Author: Mike P

Singapore – Bring on the Food – Days 183-188

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With the exception of Melbourne, we’ve been on a good streak of cities we LOVED.  Fortunately, Singapore kept that trend alive.  We were booked into a nice hotel for six days and would welcome the New Year in style. We would use our time here to get acclimated to travelling in Asia. And finally, Paige and I were going to undo all the health gains from the previous weeks by eating non-stop for six days. As Nan and Cathy (a family friend) were joining us, this would also be our last stretch with family.  After Singapore, we are on our own until the end of March.

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Bali – The first two weeks – Days 154 – 168

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Two girls looking at rice field

Finally, the weather we had been chasing! It was allegedly the rainy season but we saw little rain and were blessed with hot, sunny days for our first two weeks in Bali. We based ourselves in the south of Ubud at an accommodation called Villa Ole. We planned to spend two weeks there and then relocate to the north of the city. Paige’s family was expected to arrive for Christmas and we would need a larger place. We relished our time in Ubud and got off on the right foot. The children got beautiful tans, we explored the surrounding areas and, most importantly, we slowed things down.

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Spirit of Tasmania – Day 149

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Spirit Tasmania Boat Docked with Cars

The journey between the two major tourist centres of Devonport and Geelong merits an entire post! Instead of flying back to mainland Australia, the family opted for a passenger ferry called the Spirit of Tasmania (we love the name). The children had been looking forward to this leg for over six months. This would be their first overnight ferry and they could not wrap their heads around sleeping on a boat. Paige made us reserve an outside cabin, meaning bunk beds AND a window. We were tired of answering the kids’ questions, so we showed them some YouTube clips about the journey.

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St. Helens – Days 147& 148

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Landscape on sunny day at Bay of Fires

Our next destination in Tasmania was St. Helens which would be our base for exploring the surrounding Bay of Fires. We checked out of our Airbnb, took an uber to the local library and did some schoolwork until our rental car was available next door. We got some stares from the librarian as we dumped all our gear in the kids’ section. At noon we picked up the vehicle and drove across the bridge exiting Hobart but got mixed up with a roundabout on the other side and ended up back in Hobart! Apparently, we didn’t want to leave. We sorted out our directions, crossed the bridge again and were actually on our way.

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Birthday adventures in Hobart – Days 139-146

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Children chasing each other on secluded beach

At Cradle Mountain, the weather cleared the morning of our departure! Paigey and I wanted to return and hike the trails we avoided because of the rain. Isabella and Julie begged to go see some more wombats. Katie just wanted to take more blurry pictures. Instead, we opted to start early on our long drive to the Tasmanian capital. Hobart would be our home base for the next 8 days, allowing us: to get schooling back on track, do some laundry and bake a dinosaur cake! The adults were ecstatic at having an actual HOUSE for a week while the kids were thrilled with their own room. The house also had a mammoth BBQ and a full kitchen which was needed for baking.

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Cradle Mountain – Rain, Joeys & Wombats – Day 138 : Guest Post by Katie Policicchio

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Wombat eating grass at picnic site

This is a guest post from my sister Katie who is joining us in Tasmania!

G’day from the Land Down Under! 

Not wanting to eat leftover taco meat for breakfast, Paige and I headed out early Sunday morning to the Penguin Country Bakehouse. To our delight, the small town bakery had a large selection of goodies and coffees, and was a nice break from the cold rain. To our dismay, when we returned to our apartment, we realized that we had locked ourselves out. We attempted to adopt the Aussie “no worries” attitude but after 40 minutes (that turned our hot coffees into iced versions) we became frazzled. While Mike was homeschooling, Paige and I would take turns running to the front of the apartment, jumping on the street, waving our arms and yelling. I’m pretty sure everyone except Mike and the kids saw us.  

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No Penguins in Penguin – Day 137

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Man looking for penguins on beach with signpost

Next on the agenda was a ten-day stint on the island of Tasmania. The team was now five as my sister joined us for a few days on the island (she had flown in from Canada to visit us). I had no preconceptions about Tasmania as Paigey had planned this entire leg on her own. I knew there would be some driving (which I didn’t miss in the least) but I also anticipated good food, scenery and wildlife. And boy, were there some wildlife memories to be had.

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Halloween in Bogota – Days 121-125

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Children sitting in the Bogota sign

We arrived in Bogota recognizing that the Colombian leg of our trip was ending.  Our last 5 days consisted of doing some slow living (i.e. laundry), watching the Raptors and getting schoolwork done.  We did no research on Bogota ahead of time and felt like we had no real objectives to cross off. When it was all said and done, we watched some Raptors, we had our first doctor’s visit and the kids got to experience Halloween, “Bogota-style“.

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Medellin – Bring on the Tours – Days 113-118

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Two children riding the cable cars in Medellin

We arrived in Medellin (pronounced Medejin as Julie keeps correcting us) with our sunburnt bodies. We settled in the area of Laureles, as Paigey decided that was the place to stay. She found a “hipster-ish” Airbnb that worked for us perfectly (it had laundry which we desperately needed). Our goal was to spend a full week settled in one place doing some slow living and some schoolwork. We filled all the drawers with our freshly laundered clothes. We filled the fridge with actual groceries (yep, we bought butter) and not just snacks. We even signed up for an NBA league pass to watch Raptors’ basketball in Colombia. We made ourselves a comfortable home base.

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Tayrona National Park (but not really) – Days 110-112

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Family buying bananas on side of the road in jungle area

If you’ve had 4 days of warm, wet weather, why not go someplace with warmer and wetter weather?! We had a great intro to Colombia with our stay in Cartagena but since we had booked things ahead of time, we were on the move! Our destination was a mini-resort hotel just outside of Tayrona National Park at the base of the Sierra Nevada mountains. It was our first internal transit day and we were anxious to see if we still had those backpacker skills from years ago.

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