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Update: France

4 continents in 4 weeks, not too shabby! I'm now in Noirleu, a small commune outside of Bressuire. I'm staying in a 13th century castle helping to renovate and restore it. Yea, you heard that right. There are definitely worse things I could be doing with my time. It has a moat, and even a dungeon. My window has a view of the moat and the village church spire. The people here are just amazing too. The hosts are wonderful, and the other volunteers are really fun. I'll post some pictures of the castle and the village over the next couple of weeks!

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Update: Australia

Australia was amazing! I got to look around Perth, try milo and tim tams, see some old travel friends. And, oh yea, hang out with kangaroos ;) I met a lot of awesome people and had an absolute blast!

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Perth, Australia

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Taylor meets a kangaroo (unfortunately there's no audio, which is probably a good thing..)

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Tam Coc

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Halong bay

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Update

As I suspected, I am horrible at updating this thing! Things have been really wonderful, and I'm having an amazing time. Since Hue I took a 14 hour sleeper bus to Hanoi. I spent the majority of my time there exploring the old town, which was so incredible. Look up pictures or videos- I didn't take any as I was too distracted taking it in and trying not to get run over with a motorbike 😜 I went on a tour to Halong bay, one of the most beautiful places I've ever visited. We stayed on a private island, went swimming and kayaking through floating villages, and just relaxed a bit. Oh, and I saw a monkey. Honestly, that was probably the highlight. When we came back to Hanoi I only had a few days left in Vietnam. An Australian I met in Nha Trang invited me to come stay with them back at home, and I couldn't exactly refuse an offer like that! On a whim I decided to go to Tam Coc just outside of Nihn Bihn to take in some scenery, and two other girls from my hostel who were traveling solo joined me. We got there at 9 at night to a torrential downpour, and trudged our way down a dirt road surrounded by rice paddies to our Homestay, where we were treated with plenty of "happy water" (rice wine)! Unfortunately about an hour after we got there the power went out, and ended up being out for 36 hours. But it was kind of cool being disconnected from our dead technology devices and living in a bit more rustic way. In Tam Coc we visited some beautiful pagodas and rode bikes through the beautiful area of Trang An. Again, one of the coolest places I've ever seen. After that I had to return to Hanoi to fly over to Perth! So far it's been great fun, I'll post more on Australia later. Tay

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Finally popped my squat toilet cherry... Yes, I realize this is kind of gross :p

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Hue

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Bus stops are a lot more beautiful in vietnal

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The lake I went swimming in

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Update: Hoi and and Hue

Sorry it has been a while! Bad internet connection and mild heat exhaustion leave not much time at night for tumblr ;)

A few days ago I left Hoi An. It was a beautiful little town with a pretty river and nice market place. The highlight, though, was my adventures outside of the city. I met a nice Australian guy with a motorbike, and we went in search of a supposed waterfall that had been spotted by some people a few days earlier. While we never found the waterfall, the search ended up being more fun anyway.

We zoomed through several small town and villages, stopping for a beer every once and a while. Literally no english was spoken, so it took a lot of hand gestures and pointing to get what we wanted. Outside of the city, though, you feel like a rockstar just for being a white person. Everybody was always watching you, trying to talk to you (trying being the operative word), and smiling and waving. It was quite weird, but it was fun seeing so many smiling faces. It sparked many a debate if people were friendly because they are inherently friendly, or because of the color of our skin and our speaking english. 

Eventually we found  a small lake surrounded by hills, sat down to take a rest and then went swimming. The only other souls were two men in a little fishing boat, and a little dog and water buffalo on the shore staring at us. It was such a beautiful and peaceful lake, I loved just floating in the water and... existing. 

Fast forward to Hue which is a bigger city, the former capital of Vietnam. I took an *interesting* trip to some caves, which were absolutely stunning. Truly massive and incredible. Now if only it didn’t take a 13 hour day to spend an hour in the cave... a well, lesson learned. Don’t sign up for random tours with out researching travel times!

Tonight I’m on a 12 hour sleeper bus off to the capital, Hanoi. Wish me luck, I need it.

-Tay

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Out in the countryside on the back of a motorbike

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Out in the countryside on the back of a motorbike

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Out in the countryside on the back of a motorbike

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Out in the countryside on the back of a motorbike

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Graves out in the countryside