Jun 2009

After more than four-and-a-half months of travel, our “Excellent Adventure” has finally come to an end. Here are some interesting numbers and statistics from the big trip:

35,369: Number of Miles Traveled

138: Total Number of Days

18: Number of Countries Visited

5,025: Number of Photographs Loaded on Flickr.com

210: Amount of Dollars That We Went Over-Budget (Not bad!)

50: Number of different hotels, hostels, or huts

22: Number of Flights

2: Number of Overnight Trains

2: Number of Overnight Buses

2: Number of Overnight Boats

13,671: Total Number of Hits on our Travel Blog

434: Average Number of Unique Visitors Each Month

Anyway, we want to thank all of you for taking the time to read our entries and follow along on our journey. We’ve been amazed by the number of people who have regularly visited our site for months on end. Each and every month, our website has been visited by hundreds and hundreds of people from around the globe. (Very, very cool.)

We would love to know who has been reading along, so---if you've read at least a few blog entries--- please post a comment to this entry or send us an email at alrosenfield@gmail.com. (Thanks!) Feel free to also send us any questions you may have about travel in general or a specific destination that we visited. (We hope that our blogging has or will inspire at least a few of you to travel abroad in the near future...) Happy travels!

Cheers,
Amy & Kev

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Even before arriving in Paris, our prior travels had taken us to some Paris-like monuments. We saw the quasi-Eiffel Tower in Dalat, Vietnam:

And we saw the quasi- Arc de Triomphe in Vientiane, Laos:

But neither were quite as awe-inspiring as finally seeing the real thing:

Paris was the final destination on our round-the-world travels, and—despite initially feeling a bit burned out —it’s hard not to feel energized by the sights of Paris. Incredible buildings and sites are seemingly around every corner, and we had a great time wandering through the city’s various neighborhoods (in addition to visiting the requisite landmarks and museums, and eating the fantastic cuisine).

We also were pleasantly surprised to discover that the French Open was going on during our stay in Paris. Roland Garros is only a short subway ride from the city center, although we had to wait in line for two hours in order to snag an evening grounds pass. This was Amy’s first in-person experience with professional tennis, and we both had a blast wandering from court to court to watch a few games or a set from various singles and doubles matches---usually sitting less than fifteen feet from the court.

You can check out all of our Paris pictures by clicking here. Hard to believe, but Paris is the LAST STOP on our four-and-a-half month, round-the-world trip. The adventure has come to an end... We have definitely had an incredible time these past several months, but we are both quite excited to be back in Seattle again. We will try to post a few wrap-up blogs soon…

We’ve fallen a bit behind on our blogging, so I’m going to keep this entry short---and let the photos do most of the talking. Santorini was easily our favorite island in Greece. The size of the island is much smaller and manageable than Rhodes and certainly Crete (which is huge), and the island’s natural scenery and whitewashed, cliff-side villages are stunning.

Our hotel was built on a steep cliff overlooking the Caldera, which is the water-filled volcanic center formed by one of the largest volcanic eruptions in history. The nearby picturesque villages of Fira and Oia are similarly built on cliffs, with narrow pedestrians streets and whitewashed buildings perched above the deep blue waters of the Caldera. Very unique. Very cool.

We spent three full days on Santorini, spending our time exploring the island on ATVs, taking a sunset sailboat cruise through the Calderra, hitting wineries, and hanging out by our hotel’s pool and enjoying the incredible views. Three days is enough time to adequately see and enjoy the island, but we could have easily spent several more days there…

You can see all of our Santorini pics by clicking here. From Santorini, we spent just over 24 hours in Athens, which was enough time to spend an evening in The Placa and tour the Acropolis and Parthenon. Our next and final stop: Paris.