Author: Thorsten

After the extensive wedding celebration week in Melbourne it was finally time to leave Australia behind and head on to Hong Kong to meet old friends and indulge in some nice last-minute x-mas shopping rush

Our way from Melbourne to Sydney was a bit different than planned – all I say here: NEVER fly Tiger Airways, unless you wanna end up on a plane that gets cancelled without notice – but this way we both got the new experience of buying a ticket for a plane that leaves in only an hour directly at the airport :lol:

Sadly enough, there was another last-minute change…and Pete (an old friend of Iris) had to leave early back to Germany so we missed him *smiley crying* Nevertheless our special thanks to Pete for the most luxurious accommodation throughout our 6 months journey *smiley surprised*

Continue reading Last, but not least…Hong Kong, once again *smiley winking*

On the way back to Australia we discovered a new feature in Qantas’ board entertainment system…the seat-to-seat chat. For sure we extensively used it and Iris convinced me, not to send any flirt messages randomly around the cabin as the system tells you the seat number of the sender

After getting started for our “adventure” with the Sydney bus system (if you ever have some spare time, I am happy to listen to whoever feels confident to explain it to me) we spent some time exploring The Rock (no movie, just the city area close to the Harbour Bridge) an it’s surroundings…

Continue reading Sydney – all about water…

What happens if you don’t really plan in advance? Sure, we all know…but it happens anyway We had not enough time to really fully explore the north island of New Zealand after spending most of the one month in the beautiful and spectacular south!

Boarding the ferry on the south island in Picton gives you some very nice views of the northern fjords…

Continue reading North Island – in a rush…

After only few hours of something you might call sleep in our JetStar plane, we arrived about some thousand kilometre further down south in Adelaide.

As many other towns in Australia, Adelaide looks nothing special to us…no really historic places/houses and everything nicely laid out in an ordered grid system of streets. So what to do here ? Easy: Shopping, Relaxing and BBQ

Continue reading Great Ocean Road: Adelaide to Melbourne

It has been a while since the last posting…but – other that expected – getting free internet in Australia and New Zealand is much more difficult than in South America…

After nearly one week throughout Queensland including Daintree National Park and another visit to the Great Barrier Reef it was time to switch locations again…and how do you do this best in a country where there’s thousands of kilometres between major cities? Right, simply take a plane from A to B – and be prepared, that people you will meet more in our local buses rather than in a plane will do the same: “Cheers mate!”

Apropos “mates”: We’re still travelling together with my dad Peter and my sister Kirsten

After some initial trouble getting an acceptable rental car – thanks to our “friends” from Hertz, which still haven’t been able to sort things out in their system – we easily found a nice hotel to stay.

Next morning it was time for our Northern Territory adventure: Well equipped with tips from Iris’ dad, we opted for an early start to the Kakadu National Park *yawn*

Continue reading All around Darwin: Kakadu and Litchfield National Parks

…at least that’s what an old German saying tells us – and it’s true, especially if you wanted to do something “special” and visit Vanuatu

According to various sources Vanuatu should be, what everybody considers “paradise” – not yet overflown by tourists, comparable cheap, sunny, friendly people all over the place, smiling all day long, …we could continue for some more time, but…

Back to the German saying mentioned above: You already have a vague idea, what this is heading to? Right…but let’s go through the topics one by one – in German, we found a word beginning with “Un” for each of them:

“Unverschämt teuer” – Lets just remember, that Vanuatu is a third-world-country and only every 7th person has something you would define as a job… The prices in the supermarkets and on the normal communal market on the street struck us like lightning: 1,40 EUR for 1 liter of milk, 1,50 EUR for a small can of really cheap beer (kind of “Öttinger-Pilsner”*smiley winking*, at least 14 EUR *smiley exclamation mark* for a main course in a restaurant (meat, pizza, what so ever), cheapest accommodation we could find 30 EUR per night

“Unfreundlich” – We read a lot of articles about Vanuatu and its famous number 1 rating in a survey looking for the happiest people in the world… But nobody was laughing and/or looking happy at all in Port Vila. Maybe we just got a wrong start there, as we found some more “happy” people away from the capital later on…

“Unwillig” – Nobody seemed to be willing to do anything at all…only if one of these annoying and disturbing tourists was pushing you can be sure some effort is done to get rid of you…

“Unfähig” – And even if you do try to push people and make sure that you get what you want, it still doesn’t always work…after one week discussion about flight dates, tours and hotels they messed up with the final confirmation and we could not go to Tanna or any other island as planned…

“Ungeziefer” – We couldn’t avoid it any longer….even after surviving South America without any major incidents (let’s forget about this small cockroach invasion in the jungle). Disaster stroke with a flea plague here…you’re reading correctly: Fleas!!!

Well, not everything was bad and we really tried to make to best out of it by searching for the nice spots with nice people…which worked out in a way

Continue reading Vanuatu – or “Wer eine Reise macht kann was erleben…”

Even if the weather was not perfect, we don’t wanna hide the “best available” view onto the lagoon from the airplane *smiley laughing*

Well, ok…two of these shots are “comercial” pictures found view Google Picture Search – guess which ones *smiley winking*

But anyway, this really was a glimpse of paradise *smiley smiling*

Absolutely no need to be sad – at least from what we have seen, experienced and mastered To sum it up a different way, than just putting together some numbers we tried to find some more “interesting” milestones – *!?#…that still sounds much like “Berater” slang, but we have another 3 months to get rid of that

Most unusual bathroom(s)

“Lightly” separated bathroom/toilet in Sucre

“Outdoor” feeling on Bora Bora

Most unusual “beach”

Some gravel at the Bolivian-Chilean-border area at more than 4000m and less than -20 C outside temperature on the way into the pool

Continue reading Half-time…already!?

Day 3

5:00am! We will definitely beat the crowds visiting the Moai at sunrise!

Unfortunately the sunrise is on the other side of the island, its pitch dark (no street lamps), the road has quite some pot holes, we have a scooter… and it is raining *smiley annoyed* Don’t ask how, but we made it well before any sun light was hitting the horizon and enjoyed a dramatic looking scenery

Continue reading Rapa Nui by scooter / Mit’m Roller über die Osterinsel – continued

After quite some time in more (or less) remote locations (see our Salar de Uyuni blog), we arrived in the modern mega-city of Santiago de Chile on a Sunday… and is was a special Sunday: There was some type of ceremony for the president of Chile!

Sounds good! But result et in a very frustrated taxi driver dropping us off some five blocks or so from the hostel, because he simply could not get closer due to closed streets. And that meant walking through a deserted city center (all people must have been somewhere else watching the parade) after a 24hour bus ride with our backpacks *smiley annoyed*

We stayed in the hostel Plaza de Armas directly at the central place – with the same name – and in a converted apartment. Straight to the point: Location great, facilities (showers, kitchen, WiFi=WLAN) good, staff sucks – but fortunately we haven’t come here to meet them…but to do some sight-seeing

But as Europeans and after more than two months on the road we got more attracted by the modern amenities than the whole sight-seeing *smiley winking*

Continue reading Back to the city! – Santiago de Chile and Valparaiso