Coopers
Cooper Family Joined: August 15th 2009
Logged in: January 13th 2012
Logged in: January 13th 2012
Travel Blog Posts
Greece
The Results are in! Seeing as verbally conversing with young males is akin to walking through plate glass, I thought I would try to elicit their views of some of the favorite things on our tour with a survey. I locked them in a room until they were done and, combined with Nadine and my surveys, the results are below. Even this quick survey, brought some surprises. So without further adieu…ladies and gentlemen…the results of the favorite things from the Xploringcoopers world tour are: Best Weather 1. Australia 2. Everywhere else! * we hit a couple of 40 degree days…’but it’s a dry heat’ Best Beaches Of the 8 countries we visited 5 were in the running…and the surprise winner is… 1. Spain 2. Australia 3. Thailand * we spent a lot of time on beaches ... read more
P1310002
It had to happen! Someday our tour would have to end…and that was February. The determination of when the tour would end was budget based. When the money runs out, the tour would end. So we are back in Canada and settled in our new home city of Ottawa. So while the tour around the world has to end…our adventure continues…just in a different form! The budget we created for the tour was essentially four months and we were hoping to stretch it to at least six, with the sale of my car and some frugality. Well the car did not sell, and we arrived at a point where the end of the budget was in sight. So we made a tentative return plan and, once that was determined, it no longer made sense to sell ... read more
Homework at Bangkok Airport
First of all let me apologize for the tardiness of this post...we are back in North America now and living in Ottawa...I will fill you in in a later post...but as we were so close to landing in a new city, reality gets in the way. So much of our time has been spent on finding places to live, making arrangements and applying for jobs. But like I said I will get this blog out and fill you in on a blog to be posted very shortly (promise) on our resettlement Ausanada! Canaustralia! Whatever...they both work. Australia seems to be Canada's long lost brother! Auzzie's act and do things very much like Canadians. Almost everything is familiar here...except the trees, flowers, birds, animals, beaches, and other things. But aside from those things we are one! It's ... read more
PYTHON!
Off we went into the ‘winter’ season of Thailand, which is also peak tourism season. This will be our first place to visit at peak tourism season, we are expecting inflated prices, lots of tourists, an increase in touristy activities, and hot…lots of hot. Winter here does mean cooler temperatures…but cooler temperatures are still 30 degrees! We have to endure another marathon flight from Athens to Bahrain for a 12 hour layover before flying into Bangkok. We flew Gulf Air, and they put us up in a hotel for the evening because of the long layover. However, we lose another 1.5 days traveling…it’s a big world! Upon our arrival into Bangkok airport, we were picked up by a driving service and headed 3 hours South to a town called Hua Hin. I initially thought that Hua ... read more
Corinth Canal
I had a problem with the photo updater, so only a limited number of photos appear here. More will be published in a separate blog...sorry about that. One of our shorter flights on our trip was the three hour flight from Cairo to Athens. Short flights are great…you get everything a long flight gives you except a numb butt. Athens was where we will be spending Christmas…not a white Christmas mind you…but Christmas. We planned to travel the Peloponessos region of Greece for a few days first before settling in Athens for a week and Christmas. I am not sure what it was about arriving in Greece, but I was very happy to be here. It felt that we had arrived back in civilization…not that I ever consciously thought that we were out of civilization…but everything ... read more
Cooper Family
We just wanted to take the time to wish our friends and family an incredibly wonderful Christmas! This is going to be a special Christmas for us as we will be spending it in Athens, Greece. While we will miss our families and friend this Christmas, please know we are thinking of you and wishing you all the best. We look forward to seeing you again in early 2010! ... read more
Saqquara Pyramid
Sorry for the delay in this post. We had all of our planning done up to and including Egypt before we left, but nothing after that. So once we had access to the internet, most of my time has gone to making preparations for Greece and Thailand at the expense of staying on top of the blog. Our third country in Africa is Egypt. Nicolas chose this stop on our tour because of the pyramids he learned about in school. We spent 10 days in Egypt and decided to use a tour guide service as we were informed that signage and information at the sites were in arabic. We are glad we did as the information we received was very good and you really cannot do this on your own as there are no explanations (in ... read more
White Fathers Mission
…Burkina Faso Continued After departing the Ste. Cecile orphanage, we returned to Samagan, the White Father mission where Jacques lives. The White Fathers, as they are called, are the Missionaries of Africa organization. They are nicknamed White Fathers due to the distinctive white robes they wear. They are stationed in over 20 African countries to live and integrate within the communities and be witnesses of God. The gentlemen who become White Fathers come from around the world including Mexico, India, Rwanda, Nigeria, Burundi, Congo and elsewhere. They spend nine years training to be ordained as a White Father. As part of that training they must learn another language, to show that they are adaptable and able to integrate into a community. We spent three days at Samagan dining with the students and the White Fathers. The ... read more
Nicolas et Nicolas
After a week in Burkina Faso we need to post a blog as there is so much to tell and show. We have almost 400 pictures from the past several days, way too much to include on a blog. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and while I believe that to be true, our pictures however still do not truly capture our experience. It is very difficult to describe Africa, and our experiences. So an extra long blog follows, and together with the pictures, hopefully provide a glimpse of a totally unique experience: Nadine’s mother (Marie) met us in the Casablanca airport from Montreal to join us for our Burkina Faso leg. As you will read, she has a special connection with this place. We arrived at the Ouagadougou (the capital of Burkina ... read more
Tunis Coast
For the first time in our trip we are seeing a culture that is significantly different than ours. Tunisia is where Nadine and her family lived for a year when she was 14 years old. Her and her sister (Annie) went to a French school in Sousse for a year. So Nadine is trying to go down memory lane…but apparently, Tunisia has undergone many changes in the 27 years since Nadine went to school here. She remembers the roads being clogged with horse or donkey driven wagons, bicycles, and people. Today the roads are still clogged…but now with other cars, trucks, mopeds, and people! People outside of Sousse compare Sousse today with New York city…in reference to its neon signs that have sprung up over the past decade. So it has changed, but it is still ... read more
