The End
Okay, so you know how I wrote that I'd do a final update on the blog in early January, in Ontario...well that didn't quite happen.
It's now February and I am writing this from our new apartment in Vancouver, but better late than never as the saying goes.
We did indeed make it safely but very, very jet lagged to Montreal on New Years Eve where my parents kindly picked us up. The only bad moment was that the line up to the Tim Horton's at the Airport was really long and the staff were really slow, so after 6 whole entire months of no Tim's, I had to wait in the slowest ever Tim's line up - NOT COOL. However, in the end I got my Tim's and man was it ever good. (For the curious among you, I'm at 37 cups since we returned to Canada!)
We spent a lovely week in Williamstown, most of which was spent sleeping and being spoiled by my folks. I also got to visit with quite a few old friends in Ottawa and close to Williamstown, which was great. The highlight, of course, though was getting to see Mishka again - what a cute cat he is! Then it was off to Toronto for a few days to visit my sister; the visit was lots o' fun, but man the Sunday morning after spending Saturday night catching up with Dakin was rough, man, rough...
Then on the auspious date of January 9th, we flew back to the city where it all began and completed our full circle...well, not really a circle, more like a really oddly shaped octagonal parabola...beautiful Vancouver. Aaahhh...for the first few days we just revelled in the fact that we were in a city where we did not need a map or a tourist guide or to act random strangers for directions. It was such a relief. We mooched of Caelem and Hannah's good graces for about a week, but were able to find an apartment with surprising ease! We now are living in a two bedroom place in downtown Vancouver, so all the cool kids whom we met while traveling are officially invited to come visit.
And now onto the fun stuff. Here are my Top 10 Lists for the trip>
Top 10 Best Moments
1) Watching the sunrise over Mount Sinai in Egpyt
2) Landing at the brand new and shockingly clean airport in Bangkok, Thailand (after a month of being in dirty, dirty, dirty India)
3) Seeing the Taj Mahal and the Ganges River in India
4) Climbing the glacier in Finse, Norway
5) Meeting an elephant face-to-trunk and getting to pet it and feed it bananas
6) The goat on the bus in Pushkar
7) Seeing the Jungle Temple in Siem Reap, Cambodia
8) Going to Paris for 9 hours (especially the coffee at the Arc de Triomphe)
9) Swimming in the Nile
10) The Brewer's Tours 8 hour walking tour of Berlin
Top 10 Worst Moments
1) Being sick in Turkey
2) Being sick in Egypt
3) Being sick in India
4) Driving in a tuk-tuk in Varanasi, and seeing the guy hauling 14 canisters of propane almost get hit by a bus
5) Driving in a tuk tuk down the very, very steep hill from the Monsoon Palace in Udaipur with the driver who didn't believe in steering or brakes because 'it is all up to God'...
6) The goat on the bus in Pushkar
7) Visting the Tuol Sleng museum and the Killing Fields in Phenom Penn, Cambodia
8) Crossing the street in Cairo - it was a life an death experience every single time
9) Brad getting lost in Athens and consequently nearly missing the flight to Bahrain
10) The truly disgusting accidentally ordered seafood pizza in Munich
Top 10 Most Surreal Moments
1) Touring around the Haw Par Villa in Singapore - words cannot explain, you just have to look at the photos from the Singapore blog entry
2) Listening to our Vietnamese tour guide encourage tourists to climb on the American tank that had killed many of his countrymen during the war because 'it makes a great photo oportunity'
3) The Vodka Breakfast in Volgograd with Olga's grandparents
4) Standing on the platform of the train station in Varanassi as about 3 dozen Indian gentlemen all gathered round to stare at the strange white folk
5) Stepping out into traffic in Hanoi, Viet Nam for the first time; it felt euphoric afterwards, because we were so amazed to still be alive
6) Being offered student cards by our official Egyptian Tour Guide, as "the Egyptian Government wants you to be able to experience all Egypt has to offer"
7) Just being in Transylvania
8) The Dairy Queen Peanut Buster Parfait (without the peanuts) in Bahrain
9) Seeing the line up to get into the Gucci store in Singapore after having spent 3 months in third world countries, where the cost of one item at said Gucci store would have fed a family for a month
10) Being back and realizing that this all acutally happened and wasn't just a pleasant dream
Top 14 People to Thank
1) Jason and Sveta for the driver who picked us up from the airport in Moscow, the accomodation and the beer.
2) Olga and Olga's relatives in Volgograd for being so welcoming when we showed up for the wedding, and of course, for the unforgettable Vodka Breakfast.
2) Toby for the incredible glacier experience, the unforgettablely painful 60 kilometre bike ride, the best bread ever made anywhere, the accomodation, and one of the best parties of 2006
3) Valerie for the vegetarian food from Marks & Sparks, the accomodation, and of course the Scrabble
4) Christa and Craig for the coolest accomodation anywhere in Scotland, the packed lunch for our train ride and the Kicking Horse Coffee
5) Malcolm and Jennifer for the Cypriot coffee, the swankiest accomodation of the whole entire trip and the best mini-golf experience ever
6) Mustafa, our guide in Egypt, for being so amazing, so interesting and so willing to answer our bazillion random questions
7) Andreas for the accomodation in Berlin, the yummy breakfast, and the rock climbing experience that we will certainly never, ever forget
8) Klaus, Stefanie, Peter and Anna Dippe for the tour of Dresden and Saxon Switzerland, the great lunch and supper, and for the the 'Whiskas' comment
9) Margarita and Alfonso for being the best Madrid Tour guides, all the food and the beer and the entertainment, and for the 'Germans up your nose' comment
10) Dia and Dia's family in Athens for the accomdation, tour guiding, climb to the lookout point over Athens and the entertainment
11) Jitu for being the most amazing and understanding tour guide in all of India and for the birthday cake
12) Andrea and Eric for letting us recover in the swanky-ness that was the apartment in Phuket - man, did we ever need it
13) Michael, Mylene and Morgan Jane for a truly lovely Christmas, the waterfight on Christmas Day and all that wonderful cheese
14) Simon for showing us all over Sydney and all the coffees and beers
It's now February and I am writing this from our new apartment in Vancouver, but better late than never as the saying goes.
We did indeed make it safely but very, very jet lagged to Montreal on New Years Eve where my parents kindly picked us up. The only bad moment was that the line up to the Tim Horton's at the Airport was really long and the staff were really slow, so after 6 whole entire months of no Tim's, I had to wait in the slowest ever Tim's line up - NOT COOL. However, in the end I got my Tim's and man was it ever good. (For the curious among you, I'm at 37 cups since we returned to Canada!)
We spent a lovely week in Williamstown, most of which was spent sleeping and being spoiled by my folks. I also got to visit with quite a few old friends in Ottawa and close to Williamstown, which was great. The highlight, of course, though was getting to see Mishka again - what a cute cat he is! Then it was off to Toronto for a few days to visit my sister; the visit was lots o' fun, but man the Sunday morning after spending Saturday night catching up with Dakin was rough, man, rough...
Then on the auspious date of January 9th, we flew back to the city where it all began and completed our full circle...well, not really a circle, more like a really oddly shaped octagonal parabola...beautiful Vancouver. Aaahhh...for the first few days we just revelled in the fact that we were in a city where we did not need a map or a tourist guide or to act random strangers for directions. It was such a relief. We mooched of Caelem and Hannah's good graces for about a week, but were able to find an apartment with surprising ease! We now are living in a two bedroom place in downtown Vancouver, so all the cool kids whom we met while traveling are officially invited to come visit.
And now onto the fun stuff. Here are my Top 10 Lists for the trip>
Top 10 Best Moments
1) Watching the sunrise over Mount Sinai in Egpyt
2) Landing at the brand new and shockingly clean airport in Bangkok, Thailand (after a month of being in dirty, dirty, dirty India)
3) Seeing the Taj Mahal and the Ganges River in India
4) Climbing the glacier in Finse, Norway
5) Meeting an elephant face-to-trunk and getting to pet it and feed it bananas
6) The goat on the bus in Pushkar
7) Seeing the Jungle Temple in Siem Reap, Cambodia
8) Going to Paris for 9 hours (especially the coffee at the Arc de Triomphe)
9) Swimming in the Nile
10) The Brewer's Tours 8 hour walking tour of Berlin
Top 10 Worst Moments
1) Being sick in Turkey
2) Being sick in Egypt
3) Being sick in India
4) Driving in a tuk-tuk in Varanasi, and seeing the guy hauling 14 canisters of propane almost get hit by a bus
5) Driving in a tuk tuk down the very, very steep hill from the Monsoon Palace in Udaipur with the driver who didn't believe in steering or brakes because 'it is all up to God'...
6) The goat on the bus in Pushkar
7) Visting the Tuol Sleng museum and the Killing Fields in Phenom Penn, Cambodia
8) Crossing the street in Cairo - it was a life an death experience every single time
9) Brad getting lost in Athens and consequently nearly missing the flight to Bahrain
10) The truly disgusting accidentally ordered seafood pizza in Munich
Top 10 Most Surreal Moments
1) Touring around the Haw Par Villa in Singapore - words cannot explain, you just have to look at the photos from the Singapore blog entry
2) Listening to our Vietnamese tour guide encourage tourists to climb on the American tank that had killed many of his countrymen during the war because 'it makes a great photo oportunity'
3) The Vodka Breakfast in Volgograd with Olga's grandparents
4) Standing on the platform of the train station in Varanassi as about 3 dozen Indian gentlemen all gathered round to stare at the strange white folk
5) Stepping out into traffic in Hanoi, Viet Nam for the first time; it felt euphoric afterwards, because we were so amazed to still be alive
6) Being offered student cards by our official Egyptian Tour Guide, as "the Egyptian Government wants you to be able to experience all Egypt has to offer"
7) Just being in Transylvania
8) The Dairy Queen Peanut Buster Parfait (without the peanuts) in Bahrain
9) Seeing the line up to get into the Gucci store in Singapore after having spent 3 months in third world countries, where the cost of one item at said Gucci store would have fed a family for a month
10) Being back and realizing that this all acutally happened and wasn't just a pleasant dream
Top 14 People to Thank
1) Jason and Sveta for the driver who picked us up from the airport in Moscow, the accomodation and the beer.
2) Olga and Olga's relatives in Volgograd for being so welcoming when we showed up for the wedding, and of course, for the unforgettable Vodka Breakfast.
2) Toby for the incredible glacier experience, the unforgettablely painful 60 kilometre bike ride, the best bread ever made anywhere, the accomodation, and one of the best parties of 2006
3) Valerie for the vegetarian food from Marks & Sparks, the accomodation, and of course the Scrabble
4) Christa and Craig for the coolest accomodation anywhere in Scotland, the packed lunch for our train ride and the Kicking Horse Coffee
5) Malcolm and Jennifer for the Cypriot coffee, the swankiest accomodation of the whole entire trip and the best mini-golf experience ever
6) Mustafa, our guide in Egypt, for being so amazing, so interesting and so willing to answer our bazillion random questions
7) Andreas for the accomodation in Berlin, the yummy breakfast, and the rock climbing experience that we will certainly never, ever forget
8) Klaus, Stefanie, Peter and Anna Dippe for the tour of Dresden and Saxon Switzerland, the great lunch and supper, and for the the 'Whiskas' comment
9) Margarita and Alfonso for being the best Madrid Tour guides, all the food and the beer and the entertainment, and for the 'Germans up your nose' comment
10) Dia and Dia's family in Athens for the accomdation, tour guiding, climb to the lookout point over Athens and the entertainment
11) Jitu for being the most amazing and understanding tour guide in all of India and for the birthday cake
12) Andrea and Eric for letting us recover in the swanky-ness that was the apartment in Phuket - man, did we ever need it
13) Michael, Mylene and Morgan Jane for a truly lovely Christmas, the waterfight on Christmas Day and all that wonderful cheese
14) Simon for showing us all over Sydney and all the coffees and beers
posted by TK at 7:26 PM
