Tag Archives: budget backpacking

15 Nov 2011 · 4:46 PM

Cape Town…the most beautiful place in the world!

Six months flew by far too quickly. The last ten days, even more so. When we boarded the plane to Cape Town on Friday evening, we were relieved to be going home, and ready to reunite with those little comforts of home. Arriving in Cape Town we were met by lots of balloons, confetti and a wonderful welcome home party including lots of family! It was a special time, finally being back with familiar faces and hugs.

The first thing we saw as we were coming in to land was Table Mountain and we looked over to each other and said “We’re home!”, it was a beautiful sight. Even more exciting is that I found out shortly afterwards that Table Mountain was pronounced (provisionally) as one of the New 7 Wonders of the World. [Thanks to everyone who voted!]

Some people asked us what the first thing we wanted to do when we got home was, but once we were home, it wasn’t long before we were back to our old habits, like sitting on the couch catching up on TV and Playstation games! It was definitely a treat to sleep in our own beds once again and to still be sleeping in our own beds three days later. We had a fantastic evening on Saturday night with a few friends doing the traditional South African thing, a braai (that’s a barbeque), and since then, we have been doing washing-or throwing out clothes no longer suitable to be worn-and doing admin like banking and making appointments for the dentist!

One thing in particular that we have realised is that when you have been living for six months with just the belongings in the backpack on your back, and you arrive home to a room full of things and clothes, you begin to feel like life is too cluttered. I, in particular, really missed my clothes and shoes, but now that I know that I can go six months wearing the combination of about 10 items of clothing and 2 pairs of shoes, my large wardrobe now seems like an utter waste of space. However, saying that, I don’t have the willpower to get rid of it all so I will have to just get used to it!

There have been a few common questions from friends and family since we have been back and so I thought we would answer some of them here:

1. What was our favourite place?

Our common and easiest response to this question was Thailand but to be very honest, it is a very difficult question, considering the number of places we visited on the trip. The best way to answer this, although not something you will want to hear, is that each place has its unique qualities and every place that we visited gave us new memories and adventures. To break it down though, our favourite landscape had to be Lake Pangong; our favourite holiday destination was definitely Thailand, with its relaxing beaches and beautiful islands; our favourite futuristic city was Singapore, living in the future; our favourite place most like home was Sydney but Brisbane and Melbourne are a close runner up; our favourite natural wonder in America was Antelope Canyon; and our favourite American city…now that’s a hard one…San Diego? Austin? New Orleans? New York?

2. Best travel experience?

Driving the RV across Mid-West America!

3. Worst travel experience?

Getting sick in Mumbai on our second night in India!

4. Time when we were the most scared?

Various times driving through India on non-existent ‘highways’ and on the edges of mountains.

5. Best food?

This would definitely be the cuisine of Thailand – from Pad Thai to fried bananas and fruit smoothies! But special mention to New Orlean’s southern cooking, like Jambalaya, and Asheville’s Shrimp and Gritz! Apart from the fact that we got so sick, most of the Indian food was also pretty good – although spicy food for breakfast can get a bit much!

6. A place that we could see ourselves moving to if the opportunity arose?

This is also a difficult one, as so many places have different opportunities and attractions. Places like Brisbane and Australia in general caught our eye because of the similar climate and friendly people. There were some other places for various reasons, like Singapore, Asheville, San Diego…but in the end they all still pale in comparison to Cape Town!

Those are the usual questions but if anyone has anything in particular to ask us, leave us a comment or send us an email through our Contact Us page!

We would like to send a special thank you to each and every one of these people who hosted us along the way and took care of us. Bear with us there are a lot of people to thank. Firstly in the UK, Dorothy and Keith Baldwin for putting us up and even taking us to the airport at some unearthly hour! In Europe, big thanks to Chrissie to hosting us in Schape and showing us around Berlin. To Trevor for spoiling us in Geneva, it was lovely to see your beautiful apartment and to spend time with you in your new city. In India, our very generous friend Praveen Kumar who not only helped us to find our feet but also looked after us while we were ill in Mumbai. To Ali and Nigel for the most unexpected luxurious experience of our trip in Agra, letting us stay in the Oberoi and treating us like their own children! To Marion and Jade who came to visit in Thailand, this really made it one of the most special places we visited. Also to Lindsay and Hayley in Phuket, two extremely fun girls Then to Karen and Ronan for inviting us to stay with them in Singapore and for the fun week we had there. To our Aussie family Lee, Rob, Claire, Glen and Kyle in Melbourne, Jeanne and Edwin in Sydney, and Robs and Dean in Brizzy, you guys made our stay in the land Down Under really memorable and really comfortable after the trials in India.

In the USA, Dave Nadelberg in Los Angeles who graciously gave us a place to sleep even though he didn’t know us from a bar of soap. In Phoenix, Bret and MJ, not only did they give us a place to stay, they also made sure that we had a tent for our trip to the canyon-lands and let us borrow the blow up mattress! To Adriano and the rest of the gang at Newport Place in San Diego, thanks for a great week and a lot of laughs! To our couch surfing host in Daytona Beach, David, you are a lifesaver, thank you so much! To Veenen for taking us flying in Daytona Beach! To the Gurney family in Asheville, who made us feel quite at home and took care of us so well. Getting to the end now, to Renee and Vincent in Cary, who gave us the good stuff-their homemade boerewors-and showed us the most authentic Southern experience, a corn maze! To Jean-Pierre who let us stay in his spectacular apartment in DC, for taking us out for dinner and for treating us to great South African wine-we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. To Helen and Judy in New York for completely spoiling us, and for driving us through snow storms-and spoiling Trist on his birthday in the Big Apple!

Back in the UK, to Ang, Grant and Ethan for letting us recover from our jet-lag and for the late night karaoke session To Ailsa and the Briggs’ for spoiling us in Worcester, taking us flying, and to Jonathan for the fantastic Roast lunch! To Michael for putting up with us both at the beginning and the end of the trip, and giving us his bed while he slept on the floor. To Rich for having us in London in the beginning of our trip and for taking us out in Notting Hill at the end. And last but not least, to Amandine and Barry for the last minute hosting, in London and in Dublin and for celebrating our last couple of days on the URT with us!

Finally, to our families and friends back home for all the support and love, and to all of our followers for keeping up with our travels along the way. We will continue to write about the planning and the stories of the Ultimate Round Trip so continue to visit the site when you can, or if you haven’t already, subscribe to the emails on the home page!

D & T x

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Filed under South Africa

Tagged as budget backpacking, Cape Town, India, round the world, Thailand, the Ultimate round trip, travel blog, URT, USA

09 Nov 2011 · 3:42 PM

The Countdown Begins

As our trip winds down to the end, we start to tick off all of the last little things we want to do before we head home this weekend. We arrived in London on Wednesday last week and we were hit by a wave of jet lag, something we have managed to avoid for the past five and a bit months by some miracle. As it is coming to the end of our six month trip, I feel like my body has been beaten and my mind is exhausted. I wonder how on earth some people travel for years at a time, but then I think we may have pushed the boundaries a little by visiting over 45 places in just 180 days. Thats a new place every 3 days, on average. When I see that I realise why I am so drained!

Trist and Ethan playing trains

What better way to recover from a tired mind and body than with a comforting home of family and friends and thats what we have been enjoying for the past week or so. It started with a two day stay in Knapp Hill, in the cosy English home of T’s cousins, Angela and Grant, and their adorable four-year-old son, Ethan. We spent the entire two days at home, sleeping, playing trains, and listening to Ethan sprout about his dinosaur collection, the this-asaurus and that-iraptor, words I could not even pronounce but that he said with ease. It was great to catch up with T’s family again, having dinner with his aunt Rita and uncle Ian, as there is nothing better than hearing family stories straight from the source I must admit, I also rekindled my love for Singstar Karaoke in a late night session with A and G! What fun!

Next we were off to Worcester to visit long time family friends, The Briggs’. We were really excited to see the whole family as I feel like they have become a special part of our family over the years. To put it into perspective, the Briggs’ lived in Cape Town for many years when Jonathan and Ailsa Briggs and my parents were at school together, so the connection goes back a generation or so and we have grown up pretty close (thanks to a good few visits and lots of Facebooking!) [On a side note: I always find it funny that this special part of our family live in Worcestershire, United Kingdom and I was born in Worcester, South Africa.]

Anyway, I digress, we arrived in Worcester on Friday afternoon after a 3-hour train journey from Woking to Worcester (via London) and Ailsa was there on the platform to give us a much needed cheery hug. Still tired, slightly flu-ish and after losing my iPod on the train, we were ready for a cuppa tea and a good sleep. We had a relaxed afternoon at Ailsa’s, catching up with Jonathan’s son Jamie when he came over and going for a pint or two at the pub down the road. When Ailsa and Amelia, her six-year-old daughter, met us after work/school, we went home to have some delicious traditional fish and chips for dinner and a long catch up with Ailsa while playing hairdresser with Amelia before crashing.

Ailsa and I in the back of the Cessna

Saturday morning it was a delicious bacon breakfast before heading out to meet Ailsa’s friend who took us up in his four-seater Cessna plane over

A beautiful view of Worcester Cathedral

Worcestershire and Herefordshire! This is the second opportunity we have had to go for a ‘spin’ in a small plane and I’m starting to get quite used to it I was slightly ill on the way up as I’m not very good with motion at the best of times, but sitting in the front on the way back I was able to concentrate more on the beautiful scenery rather than on my stomach! And beautiful scenery it was! We took off from a little grass runway in a farmer’s field somewhere, and flew over the city of Worcester, the beautiful Worcester cathedral and the river running through quilts of brown and green fields. Our pilot, Clive, is a very experienced flyer and he knows the area really well so he was really good in explaining the history of the area to us. We flew over the Malvern Hills and over Jontahan’s house in Cradley and after a good while, landed on a small airfield to have some tea. It was a nice day for a change, no rain and the sun was peeping through the clouds to catch on all of the lakes in the area. The trip back to the farm was quicker as we didn’t do as much of a loop around, but watching the fields below me fly by I realised the scenery was quite different from last time we flew, over Daytona, but just as beautiful. England has a different feeling about it from the USA, theres a history that comes through and you realise how old the farmlands and the castles below you really are. Landing was a breeze for Clive, even on grass, and then we were back at the hanger pushing the plane into its designated spot.

The CessnaPitchcroft Fireworks

We spent the rest of the afternoon visiting Mr and Mrs Briggs, and having another restful afternoon. Luckily for us, Saturday night was Guy Fawkes, or bonfire night as it is also known here. So after dinner we all headed out to the Pitchcroft Racetrack where they had set up a fair and a massive bonfire ready to be lit. It was a great evening, Amelia draggin Trist and Jamie onto the rides and Jonathan and I enjoying watching the people. Finally it was time to light the bonfire and everyone stood mesmorised watching the massive pile of junk burst into flames. It was pretty amazing actually, and the heat it gave off was impressive, it definitely warmed up the chilly Worcester evening. Shortly after the bonfire reached full blazing potential, the fireworks began, and they were spectacular-although I must admit I have seen a few incredible fireworks displays as my uncle Viv is a pretty amazing pyrotechnist!

The Bonfire starting out

Us at Pitchcroft fireworks

Sunday we all went out to Jonathan’s for a Sunday Roast. Wow, and what a roast it was. I guess it is a pretty traditional thing to do here in the UK, but at home we rarely do such a spectacular meal unless its someones birthday. The whole family was there, well almost, but the best for me was to see Jonathan’s daughter, Jenny, handle her three little boys with ease. With four generations in one household and a house full of children’s laughter, it reminded me a lot of my family back home and the big family gatherings we have. Jonathan outdid himself, doing all the cooking, and producing a feast of roast lamb and pork, roast veggies of all kinds and even a dessert or three, all topped off with some great South African wine. Ailsa, Jenny and I took all four kids off to the park between courses as they needed a run and we needed to work off some lunch so we could have dessert! I had so much fun running around with the kids and enjoying the sunny but crisp weather.

Sunday Roast at Jonathan's House

Soon though, after a few hours sitting around chatting, it was time to head back to Ailsa’s house. Aaron, Ailsa’s older son, was there on his way out to work, so we caught up and then watched a movie before bed. It was a great weekend, so nice to pick up where we left off with all of the family and really looking forward to seeing them all in Cape Town soon.

From Worcester we took a train to Nottingham for one reason, to see T’s favourite band Incubus live at the Capital FM Arena! I bought tickets for us for his birthday but the only place we could see them was in Nottingham, so off we went. It was pretty miserable when we arrived but after dragging our bags a good few kilometres, we found the Arena and a few hundred metres down the road, the hostel. It was a quick change because we wanted to get in to the arena early to secure a decent spot at the front of the crowd so we stood in the queue from about 5pm. Doors opened at 6:30 and the show only started at 7:30 so it was quite a bit of standing. We had to push through though and I’m so glad we did because the concert was incredible. The opening act, Fin, wasn’t amazing but they really weren’t going to be much in comparison to Incubus anyway!

They just blew us away, the front man Brandon has an incredible voice and all the other members rocked out. We sang along and enjoyed songs from all the way through their discography, incorporating their older stuff with the new album. It was phenomenal!

We went straight to bed and straight back to the station in the morning, and that was the end of the short trip to Nottingham. Since we arrived back in London, we have been chilling out with our great friend Mike down in Walton-on-Thames. We’re getting ready to go home on Friday evening, only three more sleeps so it is starting to get quite real now. I guess the next post you will get will be when we touch down in Cape Town on Saturday!

Until then! D& T

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Filed under London, Travel Planning

Tagged as budget backpacking, London, Malvern, round the world, the Ultimate round trip, travel photos, UK, Worcester, World trip

05 Nov 2011 · 2:48 AM

These Vagabond Shoes…

New York, New York, the city that never sleeps… well we tried our best to keep up with her but it was a losing battle unfortunately. As we wind down to the end of our journey, we can’t help but feel fairly worn out. The trip has taken it’s toll, and although our travel hungry minds would love to carry on, our bodies have had just about enough and are certainly ready to head home and recoup.

Chrysler Building, lit up at night

As with Washington D.C, New York City was a place that we had previously spent some time and thus had already seen many of the more touristy sights. Well, as many as possible in the sub-zero temperatures that the city was experiencing at the time. The difference between then and now was stark, all of the trees still had their leaves and were slowly changing to the oranges and yellows of the fall, there was a chill in the air but not the nose and toe numbing cold that we walked around in and lastly the incredibly obvious thing was that there wasn’t snow and ice around everywhere, well for a while anyway until the snowstorm hit and everything went pear-shaped. New York is a great big city, with Manhattan only one of the 5 boroughs, and you feel this as soon as you arrive, it is as if you have stepped into a special place that has so much more to offer. It’s a strange feeling, similar to the one I felt when first visiting London and there is a lot of novelty value with new experiences to be had around every corner.

We had booked ourselves into probably the least expensive hostel in the city for two nights to be right in NYC and all of the action before we headed out to stay with some friends who live in the Bronx. The Tone Hostel on Lexington (that was actually closer to 3^rd) was decent, clean and they had free breakfast and wifi… Champion find! And although some of the guests were complaining of bed bugs, we didn’t experience anything of the sort and would really recommend it to anybody visiting NYC on a budget as it was a mere 25 bucks a night. That’ not India or Thailand cheap but when the local Holiday Inn is already charging upwards of $200 a night for a standard room, this find was a great one. There are also a number of Tone Hostels around the city if you would prefer to stay in a different area.

Times Square, the chaos of inner Manhattan

Helen and Judy, our family friends from Cape Town, took us in and spoiled me rotten on my birthday with an awesome roast for dinner and we chilled with them for the weekend up in the Bronx.

Here are some of the memorable moments of New York City… in no particular order!

Brooklyn Bridge connects Manhattan with New York’s largest borough, Brooklyn, with a myriad of cables and some pretty impressive double arched pylons. The roadway runs underneath a pedestrian boardwalk, and a rent-a-cop with a whistle patrols his turf with vigour.It was hilarious watching him trying to warn foreign tourist of oncoming bicycle traffic… waving his hands about and blowing sharp trills on that infernal whistle!

Billionaires in the 30's certainly knew how to deck out a lobby properly, far more specced than any of Donald "Toupe" Trump's creations! - Empire State Building lobby

We took the plunge and forked out the cash to visit the observatory on the top of the Empire State Building only to find out that they don’t take you to the top anymore… Well not unless you double up on your donation to the great city of NYC! But we were still quite chuffed with the 86th floor and had a great view out over all of Manhattan’s tallest buildings and out to the neighbouring boroughs too.

Although we missed the celebrations for her 125th Birthday, we managed to sail straight past her Ladyship on our (free) trip out to Staten Island. Apparently there were massive fireworks and all the hoo haa’s going on but due to lack of advertising… the most important guests (us South Africans) were not invited. The ferry to Staten Island is free of charge and is a great alternative to getting up close and personal with the Statue without forking out masses of dollars to actually ferry to the Liberty Island. The authorities swiftly closed her off for renovation that evening so even if you did want to visit… she’ll be closed for a year whilst they give her a change of clothes… anyway oxidised copper green is so last century.

Sunset from Battery Park looking out towards Lady Liberty.

After dragging ourselves through the security and queues to get into the recently opened September 11th memorial park at the site of “Ground Zero” we were pleasantly surprised by a moving (in motion and emotionally) tribute to the memory of those lost on that fateful day in 2011. We visited another memorial for the lost Staten Island residents, they’ve done well to create some very beautiful and impressive monuments.

Parading revellers filled the streets of Greenwich Village on the Lower West Side, from eyeballs to skeletons and everything in between. The only thing more impressive were the everyday people who turned up in their thousands to spectate. Easily the biggest fancy-dress party we’ve ever been to.

Greenwich Village was running amok with all sorts of ghoulish characters, at one point we even saw The Incredible Hulk but that may have been the costume that he wears most days… There are all sorts down there…

It was our first proper Halloween and I’d made it a personal mission to carve a pumpkin. After missioning about in the crowded streets of the Village we managed to find this squash at Wholefoods and he turned out to be a fairly cheerful chap. So we named him Jedidiah!

And so with a couple of days left of the URT we head back to the original Empire and to Family and friends in Knapp Hill, London and Worcester… so close! 6 months has disappeared!

T & D

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Filed under USA

Tagged as budget backpacking, halloween, New York, round the world, the Ultimate round trip, travel blog, URT, USA, World trip

20 Oct 2011 · 6:45 PM

Featured on Duty Free Canada

We were pleasantly surprised to see that we have been featured on the Duty Free Canada website this morning! Although we’re not entirely sure how they came across our site, and also how they came to conclusion that T gave up his career to travel Nevertheless, its always nice to get some free publicity!

We’ve been enjoying a few days of comfort in beautiful Asheville, so look out for our next post and gorgeous photos of the Fall foliage.

D x

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Filed under USA

Tagged as budget backpacking, Duty Free Canada, round the world, travel blog, Ultimate round trip, URT, USA

19 Oct 2011 · 5:53 PM

Florida Flew By

The first thing we were confronted with in Daytona Beach was the thousands and thousands of motorcycles…Biktoberfest 2011. This is a ten-day festival where bikers from all over the country ride down to Daytona Beach and take over the streets. We couldn’t stay with our friend Veenen as he was already staying with a friend, so we used the Couch Surfing website and this time we were really lucky! We arrived at our hosts door and felt immediately at home, David opened his home for us even while his mum was visiting and he had another three couch surfers at the time. If there is one thing I love, its busy home Once we had rid our selves of our backpacks and said our hellos, we decided to take a walk down to the Main Street which was conveniently located a few blocks from David’s house.

Our Couch Surfing host, David and fellow Couch Surfer, Naomi

When I said the bikes take over the streets, I really mean they are everywhere. The Main St was blocked off entirely so that the spectators could walk around and ogle the bikes, and the bikers could rev their engines all the way down the road. It was fun though, to watch the posers and the biker girls showing off J, or maybe they were just showing their girls off and the bikes were just secondary.

Biketoberfest!

Saturday started out slow, but we took the bus out to the Daytona International Speedway to see the massive track. It was built in 1959 and the track is 4km long. By far the most impressive spec of this motor racing stadium is it’s crowd capacity, 167 785 people squeeze themselves into the park to watch a bunch of cars make 800 left turns! Crazy!

Daytona International Speedway

This day though the bikers were king, choppers and Harleys and “Crotch Rockets” all over the place in as many colours that you can imagine. Along with all of the retail that goes with the festival, it’s a biker’s heaven where they can add to their badges on their jackets or buy a new faring with iPod and Navigation support. The beer was flowing and the sun was out so the cops had a lots to keep them busy. We saw a couple of blokes picking up their bikes because they’d lost the ability to keep them rubber side down.

The real reason we made our way over to Daytona was to catch up with The Incredible V, turns out he makes for a great superhero name too. Ourmate who has been studying to be a commercial pilot for 4 years at Embry-Riddle the premier aeronautical university in the States. And catch up we did, starting with some beers at the biker-flooded beach bar Ocean Deck. It’s worth a visit for it’s evening time karaoke and pitcher specials but it was a bunfight with all of the tattooed and hefty making a rager out of their weekend at Biketober! We did manage to produce a long winded and detailed account of the URT thus far and talked away, and drank a bit too much… oops, all in good fun eh! Damned pitcher specials!

Catching up at the Ocean Deck

Rocking out with the bikers at the Ocean Deck

Sunday bloody sunday! Flying day and the weather was splendid! We headed out to ERAU mid morning and Veenen set about getting us ramp badges and headsets, he was decked out in his instructors uniform complete with epaulets and we were both quite impressed to see how professional he’s become! Such a champ! After a pre flight inspection of the plane we started her up and Dom taxi’d us down the ramp and to the runway. And then it was full power and Ven let her take off too, just pulled back on the yoke and we were up in the air! I can say how exciting it is to do because I was the one sitting up front on the way back to Riddle. We headed North and landed up at Flagler County Airport where V parked up the plane and we followed the air traffic controllers direction and enjoyed our lunch. Highjackers, the diner right on the runway is known for it’s burgers and we got stuck in to their seasoned fries and hush puppies too… So goood!

Flying!!

Unfortunately we had to have the aircraft back by 16h00 so we headed back up, Ven showed us some cool stuff the plane could do and also some of the surrounding area from the air and we headed back to land at Daytona Beach. It’s an incredible thing to fly the plane but in such a small craft you feel all of the bumps and by the time we were about to land I was feeling a bit nauseated so I was glad to be back and at the same time sad that it was all coming to an end. It was such an amazing day and reminded me of how much I missed by bike back home because flying is what V does and we could see how stoked he was when he was up there!

Embry Riddle Cessna 172 N454ER

We spent the rest of the afternoon/evening back at Mai Tai’s cocktail bar having beer and Lava Flows and saying cheers to Veenen. And as the bus system is so shocking, our original plan was thwarted by the route being closed on Sundays so our amazing hosts David and his mum drove us the 40 minutes to Deland to catch our train.

Daytona was super fun, bikes, beer, flying, burgers and catching up with a great friend! We both wished we could have stayed longer!

Great day out!

D & T

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Filed under USA

Tagged as Biktoberfest, budget backpacking, Daytona Beach, rtw, the Ultimate round trip, travel blog, travel photos, URT, USA, World trip

13 Oct 2011 · 1:01 AM

The Big Easy

New Orleans is not called ‘The Big Easy’ for nothing… This city is chilled out to the max. From the blues and jazz on every corner in the French Quarter, to the laid back street cars rolling along on their own schedule. The epitome of this being after eight when every second car is heading back to the ‘station’ for the night.

Our time in NOLA, New Orleans Louisiana, was just as laid back, and for a change we forgot about our big rush to see everything we could and rather relaxed into the city. We were supposed to leave on Monday evening but extended our stay one more night. We slept late, ate a lot of great food, listened to some great live music and walked around taking in the Southern atmosphere ’til our feet were aching!

Jazzing it up in Bourbon Street

NOLA has an interesting fascination with anything haunted or spooky, so you’ll find Haunted House tours, Voodoo gift shops and a lot of cemeteries. The cemeteries are interesting places to visit especially because not many cities boast their cemeteries as attractions for tourists. These cemeteries are in fact pretty interesting, owing to the fact that New Orleans is built below sea level and the water table is very high. Add to that the risk of flooding in this area and it makes burying your loved ones a difficult task, unless you want to see them float up to the surface to say howdy again. They solved this issue by burying bodies in family tombs and also in three layer mausoleums above the ground. A lady we met on the train put it fairly graphically when she said that they bury a body and within a year the body has already decomposed because of the climate down here. So when they next bury a family member they just push the body over and the remains fall through a grate so they can put the next one in there! Pretty gruesome!

It gets better… If two family members die within a year of each other, the second one can be put in a temporary tomb until the remains can be moved to the family grave. At least you get to have some different neighbours for a while! We visited a few cemeteries and found it morbidly fascinating to see the old and broken tombs with inscriptions of hundreds of peoples names on them. Many of the tombs date back to the 1800′s. One tomb which stuck out was that of Marie Laveau and her family. Her and her daughter, Marie Laveau II, were very well loved people in their day and were also practitioners of the popular Voodoo practices in those days. Even now people still leave gifts at their tombs in hope that they will grant their wishes.

Family tombs in St Louis Cemetery No. 2

There are a few main areas to see in the city, the French Quarter, the Garden District, Uptown and the Riverwalk, amongst a few others. The French Quarter is by far the busiest and most touristed area, and for good reason. This is the home of the famous Bourbon Street, and a few other beautiful old laneways full of antique shops and cafes. Live music is the drug of choice in this city, with live bands playing all over the quarter every night of the week. One street in particular is popular amongst the twenty-somethings is Frenchmen Street where brass bands and jazz musicians play in small joints with cheap drinks and no cover charge. Here you can get your fix and not break the bank. Bourbon Street is fun and definitely worth a visit, especially to get a signature Hurricane from Pat O’Brien’s, but the drinks are generally overpriced and quite frankly, it smells funky.

Enjoying a signature Hurricane at Pat O'Brien's with a souvenir glass!

The Garden District and Uptown are situated on the St Charles Streetcar line, so you can hop on the one side and go all the way to the end and then come back to the French Quarter. It is a beautiful old area, lots of Southern homes and lots of money. We wandered around the Garden District for a little while but to be honest, if you don’t have money to spend in the little shops and cafes, its more fun to be in the French Quarter. Uptown is beautiful just to look at the houses and we stopped off at the University to gape at the massive old stone buildings and big old trees in the squares. An inspiring place to study, that’s for sure.

St Charles Streetcar

Along the Riverwalk there are the normal popular tourist attractions such as the Aquarium and also an Insectarium situated a little way down Canal Street. However, as I said, we took it really easy so we didn’t do any of those things, but we did stumble upon one cool event, the New Orleans leg of the Redbull Mississippi Grind. An ingenious idea by the guys at Redbull, to put a skateboarding park on a barge and float it down the Mississippi river holding contests at various stops along the way! We watched a bit if the competition on the first day and decided to go back to watch the finals along with the local skateboarders of New Orleans the following day. We spent Sunday afternoon whooping and cheering as 8 skaters aged 14 through 23 competed for $2000 and the chance to be the best skater to set foot on the barge! The great thing was that Redbull also donated the skate park to the city for all of New Orleans’ skaters to enjoy!

Skating tricks at the Redbull Mississippi Grind

The hostel we stayed in, called India House Hostel, was really nice and just a block away from the Canal Street Streetcar line, so it was easy to get to the French Quarter from there. It has a nice big kitchen and lots of fridge space so you’re able to cook your own stuff, and it also sells good local food for $5 per plate in the evenings. Great for lazy tourists who are sick of fast food Although, we did come across a great restaurant called Cafe Maspero on the corner of Decatur and Toulousse Streets, which had fantastic food, massive portions and $1 Strawberry Daiquiris, could you ask for more?:)

Cafe Maspero, great food, great value!

Lastly, a visit to New Orleans wouldn’t be complete without a visit to Cafe Du Monde, a French-style cafe which started out as a 24-hour coffee stand in the 1860′s still serving cafe au lait and hot beignets. Beignets are french-style doughnuts which arrive in a bowl full of icing sugar. They are delicious! We also found some creative things to do with our leftover icing sugar Oh and of course, a visit to the everything-Tabasco shop, where they sell, you guessed it, everything that you can think of with Tabasco!

Icing sugar was just too hard to resist

Next time we go back I’d love to take a horse and carriage tour of the city, eat more beignets and maybe spend some more time exploring those galleries on Royal Street! For now though, thats all we had time for, but it was a great few days in the Big Easy!:)

Sadly we’ve entered the last month of the URT trip, but it is coming to the point when we are missing those little comforts of home. However, we still have lots to see and after another long bus trip we have arrived in Orlando and we’re thinking about checking out the Disney nightlife this evening!

D x

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Tagged as Bourbon Street, budget backpacking, French Quarter, New Orleans, Pat O'Brien's, round the world, rtw, the Ultimate round trip, travel blog, URT, USA, World trip

30 Sep 2011 · 5:35 AM

San Diego…City of Sunshine!

The train trip down from Maricopa, Arizona down to San Diego was pretty painless, in fact by the time we arrived in Los Angeles to catch the connecting train to SD, we were well rested and ready to go. There was a moment, however, when we thought we were going to miss the train altogether, like venice all over again… but it was quickly sorted out by MJ’s speedy Nascar driving

Luckily when we arrived we found a Starbucks to stand outside and siphon some wifi off, and quickly orientated ourselves and found the trolley (tram) station. Our school friend Adriano, who is currently studying here, met us at the trolley station a few stops down and off we went to his student digs down the road. Newport Place, a modern apartment block across the road from the City College, is a hub of activity with students coming and going at all times-and then of course, there’s Roger, the 60-year old biker dude, who also joins in the festivities. It’s like one big family here, everyone knows everyone and if you need anything, you just pop over to your neighbours and ask. Every day at 5pm is cocktail hour, everyone gets together in the courtyard downstairs to have a drink and a chat, then either they bring some food and share it or they head back to their apartments and make their own dinner. A really friendly vibe Last night we even chatted about their attempt to make Newport Place into a reality TV show…it would definitely catch on, I’d say…never a dull day I hear!

Our first day was get-to-know-San-Diego day, we went for a long walk all around the Downtown area and down to the pier to see what’s what and made it back to the apartment for cocktail hour Today we got out after lunch and took a trolley down to the pier, then we hopped on a ferry to the island Coronado. Coronado is mostly a Navy retiree town, but it’s also a beautiful town full of boutique shops and a really nice resort on the beach. We took a bus down to the resort and had a look at the beach, which is really beautiful, just like Cape Town’s camps bay, but we got a bit hungry so we walked back into the village and found a nice pizza place to enjoy a slice or two. After lunch we ventured down to the marina to ogle at the yachts and then back to the beach to have a cocktail or two.

We found a spot to sit on the deck facing the sea and there we sat drinking beer/pomegranate daiquiris until late afternoon. Ah bliss…

Cocktails on the deck

There is also a Naval and Air Force base on the island so every so often there were a couple of low flying black hawk helicopters or carrier planes which would fly over and stop the conversation while everyone stared at the sky.

Low-flying aircraft!

When we eventually made it back to the ferry around 6pm, the sun was low and the skyline of San Diego was showing off in all it’s glory.

San Diego skyline

Certainly a great day all round! Now its time for dinner and maybe a couple of drinks with the neighbours, tomorrow we’re off to Balboa Park!

D x

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Tagged as Amtrak, budget backpacking, photos, round the world, San Diego, the Ultimate round trip, travel blog, URT, USA

28 Sep 2011 · 5:14 AM

Canyonlands

Here is the long awaited post, get settled ’cause it’s a bumper edition!

Our first real camping trip, tent and all, has been an exciting challenge to say the least. From deciding how to make dinner with one pot on a fire, to how to keep warm in a summer tent when it’s 3 degrees Celsius outside, we were creative and we managed not to starve nor get hyperthermia-despite the odds.

Camping in Page

Our first stop was Page, Arizona, and after quickly learning how to drive a normal size car on the right-hand side of the road-a breeze compared to the RV-we made it to this little town on the border of Utah by just after sunset. Having never put up this little tent of ours before, Trist set to work and I stayed out of the way. We had stopped at Walmart to stock up on food but considering we didn’t have a fridge and the daytime temperature is an average of 30 degrees Celsius, it left us with kind of limited However, we failed to buy wood/charcoal and therefore feasted on cheese, salami and crackers for dinner. The little campsite in Page-called the Page Lake Powell Campsite-was a gem to say the least. The fee was marginal and included showers and restrooms, electricity points and free wifi. So after a bit of planning and surfing we headed to bed, and although it was warm when we climbed into our very thin sleep sacks, we were not prepared for how cold it got in the middle of the night and therefore had minimal sleep and froze. Nevertheless, when the sun came up we finally got a couple of hours of sleep and we were ready to take on the day.

We had been talking about going to see Antelope Canyon since before we left home so we were pretty excited to see the slot canyon. There are a few mixed messages about how to see the canyon, but what we figured out was there are two options:
-Pay upwards of $35 to have a tour of the Upper Antelope Canyon-a more touristed part of the canyon and therefore busier.
-Pay $26 to either have a tour of the Lower Antelope Canyon or get a two hour photo pass to walk through on your own and take photos.

So you can guess which option we chose, the only problem was that to qualify for the photo pass you had to have a large tripod-not very conducive to world travellers…
Anyway, eventually we found a kind guide who lent us his tripod and off we went down into the slot canyon to take as many photos as possible.

Words cannot describe the beauty of the rock formations down there or how the light falls on each angle of the rocks, so here are some photos to explain:

Entering lower Antelope Canyon

Antelope Canyon

The rest of the day was spent exploring the Glen Canyon National Park and finding a spot to sleep for the night. On out explorations we found a little slice of heaven at a place called the Coves, where we escaped the heat of the day by jumping off of the rocks into the crystal clear Lake Powell. We ended up revisiting out little spot a few times during the week!

Lone Rock near the Cove

We ventured a few miles over the State border into Utah (and we were in two places at once at one stage ) and found a ‘primitive’ campsite, as they call it, right on the lake. Primitive in this case means no electricity, no wifi, no showers… there were toilets but they were a little out of the way so it was all bush toilets for us! We set up camp next to a stone campfire that someone had left behind and, this time remembering to buy wood, made a nice cosy fire.

Camp at Lone Rock

With our little pot, a packet of pasta, a tin of sauce and a smoked sausage, we made a feast for dinner and sat by the fire until it burnt out. Thus time arming ourselves with fleeces, leggings and thick socks we thought we were more prepared for the cold, but being by the lake, we still froze and got very minimal sleep! We thought about heading back to Walmart to buy a warmer blanket, but die-hards we are, we decided we would wear even more clothes the next night and risk it

Early the next morning we headed to the toilets in the other side of the beach to wash our dishes and our teeth and had some cereal before heading further into Utah to Bryce Canyon. The drive to Bryce was long but we came across some beautiful red rock formations and tunnels made of rock

Red Rock Tunnels

along the way. Once we had arrived at Bryce Canyon National Park and paid our fee we explored our options for camping. The only available campsite was a forest site, which was really nice and close to the canyon rim trail walking paths but didn’t have any shower facilities either nor electricity, and we were already in need of a shower! We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the canyon and had lunch overlooking the Bryce Canyon Amphitheatre-a pretty spectacular sight! We’ve certainly had some pretty good views to dine to over the last week. The amphitheatre is sedimentary rock that has been eroded by water, wind and ice over millions of years to create pillars or hoodoos which we saw and walked among. We watched the sunset over the amphitheatre watching the shadows formed by the hoodoos as the sun went down. As the sun set, the chill set in, so we quickly made a fire for warmth and to make dinner. Using a griddle made of wire pokers we managed to cook our ribeye steak and potato dinner, roasted a few marshmellows and were in bed by 9:30. The funniest thing was that we found out, while getting stuff for dinner, that we had changed time zones as we went into Utah and

Hoodoos at Bryce Canyon

we didn’t even know, so technically we were in bed by 8:30. It didn’t matter though, it was so freezing cold by that time that we knew we weren’t getting any sleep. Even wrapped up in all the clothes we could, and with our sleep-sacks, blanket and towels, we spent the entire night shivering away. Needless to say our intentions for getting up to see the sunrise over the ampitheatre went out the window and we slept as much as we could when the sun finally warmed the tent up.

We finally found a shower after packing up as quickly as we could, and had to pay $2 each for an 8 minute shower… bit of a rip off and a waste of water if you ask me, but we were clean and ready to take on the day.

We made one more tour of the park, seeing the beautiful natural bridge made of sedimentary rock before heading back to Page to our little gem of a campsite. At this stage we were ready to be back to some civilization and to charge up our low camera batteries. We took the same route back to Page but stopped along to the way to see the small towns. We happened across Glendale, the first Morman settlement in North America and also a little ice cream shop/souvenir store in the town of Orderville, called The Rock Shop, where the owner asks that you put a pin in your hometown on her map. She’s had thousands of visitors from all over the world, even two others from Cape Town this year!

Natural Bridge at Bryce Canyon

We made it back to Page in time for a swim at the cove and to get some groceries before we set up camp. We spent the evening chatting to some really nice German people who are also traveling the States for two months while we braai’d our chicken and veg We had originally planned to head to the Grand Canyon the following morning but we found out that the campsites were not equipped and it would be pretty cold, so we decided to spend only one night there and stay another night in Page. So we spent the morning catching up on sleep and looking through all the great photos we had taken during the week. It was a nice hot day again so we got some rolls and took our picnic down to the Cove to enjoy the sunshine. The water was refreshing and we splashed around for an hour after lunch. There were hundreds of people out on the river in boats and jet skis, Page is apparently a year-round holiday destination. On our way back to the camp we stopped at the Carl Hayden Visitor Centre which gives tours of the Glen Canyon Dam, a large dam across the Colorado river. We walked across the bridge and marveled at this gigantic wall holding back the billions of cubic meters of water!

Glen Canyon Dam

That evening we had yet another braai, chicken, yams and corn on the fire, and we discovered that there was a music festival happening just over

Lake Powellapalooza from the hill

the hill from the Campsite called the Lake Powell-A-Palooza Music Festival, so we climbed up the hill and sat on the top watching the people and listening to the music. A really cool take on the South African trance parties, but in the desert. People camping everywhere, big sound rigs, funky coloured lights and arty creations all over the place. That night we were slightly warmer, but woke up with a sore throat and a headache so we took a bit longer than usual to get motivated. Eventually we were on the road to the Grand Canyon at about 11am, armed with some decongestants and painkillers. However, I just seemed to get sicker and sicker the whole way there. We stopped a few times to see take photos of the canyons and the red rocks and once more in Cameron, a small trading post on the road from Page to Flagstaff, to have some lunch. We noticed that there are a lot of Navajo (pronounced Nav-a-ho) tribal people who have set up stalls along the roads selling dream catchers and jewelry made from native stones, and one who even sold Elk jerky (biltong)!

When we arrived in the Grand Canyon, we were pleasantly surprised to hear that it was the National Parks Fee-Free day so that was $20 saved, but that also meant that the park was even busier than usual. I was feeling pretty awful but we stopped at all the view points we could because we certainly didn’t want to miss anything. Our aim was to get to the village and get a campsite at Mather Campground which was in the Grand Canyon Village. We found that the canyon was extremely beautiful, and looked like a painting, but no matter where we stopped to look at the view, Bryce Canyon’s hoodoos and Antelope Canyon’s curves still seemed more interesting to us. That said, the Grand Canyon is certainly GRAND… it is enormous and majestic, but the more you look at it, it starts to look like a painting. When we got to the campground, we found it was full, and we were super disappointed but we found that we’d seen enough of the canyon and felt that it was quite crowded so we took one more drive around the park and then drove down to the ten-X campground just outside of the park to spend the night. Yet another freezing night, this time we stopped at Walmart to buy $2 fleece blankets but they were little combat against the icy forest. Trist even woke up in the middle of the night hearing a pack of Coyotes howling at the night! Creeepy!

Campsite at Ten-X

The next morning we woke up grumpy and cold and without possibility of a shower, so we did a sneaky and popped into the closest RV camp to steal a quick shower and hot-footed it back out of there. Well, technically we paid 50c each for the shower, but anyway… I digress. After that we drove straight down the 64 to Oak Creek, and found this great little road into the creek and a perfect spot for lunch at Slide Rock National Park. First we took a drive into Sedona, which is a really sweet little tourist town, where the buildings are all made to resemble the natural red rocks that make up the surrounding hills and all the shops sell bits and bobs including a selection of locally made paraphernalia. I found out that 43 famous Western movies were shot in and around Sedona. We enjoyed walking around the town for a while and when we were too sun exposed we headed back to Slide Rock with some rolls for lunch.

The famous Cowboy Corral in Sedona

Slide Rock is incredible, if you think of the most fun you can have at waterworld and double it! The sandstone has been worn away into a slippery slide of epic proportions, we spent the afternoon cooling off in the freezing cold spring water and jumping off the rocks into the deeper pools.

Slide Rock

And that was it, our week of camping. And freezing our butts off at night… so we were sad and happy at the same time. But we set up camp for the last time and braaied a choppie for dinner! Oh, and we even had a little visiting skunk at our campsite

Our little skunk at Cave Springs Campground

A last look around Sedona for the morning saw us at the Chapel of the Holy Cross that has been built into the red rocks.

Chapel of the Holy Cross, Sedona

And then the long drive back up the long straight roads to swelteringly hot Phoenix to drop our car off! T’was a great week! Now, we’re off to San Diego, after recovering in Phoenix today!

Us at Horseshoe Creek, yet another beautiful spot!

D & T x

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Tagged as Antelope Canyon, Arizona, Bryce Canyon, budget backpacking, Grand Canyon, Page, round the world, the Ultimate round trip, travel blogs, USA, Utah

19 Sep 2011 · 4:22 AM

Up next, the Canyons

So tomorrow we embark on another journey, this time through Arizona to visit all the amazing canyons we can… Antelope Canyon, the Grand Canyon and maybe even Bryce Canyon in Utah!

We are hiring a car in Phoenix from Enterprise for a week and making the trip up to Page and across to the Grand Canyon before we make our way back to Phoenix through the smaller towns of Sedona and Jerome.

It should be interesting once again as this time we will be taking a tent and camping along the way

Look forward to telling you all about it when we get back to Phoenix on the 26th!

One Night in Vegas

After Yosemite, it was a straight shoot through the beautiful Sierra Nevada and on to Las Vegas. The scenes were something out of Jurassic Park with massive plains of desert, where it seemed that dinosaurs might once have roamed. Even though there was desert everywhere, in the background were the large snowy mountains of the breathtaking Sierra Nevada mountains.

A long road to Vegas

We arrived in Las Vegas and hit the rush hour traffic. From the freeway we started to see the outline of the monstrous casinos and hotels of the Las Vegas Strip. We were so exhausted from the long drive from Lee Vining that morning that after we eventually found a RV park right on the strip, we went straight to sleep for a power nap. When we woke up a couple of hours later, it was dusk and we were starving, so we made some dinner in our handy RV kitchen and then headed out to paint the town red!

Welcome to Vegas

We started our walk down the strip starting from the RV park at Circus Circus Casino where we were parked. It was a decidedly warm night, probably about 30 degree Celcius even at 8pm. From the minute we started walking down the strip, we were overwhelmed by the towering buildings, bright lights and the sound of a non-stop party. We were amazed at the detail of each of the themed hotels on the strip…The Venetian, with its gondolas and a mini St. Mark’s Campanile, Treasure Island, with its pirate ship and even Paris casino, with a mini Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomph! We walked through the casinos and watched all the different people gambling and enjoying themselves. There were a few different types of people: the bachelor/bachelorette and their party who were crazily celebrating their last night of ‘freedom’ before the wedding; the tourists like us who looked like deers in the headlights while we wandered around open-mouthed; the seasoned gamblers, who sat for hours at the same machines smoking and drinking away while they gambled, and the American families, some gambling, others just enjoying the festivities.

We took a walk through the Venetian wandering through the ‘allyways’ with their fake sky ceilings and old-looking buildings just like the real Venice and we were glad that we had been to italy to see it for real. The casino even has a river running through it, with gondolas and singing gondoliers to set the tone.

Outside the Venetian with a mini St Mark's Calamine

After the Venetian, we hot-footed it over to the Bellagio to see the world-famous fountain show. It was spectacular, to the tune of Elvis’ Viva Las Vegas!

Next we headed over to Treasure Island to see the Pirate Show, a musical skit with fireworks and special effects to entertain the whole family, and down the strip a little further to the mini Eiffel Tower!

Treasure Island Pirate Ship

Eiffel Tower in Vegas!

We had to say that we gambled in Vegas but managed to do it budget style by starting with a dollar in the penny slots and trying to make up as much as possible… lets just say that these casino’s will even take you for your dollar… sneaky buggers! It was great fun though, going from Casino to casino, watching the shows and seeing all of the interesting characters that frequent Sin City.

Gambling our $1 at Casino Royale

Much later, we stumbled home on aching feet and crawled into bed at 3am completely knackered. Who said you couldn’t do Vegas in a day? Well it would’ve been fun to have some more time! Another place to return to then!

The next morning we were up fairly early again to take the RV back to the rental company and got a shuttle back to the strip to wait at the Excalibur for our bus to Phoenix!

The Excalibur Hotel and Casino

It has been a lazy few days in Phoenix and we’re enjoying catching up with Bret and MJ as well as our sleep

On the Bus to Phoenix

D x

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Tagged as budget backpacking, Las Vegas, photos, round the world, rtw, the Ultimate round trip, travel advice, travel blog, USA

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