The End

Well Mexico was good... while it lasted.

I am now back in Tassie, having returned home a few days early after returning to my hotel in Ixtapa with all my money, jewellery, phone and camera missing.

So I got to spend 6 hours in a Mexican police station with a translator, yay!

I decided I didn't want to keep going on tour with no camera and money and I managed to change a few of my flights, and now I'm home!

It was touch and go for a while, with my Acapulco to Mexico City flight delayed TWICE, and me trying to make a connecting flight to LA, and everyone was speaking Spanish grrr. I even got a letter apologising for the delay - in Spanish!

The day improved once hitting US soil, the Qantas guy at check in let me have an exit row no cost, and when I boarded the very full plane, the only seat free was the exit row seat next to me! Yay for space. Watched myself a movie then stretched out and slept for 10 hours, best international flight ever!

So I'm out of contact until I get a new phone but am on email if anyone needs me!

Hola!!

Hola (hello) all,


I am in Mexico!! It's very exciting. Day 2 of tour already and I am loving it!


Flew into Mexico City on an almost empty flight after an awesome morning in DC where I got a massage, ate at Ben's Chili Bowl (recommended by Anthony Bourdain) and got told I was looking beautiful but a random black man (a bit of a theme with Loz and I!). Had a row to myself on the flight and when I arrived at the airport there was a Melb girl on my transfer shuttle who was on my tour! 


Arrived at the hotel and checked in, ended up rooming with Sarah the Melb girl, too easy. We raced to the bar 10 mins before close to have a tequila shot and a margarita each. After all it is Mexico!


Up to meet our group the next day and there are only 20 all up (low for a Contiki tour, they usually fill a 50 seat bus). But everyone seems very cool, mostly Aussies as usual and a good range of ages - and I'm not the oldest!


Off to Morelia on the bus, the comfiest bus ever. Played some introductory games and then arrived in Morelia on the city's 471st anniversary so of course the old town was in full swing celebrating. No other tourist buses in sight which is a welcome change!


Proper Mexican food for lunch and I ordered off a menu in Spanish so wasn't sure what I was getting - Enchiladas Meridianes - chicken enchiladas with cubes of potato and carrot on top - weird but good! Did a 2 hour tour of the city with a local guide which was good but we were all a bit tired after the bus ride and lunch time beers... so when we got to the hotel which was right on the main square where all the celebrrtions were taking place, I had a snooze.


Included traditional Mexican dinner - cactus soup as entree! Then make your own beef fajitas with delicious guacamole and churros for dessert. Next we went out for a night on the town with the group - and what a night! Drinks all under $5 including tip, free pour alcohol and the intro of the blue motherf... (censored for my mum) drink - hereafter referred to as the blue drink of death haha. We asked for something strong and he told us this would do the job in one drink. It had at least 9 different spirits in it, maraschino cherries and some soda water - but somehow tasted syrupy and delicious and not very alcoholic! I was a fan but no one else was. Afterwards I called it a night around 1 and was feeling much better than most this morning. 3 people slept through their alarms and almost missed the bus!


Today we drove to Ixtapa, a beach town, and half of us spent the arvo at the pool which is amazing. The others went off to swim with dolphins. Soon we have another included dinner and then we're hitting the town again. Dave, book a trip here, it's totally your type of place!! 


Tomorrow we have a beach and watersports day, yay!


Photos to come when I have a chance to download them!


Buenos Dias!

Washington DC

Well I must say it's odd being by myself but I am enjoying it! DC was a good choice I think - the weather has been perfect in the mid-20s and it's a very beautiful city. Lots of lovely old buildings, speccy monuments and gardens and parks.


I am managing to find my way around pretty easily. The streets are numbered and the cross-streets are lettered so it's easy to know how far you have til your destination. I'm staying at O and 20 streets which is quite central but in a nice quiet street. My hotel is very zany but I knew that when I booked it! It's 5 old houses joined together into a 'mansion'. There are 100 rooms and 32 secret doors and every room is themed and jam-packed with bric-a-brac, antiques, books (they have over 30,000 books!) and just weird stuff.


I'm in the Newport suite, which is usually $750 a night but it was free so they let me have it! 3 bedrooms, 2 with giant king beds and a bathroom with the world's best shower - literally! It has an overhead rainfall function which is my favourite, as well as a normal shower head, side spray jets, a foot massager and it converts into a spa bath as well. Oh and it has 3 different lighting settings and a radio. Score!!


On my first full day I braved the public transport system and went to the zoo. It's a lovely zoo, free to get in and I spent a whole afternoon there just wandering. I saw the giant pandas, the octopus feeding and my favourite - the naked mole rats. Such weird looking creatures!! They also had some exotic spiders including the world's largest - Goliath bird eating spider. Gross.


Here's some pics:

Naked mole rat!

Mexican yellow knee tarantula - let's hope I don't see any of these in Mexico!

Goliath:

The next day I booked onto a tour to see the sights as it was just going to be too hard to walk/taxi/bus to them all. The tour was 6 hours and went to:

US Capitol Building
Washington Monument
World War II Memorial
Jefferson Memorial
FDR Memorial

Martin Luthor King Jr Memorial
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Lincoln Memorial
Korean Memorial
Marine Corps Memorial (Iwo Jima)
The White House
Arlington Cemetery

and we also did a Boat Cruise Up the Potomac River.

I took around 300 photos so I must have had fun! 

Me and my buddy Abe:

Washington monument:

Iwo Jima Memorial:

Pretty exhausted after all that so I treated myself to a margarita and a smoked chicken and pecan salad at Hard Rock Cafe. Yum.

Today I went to the National Art Gallery's Sculpture garden which was good. Then the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History which was good but full of annoying kids and not as good as the one Loz and I did in NY. I did see the Hope Diamond though which is pretty impressive. I also went to the White House Visitor Centre. Currently I am resting my blistered feet!

Then tomorrow afternoon I am off to Mexico!!

Taxiing and Cruising to the Bahamas

After our stint in Orlando we were amped up for our Bahamas cruise! 


Oddly, Orlando has no public transport to the Port and all the shuttle companies I enquired with didn't get back to me, so we paid $168 for a taxi to the Port, with the taxi driver who had given us her card on the way from the airport. 


Now hindsight is a wonderful thing; we had taken several taxis while in Orlando and had some nice cabbies so why we called Ellen is beyond me. She talked our ear off on the way from the airport so why would we take an hour an a half cab ride with her? I question our sanity but we endured the ride and indeed arrived in time for our cruise. 


Boarding was a fairly smooth process and I was told by a porter I should tip for good service so I gave him $5 to take our bags. Once he'd walked away I noticed a sign saying porters are salaried and not to tip them however when we got to our room our bags were there and I heard people complaining 4 hours later that they still hadn't received theirs - so I consider it an investment!


We wandered around and quickly oriented ourselves - it wasn't a huge ship so we shouldn't get lost although for some reason I kept going up instead of down and vice versa.


Our cabin was on deck 6 out of 12 so fairly well located and with an above water porthole window. Very small but comfortable although next time I'd consider splurging for a suite if it was a longer cruise.


Our ship:

We went and had the buffet lunch and were suitably impressed - full salad bar, bread selection, 12-15 hot dishes plus a make your own burger or hot dog bar with salads and condiments. Plus 3 different soups, fruits and desserts and a range of water cordials, teas and coffee. Not bad for an included lunch!! No wonder they refer to Royal Caribbean's cruises as '5kg cruises' although ours is luckily only 3 nights.


In the afternoon we did trivia which was mostly about the USA so we failed miserably. Then we had a nap and went for our dinner in the restaurant (you could do a serviced dinner or the buffet or there is also a pizza bar). Such a hard life. The menu was lovely - I had roast garlic soup and a lamb shank with vegies followed by choc mint mousse cake and lemon sorbet. By dessert we'd cottoned onto the fact that it's not a normal 3 course menu - the couple next to us had 4 entrees, 3 mains and 4 desserts! Something to remember for next time...


Overnight we sailed to Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas and we disembarked at lunch time. There were a heap of optional activities but we wanted to shop and hang around so we did just that!


We shopped for souvenirs and dresses and had a look in a few of the fancy jewellery stores. Up to 80% off diamonds in some of them but they were still a bit above my budget! We had been told to try the local delicacy conch so we found a cafe and I had some conch chowder and grouper fingers while Loz had fried conch. Loz tried the local beer Kalik and I tried the local cocktail Goombay Smash. All very good.


Docked in Nassau:

Fried conch:

We dropped out shopping at the ship and then went on a sunset champagne cruise around the bay - a fantastic time! 4 champers each (1/2 glasses) and a cocktail while we cruised around the harbour and saw all the big houses (including Tiger Woods and Oprah's) and chatted to some people off the cruise. A lovely time indeed:





When we got back we couldn't be bothered doing the whole serviced dinner thing so we grabbed some plates at the buffet and retired early. We arrived back in our cabin to find that the stateroom attendant had made us a towel gorilla!





The next day we docked at Cococay, Royal Caribbean's private Bahamas island. We took the transfer to shore and went parasailing! Amazing! Beautiful clear waters and barely a person in sight at that time of day. By the it was nearly 10am so obviously it was time for cocktail of the day - after all it did come in a souvenir cup! Some sunbaking and a paddle in the Caribbean sea and back to the ship for lunch - tried 4 different curries at the buffet and all were delicious!


The others parasailing - obviously I couldn't photograph us!

Cococay beach:

View from our parasail speedboat:

Tried our hand at trivia again and came second, not bad since it was all about US tv shows. A swim in the rooftop saltwater pool and then off for another nap and to repack our cases - the cruise has been relaxing but has gone very quickly!! Off for our dinner reservation where we were more resourceful this time and shared 3 entrees, had a main each and then shared 3 desserts. Off to bed while we sail back to Florida.


We had a tight connection when we returned so we called our fave taxi driver Ellen who came to pick us up. We asked her to come at 8.30 but she assured us it would take ages to disembark so she showed up at 8.50. Of course we deboarded smoothly and had been sitting there since 7.55am... we were pretty mad but she knocked the price down a bit and we got to the airport on time so that was that.


And then we checked into our separate airlines and had to say goodbye. I must say I left a bit lost when Loz left - who will organise me and get me up in the mornings and tell me where my room is and have the key in hand when we get there??

Luckily my sadness was lessened when I was bumped up to Premium Economy so a family could sit together - thanks United! The joys of a solo traveller - what will I get up to now! Next stop Washington DC!

Some Photos from Orlando

Hogsmeade (Harry Potter village) replica at Universal Studios

Hogwarts replica which has a ride inside it

Harry Potter Butterbeer (delicious!)

Loz on the Carou-Seuss-el

Back to the Future baby!

Some poor people stuck at the very top of a rollercoaster

Christie Crockett, King of the wild frontier!

Some dwarves made from hedges at Disney

World's largest Hard Rock Cafe and live venue (where we saw Slash)

Some Photos from New Orleans

Peel n eat crawfish at Jazz fest

Our Po'boys at Johnnys

Atchafalaya basin

New Orleans

Some locals getting married

Rebuilding after Katrina - this guy has built his house 8 feet above sea level

Look closelyand you can see the waterline - one of the few remaining houses after Katrina

Another Katrina survivor

Our swamp airboat

Me on the airboat tour

New Orleans swamp gator

Airboat tour scenery

Jazz Fest to Theme Parks

Well day 2 of Jazz fest was also HOT but we spent the morning in the city so we wouldn't be there for such a long time in the heat. Went and lined up at Johnny's for lunch - they do the original po' boy (poor boy sandwich) where we split a fried oyster one and a surf n turf - roast beef and gravy with fried shrimp - sounds gross but it totally works!

Off on the bus to jazz fest where we headed straight for the Blues and Gospel tents to try and avoid the sun. Then we spent 2 hours (during which it was rainy, sunny and hot, cloudy and windy at different times) watching the epic Foo Fighters set on the main stage. Not as packed as the Eagles the day before but still very busy. They sounded great live and interacted with the crowd heaps.

Later that night we had a reservation at Brennan's, one of New Orleans' oldest and most prestigious restaurants. I tried turtle soup which was nice.

The next day we were up at 3.30am for our airport transfer and the whole day was pretty much a write off travelling to Orlando until the evening where we headed up to the world's biggest Hard Rock Cafe to see Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators featuring Slash. Yes, Slash the former Guns n Roses guitarist, known to be one of the best in the world. Fantastic concert!

The next 2 days were Universal Studios - day 1 the Islands of Adventure park featuring Harry Potter world and the day 2 the traditional studios. Both great days although day 1 got off to a rough start when we were late getting there and then the first ride broke down on us! At least we got given an express pass to ride later on.

Tried Butterbeer in Harry Potter world, delicious! Did all the rides as you do and then of course we spotted Slash and the band from the night before just hanging out in leather and doing Harry Potter rides! 

Went and saw the Avengers in 3D IMAX, fantastic!

Tomorrow is Disney where we are trying to conquer 4 theme parks in a day, ambitious yes but if anyone can do it we can!

Pics to follow, the internet is being glitchy.

Hi to all and happy almost mother's day to our mums :-)

Some of What We've Been Doing - Part 2

From Memphis we had a night in Lafayette on our way to New Orleans. Not much around the hotel but we signed up for a Cajun Sensation evening of food and dancing. It was a bit of fun and the grilled catfish with shrimp etouffe, baked cheesy spud and jambalaya was amazing! Loz burned up the dance floor with the instructor much to the disappointment of our arch nemesis who wanted to be the best dancer.

Next day we were onto New Orleans via the Atchafalaya Basin where we got to go on a swamp cruise with an old cajun dude at the wheel. The swamps are really beautiful, with partly submerged trees and floating liiies. We saw some gators and lured them to the boat with chicken so we could take pics.

Into New Orleans city where our hotel is right in the French Quarter and only one street from Bourbon St (bars and red light district) - so we get the location but not the noise, nice!

Checked in and got changed for a night on a paddle steamer! Buffet dinner and a cruise down the Mississippi River with a lovely sunset and a band. Also tried the local cocktail the Hurricane, which is VERY alcoholic and yummy! Attacked by bugs towards the end but otherwise a lovely evening.

Next day we did a city tour including the rebuilding after Katrina and then headed out of the city for a swamp tour on an airboat (the ones with the big fan at the back)! Heaps of fun and we saw turtles and gators and fed the gators marshmallows. Loz held a baby gator.

Back into town and we lined up for 50 mins to dine at Acme Oyster house, a NO institution. Totally worth the wait! Chargrilled oysters to start and then some authentic gumbo and a po'boy (fried shrimp and crawfish tails in a French bun with lettuce, tomato and pickle). Crawfish is like a prawn by the way.

Today we did our first day at the NO Jazz and Heritage Festival and it was HOT! Well into the 30s, not just burning sun but muggy too with not much breeze. Great music and such a well organised festival but we were sweaty messes by the end of it. Went to a very well air conditioned restaurant for dinner- tomorrow more jazzfest including the Foo Fighters and then we're off to Orlando for theme parks!

Some of What We've Been Doing - Part 1

Since Nashville we've been soooo busy, Memphis was a highlight for both of us and then we went to Lafayette Louisiana for a night before coming to New Orleans, where we are now.


Weather is crazy, in the 30s every day which makes it hard to do anything for long (outdoors anyway!)


In Memphis we went to Sun Studio where awesome artists like Elvis and Johnny Cash recorded, very cool. Went to where Martin Luther King was killed and also Beale St for some blues - we were hard pressed to find any real blues however the bands there were good.


Second day in Memphis we went to Graceland - although very tired and hungover from the 'free pour' cocktails on Beale St, we had a good time. I'm now an Elvis fan and managed to take over 200 photos there!


2 major food highlights in Memphis - Gus's World famous hot n spicy fried chicken - AMAZING, so amazing we wanted to eat the bones... and Rendezvous' dry rub ribs mmmm. Pics below. We also ended up getting along really well with a lot of the 'oldies' on tour and some of them went to Gus's and Rendezvous and enjoyed our awesome food highlights too :-)


Sun Recording Studios:

World's best chicken at Gus's:

Lounge room off the foyer at Graceland:

Tinned possum, discovered at a random rest stop:

Rendezvous ribs n chicken combo:

New Orleans update to come!

Making friends ... Not so much

So Nashville.... Not really a big fan but what can you do... They play country music everywhere... Even in the bathrooms so noone is safe :( we were good though and did that grand opry shit.... I would rather see hinder.. Yeah I said it! AND they stopped serving drinks an hour before it finished!!!! How retarded... I may have fallen asleep during one of the 91 year old midget cowboys song.. Good times! And we totally have a nemesis on tour YAY ... Just the sound of her voice makes me wanna rampage!!! She only eats fruit and air, appears to only drink water and during our photo stop yesterday she ran up and down stairs... Yeah my kinda person... In the land of not :) she was bagging us out to some old bird coz we don't like country .... Ah yeah coz country is lame... I'm gonna ram some blues down her throat today in Memphis ... See how she likes that shit Ok enough of the rant haha I hope everyone is well back home xox