Wow.
Asia to Africa was a huge change. A huge dollar sign change.
Simple meal in Asia? $1. Simple meal in South Africa? $5-$10. A room in Asia? Anywhere from a few dollars for basic to $15 for air conditioning and satellite TV. A room in South Africa? Anywhere from $40 to infinity.
We have been living off of peanut butter sandwiches, oranges, and carrots and sleeping in our rental car. Oh- and the price to sleep in our car? Between $17-$30. No joke. We can't just park anywhere and sleep because it's not safe, so we have to pay a hostel to "camp" on their property.
It was much cheaper for us to rent a car than to buy bus tickets (over $700 for 2 tickets for 2 weeks!!), so it has been nice to have the freedom of going where we want, when we want, and being able to sleep in the car has saved us a lot of money.
Oh, and we haven't been able to blog because internet is about $15 per hour! In Asia it was $1 an hour or 99% of the time it was free at your hostel... We're finally camping at a hostel that has free wifi, which I profusely thanked the owner for.
All this has made us realize how amazing Asia is. So cheap. So wonderful and cheap.
Speaking of Asia, we spent our last couple weeks there just putzing around Northern Thailand, spending most of our time in the hippy mountain village of Pai. A couple of highlights were the night markets in Chiang Mai, our $10 two hour thai massages, eating as much durian (Shawn) and pineapple (Steph) as we could consume, and satisfying my mom's dream for us to ride an elephant : )
We spent 'one night in Bangkok' (that song was in my head for days) where we decided to splurge and stay at a fancy hotel. The room was a whoppin' $60 for the night, which is a little bit less than a week's budget for accommodation, but a great price for a room at a resort. Then we were off to South Africa.
Ok, if anyone ever has the chance to fly with Qatar Airlines- do it!!! It was the most extravagant flight we've ever taken. Before our flight we rushed to grab subs from the Subway in the airport. We brought the sandwiches on board and were wondering why people were giving us strange looks. The looks were because we were served FOUR meals on the two flights from Bangkok to Johannesburg! Also there were wide screen tvs on each seat that had over 200 movies and a ton of games! It was a-maz-ing! We didn't want to get off the airplane. All that and more was included with our coach class tickets. We can't even imagine what first class is like.
When we arrived in Johannesburg we picked up our rental car and started driving. We heard from a fellow backpacker that Blyde River Canyon was nice, so we headed there. After leaving the canyon it was time for us to find a place to stay. This is when we starting freaking out. We checked all the guesthouses in town, and they all quoted us around $70 for the night. The caravan park wanted $30 for us to sleep in our car. Thankfully, we talked down one of the hotels to give us a room for $50 and then cried ourselves to sleep. Not really, but I wanted to! Since then almost every night has been spent in the car.
We really wanted to do a safari at Kruger National Park, but that would've cost around $1500 so we didn't. Instead we drove ourselves through a smaller park called Mkuze Game Reserve for $15 : ). We saw a lot of spring bok, water bucks, baboons, zebras, buffalo, and even some hippos chillin' in a lake. No cats : (
Another highlight has been staying at a guesthouse in Durban on Warner Beach where we hit it off with the owners, Nel and Will. One of the days we were there, they had a big get together and a braai (BBQ) for the South Africa vs Whales Rugby World Cup game which was the funnest day we've had in the country so far. We came as strangers and left good friends.
We have to get to Cape Town by the 20th to turn in our rental car, so we pretty much have been driving along the coast every day so that we make it there in time. Once we get there, we'll have 5 days before we fly to Buenos Aires. There's quite a bit to do in Cape Town, so it will be nice to be settled somewhere and have time to do some activities.
One of the best things about South Africa besides the beautiful scenery has been the weather! It is spring time! We've been constantly sweating for months and months, so (besides freezing in the car at night) we are loving the fact that we get to wear jeans, hoodies, jackets, and beanies!
Asia to Africa was a huge change. A huge dollar sign change.
Simple meal in Asia? $1. Simple meal in South Africa? $5-$10. A room in Asia? Anywhere from a few dollars for basic to $15 for air conditioning and satellite TV. A room in South Africa? Anywhere from $40 to infinity.
We have been living off of peanut butter sandwiches, oranges, and carrots and sleeping in our rental car. Oh- and the price to sleep in our car? Between $17-$30. No joke. We can't just park anywhere and sleep because it's not safe, so we have to pay a hostel to "camp" on their property.
It was much cheaper for us to rent a car than to buy bus tickets (over $700 for 2 tickets for 2 weeks!!), so it has been nice to have the freedom of going where we want, when we want, and being able to sleep in the car has saved us a lot of money.
Oh, and we haven't been able to blog because internet is about $15 per hour! In Asia it was $1 an hour or 99% of the time it was free at your hostel... We're finally camping at a hostel that has free wifi, which I profusely thanked the owner for.
All this has made us realize how amazing Asia is. So cheap. So wonderful and cheap.
Speaking of Asia, we spent our last couple weeks there just putzing around Northern Thailand, spending most of our time in the hippy mountain village of Pai. A couple of highlights were the night markets in Chiang Mai, our $10 two hour thai massages, eating as much durian (Shawn) and pineapple (Steph) as we could consume, and satisfying my mom's dream for us to ride an elephant : )
We spent 'one night in Bangkok' (that song was in my head for days) where we decided to splurge and stay at a fancy hotel. The room was a whoppin' $60 for the night, which is a little bit less than a week's budget for accommodation, but a great price for a room at a resort. Then we were off to South Africa.
Ok, if anyone ever has the chance to fly with Qatar Airlines- do it!!! It was the most extravagant flight we've ever taken. Before our flight we rushed to grab subs from the Subway in the airport. We brought the sandwiches on board and were wondering why people were giving us strange looks. The looks were because we were served FOUR meals on the two flights from Bangkok to Johannesburg! Also there were wide screen tvs on each seat that had over 200 movies and a ton of games! It was a-maz-ing! We didn't want to get off the airplane. All that and more was included with our coach class tickets. We can't even imagine what first class is like.
When we arrived in Johannesburg we picked up our rental car and started driving. We heard from a fellow backpacker that Blyde River Canyon was nice, so we headed there. After leaving the canyon it was time for us to find a place to stay. This is when we starting freaking out. We checked all the guesthouses in town, and they all quoted us around $70 for the night. The caravan park wanted $30 for us to sleep in our car. Thankfully, we talked down one of the hotels to give us a room for $50 and then cried ourselves to sleep. Not really, but I wanted to! Since then almost every night has been spent in the car.
We really wanted to do a safari at Kruger National Park, but that would've cost around $1500 so we didn't. Instead we drove ourselves through a smaller park called Mkuze Game Reserve for $15 : ). We saw a lot of spring bok, water bucks, baboons, zebras, buffalo, and even some hippos chillin' in a lake. No cats : (
Another highlight has been staying at a guesthouse in Durban on Warner Beach where we hit it off with the owners, Nel and Will. One of the days we were there, they had a big get together and a braai (BBQ) for the South Africa vs Whales Rugby World Cup game which was the funnest day we've had in the country so far. We came as strangers and left good friends.
We have to get to Cape Town by the 20th to turn in our rental car, so we pretty much have been driving along the coast every day so that we make it there in time. Once we get there, we'll have 5 days before we fly to Buenos Aires. There's quite a bit to do in Cape Town, so it will be nice to be settled somewhere and have time to do some activities.
One of the best things about South Africa besides the beautiful scenery has been the weather! It is spring time! We've been constantly sweating for months and months, so (besides freezing in the car at night) we are loving the fact that we get to wear jeans, hoodies, jackets, and beanies!
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