Itinerary - From Hawaii!

Well, our trip has begun... Aloha from Hawaii!

Our final itinerary looks like this (in this order):

USA - Hawaii
Japan - Tokyo
Thailand - Bangkok, Chiang Mai
Turkey - Istanbul, Selcuk/Ephesus
Italy - Rome, Florence, Venice
Slovenia - Ljubljana
Croatia - Zagreb, Rijeka, Split, Dubrovnik
France - Paris
Morocco - Marrakech, Fes
Spain - Madrid, Barcelona, Sevilla
Mexico - Cancun

Meanwhile, as dedicated followers may recall, our posting this from Hawaii means that Melissa won and we went to Hawaii. (As one insightful commenter suggested, "Happy wife, happy life." Turns out Hawaii, and specifically Maui, has made the wife AND the husband happy.) We've spent about five hours snorkeling over the past two days (pictures to be posted after the trip), we've been to an awesome luau, and we've had some really great food (and drinks!). Neither of us had been snorkeling before - or, if we had been snorkeling, it didn't compare to the extent that we forgot we had been snorkeling - and it's crazy. We've seen hundreds of fish (including Melissa's favorite, starfish) and about five or six really big turtles. In fact, Trevor got a little too close to one of the turtles and it chased him all the way out of a reef!

For the remainder of our Hawaii leg, we have scheduled a helicopter tour of Hana and Haleakala (recall that Groupon is on the hook for three "excursions" at its expense - that's one of them), and we might do an amateur scuba diving trip, too. We'll also have to save some time to do laundry (lame!) before we go to Japan (not lame!).

We are staying in the Kihei / Wailea area - is there anything else that should be on our to-do list in the next couple days? Shaved ice, maybe? Let us know in the comments!

Tentative Plan

We're back!  It's been a good long while since our last post, and for that we apologize -- we're trying to plan a wedding, too, and we both work full-time.  BUT, we've also made a lot of progress.  We've decided which way we're going, and we have a tentative list of places to visit!

East or West?

One of the restrictions on our trip – pretty standard, we think, for round-the-world travel – is that travel must continue in one direction for the duration of the trip.  As we explained previously, that likely isn’t a burden.  But it does raise an interesting question: should we go East or West?

As best we can figure, each option has advantages and disadvantages.  We’ve brainstormed a bit and shared our results below, but if you have any additional insight, please share it with us in the comments!

To Lei or Not to Lei?

We’ve been driving a lot lately (Santa Fe to Chicago, then Chicago to Cleveland, recently back to Chicago, and eventually back to Santa Fe), which has given us a lot of time to discuss our first big issue for the honeymoon adventure: whether to visit Hawaii.  We have discussed this at some length, and thought it would be good to get some outside input on the idea, as well.

We both agree that it would be ideal to spend some time on (or at least near) a beach, immediately after our wedding, to decompress, relax, and generally prepare for adventures to come.  Where we disagree, though, is on which beach(es) to do said relaxing.  Melissa is of the opinion that Hawaii could be an awesome place to visit, and Trevor – though he’s coming around – is inclined to disagree.

The Rules

We thought it might be helpful to discuss some of the rules and limitations surrounding our pending adventure.  You can view the complete Terms and Conditions at Groupon’s site, and we will highlight those we think are important here.  (If you think we have undervalued any of those terms or conditions, please tell us in the comments!)

First Post!

Hello, and welcome to our blog!

We recently snagged one of only three available Groupons for round-the-world airfare packages, and we thought this would be the best medium through which we could keep friends and family informed about where we are, where we've been, and what we're doing.

We just bought the Groupon a couple weeks ago, so we're very much in the planning phase... we're thinking about where we should go, what we should do, and so on.  We have some plans in the works -- for example, we've talked about going west and hitting Hawaii, Japan, China, Thailand, India, Italy, France, and Spain along the way -- but there are lots of possibilities!  Is Hawaii worth it when you can go anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere?  Does it make more sense to go east or west?  Given that Melissa has traveled in Europe and both Trevor and Melissa have traveled in Central America, should we visit the "most foreign" places first or last?  Are there any cities or countries we absolutely must visit?  We would love to hear your input -- please feel free to comment on this post.

In the meantime, thanks for stopping by, and be sure to check back for updates as we continue to develop our plans.

Cheers,

Trevor and Melissa

Update (12/21 @ 11:57a): We're getting married in September 2012, and will be using the Groupon for our honeymoon.  So, we're looking at maybe eight to ten weeks' worth of travel, from roughly mid-September through mid-November, depending on our schedules with pending work, etc.