http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/dt99/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from dt99 en-us Sun, 29 Nov 2009 08:32:55 +0000 Sun, 29 Nov 2009 08:32:55 +0000 We didn't spent all of our time eating food and taking pics of the Alhambra. One of our day trips was to traipse into the Sierra Nevada to see the snow. Now we were under absolutely no illusions that we were going to go do anything physically strenuous like actually snowboarding or skiing or snowshoeing. Or no that would be too much work. We were going to drive to the snowfields LOOK at the sn http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/Andalusia/Granada/blog-381818.html It had been a very long day we'd started the drive from Seville at 6am and it was now almost 10pm as we drove into Granada. We were utterly tired but had that satisfied feeling that you get when you've got a lot accomplished. So our first impressions of Granada were in the dark. Tell you what arriving at Spanish cities and trying to find your hotel in the historic centre at night is tough I http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/Andalusia/Granada/blog-379864.html Done with Seville We had really enjoyed our time there now it was time to head to Granada. It was only about 300km but we were going the indirect way over the coast planning to stop at Cadiz and Gibraltar and maybe Malaga on the way. To get the most out of the day we checked out at 545am and were on the road at 6am. One nice thing about having a baby is we are now very used to being up at t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/Andalusia/C-diz/blog-374763.html We were staying in Seville for 5 days with intent to use it as a base for a couple of day trips into the countryside. We even had a tentative idea that we could go to Morocca the boat goes across from the south coast and takes 35 min however further investigations revealed that it only went to Tangiers and it would have cost us around 400 AUD for the day trip not worth it to see Tangiers http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/Andalusia/C-rdoba/blog-371948.html We hit the road at midday for our 500km drive to Seville. Having never driven in Spain we were really not sure what we were in for. Armed with Brenda our GPS and a large map we headed out of Madrid excited about the adventure ahead.Were we in for a treat The roads in Spain are unbelievably good. Well signposted fantastic quality almost always with 2 lanes for each direction and both dire http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/Andalusia/Seville/blog-371643.html Madrid was always going to be a quick stop for us. Land rent a car get to hotel sleep wake up go see the Guernica that's a Picasso that Catherine really wanted to see and then drive to Seville. We landed at 11am exhausted but jubilant that we were finally there. Picked up the rental car and headed out to find our hotel. After her 3 hours sleep in 24 Sahara fell asleep before we had actual http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/District-of-Madrid/Madrid/blog-370005.html Time for another adventure Catherine is turning 30 this Feb and since we were flush with Frequent flyer points we figured we could fly almost anywhere Catherine's choice. Of course she then really struggled with the options for ages after all when yoursquove got the whole world to pick from how do you make a choice Our choices were complicated by the fact we are now the proud parents http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/District-of-Madrid/Madrid/blog-368770.html We last left you guys with us bustling our way through busy Beijing. So far Beijing had been very exciting we had eaten far too much food shopped like maniacs cheap clothes and spent far too much time trying to figure out the public transport system... so it was time to get on to the real things we were there to seeThe Forbidden City was one of the first stops. It's situated smack bang in http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Forbidden-City/blog-89229.html It had been a harrowing and difficult time getting out of the UK and I was glad to be finally leaving the country Even more exciting was the fact that I would FINALLY get to see my girl It had been far too many weeks of just phone calls the odd video call and countless emailsI was also looking forward to Beijing for lots of other reasons of course To start with it was yet another new p http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/blog-85952.html I last left you all with me traipsing through beautiful Boston laughing it up with the locals. I've got lots of comments on the fact that I seemed to meet lots of friendly people and got out lots well it wasn't always like that I definitely did spend lots of rather boring nights stuck in a hotel room with my laptop and CNN to keep me company My plans after Boston were to go spend a week in N http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Greater-London/blog-84487.html I last left you guys with me arriving in Boston after a rather gruelling 32 hours of flight. Spent the rest of the week working pretty much all day and all night although the work was punctuated with lots of food and fun as well Still was missing my girl and getting far too many late nights and it was all a bit too much so when the weekend came up I turned down all the kind offers for en http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Massachusetts/Boston/blog-82792.html Right Time to write. It's always hard to get the first words out however as you all know once I get started it's hard to stop me I left Sydney on the 26th of July. Had an emotional farewell with my girl Sunday morning 7am at the airport. It was really sad to say bye we were going to be apart for a whole 3 weeks which is the longest we've ever been separated. So even though I was excited to http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Massachusetts/Boston/blog-82540.html Hi everybodyWell after last year's roundtheworld whirlwind we couldn't quite get rid of the travelling bug so here we are re off on another trip This one is slightly different to the last one though. I Dave will be travelling for work for a few weeks going to the US Boston New Jersey Denver followed by London Dublin and Norway And then the fun begins for real I will be meeti http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-76445.html Well we are home again and I just wanted to finish this blog with some reflections on our trip. It truly was the trip of a lifetime and I think that we learnt more about the world and each other in four months than we have in the last four yearsEven though we have attempted to capture some of the wonders that we have seen on these blogs when we reread them now they just don't seem to capture th http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-16410.html Well it's been a really long long while since we updated you all with our story but we thought it's time to do so again. In the last blog we were dying in delhi slightly fed up of the whole heat travel tout thing possibly a bit homesick... all in all we didn't really leave India feeling like victorious conquerors because we knew that we hadn't really seen much at allBut that was the past. http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Cambodia/North/Angkor/blog-16408.html So we're on the road to Delhi. Our final stop in India. We have completely failed to be Intrepid Travellers so far and have piked out on most things due to the heat and a general lack of enthusiasm for all things Indian in general...But we are looking forward to Delhi. Why you may ask Is it because it's the capital of the nation Huge bustling crowds Largest mosque in India The famous red fo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/National-Capital-Territory/New-Delhi/blog-14509.html So finally we were on the way to the main reason that we were in India The Taj Mahal It is located in Agra a city about 3 hours south of Delhi and we landed in the early afternoon from Jaipur having caught a train very early in the morning. What is amazing about India is that there are always people sleeping everywhere... i mean station platform floors there will be hundreds of people s http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Uttar-Pradesh/Agra/blog-13149.html After a few days in Mumbai we headed out to Jaipur. Originally we had planned to head south to Aurangabad to see the world famous Ellora and Ajanta caves but unfortunately there were no tickets available on the trains and we didn't want to hang around until there was availability so regretfully we had to skip on this Next time I guess but a word of warning to future travellers book yo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Rajasthan/Jaipur/blog-13147.html Well we finally have gotten around to writing the next update... a huge apology to all of you who have been waiting for this one We last left off arriving at Mumbai airport after a ridiculous 2 day journey from Kigali... So here we were in Mumbai We worked our way through the rather disappointingly small airport got our bags figured out how taxis worked in the country and headed off to our http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Maharashtra/Mumbai/blog-13139.html Hooray Time to go to India After enduring what seemed like an interminable period of incredibly boring food it was time to go somewhere where they used spices We had been looking forward to India for a variety of reasons. Apart from the food there was the culture the insane traffic and of course several centuries of history and architecture to look at We were also steeling ourselves for http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Maharashtra/Mumbai/blog-11781.html