NickandMarta

Day 100 We got up and went straight to Auckland Airport to catch a flight back to Nadi, Fiji. Where we then had to wait in Nadi airport for our connecting flight for six hours! For those who have ever been there it is a very small space with limited facilities to spend six hours. But after some reading, chatting and people watching our flight was finally called. We boarded the plane at 10 pm on the 19th July. We were quite lucky as the flight was not full so we got three seats between us both and were able to stretch out a bit more. The flight took six hours and then ground hog day happened as when we landed in Honolulu our body clock was on 4 am 20th July but because we crossed ... read more

Day 77 Today was another one of those boring transit days! We checked onto our flight, logged onto the internet and discovered that Michael Jackson was dead - Which was a real shock! We then flew to Nadi on the mainland of Fiji and checked into a hotel near the airport and took a very scary taxi ride to a cash point. When I say taxi I honestly believe it was the baggage guys cousin as it was a clapped out car that was barely held together and there was no taxi sign or meter. Anyway he got us to the cash point and back quickly and in one piece! We sat and had dinner whilst a band played chilled out Fijian songs before going to bed ready for our transfer tomorrow. Day 78 We got ... read more

Day 66 Well it was another uncomfortable night on the smelly Greyhound bus followed by an early arrival into Cairns - 6 am. So after not having much sleep we checked into our accommodation and slept right through to lunch time. We had something to eat and then decided to go and see the flying doctors visitor centre. Again we experienced the lovely Aussie hospitality as the bus driver forgot to tell us when to get off (he only had six passengers so it wasn't that hard to remember!). Instead we ended up with a magical mystery tour of Cairns and its suburbs as we didn't have time to go back to the centre before it closed so a wasted day! Day 67 After the travelling and the disastrous previous day we stayed at our hotel ... read more

Day 52 continued...... This was our first real day in Brisbane. We landed at 6.35am after having no sleep on the flight thanks to some horrid screaming babies. We were both cold after having become accustomed to a South East Asian climate. We settled into our accommodation which is a nice typical Queenslander house that has been converted into self catering bedsits. We took a nap to try and regain some of the sleep we lost on the flight before heading in to explore the city. Our first impression of Brisbane is that it is so quiet considering the fact that it is supposed to be a city - there seems to be hardly any residents! We took a walk around and sorted some errands, but being a bit zombie like we didn't get much done! ... read more

The more observant amongst you will note from the title that quite a lot has happened since we last updated the blog but rather than cutting straight to the juicy bits (pardon the pun) I will address things in chronological order, in order to build the dramatic tension. Day 28 We got up and had some breakfast before taking a taxi from our guesthouse in Bangkok to Ayutthaya. We had decided to rent a room for one night (even though we would not actually be staying overnight in Ayutthaya) so that we had somewhere to dump the bags and somewhere to take a shower. Our previous experiences of temple viewing had taught us that the more you see, the more you sweat! Given that we had lined up a day of power temple viewing a shower ... read more