A Couple’s Journey

Well let me start with the plane ride over.  Normally I can sleep like a baby on a plane; however we were not so lucky this trip.  We had two young ladies sitting in front of us who thought that plane rides were just another place to party.  They seemed to have a great time.  But none of the passengers around them seemed to hold the same enthusiasm they did for the ride.  After they were told off by the guy in front of them and the stewardess several times. They finally seemed to pass out for a while and let others sleep. This was great but only getting 2 hours of sleep on the plane made it pretty hard to stay up once we got here.  Unfortunately Jared didn’t get any sleep at all! L

 So now let’s talk about the taxi over. For all of you that have been to Bangkok you will know just what I am talking about here.  We go to the desk for metered taxi.  Get in a cab that they provide and then the taxi driver does not want to turn on the meter. He tells us, I have done this trip many times and it cost 500 baht. So why don’t you just say 500 baht and I don’t have to turn on the meter.  After some argument he finally turned the meter on.  I bet you will never guess how much it came to when we made it to our destination.  240 baht. WOW!  Really this man has done this trip many times and he does not know how much it will cost.  Well we were kind of nice and gave him 300 for almost killing us 10 times on the way over.   This man used medians, tried to run over motor bikes, did not seem to understand when the guy In front of him was at a dead stop he was suppose to stop too.  No that is not the way it worked in his world. He thought that if he just flashed his lights tons of times the man would move. So this is where people in Doha learned to drive. 

Well we are now safe and sound in our hotel room and we are all booked for our train and ferry to Koh Tao on the 3rd.  I can’t wait to get there!

Hello all this is Jared and here is my 2 cents!  Okay flying is stupid; I really wish I got a prescription of Valium before flying!!  OMG sitting in the back of the plane when you don’t like flying is awful.  Needless to say I was happy when we finally made it.  Okay now a word of advice, yes it might be romantic to just wing it when you travel and think okay I will just look for a room after we get there! It is not romantic, wow after a long flight and almost dying in a taxi, the last thing I wanted to do was look for a hotel in a place like Bangkok.   So we paid more than we would of if we would have booked online.  So screw the new sense of freedom you have by taking a this trip and at least get a room for the first night.  You can then get your bearings!  Okay granted it wasn’t like Maryanne and I had a hard time, it just would have been nice after a long sleepless flight. 

We are both so thrilled to be here together, no job, no worries, just all smiles!!!   

PS naps in the middle of the day ROCK!

Well after some teary goodbyes and calling home to friends we are leaving to the airport in 1 hour!!!  I can’t believe it is that time already.  Time seemed to pass us by just a little to fast.  We are really going to miss all of you very very much.   You all have to come visit us from time to time.  There is no excuses all of you have a vacation to kill somewhere, so might as well be with us. 🙂  

On the other side of that we are really excited about starting our adventure to the great unknown.  It is going to be hard not having a job.  And maybe I might go a bit insane while we are out and about.  Who knows.  Jared is going to be there to take care of me right.  Jared told me the other day that if anything were to happen to him on this trip that I must immeditaly go to the airport and go home cuz I could not do it with out him.  Well I think there might be some truth to that.  I think I would wander off in the woods somewhere and get lost with out him.  It is a good thing we are going together, right.    I hope I bring something to this relationship!!!  🙂   

Well okay I don’t have much to report other than we are in the last month!  Maryanne has finally gotten excited, as for me I have always been excited!  There is only a few things left that we have to do before we take off.  Just a few boxes to mail off, two more shots, sell our dining room table, etc.  We decided to bring an extra backpack, mostly for our snorkel gear and large liquid bottles we know we can’t have as carryon stuff.  Luckily our first 2 months we will be in one place.  So I don’t mind having the extra weight!  Even though at the moment I am only around 35lbs.  Which considering I used to hike with over 100lbs of weight, I should be okay.  Then again I am not 20 years old, but still in good enough shape for 35lbs.  I don’t see us walking over a few miles anyway with our packs, so we will be in good shape.  Maryanne just got her packing cubes in the mail, so she will be figuring out what exactly she is going to bring.  The packing cubes really do make a big difference in terms of keeping things in order and leaving a lot of extra room in the pack.  Okay I have rambled enough, I am just so excited!!!

Well today we finally did it, we got our one-way tickets to Thailand!!!!!  We were going to do it yesterday when we booked our Dive Master course, but of course Qatar Airways website was down.  Oh well we got them today!!  What a wonderful day!!  These 39 days are going to go by very slow.  Well at least it will give us more time to spend with friends before we leave.  Two of them are getting married this week, which is awesome they are both fantastic people!! Although with one of them from South Africa and the other from England, I would not want to be in the house during matches for Cricket, Football or Rugby when their countries meet!  🙂  Eugene and Emma congrats, we sure will miss you guys!  It is also Emma and Scott’s 30th birthdays being held at the local Rugby Club this weekend!  It should be a wild night!  Hopefully Scott doesn’t go on a walkabout (he is Australian and makes his countrymen proud!), or if he does he takes me with him!  LOL  The list goes on, there are so many people here we will miss dearly.  It is tough to be excited about leaving for our trip, when we will have to say goodbye to so many wonderful people here in Qatar!! 

Alright we actually missed blogging about our trip back to the US in March. We had a wonderful time getting to see our families again. It has been about a year and a half since we were last in the US and since we planning a 2 year trip, it was important to see everyone. I was even able to make it up to Minnesota and see my brother and sister. Having such a large, spread out family makes it a little difficult to see everyone unfortunately. The only downside to my trip was that I felt really old as my nephew and niece kicked my butt at Guitar Heroes. Man they are good, so I think I will stick with bowling on the Wii!

We did find out that Indian food in the states is not the same is it is made in Qatar. Both made my actual Indians but somehow it is better here, interesting! Aside from food, we had a wonderful time meeting my brother and sister-in-laws friends in Orlando, they are awesome! We spent quite a bit of time in Orlando, not only cause of family but we also had to take care of business stuff there, banking, shopping and putting our stuff in storage. You know you actually get a discount from paying in advance! Man I love saving money, plus it will be another thing we will not have to worry about till July 2010! We also spent a bit of time at the Travel Country store, man that place rocks. The staff was awesome; we spent a lot of time chatting with them. I think when we come back to the states I want to work there! They helped us a lot buying the stuff we need for our trip. Jason and Kara, thanks for letting us crash with you guys! Hope you guys can keep up game night!

It was also great to see the folks! My parents are fantastic what can I say! Although they have a way of making me feel really lazy, they are the most active people I know! Just hearing about what they do in a normal day makes me tired!

I also got a chance to visit with an old friend whom I have known since I was a kid! It was great to reconnect with her and swap life stories face to face. She’s great, love ya Amy!

We also went out and had a good visit with Maryanne’s friends and family. Pensacola is so not my favorite place! I am still convinced I can get them all to move out of there at some point in time! LOL

Ok It is my(Maryanne) turn to write a little something, something. I had a great time while we were in the States. It was so great seeing our families. I know it was a short visit but I got to spend time with all of you. To my best friend Jann and her lovely husband Shane. Who can say that they still have there best friend from childhood, when they live across the world from each other. Every time we get together it is like no time has passed. I really miss you! You guys take care of each other and your beautiful little girl Payton. She is the cutest.. Ok, Ok I my be a little bias on this one.. 🙂

Dad, I miss you bunches and bunches. Please take care of yourself.

To my bothers and sisters-in-laws – Chris, Holly, Micheal, Erica and Nick I am glad I got to see you all. Erica, No shots next time. Holly thanks for the dinner it was lovely.

To Kara and Jason Thank you so much for letting us stay with you. I hope we were not to much of a pain in the butt. I know if we were Kara would have no problem telling us. 😉 We miss Fritz and Sophie.

Mom and Dad Davis. As always it was a great visit. I really enjoyed the time we spent with you both. It was nice just sitting on the back porch talking.

We are getting so close I am almost ready to explode with excitement!  Coming to work is so tough, seems like all I want to do is call in sick all the time.  I did say the other day that I have worked so hard the last few years, so I really need this break since I am burned out!  Then everyone started laughing…. okay truth be told I don’t have what some people would call a stressful or hard job.  Maintaining a website isn’t really rocket science, but in my defense I do get busy from time to time.  Anyway the point is I can’t wait to go!  I recently got a new backpack; technically this is my third backpack.  Although the first one I got was really cheap and I thought I could make it work but sadly when it was filled with stuff it was crap to wear!  The second pack I got said it was 60 liters however that actually worked out to 45 liters for the main pack and 15 liters for the daypack.  When I actually packed my things it really wasn’t able to fit in the pack, I wanted more wiggle room.  You know in case one day I didn’t feel like tightly rolling up my clothes and packing everything just so.  Thankfully they just opened a proper sports store in Qatar that actually sells hiking backpacks.  So I found a nice 85 liter pack.  I know most travelers on bootsnall don’t travel with such a big pack, but filled it is only 22lbs.  Considering in my early twenties I did camping trips (military style) with a 110lb pack this is light in comparison.  Not to mention we are travelling slow so I won’t carry it that often.  Maryanne has been laughing at me since I keep repacking, but after our last trip she learned a few things about packing her bag better.  So it definitely is a learning experience, one that I would rather learn at home than along the way.  Again I am the planner in the family; I love to feel prepared (well as much as possible)!   

We just recently completed our first series of shots for Hep A and B, with an influenza shot for good measure.  So next month we will have another dose of Hep A and Hep B, then another Hep B shot in 5 months.  We will get our malaria pills a week before we go.  Qatar is awesome as they will give us a three month supply for free!!  The shots were not too painful thankfully however they do leave a nice bump and some soreness.  Maryanne is a little worried since her spot on her arm is actually pretty warm!  🙂  She is cute! 

Well we just back from a wonderful trip to the Maldives. It was amazing. The water was wonderful. We did a lot of snorkeling. We saw a lot of cool things such as; Turtles, sting rays, Spotted rays, Lion Fish, eels, sea snakes just to say a few. The greatest part of it all was when my lovely Jared got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife. The setting was prefect we were on the beach at sunset; there were only a couple of people around. Let’s just say it could not get any better then this. I said yes of course and I cried like a little girl. It took me a good 2 mins before I could even see the ring, because my eyes were all watery. The ring by the way is absolutely beautiful. What a wonderful vacation.

Now about the Maldives for those of you interested. This was our second time to the Maldives. This time we stayed at the Kuredu resort. It is one of the bigger islands, so there was actually a lot to do there. They even have a golf course. I believe they are the only island in the Maldives to have one. The Jacuzzi Villas are lovely. I would really recommend them, over the water villas. The water villas are nice, but the good snorkeling and dive sites are on the side of the island where the Jacuzzi villas are at. The Jacuzzi villas had a wonderful bathroom compared to the water villa as well. Overall I was impressed with the Kuredu Resort, for the money it was well worth the trip. Oh and if you like flying like I do you get to take a sea plane to the island. It was a beautiful view.

More pictures of our trip

Well since we haven’t actually departed yet, we are uncertain of what the costs will actually be.  That still hasn’t stopped us from guestimating what they will be, I would rather overestimate than underestimate.  Hopefully while away we get an administration in the US which will help lift the falling dollar!  It is the reason we are staying away from Europe for now.  

Basically we are hoping to keep under $40k per year for both of us.  Since all of the first year will be spent in Asia that should be plenty.  Whatever is left over will go towards year two (giving us more financial freedom) which will include Australia and New Zealand.  My hope is to keep it under 80k, but we will see.  This will include all food, transportation (pay as we go flights, buses, trains and tuk tuks), lodging and tours (admission costs to museums, parks, etc). 

With this budget it will be about $100 dollars a day.  Luckily for most of Asia will be tough to even get close to this amount, however we plan to do a fair amount of diving along the way.  Our accommodations might be higher than most as we will be looking for private rooms with own bath 95% of the time (5% in case we don’t have a choice).  Also might have to need AC, Maryanne really doesn’t sweat so might be tough for her with only a fan to regulate her body temp in the summers.  So we will have to base rooms on how she copes in the heat.  Also as we get into Micronesia and Polynesia costs will go up we are sure, even if we took ferries as opposed to flying from island to island. 

We really don’t want to limit ourselves to much however would like to save where we can but just not go crazy by being frugal.  So if we can great, but if we want to splurge and enjoy that Starbucks coffee or Bungee jump in NZ knowing we can will help make this trip even better.  For most of the trip we hope to be out of our comfort zone, but for those of you that know us, it will be hard to always do that!  Damn Starbucks why do you have to be so good!!!  Also it will be tough to watch a sunset without a beer or gin and tonic!

Like others on Bootsnall have said once you get out of the vacation mentality and into the long term travel mode, costs will come down.  We may even find that the money spent on Starbucks is not worth it *GASP*!!  In packing up all of our stuff, we have already realized how much money we waste buying “stuff”.  Hopefully this trip teaches us more about the differences between wants and needs!  Mom and Dad would be so proud! YES I am kissing up in case my parents read this 🙂  Yes I am a guy and I love to shop and spend money!  So this trip hopefully will be like one long AA meeting for me.  Others we might go through 80K in 6 months, just kidding, I am not that bad! 

Okay back to the budgeting!  OZ and NZ budget will be interesting for sure.  We haven’t decided on transportation methods yet.  At the moment we are leaning towards Grey Hound for OZ, maybe doing car rentals for a few days just to explore and area before taking the bus to the next city.  We will probably fly to/from Perth, as it would be a really long bus ride.  I usually can entertain myself for hours (just ask Maryanne), but that trip might be tough even for me!  There are so scenic train trips we are looking at but damn if they aren’t expensive!  So we will see.  Also I am sure we will be in Sydney for New Years at some point.  We will probably stay somewhere nice again like the casino.  So that will blow the budget out of the water completely! We stayed there last time and it is such a nice hotel in the quieter Darling Harbor!  Now for NZ we are looking at renting a car/van to explore both islands.  Mostly because there are so many little out of the way areas that are beautiful and you can’t get to them all by bus.  When we met my folks there in 07 they were doing it by car and loved it.  Well we wont be in OZ or NZ till around the end of 2009 so we will cross that bridge when we get there.

Yes I talk a lot, I know!! 

This is about as close as I am probably going to get for a budget, however I hope to keep a more detailed accountant type record while we travel and will share them as we go. 

I will say one more thing though!  Most of the places we have looked at staying that do have private room, own bath and AC average about $30 a night!!  So more money for drinks, I mean cultural experiences! 🙂

Hello all!  Maryanne finally let me write on our blog (okay she showed me how to login to our site).   Of the two of us I am the planner/worrier/anal retentive/retard of our duo.  As for planning, I had it all down pat we were going to go to Thailand for our 3 month dive master internship, then a month each for Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, back to Thailand again to explore the rest of the country, then to Malaysia in Feb 09 for a month, two months in Indonesia, Philippines for 2 months, then Guam, Saipan, Yap, Australia for the 3 months and then New Zealand…..  I was trying to factor in weather, festivals, possibility of shark attacks and the earths rotation.  Maryanne had to remind me this trip was about the freedom to do whatever we want whenever that may be.  So needless to say after some back and forth, I lost that battle. However she did agree to be in Australia and New Zealand for the summer.  So my manhood, head of the household feeling has been restored!

 As for me being the worrier and retard of the group they sometimes go hand in hand.  Never having dived before, I am a little worried about sharks.  I would be less worried if they made an automatic spear-gun holding at least 100 spears!  So while I wait for that to be invented, I decided it would be best to at least of 2 dive knives.  One for each leg!  The theory being, if a shark bites off one of my arms I can still reach a knife with my other arm to fend him off.  Also if somehow my arm gets pinned under a rock or a falling ship I will still be able to cut it off.  Logical right?!?!  It seems I am the only person who thinks this is a good idea!  Well since Maryanne says I can’t wear a chainmail suit, I figure at least the two knives will be acceptable to her.  Sheesh I am just looking out for our safety! 

My anal retentive side may be laughed at by Maryanne; however we have backups for everything.  Deep down I know she is happy I plan for unforeseen things!  Although I did concede that having my passport page and shot record tattooed to my butt might be a little extreme.  I still think it isn’t a half bad idea, although since I hate needles I am happy she talked me out of that one!  Thankfully we still have 92 days left as I am still working on the security option of our trip.   Being forgetful and prone to needing a hospital visit at least twice a year, this will require a lot of planning.

Speaking of hospitals, we are almost done with our visits!  We just had an allergy test for Maryanne, which luckily came back with only minor allergies to things.  Mostly shellfish, but luckily she has only a low tolerance.  This means we won’t need to get the EpiPen, since she will not die if she eats shellfish!  The thought of having to get “Shellfish will kill me!” translated into every language of where we are going was going to be a lot of work!  Luckily we only need to more types of shots Hep A and B, we will start those when we come back from States in April!

I think I have rambled enough for today…  I am just so excited to start our trip!  We are so close, we only have 10 more boxes of stuff going into storage to mail home! 

Coming soon!