Cusco, Macchu Picchu and Lake Titicaca

Hello!

Right now, I am sitting on a boat heading back from Isla del Sol to Copacabana. It is a long trip of 1,5 hours, so this gives me the chance to give an update on our adventures. 

So, the last time I was writing, we were in Cusco. We arrived there two weeks ago, the 6th of November. We were starting our hike the 10th, but due to the altitude during the hike, we were advised to stay a minimum of three days in Cusco. Cusco itself is at 3100 meters, and during our hike we would be reaching 4500 meters (!!), so those three days would allow us to get used to the altitude. We arrived in Cusco around 18h,  and did not really feel any difference. We decided to go out for dinner. Claudio found a cute place 1km from our hostel. Ok no problem! However, Cusco has steep streets, and we to climb a bit. Now we were definitely feeling the difference! We were out of breath immediatly! Even worse, we couldn't find the place... For some reason, the numbering of the houses in the streets is not really cronological, and google maps does not always work. In the meantime, we encountered this problem already multiple times, but this was the first time. So we could not find it and just went to another restaurant nearby. We ordered a pisco sour (a typical Peruvian cocktail, delicious!), and some pizza. We started eating, and all of the sudden we felt lightheaded, disoriented, and superweird. My stomack started turning, damn! We left the restaurant as fast as we could and realised it was the altitude getting to us. For one moment we thought the waiter, who clearly chewed too many coca leaves, slipped something in our drinks, but it was just the altitude. We went to bed early, and slept alot. 

The next day, we already felt better, and headed out to explore the city. Wow, Cusco is so beautiful! We both love it! 

Cusco by night

Plaza de Armas, Cusco

We went to Plaza de Armas, which is the main square and is surrounded by beautiful churches, and other colonial buildings. We learned that the Spaniards destroyed all the temples of the Inca cultures, as they cotained a lot of gold. So they were basically just melted down. So sad to think about it... And it makes you feel guilty that you like the colonial buildings set up by the Spaniards :s 

We walked a bit more uphill, and discovered a beautiful fountain. The area was some kind of hippie place, with a cool relaxed vibe. 

At the end of that day, we went out for dinner, and unfortunately, the next day was not a good day for me and my intestants... I will not go to much into detail, but lets just say I had to stay in as I needed to use the toilet quite often :D

The following day we had a guided tour of the city. This was included in our package with Cusi Travel, for our hike the following day. We visted the center again, but also visted some local markets and saw how people actually live. What a difference with the touristic bubble we were in for three days! People are quite poor in Peru, and this was our first confrontation with reality. Still, Peruvians are kind people and rather shy, not intimidating at all. So we never felt unsafe. We just felt really TALL! All the market stands were like 1m65 high, and we constantely had to bend not to hit the top of the stands. 

Local market in Cusco

It was a really nice tour, and we would recommend it if you are ever in Cusco. Just check out Cusi travel! 

So, right now I'm not on a boat anymore but on a bus towards La Paz. I will continue writing from here as I have gour hours to kill :-)

So, the day after our guided tour we were going to start our hike! We got up at 5.45h, had an early breakfast, and at 6.30h our guide came and picked us up. We drove 1,5h and arrived in Calca. Here you had a little local market where we bought a warm jacket for Claudio, some gloves and hats for when it would get cold at night. We drove another 2 hours and arrived in Lares, where we were going to start our hike. The first hours were already hard, cause we climbed from 3100 to 3700 meters!! It was also very warm so it was pretty tough. However, the views were just spectacular! It was just me, Claudio, and the guide in the middle of the Andes. No other person anywhere... It was so silent, just magnificent. 

Lares hike, Claudio and Juan our guide

Views during the Lares hike

Views during Lares hike

After a couple of hours we arrived at our campsite. It was getting dark and cold, so we put all our warmest clothes on, brrr. There was also no shower, warm water, electricity... Just nature, the moutains and lots of animals (horses, alpaca, lama, dogs, sheep, ...). All the animals also live freely in the mountains, it must be like paradise for them! And they were all so cute and sweet, even the dogs. Anyway, back to the hike :) So, we slept at -5 degrees in our tents, but strangely enough we slept well. We got up at 6am and started the rest of our hike, up to 4500 meters! I was dying OMG. The air was horrible and it was so difficult to breath! But at 12h, we were at the top. We made it!! 

Climbing :)

Sleeping in the valley

¡ Lama's everywhere !

We had lunch, and started decending again, till arriving at 2800 meters again. The third day, we climbed till 3500 again (grrr I though the climbing was over). We saw an old Inca ruin, and our guide explained is alot about the Inca culture, which was really interesting. Finally, we arrived in Ollantaytambo, a small touristic town which is visited for its Inca ruins as well. Finally we could relax. The hiking was over. After three days without showering or going to a decent toilet, we longed for a clean hotelroom. So, we took the train from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Caliente with Perurail. We learned from our guide that Perurail has a monopoly for arriving in Aguas Caliente, the town from which you can visit Macchu Picchu. So you cannot get there by car, motorcycle, bus, ... Even the buses that bring you from Aguas Caliente to Macchu Picchu are brought into town by train! The only other way you could get into Aguas Caliente is walking from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Caliente, but it's about 35km. We met a couple that was actually doing that, as they could not afford the 100$ train ticket! 

Anyway, we took the train and arrived in Aguas Caliente and our lovely hotel room.

For Claudio however, the day was not finished yet... Our guide had told us about the possibility to climb a mountain facing Macchu Picchu. It was a free climb however, there is no official path. Hm, ok, not my thing, plus I was so sick of climbing djeeeez! But Claudio went anyway :) and he made it! He had a nice view over Macchu Picchu so he saw it one day before me. Bravo Clappie!

Behind Claudio the mountain he climbed.

The next morning we were off to Macchu Picchu! We took the first bus to get there at 5.20h so we got up at 4.15h :s. We did this because we wanted to see the sunrise. But we were unlucky because it was super foggy, damn! Anyway, there were only a 100 people there when we entered the site, so it felt a little bit like we had the place to our own... So nice. We also hiked to the sungate to get a nice view from Macchu Picchu (another hike ;) ). It was magnificent. Truly the most beautiful thing that we have ever seen in our lives. The pictures don't do it justice. You have to see it, as it is surrounded by the jungle and different mountains. It's just amazing. 

Macchu Picchu

In the evening, we headed back to Cusco with the train (4 long hours). We stayed there for another two days, just to rest from our tyring hike. But last Friday, it was time to say goodbye to cutsie Cusco . We were sad to leave as we really loved it here! But it was time a new adventure. Up to lake Titicaca!

We took a night bus from Cusco to Puno, which is a town at the Peruvian side of the lake. We drove with Cruz del Sur, which has really nice busses. We read about so many horror stories of accidents and drunk bus drivers, so we decided to go with a more reliable company. It was an 8 hour trip, very comfortable. At sunrise we arrived at the lake. 

Puno itself it not really nice actually, and we were happy to leave for Copacabana, the Bolivian side of the lake. So we hopped on another bus. We crossed the border easily, it's so good to be European. We just got a smile and a stamp on our passports. Americans on the other side had to fill in some documents and had to pay 130$. An American girl told us that it's the same for Peru, Brasil, and other South American countries. They do it because the US treats them in the same way. So it's some kind of "revenge"...

After three hours we arrived in Copacabana. It was so beautiful! The next day, we got up early, and took a boat trip of 2 hours to get to Isla del Sol. We went to the north side of the island, and did a four hour hike over the island to get to the south side. Many people did the same, and it was also a fun way to get to know people! We also noticed that there were many people that we saw in Cusco or Macchu Picchu, that were now with us in Copacabana. So weird!

So, the hike was tough again, climbing in the hot sun, but the views were so beautiful... So peaceful and calming. 

Hiking Isla del Sol

Gorgeous views at Isla del Sol

At night we were back, and the following day we were leaving for La Paz. But that will be for my next post! 

So, until now, we saw beautiful places. We enjoyed the food, the nature, the historical sites, the Inca culture, and the weather. Now it's time for 2 weeks of Bolivia!! I will keep you all updated 😉

We send you all positive vibes, some sunshine, and lots of love ❤ 

Big kisses,

Marj & Cla

Our first days: London, Lima and Cusco

Hello everybody!

So, here I am, in Cusco, writing my first real post while I am actually not in Belgium :-) One week ago, we left Hasselt, and it already seems so long ago! The day before we were about to leave, on Thurday 31/10/2013, I looked at Claudio and we both tought the same: what the f*** are we doing? We are leaving our easy life, our jobs, security, friends, family, the cats, our apartment. Oh my god, what did we do? And there I was, with nothing but my 10 kg backpack in front of me. No, we will be OK, we have to be strong, come on! And the moment passed, and we felt excited again. It was very hard to say goodbye to everybody though. Wednesday night I saw my mam, and Thursday night I said goodbye to Davinia  and Pieter. And Friday was the last Belgian/Italian lunch at my dad's place, and my sister stopped by as well to say goodbye. Everybody was great, and it was very difficult for me, but I promised myself that I was not going to cry so I didn't. Let's stay positive :-) So Friday afternoon, my dad brought us to Brussels midi where we took the Eurostar to London at 15h. Our adventure had begun!

In London, we booked our accomodation through airbnb, as London is rather expensive. We stayed at a lovely woman´s place, Ilona. She was very nice and made us feel at home. It was actually better to stay with someone, because you avoid the empty character of a hotel, where you are isolated from other people. We had a cute room, so off to a good beginning. At night, we headed to Picadilly Circus, and had a meal at Jamie Oliver's Diner. It was soooo good! We had a cheeseburger and fries, with some salad. Note that I ate a burger on day one, so there goes my veggie diet!! In my defense, they claimed to use biological meat ;) ;)

Dinner at Jamie Oliver's :)

Burgers

The next day, we went into town again, to South Kensington, a neighbourhood in London. Afterwards, we went to Oxford street, as we were meeting a friend there who is studying in Oxford now. We visited the Big Ben, Westminister Abby and walked on the South Bank. It was so much fun to see a familiar face in the beginning of the trip, so we can ease into this trip better. At night, we said goodbye to Mike, and had another lovely dinner at a Turkish place. We were actually staying in a Turkish neighbourhood, Green Lanes. Super friendly people and delicious food everywhere. And surprisingly cheap for London.

Bromance

  

Turkish salad

Oxford Street 

The next day was already time to leave. We left Ilona's place at 9AM and headed to Heathrow, which took one hour. Then we had our first flight to Miami, which took another 9,5 hours. So we landed in Miami at 17h (+6h), and then we had to wait a long 7 hours to our next flight to Miami. I fell asleep at the airport cause I was so destroyed. Then I was able to sleep on the plane again so when we landed at 5 AM I was ready to start the day :)

Marj sleeping at Miami Airport

We took a cab to our next Airbnb host, Rachel. She is living in beautiful part of Lima, Miraflores. This is the richer area of Lima. We decided to stay in this area because the center of Lima is considered to be rather dangerous, and we thought that for the beginning of the trip it would be better to stay in comfortable places where we feel safe. We will also be returning the middle of December to Lima for three days, so we'll tackle the center then :)
So we arrived in Lima and the first things we noticed was that EVERYBODY uses their claxon like crazy!! There was so much noise on the street, really old cars everywhere with lots of dirty smoke coming from the cars. Sometimes I did not even want to breath brrr. But I guess I'd rather get used to it, cause now we are in Cusco and it's exactly the same. Anyway, traffic was crazy, and our taxi driver drove through the red light, and honked his horn 25 times, but we arrived safely in Miraflores.
Our room was a bit disappointing compared to the other place we stayed in. I didn't trust the cleanliness of the sheets so I just slept in my sleepingbag for two days. After taking a shower, we went for a walk alongside the ocean. We encountered a huge mall, and went inside. It seemed like we were in Europe, very high prices and rich people everywhere. It seemed fake. No doubt that only the richest of Lima can shop here. After this, we went to the beach, and layed down a bit. It was only 20 degrees and cloudy, so not in our bikini's but in our jeans and warm hoodies. We watched some people surf, relaxed and read a bit. At night, we had an amazing dinner, and probably the best fish I ever ate in my life! So far, only good food, njam. Lima is also known to be the food capital of South America, and now I understand why! Also the day after, we had an amazing lunch and dinner.... at the supermarket :) If you are ever in Lima, go to supermarket Wong: you don't spend a lot and the food is amazing. The second day, we visited the center of Miraflores, the park, and checked out the neighbourhood.

Sunset in Lima

Please do not honk your horn all the time :)

Tasty and cheap lunch

So Wednesday we already left again, on to Cusco! We decided to take a plane to Cusco as it is only 1hour. With the bus it would have been 20 hours, so after our superlong flight from London, we were not really in the mood to travel that long again. So we were off to the airport, and it took forever to get there in the crazy traffic of Lima. At one point, we were even stuck on a railway that ran right through the road, without any stopsigns or anything. And all of the sudden a train was coming, and we were ON the rails!! I thought, omg, I will have to jump out of the taxi, but then maybe, the taxi driver will steal our luggage, but I don't want to dieeeeeee hahaha but right on time the taxi moved and I was still alive :D Our flight itself had a 3 hour delay...But yeah, that seems typical here. Everybody is so relaxed, everything takes forever. Even to pay at the cash register takes 10 minutes, when you are the only client! Luckily I am on holidays, so I can stand it. I think if they would see how fast we live in Europe, they would not understand why we rush everything so much. Just take it easy :)
So we are in Cusco now. But I will write about this amazingly beautiful city when we return from our hike next week. There is too much to say and too many pictures to upload. And the computer is sooooo slow, so I am losing my patience a little bit. So next week, there will be another uplate. Until then, hasta luego!

Two more weeks

Hi everybody,

A last update before we are finally leaving.... I just looked at my calender and in 2 weeks we will finally be leaving! 14 days!! It seems so surreal, that in some moments I just cannot comprehend it. But it is becoming very very real. We are moving out of our apartment next weekend. We (read "I" ;-) ) packed a lot of boxes already, and next week we'll pack the last remaining things. It is very sad actually, as I love living here. The apartment is great and I will miss it for sure!
My dad will help me move all our stuff to Hasselt again next weekend. So we will move in with my dad for a couple of days while we prepare for our trip. When we are back in May, we will move in with my dad as well. Claudio will probably go to China for two months for his work, between May and July. So I decided to stay at my dad's during that period. When Claudio is back, we will have to summer to look for an apartment, and hopefully we can be back in Antwerp by September.

So the apartment is gone, all my subscriptions have been cancelled (tv, internet, gym, phone,...), my work agenda has been cleared completely, we found a place for the cats to stay during our six months (THANKS JURGEN!!), we changed our address, we got all our vaccinations, and we even went to the dentist. I feel quite prepared. To get to this point was tough though. These last few months have been crazy. Planning and preparing for the trip has been mentally exhausting. So it better start soon cause I am soooo tired. I need a holiday :D

Last weekend, I also said goodbye to my big family. We had a nice party with lots of food and drinks at my sister's place.

 

My whole family was supernice and genereous (thanks everybody!!). My sister baked an amazing cake njaaaam and baked pizza, and my mam and me prepared quiches, salads, and meat. It was an awesome day, and it seems crazy that I will not see my family till May.

 

The weekend before that, my best friend and homy for life Davinia came to Antwerp for the whole day as well. We shopped till we dropped, and afterwards had an amazing dinner at I Famosi (thanks Daviiii!). Everybody is so nice to me, I should leave more often ;-) Also this weekend we'll make Hasselt unsafe and enjoy the Jeneverfeesten. And on top of that, next week she will help me paint the apartment. Can you wish for a better friend?

 

Off course I also have goodbye dinners planned with my mam, dad, and sister. But that will be right before I leave. Hm, I hope it will not be too sentimental, cause I'm not good at it :s Claudio is also in Italy right now, saying goodby to his friends and family in Bologna. Wow, so many goodbye's...

 

In the meantime, we are preparing the trip further. We outlined out itinerary for Mexico and New Zealand a bit better. I have so many things to say, but I will limit it, else I will have nothing else to tell you anymore when I'm actually experiencing it ;) I will just say that between Xmas and NY, we booked a little apartment in Puerto Escondido and booked some surf lessons. Hopefully we will be able to learn how to surf in that week. I'm sooo excited about it! And the crazy thing is, that for that week, we are paying 375 EUR for the two off us, everything included: surf lessons, apartment, surfing gear, transportation to the beach,... Can it be any cheaper? :)

I just cannot wait to be at the beach and enjoy the sun, the waves, some cold bears and delicious Mexican food! I'm highly doubting that I will be able to resist eating meat!!

 

In New Zealand we booked some nights in Queenstown. When you look at pictures, the town looks amazing. Queenstown is also known for it's crazy sports. You can do everything there, from skydiving to kayaking, to bunjee jumping. We decided we are going to skydive. Jump from 3000 m out of a plane with a professional skydiver. Claudio is afraid of heights, so I think it will be pretty funny :D

 

So darlings, that's all for now... I'll keep you posted ;)

 

X Marj

Countdown has begun

Hi all!

It's been two months since the last post, so I thought it was time to post an update. Realizing that there are only 12 weeks, or more specifically, 83 days left before we leave, makes me nervous. VERY nervous. I am a huge control freak, so my compulsion to try to organize everything to the slightest detail is driving me insane! Luckily Claudio is helping me out, and is trying to remind me that you don't have to plan everything in advance. So I am trying to let go a little bit. But it's difficult... :) 

So what did we do in these last two months? Well, we set our official departure date: it will be the 1st of November 2013! We booked a flight from London to Lima on 03/11. So we decided to go to London two days before our flight leaves, and enjoy London a bit. It has been 15 years since I've been there, so I would love to go back. Soooo, we booked the Eurostar at 15h, leaving from Brussels South. Not so dramatic as an airport departure, but hey, it was cheaper to go with the train :D 

When we arrive in Lima, the 4th of November, we plan to stay in the city for 3 days. Then, the 7th, we will take the plane to go to Cuzco. We originally wanted to  take a bus, but since the bus is 20 hours, and the plane 1h30, and our time in South America is limited, we decided to take the plane. Our only concern is the high altitude. When you go by bus, you go up gradually, so you feel less nauseous. By plane, there is more risk for altitude illness. So hopefully it will be OK. We will probably stay in Cuzco for 1 week and visit Machu Picchu. From there, we are taking the bus to Puno, Lake Titicaca. From there, we will travel towards La Paz (Bolivia), taking a couple of days, and visit Copacabana and Isla del Sol at Lake Titicaca. 

So around the 17th / 18th we will be in La Paz. From there, we will take the bus to go to Uyuni. There we would like to take a tour of 2 days. When the tour is finished, we will travel towards Santa Cruz by bus, stopping in different Bolivian cities/towns. We will have around 1 week to do so, as we have a plane from Santa Cruz to Buenos Aires 2 December. 

Once landed in Buenos Aires, I booked a place for 5 days with Airbnb. Hopefully in those days we can also relax a little bit after the intensive month of travelling. From Buenos Aires, we will also go to Iguazu waterfalls. To go there, we will take the bus (20 hours !!!) and to go back we will fly (probably the 11th of December). The 12th of December we leave for Lima again, also with the plane. I know, A LOT of flying. Then, the 15th we leave for Miami. We are also planning to book our three nights in Miami with Airbnb.

It's such a nice concept: people offer a room in their home, sometimes with private bathroom included. You pay a much lower price than you would in a hotel. You can read comments from previous visitors, so you can see if it's reliable. When we are in Hawaii, we also booked our accommodation through Airbnb, because hotels are super expensive there! In that way, we can stay within our daily budget!

Besides the travel planning, we are also occupied with other important things. We are trying to choose/buy a backpack. We made a pile of all the things we want to take and Claudio arrived till 9 kilo's and me 8. So we are planning not to take a bag that is too big. We need to live with the bare minimum! 

In addition to that, we would like to buy a decent camera, that also doesn't occupy too much space in our backpack. So today is shopping day! Hopefully we can decide on something today, so we cross it of our list.

We are also looking for a good health / travel insurance. We are doubting between the travel insurance provided by our travel agency (Travel Nation) and the one of World Nomads. The decision will be taken next week.

And last but not least, we are making sure that our health is OK, going to the doctor, getting our shots, prescription drugs, etc. 

There is also good news regarding our apartment: we found new renters! This means we do not have to pay a fine for breaking our rental agreement. We are moving out the last week of October, and are moving in with my dad again. We are also leaving all our stuff there, so that is very convenient. Thanks dad :-)

So, everything is developing fast. Less then 3 months to go... It's becoming so real. I'm even planning our goodbye parties already! Crazy....

We'll talk soon!

Hugs XXX Marj & Cla

Tickets are booked

Hi all,

It's been a while and have a lot of news...

After Claudio told his employer that we are leaving in April, I decided that I should say it as soon as I could. It was becoming so difficult to lie to my colleagues at work. So, I told my boss last Thursday, roughly 10 days ago. I entered his office with a pounding heart and a flushed face and with all the courage I had (I talked to myself in the mirror in the bathroom to calm my nerves ;) ). To my surprise, my boss was super nice! He even asked me where I wanted to travel, and after I told him everything, he suggested we had to go out for dinner for a client... Awesome :-)
So, we agreed that I can leave in November, taking holidays for one month, and 5 months of time credit. So I can start working again the 5th of May. I also took the option to take time credit for another 4 months , which my boss approved as well strangely enough. This is because there is a chance we might move to China for 4 months, for Claudio's work. But this is not sure yet. So I won't elaborate on it, cause we don't know yet if and how this will happen.

So, now, everybody knows! Finally, after 9 months of planning and silence, I can tell everyone! Such a relief...

Since my work approved of my time credit, we were finally able to look for plane tickets. We had a discussion last weekend about the destinations, because I was not completely convinced yet. The planning was, as explained before, to go to South America, then Mexico, and from there fly to New Zealand and the SE Asia. I had some destinations that I wanted to include, such as Rio de Janeiro, Cuba, Miami or Hawaii. After a somehow heated discussion (Claudio is very stuborn :D ), we decided to see how much it would cost to include some of these destinations. So, that weekend, I started performing some research on the cost of plane tickets. You all probably know, but there are special round the world tickets (RTW). This is offered by alliances of airlines, but also travel agencies. For example:

Airlines:
Star Alliance: http://www.staralliance.com/en/fares/round-the-world-fare/
One world: http://www.oneworld.com/flights/round-the-world-fares/oneworld-explorer/
World Walkabout : http://www.qantas.com.au/travel/airlines/world-walk-about/gb/en
See also some others : http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Round_the_world_flights

Travel agencies:
Travel nation: http://www.travelnation.co.uk/
Round the world flights : http://www.roundtheworldflights.com/

In general, RTW tickets are cheaper than booking one way flights. A great website is Skyscanner (http://www.skyscanner.net/), where you can select whole months to see the cheapest prices or where you select different airports to leave from. In this way, it becomes easier to find the cheapest tickets. Also the app is really good (even better than  the website in my opinion).

We started looking for flights on Skyscanner, but it seemed to be very expensive to book one way tickets. Usually, return flights are even a bit cheaper than just booking a one way flight. I was not able to find a decent itinerary on Skyscanner, so I decided to get some quotes for RTW tickets.

Star Alliance and One World were very expensive, so I decided to contact two travel agencies, Travel Nation and Round the world flights. Travel nation gave us a really good quote! We were appointed a "travel consultant", and this guy was super! I asked for different destinations, changing it 20 times, and he was really friendly and helped me organise my trip. We planned the following itinerary:

03/11  London - Lima
15/12  Lima - Miami
18/12  Miami - Mexico City
13/01  Cancun - Mexico City
14/01  Mexico City - Honolulu
01/02  Honolulu - Auckland
27/02  Auckland - Singapore
28/04  Singapore - London

I asked to include Hawaii (Honolulu) in the itinerary and it did not seem to be super expensive! Then, first, we had a connecting flight from Lima to Mexico City, transit in Miami. We were able to postpone the connecting flight with 3 days, so we could stay a couple of days in Maimi -> perfect!
We were very satisfied about the price, the help of the agency, and our itinerary. So we decided to book all the flights. One part of the payment was done on Friday and this Monday we will booked the second part of the trip!

We also booked two flights in South America with TAM airlines. Through the agency it was very expensive, so we looked ourselves and found a formula which is called "multicity":

02/12  Santa Cruz (Bolivia) - Buenos Aires
13/12  Buenos Aires - Lima

This formula is a lot cheaper than booking a single flight Buenos Aires - Lima (700 EUR cheaper!!). So we booked these flights as well, as we noted that a lot of dates were already not available anymore (due to the holiday peak season).

So all our flights are booked :-) What a relief!!!!! And, I'm happy we included Hawaii and Miami in our plan. Hopefully when we are in Miami we can see an NBA game, let's hope they're playing then!

After this intensive week of planning and booking, we need a break, wow... Luckily it's sunny, so it's time to go outside and lay in the sun :-)

Hope you enjoyed my post, and if you are thinking about travelling, I hope the info is useful! If you have any more questions, just leave a message or email me!

Hugs,
Marj & Cla

It's official....

... We just received the confirmation from Claudio's work that he can take 6 months! We'll leave in November and we'll be back the end of April!! It's getting so real now..............
I can't wait to communicate it at my job. I think I will do it next month. Then I can tell everybody, I can't wait!

Lots of love and good vibes <3

Talk to you all soon!

Follow up (April)

Hi all,

So... it's been a while! A lot of things have happened in these last 3 months. Work was super busy, and it was difficult to find the time to organise our trip. Coming home from work at 20h every night, makes me more determined then ever to do this trip though!
Claudio already requested time credit at his work, and the response was not that great. They only want to give him 4 months of time credit + 1 month of actual holidays. This would reduce our trip with 2 months. We would leave November and be back in the beginning of April. Claudio is trying to negotiate for one more month, so we could stay away till the end of April. Let's hope it will work! 6 or 7 months is not such a big difference, but only 5 would not be ideal.

In the meantime we decided that we will start our trip in Mexico. This will normally be in November 2013. We are planning to stay there for 4 weeks. First, we want to fly to Mexico city, and stay there for a couple of days. Then, we want to visit Teotihuacàn, were you  can see ancient pyramids. After that, we want to travel to Oaxaca, and later Puerto Escondido:

Later, we will move upwards towards Cancun. On our way, we will visit the ancient Maya cities and ruins. We will end our trip at the beach, in Tulum & Cancun - hopefully without hurricanes :-)

At the beginning of December, we will go fly to Lima, Peru. After some days in Lima, we'll head to Cuzco. From there, we will go towards Machu Picchu. We are still undecided whether we are going to do the Inca trail or not. It is a 4 day hike that is rather challenging, but is supposed to be amazing.
After that, we would like to go to Arequipa, if time allows it. From there, we'll head to Lake Titicaca, and there we'll cross the border to go to Bolivia. There, we want to visit the Salar de Uyuni, which is basically a salt desert.

At this point, it will almost be Christmas and New Years, and for that, we would like to be in Buenos Aires, and enjoy city life for a week or so. After that, we want to visit the Iguazu Falls.

Here ends our American adventure. Mid January we will head towards New Zealand and we are planning to stay there for one month.
From here on we are just starting now to plan our route. We are thinking about several possibilities, different countries/cities, such as the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong, Beijing.... It will depend on how much time credit Claudio can take. We will know by the end of this month, and then we will start planning the second part of our trip. One country that we won't be able to visit will be Indonesia. There are showers every day in March & April. As a result, we chose to visit other countries, were the weather is better. Indonesia will be for another time... Maybe even the summer of 2014... We'll see!

We have also been looking for flights already. We found a round the world ticket for 2300 £ (which is +/- 2750 €). We are checking out some other options, but this one seems quite OK! Once we decided our whole trip, we will purchase our ticket.

I also wanted to say that from now on, comments are allowed on this blog! So feel free to leave comments!!

Thanks for reading, and hopefully next time and can bring some good news!