Six Months Down - Highlights and Lessons Learned

Pamela having a little rest at the Canyons Resort in Park City, Utah

Wow! February 5th marked the sixth month, and planned halfway point, of our round-the-world honeymoon. I can’t believe we’ve already been on the road and married for over six months. Time sure does fly when you’re having fun, it seems like just yesterday we tied the knot in Fiji.

This last month of travel has had us bouncing across North America searching for good snow, cruising through the Caribbean and relaxing with family and friends in California. We’ve had a couple bumps along the way but overall this last month has been awesome. We’ve been so busy that I’m almost a week late on this article and several weeks late on many other articles. Hopefully this week I’ll have some time to catch-up as we’ve had some great times the last few weeks and heaps to write about.

Lessons Learned from Month #6

-   Cruising, at least in tropical destinations, is probably not for us. Our cruise was a good experience and something we’re thankful we did, but would have enjoyed spending longer times in each port with less people.

-   When visiting the US Virgin Islands, especially St. John, it is very helpful to hire a rental car. Taxi prices are ridiculous, even charging for your baggage, which makes the cost and freedoms associated with a rental car a better value. Had we hired a car for our St. John trip we could have seen and done a lot more without having to depend on very expensive taxi services. For example it cost us over 70 dollars to get from the airport to the hotel which could have paid for that full days hire car.

-   Using online lift ticket services, like Liftopia, are a good deal when visiting Park City. We saved about $25 USD on each regularly priced $96 USD ticket because we booked in advance. $96 USD is a lot to pay for a single day skiing, especially if you’re on a budget.

-   Eco-lodge travel is definitely hit and miss when it comes to your comfort level and what you’re willing to put up with. Definitely thoroughly read into your destination ahead of time to ensure you’re up for the creature (dis)comforts some of these resorts offer.

Highlights from Month #6
Pamela –  Banff was beautiful but I really-really loved Lake Louise. Walking on the lake with the ice castle was like a dream come true.  I also really loved visiting Key West for the day. The artsy town and all of the beautiful galleries really made my day.

Dave  - Thankfully during this month I got to travel to some of my favorite places so practically the whole month is a highlight. I loved visiting family/friends, snowboarding in Banff and Park City and spending several days on the island of St. John.

Lowlights from Month #6
Pamela – Easy, all of the bug bites I received in St. John. It’s been nearly a month and I’m still itchy in a couple of places, not to mention all of the new scars from my scratching. Never again will we be eco-lodging it on St. John.

Dave – Watching Pamela suffer with all the bug bites in St. John was not fun at all, I felt so bad for her.  It was really hard to enjoy the natural beauty of the island when my wife was suffering so much.

Looking Down on Park City from the Park City Mountain Resort



Stay tuned for upcoming articles from our time snowboarding in Park City and the Reno/Tahoe area.

Cheers for Now –

Pamela and Dave

One Month Down - Lessons Learned and Highlights from Month One

The 5th of September marked the end of our first month on the road! We can't believe how fast the time is going. Sometimes it's hard for us to remember where we were last week or even what we did a couple days ago. For this reason, at the end of every month on the road we want to capture our highlights and lowlights of the previous month and any lessons we have learned that will help us or other travellers like us in the future. So here goes for month number one, hopefully there will be eleven more to come.

Travel Lessons Learned:
1. When arriving into Northern Vietnam airports it's a good idea to have your arrival airport transportation booked ahead of time, preferably with the hotel you're staying at. We found not doing so left us too vulnerable to scams and generally made the arrival process unpleasant.

2. Only book bus tickets from the place you're currently located. We booked a bus ticket while in Hoi An for a Saigon to Siem Reap bus and ended up with a bad experience. We only pre-booked like this because it was a holiday and heard the buses might be full. In the end it didn't matter that it was a holiday and could've booked the day before.

3. Do not swim in Halong Bay where the boats park for the night. It's okay to swim in places where there's not many boats parked. I (DW) was jumping off the top of our Halong Bay boat where we parked for the night and ended up very-very sick, not to mention coated in diesel.

4. Sometimes it's better to pay the extra money and fly than to take overland trips, especially between countries. Yes, this is not really budget travel but I don't think we're budget travellers. We want safety, reliability and comfort and need to keep these things in mind (not just cost) when choosing travel methods.

Highlight of the Past Month and Why:

Dave -The Temples of Angkor 

Angkor is an amazing place and a true wonder of the world. The people of Cambodia are amazing and have done a really good job setting up the area for visitors.

Pamela - I have two. Playing with the Baby Tigers in Chiang Mai, Thailand and The Temples of Angkor
The baby tigers are too cute. The Temples of Angkor are great because you can see so much history preserved so well.

Lowlight of the Past Month and Why:

Dave - Being sick in Halong Bay, Vietnam

I had such a high fever and was generally miserable in a beautiful place.

Pamela - 17 Hour Bus from Saigon, Vietnam to Siem Reap, Cambodia
We got so ripped off and lied to in Vietnam. The bus ride was terrible and the Vietnam exit border was one of the most corrupt and dodgy places I've ever seen in my life. You needed to hand your passport to the officer with money in it if you expected to get an exit stamp. Amazing.