Well, why not!Thanks to all!

Well, folks, that's it!

Not only are we home, but we've posted the last photo of the trip. The Marrakesh galleries are now complete and Rio de Janeiro has also been uploaded.

Overall – that's camera plus iPhones – we took nearly 2,500 photos. 846 of them made their way on to the website.

If any of you (that's Kathleen and Polly T!) have looked at every one, you deserve an award. Perhaps a signed print of the photo to the right will do?

Interestingly, of the fifteen flights we took to do our circumnavigation, only one was delayed (the last one, bringing us home). None was cancelled or gave us any other problem. We think that's impressive. Well done, airlines!

As some of you may know, Polly had three bank cards and her driving license stolen in Beijing. That was pretty horrible, but apart from requiring a fair amount of time on the phone to bank fraud departments, it didn't give us any problems with the rest of the trip. Unlike our credit cards, the debit cards do not share a card number, so I was able to use mine to make all our payments as well as to draw cash during the rest of the trip. The banks paid for the $20,000+ that was fraudulently spent on the cards and also denied an attempt to spend another $10,000. I guess that the card theft was one reason why we felt less than enamored about Beijing.

Towards the end of the trip it did get a little wearing having to worry about pickpockets or other possible petty crime when we were in crowded places. We also got so used to brushing off offers to "show us the sights" that we definitely walked away from some folk (particularly in Istanbul), who could see that we were unsure of of our route and were genuinely just trying to help. For this reason, I always tried to do the "brush-offs" with a smile, a joke and a thank you.

Thanks again to all of you who followed us on this intermittent blog. We hope you enjoyed some of our photos. If you have any favorites, please let us know.

Best wishes to all!

POLLY's Final Thoughts

What a blast! All been said above except:

Couldn't have been done without help from various people/things:

Thanks to the skill of the pilots/air traffic controllers who got us safely through dark skies at 38,000 feet across Mongolia /Sarawak and the like.

Thanks to all the cleaners/taxi drivers/ housekeeping staff/waiters/waitresses who despite no doubt earning minimum wage, were pleasant  and helpful.

Thanks to my New Balance trainer shoes who walked me many miles in many historic places with not one bruise, blemish or blister.

And thanks to David, who amongst other things, dragged the whole of Copacabana Beach with me looking for a specific yarn shop so I could finish my Mother Bear Project teddy number seven.

So all that remains now is...where to next year?

Some of Polly's 'best of's'

Best airline:  ANA (All Nippon Airlines)

Best Airline food:  Turkish

Best airline staff:  ANA

Best hotel we stayed in:  Park Plaza Beijing

Best hotel staff:  Byzantium Istanbul

Best general food (at our price level):  Rio de Janeiro

Most/least comfortable place to walk around:  Kyoto/Beijing

Place most likely to speak some English:  Kyoto

Best atmosphere:  Marrakech Souk

Most photogenic site:  Fushima Inari, Kyoto

and finally, most memorable item:  Seeing the Cistern behind the restaurant in Istanbul.

David might (of course) have a completely different set.

Dinner music

After a few hours' sleep and important visits to Sweetwater Tavern and Trader Joe's we switched back into photo mode and uploaded two of three Marrakech galleries. These first two are both compilations of shots we took as we explored the Medina – one set by day and one by night. We'll try to upload the third set (of a trip we took to the Ourikah Valley, the heart of Berber country) tomorrow.

Click here to visit the Marrakech galleries.

Best wishes, D+P

This meant that we could doing some final work on the Istanbul photos, which ARE NOW ALL POSTED (yay!). Of course, that still leaves Marrakech and Rio, and we'll get to those. The new Istanbul galleries cover our visits to the Topkapi Palace and the Grand Palace Mosaic Museum, plus a "bonus" set of Istanbul photos that we like, but had no other home. Click here to visit the Istanbul galleries.

So, tomorrow afternoon we fly to Sao Paolo and at midnight tomorrow we catch United flight 860 back home to Washington, having gone all the way round the world!

More soon; best wishes to all, D+P

Cable car ascent to Sugar Loaf Mountain

A beer and some fish on Copacabana beach and we were ready for our ascent of Sugar Loaf. Fortunately in 1912 the first cable car to the top was completed so it was an easy climb. 396 meters high (1,300 feet) brought us up to glorious 360 degree views showing what a beautiful bay Rio is on. We spent some time just absorbing the beauty, sipping Coke and buying the obligatory tee shirts for the grandchildren then finally said goodbye.

The beach in front of our hotel

Ipanema Beach from our hotel

Fingers crossed, I'm feeling quite a bit better today, but we're "taking it easy", which means that I'll catch up on photos and P will catch up on her TripAdvisor duties.

Rio is outrageously expensive, so we picked a hotel out of the really "hot" places (Ipanema, Copacabana). We are at the end of the district called Leblon, next one past Ipanema. That's fine, because it's reasonably quiet and hotel runs a shuttle down to the busy areas and back.

The first photo above is a view of Ipanema from our hotel window and the second is the beach in front of the hotel – not too shabby!

I'm sure we'll go up Sugarloaf and get to see Jesus, but in the meantime, we're taking it easy!

Best wishes, D+P

Well, the Islamic phase of our trip is over: we loved Istanbul and Marrakech was crazy in a scary and lovable kind of way. Internet access has been patchy in both places, so we are behind with posting our photos. With faster Net access we would have uploaded a short video that P took of Jemaa-el-Fna, the main square in the Medina in Marrakech. It reminded Polly of the craziness at the Munich Oktoberfest – but it happens every night in Jemma-el-Fna: market stalls, major food stalls, snake charmers, beggars, hawkers, Berbers in their stunning blue robes, women mainly with their heads covered, some in full burkhas and noise, noise, noise. Anyhow, click here for the video; see if it gives you a feel for the place.

Sorry for the loooong delay, but I'm glad to say that we at last have posted the final set of China photos – those from our visit to the Forbidden City. Click here to view them.

The first of our Istanbul photos are from the wonderful underground world of the Basilica Cistern, which was apparently used in the 1963 James Bond film, From Russia with Love. Our photos are here; we love this set and hope that you agree.

We have noticed a regular pattern in our stops: Day 1 we're generally recovering and wondering where we'll eat in the evening. Day 2 we walk around to get a feel for the new city and generally try to understand how to use the public transport system. Day 3 is when the place starts to make sense and we know how to walk home in the dark from our chosen restaurant. By Day 4, we're feeling like locals and giving advice to (other) tourists. Day 5 is when we're sorry that we didn't get to see everything and we decide that we really like the place (except perhaps Beijing, I'm not sure that we "liked" it).

In about 15 minutes, we'll head out of the lounge to board our 11:25pm flight to Rio de Janeiro ("January Bay", I believe). We get there at 7:25am tomorrow and hope to be collected by a hotel car. This stop is supposed to be where we relax and "recover" from the trip. We'll see :)

Best wishes to all and thanks for following us.

Spots on the sun

Marrakech is...intoxicating. We know that's hardly original, but no other word comes close. It's a shame we can't post smells, sounds, smiles and so on. The square (Jemaa-el-Fna) is enormous and at night is covered with locals and some not so local, all doing "their thing", eating, cooking, dancing, and let's not forget bartering.

Oh, so many photos behind, but please come back for the Marrakech ones especially.

Taking our bags to the Riad HamdaneThe van that collected us certainly wasn't going down these narrow lanes!

The Riad is lovely, although the room is not quite what we've been used to so far. We'll manage.

We are just two or three left and right turns away from Jemaa-el-Fnaa, the main square in Marrakesh. Last night we ventured out to eat and were completed knocked out by the place. I read in one travel guide that whoever named the Barnum and Bailey Circus "The Greatest Show on Earth" clearly hadn't visited Jemma-el-Fnaa at night. I concur!

More from us later, depending on Internet access.

Or click on the the Beijing page to get access to all the China photos so far.

Only The Forbidden City to go now – then we can start on the Istanbul pictures :)

In the lounge at Lisbon AirportLooks like P disapproves of something that I'm doing!

We're currently in the lounge at Lisbon airport, whiling away the 4.5 hours between flights. One of the "features" of this round-the-world award ticket (as we've come to realize) is that you don't get the best routing between your stops. For example, Turkish Airlines no doubt flies direct Beijing to Istanbul, but our routing took us via Seoul, with a few hours layover. Still, it beats paying for the tickets!!

We promise that we're working hard on the photos and should get the rest of the China ones up soon.

Thanks to all of you for following our blog,

D+P

Honey on the comb

The breakfast buffet is basically Turkish, which is fine by us. A great feature is the honey – if you want some, just cut a chunk of comb!

Another nice feature was that towards the end of the afternoon, as we were resting in our room, a knock on the door signaled the arrival of three members of hotel staff holding a birthday cake for Polly, complete with candles and two sparkling sparklers!

A nice, friendly place!

Candlelit dinner in the sky

Many of you will have flown through the night. We flew Turkish Airlines from Seoul to Istanbul and they gave us an electric candle in a tiny paper bag with our dinner so we could have a “candlelight dinner above the clouds”.

To walk the darkened aisles and see these candles flickering while 38,000 feet up over (probably) Mongolia was… a memorable moment.

We're in Istanbul watching the ferries crossing the Bosphorus, and have just had a great day tourist-ing. We'll be catching up shortly.

However, we wanted to let you know that the Beijing Tian'anmen Square photos are now up. Click here to see them.

More later!

Click here to go to the top level of the 2014 Round the World galleries and click away!

Have fun!

P spreading the Birchmere word in Tien' anmen

Our N Virginia friends (and some others) will enjoy this shot of P spreading the good word about the best music hall in the States. We also sent it on a postcard to our friends in the box office at the Birchmere.

Right now, we're in the lounge at Beijing Airport, waiting for our delayed flight to Seoul. Luckily, we have so long to wait at Seoul before our flight leaves for Istanbul, that an hour or two delay here doesn't matter!

In fact, it gives me time to get some of our Beijing photos posted, so I'd better get to it.

P&D on the Great Wall

We had a fabulous day visiting the Heavenly Way, leading up to the Ming Tombs, and then walking part of the Great Wall of China at Mutianyu, about 70 km (44 miles) north-east of Central Beijing. As you can see, the weather was wonderful! Pictures to follow.

Security was just about as tight as we've ever seen but that was, we decided, reassuring. The square is the largest paved area in the world but with literally thousands of people there it didn't appear quite as impressive as we'd hoped. Mao's Mausoleum was closed so we couldn't buy the traditional flower to throw on his tomb. We then crossed into The Forbidden City, got tickets to climb Meridian Gate and along with thousands of others made our way up into the City. By this time we'd had just about enough and I'm afraid two cold beers held more attraction than yet more antiquity. Tomorrow, The Big One...The Great Wall of China! Pictures soon.

As an extra I thought I'd post a snapshot of our impression of the Chinese people and rule-obeying. They just don't. "No Photographs" means get your cameras out and as for crossing when the little green man is illuminated, twice we came within a hair's breadth of being flattened. You learn pretty quickly.

David @ Tien'anmen Square

Have fun!

D+P

Beijing Air Quality Index...above 301 is hazardous!

Interestingly, both Facebook and Google seemed to be blocked on the hotel Internet. I think we can get to both of them on our phones when not on wifi (just using data roaming).

Just out for a gentle wander today. We'll be booking a coach trip to the Great Wall for Monday, our wedding anniversary :)

Ground crew and policeman waving goodbye.

...and it is as hazy as the newspapers say. Apparently, yesterday was worse! Had a certain amount of fun trying to tell a taxi driver which hotel we wanted. She spoke no English and we didn't initially have a Chinese version of the address. Google came to the rescue. Checked into the hotel and let them talk us into upgrading to a suite. Very nice for six days :)

The photo shows two ground crew and a policeman waving goodbye to our plane as we taxied from the gate at Incheon Airport, Korea. After waving for 30 seconds or so, they all bowed. This also happened when we took off from Tokyo and Osaka airports in Japan. What a great gesture!

Finally, we have just posted another set of pictures from Kyoto, when we visited Ginkakuji and Nazenji temples. You'll find them here.

Off to Happy Hour!

Stargate Hotel, Rinku Town, OsakaOur airport hotel before we fly on October 9th.

Watched the total eclipse of the moon, while eating a beautifully prepared Chinese meal.

Early to bed, because it's off to Beijing tomorrow, via Seoul.

​If all goes well, we should land at Beijing Airport at 2:30pm and, perhaps, get to our hotel about 4 to 4:30.

More later!

A collection of happy memories but what stands out at present in my mind is the genuine friendliness of the Japanese people that we met. Even though the only word we had was "arigato" (thank you) just about everyone had at least a smattering of English and those that didn't were more than willing to mime. Helpful to a fault, one lady even went about half a mile out of her way to make sure we got to the shop we were looking for. A Plasma Physics Professor took us to his favorite bridge and a young local restaurant owner spent time miming what he would cook for us then sent us on our way with six saki cups.

Chic middle aged ladies, outrageous teenage fashion and easy-to-use public transport. Love miso soup (it comes in so many savors...sorry Polly T!) but had enough of noodles for a while.

Yesterday we had a shrine walk (a bit like visiting English country churches I suppose) and the photos will be up soon but here's a couple to be going on with:

Jojakko-ji TempleOur favorite temple grounds. Adashino Nenbutsu-ji TempleOver 8,000 gravestones relocated here from around Adashino about 100 years ago.

Prisoner in cellMelbourne Old Gaol

Polly's Impressions of Melbourne.

Young girls don't wear much make-up.

Youngsters offer their seat on trams.

Lots of outdoor smoking.

Teeth remain unbleached.

Skirts and jeans are as tight as can be.

Fierce wind through the streets.

Lots of smiles.

Kyoto Weather...according to weather.com

We'll be leaving our Melbourne Hotel in about an hour to catch our flight to Kyoto, with a change at Bangkok. Another marathon (18 hours), but only one hour of time shift, which should help.

As you can see from the forecast on the right here, the weather really doesn't look good for Kyoto. That's a pity because we were both looking forward to working the camera really hard!

I'm sure there will be more photos tomorrow, then on to...Kyoto (via Bangkok once again).

Comment, if you feel like doing so. Best wishes from both of us!

We were completely knocked out by the power, authenticity and frankness of the exhibition. Here are some links to more information;

http://museumvictoria.com.au/bunjilaka/visiting/first-peoples/

http://museumvictoria.com.au/about/mv-blog/aug-2013/bunjils-wings/

http://www.eness.com/?r=Project&p=40

http://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/creators/kinetic-sculpture-brings-melbourne-creator-to-life

Tokyo airport and the ground engineers had finished servicing the plane. As we taxied to the runway I saw all four of them in a formal line with yellow gloves on waving us goodbye. I really felt they had taken a personal interest in us.

CityscapeMelbourne cityscape from the South Bank of the Yarra River.

Flinder's Street Stationat Melbourne's Federation Square

Teenage terror suspect 'shot dead after stabbing two police officers' in Melbourne

Photo Sep 24, 9 55 55 AM

We stayed at the airport Hilton, slept well, with some "assistance", and are now back at the airport for a looong day: a 6-hour flight to Bangkok, 8-hour layover and 9-hour flight to Melbourne. It's Thai Airlines today and we have high expectations!

More later.....

It shows our route, including the layovers, which vary in length from 2 to 7.5 hours. Our six major stops are shown in blue below. We have at least five nights in each of them.

IAD (Washington) to NRT (Tokyo) – just an overnight stop because we couldn't get a better routing.

NRT – BKK (Bangkok) – MEL (Melbourne) for our first stop, staying with cousins, Jyl and Steve.

MEL – BKK – KIX (Osaka Kinsai) for our stay in Kyoto.

KIX – ICN (Seoul) – PEK (Beijing)

PEK – ICN – IST (Istanbul)

IST – LIS (Lisbon) – RAK (Marrakesh)

RAK – LIS – GIG (Rio de Janiero) for a rest :)

GIG – GRU (Sao Paolo) – IAD (home!!)