All Diary Entries

By far the festival we enjoyed the most last year was Ganpati Chaturthi - a 10 day celebration of Lord Ganeshs' birthday. It is also the most importan...

We arrived at Butts Clermont Houseboats to warm hugs from Mr Gulam Butt, the gentlemanly proprietor who became more like family than our host by the e...

Today Yearaway.com is officially 10 years old! It was 10 years ago, on April 4th 2001, that we set off on our extended honeymoon and what a honeymoon ...

We had been planning this three-week trip on and off for a couple of months. This year's big vacation - flights booked, hotels identified, restaurant ...

The week started with a new car puja – a little ceremony involving breaking a coconut, drawing a swastika on our car in red powder called kumkum and s...

The festival season is upon us. A weekend earlier in the month saw the collision of four festivals - Eid, Ganesh Ganpati, The Feast of Mother Mary and...

After numerous requests and a first month of craziness in this new city we are calling home for a while, we have decided to resurrect yearaway. But wh...

Well, we bought the sleeping bags to keep us snug down to minus 10 degrees and on this last trek we really tested them! On the morning of day five we ...

Tea in these parts is a complicated business and rather different from what we're used to. Firstly the tea itself - Solja Kante - is tea, butter and s...

On the third day of our Nubra Valley trek we are woken by Tashi with the usual, " Sue... Nathan... bed tea." I rustle out of my sleeping bag, unzip ...

We were nervous - to say the least - about our first Himalayan trekking experience. We were worried about everything from being able to breath, to our...

So, after months of training we said goodbye to Sydney and the very special friends we have made there amd headed off to the high Himalayas in Norther...

So after three and a half years we are on the move again. The plans have been made, the gear has been bought, the training has gone well (despite a fe...

It’s been a while since our last update, must be getting lazy! But, now that the UK is in post election delight (!!) its time for a short entry on our...

I know…I’ve been a bit slack on updating the diary but I’ve been busy bee. Hope you are all sitting comfortably because this may take a while…well, we...

We’re sitting on our balcony at the Fatumaru Lodge watching an afternoon shower make its way across the bay. This herald of an early rainy season seem...

Sometimes on this trip, as I have said before, we have felt like we were starring in Japanese Endurance, at others we have felt like we’d been transpl...

We're sitting here by the pool in 32 degree heat, under the palm trees, enjoying the last couple of days of our holiday up here in the Top End of Aust...

On the Road again... and it took absolutely ages to get through the border, but eventually we arrived in Vancouver, Canada. What a nice city! And sooo...

Thelma and Louise checking in…We arrived safely in the US of A but only after we filled out some forms confirming that we were not seeking entry to en...

Well it has been a while since my last entry…lots of adventures so hope you are all sitting comfortably!!I left Magnetic Island and travelled onto Air...

Well, I guess it is time for entry number 2…I've done a few trips since leaving Sydney but I guess I better start at the beginning. My first trip was ...

Well, here it is finally, what everyone has been waiting for, the news from Down Under!What can I say? All of you who have been to Sydney already know...

Uluru – more commonly known as Ayers Rock – was our destination for Sue’s 30th birthday trip. Neither of us really knew what to expect. I mean, was it...

As soon as we arrived on Kangaroo Island we sensed the remoteness of Australia’s third largest island. Just 45 minutes by ferry from the South Austral...

We were awoken just before 1am on Monday by our bed shaking violently. This was accompanied by a loud moaning sound. Half awake and half asleep Sue st...

When we first started out from our apartment that Saturday morning everything seemed to be against us. We were both painfully hungover, our flight to ...

It’s been ages – we know! But, since we’ve been in Sydney we’ve been just too busy settling in to write a yearaway entry. Let’s start from the beginni...

Early one morning just as the sun was rising we donned our backpacks for the last time and disembarked from the ferry at Hull. This was to be our last...

After a final week in Goa we were flying west towards Poland. Thirteen months away and we were on our back to Europe – can you believe that? We always...

Two hours above the sweaty plains of West Bengal we found ourselves wrapped in thick fog and shivering from the cold. We were in Darjeeling, Queen of ...

The one time capital of British India Calcutta is probably the most famous city in India (although perhaps infamous would be a more accurate descripti...

Today is Holi - the official end of Winter - and a good excuse to cover everyone with colour. The 'colour' usually comes in the form of vegetable dye,...

After meeting up wih Viv and Heleyne in Mumbai, the four of us embarked on a train journey north to the hillstation Mount Abu - little did we know tha...

Our first destination in Goa was a town called Panjim. The old part of town, where we stayed, still oozed with old Portuguese charm. We could have bee...

This is the part of the trip that Sue has really been looking forward to. In fact, for her, seeing India again was one of the main reasons for going t...

We saw in 2002 on Ray's boat on Lake Wakatipu with Ray, Daniel Day, Viv (Sue's sister) and Heleyne (her partner). Quite obscure really a gathering of ...

Yet again, we haven't written an installment for absolutely ages and we've received a few complaints. Our only excuses are that we have been on the mo...

Of late, people have been asking us how we're going to be able to lead a normal life when we get home from this trip. When asked, we looked blankly at...

After a four hour flight we finally arrived in the hot steamy part of Australia, Cairns, in the north east. It’s just amazing that you can fly for fou...

As we were flying over the spectacular Great Barrier Reef this afternoon we realised that, once again, it has been a while since we last wrote an entr...

So, what are the Aussies like then? Do they all dress like Mick Dundee out in the bush, wearing hats with dangling corks and wrestling crocs without s...

Sitting here in our luxurious apartment in Perth, Australia, quoffing an exceedingly good bottle of red, Sue reminds me that we haven't written a year...

'I never thought we?d actually get here!? said Sue as we sat among the stupas at the top of the Buddhist temple of Borobudur. We were up there at five...

So, the decision was made and we headed down to Melaka, probably the most famous and therefore possibly the most touristy place we'd been to in Malays...

We're back in KL again and there is a decision to be made. Should we go back up to Penang and sit on a beach for a week or do we pay a visit to the hi...

The slow, bumpy bus ride back to Kota Kinabalu seemed to last forever. Exhausted, bruised and battered we dreamt of pizza and beer in bed on our retur...

Sitting at my desk at work I often dreamt of those lazy days relaxing in a far flung coffee bar, sipping cappucino and watching the world go by. On th...

The orangutan is an endangered animal and can now only be found in two places on the Earth - Borneo and Sumatra. When you see one it's impossible to i...

We flew into Sandakan on Borneo in a twin propellor Fokker aircraft, which was adventure enough for Sue as she hates flying at the best of times! We t...

Raffles Hotel (http://www.raffleshotel.com)at 1, Beach Road, Singapore is probably the worlds most famous and luxurious hotel and we were about to be ...

We arrived in Malaysia after a very long overnight train journey from Bangkok feeling knackered and skungy only to find that the first train to KL did...

Arriving back in Bangkok marks the end of the first stage of our trip. This part was Sue's baby really. I was the apprehensive one. But, we have both ...

One of the reasons we came to Cambodia is because I wanted to celebrate my 30th birthday by seeing Angkor Wat. We stayed in Siem Reap, a small place t...

We were somewhat cautious as we arrived in Phnom Penh because of all the warnings in the guidebooks about armed robberies of tourists. We were expecti...

We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City a few days ago – this is our last stop in Vietnam before heading for Cambodia. Since we last wrote we have been to two ...

Halong Bay is the product of millions of years of erosion and chemical reactions working on limestone to produce around 300 islands rising from the Gu...

We arrived in Sapa in the early morning, fresh off of the Victoria Express - a luxury train run by the Victoria Hotel Sapa, our home for the next 6 da...

Just a quick entry to let you in to our first few days in Vietnam and to give you some of our first impressions.Well, first off, customs wasn't as hor...

In the middle of a very hot afternoon we boarded the train from Chiang Mai and headed south to Nakhon Lampang. The train was a wonderful way to see th...

Chiang Mai, according to the guidebook, is a quaint, moated and walled city surrounded by mountains with legendary mystical attributes. It still kind ...

The name Bangkok comes from 'Bang Makok' which means 'place of olive plums' and refers to the original site which is today the old part of the city - ...

Our last night at the Retreat turned into a real wildlife fiasco. Sue was sitting there writing her diary for the day when from the top of the wardrob...

We flew out of Bangkok on Saturday lunchtime in a super-dooper modern plane (Thai style!) with propellers. It was a bit scary really, but we got here ...

Arrived in Bangkok - only just though - we got a little caught up in the airport and only just managed to get on the plane. Needless to say we were ra...

Well, Saturday was the wedding and everything went really well, but it was all extremely nerve-racking. Neither of us heard much of the ceremony becau...