Greetings from Middle-earth!

Kia Ora from the other side of the globe!

Almost three incredible weeks have whizzed by in New Zealand, ad it's also hard to believe that I left homealmost 7 months ago. NewZealand has not disappointed Emma and I in the slightest; we've had quite an adventure so far!

We started our journey in Auckland in the North Island, where we stayed with Fiona's Aunt Michelle and her man Graham. Auckland is a great city, we celebrated St. Patrick's day there in an Irish Pub and followed that with a performance of Mamma Mia at the Civic Theatre. What larks! We went up Sky Tower which provides 360 degree views over Auckland and it took me 5 minutes to get the guts to walk over the glass floor bit of the observation deck because I was actually convinced I would plunge through and go splat on the pavement below. We also took a trip to Waiheke Island where we had a glorious picnic on the beach as well as did a wee bit of wine tasting at a vineyard. Good wines, apart from one of the reds was kind of icky. We then enjoyed a glass each with spectacular view over the bay and of Auckland City. Not bad, I tell you folks.

After bidding Auckland goodbye we hopped on a Naked bus (or as we like to call it Completely BillyBollocks bus) to Hamilton, where we based ourselves for a few nights whilst exploring Hobbiton and the Waitomo glow worm caves. Hobbiton was a scream. We took the bus there and changed to a Hobbiton bus in Matamata, and I swear my tummy was doing somersaults. I was that excited about visiting The Shire. The tour started off with a walk through the Hobbiton village, where there are 44 hobbit holes. All of them are exterioriors, the inside of Bag End etc was shot in Peter Jackson's Stone Street Studios in Wellington. Hobbiton employs plenty of full tim gardeners who tend to the area; it has full vegetable patches with giant pumpkins! Bag End sat majestically on top of the hill with a fake tree sitting on top of it. We had plenty of time to able around and take photos before heading to the Green Dragon for a pint of brew. The pub was a merry old place, and the stout I had was very tasty indeed!

Waitomo glow worm caves were adorned with magic. The little boat ride through the pitch black cave with a ceiling dotted with little blue lights being emitted from the worms tails and everyone being silent on the boat was stunning. We rented a car for the day and Imanaged to keep us alive driving for the first time in 2 years! From now on when I listen to Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse Of The Heart I'm going to be thinking of my drive through New Zealand with Emma.

Our next stop was Rotorua, a smelly, smelly town in the heart of volcanic activity.A walk on the street would be accompanied by some delightful scents of sulphuric acid spewing from what evere nooks and crannies it could escape from.  We did a great little hike in the Redwoods forest and we also went zorbing! Zorbing is when you get inside a plasticc ball with a bit of water in it and then you proceed to roll down a hill in itscreaming with pure, unadulterated joy. This was followed by a soak in a hot tub.

Rotorua and its scents were traded for Taupo, a town by a massive lake with views of the mountains of Tongariro National Park, New Zealand's oldest Nation Park. Tongariro National Park is also home to Mt Ngauruhoe which is more commonly known as Mt Doom fro The Lord of the Rings. Tongariro is also where you can do the Tongariro Alpince Crossing which is regarded as one of the best one day walks in the world. So off we set at 5.30am and headed for the park to do 19,4km of hiking. We set off at 7.30am and the first hour of the walk was easy going, but then you reach the Devil's Staircase, a long uphill battle on a clear path and steps. When you get to the top it'spossible to go and summit Doom, but we both gave up on the idea when we gotthe top pretty tired. After a easy 10 minute walk it was time to ascend again. THough the ascent wasn't as long as the earlier one, it was much harder because the path was made of volcanic rocks and ash and I spent most of my time trying to find footing and not slip right back down again. At the top you are rewarded with great sights and wind like I've never experienced before. Now I'm a big girl with weight on me, and I was swaying about struggling to stay in one place, and all I could think of was how the hell are the little, lithe people not being flung off the mountain into the distance. Alas, all were ok, even after the hellish descent from Red Crater. I basically slid down the ashen slope and emptied roughly a beachs' worth of volcanic ash from each shoe at the bottom of it. From there it was easygoing until the end,which was roughly 10km. I managed complete the hike in 6 hours, a feat I am rather proud of! And my legs weren't even that sore the next day, just the top of my butt.

Fom Taupo we travelled back in time upon visiting the town Napier. It was hit by a earthquke in 1931, and most of the town was destroyed. Napier was then rebuilt in the art deco style of the decade, and is now the art deco capital of the world. I felt like I was in the middle of a Hercule Poirot mystery, and was half expecting to see Gatsby ride by me in an old car. We had fish and chips on the beach before heading to Wellington for a few days.

After spending time in smaller towns Wellington was an ambush of sorts on the senses. It was clearly a city; plenty of people and cars ad buses, and it was windy too. We spent a few days exploring the city, Emma explored the museums too. We also ventured on an another Lord of the Rings tour. This one took us to Mt. Victoria, a hill in the city where they shot the Hobbiton forest scenes for the Fellowship of the Ring. The tour was great and we also got re-enact some of the scenes! I got be Pippin in the 'Shortcut to mushrooms' scene lying on the ground with another traveller and Emma on top of me, and a fake pile of poo infront of my face. We then drove past Peter Jackson's studios on Stone Street, and then went to Weta Caves, the home of the special effects company that worked tirelessly on creating th magical world of Tolkien's Middle-earth as wellas many other films and tv programmes (like Xena!). That was cool too.Our little nerdy brains were having the time of their lives.

We then bid the North Island goodye, and headed over Cook's Straight the South Island and then to Nelson, where we proceeded to drink wine and little else. Our plan of going to stuff in Abel Tasman National Park was foiled by the prices of all the offered ativities. Instead we headed to Punakaiki, a place that Graham had told us not to miss. We stayed at a hostel right by the beach, went to see the pancake rocks that were there and had a nice fire on the beach with some of the other hostel guests who were all primarily german. Even the owners were German, and when we chcked in, the woman spoke german to me and I had to tell her that nay, even with 11 years of german lessons at school I have failed to grasp anything from that language. We also went kayaking, which resulted in me getting wet as I fell in the river twice. Why do these things always happen to me?

We next went to Fox Glacier, which wasn't anything special to me. A cool glacier, a dull town. We then took a bus to Wanaka(we got free pies on the ride there!) where I got locked out of the dorm room for the night thanks to the person who locked the door when I'd specifically left it open whilst I went to pee. Too cold to sleep, I stayed up all night and read a really bad book I picked from the book shelf.

Now we're in Queenstown, and have great plans! Pub crawl, horseback riding and a day trip to Milford Sound. It's all super groovy, but it's all gone by so fast. Emma goes home in a few weeks, and I stay on until May 14th, when I make my way to Australia where I'll be until 2.2.2015 before heading to Japan. I touch base in London on Feb 16th at 3.30pm. A concession would be greatly appreciated.

Don't be a wanker, be nice.

I type this on my penultimate night in Asia, in a Starbucks (it has AC) in Kuta in Bali. The past 6 months have whizzed past in a whirlwind of events, emotions, people and places. I've really had the time of my life an as sad as I am to be leaving this spectacular continent, I'm super jazzed to be moving onto a completely new adventure!

Now after 6 months of travelling I've picked up on a few do's and don'ts of backpcking through these. You probs don't care, but I'm gonna list them anyway.

-DO learn the basics of every language, especially thank you and hello. My favourite thank you is in Lao, kap chai lai lai (spell check please).

-DON'T leave a motorbike unattended for 10 hours infront of a local market in Cambodia. It will get stolen and you'll have to cough up a load of dollars to the owner. Luckily, they might find the bike INSIDE the market the next (you'll still have to cough up some dollars for the dude who "looked after" the bike for 16 hours)

-DO have a local beer on the first night you get into a new country. Bintang gets better the more you drink, and in Thailand choose Chang. Vietnam will provide you with the cheapest beer in the world.

-DON'T fight with border officials or people working in embassies. You may not be able to enter the country or you might be denied a visa (this never happened to me because I pick my fights and get into epic tiffs with tuk-tuk drivers).

-DO eat crap loads of good food.

-DON'T go batshit crazy when a bus journey doesn't go as smoothly as you wanted it to. You are backpacking through South East Asia, so the chances of things running smootly are quite slim. Also add at least 2 hours to the total journey time the ticket seller. Most of the time you'll arrive in your destination within the 2 hour margin, sometimes it might take 10 hours longer. Read a book, play cards, be cool.

-DON'T be too bummed if a rat eats a massive hole into your rucksack (happened to me in Vang Vieng, Laos). You've got a good story to tell people.

-DO try new and cool things. Jump a bungy. Go diving, but DON'T get your ankle caught in a fish line with octopus on it (yup, happened to me) and then get a perforated ear drum because you couldn't equalize properly. This will result in a doctors bill, and no diving for at least 2 weeks and a course of antibiotics. With only being 1 dive away from completing your open water certificate this really sucks balls.

-DO make awsum new friends and get drunk with them. Or be civilized. That works too.

-DON'T forget to put on sun block. You will get burned and the proceed to peel like a banana.

-DON'T be intimitated by what the guide books tell you to do. If you don't want to do something, you don't have to. Staying in your hostel chilling all day only leaving to get food is perfectly acceptable.

-DON'T smell like a hobo, looking like one is ok though.

-DON'T be mean to locals. Otherwise they won't give you that extra cup of chai or extra pickle. Be nice, man.

-DON'T take clean cothes for granted. I only get them washed when my pants supply is low.

-DO travel with an open mind, expect the unexpected and just go with the flow and you'll be having so much fun you won't ever want to go back home.

The land of pho.

Long time no write, and for that I am sorry. I could make up excuses as to why I've neglected this blog but I shan't try to excuse my lazyness though I have to admit I take some pride in that.
Since my last (rather cheerful) update, I've bid India goodbye, and though I had my lows, I left feeling overwhelmingly in love with the country. Almost twelve weeks we spent together, and I wouldn't trade them for anything. The diversity the country posses, the people, the food... I could go on for a long time but I shan't bore you. I will tell you that the state of Kerala is one of th most beautiful places I've ever been to. And that I had goat I mean great Christmas and New Year's on Goa. And yes, I did behave. For the most part.

After virtually no sleep from New Year's shenanigans and early morning flights with layovers, I arrived in Bangkok, Thailand where I ony spent a mere 3 days gorging on delicious street food and sleeping on the loudest beds in the history of the world. I witnessed a Danish elder having a self pleasuring moment on the computer of the hostel's lobby (he was looking at girls photos on FB. WTF?) and was then hit on by a lady boy. Pretty standard.

After the whistlestop visit to the kingdom I jetted off to Vietnam to meet Ofira, a friend whom I'd met 4 years ago in Peru and Argentina when we were volunteering there together. Luckily if one is in possesion of a Finnish passport, one doesn't need to apply for a Vietnamese visa nor does one have to pay for it. After gleefully smiling at all the other folk at Hanoi airport who had to wait in line to have their visa approved and pay for it, I rushed to fetch my bag which has managed to reach mammoth proportions and met Ofira. We finally made into Hanoi City after spending a good hour in a crammed minibus stuck in a traffic jam. We found a cheap hostel with free beer (I was sold the moment I aw the free beer sign, though sadly the beer turned out be watery swill) and a decent dorm, and then left to fil our starving stomachs. And the moment I got that hot, almost bucket sized bowl of pho infront of me, I just sighed and went to heaven for a moment. And omnomnom.

After spending a day exploring what Hanoi offers, we jumped onto a snazzy night bus and headed up to the North of the country, to a small town called Sa Pa with stunning views, ride paddies and terrace farming. Arriving there at 6am was so cold. I was glad I don't have gonads as I don't where they would've been. After showers we rented a motorbike and headed for the hills to see some waterfalls and a high pass. I even taught Ofira how to ride the bike, and it was a success. Well, apart from when she dropped the bike twice. But Sa Pa was absolutely beatiful and breathtaking, and very different to the Vietnam that is advertised. A place well worth visiting if you're planning to go.

From Sa Pa we headed back down to Ha Long bay on another night bus. This bus was less nice than the bus from the night before but we made it to Ha Long none the less in one piece. We booked a boat tour as well as bus ticket for our third consecutive night bus. There really isn't that much to see in Ha Long City itself, most of the happenings are on an island on the bay, but we settled for ambling on the sea front and then headed for the tour. The boat took us around the bay, and even on a misty day the scenery was beautiful. Included in the tour was also a visit to some caves, an the were very stunning with striking stalagtites and stalagmites lit with different coloured lights.  We finished our tour with good spirits, and went in search of pho, tea and a bakery. After finding all three, we were mentally preparing for the bus ride ahead, due to take us all the way down to Hue. And no amount of preparedness could have prepared us for what was ahead of us.

Vietnam has sleeper buses for tourists, and then ones for locals. Unfortunately, the idiot in Ha Long charged us a tourist bus ticket, but we were plonked on a local bus. The journey that was supposed to take a reasonable 13 hours ended up lasting 23,5 hours. At least we weren't the only other foreigners on the bus, but unfortunately they were a cretinous, drunk swedish couple and his Mum who didn't speak English. I don't even want to think about what her bus journey was like. Anyhoo, Ofira and I got beds at the very end of the bus on the upper level (luckily the beds were horizontal so I actually slept) and squeezed ourselves and our backpacks up there, cozied into our silk sleeping bags and attempted to drown out the sound of the drunk swedes. At 1am Ofira woke me up and we then discovered that the bus had driven to a petrol statio in Hanoi to fill up and in the process had got caught up in some low-hanging electrical wiring. This had resulted in one of the emergency exits on the roof to be flung off completely, and the other one (which was conviniently directly above me) to open quite a bit. The lost exit was retrieved, the other one shut a bit so that it still remained open for the remainder of the trip, and after some playing around with string the loose door was tied to the interior of the bus so we could continue our journey.

We were told that we should be arriving in Hue at around 10am, and so when I woke up around 9am I was getting prepared to arrive in Hue. Well, that arrival time of 10am was dead wrong as we discovered. We stopped for lunch at around midday and this Vietnamese lady was feeding me all this food that we were given. We were then asking the others if they knew where we were, and we discovered we weren't even halfway between Hanoi and Hue. Oh. My. God. Thus we spent an entire day on that bus, and one point a local guy joined our upper level dwellings, played cards with us and fed us snacks. After a dinner (with the same lady feeding me again) we finally arrived in Hue. At 8.30pm. Boom. Shower and quite lot of beer, and I slept well.

Hue is nothing to go on about, but Hoi An is. More beautiful at night, the town gets covered in colourful lanterns, and has a nice atmosphere. We also took a trip to My Son, some old Hindu temple ruins near Hoi An, which were beautiful nesteled in a msty mountain scenery. Two delightful nights in an actual bed in hotels, and we were back on a bus for the night, this time to Da Lat where we rented motorbikes and rode around taking in the beauty that Vietnam has to offer, and I had my very Long Way Round moments cruising around on the bikes. After a slightly cold and wet day, Ofira and I were gearing up for our last night together, to be spent on, you guessed it, another bus. We were headed for Ho Chi Minch City, or Saigon as it used be known as where I'd stay for a few days to recuperate from our manic travelling and Ofira would be travelling home.

Arriving at any place at 4am with no where to go is the least fun I can think of. But atleast this bus station had a cafe wih comfy sofas so I napped and we felt that at half six we could go and drop our bags off my hostel (18 bed dorm, booyah!) and then headed to the War Remnance museum (via a bakery! Delish custard tarts!). The museum was thorough, and had striking photos of the effects of the Vietnam War (known as the American War in Vietnam) and Agent Orange. Being in Vietnam and now in Camboda, it's made me realize how humand are far too developed for their own good, and we use all this knowledge and ability to create weapons to hurt others and kill each other. Kind of sickening.

After bidding Ofira goodbye, I spent three days in HCMC doing nothing. I ate, I drank, I walked. That's it. I then went to Can Tho, the biggest town in the Mekong Delta for the floating market they had there (lots of pineapple nd watermelon!) and for a foodie tour recommended on Trip Advisor. I tried to do a cooking class in Vietnam, but they were incredibly expensive so I opted to do this tour with Phuoc instead. Phuoc is a 19-year old guy who is studying Can Tho, and also organises food tours in Can Tho for $5 dollars (you also pay for your own food, my grub totalled at around $3,5) in the evenings for willing tourists. I lucked out by being the only person on the tour! Phuoc's level of english is phenomenal, and for the 3 hours we spent together he kept up with my fast jibber jabber and not once did our conversation falter. He was very good about answering all my questions on Vietnamese culture, and is incredibly knowledgeable. Anyway back to the food: first he took me to a place where I had vietnamese spring rolls (you made the rolls yourself!) with pork, herbs, salad, lotus root, carrot, pineabble, cucumber and rice noodles with a thick soya dipping sauce. AND OH MY IT WAS SO GOOOOOOOOOD and then Phuoc complimented me on my chop stick skills! The epic spring rolls were followed by little deep fried mince pork and bean buns at another place, wrapped in herbs and lettuce. OMNOMNOM. Then we had Vietnamese  hot dogs, YUM and then a drink at a local cafe. A perfect evening *u*


After Can Tho, I went to Chau Doc also in the Mekong Delta to get a boat to the border of Vietnam and Cmabodia, and then proceeded to Phnom Penh. SO far I am in love with Cambodia, but I'll tel you all about that in the next post because I am sure by this point you can't be arsed to read anymore, and to be frank, I'm too lazy to write more. Toodles, lovelies!

Ps. My Cambodian visa says Maria Charrington (Y)

Pps. Enjoy the muzak I enjoyed whilst typing this: