white sand beaches, turquoise waters, perfect avocados, friendly locals, pina coladas, cheap beer, rustic cabanas, hammocks, mayan sauna, cenotes, swimming and a monkey too. what more can you ask for in a trip... enjoy some photos. [View Full Entry]

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Okay just one more... I arrived in Shanghai around 8pm Tuesday night and as I stepped off the plane I was greeted by a small asian man holding a sign with my name. He then lead me in the direction of customs where I managed to conquer all the long line-ups and headed for my baggage shortly after. It was after my baggage pick up that I was rushed out the doors of the airport and into a shuttle. I was the only person in it and no one spoke any english to me really, they just pointed at things so [View Full Entry]

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We have finally made it back to Melbourne... We had a wonderful three weeks of roughing it in our tent and are glad to be back here. It's sort of a home away from our home. Anyways, where do I begin? We flew into the gold coast airport which is in a small town called Coolongatta in Southern Queensland. We walked from the airport to our first caravan park that we stayed in and just stayed one night. It was a beautiful place, the beach was just that, golden and the sky so big. We decided to move further north the [View Full Entry]

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So we caught a plane almost two weeks ago that took us up to the Gold Coast airport in Queensland on the Eastern coast. Ever since then we have been travelling the coast with only our backpacks, a tent and brett's guitar. It has been quite the experience. Right now we are in Byron Bay, a tourist haven, but we only plan on being here a couple of days and then will take a long bus trip down to Sydney to explore the harbour, see the opera house all that kind of stuff. There was a cyclone that hit the North [View Full Entry]

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Well I finally made it to the aquarium the other day! It was alright but not really worth the twenty-three dollars per person. Luckily we had a 2 for 1 coupon. I think that the neatest thing was this aquarium tunnel in which you could stand in and watch all the sea creatures swimming above you. There were giant stingrays and sharks in there! They also had this giant squid on display which has been frozen in ice. It is 7 metres in length, but doesn't really appear that giant because it's tenticles are all curled up. I really liked the [View Full Entry]

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I kept calling the place we were to camp at Wilson's Promenade in the last one, but it was actually Wilson's Promontory... Anyways, we ended up going and I had an amazing time! It was about a three hour drive or so from Melbourne which took us to Tidal River where there was a campground for us to stay. As soon as we pulled into the National Park I got my first glimpse of a few different Australian animals. First I got to see a wombat, which was interesting, the thing kind of looked diseased though, it had rough patches of [View Full Entry]

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I have now been here 25 days and still haven't really done a lot in the way of touristy things... However, we have moved from the living room floor of our friends house to a room in this gigantic house. It is a big three bedroom place a few blocks down the road from where we were staying before. There are two others who live there, an aussie and a girl from France who doesn't really speak much english. The flatmates are about as good as they get in a sharehouse situation, everyone keeps to themselves and does their own thing. [View Full Entry]

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So I finally made it, I am in Australia now! Melbourne reminds me a lot of Vancouver except that it is sunny and hot unlike the 30something days of rain that I left behind. I can't say I am upset about that at all. I am living in the suburb of Fitzroy which is a lot like east van. It is filled with tons of vintage clothing shops, artsy bookstores, vegetarian restaurants, pubs, bars, the usual. I have spent way too much money here though, I can't stop this shopping addiction that I have. The women here are beautiful and they [View Full Entry]

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Before I go on about Chichicastenango, I realized I forgot to explain why the local buses are called Chicken Buses. Basically anyone is allowed to bring aboard pretty much any kind of cargo which sometimes includes live chickens. You pretty much never know what to expect when you get on. I also forgot to show you a picture, this one isn´t that great, I have to take a better one, but you get the idea... Most of them are more colorful and have a woman´s name painted across the side, usually a daughter´s or wife´s. The same is for most of [View Full Entry]

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So Thursday morning I changed my mind about going to Chichicastenango for the market and decided to take the bus to Quetzaltenango to do some exploring. It is the biggest city in the western part of Guatemala, very close to the Mexico border. It is also referred to as Xela, that is what the indigenious people call it. I was quite unsure of my decision to go here cause I really had no idea what I was going to do there, but as usual I ended up having a great time. The city centre is absolutely amazing, all of the buildings [View Full Entry]

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