TravelBlog » Helen and Mark

Helen and Mark - Once in a lifetime trip

We have decided that we are ready for a break from academia/work and want to spend some quality time together seeing the world!

Our first stop is Bangkok in Thailand, where we spend a few days sorting out visas and visiting the delights that the city offers! We then move onto Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and back into Thailand in the north, travelling into the south to Malaysia and Singapore. We'll fly to the island of Java and then onto Bali, where we fly out to Darwin, Australia at the start of December. A few weeks will be spent travelling down to Ayers Rock, where we then fly to Cairns and make our way down the east coast of Auss to Sydney and Melbourne. We then fly into Christchurch in the South Island of NZ and spend time exploring this island before hopping over to North Island. Mark will fly back to the UK via LA for a few days as he has to go back to work in mid-March. Whilst Helen will continue to North Island and fly to Cape Town in South Africa to begin a 4 month overland tour of Africa, finishing in Cairo, Egypt at the end of August 2008!

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Last Login: August 27th 2009

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Blogs & Travel Journals

by Helen and Mark, order by Date newest first.

By Helen and Mark
July 27th 2008

Sudan - Desert, Sand, the Nile and the most hospitable and friendly people in Africa Africa » Sudan

Date palms, sunset, the Nile

I've finally got round to publishing my last part of my blog! I should probably start off by explaining the 13months of sunshine thing in Ethiopia before making a start on the awesome experiences that we've had in Sudan..... It gets very confusing with dates and times in Ethiopia because it apparently took another 8 years for word to reach them that Jesus Christ was born therefore they have just celebrated the millenium this year (we couldn't understand the celebration banders when we first arrived!). Another confusion factor is that they have 13 months of the year, still 365 days of [View Full Entry]

In the eye of the sand, rain and electric storm

Our little friend the scorpian who sheltered under our tent during the storm

By Helen and Mark
July 3rd 2008

13 months of sunshine - where is it?? Africa » Ethiopia » Oromia Region

Another new country, only three more left now and maybe only six weeks (if all goes to plan!). So after being deposited by the armed guards at the border, we had lunch in a local cafe where we got many stares whilst we ate the traditional mixed bean dish and pilau rice, it was very yummy though. We then drove to immigration where we were stamped out of Kenya with relative ease and then crossed nomansland to the Ethiopian immigration which took several hours even though we had already got our visas in Nairobi! Once customs had 'checked' the truck over [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
June 21st 2008

Kenya - the last of the game drives and entry into rebel country Africa » Kenya

We had a long driving day on 21st June crossing from Uganda into Kenya although we didn't get to see much of the scenery as it was a miserably wet day. It cost $50 for the visas and immigration was quite straight forward. We drove to a town called Eldoret on the Kenyan side and managed to arrive their before the bakery closed allowing us to grab a cake before we continued for another 25km to our campsite which we would be using as a stopover. The campsite was new and quite groovy. We were the only ones staying there but [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
June 15th 2008

Uganda Africa » Uganda

White water rafting, the first grade 5 our raft went down

On 14th June we crossed over into Uganda and bushcamped at the side of the road soon after. It was my cook groups night to cook the evening meal so on the camp fire we made spag bowl and apparently it was very nice. On 15th we drove 400km to Kampala, the capital city of Uganda, along the way we stopped at the equator and played with the experiments, you know, which way does the water go down the hole and all that. By late afternoon we'd arrived at our campsite in the city of Kampala for a few days. It [View Full Entry]

Our raft right in the first grade 5 rapid

By Helen and Mark
June 10th 2008

Rwanda - the most beautiful country so far Africa » Rwanda

The truck gets surrounded

From the Tanzanian/Rwandan border we drove about 150km to Kigali, the capital city. It was along drive as the country is very mountainous so we drove around winding roads, passing small communities and watching the beautiful scenery. We soon discovered that the Rwandans were the friendliest people, the most proud and the most hardworking of the African countries so far. There was no rubbish around even in the capital and their houses were clean and tidy and some had little flower gardens. Every piece of land was cultivated no matter how high the hills were, it was so beautiful to see [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
May 26th 2008

Tanzania Africa » Tanzania » South

Our Ngorongoro game drive vehical

From 26th May we drove for three days (one more than we expected) to Dar es Salaam on the coast of Tanzania. The scenery when we first entered Tanzania was out of this world. It was all uphill (hence why it took 3 days) through tropical rainforest, although there wasn't much of that left as most of the land had been cultivated with tropical fruit trees and crops. As we drove higher and higher, over 2000m, it very cold and we were sat on the truck with our jumpers and fleece blankets wrapped around us! At the higher altitudes tea was [View Full Entry]

The view from the rim before we preceded into the cater

By Helen and Mark
May 20th 2008

Malawi and its Lake Africa » Malawi » Lake Malawi

From South Luangwa NP we drove 150km to the Zambian/Malawi border at Chipata. Our visas for Malawi were free! Excellent, I like this country already! We drove another 2 hours to the capital Llongwe. It seemed a very nice, low-key city, especially for a capital as we drove through it to our campsite. The following day we got to explore it a bit more and I still felt the same, the people were friendly and the city had a nice feeling although there wasn't much to see. In the afternoon, we headed north along Lakes Road, although we didn't see the [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
May 14th 2008

Zambia Africa » Zambia

It took us 2 days to get to Lusaka, Zambia's capital, and to be brutally honest, not worth it at all! Along the way we did two bushcamps, one of which was at a police post, at least we felt safe! We only spent a day in Lusaka to start the process of applying for Sudan visas and doing some shopping, we then drove along the Great East Road to make our way to South Luangwa National Park. The drive was beautiful, we passed through rolling hills and mountains with lots of little villages and communities. The vegetation and crops grown [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
May 10th 2008

Zambia not Zimbabwe Africa » Zambia » Livingstone

The next morning (10th May) we left Casana and drove a few kilometres down the road to Kazungula ferry port to make the short crossing over the Chobe River to the Zambian border (we were suppose to travel through Zimbabwe but the FCO reccommended not to as a result of the election issues). The port was quite a scene! There was no organisation and it really wasn’t a port but just a muddy bank with a chaotic scramble of lorries, cars, vans and hundreds of people awaiting to get on. Our driver managed to make a few deals and get us [View Full Entry]

By Helen and Mark
May 3rd 2008

Botswana Africa » Botswana » North-West

I cannot believe how long it has been since I last entered a blog - so much has happen and I’ve seen so much its hard to know where to start! The lack of blog entries and photos has mostly been due to being on the move a lot or just not having internet, and usually when we do it is sooooooo slow (i.e. 15mins to get into Hotmail - that sort of thing!). Anyway, the only reason I’ve been able to put the following blogs on is because one of the guys on the trip kindly lent me his laptop [View Full Entry]

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Helen and Mark | Once in a lifetime trip | Travel Blog

Helen and Mark - Once in a lifetime trip

Blogs & Travel Journals