capture that moment

some new photies for you - http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=90806&id=732850985&l=57fe966b6e

we left vegas this morning and are now at the edge of yosemite national park which we will descend on tomorrow - v excited, hope your all well xxx

Going to the chapel ...........

yes thats right folks ricky and i have bowed to the pressure and finally done it........ yes thats right we actually got it together and gambled whilst we were in vegas - what a cliche - what thats not what you thought i was going to say?????? haha sorry to dissapoint all of you who have sent us emails asking if we tied the knot but no the deed has not been done.

vegas is a bloody weird place - kinda seedy, kinda freaky and really bloomin expensive in a completely over the top Cher kinda way. and no i have not caved in a saw cher yet although bette midler and barry manilow are competing for my attention - i have already seen the mighty nose job so perhaps bette is in with a better chance.

i am loving it though, its actually a pretty chilled place and we have been bowling/ to the cinema and lapping up the sun by the pool and thats just been in our hotel. i cant believe the size of the hotels here. last night we visited the bellagio for sushi (raised a glass for you there col), to paris and to ceasars palace, they are so massive its ridiculous.. ricky came very close to actually visiting a strip bar when i obliviously walked into a place called shadows thinking it looked like quite a cool place for a drink. i didnt have my specs on and didnt notice the naked silhouttes dancing behind the screens oooooops - still i think ricky enjoyed my faux pas he was looking a wee bit flushed afterwards anyway.

i think vegas opitimises everything i have been thinking about the US for the last couple of days - its a place where it is right to be morally wrong. as is my bag i have been paying attention to the hilarious tv and radio adverts that are promoting extendez, viva viagra and shops where you can buy all the adult entertainment you could ever wish for however at the same time the films have been stripped of all swearing (the use of the word "frig" is a personal favourite) and man/womanly loving. its a strange concept, i can advertise sex but i dont want you to see it - it is rude afterall. i have also been loving the sheer imagination of some entrepreneurs who call their businesses "happy floors" !!!!!!!!! and"the liquor store" - have you ever met a happy floor - its not two words i would really ever put together.

as much as i am having fun though and loving the food options (the last few days in the canyon were quite hard -i couldnt eat anymore red meat or gravy and no i dont want eggs with that) i will be pleased to leave las vegas as will our bank balance. its fun to have some craziness but its also going to be great to get back on the open road, we head for yosemite tomorrow which i am so excited about and then on to san francisco on friday for 3 whole nights. its all good. - anyway i will upload some of our photos soon - i dont think however they will do justice to the amazing sights which we saw. till next time - her name was lola .......

Monumental

Hi Folks,

After chilling out in Fiji for a week, we've hit the road hard in the States and have already covered a huge amount of ground (3 states and counting). As usual I've managed to slightly underestimate the distances between places but our cause has been helped by actually having a decent car for a change. We upgraded on arrival in LA and were simply told to pick a car from a section of the carpark! We couldn't quite believe that they expected us to get in and drive away whichever car we fancied. I resisted the temptation to get a huge jeep and went for a mean looking saloon. So far it has been a dream to drive.

Anyway, Emma mentioned that we spent a day and a half at the Grand Canyon. It is no understatement to say that it is the most immense place I have ever seen. I really don't think anything on our trip will beat the first sight of the huge canyon and watching the sun set.

Having torn ourselves away from the Grand Canyon, we headed a couple of hundred miles to Monument Valley - home of the Wild West films. We were able to drive round the rather bumpy track which enabled us to see some of the most amazing scenery. We then made our way to Lake Powell whereby numerous canyons have been flooded by a dam. The Lake is now a huge tourist attraction (amazingly attracting twice as many visitors as the Grand Canyon), with loads of very ugly house boats. Although we enjoyed a boat trip on the lake, there was something very unnatural about it all and we weren't sorry to leave the place.

Next on our "to do" list was Bryce Canyon which we've visited today. We were slightly scared when someone in the tourist information office said that you can expect a good deal of snow up there. Obviously we had forgotten that Bryce Canyon is some 9,000 feet above sea level! True enough, we woke up this morning to see our second snow shower of the holiday. Thankfully it was only a light dusting - no need for those snow chains yet!

Tomorrow we head to our final canyon at Zion National Park before making our way to Vegas in the hope of securing funds for the rest of our trip! If unsuccessful, we may be home sooner than planned. Fingers crossed we can get some decent food there as so far we are struggling with the lack of choice: burger, steak, pizza or burger.

Anyway, hope you're all doing well.

Ricky

new photies!!!!!

sorry for the late arrival - finally managed to get some photies uploaded emx

rest of new zealand http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=90801&id=732850985&l=e9b7297ab8

fiji http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=90804&id=732850985&l=c13a79e845

grand canyon - there will be more http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=90806&id=732850985&l=57fe966b6e

didnt make monument valley today as we explored more of the canyon - couldnt get enough- so will make it tomorrow - will blog soon with the chat x

what a coup!

well guys - its been a while but i have finally managed to regain controls of the blog once more from the tyrant that is mr murray - i cant believe the propaganda he was feeding you in his last post - honestly he is such a dictator:)

well all i can say is fiji - what coup????? we saw and heard nothing and have come to the conclusion that there was some dodgy reporting which seemed to be making more of it than the fijians - what a lovely bunch they were. we had such a great time and made some cracking new chums - big shouts out to cody/leena and char - you made the holiday what it was. the resort was really cool and relaxed and apart from some rather hairy large spiders (even bigger than australia) and a lot of giant midgy bites we have come away with brilliant memories. Our bure was really cool (actually it was bloomin roastin due to the humidity), it had an outdoor shower which flooded every other night due to some tremendous rain storms but hey living in scotland prepares you for the washing in the rain with ricky flinging soap at you as you dodge it .

we managed to go handline fishing and caught some big no i mean huge, even bigger than huge baracuda (and some poisonous fish, but we will ignore that for the time being) which we had grilled for lunch the next day - bloomin genius. we also got in touch with our godliness and had a visit to the local village church to hear the choir sing - it was so breath taking - enough to make you want to go every sunday - well maybe not. the kids , just made it though, it was so much more relaxed than our type of service as they ran about everywhere, laughing and having so much fun - it was really humbling to see kids act like kids - so innocent, with such huge mischevious smiles and not a playstation in sight, only bibles which to be fair were being used in a rather unholy way, maybe god would prefer the video games.

the evening entertainment was just as good and we joined in the international crab racing, although i am sad to say our crab did not make it past the first round (could be because i dropped it twice on its head-well it did try and nip me). we also watched some films under the stars, munched some pretty amazing food, drank a few rather potent cocktails and took part in a potato pooping competition which incidently we won - could be because we had a lot of irish on our side ha -

so think you can see we had an immense time - i will upload some photies when i get a chance to sort them out.

yesterday we made the fun journey with turbulance included for free to LA where we arrived to blistering temperatures of 34c - whats that all about. anyhoo not complaining, we picked up our beast of a hire car and drove for a few hours before crashing in a nice motel. this morning, jet lag dispersed with we made it to the grand canyon and i have to say no simile, adjective or metaphor will ever do that place justice it was simply stunning and made me at a loss for words - rare i know. we stayed behind to watch the sunset over hopi point on the south rim and it was just a once in a lifetime thing - i thought the trip couldnt get any better - and then we had steak and beer - what a day.

tomorrow we are off to monument valley where we are hoping to do a tour with the native nevajo indians around their settlements, so better hit the hay, will catch yall later xxx

Radio Silence

Alright Folks,

Like the Fiji media, there has been radio silence from myself under the repressive Cowan Administration. Thankfully I've managed to escape and post a long-overdue blog.

Well we are currently in Auckland on our final night in New Zealand before heading off to the slightly politically unstable Fiji (though at the moment the Foreign Office still say it's OK to travel there). What a time we have had in New Zealand. Emma has covered most of the things we have done in previous postings, though she admitted that she didn't quite give sufficient attention to the Milfort Sounds which we saw last Thursday. Not wanting to exaggerate, but it is one of the most amazing places I've ever seen and definitely the highlight of our time in New Zealand. If you've never heard of it, then just Google it.

Overall, we thought New Zealand would struggle to live up to the amazing time we had in OZ. However to be honest i think it is about on a par, given the complete contrast in the landscape in a country the size of the UK.

After slumming it in a white van (or rather campervan) these past few weeks, we are currently enjoying some luxury in a quality hotel in Auckland. It was an emotional farewell to the van this morning before flying up from Christchurch. The van has become a close friend these past few weeks and has opened up new career opportunities for when i get back home as a whitevan-man. All that cutting people up and causing long tailbacks has been great fun!

We had a great time staying with Mark and Fiona (and Sophia) in Dunedin and thoroughly enjoyed our we visit to see some pengiuns in the wild. They seemed perfectly happy with us sneaking about in a war-like tench taking photos of them as they sat enjoying the afternoon sun. Certainly better than watching them walk zombie-like in Edinburgh zoo.

Anyway, I'd better head off before Emma spots that I've managed to sneak on the computer without her supervision! Hope you're all doing well back home and that you had a great Easter.

Ricky

P.S. It's unlikely that we'll be able to update the blog for the next week or so in Fiji, but normal service will resume when we get to the US.

Happy Easter

hope the easter bunny has dropped of lots of chocolate for everyone. i couldnt eat another thing, we have just returned from a lovely meal with mark and fiona in dundedin. its been so awesome catching up with these guys after not seeing them for so long - i cant believe its been 5 years and so much has changed within that time and some things just havent changed at all. dunedin has been a cool place to spend a few days and today we went to see some yellow eyed penguins in the wild. it was pretty immense to see them so close (perhaps not so nice having to smell them), they didnt seem in the least perturbed about us being so close as they were moulting, which to be honest made them look a wee bit mangy, not the sleek wee black beasties we are used to seeing, but they were cute in their own way. we also saw some seals and to rickys delight more sheep.

Dunedin is a really funny city to be driving around in as it resembles edinburgh in so many ways what with the street names being the exact same, i feel as though i could walk around without a map and find exactly where we were going. the landscape is also so like scotland and well it rained so we cant get any more like home.

we will be really sad to leave here tomorrow and hope its not another 5 years before we catch up with these guys again - thanks so much for having us, we have had the best of times and will miss you loads.

tomorrow we are heading towards christchurch which will be the last leg of our journey in new zealand. we are really looking forward to dropping off the bus which to be honest seems to have started falling to pieces. its all getting a bit wiffy and i think the toilet is leaking - thats what ricky keeps telling me anyway - we got a bit of a fright on friday when we heard a massive bang and then some suspect rumblin noise - turned out the fridge had accidentally opened and a bottle of wine had fallen out - thankfully it didnt smash and we didnt loose any of the lovely nz wine which we had been saving.

on thursday we made the trip to milford sounds which was just breath taking - the weather couldnt have been any better and i kinda struggled to take it all in - there is a reason they call it the 8th wonder of the world. promise i will post some photies soon.

next stop is fiji where i am hoping the political situation may have calmed by the time we get there otherwise we may have to prolongue our time here in nz - what a pity eh?anyway i need to go to bed as we are knacked and another big drive beckons - enjoy the holidays folks and we will chat soon xx

a visual reference

After fighting with the internet connection i have finally won -some new photies have been uploaded here http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=88015&id=732850985&l=ed0b7c901b

there is no more 24 to watch -what am i to do with myself

snow joke

what a difference a few miles and mountains makes eh? the weather has changed completely and we have gone from wearing our sun tan lotion a couple of days ago to buying beanie hats and walking around with our jackets and boots on in the snow. its really cool although my feet are not liking the change in temperature and are as we speak trying to defrost against our heater in the camper van (it comes with all mod cons this up market mini bus does). its not just the temperature that has altered though the scenery has changed too from lush green forests and roaming meadows to massive mountains with snowy tops and lakes.

after very nearly floating away down a river because of torrential rain during monday night, we set forth to view some glaciers on tuesday morning and man they didnt disappoint, it was so cool. i was never really into geology at school and so my knowledge of how they form etc is pretty rubbish but it was awe inspiring to be seeing one for the first time and to learn about its movements. we tried to walk up to it and do some ice cave walking but unfortunately because of the rain we couldnt get near it as the face was unstable so we had to make do with seeing it from a distance.

we then moved about 30km south to fox glacier, we just managed to get a glimpse of it before the weather closed in and the rain started again. the mist descended so quickly and its such a shame because on a clear day you can see right across the southern alps from there, however it was not to be and we bought a postcard with a view on it to console ourselves. rather than hanging about and hoping it would clear we pressed on towards queenstown and had an amazing drive through the haast pass (through the alps and national forests) again because of the mist we couldnt see much but it was so atmospheric and because of the rain the rivers and waterfalls were in full speight.

we stayed the night at a brilliant wee campsite next to a lake - we obviously had gone to higher ground during the drive the previous day as it was absolutely freezing the next morning and we woke up to snow on the mountain tops (good thing about the cold is no midges - i am still scratching from the last attack). we packed up the van and headed to wanaka for breakfast and some excellent coffee and did a bit of sightseeing beside another lake which was surrounded by more mountains.

we made it to queenstown this afternoon and headed up on the gondola's to bob's peake which is the best view in town - it didnt disappoint - what an amazing view across the valleys and mountains and then to top it all off it started snowing - que a trip to the shop to buy some winter woollies. on the way down we noticed the place where ricky will be doing his bungee jump and i think it spooked him a bit - he is already saying he thinks its too cold to do it haha we will see whether he actually does it or not. maybe he just needs a helping hand or push - i will be happy to assist in whatever way i can :)

tomorrow we are heading to milford sounds and taking a bus trip to give ricky a bit of a breather from the old road - i am so excited about it, it looks light a pretty amazing place even if it going to be 4 hours there and then 4 hours back. on friday hopefully ricky will do the bungee jump and i will try some jet boating down the shotover river - conditions will dictate i am sure. we then hope to get to dunedin in the evening to see fiona, mark and sophia which will be fab.

i was trying to upload some photies but the internet is a tad slow so will try again tomorrow night, i am off to do my best julie andrews impression in this alpine environment - all together now - high on a hill was a lonely goat herd ........

misty eyed

hello from the south island where at the moment its rather misty and raining. dont really care as to be honest i am following in my west coast roots and havent had a shower today so perhaps the rain will wash me clean (along with some of my tan)...... actually there is a reason for not showering and that is because i actually think that i might have come out of the shower dirtier than i went in it this morning - to say they were a bit rustic might be putting it politely and you had to pay $2 for the privelage... i dont think so. so i saved myself (poor ricky) until we got to our new campsite where we have just arrived so i can have a free scrub.

the last few days as usual have past in a bit of a blur. on friday we went to the nz v india cricket game which was great fun. the sun shone for us all day and we had a picnic and a few beers and enjoyed the day. we left wellington early on sat morning for the ferry across the marlborough straits and although we had been warned it might get a bit choppy as it can be quite windy we had a near perfect crossing with no sea sickness from mr murray - i am starting to think he has finally found his sea legs. the views across the straights were absolutely stunning and reminded me of sailing up to mull.

once we landed we wasted no time in driving up to abel tasman national park on the top of the south island. the drive was a bit hairy in places for ricky ( a few tight corners) however i was sitting back and enjoying the view - pretty immense - its like scotland a lot but more extreme ie everything is bigger, greener and right in your face. we found a lovely we campsite right next to a cool we beach and then we headed out for a walk and some beer and sampled the local macs gold - cheers for the tip fi - it certainly did the job.

yesterday we got up bright and breezy and decided to test those sea legs again by doing some sea kayaking up to split apple rock which was brilliant fun - arms are still a bit achy today but it was definetly worth it. we were in a double kayak and ricky was getting his own back on me by soaking me with his paddle (no dodgy comments please jim) every five minutes. we passed so many we isolated beaches and the water was so tranquil - we then got on a boat and headed further up the coast to do a bit more exploring of the park. we got off and did a bit of a hike to an amazing vantage point where we could sea across to the north island - it was so clear. after a frantic walk back to make sure we caught the boat we manged to have a wee paddle, the water was freezing but so nice and refreshing after being roasting from climbing up way too steep hills for my liking.

we packed up and ventured a little south where we found a recommended campsite - recommended my arse - it was manky and to top it off it had loads of midges - but i did however for the first time manage to get a full mobile reception to enable me to phone home as it was my dads birthday - happy birthday dad - even if i did misjudge the time difference - sorry everyone.

today we drove down the coast, where the weather has changed a wee bit, however i am sure it will clear by tomorrow. we are basically at the foot of the franz josef glacier and are hoping to get out on to the glacier tomorrow for a bit of a hike before heading for a view of mount cook. we will then be pressing on to queenstown where ricky will contemplate giving up his life all in the name of a bit of fun to do a bungee jump - pray for him people.

so its all good - hoping i can get some pics of the kayaking up soon - keep me updated with whats going on your end - big shout out to em k and mark who are celebrating birthdays this week - hope you have a good one xxxxxx

in search of frodo

i know what a miracle eh? two blogs in three days - and what a three days it has been. i truly feel as though i am reliving lord of the rings around every turn. from mordor to the shire - its all here and looking every bit as cool. think ricky is getting a bit annoyed with the continual gollum impressions and the me sighting everything as "the precious" but hey i still find it quite funny. think i might find myself tipped in to mount doom and not the ring if i am not careful (i have some great photies of it by the way which i will upload next time i am on).

since i last blogged we have become pretty steeped in maori culture - we went to a traditional hangi feast the other night and the food was just immense. ricky learnt the haka which was so funny, his rolling eyes and thigh slapping kept everyone entertained. i didnt escape lightly however and was invited to learn the traditional art of poi dancing - whatever training i had received in the past escaped me big time as i was useless - it was so difficult - will need to sign up to classes when i return, i wont let a ball and string get the better of me.

yesterday was pretty much spent driving south and we passed through some pretty spectacular countryside as the sun was still shining. after staying at a really nice spot near a beach on the east coast (where incindentally the beach was used as a road and people let their dogs out drove on about a mile so the dog could run behind them and pick them up!!!!!!!!!) we got on the road nice and early this morning - making it into wellington at about 12.30pm.

we had a nice saunter through the center and then took a cable car trip to the top of the hill where the botanic gardens are to get an immense view of the city. we then strolled down through the gardens and ended up at the really cool beehive parliament building. wellington really is a lovely city, very european with loads of coffee shops and cool wee alley ways. we have another day here tomorrow as we are hoping to get to the nz v india cricket test match, something which we are both pretty excited about before getting on the ferry on sat morning to head for the south island.

its all go and its a great feeling not to have a clue where we are going to be staying the day after tomorrow - we are just going where the road takes us. and with that i shall leave you with the words of that great hobo who whistled and then sang - theres a road, keeps on callin me, down the road thats where i'll always be - every step i take i make a new friend...................................................................................... (cant remember the rest but sure you get the gist) ....... maybe tomorrow i'll wanna settle down, until tomorrow i'll just keep moving on, do do de do do do xxx

ps some new photies for you http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=86885&id=732850985&l=3c573a3a1e