DASH
David and I are officially "retired" and have decided to travel the world for a while.DASH dave and ash
We are starting out in Thailand on Aug 16th, will be meeting up with a few of his friends there and his cousin lives in the north of the country.
Then we are going to travel down into Malaysia and Singapore. Where another friend and his girlfriend will be meeting up with us for a few weeks.
Then we are scheduled to jump over to Bali, which is the only place in the entire world that I must see. Enjoy that island for 10 days and fly over to Australia.
We have 5 weeks to travel down the East coast of Australia and will hopefully get certified to scuba dive in Thailand and be able to see the Great Barrier Reef up close.
Then to New Zealand for just under 4 weeks.
Over to LA for a few days and then finally end up in NY on Dec 23rd.
Just in time for Christmas and to spend it with my family.
We have tickets to go back to Cork, Ireland on Jan 12th.
We have done a ton of research, bought brand new backpacks or rucksacks as Dave calls them, have plenty of bug spray and the camera is ready to go.
We miss out family and our friends a lot...but as my favorite band says... IN THE END MY FRIEND WE WILL ALL BE TOGETHER AGAIN.
Much love to all,
Ashley and Dave
Travel Blog Posts
Dave Emmigrates to the US of A
Published: May 10th 2009North America » United States » Pennsylvania » Philadelphia
May 10th 2009
David got a GREENCARD!! David was lucky enough to get selected for the lottery system and after a while of gathering paperwork and getting specific photos taken and paying lots of money. . . . HE HAS A GREENCARD!!!!!!!!!! I did not know how the whole lottery process worked so I did some research. Every year the US allows a certain number of visas to be given out to different countries as a way to diversify America. Dave has been entering the lottery for a few years now since its free to enter and would be a good opportunity to come here for work. This year he was one of 132 Irish people who were awarded a Greencard. I am very grateful that we are so blessed to have everything falling into place so that we ... read more
December 20th 2008
Our days are winding down quickly in New Zealand. We drove the long drive from Wellington to Rotorua. It is kind ofdifficult to pronounce the town names because a lot of them are Maori words and we never heard of the words before. Needless to say we butchered a lot of the town names. Rotorua is basically known for smelling like rotten eggs. Kidding, they have a lot of thermal pools and they smell like rotten eggs!!! It is amazing to see so many clouds of smoke rising from the ground and i still do not fully understand how and why they work. One morning we went to a town that was burried back around 1880's after a volcano erupted. It was cleverly named the Buried village! We took a short tour and learned a lot ... read more
December 14th 2008
The first place on this blog was a place called puzzling world in Wanaka. When we first arrived we went into a huge maze and Dave and I raced to see who could get out fastest. you can guess who you think won! there was a room where a pool ball went up a slanted table, and faces followed you when you walked, and a lot of Escher pictures. Then we had a bit of a drive to a place called Fox Glacier. It was pouring rain so we kinda had a reading day in the campervan and relaxed. We also signed up for a Glacier hike, only a half day though...dont think I could make it up a full day hike. As the morning rolled around it was still pouring rain so we went in ... read more
Watching seals, saving a hedgehog, eating chocolate and bungy jumping!
Published: December 7th 2008Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Queenstown
December 7th 2008
So continuing where I left off. Down the road from the amazing boulders was a place where you could watch fur seals. We weren't expecting to see too much but thought we would check it out. There were a lot of lazy seals all over the rocks! I guess they are pretty predictable and they sunbathe and sleep on the rocks daily. We got pretty close to them, and then decided to back it up a bit as its their territory. Some were hopping around like they, some were fighting and lots were sleeping or keeping an eye on us. After this we had a bit of a drove down the coast to get to Dunedin. While in this town we checked out the railway station, a church, there is an octagon with shops, visited the ... read more
Driving through the South Island
Published: December 7th 2008Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Lake Tekapo
December 7th 2008
The campervan is huge but has everything we need. It has a shower, tiolet, bed, sink...we didnt get the linen with the van...so the first 2 nights we slept with towels covering us and a few layers and FROZE!!! We eventually found a shop that sold sleeping bags and now there is no problems! After picking up the car, filling it with fuel and food, we drove to Lake Tekapo which is a bit inland. The drive was beautiful and the roads were lined with colorful flowers and eventually we saw our first snow-capped mountains ahead of us!! We of course stopped and took a few pictures. We got the the lake and found a free camping site which was right next to the lake and across the lake you could see Mount Cook. This is ... read more
November 28th 2008
The flight from australia to NZ was painless with no delays or complications as we seem to be prone to. Dave booked a hostel for our first night, as we landed around 930 pm and got into town after 11pm. There was one problem, we never wrote down the exact name of the hostel and wound up trying to book into a place we had no reservations for. Dave checked his email and saw we were at the completly wrong place, and had about a 10 minute walk over to the right place. By this time we were so tired because we lost 2 hours and it was about midnight and we go to bed at 930pm like I said. our first day we walked a few blocks to the Sky Tower, and went up to ... read more
Down Under in Sydney
Published: November 28th 2008Oceania » Australia » New South Wales » Sydney » Opera House
November 28th 2008
Sydney, Sydney, Sydney. This city is very big and bustlinig with businessmen and women and also lots and lots of tourists like us. So we still had our fabulous campervan as we drove into the city. Imagine this big camper trying to dodge the people jaywalking, not having a clue where we are and me navagating. We had to drive the van into the city to fond somewhere to ship our didgeridoos home. After trying Fed-Ex who quoted us over 600 Australian dollars....which we said thanks but no thanks to, we found a place to send them for 99 AD each. That was a relief because they oncy cost us 90 and 130 dollars. After getting those shipped, we checked into a hostel in the center of town and then said our final goodbyes to the ... read more
Pit stops along the East Coast
Published: November 27th 2008Oceania » Australia » Queensland » Brisbane
November 27th 2008
So we travelled back into Brisbane and stayed there for a night. We met up with Daves friend from college, Don, who recently moved here for a bit. We also visited the Gallery of Modern Art while we were here. This was when the rain started and we could have kissed our tans goodbye. Next on the itinerary was Surfers paradise. But it happened to be a wash out because the rain was relentless our 2 nights there. We had planned on learning how to surf here and also to visit a theme park and ride some big rollerclasters. Unfortunately the rain kept us from doing this and we headed out of the city a little earlier than expected. We went down the coast to Byron Bay, and the rain let up and we toured the ... read more
CRIKEY, Steve Irwin Day at the Australia Zoo
Published: November 27th 2008Oceania » Australia » Queensland
November 27th 2008
Today was the day in our itinary that we decided to go to the Australia Zoo. We turned up there and there were signs saying Today is Steve Irwin Day 2008...YEAH This was a great surprise. It meant that there were a lot more interactive things to do today to celebrate Steve Irwin. This zoo is by far the best zoo we have ever been to. It is very hands on, and the animals seem to be really taken care of here. There was a show where Terri, Steve's wife, came out and did a whole demonstration of feeding a croc and explaining about them. She was very witty and put on a good show. We also had to yell out "Crikey" for good times sake. Her daughter, Bindi, came on stage and sang a few ... read more
With the backpackers in Airlie Beach
Published: November 27th 2008Oceania » Australia » Queensland » Airlie Beach
November 24th 2008
We are continuing our journey down the East Coast of Oz. The good thing about having our own campervan is A, we can sleep/eat in it for cheap and B, we have the freedom to pull over and look at the beautiful sights. During the drive we usually planned a pit stop near a beach and took a walk on the sand and had a sneak peak of the town. We arrived in Airlie Beach...a gas station attendant told us we HAD to go there. But it seems like Australians all think that whatever town they are living in is "Paradise." Airlie Beach was a real backpackers town, tons of campervans like us were there and people trying to live on a budget eating a fast food places and McDonalds 50 cent ice cream is a ... read more
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