Days 11, 12 and 13 – Bohol-iday

Next on our adventure was Bohol (not pronounced Bo-hole) which is an island east of Cebu. We got the bus north to Argao to get the ferry across to Bohol. An hour on a bus and four hours on a ferry cost about PHP400 each (about £5) I enjoy these journeys in the knowledge that they’re so cheap. We even got some free ice cream on the ferry!

Our hostel was called Sea Breeze  and was in Panglao which is to the south of Bohol. It was a small three bed dorm with a sliding sheet of wood as a door so not the best for keeping out the noise. We had a small kitchen outside our room so other people would congregate right outside our door and talk at night and in the morning, not ideal. We ate that night at a vegan place but I think we were all disappointed by the food, I had some sort of Indian burger thing but it was more like curry on some bread with some mediocre fries. Dan and Mary headed back to the hostel but I thought I’d have a quick look around the beach area. It was the most touristy place I’d been so far, it felt like one of those  beach resorts in Spain. At one point I even got approached by a lady of the night.

The next day we had a beach day. Luckily it wasn’t as busy during the day so it was a nice relaxing day. We spent a few hours at a reggae bar where I think we listened to the Best of Bob Marley CD at least three times. I also bought some new flip flops as mine had now fallen apart. In the evening we found a place offering live music, cheap mojitos and Mexican food. The live music turned out to be more like karaoke but the food and drink were decent and at least they sang Starship. The thing that made me laugh here was how attentive the staff were, they were hovering right behind you and any time you spilled even one single drop of drink they would be right there to wipe it up for you.

On day three in Bohol we did a day tour arranged through the hostel. It was PHP400 (£5) for transport plus an entry fee for each stop you wanted to participate in. The first stop was a really old church. We decided not to go in but there was a wedding happening so we watched that through the door. The next stop was a tarsier sanctuary, they’re nocturnal animals but they sit low in the trees during the day so you can still see them. Let’s just say they’re a bit cute. Next up was a lunchtime river cruise with a buffet. The food was pretty good and there was a couple playing some live music including an unexpected cover of Breathless by The Corrs. We pulled up to the river bank at one point to watch some singing, dancing and ukulele playing from a local children’s choir, it was quite adorable and Mary joined in. The final stop on the tour was the Chocolate Hills, these are thousands of brown hills scattered across the countryside, a very helpful sign pointed out that they were formed “ages ago”. We went up to a vantage point where you could see lots of the hills and I took some perfect selfies.

Days 8, 9 and 10 – Sharks, falls & eejits

Earliest start to the day so far, 5am! We were heading down south to hang out with some whale sharks, as you do. I had mixed emotions going into this experience and I'm sure once I've explained it you'll understand why. They put food out for the sharks from 7am to 11am which makes them swim nearer to shore in the morning and there are about ten people per boat with at least ten boats on the water at a time. So all of that makes it a bit unnatural and touristy. You get into the water with your snorkel for half an hour and the sharks are just hovering right on you. At some points you won’t have anybody else in your peripheral vision and you’ll be totally in the moment with a giant whale shark swimming about two feet from you, those are the best moments. You’re told not to touch them but they’re all over the place so you can’t always move out of the way quickly enough. I think everyone touched one accidentally at least once. In conclusion it was an amazing experience.

When we got back to the hostel my sunburn kicked in and I crashed hard. I wasn’t feeling very well at all so I stayed in bed for pretty much the rest of the day.

The next day we’d planned on renting some scooters and visiting some of the waterfalls which are scattered around the south part of the island. Dan had already ridden a bike earlier in the trip so he was totally up for it but I was very nervous about being in control of a motor vehicle for the first time. Obviously without even a full UK license it’s illegal so if anything goes wrong you’re not insured… but “everyone does it”. Eddie, the man who rents out the bikes, let me have a go on the slowest scooter but he wasn’t convinced by my ability to balance (I was blindly optimistic) so he recommended I got a driver for the day. In retrospect this was probably for the best and it didn’t cost too much more (PHP1000 for the day rather than PHP600 just for the bike)

We headed for the furthest waterfall (Inambakan Falls) with Mary on the back of Dan’s bike and me on the back of a bike ridden by a guy who I think said his name was “Dudes”. It took about 90 minutes to get there and obviously it started raining just as we set off. It was definitely worth the trip though, it was a beautiful waterfall with nobody else around. A Filipino boy walked us down to it and took photos for us while we spent a bit of time swimming and relaxing in the spray.



The roads hadn’t been too bad most of the way and I was thinking I could have managed it, although the dirt road from the main road to the waterfall was very bumpy. When we headed back it had stopped raining but the dirt road was very wet. Me and “Dudes” got to the main road and waited for Dan and Mary to catch up but they were nowhere to be seen. We headed back to check on them and found that they’d had a little accident. They’d been taking it really slowly but had hit a slippery patch and the wheel had come out from underneath them. Dan had taken the main brunt of the hit with cuts on his knee and elbow and actually protected the bike by the way he’d fallen. Mary had bailed off the back of the bike so only had a graze on her knee. We’d planned on visiting some more waterfalls but decided just to head back to the hostel so Dan could get cleaned up and recover.

After another 90 minutes in the rain and the dark we got back. I was up for a bit of a mad one but there was nobody drinking tonight. Last night it was drinking games and madness, tonight there was a couple playing Connect 4 at the bar. I went to bed.

Day ten was the day of the drunk Irish guy. When we went for breakfast he was already in the bar drinking. We played a few word games and he ended up inviting himself to join us. He wasn’t too bad at this point except we could probably only understand about 50% of what he was saying (not good for word games). When we went back to the room we just chilled with some episodes of Survivor. Drunk Irish guy came back to the room, wobbled a bit, then left. After dinner at about 10pm he came back to the room again and managed to climb to the top bunk (the one above me, so lucky). He talked to himself a bit, sneezed, coughed and probably slept. When we were all settling down to go to sleep he decided this was a good time to wake up. He started talking nonsense and tried sitting on my bed. I managed to usher him out of the room and he went downstairs. Mary and I voiced our concerns to the two staff members on duty and I suggested that at the very least that they didn’t serve him any more alcohol. The staff had been really great so far so we expected they’d also be good with this situation. He headed straight to the bar so I went up to our balcony to keep an eye on things. Unfortunately our faith in the staff was misplaced as they carried on serving him 6.9% beer. I stayed up there for about half an hour because I was expecting trouble when he came back to the room, luckily when he eventually came back he just went straight to sleep.

Days 6 & 7 - Mary definitely didn't vomit in the taxi

I love the smell of puke in the morning. At least Mary was nice enough to puke in the toilet in the morning, well, until we got in the taxi. “Get him to pull over!” she pleaded in desperation as her mouth filled with vomit but there wasn’t time. The window handle was too stiff so out it came, all over herself and the floor of the taxi. The driver didn’t even seem to notice so we think he’s still driving around with a little puddle in the rear footwell. Luckily it was just liquid as we hadn’t yet had breakfast.

We arrived at the bus station with a rough idea of what we were doing so once Mary had cleaned herself up and the Filipino men had stopped leering at her out of the bus windows we proceeded to the gate for the bus to Boljoon. I’m not sure if it’s just because everything is in a different language but supposedly organised things like a bus station seem to be such a free for all. I have no idea how we got on the correct bus but I had the name of our destination on my phone and kept checking it with every official looking person I passed so at least that put my mind at ease.

5 hours later we arrived at our hostel. On the bus journey I figured out that buses will stop anywhere you tell them to and also that the conductor will actually tell you when it’s time for your stop. Very helpful when you have no clue where you are.

Nordzee Hostel is right on the waterfront so I had the most garlicky pizza I’ve ever eaten plus a San Miguel Lemon whilst listening to the waves crash against the beach. 

The next day we had a chill day relaxing on the beach and we did a bit of snorkeling but the visibility wasn’t very good. Obviously I got really bad sunburn because I always do. We also met our room-mate Jack, 20 from Wales and played some drinking games (fin-fingers) with some crazy Australians.

Day 5 - Cebu City (31st Aug 2018)

As is seeming to be a running theme on this trip already, we stayed in bed until about midday. We decided to head into the city for breakfast and it turned out that the best mode of transport was a Jeepney. These things are like tiny buses with everybody squashed in the back and you pay about 10 Pesos per journey. I’d recommend them but not at peak times as they get a bit full and there’s a chance you’ll end up with a fat sweaty man sitting on your lap. We spoke to Felix on the bus who was a nice old man that Dan and Mary had spoken to the night before. He gave us a few tips and gave us his phone number so we could call him if we needed any help with anything. I’d recommend Felix.

Once we got into the city we struggled to find any vegetarian food. We probably weren’t going to have much luck in McDonald’s style fast food places but we had some interesting conversations trying to describe what the word vegetarian means “No meat”, “No, that’s a beefburger”, “No, that’s not vegetarian just because it has lettuce in it.” We eventually found a place that did a simple rice and veg meal. For dessert Mary had a “choco poo” which was a kind of hot sweet chocolate dumpling akin to a circular Pop Tart. 

We stopped into a church we passed along the way. Well I got down on my knees... but unfortunately we’d missed the morning service so we didn’t hang around for long.

Magellan’s Cross was a bit further up the road so we had a look, but the most interesting thing about it was a woman in a yellow shirt having a dance and sing next to the cross whilst waving some candles. I assume she was praying but she might have just been singing “Get your candles here! Nice, waxy candles!”

Next we headed back up into the mountains to the Chinese Taoist Temple which is the first Asian temple I’ve visited and it was really cool. It was most tranquil and very picturesque with a great view over the city, I look forward to visiting more temples on this trip.

We went back to the hostel and were planning on going up to a lookout point for sunset but couldn’t get a Grab because they wanted to charge us a fixed price due to the journey being very uphill. We even looked into getting a ride on the back of  some motorbikes but they were also charging too much. Felix turned up and said they were charging us more because of our skin colour. He then said he might get in trouble for trying to help us get a better price. Mary thought it might be to do with the Filipino mafia, I have no idea if that could be true but we just played it safe and walked off and just headed back into the city for dinner instead.

Before eating we had a quick look in a guitar shop and a book shop and then tried to find the Irish bar for food (don’t judge, it had a few decent veggie options on the menu) Google Maps failed us so we couldn’t find it and ended up at a pizza place. LUCKILY it was Seniors Night and they had some sort of seniors karaoke with a live pianist. The pizza was decent but the music was spectacular. The old people all had good voices and the pianist (Fred) provided some awesome backing. My personal highlight was the old man who wanted to walk and talk and squawk with the animals. After a couple of beers Mary decided to volunteer Dan to do a song so he got up with Fred and sand Mack The Knife. The locals loved it and waved to us when we left.

Around the corner we found the Irish bar (Marshalls). There was a musician playing some absolute bangers so we bought 6 beers (buy 5 get 1 free, obviously) and settled in for the night. REO Speedwagon, Crowded House, Ronan f’ing Keating, this was my first taste of what Asian people listen to and I have to say it made me feel like I’m really going to fit in well here with my superb taste in music. The 6.9% beer flowed, as did the superb set list. Do you remember that girl I mentioned before? Yes, that one. Well she only went and turned up at the bar didn’t she. More on her later. The time came for the musician to ask for requests and Dan said he’d do a song, so he got up and played one of his originals. A little while later somebody requested Hero by Enrique Iglesias but the guy said he wasn’t sure how to sing it, Mark and Dan to the rescue! Dan played it and I sang it (even though I had to read the words and couldn’t remember how it ended) and after we’d finished we got asked to play a few more so we went with Teenage Dirtbag and No Diggity. The white people at the front were singing along and spoke to us a bit afterwards. Mary spoke to some of them and picked the seemingly worthy enough ones (not the chav guy with amazing hair) to join us, it was that girl and the guy she was with. She was Lena, 18 from Poland and he was Cam, 19 from Middlesbrough. We had a few beers and a chat with them until things took a strange turn. Mary and Cam had ventured too close to talking about politics and Cam got up and walked off. We tried talking to him again but he wasn’t having any of it so after adding just me on Facebook they both left. 

The night had reached an unnatural conclusion so we got a taxi back to the hostel. Funnily enough it was the same driver who’d tried to overcharge us earlier so it was a bit of an awkward journey with Mary drunkenly slagging him off in the back seat and me trying to shut her up. We got back to the hostel and Mary projectile vomited her pizza all over the floor. A delightful end to a delightful first day in the Philippines with D & M.

Day 4: Flying to Cebu

I may have got about 2 hours sleep and got up at 5am. Obviously I tried not to make too much noise but after those pesky kids I think my roommates had built up a tolerance. A few pieces of clothing were still wet so I stuck them on the outside of my bag in the hope they'd somehow dry in the next couple of hours whilst scrunched up in a net pocket.

They let me take my bag as carry-on again even though it was over by 1.4kg (I have no idea how it got lighter) The veggie pho was pretty bad but I was starving so I wasn't going to be fussy.

As I got to the gate I spotted a cute girl hugging her friend as they parted ways. More on her later. I was sat on the plane next to an English girl so had a bit of a chat with her and we both had a moan when they moved a little kid behind us. Luckily he got moved again to somewhere further back, phew! The English girl realised they'd delayed her flight without telling her and she said she was going to kick off, I told her to say she was going to be late for a wedding, she took this under advisement.

4 hours to kill at Kuala Lumpur airport, to be fair it's a nice airport with lots of stuff. There were lots of people sleeping in corners so I assume it's a busy hub, either that or they have a serious homeless problem in Malaysia. Even though there were a lot of food places I really struggled to find anything vegetarian and decent. I settled on an Irish sandwich cafe which was the least Irish place I've ever been in my life, they did a nice egg sandwich though. Weird thing at KL airport is that after you clear security you can't buy anything in bottles, they just have cups with lids on. Apparently this is so AirAsia can charge you for drinks on the flight. Note to self, always have a bottle with me.When I got to the departure gate I saw the cute girl who was on my flight from Hanoi. More on her later.

The flight was pretty awful because I was on the back row so I couldn't put my seat back but the guy in front could. I mostly just slept on this flight except when they started piping their "AirAsia It's A Kind Of Wonderful" song through the speakers. Think Everything is Awesome from The Lego Movie but shit. Its only redeeming feature is that it has a key change at the end. The guy sat next to me had a moan about it too and he also shared some knowledge of The Philippines. Towards the end of the flight I could see some lightning out of the window. I don't remember seeing lightning whilst on a flight, it's pretty epic because you can see the whole cloud from the side.

When we arrived in The Philippines I was surprised that they didn't ask for proof of my onward flight but passport control was instead just really simple. I'd done a little bit of research about taxis so I knew I was getting a metered white taxi and I had the address of the hostel on my phone. In retrospect I should have pre-loaded my Google Maps because it turned out the driver only had a rough idea where we were going. We made it up to the mountains and then he just drove around asking people for directions. After lots of back and forth up and down the mountain we eventually found it and it actually only cost a fiver so again I just chalk it up to experience and move on.

I got to the hostel at about 12.30am so Dan and Mary were sleeping. I woke them up, we hugged, I ate some soy broad beans and then we all went to sleep.

Day 3 - Hanoice to meet you Hanoi

I’d had about 4 hours sleep when the kids all woke up (probably still drunk because I didn’t hear them come back) They were chatting quite loudly whilst packing. I managed to drift off and doze a little bit (thanks earplugs!) but I found out later that Tyler had pulled back his curtain and told them to shut up, which they did. Good lad. When I got up I tried speaking to the guy in the bed above me but it turned out he could only say “Yes” so that conversation didn’t really go anywhere. It was raining again so I chilled in bed until about 2pm when it brightened up a little bit.

I popped downstairs to see who was about and Conrad was there planning his Vietnam  motorbike adventure. I told him I was less adventurous than him and that I was going to have Mexican food today.

When I arrived at “Tacos” I couldn’t find the door down the alleyway and ended up going up a dark staircase to be greeted by a nice old lady who pointed me back down to the correct door. It was a tiny place  and the waiter was polite to the extreme. It seemed like he could only talk in whispers whilst backing away bowing. This made ordering food slightly more difficult than it should have been but well, it’s all part of the authentic experience. My veggie burrito was decent and what I think was a chilli sauce was really nice.

By the time I left the restaurant it was pissing it down again. Luckily this time I had my poncho and umbrella. Obviously I doubled up, I didn’t see anyone else doing it so I reckon I’ll have started a fashion trend in Hanoi.

I’d planned to walk to “train street” where a train goes through the middle of a built up area once a day and is literally inches from buildings where people live and work. Due to the rain it wasn’t such a pleasant walk and it turns out that crossing the road is twice as hard when you’re holding an umbrella and wearing a poncho. It took me about 45 minutes to get there and I’d timed it to arrive when the train was scheduled to go through… But it didn’t come did it? F’in trains. To be honest the highlight of this walk was when I came to a seemingly impossible road to cross. I waited for about 5 minutes trying to find a gap when finally I saw a Vietnamese guy going for it. I stood next to him and literally shadowed him across the road. I thanked him in Vietnamese and he nodded and smiled. That was definitely my favourite interaction with a local during my three days in Hanoi.

I walked back to the hostel with a new found road crossing confidence and managed not to get run over. I’ve finally cracked it! On my final day in Hanoi! Damn! Tyler was at the bar when I got back so I had a little catch up and a few drinks with him. Turns out he’s a welder but he’s fed up with it so he’s going to become a chef when he gets back to London.  Conrad showed up and added a few of us on Facebook. I hadn’t expected the first person I added on Facebook on this trip to be a Tory. My dad would be turning in his grave... if he was dead.

It was at this point I got a message from Dan saying they’d been advised they need an onward flight from The Philippines to be allowed into The Philippines. Brilliant. So I spent the next hour trying to book a ticket to Kuala Lumpur through AirAsia but the app and website were both failing at life. Eventually I got it to work and luckily Dan & Mary’s connecting flight on the way to NZ stops at KL, so I booked the same flight as them. Yay! Plane friends!

I ended up having a nice language barrier chat with the barman at the hostel about life, the universe and everything (I think) and once I’d finished my second gin & tonic, I said my goodbyes to everyone at the hostel and headed up to bed for a maximum of 5 hours sleep.

Day 2 - Hanoice

Had a good lay in which helped with the hangover. It was raining anyway so I chilled until early afternoon. I realised someone had stolen my towel. I told reception and they said I should have kept it in my bed or locker, even when it’s wet, yeah sure. I refused to pay and she gave me another one. Mark wins.

I headed out at 3ish to another vegan cafe and had a veggie burger, It was a bit weird and stodgy but I was starving so it did the job. The passion fruit juice was weird too, full of seeds, so they got stuck in the straw and you had to blowpipe the shit out of that bad boy. I sat on the balcony to watch the world go by but it turns out that’s what flies like to do too so I spent half the time swatting away flies who appeared to like stodgy food. I must have spent two hours using their wifi and swatting away flies before I gave up on the idea that the rain would stop and headed back out into the crazy world of Hanoi. I walked around the lake Hoàn Kiếm Lake which is quite pretty especially when they turn the lights on at the bridge and the temple at 7pm. I then decided it was about time I bought an umbrella, haggled that price down a bit, then walked around the lake for a second time. It’s the best place to walk because you don’t have to cross any roads so I put some music on and zoned out for a nice stroll in the pouring rain.

I went back to the hostel to figure out where to get my evening meal, the kids (early 20s at a guess) were all in the room getting ready to go out on a mad one . I settled on a place called Chopsticks for food where I had a veggie bahn mi (Vietnamese sandwich thingy) When I returned to the hostel there was only one other person in the bar so I had a beer and ended up finishing it as the staff were turning all the lights off and going home. It certainly wasn’t as lively in there as the night before! I think everyone had gone off to different places but I’d missed the time when people were leaving otherwise I could have tagged along with someone.

I went up to my room and shortly afterwards as I was about to brush my teeth two of the kids came back. The girl ran straight into the toilet and locked the door. Her male friend explained that she’d possibly been spiked so I might want to go brush my teeth somewhere else. I decided to wait (mistake) Two hours of puking and crying later and it finally went silent. Turns out she’d gone to hospital but the important thing was that I could now brush my teeth. Happy days.

(For the record I don’t think she died because I’m sure I’d have heard about it the next day)

Day 1: I Hanoi idea wtf is going

I never manage to sleep the night before a holiday abroad which was lucky this time around because I had so much stuff left to sort out, most of which were things I could have done weeks go.

My flight to Hanoi was leaving Heathrow at 11am which meant leaving my house at 6am. At least because the train wasn't a viable option at that time on a Sunday morning Aaron had offered to drive me there. It was a lovely drive accompanied by The Prodigy and Radiohead and Aaron's car's amazing sub woofer of a left speaker,

My bag was over the 7kg limit for carry-ons by 1.5kg but the woman at the desk didn't care. Happy days. The flight was ok, spare seat next to me but a child in the row behind me which prompted me to write this limerick

On flights I can just never win.
A noisy kid getting under my skin.
But when his mum went to pee,
she failed to see me
lock her son in the overhead bin.

They gave us some paper flip flops which almost balanced out the fact that I couldn't sleep because every time I'd drift off the kid would just randomly shout something. The food was adequate.

We arrived in Hanoi at 5am and it was still dark. There was a weird army looking dude staring at me as I walked through customs. Perhaps he was thinking if I'm guilty of something then I'm going to panic. I didn't I wasn't. I'd had a bit of a read about transportation to the city but hadn't properly figured it out. After speaking to a lady at an information desk who tried to get me to take the most expensive option (I have no idea why,,,) I settled on booking a Grab (Asian Uber, Uberasian) and the driver messaged me a few times to check where I was so I was feeling confident. Then a car pulled up and the guy beckoned me in, I showed him phone and asked if it was him, he said yes, so I got in and off we went. It didn't take me long to realise I'd made a mistake because after a minute or so he asked me where we were going. I think the beginning of the number plate was the same but I'd been too half asleep to properly check it. Needless to say I was now stuck with this guy and I knew he was going to charge me at least double what the Grab would have cost. He even got me on the phone to who I assume was his boss who spoke slightly better English and confirmed where I was going. He said he wasn't even going to take me exactly where I needed to go and would drop me off at the lake because he knew where that was (10 minutes walk from the hostel, yeah cheers mate) When we got there he asked for $30 (the Grab would have cost about $7/8, no chance mate) I offered him $20, he asked for $25, I gave him $20 and got out of the car.

It was bloody hot for 7am. 32C I think. I hadn't actually booked the hostel but I'd narrowed it down to a few. I walked to my first choice hostel and had a quick look around. They only had a 10 bed dorm available, I said that many beds would be superfluous to my sleeping requirements but I don't think she understood. There was another hostel round the corner so I thought I'd check that one out before deciding. The atmosphere and layout of the first one seemed better so I went back and checked in... although I technically couldn't check in for another 7 hours. They said I could hang around in the lobby, bar or the TV room where they had some cushions to sleep on. So I went up to the roof and nabbed the WiFi password from someone up there and proceeded to die in the heat... but at least I could now access Facebook (Thank the maker! No, not Zuck) I ended up going to sleep in the TV room for about an hour but then they kicked us out for a staff meeting so I just sat in the bar for a bit. I chatted to a couple of people, Carlos (40) from El Salvador who was trying to sort a visa and Conrad (21) from London who was planning a motorbike ride in the north of Vietnam.


I got a bit bored so went for a little walk to get some cash. A ten minute walk took at least thirty minutes due to how long it can take to cross the road. There are basically no traffic rules in Hanoi, even red lights seem optional with some motorbikes simply mounting the pavement to avoid the traffic. By the time I got back to the hostel I was allowed to check in so I did that and then chilled in the room for a little bit. I decided on a vegan cafe near the hostel for dinner and I had the vegan pho which was delicious. I listened in to some people chatting about tourist stuff to get some ideas of what to do in Hanoi.

I was feeling exhausted so I went back to have a nap at the hostel but then a group of young people arrived. They said they were going downstairs for the quiz so I obviously joined them. It was at that point there was a power cut so I just sat down on the nearest chair and joined a stranger's team by default. The people I joined were an American couple, Madison and Kevin, we had a little chat while waiting for the power to come back on and then Conrad joined us. He's a very talkative chap so I just let him take over the conversation. I suggested a few quiz team names from my extensive collection (the non-filthy ones) and we settled on Quizness Time. It was a bit of a shambles of a quiz really, having to be the first to put your hand up to answer the question. Needless to say I knew most of the answers and we got to have a shot (I'm not sure of what) after every question. The final question was worth a ton of points making the whole quiz pointless but I got that one correct to so we won. The prize was 400,000 Vietnamese Dong which we used to buy beer.

Madison and Kevin went out for food so I hung out drinking beer with Conrad. We were joined by left wing Rob from Oldham who proceeded to talk politics with Conservative Conrad. To be honest I thought it was going to come to blows at one point so I tried to join in and mediate a little bit. They calmed down a bit and we had a few drinks together. Rob was doing giant laughing gas balloons, I did not partake. Conrad went to bed just as Madison and Kevin got back so I joined them for a final beer and a good chat about life.

Back up in my room it somehow ended up that everyone was in the bathroom brushing their teeth at the same time. A lovely end to a knackering but enjoyable day,

Mark's Non-Bogus Journey

For my new adventure through Asia I've decided to start this up again. As with the US blogs it's more for my benefit so I apologise if it doesn't read very well.

I've packed this 40L bag plus my fanny/bum bag with enough clothes to last a week

My journey will begin with 3 days in Hanoi and then I'll be meeting up with Dan Poole (and his girlfriend) in Cebu (an island in The Philippines) on Aug 30th and tagging along with them, possibly island hopping for a few weeks. After that, Asia is an oyster... or something. 

This has been a most excellent adventure...

Day 90 (Tuesday Dec 21st)
"da da da daaa, da da daaa!"

The first thing Lacey did when we woke up was call the numbers she knew off by heart to see if she'd left her phone in the car. It turned out that she had and that her phone was now back in Pennsylvania. The repair shop had left a message on it saying that she could pick up her car in Jersey. She didn't want to make the journey without a phone so after I'd said good bye to Suzy and Mike we went to the nearest T-Mobile shop and Lacey bought the cheapest phone they had. We went to the Port Authority and had some food before Lacey got a bus to where her car was as 5pm. I hadn't really planned how I was getting to Newark airport but after a quick look around I found a bus that was leaving immediately for $15. I'm sure I could have found something cheaper but I was tired and it was the easiest option.

 It was very busy at the airport and but I cut the line and went straight to the 'carry-on baggage only' check-in. I made my way towards my gate but when I got near I couldn't remember if it was 36 or 38 and the screens were down for that section. I decided to guess at 38 and proceeded through security but when I got to the gate the screens were still not working. After half an hour of figuring out what to do, with no staff to ask but with a lot of time to kill, I decided to leave that section even though I knew I'd have to go through security again. I stared at the screens for another ten minutes and when they came back up it turned out I'd been at the correct gate. Back through security I went and this time I got to go through the naked scanner, yay! It was at this point that I decided to look at my boarding pass and noticed my gate number was on there, I'm an idiot. There was quite an interesting atmosphere as more people started arriving at the gate. Half of the Virgin flights to London had already been cancelled that day and there were rumours going around that we were going to be heavily delayed. One woman was on the phone for half an hour having a half English/half foreign conversation which amused me for a bit. At one point I went to the toilet and there was a muscle-bound security guard coming out as I went in, he was whistling the A-Team theme music so I joined in, we were the coolest dudes in the airport at that very moment. There were two delays to the flight but in the end we only left an hour later than scheduled. The highlight of the flight was at the beginning where I read the safety booklet because it contained some rather funny cartoons. Other than that it was a very uneventful flight home, I watched Toy Story 3, Buried and a bit of Monsters.

THE END... until next time.

An Englishman In New York... again: Part 2

Day 89 (Monday Dec 20th) 
"I do believe you almost collided with that vehicle"

As per usual I got up at midday and again I tried figuring out what was going on with the Pittsburgh posse. I wasn't sure when I'd be meeting them so I headed downtown and went for Korean food at a place that Suzy had found online. I actually had to wait ten minutes before I could be seated because it was that busy, I suppose it was lunchtime. I ordered something which I thought was vegetarian but the woman brought me a fish as a starter. I told her I was vegetarian and she exchanged the fish for some vegetable things. On the table was a bubbling bowl of tofu soup and lots of little bowls containing different vegetables and rice. For $10 it was a lot of food and I didn't manage to eat it all, I think the hangover had something to do with that too.

After a quick chat with a stranger in the queue for the toilet I headed to the New York Public Library. I'd been here before but I hadn't ventured inside, mainly because I simply didn't have the confidence to enter a building where my only reason was to take photos and videos of where Ghostbusters was filmed. I spent about an hour walking around the building, getting lost, getting found and taking photos in rooms that had signs saying "no photography allowed". When I came out of the library I was greeted by a homeless looking guy standing on the steps singing 'Time Of My Life'.

I walked up 5th Avenue and checked out Rockafeller Plaza, it was heaving because they now had the Christmas tree up. When I reached Central Park I got some photos of the bridge where the pigeon lady was in Home Alone 2. There was a bloke dressed as Big Bird wandering around the south end of the park and taking photos with people, then asking them for money. I got a text from Lacey saying they were on their way into Manhattan so I headed to Grand Central to meet up with them. There was a group of women in Grand Central singing Christmas songs with satirical lyrics, there was a guy trying to move them on but he was failing miserably. Lacey texted saying they were still quite far away so I headed back to the Plaza Hotel which was also used as a filming location in Home Alone 2. I decided to go inside, again something I didn't have the confidence to do the first time I was in New York. There were lots of people wandering around inside so I wasn't too worried about seeming out of place. I was hanging around near reception for about an hour and then I wandered down to the lower floors where they had some shops and some really nice restrooms. At one point I overheard a family asking one of the staff about Home Alone and he led them into another room to show them exactly where some of it was filmed.... I followed. Something I noticed at the hotel was an unusual amount of handshaking and tipping. Those porters must be making a fortune!

It was about 8pm when the Pittsburgh people arrived. They'd had quite a day chasing after Lacey's car which had seen them venture to Harlem and Jersey. It was all kind of sorted out except Lacey had to stay an extra day but my cousin was kind enough to agree to Lacey staying the night at their apartment. Lacey's friends needed to get home that night and Lacey actually had a friend on his way to New York to drive the guys home. After a quick visit to Times Square we headed to the Port Authority in the hope they might be able to get a free bus ticket, something they sometimes offer to stranded travellers. Unfortunately there was no way we could have got that sorted in such a short space of time so Lacey told her friend to keep driving. We went for food in a weird fast food place where the food was slow but the music was amazing. We had a few hours to kill so around midnight we headed south and had a walk around Wall Street, then we decided to do the Staten Island ferry round trip. We didn't get back to Manhattan until about 3am and we immediately got the subway back up to midtown to meet Lacey's friend. It was his first time driving in New York but he agreed to drive Lacey and I up to my cousin's place........ big mistake.

I tried to direct him but the one way system confused us a bit and some roadworks totally three us off and caused us to run a red light and almost get crashed into. A few seconds later we heard a police siren and we were pulled over. The cop said "You almost got f%ckin' ploughed!" and he wasn't happy with the fact there was one too many people in the car. He took a long time back at his car and then proceeded to give Lacey's friend a ticket for almost $200 for having too many people in the car. He let us off with running the red light otherwise it would have been a total fine of about $400.

We finally made it back to the apartment at about 4am and said our good byes. I was pretty hungry so we stopped at the 7/11 and I got some veggie tofu noodles. Once again I struggled to remember which apartment it was and when we finally got up there Lacey realised she'd lost her phone. We hoped she'd left it in the car and after eating we went to bed.

An Englishman In New York... again: Part 1

Day 87 (Saturday Dec 18th)  

"Mrs Claus has positively identified the kidnappers as Martians"

I got a couple of hours sleep and was woken by my alarm at 5.15am. Vanessa drove me to the airport and I got my flight at 7.30am. I had a four hour layover in Denver and other than having a cheap burrito I did absolutely nothing. I arrived at LaGuardia in New York at about 8pm and got a bus through Queens, across to Manhattan and got off at 125th St. where I got the subway down to 86th. I grabbed some food at Subway and then walked to Suzy and Mike's apartment. I'd planned on surprising them but I couldn't remember which one their apartment was so I called Mike who said they were actually at a restaurant around the corner. I walked there, they introduced me to some of the staff (including a pretty waitress called Sarah) and then bought me a beer. We were there for less than an hour catching up and then we went back to the apartment where I fell asleep watching the 'Santa Claus Conquers The Martians' episode of MST3K.

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Day 88 (Sunday Dec 19th)
"The Bitchin'mobile made it all the way to Manhattan and then died"

I woke up around midday and spent most of the afternoon trying to figure out what was going on with Lacey. She was driving from Pittsburgh with a few friends to spend a couple of days in New York but I couldn't get a clear idea of where she was or when she was arriving. Eventually I got a call from her saying that her car had broken down and she needed rescuing. I went down to where they were parked to help them figure out what to do. I really wasn't much help because I've got no idea what to do when a car breaks down, let alone a car breaking down in Manhattan. They managed to find a company to tow the car to a repair shop but when the guy turned up things seemed generally odd. Once he'd taken the car he just said they'd call the next day. Lacey was very worried and thought she'd never seen her car again.

Everyone was hungry and I sort of remembered where there was a Chipotle so we spent half an hour finding that. I had my usual lovely veggie burrito but Lacey's friend Ally wasn't happy with the quality of the chicken... I've never eaten their meat so I'm taking no responsibility for suggesting Chipotle. Nobody was really in a good mood so we decided to find their hotel in Queens. We got to Queens with no problem but it turned out the station was about a half hour walk from the hotel. I stayed with them at the hotel for a little bit and then headed back to Manahattan before midnight.

I'd decided to pop my head into the Irish pub called Gael's that I'd been to three months previous and that if there was someone there I knew then I'd stay for one drink. It turned out Aiden, the bearded Scotsman, was working there now, he'd been working at the Scottish bar when I was last in New York but had been fired in strange circumstances a couple of days after I'd met him. We chatted for a while about what had happened three months, how all the other bar staff that I'd met were doing and we were also chatting with an NYC cop about various current affairs. Six pints of Belhaven IPA later and I stumbled back to the apartment but forgot how to use keys so I had to wake Mike up to help me. Sorry about that...

The Adventures of El Gringo & El Vandita

Day 85 (Thursday Dec 16th)
"I'm at an almost Mexican grill with an almost Mexican girl!"

I woke up feeling the worst I've ever felt on my trip, I blame the cinnamon whisky that was too easy to drink. Somehow I managed not to puke but I think I would have if I'd gone out to have breakfast with the other guys. I chose to stay behind and get a bit more sleep, Coop kept me company. When they returned, Vanessa and I went back to her place, she very wisely said we should both sleep for a bit. I got up at around 7.30pm and we were looking for somewhere to eat. I thought it would be very fitting for us to go to a Chipotle because Vanessa is a bit Mexican and it's one of my favourite food places. We ended up going to one in Vancouver, Washington because the website said it was the nearest one. It wasn't too far and it meant I got to visit another state. When we got back to Portland we watched Operation Endgame and I had some vanilla ice cream that it had taken me at least five minutes to decide upon when we were at the store. Before going to bed I realised that my laptop had actually died and wouldn't even boot up. Not good news but rather good timing.

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Day 86 (Friday Dec 17th)
"That's not harmonising!"

I had a cold and uncomfortable night's sleep but managed to get up by midday, today was supposed to be our day of doing stuff in or around Portland. We went to a house on a hill called Pittock Mansion, with a lovely view of Portland and Mt Hood. By English standards it was more just a big house but it was interesting walking around inside and seeing how it might have looked 100 years ago. My favourite part was the kitchen area where they had lots of pretend food laid out. I wanted to do a little bit of nature so we walked five minutes down a trail before we realised it was getting too dark and we needed to go see Jeff anyway. Jeff was having some problems with his electricity and was waiting for the electric man to call but we had time to pop out and have some Italian food at The Spaghetti Factory, I had veggie lasagne with some amazingly chewy bread which Jeff failed to cut. As usual in America we had a cool waitress, I think I have a thing for waitresses, they bring me food and they have to be nice to me. When we'd finished eating Jeff realised he had a couple of missed calls so we went back to the house just in time for the electric man. He said the whole electric box thing needed replacing and it would take him at least eight hours. While he was sorting out what parts he needed we went to Fred Meyer to play with scary singing children's toys. By this point I was absolutely knackered so when we got back to Jeff's we said our goodbyes and headed back to Vanessa's. We were tempted to watch 'Beavis & Butthead Do America' because we'd been talking about it earlier... but I sensibly decided that getting some sleep would probably be a better idea. Vanessa insisted that I sleep in her bed and she'd take the sofa so I could get some better rest than the previous night, I refused for at least two minutes... then set my alarm for 5.15am and lay my head down on her pillow.

Wheeler: Exhibit D (plus one night in Beaverton)

Day 83 (Tuesday Dec 14th)
"Thomas is a miserable bastard of a train."

I was awoken at 10am by the cats crawling on me so I'd assumed Martin had let them into my room as a "funny joke." It turned out that Martin and Natalie had no idea about it so the cats must have figured out how to open doors, it's like Jurassic Park! It was early so not much was going on and Martin had the Wii Fit out, he asked if I wanted to have a go on it and we discovered that I was 2lbs underweight. I played on the Fit games for at least an hour. Natalie was catching up with some work for most of the day so Martin and I played some Mario Kart and watched some Family Guy. For dinner I had the last of the potato soup because nobody could be bothered to cook. We then watched Married With Children and because I couldn't decide on a movie we ended up watching a Thomas The Tank Engine compilation, it was the old UK episodes narrated by George Carlin, very odd indeed. We finished my last night in Wheeler by watching Giuseppe's Rooney Never Says Die DVD. Natalie laughed the most at my 'making of my song' bit... I'm not sure if it was more a laugh of pity...

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Day 84 (Wednesday Dec 15th)
"Did you just fall out of the bathroom?" "...Yes."

Martin wanted to leave at 9am so we all got up around 8am. I discovered that Tony's laptop had finally died on me, it had various errors and took about ten minutes to load Firefox. We ended up leaving at about 10am and The Reeds managed to squeeze in an argument about Fred Meyer gas before we drove to Hillsboro. I slept about an hour of the way so I missed the snowy part of the journey. We dropped the car at the garage so they could fix "the rattle that's very annoying, it's a very annoying rattle" and went to Joanne Fabrics for a bit of boredom.

When the garage called Martin, we both went back to pick up the car and Martin was rather happy about the curing of the very annoying rattle. We collected Natalie, I had my second Starbucks experience and then we drove to Jeff's place in Beaverton. He showed us his cool robots built from photocopier parts and we met his cool little dog Coop. After about an hour Vanessa arrived and we went to Big Al's for some bowling, drinking and fooding. It was a pretty cool place, they had lots of areas for bowling and lots of massive TV screens showing Safety Dance when we arrived. I had a veggie burger and the waitress joked about putting extra bacon on my burger, I gave her an evil look. We had a couple of games of bowling and I think I might have won one of them while Martin and Natalie were both fighting for last place. On the second floor they had lots of arcade games and Martin managed to win 999 tickets on one game. The best I did was 225 on some sort of Tetris game and I gave most of my tickets to Jeff because I'm nice like that. I also gave some to Martin so he could get an iTunes gift card... for himself. We went back to Jeff's for some party games, broken fuse-boxes, heavy drinking, comedy Martins, sleepy Vanessas, and apparently Natalie was trying to touch me all night. Vanessa had claimed the sofa but she fell asleep in the chair... so I did the honourable thing and didn't let the sofa go to waste.

Wheeler: Exhibit C

Day 81 (Sunday Dec 12th)
"Why did he only eat one pigeon egg?!"

I woke up at my usual time and we went to Tillamook cheese factory to do their "self-guided tour" and we got to see the production line. Martin was most intrigued by the guys who put the off-cuts on the bits of cheese that don't weight enough, I was most intrigued by the beard masks. There were some free samples of the most popular cheeses and Martin decided to buy some off-cuts of the garlic chili cheese. We went grocery shopping at Fred Meyer in Tillamook and then headed home. Natalie made a salad with cous-cous and then later on she made some delicious yakisoba. While Natalie was cooking, Martin and I watched Bear Grylls trying to survive in an abandoned factory. We then watched Legend Of The Bog which I really regretted watching for a second time.

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Day 82 (Monday Dec 13th)
"You've been stuffed!"

I planned to get up early but that obviously didn't happen. We headed up the coast and briefly stopped at Cannon Beach before we got to Astoria. We went to the shop from The Goonies, which is now a coffee shop, and I had a hot chocolate. Then we walked down to the docks and saw a few sea lions. Natalie wanted to check out an art gallery so we drove into town but both galleries were closed. Martin and Natalie were all out of ideas so I suggested we go to the Fort George Brewery where they served us beer in jam jars which confused me for a bit. The Reeds had a sausage platter but I refused to eat anything because I wanted to continue the tradition of not eating out while I was staying with them. We headed home at around 5pm and Martin made some burritos, he only cooked six so I filled myself up with some leftover chili. Max had recommended a film to us but other than starring Napoleon from Bill & Ted it was almost unwatchable so we ended up watching the wonderful Thankskilling. Before bed-time Martin played with the cats for about an hour. It was strangely fascinating just watching them chase a shoelace.

Wheeler: Exhibit B

Day 80 (Saturday Dec 11th)
"You look like the kind of people that would enjoy karaoke"

We didn't do much for the first part of the day, just a bit of Mario on the Wii. Natalie was going to make pizza tonight but she asked me to make the pizza dough. I'll admit that I had a little bit of help from the bread maker but it was mostly me. While the dough was mixing and doing whatever else it does in the break maker (okay, all I did was put the ingredients into the bread maker, I had to measure them though!) we went to the local bar, The Sea Shack (Natalie calls it Sea Sack because she can't speak) for a couple of beers and for Martin's biography. Just before we were about to leave the bar the barmaid said we looked like the kind of people that would be up for tonight's karaoke. We joked about returning later on but I don't think any of us thought we actually would.

Back at the house Natalie prepared the toppings and got Martin and I to roll out the dough, then commenced the cooking of one big veggie tofu pizza with two little meat ones. While the pizzas were cooking we watched my Goonies 25th anniversary videos including the black & white Natalie montage...... awkward but arousing.

One of the little pizzas turned out a big doughy, I assumed Martin had made that one, my one was perfect. The pizza was lovely and I washed it down with some boxed wine because we'd run out of beer. Natalie and I attempted an intellectual chat about vegetarianism but the wine didn't help with that. We then decided we should go out to the karaoke because we were just about tipsy enough for some singing.

It was about 11.30pm when we went out so we weren't sure if the karaoke would still be going on but as we got nearer to the bar we could hear some awful noises coming from within. When I got to the top of the stairs I saw a very large woman hanging off a stripper pole, it was going to be a fun night. Natalie wanted me to sing Walk Like An Egyptian and We Built This City On Rock And Roll with her and I did Hit Me With Your Best Shot on my own. There were a couple having a domestic for most of the night and I even got a little bit of it on video when the guy was singing and pushed his drunk wife off the stage. As we were about to leave the karaoke DJ came up and spoke to us, upon hearing I was leaving the next day he asked us to sit down because he was going to sing a song for me. So the night was ended by an old, bearded, white haired, fisherman-looking Oregonian man singing a Roger Whittacker song about sailing home to England.

Wheeler: Exhibit A

Day 78 (Thursday Dec 9th)
"Which position would you rather be in a human centipede?"

I got up at midday after not a great night's sleep, I assumed it was because it was the first night in a new bed. Natalie sorted me out with toast and jam and put some BBC Radio on to make me feel at home. Martin went out to test his snow chains and then realised he'd bought the wrong size. Luckily there's probably no more snow until next year, eh Martin? Martin played some of his annoying war game and Natalie made me noodles with vegetables for lunch. The men (me and Martin) went to the buy groceries in Mohler and Manzanita because you need more than shop to get everything, every shop is a local shop around here. The Wii dance game had arrived so we played that until we were too tired to stand and then Natalie made some Ecuadorian potato soup with homemade bread. On the TV schedule for that night was new Peep Show, Human Centipede and Satan's Little Helper with some beer to help those movies go down a little easier. The kitties seemed to be getting used to me but maybe it was just me getting used to them. That night it was too hot in my room because Martin had the new heater on in there. I turned it off and opened to window for an hour before it was cool enough to sleep.

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Day 79 (Friday Dec 10th)
"1 - 0 to Mrs. Reed."

Again I got up at midday and I tried oatmeal for the first time, it was okay with some jam. We went for a hike along a beach at Nehalem Bay and played football with some sort of spherical thing. We got the obligatory stupidly posed photos with various bits of dead trees along the beach and then turned left at a jetty. There were surfers and seals out in this part of the bay. The beach along the other side was impossible to navigate so Martin took us inland into uncharted territory... and fortunately we made it back to the car before nightfall. When we got home Natalie made me a burnt cheese sandwich and then we watched lots of episodes of Family Guy. Martin made "the best vegetarian chili in the world" which could have very well been the best vegetarian chili in the world.... if it wasn't so darn spicy. That's 1 - 0 to Mrs Reed on the dinner cooking front for the potato soup. We watched a dodgy movie called Centurion and at some point that night I know Natalie said "Mark's stroking my pussy" because I made a sexy mental note of those words for later.... (I was stroking one of the cats of course)

From Warrenton to Wheeler...

Day 76 (Tuesday Dec 7th)

"Why do they only let the crazy Christians on TV?"

I woke up at 11am in an empty house, I had some toast and a bagel with jam for breakfast. Randy came home at about 2pm and we went to the Astoria Column, we probably spent longer climbing up the stairs than we did at the top because it was rather cold and rainy. On the way back we stopped in to see Kerri at the animal care place she works at, she was a busy so it was a brief hello and then back home for video games. Kerri got home around 4pm and Randy made a lovely stir fry with cookies for dessert. Kerri's friend Sarah came round to watch (and play) Jeopardy which is apparently a nightly thing... I beat everyone at Jeopardy. In the final commercial break Kerri's dog changed the channel so we ended up missing the last round... I would have still won. Kerri had something wrong with her eye so Sarah drove her to the emergency room while Randy and I played some more video games. Randy went to bed at about 10pm and Kerri didn't get home until after midnight. I watched Conan O'Brien, The Day The Earth Stood Still, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report and then at 3am the only thing on TV was a crazy man shouting about God.... he annoyed me so I went to sleep.

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Day 77 (Wednesday Dec 8th)
"I will not negotiate with ants!"

I didn't wake up until midday and I remembered I'd been dreaming about football (soccer)... I do kind of miss watching Match Of The Day every Saturday night. Randy got home at 2pm and we went and walked around Fort Stevens. It's an abandoned fort from about 100 years ago so it's basically lots of bunkers with nothing in them. When we got back I played Ghostbusters until Kerri got home and then we ate. We had a delicious dinner of mash potato, green beans, some bagel things and some deep fried asparagus with breadcrumbs. The asparagus was weird because it reminded me of fried chicken and pretty much tasted the same, anything deep fried must taste the same. Sarah didn't come over but we still played Jeopardy and I won again, I think the Chinese Cinema category helped me a bit. I was leaving Warrenton tonight and I'd lost one of my SD cards so we spent about half an hour looking for it before Randy found it under the door mat. Kerri wasn't feeling too great so Randy drove me to Wheeler. We got there at about 9pm and was immediately offered some Newcastle Brown Ale. We spent the night watching Married With Children, The Hive (awful killer ants movie), Train (awful train horror movie) and I only spilt my beer twice because of the cats jumping on me.

Bye Ali, hi Vanessa, bye Vanessa, hi Kerri and Randy...

Day 75 (Monday Dec 6th)
"I don't expect you to buy me food until I'm staying with you."

I'd set my alarm for 10.30am because Ali was coming to pick me up on her lunch break to take me to the Greyhound station. I managed to get my stuff packed and had some cereal and toast before she got home. Ali dropped me off at the bus station and then one of the new Greyhound buses arrived. It was all fancy looking inside but the clientele were the same standard as usual. It was crowded and smelt of piss but it had free wi-fi, a fair compromise.

Vanessa met me in Portland and we had three hours to kill before my bus to Warrenton so we went for some Chinese food, I had some lettuce wrap things where I had to wrap the stuff in lettuce myself, lazy chefs. Vanessa insisted on paying even though I said I'd only expect her to pay for my food when I'm actually staying with her in a few weeks (jk?). We then went to a big book store called Powell's. They have about five floors and lots of different rooms, if I was into books I could probably spend a week in there. As it was, the best thing I saw in there were some faecally shaped keyrings called "Dookeys". We gave ourselves about half an hour to get to the car and then get to the station... Vanessa couldn't find the car... and when we finally found it and started walking towards the station Vanessa decided we needed to drive to the station because it was too far to walk... it turned out to be one block away. (Vanessa is great, I love her lots, please don't hurt me Vanessa).


My bus to Warrenton also had free wi-fi but for some reason the bus driver lady decided to turn all the lights off in the bus to it was pitch black. Luckily I've wasted so much of my life on the internet that I don't need to see a keyboard to type. Kerri and Randy picked me up from the bus stop (Fred Meyer) in Warrenton at about 9pm and we drove back to their place. I had my own room and my own bathroom which was rather cool. They both went to bed at 10pm so I had some soup, watched a bit of TV in my room and then went to sleep.

Dance Ali Dance: Corvallis - The Next Chapter

 Day 73 (Saturday Dec 4th)

"This ain't no book shop!"

Ali said I should sleep-in so I got up around midday. She was baking some croissant looking things and they were actually really nice with some jam. We didn't leave the house until 3pm and we didn't really have anything planned. Ali decided to show me the OSU campus where she works. There were a lot of crazy football fans hanging around on the streets and outside the stadium, we actually drove past the stadium and you could see the fans in the stands. At OSU they had a Saturday market going on with lots of weird little ornaments and jewelery. Ali bought be a Beavers t-shirt from the "bookstore" and then we left the campus because we didn't want to get caught up in the football traffic. We went to Bed Bath & Beyond which turned out to be more "Beyond" than "Bed" or "Bath". We bought a gingerbread house kit and then headed home. Our incredible gingerbread house took about an hour to make and as I'm writing this two days later it's somehow still standing. I tried eating a bit of it last night but it was all a bit hard. Ali cooked a couple of small pizzas for dinner and we also had had chips and salsa. Tonight's movie was Labyrinth (Dance Ali Dance!) and we ended the night by watching my Goonies 25th Anniversary videos.

Day 74 (Sunday Dec 5th)
"New Year's Eve Beach?"

For the second day in a row I woke up at midday. I had some jam and toast and then booked my buses to Warrenton for the next day. Ali had planned for us to go to Brownsville and see some of the Stand By Me locations but while she was getting ready I did some research and decided I'd rather go to the coast. Ali was quite happy with that so we headed west. It took less than an hour to get the coast and we stopped at the dollar store in Newport because we'd both forgot our sunglasses on a surprisingly sunny day. We drove ten minutes north to Otter Rock and Devil's Punchbowl for some nice scenery. There were some noisy sea lions riding the waves alongside some surfers. Ali wanted to walk on the beach so we went to one called Nye Beach (New Year's Eve beach to me) and walked around a bit. We watched some dog's humping and I wrote a message in the sand before we headed home. Ali was talking about eating out but I fancied some the chili and rice that I'd seen in the kitchen cupboard. After dinner we watched the Rooney Never Says Die DVD followed by Bill & Ted and some mint ice cream before bed.