Yes, I am still alive

I appologize for the lack of blogs.
To give a quick update, Gili Air (the island we stayed on near Bali) was fantastic. The water was crystal clear and the diving/snorkeling was great. We saw 2 sea turtles just snorkeling from the beach! The traveling to Australia was a bit rough, Jarryd's bag got lost, but he eventually got it back (2 days later). Cairns is a lot of fun, we've been going out with everyone from the hostel to the bars and for dinners (everything is so expensive coming from S.E. Asia!). You can't swim in the ocean because of all the crocs and jellies, but there is a massive salt water pool called the Lagoon. We went out for 2 dive on the barrier reef yesterday, they were pretty good, especially considering I saw a white tip and a massive reef shark on the first dive. It cost extra to have a dive master, so we just dove by ourselves. We managed to keep our bearings and not end up in an "Open Water" situation. The lunch was amazing, I ate a massive quantity of Lasagna.
I just booked a trip down to brisbane, stopping for a few crazy activities on the way. It wasn't possible initially because of Easter, but I managed to book it directly just in time! Jarryd wasn't with me so I had to pay for him as well, quite an expensive booking (at least I get the points!).

All Set!

I just finished a confusing search through airline websites and managed to book our flights to Cairns from Bali. For some reason, I had to do a manual connection, booking to Darwin first and then to Cairns. I got the flights for $214 each, which is a bargain compared to the "official" options I was initially given.
I'm sitting in Nha Trang, we had 2 great dives yesterday with plenty of sea life I've never seen before. We were going to to go Hanoi from here, but it's a 2 day bus trip, so we've decided to go halfway, to Hoi An, for at least a day. Hopefully they havenight dives, 'cause they don't have them here. We found China Beach, as suggested by Jarryd's parents, and it's close to Hoi An, so we'll probably beheading there.
After Hoi An we need to get to Hanoi so we can be at Halong Bay, a must see of Vietnam. We fly back to BKK on the 15th, so we need to be hasty. We'll have 13 days in Thailand to revisit the temple and do dives off the islands before heading to Bali from Kuala Lampur for 7 days. Then we arrive in Darwin at 2am and fly to Cairns at 5am. It's a little rough, but I just want to get to australia so that we can enjoy it.
I am deeply sorry for not posting more, but I've been keeping up on my journal and will make it available as soon as I get back so everyone can read it. I posted pictures on Facebook, check them out if you haven't already.

I hope everyone is well and I am very glad to see that Pitt beat #1 UConn twice!

The end of Tigers

So we have left the Tiger Temple. It is quite sad, so I'm trying not to think about it. We have a boat party tonight with all the staff from the Temple, so it should be a blast! Jarryd and I leave for Cambodia at 5:15am, so that should be interesting. I'm sorry for not putting up any pictures yet, I promise I will, but I have several hundred to sort through first.
This is the beginning of the crazy leg of our trip, so we'll see how everything goes! All is well and Jarryd and I are excited to get traveling again.
Cheers, and enjoy your freezing weather, it's starting to get damn hot over here!

Tiger Temple

Sorry again for the blogging drought. We have been at the Tiger temple for a while and we are having a ball! The people are a lot of fun and it is much more lax than we expected. We get a day off every week and go out for drinks on Tuesdays for a "staff meeting."

A typical day is waking up at 7am and walking the 4 month old cubs (who can be very stubborn) to the temple. A few tourists arrive and feed the 4 months and then the 6 week old cubs show up and get fed as well. The monks say their prayer and then we have breakfast. It really is just early lunch w/ all kinds of different food. We walk the cubs back and then do whatever needs doing. I've done painting, burning hay, making toys, deboning chicken, taking out the trash, all kinds of stuff. Then we get a break from 11 to 12. The tourists start arriving and we are assigned to either the canyon, the 4 month cubs, or the baby cub feeding. Each has it's positives and negatives, but basically the hardest part is dealing with asshole tourists who can be dumb and won't listen. We keep our camera's on us at all times, just in case, and can be smothered in 4 baby tiger cubs whenever we want. At around 4:30 we close and the tourists leave. We feed the eagle and the leopard cat and then eat dinner from thai wisdom, which someone picks up. After that it's free time and we chat, watch movies, or do whatever we want.

We are thoroughly enjoying ourselves and I'm glad this internet is working for now. We even have a hot shower here, a rare luxury. I got a free mattress and fan as well, the lucky first volunteer. Tomorrow someone else gets the same.

Anyway, I will do my best to post some photos soon, it's getting late so I'm off to bed.

Calcutta

So we survived our 38 hr train ride. It really wasn't too bad, we arrived in Calcutta at 10:35pm. We took a taxi as were joined by Simon, a guy that was in our car. We decided to find a place to stay together, our first stop was Hotel Maria. As fate would have it, there were only 2 beds left. We flipped a coin and unfortunately Simon won. We left and were picked up by an older man. He took us to another guest house with a decent room for 450 a night. We watched bits of movies and went to sleep only to be woken by an orchestra of noise in the morning. There was construction going on and lots of people. We both cleaned up and are now out getting ready for the Tiger Temple. I will mkae a better effort to write a detailed entry about India when I'm not paying for the internet, which will be after we settle at the temple (there's a restaurant with free internet). I'll try to keep everyone in the know and hope everyone's well.

Goa Chillin

So I'm not even sure how long we've been in Goa, but it's been great. Yesterday we did nothing, and I read the entire book Q&A (basis for Slumdog Millionaire) by nightfall. Our 2 friends for England, Toby and Ewan, have gone back home. Hopefully Maria will meet us up before we leave on Tuesday morning for Calcutta.
We have our train ticket, got money drawn, and we're ready to go. But not before a few more days of this gorgeous beach. I apologize for the lack of pictures being posted (I have taken 574 so far), I will do my best to put some up before we leave for Thailand.

I hope this finds all of you well and I will keep you posted.

Goa

So we've been in Goa for a while and we'll be staying here as long as possible. The beach is gorgeous, we watch dolphins come out of the water from the shore, and we meet new people everyday. The hut we're staying in is 300R's a night, quite a steal.
Anyway, we are currently booking our tickets to Calcutta and then flying to Bangkok. Just got our info for the Tiger Temple, should be interesting. I'm pissed that the Eagles lost, but oh well.
I learned how to ride a scooter today, initially they wouldn't give me one because I didn't know what I was doing. Everything's fine now, just going to relax like crazy for another week and then off to the temple!