The End...is only just the beginning....

Bewildered by his inability to win

We are tired. The constant state of awareness and consciousness that makes me feel so alive when travelling has worn me down after five months of being on the road and I think we can both honestly say that we are ready to come home. Our original plans of heading to Indonesia after Thailand have been put on hold to save for another time when we have fresher legs and more nimble enthusiasm (a honeymoon perhaps?!). Travelling for this long and under these conditions is a lot different from “vacationing” as Kaitlyn sometimes forgets and life on the road, in a constant state of movement and ambiguity, has a way of catching up to you. Our experiences have been truly amazing and unforgettable and we would not have done anything differently at all. To have had this opportunity to see so much and actually live out my own personal dream to travel around the world is something we are incredibly grateful for, the memories of which we will have for the rest of our lives together.

Thailand street food

We have spent the past few weeks, in whatever free time we have (ha!) and whenever we are privileged enough to have Wi-Fi, scouring the internet for potential career opportunities, trying to lay what little of a foundation for our future together we can being on the other side of the globe. Our return to the “real world” is officially upon us and we are both excited to get started on our lives together and sad that our once in a lifetime journey together is coming to an end. It’s been a bittersweet finale to the trip, but a welcomed transition back to the familiar nevertheless.
After a few days spent moseying around on the Thai beaches under unfortunately overcast skies (Phuket was quite expensive and touristy and disappointingly not even that nice at all), we took a ferry over to famous Phi Phi Island, the picturesque setting of the movie The Beach starring Leonardo Dicaprio. The island was devastated after the tsunami and is only now starting to get back to its once over-touristy roots. It was much more backpacker friendly and a lot more beautiful and natural a setting to spend a few lazy days.

We hung out on the beach on the one sunny day we had and soaked up the rays and crystal clear waters along Long Beach. We hiked up to the lookout point for a beautiful view of the incredible island. After a couple of days of overcast and one of perfect beach sun, we reluctantly caught the ferry back to the mainland city of Krabi.

It was next time for Malaysia as we began our descent southwards towards our final destination city of Kuala Lumpur. After a stopover in the allegedly nice island city of Georgetown on Penang, we decided to head into the country’s interior to a place called the Cameron Highlands to visit a tea plantation, honeybee farm, and pick some strawberries. Unfortunately, this area is also one of the most visited by Malaysian tourists and the one and a half lane road leading in and around the area made for quite the congestion. We literally sat on our minibus, a mere ten kilometers away from our destination, for two hours in a slow crawl forwards. After taking an enjoyable half-day tour of the aforementioned places, there really wasn’t much else to do so we packed onto a bus and headed to Kuala Lumpur. After a close encounter at a hostel involving some bedbugs (we moved places once they were discovered), we explored Chinatown and the rest of the city, including visiting a 7-story mall complete with roller coaster, bowling alley, and movie theater (and even treated ourselves to a bowl-off and a movie…splurge!).

We next headed south towards Singapore as our last new city on our tour of the globe. It was without a doubt my favorite city on the entire trip, an amazing blending of cultures set amongst a background of complete modernity. I’m a sucker for all things Southeast Asian and this island/city/country was just indescribably amazing. We stayed in Little India, the backpacker area though still extremely quite expensive, but managed to cover the entire city mostly on foot, also taking advantage of the incredibly clean and efficient subway system.

We checked out Orchard Road, a very posh and happening area complete with purple Christmas lights and tons of high-end shopping, walked along the water at Clarke Quay another posh area complete with upscale shopping and tons of bars, visited the Raffles Hotel, home of the infamous Singapore Sling (unfortunately it was early in the morning so we didn’t partake) and ventured along the Esplanade, complete with the highest observational ferris wheel in the world. Needless to say, Singapore was beautiful, modern and expensive, but definitely a place we plan on returning to when we can afford it!

We then headed back to Kuala Lumpur on an overnight bus to avoid having to shell out a bunch of cash for a place to stay in expensive Singapore. We arrived at our luxurious 5-star hotel for a much needed day of comfort spent at an actual nice place, an incredibly thoughtful and generous engagement gift from my Godmother Aunt Pat and Uncle Rick, for our final evening abroad before catching our flight back home at 2:00 a.m. Saturday morning. Needless to say, we napped on the pool chairs, enjoyed the delicious breakfast and soaked up the luxury for the complete 24 hours! After checking out we explored Kuala Lumpur a little more and went to see the Petronas Towers, the tallest twin towers in the world. (allegedly...they don't look very tall!)

Malaysia and Singapore are very unique countries. For one, with their close proximity to Thailand and large Indian population, you would think that the food would be somewhat spicy. Erroneous. In fact, Malaysia is actually turning out to be one the more difficult places to eat for the both of us. They seem to have an infatuation with seafood and even use it as an unfortunate garnish on seemingly every dish. Worse still, there seems to lack a consistency in what each dish actually consists of. Kaitlyn, with her love for culinary adventures, was even turned off after ordering a noodle dish that of course included mashed up fish…including the bones.

As we sit on one of our three plane rides today, the big 14-hour jaunt from Shanghai to New York, it is hard to believe that we really are headed home. Kaitlyn is giddy with excitement to see her “baby” as she continues reminding me (her dog, Elvis) and I’m sure all of you as well! We have both missed being able to see and talk to our friends and family regularly over the past few months. We appreciate everyone following along with us on our grand adventures and look forward to catching up with everyone soon…although we may need a few days to recover from the jet lag which I’m sure we are going to experience!

A store at a mall in Kuala Lumpur...a sign?!?!

Musings…

The Kuala Lumpur airport is located 70 kilometers outside the city. That seems pretty dumb to me…

My beard is pretty puffy nowadays and it affects my sleep. It often becomes itchy for no reason and gives the side of my head a bizarre elevation when asleep.

The Chinese airline offers wine and beer for free…who knew the Chinese were such lovers of the booze!