China: Trip Summary

Our trip to China was interesting, eye opening, and we had a lot of wonderful experiences, but it was definitely one of our most difficult. Of course having a five month pregnant girl in tow makes it a little less comfortable, but their were many other factors. First of all it was winter, we decided to visit in January and February which definitely made it a little more difficult to travel and limited our options of where to go. Second of all, China is not as cheap as its neighboring countries and prices can be extreme for certain things. For example, you can easily get a nice meal for less than $2 but an entry to a site can cost over $30. Also train and bus travel are not cheap and as distances are long that needs to be budgeted in as well. Third, very few people almost none outside of very large cities in China speak English (or any other language), nor use or can understand roman letters. Plus, Chinese is very difficult to even try to learn making communication more difficult than normal.

Budget: $15 per day per person. What we spent (including a week in Hong Kong): $13/day/person.

A delicious hotpot in Xiamen

Food: Food was actually not as easy for us to find and definitely not as easy to order compared to South East Asia. We were usually couchsurfing and had dinner with our hosts and several hosts showed us around and we would order together which made it easier as they could translate. Plus with others we could taste many of the delicious traditional hotpots! When alone we would point and ask the price (in Chinese) and often succeed. As a side note, the more expensive restaurants ($3 and up per person) usually has menus with pictures. We usually ended up eating Baoxi which is a steamed bun filled with meat, vegetables, or sweet bean pastes never knowing what would be inside, but was almost always delicious, warm, and cheap at 2 yuan or less (30 cents). We often ate noodle soup at 7 yuan (1 dollar) or if we were lucky found these sort of food stands where you could choose some meat or veggie items with rice and soup for 10 yuan ($1.50). The food is not as good as nearby South East Asia, Korea, or Japan, but is not bad. We found the food to be quite oily and often bland. Of course the regions we visited and places we went surely had                                                                    an effect on the kind of food we ate.

Flight: We found a flight for $673 round trip per person from Atlanta to Shanghai on Air Canada.

Itinerary: We changed our plans and itinerary several times as we were traveling but here was our final route: Shanghai- Ningbo- Quanzhou- Xiamen- Guangzhou- Kunming- Kaiyuan- Yuanyang Rice Terraces- Mengzi- Tonghai- Kunming- Hongkong- Shanghai

Yuanyang Rice Terraces

Lodging: We exclusively couchsurfed minus

two occasions, the first being the Yuanyang Rice Terraces  (of which hopefully I will have a second article exclusively on this wonderful place) where we stayed at a guest house for 60 yuan ($10) per night for a room with a private bathroom. Secondly, as we had to stay one night in Shanghai after returning from Hong Kong we decided to just book a hotel by the airport which cost 139 yuan ($22) for a room with breakfast and a private bathroom.

With our couchsurfing host and her old classmates

People: The people we met were all a lot more friendly that I anticipated. Of course our couchsurfing hosts were amazing always going above and beyond to make us feel comfortable. People in the streets did not go out of their way to talk to us or smile at us but were always kind if we tried to ask a question or get directions. People were curious more than anything we were constantly stared at.



Square dancing: Square dancing happens in every large city and every tiny village. Locals (mostly older women) gather in a square and there is usually a teacher with a big sound system and they have synchronized dances. We finally joined in on one towards the end of our trip in Kunming with our couchsurifng host and her mom and it was one of the highlights of our trip for sure!

9 Months

We have now been traveling for nine months, or around 276 days. In that time we could have conceived and birthed a child, made a lot of money, or built a house, but instead we...

Ate silk worm larvae, partied, sang and dance with old Korean ladies, visited the super secretive North Korean border, were fed the delicacy raw crab by our host’s super eager to please mom at 7am, listened to the soft chants of the monks in countless temples and visited one of the world’s top amusement parks in Korea.

Trying Silk Worm Larvae in Pohang. 

Japan or Korea ?

Asia is an immense and diverse continent, spreading from Turkey to the end of the world, the far East, where you will find two powerful nations, rivals since the dawn of History yet sharing so many common aspects, Japan and Korea. Japan on one hand, has been a powerful country for ages and thus has fascinated many generations of travelers while Korea, though mysterious, has always been the underdog, even once colonized and enslaved by its neighbor, Japan.

Nowadays, a lot of things have changed. While Japan is still in the mind of many travelers, Korea is finally, though slowly, catching up with its neighbor, becoming a popular destination as well, thanks to a boasting economy and a music and cinema industry spreading Korean culture all over the globe. While most people will chose Japan over South Korea, we will try to give you a more complete comparison of these two Asian dragons.

Banlung, the hidden gem of Cambodia

It was Friday the 13th when we cross the border separating Laos from Cambodia. For some people this particular day brings bad luck so we decided to think unlike the others, that it would bring good luck. We decided to hitchhike from the 4000 islands in the south of Laos to whatever city we could reach before dark in Cambodia, aiming at eventually hitting Phnom Penh since we wanted to skip the north of Cambodia to save time (wait for our upcoming article about how we crossed the border). We actually reached a city in Cambodia around 12pm, that city was Stung Treng, the first big city in the north.

A: Stung Treng, B: Banlung

Stung Treng is an “important” hub in the north of Cambodia, from there you can reach pretty much any city in the country or at least the big ones and even get a bus to Laos. The problem about Stung Treng is that there is nothing really to keep you there, it’s quite dirty and it’s not pretty, which are not our main concerns but it lacks activities. So after our first Cambodian meal at the market of rice noodles with a delicious yellowish meat-like sauce served with fresh vegetables and oddly enough flowers to add in if desired for a lovely 75 cents a positive change from Laos’ higher prices. We then tried to figure out where to go next. We remembered reading about this town called Ban Lung, in Ratanakiri Province, in the northeast, famous for its ancient and beautiful crater lake, many waterfalls, and few tourists. Looking at the map it seemed fairly close to Stung Treng but knowing it was one of the most remote areas of Cambodia we decided not to hitchhike but to take a bus there. And what a great decision we made! We would soon discover one of the highlights of our trip!

Unexpected Hospitality

We were embarking on a new journey, which required one of those grueling Indonesian bus rides, a twenty five hour journey from Bengkulu, Sumatra to Jakarta, Java, on the “economy” bus which only cost $18 instead of almost double for the same journey but of course without the adventures of an “economy” bus. Considering hitchhiking is a pain in Sumatra due to the lack of cars, the condition of the roads and the distance between cities, we just thought it was not worth the trouble.

An economy bus in Indonesia looks like this

So we opted for the fun bus ride on the type of bus that stops every ten minutes with people getting off and on, loading huge bags to transport merchandise, fruit, fish, vegetables, chickens, etc from Sumatra to Java. Unfortunately it was raining a lot so everyone closed their windows and due to the intense heat we had the lovely impression of being in a large steam room, fully clothed, full of people and interesting odors and best of all smoke. Sorry but this sounds better than being in an air conditioned bus with reclinable seats.

Picture of the Week #2

Two children in Pulau Samosir near the town of Tuk Tuk in Indonsia who were walking barefoot down the street hand in hand and came to a little shop to buy some candy. After buying the candy they sat down to pick through and compare what they had. This was such a simple yet precious moment. 

Bromo: The road less taken

For those of you that are exploring Indonesia or interested in taking a trip there a must visit site is Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park. In our previous article “Getting to Bromo on the cheap” we talked about the natural beauty of the park as well as how to visit the park with a small budget and while avoiding the majority of other tourists. However what we didn’t tell you is what you have to expect on the way, as riding your motorbike there is not a piece of cake. In saving money and getting off the well trodden path a little adventure is to be expected. If you haven’t read our previous article please read it here first: http://broketravelers.blogspot.com/2013/10/getting-to-bromo-on-cheap.html

Mount Semeru, another attraction of the park

Getting out of Malang isn’t the most challenging part of the trip, even though the ordinary chaos of maneuvering through Indonesian traffic can be tricky. If you make it alive, well congratulations, you’re just a step away from the beauty of Bromo, though we didn’t mention the height of the step...

Getting to Bromo on the cheap

When traveling, we all want to visit the most important and beautiful sites, the sites that are so breathtaking they literally make your jaw drop, the historical sites that we read about in our history textbooks, the world’s wonders that we see in a book, the natural sites that make you marvel at how the world can be so beautiful. These are the sites that no one wants to miss. Who wants to go to India and not have seen the Taj Mahal, or to Peru and not have visited Machu Picchu? Unfortunately, they are famous for a reason and thus flocked by the masses, filled with swarms of tourists and tour groups everywhere, each with a giant hundred pound camera and all with loud voices. In addition, they, in turn, are usually quite pricey, especially for budget travelers like ourselves. As for us, we also want to see these sites, but we try to find another less trodden and usually less expensive path.

View of Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park

The Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park, simply known as Bromo, is one of those sites. Understand, Bromo is one of Indonesia’s most visited tourist attractions. The park is described in Lonely Planet as “ a lunaresque landscape of epic proportions and surreal beauty,“ as the park is huge and encompasses 5,520 hectares with the main attraction being the volcano, Mount Bromo, whose name comes from the Javanese way of pronouncing Brahma, the Hindu creator god. Mount Bromo is one of five volcanoes, of which four are active, jutting into the sky surrounded by a huge sea of sand which in turn is surrounded by an ancient crater, a wonderful chain of barren mountains and on the edge a bright green plateau, these images are almost unreal in their beauty as you stand in the middle of it all.

Where we've been and where we're going

Hello folks, so eventually we would love to visit every country in the world (or almost every country) but for now here are our accomplishments as a duo and solo for some countries, as well as our planned route and future possible routes:

Countries Traveled

 

North America

1. United States 

2. Canada

3. Mexico (Jacqueline)

4. Jamaica (Jacqueline)

5. Grand Cayman (Jacqueline)

6. St. Vincent and the Grenadines (Aurelien)

Would you like a cup of coffee?

There are those moments while traveling when you just want to yell at everyone that looks at you, “Get the hell away from me!”. We were having one of those moments. Leaving the horrors of Bali, we were trying to escape to Lombok where it seems the stench followed us.

Getting off the ferry at midnightish in Lembar after the usual taxi, ojek (motorcycle taxi), transport bombardment we found a lovely waiting room equipped with AC, a security camera, and metal benches- basically our idea of paradise! I layed my blanket down on the floor with all my mosquito friends and curled up while Aurelien played guard and my personal fly/mosquito swatter on the benches.

Six hours of “sleep” and a few hundred mosquito bites later and we decided to make our way to Mataram, the capital. As we leave our paradise we are flocked by all those who see money signs, I mean foreigners walking around with backpacks. “Transport!? Senggigi!? Taxi!? Where are you going!? Ojek!?”. We were like the most famous celebrities of Lembar followed by an entourage of paparazzi wanting to take our photographs, actually just wanting to make our wallets thinner. Unfortunately, our wallets were already thin therefore we beelined towards the supposed public transport or bemos. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Indonesian bemos. These are minivans that run a certain route usually never known unless asked or the occasional destination painted on the windshield. They are quite comfy, meaning over twenty people sitting in a van meant to hold ten people maximum, and ten very skinny people without bags, or legs.