The Adventures of JB2: 2014

Moto Trip Laos 2: Wild Hogs 3 - Waterfalls and the Southern Swing Loop on the Bolaven Plateau

Since we hadn't been on a motobike in almost 7 months we were just itching to get our hands on one - even if it was a couple of itty bitty 100cc Honda Waves.

We spent a little over a week in Phnom Penh doing almost absolutely nothing. It was nice.

We last visited Siem Reap in 2012 (see our former post: Siem Reap and the Temples of Angkor), and it was interesting to return two years later. Since we had already seen the majestic Angkor Wat we didn't really feel like we had to see it again. Which was ok, because we were there to work!

When we left this crazy city two years ago we thought we'd never come back. We were wrong.

For a city that's been around since 700 BCE, the city that is now known as Istanbul feels pretty damn modern.

Getting to our workaway in Selimiye, Turkey was a 24 hour ordeal.

After a few days wandering Brasov it was time to head to our next workaway in Lomtsi, Bulgaria.

After an exhausting night spent at the Stansted airport we flew into Bucharest, Romania.

After a fast trip to Dublin, we had an even shorter stay in London. But it was still a lot of fun.

Day 90 of our trip, and we had spent all 90 in the “Schengen Zone” which meant we had to leave or risk being deported and never being allowed back. This also meant that there were only a few countries in Europe that we could now visit, among them, Ireland and the UK.

After our action packed week in Gotland, we were excited to do some actual touristy traveling for a little while, starting with Copenhagen, Denmark!

We woke up early for our long trip to Gotland, an island off the coast of Sweden, where we'd be staying with a family of 7, helping out in their ATV store and around the house.

Day 77 of our trip and we were very excited to be traveling to another country, especially since neither of us had ever been to Scandinavia before.

In our effort to show just how affordable travel can really be, we've kept a detailed spreadsheet of all our expenses. We spent a total of 75 days in France, but only spent a total of $2,022.66 while there! During our visit to France, one Euro was equal to $1.37 USD. All amounts listed have been converted to USD. Keep reading for a breakdown of our expenses:

We arrived at our next workaway at Mas Sarrat on July 18th. It was our third workaway experience, and also our third workaway in France. We spent a month there, exploring the woods and countryside, and of course, helping our host, Fiona with her catering business and with her gites.

Check out this promotional video we made for our host family in Mas Sarrat, France. They have a wonderful vacation property full of animals and many other fun activities.

After our wonderful stay in Olargues, we were off to our next destination, Estadens, a teeny tiny little village about 200 km west of Olargues.

Olargues video and extra photos

We've got plenty more to show you from our stay in Olargues.

We arrived in Olargues on June 9th. It had been a decent travel day- we took the shuttle to the airport in Beauvais (1 hr ride- 17.90 euro/person) and then a flight to Beziers, an hour's drive from our first workaway in the south of France ($26/person- funny how the shuttle and the flight almost cost the same). The airport in Beziers is very small, there are only two gates, with only one airline operating out of it. We arrived around 7pm but it was still light out and we found our hosts Elke and Norbert waiting for us in the tiny airport's parking lot.