http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Josh-and-Jenna/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Josh and Jenna en-us Wed, 06 Jan 2010 02:53:13 +0000 Wed, 06 Jan 2010 02:53:13 +0000 Hoi An Hoi An was the city we flew into to start our travel in Vietnam. It is a busy city in the north of Vietnam and it has more motor scooters than I have ever seen in my life. The city itself is not spectacular. Their were some museums and a large lake to see. We went to one museum which was kind of a modern art mixed with history Ha Long Ha Long Bay is a beautiful bay off the coast of no http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Vietnam/blog-436711.html Chiang Mai was our final stop in Thailand and it was one pretty nice city. To get to Chaing Mai we had to take an overnight train from Bangkok. The train wasn't too bad they had beds and it wasn't too hot but we defiantly didn't get a great nights sleep but it was much better than a bus. When we arrived in Chaing Mai it was 5 a.m and we were exhausted. We made one stop over in a place called http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/Northern-Thailand/blog-429161.html Bangkok has defiantly been a different experience than the rest of out trip. Sightseeing was a refreshing change from relaxing on the islands. We were in Bangkok longer than intended because the overnight train to Chaing Mai was sold out. We stayed on the infamous Kohsan Road which is a backpackers haven filled with foreigners in bars and restaurants. It is some what overwhelming with all the shop http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/Central-Thailand/Bangkok/blog-426222.html We have spent almost exactly a month on some of the best beaches Jenna or I have ever seen. It has been a very relaxing slow moving month. Every island has its own personality and when you travel from one island to the next especially in Thailand you expect them all to be the same. All the islands that we visited were beautiful and they all had something different to offer. Our schedule for trav http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/Southern-Thailand/blog-426221.html So we made it to Thailand where there beaches are beautiful and the ladyboys are out all night. We arrived in Bangkok on the 15th and stayed for one night in a beautiful air conditioned room. This was heaven because all the rooms in the Philippines were fan rooms with no TV's and lots of bugs. The next day we flew to Phuket where we stayed in a decent room on a busy street. Phuket is a very b http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/blog-421311.html We have finished our horrible contracts with our school in Korea and we are free Our first stop on our long long trip is the Philippines. So far so good here it is beautiful well at least the beach. From what we can tell the Philippines is a poorer country than Korea. Our first stop was Manila which was just a layover 1 day. We flew to Manila and stayed in a closet that they told us was http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Philippines/blog-416843.html Things I love about Korea There are no laws against dowloading movies music games and software Bread here is squishy soft and cheap Currency is about 1000 to 1 and that makes me feel rich Floors are heated Chopsticks improve finemotor skills and make you eat slower. Bowing looks 10 times cooler than waving at someone well at least here. Free bar food can consist of anything from p http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-318761.html Well our one year is up and this is our last blog in Korea. The last month here has been busy and stressful and Jenna and I are both ready to get out of Korea and go see some more places. We have been doing a lot in the last month. We have had a visit from my mom Sally gone to a baseball game been to some going away parties and we also visited the DMZ. Our visit to the DMZ was pretty co http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/blog-410320.html In Korea they like to show american titles for restaurants and businesses however they rarely get the spelling or meaning correct. Even when we go to restaurants some of the mens are in english but obviously no one proof read them. There is spelling mistakes on every line. The best is when people here wear tshirts that are very obscene and they have absolutly no idea. One time we saw a little b http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/blog-310090.html We have just had our last official vacation in South Korea. The 5th of May in the United States is usually a holiday for Hispanic people. In Korea the 5th of May is Childrenrsquos Day. I am not sure what this means exactly but we got the day off from work. This gave us a four day weekend so it works for us. Anyway Jenna and I with four friends decided to visit the east coast of Korea. We http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/blog-396488.html Our most recent adventure in Korea has been our weekend trip to a Buddhist Temple. This trip was not my idea and i protested going but I think when we were finished I josh was the one who had the most fun. Jenna Stacey Julie and I went to stay for a weekend one night at Bubheungsa Temple. This Temple is about three hours away from where we live. The trip started at 730 a.m. and we http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/blog-391169.html These past couple months have been fairly uneventful. It is now starting to warm up we are becoming more active. Two weekends ago we went on a caving and ferry trip that was pretty cool. We went on a pharry ride or so our tour guide called it Everything was mostly dead so the view was gorgeous just all brown. After the ferry ride we went to a cave. We were just expecting a hole in the wall bu http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-383006.html So we have been in Korea for eight months now. We have finally really settled in to our jobs and our lives here. As of February 25th we officially have four months left. This is good and bad. First we have finally made a great group of friends and it will be hard to leave them. But on the other hand when we leave we will fly directly to Thailand and vacation for as long as our money lasts. O http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-376987.html This is the second half of our trip to China. We originally were going to go to Xian to see the terracotta warriors however the trains were sold out. So when we went to book our train to Shanghai where we flew out of we were shocked to hear that they too were sold out. We then ended up taking a short flight instead which worked out better anyways. I guess things donrsquot always go as planne http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Shanghai/blog-366520.html . We went to China for 10 days starting in Beijing and ending in Shanghai. When we arrived in China the first issue we had was with our ldquoradioactiverdquo luggage. When we got off our plane we did the normal walk to customs and got our passports checked and what not. Following that we walked through a giant medal detector thing and that beeped so the Chinese guard whose unifo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/blog-360675.html ThanksgivingThanksgiving was definitely interesting. At school I made hand and foot paper turkeys with the kids. When I showed our bosses they said Oh peacocks which cracked me up. Obviously none of our children or bosses knew what a turkey was. Thanksgiving fell on a weekday and unlike the states we did not get that day off. To the Koreans it was just a normal day because it is an American ho http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-355472.html Ok the title of this entry is pretty ominous because it is. Many of the pictures are of the beautiful foliage in Korea. Apparently fall is the prettiest season in Korea so we are told. So we had to go to our local park and take plenty of pictures of the trees. And I have to say that the trees here are very nice to look at I prefer the mountains of Colorado but whatever I gue http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-347975.html Halloween was kind of brutal this year. Usually Jenna and I are thinking of costume ideas a month early and we both have awesome ideas and execution. However being in Korea as we are it is not very easy to find a costume shop A because they donrsquot really have costume shops and B because we canrsquot speak Korean and C if they did have a shop it would only fit midget size people. Th http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Seoul/blog-341054.html Ok we have been living in the city of Bundang for about four months now and I finally got the idea to take some pictures so everyone can see what it looks like. Our town of Bundang is huge there are over 439000 people in it how do I know that well I just googled it. Bundang is a suburb of Seoul which by subway is about an hour away. We live conveniently directly across the street from a sub http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/blog-334466.html Three weekends ago we went to Lotte World which is like the city amusement park. It was pretty entertaining however when you went through some of the slow entertaining rides like pirates of the Caribbean it was all in Korean so we sort of got bored. They did have a couple good rollercoasters but my favorite was a balloon ride that went over the entire park Lotte Word is an indoor and outdoor am http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/South-Korea/Gyeonggi-do/blog-324850.html