Category: travel

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Map of our trip

Ok, BIG announcement here everyone.

After a cubic butt load of work on Tiffany’s part and a few weeks of strangling the wordpress though island internet servers until it gave us what we wanted,

We can now present to you,

In all it’s oceanographic glory,

Along with geo-locational hyperlinks for all our entries,

(Ooooooo how completely awesome does that sound!?!)

THE MAP

(no, not the chart.  It’s not to be used for navigational purposes.  Who in their right mind uses google maps to navigate?)

View CoastGuardCouple.com – Tiff and Greg Around the World! in a larger map

You can click on the green pins to find posts related to that area.

Our current location is denoted by a green arrow and star.

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Kiwis on Water Skis

Auckland, NZ

Having completed our assorted obligations to hearth & home, we returned to a much warmer New Zealand a few months later.  As our winter is their summer, that worked out in our favor.  Tiffany would like to point out that it was “warmer” vice simply “warm.”   She is sensitive to such things.

Since we had a week before Greg’s mom arrived to join us on our adventures in Kiwi-land, we decided to take up some of our new friends on their offer to teach us water skiing.  We met Chris & Jo while we were in Tonga, which incidentally would have made a much warmer aquatic instructional environment but see they’re Brits by birth, so we just had to do it the hard way or at least the non-tropical water way…which supposedly helps the stiffness of our upper lips or something…

Continue reading “Kiwis on Water Skis”

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Grog Files Double Header

Ok so Tonga only has the one beer but really, anything they made after MAKA would have just paled by comparison anyway.  That beer was a-freaking-mazing!

We felt bad though, only having the one drink to share with everyone.  So instead of leaving y’all hanging we’re giving you our wine findings from our honeymoon in Tuscany, Italy.  This includes the wine we like so much we brought enough home to share with our wedding party!

As you can see, Greg’s sister was pretty happy about that.

So from South Pacific to Europe- this month is a grog files double-header of some of the best drinks this planet of ours has to offer!

Kingdom of Tonga

 

 

Italy

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Why Messing with Texas is a BAD Idea!

San Antonio, TX

They also have the Alamo here which almost everyone has heard of but if you’re anything like us you really didn’t realize was in San Antonio or how incredibly epic a display of Early American bad-assery this fortress represents.

Continue reading “Why Messing with Texas is a BAD Idea!”

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Sailing – How to Test the Waters

So lets assume that you read our previous article “Volunteer Crewing 101” and though you may have some reservations, the idea of travelling around the world on someone else’s luxury yacht for months on end visiting far flung tropical islands with your only expense being the cost of groceries appeals to you.

(Look, if the opportunity to travel to Tahiti for free doesn’t get your attention then there is simply something wrong with you.  😉

Let’s also assume you have never once in your life set foot upon a ship.  How do you go from clueless landlubber to salty swabbie?  Or at least how do you check this out for yourself and see if the sailor’s life is, indeed, for you?

Continue reading “Sailing – How to Test the Waters”

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City of om-nom!

San Antonio, TX

When you’re lucky enough to be exposed to a new culture with one of your good friends as a card carrying member, you get to breeze by all the touristy stuff and get a back stage pass to what real people do for a good time.

And what you do in San Antonio, is you eat

And eat…

Continue reading “City of om-nom!”

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Something Worth Going Home For

Enroute San Antonio, TX

A few posts back we posed a question to you: when is it worth it to go home?

We told you there were several reasons why we came back but we didn’t go into a lot of details on our reasons.  Remember we didn’t just fly home from Auckland.  We left in Tonga a guaranteed free ticket to Australia on a private motor yacht to hop a flight to Auckland then onto the United States.  Why the heck did we decide to leave then?

To understand this story, we have to take you back to Bora Bora.  Shouldn’t all good stories ending in San Antonio involve a detour though Bora Bora?  We think so…

Bora Bora Mountain

Remember the Bora Bora business day we had where we made phone calls to, among other people, Greg’s old business partner?  Right well he had a little more than business to discuss.

Michael – “I’m getting married and I was wondering if you wanted to be the best man.”

Greg – “Oh you bastard…”

Continue reading “Something Worth Going Home For”

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So THAT’s where everyone went!

Atlanta, GA

So, as thirtysomethings (oh, now that’s frightening…) we’ve been wondering.  For the past several years actually…

Where the heck did everybody our age go!? Continue reading “So THAT’s where everyone went!”

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Greg stars as “The Nanny!”

Atlanta, GA

One of the reasons we came back was to spend a month with our dear friends.  They had an urgent need for some help with child care for a month so Greg headed over to Atlanta, GA while Tiffany moved on to our next destination a little early to help out one of our friends with his business.

Greg remembers the first time he saw Atlanta.  He was a new ensign in the Coast Guard and by new, we mean he got his commission about a month before and was driving to his first duty station in Florida.  At about midnight he was heading down the I-75 when he crested a hill and the whole city of Atlanta lit on a clear night spread out before him.

Atlanta at nightIt was a sight he’ll never forget but then getting pulled over 30 minutes later by the Atlanta police for speeding stuck in his memory too.   What’s the deal with him and cops?

Continue reading “Greg stars as “The Nanny!””

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Local’s guide to San Jose, CA

San Jose, CA

Last time we looked at the more popular tourist sites of Greg’s home town but really, San Jose does not easily lend itself to tourism outside abject worship of assorted technology businesses.  Only so many people want to drive by Apple HQ.  However, when you know where to look, there are actually quite a lot of good times to be had.  Luckily, Greg has “normal friends” (yeah, that’s always a relative term) who we hung out with around town.  So here’s what we do to have fun – Continue reading “Local’s guide to San Jose, CA”

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