After a beautiful 5 days in Dubrovnik, we drove back to Split and hopped on a ferry to the picturesque island of Vis. Fun fact: The film Mamma Mia 2 was filmed on Vis even though the story takes place on the same Greek island as the first movie. Our first stay was in a small apartment in the little town of Komiža, on the western coast of Vis. It was a modest accommodation but with a great view…
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Our first stop after Split was Dubrovnik. But first, a quick Croatian geography lesson. The Neum Corridor is a 9 km long stretch of Bosnia-Herzegovina territory that stands between Central and South Dalmatia. Thanks to the Neum Agreement of 1998, travelers are guaranteed free passage from the city of Ploce, Croatia through the Neum corridor and Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). We knew none of this at…
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As a child, I used to love plain food. The plainer the better. Hotdogs should be eaten completely plain. Why would anyone put ketchup or mustard on it, let alone onions or sauerkraut? Pizza should be cheese only. Adding toppings would increase my workload of picking off all intruders to my pizza. Sauces were in general moist, soggy and unpleasant. Cereal was my #1 food: plain, sugary, almost…
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Once our required self-isolation was done, we started exploring the recommended sights around Split, starting with the beach 2 minutes from our Airbnb. The host lets her guests use her kayak free of charge, so we took advantage and kayaked around the beautiful bay. On the other side of that bay is the small tourist town of Rogoznica (c in Croatian is pronounced like s), which we visited to…
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We spent a lot of time considering what to do with regard to resuming travel. A lot of countries were reopening and accepting tourists with varying levels of restrictions but there were still a lot of questions as to whether travel was safe enough and if it was worth the risk. We postponed our decision a few times. We even went so far as to book and then to cancel a flight, but with Croatia having…
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So there we were waiting in line at the Siem Reap airport... the US State Department had just issued the unprecedented blanket travel advisory stating that US citizens abroad should not expect help returning to the US if they become stranded in a foreign country. With this, we decided that once we landed in Singapore we would try to fly back home as soon as we could, but little did we know that…
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January 25th to February 20th After our brief stay in Singapore, we more or less spent the next month (from January 25th to February 20th) on various Thai islands. It was a blast and a really unique experience. Looking back on it I'm probably struck the most by how different the experience was on each of the islands. We also had some interesting experiences getting to and from the different…
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Boracay: January 14-23, 2020 Changi airport: January 23-25, 2020 After Bangkok, Brandon and I spent a week in Boracay in the Philippines. It's famous for their white sand beach and recently underwent a huge cleanup effort by the government involving shutting the entire island down for months. Compared to pictures I saw, it was indeed gorgeous and clean when we visited. We stayed at a beachfront…
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We flew from Tokyo Narita airport to Bangkok and stepped off the plane into the warm embrace of humidity. It was a sharp contrast to the frost-breathing air that we had just left behind. Our time in Bangkok was not really what I had expected. The city as a whole was harder for me to tolerate walking around in, due to a combination of the heat and the sewage smells on almost every street. I tend to…
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I struggled with the title for this. "My birthday in Bangkok"? "My grandparents"? "Goodbye"? Something more deep and obscure like talking about facets of a prism? Eventually it all seemed a bit flat, so I went with description. This morning I woke up to a text that my Grandma, Emiko Ambo, had passed away. She had dementia for years prior to this and was at the end stages to the point of being…
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Traveling for an extended period is an incredible privilege and an amazing experience but it can get lonely at times especially during holidays like Christmas. This was the first time either of us had spent Christmas away from family but overall I'd say we had a pretty great Christmas. Christmas is a great time to visit Japan. It's a fun experience with some uniquely Japanese culture along with a…
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Seoul December 13-20, 2019 The week before Christmas, Brandon and I had the opportunity to visit friends in Seoul. We had so much fun catching up with Wonsub, KJ, Jungwoo, JaeAh, and Sangwon. I knew them from my time in Houston around 10 years ago when I did Teach for America. We went to the same church at that time. The night after our arrival they took us out to eat at the Korean restaurant…
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Tokyo - December 9-13, 2019 Brandon and I visited the Cat Cafe Mocha Lounge in Shibuya during our brief interlude in Tokyo again. We had never been to any cat cafe before, and we heard the ones in Japan are very nice. This one was gorgeous in decor, had many comfy places to indeed "lounge", and even had massage chairs. The pricing scheme is rather expensive but interesting in that they charge 20…
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We spent 10 wonderful days in Kobe (11/29-12/9), the hometown of two of our friends, Hiromi and Marina. It was so good to see them, and we also had fun seeing the Kobe Luminarie, karaoke, eating Kobe beef, seeing Kobe's Chinatown, and going to the Osaka aquarium. Our Airbnb this time was located in a residential area that felt laid back yet was only 2 minutes away from a subway station, and only…
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November 18-25 Last week we spent some wonderful time in Kyoto again and were visited by Hiromi, a friend I made while she was studying in Houston (10 years ago wow time flies). We had a great time visiting Fushimi Inari again, eating good food, and catching up with her. Then we took another Shinkansen to Tokyo. Steps are so tiring! Hiromi, Hello Kitty, and Chris Pro tip: After doing some…
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November 11-18, 2019 Now that we've seen many of the touristy sites in Tokyo and Kyoto that we wanted to see, and now that we've onsen-ed our hearts out in Hakone and Kurokawa, we are back in Kyoto and it feels like a different city. This is because we chose an Airbnb this time, and it is 18 minutes by walking/train to the more centralized part of Kyoto. We are in the burbs (kinda). Our current…
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November 8-11, 2019 We only stayed 3 nights in Hiroshima, with one day dedicated to the Peace Museum, and the second day for Okunoshima (Bunny Island). The above picture is of the Atomic Bomb Dome, which was close to the hypocenter. Across the water was the museum, which was well done but a very sobering and sad experience. I was definitely wiping away tears and regretting my eyeliner that…
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10/14-10/22, 2019 Our week in Tokyo began with a cold virus sweeping through our ranks. As such, much of our week in Tokyo was at a more relaxed pace than in Kyoto. We were also just tired in general from walking so much. We stayed at Onsen Ryokan Hotel in Shinjuku, which I loved since it had a rooftop onsen with gorgeous views over the city. However, the rooms were some of the most compact we’ve…
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October 8-14, 2019 Jr and Marcus met us at Narita airport, and from there we made our way immediately to Kyoto via shinkansen (bullet train). We met up with Kypt, Sam, and Matt in Kyoto and spent an awesome but very active week together. The above photo is at Arashiyama bamboo forest. We spent lots of time on trains. We noticed how clean they were, with some even having velvet seats! Some of us…
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Sept 28 - Oct 4, 2019 On September 28 we finished our packing for our “Round the world” aka RTW trip, and left to visit family and friends in Seattle. Here’s what my bag looked like (Brandon’s was not available for photography due to sleepless night packing). We each packed a carry on suitcase and a backpack. I included an empty purse so I could avoid looking like a tourist ALL the time. We also…
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October 4-7, 2019 New York was a short couple days. We had planned on using Alaska points to buy tickets to tokyo, and knew award seats open up last minute. However, that week was particularly busy (maybe due to the rugby thing going on?) and we had to last minute change our flight date to october 7th. Thankfully the Roxy refunded us a night, and we were able to change our plans. We enjoyed…
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Houston restaurant week(s) is in full swing! https://www.houstonrestaurantweeks.com/
Going from August 1 until September 2nd, it's actually an entire month long. Brandon, Nathan, Liz and I tried a Thai fusion restaurant called Decatur a few weeks ago and it had amazeballs food but terrible service. This weekend, Brandon and I celebrated an early 3 year anniversary at Pappas Bros Steakhouse in the…
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