Daniel and Celia Wilson (danielandcelia)'s photos- powered by SmugMug

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Hello All,

Welcome to our photos. At the moment all of our galleries are of our honeymoon trip. Look at the Whicker's World for a summarised version, which also has the bonus of not including us. Also see the Bad Things gallery to laugh at our various misfortunes.

All the other galleries are just lovely places. Hope you enjoy.

Daniel and Celia

Galleries

Fiona's 21st Birthday :

Fiona's 21st Birthday

Updated: Jul 08, 2007 3:03am PST

Wimbledon :

Updated: Jul 07, 2007 9:50am PST

Exeter Ball :

Updated: Apr 23, 2007 3:24pm PST

Singapore seems, with a superficial 3 day exploration, to be a utopian ...

Updated: Sep 20, 2006 2:35am PST

Hue, Vietnam : Experts on Vietnamese geography may have noticed that these places are out of sequence. Yes. We didn't visit them in a weird order, we're just erratic in our writeups. And really quite behind.

Hue itself isn't much to speak of. The hightlight attraction is getting a Dragon boat ride on the Perfume River out of town to see a selection of pagodas and tombs. The best bit (apart from when Celia got to stroke an old man's beard - pic 7) was the river ride itself, where we got a glimpse of the lives of the river-dwelling locals.

Experts on Vietnamese geography may have noticed that these places are ...

Updated: Sep 14, 2006 6:31am PST

Hoi An, Vietnam : Our first marriage lesson: don't, under any circumstances, spend any length of time clothes shopping together (Relate probably gives that one away for free). It's quite a hard thing to acheive in Hoi An, which is basically a huge shopping mall. A very beautiful, ancient shopping mall, that's also a UNESCO world heritage site, but a mall nonetheless. Every outlet sells beautiful clothes, shoes, art and crafts, which you are obliged to see by a woman tugging on your arm pleading "laydee, you look my shop". "Obliged" being a relative term for the different sexes

Obviously, you wouldn't want to let them down, so you take a quick peek. You can pick a fabric, and then point at any item of clothing in any magazine, or make something up. They then name a price around a third of what you'd expect in Topshop, measure you, and get sewing. Three hours later you have a new wardrobe. After a few days you have to leave, because both your money and your husband's patience are running out.

Hoi an didn't hit Daniel's buttons in the same way as Celia's, but even he couldn't resist a tiny little camp man offering cheap shirts and trousers. He also managed to persuade Celia into their first game of pool together, before a Vietnamese man with far too much time on his hands came over to show us tricks.

Hoi An, Vietnam

Our first marriage lesson: don't, under any circumstances, spend any l ...

Updated: Sep 11, 2006 12:26am PST

Ninh Binh, Vietnam : We arrived in Ninh Binh at 4am, crawled to the nearest hotel, and slept off the ride. Waking up and walking around, we found that the town didn't seem to be affected by the rampant tourism we've seen everywhere else in Vietnam - this meant we weren't constantly made to feel like walking wallets, which was refreshing after our last few experiences.

We hired a moped, and set off for the afternoon into rice paddy country. Daniel drove amazingly well, though if Celia's hair hadn't been bleached already it would have turned white. We met swimming boys, a herd of ducks, water buffalo and a whole lot of water. The weather turned about an hour into the trip, and we had to shelter in a small hut with a man who had been kind enough to tell us we were lost, and then offer us some tea. The ride back in the heavy rain was pretty exhilarating/ hair-whitening.

The following morning we went to the main attraction of the local area - Tam Coc. You get taken on a little boat through swampy rivers and lakes, between enormous outcrops of rock as high as hills. Then travel underneath some of them in the caves cut by the river, only a metre or 2 high: not for the claustrophobic. Truly an out-of-this-world experience, and we're sure the photos don't do it any justice at all...

Ninh Binh has some interesting local food specialities, and we're not likely to forget either of the ones we tried. The first was com chay, crispy rice cakes eaten with HEART broth! Daniel was doing okay at this, until he found his first chunk of aorta, then went a bit green and quiet. In the south, "com chay" means vegetarian rice and there may be an accent different somewhere, but still, an unfortunate similarity. The other speciality, recomended to us by Monika (thanks Monika!) was Mr Xuan's homemade rice spirit. Mr Xuan introduced himself to us by pulling Daniel's arm hair and saying "you look like a monkey". He made it all better by providing large quantities of free moonshine of the sort that makes your eyes water.

Ninh Binh, Vietnam

We arrived in Ninh Binh at 4am, crawled to the nearest hotel, and slep ...

Updated: Sep 02, 2006 2:58am PST

Nha Trang, Vietnam : The reason many people come to Nha Trang is to try out one of the famous party-boat tours. The original tours were run by a crazy lady called Mama Linh, infamous for being generous with party favours of the smokable kind. She's now in prison, but her tours are still going strong, now cleaned up and all above board (honest, Mum). The day involved seeing a few islands, but that wasn't really the point. IT was far more about relaxing and sunbathing on the boat, drinking beer, jumping off and messing around in the water - those sort of highbrow pursuits.

National stereotypes were out in force. The Italians got out of the water to smoke cigarettes, work on their suntans, and look sultry. The Brits got out to drink beer, work on their sunburn, and talk about bars they frequent back home. The Singaporeans didn't get in the water at all, for fear of catching something nasty, like the sun. The Vietnamese ate strange things and dropped all their rubbish on the floor. The American teen chattered about boys she was dating, looked nervous when alcohol was served, and decided to stick with us married types because it was "safe". (Great, married 4 months and we're already "safe"). As if to highlight our national foibles, the "entertainment" part of the tour consisted of 4 Vietnamese guys belting out songs from each of the coutries represented. We got a hilarious version of Yellow Submarine, other offerings included Bella Ciao, Frere Jacques and, impressively, something in Hebrew.

We met some cool people, and the next day we went with a couple to a water park. This meant that Daniel got another boy to run around with, and Celia got another girl to sit with and complain about how men never grow up. In the end, Daniel actually got a few boys to play with, after the Vietnamese children started sliding with him and beating him up. Celia was convinced to try the tube slide at least once, and Daniel went down the zip slide so many tmes he could barely walk the following day (Do you remember when you could play all day, and weren't stiff the next day - we feel so OLD!).

Nha Trang, Vietnam

The reason many people come to Nha Trang is to try out one of the famo ...

Updated: Sep 02, 2006 2:22am PST

Dalat, Vietnam : To celebrate Celia's birthday, where better to be than a place famed for its surreal weirdness? Welcome to Dalat, a favourite among Vietnamese honeymooners, who must be pretty odd people by the looks of it. It's meant to be like a miniature Paris but I think whoever said that has only ever been to France by way of an acid trip...

On the day itself we saw all sorts of weirdnesses:
- Several giant concrete animals (bee, chicken, kangaroo)
- An incense-holding dog
- Vietnamese cowboys
- The Crazy House. Imagine Lewis Carroll and Salvador Dali had got together as kids and designed a house they'd like to live in. It would be a bit like this.
- The Crazy Monk. Well actually, we tried to see him, but he was out.

We also spent some time in the Stop & Go cafe, not so much a cafe as the living room of Dalat's resident poet/artist/ex-mayor/dude. He put flowers in Celia's hair, wrote calligraphy in our diary, and generally hung around being arty. It's so satisfying when artists look like they should do: beard, beret and bohemian outfit.

It has some vaguely sane things to do as well. We spent some time with some ladies in a minority village, watching them weaving cloth. We looked around the ex-king's palace, which was more like a 1930's suburban semi. We wandered round the night market, slurping hot sweet soy milk. Though even doing "normal" things was made surreal by the fact that Korean tourists would constantly ask to have their photos taken with us. One pair of teenage girls in matching outfits took a particular shine to Daniel (and he took a shine to the outfits).

To celebrate Celia's birthday, where better to be than a place famed f ...

Updated: Aug 28, 2006 3:22am PST

Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam : Saigon has only changed subtley in the 7 years since Celia last visited. Still modern, still crazy, but the thousands of bikes are now motorised.

In Houston, we described the adventure sport of Crossing the Road. This is also popular in Saigon, but a different game altogether. Standing on the kerb, you are confronted with 3 lanes of motorbikes streaming towards you. You wait for a gap, prepared to make a run for it. There's no gap. The only way to cross is to take a deep breath, and step out into the oncoming traffic. Then walk across slowly, whilst the bikes part to let you cross. Providing you don't have a heart attack midway, you make it to safety. Or, you could wait around for a little old lady to help you across (it has been known).

In between crossing roads, we visited the Reunification palace, which has stayed in a time capsule since its invasion in the 70s, and the War Remnants museum. The latter displays hundreds of photos and other momentoes of 'The American War'. Despite being newly housed in a shiny big building, it's as heart-breaking as ever. On the way back through a park, we got to observe the many ways the Saigonese pass the time: badminton, foot badminton, walking in circles, and more badminton.

Unfortunately, at the start we thought we had to rush through Saigon, and only spent a day there. Maybe one day we'll go back and get to know it better, and this time with Daniel's camera fully functioning.

Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam

Saigon has only changed subtley in the 7 years since Celia last visite ...

Updated: Sep 02, 2006 3:15am PST

Beach luck (Rainy season travel) : a.k.a. Sihanoukville, Cambodia and Mui Ne, Vietnam. On our gift list, we billed Sihanoukville as all sun and sand, the Miami of the East. It might have been, if there had been any sun.

Every morning we woke up to the sound of rain falling on the tin roof, which isn't nearly as romantic as Norah Jones makes out. Quite noisy in fact, and indicative of another day with nothing to do. So we would shelter in our hut, and there we discovered someone else sheltering from the storm: a foot-long green and red spotted gecko. Aren't geckos only meant to be 2 inches long?

We asked our hotel guy what there was to do in town when it was rainy, and he laughed hysterically before proclaiming, "nothing!". Despite his pessimism, we set off into town and actually made a great dicovery - Seeing Hands massages. Most massage parlours in Cambodia offer a great deal more than your standard rub-down, but Seeing Hands is above board. the masseurs are all blind and proceeds go to the Disabled society of Cambodia, so your conscience gets a boost as well as your back.

On the morning we were booked to go on a boat trip in the nearby Ream nature park, it rained so hard that water came in under our door. We took that as our cue to leave.

Determined and hardened travellers that we are, we persisted in our search for another beach to laze around on instead. So after Saigon we headed for the supposedly idyllic Mui Ne, whch we found to be quite like Sihanoukville weather-wise, though it offered less to do and also smelled strongly of fish.

Beach luck (Rainy season travel)

a.k.a. Sihanoukville, Cambodia and Mui Ne, Vietnam. On our gift list, ...

Updated: Aug 19, 2006 11:41pm PST

Phnom Penh, Cambodia : On first arriving in Phnom Penh, we made the mistake of following a fellow backpacker to a hostel she recommended. The hostel was great, built out on stilts over a lake, but it was right in the heart of the backpacker area, though ghetto would be a more appropriate word. Every town on 'the trail' has a backpacker-favoured area, but they are usually have at least some of the local colour, or at least roads out. Not this one. Every single restaurant served marmite and PG tips, and there was only one road in. If the Cambodian government ever needed to round up foreigners, they wouldn't find it too difficult. The hotel also had the little problem of rats in the walls who kept trying to get in. We left pretty soon after we discovered that!

One of the coolest things about the city is seeing the monks in their lurid orange robes, wandering about basically doing normal things, but looking so incongruous. You expect them to be sitting and obtaining higher states of being, not zooming around on mopeds and taking photos of each other at tourist sights. Celia was disgusted at one point - "That top is way too low cut for her to be talking to a monk". Neither the tourist in question, or the monk for that matter, seemed to mind...

Phnom Penh is a lively city, where the people are great. The whole of city life appears to take place on the back of a moped, and it is amazing how many people you can fit on one (4 was our highest count, but we're convinced there are 5 or 6s out there). An amazing introduction to Asian life, we even had our first (slightly scary) streetfood here, when we first passed through - escaping with our wallets and GI tracts intact.

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

On first arriving in Phnom Penh, we made the mistake of following a fe ...

Updated: Aug 19, 2006 10:29pm PST

Temples of Angkor, Cambodia : The temples at Angkor make it onto most lists of Things to See Before You Die, and we're glad we did - A billboard for a local museum reads "See Angkor Wat and not die". If you're interested in Cambodian history, this is where the Khmer empire ruled from at the height of its power. If you don't give a monkey's about Cambodian history, but are interested in movies, gaming and/or enhanced cleavages, this is where a padded Angelina Jolie bounced (and we mean BOUNCED) around as Lara Croft in Tomb Raider. Being extremely interested in history, Daniel was in Heaven.

There are hundreds of temples spread across hundreds of kilometres, and we had 3 days. This meant we had to call on the services of a tuktuk driver called Million - "like million dollar" - to get around. Million was surgically attached to his shades - he picked us up at 5am one morning and even though it was completely dark he was still in the dark glasses.

That was the morning we joined hundreds, if not thousands, of others for what felt like a pilgrimage to see dawn behind Angkor Wat. Angkor Wat is the biggie, the famous silhouette that is represented everywhere in Cambodia: on its flag, on its money, and on the thing most people see every day, the beer, and they are rightfully proud of this place. We weren't the only people who wanted a good picture (as one woman put it - "the photo geeks are out in force today!"), and for once Daniel felt among his brethren when he pulled out his tripod and shutter release.

Ta Prohm is where LC:TR was filmed, and you can see why the location scout chose this place: semi-ruined temples, broken Buddha statues and cracked pillars intertwined with trees and roots. Again hundreds of tourists, and hundreds of tourists means about a million small children trying to sell you something. A typical conversation goes like this (always aimed at Celia, never at Daniel):
"Laadeyy, you wan buy post-card?"
"No thankyou"
"10 for dollar"
"No thankyou"
"Okay, okay, 20 for 2 dollar"
"No thankyou"
"You buy when you get back - you promise"

The embarassing thing was that at 7 they could speak more languages than we could...

When we were lucky enough to come across an empty temple, we could see how atmospheric and spiritual this place really was. A place to remember for a very long time!

Temples of Angkor, Cambodia

The temples at Angkor make it onto most lists of Things to See Before ...

Updated: Aug 18, 2006 3:45am PST

Whicker's world : Hi All,

For those of you who want to see where we're going, but don't want the unfortunate problems of jealousy and rage associated with seeing us in these beautiful places, we´ve created the exciting Alan Whicker pages.

From here you can see exactly what the world looks like ("Hello world"), without having to look at quite how happy we are sat in the sun.

Hope you like it,

Daniel and Celia

Whicker's world

Hi All, For those of you who want to see where we're going, but don ...

Updated: Aug 18, 2006 12:47am PST

Auckland, NZ : Auckland is a very photogenic city, like something out of a travel magazine: all sparkling blue water, shiny white boats, and sexy people (not just us). All we did was add to the ambience...

Auckland is also a lot more London-like than anywhere else we've been on our travels: It's cold; you can buy conveyor belt sushi; there are loads of shops where Daniel can look bored and follow Celia around saying "Do you need another strappy top?", or "How many cocktail parties are you planning on going to in the next three months?"'; And people WALK. It's so nice to be in a place where the pavements are full and lively. They take it to extremes though, elevating a road crossing to a free for all that can get a bit manic as 400 people get across the road in any direction they want. We started to get a bit homesick, to be honest.

We tried to alleviate this by hanging out in cool coffee shops (We didn't really have a choice about this - Mum/Carole has a bit of a coffee "problem"). New Zealanders are as serious about their coffee as their wine. (Perhaps more so. In Samoa, where we Brits would bring Marmite to the breakfast table, the kiwis all had coffee and mini cafetieres). This is demonstrated in their amazing coffee shops. We're not just talking Auckland: in the tiniest middle-of-nowhere towns that seemed to have not much going for them (except maybe some famous toilets) we'd find a cafe that served 'n' different types of coffee, tea, chai, plus excellent food that wouldn't be out of place in an Italian deli. We are hoping England will catch up soon (and Starbucks doesn't count).

We did some great things, like have dinner at the top of the Sky Tower and see penguins (not at the top of the Sky Tower). We had a fantastic time here and in New Zealand in general, and we want to say a big thankyou to Mum/Carole for putting up with us and being a great travelling companion!

Auckland is a very photogenic city, like something out of a travel mag ...

Updated: Aug 09, 2006 9:24pm PST

Napier, NZ : New Zealanders have this endearing habit of prefixing the majority of their restaurants, hotels and attractions with "World famous", "Internationally renowned", "Top 10", etc. The implication being that as many people have heard of this little coffee shop at the side of road in Hicksville, NZ as have heard of, say, Britney Spears from Hicksville, USA.

With a bit of willing suspension of disbelief, we decided we must have been living in a cave since we were born to not be aware of the World Famous Napier Art Deco Walk. In order to catch up with the rest of the world, we took the tour. Napier was destroyed by an earthquake in the 30s, and rebuilt almost entirely in the Art Deco style of the times, as pointed out to us by the kindly white-haired lady tour guide. Our favourite example was a brothel that had won accreditation from the Art Deco society of Napier, presumably for its architecture, nothing else.

Apparently, "Cellar Door" is the most beautiful phrase in the English language. We set out to empirically test this theory by next going on a winery tour. After 4 cellar doors and about 30 wines tasted, we had kind of forgotten the point of the experiment (not to mention most of the English language), but discovered a few new favourite wines. Ours wasn't the only dodgy command of the English language - it tooks us a long time (2 hours) to realise that "red swill" was not a wine tasting term, but our South African guide's way telling us about the soil colour.

New Zealanders have this endearing habit of prefixing the majority of ...

Updated: Aug 08, 2006 9:18pm PST

Lake Taupo, NZ : New Zealanders are lovely, friendly people, as genuine and open as you could imagine. They are also totally insane. Their leisure activities generally involve either putting themselves in danger (jumping off things, diving under things, crawling through things in the dark, etc), or putting small animals in even greater danger (we saw a hunting shop called Kilwell. Nice). These activities don't stop during the chilly winter months. Oh no, all Kiwis are under the mistaken impression that they live in a warm country. Outside doors are left wide open, people sit outside in cafes, no one wears warm clothes. One hotel owner in shorts and T-shirt remarked, "I'm toying with putting on a jumper", which was the only concession to the bitter weather we encountered.

Anyway, Taupo, on the banks of the huge stunning Lake Taupo, overlooked by snowy peaks, is the place to try these activities, year-round. Daniel tried aerobatic gliding (daredevil!), which was allowed. Bungy jumping was not (Isn't it great being surrounded by BOTH the women who want to stop you enjoying/injuring yourself - it means you have a legitimate reason to wuss out of scary activities). To start gliding you get dragged up into the sky by a small plane, and at about 9000 feet the glider is released. Then you have half an hour of falling gracefully. We managed two loops, and some other stuff, before Daniel vomited horribly into a bag (only a little bit on the harness). Let's just say the trip was cut immediately short after that. He then sat for an hour with the old pilots, trying not to be too embarrassed by the splatters on his t-shirt.

Celia and Carole went horse-trekking, and managed to keep down their lunch.

New Zealanders are lovely, friendly people, as genuine and open as you ...

Updated: Aug 08, 2006 5:11am PST

Waitomo & Rotorua, NZ : At Waitomo there are a selection of imposing underground caves. Beautiful in themselves, they are made even more so by the colonies of glowworms that live there, making the ceilings sparkle with millions of tiny blue stars. Unfortunately they dont let you take photos (the worms dont like it), so youll have to take our word for it we were there, and it was beautiful. It is mostly owned by a Maori tribe, who managed to claim it back off the nasty Crown. The biggest cave, aptly named the Cathedral, is used by the tribe for concerts and Christmas services. If our local church looked like this, we might even go occasionally.

Rotorua does not make the best first impression: It's not an imposing town, and (without beating about the bush) it smells of ass. Sulphur pours up through the ground, giving rise to amazing hot pools, and a smell of rotten eggs that has to be experienced to be believed. It was cold, and there appeared to be no one there.

We loved it! The landscape is almost prehistoric - walking through one of the town parks, there is pool after pool of boiling water, steam rising above them. The lake is beautiful. And we eventually found the people: They were all in the Fat Dog Cafe, having burgers the size of their heads.

Rotorua is famous for its hot pools and warm mud, and people would travel here in the early 1900s to be mildly electrocuted while sitting in the water. We thought this sounded like a fine idea, and opted to be pampered in the polynesian spa. Here we weren't electrocuted, but sat in the egg water for a while, and then were given Aix massages (a massage in a shower, sounds stupid, feels great).

On our way out of Rotorua, we stopped in the geothermal park of Whaka. (Whaka is the short name so tourists can say it. The real name is Te Whakarewarewatangaoteopetauaawahiao. Though, as Wh is pronounced F, even the short version can cause problems if you say it to the wrong person). There we saw a geyser going off, pools of boiling mud, and a performance of the Haka no, it is not just done by the rugby team.

As we left, we tucked into the pack lunch we had pilfered from the hotel breakfast buffet. Disaster struck twice first Daniel sneezed all over the food, and then he broke open the boiled eggs to find out they were raw. Who puts raw eggs in a breakfast buffet? Tricksey kiwises, thats who.

Waitomo & Rotorua, NZ

At Waitomo there are a selection of imposing underground caves. Beauti ...

Updated: Aug 06, 2006 11:49pm PST

Bay of Islands, New Zealand : On arriving at Auckland airport, we discovered that confusion around the international date line meant that Daniel's mum had turned up to meet us the previous day. After profuse apologies, and many hugs, we set off in the car up North with a third member of our Fellowship for the next fortnight. The road up to the Bay of islands was mesmirising. In fact, driving the roads of New Zealand is always amazing, around each corner is another view, another unexpected mountain, valley, waterfall, or procession of elves. OK, we didn't actually see any elves, as such. But there was lots of evidence that they were around. Lots of elfy things.

It would be possible to fill two weeks of interesting fun with the many roadside delights on offer. Our favourites were: SheepWorld (sadly no photo as we sped past too quickly), World Famous Toilets, the "Last cheese for miles" and cafe Eutopia (a little slice of Glastonbury in a layby). However, we managed to drag ourselves away, up to our destination Waitangi. Waitangi is where the Maori signed a treaty with the Brits agreeing to be under British rule. They also, due to an "error in translation" on the part of the whiteys, unwittingly handed over all of their land to the Crown. Ooops.

To see all of the Islands in the Bay, we hopped on a boat tour, undeterred by the freezing winds. Almost immediately the boat was surrounded by a big pod of dolphins, including a baby, that proceeded to swim with the boat and generally put on a performance worthy of Sea World. Later on, we found another pod, and the captain announced that as they did not have a baby it was possible to swim with them.

Daniel decided that this was too good an opportunity to miss, and a lack of swimming trunks wasn't going to stop him. The shorty wetsuit almost provided decency, and he was off. We'll talk about the New Zealanders weird preconceptions about their weather later, but lets just say that a wetsuit you wouldn't wear in summer in a lake in the UK does not provide a great amount of warmth in the sea in winter in New Zealand. After the shock of the cold, though, he saw the dolphins, and everything else was forgotten. So close he was almost battered in the face by a dolphin flipper, a nervous crowd of hypothermal humans swam gracelessly round the most amazing beings. Truly great, though he almost lost his left toe to frost bite. Celia and Carole enjoyed watching form the sidelines, though there was a hairy bit when Daniel, happily paddling along, nearly got mowed down by the boat.

Bay of Islands, New Zealand

On arriving at Auckland airport, we discovered that confusion around t ...

Updated: Aug 04, 2006 2:52am PST

Bad Things : As some of you know, travelling isn´t all fun and games. Someone has suggested that we create a photo gallery of the not so great bits of our adventures. He wondered if this made him a bad person - it may well do, but we liked the idea anyway.

So here by popular demand are the bad things in our honeymoon. (We hope the gallery doesn't get too big!)

As some of you know, travelling isn´t all fun and games. Someone has ...

Updated: Jun 18, 2006 3:47pm PST

Savaii, Samoa : Our final stop was the Island of Savaii, which somehow manages to be more relaxed and less modernised than Upolu. Before we got here, that didn't seem likely. This place really does look like the quintessential island paradise: palm trees, blue seas, long low beaches, and fat men with tattoos wearing sarongs. [The traditional Samoan dress is a Lavalava, just like a sarong, for both sexes. You can buy posh suity ones, and everything. Even the police wear them.]

The best bits we saw of Savaii were blowholes and turtles. The blowholes shoot seawater up to 40 mentres into the air, and tourists regularly and inadvisedly drop coconuts in to see them fired out like cannon balls. This, combined with the fact that the 'safety line' is ignored by all, means that the tourist population never gets to dangerous levels.

There's also a pool where you get to swim with a dozen or so large fresh water turtles. This really is as cool as it sounds.

In the evening, everyone staying in the fales sits together for dinner, and after dark there is not much to do except chat and play cards. We played a lot of cards with Dutch/Kiwi family, and taught them a game which we told them was called Oksel (armpit), as there were children present (though the real name in Dutch would be Kak-hoofd). We also discovered Celia's S and M addiction in a big way, on those long, dark evenings.

Probably our favourite Samoan experience was sitting in a fale, with the blowholes in the background, drinking coconuts and listening to a man singing and strumming 'achy breaky heart', in Samoan. Wonderful.

Our final stop was the Island of Savaii, which somehow manages to be m ...

Updated: Aug 01, 2006 10:56pm PST

Manono, Samoa : Next Island - Manono. Their main marketing point in the tourist literature is that there are no dogs on the island. If you have ever encountered the Samoan dogs, who attack anything that moves, even cars, and are only discouraged by a local throwing a rock at their head, you'll see why this is a selling point. England should take note and market itself as being free of roaming lions.

Getting to Manono involved getting on a local bus. This took a little longer than it would have otherwise, because the bus went to both of the Apia bus stations three times each before leaving the town. Maybe the driver just got lost. We then stopped twice en route so that various people could get off and do their shopping.

Which leads us on rather neatly to the very friendly, but incredibly frustrating Samoan way of doing things. Everything happens at a slow pace, by which we mean almost comatose. You can see the picture of the man rowing his boat while asleep. Surprisingly, Samoa is only the 3rd largest population of Samoans, most live in the US or New Zealand. Almost all of them send money back home, which means no-one actually living in Samoa has to do any work. Arriving in Manono, the following conversation took place with the fale owner:
"We've just spent 4 hours travelling, can we have lunch?"
"No, we've just had lunch"
"Okay, but it's included in our room rate, and you knew we were coming"
"..." [blank look]
"Okay, is there anywhere else on the island to have lunch?"
"No" Arrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!

Okay, enough bellyaching. The really unique thing about Manono is the over-water fales. This means your bedroom is on stilts over the breaking waves, and is quite amazing. From the front of our fale we watched the huge yellow moon rise over the sea, and the next morning watched the sun follow.

Next Island - Manono. Their main marketing point in the tourist liter ...

Updated: Aug 01, 2006 10:52pm PST

Upolu, Samoa : Arriving in the South Pacific tropical paradise of Samoa after California is a bit of a culture shock. No more newfangled conveniences such as malls, deep-fried sushi, bedrooms with walls...

Yep, everyone in Samoa lives and sleeps in wall-less huts called fales. This is great for catching the breeze (no need for air-con) and getting the rustic Samoan experience, but doesn't provide much in the way of privacy. Though with more 'modern' fales, the beautiful blue tarpaulin has been employed to help with this.

Maybe because they live their lives entirely on view, Samoans don't have any concept of privacy, or indeed personal space. It's quite common for total strangers to walk into your fale to say "hello", or to put an arm round you or a hand on your leg. One notable example was Geoffrey. Not to cast aspersions, but Geoffrey may have been drunk when he decided that Celia was the girl for him (that didn't come out quite right...). Anyway, the presense of a beefy and fearsome husband (oh yes) wasn't enough to deter our 25-stone friend, who was apparently a policeman, from stroking Celia's hair. But don't worry, Daniel had his fair share of being groped too, though not by any law enforcement officers.

Our first stop after the capital was a tiny island called Namua (which we later discovered means "place of the mosquitos" - they don't tell you that on the way in, oh no!). We were the only guests on the island, and were treated a bit like royalty. This included having one of the family stand over our food with a leaf, fanning away the flies, which felt uncomfortably colonial.

After this we moved to a much more lively spot, called Lalomanu. It was full of peace corps workers, whose chat up line of choice is: "hey, do you want to go and discuss the peace process?". No, really. Saturday night was Fiafia night, where the Samoan men dance frenetically, and the women dance incredibly gracefully. Which was impressive, considering... did we mention Samoa is the fattest nation on Earth? Afterwards the Westerners got to dance, which after lots of local beer, was neither frenetic nor graceful.

Arriving in the South Pacific tropical paradise of Samoa after Califor ...

Updated: Jul 26, 2006 9:07pm PST

On the Road, California : We took the quick, boring highway 5 up california and the windy, scenic highway 1 back down. Highway 5 was actually quite interesting in a "never seen anything like this" sort of way. Huge open spaces, interspersed with motels and McDonalds.

The 1 was another matter altogether. The road hugged the coast, and the coast mainly consisted of mountains that dropped straight into the sea. There were beaches, incredible views, and (unexpectedly) Blackpool like coastal towns. With Beach Boys on the stereo, it was a fun ride. Well, it was a fun ride for Daniel. As he had forgotten his driving license, he was chauffeured everywhere. And not a jot of bitterness from Celia, oh no.

California has a reputation for being the fun state. But in some cases it's the opposite, as you can see from the signs below, the only thing allowed was breathing.

On the Road, California

We took the quick, boring highway 5 up california and the windy, sceni ...

Updated: Aug 01, 2006 10:26pm PST

San Francisco, California : Arriving in LA, we realised it was depressing and unpleasant, so we hired a car and drove up to San Francisco. Well, actually Berkeley (across the Bay), where we were lucky enough to stay with the cousin of the mum of a friend (thankyou Patrick, and thankyou Kass!!). Convoluted to get there, but she looked after us wonderfully.

Over the next few days we overcame backpacker snobbery and became proper Tourists. It was great. We zoomed through the (rubbish) guidebook, seeing Market Street, Haight Ashbury, Golden Gate Park, Japanese Tea Garden, Alcatraz, China Town, and North Beach. We got so comfortable that we fell asleep in the park, and Daniel burnt his face to the point of glowing.

Even though Haight Ashbury is famous as the home of the counter culture of the 60s, nowadays Berkeley seems to have more of the left wing California vibe. We especially loved the organic foods, including Kass' bakery (fantastic bread for Marmite), and an unhealthy amount of sushi (though this time not deep fried, Californians would have fainted at the thought). We did a lot of sight seeing, but some of the overriding memories are about food!

San Francisco, California

Arriving in LA, we realised it was depressing and unpleasant, so we hi ...

Updated: Jul 06, 2006 9:18pm PST

Houston, USA : So, we left Central America, and returned to the "land of the free", where everything seemed mysteriously expensive. We stayed in the flat of the ever-lovely Amanda. After the torpor of Tulum, we both went into more than a little bit of culture shock, and failed to do all of the useful things we'd been planning on doing in the US, but luckily we had Mandy to look after us.

On the first day, we tried the adventure sport known as Crossing the Road, to get to the nearby mall. Pedestrians are both rare and despised in Houston, so to dodge those SUVs you need to be nippy. Less than a kilometre of walking should not entail over five near death experiences. Ever daring, we made it into the Mecca of Houston shopping, the Galleria. So many shops under one kilometre-long roof! There was even an Emo shop (on our last day, Claire, Amanda's friend, said "Daniel, you've mentioned that shop every time we've talked." It was that good.), full of interesting t-shirts, and the sort of Japanese films full of teenage girls committing suicide in unecessarily bloody ways.

Amanda introduced us to several Texan delights, including deep fried sushi (only in the US, and possibly Scotland), two-stepping under a glitter ball in the shape of a saddle, and televised church services. Daniel fulfilled a long held urge to hit baseballs in a batting cage and bowl in a real bowling alley. Unfortunately he didn't have his ID, so there were no White Russians ("It's a complicated situation, man, a lotta ins and outs")

She also took us to some totally awesome shops: clothes for Celia, and for Daniel: Central Market, a foodies' dream, where we practically lived for 3 days. We have never seen so many varieties of fruit and vegetables, or that much cheese. Fantastic, especially after foody depravation in Central America. They even had marmite, which has made us both very happy ever since!

So, we left Central America, and returned to the "land of the free", w ...

Updated: Jul 21, 2006 10:47pm PST

Tulum, Mexico : After almost two months of hard slacking we were in need of a break. Tulum is one of those special places that can provide a break even to the seriously relaxed. A small town with a 12km stretch of beach complete with some seaside ruins. We stayed in a cabana, and one of the photos is the view through the stick "wall". Not very private, and yet no breeze, the best of all worlds! Still, the pure white beach with clear aqua sea and green palms just metres away from our hut made up for it.

Daniel fulfilled his ambition to spend five days in one article of clothing, and we both managed to tan while wearing factor 50 sun cream. Celia overcame her fear of deep water and "sea things" to go snorkeling. In 2 metres of water. We're very proud of her.

There was no electricity in our cabanas, and very little nightlife in the town (we went to one "club" and as the only people on the dancefloor, we left). Five days of nothing much but the rinse-and-repeat cycle relaxed us almost to the point of coma, but you know... a good coma.

After almost two months of hard slacking we were in need of a break. ...

Updated: Jul 06, 2006 8:45pm PST

Tikal, Guatemala 2 : You can't go to Guatemala without going to Tikal. It's against the law, and rightly so. Tikal is a huge, sprawling set of Mayan pyramids, about 80% of which are still buried in the jungle. Though we had already seen 2 lots of Mayan ruins, we were still wowed.

We saw Tikal by late afternoon light, and by early morning. These times are the best because there are fewer tourists and more animals roaming round. Less chance of sunstroke, too. Between the two, we slept in a hammock dorm, which sounds wonderfully romantic until you realise you can´t sleep, and nor can anyone else around you. Only the mosquitos are having lots of fun. Anyway, it didn´t last long, as we had to get up at 4.30am for the dawn trek.

It was quite spooky, sleep-walking through the dense jungle behind the guide, in the pitch darkness, with the roaring of the howler monkeys in the not-far-enough distance. And then stumbling up 44m of very rickety wooden steps to the top of a pyramid. But it was worth it to see the sun rise behind the ruins, accompanied by a soundtrack of the jungle waking up, and supplemented by the mist, which rolled across the treetops like a movie special effect.

We especially loved the helpful signs, which say ´climb with caution´ at the foot of 100ft crumbling stone steps, and ´do not descend´ at the edges of sheer drops. No really, we weren´t intending to. Apparently they are needed though, as someone had fallen off a pyramid the previous week. We wish they hadn´t told us that...

Tikal, Guatemala 2

You can't go to Guatemala without going to Tikal. It's against the la ...

Updated: Jun 18, 2006 3:43pm PST

Flores, Guatemala 2 : On our way back through Guatemala, we stopped first at Coban in the highlands, and than Flores. We weren't planning to stay long in Flores, mainly because our 'trusty' guidebook says 'This town sucks ass - big time'. Both elegantly put and wrong, in our opinion.

The book was also wrong about Coban, which they said was great and we thought, ahem, sucked ass. In fact, we have disagreed with them on quite a few points. Interpreting the book is a bit like trying to decipher the jargon in an estate agent's brochure. Here are a few translations...

'This restaurant is popular with locals' = Good restaurant
'This hotel is popular with locals' = BAD hotel
'Moderately strenous trek' = Only attempt if you have a death wish
'Coban has the feel of a German mountain town' = This author has never been to Germany. However, Coban is a bit like Europe in that it rains an awful lot and in some places you can eat sausage.

Anyway (rant over), Flores is a cute little town consisting of ice cream coloured houses with red roofs piled onto a tiny penisula on a huge lake. With a lady we met in town, Celia went off across the lake to visit an animal sanctuary, while Daniel stayed behind to put in some serious photo time.

Flores, Guatemala 2

On our way back through Guatemala, we stopped first at Coban in the hi ...

Updated: Jun 18, 2006 2:34pm PST

El Salvador : The chicken bus that took us to our first stop in El Salvador, Tacuba, was full of people who had never seen a gringo in the flesh before, and certainly hadn't seen a blonde one. It was like travelling with a film star, the amount of attention we got. Though I'm sure there were more old men in hats asking Celia to sit next to them than the average starlet gets.

The house we stayed at was lovely, with a cat and a dog, and a duck for company. The family who looked after us were lovely as well, the mother Lydia talking to us in slow Spanish so we could understand. On saturday night we stayed up drinking with a veteran of the civil war, an ex model who had had his ARM SHOT OFF (then re-attached by god, apparently), and a member of the rich elite, who was starting his life in politics.

On Sunday we went out for our walk into El Impossible national park. It turned out that Manolo (the war veteran and english speaking member of the household) was busy or hungover, so his 63 year old father would be taking us on the walk. We started to get a little nervous after Osiris (great name) made Daniel translate for the other two that we all had to move from tree to tree, and always hold on to something. After Daniel slipped the first time, and was only saved by the tree he was holding onto, we realised how correct he was. After Osiris fell for the 2nd time, while walking back to where he left us while looking for the path that he'd lost, we realised we may not get out alive.

We abseiled down a 20 foot rock face, using a big stick as support, to get to a pool for lunch and swimming. It was at this point that it started to rain. The torrential rain was fun. For one thing, it turned climbing back up that rock face from adrenaline pumping to terrifying. For another it turned the earth to mud, which was kind of nice. It hadn't been enough of a challenge up until that point. After that it was simply a matter of staying upright for long enough that you could move forward a bit before you fell again. When a log that Celia was standing on slid 50 feet without warning Daniel was about to beat Osiris. Celia is still alive, though, and so is Osiris. We made it back to the car, and the photo of us smiling is of that moment of jubilation - Daniel's sandal is off because his foot is bleeding.

While in the car, we decided that we'd roughed it enough for the moment, and needed some pampering. The following day we left for San Salvador, and the mall, where we spent three happy, happy days. We saw X-men 3, the Da Vinci Code, and ate enough fast food to put on all the weight we lost on the walk. We even cashed in a gift, and stayed a night in the Intercontinental!

The chicken bus that took us to our first stop in El Salvador, Tacuba, ...

Updated: Jun 18, 2006 1:46pm PST

Antigua, Guatemala : An almost suspiciously pretty town surrounded by volcanoes, Antigua is a world heritage site for good reason. Famed for it's language schools, and loved by all gringos who see it, there are more than one or two places with a distinctly European feel. Here we had one of our best experiences so far in Central America - Marmite! Celia's head looked like it would explode when she saw it on the menu.

Antigua is the sort of place that a lot of people run away to. There is a north London geezer who hangs out on street corners selling (rather unexpectedly) aromatherapy oils. The interesting guy on the bike is a 74 year old author who is riding through Central America to Argentina on his motorbike. Made us feel quite tame in comparison!

The area round Antigua is beautiful as well, and we managed to see this first hand by renting some bikes. This is our first exercise of the journey, so we were more than a little surprised that it was fun! And there are at least two photos that have bikes in, so we can at least prove that we rented them. In one of the little towns we were (inevitably) taking photos, and some of the local children asked to take photos with the camera. As it was set to multi-take, and is quite heavy, we have about 50 photos of feet. Two of their best are below.

Antigua, Guatemala

An almost suspiciously pretty town surrounded by volcanoes, Antigua is ...

Updated: Jun 09, 2006 6:11pm PST

Lago de Atitlan, Guatemala : It has taken us quite a while to put words to these photos, because we liked it so much, and didn't know quite what to say.

The lake is a huge collapsed volcano, surrounded by little towns, most of which are only accessible by boat. To start with we stayed in a the main Gringotown, Panajachel. Most people seem to leave as quickly as possible, but we loved it. Everything seemed to be targeted at us. Isn't it fantastic being a demographic? Still, it was brilliant to get some tofu (says Celia). We found a lovely little family run hotel place by running away from a tout.

Daniel´s favourite part of this place was having an adoring audience for his juggling. When he started juggling, the 5 children of the household started screaming ecstatically, and wouldn't let him stop for an hour. They were equally overjoyed when he did a new trick or dropped a ball. If he tried to leave they would shout "Mas, mas!". He doesn´t get this sort of appreciation at home.

Next we moved to a little village called San Marcos, home of the hippies. Celia was in heaven, there was a cat who insisted on sleeping on our bed, a tarot reader, and a spherical dream catcher 3 feet tall. The 4 dawn photos below are part of a series of 150 that we took that morning. Worth getting up with the cockerels for (though for those of you who don't know, a cockerel can crow at any point in the day or night, and often does, enthusiastically).

We didn't do a lot, but look round, buy a mask, and hangout. It was such a beautiful place it didn´t matter really.

Lago de Atitlan, Guatemala

It has taken us quite a while to put words to these photos, because we ...

Updated: Aug 01, 2006 10:33pm PST

Quetzaltenango (Xela), Guatemala : Glitz, glamour, and a bloody good Cuba Libre (certainly the latter), Xela is one of those towns where Language students end up staying 6 months in order to sit and read in the lovely central park.

Unfortunately, while we were there, it rained non-stop, so we were forced to sit in arabic bars and wail along to radiohead. The song Creep seems to have followed us around ever since, so maybe we don't quite belong. Or something.

The rain brought out Daniel's arty side, and after failing to take a good photos of central park, but a fabulous selection of trees and flowers, his camera was confiscated.

By the way, Salon Tecun is the oldest bar in Guatemala, so sitting in there was actually the same as visiting a museum. But they do better white russians.

Quetzaltenango (Xela), Guatemala

Glitz, glamour, and a bloody good Cuba Libre (certainly the latter), X ...

Updated: Aug 01, 2006 10:41pm PST

San Cristóbal, Mexico : By this point, we had got into our travelling stride: arrive in city, find hotel, take photos and leave. Unfortunately, San Cristóbal ruined this by being so pretty we had to stay for far longer than planned. It´s all decorated in red and yellow, with cute colonial buildings and surrounded by traditional Mayan villages, and a thriving stencil graffiti community.

We bummed around for a couple of days, spending some time in a bar that played fantastic live jazz and mediocre reggae. Very unmediocre was the house cocktail, Revolucion, which was a beer/bloody mary mix.

The highlight of the stay was when we treated ourselves to a night in an amazing hacienda/museum/photo gallery/NGO called Na Bolom (House of the Jaguar). We got a very luxurious room, and Daniel got to have lots of fun trying to light the fire.

We thought it would be hell going back to a normal hostel room after that, but we by chance ran into a hotel developer down on his luck, who offered us a whole apartment for the price of a cheap nasty room. We assumed it was too good to be true, but the place turned out to be gorgeous , with views over the city, and Sky TV. 2 days of doing not much but watching films and eating pizza followed, before we got back to the real business of sightseeing.

So, we visted nearby Chamula, the home of one of the weirdest sights yet. The floor of the church is covered with pine needles, and whole families spend all day there lighting row after row of candles and drinking Coca cola because they believe it banishes evil spirits. No photos allowed unfortunately, as it is impossible to describe.

San Cristóbal, Mexico

By this point, we had got into our travelling stride: arrive