it's a long way from whitley bay...

Final round up

sarahandphil — Tue, 2 Sep 2008 00:05:00 GMT

It's Whitley Bay!!

Well, we don't know if anyone's still reading this - seeing as we're back in the real world now! But seeing as we promised a final round up, and seeing as Sarah is now unemployed and needs diversions to keep her from Jeremy Kyle-induced madness... (did we say American TV was bad?!) here is a compilation of some of our favourite, and a few not-so-favourite (!)things from around the world that we wrote up on the plane home.

We hope you find them interesting, and maybe even find some inspiration in there! We also really hope you've enjoyed hearing about our travellers tales, traumas and general tittle tattle over the past ten months, and would like to thank everyone once again for reading, and especially for all of the messages we've received which kept us smiling, even when our chips (or, more typically, the Internet connection!) were down.

So, with lots of love, and wishing you many happy adventures of your own, it's bye bye from us (for now!)

Sarah and Phil x x

Phil’s answers	Sarah’s answers

Countries

#1 New Zealand	Joint #1 New Zealand / USA / Thailand / Japan
#2 Japan	Joint #1 New Zealand / USA / Thailand / Japan
#3 China	Joint #2 China, Laos

Cities

#1 St. Petersburg	#1 New York, New York!
#2 Luang Prabang, Laos - the whole city is UNESCO listed and we can see why	#2 Buenos Aires - shopping, tango and eating 'til the early hours - all at bargain prices - heaven!
#3 Buenos Aires / New York	#3 Sydney - it's pretty hard to beat this setting - just avoid the cockatoos!
and the booby prize goes to… Delhi / Moscow	and the booby prize goes to… Wuhan, China - they're throwing concrete around at scary rates here. Get some trees!

Sights

Joint #1 the Iguazu falls / all of New Zealand	Joint #1 Pushkar camel fair / the Iguazu falls
#2 the Grand Canyon	#2 Lake Tekapo, NZ - the most amazing blue I've ever seen, and incredibly silent
#3 the Atacama desert, around San Pedro	#3 monks collecting their alms at sunrise, Luang Prabang



Animals

#1 Cheeky thieving monkeys, Delhi	#1 Giant pandas, Chengdu
#2 Tahi the one-legged Kiwi, Wellington	#2 Koalas, Brisbane
#3 Pandas, Chengdu	#3 Sea Lions, NZ
and the booby prize goes to… pesky mosquitos, especially the one that bit Sarah on the eye

	birds

	#1 Tahi the one-legged Kiwi
	#2 Black cockatoo that liked talking to me, Australia
	#3 Yellow-eyed penguins

Meals

#1 Steak / Chicken / Chorizo brochettes, Santiago	#1 Doyles fish restaurant with Mum and Dad B, Sydney
#2 Steak, with red wine, Buenos Aires	#2 Camarou Muqueque, Salvador
#3 Mushroom curry, Delhi	#3 Churrascaria buffet with dancing, Foz de Iguacu
and the booby prize goes to… a pot of Pea Yoghurt, Beijing	and the booby prize goes to… chips with mash, Buenos Aires

Food discoveries

#1 Laos coffee	#1 chocolate brownies – a lifesaver in China, and a treat pretty much anywhere and everywhere!
#2 Bundabergs drinks, New Zealand	#2 Sticky rice – with anything – sushi in Japan, mangos in Thailand, hot curry in Laos…
#3 Beerlao	#3 Lao coffee
(aren’t these all drinks Phil? – Ed)	and the booby prize goes to… fried pork fat, Chengdu
and the booby prize goes to… live, shell-less turtles in Chinese supermarkets

Journeys

#1 Tubing, Vang Vieng	#1 Any of our long, lazy Southeast Asian boat adventures – down the Yangtze or Mekong rivers, or sailing around Halong Bay on a junk in Vietnam
#2 Elephant trekking, Chiang Mai	#2 Driving Route 66, USA
#3 Yangtze river cruise, China	#3 Tongariro crossing, NZ
and the booby prize goes to… sharing the Moscow – St. Petersburg sleeper train with a Class A psycho Uzbekistani	and the booby prize goes to… our mad dash to, and around, the train station, Mumbai

Sports events

#1 Thai Boxing	#1 Musical chairs at Pushkar
#2 Kabbadi, Pushkar	#2 Baseball, San Francisco
#3 Aussie rules, Melbourne	#3 Aussie rules, Melbourne
and the booby prize goes to… competitive car horn beeping in India	and the booby prize goes to… kayaking in Thailand – hopefully we’ll get our timing more together in time for the first dance at our wedding, otherwise there could well be early marital dischord, if not injuries!

Nights out

#1 Baked potato, baked beans and champagne in our camper van in NZ, after we got engaged	#1 San Pedro de Atacama – around the fire looking at the stars…
#2 Sydney Opera House	#2 Sydney Opera House
#3 Las Vegas	#3 Las Vegas / Shanghai acrobats
and the booby prize goes to… driving round LAX for two hours looking for a motel	and the booby prize goes to… the boneshaker Chinese night bus on which I got 1 hour sleep, during which my camera and i-pod were stolen L

Essential things to pack

#1 mosquito repellent	#1 books
#2 good books	#2 silk sleeping bag liner
#3 pants	#3 scrabble

Things we missed (other than friends and family, who of course were always number 1!)

#1 Sunday roasts	#1 Having a proper Sunday
#2 Breakfast on Stoke Newington Church St	#2 Cooking (NB: I might retract this at a later stage)
#3 Sky Sports	#3 My i-pod (see above!)
and the booby prize goes to… work!	and the booby prize goes to… cigarettes (very proud to be a non-smoker since Jan 1^st though!)

Books read

#1 Wild Swans, Jung Chang	#1 Zorro, Isabelle Allende
#2 The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bilgakov	#2 The Corrections, Jonathon Franzen
#3 The Damage Done, Warren Fellows	#3 The Lost Continent, Bill Bryson
and the booby prize goes to… How the Mind Works = How the Mind Hurts!	and the booby prize goes to… Touching the Void, Joe Simpson (just a bit on the scary side when about to go up a mountain!)

Cities to live in

#1 Auckland	#1 Auckland
#2 San Francisco	#2 Vancouver
#3 New York	#3 San Francisco
and the booby prize goes to… Mumbai - we'd last 5 minutes!

Hotels

#1 Ryokan Kangetsu, Tokyo	#1 NZ camper van
#2 Barra Guesthouse, Salvador	#2 Ryokan Kangetsu, Tokyo
#3 Hostel Tanguera, San Telmo, Buenos Aires	#3 Hostel Tanguera, San Telmo, Buenos Aires

Bargains

#1 £3 /night hotel, Khao San Road, Bangkok	#1 Parks – always a nice, free way to chill out in a city. And often come with ice creams, animals or some kind, audience participation opportunities…
#2 Argentina	#2 Buenos Aires (steak, wine, shoes the zoo, and underwear particularly!)
#3 20p Pad Thai, Bangkok	#3 Chanel eyeliner – one pencil got me all the way around the world without fading into the background in all our photos– thanks Orange folks!)
#4 1st class cabin, Yangtze cruise - well worth it to escape the kara-jokey	#4 free refills in the USA

Experiences

#1 Getting engaged!	#1 Tubing, Vang Vieng, Laos
#2 Walking (some of!) the Great Wall	#2 Elephant trek, Thailand
#3 Driving across the USA	#3 Sandboarding, Chile
	#4 Getting into the whole spa and massage thing – in Budapest, Japan and SE Asia...
and the booby prize goes to… being Mad Freddy’s assistants in Santiago. Still makes us blush!
Museums

#1 Hermitage, St. Petersburg	#1 Hermitage, St. Petersburg
#2 Te Pa Pa, Wellington	#2 MOMA, New York
#3 Hanoi ‘Hilton’	#3 Monterey Bay Aquarium, California
	#4 Pre-Columbian Art, Santiago
	#5 Lincoln Experience, Illinois

We have loads more recommendations too, and copious notes that it would be lovely to think were worth taking -so if anyone is interested, ever, just ask!

Big Sur, Boston & back home!

sarahandphil — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:16:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

That's it! After 9 months, 16 countries, 17 flights, 12 train journeys, umpteen bumpy bus rides and nearly 12,000 miles by car and van, we've made it round the world and back. And after all that, the weather in Britain is still rubbish.

We tried to bring some sunshine home with us but apparently it contravened some customs rule about importing strange and unusual foreign goods.

We arrived back in London on Monday evening having finished our US road trip in Los Angeles and spending 3 final days of sunshine in Boston.

Though the weather wasn't sunny all the way, as the fog that enveloped San Francisco Bay decided to accompany us all the way down Big Sur and only lifted when we started to head inland about 100 miles from LA.

Big Fog

Big Sur is a 90 mile stretch of rugged and (apparently) incredibly scenic road that hugs the coastline between Monterey and San Luis Obispo in central California. Unfortunately northern and central California has a weird climate that makes the coast about 10 degrees (celsius) colder than just a couple of miles inland and often leaves the coast shrouded in thick fog.

We delayed our journey down the coast by a day, hoping that the fog might lift and, though it didn't, it gave us time to spend Tuesday afternoon at the Monterey Aquarium which was really good.

Apparently it's one of the best aquariums in the world and it's not hard to see why. There's a seal colony on the beach right next to it and inside they've got sharks, hammerheads, crazy coloured jellyfish and, slightly strangely, otters. They've also got pools where you can touch bat rays (they look like stingrays but had had their stings removed for obvious reasons) and other sea creatures. There's even an outdoor pool where kids under 13 can go scuba diving with instructors.

Elephant seals. You wouldn't want to meet these lot in a beach volleyball match!

We didn't quite look young enough for the scuba diving though this travelling lark must have helped roll back the years a bit as we've been asked for ID nearly each time we've tried to buy a beer. That's not entirely surprising for Sarah as shops and restaurants are meant to ask for ID if you look under 30 but Phil will be 34 in a few months and isn't sure whether he should be pleased or insulted at these requests. Especially confusing was the reaction of a shopkeeper outside Monterey who, when presented with Phil's passport, said "Oh 1974, that's really old, I thought you looked young!" Er, thanks Mr Shopkeeper.

Wednesday was Big Sur day and though the fog did get in the way a bit, we could still get a feel for how beautiful that bit of coast line is. Maybe we'll just have to come back and do it again one day when it's sunnier! We can't really complain though as we reckon we've been very lucky with the weather on the whole trip. We've barely had a bad day and nothing that's really hampered our plans.

One bit of Big Sur that we did spot through the fog...

...and some bits that we didn't!

We then drove through Malibu and Santa Monica on our way into Los Angeles and saw a beautiful sunset across the Pacific and then looked for somewhere to stay. We were still looking 2 hours later...

Sarah in Santa Monica and Malibu sunset

At first we thought we'd try Santa Monica for a hotel but we missed the turn off and had to do a 30 minute detour back onto the freeway. When we made it back, pretty much everywhere was full but we found a motel on the edge of town which had one room left. "Hurray" we thought. But it cost £120 for the night. "Boo" we thought. So we gave up on Santa Monica and decided to head down the road towards the airport where we were sure we'd find cheap accommodation...

And we thought Heathrow was bad. The area around LAX airport is horrific. It's like a composite of all the bad bits of America in one place. Chaotic roads with drivers tearing around and cutting you up, endless drags lined with neon motels and fast food joints and whatever the American equivalent of hoodies is hanging around each corner. Arriving there at 11pm, it felt like something out of Bladerunner.

After having no luck at any of the chain motels, we eventually found a room at a run down independent further down the romantically named Airport Boulevard. We carried our bags up to our room (past a guy who had his door wide-open, blasting the TV out, while he sand-papered his skateboard with no shirt on) and collapsed into our room and hit the sack.

Luckily we made it through the night without incident and returned our car the next morning so we could catch our flight. We thought we'd need to get a shuttle bus to the airport but a kindly old guy from the rental company offered to drive us to the airport in our car! Legend. We had a great chat with him about Vegas and he told us about all the stars he'd seen there, including Frank Sinatra and Elvis. After that and the free upgrade from the Ford Focus to the Rav4, we're happy to recommend Hertz car rentals to anyone thinking of driving in the US. Assuming it wasn't all a mistake and we get stung with loads of extra charges when we get home that is...

And so to Boston, our final stop. We stayed in a fabulous B&B in the Dorchester area of the city. It was built at the turn of the century by a Bostonian big wig who was apparently a political rival of John F Kennedy's dad. It was a lovely big wooden building with verandas and a huge old fashioned drawing room where we spent the evenings playing pool on the full size table and watching the olympics on the giant TV.

Carruth House - our B&B

Wandering round Boston was a great way to unwind from the road trip. It's a very nice looking city and probably the closest in style to an English city that we've come across. That's probably due to it being one of the earliest places to be settled by the original immigrants from England (it's named after Boston in Lincolnshire where they came from) so wasn't designed on a grid system or with big roads for cars.

We followed the 'Freedom Trail' through the city on Friday and Saturday, which takes you past all the major historical points, mainly to do with how they won independence from Britain. We also spent some time in the parks and had a big meal on Saturday night to mark the end of the trip.

The Old State House - scene of the 'Boston Massacre'

Sunday was mainly spent recovering from said meal, watching the Newcastle-Man Utd game and relaxing in the park before catching our flight home early on Monday morning.

And now we're home! We bet you're all nearly as exhausted as us having read through all these blogs but thanks for sticking with us. We've really enjoyed writing them and it's been a great way to stay in touch with our friends and family even when we've been far from home. We're really looking forward to seeing you all again in person soon!

That's not quite it for the blog though. You don't get away that easy. At some point in the next week or so, we're going to do one more blog entry with our highlights (and a couple of lowlights!) from the whole trip. So if you're after any far flung holiday ideas for 2009, stay tuned...

Love Sarah and Phil x

Grand Teton, Yellowstone, Vancouver, Seattle & San Francisco

sarahandphil — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 12:07:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

Sorry it's been a while - we've been making the most of our last couple of weeks of freedom (arrrgh - mild panic!!) and packing it all in as usual, so there's lots to tell you about again.

After leaving you in Utah last week, we decided to make the most of the National Parks pass that we'd invested in, and spent the next two days touring around the big wilderness areas of the north west - Grand Teton and Yellowstone in Wyoming.

The Teton mountains are part of the Rockies, and were named after members of a French expedition were reminded of erm big bosoms! Blooming French, bringing the tone of our blog down, tch. Makes you wonder how they'd feel if a U.S. party turned up and re-christened the Pyrenees 'lil' dunkin' donuts'...

Sarah by Lake Jenny - and Phil, trying his best to snap his ankle so we might stop a while longer...

The park really was stunningly beautiful and we had a lovely day ambling about, and hopping in and out of the car to have a look at things. For those of you that haven't had the chance to visit U.S. National Parks, they are quite different to ours, and you have to get used to doing things a bit differently. The obvious thing is the scale - so it is great that they have well-thought out scenic roads to give those with little time, like us, a taster of the best bits. And of course there is no Kendal mint cake!

The northern parks are also extremely rich with wildlife, partly to the credit of early management of human use of the parks (though they didn't always go about that in totally the right way, it has at least kept these parts of the 'wild west' properly wild). So even from the car we were able to see bison, elk, antelope, beavers, raccoons and bighorn sheep.

Bison right outside our car window

We did also manage a walk up to 'Inspiration Point', overlooking Lake Jenny - in our flip flops (raising a few eyebrows amongst the better prepared hikers!). It was a lovely walk, passing rivers, waterfalls, and of course the big Tetons themselves.

The following day we drove up to Yellowstone, which is really enormous (the circular route around it is about 100 miles in circumference!) - so it was really a whistle-stop tour, but fantastic to get a glimpse of the main features the park has to offer. And they are features and a half!

Firstly, we had time for a picnic while waiting for the famous Old Faithful geyser to erupt - a full 7 minutes late, so not so faithful to the timetable after all. He must be getting cantankerous in his old age!

The old geezer comes to life (check out the crowd!)

Then on to the spectacular canyon of the Yellowstone river, via more geothermal features, lakes, snakey rivers, stalagmite-filled valleys... There are so many amazing things to see, but time is tight - both yours and ours! - so a small sample of pictures might be a more efficient way of sharing them with you...

Yellowstone sights

We also saw a forest fire which had started to the east of the lake, and looked pretty dramatic as clouds of smoke rose into the sky. They seemed to get it under control pretty quickly though - it seemed pretty much par for the course at this time of year. Apparently though one of the firefighters was attacked by a bear who had been woken from his slumber by the fire and wasn't too happy about it. Scarey!

Fire in the park

One final Yellowstone 'highlight' we must mention though, is that we spotted an Alaska number plate in the car park! Now this might not be the holiday anecdote that has you logging on to lastminute.com in droves, but it was pretty exciting for us because, like the big geeks that we are, we've been playing that long car journey classic 'spot the car plates from all the U.S. states' - and had had Alaska on the 'doubtful' list from the outset. So it was with some excitement that we ticked it off. Hopefully the driver of the car wasn't too perturbed by our pointing and high-fiving as we drove by...

We still have South Carolina to get for the full set - but are hopeful for a spot when we fly back east to Boston for the weekend. Watch this space!

On leaving the park, we had a beautiful drive through Montana, for a long time following the Yellowstone river through 'big sky' country, which looked especially golden and delicious in the fading sunlight. Which proved a distraction too far for Sarah, who got pulled over for a wee little bit of speeding. She got away with a pep talk and a warning from the police officer who must have had a soft spot for English blondes. Phew!

Big sky country in Montana - surely there'll not be any traffic cops round here...

Next day we had a long drive across to Seattle (about 560 miles) - which we took at a slightly more steady pace (at least until we got into the state of Washington, where the warning doesn't count-tee hee!). We got there by 4pm, in time for a coffee (of course) a look around the enormous Pike Place market and Belltown (birthplace of grunge).

From our brief glimpse, Seattle seemed a nice, offbeat sort of a place, where you'd definitely still feel at home in a lumberjack shirt and bleached out mop (as long as you didn't work at that other Seattle institution, Microsoft - we spotted some mini-Gates's on a corporate bus, looking like fully paid up members of the chinos and blazers club!)

Pike Place Market in Seattle and Sarah enjoying a celebratory wine after we finally made it to the west coast!

On Wednesday, we drove up to Vancouver for a day trip. Again we only really had a taster, but it seemed a very attractive, progressive sort of a place with lovely parks, funky modern architecture, and our favourite bit, Granville Island, home to loads of art galleries, shops, bars etc. and colourful floating houses. You can definitely see why Vancouver is so often voted one of the best places in the world to live. Here's proof that you really can't have everything though - there were hardly any tacky fridge magnets to be seen! Poor Vancouver.

Vancouver: nice parks and funky floating houses (in the foreground, the skyscrapers aren't floating...)

We stayed in Olympia, WA that night, so that we were positioned ready to start our drive down the west coast. Olympia was actually a pretty cool place, very studenty and 'alternative', with a proper small town feel, and a real small town centre - unlike so many towns we've passed through which are just one long strip of identikit fast food chains, and drive-thru everything, which make it difficult to tell where the town is (and even more difficult to see any real people).

Whinge over, Olympia was nice, and so was Portland, our lunch stop, and another trendy sort of place with old buildings, vintage clothes shops, live music venues, and other things encouraging 'walk-through' and 'maybe even stop for a while' behaviour.

Seagull - stopping for a while

The next couple of days were spent winding our way down Route 101, the coast road, through Washington, Oregon, and into California. We had a symbolic dipping of the toes in the Pacific in a nice little town called Cannon Beach in Oregon - it being a little on the chilly side for full body dipping (it is about 20 degrees cooler on the coast than inland, rather to our surprise!)

Sea, feet, chilly, brrr.

As we entered northern California we noticed the trees getting bigger and realised we were in Redwood (and Big Foot!) country and we took a side trip down the 50 mile 'Avenue of Giants' through Humboldt Redwoods State Park on Saturday morning to have a closer look. The trees really are massive! Many of them grow to over 90 metres and the tallest is 115. We didn't manage to see that one but we did see the 'Dyerville Giant' which measures 113 metres and is 1600 years old. Though unfortunately its current 'height' is more like 3 metres because it fell in 1991 when a nearby tree collapsed into it. Apparently the Park Ranger was asleep in a nearby cabin at the time and thought he'd heard a train crash!

After coming to terms with the awesome height of the Redwoods, we decided it was time for a closer look, so what better way than to drive through one?! Well they have drive-thru everything elses here (fast food, ATMs - it can only be a matter of time before they invent a drive-thru loo) so why not trees? Here's us driving through the famous Chandelier Drive-Thru Tree in Leggett.

What the phrase "only in America" was designed for

We arrived in San Francisco on Saturday afternoon and were there until Monday evening. When we arrived the Golden Gate bridge was shrouded in fog - as it famously often is, but the city itself looked gorgeous in the sun and we had a brilliant couple of days there.

We hung on by our hats (and arms) riding the famous 'cable cars' (which are really more like trams) up and down hills, so we could explore the different areas around touristy Fisherman's Wharf (back in the fridge magnet game!), North Beach (including Little Italy), Haight Ashbury (where the original flower power kids used to hang out), Pacific Heights (gorgeous houses) and the shops around Union Square.

Hold tight now those hills look steep!

The best shop we've seen on the whole trip (Phil was so excited his hair stood on end)

We also went to a ball game on Sunday! Phil had spotted that the San Francisco Giants were playing the L.A. Dodgers and managed to get tickets online on Saturday night. It was a great game to catch, with packed stands (there is quite a big rivalry between the two California teams) and a great atmosphere as everyone tucked into their hot dogs and frozen lemondade to watch what turned out to be a very tight match, the Home team coming back from 4-3 down to win the match 5-4 in the final inning. We seem to have a knack of seeing this kind of result in far flung places - shame it never seems to work whenever we go to see NUFC...

Rounders...er...sorry Americans, we mean baseball, in San Francisco

So now we're about to make our way down Big Sur to L.A. and then we fly to Boston on Thursday for the final destination of the trip before we fly home on Monday.

It's been fantastic to read everyone's comments and really meant a lot to us and we're glad we seem to have kept you entertained - we were worried we might only have a couple of readers left by this stage, so thanks for sticking with us! We can't wait to see everyone when we get back and it'll make up for the trip being all over!

In the meantime, stay posted for the final blog!

Love Sarah and Phil x

P.S. And don't forget that all our USA and Canada photos are over at http://journals.worldnomads.com/sarahandphilusa

Route 66 (part 2), Grand Canyon, Vegas & Utah

sarahandphil — Sat, 2 Aug 2008 23:20:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

We're still on the road and zooming our way through the US with the distance to Los Angeles shrinking faster than Gordon Brown's approval ratings.

We're now in Idaho and not far off the top of our big western loop. In fact we've managed to stick very closely to our original plan and have got through 5,000 miles in two weeks. Fact fans may be interested to know that that's the same distance as London to Beijing. Maybe road trips could become a new Olympic sport?

So, we left you in Elk City, Oklahoma and another 100 miles took us into the Texas 'panhandle' (the sticky-outy bit at the top) where, true to stereotype, we saw lots of cattle and roadkill armadillo. Less expectedly, we also came across 10 cadillacs half-buried into the ground just outside Amarillo...

Pink cadillacs, oozing, erm into, the street

We didn't find Peter Kay or Tony Christie in Amarillo (presumably they still haven't found anyone who knows the way yet) but we did find this inspired bit of advertising at a Burger King right next to a McDonalds...

The local burger joints not on such good terms in Texas then...

We stopped for lunch at 'the Midpoint Cafe' in the tiny town of Adrian, - another fantastically retro place, which marks the halfway point on Route 66 between Chicago and LA (the clue is in the name!).

It's a cafe, at the mid point!

The roast beef, spuds and veg was the first "proper" Sunday lunch we've had on the trip. Thai stir fry and Vietnamese spring rolls just don't quite cut it. We nearly managed it in Argentina but as they haven't discovered vegetables yet, Sunday beef and red wine didn't count...

After lunch we crossed the border into New Mexico and right on cue, the landscape turned a lot more barren and red and generally more desert than farm-like, and the roadkill armadillo stopped, thank goodness. The place names and radio stations all became Spanish too, so the country and western music that had accompanied us for the past few states changed to, er, Coldplay, whose CD we picked up in Toronto. Have you tried listening to Mexican music?!

New Mexico was beautiful though and we stopped off at Santa Fe and Alberquerque. Santa Fe is all adobe buildings and it has the oldest church in the US.

View of the Plaza Santa Fe

Alberquerque is a bigger modern city but the old town is really well preserved with a nice square in the centre. They also have hot dogs, but, sadly, no jumping frogs...

Between the two cities, we also found a little place called Tinkertown. It's a quirky little home-made museum, stuck in the middle of nowhere, and full of what seems like millions of miniature towns and people that were crafted out of scrap and things found by a husband and wife over 40 years. If not to everyone's taste, it was pretty amazing, and quite inspiring to see what they'd created just in their spare time. A plaque near the entrance sums it up brilliantly: "We did all this while you were watching TV!"

One of the exhibits in Tinkertown - a tiny circus (and why not?!)

After New Mexico we crossed into Arizona and stayed in Flagstaff before heading to the Grand Canyon the next day. There's not much we can say that the pictures can't do better but the Canyon was of course fantastic. The scale of it is just incredible and the different coloured layers of rock, some of which are billions of years old, make it a truly awesome sight.

The Grandest of Canyons

After leaving the Grand Canyon, we hit Route 66 again for the last time. We left it in Nevada, just 250 miles short of LA so we could head north to the bright lights of Las Vegas.

Bye bye Route 66, hello Las Vegas!!

We knew Vegas was pretty much in the middle of the desert but we were a bit concerned as we watched the temperature gauge steadily creep up as we approached, despite it being late evening. By the time we pulled onto the (in)famous Strip (where all the casinos are) and parked up at our hotel, it was gone 11pm and the temperature was 100 farenheit - about 36 Celsius. We couldn't believe it, so in case you don't either, here's the proof!

We only had two nights in Vegas and had to make the most of them so we checked in and promptly went a-gambling and a-drinking till gone 3am. Perhaps the a-drinking wasn't such a-good-idea though, as having steadily turned his 20 dollars into 100 on the roulette wheel, Phil started to think he was George Clooney and went all in on black and lost the lot on the last spin of the wheel!

Oh well, if you can't lose your shirt in Vegas where can you? Luckily we won it all back the following evening and this time tucked the winnings safely away before temptation (or booze) could get the better of us.

Leaving Las Vegas - with some money!

We were staying in the Flamingo hotel right in the middle of the Strip, opposite Caesar's Palace (where Elton John was playing that evening) and just along from the Bellagio (which was the casino in Ocean's Eleven) and the Venetian (which has to be seen to be believed).

The Flamingo, and comparing sunglasses with Elton

The Venetian was until fairly recently the largest hotel in the world and features a replica of Venice's Rialto bridge (to scale!) and has a canal running through it with gondoliers offering rides on genuine Venetian gondolas. Unbelievable. Vegas may well be the most over-the-top, ridiculous place in the world but it's hard not to be impressed.

Real gondolas in not-so-real 'Venice'

Our hotel was a little more normal (at least by Vegas standards) though it still had live flamingos in an area near the pool. A pool which came in very handy on Wednesday afternoon when the temperature peaked at 42 degrees!

On Thursday we left Vegas and headed to Utah, with a detour to the Hoover Dam. The dam is on the Colorado River and provides all the power for Las Vegas with enough left over to power another million homes. That's quite an achievement considering Vegas must have more neon lights than there are grains of sand in the desert. And almost as many air conditioned hotel rooms.

The Hoover Dam - with all those neon lights to power, how does it ever get the vacuuming done?!

Utah was really fantastic. We visited three national parks: Zion, Arches and Canyonland. They were all great with incredible scenery and massive rock formations. Zion was very beautiful, with pink, red and white formations, and the arches in, well, Arches were really picturesque.

Zion National Park

Arches national Park

But Canyonlands was the most awe-inspiring. It's absolutely vast and the red rock canyons are like nothing we've ever seen. Apparently it has some of the most inhospitable terrain on the planet and we can believe it. It looks like Mars and if you had some better walking shoes, and better heat tolerance than we did, you could happily spend weeks just exploring.

In Canyonlands National Park (not the Grand Canyon - just a normal one apparently!)

Today we've driven north through Utah and into Idaho, via Salt Lake City. We had a quick paddle in the lake, but it's not somewhere you'd probably want to spend too much time in. The lake is surrounded by sulphurous smelling flats and the rim is covered in millions of tiny tickly flies. It was nice to look at, but a little bit eerie. A bit like the city itself.

The salt lake

We parked in the centre of Salt Lake but there were no shops, just lots of offices, conference centres and churches belonging to the Mormons. There seemed to be about 20 different newlyweds having their wedding photos taken but no one else was around. We walked into a big food court which had just two other people in it, so we left. Maybe we should have come on a week day or we were in the wrong part of town but it felt a little like wandering into the twilight zone.

The state building, Salt Lake City and could this be the only shopping mall in America that is empty on Saturday??

So we scarpered to Idaho. Which is famous for....drum roll....potatoes. Exciting eh? Idaho's nickname is The Spud State. They're very proud of their tattie heritage, so much so that they even have a spud museum. Really...

We're spending tonight in Idaho Falls and plan to spend the next two days in Grand Teton and Yellowstone parks. After that we're heading to Seattle and hopefully we'll fit in a day trip to Vancouver. Then it's a drive all the way down the west coast to LA via San Francisco.

Just before we go, a quick word on American television: Aaagghh! Just had to get that off our chests!

Take care everyone,

Love Sarah and Phil x x

Toronto, Chicago and Route 66 (part 1)

sarahandphil — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 15:03:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

We've clocked up 3000 miles now on our road trip across the states, and have just seen a sign for Miami out of the window... hang on a minute, didn't we tell everyone we were following the pioneers and heading out west?

Actually we are still on track and it's Miami, Oklahoma we've just passed... phew! They have a habit of doing that around here. We've almost lost track of the number of Springfields we've driven through (and not a single one inhabited by yellow cartoon characters either;). But yes, we have made it pretty much to the half way point already after a busy few days on the road...

We spent our last night in Canada having a delicious meal at the top of the CN Tower in Toronto, which has amazing views as you'd expect, but to our surprise, was made particularly memorable by a huge thunderstorm, which we got to see close up at 400 metres above ground, and from every angle as the restaurant revolved through 360 degrees. Not recommended for the faint-hearted!

The view up - and down - from the scary CN Tower

We really liked Toronto though - it has funky shopping areas a-plenty, loads going on in terms of music, art, film etc. Plus the great lakes are right on the door step (or stoop as they'd have it round here). The people that live here all looked sort of wholesome, but fashionable and are obviously pretty clever to live somewhere so nice but cheap too. Irritating really.

The new extension to the Royal Ontario Museum, designed by Daniel Libeskind (who also has the commission for the new World Tade Centre site in NY)

The Toronto-ites have also managed to pick up on some of the best things about US restaurants (friendly waitresses, free coffee refills, fresh ingredients) whilst having the good sense to leave the '6 free donuts with every side salad' - mentality to their southern neighbours. No drive-thru gyms for these guys!

We made some progress back towards donut-land that night (sorry - we'll stop all this rudeness soon!) - and stayed in a town called Hammond, just south of Lake Michigan, then made an early start next morning as we were headed all the way to not so windy, but hot and sunny city, Chicago.

This actually was a slight change of plan from the original, which had us headed in a big northern loop round the lakes and via the Upper Michigan peninsular. We were put off doing this by the Michigan slogan though - "if it is a beautiful peninsular you seek, look around you"... For goodness sake. We were also slightly put off by the fact that it would have meant a 500 mile detour with no time to stop to appreciate the beauty of said peninsular. Which we are sure you will agree, would have been a great shame!

The more direct route to Chicago took us fairly quickly through
Michigan, skirting around Detroit (apparently they build a lot of
cars there so they can get out quick...), and on into Indiana. The scenery is really quite pleasant here, with giant fields of corn
looking for all the world like the home of the jolly green giant and purty white clapboard houses all along the road - mostly draped in stars and stripes and with an old boy catching some shade out on the verandah. All very picturesque.

There are also some of the largest Amish communities anywhere in this
part of Indiana, and sure enough we saw lots of people in horse drawn
carts, dressed in traditional clothing and just going about their
business, trying not to get run over by the giant trucks (or Rav 4s!)
steaming through on their way out west.

Amish folk - Shipshewana, Indiana (photos taken with paparazzi-like subtlety out of the car window...)

We stopped off in a couple of the villages to have a look around - and had a delicious cherry (Sarah) and banana cream (phil) pie in a lovely Amish-run place in Middlebury. Just in the interests of cultural enlightenment you understand...

We stayed just outside of Chicago that night, in a cheap motel next to a Best Western - so we could go to their restaurant and borrow their wifi for free tee hee!

We then had a full day in Chicago on Thursday. Its a really nice city with some amazing architecture - new and old - and, coming as a surprise to us, several beaches.

Some things we saw in Chicago

Chicago is located on the edge of Lake Michigan, and the residents know how to make the most of it - they have created beaches which spread out to the east of the city - and they were chock full of sunbathers, people playing volleyball or just hanging out at beach side bars.

One of Chicago's lovely beaches - a bit of a different atmos these days to the gritty world of Al Capone!

We walked the whole stretch, stopping for ice cream despite it apparently being 'Christmas in July' (?) and to jump out of the way of people learning to ride 'segways' - which are rather awkward looking two-wheeler motorised buggy type things that seem to be flavour of the month round here.

Get a calendar (and a bike) we say

Leaving Chicago on Friday meant making like Jack Kerouac and joining route 66 - which will take us all of the way through the Great Plains, the mid-west, and eventually to sin city itself. No, not Watford, Las Vegas...

Our first day on the 'mother road' went pretty much to plan. We drove about 1/3 of it, mostly on freeways that have been laid over the original brick road, though there are also still some original sections to follow, varying from Devon-ish single-lane dirt tracks to dusty two lane highways. And they didnt even have su doku to kill time!

No wonder so many great inventions have come out of this country. If it weren't for all those long car journeys maybe they'd never have got around to dreaming up drive through ATM machines, buckaroo, or space hoppers... we were grateful for the invention of air con anyway - it's been hitting 100 degrees most days - and that we could make steady progress on the surprisingly empty freeway sections.

This made time for diversions on to the old sections of road and for stops to see various original landmarks - there are some great old gas stations, neon signs and billboards and after a few stops at some real old skool diners, we were beginning to feel just like extras in 'Happy Days'. Its just a shame that Phil left his 'the Fonz' jacket behind in Japan, there surely would have been waitresses on roller skates flocking in no time!

English visitors still seem to be rare enough to raise a few
eyebrows in these parts, and we were a bit of a conversation point
on a few occasions (you're driving how far??).

For example, in Litchfield , IL, we got chatting to a farmer who was on a trip with his sons to buy a new boat trailer. He didn't actually seem to believe that we had really come all of the way from London and asked us a few questions, perhaps by way of a test...

"so you don't have too many farms in England then?"

(no, not many in London but there are some left elsewhere..)
"no corn 'n' no beans huh. That's something ain't it"

(well we mostly go to the supermarket but we might try and develop our 3
square feet of land into a herb / aromatherapy garden when we get
home...)
"uhuh. How much does a five bedroom house cost in London these days then?"

(wild guess - a million dollars - we don't know either)

"you folks must be totally outta your minds!! Well you enjoy your
trip now and come by our farm of you wanna place to stay a few days..."

Maybe he had a point...

One other interesting stop was in Springfield, Illinois, which was where
Abraham Lincoln spent his early years. As well as his childhood
home, lawyers office, favourite laundrette blah blah blah, you can
also visit an excellent new museum all about his life, the abolition
of slavery, and the civil war.

It was put together extremely well, with some really interesting
original articles (like the actual Gettysburg address), plus more
high tech stuff like a white house reconstruction and a modern-day
style newscast of what his election campaign might have looked like
if it were today. Well worthwhile stopping by for a couple of hours.
Even if our budget is now in serious jeopardy as a result of the
gift shop's collection of fridge magnets and Abe-style beards
tempted us into a few purchases...

Hmmm

In the afternoon we made another stop at a place called Cahakia, on the outskirts of St. Louis. Here they have discovered the site of the largest ancient civilisation north of Mexico - at one time home to 20,000 people! It had suburbs and everything. All that's left today though are
some earthen mounds and a museum, so you have to use your imagination a
bit but again, it was really well done, and it was good to reflect a while on how much change this part of the world has seen.

The site of the ancient city of Cahakia now, and how it might have once looked

You also get a good view of St. Louis's giant gateway from the top
of the main mound...

This might be the best way to see St. Louis, which by all accounts is one badass place closer up, pretty impoverished and with big crime problems. It is also apparently so polluted that its river caught fire! And we thought London was bad... We made a speedy exit anyway, and got back on the road for Springfield (this one in Missouri - keep up!) for the night.

We stayed in a brilliant motel (the Rail Inn) which had been fully
restored to its 50s glory, and was also just up the road from an
original Steak 'n' Shake diner, where Sarah had a steak and a shake
(of course) and Phil had a salad... hopefully we'll not be arrested
for this most strange and out of town-like behaviour!

The Rail Inn

Shake

Day 2 on route 66 took us another 450 miles, out of Missouri, briefly
through Kansas (just missed the Wizard of Oz tornados thankfully) and across most of Oklahoma. We put in more driving hours on slightly older roads (about 9 1/2 hrs total) and stopped a little less.

The view out of the window shifted gradually as we headed further south west, and there are fewer fields of corn, more fields with cows, and there seems to be a greater variety of housing - some richer, some much poorer.

You also of course notice more country music on the radio, and more
'God is your true friend, so repent or else he gonna getcha' - type messages start to provide variation from the endless gas prices debates...

Possibly our favourite sign so far: 'What would Jesus eat?' (a tasty mixed grill at 'The Crossing' apparently...)

We did have time to stop for a sneaky peaky at Carthage, a nice old-fashioned Missouri town with a fancy courthouse, and, slightly incongruously, a British vintage car rally going on.

We also stopped in Tulsa, where it really was very, very hot - to the
point where there was no - one really around, and many of the shop's
had shut, despite it being Saturday afternoon. We actually saw tumbleweed drifting about! The quietness meant we could stick our feet in the nice street fountains in peace, and cool off before leaving for Elk City, Oklahoma, where we spent saturday night.

No elk sightings to report, but plenty of cheap cow on offer at the local eatery. Phil has also now given up on the healthy eating 'plan' and we both tucked into beef tacos before hitting the sack in preparation for making our way to the wild wild west...

However, this entry has now gone on for almost as long as route 66 itself, so we'll let you get on with something more useful now and tell y'all about that in our next entry...

Thanks for sticking with us everybody - only a few more of these to go now!

Lots of love,

Sarah and Phil x x

Montreal, Ottawa & Niagara Falls

sarahandphil — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 07:07:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

Since picking up our car on Friday we've managed to cover about 1,000 miles and spent 18 hours on the road buzzing around Canada's big cities and Niagara.

We picked up the car on Friday night and had planned to head north through New York state and find a motel on the US side of the border before heading across to Montreal the next morning. Unfortunately things didn't go quite to plan.

Just as we pulled off the motorway (sorry freeway) at about 11:30pm to find a motel in Plattsburgh, the last US town before the border, a torrential downpour came out of nowhere. No problem we thought, we'll just drive slowly and find a motel and get some sleep. Not so simple as it turned out. It was a Friday night and half of Canada had decided now would be a good time to visit their neighbours and all 4 of the motels we tried were full and it seemed we weren't likley to find anywhere before Canada.

We pressed on and crossed the border at 10 past midnight on Saturday morning. We drove another 10 miles and eventually found a couple of motels. The first was full but the second had one room left and it took us all of about a millisecond to agree to take it and get some rest.

Luckily the sun came back out on Saturday morning and we had a short drive into Montreal and parked up and found a great cafe for breakfast, serving up huge salmon and cream cheese bagels with free refills of coffee. Suitably refreshed, we strolled through downtown Montreal and towards the old town on the banks of the river.

Breakfast in Montreal

At this point, we should mention that Montreal is in Quebec, which is Canada's French-speaking region. Luckily for us though, our GCSE language skills weren't put to much of a test as everytime we tried to speak to someone in French, they immediately twigged we weren't native speakers / didn't have a clue what we were on about, and replied to us in English. Phew.

The Place Des Armes in Montreal

The city is really nice with a good mix of new buildings and skyscrapers with a lot of preserved old Victorian buildings. We wandered round the old town for a bit and had a cup of coffee and made the obligatory fridge magnet purchase (a furry mooses' head - awesome) before getting the metro to the botanical gardens. Where we spent about 20 minutes before another torrential downpour had us cowering in the rain for the next 20 minutes.

You know, I think it might be raining...

From Montreal, we drove to Montebello where we spent the night. According to Wikipedia: "The village is world famous for the Château Montebello resort, the largest log structure ever built. The resort was the host for the 1983 NATO Nuclear Planning Group, and the 1981 G7 Economic Summit." Wow! Those are some exciting stats aren't they! We did have a look at the Chateau and can confirm it was very nice. Didn't see any world leaders though.

On Sunday we continued westward to Ottawa, Canada's capital city. Apparently Ottawa was chosen as the capital for similar reasons to Canberra in Oz, in that it was a bit of a neutral choice half-way between two big rival cities (Montreal and Toronto in Canada's case). It's quite a small city and centred on the parliament building which looked rather similar to a certain parliament building in London...

Canada's (not Britain's) parliament building

We had lunch in the funky Byward Market and a brief stroll to parliament and down the Rideau Canal before getting back in the car and heading south into the USA again. We must have passed the fabled grilling of quickfire questions from the border guard ("Where ya from?", "How d'ya know each other?", "Where d'ya work?", "You're driving how far?!!" etc.) because she eventually let us pass after 5 minutes and we were back in New York State.

We made our way south and then took a right turn (i.e. west) after we'd passed the eastern shore of Lake Ontario and spent the night in Rochester, about 60 miles east of Niagara. In the morning we visited the Strong Museum which has over 500,000 pieces of assorted Americana but concentrated on toys dating from the 18th century up to the present day. We spent quite a while looking at the section on the 80's which had lots of toys that we'd had as kids. And Phil thrashed Sarah on the Atari racing game too. Get in.

From Rochester we drove along the southern shore of Lake Ontario to Niagara Falls. We managed to stumble upon a beautiful little town on the banks of the lake where we stopped for an ice cream and a fridge magnet and from where we could see the tops of some Toronto skyscrapers, including the famous CN Tower, which must have been at least 100 miles away across the water, before carrying on to Niagara.

To be honest we were kind of prepared to be underwhelmed by the falls because the guidebooks had said they were often built up to be better than they are in real-life ("the first disappointment of married life for all of those honeymooners" - the big cynics). We thought they were really impressive though - and there's a nice atmosphere about the place with lots of families and kids all excited to be there. Sure the falls themselves are not as vast as Iguazu but they still drop a long way down and the noise and force is huge. Superman certainly had a job on his hands resucing that small boy in the film!

Unlike Iguazu, Phil didn't have to take his pants of this time! Thank the lord.

We had a good look from the American side before crossing back into Canada (with a much briefer borderguard quiz). The view of the Falls is meant to be much better from the Canadian side because they face head onto to the Falls, so obviously the first thing we did was to...er...go to the cinema to see the new Batman film! We went back to the Falls after the film to see them lit up at night though and then went back for a proper day time look this morning.

Da na da na da na da na Batman...

Today (Tuesday) we drove to Toronto and have just had a brief look round so far. We're going to have more of an explore around shortly, before having dinner in the restaurant at the top of the enormous CN Tower tonight.

We've got some serious road action ahead of us after we leave Toronto though because it's the big drive around the north of the Great Lakes before dropping back down into America at the Michigan Peninsula and then onto Chicago.

Love Sarah and Phil x x

***IMPORTANT PHOTO NEWS!***

We've apparently managed to fill the 1500 capacity photo limit that World Nomads allows! So we've created a new journal page to hold all our USA and Canada pictures. So from now on, if you want to see the galleries and all the photos from North America, then you'll need to go to this page: http://journals.worldnomads.com/sarahandphilusa where you'll find the photo galleries listed down the right hand side as usual. We'll still be putting all our stories on the original site though.

New York, New York

sarahandphil — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 13:45:00 GMT

"Ba ba dah da da da ba ba dah da da da da... start spreading the news...." Yes, we arrived in NY early Tuesday morning and, fuelled up with all that steak and south american coffee, were ready to hit the ground running. Well, walking faster than usual anyway!

Armed with coffee and ready for a big day in the big apple

We had intended to do as much as possible in our 3 1/2 days in NY and seriously went for it, running around ticking off sights and shopping like amphetamine-crazed mad people. Anyone seeing us flying about would have thought we'd never seen a big city before but it was all excellent fun.

We started with a walk up 5th Avenue and a deli breakfast, then picked up a ticket for the city tourist buses, which had been recommended by several friends as a good way to see the main sights - all sitting in the open air.

Outside 'Radio City' - looking too cool to be hot

We thought this was a big bonus seeing as it was extremely hot and sunny, and also gave us the added erm, excitement of having to duck whenever we got close to an overhanging branch or various other obstacles that seem designed to catch out unwitting tourists. Apparently someone was seriously injured just a few weeks ago as a result of standing up to take photos just as one of those hanging yellow traffic lights approached...ouch. They may have cleaned up the crime scene here but this city is still a dangerous place to be!

The buses take various routes around uptown and downtown Manhattan and work on a hop on – hop off basis. We've been on a few of these tourist buses in vairous places on the trip now and have grown to really like them. They're a great way to get orientated and are a bit like big temptresses on wheels, giving you a taster of all the main highlights so that you want to go back for more!

Taxis heading for Grand Central Station

We started on the downtown bus, which took us around the South of Manhattan island. At this point it was about 9am and about 90 degrees. By the time we’d been on the bus an hour it had climbed to well over 100 and our heads were starting to melt. Or so it felt like. So we got off and jumped on a nice breezy cruise around the harbour, over to Ellis island, and to see a statue of some bird with a fancy head-dress...

Some bird...

There’s also an outdoor art installation on at the moment consisting of four large waterfalls positioned at various points around the harbour. It is really quite nice and was a welcome opportunity to get some relief from the heat in the form of spray. Just like the Iguazu falls all over again. Well, sort of...

We then visited an exhibition called ‘Bodies’ which is on at Seaport harbour. Well, to be more accurate, Phil visited the exhibition. Sarah had previously seen Gunther Van Hagens ‘Bodyworks’ exhibition in London, which is based on a similar plastication / dissection technique – and felt rather wobbly about the whole thing, so was happier wandering around the shops. She is however determined to get past the ‘bones’ section of the souvenir book that Phil bought one day when she is feeling strong...

After the boat trip we walked up Wall Street looking for Gordon Gecko but found Pret a Manger – it was a very special moment being reunited with our favourite sandwiches after so many months scraping by without even a bite of cheese and pickle!

We're pretty sure this stock exchange is American....

Next we got back on the bus which took us through the lower East side, and then back to Broadway, where we hoped to pick up some tickets to see Ricky Gervais, but (quelle surprise) he had sold out, so we went to see some local stand up instead. A good move!

We got six acts for our $10, four of which were really very amusing (the other two were slightly upstaged by our giant stack of nachocs, but still not awful). Also quite comedic were some of the audience, who appeared not to take to the sardonic NY style of humour, and pulled some excellent ‘we are from Texas sonny Jim and we NOT amused by your ‘clever’ jokes about southerners’ faces. Thankfully they must have left their AK47s back at the ranch and were happy just to shoot some evil glances and go. A fun evening’s entertainment all round!

Next day we went for some ‘proper’ culture and hit the awesome Metropolitan Museum of Art for most of the morning. Then we chilled out with a salad at the boating lake in Central Park for a couple of hours before carrying on on the bus through Harlem.

On the roof of the Metrolopitan Museum

Sarah with some crazy sculptures on the Met roof

John Lennon memorial, Bethesda fountain, and political badges in Central Park

Evening was spent browsing the shops – especially the (big!) Apple store. The queues were so long though - estimated at 3 hours by one shop assistant – that we decided to go for dinner first, then as the shop is open 24 hours, we went back at midnight to make our purchases – by which time the queue had subsided - yay!

So Sarah is the proud owner of a new iPod touch (like an i-phone without the phone) – a replacement for the one that was stolen in China back in February. In the apparent absence of any internet cafes around here (maybe everyone has Internet at home??), this is currently acting as our main point of Internet access at the moment as it has wifi – but we can't upload pictures with it, hence the un-decorated look of this entry - sorry. Also it is a bit fiddly to use, so apologies to those of you who have received more illiterate than usual emails in the past few days!

Sarah and her new purchases

Back to NY anyway, and Thursday we had another morning of art – MoMA this time – which was also really fantastic. Lots of stuff we recognised, lots more we didn't, and fantastic shops! Then we spent the afternoon looking around Tribeca, SoHo and Greenwich village and doing a spot of shopping.

Now those of you that know NY and know Sarah will appreciate that this afternoon was never going to make for a feature in ‘effective fiancial management magazine' and indeed we came back with a tad more than our usual strict two fridge magnet per city souvenir budget allows for. Oops.

However, we were not spree-ed out yet, and managed yet more shopping in the trendy meatpacking district on Friday morning (well, someone has to give a lift to the faltering US economy don't they?) before catching a train to Stamford, CT, where we picked up our Toyota Rav 4* to begin our loooooooooooooooooooooong road trip to LA.

We made a good start, getting straight on Interstate 87 on Friday afternoon and putting the 350 miles to Canada behind us that evening. We stopped for a realy gorgeous dinner at Lake George in the Airondacks, where some lucky New Yorkers get to hang out on with their boats at the weekend, then overnighted at a Motel on the border ready to visit Montreal yesterday. We’ll have to tell you about that in our next entry – when we’ll also try and get some photos up… in the mean time, we're off to Taco Bell for a cheap dinner!

Love to all,

Sarah and Phil x x

*Bit of a result this since we had booked the much cheaper Ford Focus. We haven’t had to pay any more yet, so are just hoping that no-on tells Hertz…

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***IMPORTANT PHOTO NEWS!***

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The Plan for the USA

sarahandphil — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 20:39:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

We've made it to our 15th and penultimate country of the trip and are currently zooming round New York and trying to see everything in 3 and a half days before we pick up the car on Friday.

We thought that before we hit the road, we'd tell you about the route we're hoping to take so you can follow our progress or see if we get lost and end up in Mexico.

We're planning to drive from Stamford, Connecticut (just outside New York) to Los Angeles (via a bit of Canada) in four weeks. If we follow our intended route, then we'll cover just over 7,000 miles, which is about the same distance (in a straight line) from London to Buenos Aires or London to Singapore!

We worked out that we did just over 3,000 miles in New Zealand, so this is going to be much more of a road trip with less time for sight seeing and we reckon we'll need to drive an average of 4 and a half hours a day. Though no doubt we'll fit in some more of those 7 hour walks along the way somewhere...

If you're wondering why we're starting in Stamford, it's because New York City is just about the most expensive place in America to hire a car from. After a bit of hunting around, we found we could save a quite a bit of cash by jumping on the train for a 50 minute ride into Connecticut and pick up the car there. See, our budget traveller skills are still intact after all this time!

From Stamford we're heading straight up north to Canada (the last country of the trip!) and Montreal. From there, we'll go west to Toronto, via Ottawa, and then down to the Niagara Falls. From Niagara we'll need to re-trace our route back to Toronto before heading west again and drive round the northern side of the Great Lakes before dropping back down into the USA through the upper Michigan Peninsula.

Does anyone know any good car games...?

That will take us to Chicago and the beginning of the famous Route 66. Although it no longer bears that name and has largely been replaced by interstate highways, you can still drive the old route from Chicago to Los Angeles. Route 66 will take us from Chicago through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, which is where we'll come off it so we can visit the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas.

...can you recommend any good Hicksville radio stations?

From Vegas, we're hoping to have time to take a great big loop up to the north and the border with Canada, before driving back down the west coast to Los Angeles. The route will take us through Utah and Salt Lake City, Yellowstone Park and up to Glacier National Park in Montana. From there, we'll head west to Seattle and then down the west coast, via San Francisco, with a detour inland for Yosemite National Park.

Though if we run out of time, or lose all our money in a Vegas casino, then we have plan B up our sleeves and can cut the loop short or even just take a left at Vegas, go straight to LA, and save ourselves 3,000 miles (thanks for that suggestion Anna!).

...or have any good knitting patterns we can try out?

Phew! Quite a way to go then! We fly from Los Angeles to Boston on 14th August, so we have exactly four weeks on the road. We've got a few days in Boston for a final fling and a few cups of tea before flying home on the 18th.

So if all goes to plan, and we haven't taken a wrong turn and ended up in Alaska, we'll see you all in a few weeks. By then we'll probably be the size of houses having eaten our body weights in super size everythings with fries and cream on top, so please don't bring your cameras!

Can't wait to see everyone soon, but in the mean time, keep watching out for journal updates, and do let us know if you have any roadtrip tips or suggestions for places we might be passing through (thanks also for those already received!)

Love,

Phil and Sarah x x

Buenos Aires - The Sequel

sarahandphil — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 23:38:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

This week we're bringing you a tale of tango in San Telmo, partying in a Paddy bar, bling at breakfast and pants in Palermo. Stay with us....

We're also saying goodbye: to Louise and Vanessa and also to South America where we've had 7 great weeks, but which we're leaving on Monday to go to New York.

Let's start with tango. Wednesday night saw us hit El Querandi for a dinner and tango show. We couldn't leave the home of tango without seeing exactly how it's done and the show was great. It was a bit touristy (but then we are tourists!) and the dancing was very impressive - not to mention some of the skimpy outfits, which of course Phil hardly paid any attention to as he concentrated on the footwork and dance techniques.....

The tango band and the audience

Earlier that day we'd gone on a shopping trip to the trendy Palermo district. It's fair to say that clothes shopping with three girls probably wouldn't be top of Phil's list when it comes to best ways to spend an afternoon - one's bad enough! - but Sarah, Louise and Vanessa were quite restrained and restricted themselves to just a few items. And Phil bought two pairs of pants. Which was nice.

Just the two bags...

On Thursday, we headed to the colourful Caminito area of La Boca for a look round and for some art and fridge magnet shopping. La Boca has a bit of a reputation for being, shall we say, a little rough around the edges and our taxi driver recommended that we not stay beyond 5pm and stick to the Caminito area or we might run into some of the friendly neighbourhood muggers. We did as advised and ran into no one more dangerous than a man dressed as a giant red mosquito. As you do. We have no idea what he was doing but he seemed friendly enough.

Mosquito man tries to explain himself

Louise choosing a painting in La Boca

We've also been quite restrained with the booze this week too....until Thursday that is. Sarah and Phil had thought that Louise and Vanessa might want to party, party, party all week but a combination of a touch of the snuffles and the fact it takes several hours to eat dinner thanks to the massive size of the steaks, means that we hadn't had much time for bars. But by Thursday Louise was feeling better and in the mood to get back in touch with her Irish roots. So that evening we went to Buenos Aires' top Irish bar (there's a phrase we bet you never thought you'd read) which goes by the name of Shamrock's.

We nearly didn't make it though because having agreed to meet up at "the Irish bar", we all ended up at the wrong one - who'd have thought Buenos Aires would have two Irish bars?! Phil and Sarah got there first and were just starting to question Time Out magazine's description of it as one of the best bars in the city, when we realised the name of the bar wasn't actually Shamrock's but an Irish bar called, er, Di Matias. Not a typically Irish name, we'll grant you. We were also the only people in the entire place, which was quieter than a sponsored silence in a library. We'd just realised our mistake when Louise and Vanessa arrived. We all "enjoyed" a quick drink before making for the exit.

Shamrock's turned out to be a good deal livelier and the upstairs bar was packed with a young after work crowd and students. We got chatting to some of the locals who told us this was the place to be seen on a Thursday night and that they'd be here till the early hours before getting up for work at 7am the next day. Which led us to conclude that either Buenos Aireans have incredible stamina or we'd just discovered the reason why their economy had been ailing for the past decade.....

Cheers!

Phil and Sarah stayed upstairs chatting while Louise and Vanessa decided to hit the dancefloor downstairs. The photographic evidence from Louise's camera suggests that they did indeed quite enjoy themselves and made several new friends. Mostly of the tall, dark, male and Latin variety.

Suffice to say it was quite a night and most of Friday was spent in the recovery position, with frequent raids on the aspirin. Though we still managed to meet up in Palermo that evening for a cocktail and dinner at an Italian restaurant. Maybe we could handle this Buenos Aires lifestyle after all?

Nice meal, but the picture hanger-upper needs sacking

We were all a bit worn out by Saturday but Louise and Vanessa had planned the perfect pick me up. They treated us to a five star breakfast at the Four Seasons Hotel, just round the corner from their apartment in Recoleta, as a leaving pressie. The breakfast was fantastic and just what we needed: a huge buffet with eggs cooked anyway you like them, including eggs benedict with salmon, mmm. Thanks girls!

Suitably stuffed, we needed a stroll and walked through the city centre shopping district and back to San Telmo. We just had time for a cup of tea and a cheeky beer in the sun in the main square, when the clock struck 3 and it was time for a late lunch. As the final meal of Louise and Vanessa's trip, we also made sure it was a good one and went to Phil and Sarah's favourite restaurant of the whole trip: La Gran Parilla on the corner of Chile and Peru streets in San Telmo.

We'd left it just about long enough since breakfast and all managed a perfectly cooked steak each and a great bottle of red and all for about a tenth of the price it would have been in London! Then it was time to say goodbye and for Louise and Vanessa to jump in a taxi to the airport. And yes, the odd tear was shed. And not just because of the onion in the salad.

We really want to say a massive thanks to Louise and Vanessa for coming all this way out to see us (though we're willing to concede that the prospect of visiting Rio, Iguazu and Buenos Aires may also have had something to do with it). It was great to see Louise and to meet Vanessa and we had a fantastic two weeks with them.

So now it's just the two of us again, with only 5 weeks in the USA and the small matter of 7000 miles in a car between us and home. We can't quite believe we're nearly at the end. We're really looking forward to seeing friends and family (and Britain!) again but it's a bit strange to think that this trip that we spent two years planning and saving for, and that we set off on 9 months ago, is nearly over.

But we're banishing those melancholy thoughts for now because a whole new country and adventure awaits. We've planned our route already and will be putting up another journal entry in the next couple of days so everyone can see our intended route. Oh, and we've also booked the car: a "Ford Focus or equivalent". Not exactly rock n roll but unfortunately you don't get backpacker discounts on Cadillac convertibles.

Love Sarah and Phil xx

Gallery: Buenos Aires

sarahandphil — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 09:46:00 GMT

The Iguazu falls

sarahandphil — Mon, 7 Jul 2008 23:23:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

We have spent the past three days travelling to, and exploring the Iguazu falls - the spectacular waterfalls that form the triple border between Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay (see map below).

We reconvened with Louise and Vanessa in Foz de Iguacu (the border town on the Brazilian side) on Friday , Phil and Sarah having left a whole day earlier to catch the bus, whilst the girls for some strange reason thought that 22 hours on a hot sweaty bus with snoring co-passengers (no names mentioned Mr. Shaw!) might not enhance their holiday experience... we blame too many Glamour magazines and not enough ´South America on a shoestring´ - tch!

We spent the afternoon recovering from our journeys by the hotel pool (this took a wee bit longer for Sarah and Phil, who fell asleep for a good few hours thereby establishing their ´world weary travellers´ credentials even further...) - and then headed out to the local 'Churrascaria' restaurant.

Churrascarias are traditional Brazilian ´all you can eat´ grill and buffets, and we´d heard there was also live music and dancing to help wash down the meat feast at this one.

We filled our plates enthusiastically, creating some combinations of foods that bring new meaning to the word 'fusion´ (chow mein, paraguayan soup with sushi and quails eggs on the side anyone?), picked a fruity red number, and settled in for the evening´s entertainment.

Little did we know but we soon discovered we had managed to pick the most over-the-top touristy show in town, but once we had readjusted our expectations from ´authentic cultural experience´ to ´massive camp-fest´ it was absolutely brilliant! We hadn´t expected to see Paraguayan ballads played on´electric guitar, Brazilian samba girls descending from the ceiling in bikinis, or giant sequin covered ´birds´ on stilts flapping everbodies napkins off the tables, but now we have, we wouldn´t have missed it for the world!

Some of the performers had some genuine talent hiding under all the sequins too - particularly worthy of mention were some amazing Brazilian Capoeira martial arts / dancers, who were extraordinarily agile and did somersaults and flips and things like some of the guys we´d seen on the beach in Salavador (but with much snazzier outfits on), and a Uruguayan lady who twirled balls and firey things around at scarily high speed (excuse the limited dance vocab - we´ll never make the ´Stricty´ panel will we?!)

Plate spinning, bouncing and booty shaking

We also managed yet another audience participation moment, thanks to Louise, who told the compere that we had recently got engaged, the cheeky blighter! We got off fairly lightly, only having to join in with the congo at the end. A mere trifle compared to our ordeal with Mad Freddy of Santiago!

But the star turn of the evening was definitely Vanessa, who got picked out to boogie along with one of the Brazilian chappies, who apparently wanted her to join in with the ahem, traditional, bottom-smacking-with-a wooden-spoon dance. She dug deep and put in an admiral effort shaking her stuff up on the stage to much applause from the audience. Full respect!

Vanessa on stage - you go girl!

The next morning we went to visit the falls on the Brazilian side. We seem to have hit a new run of weather luck and the conditions were perfect for seeing the falls, following a recent rainy spell in the interior of the country, they are really full at the moment, and in the hot sunny weather, rainbows form everwhere in the spray from the falls.

The falls are just immense - apparently four times wider than Niagara, almost 3km in total - and taller too. It is difficult to do justice in words to the sheer scale and awesome force of the water. It is actually really quite overwhelming, and we wandered around oohing and ahhing and taking photos happily for a good few hours.

We got back to the hotel in time for a spot of sunbathing and ping pong before catching a taxi to the border to cross over to the Argentinian side, where we had a hostel booked for the next two nights.

The hostel turned out to be a ´jungle lodge´ - i.e. picturesquely leafy but absolutely full of pesky insects, so the best thing to do seemed to spend as much of the evening as possible safely tucked inside a restaurant introducing Louise and Vanessa to the pleasures of cow-sized steaks and cheaper than water wine. Well we wouldn´t want to let too much blood into our alcohol would we?!

Phil in typical South America pose - ordering food on behalf of the ladies

Next day we went to visit the other side of the falls, which were no less impressive views-wise, and also gave us the opportunity to get up close and personal with the waterfalls on a speed boat trip into the bottom of the falls. We were wished a ´happy shower´ by the tour guide - which was our first warning of how wet we were going to get...

Sploosh

We stripped down as much as we could whilst retaining some semblance of respectability - apart from Phil who left his respectability firmly on the river bank and got down to a funky pants, anorak, and lifejacket ensemble. The photos of this most spectacular outfit have mostly mysteriously disappeared, but below is a taster. If you are easily shocked please look away now....

The boat trip was fantastic - we were sped right into the falls several times, until we´d all had a good pummelling and there was no part left unwetted. Definitely a good way of getting rid of the hangover from the night before, but not a patch on the Chessington World of Adventures log flume. Hmm.

Before...

During...

...and after!

Aside from the falls themselves, the area is also home to lots of wildlife - birds and butterflies particularly, some of which are incredibly colourful, not to mention a good photographic challenge.

All in all it really is the most beautiful, awe-inspiring place to visit, and definitely one of our very top favourites of the trip. The only slight drawback was that we missed out on the Wimbledon men´s final, but thanks to Sarah´s Dad we were kept up to date by text message with an almost game-by-game regularity - we counted 16 text messages which must be some kind of Dad record!

Today we have to pack our soggy clothes and are splitting once again as Louise and Vanessa fly to Buenos Aires, and Phil and Sarah embark on their last epic South American bus journey. After the relative hardship of the standard Brazilian bus, we´ve decided to go first class tonight, where we´ve been led to believe there will be steak, champagne (!) and fully flat beds awaiting*. Blimey.

We´ll write again from B.A. before we fly to New York next Monday to pick up a car and begin our final adventure, driving from coast to coast across the USA, which we are still as excited about as on Day 1!

Until then, lots of love,

Sarah and Phil x x

*Yes we know Louise, that one wasn´t in South America on a shoestring book, but we´re celebrating you being here - hooray!

Gallery: Iguazu Falls: Argentinian side

sarahandphil — Mon, 7 Jul 2008 22:43:00 GMT

Gallery: Iguazu Falls: Brazilian side

sarahandphil — Mon, 7 Jul 2008 21:31:00 GMT

Rio de Janeiro

sarahandphil — Wed, 2 Jul 2008 07:43:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

You remember that last time we wrote, we were telling you how brilliant the weather had been in Salvador and how we'd spent every day basking in sunshine on the beach? So, can you guess what happened next....? That's right, it tipped it down for the next 4 days!

We suppose it is technically the Brazilian winter after all, so we can't complain too much and it there was the silver lining of being able to watch lots of Wimbledon, as well as the football.

We did manage to get to the beach during breaks from the rain on 2 ocassions, though the first time we were literally the only people there and our only company was our misplaced optimism that the clouds would clear. They didn't. Maybe we should have realised that no locals on beach = no chance of sun.

Well somebody had to make some footprints in the sand!

. .

We also popped down to the beach on Friday and managed to get 45 minutes of sun before a torrential downpour arrived. We sat it out in a bar and then headed back to the hotel once we were sure the rain had cleared. Unfortunately though, we're unlikely to be invited to audition as weather forecasters any time soon, as the rain started again when we were halfway back and we ended up drenched. Oops.

. .

Just to prove how wet we got...

. .

On Saturday we caught the plane back to Rio to meet up with Louise and Vanessa. We arrived at the apartment at 11pm and fully expected them to samba-ing the night away on their first night in Brazil, but the jetlag and a 4am start had caught up with them and they were both in bed! Poor lambs.

The apartment is really nice and just a couple of roads behind Ipanema beach and only a very short distance from the place we stayed in when we were in Rio a couple of weeks ago, and we´ve settled in very nicely, Phil especially enjoying the raised eyebrows he is getting walking back with all of these blondes on his arm...

. .

Phil and the ladies

. .

Much to the girls´excitement, we have also found a brilliant flip flop shop right near the apartment. Lucky we don´t have to go too far or Louise and Vanessa might have been heading back to the UK with longer arms after carrying the 20 pairs that we´ve bought between us so far....we are working on the story we´ll tell Brazilian customs if questions are asked (like, we have a lot of feet...??)

. .

Our flip flop purchases - and Phil trying his best to become an honourary girl (yes, that is ´Glamour´ magazine he is reading, brought all the way from London by Louise!)

. .

We have also got Louise and Vanessa playing scrabble already - well they can´t say they hadn´t been warned...

. .

Thankfully the weather is much better than the last time we were here and we all hit the beach on Sunday to soak up some Rio rays. We walked to Copacabana for lunch (it's a hard life isn't it?) and then the girls decided to stay on the beach afterwards, while Phil went to a bar to watch the Euro 2008 final, where they joined him at half-time when the sun had gone down.

. .

Rio beaches... and us being foolish (this was Louise´s influence. Honestly.)

. .

The bar we went to was packed with German expats and also had a TV crew trying to film everyone and hoping for a big reaction when Germany scored. Which of course they didn't. We're not sure where the TV crew were from, but we're assuming their footage probably didn't make for the most gripping news item that evening....

. .

On Monday we all found Jesus. Or 'O Cristo Redentor' as he's known in these parts. Or the statue of Christ the Redeemer as he's known in the English-speaking world. The statue is 130 feet tall and weighs 700 tons and stands atop the peak of the Corcovado Mountain, overlooking the city (isn't Wikipedia great for stats?!) and we took the tram to the top, where you can walk around the statue and admire the views of Rio.

. .

. .
Though admiring the view is easier said than done because the clouds tend to have a habit of getting in the way, as do all the other tourists getting their picture taken while copying the statues arms out-stretched pose. Luckily the cloud cleared just long enough and we managed to duck enough arms to be able to get some pics.

. .

Spooky-looking pylons in the clouds above Rio

. .

Waiting for ´that´ photo opportuity...

. .

We had a meal in Ipanema that evening where Louise and Vanessa were once again amazed by Phil and Sarah's grasp of Portuguese. Though when we say "amazed" we mean in the sense that they were amazed the waiter understood what we said and that we got what we ordered rather than another 4 plates of mashed potato and another 4 of chips like we got in one particularly memorable meal in Buenos Aires when our Spanish let us down. It's tricky this language business.

After dinner, Louise was keen to get back to her Irish roots so we headed to Rio's best (and possibly only) Irish bar: Shenanigans. We're not sure if the residents of Galway or Kerry or Cork would have recognised it as such but it was good fun and we knocked back a few traditional Irish drinks like er, Heineken and er, vodka and coke while bemoaning the fact that we'd arrived about 10 minutes too late to join the quiz.

We had planned to make an early start Today but the 2am finish and alcohol consumption put paid to that so we dragged ourselves out of bed and down to the beach instead. We wandered down from Ipanema to Leblon for lunch and had the world's most expensive ice cream (2 pounds 90p for a Cornetto!!) for dessert while overlooking the beach.

. .

Lunch in Leblon, and trying not to look shocked at the Cornetto prices in Ipanema

. .

On Ipanema beach again

. .

Tonight, we're off to a samba club. Though, like the football on the beach, we'll probably do more watching than joining in so the Brazilian don't laugh at us....or at least until we've had a few capairinhas to loosen up....

We're hoping to catch the cable car up to the top of Sugar Loaf mountain on Wednesday before Sarah and Phil head to Iguazu on Thursday. Louise and Vanessa have understandably decided to fly rather than join on us the budget option which involves a 22 hour bus ride, so they'll meet us there on Friday.

We've got 3 days in Iguazu before we all head to Buenos Aires for a week for tango, giant steaks and, hopefully, cheaper ice cream.

Hope all's well at home. We're assuming it's Murray-mania at the moment. Unless of course you're reading this after Wednesday and Nadal has knocked him out....

Love Sarah and Phil x x (and Louise and Vanessa!! x x)

Gallery: Rio de Janeiro

sarahandphil — Wed, 2 Jul 2008 07:38:00 GMT

Salvador

sarahandphil — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 23:39:00 GMT

Bonjourno everyone from Salvador,

Sorry it has been a while. We haven´t been doing much!

Since we arrived in Salvador last Tuesday we have fallen into a very comfortable, if predictable, pattern of spending the day on the beach, the late afternoon watching Euro 2008, and the evening drinking beer and eating prawns...

The beach we´ve been going to (Praia Barra) is really gorgeous - it is sandwiched between two old fortresses, and has loads going on from music and dancing to massages and the inevitable hawkers selling tarot readings, coconuts, and suncream.

The main drama is provided by a constant letting off of firecrackers, and a noisy cannon at one end of the beach, which keeps us unnerved all morning by going off in a slightly volatile way every lunchtime. Yesterday it actually completley misfired and appeared to go off in someone´s car parked nearby. Hmm. Today we are moving to the other end of the beach...

Click here to see a video of the cannon misfiring (wait for the second puff of smoke in front of the white building...)

Oh and there is also the excitement of whether or not we´ll get a soaking! The tide comes in very quickly at seemingly unpredictable times of day - resulting in increasingly panicked movements up the beach to the point where everyone is giggling and huddled together at the back with their bags on their laps. It is truly a daily battle of man versus nature and nature always seems to win!

Ready for battle

And if we don´t get soaked by the waves, there are always the people who come by at regular intervals with watering cans to water your feet with. Some are trying to advertise their foot massages, others seem to be just doing it for your pleasure - but it can be a bit of a surprise when you´ve just nodded off!

Two trainee foot sprinklers

There is no trouble drying off though as the weather has been absolutely perfect - approaching 30 degrees and glorious sunshine from mid-morning until sunset. So that trip stat about % of days sunning ourselves on the beach will need some adjustment next time around as even Phil´s Geordie legs have been protruding more than usual from beneath the safety of the ´sombrero´ and have started to turn a distinctly cafe latte colour*.

*It is unclear just how much this has been spurred on by the imminent arrival of Louise and Vanessa and the threat of being the palest person in their facebook pics, versus the presence of a remarkable number of well-oiled and buffed muscle-men types doing their excercises and performing impressive feats of acrobatics on the beach. Either way it is all very entertaining for Sarah!

NOT one of the muscle men! (have you ever seen such a big shadow?!)

Meanwhile Sarah has worked her way through 930 pages of David Copperfield at record speed and is now a fully competent magician.

Haha, not really, she has acually been reading the Dickens book. This perhaps unlikely Brazilian beach read has also got us the attention of a friendly chap named Thalis on the beach who came over to remark "My my, Charlie´s Dickens on our beach. That is wonderful!" - and invited us to a party he is holding at his family home tonight!

We are hoping to go along, and also have plans to drag ourselves into the old part of town later on, as there is a street party going on which is supposed to be well worth seeing. So this afternoon´s chore is to find some sequined bermuda shorts or something to turn up in - the clothes around here being at the glamorous (and skimpy) end of our wardrobes!!

Meanwhile our attempts to amuse the entire Brazilian restaurant community also continue as our shameful grasp of Portuguese menus has seen next to no improvement. We did manage one really good meal last week, on the recommendation of Russell from our guest house. It´s name was Camarou Macqueque (spicy prawn stew with rice and beans) - and it was so tasty that we made a special effort to remember Camarou = prawns.

And so we have been eating our way through every dish with the word camarou in it at the local restaurant ever since, to the point where on Saturday night we went for the unprecedented combination of prawn balls, prawn kebabs, prawn patties, prawn stew and prawn soup - much to the bafflement of the waiters!

The relentless prawn feast had to pause sadly last night however as, little did we know, but Monday is Off night around here and everything was shut.

Luckily, earlier we had (trying to get into the Wimbledon spirit!), bought ourselves a punnet of juicy strawberries. And we managed to find a pharmacy open, which was selling crisps. So that was dinner :( Yes, we know, it really is a wonder that we´ve got this far around the world without becoming malnutritioned!

Right, the beach is calling again before we drag ourselves up to the bar to watch Andy Murray at Wimbledon later on to see if he can cope with the inevitable `will he be the next Fred Perry´ media pressure... it is amazing how the sport headlines change so little from year to year isn´t it?!

Love to all, enjoy your sunshine too,

Sarah and Phil x x

Gallery: Salvador

sarahandphil — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 08:36:00 GMT

Cordoba, Santiago & Rio de Janeiro

sarahandphil — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 22:42:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

Our whistle stop tour of South America continues, with 3 days in Montevideo followed by 2 in Cordoba, 1 in Santiago, 2 in Rio and finally a planned 10 day stop in Salvador.

We took yet another South American bus from Montevideo on Wednesday evening (11th June) and it plonked us in Cordoba 14 hours later. Cordoba is Argentina´s second city and made a handy stop off on the way back to Santiago, which is where we needed to catch our flight to Rio.

Cordoba is a pleasant place with some old colonial-style buildings and a big central square that reminded us a bit of Dejmaa El Fna, the big square in Marrakech, with smoke rising from umpteen bbq stands grilling sausages.

Cordoba´s slightly creepy cathedral - and a horse and cart

Then on Friday, we decided it was time to see some Argentinian countryside rather than just stick to the cities, so what better way to do it than book ourselves on a wine and food tasting tour! The tour took us to a local vineyard where the owner delivered a fascinating explanation of the wine making process. Well at least we think it was fascinating but can´t be sure as it was all in Spanish...

Well, I suppose it is after lunch time in the UK - top me up!

We then went to a local farm where the owner once again gave a long talk in Spanish about how they made salami. The Argentinian tourists all started buying great big salamis at the end, so we assumed that what the lady said must have been good and bought one for ourselves for dinner.

Mrs. Forlini, the sausage shop owner. You wouldn´t want to meet her down a dark alley with that knife now would you?!

Though we were almost put off eating our salami meal after we were then taken into the farmyard to see the next lot of pigs destined to end up as spicy Italian sausage. We got over it though. And scoffed a whole salami for dinner.

Sorry little piggies!

After our salami feast that evening, we got another bus back over the Andes to Santiago, with plans to eat at our two favourite restaurants before we went to Rio.

Unfortunately we arrived late afternoon on Saturday and our flight was at 7am on Sunday, so we had no time for lunch and dinner. It was time to get creative...

The last time we were in Santiago, two weeks ago, Sarah had fallen in love with the anchovy toast at a little restaurant three blocks from our hotel, while our favourite meal of the whole trip was at another restaurant one block away. So there was only one thing for it. Anchovy toast starter at restaurant #1, followed by steak, chicken and chorizo brochette for main course at restaurant #2.

Unfortunately though when we got to the first restaurant the anchovy toast wasn´t on the menu, so we settled for soup instead. Luckily the brochettas were still going strong and the second place, so we piled in once again for brochettas, veg and great bottle of wine for 12 quid. We tried to persuade them to open a branch in Stoke Newington but where not sure they quite understood. Curses.

We got up at 3.30am on Sunday for the shuttle to the airport and landed in Rio early in the afternoon. It was bright and sunny and 27 degrees when we landed and just as we´d hoped it would be. From the plane we could see the famous landmarks like Copacobana beach, Sugar Loaf and the statue of Christ the Redeemer towering over the city. We had visions of sunning ourselves on the beach before donning our best samba ouftits and drinking capirinhas....

Sunrise views over the Andes as we left Santiago

But the weather had other plans. By the time, we reached our hotel in Ipanema, the temperature had plummted to mid-teens, a wind had started blowing and dark threatening clouds were threatening armageddon over Sugar Loaf mountain! We still had to see the beach though, so we popped down, stood on it for 45 seconds, then decided we´d better go back to the hotel and get our coats before we went out for dinner...

Her name is Rio and she dances in a... scarf?!

The following day, Monday, wasn´t much better and stayed overcast and barely 20 degrees all day, so we decided to sort out all our travel arrangements for the coming weeks instead...and for Phil to finally get his haircut (by Tracy, the Aussie hotel receptionist and hairdresser to the stars). Which was the first haircut since he got Sarah to shave it all off at the end of October and here are the results:

Today (Tuesday) we flew up the coast to Salvador in the Bahia region, which is known for its sunny beaches and African-infused carnival atmosphere and so far it looks like the weather at least isn´t going to disappoint. We got our pasty bods out on the beach for a few hours this afternoon and are hoping the sun will keep his party hat on for the next 10 days before we head back to Rio to meet up with Louise and Vanessa.

Sunshine at last!

Hopefully our Portugese wll improve too. We have just got back from a Grange Hill-style dinner of mixed meat covered in thick cheese sauce as a result of being forced into another entirely random selection from the menu ´cos we can´t speak a word of it. Help!!

Hope all is well at home. Stay in touch,

Love Sarah and Phil x

Gallery: Cordoba, Santiago and Rio

sarahandphil — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:57:00 GMT

Trip Stats - 2/3 of the way!

sarahandphil — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Can we have a drum roll to begin this entry please? Thank you...

Yes, it´s what you´ve all been waiting for for these past three months - a second round of Sarah and Phil´s trip stats! Stay with us readers*, this one has pie charts and everything...

*prospective employers excluded

Countries we've been to = 13 - only 2 to go!

No. of days we have been away = 185

Cheesy fridge magnets now in our collection = 45 (wedding gift idea - large fridge!)

Total number of days spent on buses so far = 9.5 (6.5 of those have been in South America)

No. of times we have watched the Bourne Ultimatum on buses = 5

Total number of days spent on trains = 5.5

Total number of days spent on the beach = 4

No. of days spent playing scrabble = 2.5

Games of scrabble completed = 51(current score S32/P19) - Phil´s share has improved by 1% (though he is standing behind me now and would like to point out he did get the highest score for one game - 451!)

Books read so far = 21 (Sarah), 15 (Phil). The dramatic slowing of our reading rate is rather difficult to explain but we think it is something to do with the rising price of oil and the decreasing quality of words in general

Number of times we have read an actual physical newspaper = 4

Number of times we have read the news online = approx 370

Number of times that Phil has been asked for alternative ID = 3. Twice for buying booze (once real ale - and he has a beard for goodness sake!!), and once to get into Uruguay with the beard!

Amount spent on hair cuts = 3 pounds between us

*see fig 2 for how this breaks down against the rest of our budget...

Mosquito bites - S = 36 (almost all in South America and two on the eye and one on the ear!), P = 1 suspect, though it might just have been a spot

No. of friends who have had babies / are expecting = 3

Big Congratulations to Kerry and Lee, Nella and Ben and Jaye and Tom!!!

to be continued!...

Montevideo

sarahandphil — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 01:35:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

Just a quick Hola from Uruguay before we get on yet another overnight bus - to Cordoba this time.

Firstly we must tell you about the first bad meal experience we´ve had for ages, which we had on our last night in B.A., after writing the last journal entry. Feeling slightly remorseful after admitting to you all about our steak and wine excesses (and because we´d already eaten two Empanadas - ham pies - each whilst doing the journal), we thought we´d try and behave like proper budget travellers again and headed for the first place we saw with a cheap tourist menu outside, despite the only people in there being the surly-looking waitress... that was our first mistake.

Next was ordering chicken - not the speciality round here, and this one was still virtually flapping when it reached our plates. As ´luck´ would have it, we´d managed to order by mistake not just two portions of mashed potato, but also two portions of chips. Since that little episode we´ve been practising our Spanish numbers - which might serve us better when it is Bus Bingo time tonight as well... fingers crossed!

Spuds... with spuds on the side. Nutricious and delicious!

On Monday we got the ferry across to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay, and then a bus on to Montevideo, where we´ve spent the past couple of days.

Montevideo is, as the Lonely Planet says, a nice compact sort of a city compared to B.A. and easily explored on foot. In theory. In reality, when we arrived, it was absolutely chucking it down, and within ten minutes we´d had quite enough of exploring and plonked our soggy bottoms straight down in a bar showing the Holland versus Italy match - where we stayed for most of the afternoon.

Montevideo on a rainy day

The bar was actually quite typical of many round here - with smart/shabby dressed waiters looking like they are auditioning for a 70s sitcom, chatting to a constant stream of men at the bar who have popped in for a quick snifter of something to warm them up on the way home from work.

You get a lot of ´little somethings´ for your money around here too. Our journey through South America so far has been mostly fuelled by Cortados - espresso with frothy milk on top. In Uruguay though, you order a Cortado, and you get not just the drink as described, but also a little dish of whipped cream, a shot of freshly squeezed orange juice, a glass of sparkling mineral water, a basket of popcorn, a miniature meringue, and a toffee sweet. What´s not to love?!

Cortado-tastic

The weather improved yesterday, so we got to have a better look about the city. You can tell it was quite a grand place in it´s heyday - with elaborate gothic buildings, palaces and some enormous municipal buildigs. However it definitely has seen better days and it is a bit sad to see many beautiful old buildings seriously crumbling.

Palcio Salvo - once the tallest building in South America

Central Montevideo

There is a mausoleum as well - so of course we had to pop in to tick off yet another famous dead person, and see Jose Artigas - a national independence hero from early 19th century battles with the Spanish who is now housed underneath the main square.

Artigas´ mausoleum

There are also some more lively characters around - business men wearing very smart suits, hats and moustaches and looking very mafiosa, rag and bone collectors in horse-driven carts, and everyone drinking ´mate´ - a kind of herbal tea that is sucked through a silver ´straw´ from a mug, and constantly topped up from a thermos flask tucked under one arm. And we thought the English were obsessed with tea!

So all in all we´ve had a pleasant couple of days seeing what Uruguay is about, and we´re definitely intrigued enough that we´re thinking it could be another place to come back to when the weather is a bit better...

All for now then. Love to all, and stay in touch,

Sarah and Phil x x

Gallery: Montevideo

sarahandphil — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 01:12:00 GMT

Gallery: Buenos Aires

sarahandphil — Mon, 9 Jun 2008 09:06:00 GMT

Gallery: Mendoza

sarahandphil — Mon, 9 Jun 2008 08:35:00 GMT

Mendoza and Buenos Aires

sarahandphil — Mon, 9 Jun 2008 08:21:00 GMT

Hi everyone,

Well, we have made it to the other side of South America! We first caught a bus across the Andes to Mendoza, where we spent a couple of nights before carrying on to Buenos Aires, where we´ve been for the past five days.

After spending 20 hours on a bus from San Pedro back to Santiago, we´d been less than excited about getting straight on another bus for 8 hours more - but 8 hours is beginning to feel like a short hop around here, and it was actually a pretty enjoyable journey. We wound our way right up through the snowy Andes through winding roads and tunnels (some of which had ski pistes running over the top of them!), and then after stopping to be sniffed at by the border control huskies, curled back down the other side through central Argentina´s wine country.

Sarah - not demonstrating the reclining seats very well

The scenery here seemed suddenly very different to the vast deserts of northern Chile, snowy river gorges and red canyons, plus vineyards, ranches and horses everywhere. We didn´t spot any condors - though we´re guessing from the fact that every road side cafe, shop, hairdressers... was called El Condor, that this is where they live!

Views from the Santiago-Mendoza bus

Mendoza is a really nice town of big boulevards, Spanish-style buildings and squares, and street-side cafes. But the main attraction is definitely the vino, some of which we reckon we may just have sampled before from El Bodega de Morrisons, but it does seem more enjoyable with a big juicy steak to go with it...

The mendoza tram

A couple of days of this and we were feeling rejuventaed and ready for another bus jaunt, and booked ourselves on the overnighter to Buenos Aires. This was another awesome affair, with leather reclining seats, DVDs, and a steak and wine dinner! If Harry Potter hadn´t been the film of the day, we would have been convinced that we´d stumbled onto P Diddy´s tour bus by mistake! Oh, and did we mention you also get a game of Bingo on Argentinian buses? We tried to keep up with the rapid-fire Spanish number caller, but sadly have no idea whether we won or not :(

We arrived in Buenos Aires on Thursday, and LOVE it. It is really attractive, with grand old colonial buildings, and great big boulevards, and there is just loads to see and do.

Sarah, in the middle of the world´s biggest boulevard

We are staying in San Telmo, which is one of the oldest working class districts in the city, and the home of Tango dancing. There are actually some Tango students staying at our hostel which means free shows in the afternoon as they sashay around the living room...which is all very good for atmosphere, but not when the French Open finals and Euro 2008 are on the telly. Grr!

Street entertainment, B.A. style

San Telmo is also the location of some brilliant art and antiques markets - and we found ourselves buying some Uruguayan wood block prints to bring home yesterday, as well as some high heels for Sarah... well, we have to be prepared just in case we get dragged into any more street performances don´t we?!

Gramaphones, match boxes, soda bottles and records in San Telmo - if only we had bigger backpacks!

Predictably, we´ve also been eating several Aberdeen Steak Houses-worth of steak, chastising ourselves for eating too much steak, and then drifting into yet another steak restaurant for dinner...

Our favourite restaurant so far, ´Gran Parilla Del Plata´

It really is the best we have ever eaten, and at bargain prices too, so we´ve got to eat out in some lovely places, most of which are just a quick stumble down a cobbled street or two from our hotel. Sarah even has steak and wine tasting notes these days!

Don´t worry, there is still enough steak left in B.A. after our visit for Burger King to carry on offering these delights...

Argentinians are apparently the biggest users of plastic surgery in the world, and we can see why - it would be quite a tempting quick fix with all this steak to eat and the beach lurking just around the corner! With our dreadful Spanish though we could end up looking like the Bride (and Groom!) of Frankenstein, so we´ll spare you that drama and stick to tucking our own tummies in instead.

We´ve also done a fair bit of walking our dinners off, and have got as far as the trendy shopping and residential areas of Palermo and Recoleta.

A trendy Palermo resident

Recoleta is the wealthiest part of the city, and has the poshest cemetry ever. It is where Eva Peron is buried, and is like a small city of plush-looking tombs. Some really look quite cosy! There are also lots of cats, who seem to like curling up in cobwebby nooks, and freaking out passing tourists!

We´ll be back in B.A. a couple more times yet, and can´t wait. But before that, we are hopping across the water to Uruguay for a few days. Hopefully they have vegetables there...

Hope you´re all well and enjoying the sunny weather we´ve heard about at home. Lots of love, and stay in touch,

Sarah and Phil x x