Whoops - we did it again

Cycling during the hottest month in Japan and crossing Mongolia when it is barely 0º was not the best idea, so after some thinking, we've thought about a new route. it's not better, it just makes more sense! I will not dare say it's "final" though..

So, for the update, it will be China, then Mongolia, then China again and Japan.

Voila.

Van in New Zealand is booked

My bank account statement reminded me that our van has been booked for New Zealand. I know it's in April, but the sooner the better, we got a sweet deal too. Woo hoo!

This is gonna be our home for a month. Don't be fooled though, it's top comfort!
3 bedroom with one en-suite, lounge, bowling alley (in the basement) and a massive garden. :)

RTW - 2.0

This time it's booked, so it shouldn't change too much :)
See below:

THAT'S IT!!!

Yumi and I went to Trailfinder in High Street Kensington and guess what happened?

Yes you guessed, we bought our round the world tickets! Woo hoo!

So that's it, we are airborne! Well, almost.

We'll leave London on January 7th 2011 and our journey will take us to Argentina (via Sao Paulo), Chile, Bolivia, Peru, New Zealand, Australia, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Hong Kong, Tokyo, South Korea, China (again), Tibet, Mongolia, China (again, again), France...and England.

Voila!
Bye for now

:)

Yumi got Jabbed!

Yellow fever, japanese encephalitis, rabies, Hep A, Hep B, Typhoid....blahblah blah.

Yumi started the jab race! We thought it's better to be safe than sorry on this one, especially when we'll be in the rainforest in Peru and in South East Asia. We just didn't expect to spent about 500 pounds on jabs alone!

Corsica '10!

Having slept 10h in the previous 5 days, (proper) holidays came at the perfect time for Thomas. Coincidence? no no no. Have no doubt: Yumi was ready for some sun and Corsican food too!

We stayed in the village, less than a km from Grandpa's house. There were no plan B, but there were no plan A either. We only wanted to fit some:
- beach volleyball
- food
- trekking
- food
- helping Grandpa in the garden
- food
- see friends and family
- food
- chilling/relaxing time

oh, and have some good food too.

It worked perfectly as we did all of the above. We love it when a no-plan plan comes together.

It was great to spend some quiet time at the local beach. It's not the most beautiful beach in Corsica, but Thomas likes it, he's been going there for 29 years after all :)

On the first day we met Thomas's childhood friends Antoine, Jeremy and Audrey, as well their other halves: Sandy, Marion and Romain respectively. Wicked time. Thomas was sleeping -at the table- by 11pm. Was it the 2h we slept the previous night or the past 5 days training 1h per day that tired him, we'll never know...

The other days were a mix of playing some beach vball, swimming, going to the villages around, gardening. We also went to the Restonica Valley, near Corte in the centre of the island. It's a great place, it's not too busy as the trails are not so easy. We walked to the  lac du Melo and the Lac du Capitello.

The views were amazing and the weather was great too. we were a bit light on water (only 1.5l for both of us) but a little swim in the lac du Capitello managed to keep us cool for the way down. We were at about 2000m and the car park was at 1200m so the way down was tough on the knees but we managed it just fine, needing only a Diabolo-Menthe to recover.

ok, and an ice cream too.
oh, and some wild boar when we got home. hmmmm. Thomas is still drooling about it! :)

We had a lovely time there and before we knew it, we were back in London, but hey, we returned to "The Old Smoke" with our heads filled with great memories and good laughs as well as figatelli, donkey sausage, pastis and some other good wild boar paté, so we won't complain about it! :)

Rome

Last weekend, we were invited to Maureen and Giacomo's wedding in Castiglione Di Pescaia, a little town north of Rome, so we decided to spend a day in Rome.

 
We started with what we do best: Eating! before walking to the Vatican and St Peter Square.

Apart from the St Peter's Basilica, the other thing you cannot miss are "The Swiss Guards".

 They have a high reputation for discipline and loyalty to their employers. Apart from household and guard units, some formations also serve as fighting troops! So basically, don't laugh and point at them when you check them out :)

The Basilica is really impressive, it has the largest interior of any Christian church in the world, holding 60,000 people. 

I know what you think: YES! football games could be organised inside!

We didn't go in as the queue was simply massive, and we didn't feel like waiting half a day to get in. If you want to go there, get in the queue as early as you can (think about trying to get a ticket at Wimbledon on a saturday or get an i-Phone 4 before everybody else...).

See for yourselves!

We found a few minutes to post some letters. It is thought that many Romans make weekly trips to the Vatican just to post their important letters, as the Italian post is quite unreliable. Italian stamps may not be used on Vatican mail nor vice versa. It is believed that more letters are sent each year, per inhabitant, from the Vatican's postal code than from anywhere else in the world. 

It doesn't really come as a surprise when you think that the Vatican has a population of just over 800 and that 4.5 million tourists visit the Vatican every year!

We then walked across Rome to end up at the train station to go back to the airport to meet Marion and Johannes to drive to Castiglione.

Rome is a beautiful city. Castel San Angelo, the Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon, the Forum, The Coliseum... So many great sites. We stayed there for a day, but it was not enough to see it all.

Go there! It was a real surprise for us (mainly Thomas, as it was his first time there), as we are not big fans of crowds and touristic places. :)