Category: Backpacking

How My Love of Busted Got Me Thinking About Life Choices

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About Busted…. For those of you who aren’t British, Busted are an English pop band, consisting of Matt Willis, James Bourne and Charlie Simpson. Their music graced our ears between 2001 and 2005. They broke up because one member of the band (Charlie) wanted to go focus on his other, rockier band. I was 15 and heartbroken. Everyone has a favourite band, but Busted weren’t just my favourite band, they were my hobby. By this I mean, my evenings were spent on the Busted message board (Username: ***I love James***). I’d buy weekly magazines so I could read interviews and get …

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A Whirlwind Weekend Seeing The Terracotta Warriors

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With just over a month left in China, Mitch and I are pushed for time to visit places. While we take opportunities during the Chinese National Holidays, these weekends are ridiculously busy at the hot-spot tourist places (The Yellow Mountain on New Year’s Day = Very bad idea!). With this is mind, we decided to pick a random weekend to visit the famous Terracotta Warriors in Xi’an. A domestic flight from Hangzhou airport got us there in about two hours. We’ve avidly been trying to avoid air travel while in China (up until Xi’an we’d only taken two domestic flights in …

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Travel Planning, Blogging, and Life Post-China

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I love planning. I love lists, researching and organising, and I love the implementing of said plan. However, with travelling, I’ve come to realise that planning only gets you so far, and then you just have to go with the flow. Mitch and I planned to go to Vietnam together two years ago, but unexpected eye surgery got in the way of that. When we travel, we have vague plans, and that’s what I like. We finish our teaching jobs here in China at the end of June. Naturally, we have begun to talk about our plan for afterwards. We’ll …

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Liebster Award: Bristolian Backpacker

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It’s been about 3 months since I made a domain name for my Bristolian Backpacker blog. So I am excited to say that I have been nominated for a Liebster Award by What Way Today – thanks guys! How does it work? Well, the Liebster award is for newer or less high profile blogs to gain some recognition for their hard work and awesome content. Once you’ve accpeted the award, you then answer 11 questions from the blog who nominated you. Find 11 more people to give the award to, and give them 11 questions. Awesome right? So here are …

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Visiting Guangzhou: What to see and do

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This year, there were many pictures on the internet of Guangzhou during Chinese New Year. As a major transport hub for China, the city was overrun with people trying to get home as a number of trains and planes were delayed due to snow and general bad weather. Luckily, we arrived in Guangzhou after spending Chinese New Year in Hong Kong. The city was much quieter and, thankfully, we had no transport issues. So, what did we do in Guangzhou? The Cathedral of the Sacred Heart Stepping into this courtyard is like stepping into a European city. Apart from all the …

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A day in Suzhou

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Mitch and I have realised that this semester at school in China is going to fly by. As such, we need to make the most out of being here. It’s safe to say we’ve explored Hangzhou a lot (there is still more to see as it’s a big city), but we’ve enjoyed all the main attractions and delights the city has to offer. For our weekend adventures, we now turn to those places we can reach easily on the train or bus, and spend a day and a half or so there on a weekend. Suzhou is one of those …

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