Casey and Paul Thomas
Paul's from Australia. Casey's from the States. We met in Africa, married in Puerto Rico, and now after three long years in Greensboro studying and working our bums off we're ready for a little adventure. Join us as we explore the Americas, and let's see where we end up . . .The Travel Bugs
We refuse to keep too tight of an agenda, but here’s a rough outline if anyone wants to catch a flight and meet us anywhere.
Mid-May to Mid-JulyThe US of A. Lots of National Parks as we first head up, then over, then down.
The rest of July and AugustMexico and this funny little island in the Caribbean that’s famous for cigars.
September and OctoberCentral America with lots of volcanoes and nature and . . . who knows what else. We’ll find out.
November, December, and onwardSouth America. We’re for sure going to see Machu Picchu. The rest is a glorious question mark.
Visited Countries Map
Travel Blog Posts
March 28th 2010
Once upon a time, we would take the long way for the experience, opt out of air conditioning if it could save us a couple of bucks, and would even switch our undies inside-out so that we could get another day's use out of them. That was then . . . and well, this is definitely not then. Nope, we're respectable parents now and as such, we've got another little guy's health and well-being to look after. And let's just face it we're getting a little soft. The bones ache after too long of a flight, I get cranky if I'm forced to skip a meal, and if we're in the tropics I want my AC for pete's sake. So with all of this in mind, we decided to live it up on our first international ... read more
January 28th 2009
Once upon a time in a continent famous for half-naked parties and outrageously oversized reptiles were two weary travelers making the most of the final weeks of an amazing journey. You may have thought that they simply fell off of the face of the continent never to be heard of again . . . and in a way I guess they were. But instead of being swallowed up whole by anacondas or impaled by poisonous arrows of aggressive Amazon tribes, they were simply eaten up by the humdrum of stationary life. Now just over two years later as we await our first baby and a totally new adventure, let’s welcome back those wavy lines from Scooby Doo and head back to Peru. The Journey to La Paz. It was bright and extremely early when we boarded ... read more
December 12th 2006
If you recollect from last post, we abruptly whisked you back in time about a month to our adventures in lovely northern Peru and then wrapped up in Cusco with us all gung-ho for the Inca Trail and all the other ancient wonders of the region. Well, our spirits were gung-ho anyway, our bodies were absolutely uncooperative. They wanted to do nothing but sleep at this altitude. But before I get into all of the wonders of the Andes (and of the coca leaf for that matter), I thought I’d write a line or two about the Incas. And since I never got around to listening to the lecture series on the Incas that dad had checked out of the library for us, it really will be much less wordy than my usual historical ramblings. Here ... read more
November 27th 2006
It’s been a while since we’ve blogged, and we’ve covered a lot of ground and gotten quite a bit behind. After toying with the idea of blowing off the whole blog thing, we decided that we’d do what we could when we could, and hopefully if we’re not too busy holding babies when we get back to Washington we’ll have time to finish up this thingamajig sometime before the end of the year. But for now, we’ll turn back time a month, and go back to where we left off way up in Ecuador. It seems so long ago now. (Picture wavy lines going across your screen like from Scooby Doo to signal our trip back in time.) Heading into Peru, Paul and I were really looking forward to a couple of peaceful days lying on ... read more
November 2nd 2006
What a difference an hour and a half flight can make. Going from Panama City at sea level to Quito at over 2800 meters in altitude (that’s almost 9000 feet—yikes) was a bit of a hit to our systems. I felt very weak, congested, and downright ill the first day and both Paul and I have gotten winded climbing a flight of stairs, never mind the longer hikes we’ve tried. It gives us a real confidence boost for the upcoming Inca Trail—four days of walking between 2742m (8500ft) and 4195m (13005ft). Gulp! Culturally it felt totally different, as well. Instead of seeing indigenous folks in island style wrap skirts and brightly colored beads up their arms and legs, like in Panama, the beauty was in more subdued colors, with woolen sweaters, felt bowler hats, and dozens ... read more
It’s not just for fancy hats and drug lords anymore
Published: October 24th 2006Central America Caribbean » Panama
October 24th 2006
Panama has really surprised us. Maybe it’s because we didn’t do our homework and learn more about Panama before we came. Or maybe things are changing rapidly here these days. Probably a bit of both. But, this is one amazing, diverse country, and they’re practically giving it away for folks who want to come and live there. Paul and I are tempted. I should probably give a little bit of background on the place, although keep in mind much of this has been gleaned from conversations from taxi drivers that I’ve spoken to and blurbs from our crappy guide book and is not from any scholarly reading or such. As you probably already know, Panama has been a pretty valuable piece of real estate ever since way back when the explorers and pirates discovered the Americas ... read more
Costa Rica: Red hot lava and pretty little butterflies
Published: October 20th 2006Central America Caribbean » Costa Rica
October 19th 2006
Holy dooley have we seen some pretty nature stuff since we last wrote! I know that Costa Rica is famous for it and all. Well, let me tell you that they come by that fame honestly. But, before we could arrive in Costa Rica and see all that neat nature stuff, we had some serious journeying ahead of us. If you remember, we last posted from Isla Ometepe in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. Well, the next morning we started out bright and early, (we’re talking sunrise, folks) in hopes of arriving in Fortuna, Costa Rica, the hub for those wanting to take a closer look at the very active Volcan Arenal, before nightfall. Getting between the island and the volcano requires various forms of transportation as you might guess, and our day went a little ... read more
October 10th 2006
To be completely honest, the Honduras part of our journey was a bit of a let down for us. It seemed a bit more dangerous than the other places we’ve visited (although I don’t know that it is), and due to the different accent I struggled to communicate much more than normal. Now to be fair, we really weren’t there long enough to form a proper opinion or to write the place off completely, and there were a couple of spots that we really liked. But all in all, the place just didn’t do it for us. Maybe it was because we started out on the wrong foot. Our journey into Honduras was rough. And it wasn’t just the getting up at three in the morning to catch our little tourist shuttle. It was more due ... read more
You better hope the chicken dances-Part 2
Published: September 25th 2006Central America Caribbean » Guatemala
September 24th 2006
So there we were in Xela, exhausted, but bound and determined to make it to that darn Feria . . . (if you haven't already, you probably should read Part 1 first) We walked the kilometer or so to the place where public transport took folks from town to the fair. And, as always, they made sure the shuttle bus was good and full. I sat on the tire well and Paul got cozy on the floor. We didn’t think much of the discomfort since the fairgrounds is only a couple miles out of town. Again, we weren’t thinking. There was really only one road out to the grounds which the drivers decided to turn into a parking lot by trying to pass one another and squeeze as many cars wide as possible onto the road. ... read more
You better hope the chicken dances-Part 1
Published: September 24th 2006Central America Caribbean » Guatemala
September 24th 2006
This one is a doozie, folks. Brace yourselves. We’re still in Guatemala, but we’ve covered a lot of ground since we last blogged. And being that we’re not so good at editing things out, that means that there are lots of stories and photos for your enjoyment, perhaps even more than you would like. Bear with us. We last left off in Livingston our port of entry into Guatemala. And it was a really good place to transition from Belize. In Livingston, the folks by and large speak Spanish, but English is pretty regularly used, and we still got to listen in on colorful conversations in Creole. The people in Livingston are more diverse than in other parts of Guatemala and the Garifuna culture (black Caribbean) is still prevalent. This was great for us as we ... read more
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