Ireland home of the weeee people and giants, both

Top o' the morn' to ya all! (for those of you who don't know I am Irish on my mother's side) It is my distinguished duty to write the blog about Ireland. After taking the train from Edinburgh to the Scottish coastal village of Stranraer we made our way via ferry to Belfast. Belfast is the best jumping on point in Ireland to the Giant's Causeway. For those of you who don't know, the Giant's Causeway is a naturally occurring formation of polygons of volcanic basalt. In other words, the rock has naturally cooled from its volcanic state to form these; hexagons, pentagons, and octogons etc.. It is of such interest that UNESCO has made it a world heritage site. I must admit it is quite awe insiring...The causeway is about 60 km up the coast from Belfast. We decided to do the day tour thing as we got to see some other stuff along the way and a little of the history of the area as we were driving through.

First stop castle Carrickfergus (I desperately wanted to call it Castle Grey Skull and herein after all the castles names I can't remember 'Grey Skull' but I'm almost certain A:Corina would not let me get away with it and B:It would get old.) It was here William of Orange won somthing. I'm sure as there is a statue of him outside it. Second stop was Bushmills distillery, the worlds oldest whiskey distillery. I had a sample of a nice 10 year old. Third stop Dunluce castle, a castle ruines just up the coast from the causway. Fourth stop and star attraction, the causway...like I said, outstanding...and finally the last stop was the Carrick-a-rede Ropebridge, an 80-foot drop across a 2 1/2 foot wide rope bridge, which I don't know if it was worth the £4 to cross. (Corina chickened out) All in all a nice little trip well worth the stay in Belfast... (Belfast BTW was a little anti-climatic after Edinburgh.)

Next we traveled south to a smalltown, about an hour outside of Dublin, called Drogheda. We wanted to go and take a gander at yet another UNESCO site called Bru Na Boinne. This is an area with a number of 5000 year old tombs, some of which are passage tombs. We even got to go into two of them at Knowth and Newgrange. We saw some ornately carved stones that surrounded the passage tombs and a recreation of the Winter Solstice at Newgrange.

Newgrange Entrance Stone

Knowth Passage Tomb with Satellite Tombs

Finally, we had a whirlwind tour of Dublin. We went to the newly developed Docklands, Temple Bar area, Trinity College, drank a pint of guiness and saw the spire. Unfortunately, that is all that time allowed us to see.

Dublin Spire

We're back in England until we fly to Berlin tomorrow afternoon. We're looking forward to experiencing Berlin.

our time in glasgow...i mean edinburgh

for some reason jay had a hard time remembering that we were going to edinburgh not glasgow. he knew it in his head but his mouth would not speak the word 'edinburgh'. everytime we talked about it while we were in york he would say glasgow. it got to the point where i would have to look at him to see if he was seriously saying glasgow AGAIN or if he was saying it because he was teasing me. then on the way to catch the train to stranraer (via glasgow) he mentioned we had a one hour stop over in edinburgh...sly look in his eye...got a punch on the arm for that one!

so okay. i realize that i've now described london & york as gorgeous...but for really...edinburgh is gorgeous! i think my favourite city so far...possibly the most expensive...but that is par for the course when you are me. expensive taste is another fault (fault?) that has followed me on our travels.

our visit to edinburgh would not have been complete if we hadn't visited the castle. positioned high on a cliff...bluff...hill, whatever you want to call it...spectacular was what it was. up top there was a tiny chapel. the day we were there a wedding was about to begin. the bride arrived in a classic rolls royce and as she walked up the winding path to the chapel the bagpipes began to wail. the audio guide we were listening to really emphasized how pretty it was on the inside so we decided to come back after the wedding to have a look. it was tiny. i'm not sure how the priest, bride & groom fit in not to mention the 25 guests that a tour guide said were inside.

we spent a few hours going to and through the rosslyn chapel. made famous by dan brown's "the da vinci code", it now gets 10 times the amount of visitors than prior to the movie/book's release. the tour of the chapel consisted of people seated in the nave while the guide pointed with a red laser beam as the crowd was too large to lead around. she pointed out a few hollywood-isms that were not fact...such as there is no star above the stairs to the crypt and the crypt is just a plain room - nothing like in the movie. the ornate sandstone carvings inside are quite amazing but some idiots thought that by spraying them with cement they would preserve them. in fact the opposite has happened. the concrete does not allow the sandstone to breathe so when the roof began to leak the water went down into the pillars and had no where to go. they've put a metal shed roof over the whole chapel...not so pretty in pictures but they've effectively stopped the water problem. there is also a conservation project happening right now...i think the guide said £30 million was to be spent before it was complete. there is scaffolding all over the chapel which again doesn't make for stunning photos but it did allow us a close up view of the roof line.

other notes of interest in edinburgh are: the royal mile - from the holyrood palace to the edinburgh castle this is a mile long stretch of historical sites, shops and restaurants, calton hill - which we climbed to see beautiful vistas of edinburgh and the scottish parliament - which is a bit controversial because it went £300 million+ over budget.

view from calton hill - holyrood palace

scottish parliament

during our stay in edinburgh we experienced hostel life. a first for me...not for jay. we could only find a place with a 4 bed dorm. without going into the gory details we made a friend named kathy from australia. hi kathy :D

we're now in ireland...on to dublin tomorrow morning. if time allows jay may have a word or two about ireland...or we may just spend all our money posting pics to this one.

cheerio, corina

what to do, where to go

our indecisiveness is becoming an issue. maybe? we are staying with couchsurfing hosts in king's langley, northwest of london and we don't want to take advantage of their kindness and flexibility...but...we have no idea where we are going tomorrow. i mean, we have an idea. but we're not sure how we are to get there, how much it will cost or more importantly where we will stay once we get there.

i'm supposed to be doing research into this as jay cooks us all dinner. but, even when you travel your faults follow you. i am a procrastinator. so...the thoughts are that we will go to oxford, cambridge and york and then perhaps up into scotland if we can find a bus or train to take us there. i'd also like to see stonehenge. as of now it seems that ireland is off the itinerary as its too last minute...too expensive to swing it. i suppose at some point one has to say...there's always next time but when you are so nearby its frustrating not to be able to see everything.

...i feel like procrastinating just a bit longer...

london is gorgeous, big and overwhelming. there are way...WAY...more tourists here than in san francisco or nyc. and its expensive. yup, the rumours are true! we ducked out of london quickly as we needed to catch our breath after nyc and catch up on sleep. we managed to squeeze in a bus tour (i know...very touristy but i was tired and didn't want to walk everywhere) and the london tower before we head for the villages. the last couple of days have been very relaxing as we've slowed the pace down perusing england's home counties. yesterday we went to st. albans where we walked through a park that had roman ruins from 200 something AD, a gorgeous cathedral and up a hill to the town market. jay had a beer in the fighting cocks, which is reputably the oldest pub in britain. today we joined our hosts at a small festival near hemel and saw a large assortment of old cars & steam engines.

well, i best get on with the task at hand. (is it me or am i sounding more british everyday ;p)

cheers,
corina

p.s. photos have been taken and will be shared soon. ooooo i miss my macbook...sob

interview @ royal lake

our good friends, emily and jason (a.k.a. j.r. as not to confuse the audience with too many jasons), had the idea that it would be good to interview us before we left and when we get home. the thought was quiz us now with our expectations and quiz us later to see if the expectations where realistic, met &/or exceeded. have a look (we apologize for the sound quality...next time we'll have microphones or do a voice over ;p)

for those of you who don't want to sit through 18 minutes of ums and uhs these are some of the highlights:

q: what city/country are you most looking forward to?

c: spain/barcelona because fascination with architect antoni gaudi, i want to experience his spaces...sit on his park benches...that will be way better than looking a photos in my design history text books

j: paris

q: what scares you the most about this trip?

j: nothing specifically...the potential for disaster?!? haha

c: the process of preparing for this trip has been the scariest thing so far. the unknown is scary...unfamiliar countries.

q: as an aside to that what about tsunami season in malaysia at christmas time?

a: jay is not scared of tsunami season and after j.r. posed this question i looked up tsunami on google and apparently there is no specific tsunami season as tsunami's are like earthquakes just under the water...unpredictable. the good thing is that we can change our flights accordingly if necessary.

q: what do you hope to gain? 

a: (lots of pauses here)

c: less stress, perspective on the world, expanded experiences

j: we are generally insulated in north america so this is a chance to broaden our way of thinking 

q: who will forget/leave their bag behind first?

c: usually we would say jay...but on our recent travel experience to san francisco i lost my bus pass the first hour i had it.

j: i think corina lost 2 or 3 things and she said 'is this what its like for you all the time?' and i responded 'welcome to my world'!

c: jay's absentmindedness may be wearing off on me. oh no!

q: who will stop shaving first?

c: jay

j: corina (repeatedly pointing at corina)

q: what is the dollar amount you have spent on your trip so far?

c: $12,000 - plane tix $5000 each plus gear, shots, clothes, travel insurance...

j: $13,000

q: how much will the trip cost?

c: we hope to keep it in at $35,000 including what we've already spent

-after looking at our bank account and our daily budget it may be closer to $42,000. eek.

q: what electronics are you bringing with you?

c: there is some indecision about if we should bring a laptop or an iPod touch or both. we have 2 cameras a digital SLR and a point and shoot.

j: i think we should get an iPod touch regardless.

q: are you bringing a hair dryer or straightener corina?

c: nope. i'll be going natural for a year. 

q: what comforts from home are you bringing with you?

c: hair conditioner!

j: underwear (smirk)

c: and a mini photo album of friends, family and our cats

q: who will be the first to check the prices for flights home?

c: neither - we'll hang out in california 'til the money runs out!

the end. stay tuned next year for 5 individual questions from each of us...filmed without the other one hearing the questions or answers...

Jump!

First click on the title of this blog to cue cheesy 1980's keyboard intro...Then let the music play in the background while you read this next post for full effect...  

How many of you out there have ever jumped off a tall diving board? A small plane with a parachute strapped to you? A bridge with an giant elastic band tied to your feet? Or a 20M cliff into a Caribbean lagoon. (the last one... me) Well, there is a moment when you are weightless. I felt that way after we purchased our rtw tickets this past monday. Like my stomach was in my mouth in the best way possible. WE ARE DOING THIS! eeep Someone, who we will call thunder steeler, has posted our itinerary, even tho she said I could... (gurrrr thunder steeler) So all I am left with is cheesy 80's music and even cheesier metaphors...(Je suis le grand fromage! (mmmm mmmm fromage) CURSE YOU THUNDER STEELER! Be that as it may, the metaphor is accurate. 

 

I have recited the itinerary so often I don't have to think anymore...You're doing what? WOW that sounds exciting (tho' not as exciting as the Eddie Van Halen solo coming up if you linked on the youtube video and let it play like I asked). Can I/we come with you? Ahh, the green eyed monster lurks 'round so many corners now-a-days. For all of you jealous types who want to come with us here's how you can. Sell your house and the majority of it's contents. Quit your jobs (or if you can get a leave of absence) and drop about $10,000 for 2 plane tix around the world. There...that wasn't to hard was it? 

jason

'round the world we go!

our tickets are booked! 

we followed the lead of fellow winnipeggers/world travelers/couch surfers, rebecca & gadi, and used www.oneworld.com to book our 'round-the-world' (rtw) ticket. the people at american airlines' oneworld desk were incredibly patient and helpful. it really puts us at ease to know that these people will be there to help us while we are on the road. the last agent we talked to even wanted us to email our travel blog address to her! so a big thanks has to go out to the agents that helped us over the last 2 months of planning and pricing.

 

for those of you that are contemplating this type of trip...and you are leaving from canada...you can expect to budget about 5000 CAD/ticket for 4 continents with oneworld. we priced out tickets with another airline group, star alliance, but oneworld was consistently $1000 cheaper for the routes we wanted to fly. they also have an online trip planner that will even let you see if there are flights available as you plan your route. it takes a bit of a learning curve to get the hang of the planner but by the end we were pros.

so, our flight itinerary is prepared, now we just have to fill in the blanks. i think for the most part this will be as we go. plan our next destination based on our whims, must see/do list, cost, advice from travelers, getting to our next flight departure. this is the fun part :D

our flight & semi-planned itinerary 2009/10

july 13th 2009 fly to vancouver

july 17/18th fly to new york city

july 21st fly to london

august 10th fly to berlin

overland segment through europe to istanbul, turkey

spend time in germany, netherlands, france, spain, morocco, italy, hungary, greece, egypt, croatia, turkey,

december 5th fly to dubai via amman

december 10th fly to hong kong

december 15th fly to singapore

spend time in malaysia, indonesia

january 5th fly to bangkok

spend a month in thailand

overland segment through laos, cambodia & vietnam

march 9th fly to tokyo

spend time in japan, outside of tokyo

march 21st fly to sao paulo

spend time in brazil

may 7th fly to santiago, chile

not sure what to see here...need to research (any suggestions?)

open ticket to lima

go up to machu picchu

open ticket to los angeles

open ticket to san francisco

hang out in california before finding flight home

the end 

i was supposed to let jay write this entry but i'm home, unemployed and needed a break from packing & collecting stuff for our moving sale. sorry jay :p maybe you can add your 2 cents as an edit...

re-routing... maybe...

So first it was Toronto-London-European adventure to Istanbul-Cairo- Delhi-Singapore-Bangkok-Ho Chi Minh-Hong Kong-Auckland-Perth-Sydney-San Francisco... Then we shuffled the deck and came up with dropping Delhi in favor of  adding Tokyo later on in the Asia leg.  Now we might drop Oceania in favour of South America.  So substitute Auckland-Perth-Sydney with Sao Paulo-Lima-Santiago.  Too many choices, not enough time and money! Oh and now we would start out of Vancouver.  

I think we might be over analyzing things. (I know, c'mon Mr. Fast and Loose! faster looser) Well, I do tend to analyze things to the Nth degree (did I warn you that I am often contradictory?). I think I like the South American thing marginally better than Australia/New Zealand. But honestly it's like choosing  two fabulous prizes on the Price is Right (or the like) whatever the choice I think it will be a good one. What we need to do is get-a-move-on! So if the universe co-operates and we get our fancy new aeroplan Visa we can book a flight to Vancouver and thus the adventure would begin! No looking back. no... Ohhh what if's? Only looking forward, and focusing on the total awesomeness that will be confronting us.  Now if only we could make up our minds... =)

step three: plan trip itinerary (for real)

jay mentioned in a previous post that he had purchased a map. the map is massive. its of the whole world. we've mounted it to cardboard and it now has a place of prominence in our living room. 

we poked pins into each and every place we could think that we would want to go. ever. in our entire lives. well, the whole map was covered from top to bottom with pins...ok...that's an exaggeration...neither of us wanted to go to antarctica that badly. so how do we whittle down the destinations into a realistic itinerary? we procrastinate!!

since we sold the house we have done little to further our plans. its scary how easy it is to become complacent. i guess i wrote my letter of resignation, i postdated the cancellation of our house insurance, i set up an appointment with the real estate lawyer AND we have our physicals next week. the list of things to get done is in my head and i really, really need to get it onto paper. even jay said to me after a long, stressful day at work 'i didn't realize how much work this was all going to be'... mr. fast and loose, eh?

so here is a fast and loose itinerary that we are currently contemplating, currently looking for rtw tix vs. one way tix for and currently avoiding making decisions about:

fly winnipeg to toronto

fly toronto to new york

spend 4 days in new york city

fly new york to london

spend 4-6 weeks in uk

fly or train to paris

spend 6-8 months in western & eastern europe

including france, spain, morocco, italy, germany, netherlands, czech republic, austria, croatia, hungary, estonia, latvia, lithuania, st. petersburg?, turkey, egypt, greece...

fly athens to dubai (altho' we've had a hard time finding a flight for this leg)

spend 3-4 days in dubai

fly dubai to delhi

spend ? in india

fly delhi to kathmandu & then back to delhi (unless other flights available)

spend ? in nepal

fly delhi to bangkok

spend ? in thailand, laos, vietnam, cambodia

fly bangkok to singapore

spend a few days in singapore...bali?

fly singapore to hong kong

spend 5 days in hong kong

fly hong kong to tokyo

spend 5-10 days in japan...pusan? seoul?

fly to papua new guinea, australia and new zealand? OR just

fly tokyo to los angeles or san francisco

spend a week or 2 in california

fly california to vancouver

spend 2 weeks visiting in b.c.

fly vancouver to home

keep going to south america? money? energy? road trip?

as i was writing this list and referring back to the map i went back and added more countries. this is going to be hard to narrow down...or do we have to? do we just leave and hope that the plan will fall into place as we go?

my head is spinning...

corina

planning, planning and more planning

One might say I tend to play it a little fast and loose.  It works for me, mostly.  More on that later.  I do see the benefit of planning, I promise. Today Corina and I  started planning where to go on our world tour. I had purchased a map yesterday so we could see everything all at once. The map was unrolled and the pins started going in. This got me all excited as I have a small thing for maps and that we could see a basic lay out of where everything was.  An idea of where we wanted to go was starting to jell... The reality of what we are about to do is sinking further and further in each day...  I know full well that Corina's desire to have a basic route, to look at is the most  prudent idea.  She knows what's what, after all I'm Mr. Fast and loose. I actually think that combined we could kick ass and take down names!  Watch out world, here we come.

jason