World Cup Euphoria in Spain! - 11 July 2010

Watching World Cup Finals along w Spaniards.. AWESOME!!
Shouted till we lost our voice, stayed out so late till no transport, ended up with aching legs (YES, till NOW!) cos we walked for hrs back to our hotel...but totally WORTH it! See if u can feel atmosphere fr the pics....

View pictures here

Our route so far.....

View Mehhu Gap year/2 in a larger map

Hola - Live from Spain on 7 Jul

Hola! We arrived in Spain, Malaga, last Friday after a 3 hours flight delay....

Spent a day and a half catching up on sleep and took a walk around town. Lucky us, Malaga's weather had been welcoming for us...not that hot. We left on Mon and took a 2 hour bus to a little hot town, Ronda, and the ride was beautiful! Reminded us of our travel in India...hot, no itinerary...hop on a bus and travel...the Spanish have been friendly and smiley too! We are learning Spanish fast too cos the locals hardly speak any English. 

Si, no, uno, cinco, cero, gracias, la cuenta...hola, adios, dos...hehe..

With failed attempts to WOOF around Ronda, we have checked ourselves into a cool eco friendly yurt for the next few days to chill out in the wild and green...and plan for our next stop in Spain.

This is most probably our last blog for the trip...do not be sad if you have been faithful followers..the photos will still be uploaded onto facebook. With 5-6 weeks left to go and limited internet access here...we have decided to just relax, chill, cut off from internet (apart from checking up on the trip!) and enjoy what's left! 

Time flies and we were still home sick on week 6. Now with less than 6 weeks to go, we do not yearn to go home...hehe...

Beautiful pictures of Spain below...Adios and see u in Singapore!!

Seat on the bus - we should have this back home. So cool!

Time of arrival in Spain!

Our first Tapas! 

Crab Salad and Spanish Omelet

The dried up river next to our hotel. Global warming is really bad everywhere...saw so many dried up rivers in India, England etc..

Makes me so conscious of using water nowadays. 

Remember to bring ur shopping bag when buying stuffs and reduce, reuse and recycle whenever you can...

The beach next to Malaga town.

Streets of old town in Malaga. Check out the shelter used to block out the heat..

Japanese newsapaper man!

Bus ride to Ronda

Sunflower fields!!! plenty along the way..

Gorge of Ronda. This is the view from our hotel room! Cool ah? but i got a little scared just looking out of the balcony...hehe

Bull fight in the oldest bull ring in Spain!

Let's see which bull is more fierce?

So who wins?

That's our hotel. Perched right on the cliff.

(Min, there were alot of tourists snapping photos of our hotel, cliff and bridge at the view point opposite us! Reminded us of you and Santorini)

Sunset view of Ronda.

Night view of the bridge from our hotel. 

(ps: the architect of this bridge jumped down from here after it was completed cos he felt that he would never built another one so beautiful..)

Our yurt! Peiyi, since we can't make it to Mongolia, this is probably the closest we can get here..haha

This is the coolest place and closest to nature apart from the desert under the stars in India..

That's where we are sleeping tonight and next few days..

Electricity run by solar panel. 

Water from mountain..

Outdoor shower and toilet.  There's no doors!

The most cool thing is the toilet..

No water but uses woodshed and everything self compost. 

The place is listed as one of the most eco-friendly accommodation in Spain! If you are interested, check out http://www.yurthotel.com/

Adios!

Arriving in London on our 5yrs wedding Anniversary - 12 June

We arrived in London 5 days ago and I thought I would have alot of time to myself when the World Cup starts to blog but apparently NOT. London isn't quite what I remembered to be...after all, it has been more than 10 years since I last came.

For a start, people we met at the airport had been super friendly and patient. We understood everything cos it was all in ENGLISH! The transport system is super tourist friendly, clear signages and every bus stop has map indicating where we are etc...think we can probably walk about without a map in London!

Arriving from Athens, London appears to be alot cleaner, organised, less rowdy, pleasant and exciting. And luckily for us, the weather has been great! Not too cold or warm.

There was a fair  on Sunday and we were happy to be there...home-cooked dinner followed by world cup match for Jeff...

Mon was spent hotel shopping for my sis and bro-in-law who will be arriving tomorrow morning!

Tue, we caught a play, MouseTrap and spent more time exploring the city centre...

Wed, we watched Sex and the City 2! Dun trust the poor reviews! If u like Sex and the City, it's just as girly good! haha..even Jeff enjoyed it!

Today, we were supposed to head out to Greenwich but the S.Korea vs Argentina was too good to be missed by Jeff that we headed back to Liying's plc to catch it. That's why I'm sitting here...writing this blog...hehe..

Ok, some photos to share on London...and if internet is stable, more posts of India we wrote on our plane ride here..

Glimpse of London from the plane

Once in a year Marylebone Fair!

Children's rides..

Exciting Spanish food...too full to try after dim sum in the morning..

But had some space for Churros and summer drink

Oysters too good to miss...

(according to those who tried..)

Our hosts in London!

Meet Liying and Yongtai =)

There were dance floors at the fair! Cool!

And we saw David Beckham!!!



Lookalike...haha.. (but it did says, Take a photo with David Beckham..)

The day ended with Bak Kut Teh and oyster spinach cooked by Liying!








 

Yummy Sichuan food

Reminded us of the delicious Sichuan food we had with Wouter N Zanne in Dongguan. Hey, u two can try when in London!

Looks spicy and oily? but GOOD!

Plans after dinner?

Catch the Hogwarts express at Kings Cross station!

Only Jeff made it into the platform...

The 1st play we watched....Do u wanna know who's the killer? hehe











 

In the theatre, it was so steep that Jeff felt nausea...haha






 

Busy day at Trafalgar Square..

I'm attracted to the big shoe..and can't decide which musical to watch!!

Managed to watch Sex and the City 2!! Yeah!

Who says it's not good?

We had the whole cinema to ourselves with other 7 people! haha..morning show..








 

We met a guy at the Athens airport who said that we have to visit the British Museum to see the other half of Acropolis...

Check what it says about their possession of Parthenon in Acropolis..

And they probably have half the world's treasures!!!








 

All very well preserved...and we also suspect that they have more Mummy than Egypt!

Leg 3 of our trip - Enjoy life our 2nd home in Amsterdam 8 - 24 May

Amsterdam was our pit stop to take a break from our travelling.

Before we started on this trip, I never understood why people need to take a holiday while on a holiday. Now I do. Continuously travelling tires one out. The motion of sightseeing, eat, sleep, pack and long hours on train or buses does tire one out. Sometimes, it kills off the beauty of a place cos attractions look the same after a while.

We started asking fellow travellers if they are tired of travelling too...Some has been travelling for years, some for months and some on a 6 months break from work, life or on a long honeymoon. Thankfully, most said yes. At some point, it got me to pondering if it's cos we are not suitable to travel for long! But now, after 4 months of travelling, we don't wanna go back! hehe..I guess once we break through the runner's wall, there's no turning back!

We are very lucky to have friends residing in Europe and friends visiting Europe. They helped us to cure a large part of homesickenss and food supplies from S'pore. Being foodies, we missed food back home the most! We can never walked past an Asian restaurant without getting excited. Haha...so when we got to Amsterdam, we ate our filled!

Here's photos of our pigging out time when we were in Amsterdam 2 months back..hehe and our great time in Amsterdam!

Click on the links below for photos...

Day Trip to Keukenhof

Pigging out days in Holland


...

2 weeks in Holland! May 7 - 24

After the hit and run 2 days in Nepal, we arrived in the cold Amsterdam on May 7! 

Looking back, we were in 5 countries in less than a week. 

Mon - India, Tue - Nepal, Thur - Greece, Fri - Netherlands. Quite an achievement, isn't it?

And guess what after we left Nepal, the strikes ended on Friday! Happy for PY and KX cos it means they will not be stranded and can head to Tibet. As for us, though it was a shame that we are unable to travel & work in Nepal as planned, we were happy to head to Europe earlier too....especially to the house of Zandvoort!

After almost 9 weeks of travelling, it was great to take a break and stay in our good friends' place. =) We had been quite tired from the travelling..hehe...and it was great to recharge for the next leg of our trip. Coming to Europe was on original plan 1 (costly then took out..) then we had plan 2 to go Tibet & China after Nepal and now by twist of fate, we are back to plan 1 - Greece! So it didn't help to plan too far ahead...and it makes it more exciting!

We have alot of reflections for India and have a few more posts for India too. Will dish them out when ready...right now, we are really far behind with our blogs and frens have been asking "why no updates?!" and if we are still continuing with our blog. hehe. 

It's strange that when we are not travelling and have internet access almost 24 hr a day, why no updates? haha... Well, life at the Zandvoort had been pretty fun and occupied. We spent our days eating out (dim sum, singapore-malaysia food etc), shopping, watch movies, cook yummy meals (we even had home made steamboat!!), visit tulips garden, cycle around, go to markets (like our pasar malam), chit chatting, surfing web for England (yes, we are gg England to fulfill Jeff's dream - Manchester!)... So we have been very busy and two weeks went past in a flash!! 

Part 2 of our 6mths break will be time abroad with friends!

So it's time to head on the road again tomorrow..next stop - Belgium.

Before that, here's some nice pictures of things we have been doing in Holland!

 Day 1 - Arrival and pickup by Suzanne!! =)

Day 2 - Dutch Breakfast with Wouter & Zanne

Sunset view from their balcony

Our little adventure ride to town..

Visit to tulips garden - Keukenhof

Strolling and cuddling in the tulips garden.. =)

Feeding ducklings in the pond..

Streets of Amsterdam city..

Torturing rides for the Zanne & Wouter cos we were too slow for them!!

Chef Wouter preparing his delicious salad!!

Checking out their market..

Our cosy sleeping corner in the living room..

BBQ in the park with more Singaporean frens on holidays!