around-the-world-in30-days

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 16 4/20/25

Koh Samui- Bangkok

Today we travel to Bangkok! Definitely sad to leave the Four Seasons, but excited to see what Bangkok has in store for us!

The airport in Samui is kind of crazy to leave. It is an open air airport so you get no relief from the crushing heat and humidity. To get through security, everyone is packed into one line which has some overhead cover but you have to stand in the sun for far too long.

And when you get to the gate you just have to sit in the heat and sweat until it is time to board, luckily it is covered. They did have some fans running, and they provide some free water bottles and a few packaged snacks. There was only one other couple at our gate when we got there. We purposely sat in a spot that was in the path of a fan to get some relief. About ten minutes later, a family sat down behind us and to the right a little and the guy walks over to the fan and moves it so it is pointed to them instead of us.😱😱 wow! We didn’t say anything and maybe he wasn’t even realizing that he moved it off of us, but it surprised me for sure.

Finally we boarded the plane and we were in air conditioning again! 😅

It was only an hour flight to Bangkok.🤗

We’ve nicknamed Bangkok airport the “Seven Circles Airport” because you when you board a plane or get off a plane you have to get on a bus and then it seems like it makes 7 circles around the airport in a figure 8 pattern and then you finally get to where they let you off and that seemed to happen every time we were there!🤣

We took a car from the airport to the Grand Hyatt Bangkok. The traffic is crazy in Bangkok!! Worse than NYC. There are cars, Tuk Tuks, and buses at a standstill and then a constant river of mopeds that flow between them all! It us took us awhile to get to the hotel!

Later, we went on a guided food tour through Bangkok. We met everyone and our guide and hopped in our Tuk Tuks to the first stop. Our driver was a really cute old guy that kinda reminded me of my dad- he didn’t really speak much but he was very protective about making sure we didnt get out in or out near traffic- he was really cute- he also drove super fast!

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 15 4/19/25

Koh Samui Part 2

We went down to the big pool and beach at like 7:00 am. We can’t seem to sleep in here.🤣

No one was at the pool or beach, no towels on the beach chairs. Not even any staff…maybe it wasn’t open yet? We decided to get in anyway and it was perfect, like our own private resort.🤣

Jesse noticed the hammock in the bay that was filmed in the White Lotus- at one point, the three Ratliff kids lounge in it.

It wasn’t in deep water at all, just about to my waist, but that is still a little deeper than I’m comfortable with.😱 I’m just such a chicken in the ocean, but Jesse held my hand as we walked to it. That made me feel a little better. At least a shark would get us both that way🦈🤪 (sorry kids). We hung out in the hammock for awhile. Jesse said he could sleep there for hours and all I could think of was waking up to the tide having come in and having to swim back to shore through shark infested waters. 😬 I have to get my imagination under control!

By the time we got back into the pool, some staff were putting towels in the chaises and setting the bar up. Clearly we had gotten in before it opened. That’s when Jesse saw the “hours” sign 8:00 am-10:00pm-oops we were an hour early.😬

Went to breakfast overlooking the Bay of Thailand and ate among other things, best croissants ever!!!

Later, we had an appointment down in town for Thai stretching- I thought this meant we would have someone teach us to do stretches.

Nope, we met two women at a house and they stretched us. It was kind of like an intense Thai massage but they also pushed and pulled on our limbs until we felt totally relaxed and a little what I would call “wobbly bones”. No more tension anywhere.

It was still early in the day so, next we went to the Samui Elephant Sanctuary where we got to watch and feed elephants. They were so cute!

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 15 4/19/25

Koh Samui!!! Part 1

The Four Seasons Koh Samui is a paradise.

I’ll let the pictures do the talking.

It is everything you want from a luxury beach resort!

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 14 4/18/25

For the most part, today was a travel day. We were sad to leave Cambodia so soon. Two days in Cambodia is definitely not enough. We could have spent at least a week there.

We barely had time to enjoy our beautiful room. We did manage to get in a swim at the pool yesterday but only for about 20 minutes before we had to get to our massage!

But we were headed on to Thailand. One flight from Siem Reap to Bangkok and then a short one hour flight from Bangkok to Koh Samui.

The airport in Siem Reap was totally empty except for a bus of Viking River cruise passengers who got there at the exact same time as us and were also on our flight to Bangkok- that made things take a bit longer but not too bad.

The airport was small but really nice and easy to navigate. We stopped for a coffee to kill time.

If it seems like we’re always eating… we are and Jesse loves to get great pics of me while I’m mid bite!🤣🤪

We flew on a propeller plane from Cambodia to Bangkok😬, but no troubles at all!

The airport lounge in Bangkok had a couple massage chairs we both sat in one and let the tiny baby wizards do their work!🤣

Finally we got to Koh Samui around 4:00. Grab cars (Asian Uber-like service) is t allowed to park at the Samui airport so we took a taxi a short distance to have dinner first at Nahm.

After dinner we got a Grab and he drove us through crazy 5pm Friday traffic to finally get to the Four Seasons hotel, where White Lotus season 3 was filmed, at sunset.

It is as gorgeous as it looks on tv!

Here are some of the views

We swam in our pool while it was dark and got to see bats swoop down from our big tree to feast on insects.

A couple times they weren’t too far from our heads while we were swimming.🤪

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 13 4/17/25

Angkor Wat!!

Ever since I heard that there were ancient temples discovered in the jungle I dreamed of some day going to visit them. I didn’t really think I would ever actually get there.

We had our Tuk Tuk driver, Tiger, pick us up first thing in the morning. From our hotel it was about a half hour to the temples.

The temples were built over a 30 year period from about 1110-1150 A.D making them about 915 years old!

According to the website- Angkor Wat covers over 402 acres of land and is the largest religious monument in the world. We definitely didn’t get to see all of it but we spent a half day exploring it!

Jesse took soo many pictures it’s hard to choose which ones to post!

These were all from the main temple that is the biggest. In order to visit the temple men need to be wearing long pants and women need to wear skirts that cover the knees and have the shoulders covered, hence my long dress and shirt despite extremely oppressive heat and humidity.

Our driver also took us to the place where they filmed Tomb Raider with Angelina Jolie.

These trees just grew into the temple!

This is one of my favorites— it’s from a smaller temple I think Tiger told us it was made in the 11th century, but sometimes things get mixed up in the language barrier.

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 12 4/16/25 Part 3

Songkran— New Year’s celebration in Cambodia and Thailand

It is a time of purification which they often do with soaking each other with water guns buckets or hoses.

We picked up our squirt guns from our room to join the fun in the streets. We stood on the street corner right in front of our hotel and waited for people to come along.

When I headed over to where the bucket of water was to refill a group of young guys, saw me with the water gun and one of the younger guys dropped a bucket of water on my head. I just stood there laughing and tried to get him back as much as I could, and then a second guy dumped a much colder bucket of water on my head. Again I just laughed and played along.

I guess they liked that and it seemed like they felt a little bad for getting me so drenched. They offered both me and Jesse a beer and motioned for us to join their posse.

It seemed the people passing by loved seeing Americans play along and they always smiled when they saw me and Jesse joining the fun.

Every once in awhile our new friends would smear white powder on our faces.

At last we were frozen from all the ice cold water being dumped on us. There were several times the water got in my mouth😬 and I wondered if we would have diarrhea for days because of it, I hoped not but honestly it was worth it— it was such a special celebration to be a part of.

We played for like 2 hours. Before we left our group wanted to take pictures with us. 😃

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 12 4/16/25 Part 2

Finally made it to the Park Hyatt Siem Reap. The room is gorgeous- it has its own sitting room and outdoor space a large bedroom and indoor and outdoor shower!

Jesse had found and scheduled massages for us so we stopped in at Relax Spa and each had a four hands massage- which if you’ve never had one you should definitely try it. For some reason it is much better than two times a regular massage.

Then we headed to find a quick late lunch at the Golden Pumpkin. I had curry and Jesse had fish amok.😋

On the way back to the hotel, we saw people starting to squirt each other from the back of pick up trucks for their New Year’s fun.

We didn’t have our squirt guns so they didn’t spray us- I caught a couple peoples eye and I motioned that it was okay to spray me so they did but we couldn’t get them back at all. So we went up to our room to get ours.

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day 12 4/16/25 Part 1

*I have several videos I want to share so I’ll do this day in multiple posts.

We had an early flight from Singapore to Bangkok so we woke up early and had a quick breakfast of Kaya Toast in the airport— our last one this trip probably then we got on plane to Siem Reap Cambodia.

We took a long car ride to Siem Reap- which thankfully had air conditioning because it was very hot- about 85 and high humidity.

We took a Grab (Asian Uber) from the airport in Siem Reap to our hotel. Traffic was crazy!! Partly because we were in Cambodia where there are lots of scooters Tuk tuks and cars zooming in and out and and there aren’t really too many traffic signals- it’s mostly people merging and relying on others to let them in and also because it was Songkran, their New Year’s celebration this week.

But we made it to our hotel safely!!😃

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #11 4/15/25

We woke up early enough so that I could do push ups with Ryan back home!! I love doing it— we FaceTime and then he can share a song and we do our push ups together, today I was able to do 28 and I think Ryan got to 35! I’m glad we’ve been able to keep doing it most mornings though on the days we’re flying it’s hard to find the right time.😭

We ate breakfast at the hotel and went for a nice walk all around the Opera house then headed back to check out and catch a train back to the airport.

We made it to the First class lounge where we met Marta. She was an older woman- maybe late 60’s early 70s not sure- she seemed to want to talk so I asked her where she was from and she said Vienna so I told her we were going to Vienna as our last stop. And then she just kept wanting to talk she ended up turning her chair-with Jesse’s help- to join our little table and we talked about Sydney and travel and things to do in Vienna and she told us about her son who’s married and lives in Germany and we talked the whole like 2 hours til our flight and she was on our flight back to Singapore she was headed to Tokyo for a cruise around Japan. We walked to the fat with her and she said - oh Jesse we’re not standing in line so she got us in the front where we boarded right away- her suite was right across from mine!😃

Singapore Airlines Suites amazing!! Our suites were incredible!! So much room and an actual small mattress that they pull out.

And they really spoiled us. More champagne than I could drink and wine and caviar and then soo much food! I was so full by the end, I didn’t think I’d want to eat for three days. And the staff was so sweet. They took pictures for us and Serene, one our staff members, taught me what to do with the caviar, toppings, and bread thing.

Even though we had beds, I wasn’t really all that tired because it was only about 3:00pm. I climbed into the bed and got comfy though in the pjs the airline gave us.

I watched Wicked while trying to write one a post but my internet kept not saving any of what I wrote. 🤣🤣🤪

Before landing the crew surprised us with an extra celebratory triple chocolate tart with flashing lights and two extra glasses of champagne to celebrate our anniversary. I would definitely LOVE to fly Singapore Suites again. We loved the staff so much, we asked if they would take a picture with us and they very happily did!

After about 8 hours of flight time, we made it to Singapore and thanked the crew profusely and gave Marta a hug goodbye at the Singapore desk so she could find her next flight. Then we were off to the Crowne plaza in the Singapore airport and went to sleep.

This was the most memorable and special flight we’ve ever taken. Thank you Singapore Airlines!!❤️❤️

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #10 4/14/25

Jesse got a gorgeous time lapse video of the sunrise this morning!

After breakfast, we headed over by ferry to see the Taronga Zoo. Unfortunately, we somehow forgot the bag Jesse was carrying and left it on the boat. We tried to see if we could have them just bring it in their next trip to the zoo, but the guy in the dock couldn’t get a hold of the boat we were on. We did send an email to the boat company hoping they would find it and hold onto it.😬 Luckily nothing super important was in there except for Jesse’s glasses.

My favorites were the koala bears!! But I also love watching the kangaroos, seals and otters. We also got to see a Tasmanian Devil which looked like a really fat raccoon with no white stripes. The platypus seemed to be hiding. I always love seeing all the snakes and lizards- I can’t imagine coming upon an anaconda in the wild!!😬😬 Oh and we also saw a bunch of tiny little mice that were scurry and jumping all over! Sooo cute! I love seeing all the nanimals!🥰🥰

Side note* I heard an Australian mom say, “Chloe, look at all the Lizzie’s!”- I like listening to the expressions they use in other languages. A waiter asked us if we were “right” to order.

After seeing most of the animals we headed back to the boat. On the way down, in all the bushes and trees beside the sidewalk- I heard a mom point out, “Oh look at that gorgeous scribbler spyyduh. I turned to our left and there it was maybe 6 inches from us, hanging in his web! He was beautiful with greens and yellows and black but he was HUGE!! His bulby body was about the size of a Dunkin Donut hole!! 😬😱

I wish I’d gotten a picture but we were all kind of just walking and I didn’t want to stop with people behind us.

We got back to the boat docks in Circular Quay and the ferry company had found our bag and held onto it for us!! Yay!

We walked around a bit to find some food. Jesse wanted to try out this special bakery first so we looked all around this gigantic mall area and we couldn’t seem to find it.

Finally, we found it tucked away in this tiny little corner and it was worth the search.

Black Star Bakery!

We had their delicious watermelon layer trifle and a raspberry lychee one with a watermelon matcha! 😋😋

There was an actual slice of watermelon as one of the layers. I’d never had anything like that before.

As we headed out of the mall to the next place we saw Mochiric’s a tiny little mochi donut place. We picked out a churro one. It was so light and fluffy😋

Next we walked over to Darling Harbour where lots of big yachts are anchored. We ate lunch at Jordan’s right on water.

We walked over 18,000 steps today!!! Yay!!

We went back to the room, relaxed for a bit and packed up most of our stuff since we were leaving the next morning. Then we headed out for our last dinner in Sydney.

We were lucky that Jesse had been contacted that a reservation had opened up at a fancy Sydney spot called Café Sydney. It was in the 5th floor of the old customs house and it overlooks the harbour.

They sat us inside at first and the they asked if we wanted to move outside to have our main courses!! Yes!!

I had tandoori salmon and Jesse had steak tartare.

It was a wonderful way to spend our last night in Sydney.

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #9 4/13/25

Today we had a surfing lesson!!! But not in the ocean, because you know I’m terrified of 🦈🦈

Even in a pool I was a little nervous— I guess I just get nervous doing anything new🤪🤪

The current in the pool was really strong at some points and I had to fight to not fall over🤣 but the surfing was soooo much fun!!

We had about an hour and a half group lesson. The instructor had us line up in the pool and one at a time her would assist us catching a wave. I was happy because I was able to stand up on the board and ride it at least a little ways about 80% of the time. I had a couple big falls where I tipped one side of the board under and it just threw me🤣, but I didn’t mind falling in…because no 🦈🦈!!! 🤗😃

Jesse was good to though he had a little more trouble, the instructor told him next time he should have a “more advanced board” well that’s how Jesse heard it anyway— the instructor really said he should have a bigger board because he has more muscular mass and that will help him balance more.🤣

We hopped in a car and went to this great little restaurant called Piña! Oh my goodness all the food was delicious!! And we ordered like 5 different things, including their special strawberry matcha drink!!😋😋

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #8 4/12/25

Today turned into a culinary tour of Sydney! We had breakfast at our hotel, the Park Hyatt Sydney, where they have a sumptuous spread of fruits, pastries, and yogurts buffet style then you can order off the menu as well.

Then we headed straight for the ferry boats and headed to Manly. We saw a pod of dolphins swimming near the boat which was fun. I of course spotted their fins breaking the water first🤣.

From the ferry boat you get a totally new perspective of the city. I hadn’t realized the Sydney was so hilly, and from the water, you can see how all the surrounding neighborhoods and towns are built on small hill sides on the Bay.

It seems everyone in Australia is always being active outside and Manly Beach was no exception. And I also didn’t see people on their phones capturing the “perfect” shot of whatever they were doing either. They were playing beach volleyball, running into the surf, surfing, swimming, or playing a beach version of pickleball!! Or just running/walking the beach but whatever they were doing they were 100% in the moment.

The beach itself was nice soft sand without tons of shells that hurt your bare feet.🤗

Manly the town is super cute with lots of shops and little cafes and restaurants. We popped into a cafe for an iced coffee and to try to get out of the sun a bit, but there weren’t sufficient table umbrellas and we kinda had to squeeze close together which was fun anyway 🤣.

We took a lap around Manly’s main square area and found a cute pastry shop called Roller’s Bake House that served sweet and savory pastries. I heard the people behind us talking about how amazing the lamb sausage croissant was so we ordered that!! It’s definitely not an order I would have normally placed but I’m so glad we did. It was buttery and flaky as croissants should be and the lamb sausage filling had just the right touch of spice and mouth watering texture. Sooo good- I’m getting hungry just thinking about it.🤣

Next we made our way to Newton- we took a boat then a train and then walked to Tokyo Lamington’s. I had never heard of a Lamington but clearly they were a huge deal in Sydney. There was even a sign in the place asking which side of the debate you were on New Zealand Lamingtons or Aussie.🤣

Basically, it’s a rectangular layer cake with jam in between and a frosting on every side. We ordered the OG flavor, an iced matcha and a salmon onigiri. They were all very yummy!😋😋

To end the evening, we went to the Sydney Opera House to see a performance of Mozart and Bruckner.

It was a lovely day!

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #7 4/11/25 (it’s getting confusing which day it is🤣so I thought I’d better add the date too)

Singapore- Sydney, Australia

Our flight to Sydney was in the evening so not too much to report there- we mostly slept. At one point though I did get lost on the plane🤣, well not really but I didn’t take my glasses with me when I went to the restroom in the middle of the night and it was so dark when I came back that I couldn’t see which was my seat. I came part way up the aisle and didn’t see Jesse so I turned back. The flight attendant saw my troubles and told me to come further up. We both chuckled.🤪

It was super easy to go through immigration and customs to get into Australia. We had filled out our visa applications prior to our trip and we did the customs form on the plane.

It took maybe 10 minutes to get through all the checkpoints and collect our checked baggage.

We hopped on the metro and it took about 20 minutes to get to our stop at Circular Quay, and then it was a 10 minute walk to our hotel.

It was still early in the morning so our room wasn’t ready yet so we dropped luggage at hotel and went to breakfast at Bill’s, a local brunch place.

After breakfast, we walked over a few blocks to Single O—a cute little coffee shop, where everyone was taking selfies in front of the shop with their coffees.

We almost got on a train to who knows where because the one train station was pretty confusing. Luckily Jesse realized it didn’t quite look right and we didn’t end up in the middle of the Outback🤣.

Before we could relax in the room we had to head out to our bridge climbing adventure.

My heart was racing even though I’m not the one afraid of heights, I’m just super clumsy.

But the views from atop the Sydney Harbour Bridge at sunset were spectacular!

Finally, we got to rest, relax, and enjoy the view of the Sydney Opera House from our room.

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #6

Swimming finally!!

This morning it was bright and sunny so we went swimming right after breakfast, before the weather changed.🤣

It’s a pretty incredible view from up there. It seemed like we could see all the way past Singapore to Malaysia.

Unfortunately, we had to check out of our room by 11:00 so we soaked up what sun we could and then we packed up and headed out for lunch at Maxwell’s Hawker Center one last time.

This time we got chicken rice from Ah Tai, both of us actually like this better than the one from Tian Tian.

Just to make sure we didn’t get hungry too soon, we also got some dumplings.😋😋😋

That was our last meal in Singapore for this trip- hopefully we’ll be back again!!!

We collected our luggage back at the hotel and took the 1 hour train trip to the airport! As usual Jesse was able to navigate transport and we arrived at the airport seamlessly!

Our flight wasn’t until 8pm though so we had time to walk around the gorgeous airport, which is truly like no other.

They created a huge rainforest greenhouse in one section of the airport named, The Jewel. There are hundreds of different species of trees and flowers and tropical plants and a giant circular waterfall in the center.

When Jesse got too hot in there we headed over to the KrisFlyer Lounge which he was super excited to try out. 🤣 They even have showers in there and a sleep room where you can wait for your flight. It was definitely nicer than the most airport lounges.

Finally it was time to board the plane and sleep until we made it to Sydney!!

❤️❤️

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day # 5 Part 3 (exciting conclusion 🤣)

We were lucky, they had a table where we sat, drank a pot of tea and watched the storm.

If only we’d had a covered hammock it would have been lovely to fall asleep to the sound.

We made it back to the hotel and decided we needed to just relax by the pool. The rain had mostly stopped, it was just sprinkling and we figured we’d be wet in the pool anyway.

But today was a day of our plans being changed. We got to the gorgeous rooftop pool and they said it was closed because of lightning warnings.

Oh well.

We took a much needed nap instead. It was supposed to only be 45 minutes but it turned into 2 hours🤣. I guess we weren’t over jet lag.

We ended the night at a Turkish restaurant, bought some bandaids (called plasters here) at a tiny 7-11, for Jesse’s toes and made our way back to the hotel on the subway.

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #5 Part 2

We also got fried curry puffs at the Hawker center one was chicken and one was anchovies. And we had to get bubble tea for Alyss!!😋😋

We continued our culinary tour by stopping into a cute little place called My Awesome Cafe. Jesse got a protein shake and I got a delicious probiotic drink that had yuzu lemon, honey, mint and chopped up kumquats in it!

I also got their version of a pineapple upside down cake with coconut ice cream. It was a perfect afternoon snack, the cake was light and moist and not too sweet!😋

After that we decided we would go walk around the outdoor gardens. It was still a bright, hot sunny day so I figured that was better than going to the pool and getting sunburned- at least the gardens would be more shaded.

We got off the train and as soon as we entered the gardens, I noticed a dark cloud above us, but we brought our umbrella so it was all good.

…or maybe not. It was a torrential rain. We hid under a tree for a little bit, but It rained soo hard it didn’t even matter that we had an umbrella. Our feet were getting soggy and every step irritated Jesse’s blisters on his toes(he wore new dress shoes the day before😱) so we stood still under the umbrella for about ten minutes hoping the rain would cease or at least slow down.

It did not, in fact I kept getting more intense with no end in sight.

Finally, we decided to make our way to a little outdoor cafe, hoping there were seats under the awning.

*I can only post 1 video per post so check out the next one to see what happened next🤣🤣

[around-the-world-in30-days]

Day #5 Part #1

We walked over to the Gardens By the Bay before it opened.

Flower Dome:

There weren’t actually too many flowers blooming in the flower dome when we were there, mostly plants that I’ve had in my gardens but they did have Japanese cherry trees blooming😃

Cloud Forest:

Okay, I could have stayed in the cloud forest all day!! It was one of the most impressive collections of plants I’ve ever seen. Even Jesse got into taking pictures of flowers😃. I maybe got a little too excited being surrounded by so many gorgeous specimens— at one point I was so overwhelmed by them all, a few little tears formed at my eyes- I quickly blinked them away so Jesse wouldn’t make fun of me. 🤪

Here are some of my favorite pictures. Most of them are from Jesse because despite my trying he takes much better pictures than me.

We went out to lunch at a Hawker center- basically a giant food court but with tiny stalls manned by one or two people.

Today, we went to a Nasi Lemak stall and had the most delicious fried chicken with rice, some hot roasted peanuts, hot sauce, a fried egg, and cucumbers.

I don’t know what the crust was made of in the chicken maybe some shredded coconut? All I know was Jesse took one bite and said, “hmmm, hmmm Oh my God.”

It was that good!!

That’s all for now! Day #5 Part #2 will come soon!!!

❤️❤️❤️