Well, it's finally come to an end and life is returning to normal. We thought we'd be coming home to spring but Alberta had other thoughts. Now that I've had some time to relax and let things sink in, I thought I'd make one final post.
Now the question we've been getting from everyone is "What was your favorite place?" That isn't an easy question to answer because I don't have a single answer to it, so here is the long winded one. My favorite experience from the trip was our Habitat for Humanity build. It was such a rewarding experience to be able to give something back during our journey. The family we built for (Milee, Lakwa, Deepak and Amir) were absolutely wonderful and were so deserving of a new home. The people in the community made us feel so welcome and cooked us fantastic meals. We also made some amazing friends on the build team from Canada (Cailin, Heidi & Christian). All in all it was the highlight of the trip and look forward to be able to do another build in the future.
In terms of a favorite country, I can narrow it down to three...Vietnam, Cambodia, and Jordan. The big thing going for all of these places is the warm and welcoming people that make traveling there such a pleasure. Vietnam has some beautiful scenery and fantastic food (spring rolls and pho). Cambodia has persevered despite such a turbulent and terrible past, wonderful $5/hr massages and Ankor Wat was awesome. Jordan has such a rich culture and some truly amazing sights (Petra and the Dead Sea). I could probably write a book about the things I loved about these places but will not bore you with all of that.
Favorite city has got to be Berlin. It is a truly European city with stylish people and endless cafe's but it is more than that. The city has a vibe and an energy to it that is contagious. There are countless museums and art galleries and it has a real cultural an "artsy" vibe to it. There is also so much history from Nazi Germany to the DDR and the Berlin but the people have moved on from that and have "created" a wonderful city.
I think that is about it for now but want to make a few thank you's. First and foremost is to my wife for being such a fabulous travel companion. I am so grateful to have someone I can travel the world with and can't imagine doing it without her. It is a true testament to our relationship when we can spend 24 hours a day for 4 1/2 months together without having any major disagreements. Next I want to thank the people that helped make this possible...Jen's dad Richard, my parent's Lorne & Marelyn, our neighbors Cindy, Roland, Tracy & Amanda, and everyone else that helped us out while we were gone (sorry if I forgot to mention anyone). I also want to thank our great friends that we got to visit (and gave us a place to stay and fed us and showed us the sights and...), Erin, Martin & Antje, and Daniel, Louise & Gustav (and Daniel's entire family, Kai, Lillian, Vinnie, & Stephan).
Finally, thank you to everyone who read our blog. I hope we were able to share some of our experiences with you and hope you enjoyed it. It was great to hear from so many people and glad we had some readers, otherwise there wouldn't have been any point to writing it.
And that is it. Real life is kicking in and we have started looking for jobs. This trip was a rewarding and amazing experience and we don't regret doing it for a second. So until the next trip (which won't be for a while), so long and happy travels!