Leaving Iran We flew from Iran to Uzbekistan, (our first flight since leaving home) as getting a visa to travel over land through Turkmenistan takes a lot of time, needs a letter of invitation (expensive) and even then may be a bit hit and miss. It was 1am by the time we reached the Emam Khomeni airport and on the departure board was a BMI flight to London; it felt odd that having travelled for over six weeks to get this far we could just pop on a plane and be back in Heathrow in 6 hrs. We’d fully expected the [View Full Entry]

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Border Crossing After the previous day’s disappointment and a poor night’s sleep we were up early; 7.30am saw us at a modern bus office, awaiting our bus to Oromiyhe. Come 9.00am and three different bus offices later (each one progressively more dingy) we finally boarded the bus. The journey through south east Turkey and into Iran was a joy; winding through stunningly beautiful mountains and over high, snow covered passes. It’s a Kurdish area and whilst we felt safe, apparently local people will not use the route other than during the day, thus explainin [View Full Entry]

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We’re heading into Iran now where internet access may not be easy and we really wanted to complete our record of the Turkey tour, but don't know when we'll be able to publish this. Up Up and Away Cappadocia was our last port of call on the West Turkey “tourist trail”. What an amazing place topped off with our Hot Air Balloon ride, a 50th Birthday Present for Terry from folks back home. It was a beautiful sunny morning and as if being in a hot air balloon wasn’t exciting enough (especially for Terry with all those cylinders valves and functions) [View Full Entry]

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Weight Loss, Without Dieting Huge thanks to everyone for all the comments and messages on our last blogs... So far we've travelled 75hrs by train and 30 by bus, and confess it all feels more like a holiday than travelling (whatever that is). We promise our next blog will have a map showing our proposed route, but its a little up in the air until we get our heads around what China is doing with the new limits on their tourist visa. Back to comments received; an especial thanks to the girls for the encouragement on the size of my [View Full Entry]

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Only 728 days to go Really enjoyed Budapest and discovered literal meaning of Pest is oven or kiln (courtesy of the Budapest Museum). Lots of open spaces, an incongruous mix of restored grand historical buildings, soviet block like architecture and ugly new International hotels ( the good, the bad and the ugly! . The city is coming to terms with its recent history, when I first saw this holocaust memorial I thought some one had left or was selling old shoes by the riverside. Budapest is full of thermal Spas, but having found a "hot tub" but sadly no time [View Full Entry]

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The Jouney Starts Both the Eurostar and Thalys train journeys were horrible; full and hot. Even worse the train to Cologne ran late so instead of having a pressurised 20 mins to get connecting overnight sleeper to Vienna we ended up with only 6mins. Having run from train with the heavy bags and eventually finding the right platform, our deluxe (!) overnight train was running 50 mins late! Excitement in hearts as we awaited our first sleeper - a modern carriage with en-suite shower and toilet. It didn’t disappoint and happy Phillips’ were tucked up early after [View Full Entry]

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They're Off Phew, we've condensed our essential belongings into two bags (hooray) but they're still too heavy. Guess stuff will get jettisoned when arms get too tired. After a lovely send off, we left Jude and Stu’s on Monday morning (31st march) to the delight of various vital organs (including a happy heart and a relieved liver!). After an anxious wait at Chorleywood Tube Station (being spied on by Stu - see below) we whizzed out of St Pancras to travel by assorted (very assorted as it turned out) trains across Europe through France, Belgium, Germany, Austr [View Full Entry]

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We've left all this behind and are heading off [View Full Entry]

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