Landed

Well we managed to convince the nice BA man at the counter that we did actually have three bags each as our allowance for the flight (note, pay for an extra bag on the internet before you fly - it's much cheaper) and then we were off.

So, we're in Sweden now, and though we will do a few touristy things (if I have anything to say about it), our main purpose here is to set up our flat, get married and recharge before our big adventure which starts on the 8th September.

For those of you planning to come to Sweden for our wedding later on this month, there will be a race for those of you who travel from the airport to Nynäshamn. The clock starts ticking when when you head through the doors from the baggage section to the outside world and ends when the train pulls into the station at Nynäshamn. Prizes for the winners.

For those a little less adventurous, I will be compiling a set of picture instructions which should help you find the way and putting them on our wedding blog.

Now we're off to see if the Swedish authorities will permit us to get married here - yikes! I hope so, or else all this work will have gone to waste... I hope none of the people invited to the wedding are reading this now...

We're about to head off

The adventure starts here, well for Vaniah it does, I'm just going back home for a few weeks.

If anyone thinks its difficult living out of a suitcase for such a long time? No problem - just bring a boatload of suitcases, as you can see we are... :)
And a golfbag.
Who says going around the world is roughing it??

We've been running around like little mad people for the past few days sorting out the admin, packing up, shipping things so apologies for the ones we havent been getting back to, fortunately they have phones and internet in Sweden too.

You'll be hearing from us soon again, after our 'first leg'

Itinenerary

We are getting a lot of questions about where we are going, so I thought it might be a good idea to make that a post.
And it will also give us a perfect location to collect all the suggestions of where to stay, eat, avoid etc that people keep giving us.

So please, make use of the comments.

So this is the itinerary, though there is a big disclaimer, nothing of this is set in stone (apart from christmas, that is a fixed date)

• Japan , 10 days
• Tokyo, a few days to explore Tokyo and fight jet-lag. We'll probably hit the fish market and the camera shopping district. Once we get back from Kyoto we'll go see some Sumo wrestling and hopefully meet up with some of the people we know in Tokyo.
  
• Kyoto/Nara/Kobe(?) for a couple of days to explore some of the must-sees on a short trip. We were hoping to explore a litle bit south on the peninsula as well (There is this monestary which is supposed to be superbly tranquil, fingers crossed)
• China. 5 weeks (roughly)
• We'll start out in Beijing for a few days to see the palaces, parks, squares etc
• Xi'an will be the next stop, to see the terracotta wariors
• Off to somewhere we can spot some Pandas (Chengdu, wolong??)
  
• A yangtze cruise from chonqing to yichan
  
• To Shanghai for a few days
• Guilin, to give my new lens (see Tokyo) a whirl in some stunning surroundings
• Hong-Kong to catch our flight to Singapore
• Singapore, 1 week
  
• Meeting up with Vaniahs cousin, eating and sleeping.
• Australia 4 weeks
• Adelaide, winecountry. Enough said
• Alice springs, Uluru. Apparently that big red rock has to be seen so we will.
• East Coast, Cairns to Straddie in about 2 weeks to see some coral reefs, beautiful sand-dunes, surf etc..
• Sydney, a birthday dinner for Vaniah at the Darling Harbour, a bridge climb(?) and maybe some aussie-rules football..
• New Zealand 3.5 weeks
• Auckland, Bay of Islands, Rotouru on the north island , christchurch, the glaciers, the fjords and whalespotting on the south island.
  
• We havent really planned this, and there are so many places to see, We'll probably rent a car and stop where we feel like stopping.
• USA, 1 week
  
• Houston, meeting up with Suzanna and Neil, Vaniah's sister and brother-in-law who lives there.
  
• We will see the space centre and whisper "Houston-we-have-a-problem" at some point
• Jamaica, 2 weeks
  
• For Christmas and a second wedding reception.
  
• Peru,
  
• Iquitos and an amazon jungle lodge for a few days
• Cuzco and a trek to Machu Pichi
• Bolivia,
  
• We'll need to get to Argentina, and Bolivia is on the way. I'm sure there are interesting places to see on the way
• Argentina.
• We'll be arriving from somewhere in the north, depending how the buses go, and will be travelling south
• Mendoza is probably the first target.
  
• Then Patagonia
• Then gaucho country (I believe thats the central plains) for some horseback-riding.
• Iguazo falls.
• Buenos aires, Tango dancing, football season will just have started, can't be that bad can it?
  

We're aiming for a return in Mid March somewhere, I'd really not want to miss my grandfathers 90th birthday, so maybe thats a good target.


There, thats a general idea of what we'll be getting up to, now please give us ideas...

Last day of work this year (unless I have to mop up any mess I might have created)

There.

Now I am finally done and dusted as well. Friday afternoon, 17:00, I handed in my temporary staff pass for work and exited the building. But I expect to be back once more, that is when I find my real pass which I 'misplaced' a few weeks back. I'm sure its around here somewhere...

It feels like Vaniahs been off work for ages, but its only been a week, I guess you quickly get used to having food waiting for you when you get home from work :).

So only a little packing, beer-drinking and cleaning up to do before we're on our way, 6 days and counting... I guess life is kind of good after all..

Last day of work this year

Not sure what I want to say here but it feels like it should be a momentous occasion that I should record. I'm not planning to go back to work this year; during the next two weeks I shall be packing up my life in London and moving all my stuff to Sweden. At the end of next month we get married and then our rtw adventure really starts. But, I guess, as Johan says, my adventure has now already begun.

I'll let you know how I feel when it starts to sink in...

One week to go...

No, not until we leave for our trip, but instead one more week of work before I finish for a while. I can't wait. I've met my replacement and she is lovely so I will be leaving my team in good hands. It's weird, a year ago I was crawling up the walls to get out of that place but now I have a brilliant project with a great, functioning team and I'm actually quite sad to leave. Sad but glad of course, I will be embarking on a great adventure which I can't wait to start.

I will miss our daily morning walks to work along the Thames (pictured) but I'm sure we will continue to walk great distances, and hopefully with scenery which is just as varied and interesting as the Thames. I will miss the buzz of London though I won't miss the complete craziness and expense of it. I will miss my monthly paycheques :) but I'm sure that in the right time, I will find another job! One thing I am sure of, I won't regret throwing it all in and going on this trip.

No if only time would hurry on by...

Preparation

With less than two months to go I have realised there is a lot of work involved with taking such a long time off. Imagine that.

We are going to need advance Visas in order to be let in to some countries so that is pretty high on the list. Fortunately we are able to fill out a majority of them online, which is a great thing, unless you have a weird passport like me that crashes the application form. That struck me as a kind of funny, since I thought internationalisation support would be high on the list for an e-visa application, but that may just be me. I hope the paper based one copes better.

Vaccinations is another thing that is a pain, quite literally. Since we'll be covering a lot of ground, we'll need a lot of vaccinations, and they are not the most pleasant ones either. In fact, I count 7 individual jabs, all done over a period of 4 weeks. Is there no UN resolution about that? We've both already caught the jab-flu once and with a couple left, chances are we'll get it again. But at least its not swine-flu.

One thing that has not been that much of a problem is getting all the gear we need together. Turns out we are quite good shoppers. I'm typing this on our netbook, which we bought just to bring on the trip so we could keep on updating this very blog. We've also hunted for other travel essentials as first aid kits, trekking shoes, walking sandals, proper clothing, swiss-army knives, stuff-sacks, sink-plugs . This list goes on and on - and then on for a little bit longer. And I haven't even mentioned all of the other electronics we're bringing either, that list is fairly long as well :)

Good job we got proper backpacking backpacks that can take a lot of stuff.