Somewhere back in Europe ...

We have proved that indeed the World is round, and travelling eastwards for the last 8 months, in a journey starting at the end of December, a cold windy day in Frankfurt, Germany, we have ended up back in Europe, in a much sunnier Portugal, a fitting final as a tribute to the first world traveller Ferdinand Magellan (or Fernão de Magalhães) who set this trend which we have now followed!

And what eight months we had, so many countries we have seen, cultures we have encountered and people we have met and made friends with! Oh and how we already miss the Thai street food, the Angkor ruins, the Mallaccan "Portuguis", the Singaporean tidyness, the Australian beaches, the New Zealand scenery, the Macau and Hong Kong skylines, the Chinese temples, the Korean barbeques, the Japanese trains, the Hawaiian sunset, the Canadian Tim Horton's coffee and the US beautiful scenic drives! So much we have done and seen, we come back with a wealth of experiences that is so rich it will take a long time to digest it all, review it and remember - when we are back home to Strasbourg in early October we will need to organise a long party just to go through all the hundreds of photos and fill back our famously empty bar!!

It is impressive how seeing something new and amazing every day and moving from one place to another can be so tiring, but thankfully during our journey we were so lucky to find so many amazing people all over the world who were so happy to take us in to their homes and allow us to set down our heavy backbags and relax our weary feet, and share in their lives if for just a little while, to all of you - you know who you are - a very big thank you!

And it is with mixed feelings that our last day in our travel reached an end, a party in the lovely town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania a perfect finale, after having visited the wonderfully free and museum-ridden capital city of Washington. We packed for the last time the few belongings we took during these 8 months (packing is certainly a skill we have perfected in this time!), bid farewell to our last hosts Matt, Lisa, Maddie and Moby and took our final plane back to Europe. But in all this time we never felt alone and the 4,000 visitors to this blog have kept us company all throughout with their reading and comments, and it has been great for us to be able to share what we saw and did with you, it never felt like we were too far away!

Eight months of travelling takes its toll and we reach the end tired and happy to be back with family and friends, with homecooked food and familiar places, the bar which has not changed a bit and the friend whose conversation resumes where it left off. This is the end of our round the world trip, and what a fantastic trip it was, but it certainly will not be the end of our travels, once the travel bug bites, you can never get rid of it, and we have been very badly bitten! We will probably go back to many of the wonderful places we have been to, and visit many new places that remain unseen, and we will try to continue sharing our stories in this blog, but until that happens, it is time for us to take a small rest, regain our energy back and watch the World go round ...

Somewhere in...between both ends of the East Coast

It is again some time ago since we shared with you our journey. It is not because we are getting lazy or because we stopped caring about you, but believe it or not we were quite busy. In a week's time we will be sitting in the plane which will take us back to Europe, so we are trying to enjoy every single minute of each day.

After Quebec we crossed the border back to USA, though the queue was much longer and the process much more difficult than going to Canada. But they have let us in and we stationed ourselves for couple of days near Boston.

The area of New England is quite unique and very beautiful. We drove for a short trip to Rhode Island to visit and dine with Pedro's uncles and to see beautiful Newport with lovely scenery and gorgeous houses, where each of them had sweeping sea view.

We don't have to introduce or explain anything about Cambridge, the town where one finds the famous Harvard University and the MIT. Pleasant parks, walkways, hundreds of cafes and thousands of students and tourists passing the centuries old university buildings and campus.

Boston was a big pleasant surprise. This beautiful city with lots of history has lots to offer. From beautiful churches, history lessons on the American Revolution (including the famous local Tea Party) Constitution, to a pleasant afternoon in the famous Cheers bar (from the TV series, where everybody knows your name). We had a great day there (not just in the bar), but the beer was as well very good.

After Boston we have made a huge jump and took a plane from Newark to the famous party place - Miami, Florida! We had a fantastic weekend with Matt&Lisa and some of their friends who live in this very chilled out part of US. What could you wish more than gorgeous long sandy beaches, fantistic torquoise water, air-conditioned bars with lots of colourful cocktails and friends with a fantastic sailing boat, who took us all on Saturday aboard and sailed around the Miami bay. Lenka has tracked down her relative who came to the US in 1970's, so we can even mark this journey around East coast as a collection of small family reunions.

Beautifully tanned and tired we have arrived on Sunday night and left on Monday to say quick good bye to the never sleeping city NY. And as this is a journey of reunions, Pedro met up with his american friend from Edinburgh University and she generously offered us her appartement to stay. We could experience Manhattan, Greenwich village, Soho and all beautiful parts of NY all over again.

There is just Washington left and then we are saying good byes and packing... But we still have a week to go, so we will continue keeping you posted ! :)