White Christmas!

It has snowed on Christmas day! The snow held off until evening and has started falling, with temperatures due to drop to minus 10 degrees tonight, chilly!

We went out for a Christmas evening walk to experience snow on Christmas day, which for an Englishman is quite a rare occurance.

Here's some snow graffitti we carried out on some unassuming ping pong table, we thought it would be cool to write this in snow, and then a few months later in sand on a tropical beach somewhere in Asia.







Two days ago we visited the town of Regensburg which is about one and a half hours outside of Munich by train. It's very well known for it's Christmas market which is held on the premises of a royal palace. We visited this after dark, which was very nice and really Christmassy, the German christmas is a lot more traditional and in some ways retains some of the magic of Christmas that we seem to have lost in England through over commercialisation.

At the Christmas market i also discovered the culinary delights of the half meter feuerwurst (fire sausage), it's a hot dog and a half (metre)!

This photo is of me and Christinas father (Georg)

Tomorrow we're due to visit the mountains which will be nice, especially after all the snow we're due to have tonight.

Christmas in Munich

We're in Munich now!

On Saturday we moved out of our flat in Highbury and suddenly realised while walking down the street that we are officially homeless for the next six months. A very strange feeling, but quite liberating as well.

We flew to Munich yesterday, and were greeted by loads fo rain. Apparently for the last two weeks it was snowing all the time, but just befiore we arrived the temperature went up and the snow has turned to rain.

Today we went to the Thai embassy here in Munich and got our visas for Thailand. Previously i got the visa on arrival at Bangkok airport, but we can't do that this time because we don't fly out of Thailand, as we're leaving via a land border crossing into Laos. It was still very easy to get the visa, took about 15 minutes in total without any kind of appointment, which was useful as the embassy was only open for another half an hour! The price was ok as well, it cost us 25 euros for a 60 Day single entry tourist visa.

We now have the Indian, Thai and Vietnamese visas. The rest we will obtain en-route in Asia.

10 / 10 Vaccines

Woohoo, i've had 10 out of the 10 vaccines i require now!

I counted it and in 2008 so far i've had 15 injections (including dental injections), enoughs enough, i'm not a pin cushion damn it!

We're just finishing off our last week at work right now, and then we fly to Munich on Sunday morning.

It's getting close now...

Moving House

We moved all of our stuff out of our flat today, which my parents will store back at their house in Devon.

Seems strange now, it's like we've been robbed, but by very neat burglars, who left my laptop!

The trip seems really real now, we have one more week at work, then this time next week we fly to Munich.

Just another two vaccines to fit in between then and now, oh joy :)

Vietnam Visas - Check!

We received our passports back from the Vietnamese embassy today, complete with visa :)

This was a big relief as we were starting to have nightmares of the passports getting lost in the post, and the whole trip having to be cancelled, which would have been tragic.

But we now have the Indian and Vietnamese visas, we'll pick up our Thailand visa in Munich while we're there over Christmas. The Nepal visa can be obtained at the boarder crossing from India, and we'll apply for the Laos and Cambodian visas when we're in Bangkok as they both don't have embassies here in London.

We're packing all our possessions up right now to move most of our stuff out on Saturday, it's all go!

Dangerous Destinations

Excellent! Just when you're really starting to look forward to the big trip, two of the countries enter the Top 20 most dangerous destinations in the world.

It was with disbelief that we watched the Mumbai terror attacks on the breakfast TV, feeling a bucket load of sadness for the victims, but with that niggly voice inside saying "Isn't Mumbai the first place we're flying to in India in one month?"

Then of course we see the protests that are currently kicking off at Bangkok airport in Thailand, nice!!

Flip it, it'll work it's self out, and we're still going either way :)

6 Vaccines down, 4 to go

I've had six vaccines so far, and i'm starting to feel like a pin cushion!

I underestimated how close together getting the vaccines are, this week i had my first Hepatitus B jab, and my last Rabies jab (of 3), next week i have my 2nd Hepatitus B and Typhoid on the same day!

No adverse side effects as yet, except for being incredibly itchy after the first 2 rabbies jabs, am i turning into a dog?

Denmark

So thought i'd fit in a quick weekend break away in Copenhagen, Denmark.

It's a really nice city, very clean, but very expensive.

Today we visited the Carlsberg Brewery, too much beer is being consumed this weekend!

Visas, Vaccinations and Vietnam

We're currently amidst the planning and preparation of our trip. You don't realise how much there is to organise for a trip this long.

We've got an appointment with the Indian Embassy tomorrow to process our tourist visa application, hopefully this will be an easier process than applying online (40 minute nightmare!).

Once we have our Indian Visa we'll apply for our Vietnam one, if we have time, else we'll just have to try and get it in Bangkok :s

We're due to get our second Rabies jab on Tuesday and i'm starting my Hepatitis B jabs soon. I feel like a pin cushion!