![[IMAGE]](general/images/tallinn_and_eger_to_auckland_shortest_path.png "Shortest path connecting Auckland to Eger or Tallinn.")
The total number of days spent in each country.
1 48 Brazil
2 27 Ecuador
3 25 Thailand
4 25 Peru
5 23 Vietnam
6 21 Tanzania
7 18 Indonesia
8 17 India
9 17 Argentina
10 15 Kenya
11 15 Chile
12 14 China
13 13 Zambia
14 13 Bolivia
15 12 Namibia
16 11 Laos
17 11 Cambodia
18 10 French Polynesia, France
19 9 Papua New Guinea
20 9 Hong Kong
21 9 Australia
22 8 South Africa
23 7 Uganda
24 5 New Zealand
25 5 Malawi
26 5 Botswana
27 4 Rapa Nui, Chile
28 4 Malaysia
29 3 Rwanda
30 3 Macau
31 2 United Kingdom
Additional countries that we visited only shortly (and except for Finland, not formally crossing their borders):
[BUG: TODO]
| Name | Countries | Coords | When? | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ... | ||||
| Kazungula | Zambia–Botswana | Wikipedia: Quadripoint:
|
||
| ... | ||||
| Three countries: Tabatinga (Brazil) / Leticia (Columbia) / Santa Rosa (Peru). | Brazil–Peru | |||
| ... | Bolivia–Chile | High in the mountains. | ||
| ... | ||||
| ... | Argentina–Chile | |||
| ... | Chile–Argentina | |||
| ... |
| Altitude | Where? | When? | How? | Who? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6014m (measured with GPS) | Almost at the top (1h to go, according to the guide), Huayna Potosi (6088m) | 2010-02-20 | walk | both |
| 5895m (Wikipedia) | Uhuru peak, Kilimanjaro | 2009-07-20 | walk | both |
| 5822m (Wikipedia) | El Misti | 2010-02-07 | walk | Csilla only |
| 4909m (measured with GPS) | Sol de Mañana | 2010-02-26 | car | both |
| 4910m (GPS: 4836m ?) | Mirador de los Andes, Patapampa | 2010-02-03 | car | both |
| 4650m ? (measured with GPS) | Almost at the top, Pichincha Rucu (4700m ?) | 2010-01-01 | walk | both |
| 4536m (measured with GPS) | El Misti basecamp | 2010-02-06 | walk | Kaarel only |
The equator crossings are given as a triples in the form (Longitude, Elevation, Timestamp). Note that in the case of flights the altitude information is unreliable.
# Flight: Cairo -> Nairobi 36.775901 1539.619 2009-07-13T00:22:52Z # AA Truck: Bantu Lodge -> Umoja camp, Kenya 37.070619 1988.169 2009-07-25T06:38:26Z # AA Truck: Umoja -> Thomson Falls, Kenya 37.042113 1945.799 2009-07-27T10:15:59Z 36.501082 2261.071 2009-07-27T13:00:26Z # AA Truck: Around Nakuru, Kenya 36.231144 2033.235 2009-07-28T05:24:33Z # AA Truck: Kenya -> Uganda 35.852145 1760.983 2009-07-29T05:09:43Z 35.697825 2301.435 2009-07-29T05:52:43Z 35.534641 2771.772 2009-07-29T06:30:03Z # AA Truck: Jinja -> Kampala -> Mbarara (Uganda) 30.651392 1428.060 2009-08-01T16:25:34Z # Equator monument in Uganda 32.039871 1176.528 2009-08-06T08:00:24Z 32.039972 1175.207 2009-08-06T08:01:51Z 32.039986 1175.495 2009-08-06T08:02:06Z 32.039990 1175.064 2009-08-06T08:02:21Z 32.039993 1175.828 2009-08-06T08:02:46Z 32.039755 1175.391 2009-08-06T08:04:34Z 32.039969 1175.973 2009-08-06T08:04:59Z 32.039884 1177.227 2009-08-06T08:19:28Z 32.040137 1186.719 2009-08-06T08:23:51Z # AA Truck: To Nakuru (Kenya) 35.534993 2800.027 2009-08-09T07:05:15Z 35.698171 2342.896 2009-08-09T07:31:18Z 35.852523 1781.007 2009-08-09T07:55:45Z # [BUG: error?] 24.788034 -125.880 2009-10-31T12:12:04Z # Flight: London -> São Paulo -46.489572 649.213 2009-11-14T10:50:52Z # Mitad del Mundo -78.454228 2508.405 2009-12-31T17:42:37Z -78.454065 2515.751 2009-12-31T18:59:06Z -78.454227 2488.959 2009-12-31T20:23:29Z -78.454033 2488.680 2009-12-31T20:26:11Z # Bus: Quito -> Otavalo -78.307355 2416.353 2010-01-02T15:16:41Z # Bus: Otavalo -> Quito -78.307345 2476.868 2010-01-03T16:33:49Z # Flight: Surabaya -> Batam (Indonesia) 105.527336 2049.090 2010-05-24T02:55:15Z
[BUG: TODO: plot also on Google Maps]
[BUG: add the exact lon/lat points where the distance is the largest]
[BUG: explain: why is Eger further away?]
Visited volcanoes with a clearly distinct crater. In parentheses: what was inside the crater.
[BUG: Check for completeness]
The above includes only the sites listed in September 2010, later some additional visited sites have been added to the list (e.g. Lake Nakuru, Kenya). See also the full World Heritage List.
... which are taller than 11m. Based on Wikipedia: List of statues by height.
[BUG: Check for completeness]
| Statue | Height (m) | Country | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reclining Buddha at Wat Chayamangkalaram | 54.864 | Malaysia | (Not included in the Wikipedia list.) |
| Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho | 46 | Thailand | (Not included in the Wikipedia list.) |
| Virgen de El Panecillo | 30 | Ecuador | Observed from downtown Quito |
| Cristo Redentor do Corcovado | 30 | Brazil | |
| Bronze Guan Yin of Kek Lok Si Temple | 30 | Malaysia | Was under renovation |
| Kun lam statue | 20 | Macau | Closed for the night when we visited it, so couldn't go closer than 10 meters. The firework competition was going on at the same time. |
| Phutthamonthon Buddha | 15.875 | Thailand | The platform was so hot from the sun that it was impossible to walk on it barefoot (but one had to take off shoes as usual). |
During the 408 nights of the trip, we have stayed in 214 different accommodations.
Frequency ranking of the types of accommodation:
156 dbl+b
75 dbl-b
73 tent
26 dorm
19 bus
16 bungalow
7 hammock/boat
5 sng+b
5 plane
5 dbl+b/boat
4 train
4 mat/boat
3 hammock/shelter
3 dbl-b/boat
2 village
2 roof/dbl+b/boat
1 sng-b
1 hammock/beach
1 couch
8 dbl+b, TST Kowloon Guesthouse, Kowloon, Hong Kong
7 dbl+b, Volga, Ahmedabad, India
7 dbl+b, Happy House, Bangkok, Thailand
6 dbl+b, Transilvania, Baños, Ecuador
6 dbl+b, Ta Som, Siem Reap, Cambodia
6 dbl-b, Las Palmeras, Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
6 dbl-b, Flowering House Hostel, Beijing, China
5 tent, Grotto camp, Livingstone, Zambia
4 tent, Cabañas Chez Cecilia, Hanga Roa, Rapa Nui
4 mat/boat, N/M Sagrado Coração de Jesus, Amazonas, Brazil
10 dbl+b, Happy House, Bangkok, Thailand
8 dbl+b, TST Kowloon Guesthouse, Kowloon, Hong Kong
8 dbl-b, Flowering House Hostel, Beijing, China
7 dbl+b, Volga, Ahmedabad, India
6 dbl+b, Transilvania, Baños, Ecuador
6 dbl+b, Ta Som, Siem Reap, Cambodia
6 dbl-b, Las Palmeras, Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
5 tent, Grotto camp, Livingstone, Zambia
5 sng+b, Golden House, Chiang Mai, Thailand
5 dbl-b, Caravella, Cairns, Australia
Prices are given for a group of two people.
The Kumul Lodge and the Magic Mountain Lodge (both close to Mount Hagen, Papua New Guinea) were probably more than 40 USD per night, but the exact price is unknown as the PNG tour was paid as one package.
Note that some Indian hotels have a 24h check-out policy, i.e. the check-out time depends on the check-in time, specifically: the time of check-out cannot be later than 24h after check-in.
| Itinerary | Date | Airline | RTW? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Budapest → Cairo | 2009-07-12 | Egyptian Airlines | |
| Cairo → Nairobi | 2009-07-13 | Egyptian Airlines | |
| Cape Town → Johannesburg → Istanbul | 2009-10-09 | Turkish Airlines | |
| Istanbul → Budapest | 2009-10-10 | Turkish Airlines | |
| London → São Paulo | 2009-11-13 | British Airways | ✔ |
| Iquitos → Lima | 2009-12-26 | Peruvian Airlines | |
| Guayaquil → Baltra, Galapagos | 2010-01-16 | AeroGal | |
| Baltra, Galapagos → Guayaquil | 2010-01-22 | AeroGal | |
| Nazca → Nazca | 2010-01-29 | Aero Condor | |
| Ushuaia → Rio Gallegos → Buenos Aires | 2010-03-20 | Aerolineas Argentinas | |
| São Paulo → Santiago | 2010-04-07 | LAN | ✔ |
| Santiago → Rapa Nui | 2010-04-07 | LAN | ✔ |
| Rapa Nui → Papeete | 2010-04-11 | LAN | ✔ |
| Papeete → Auckland | 2010-04-21 | Air Tahiti Nui | |
| Auckland → Sydney | 2010-04-26 | Qantas | ✔ |
| Sydney → Cairns | 2010-04-30 | Qantas | ✔ |
| Cairns → Port Moresby | 2010-05-01 | Air Niugini | |
| Port Moresby → Mount Hagen | 2010-05-02 | Air Niugini | |
| Madang → Port Moresby | 2010-05-10 | Air Niugini | |
| Port Moresby → Cairns | 2010-05-10 | Air Niugini | |
| Cairns → Sydney | 2010-05-14 | Qantas | ✔ |
| Sydney → Jakarta | 2010-05-14 | Qantas | ✔ |
| Surabaya → Batam → Medan | 2010-05-24 | Lion Airlines | |
| Bangkok → Mumbai | 2010-08-15 | Cathay Pacific | ✔ |
| Mumbai → Hong Kong | 2010-09-01 | Cathay Pacific | ✔ |
| Hong Kong → Beijing | 2010-09-12 | Dragonair | ✔ |
| Beijing → Helsinki | 2010-09-26 | Finnair | ✔ |
[BUG: add some info about the earned miles and how much free flights they amount to.]
To compare, cost per person per day in USD according to Lonely Planet (South America, Mar 2010; Indonesia, 2007):
| Country | Cost |
|---|---|
| Brazil | 45–50 |
| Chile | 40–50 |
| Argentina | 35–45 |
| Indonesia | ~40 |
| Peru | 20–30 |
| Ecuador | 20–25 |
| Bolivia | 15–25 |
where the person is traveling together with another person mainly by buses and sleeping in dorms, with an occasional expensive activity.
Average spending by country per day per 2 persons in USD. In parentheses is the number of days for which the spending data was recorded. For the South American, Oceanian and Asian countries this is (almost) always equal to the number of days spent in the respective country. For the African countries the data is very sparse, only RSA was completely recorded. In total the spending data exists for 350 days.
396.35 Papua New Guinea (9) 174.24 French Polynesia, France (10) 143.96 Chile (15) 123.53 Ecuador (27) 122.51 Brazil (46) 111.61 Argentina (17) 110.41 Australia (9) 90.70 New Zealand (5) 83.59 China (14) 81.96 Macau (3) 77.13 Hong Kong (9) 74.43 Peru (25) 71.28 Indonesia (18) 69.35 United Kingdom (1) 63.87 Rapa Nui, Chile (4) 61.76 Laos (11) 58.18 Bolivia (13) 55.70 South Africa (8) 53.02 Thailand (25) 49.68 India (17) 46.08 Zambia (6) 44.18 Cambodia (11) 43.02 Vietnam (23) 35.85 Malawi (1) 34.81 Malaysia (4) 34.08 Kenya (1) 32.54 Namibia (9) 18.75 Tanzania (8) 16.59 Botswana (1)
GDP per capita of the visited countries. (Click on the image to see an interactive chart.)
Note that otherwise cheap countries like Ecuador appear at the top of the list because some expensive activities (e.g. visit to the Galapagos Islands) were done in these countries. Rapa Nui which is quite expensive appears as cheap because we slept in a tent and ate only supermarket food.
For the African countries the spending does not include two daily meals, accommodation, and most activities as for the most part we traveled by pre-paid overlanding.
List of places where there was snow:
List of 395 wifi networks that we connected to during the trip.
The most we actually paid for the internet was in Tahiti for the ManaSpot access.
[BUG: complete]
![[IMAGE]](general/images/P1370852.JPG "[BUG: replace this picture with a picture of all the 4 bags]")
We carry two large backpacks (70l + 80?l) and two small backpacks (day packs). The following table lists the weights of our large bags before some of the longer flights (which mark the end/beginning a subsection of the trip).
| Date | Weights K's + Cs's check-in luggage | Flight | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010-04-07 | 12.8 + 17.6 = 30.4 kg | São Paulo → Santiago | The day before got rid of 4.7kg by posting it to Europe |
| 2010-05-14 | 36 kg | Cairns → Sydney | + 7 + 7 = 50 kg together with the small bags |
| 2010-08-15 | 29.5 kg | Bangkok → Mumbai | + 6.5 + 6.4 = 42.4 kg together with the small bags. The day before got rid of 8kg of stuff by posting it to Europe and ~5kg of books by selling them. So our bags' weight used to be ~55kg before (probably the maximum during the trip). |
| 2010-09-13 | 31.6 kg | Hong Kong → Beijing | + 6.6 + 7.7 = 45.9 kg together with the small bags. |
| 2010-09-26 | 15.5 + 19.8 = 35.3 kg | Beijing → Helsinki | + 7.1 + 6.9 + 1.2 = 50.5 kg together with the small bags and a gift bag. |
Listed in temporal order. Not counting socks, handkerchiefs, underwear, toothbrushes, etc.
| Item | Where/when? | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| K's T-shirt | Lake Naivasha | Got lost in laundry |
| Cs's head torch | Malawi | Disappeared |
| K's flip-flops | Lilongwe | Broke |
| K's fork-spoon | Somewhere in Africa | Broke in contact with hot water |
| K's sun hat | Tefe | Probably, blown into the river from the motorboat. |
| K's shorts | Tabatinga | Bought new shorts. Threw old away because were worn out. |
| Cs's sun hat "Uluru" (with mosquito net) | Iquitos | Got lost in laundry. |
| K's flip-flops | before Nazca | Broke? |
| 2GB SD disk | Laguna Colorada, Bolivia | Some of the photos cannot be read back anymore. Lost about 10 photos of the borax-field next to the lake. |
| Water bottle "Swiss Rowing Federation" | Chile? | |
| Cs's long trousers | Chile? | |
| Lighter | [BUG] | [BUG] |
| Foldable eating bowl (made of rubber) | Torres del Paine, Chile | Partly eaten by mice. Still usable, but mainly for solid food because has large holes on the sides. |
| K's flip-flops | Rapa Nui | Went swimming wearing the flip-flops because the bottom of the sea was covered with sharp volcanic rock. Wave pushed me over and flip-flops came off and disappeared. |
| K's flip-flops | Madang | The flip-flops bought one week earlier in Parramatta for 2 AUD broke while visiting the Madang market. Immediately bought new ones at a nearby shop for about 5 Kina. |
| Laptop cable/charger | Goroka | The charger (or the cable?) had been unstable already since the Amazonas, taking it ever longer and longer to find a position in which it would charge. In Goroka it wouldn't charge at all anymore. Bought a new cable in Cairns. |
| K's flip-flops | Bangkok | Broke |
| Cs's PIN-calculator | ? | Stopped working |
| K's "Panama" hat | Bus from Vieng Phoukha to Houayxay, Laos | Forgot in the bus. Was very broken anyway. |
| K's sun hat | Somewhere in Phonsavan, Laos | Disappeared |
| K's T-shirt "Adidas" | Probably Sihanoukville | Probably got lost in the laundry. |
| K's white long sleeved shirt | Probably Sihanoukville | Probably got lost in the laundry. |
| K's light Fjällräven hiking pants | Broke in Bukit Lawang, threw away in Bangkok (2010-08-13) | Pocket broke in Australia, but sewed it back together in PNG. In Indonesia developed a long cut on the back. A tailor in Georgetown said that it's not worth repairing them. |
| K's hammock | Bangkok 2010-08-14 | Threw away because was too heavy (300g) and took too much space. Bought in Belem for the Amazonas river trip. |
| Half-full bottle of sunblocker | Bangkok Airport | Confiscated by Airport security |
| K's wool hat | ? | Disappeared |
| Lighter (bought before Torres del Paine) | Beijing Airport | Was in a carry-on bag because we thought that it shouldn't be packed into the check in bag. Confiscated by Airport security |
| Garmin GPSmap 60CSx | 2010-09-26 | The on/off-button does not work. This button is necessary for turning the device on (to turn it off one can just remove the batteries). Since Amazonas the button has been slowly deteriorating. One needed a pen or a toothpick and several tries to get it working. On the last day, after the plane took off from the Beijing Airport spent 15 minutes trying to turn it on before giving up. A few hours later tried again, and then succeeded. It's annoying that a complex device which otherwise works perfectly cannot be used because of the on/off button. |
Not counting shorter diarrhea, mild running nose and sore throat.
| Who? | What? | Where/When? | Duration | Treatment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Csilla | Sand in the eye | Maun, Botswana | 1 day | Saw doctor |
| Kaarel | Diarrhea | Amazonas | On and off for most of the river trip | Carbon pills didn't help, eventually took antibiotics |
| Kaarel | Tonsillitis | Baños | 5 days | Saw doctor; took antibiotics |
| Csilla | Flu, 39C fever | Puno | 3 days | Saw doctor; took antibiotics |
| Kaarel | Mild cold | Cairns (2010-05-11) | 2 days | Coldrex |
| Kaarel | Mild cold | Muine | 2 days | Coldrex |
| Csilla | Superficial bite by a stray dog | Mumbai | Saw doctor; Rabipur booster: day 0 + day 3 | |
| Kaarel | Flu, 38C fever | Ahmedabad | 4 days | Saw doctor; Paracetamol |
| Csilla | Flu, 39C fever | Ahmedabad | 7 days | Saw doctor; Paracetamol, antibiotics 5 days, antiviral 5 days |
Estonians met:
2 in Sihanoukville, Cambodia.
Hungarians met:
2 in Arusha, Tanzania; 2 in Mendoza, Argentina; 3 in Auckland, New Zealand; 2 in Sydney, Australia; 2 in Georgetown, Malaysia; 1 in bus: Sihanoukville → Phnom Penh, Cambodia; 2 at the Great Wall, Badaling, China; a group of ~10 tourists at the Terracotta Army site, close to Xi'an, China.
Number of free (i.e. completely empty) pages in:
We both started the South America leg with a completely empty passport. In all the countries that we visited from then on, the visa regulations for Hungarians and Estonians were the same, with the exception of Brazil. For some unknown reason Estonians need (still in mid 2011) a visa to enter Brazil. The Brazilian authorities think that it's optimal to stamp 2-page visa stickers, half-a-page entry/exit stamps, and half-a-page denial-of-entry stamps in people's passports.