August 21, 2004
BACK HOME!
Well were finally back home after our 10 month round the world trip. As an experience it was awsome. We did so many amazing things. When I start to look back it kind of blows my mind!.....
Everyone asks where we liked best.....well for us we loved Laos, Uganda/Rwanda, Oz, New Zealand best
Places we wont be visiting again..U.S probably, Egypt(ancient egypt was amazing but modern egypt is a pit!)
Favourite things we did....
Mountain gorillas in Rwanda, Game drives in Kenya, White water rafting in Uganda, Nile cruise egypt, Everything about Oz (particularly jumping out a plane over the great barrier feer and landing on a tropical queensland beach).
Everything about new zealand(particularly flying over the southern alps and landing at high altitude in the snow).
Jesus I could go on for ever......
We were very lucky indeed, our trip went like clockwork and we met some great people.
We are so lucky to have had this amazing experience, we will have these amazing memories for ever.
Thankyou to all our families and friends back home who helped us in many ways, we did miss you all. Thanks also to our friends in Oz and The U.S who looked after us and let us stay with them.
Thanks to the guys from bootsnall for letting us rant and rave on this blog. If anyone needs any advice on travelling to anywhere weve been ,please get in touch, We'd be delighted to help if we can.
Now its time to get back to reality sadly.
The end of David and Kris's Round the World Adventure
August 20, 2004
NewYork
Second last flight for us!.....flew to nyc with Continental...they werent that good!..plane was really small and cramped....not in the league of Emirates, they were superb.
Getting pretty tired of travelling now, tired of living out the rucksack, looking fwd to getting home!
Anyway, arrived safely and caught the coach into Manhatten from Newark. Couldnt face the subway so we hopped in our first new york cab, cabbie was very entertaining, when we told him where we had been recently, it kind of blew his mind!...so many americans get only about 2 or 3 weeks hols a year and never manage to leave the U.S all their life!....
Checked into the budget hotel that we pre booked... the riverside tower hotel. I'd heard quite a few mixed reports about this hotel, in reality we thought it was fine!..compared to some of the hell holes we've been in recently it was not bad at all.
Main issue is that the rooms are very small by any standards, but basic facillities are good...room had ensuite, decent shower, microwave, a/c and fridge/tv. Not bad for Manhatten and in a nice neighbourhood in the upper west side. Just dont expect glamour and remember the rooms are small!..
Anyway, how did we find newyork.... Well im going to be honest as usual, if something sucks , I will say it did , and if was fantastic, I would say that too!...
Lets say we found it a tad more towards the sucking end of the scale!
Things we enjoyed ....
Central park was nice, a welcome escape from the city.
Went to see Rent, it was excellant, now I know what happened to scary spice (mel b), shes actually really good in rent!
The Intrepid museum is reallg good, its got a massive aircarft carrier, a selection of fighter planes, a nuclear sub( comedically called the Growler...lol) and a concorde!...all of which you can have a good look around in..
Took the staten island ferry(which is free) this sails past the statue of Liberty, and gives good views of the downtown water front.
We chose not to go to the island because we got too traumatized by the humumgous queues(lines).
Views from the Empire state building were amazing, but I dont know if it was worth the 2 hrs that it took to get up there and get back down.
Enjoyed a walk over the Brooklyn bridge
Things we didnt like
Well it has to be said, weve travelled through 17 countries over the last 10 months and we found the newyorkers to be the rudest people we've encountered yet!...Please and thankyou dont really happen much in NewYork. Customer service was often shockingly bad. To be honest it made me angry and I often confronted the rudeness which they really didnt like...but it had to be done, as they were just SO rude!.
There are some really cool old buildings in manhatten but in reality a lot of the buildings are very boring concrete blocks with little character, the empire state, chrysler, flatiron building however were the exceptions.
The subway was pretty rank to be honest...really hot and smelly, plenty of trains running 24hrs but limited information and signs are poor, and gawd help you if you dawdle and get in someones way, or dare to ask directions...
Aw well maybe we have just been travelling for too long...
Another good thing for us was we were able to catch up with Claudia and Kathy the american girls that we met in Malaysia and singapore, it was great to catch up!..hope to see them both again some time in the future.
If your into shopping, Macy's was fab and bloomingdales was crap.
All in all we felt Manhatten was all a bit over hyped and over glamourised, there's a lot of self proclaiming going on...ie were the best in the world at this and the worlds center of the other and the worlds bigger whatever...our advice to some of the americans....get out a wee bit more!..theres a big world out there!, and some of it is even outside the U.S !....Heaven forbid!..
One final bit of advice for fellow travellers...if you can possibly do so AVOID CONTINENTAL AIRWAYS
They demanded money from us for date changes to our ticket. Our ticket allowed us free unlimited date changes. Once again they were downright rude.
We had no hassle with any of the airlines over the past year and made stacks of changes to all our flights, but Continental were the only ones that gave us hassle...they suck!...