As we speak to and email with others about our travel experiences, we receive many of the same questions from folks who want to understand how we prepare and stay healthy and safe on the road. Our around the world trip also raises questions about our motivation for taking it, the planning involved and traveling with kids for a long duration.
When we first began discussing our 4 1/2 month around the world trip with our family in 1999, we wanted to get away from everyday life, experience the world, be with our daughters (12 and 10 at the time) and learn something in the process. However, planning it and actually making it happen were anything but that.
Even more than five years after we took our 4 1/2 month around the world trip with our girls in 2003 to 2004, we still get questions about what the circumstances were leading up to that journey and why we decided to do it. We received our initial inspiration from several sources.
Feeling bad while on the road and being in a strange place is one of the worst situations one can experience, especially when so much time, money and effort have gone into planning a trip. While I have had my share of feeling “under the weather” during my travels, I have developed techniques for preparing and dealing with food and drink that have helped me.
Yesterday, I received the latest (April 2009) edition of National Geographic Traveler. On page 76 a story caught my eye entitled Ecuador: Avenue of the Volcanoes. Two of the haciendas mentioned, San Agustin de Callo and Cusin, are the same ones we stayed in during our trip in November 2008.
During our month in Africa, we saw a variety of sights, including a camping safari deep in the heart of Botswana, mokoro and walking trips in the wild, an epic 40 hour train journey from Zambia to Tanzania and the relaxation and history of Zanzibar. This video provides an overview of that experience.
This overview provides some snapshots of the five weeks that we spent in India. In addition to visiting the major cities of Mumbai and Delhi and, of course, the Taj Mahal, we also were able to experience the beauty of two national parks, a spectacular hike in Sikkim through the Himalayas and the charm of Rajasthan.
We spent 3 1/2 weeks in Australia and saw a great variety of the country, from the east coast cities of Brisbane and Sydney to the smaller towns of Adelaide, Alice Springs and Darwin, with Ayers Rock, Litchfield National Park and the Outback in between.
This overview provides some snapshots of our visit to Phnom Penh and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. As we visited some sites associated with the Killing Fields and genocide, be warned that there are some disturbing images that follow.
We spent three weeks visiting three major areas of the country: Bangkok, Northern Thailand and Southern Thailand. In Bangkok, our major activities were viewing the temples and seeing the city by foot and by ferry. In Northern Thailand we visited Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai. Southern Thailand, our last stop, was experienced on the island of Ko Pha Ngan.
