Oprah The Destroyer

One thing I have learned on this trip is that, no matter what, there is no escaping American pop culture. I thought I could leave behind the Beyonces, Lohans and by god the worst of them all, the talent-less Keishas, but no American pop culture is like herpes, no matter where you go, they're never far and can pop up at anytime, at least that's what my buddy Gaurav tells me about herpes.

Just when you thought you've escaped pop culture into possibly the furthest place on earth from the US, here comes the queen diva herself, the alpha-icon, goddess of daytime television, Mrs. Oprah freakin' Winfrey.  In spite of all the atrocities and stories occurring around the globe, she is the headline on every front page: "Oprah Visits the Zoo and Holds a Koala, Later Knighted and Rename Hope" or "Opera Passes on Visiting the Gold Coast Until They Rename it the Platinum Coast" Actually, aside from Huge Jackman zip lining face first (literally) into the stage to meet Oprah on the set of her show, the biggest story was Oprahs disapproval of the Aussie icon called a Walligong.

What is a Walligong you might ask. Well, it could possibly be the most hilariously racial toy every created, one that if any kid in America owned, would be getting recruitment letters from the KKK. Apparently, these dolls are very nostalgic to many Aussies as their parents parents were playing with these things, you know the parents that came over on the boat... which, I don't think they were rowing themselves. To add to the already physical racist-ness of these things, Aussies use the term "walli" as a derogatory reference to anyone with color i.e. the aborigines. I'm pretty sure Oprah may have a point with this one.  

Aside from awing at the Walligons, we did get a little driving and sightseeing done as well. Driving in Australia is kind of like playing a really long (and often tragic) video game; instead of putting a quarter in the machine, you instead put $40 in the tank and put your pedal all the way to the floorboard (we had a Toyota Yaris so we could actually do this without breaking the speed limit) and play the villain in Frogger. Instead of frogs though, you get to dodge the most unique and most adorable animals on Earth. A drive in Oz goes like this: "Awe, look a dead wallaby, no wait that was another kangaroo... or was it a Wombat? I don't know, but I'm getting hungry, wanna’ pull over for a cheeseburger?" Needless to say, the wildlife in Oz is amazing. On our first day out of Melbourne, we went for a short hike and spotted 20 or 30 wild Koalas. In the wild Koalas are very hard to find, but once you see one, you can often find a few others since they only eat five or six of the 20 something varieties of eucalyptus, and really only prefer just one. On our eight day road trip through OZ, we saw such a variety of wildlife: Kangaroos, Wallabies (even a rare black one), echidnas, monitors, sugar gliders, possums, etc. To spot these guys, we ventured from our tent and went on a few night hikes, one of which was cut short when Krissy was nearly cut short by a fruit bat (apparently going after the bugs flying around our headlamp); I've never seen Krissy move so fast. To her defense, the bats in Oz are huge and look like Satan himself (see creepy pic. Below); however, contrary to Krissys belief that it was zeroed in on her jugular, they are harmless.

Spawn of Satan?

Koala in the Mist

After out self guided tour of South Australia, we arrived in Sydney and met up with Chris, a cousin of our close buddy Brian James back home. Chris lives with his girlfriend Helen in a town right outside of Sydney. Chris is the ultimate host; insistent on picking us up and dropping us off wherever, hosting BBQ's and letting us partake in his daily life. His girlfriend Helen even insisted on giving us both hair cuts before we left (don't worry, the fro' is still going strong, I just got a trim). While we were there, Chris and Helen brought their dog home from the pound for the first time... little Oscar (named after Oscar De La Hoya, the boxer). It was really nice to have a little substitute Morgan for a few days as most of you know how much we miss our dog back home at Camp Schwalm.

Chris, Helen and Oscar

It didn’t take long to discover Chris’s true passion which happens to be the most god awful, boring sport know to man (aside from women’s basketball of course), the sport I speak of is Cricket. Imagine a huge field with a tiny dirt runway in the middle of it, then take 10 or 11 guys and plop them around this runway in any random order. Finally, the most important part happens when the spectators then gathers up all the grass and dry leaves around them and attempt to conjure up some sort of pillow or mattress because there will be no better time in your entire life to catch a nap. Being the cultural investigators that we are, we kindly took up Chris’s offer to come watch his Cricket match, I’m not sure what he had against us (maybe we looked tired), but we almost made it through the entire 6 hour ordeal. Four hours after we arrived, Helen decided she had had enough and off we left with her. Chris finally came home after a few hours and tossed me the game ball as to say “You and Krissy really earned this; nobody has lasted THAT long watching a Cricket match!” I thanked him and named the ball Lunesta as one glance at it puts Krissy and I both to sleep. To Chris’s defense, he owned the field acrobatically catching any ball in his vicinity and then crushing the ball over and over again when he was up to bat.

Krissy and I are both pumped to host Chris and Helen at the upcoming Brian James and Sarah wedding, which is not set due to a lack of proposing (get on it Sarah!)... but we know it’s coming soon.

Australia, is such an amazing place. In my opinion, I think Sydney could be the most livable place on Earth – it really does have it all. At the moment; however, God must have it out for Oz as they are experiencing floods of Biblical proportions (nearly 300,000 affected). In the Northeast, places that have not seen water in 10 years are getting washed away . Then down south near Melbourne, crops are being decimated by a plague of locusts that would make Moses proud. Mostly the locusts are ravaging the vineyards, so all you wine-o’s out there, it may be a good time to stock up on Aussie wine now as they’re predicting the next few years may be affected by the onslaught.

The Locals "Bondi"

As for now, we’re off to Borneo! Most of you know we’ve been in Malaysia for the past few weeks, but the timing is perfect for this blog thanks to mainland (peninsular) Malaysia not having anything to write about. However, for all you Tra-vow followers that want to know, I’ll sum up mainland Malaysia like this: Trash, Crowds, Fish Sauce, Diarrhea, Homelessness, No Cultural Identity and Rats... there, I just saved you from buying the Malaysia Lonely Planet. All I can say about traveling is, you win some and you lose some and we definitely lost one with Malaysia.

Tomorrow we’re headed into the jungles of Borneo (Bako and Mulu) for some serious trekking. We may be out of reach for a week or so, but feel free to send us any messages via email and facebook – we love hearing feedback from our blogs... other than we don’t write them enough!

Sorry for the lack of pics - we have many more but they take forever to upload on the blog!

Shout Out's from Overseas:

Happy Birthday to Kerry, Mama Muholland, Mike and Mormann

Cangrats to Jeff and Amber and Happy Birthday to Jeff (soon)

Congrats to Juicer for the bid on the house and other things.

So Long Kiwis Hello Roos

Our two day hike through Abel Tasman Park was full of lush forest, white sandy beaches and beautiful blue waters; quite a contrast to the rest of New Zealand's scenery. The tramp itself was hilly and exhausting, but definitely worthwhile. Norch reeled in his first New Zealand fish and we learned that crabs live inside of mussels which grossed out our German neighbors.

Afterwards we navigated our way back to Auckland to celebrate Thanksgiving. Unbeknownst to us, our arrival coincided with the U2 & Jay-Z concert practically locking down the city; however we managed to find ourselves a hostel worthy of celebrating our favorite holiday. We briefly flirted with the idea of hunting a wild turkey since the nearby stores only offered a very expensive frozen option, but a) neither of us could kill one and b) when we asked some locals they looked at us like we were crazy, exclaiming that wild turkeys carry all kinds of diseases. So we settled for option B, a chicken, and bought all of the usual fixings after questioning every grocery store employee as to where we could find the cranberry sauce (so essential!). While sitting down to enjoy our feast at the hostel, we were approached by a friendly kiwi couple asking if we were Americans celebrating Thanksgiving. Touched by their friendliness and knowledge of our holiday we shared our meal and hung out with them. Later they admitted they had googled our odd assortment of food on their iPhone and put two and two together. Thanksgiving this year wasn't the same as being home with friends and family or watching the Lions loose...I mean play, but it was still a great experience.

Post Turkey Day we spent our last week winding down in the small beach town of Port Waikato with a Swedish couple, a Kiwi (the owner), a Frenchie and a few stray kittens. Dean, the Kiwi, is in his early forties, an avid surfer, prison guard, former race car driver, world traveler, a bit of a hoarder (that is a bit of an understatement) and an all around cool guy. Tomas, the Swedish guy was a very very lazy surfer with a culinary knack that lead to us eating some of the most amazing dishes. Minna, Tomas' girlfriend, in contrast was a very hard worker, constantly cleaning and in her free time enjoying Sweet Valley High books. The Frenchie, Laura, a very sweet girl with minimal English arrived a few days before we headed out. Apparently Dean had told Laura that his house was full, but something was lost in translation and she showed up anyways.

Despite being in a small town (I'm talking one convenience store and no stop light small) we had a good week chalk full of activities from flounder fishing to watching a race car event from the corporate box (VIP baby!). Unfortunately the flounder fishing only netted one medium sized crab, which was similar to our crayfish excursion, but we had fun. Mid-week the guys did some deep sea fishing in a boat which looked deflated when they returned due to a slow leak. Norch, not having the best sea legs, chummed the water with vomit and was coincidentally the only one to catch a fish.

Norch's race car

While in Waikato we successfully sold our car to two redneck kiwi girls, which thankfully was a really smooth process. The second they stepped out of the car Dean announced that we couldn't have found more perfect buyers and declared the car would be sold in 5 minutes time if Norch turned on the charm. And just like that Norch put his shirt back on and we watched Ewik (our car) head off into the sunset. One of the more entertaining moments of the week was when Dean decided to pinch the neighbor's rain water tank by rigging up a long plastic hose and sticking one end in the neighbors tank (after Norch climbed it and pried the lid off), then began syphoning the other end and plopping it into his tank. He said that the neighbors were friends and they hardly ever came down to the beach so they definitely didn't need all that water. We decided not to question his ethics and had a good laugh when he accidentally took a little more than intended leaving them with about 1/10 of what they originally had... hopefully it rains soon!

Overall we had a great time in New Zealand and met some really interesting folks. We're both excited to get to Australia for the warm weather, kangaroos and beaches. (Norch is already working on the next blog on Oz).

Happy Holidays everyone!

New Zealand EXTREME!

Extreme-ness

Well, we came, we saw, we conquered Queenstown... definitely one of our favorite places so far. The streets and air is filled with energy and excitement in QT; extreme this and the most outrages that; it's definitely an adrenalin junkies mecca. The town itself reminds us of a smaller Aspen, tucked away amongst beautiful mountains, a bit commercialized but in a way that still allows the city to maintain it's charm. The town is surrounded by exciting but expensive activities: Jet boating, river sledging, skydiving, bungi jumping, mountain biking, luging, etc. All expensive activities, unless you happen to "know people"... and thankfully for us, we started to know people after a few days.

 After a few days we befriended the weekend manager at our hostel, Mike. Mike is what Engenders call "bonkers" and Americans would call batshit crazy! He's a throwback to the Cockney Englander, at least in discussion cause neither Krissy nor I could understand a word out of his mouth most of the time. Mike, fully embracing the culture of the city knew that to mountain bike here, one most risk life and limb every 4th rotation of the pedal. Finding out first hand, Queenstown mountain biking is more along the lines of, "Let's push our bikes up that 2,500ft mountain, get to the top we're Mike will then proceed to give you the most incomprehensible (but possibly most important) 30 second lesson on how not to die while traveling 40 mph on numerous cliff edges and overhangs, hop on our bikes and find out actually what "putting yourself at risk" is considered to our health insurance companies. Oh, and all of this while riding a bike Mike borrowed from his buddy that tends to make a weird screeching sound when I tap the brakes and has a for sale sign for $150 hanging off the back of my seat. I later found out that the bike I was riding was originally bought new for roughly $1,500, meaning, either something on the bike is terribly wrong or this guy is seriously hard pressed for beer money.

Mike and Me

Me trying to navigate a turn

I've done the skydiving, the various cliff jumps, the cave repelling, the driving in Northwest D.C. at 1 in the morning... but nothing compares to the rush of flying down a mountain side under a "controlled" skid , with a braking system opposite to the kind we're used to in the states. What a rush! I was ecstatic when I jumped though the open window of our private room back at the hostel while Krissy was peacefully doing the PX90Yoga session... she definitely needed to do laundry after that... but to be honest, so did I.

We went back a few more times and each time I got a bit more comfortable and daring resulting in a gamut of scary, but painless crashes (did I mention the braking system is opposite to ours?). All of my crashes resulted with me going over the handlebars while trying to slow down but all luckily involving nothing but dirt and my helmet (mountain biking rule #1: Always try to land on your helmet). Mike however rides a bit faster thus launching him into various obstacles in which one would otherwise tend to avoid (i.e. trees, cliff faces, 40 feet of nothing but air and possible a flying bird). On one of these falls, Mike tried to break his fall with his arm and ended up with a series of deep gashes and a encore of purple bruises shortly after. It was pretty nasty, so nasty and bloody that Mike felt the need to ask for a band-aid when he got back to the hostel. I told him that at least one of those cuts required stitches (which he agreed), but thought super glue would work out just fine... after a quick demonstration on the application procedure of antiseptic wipes, he cleaned the cuts, put a few squirts of crazy glue in and viola... good as new (if new meant a more beat up version of the old Mike).


Mike had the camera ready knowing full well I had no chance of making it down the plank!

All in all, Mike was a great friend to have in Queenstown, someone who couldn't sit still and liked to have company on all of his exploits.

Since we were staying at the hostel for two weeks and helping out around the place, we got pretty close to the owners, Marla and Tim. Marla, a Wisconsin native fell in love with Tim in Aspen, six months later they were in QT with a business plan called the Magic Bus (a hugely successful touring bus company out here in New Zealand). Needless to say they had a bit of money and built an AMAZING house overlooking some of the ski fields and naturally, Tim took up golfing. Tim is the 4th member at a club called The Hills, a very prestigious course that the New Zealand open is hosted at. As most of you know, I ONLY play the best courses (i.e. West Potomac, Rock Creek and the Sterling Par 3) so when Tim asked if Krissy and I wanted to come out for a round one Sunday, we graciously accepted the invite. We were concerned that the $500 round may not fit exactly into our budgets; however, to our delight Tim explained that he could get us on free, which coincidentally, fit into our budget perfectly! With Tim, being a straight up and down hitter and me an unintentional left and right hitter, we where able to see ALL of the course, and boy did it live up to the hype. Every hole Tim would say, "alright guys, get the camera out, this next hole is the money shot"... after 18 holes, lets' just say we needed to unload our camera card when we got back. What a unexpected and great treat to find yourself on a course like that.
 

I'm sure the next words out of my mouth were "Hey, did anyone see where that went?". What can I say, I was distracted by my beautiful caddie!


We wrapped up our time in Queenstown with some great memories and great friends. Now it was on to the famous Fox and Frans Joseph Glaciers.

As we ventured North we passed through some charming towns and beautiful Mt. Aspiring National Park. In my opinion, Mt. Aspiring NP is the most beautiful place in New Zealand. Places like Milford and Doubtful Sound, The Pancake Rocks and Able Tasman get all the hype and their faces on the postcards, but I think there is something to be said about less populated locations. Whether your at these attractions with a group or by yourself, you tend to always have a sense of being part of the "tourist heard". Don't get me wrong, these places are beautiful and should not be missed (except Milford Sound, but that's another story), but personally, I prefer a spot off the beaten track; a spot where you pick and choose what to see not a spot you're shown... Places like Mt. Aspiring (to come full circle). Waterfalls drop from everywhere, trees are in abundance and cars are few and far between - my kind of spot.

Moving North with one more (German) passenger who discussed mostly his allegiance to Star Wars thus could not comment on Star Trek (yes, we often pick up hitchhikers - only the nice ones though i.e. chainsaw-less). Random fact: Did you know there are about 40 books after the last movie came out? And in case your wondering, many galaxies far far away, people on Earth are still giant Star Wars nerds.

Anywho...

After unloading our German, we took a quick look at Fox glacier, we decided to take on the larger and more picturesque Frans Joseph, or as many (me) refer to it as Franny Joe. We began the short trek to the glacier and got almost up to it where we then noticed the roped off section around it stating "Do Not Pass, you will get crushed by falling ice or rocks". I'm sure we would have taken the sign seriously (I promise) if we hadn't seen hordes of tourists heading up under the supervision of their one glacier guide. As we sat there waiting for the guides to get up the hill leading to the glacier, we discussed in frustration how the Kiwi's could even turn a large block of ice into a $100 tourist trap. While we conjured up our devious plot to touch the giant, dirty ice cube another guideless couple joined us. After telling the guide that we were going up whether we had to break out our pick axes or not, he confirmed that they could not stop us but recommended us not to get on the ice since we don't have crampons (Ice shoes). The four of us moved up the ice, happy that we avoided yet another tourist trap while the $100'less suckers that paid we right in front of us clearly frustrated. With our new comrades, forged in saveyness, we walked back down discussing our agendas for the rest of our time in NZ. Coincidentally, they matched up almost perfectly, henceforth the Fellowship of the Iceberg was created... uhh, sorry, too much Lord of the Rings I guess.

Krissy, Me and Franny Joe

That night we got to know Luke and Jade over a few beers, a box of wine and a rousing game of shoulders which was halted every time it got to Luke on number 5; you have to point Luke! And all you friends that know the game of shoulders and follow the worldwide rankings, I'm officially now an international champ, I expect a parade upon return. We spent the next 3 days with the couple from Brighton exploring some of the West Coast and partaking in some of the local cultures such as panning for gold (no luck), knife making and trying whitebait. We also got to spend even more time after we (I) locked our key in the car and had to spend half the day trying to get in before we succumbed to hiring a mechanic to break in, not before Luke almost had our entire door panel off though... I guess he was still looking for that elusive gold.



Jade, Luke, Krissy and me panning for gold 

In closing (finally), one of my favorite things about traveling long term is the people you meet. It's funny how a simple conversation while sitting on a rock staring at and ice cube can lead to 3 days of great fun and camaraderie. Or while just standing near your tent wondering what to do next can lead to meeting companions that you will spend Halloween and an 8 hour car ride together to and from Milford Sound. Traveling in the fashion we have chosen allows us to meet lots of people but rarely allows us to truly bond and make true friends. Those that we have had the fortune to get to know such as Luke and Jade and Chandler and Jay (our favorite Canadians), reminders us of the things we miss most back home; our amazing friends and family.

Our favorite Canadians, Chandler and Jay (Chandler forgot to dress up)


In summary: Life is great.

Coming soon: A summary of the Pancake Rocks, Able Tasman Trekking and find out how long Krissy can go without showering... all on the next episode of Idiots Abroad... uh, I mean Our Tra-vows.

Finally, for all you that keep up with the big man upstairs, please keep the 30 coal miners from Greymouth that perished in an explosion the day we were there in your thoughts and prayers.
Future travels: Arrive in Australia Dec. 5th, Arrive in Malaysia Dec. 20th.

Random Pics:

This Kea (New Zealand parrot) was one second away from flying off with our keys.

...New Zealand sunset

What Exactly do You Mean by "Boil"?

We awoke at dawn our third day on the South Island to the sound of a loud banging on our tent. For those of you that camp you can probably relate, it's always in the back of your mind....you're vulnerable to outsiders. Quite startled, I, Krissy, let out a scream and Norch looked at me just as alarmed. Norch moved quickly attempting to unzip the tent door, but not before we felt another punch. I just sat there frozen. As Norch got the tent open and prepared to defend us, we looked out to see a pint size tike who yelled "daddy" and ran off. A few moments later as we were laughing about the whole ordeal, the little boy came back for round two, but this time his dad stopped him and apologized after the first blow. Since we were up so early we figured we might as well get a move on it. Plus we didn't want the chaps we chatted with the night before to think we were actually going to take them up on their whitebait breakfast offer. I can't speak to the taste, because these undeveloped fish look more like embryos and we don't have the stomach to try them (see pic below).

Whitebait

We drove along the coast through Kaikoura where we saw sea lions perched on rocks alongside the road and enjoyed amazing views of snow capped mountains parallel to clear blue beaches. The drive along the east coast is a must for any future visitors! From there we headed south through Christchurch to an old French town called Akaroa for our first week of WWOOFing. We arranged with a local to help him prep his dolphin tour boat for the summer season in exchange for free accommodations at a local hostel (run by his business partners). The deal was actually quite sweet because we worked a total of about 10 hours painting and sanding and got a free tour of the harbor. So we had plenty of free time on our hands to explore the area, take in the community touch rugby league (to which Norch declared it was weenie and pales in comparison to flag football), and enjoy lawn bowling with local retirees (not to be confused with bocce).
We go to know the other, mostly international, WWOOFers at Chez La Mer hostel pretty quickly, especially when we bonded over the best YouTube videos (double rainbow has gone worldwide) and differing rules to playing kings aka ring of fire. One of the funniest moments was when David, one of the Germans we befriended, tried to explain that the tabloids in his country were reporting Lady Gaga had a "boil" and was actually a guy. After several confusing moments of trying to translate what he meant, he finally stood up and used his hand to depict a "boil"....at that moment we realized he meant boner. We had conversations with a bit more depth talking candidly about our countries. The question on the everyone's mind was what we thought about Bush. After making it clear that not everyone was a supporter of Bush it opened the gates to talk about more touchy subjects...namely World War II and Hitler. The two Germans talked about how they spend a lot of time studying the war and what happened. Mein Kampf is actually banned in the country and can only be read in University libraries but not allowed to be checked out. One said that his grandfather was a general at the time and had no idea about concentration camps or half of the atrocities that were taking place.

Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula

Pongo - a Chez La Mer regular

Our last day in Akaroa we gathered mussel along the harbor for our send-off family dinner at the hostel. I was picking what I thought were good sized mussels till I found Norch with mussels as big as my hand. And he came across a paua, which is a large snail found in New Zealand and considered a delicacy among the Maori. As luck would have it, a local Maori woman was patrolling the area to make sure no one was illegally harvesting young paua. She was quite a feisty lady and tried to convince us to eat our paua raw; we declined, thanked her for her tips on how to shell the mass and went home to cook it up with butter and garlic. It tasted a lot like octopus and was surprisingly delicious. That night we enjoyed our mussels which were cooked by one of our new friends and ended the night at the bar dancing with everyone to some kiwi tunes.

Mussel picking

Local Maori explaining how to shell the paua

Chez La Mer family dinner

Grey Skies Are Gonna' Clear Up...

Norch here, which means the worst and possible end to our trip is currently underway: Krissy is driving. All those who thought her last posting depicting my European style driving abilities (or lack of), rest assured, Krissy is no better. Dare I say she quite possibly could be worse if basing my judgment on the 12 minutes it took for her to start the car (to her defense, the steering wheel is placed on the right hand side of the vehicle making it much more difficult to locate). In hopes not to see the cruel ending what will inevitably be a head on collision involving our Honda and a sheep (since there are roughly 40 million in the country - 10 times the human population), I have decided to bury my head into this laptop until Krissy impression of an Asian-American (woman) driver has ceased.

 　
New Zealand, the land of changing climate and topography; one hour you can be in a desert surrounded by patches of snow and the next in a temperate forest in a dry heat. New Zealand is the worlds youngest country (physically) and you can tell just by driving it. It seems the land has not yet decided what it wants to become; a luscious tropical paradise similar to the Gold Coast of Australia or a rolling hillside filled with mountains and valleys similar to Ireland. To suffice both worldly desires - New Zealand has become both and much more.

Appropriately enough, our first encounter of the attractions New Zealand has to offer is it's geothermal activity. It's appropriate in a sense because this is exactly how New Zealand itself began - through growth by volcano, similarly to Hawaii. Driving through the North Island, you can literally see the volcanic steam arising out of vents in much of the region. In fact, there are so many geothermal vents, fissure and heated pools that New Zealand is yet to sell each feature off to commercialize them - yet. Most of the really popular geothermal pools such as Wai-o-tapu are pretty expensive to get into but luckily for us (me), we (Krissy) did some research on some cheaper options such as Kerosene Creek (pic. below) which is a warm spring somewhat in the middle of nowhere.

　

After driving a bit further south past Rotorua and Taupo, we came to Tongariro Crossing, a famous mountain pass that is frequently tramped. Regarded for it's difficulty and beauty, the pass is a major tourist spot. Unfortunately, after two days of waiting, the weather never cleared and the pass was impassable, so we ventured southward.

After 5 days in the north, we were completely tired of the rain and cold, so we packed up our gear and headed south. We may plan on heading back up north to take on the stubborn island later in our trip.

Our shot in the dark attempt at nice weather panned out right from the start of our South Island adventure. After a crazy late night drive to our campsite down what has to be one of the steepest and windiest roads on earth, we found a beautiful site along the water in the Marlborough Sound. When we woke, the clouds parted and the sun came out, what a great start!



More postings to follow very soon!

Norch's 15 Minutes of Fame in Fiji

Squints McGee & Cousin It (Fiji)

Bula Bula! We've arrived in New Zealand sun burnt yet refreshed on the heels of our Fiji adventures to find the "spring season" is closely akin to a rainy winter day in the states. As soon as we got off the plane we had to bust out our fleeces and are still half considering returning to Fiji to wait out the good weather. Fiji was awesomeness afterall. And Norch is a local celebrity after getting quoted in the newspaper by a sports writer saying Fijian rugby makes American football (or grid-iron as they call it) look like it's played by little girls. While visiting we caught the biggest game we caught the biggest game of the year where Nadi challenged Nagro for the cup. Neither of us had ever seen rugby live (or really understand the rules to be quite honest), but it was an exciting game with a lively crowd that kept roaring "boom". Norch has decided he's man enough to learn to play. I just want to learn how to make roti stuffed with curried potatoes which was sold at the game and tastes like heaven.

As I'm writing Norch is driving along in NZ and almost just killed us for the 10th time while making a turn into the right hand lane instead of the proper left. Perhaps one day he'll get the hang of it. At least he didn't turn on the windshield wiper blades instead of the turn signal again. And I just saw a sign for sheep poo for $5...curious.

Back to Fiji. One of the highlights of our time in Fiji was the local market where we bought delicious fruits, veggies and spices from farmers. And had our first taste of the infamous Kauva. Kauva is a traditional drink made from grinding up the Kauva root and adding water. It was described to us as medicinal, which we can only assume is the fancy way to say it numbs your tongue. Norch tried to capture the excitement of the market with lens, but was quickly asked to stop by some young street pharmacist who said that we were making those buying and selling weed uncomfortable. So much for the classic market photo.

The most educational part of our trip was getting to know the locals and realizing despite our western perceptions they were genuinely kind and never had an agenda such as selling us something or asking for money. Whenever we needed directions or other assistance no matter who we approached they were welcoming and overly helpful. The Fijians still have a tribal lifestyle with more of an emphasis on day-to-day happiness than working hard to save money to buy stuff down the road. They can live off the land after all with plentiful seafood, bananas, coconuts, papaya, etc. all around and have close knit villages full of large families and neighbors. It's quite the life in a beautiful country.

Our near future plans include my on-going quest to hug a baby lamb and Norch's desire to reenact Lord of the Rings L.A.I.R.E. style. Oh and our accents are coming along quite nicely.

Cheers!

Celentano Nuptials

We got married August 27th in Stafford, VA at the lovely Rock Hill Plantation House. The wedding was absolutely amazing and all of the little details came together perfectly with the help of our fabulous friends and family. We are truly blessed and now happily married. We're still waiting on the official wedding photos, but posted a preview for your viewing pleasure.

When we first started dating it became quickly apparent that we both have a passion for traveling and adventure. So only naturally we planned a five month backpacking honeymoon adventure in the Pacific/Asia region. Since the wedding we've been furiously mapping out our travel plans, convincing friends to come visit us and moving out of our very first nook. And Nathaniel is trying to convince Krissy that she can survive with less clothing than she typically wears in one week.

We plan to use this forum to talk about our travels, post photos and stay connected to home.