The Grand Finale

Australia is booting us out, Masters courses and the dole beckon us back to Ireland and 9 months overlanding is unfortunately not an option. We cut a few swathes through the Australian landscape in cars and campervans, highlights being the Great Ocean Road and the amazing Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park.

Bye-bye our little house on Dorrit Street, bye-bye Grill'd, bye-bye Jimmy Watsons and Puggs and Brunetti. Fiona is off in July via KL and Paris. Seamus is following in September via Darwin and Saigon with a brief sojourn at Jungle Beach, then on to KL and London and finally Cork.

It has been a blast.

What we done

2 of Us

9 Months

29,240 Kilometres

18,175 Miles


8 Tonnes of Carbon between us (compared to 17 tonnes if we flew). We need to plant 40 trees.

18 Countries

Ireland France Germany Poland Belarus Russia Mongolia China HongKong Macau Vietnam Cambodia Thailand Malaysia Singapore Indonesia EastTimor Australia

Over 70 Towns and Cities

Cork/Dublin Rosslare Cherbourg MtStMichel Granville StMalo Paris Cologne Moscow Irkutsk Litsvyanka Ulaanbataar Beijing Xian Chengdu Chongqing Guangzhou Shenzhen HongKong Macau Haikou Sanya Beihai DongXing MongCai HalongCity CatBa HaiPhong Hanoi LaoCai Sapa Hue HoiAn NhaTrang Saigon PhnomPenh SiemReap Poipet Aranyaprathet Bangkok HuaHin Georgetown KualaLumpur Singapore Batam Jakarta Makassar Larantuka Maumere Dili Darwin Maningrida Nhulunby Seisia PortlandRoads Lockhart River Weipa Coen Cairns Townsville Marlborough Gladstone Maryborough SurfersParadise ByronBay Brisbane NelsonBay Sydney Gundagai Melbourne

Plenty of Books

Weird, wonderful and downright odd People

Boats

Rosslare-Cherbourg HongKong-Macau Macau-Shenzen Haikou-Beihai MongCai-HalongCity HalongCity-CatBa CatBa-Haiphong Singapore-Batam Batam-Jakarta Jakarta-Makassar-Larantuka Larantuka-Timor-Darwin-LockhartRiver

Trains

Paris-Cologne-Moscow Moscow-Irkutsk-Ulaanbataar-Beijing Beijing-Xian Xian-Chengdu Chengdu-Chongqing Chongqing-Guangzhou-Shenzen-HongKong Guangzhou-Sanya HaiPhong-Hanoi Hanoi-LaoCai Hanoi-Hue HoiAn-NhaTrang NhaTrang-Saigon Bangkok-Georgetown Georgetown-Singapore

Busses

Beihai-DongXing Hue-HoiAn Saigon-PhnomPenh-SiemReap

Cars

TD Golf Cherbourg-MtStMichel-Paris

Smart ForTwo Macau

Mitsubishi Lancer Sanya

Hilux Ute Nhulunby

Nissan Patrol Weipa-Cairns

Mitsubishi 380 Cairns-Melbourne

Milkfloat
DongXing-MongCai

Mule

Terelj




Give us a bit of time to catch our breath, we'll be back on the road soon enough.

Road trip!

Being a fan of things wheeled, Seamus arranged with Avis for a one-way rental to Melbourne allowing us 9 days to make the trip from Cairns. A 3.8 petrol V6 Mitsubishi 380 Platinum should do the trick. Vroooom.

We bid goodbye to our sailing buddies and headed off after a final dose of fine sushi. Night the first was to be spent in Townsville, a coastal town a few hours down the coast. We had over 4000km to do in 9 days so we'd need to be aiming for 450 or 500km a day. Queensland has an awful lot of empty space, long empty roads and roaming packs of suicidal marsupials determined to dent your bumper. We managed to avoid the koalas, wallabies, 'roos and cows that blocked our path, just about. Along the way we stopped off at tiny roadhouses, motels and parks at Marlborough, Gladstone, etc. They start to blend together after the first couple of non-descript motels.

A 3 day trip to Heron Island provided a welcome respite from the road.

Back on another catmaran

Yarr

Lemon Sharks in knee-deep water.

Yes of course we went in for a swim!

A Black Noddy, nesting outside our window

A Green Sea Turtle returning to the water after digging a pit and laying over a hundred eggs

The southernmost Island on the Great Barrier Reef, Heron Island is a coral cay, formed from dead coral polyps over millenia rather than a true island made from land, or at least that's what I think it said on the resort spiel. We passed the time snorkelling with sharks, turtles, rays and fishies, and walked the beaches by night to watch Green Sea Turtles crawl up the beach to lay eggs. What a stunning sight. The island is home to huge numbers of birds including herons, noddies, something brown that makes eery noises at night, bizarrely similar to screaming children. The sun, sea and sand couldn't last forever, we headed back to Gladstone to continue south to Surfer's Paradise, where we took a tour up the tallest residential building in the world, Q1. At 330 metres it tops the Eiffel tower. Tourists can access the 77th and 78th floors with panoramic vistas over Southport, Surfers and the ocean.

Nearly there! (Q1 at Surfer's Paradise)

We continued on to Brisbane, and drove straight past it. Byron Bay beckoned with its beautiful beaches and good food. We managed to find the same place we stayed in 4 years ago and bought some jewellery to mark the occasion. Our final coastal stop on the way south was at Nelson Bay, an hour north of Sydney. Whalewatching beckoned, we headed out on a huuge catamaran in big seas and caught up with a family of humbacks, blowhards with tails all over the place. A fantastic sight.

We skirted Sydney, stayed away from Canberra and made the final approach to Melbourne on a rainy Friday. Our last night on the road was spent in a remarkably bland motel in Gundagai. A 5 hour trek on Saturday morning and we roll in to Carlton in time for a feed of pints with Paddy, Ben, Ruth, Barry and some of their local friends. It's been a long time coming. Stats to follow.

Having the last remains of itchy feet, we set out again at the first opportunity, taking a drive down the Great Ocean Road to Apollo Bay and Beacon Point. More Koalas than you can shake a stick at. Welcome to Australia, mate.

...and then the mast fell down.

The boat boated, the sails sailed, we headed out of Darwin on a beautiful Saturday morning after stocking up and crewing up for the trip across the top end. Jonna, a Swedish firefigher. Sara, a Scottish Dame. Elodie, a French firebrand. Jennifer, a Leeds lass. Sounds like the start of a very bad joke.

Over the course of a few days we worked our way east across the northern edge of Arnhem Land, a large part of the Northern Territories populated and governed by Aboriginal Councils. We stopped at a few islands to cook the huuuge fish we caught on trailing lines, learning how to navigate in reef waters, how not to panic when the tide drops and how to make a Spanish Mackerel taste divine. We stopped off at Mirimbina in Arnhem where crocs patrol the harbour and glass hides in the mudbanks, perfect for severing ill-protected toes. Our final destination in the northern territories was the mining town of Nhulunby and its bauxite extraction industry. After setting up camp in the Yacht Club we set about renting a ute and trying to fit in with the less than stable locals. Mining tends to attract people from the odder spectrum of humanity. It says a lot about the place that permits are required to purchase alcohol, so we duly queued up at the courthouse with the miners to get ours.

Our next odessy was crossing the Gulf of Carpenteria, connecting the northeast of Arnhem land and the extreme north of Queensland, Cape York. Naturally, the wind wasn't in our favour so we tacked and motored our way for 4 days in open water, on the go 24 hours a day and lamenting the loss of one of the masts on day 2. With Seamus hanging from the side of one of the hulls, we watched as circling sharks eyed up our idle boat while the mast stays were being reattached. A few bits of sausage got their attention and all was going well until some screaming alerted Seamus to the fact that a couple of massive grey fins were making straight for the boat. Oh dear. Turned out to be a squadron of enormous dolphins, easily 9 feet long, coming to check out the situation. With the arrival of the dolphins the sharks bolted. Wusses. The dolphins stayed close until we got moving again, their shark bullying tactics a success. The sea is a weird and wonderful place. We trailed a few hooks with glowing squid lures on the way and hauled in some monster fish, a 4 ft barracude, 3.5ft spanish mackerel and a couple of tuna. Yummy, although barracudda stinks a bit.

We sailed into Seisia on the 4th day and set about getting badly needed showers, ales and beds. Seisia is close to the community of Bamaga and serves as a good starting point to fish, sail and explore Cape York and the islands. For us it was a chance to refresh and revive before heading north again to round the Cape, the most northerly point of mainland Australia, and continue our journey down the east coast.

Our night anchored at Cape York did not bode well, with wind roaring through the night and all of it coming from the south and east, exactly where we were headed. The following day we made a break down the coast and in 30 continuous hours made it to Margaret Bay, a relatively secluded spot a million miles from anywhere. Things went from unsure to despondent as the wind kept picking up and weather warnings coming over the radio. 25-30 knots heading straight into our bows from a high pressure system all the way down in the Tasman sea. Hold tight, we'll be out of here soon. Or not.

A week later, water running low, stocks dwindling and cabin fever well established, we made a break south to Portland Roads, the last outpost of civilisation on the east coast of Queensland before the coast dwindles to rocky, crocky outcrops heading north to Cape York. Naturally, the only shop in the place was closed for the day, off we headed again for Lockhart River, an aboriginal community a few hours south, with promises of a supermarket and the possibility of car rental to get us out of dodge. The weather warnings weren't waning, the wind and swell was making sailing impossible, the timeframe to get to Byron Bay (originally 6 weeks but looking more like 12 at the rate we were going) was killing the budget. After asking all around town we had resigned ourselves to another week of waiting for a break in the weather when good news arrived. Finally, things might start to go our way. A charming Scottish man working in the council heard about our predicament and offered to take the four of us, Jonna, Sara, and ourselves, to Weipa, a bigger bauxite town on the other side of the cape facing the Gulf of Carpenteria. It doesn't bring us any closer to Cairns or Melbourne but they have hotels and a Thrifty agent, can't be all bad. We unloaded our substantial load of luggage and headed off, creeks, dirt roads, wild turkeys and trembling crocodiles in our wake.

After a night in the mecca of Weipa we collected our ride, a rented Nissan Patrol, one of those giant 4x4s the Irish Army use to wander around the world. 800km to Cairns, best to make an early start. After a bit of shopping of course. 600kms of dirt roads, gravel, creeks and road trains later we hit civilisation and make the rest of the trip on tarmac through mountains, counting the wallaby carcasses on our way. Naturally, a puncture decided to arrive only 20km from our destination, in the middle of the night on a dusty highway. An hour later we're ready to go, covered in dust and oil but delighted that we managed to sort it out with the miniscule jack and pathetic equipment provided by Nissan for the purpose. Cairns has never looked as good, nor has the lovely soft beds we found. Bliss.

Cairns is a fantastic town. We thought so 4 years ago and our suspicions have been confirmed. Jonna and Sara started the job hunt immediately, interspersed with dinners and trips to the pub in the lively town centre. It was our pleasure to attend the Coyote Ugly night at PJ O'Briens and enjoy the spectacle of a hairy Cavan man strip off his shirt and dance on the bar in return for a small bar tab. He lost, the 5 ft tall Chinese guy had much better moves. We set about arranging for transport to Melbourne asap, we're approaching the 9 month mark, funds are dwindling and the prospect of going for a pint with our friends down south is too tempting. Onwards, always onwards. Upwards, or in this case southwards.

A good place for a village

After what will forever be known as “Maumere-gate” or “Seamus being incredibly thick”, we finally met up with Neil and the crew of the Electric Guitar Fish, a 38ft Wharram Tiki catamaran built in 2000 by some daft brothers and now owned by a Byron Bay based Plymouthian who sells icecream.

Electric Guitar Fish
Larantuka Harbour at Dawn

Ben and Wolf had been on the boat since Bali a month before, a Californian Lawyer and a German working as a Royal Flying Doctor out of Perth respectively. Paul and Haley, Canadian couple on the way to work in Oz, had gotten on in Labuan Bajo, Western Flores, 4 days previously. A quick Bintang and off we headed to our tiny berth to settle in for our first night on the water.

We left Larantuka at dawn, planning to clear Flores that afternoon and head overnight for Atapupu in the Indonesian side of Timor. Crystal clear water, dolphins, flying fish, fresh air and good food. Perfect. To expedite the sorting out of crew permits and passports we hopped off at Atapupu and made our way by moto and ancient taxi to Dili, where we spent a few quality days soaking up the tense but fascinating vibes that permeate the place. The locals get fairly rowdy on a Friday night in town, what used to culminate in pickup parades through town with AK-47s now manifests itself as a crazed frenzy when the DJ fires on “La Bamba”.

After fueling, watering, and flooding up the boat we set off again for the Eastern tip of Timor. We set a few lines off the back and after the first day we're setting up camp on a remote beach cooking up fresh Spanish Mackerel, a 4 ft specimen hauled in and chopped up by Ben. Before the fire is even lit we're engulfed by police and army pickups with forces from Sri Lanka, East Timor and African Nations. What are you doing out here? Fair question. After contacting HQ and the area commander we were promised that we'd be looked after for our stay with rotating shifts of soldiers close by and a contact number for the commander if we needed anything. Fantastic bunch, can't wait to get the photos from Haley.

Our second night on the move we pull in to Lautem farther east from Dili on the northern coast. Poverty and decimation from the Indonesian withdrawal in 1999 are very evident. No power, no infrastructure, nothing to do for some people except break up small rocks into smaller gravel by hand and wait for somebody to drive up and buy your pile of pebbles. Our industrious assistant Dino tracked down Benzine and Bintang for us for a small commission, fair play to him. We spent the night anchored off the beach and set off again at dawn, waved off by even more police on the beach.

Piglet and Puppy

We sailed across the Timor sea for 4 days and 3 nights, taking 3 hour shifts with 3 rotating teams. Not good for sleeping patterns. Waking at dawn to see 20 dolphins playing in our bow wave makes it all worthwhile. At some points we were seeing up to 50 dolphins in one area, with up to 20 of them jumping at the same time. Breathtakingly beautiful. Sea snakes, giant bats and even a whale were all sighted at some point. Our lines bagged us a few tuna at dawn which made for some sashimi and a serious steak dinner. Doesn't get much fresher than that.

Seamus and Neil keeping watchBen, Wolf, Tuna

Dolphins, Timor Leste

As the sun rose on the 4th day we spotted some land in the distance, Bathurst Island at the northern tip of the Northern Territories. By nightfall we were approaching the lights of Darwin and settling in for one more night on the boat before we could clear quarantine and customs in the morning. Fingers crossed that they would let us in.

By midday we've been given the immigration thumbs up and off we go to track down a kangaroo burger and some croc-on-a-stick. Darwin is a funky little town, aimed mainly at tourists with everything concentrated in the middle of town, a short hop to the beach. A room at the cheesy Travelodge will provide air con, a shower and a proper bed for a couple of days. Bliss.

The obligatory night out in the local Oirish Bar does not disappoint, with pints and grub in Shennanigans the onwards to every club we could find until the posse ended up at Throb, home of some very interesting dancing she-males. Seamus is glad he wussed out early and headed to bed.

Now that we're sort of Australian, for 12 months at least, we set about the boring tasks of opening accounts, getting tax numbers, Ozzie mobile phones and all that stuff. Mostly we're enjoying the sunshine and sat around soaking up the ambiance and whatever else was going. Our shipmates, except for skipper Neil, are all heading their separate ways, back to the US, Perth or onwards to Melbourne. New crew are required, the boat needs a hose down and the galley needs some serious stocking for the next few weeks. The plan is to head east across the Gulf of Carpenteria then south along the East Coast through the Whitsundays and Barrier Reef as far as Byron Bay. Onwards from there in new car hopefully, to Sydney, Tasmania and Melbourne as our final destination.

www.flickr.com/photos/seamuswalsh

Shipshape

A furious hotel spree in Singapore and we're off. Batam, one of the Indonesian Riau Islands south of Singapore, beckons with its promise of further luxuries and a boat onwards to Java. Our ride to Australia has made it as far as Flores with the next stop being East Timor. Time to get a move on and overtake them.

Our hotel in Batam wins the inauspicious award of being the most hideous, tacky thing on the planet. A full scale concrete model of a ship with a small gunboat beside it. The "Greek Mythological Inspired" decor, porthole windows and gilded Titanicesque windows contributed to a bemused thumbs down. Thankfully the staff were able to help us arrange tickets on a Pelni ship heading to Jakarta, even if they couldn't help us get decent food or a nice Margarita.

Thirty miles of bumpy road later and we're piling into what can only be described as a giant cattle shed with 400 other souls, all waiting for a ship that may or may not be arriving today. Oh dear.

Just as the rain is beginning to pick up, the ship arrives and we all pile on, elbows and shouting being the preferred means of heading up the rickety gangway. Bye bye Batam.

We settle into our little cabin and prepare for 30 hours of waiting to get off the boat. And waiting... And waiting... A mere 5 hours laters that schedule the ship heads off into the night, just as we're tucking in to a dinner of dry rice and cold tofu with fish heads with our new friends, the only other westerners on the ship who have been forced to make our acquaintance as the crew shepard us all towards a table laden with cloudy water and something approximating chicken bones.

Naturally, the Australia couple are doing almost exactly our trip, London to Brisbane (instead of Cork/Dublin to Melbourne) and after 5 months of Trans Siberian, Chinese and Southeast Asian delights are on the home stretch. They have similar notions of ships around Indonesia, perhaps a brief jaunt to East Timor then onwards, somehow and on something that floats, to mainland Australia. We wished them luck, but we'll try to keep a bit of that luck for ourselves.

On reflection we're had to trim and chop our itinerary for a number of reasons. We traded 4 fantastic months in Vietnam for the honour of spending less than quality time in Northern Thailand, Laos and the Thai and Malaysian Islands. We were disappointed not to have had a chance to see Fiona's uncle and his growing family in Pattaya and missed meeting a contact in Singapore by a day because we were rushing to get these boats to Indonesia. We also didn't have a chance to get to Bali, Lombok and Komodo on this trip or to catch up with Eoin and Caoimhe in Bali due to shipping schedules, and we might not have a chance to experience a full month of Ramadan in Indonesia, all that fasting and prohibition we were so looking forward to. All of this and more has gone out the window for the sake of the over-riding mission, to blaze a trail to Flores and board a catamaran that promises to take us around Flores, onwards to Timor and across the Timor sea to Darwin, maybe even around the coast as far as Byron Bay. Not the most harrowing trade-off we've ever been forced into. And anyway, we'll be back.

Still on the ship to Jakarta we've just been treated to another wholesome meal of cold rice, tofu, burnt fish and some sort of green past. Dessert was a view of the sun setting over the equator off the starboard bow. Picking our way back to the cabin over the hundreds of bodies littering the deck, we wait patiently for the evening call to prayers to boom over the intercom. Our fellow intrepid travellers had tried to avoid the 1st class option and opted for 2nd class closed cabins with 6 berths. "No" said the Pelni ticket office. Apparently women are not permitted in these cabins. Best not to ask any more.

A couple of thrilling taxi rides later and a decadent club sandwich in our Jakarta hotel, we were ready to head off again into the big blue, but the boat was leaving in an hour and we weren't sure we could survive 5 days on pot noodle alone. 20 minutes of supermarket sweeping later and the pantry looked thusly...

Off we go.

The 5 days on the Kelimud from Jakarta to Surabaya to Sulawesi to Flores isn't hard to sum up.

Day 1
Fish and Rice. Hollow man on HBO.

Day 2
Fish and Rice. Perfect Stranger on HBO. Our walk on deck was only mildly interrupted by a thump from a salivating girl chained to the deck railing. Pelni, moving people around Indonesia around Indonesia like cattle for donkey's years.

Day 3
No fish. No rice. I think we've been forgotten about. Hollow man on HBO. We made our own Sudoku puzzles from scratch to pass some time.

Day 4
Fish and Rice. Perfect Stranger on HBO. Getting sick of "Heh, mister", "Hello, mister", "Marijoowana, mister?". Where you work, where you from, where you wife, give me cigarette, no cigarettes sorry, oh no no give me cigarette, where irlandia? The ship pulled into the port of Makassar on Sulawesi and we once more stood witness to the chaos and mayhem of unloading and reloading with everything from onions to people, vases to coffins. We leave Makassar severely overloaded. No longer possible to leave the room with the amount of people on the floors.

Day 5
No fish. No rice. Hollow man on HBO. The cockroaches and screaming babies are getting to be a bit much. We met a Catholic nun at dinner, we think there might have been a call to prayers for the Jesus-folk. A screaming erupted on the deck outside our window, lots of screeching and hair pulling, lots of laughing men enjoying the show.

Midnight of day 5 we finally arrive into Larantuka and search for an open hotel with something soft to rest our weary heads. Hair-raising moto ride later and we've checking into a "VIP" aircon room at Hotel Fortuna I, feels like a small slice of heaven after the confines of the boat. Here's hoping that catamaran shows up.

More foodie stuff

You have me on a mission now Cathal!!

Fiona's food to do list:
Huevos rancheros
Steak tartare
Carp
Heirloom tomatoes
Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
Bagna cauda
Wasabi peas - mmm, nobody said this was gonna be easy
Salted lassi
Root beer float
Clotted cream tea
Curried goat
Phaal
Fugu
Umeboshi
Abalone
Dirty gin martini
Poutine
Frogs’ legs
Gjetost, or brunost - Dedicated to Jonna from Sweden (this is really getting tough)
Roadkill - DONE at the Mindil Beach Sunset Market, Darwin.
Baijiu
Hostess Fruit Pie
Lapsang souchong
Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant (they have them in Japan now!!)
Kobe beef
Horse
Rose harissa
Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
Snake


Ok Cathal, I do as you say!

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.
4) Optional extra: Post a comment here at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare (One to try, deffo)
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht (couldn't get away from it in Russia)
10. Baba ghanoush (thank you Drea)
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart (God bless Copenhagen)
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns (Possibly my no 1 fav snack)
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes (grrrr)
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese (do crúibíní count?)
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects (yummy - Earwig)
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette (thank's to Rong)
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie (do Hostess Twinkies count?)
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant. (soon, verry soon...)
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare87. Goulash88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano (in Edinburgh of all places)
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

Oooh! That was fun, lots of Wikipedia needed there! 66/100 isn't too bad. It seems I will have to eat a tomato to finish the list though, I think I'd rather the roadkill. Might have to go to mexico too! Cant wait to do number 84, in Chapter One when it gets three stars :)
I think I'll start completing the list tonight with a Dirty gin martini.

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