We've been left speechless by the Phillipines, but dead-gunnit we're gonna try and capture it. A 'country' made up of over 7000 islands, teaming with wildlife (not to mention little thin deadly snakes sniggling among your beach camping area), electrically vibrant greenery, and surrounded by clear waters with an abundance of water-life. Plonk in an A-Grade collaboration of people, the most local fish available - Tuna, a fine local beer, ridiculous beaches, sailing catama.... sod the summary, let's go.
Another action packed 2 weeks have passed, squeezing in what we understand to be the key spots in Cambodia. And what a country. Beautiful sights, beautiful people (I can see why Angelina bagged a few littleness from her trips), but another that's not without a rather brutal recent history that certainly wasn't covered in our history lessons. We've also managed to pull ashore two middle eastern goats for a week.
Thickly slathered with gert lush green rice paddies. A plethora of oriental treats like roasted pork and pickle-filled crunchy baguettes, and aromatic noodle soups. And probably the cheapest beer in the world, a mere 30p a glass. Good day to you Vietnam.
All the ingredients were in the mixer. Lob the headline acts of Tom and Lucy in there for 3 of the 5 weeks we had here, and we had a show on our hands.
India - a country of contrasts. In summary. It'll serenade your senses with its spice-rich curries that melt you to your undersized stool, then punch you square in the stomach, serving up 20-a-day Diarrhoea (just in time for a 30 hour train). It will teach you the positive ways Buddhism leads people to treat other beings, yet rip up that rule book when you see a stray dog being booted by a shop owner. And what would an India summary be without a smel-aphor, it'll shower you with incense smoke and lotus flower aromas, then regurgitate cow and human shit across every street, with often no smellual respite. Yup, it's been the most colourful part of our journey, and we'll miss it as much as we won't.
Shifting from Latin America to South Asia was a big change that we were actually really ready for. Sri Lanka being known for its stunning tea plantations and mountainous landscapes, friendly people and of course, coconut fuelled curries, were just three of many selling points that would breathe life into newly set sails for the second half of our trip.
Stopover number one from NYC, in China (trying to look as weird as possible, don't be too alarmed)
A Mole attempting to bed down on turmeric infused (look and smell) carpet in Delhi airport.
On with the show. Another major change in life on the road for us was the abandonment of just that - roads. See you LATER buses. You hear so much of the trains in Sri Lanka and they do not disappoint.
The track from Kandy to Ella totally lives up to the hype. A 7 hour train journey that neither of us needed any other entertainment than simply gawping at the rolling hills as the train snaked over and around them.
Hold me Jack!
The food has of course been a particularly welcome change of flavours, moving from largely rice and beans, to some of the most delicious 'Indian' food we've had, and contrary to what we'd thought, really simple in how it's made.
This is a typical Sri Lankan breakfast of Dal, Coconut Samba (pretty much spiced desiccated coconut), tangy onions and chappatis - an other worldly way to start the day.
Breakfast was of course washed down with a pot of locally picked and brewed Ceylon tea (Ceylon is the former name of Sri Lanka).
A popular lunch meal is the Dosa, some of you may have had these before. Essentially it's a giant pancake with various filling options, our pick being the Aloo Masala. This always comes with curry and a coconut sauce to rip and dip into. Killer.
Also available in Chocolate and Banana : )
To whip up your own, truly authentic and super easy Sri Lankan curry assortment - in a mere hour and a half, check out Grandma Daya's recipe that I wrote up on the main site - www.themockingbird.me
Food and travel aside, Sri Lanka has totally ticked every travellers, or holiday makers box. Tourism here, believe it or not, is still in its relative infancy, with the brutal civil war only having ended in 2009. This means that the beautiful, overwhelmingly kind and warm people here have not yet been morally beaten down by tourists. What I mean by that is that the places we've been so far that are significantly more touristy, generally tend to have locals that are much more money grabbing and uninterested in you other than for your money. The amount the Sri Lankan people smile is off the charts, and if you show an interest in them, you'll be rewarded with what feels like a lifelong
friendship.
From a travelling perspective, getting around is cheap and easy (that 7 hour train through paradise was £2 each...), and most people speak sufficient English. Having come from places like Bolivia, where we'd spend night buses riddled with worry trying to memorise a 7 word Spanish phrase to make sure we're let off at the right place, you can waltz in to most travel days with minimal research and you will always be helped by locals or the station staff.
Here's an array of photo highlights from our 2 weeks here.
Sri Lanka has a big Buddhist population, of course meaning it's people are very peaceful, and it's temples enchanting.
Our first ever safari, in Udawalawe national park - a vast area of wild land that boasts the highest density of elephants in Asia. Fair play.
Seeing phanties in the wild is a really magnificent experience and a sure highlight of Sri Lanka.
Go on son.
Mum helping her baby to snorkel across one of the lakes. Heart warming stuff. They made it btw.
After our safari we went to the Elephant Transit House, an orphanage for elephants that are brought up to full strength from babies before being released into the park. This is a truly ethical system that's not just there for show. Elephants here are treated very well and visitor times are limited to half an hour each day. Refreshingly positive to see and contrast with some of the setups in Thailand.
Good eggs.
No trip here would be complete without a visit to a tea plantation and factory. We found some women picking leaves on our walk there.
Tea pickers taking their brimming sacks for weighing. Sorry, weird phrasing. Bulging bags. Nope, it's impossible.
Being showed around the factory. Every square inch was taken up by boxes of tea leaves and the whiff was bloody fantastic.
And the tasting. My God is it good to drink proper tea again.
We did home stays throughout our time in Sri Lanka and it is absolutely the way to do it. This was the gorgeous family we stayed with in Mirissa down on the South coast.
The backwaters of Mirissa. A sunrise start that Moles can't adjust too quickly to.
A Water Monitor. Pretty eery seeing a lizard swimming.
Cinammon leaves! Actually really bitter and boog but interesting to see and smell in the flesh.
And last, but certainly not least. February to April is prime time to see the Blue Whale off the south coast. Yes we'd been to see humpbacks in Peru, but the opportunity to see the largest mammal on earth just couldn't be passed up.
I still vividly remember watching Blue Planet with Ali after work at The Fox one night and hearing those wisdom filled dulcet tones introducing it at the start of the episode- 'This. Is a 30, metre, Blue Whale'. Shit. Off.
The best way to show and tell this is through the means of the H[oo]D... (change quality to high)
And that, is what 2 weeks in Sri Lanka looks like. I've not given much detail on where we went throughout this but if you're thinking of planning a trip here, which you really really should, let us know and we can give you an itinerary. Big thanks to Kate Mahone and her Dad for lots of the places we went : )
After being forced to stay in the home of Spring Break (the Yucatan peninsula in Mehico) over New Year, you'd expect us to have wanted to be as far away from The States as possible come the end of January. But landing in proper Christmassy temperatures and hearing 'English' was a surprisingly welcome western hug that we were all too ready to hurl ourselves into. And actually, one we may not completely let go of...
Bienvenidos indeed, to what has to immediately be called out as the culinary climax of the front 5 months of our trip. The prospect of eating tacos and quesadillas every mealtime for the 3 weeks we spent in Mexico was willy quivering, and knew from my Dad's trip further south of here, that we'd be getting variations of comida mehicano throughout our 6 week Central American leg. Here we go.
As our time working on the farm came to an end we really begun to feel the weight of excitement for what in reality, was the section of the trip we were most looking forward to - Medellin, the Caribbean coast of Colombia, and excitingly, the arrival of Will (my brother).
First stop, well actually quite a few bus stops out from the farm, was Medellin, a city once better known as Escobar's shooting range. But now, a free and culture drenched city loaded with incredible food spots and hip-snaking salsa pros.
Though I'd had a lot of fun coupling up with Alice for dance lessons on the trip so far, she, in the kindest way she could, made it politely clear how much she'd love a private salsa lesson.
I managed to sneak in halfway through and take a few snaps, but alas, both myself and Will would quickly reap the benefits of Alice's learnings just a few days after this.
We'd managed to keep hold of our Deutche freund Ulla from the farm for a few days, and collectively decided to hit up Guatape, a place I'd come across when doing Pinterest research for Colombia. I won't bore with too much background but essentially a purpose built dam has created a bonkers looking network of lakes, so we were keen to get up there to check out the view, and of course, get out on/in the water somehow.
Medellin and Guatape proved to be everything we'd hoped, but above all, was welcome down time before Will's arrival; two weeks we'd know would be action packed, and fiesta filled.
This grinning mug was a bloody welcome sight on the evening of December 1st, as he bobbed his way through arrivals at Cartagena airport, with what looked to be a backpack with the best part of two t-shirts, trunks and a towel. He's the first of a few to come out and see us on the trip, but of course being family, was a particularly special one.
He'd had two nights of sleepless travel from London, so was pretty KO'd when we got to our hostel at 11pm, so after a couple of swifties in the bar, we hit the hay so we could step up to the plate fresh for day one.
And night one was a monster. We'd started drinking at lunchtime after a mornings stroll around sticky Cartagena, and gently mosied our way through the afternoon sipping Club Colombias (the standout beer of the continent) and catching up over some tunes.
The hostel we were in was pretty social so we'd met quite a few people as the evening begun to draw in, one of which we were avoiding though, was Gollum, our dormitory companion we'd nicknamed because he'd been boshing powder all afternoon and was either climbing the walls of our 8 bed pit, or
doing laps of the hostel pretending he had a purpose.
With Gollum successfully binned at about 10pm, we headed out on the town with 2 Aussies and a yank, and with some of Alice's Salsa moves in our back pockets. The main chunk of the night, or early morning, was spent at a salsa bar with our new amigos, and also, quite randomly, a local father and daughter who'd asked to dance with us. Why not aye.
Dad was very clearly into Alice, but was a very good dancer and it all seemed normal and harmless, and Will and I shared the daughter, who also seemed quite into the two of us. By the time 4am came around, I was co,img to the conclusion that Salsa is probably the closest thing you'll get to intercourse without the down and dirty, so in my eyes, it was a steamy night of leg humping that was somehow on the right side of adultery. In fact, I'd say that on further reflection, Salsa is God's gift to Latinos to tackle that whole 'lead us not into temptation' mallarchy. Western society just got porn, so I reckon
this lot got a much sweeter deal.
The next morning we were due to be leaving the hostel at 8am for a boat we'd booked to our next destination, but Will and Alice, having applaudingly woken up at 7am, couldn't find me anywhere.
For a full hour they searched and shouted throughout the hostel, and near tears, were beginning to think I'd been kidnapped.
I awoke a little after 8am on the toilet and rather hazily waddled my way back to the dorm in my pants, expecting just to go back to bed, and certainly not knowing I'd been asleep on the toilet for however long. Will powered up to me after seeing me from the other end of the communal area, in a state of total panic, and blasphemed at me to see where I'd been. With the Trauma averted though, Will had packed up all my things and within a few minutes we'd be power walking to the pier, hoping
our boat was as late as all our other South American travel typically was. Luckily, the boat was indeed late, so after piecing together the night and a lot of apologies from me, we geared up for a recommended hostel we felt particularly excited about.
Casa en el Agua - a floating hostel an hour from the mainland by speed boat. A place surrounded by crystal clear Caribbean water, an abundance of fish and lobster (: )), flawlessly curated beats, and a righteous amount of Rum and Coconuts to continue the fiesta for another 3 nights.
We slept in hammocks on the upper floor (much more comfortable than you might think, and a rather special way to wake up)...
...spent our days pissing around in the Caribbean...
...and supping on more Club Colombias with the Dutch owner, and our Aussy and Yank amigos from Cartagena; who were equally feeling the weight of the night before (less the morning's drama) but like us, were high enough from how ridiculous this place was.
Like all of the places that would follow here, we could have spent weeks at this hostel. When you reach such a peak when travelling, you ask yourself why you persist to keep seeking better. But time was tocking, and Tayrona national park was knocking, so we saddled up, and said farewell.
Tayrona had been shut throughout November, and a number of other backpackers had said how gutted they were to have missed it. Having heard a lot of good things from those who had caught a glimpse before its shutdown, it felt like we could be in for another stunner, though welcomely, a tad tamer on the sauce front.
We had to walk for about an hour to get to the camp site (there are no hotels or hostels across the park), but among some of the most pristine, palm-studded beaches we've ever seen.
There are still heaps of indigenous people throughout the park, the few of which we came across were shifting Coconuts for a few peso's, which an hour's walk in and a hangover deep, was rather welcome.
Upon arrival at a particularly well tipped beach - Cabo San Juan, we discovered there was the option of sleeping in hammocks up on the above point, which of course we silently established we'd do anything to experience. Being the Brits we are, though we were told to return at 2pm to check if there was space, we sat outside the bookings hut for the 2 hours we'd arrived beforehand, and to our delight, secured three of the last five of the hammocks in the sky. SELECTAAAAA.
We ended up staying 3 nights at Cabo. It was such a beautiful place to chill, and just the place we'd imagined when Google image'ing Colombia before the trip. We mainly flitted hrough our books, freshened up in the warm blue sea every now and again, and explored some of the incredible trails around the park. Here're some more snaps of it all...
Knockout.
Watching a typically high standard of football.
After Tayrona, it was off to an Aussie run joint called Rancho Relaxo (could that be a better marriage of Spanish and Aussie?). We could only manage time for one night here, but used it as a base to go off and do some tubing in Palomino (very unofficial, from the motorbike ride up a dirt track, to floating into a military base down near the mouth of the river). After 4 hours of floating on a tractor inner tube through some mesmerising scenery, and getting pummelled by mosquitoes on the walk back to the highway, we hailed down a bus. We got back mid afternoon and managed to enjoy the 'Eco-pool' and play with their FUDGING-fantastic pet pig.
For our final few days with Will, and with not many more after that for us in Colombia, we shifted to our final stop, Casa Elemento - another highly tipped spot on the backpacker trail, and one I knew from being the number one hostel on some BuzzFeed article I saw before leaving (http://bzfd.it/1mRMkXr), would be some finale.
The hostel is high up beyond the mountain town of Minca, among a thickly vegetated region of steep rolling hills and stunning views. It's famous for its infinity hammocks, which had looked pretty special in photos, and were truly breathtaking in person. We spent our remaining days here doing various activities in the area, from climbing waterfalls to coffee plantation tours; all of which were intertwined with plenty of the local craft beer on that hammock.
And that, guys and dolls, is South America! 3 and a half months that has gone quickly, but hasn't been too frantic. It's a sub-continent of serious cultural contrasts, we've met some incredible people, and ticked off more bucket boxes than we could have imagined. If these photos don't act enough as an advert to come and check it out for yourself, I don't know what is.
