Happy 15,000 Hits to TwT!

Today is a special day.

My baby, Travels with Tavel, has made it to 15,000 hits — thanks to YOU! I don’t know what that means (probably very little) but hey, I’m proud of this vague achievement. Ah yes, a lot of those hits came from accidental Googling by people in India and Ecuador. I do have the pleasure of seeing exactly what searches lead to my blog, and I find it very interesting to analyze.

To give you an idea, here are a few of the recent Google searches that somehow led people from around the world (you can see where exactly on the Cluster Map to the right) to random TwT posts: “farewell tavel,” “strange things,” “are gringas attracted to Ecuadorian men?” “Die Echten Reber Mozart Kugelin” [this is actually the number one search that leads people to my blog, besides numerous searches with typos of the word “travel” without the “r”], “how to become normal,” “the two paths of darkness,” “gun stores in Quito,” “huge rubber boots,” “why are bus seats in Ecuador so uncomfortable” and “why do Lucky Charms make my stomach hurt?” So, as you can see, not everyone is LOOKING for TwT, but I like to think that at least a few of my accidental readers are happy when they get here.

15,000 is a lovely number, so I will celebrate with a good ol’ fashioned MYSTERY SNAPSHOT! A lot of you have been asking me “what happened to the Mystery Snapshots?!” and I’m sorry they ever disappeared. I will be bringing those back, and accepting submissions (yes, please email me, travelswithtavel@gmail.com, your submission and get a shout-out on my blog!). Afterall, you can only tolerate so much of my thoughts on life…

Here is the Mystery Snapshot. Can anyone out there tell me what city and/or what country this might be?

Mystery Snapshot Dec 2010

THANK YOU for helping me pass the 15,000th -hit mark. I couldn’t have done it without all of you (yes, that includes you accidental Googlers) and I hope you continue to tune-in as I shoot to have an interesting enough life to earn the next 15,000 hits.