Time to come home - Fun Facts!

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Originally uploaded by theslaad.

We can't believe it's time to come home! It doesn't seems like very long ago that we were saying goodbye to our parents at the airport, but I suppose it does feel like a long time ago since things like overnight trains in China and learning to dive in Vietnam.

So, here are some interesting facts about our travels....

We've visited twelve countries and ten capital cities. We don't really have a favourite country, but Mexico City was by far the best capital city.
We've been speaking quite a lot of Spanish over the last three months but have also learnt some words in Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese and Maori. Usually how to say 'Cheers!'.
We've been to 23 airports and have taken 18 flights (but it's okay because we bought energy efficient lightbulbs for Jamaicans). We've been on 5 trains, 2 campervans and god knows how many buses and taxis!

We've had good and bad weather. The hottest place was King's Canyon in Australia, at about 47 degrees, and the coldest place was the desert in Bolivia before sunrise, at about minus 5 degrees. This was also the highest place we went to at over 5000m. The lowest place was next to an octupus in Koh Phi Phi, at 19m below sea level!

The longest time that we spent travelling was the 27 hour train journey from Shanghai to Guilin, after which we had to take a bus for a couple of hours to get to Yangshou.

The worst thing that we did on the whole trip was early on, in China. We cycled to Moon Hill and then climbed it. It was ridiculously hard work in the blistering heat and not at all worth it, as the nice moon shape of the hill was perfectly visible from the bottom, and the view from the top was rubbish.

We don't really have one best thing, but some contenders would be (in order of doing them): The Great Wall of China, Angkor Wat complex, Mui Ne beach, staying with Stuart & Wiccha in Chaing Dao, Sydney, driving around in our van in Australia, glow worms, sperm whales, staying in the Mezkalito hostel in Oaxaca, Chichen Itza, Nazca lines, Machu Picchu and the Uyuni salt flats.

We've eaten well, but more often not so well. The best food we've had was at the Friends restaurant in Phonm Penh, Wiccha's cooking in Chiang Dao and the Hangi in New Zealand. Of course, our campervan-cooked food in Australia and New Zealand was pretty yummy.
We've eaten at some truly diabolical places (as proven by the nice food poisoning). The worst place is hard to pin down, but generally nowhere in Vietnam or Peru was very good.

We've been very lucky and have met some really nice people along the way. Most of group in China were fun to be with, Vicky our dive instructor was cool, it was nice to see Stuart and meet Wiccha and Joseph in Chiang Dao, we had fun with a group of people in Oaxaca, we met a couple from Wymondham whilst we were in Nazca, we loved staying at the Frankenstein Hostal in Cusco with Ludwig, Maritta and little Fiona and the people on our Uyuni trip were very nice too.

So this adventure is over, but we plan to have many more. We're really loking forward to coming home and seeing everyone, being able to eat good food, flush paper down the toilet and catch up on pop culture (all the TV we've missed!).

We've missed you all and look forward to seeing you very soon!