Welcome to a new beginning

I recently reorganised the posts covering our global sabbatical travels in 2005. These posts were previously published in 2006, shortly after I started this blog. Over the years, the blog has morphed into something akin to a travel diary. As a result, it seems appropriate to date shift these early posts into folders matching the months (and year) in which they actually occurred.

As part of this exercise, I've revisited and revised each post. I’ve also created new entries that expand on our travels. My original posts were mainly repurposed emails I’d sent to family and friends while on the road. Given the depth and breadth of our travel itinerary at the time, these updates barely scratched the surface of the adventures we enjoyed. 

Over nine weeks, Garry and I travelled through the USA northeast, Eastern Canada, South America, and the Middle East before finally landing in the UK ready to start a new life in London. During this period we experienced so much including the spectacular Autumn colours of Canada, the awe-inspiring ruins of Machu Picchu, the steamy Amazon jungle, the energy of Rio de Janeiro, the ancient Nile, and the serenity of Petra. I doubt we'll ever experience anything quite like it again.

As I revisit these early posts, I've started progressively fleshing them out and adding additional images. This is very much a work in progress. No doubt I'll continue working on them long after I've retired. For now, enjoy these incredible highlights of a global journey that kicked off with three days visiting family in New Zealand, followed by three nights each in Washington DC and Boston.

I've also begun adding retrospective posts covering our travel adventures in the years before this blog began. You can read these here, here and here. I’m still debating whether these posts should be date-shifted as well to reflect the years in which they occurred. 

For now, the jury’s out regarding this blog’s primary function. Is it still a living diary? Or is it an evolving chronology of my life? In other words, is the travel diary focus slowly changing?  I can envisage eventually sharing stories from my childhood years, especially after posts go live about back-packing in Europe in 1990. I turned 25 while staying in Zurich that year. Hence it’s not much of a stretch to imagine backfilling my first two decades of life. I’ve already published one such post here.

Until then, enjoy our journey...

More detail for the curious reader

Here's a summary of our entire sabbatical itinerary.  It took me a lot of research to find three small group tours with dates that flowed from one tour to the next so seamlessly (and it took almost as long to work out how to HTML code this table so that it fitted neatly into the blog!). We also saved ourselves thousands of dollars by cashing in Starwood loyalty points for hotels in North and South America.

DAY	DATE	LOCATION	NOTES
SAT	08 Oct	Auckland	Visiting the McGregors
SUN	09 Oct	Auckland
MON	10 Oct	Auckland
TUE	11 Oct	Washington DC	Four Points by Sheraton Downtown
WED	12 Oct	Washington DC
THU	13 Oct	Washington DC
FRI	14 Oct	Boston	The Westin Copley Place
SAT	15 Oct	Boston
SUN	16 Oct	Boston
MON	17 Oct	Princeton	Text 100 offsite
TUE	18 Oct	Princeton
WED	19 Oct	Princeton
THU	20 Oct	Princeton
FRI	21 Oct	Princeton
SAT	22 Oct	Montreal	Le Centre Sheraton Montreal
SUN	23 Oct	Montreal
MON	24 Oct	Ottawa	Four Points by Shearton Gatineau
TUE	25 Oct	Toronto	Westin Harbour Castle
WED	26 Oct	Toronto
THU	27 Oct	Lima	Sheraton Lima Hotel & Casino
FRI	28 Oct	Lima
SAT	29 Oct	Tour Day 1	Lima
SUN	30 Oct	Tour Day 2	Arequipa
MON	31 Oct	Tour Day 3	Arequipa
TUE	01 Nov	Tour Day 4	Arequipa
WED	02 Nov	Tour Day 5	Puno
THU	03 Nov	Tour Day 6	Taquile Island
FRI	04 Nov	Tour Day 7	Puno
SAT	05 Nov	Tour Day 8	Cusco
SUN	06 Nov	Tour Day 9	Cusco
MON	07 Nov	Tour Day 10	Machu Picchu
TUE	08 Nov	Tour Day 11	Cusco
WED	09 Nov	Tour Day 12	Cusco
THU	10 Nov	Tour Day 13	Amazon Jungle
FRI	11 Nov	Tour Day 14	Amazon Jungle
SAT	12 Nov	Tour Day 15	Amazon Jungle
SUN	13 Nov	Tour Day 16	Lima
MON	14 Nov	Tour Day 17	Depart Lima. Fly to Rio
TUE	15 Nov	Tour Day 1	Rio Private Day Tour
WED	16 Nov	Tour Day 2	Drive to Parati
THU	17 Nov	Tour Day 3	Parati
FRI	18 Nov	Tour Day 4	Minibus to Sao Paulo
SAT	19 Nov	Tour day 5	Sao Paulo
SUN	20 Nov	Tour Day 6	Drive to Curitiba
MON	21 Nov	Tour Day 7	Curitiba
TUE	22 Nov	Tour Day 8	Iguazu Falls
WED	23 Nov	Tour Day 9	Iguazu Falls
THU	24 Nov	Tour Day 10	Fly to Buenos Aires
FRI	25 Nov	Buenos Aires	Sheraton Libertador Hotel
SAT	26 Nov	Buenos Aires	Evening flight to Egypt via Madrid
SUN	27 Nov	Tour Day 1	Arrive in Cairo
MON	28 Nov	Tour Day 2	Cairo
TUE	29 Nov	Tour Day 3	Luxor. Karnak. Valley of the Queens
WED	30 Nov	Tour Day 4	Valley of the Kings. Nile cruise
THU	01 Dec	Tour Day 5	Edfu - Kom Ombo
FRI	02 Dec	Tour Day 6	Kom Ombo - Aswan
SAT	03 Dec	Tour Day 7	Aswan - Abu Simbel
SUN	04 Dec	Tour Day 8	Cairo
MON	05 Dec	Tour Day 9	Alexandria
TUE	06 Dec	Tour Day 10	Mt Sinai
WED	07 Dec	Tour Day 11	Mt Sinai - St Catherine - Aqaba
THU	08 Dec	Tour Day 12	Wadi Rum - Petra
FRI	09 Dec	Tour Day 13	Petra
SAT	10 Dec	Tour Day 14	Kerak - Madaba - Mt Nebo - Amman
SUN	11 Dec	Tour Day 15	Jerash - Amman
MON	12 Dec	Tour Day 16	Amman
TUE	13 Dec	London	Flight to London