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For me, a new year always brings with it a lot of reflection. While 2016 is full of promise: an exciting new life in Spain, a chance to travel in mainland Europe and explore new work opportunities, lately I’ve also been battling with some serious fears and worries about the future. We’ve spent the last few weeks cat sitting in London and while being back in my favourite city and catching up with friends has been wonderful, our time here has also brought a lot of doubts and dark feelings to the surface.
This time next week, we’ll be in Spain! Before settling in Madrid, we’re taking a four-week road trip around the country to get a feel for Spanish life and as our departure date draws closer, we’re trying to formulate a rough itinerary of places to visit. Fortunately, Patti from One Road at a Time, who walked the Camino de Santiago across Spain with her husband Abi last year, was able to give us the lowdown on all things Spanish and the best places to visit.
Our trip to the USA was one of my favourite travel experiences to date. During our three-month stay we took an epic autumn road trip through New England, visited mighty Niagara Falls and hit up the bright lights of New York City, Philadelphia and Washington DC.  We ate plenty of delicious food, stayed in some amazing places and took on all kinds of activities, from boat trips and ghost walks to historical tours and museum visits. So, how much did it cost us to travel for three months in America?
Unbelievably, it’s been three years since we touched down in our first Asian country: Indonesia. Although we went on to spend over two years travelling and living in South-East Asia, I’ll never forget the strangeness and excitement of that first week in Java. I remember the intensity of the sounds and smells; the beeping throngs of traffic, the humid wall of heat, the spicy food, ornate temples, smoking sticks of incense and huge spiders.
It’s a sad fact that places can become synonymous with tragic events that occurred in them. Vietnam, for instance, may immediately bring to mind images of war for many people; when we travelled in Cambodia, I couldn’t help seeing the scars of genocide everywhere we went.   Similarly, we couldn’t ignore the huge mark the 9/11 terrorist attacks have had on the world, so while we were visiting New York City we chose to visit the 9/11 Memorial Museum and Tribute Center.
We spent our last week in the USA with Andrew’s relatives in Brooklyn, New York City. Much of our time was spent sightseeing on foot in Manhattan, visiting museums, landmarks, parks and soaking in the atmosphere of this fast-paced metropolis.  Our visit also happened to fall over the Thanksgiving holiday, so we were able to celebrate our first ever, somewhat unconventional, American Thanksgiving.
We couldn’t visit America without taking a trip to the Capital: Washington, DC. What we discovered during our fast-paced visit was a small, understated city full of museums, memorials, history and a few blogging friends. Visiting Washington DC was thought-provoking and intense as we looked back on past struggles, caught a glimpse of the less-affluent side of the city and learned so much about the history of the USA.
2015 has been a year of two very different halves for us; the first spent in Asia, the second in America and the UK. We lived in Vietnam’s crazy capital city, Hanoi, where we saved over £14,000 (and nearly lost our minds!) by teaching English. We relaxed on beaches in Thailand, house sat in London, toured South Wales and took the best road trip ever through New England in the USA. As we prepare to celebrate Christmas in Blighty for the first time in nearly three years, here’s our 2015 travel round-up.
I’m not going to lie; Philly came as a bit of a shock after spending two months in idyllic New England. Gone were the tiny towns full of independent shops and cute cafes, the craggy coastline and sweeping forests. When our bus pulled up in Philadelphia we found ourselves back in a concrete jungle, ready for five days of intense city sightseeing; what we hadn’t banked on was an Airbnb bedbug disaster and the tougher side of city life in Philly.