We are Sam and Sarah. An Australian couple in search of new adventures, the road less travelled and delicious food. We have climbed a volcano, lived in a small village in the Rhodopes Mountains in Bulgaria, eaten pigs ears and stood on the most western point of Australia. We have a slight obsession with the different types of red and green men on traffic light crossings and are constantly failing in our attempts to pack light.
We left Australia in mid June 2011 and are currently backpacking for as long as we can afford to eat, sleep, and have fun. Our eight (so far) months on the road have further fueled our desire to see, learn, experience and understand as much as we can and the list of where to next is never ending.
Food Travel Bliss is our travel blog, have a look around and if you see something you like, feel free to leave us a comment.
The blog.
Whilst planning and saving for a year of travel we read some amazing, inspiring, funny and helpful travel blogs. There are so many great stories out there that kept us inspired and spurred us on as we stayed in on a Saturday night to save for our current trip. After reading all these great blogs we decided it looked like fun and wanted to start our own. Plus we like the idea of it being a way to send news back home as well as keep a record of our travels for ourselves, as it so easy to forget some of the things you have done.
Our thoughts on travelling.
“Once the travel bug bites there is no known antidote, and I know that I shall be happily infected until the end of my life.” – Michael Palin
It might be a corny quote but it really does sum up our feelings towards travelling. What is there not to love. No more office job, no uncomfortable stockings, no grumpy early mornings, no routine, no commitments, just the freedom to take it as it comes.
We are travel on a limited budget as we want to continue to travel for as long as we can. Our accommodation is hostels, with people we know or couch surfing, we try and shop locally, travel by public transport, and more recently have started working for our food and accommodation as a different way of experiencing the places we are travelling to.
More about us…
Sam
Whatever I am doing in my life I will always strive to find the time and money to travel. I grew up with a good sense of adventure, having spent a lot of time travelling with my family on weekends and holidays as a kid. My best memories are from the camping trips we would go on through out Western Australia, setting up camp in our old camper trailer anywhere it would fit. Study, work and holidays have taken me to most states in Australia as well as Europe and some parts of Asia. I am a keen snowboarder, even thought I grew up over 2500 kms from the nearest snow, and over the last few years have hit most of the slopes in Australia as well as New Zealand, Japan and Bulgaria.
I also love storytelling. Ask me a simple question and you’ll probably get a half hour explanation with loads of over exaggerated facial expressions, too many wild and unrelated tangents and lot and lots of hand gestures. I enjoy writing my thoughts and our stories down and sharing them with family, friends and anyone else who wants to come along for the ride.
Sarah
When I was a kid I couldn’t wait for family holidays, school excursions or guide camps, whether it was to the beach, country side or the city I craved the sense of adventure in experiencing something new.
Travelling for me is my favourite way to learn, I love immersing myself in the history, culture and of course the culinary delights each new area has to offer, and must admit I turn into a bit of a geek at the prospect of a new museum to explore.
Aside from dreaming about or planning our travels I like to play hockey and netball and am slightly addicted to the Amazing Race. I also enjoy documenting, photographing and sharing some of our more memorable and of course non memorable experiences on the road.
Food, food glorious food.
One of the BEST things about travel is all the fantastic, new, different, delicious, exotic, tasty (and not so tasty) food you get to eat in every new place.
We know the rules around budget travel often dictate things such as;
- take the longer/slower transport option as it is often half the price,
- ferret out the cheap accommodation, even if it is a bit on the cramped side because “you only need to sleep there”,
- wear your clothes again and again, inside out, upside down and back to front until you no longer know what colour they were or what item of clothing they originally were, before you fork out to buy more.
This is fine, but we cannot bring ourselves to eat peanut butter sandwiches three times a day in order to make the buck stretch further if it means we are missing out on the local speciality dish.
Thus we are always on the lookout to try some new, seek out the signature dishes of the area we are in, watch food being prepared traditionally or getting involved in the making. For us it all adds to the ultimate experience of travelling. In saying this we won’t normally seek out the fine dining experiences, our best meals are something that tastes great but costs little.
What about the bliss?
We believe that no amount of planning can create the perfect ‘blissful’ trip. Things won’t ALWAYS go to plan, the unexpected WILL happen, you will MOST LIKELY get lost.
But this doesn’t mean you don’t have to have a great trip. We personally don’t like to plan too much as you never know what might come up along the way and over planning can often lead to heightened expectations and let downs. Taking it as it comes and making it up as we go is often the key to a great trip.
Having said that, while having no plans can have it benefits, being familiar with where you are going doesn’t do any harm. When you know what to expect when you arrive, it can get you a long way to ensuring you have a great time. We are still learning a lot as we travel and if we think something is useful we will probably share it, because you never know, if it helps just one person have a more blissful trip then that is great.
