How Gwil spent his birthday

Gwil turned 26 yesterday! Old man!! But more about that later...

When we got back to Saigon from Cambodia, we got to catch up with Daz for dinner. Gwil had been keen to try scorpion or some other crazy menu-item from Vietnam, and thought that Daz would be a great partner-in-crime (ie. "I'll do it if you do it!"). So we left the ordering to Daz, as he could do it in Vietnamese. We had amazing BBQ beef and very fresh prawns (they were still jumping when put on the hot BBQ). Then out comes a big plate, with an even bigger scorpion on it. SCORPION. Not Scorpions!! Daz had ordered only ONE, which was all Gwil's!! A nasty trick, but once it was in front of him, Gwil couldn't turn back.



We are now in Phu Quoc, in a pretty fancy resort, with a bungalow that opens onto the beach.

Celebrating Gwil's birthday here was a lot of fun, with a big focus on doing not much at all!

We got massages on the beach,


chilled out under palm trees,


watched the sun go down from our bungalow's balcony,


and ate the most amazing seafood buffet we've ever had, while barefoot on the sand, right at the ocean's edge.

No more countries to go...

We have returned to Vietnam from Cambodia... and this is our last stop. We've made it through 19 countries since the end of March this year.

We have climbed the Eiffel Tower in France, a Saharan sand dune in Morocco, the Giralda Tower in Spain, Holmenkollen ski jump in Norway, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Our feet are getting a tiny bit tired, and we can't wait for our final week and a bit of relaxing on Phu Quoc Island.

Our view of Cambodia by the end of our trip there was really positive. The country and people have the most amazing energy. We met so many interesting and friendly people in the short time we spent there, and the temples of Angkor are incredible.

On our first day of exploring temples from Siem Reap, we did it the lazy way - with an 8am start, a guide and a tuk-tuk. We elbowed our way through the crowds of Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom (The Bayon), and felt a bit like we were in a giant outdoor museum.



So, the next day, we set our alarms for 4am, and headed straight for the temples before the crowds. We watched the sunrise at Angkor Wat, and then headed to Ta Prohm (famous for being the 'jungle temple' covered in trees, and the location of some of the shots in Tomb Raider). We had Ta Prohm all to ourselves, which was an amazing experience. We wandered around the narrow temple corridors, under massive tree roots, and over piles of stone, without another person in sight. It was almost Indiana Jones style exploring!

Countdown to Sydney

We are now officially in the last two weeks of our adventure. We're spending the remainder of this week in Siem Reap, visiting the temples of Angkor, and then are spoiling ourselves with a week in a resort on Phu Quoc Island, just south of the border of Cambodia and Vietnam.

We found Phnom Penh a really interesting experience. Cambodia has been through so much conflict in the last hundred years, and many of the Khmers live in poverty. We were told by a woman who works at the Australian embassy that the government here can't support the Cambodian people, and they rely on donations from other countries and tourists. It particularly affects the children, with hundreds of street kids begging or selling books/jewellery/post cards, and others getting involved in the horrible sex trade. We had heard lots of things about kids here, but we never realised just how serious it is.

We made it a mini-mission while in Phnom Penh to eat at restaurants that trained street kids, to travel in tuk-tuks with drivers who are part of the "Child Safe" program (keeping street kids out of dodgy situations), and to buy souvenirs from shops that help charities or orphanages. Another part of this mini-mission was to find a REAL massage parlour (ie. not a brothel!), and get as many massages as possible. We had a great time supporting local business!

Food glorious food

We've made it to Phnom Penh, after 5 days in Saigon (stuffing ourselves with amazing fruit and food) and a boat trip down the Mekong Delta across the border of Cambodia.



Just before leaving Saigon, we discovered a restaurant called Bo Tung Xeo, which boasts on it's menu an assortment of strange animals (and animal parts) such as Scorpion, Worm, Rat, Snake, and Goat Penis! We weren't feeling adventurous enough this time around, and settled for the BBQ beef which is their specialty. But we will be back in Saigon again before we fly home, so we might be able to let you know whether Rat or Scorpion taste "just like chicken".



Our trip down the Mekong was great, and we got to see a side of Vietnam that we hadn't experienced yet. Floating markets, a Cham minority village, a fish farm village, coconut candy factory, and a crocodile farm. The people in the Mekong area were all really kind, and we spent one night near Can Tho staying with a family who lived right on the river.





The boat trip to Cambodia took us through some remote villages dotted along the Mekong, with houses built high on stilts, and kids running to the shore to wave to the boat as we chugged past. They were all so cute and genuinely excited to see such strange pale skinned people! We're working on getting rid of the moon tan that seemed to attach itself to us as soon as we got back to London from Morocco!



We're now relaxing in Phnom Penh for a few days, before taking on the crowds at Angkor Wat later in the week. Cambodia is beautiful, and the food here (a constant focus of ours!) is also fantastic. It's a bit of a mix between Thai and Vietnamese, so there's lots of spice and colour.

Seaford to Saigon

Our last trip in Europe was to Seaford (where Em's dad and grandparents are from), which is right next to Brighton, on the south coast of England.



Seaford is a beach town, and was a good few degrees warmer than the rest of England, although it was still pretty cold!



We were yet to try English fish and chips, so we then drove to Brighton to eat at Harry Ramsden's and to play old-school arcade games on the pier.



We got back to London for Guy Fawkes night, and to spend a few days there packing our things and catching up with Bill, Oli, Zara, Saph & Rod, and big Gee from FBi.







And are now in Saigon, Vietnam.

We've spent 4 days back here so far and are loving the craziness and energy again (the traffic is somewhat less crazy though this time around, and even seems to be following rules, unlike when we were last here in April. Cars now drive only on the right hand side of the road, and they stop at red lights!). The Vietnamese people have to be some of the friendliest that we've met in the entire world, and the food here really is amazing.

Search results... did we find another Gwilym?

Our search to find another Gwilym in Wales led us through the south of England, travelling past some of the UK's major tourist attractions... but we didn't actually go in to see most of them.

We went to Windsor (where the castle was too expensive to enter, so we saw it from outside), Stonehenge (which had closed the gates 5 minutes before we got there, so we saw it from outside), and Bath (where the baths were too expensive, so again, we saw them from outside).


Outside the walls of Windsor Castle


Sunset at Stonehenge (through the fence)

There were a few funny (and free) attractions that we did get to though. We made it to the smallest pub in England (in a town called Godmanstone), and also to see "The Rude Man" (AKA the Cerne Abbas Giant) - which is a man carved into a chalk hillside 2000 years ago, with a large appendage between his legs!


The Rude Man


The smallest pub in England

Making it to Wales late on Friday night to begin our search for another Gwilym, we pulled up in Cardiff to discover that there were almost no hotel rooms free... as we were there the night before the Wales v Australia game, and the people we met thought we were incredible unpatriotic to not know that it was happening!! We ended up finding a room after a long search, and got to experience the Welsh craziness that builds up before a rugby game.


Understanding Welsh

We spent the next morning shop-hopping, trying to find the name Gwilym on a keyring or a pen, but had no luck. So, we began our search to find another person called Gwilym... We unsuccessfully checked out the name badges of staff in bars and shops, and ended up in in Welsh shop to ask the girls behind the counter if they knew a Gwilym that we could meet. "No", they answered, "But you might find one in the mountains"!!! So it seems that Gwilym is just as unusual a name in Wales as in Australia!!

In search of another Gwilym

We had a hilarious night out last night with Zara and Bill, and their lovely boys - Dan and Oli, at an all-you-can-eat sushi place in Soho. We absolutely stuffed ourselves with salmon sashimi! Yum!!



Today we're heading off on a road trip out of London. We really want to see Stonehenge and Windsor Castle before we leave the UK, and we found out that Starlight Express is playing tonight in Bournemouth... so we got ourselves tickets and we're going to see some rollerskating and singing!

After a night in Bournemouth we're then going to drive towards Wales, so that Gwilym can meet another person called Gwilym... and so that we can buy him stationary with his name on it!

FBi Radio is holding their Block Party this week. If you don't support them already, you should. Even if you don't live in Sydney, you can still listen on-line and there are loads of prizes to win by getting on board as a supporter (but if you win the flights to NYC you have to take us with you!). Check out www.fbiradio.com for all the info. But it's only happening for a few days, so get cracking.

London for the last time

The European winter hit us in Granada. Our poor little Aussie bodies couldn't handle the cold in the south of Spain (it was snowing just outside of Granada, so it really was cold!). It was a good excuse though to go shopping for knee high boots and long coats to keep us toasty in London, and to soak up as much tapas and red wine as possible before heading back to the UK for the last time.



Guy Fawkes night is next week, so at the top of our list was to go shopping with Gwil's brother Tom for fireworks! As we can't buy them in Australia, this was really exciting. We had no idea what most of them did, so took the easy option and bought an enormous assorted box so that we'd have one of everything!



We let a few of them off that night in Tom & Emma's backyard. Some of them were pretty big!

We leave London for the last time next week, to fly back to Asia before making our way home. Looking forward to soaking up some more sun, and eating lots of dumplings, bowls of noodles, and seafood!