We love to travel and this year we are going big. Throughout 2015 we will be traveling around the world from Fiji to Lisbon and everywhere else we can in between. Use this page to track our itinerary, take walks with us on our hyperlapse video tours and read about our experiences and learnings.
I’m so glad we decided to rent a car and drive through New Zealand. The countryside is truly inspiring. (It is like a constant view of Windows Desktop XP for you nerds out there.) The peaks and valleys of green grass framed with blue skies are something not to be missed You can see why it was a great place to film the countryside for the movie Lord of the Rings.
To make it even more picture perfect we passed thousands of packs of cows and sheep along the way.
If the roadways of New Zealand are considered majestic then imagine how beautiful the countryside is when you go off the road into specifically designated national forests. We haven’t visited the famous hills of The Sound of Music – yet, but I would have to assume they are similar to these. Since pictures (and video) are worth a thousand words let’s make it easy and have you check out the hyperlapse video below that I took of our hike through the Tararua Forest Park.
As I mentioned the video, the countryside is more of a rolling plains type visual, were as all the forest we visited had more of a tropical foliage landscape.
When we asked our New Zealand friends what we should try while we were there they responded quickly with “The Feijoa!”
I have no idea why this fruit can’t be found anywhere else than New Zealand. It taste just like candy and would go over well with kids if they had to make these part of their daily fruit and veggie regiment. We also found the fruit in soft drinks – which were delicious as well.
I didn’t clarify well at the end of the video but you get the idea. It really does taste like a sweet tart type candy. So much so that it is a bit of a surprise when you eat it. You brain says, I’m about to eat a fruit, but your mouth says “I just ate candy right?”
One side note: We noticed that all the produce in the super market was either labeled “product of New Zealand” or “product of U.S.A” No other country was listed. Thought that was interesting, NZ prefers our produce over their neighbors.
If I had to sum it up I’d say Waiheke island was a cross between Sausalito, CA and OBX, VA. There are wineries, beautiful mountain views with glistening bays between. We really enjoyed our time here. To make the visit even more unique and special Jackie got us a Glamping tent on AirBnB for our stay.
We happened to have arrived during the Waiheke Jazz festival so most restaurants had bands playing. We strolled through the countryside and stopped at a few wineries. Our first was by far our favorite, Kennedy Point Vinyards. Not only was there a great selection of wine, but the staff was incredible helpful and fun.
The staff explaining a flight of Sarah from freshly picked grapes to aged ones.
Allie, one of the staff at Kennedy Point, saw us walking down the street later in the day and offered a ride home. Our feet were pretty tired so we took it! One conversation led to another and we ended up going to one of the Jazz show with her and her husband Felix. They were such a wonderful couple and we had a awesome time.
The other wineries we visited on Waiheke island were Stoney Ridge, which had an amazing view from it’s balcony, but it was a bit on the pricey side (shown below); and Wild on Waiheke, which didn’t have the friendliest staff and boasted archery and games on the vineyard but the came with an hour wait and around $30 price tag per person.
On our way to the Waitomo Work Caves we made a stop at the Marokopa Falls. It was a brief walk through the jungle-like bush before we could hear the force of the falls against the rocks in the distance. We started recording right before we first layed eyes on the falls so we could capture our reaction on film. It was a magnificent display of mother nature.
We arrived in Auckland at 5PM on April 3rd. It was a 3 hour flight from Nadi airport on Air New Zealand that we got for about $500 per person (not including the exorbitant price to check our backpacks.) We were picked up by a couple of friends that gave us a tour of the city. We got to catch some local vistas, took a walking tour of the shoreline and ended with some good food.
One thing we noticed from the vistas was the sprawling valley of one story houses. They spanned the horizon.
“Here we go – one month left until move-out day!” With our plane tickets bought, it just got real.
We posted to Facebook, Craigslist and taped signs on the street, “EVERYTHING MUST GO!” If you we’re looking to fill your apartment with more stuff, Sean and Jackie’s house was the place to be.
Why were we getting rid of everything? Well, this wasn’t like any other move-out day because it wasn’t really a move at all. We were going “nomad” for a year and for the first time in our moving history we were NOT figuring out how to relocate our stuff into another set of rooms and closets. It sounds like a subtle difference, letting all the things you’ve accumulated over the years go versus “go somewhere” but the feelings were monumentally different.
Our goal was to take everything we needed (and I emphasize *needed*) and make it all fit into each of our 50 Liter backpacks. So, goodbye couches, tables, blenders, utensils, and plates. Goodbye to our multitude of change-of-clothes options, Jackie’s coveted hairdryer, and, most notably, our current concept of home.
We’ve been planning this for years, well, at least talking about it for that long. You know the conversation, right? “Hey babe, what if we just dropped everything and just – went? Just you and I. Somewhere far away. Wouldn’t that be great?!”
The conversation would usually end with either an imaginative tour of all the top places we’d want to see or end with a comment like, “we have too much going on right now to leave.” Just like a modern day Goldie Locks it never feels like the right time to make it happen. The economy is always going too well or too poorly – when is the timing just right?
“Okay”, Jackie said, this time changing the typical end-game phrase, “If we did this what would it look like?” We talked about going to South America and making our way down to Patagonia. Maybe visit family in DC and then start in Europe? We could make the dollar stretch if we went to the South Pacific, right? How long would we go? Three months? Six? Sadly, the more time we gave ourselves to travel the more things we were able to do and thus – out of time again. In the same way our bag size grew and filled, it never felt like there was – enough. We were living Parkinson’s Law.
I won’t bore you with the play-by-play, but trust me in that researching locations, costs, transit systems and weather had us going back and forth between destinations, routes and timings ad nauseam.
But, now with our plane tickets bought there was no longer an ever widening gap between theory and reality. Our first stop is Fiji and we have 30 days to jettison what we didn’t need, pack what we do, and go.
Next up, making it happen economically!
Unbeknownst to Jackie I had been lugging around an Engagement ring on the trip. On every flight and customs check I feared a botched security check would force me to expose the ring I was carrying. My concern almost drove me to propose before we left – but we were starting in Fiji and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to do it there. Lucky I made it to the hotel with no security checks. When we arrived at the hotel I hid the box in the back of the safe, covered it with the safe’s matting and other nicknacks Jackie would surely avoid.
It was hard finding the right oppertnity to do it. Not only was there a large box I’d have to conceal in my swim shorts, but we never really planned out any of our days and anything could happen. For example, if we went for a random swim I’d be in a tough situation to leave the ring on the beach or take it into the water. I chose neither. So it sat in that safe for 3 days.
Luckily the final day before we left was awesome. After an incredible day visiting an uninhabited island and snorkeling with schools of fish we set off to dinner. Before we ordered I “forgot something” back in the room and went to get the ring. As I walked back I tried to conceal the massive square box bulging out of my pants pocket and did so quite successful to my surprise. We had an awesome meal and I asked Jackie if she wanted to take a picture on the smaller island connected by a bridge. (I had been mentioning I wanted to do this from day one to decrease any suspicion.)
As we walked across the bridge I once again awkwardly canceled the box bulge and we made our way to a nice spot underneath some lighted palm trees.
I had bought a stand for our camera that allowed me to velcro it around a tree or pole. I looked around for something to strap it to. The ruse was simple, we were on vacation, it was our last night in Fiji and I wanted to set up everything just right to take a great shot of us. It was taking me a while to setup and Jackie began getting a little fidgety. “What’s taking so long?” she said. I was actually setting the camera up to take video and not a picture, but thought the need to set up the camera to take a video of us standing on the island at night would be hard to explain. “Almost got it” I said. I caught Jackie on the video dancing by herself (to no music whatsoever) as she waited for me to finish. It was a nice addition to the reel. Once I was done I walked up, turned her to me and dropped a knee.
She said yes 😉
Fiji was an overall great experience. Between the views, islands, and water temp it was an amazing way to start our trip.
That being said there were a few – funny – things that happened on our final day there of note.
We were warned when coming to the hotel that there may be some bugs and if there was a problem we could call the front desk and the’d spray the room. So, mentally we were prepared for a few. Every Night before we went to bed there was a few ants on our pillows and we would brush them off. We never slept really well because it always felt like there were a few ants crawling on us in the night, but we thought it was all in our head. Every morning we’d find a few ants on the bed and just went with it. On our final night in the hotel we looked up and caught a few ants on the wooden rail above our head. On close inspection it turned out there there were thousands crawling across the rail right above the head of the bed. We ended up moving the bed to another location of the room. Morning when we were leaving we mentioned it to the worker there and showed him the mass amounts of ants. His response – no words just a “so what” shrug. We were on our way out so we didn’t care to persue.
The second thing that happened was far more agitating. When we arrived to the counter at the Nadi airport we placed our bags on the carousel to check in. The lady at the counter tapped some keys and said, “That will be $200 USD please.” Mind you we already paid for the tickets in advance. This was a charge to check bags on the plane. I was pretty upset as it was clear we were being fleeced. There is no airport in the world that charges $100 per bag that weighs less than 10K. She was persistent and honestly what could we do, pout until our plane left? After some complaints to management they said they would only charge us half if we wrapped our bags together (which cost another $10) and left begrudgingly.
Not a great note to end on for our trip in Fiji on, still makes me a bit upset to this day.
Kava is a traditional drink of Fiji that has special sedative power and is used in daily social gatherings. Luckily for us, our hotel hosted a kava ceremony while we were there and we jumped at the opportunity to participate.
We were the first to arrive and struck up a conversation with the Wise, the host of the ceremony, while he was churning the kava filled bag in water. You can see his explanation of how the ceremony goes below.
Since I was the first one there I was bestowed the honor of being the Chief (I know I said King in the title – alliteration sounded better) of the kava ceremony. With that, my responsibility was to make sure everyone clapped appropriately to ask for their drink and determine when it was time to give the group another round.
Kava tastes like – tingling, numbing, dirt. It isn’t pleasant but the effects on the mouth after pushing back a coconut filled cup of the stuff is an experience. You have to drink six or more cups of this stuff and even if you get past the taste the sheer quantity of liquid consumed is hard to swallow. Everyone did their best to keep up but it didn’t take long for people to back out, myself included.
I was hoping for a peaceful deep sleep as the kava promises, but neither I or Jackie got one. I don’t think it worked on us, but to each their own.
Sean Shadmand 
