The Most, Best, Worst, and Top Lists of Everything

After seeing only a very little part of the world, here's a summation of many of our experiences. The superlatives, if you will. I'm sure as time passes and I reread my journal and reflect on my trip, this will be edited and updated, but for now, this is what we've come up with. 

Most memorable (Liz) - Game drives, especially night drives

Most memorable (Paul) - While Liz was hiking up Wayanapicchu, Paul took time to sit and enjoy the scenery in Machu Picchu. Surrounded by butterflies and llamas that tried to eat him, he enjoyed the calm, relaxing day.
Best natural scenery - Tie between our 4 day tour across Bolivia and Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania. I took thousands of pictures in Bolivia, and our experience in Ngorongoro Crater was our first game drive, and although not the most exciting, definitely the most memorable.

Ngorongoro Crater after a day of game driving 

Atacama Desert, Bolivia

Most surprising natural scenery - Iguazu Falls, because pictures can't even begin to show how it feels to stand next to such powerful falls.

Most astounding man-made area- A tie between Machu Picchu and Angkor Wat Just trying to imagine how much detail and planning it took to design this, and contemplating the life of the people who once lived here gives me shivers. 

Temples, giant heads, intricate carvings, I loved it all!

Most eye-opening place - The Killing Fields outside Phnom Penh. 
Most Dangerous place - Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) and Stone Town (Zanzibar)

Although beautiful scenery, this beach campsite in Dar Es Salaam had gigantic thick walls with round the clock security. We were told not to leave the campsite for ANY reason, unless we wanted to be robbed at gunpoint.

Safest Place - Tokyo, where everyone trusts everyone else. People left purses, bags, strollers, you name it just laying around and we felt safe at all hours of the day.

Best food - a three way tie between Rio (for high quality variety), Lima (the fresh ceviche is to die for) and Japan (the sushi!)

Japanese Sushi - yum!

Ceviche in Lima 

All you can eat meat skewer buffet. Heaven!

Worst food - La Paz (but we found Bolivia in general to be quite bad)

Best 3 drinks: sterilized water, caipirinhas, plum wine

 

Worst 3 drinks: sterilized water, Pisco (liquor from Lima), Zambian red wine (so bad, we threw out the bottle)

Most expensive food- New Zealand - prices rivaling even Switzerland!

Least Expensive food - Cambodia - a full delicious top end meal for $3-5 (and $2 pitchers!)

Best toilets - Japan... If you've never experienced them before, you are missing out! Complete with a warmed seat, music and flushing sounds, bidets and warm air.

Worst toilets - A tie between Dar es Salaam (dirty hole in the ground, no door) and a bus stop on the way to Tupiza (the lights went out, and that turned out to be an improvement)

Best Value for Money - Our Africa overland trip, which included all activities, accommodation, food, and transit for less than $100 per person per day. Not bad!

Our overland Africa truck - comfy with lots of legroom!

Worst Value for Money - Kenya day tour, including Kenya National Park. After seeing the other game drives, we realized we paid far too much for very little. At least I enjoyed seeing the baby elephants and feeding the giraffes!

Top 3 Most Dangerous Driving Experiences: 

1)Tanzania where a passing truck (coming head on) refused to move, forcing our overland truck onto the hard shoulder at the last minute

2) Bolivia on the way to La Paz - sitting up front on the top of a bus, watching as our double decker tried to overtake a truck. Up a hill. On a blind curve. Paul was stamping on his imaginary brake for the whole trip. Don't even get me started on the actual drive in the city!

3) Rio where a driver was watching a football game while driving through crazy traffic

  

Top 5 worst parts of traveling:

1) Constantly unpacking, repacking, unpacking, repacking our things

2) (For Paul) Being hot and sweaty and not being able to do anything about it (Cambodia and Thailand among the worst locations)

3) Altitude sickness in Bolivia

4) Traveling in general - the actual moving between places. Really, it just sucks. Long days on boats, buses, taxis, planes, tuk-tuks, subways, you name it. The days were long, and we were often tired and snappy and ready to just be teleported to our destination. 

5) Explaining who you are, where you're from, and where you're going to EVERY SINGLE PERSON YOU MEET.  You feel like a broken record and that maybe you should start making up things about yourself and your trip just to keep things interesting.

Paul HATES being hot and sweaty... so a day long tour in Angkor Wat was not his cup of tea. 

 

Things we are thankful for

1) Clean, drinkable water

2) Washing machines

3) Being able to understand what's happening around us and be understood, as well as....

4) The popularity of English EVERYWHERE. Menus, instructions, metro stops, English everywhere made travel much less stressful, and French and little bits of Spanish helped us too.

5) Showers with hot water (I'm looking at you, airport lounges!)

6) Reliable electricity
7) Getting the chance to take this incredible trip! Even the travel-adverse husband of mine agrees he came along for the ride :)

Places we'd maybe visit again:

Together- Japan, New Zealand, Australia

Liz - Brazil, Peru, Thailand, South Africa, Zambia

New places added on the Bucket List:
Ecuador, Chile (Easter Island), Argentina, Cuba, Venezuela (Angel Falls), Fiji, Russia, Mongolia (trans-Mongolian express)

And that is our wrap up! So many experiences made it difficult to actually choose these, but every moment of the trip lives on in our memories, blogs and journals.