i can imagine the cold anymore

cos its so damned hot here. love it.

rich and i flew up to siem reap to see angkor for 2 days. Our flights were $100 vs $3.5o for the bus, but as we are very time poor it was well worth it.

managed to see more temples but in far less detail than i did last year, as we had to speed tour to get it all in for rich and get to the outlying temples for a new experience for me. so whilst sweating approximately 1 litre every 45 mins we soldiered through, awestruck. Ranging from 900-1200ad, the variance in the temples is amazing, each with different architecture and engineering, and tales of war, of gods and of kings.

back in pp now. retuned to a middle eastern theme a home last night on rach's deck. smoking a huge sheesha pipe, mint, melon, cinnamon and apple tobaccos were sampled , burning frankincense and watching huge bats fly past. ahhhh. to add to my agony i started today with a full on shiatzu massage. man he knew what he was doing. my shoulders are apparently like rocks...oh oh. posture classes when i get home.

cant beleive its our last day here. i feel so at home, i cant bear the idea of our 5 flights to get home to the cold and probably a destroyed garden from the hail!

got some bugs for dessert tonight, grubs cricket cockroaches and all. wooop.

see ya'l soon x

We heart Cambodge

back again and oving it.

as always we are hosted by the lovely Rach, this time in her Phnom Penh palace, with our own room with an ensuite! spoilt! Its a lovely airy naked wood home with a large deck dripping with orchids aching of the humid romance of the east. we were greeted by geckos in the house on our arrival and the sounds of the neighbourhood kids playing in the street. Needless to say we are loving her new surrounds.

in typical expat fashion we have tiki toured round town in tuk tuks, dining on khmer food(including tarantulas!) and all sorts other international food, from french o Italian and Lebanese. Eating like royalty to.

we have shopped, visited some sites, some have worked, while others have swum at pool bars and taken afternoon massages. And did i mention eaten like sultans!? it's been Divine.

great times catching up with rach. pleased to say she's well after a bout of fever, running rings around me as i type decorating her house middle eastern/kiwiana style, and is fully assimilated into life here - and tempting us into it as well. its a far off possibility but not this time for us.

anyway, must be off to pack for angkor wat tomorrow. xx

feeling hot hot hot

yes, it is very hot and muggy here. i hear its hailing in welly?! wow - we picked a good time to go!

the sun burn continues too. i now have passed the white hand of sauron stage and now have psuedo arm bands of white. terrible.

had a beautiful snorkle around some coral filled inlets in phi phi ley yesterday. saw lots of little fish, and large parrot fish. brain coral are huge and sorta funny. like lots of submerged brains muttering on the bottom of the ocean. we also went to monkey bay and saw charasmatic local monkeys with baboon like faces with white coloured eyelids. little baby ones and old wise looking fellas.

any who, gotta go eat some seafood and visit ZARA! xx

the journey continues

here we are, back in Thailand! my third time in Phuket, and Phi Phi right now.

Its hot, lush, green, muggy and beautiful.

We have swum, shopped, fended off mosquitoes, hoovered pad thai and fruit shakes to our hearts contempt. We'll, when is it ever enough, its only been three days! Could do longer in Thailand easily but somewhere else next time I think is on the cards.

What a mission getting here though. WLG - AKL (8 hour stop over, boozing with Kendra and other welly relics, and a surprise pop up (literally from behind a pillar) from Marina on K rd!!), then flying to Brunei (11 hours), 2.5 hour stopover, then to BKK for another 2.5 hour stopover , then to Phuket. 30 or so hours later its still the 3 of October. Exhausted.

We followed this with a day of debauchery. I gave up before 12am, and found the boys at 9am (!!) the next morning wandering the beach, wet, covered in sand, ears and all, a little incoherent and drunk describing a night of buckets of red bull and whiskey, a popular tourist drink in Thailand, aren't we sophisticated, and many, many night swims....classic

so i put them to sleep and spent the day bathing and swimming as they slept it off!

Classic thai times. I have cuddled a lot of cute little kittens but fear not, it seems they have cleaned up around here. they're not the mangeythings they used to be, most have collars and look pretty healthy. so i cant resist. i may have recieved a few flea bits through...opps.

I have the most ridiculous tan marks too. described as a white tee shirt with the white hand of sauron across myt chest i have achieved a truly shameful, 'english tourist' type lobster burn. hopefully i can even it out once before i get home...

feels like we've been here a lot longer than we have, but thats always the way with travels.

Back to Phuket tommorow, to see a lady about some monkeys and a shop about zara. xxx

Home sweet home

It's the end of an era.

I am sitting in my mum’s lounge with a cup of tea and CNN blaring in the background. Tui keep flittering past the window to gorge themselves on the flax flowers out the front, the birds are going berserk, shrieking as the sun bursts through the breaks in the clouds, sweeping by in the high Wellington wind. This is home.

Our days have been filled with reunions and surprises, as we decided early on to keep our return secret so we could scare the crap out of our loved ones. Nice eh!!

We've managed to do so with Dad and Wendy, who we scouted straight away on the way through town from the airport - a testament to the village like size of Wellington; then arrived home to a dinner party at Mums where I freaked my brother Brett and my lovely Grandma; and since then have continued to spring our friends daily. It's been fantastic and there are still a few people to get around but I hold out little hope for the gossip wheel to keep our return secret for much longer.

So it's over, no more UNESCO World Heritage Sites, world wonders, culture shocks, hostels, backpacks or lengthy transits. This had become our lifestyle and our job over the last eight months, as it was 24-7, planning, prepping, doing and enjoying. Undoubtedly, it's been the most amazing experience of my life and I will always be thankful to Andy for planning and undertaking it with me.

The best decision I've made was to do it. My life savings are gone and substituted with a rather large visa debt but I am enriched with a huge wealth of experience and knowledge about the 22 countries we visited, about the world, and about myself. Personally it has grown me, in my sense of self, my values, and taught me truthfully my strengths and weaknesses.

It was a whirlwind tour of sorts, despite the length of time we were away, the fact we were always moving, never working a day and having had so much to see in every country. It was hard at times to decide what to see and what to skip as its impossible to do everything, but when torn we would remind ourselves of how amazingly lucky we were to be in these places at all and that we can’t see everything, so if we truly want to see these things we will return one day.

Our mantra was that this trip was like a world tasting platter. Arranged as a taste test of everywhere we have always wanted to go, it would provide us with a better understanding of the realities of these places and would serve as an experience to learn where we enjoy the most, where we didn't enjoy and where we want to return and travel more extensively in the future. This was the perfect type of travel for me as prior to this trip I had not travelled much and had little idea, really, of what I would prefer as I had little to compare it against.

It's hard to know yet the outcome as it is all so fresh and still filtering through, and we are so happy for the beauty and culture of home, but currently what sits in my mind is the Caribbean, Central America, and India. We loved Guatemala which has led to an interest in the entire Central American and Caribbean region, and unfortunately as India was always to be in monsoon season when we were able to go we couldn't visit it on this trip. Regardless it is a place that requires more time than we could have given it. Asia of course is high on our list to return to as it is beautiful, easily accessible from NZ and holds the lovely Rachael Lowe, Andy's sister, in Cambodia one of my favourite countries. And finally Europe is also top of mind as it is so rich, stylish and historical, we love it and will no doubt return there too. So pretty much everywhere is a goer, I should've known, it's rare I don’t try and enjoy a little bit of everything on a platter!

We met some amazing people on the road who will forever be in our memory and hopefully we will see again one day. I must say too, thanks for all the love and support we received from home, it always brought a grin and much gossip to hear from you.

Travel in the 21st century is such bliss, I shudder to think of the same trip fifty or even twenty years ago: no internet; no skype; no short haul flights; and in many areas no roads or access at all; and loads of dodgy overland travel. It would have been a dangerous, long, lonely and hard road. The reality now is that home is an internet cafe away, and if a country is not in conflict it can be travelled. The tourist market is one of the biggest consumer markets in the world and is protected as such. Travel in most regions is quite easy and many of the harder to travel countries have tourist police due to the government’s desire to protect its industry.

In eight months we suffered little more than a cold and the travellers tummy, nothing was stolen and we had little trouble. So I implore you, if you have the desire to travel go and do it, on your own terms, wherever it is you have always wanted to go, pick a goal, do your research and go.

Travelling is an addictive thing that leads to more and more roads and for me brought a strange reality of how huge and varied the world is, and yet how small and the same it is in many ways. Oh and guys, I must finally say, that we did it all in jandals

Peru = Alpacas, altitude and ancient ruins = ace

We loved Peru. It´s another slice of the international pie with a very distinct flavour, coca.

Coca is the plant from which Coca Cola built it´s empire and the cocaine industry also flourishes, but before all this abuse it was and still is an important ingredient in the Andean culture religiously and practically for altitude sickness and pretty much all other ailments you may have right up to childbirth. And now it´s an important part of my daily ritual in the place of my long love, coffee. I´ve been drinking 2-4 cups daily to the joy of my numbed mouth and soothed heart.

The altitude of Peru was fine initially apart from some heart thumping moments walking up the hill to our hillside hostel in Cusco and around Machu Pichu. The coca tea helped too but after the first week of extreme altitude and crap hostel's and the coldest weather we've faced bar topless bus tour in Paris, I´ve finally succumbed to my first cold of the trip. Bums. So here I am sunburned from Machu Pichu with a cold. Will the irony ever cease.

Machu Pichu was mystical, surreal and grand. We missioned up at 5am to make the first bus and arrived at 7am, disappointed to find that there was no 2 hour hike up as we thought but a gate straight in. Our guidebook was rather misleading and my sleepless anxiety of a early morning hike in the altitude was all for nothing. It took me a while to realise this however as when we first came through the gates it was so misty that I couldñ´t see jack apart from some rather large rocks and several alpaca mowing the lawn.

Felix our German comrade since the Galapagos Islands suggested we climb Wayana Pichu first, the peak at the end of the complex, as it´s a great viewing point and only allows 400 people up a day. Great call. We were some of the first 10 people up that morning and were in the best spot possible to see the mist clear.

Surrounded by the huge jagered peaks of the Andes, with mist flying upwards like water flowing against gravity in the growing morning sun, we climbed the steep stairs, with the help of steel rope, fighting off the strain of the altitude that was causing our hearts to thump and breath to leap from our lungs. It´s not a great distance but at that altitude its hard going. The only grace is that we did it at 7am and not at 10am like the second 200 people in the heat of the morning. Oh dear, they were actually moaning as we skipped past on our way back down!

Thankfully, the beauty of the ruins, the exotic lush alpine forest, the sharp crown of mountains, silver shining rivers 1000 meters below, the buzzing hummingbirds and slowly clearing teasing mist forced us to stop every few minutes to take snapshots and just breathe it in on our way up. A good thing so we didn't burst our hearts under the strain.

As we climbed the mist would briefly part and the image of Machu Pichu would flash past us, a second later swallowed up again. The higher we got, the better the angle and clarity became until we were at the top of the hill, sitting on huge grey boulders at the far edge of the ridge, in silence, watching the ruins reveal themselves. It was pure serenity. We sat there for two hours enjoying one of the best views of my life.

A 600 year old, geometric, organic, jewel of mans creation in the natural crown of the Andes, Machu Pichu is mesmerising. After the mist cleared, and the small cloud ribbons fell away from the peaks, the sun burst through the sungate on the opposite side of the mountains and sent a ray of light directly across the valley striking the main complex of the ruins directly. Think Indiana Jones, Raiders of the Lost Arc, the scene with the light ray in the cave marking the spot on the mimi city, but on a huge and real scale. If we had been down there we would have seen the light burst right through the three windows, a sacred temple through which the sun's rays pass illuminating the "Sacred Plaza" beyond. All proving how well the Inca designed the city around the movement of the sun and stars.

It´s an amazing structure built around the astronomy of the region. The site is believed to be selected because of its position relative to sacred landscape features—such as its mountains, which are in alignment with key astronomical events that would have been important to the Incas.


Deservedly a world wonder, we spent the day exploring, and went away grining ear to ear, dehydrated and exhaughsted with about 700 photos up our sleeves (plus video). I´ve managed to get it down to just over 400 keepers but thats as far as I can get it.

Damn world wonders!

The one and only Galapagos Islands

WOW.

I have never experienced anything like the Galapagos Islands in my life. Nowhere else even comes close. Its pristine environments, the variety of such unique species, and their indifference to your presence makes it a surreal, unforgettable and amazing experience which is hard to put into words. But of course for you, I'll try.

My initial expectations were far exceeded which was a hard feat as they were so so high to start with due to my love of the environment and concept of the Galapagos as my environmental Mecca. I was not wrong!!

I saw every animal I'd hoped to see, most of which we were within touching distance of. True to rumour they have little fear of humans so you can get as close as you like as long as you don't touch them, which I did with all bar the sharks and rays, go figure. If you love animals you must visit the Galapagos one day.

We booked the trip last year, paying a whopping amount without question as we both knew it would be a priceless experience that we absolutely had to do. We opted for a 8 day cruise on a small yacht which allowed us to visit both the north and south islands of the volcanic chain. We chose a small yacht which turned out to be the last yacht tour operating on the islands as all the other companies have upgraded to the larger cruise ships to maximise on patrons. These take up to 200 people who are treated to an en suite, gym, restaurant and god knows what else...not our style at all!

Our tour was perfect for us. We had a maximum of 6 other tourists at a time so were treated to the small group experience. This meant we could organise ourselves to be the first each day to the islands beating the other enormous tours so we could experience the islands on own. It also meant that we were with relatively young travellers that could cope with yacht life who were more suited to us than the elderly loads we saw ambling along the shores.

We were also very lucky to have the best tour guide, a Galapagos born environmental guru who know the ecosystems and their components inside out, and respected the environment and its inhabitants. Our biggest fear was being lumped for 8 days with grumpy comrades and a bad tour guide after reading about guides that fish up our dinner from the protected waters and pollute the park under your nose without respect or care for what they are working for. There was none of this with Che Che thankfully.

One of the greatest things about the Galapagos is how close you can get to the animals. When I saw one I'd just walk on over to it and take a closer look. This was with both land and sea animals, walkers and flyers. Unless you are a bumbling, loud, tourist that will surge up to them and make them uncomfortable, which I did only once approaching a playful sea lion for an underwater photo and almost collided with it in my enthusiasm, they'll calmly trust you to approach them without fear.

I first experienced this with the tortoises on our first day when we hopped out of the ute and walked straight up to the old giants in the wild. If you walked too fast they would pull their head in but moments later it would pop back out and continue ripping at the grass or just sunning its wrinkled face completely un-threatened. We'd been whisked straight from the plane to some farmland to see these huge and ancient tortoises in the wild. A great start to our expedition!
I was relieved to see there were heaps of these old giants lumbering around on the grasslands, bathing together in muddy pools, and wandering on the dirt road as we approached causing us to go off road as they calmly sat on the road and watched us swerve!

Above their mammoth size what is most fascinating to me about the Galapagos Tortoises is their age. The oldest recorded one has lived to a whopping 150 years in the wild, which is a a conservative estimate compared to the locals, as our guide believes they live to over 250 years! Our children's children will have the result from the current research. I rolled this around in my head as I perched on my knees, and looked into a tortoises wise old eyes, with it looking right back at me. I was marvelled by its age, and thinking about all the human history that has passed in their lifetime, the arrival of Europeans on their islands, the species that have been erased, the wars that have passed and the US strategic stations that invaded their habitats in the Galapagos; and more personally, the generations of my family that have been born, lived, and died, and me sitting in front of him the meagre 5th, 6th or 7th of my ancestry to live to his one.
Later in the trip we had the privilege to meet the famous 'Lonesome George', the last known individual of the Pinta Island subspecies of Tortoise in existence. A sad result of the destruction the introduced species have caused to the Galapagos ecology. George was found on the island alone when it was too late to begin a breeding programme. There is however a small hope for his kind as they have recently bred him with a very genetically similar subspecies, only resulting in 3 viable eggs. Unlikely to succeed but you never know, well, actually we will know the result and the future of his species in less than three months. Fingers crossed.

Once on the yacht, our days were divided between trips to the various islands, snorkeling, eating and playing cards on the long journeys. Every day was filled with new experiences and learning. Each island had its own welcoming party for us, be it sea turtles, sea lions, rays or sharks in the shallows, a penguin or sea iguana watching us from shore, or a frigate or booby flying over head. Usually several of the above.

We'd adventure into the islands, eyes needlessly peeled for the different species on offer as they tended to be so prolific you barely had to try to see them as they'd be sitting right in front of you! Some islands had endemic land iguanas, huge and colourful, brilliant yellows with large spines, brown eyes and weathered scaled lips, lying flat on their bellies absorbing the heat; sometimes there were flamingos, sitting on one leg, a brilliant pink staring back at us like plastic figurines from the garden ...that blinked; there were huge piles of communal sea iguanas, lying upon each other for warmth, snorting spurts of salt from their noses at us to our disgust and entertainment; we smelt the rich perfumed sap of the various endemic deciduous trees, that was sometimes like frankincense, sometimes a rich woody sandalwood other times like a musky rose; we watched huge albatross chicks wait patiently in their nests for their parents and then the parents run down the aptly named 'albatross runways' leading off high cliffs to take flight; we walked across hardened lava fields that had poured into the sea, now a frozen black river over barren red landscapes, similar to icebergs, we found that once we were surrounded by the black mass the detail came out, it became hugely variable, made up of different oil slick like colours and varieties of frozen organic forms, from the ripples of waves, to piles of thick sailor rope, and bouquets of open faced roses strewn on the ground.

We always had to be careful where we stood at all times in case of the small trusting lava lizards or iguanas bathing on the rocks, or nests being trodden underfoot. We had to be even more careful still with the gorgeous little sea lion pups to not let them touch us as they often tried to do!

These were high on our favourites list, with a call like a high pitched yelping lamb they sat on the beach sun bathing, paddling, playing with each other or shells and sticks as toys, passing time until their mother returned with dinner. Like sirens they'd try to seduce us closer but in their case with their cuteness, chasing our shadows, crying to us, rolling around in the sand and sometimes even sneaking up on us for personal contact but it would be to their detriment not ours if we made contact. They're absolutely harmless, posers for the camera and the epitome of cute but sometimes tragic reminders of how our small actions can influence a life. Sadly this is because if we give in to temptation to allow contact with one of these little creatures they will likely be rejected by their mothers who operate on scent recognition and will subsequently eventually starve. We saw several skinny, lost puppies, desperately tying to get milk from other mothers who aggressively rejected them. It was really upsetting to see.

Little surprise then that when me and a gal from our boat saw other tourists allowing the pups to rub against them onshore we let rip at their tour guide. He had the gaul to say that it is not a proven reaction to which I sharply shot him down with the question of the 'is it worth the risk!!!?' argument. Ridiculous. We also spoke to the tour group about it directly, with a boiling rage under the surface yet outwardly calm demeanor to ensure they understood their potential impacts on these pups that they seemed to have such admiration for. It was not my place but after seeing their actions and hearing the pathetic justification of the tour guide we took it upon ourselves to get the message out.

The snorkeling was the best I have ever experienced due to the abundance and variety of animals and beauty of the unpolluted pristine waters. We often swam both in the morning and afternoon. In one amazing dive I swam with almost everything I had hoped for on the entire trip within 3/4 of an hour. We began by following a reef where we spotted various rays, huge puffer fish with cartoon like eyes, corals, starfish, surgeon fish, and tuna darting at us from the depths. There were trumpet fish lingering in the current like long ropes with pig like snouts and reptile eyes, occasionally a sea iguana would swim past with colours of the rainbow, red, green, yellow on their black coal base. We followed huge schools of fish, each occasionally flicking their sides to us, flashing silver as a knife, when a large sea lion whipped past me within a meter dancing around its prey before my eyes. I saw a Ridleys Sea Turtle, the same species as the one we saw laying her eggs in Guatemala sitting in an underwater crater. She lifted up and I swam beside her alone as she stared back at me. magic. That was until the cold shiver of being alone in shark infested waters rippled through me and I returned to the guide! We continued on and after a while I realised our swim team of 7 was reduced to just me, the water baby and the guide as the waters were very cold so people were dropping off to the trailing dinghy. Sad for them they missed out on the highlight of the days dive, a HUGE stingray about 1.5-2m in diameter, digging on the bottom, already 30 cm or so deep into the sand scuffing up food for it as the many hangers on surrounding him feeding on the food he threw up. We dove down to it and saw up close the yellow tiger eyes watching us as it churned the sand up. A beautiful sight.
The female sea lions were fine to swim with, perfectly safe as long as you don't encroach on their space too much...no matter how much they do on yours! We had to be cautious of the males as they can be aggressive and are very territorial due to their harem lifestyle. A few times they hopped in the water to bark at us, warning us to back off and then herded their ladies back on shore. We naturally respected their wishes and froze in those situations.

There was one sea lion that played with us on shore mimicking the other divers, spinning as we spun, blowing bubbles back to Andy and swimming under your legs given the chance. The sea lions are so charismatic. The puppies of the sea.

One of the best moments we had was late at night when we were all lying up on deck staring at the starry sky competing to see who could spot the most shooting stars when blind Andy spotted some fast moving shapes over the side of the boat. We leapt up to check it out and realised that it was two predators and our boat was surrounded by phosphorescent plankton!! It in turn was attracting a whole feeding chain of animals for our entertainment. The fish were feeding on the plankton, and those that were feeding on the fish there were the real stars. First we saw fast, graceful animals darting about which we worked out to be sea lions. After that we saw slow, long, swaying animals, which we worked out to our excitement to be white tip sharks....but and most exciting of all we saw a strange shape, far larger than the other predators with a broad face.....swaying through the school like the whitetips....a HAMMERHEAD SHARK! Crazy. Such a strangely shaped animal, and to see this lit up in the water like an aquatic Greek constellation in flux in the black sea of glittering phosphorescence was unreal.

There are so many other stories to tell, but as this post is already ridiculously long, I´ll save them for when we are home, wine in hand. xx