$40 worth of fear

After a week or so of (mostly) civilised amusement and sightseeing, we thought we ought to turn the excitement dial up to 11 and do some Xtreme Sports - far out!

So we paid a visit to HighZone, just south of Whitianga. First of all, instructor Jeff kits you out and tells you some stuff about safety and state of mind and all that nonsense:

Then he makes you climb up a 12 metre telegraph pole and do really stupid things like this:

And this:

It was scary.

Very scary. Trembling legs and everything. Especially the bit where he made me hop on the crossbeam. And walk backwards with my eyes closed. Deb's worst bit was the big swing at the end, which frightened her so much she couldn't even scream. Hard. Core. To. The. Max.

But we were happy at the end. Look!

Ben

Cañoneros!

A day trip from San Cristobal de las Casas, the capital of Chiapas State, to Cañon del Sumidero. Here it is!

We weren´t going to even be in San Cristobal on this day, but we got talking to a couple of Israelis at the Hostel the night before and decided to stay on so we could go croc hunting:

We were "lucky" to see so many crocs - about 10 or 12. Others who went later in the day only saw 1, and they thought it was probably dead, since it stayed in exactly the same position for over an hour. Our crocs were menacing us: Debs in particular.

Our boat driver also mercilessly buzzed a huge flock of little black water birds of some description, despite the clearly displayed "Don´t disturb the wildlife" signs at the start of the tour ;-)

Ben

Auf Wiedersehen!

Bye bye England
Bye bye Europe
Bye bye any sense that we have the slightest idea what we're doing
Bye bye comfort
Bye bye laptop
Bye bye friends
Bye bye family
Hello adventure!

Here we go! w0000000000000000t!

Thanks to all our friends and family for putting us up/ putting up with us over the last month, and for your all round excellence. If we have as many interesting adventures around the world as we've had with you lot, we're in for a great year :-)

Girly love and manly hugs to you all. Missing you already!

1st stop - Havana...

Ben and Debs

T minus 86 hours and counting

Our mini-tour of the UK is almost over. Zero hour approaches... and we're scared!

This whole World Trip project started in December last year, when one of us bright sparks came up with the idea. Then we spent a few months researching, planning and working out if it was feasible... and before we knew where we were, we had quit our jobs, let the flat, sold the car and flown the coop.

Now we're wondering: what the hell are we doing?

Amidst a frenzy of friendly expressions of jealousy or admiration, we're quaking in our boots.

For every family member who says, "how brave!" there's a gremlin in our minds saying, "you fools!"

Having failed to find any strong disincentives to dropping everything and buggering off for a year, we're not about to fall at the last fence, but, y'know - damn! - it's all gone a bit daunting.

Look! Here we are, looking daunted (well, kinda daunted, Debs looks half amused too):

Enough whining! Pull yourselves together, Blenches.

Ben