Europe trip 2023

Our awesome Taiwanese experience started in Vietnam, we were fortunate to be plucked out of a check in queue and directed straight to priority check in so we were processed very quickly. My backpack had done some dieting in SE Asia and luckily came in at 20.2kg. 200 grams over my allowance, it had been up to 2kg over!

 

A delayed flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Taipei was a slight blip but it was a good flight. We processed through customs in 25 minutes and found our bags were faster than us and were going round and round on the conveyer! 🙄 Money changed, SIM card purchased and we were on our way to the MRT that would take us to our apartment.

 

Unfortunately for us our Airbnb host got a bit mixed up because we headed for number 197, only to find a security person who said “no resident” via google translate. However he was so kind to us, letting us in anyway, giving us chairs and water to drink while I sent very firm emails to our host asking where the heck we were meant to be. The host was quite unhelpful and would not give us a phone number to call. The kind security guard then stated the obvious “wrong address” into his google translate. Eventually I scrolled back through our early communication with Airbnb host and he had said 179, so off I took with family with security guy tailing us to the correct place.

 

We checked in no problems, thanks to a 24 hour front desk, but then we got inside the apartment to find only one bed! 😫When booking I had had a conversation about the kids. More sharp emails to the host and we split the bed in half (it was two mattresses) found some linen, hoped it was clean, and put kids to bed!

 

The next morning I woke to a $80 refund on Airbnb, a kind gesture from the host.

 

That afternoon we met up with BK’s brother, John. He so kindly got us easy cards which meant tapping in and out of the train station was really simple and sped up the process through stations. We explored a market called Shinlin, had street food for dinner, a beef curry wrap for me, yum, then home to bed. 💤

 

The following day was a rest, laundry, supermarket kind of day. We looked for somewhere nice to eat for dinner but being Chinese New Year everything was shut. McDonald’s it was, and it was cheap!!

 

On Sunday we decided to visit a museum but by the time we got there and looked at the crowds we were like….nooooooo thanks! So relaxed in their gardens instead 😄

 

By this time we were over public transport and needing to meet John and his partner for dinner, so we Uber’d. Team Knowles loves Uber, apart from back in Bangkok!

 

A grand hotel buffet was the plan for dinner, we have been getting all our food cooked fresh for us for the last 7.5 weeks but thought that this flash hotel’s food would be ok, and it was. The buffet didn’t have time to have germs on it with a fast turn over. It was the best food we’ve had the entire trip!! Yum and yum and yum!

 

Monday was forecast to be a beaut day so I chose to take the fam out to the hinterland to a little village called Shifen where it’s the only place in Taiwan to set off a Chinese lantern. Being Chinese New Year it seemed fitting, however it turns out everyone else had the same idea and we stood very squashed in a few trains. Glad everyone had showered!

 

We explored Shifen, looked at a waterfall, which was nice but I can see why the Chinese LOVE New Zealand, we also have beautiful waterfalls but we lack the pile of people to squeeze past to see said waterfall!

 

The little village was all based around the railway. Lots of people were setting off their lanterns around the railway track. We hopped onto the train again and off at another village called Pingxi. We got some dinner, looked at the sunset then decided it was time to buy a lantern. We chose dark pink which apparently represents ‘happy marriage and family harmony!’

We decorated it then it was time to light it, the old man who owned the store picked up our lantern and off we marched after him to a perfect spot, not on the railway like a bunch of other people. We held it, he lit it, it filled with hot air and up it went! We watched it till it disappeared. A fantastic experience!

 

After that it was back to being packed in like sardines again for the train home. We had to transfer trains half way, I couldn’t stand anymore so R and I sat in a heap in the middle of an aisle in a carriage. You know how I said a few blogs ago people make the experience? Well let me recount that second half of the train trip for you…

 

Two ladies and a baby took us under their wing, got out their google translate and commented how beautiful R was, I translated back, “thank you it’s our first time in Taiwan” and so started this lovely conversation with the ladies all around us. A lady traveling with her two young girls joined in, she spoke English, a lady behind her joined in (found out right at the end of the trip her and her husband live in California and spoke perfect English) the old lady behind them stood and leaned over the seats to look at us. We were given a sweet rice cake to eat, the lady with two girls told me what it was when I gave her a ‘what the heck is this?!’ look, it turned out to be really nice!! R was also given a snack size pack of m&m’s to eat.

After photos were taken, more convo with Americans about what we were doing this year, we parted ways at Taipei station like old friends “Byyyyyyyyye!!!!” waving till we couldn’t see each other anymore.

 

So instead of shutting my eyes and thinking about my very sore hips and why was I sitting on the floor of a rail carriage and that I needed a hot shower and some sleep, it turned out to be a wonderful trip back to Taipei. Such a highlight.

 

I know you’re thinking, where were the boys? Well I had C with me, he was sitting on the floor behind me watching someone play their Nintendo. BK however was waaaaay down the carriage, I threw the kids on the train as soon as it stopped but he’s a bit more polite and let people board before him 😄

 

That evening there was a 5.3 earthquake, quite the experience being up 11 floors and swaying. I have since found out that if you want to build a building for business use, you build it then you have to leave it empty for an entire year before you can occupy it! Apparently this is mostly because of the amount of earthquakes Taiwan has and if after a year it’s had a good ol’ shake and it’s still standing you’ve built it well and you can use it!

 

Tuesday and Wednesday consisted of rest, laundry, supermarket, a trip IKEA on the bus (a kind lady gave our kids lollies!), schoolwork and BK working.

 

By Thursday we were ready to go again. It was a rainy day so I decided a hop on hop off bus tour would be good so we could sit and be driven around the sights of Taipei. We managed to get front row seats on the top level of a double decker bus. The kids were given a free magnet each by the kind guide on board (I don’t think she was meant to – no one else got one!!). Apart from Ruby having ants in her pants, it was a great trip and I was happy that we had seen a lot of the sights so I made a plan in my head how to execute the rest of them in the weekend.

 

Friday we went out for lunch at a local sandwich place and then it was off to see a temple, but when we got there, there was a service going so we had a look but felt like we were imposing so we left and walked to what I think would be C’s highlight, a restaurant called ‘Modern Toilet’ and yes, you guessed it, we sat on toilets, the menu was the shape of a toilet seat, the food came in mini toilets and the sprite came in a mini urinal, the garlic bread even looked like a pile of poop! 💩

Hilarious. Apparently it’s quite a popular Japanese chain. Following that delightful experience we decided to walk the streets to the main station and came across quite a nice modern market.

 

Saturday it was up early and off to the zoo. It was NZ$2.60 each to get in and R was free, so I didn’t have overly high hopes, but it was amazing, obviously not Singapore standard but just as good as the Auckland & Wellington Zoos. A highlight there was a panda coming to sit right in front of us to eat. Amazing. Lots and lots of animals in good enclosures and obviously well looked after. I walked 17k steps, so little R must have done 20k plus with her tiny legs, she gave up walking after a while and it was walk 5 minutes, carry 5 minutes for the last hour.

Unfortunately our plans were rained out on our last full day so it was a quiet rest day and dinner with BK’s bro at his house. That evening, well, 2 o’clock in the following morning, we were woken by sirens through our apartment block, then they stopped, then a few minutes later they started, then they stopped, then a few minutes later another earthquake! Cant quite decide if its related, I took video of the noise and words it was saying, so I am working on trying to get it translated!!

 

Taiwan, you’ve been wonderful, your people are so very very kind and generous. We can certainly see ourselves coming back, maybe we’ll tag on Philippines/Japan/China while we’re at it.

 

Till next time,

 

Claire

 

Budget update :

Taiwan – $53 over

Total budget – $246 under

It was a shock to leave cheap SE Asia and find normal prices again, had to work hard at the budget this week as our accommodation was 80% of our daily budget! We were helped a lot by all the things BK’s generous brother gave us!

So after our adventure getting to Siem Reap (see last Facebook post) we took Wednesday to recover. Swimming and screen time and rest. We had a 30 minute orientation drive around in the late afternoon which was nice. We liked the size of Siem Reap instantly. A quick google told us it was a similar size to our home town.

 

The following day BK did some work so the kids and I headed out to a butterfly park/sanctuary. Very educational, our kids both know the life cycle very well from their Montessori preschool covering it extensively. The afternoon was spent in the pool.

 

Friday I didn’t feel too flash so spent most of the day in bed. BK took the kids to play arcade games and they had a ball (all 3 of them!) they came back to get me and we all went into the Main Street in town for dinner (pizza – this girl is a little over rice!)

 

On Saturday we decided to do a sunset tour of the Pre Rup temple. If we bought tickets for the temples for following day after 4.30pm we could get free entry into the temples for that evening. So from 4.30pm it was a rush to: buy the tickets, race out to the temple, climb it and then sit and watch the sky turn fire engine red!!! Amazing. It was also fun to have a quick look around to see what we were in for the following day.

 

We were up at 6am (most people are up at 5am to do the sunrise but not us 💤 )

It was chilly (18 degrees) so R and I wore our jackets. We decided to see the temples the opposite way to the norm to avoid some of the crowds. This was the best decision of the day. We arrived at our first temple 4 minutes after it opened. Beautiful, peaceful and cold! We clambered around for a whole hour before moving on to the next one, and the day continued like that….

 

We saw:

Ta Prohm (if you’ve seen the movie Tomb Raider….that one with the tree growing through it)

Bantesy Kdei

Ta Nei

Chau Say Tevoda

Thomanom

Terrace of the Elephants

Bayon

Angkor Wat

 

By 2pm we’d had enough. The sun was hot and our legs weren’t wanting to go any further. The trusty Fitbit told me I’d walked 15km. No wonder R was refusing to walk by the end of it.

 

Unfortunately the pool had turned a green colour by the time we got back to our villa so no one was going in there to cool off. Sitting under the air con had to suffice, of course it did when there were screens to look at!

 

Monday was spent doing errands around town such as, checking out where the bus to our next location leaves from and having some of the best ice cream in town. And also errands online like paying GST and having email conversations with the kids’ school. Yes, life at home carries on, got to keep up!

 

So thanks Siem Reap for a great time. The week whizzed past so quickly. I would have liked to do the floating markets/village but we ran out of time. I guess we will have to come back!

 

A really cute moment was when C decided that when he is older he had to bring his best friend back to Cambodia to show him the temples he was having such a great time clambering over. Maybe his Mum and I could tag along…

 

Till next time,

 

Claire

 

 

Budget update :

Siem Reap – $136 under

Total Budget – $399 under

I had heard a lot about this being a place visitors love. Well sign me up to that list! It’s been great. The temperature has been manageable, some nights we’ve even slept with the air con off. One morning was a cool 17 degrees!

 

The flight up here from Krabi was great. Followed by a quick Uber to our apartment and falling straight into bed as I did not feel well. A fever and dehydration took me a couple of days to recover from, I couldn’t eat much but sculled the rehydration sachets my doctor had so kindly given me before we left home.

 

On Friday I finally felt well enough to Uber into the central town to see a monument and grab dinner. Hawaiian pizza was all I could manage.

 

On Saturday we went to a mall, which was ginormous as seems to be the norm here. By then I had worked out the little boy had lost the spacer to his asthma inhaler and spent my time at the mall pacing the pharmacies looking for one, with a picture of it on my phone in one hand and the inhaler in the other hand!! I failed unfortunately and will have to keep looking, but his asthma has been under control without the inhaler thank goodness.

 

That afternoon we decided to go up a mountain to visit a temple called Doi Sa Tep for sunset. You have to fill a red truck with 10 people before they’ll take you any where. So we sat, a German girl arrived, yay half way! Then 2 Korean girls arrived, that’s 7, we sat, we waited, we looked at our watches, sunset was getting closer…..Finally one Korean girl and I negotiated with the driver a 20 baht discount for each person and he would wait for us until 7pm so we could see the sunset. Winning. It would have been a lovely view if Chiang Mai got its pollution under control! But there was beautiful sunset light reflecting on the temple.

 

The next morning, we were up early with great anticipation, it was time to spend the day with elephants! I had researched extensively. I knew we did not want to ride and didn’t want any nasty hooks, we were not going to support any abuse to the animals at all. I knew I wasn’t keen to go where there was heeeeeaps of people. So I had found a place online and had been into their offices on Friday to book, pay and run all my requests past them. They passed with flying colours. Elephant Nature park here we come. Except we weren’t going to the actual park we went on a ‘saddle off’ tour.

 

The van arrived to collect us at 8.30am, and when the van door opened I was stoked to see only 4 other people! Plus our driver and a guide. We were off to a great start. We drove 1.5 hours south, then transferred to a ute for another 20 minute drive. We had finally arrived. As we changed into the clothes that were provided, 2 beautiful elephants came down the paddock towards us and as they got closer we noticed a baby was with them also!

 

We learnt that these animals, all female, had only been freed from riding camps 3 months ago. The adults were 38 and the baby was 4. One adult was pregnant, she’d been pregnant for a year….with another year expected to go! It was time to give them some love, so we got straight into feeding them sugar cane, then we were given bags full of mini bananas to carry and took them for a bush walk with their handlers ‘mahouts’. They sure knew what was in those bags! Elephant trunks came nosying around, looking for food if you weren’t paying close attention!

 

After our lunch we made them rice balls and left them to set while we took the elephants to the mud pit and smeared mud all over them! Then it was time for a play and wash off in the waterfall for everyone!!

 

The kids were amazing. Mr 8 was all guns blazing, his new BFF was the guide, he sucked out any detail he possibly could, if you know our boy you’ll know he will chat your ear off if you let him!! He was in his element!

 

Little Miss 6 went between excitement and fear. She almost had a few mishaps like when she almost fell in the water, and almost got squashed when an elephant backing up and she didn’t realise or when she held onto the banana too long and the elephant got too close to her and she didn’t like it (sometimes she did like it🙄) but with 2 parents, a guide, a driver, 4 tour buddies and 3 mahouts looking out for her when she made frightened noises somebody scooped her up! Needless to say, once we transferred back to the van she used her Daddy’s arm as a pillow and slept all the way home!

 

A truly memorable day with plenty of photos and GoPro footage taken for everyone to remember it by.

Budget update :

Chiang Mai – $82 under
Total budget – $260 under

Crossing the causeway from Singapore to Johor, Malaysia was a cheap and easy experience, only NZ$11 for all of us.

We arrived at our lovely Airbnb which was an apartment in a tower above a big mall.

We were directed to a hawker centre with great food for dinner. The following day we had a quiet day which was spent at the pool, doing laundry, buying BK some jandals and generally resting after a very full on time in Singapore.

It was then time to fly up to Kuala Lumpur, remember those flights I mentioned in an earlier blog that were only NZ$3 each? This was that flight! It left 10 minutes late but arrived 7 minutes early! I was lazy and booked a transfer which scooped us up from the airport and drove us most of an hour into central KL to our next Airbnb which was another apartment in a tall tower. We arrived in the early evening and were greeted by an amazing view of the KL tower.

Out exploring the next day we saw the Petronas towers, the kids had a play at the park right beside them and then we had a good wander around the mall which is under them. That evening we had our first google fail leading us (or not in this case) somewhere to eat. Not good when hot and hungry. Eventually we found an average place in yet another mall and quickly ubered home to bed.

BK worked in a coworking space the next day so it was time for Kidzania for the kids and I. If you aren’t familiar with Kidzania, it’s a mini town where kids do jobs and earn ‘kidso’ money then they can spend it on getting things like their driver’s license and driving a car or getting nails done or buying things at the store. There are several of them around the world. It’s all about the kids, so the parents aren’t allowed to interact/help with the ‘work’ so I just ended up being the bag lady and standing with a bunch of other mums trying to peer through the windows at your cute kids. It wasn’t cheap but it was totally worth it, our kids had a ball!

This was followed by another mall food court for dinner. There are a lot of malls here in KL!

We had heard Batu Caves were an interesting place to visit so it was up early the next day to get there before the heat really set in for the day. The 272 steps to climb while watching out for monkeys was a challenge but it was interesting in the caves. We were back at our apartment before 10am for a rest and more mall visiting for lunch and dinner!

In front of our apartment block was a monorail station, having never been on one before we chose another mall to visit for lunch that was one stop down the line. At NZ$3 for all of us return it seemed like a great idea! It wasn’t as smooth as proper rail but fun all the same. The mall and lunch were great too!

Two days of rest followed that with quite a lot of lazing round our apartment. More mall food courts for lunches and dinners, yep that’s getting old already. We did manage a visit to the next door hotel’s pool, since we could see how awesome it looked from our balcony we invited ourselves over, well the kids and I did, BK stayed home as he was horrified!! Ha!!! Oh we also dug out the maths books, first 6 pages ✔️

So Malaysia, you’ve been interesting, I can see you are trying and wanting to be like your beautiful little sister Singapore to the south. Your food has been amazing, so cheap yet so yum, my favorite – coconut steam bun for 59 cents.

I’ve enjoyed the slower pace of life, I probably could have packed our week full but it was nice to relax.

See you again Malaysia on our way out to Sri Lanka in a few months time.

 

Till next time!

 

Claire

 

 

Budget update

Malaysia $90 under!

That is amazing as it includes $65 for some new glasses for Connor since his got lost somewhere between leaving my parents place and Auckland airport. 🙄😩

 

Total budget update : $75 under.

September update

So we’re getting asked, a LOT, where are you actually going???

So to be vague and keep our family safe… but not too vague for all you curious people the trip looks like this…

 

Disclaimer : We ask for those select few that know our exact cities and dates to please keep them to yourselves.

 

December 

New Zealand, Australia, Singapore

January 

Malaysia, Thailand

February 

Vietnam, Cambodia, Taiwan,

Hong Kong (+China & Macau)

March

Sri Lanka

Greece, Croatia

April

Bosnia, Slovenia, Montenegro

May

Italy (+San Marino & Vatican)

Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Germany

June

Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, Belgium,

Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Switzerland

July

France (+Monaco & Andorra)

Spain, England (+Wales)

August

Ireland (+Northern Ireland), Iceland, Canada

September/October/November 

America, The Bahamas, Mexico, Canada, New Zealand

 

Some countries we’ll be there just long enough to have lunch! Some we’ll be there for weeks or a month or some monthS 😃

Some countries we’ll revisit or go over the end of one month and start of another but you don’t need that much detail!

 

Till next time! (which will probably be next month – there’s more to say now so blogs will come out faster I think!)

Claire