide that later.