Here’s our summary of the last three months.

Clockwise from top left: at the spring float festival in Takayama, beautiful cherry blossom at Kenrokuen garden in Kanazawa, beside Lake Motosuko with Mt Fuji in the background, at Ginkakuji temple in Kyoto

Countries visited in the last three months (1st April to 30th June)

Singapore, Japan (total visited to date on this trip = 14)

Have you managed to stay within your budget (£70 per day)? And what has been the expense breakdown?

Nowhere near, we knew before we departed that Japan would be expensive but it still came as a shock after a year of travelling the rest of Asia, although to be fair it’s probably no more expensive than travelling in Europe would be.

Our average daily spend over the three months has been £99.83. Our daily spend to date since we left home has been £69.67 which is exactly what we’d hoped – our savings to date were enough to balance the overspend in Japan.

• Accommodation is yet again the biggest expense at 38.0% – for most of the time we stayed in business hotels which as a couple usually work out cheaper than hostels with the added advantage of an ensuite bathroom. The downside compared to a hostel is you don’t get to chat with the host or other travellers and there’s nowhere to prepare meals (not that all hostels have kitchens but some do).
• Food is next highest at 24.0% – we’ve eaten really well in Singapore and Japan and while it’s possible to find relatively reasonably priced food it certainly can’t be described as cheap.
• Intercity transportation was high at 18.5%. We had two flights in this quarter, from Dhaka to Singapore, and from Singapore to Nagoya (Japan). When moving long distances in Japan we usually travelled by Shinkansen, the famed bullet train. Very fast, clean and comfortable but not cheap. We kept costs as low as possible by taking occasional buses or travelling by local train when moving between nearby cities.
• Local transportation was comparatively high at 5.2%. Although buses and trams are not too expensive (usually £1-2 each per trip) they do add up. We also did a few long distance day trips which were possible because of the speed and efficient timetabling of buses and trains, for example to Kamikochi from Matsumoto and to Ibusuki from Kagoshima
• For the first time on this trip the visa spend for the quarter was absolutely nothing – no spend and no stress! Both Singapore and Japan allow UK passport holders to stay for 3 months visa free.

What has surprised you most in the last three months of travel?

If you listen to the continental Europeans or Americans they’ll have you believe that the British are plain weird for driving on the left, pretty much unique. Well, in the last 9 months we’ve visited no less than 6 other countries who also drive on the left (Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Singapore, Japan) and while it could be argued that for some of these countries, though certainly not all, this is due to a colonial British heritage I don’t think we should let that detract from a good argument.

Apart from family and friends, what are you missing most about life in the UK?

Not much to be honest. Travel in Japan and Singapore has been pretty easy, with all our creature comforts adequately provided for. Although we both love trying new foods we do get the occasional hankering for a good cheese sandwich or a plate of fish and chips.

What’s the most memorable sight that you’ve seen in the last three months?

Julie – I loved Okunoin cemetery in Koyasan. The huge cedar trees amongst the gravestones of all ages, the surprising statues that we came across and listening to the monks’ morning chanting all added up to an experience I won’t forget.

Andrew – My preconceptions about Japan were fast trains, commuter-packed metros and high tech everything, so the most memorable sight is the amount of greenery and scenic beauty here. Julie won’t let me have that as it’s not specific enough, so I’m going to pick Mt Fuji, the iconic mountain of Japan.

Tell us a funny story from the last three months of travel.

On our first day in Kanazawa we had lunch at Omicho Market and bought a small cake each for dessert before walking across town to Kenrokuen garden. Inside the garden we found a bench from where we could admire the view while eating our cakes. Suddenly, I flinched back as I caught sight of a bird seeming to swoop very close. When I turned to Andrew to see if he had seen it, he was looking in disbelief at his empty hand which had been loosely holding his cake. A Black Kite had swooped in and taken it without touching him! Since then we’ve always been very watchful when eating out in the open…

Who is the person you’ve met that you remember the most from the last three months?

Our host in Singapore, Diana, was such a pleasure to stay with. We booked her spare room through Airbnb and it was an ideal place for some R&R after the somewhat challenging travel through Bangladesh. She made us feel right at home, from her comfy sofas, fast wifi and well stocked kitchen (Julie seriously lusted after her top quality pans and knives), to her friendly conversation and introducing us to the TV programme Grey’s Anatomy which we watched avidly for a week! As an added bonus we discovered that she had lived in Japan for 6 years and didn’t mind us picking her brains. Her suggestions on where to go basically established our itinerary for the first month of our stay here.

Finally, what have you found to be the greatest challenge so far?

Julie – Struggling with the budget again. We’d really got used to staying in fairly nice places and basically eating wherever we wanted while travelling through SE Asia and into Bangladesh and it’s been a hard habit to break, needing to think twice about stopping at a cafe for coffee and cake, or whether to organise a packed lunch rather than relying on finding something while we’re out. We don’t compromise on sights and activities so accommodation, food and drinks tend to be where we try to save money.

Andrew – We’ve found that booking last minute budget accommodation as a couple has been hard in Japan, especially as we usually want to stay for three or four nights. It seems that as well as all of us foreign tourists, the Japanese also like to travel a lot, which meant we had to quickly firm up our plans and start booking 3 to 4 weeks in advance, rather than the 3 to 4 days we’ve been used to so far!

We have now reached the one year anniversary of our two year trip! Here’s our summary of the last three months.

Meeting elephants in Chiang Mai, pretending to be Buddhas at Sukhothai Historical Park in Thailand, the iconic Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, we commandeered a rickshaw in Birisiri in northern Bangladesh

Countries visited in the last three months (1st January to 31st March)

Thailand, Malaysia, Bangladesh (total visited to date on this trip = 12)

Have you managed to stay within your budget (£70 per day)? And what has been the expense breakdown?

Easily within budget, our average daily spend over the three months has been £50.59. Our daily spend to date since we left home has been £62.40.

Bangladesh has been an incredibly cheap place to travel with March’s spend bumped up only by flights and our 3 day tour to the Sundarbans. Our record day was just £9.32 including a 3 hour bus journey, an ensuite room, food for the day and a haircut for Andrew!

• Accommodation is again the biggest expense at 34.0% – half of the quarter was spent in Chiang Mai and the apartment we stayed in was relatively expensive.
• Guides and tours – 16.9%. We took some expensive tours in Thailand and Bangladesh including spending a day with elephants, taking a Thai cookery class and 3 days in the Sundarbans National Park
• Food is next highest at 16.4% – just £8.30 per day for both of us. Eating out is tasty and inexpensive in Thailand and Bangladesh, again for much of the time we were living in the apartment in Chiang Mai and cooking for ourselves – also fairly inexpensive.
• Intercity transportation was 10.0%. Lower than other quarters as we were settled in Chiang Mai for half of the time, over half of the spend in this category is our flights from Kuala Lumpur to Dhaka.
• Alcohol was 7.3% this quarter. This is wholly accounted for by the first two months as alcohol is extremely restricted in Bangladesh and we only had one small can of beer each during our whole month there!
• Local transportation was very low at just 2.4%. This includes hiring motorbikes several times in Thailand and many, many very cheap rickshaw rides in Bangladesh.

What has surprised you most in the last three months of travel?

Julie – That we would need to take a break from travelling.  It sounds crazy that anyone would need a holiday from a holiday but by November we were pretty burnt out and exhausted from almost constant sightseeing and movement (albeit at a reasonably relaxed pace) and we were craving a place where we could slow down, unpack and catch up on admin (blogging, photo uploads, Skype with family back home).  I’m pleased to report that after two months of rest we were again raring to go!

Andrew – How much we rely on the internet. For something that’s only been around for about 25 years to have dramatically altered the way we research and plan our travel is astounding to me. Perhaps it’s because we feel more comfortable about a place or a journey if we’ve got an idea of what to expect, but going from the high-speed wifi everywhere connected of Thailand and Malaysia to the no-speed wifi rarely-where of Bangladesh was both frustrating and liberating. I think it’s definitely more of an adventure to say “we’ll get a bus from here to there” and see what happens, than “we’ll get bus XYZ that departs every hour from ABC station, takes 3½ hours and arrives at DEF station, 1km to the west of the centre of town.” The good news is that even with access to the internet we can still choose to be a little more adventurous.

Apart from family and friends, what are you missing most about life in the UK?

Taking tap water for granted. We boiled water in Thailand, we were encouraged to drink water from the cooler in Malaysia, and in Bangladesh – a country that by one estimate we heard ¼ is covered in water – it was hot and we drank a lot of bottled water. There were a few bouts of the Bengali Bowels after we forgot now and then, but most places we stayed included a large bottle of water with the room rate.

What’s the most memorable sight that you’ve seen in the last three months?

Julie – The temples of Puthia in north-western Bangladesh really blew me away with their abundant carvings but the day I really remember is the day that we were elephant owners in Thailand.

Andrew – The flora and fauna of the Sundarbans is a very close second, but for me it’s the modern splendour of the Wat Rong Khun or White Temple in Chiang Rai. It’s a fairytale palace of decadent detail that I hope I’m still alive to see completed in 2070 – I’ll be into my 90s by then!

Tell us a funny story from the last three months of travel.

Julie – On the train ride from Rajshahi to Joypurhat in western Bangladesh our window was missing the bolt that would hold it open. We fashioned a bit of a wedge from some paper which wasn’t ideal but better than nothing. The two Bangladeshi ladies sitting opposite noticed our struggles and (unprompted by us) mentioned the problem to the ticket inspector when he came round. A couple of minutes later, a uniformed porter appeared, grudgingly fiddled with the window for a few seconds before slamming it shut and then unbolted and shut the ladies’ window as well! The older of the ladies remonstrated with him but he grumpily shrugged and walked off. We caught their eye and all of us burst out laughing which broke the ice and we spent the rest of the journey having a very interesting conversation with them (after we’d re-wedged our window open of course!).

Andrew – Bearing in mind that most English conversations we had in Bangladesh consisted of “What’s your country?”, “How are you?”, with the rare and more advanced venturing a “Where [do you plan to] visit [in] Bangladesh?”, it was in answering this last question that after reeling off a list that didn’t include Cox’s Bazaar (the longest beach in the world, and the proudest place in every Bangladeshi’s heart) that my inquisitor responded in true American sit-com style with a loud “No Cox’s Bazaar? Seriously?!“

Who is the person you’ve met that you remember the most from the last three months?

That would be Hasan, an English literature student we met at the Pink Palace on our first day in Bangladesh. As a precursor to the kindness we were to receive across the country, especially from students, Hasan took us on an impromptu tour of the riverside area of Dhaka into places and businesses we wouldn’t have found without his help – a school with amazing old buildings, a sign-painters, a cinema theatre (just to take a quick look – without paying!), and the markets to name a few. We enjoyed his company so we hooked up with him again on our last day in Bangladesh for a day trip to Sonargaon.

Andrew with Hasan at Sonargaon on our last day in Bangladesh

Finally, what have you found to be the greatest challenge so far?

Navigating baksheesh in Bangladesh. Baksheesh, for those who don’t know, is kind of like a tip or reward for good service, a higher tip to ensure that repeated service remains good, or a sort of Robin Hood payment that the more well-off are to feel pleased to be given the opportunity to give, and in some cases, an out and out bribe. Once we’d worked out if the situation called for baksheesh, we then hit the minefield of having to work out how much to give. There were a few uneasy experiences but they were very short-lived as we reasoned, being tourists it’s likely we’d been a little overcharged already!

Another 3 months under our belts.

Drinking fresh beer at a street bar in Hanoi, in front of the Reunification Palace in Ho Chi Minh City with Jo, Angkor Wat, Releasing a lantern into the sky on New Year’s Eve in Chiang Mai

Countries visited in the last three months (1st October to 31st December)

Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand (total visited to date on this trip = 10)

Have you managed to stay within your budget (£70 per day)? And what has been the expense breakdown?

Easily within budget, our average daily spend over the three months has been £55.89. Our daily spend to date since we left home has been £66.09.

• Accommodation is the biggest expense at 28% – a lower proprtion than the previous two quarters as it’s incredibly easy to find reasonably priced accommodation in SE Asia. Indeed you can usually find a VERY nice room for about £30 per night, and a clean, ensuite room with air-con in a guesthouse is only about £10-15. We’ve generally mixed between the two.
• Food is the second highest at 23.7%, much higher than previously. I’m not entirely sure of the reason for this as eating out has also been very cheap. My suspicion is that we’ve been a lot more relaxed about stopping off for a mid afternoon coffee and cake or refreshing fruit smoothie as we knew how under budget our spending was. We’ve also splashed out on a few meals at very nice restaurants, notably Les Jardins de la Carambole in Hue, Xu in Ho Chi Minh City, and Haven in Siem Reap.
• Intercity transportation is also up from the last quarter at 13.4%. Over half of this is accounted for by our flights from Hong Kong to Hanoi which cost £180 each.
• Living expenses is quite a big proportion this quarter at 6.4%. Quite a bit of this is the cost of an upgrade to our website hosting to give us more space for photos, but it also includes a new pair of walking trousers for Andrew and £20 for one month’s internet usage at our apartment in Chiang Mai.
• Entertainment and entry fees – 5.5%. Almost a quarter of this is our week long passes for Angkor at US$60 each.
• Guides and tours – 5.2%. Quite a lot of our activities in Vietnam fell into this category, from the Street Food Tour in Hanoi, to the Ha Long Bay cruise we took from Cat Ba island, and all of the activities that we did in the Mekong Delta

What has surprised you most in the last three months of travel?

Julie – Everything that I’d read said that it’s ridiculously easy to live cheaply in SE Asia but the reality of it didn’t really hit home until we started travelling here. And while we’ve continued to monitor our spending, we really haven’t had to try to stay within budget – there’s been no penny pinching on food or accommodation so that we could afford to do some of the big experiences that we wanted.

Andrew – The sheer number of motorbikes and scooters. Yes, I know south east Asia is densely populated – especially in the major cities – but it hadn’t occurred to me to wonder how everyone would move around. And not only for the daily commute, we’ve seen motorcycles and sidecars configured to sell all manner of tasty street-food such as noodles, fried rice, dried fish, grilled fish, kebabs, phad thai, fresh fruit smoothies, tea, coffee, and banana pancakes.

Apart from family and friends, what are you missing most about life in the UK?

I know it’s cheating a little bit but we really feel we’ve missed out on family related celebrations in the last three months. We’ve spent Christmas away from home before, but never without having a ‘Christmas Day’ on a different day before we left, and although we had a lovely day and fantastic meal here we were both a little homesick. In addition to that, both of our nephews had birthdays in the last three months (Scott was 3, and Olly was 1) and we’re hugely excited about the imminent arrival of nephew (or niece) number three but also know that we’ll be sad not to have a cuddle.

What’s the most memorable sight that you’ve seen in the last three months?

Julie – I loved the old town in Hanoi. The different craftsmen grouped together, the twisty alleys, the motorbikes with unlikely loads, and, oh, the food…the world’s best spring rolls, freshly fried prawn cakes, bowls of delicious noodle soup and 21p glasses of bia hoi (fresh beer). And, although there were lots of tourists, I loved that there didn’t seem to be, it was just lots of locals getting on with their lives and activities that didn’t have anything to do with tourism.

Andrew – I’m going to eschew the first and obvious sight that springs to mind, and instead choose the variety of things carried on motorbikes – the most memorable of which needs the stage setting so here goes: Julie, Jo and I are in a regular taxi on the ring road heading out of Saigon to the bus station, when I happen to glance across the 6 lanes of busy traffic to the on-ramp of the opposite carriageway, where the pillion on a 125cc semi-automatic scooter catches my eye because he has his arms fully outstretched like he’s on the bow of the Titanic. “Why are his arms outstretched?” I’m thinking. Then, as they join the 60km/h carriageway I see it. He’s holding upright, a full pane of glass, without a frame, about the size of a patio door.

Tell us a funny story from the last three months of travel.

We were eating crabs in Kep. After watching our crabs go from kicking to cooked in the space of 10 minutes, we’re just tucking in when a passing Chinese looking man told us to be careful. He prodded at one of our crabs and said they would probably be OK, but that they might not be fresh. Thankfully, he mistook our look of complete incomprehension for misunderstanding, whereupon he felt the need to explain he was French.

Who is the person you’ve met that you remember the most from the last three months?

That would be David from our day trip in Battambang. Not only was he great fun to be with because he was always joking, but his relaxed, unhurried demeanour put us at ease which meant we enjoyed the sights around Battambang more. He also arranged for his friend to meet us in Siem Reap, and when we got off the boat Mr Sokha was waiting for us with our name on a card and a big smile.

Finally, what have you found to be the greatest challenge so far?

Julie – Surprisingly, finding good accommodation. Because it’s so cheap, it’s very difficult to filter anything out. Whereas previously we have been able to look at the handful of options within our budget and then make a decision based on location and online reviews, in SE Asia we’ve found that restricting price really only excludes the 5-star resort places, and so it’s become much more about trawling reviews and deciding what level of comfort/local experience we want. On occasion this has worked well (we found an incredible deal on a hotel in Hue, and the family-run guesthouse where we stayed in Kampot was great) but it hasn’t always worked out so well.

Then when we arrived in Chiang Mai we’d thought it would be easy to find an apartment to rent for two months, but for various reasons it just seemed to be really difficult – we’d see an advert for a place and it would already be gone, or they wanted a six month minimum contract, or it was miles out of town, or there was no kitchen/swimming pool (OK, I know that sounds like a luxury, but after the place we stayed in Bangkok it was something we were both keen on). By the time we saw the apartment we eventually rented we didn’t care that it was 50% more than we’d hoped to spend or that the wifi was extra, we just wanted to move in.

Andrew – We were getting quite proficient in Russian, picked up enough Mongolian to be polite, and our good friends Isaac and Rebecca gave us a crash course in Mandarin, but I’ve found it really difficult to learn the south east Asian languages: Vietnamese, Cambodian and Thai. On reflection I think there are two reasons: firstly, like Mandarin, they’re quite hard for western minds and mouths to pick up – they have tones or intonations (4 in Mandarin, 6 in Thai), and the written word is, at first glance, impenetrable.

Secondly, and quite possibly a consequence of the firstly, it is too easy not to speak the native language. Since hitting Vietnam, we’re on the well-travelled tourist circuit and as most people we would interact with speak enough English, so it’s too easy for us to be lazy. Indeed, most of the Thai wats have a regular thing called “Monk Chat” where we’re encouraged to help Monks improve their English!

Incredibly, it’s 3 months since we did our original quarterly summary. Here’s the next instalment…

In the Gobi desert, with the Chinggis Khaan statue in eastern Mongolia, on the Great Wall of China with Julie’s parents, taking the Harbour Ferry tour in Hong Kong

Countries visited in the last three months (1st July to 30th September)

Mongolia, China, Hong Kong

Have you managed to stay within your budget (£70 per day)? And what has been the expense breakdown?

Almost within budget, our average daily spend over the three months has been £70.29 although with a lot of variation in the quarter. August’s spend was high, partly because of the cost of our tour to eastern Mongolia at the start of the month and partly because we moved faster than usual when Julie’s parents came out to visit us in the second half of the month. We made up for this by living very frugally through our 3.5 weeks in Hong Kong in September.

Our daily spend to date since we left home has been £70.88.

• Accommodation is the biggest expense again at 28.5% – this is skewed slightly downwards as the cost of accommodation was included in the tour price for our two long trips in Mongolia – a total of 15 nights
• Coming in at a close second this quarter is Guides and tours which not only includes our Mongolian trips but also a couple of ones that we took in Xi’an
• Next is food at just over 15%, again skewed slightly downwards due to its inclusion in the tour prices. Kitchens have only been rarely available in our accommodation in China and Hong Kong so we have been eating out for almost every meal (the exception is breakfast – fruit and biscuits/crackers can be done without a kitchen!). Fortunately this has been relatively cheap.
• Intercity transportation is a much lower percentage than last quarter at 10.7%. This is basically just our trains around China as moving in Mongolia was very cheap on the local buses or included in the tour price and we never moved very far in Hong Kong
• Entertainment and entry fees – 5%. Entry to tourist sights in China is very expensive (around £15 each for many of them), however we found Hong Kong’s sights to be very cheap or even free!
• Alcohol – seems very low at just 3.5%. Be assured that our beer consumption has not dropped, it’s just the price per pint which is cheaper! An honourable mention should be made for the Chinese brand Yanjing which we agree is the nicest lager we’ve tasted.
• Our visa costs this quarter were much lower than in our first three months. The Mongolian visa process was pretty straightforward and although the Chinese visa application was relatively complicated it was cheap. As UK passport holders we can stay for up to 6 months in Hong Kong without a visa.
• Other stuff – the remaining 7.5% covers local transportation (generally incredibly cheap), laundry, toiletries, haircuts, etc as well as a new pair of jeans for Julie and new walking shoes for Andrew (thanks to Mum and Dad for the courier service!)

What has surprised you most in the last three months of travel?

How cheap and plentiful public transportation is in other countries. I don’t know if it’s subsidised by the government but it seems incredible that the subway system in Beijing costs just ¥2 (about £0.20) per trip anywhere within the city considering the cost of a similar ticket in London (I just looked it up, the cheapest single ticket without an Oyster card is £4.50). The trains are very new, air conditioned and clean (a no eating and drinking rule means that rubbish doesn’t get left behind so much). Beijing’s buses are even cheaper – ¥1 (£0.10) to go anywhere and similarly comfortable. It costs over £2 for the 10 minute trip from our home in Gateshead to the centre of Newcastle… And it’s not just Beijing, the local transport networks in the rest of China and Hong Kong was just as impressive.

Apart from family and friends, what are you missing most about life in the UK?

Julie – Since we left Russia I’ve had very little access to kitchens and much as I’m loving the food everywhere we go I’m really missing cooking for ourselves, especially more complicated meals and baking.

Andrew – Finishing the Trans-Siberian railway, this big adventure that we’d planned the start of our journey around and which, I admit, was about as far as I’d researched into our two year trip, is a monumental undertaking in and of itself which left me contemplating “what now?”. I do wonder if those of us who have incorporated it into longer travel plans all feel a similar way. Yes, I felt a little homesick after Beijing, the knowing how everything works (where to go to buy, say, rawlplugs, or just instinctively knowing how much, relatively, everything should cost, or being able to have more than a basic conversation with strangers rather than just “hello, how are you?, good thanks, and you?”. I started to wonder if I’d had enough of travelling and wanted a “work” break – the line from Henry IV sprang to mind – “If all the year were playing holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to work”. And then the universe read my thoughts and offered me some software programming and web development in Hong Kong – I have to say I was sorely tempted (in fact, I still think about it). The reassurance that I can find interesting, challenging work was enough to put that part of my mind at ease. For the time being, at least :)

What’s the most memorable sight that you’ve seen in the last three months?

Julie – For me it has to be the Great Wall. We were so lucky with the weather to have a day of clear blue skies and the scale of it just took my breath away. It also reminds me of Mum and Dad’s visit – I’m so impressed that they managed to climb all of the steps up to the wall.

Andrew – The Great plains and expansive steppe of Mongolia’s nothingness is what I choose to remember the most from the last three months. It is so humbling and yet so inspirational an experience to see nothing but wilderness in every direction.

Tell us a funny story from the last three months of travel.

Julie – When we arrived at Pingyao station to take the train to Xi’an our tickets were checked and we were directed to the correct platform. On the platform a lady employee of the station was directing people to the correct area depending on which carriage they were in. Andrew, Dad, Mum and I were the only people getting into carriage 10 but she made us queue up in single file… As we waited for the train, Andrew decided that he would take a picture of the platform and stepped forwards to get the angle he wanted. Cue the platform lady shouting at him through her loudspeaker! He moved back into place and none of us dared move again until the train arrived.

Andrew – Our driver, guide and shepherd for our eastern Mongolia trip had a fondness for a certain expletive. As you’ll hear at the end of the video in the afore-linked post, Bacha says after we crossed a river that had we taken a 22km diversion further upstream, resulting in an extra 44km, that, in Bacha’s words, “that is bullshit” (I cut the video just before he was about to say it – we knew it was coming :o)

Who is the person you’ve met that you remember the most from the last three months?

Our 9 day tour to the Gobi desert has been one of the highlights of our trip so far – for the great people we spent the time with as much as the scenery – many of whom we’ve subsequently met up with again

[photo credit: Wasut (Khun) Pornpatcharapong]

Finally, what have you found to be the greatest challenge so far?

Curiously, we’d say again that time has been our greatest challenge. Julie’s parents landed slap bang in the middle of our Chinese visa which meant we weren’t in one place long enough to apply for an extension, so we made a Plan B and headed for Hong Kong. We’ve since decided that one-month visas are too short.
But it’s not just visa restrictions, our days seem short and after 6 months on the road we’re wondering where all the time goes! We’re usually up and out by 8:30 – 9:00am, but without 8 or so hours of a full time job to account for we still feel like we’re behind on our reading, research, blogging and photograph tagging.

It hardly seems possible, but it is now more than 3 months since we embarked on our trip. We thought that we would do a little summary of the story so far.

Clockwise from top left: The frozen sea at Jurmala in Latvia, our first Russian train from St Petersburg to Petrozavodsk, waiting for the ferry to Olkhon Island in Lake Baikal, in front of St Basil’s Cathedral in Red Square, Moscow

Countries visited in the last three and a half months (19th March to 30th June)

Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Russia

Have you managed to stay within your budget (£70 per day)? And what has been the expense breakdown?

Almost within budget, our average daily spend over the three months has been £71.41

• Accommodation takes up just over a third of our budget – a basic room in a hostel is generally about £30 but we’ve managed to save money by staying with locals using airBnB.com, and travelling on sleeper trains
• Our next biggest expense has been intercity transportation at 17%. This includes our initial flight from London to Latvia, but is mostly the money we’ve spent on trains in Russia. Still, the trains are great value for money – one journey took 37 hours over 2 nights and 1 day and cost just £57 each – you wouldn’t get far in the UK for that much!
• Close behind is food at about 16.5%. Usually we cook for ourselves, but every so often we get sick of pasta and have a mini splurge on a meal out – finding accommodation with a kitchen is a big way that we save money.
• Entertainment and entry fees – 11% includes a few guided tours.
• Alcohol – just over 7%. Usually we buy beers at the supermarket and drink in our hostel – drinking in bars can eat through the daily budget very quickly, as we found out in Helsinki!
• Our Russian visas took up quite a chunk of our budget across the three months at 5.4%. They were more expensive as we wanted a 3 month visa and also because we had to pay to register twice (in St Petersburg and in Moscow where we spent 2 weeks each).
• Other stuff – the remaining 6.5% covers local transportation (generally incredibly cheap in Russia), laundry, toiletries, haircuts, etc

What has surprised you most in the last three months of travel?

How friendly and generous Russian people are.

Apart from family and friends, what are you missing most about life in the UK?

Julie – Nice wine drunk from wine glasses – compared to beer (or vodka), wine is pretty expensive in Russia and there isn’t too much choice. On the occasions when we’ve treated ourselves to a bottle, it’s been rare for the kitchen in our accommodation to have wine glasses so mostly we’ve been drinking from tumblers.

Andrew – Definitely my bed. I love roughing it as I was brought up hiking the hills of the Lake District, but there’s nothing like a good night’s sleep at home.

What’s the most memorable sight that you’ve seen in the last three months?

Julie – Church on Spilled Blood in St Petersburg. It was stunning from the outside, but then the interior was just breathtaking as well.

Andrew – It’s so hard to choose just one from the so many wonderful things we’ve seen and done so far, but I’m going to choose something that surprised me.. I’m sure you’ve seen images of St Basils Cathedral on Red Square in Moscow, but to my eyes it looked, well, gaudy. However, my mind was changed the moment I saw it in real life, and I now think it’s spectacular.

Tell us a funny story from the last three months of travel.

It may have been the couple of beers (and the vodka chasers) at our local in St. Petersburg, but on the walk home we passed a girl on a horse who said in perfect English “Would you like a ride on a horse?” we said “no thanks”, to which she replied “horse money please?” – we turned to each other and immediately burst into laughter, while she turned away on her horse, doubting that what she’d said had made sense. Since then it’s been a running joke between us that upon seeing a horse, we say “horse money please!”

Who is the person you’ve met that you remember the most from the last three months?

Julie – On our first day in St Petersburg we met a lady who is now fondly named Mrs Pickle. We went to the market, partly because they’re always an interesting place to look around and partly because we needed some provisions for the next few days. We noticed the line of stalls covered in pickled vegetables and initially hurried past, slightly afraid of the ladies calling out from behind them. But we ventured back and our chosen vendor plied us with samples of practically everything she sold while we made appreciative noises (we hadn’t yet learned one of our favourite Russian words, ‘harosho’ which means good). Eventually we bought a couple of things from her and cheekily asked if we could take her picture, she puffed herself up and posed like a pro!

Andrew – For me, it’s Vlad in Vladimir. We’ve been so fortunate to meet so many generous people, and Vlad was really the first. He tried so hard with so little English (which was still much more than our Russian), and we had such a great time with him and his wife Tonya that we’ll remember fondly forever.

Finally, what have you found to be the greatest challenge so far?

Time, surprisingly! Before we set off, we thought we’d have plenty of time as we weren’t working anymore – time to do a little yoga in the morning, see the odd sunrise and sunset, and spend the day visiting sights, museums, culture and nature. Instead we’ve discovered it takes longer to do things when we don’t know where to look, and when we get there and we don’t speak the language. For example, imagine you’re you’ve just arrived in a foreign city – where’s the supermarket? The bus station? How do you get there from where you’re staying? Researching the sights and activities, and how to actually get there and back is taking longer than we thought it would.