Oh my frick! It’s almost the end of July. Seriously where the hell has the time gone?

I remember my mum used to tell me that as you get older, the years start moving by faster. Very true mum, very true.

I’m okay with this most of the time. Until those moments when I realise that I’m actually not that young anymore. I know, I know 25 is still young. But I still feel like I’m 18… Or at least 21! I guess you’re only as old as you feel. I’ve been waiting for my ‘adult-self’ to kick in for some time now but she doesn’t seem to be in any rush to appear.

ANYWAYS… Back to this mid year review. Here’s a little recap of the first half of 2017!

TRAVELS

January – Mid March: NEW ZEALAND

The new year was rung in in my hometown of Mount Maunganui, New Zealand. These are NZ’s summer months so when I’m home during this time, I’m never in a rush to leave. Many of my friends and family members are having kids now so Nate and I both love being home and getting to  hang out with everyone… And hopefully stick around long enough to leave a little imprint on those kiddies memories.

Just before flying out of NZ, Nate and I took our beast of a car for a roady through Napier and Taranaki. All of NZ is perfect for road trips, you can see some of the vlogs here!

The Rest of March: MALAYSIA

Our goal was to make it to Europe by the end of May for a wedding… So to help break up the long trip from NZ to London, why not have a stopover in South East Asia for a few months??

TIP: If you need to get from New Zealand to Europe (or from anywhere to anywhere that are polar opposites in the world), add an extended layover to help break up your trip. With the Air New Zealand Airline, you can utilise their multi-destination tool and add an extended layover. So since they fly from NZ to London, I would have had to either stop in the USA or in Asia. I chose to stop in Singapore for 2.5 months and then continue on to London. The cost was $850 per person… Now this is a friggin bargain, especially with Air NZ. Singapore is a perfect hub to get cheap flights to surrounding Asian/South East Asian countries. Just be sure to make it back to your connecting flight on your specified date.

After landing in Singapore, we flew straight to Malaysia. I wasn’t expecting much from Malaysia but this country seriously blew me away. Barely any Westerners seem to travel here in comparison to it’s neighbour, Thailand. Fine by me though, I want to keep it a secret! The places we visited were Kuala Lumpur, Langkawi, and Penang. You can read/watch more about Malaysia here!

Most Of April: TAIWAN

Taiwan was a random pick… Basically we saw a photo of a really nice beach in Taiwan and said something along the lines of, “Cool, let’s go”….

Yeah, we’re an easy sell.

This trip started off amazingly. Taipei was epic and blew me away. All the places are epic, don’t get me wrong. I personally just struggled with the food and I started feeling run down ect. So as our travels through Taiwan continued, I was battling a love hate feeling with this country (actually more of a dislike than a hate).

I had a love for the beautiful scenery and all the amazing locations I went to. But I had a dislike for the food and the overwhelming decrease in personal space haha. We ended up cutting our time here short and leaving a week early. Meaning we only traveled along the West Coast and missed out on the East.

Would I go back to Taiwan? For sure! I would love to see the East Coast and pick up where we left off. I just wouldn’t spend as long in the country next time. You can see what we got up to in Taiwan here.

End of April – Start of May: PHILIPPINES

After the hectic-ness of Taiwan, it was nice just to be able to relax and catch up on work in the Philippines. With it being peak season, we did run into some issues with bookings. And our plans had to be totally wiped off the table due to unavailability (you can read my post all about that here).  Check out some more posts of our time in the Philippines here!

Start of May – Mid May: AUSTRALIA

This was a quick little 5 day trip to Sydney for a friends 30th birthday. I barely had time to explore the city properly so a trip back will be in order soon!

Mid May – End of May: BALI

Back to SEA we went! We have some friends in Bali whom we hadn’t seen in a while, so we spent 10 days in Canggu visiting them. Canggu is a laid back surfer/yoga/digital nomad haven. It’s definitely getting popular with tourism and there’s new hotels and restaurants popping up everywhere. I noticed a huge difference since the last time we were there 2 years ago (we lived in Canggu for 3 months). Still a wicked spot though!

End of May – Mid June: ENGLAND

Europe!!! I have finally made it to this side of the world and my god I was so excited. We started off our English adventures at a little seaside town called Hastings. This is where our friends wedding was held (congrats Jon and Amy!).

Next up was a week in London. We’re talking hop on hop off buses, The Lion King, Thames Cruises, lots and lots of tea… And even more beer. We lucked out with the weather as it only rained once our whole time there. Score!

After our London escapades, we headed west to a teensy little town called Wantage. I have friends who have been living there so a visit was a must! A week was spent here just catching up, working, and we had a little day trip to Oxford.

Mid June – Mid July: MONTENEGRO

Nate and I had been brainstorming on where to go in Europe for a month so we could have our own space, work, and explore. It needed to be nice to our bank accounts and also not be a Schengen country! We had decided on Bulgaria, then realised Kotor, Montenegro would be much more up our alley. Guys… This place did not disappoint. My gosh it’s amazing!

Kotor is a beautiful bay surrounded by gigantic mountains. It’s not too crazy with tourism as most people opt for Croatia instead. Again, fine by me, let’s keep it a secret! Here I was able to have a routine of fitness, tanning, and working. Oh and wine drinking. Absolute heaven. This is one place I could happily reside in for a while.

Mid July: BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA

Bosnia borders Montenegro and I really wanted to visit Mostar. It’s only a 4 hour drive from Kotor, so we came here for 3 nights on our way to Croatia. Here we did the war tour and got to visit a beautiful waterfall as well. The old town of Mostar was stunning, with the Stari Most bridge and the colourful markets. This place was definitely worth the little detour.

Mid July – End of July: CROATIA

Party time! Nate had been desperate to do Yacht Life in Croatia and the time worked out perfectly as it lined up to be just after our month in Montenegro. We started it off with Ultra Europe in Split. This was an add-on for our Yacht Life Tour with LBW (Life Before Work). Then once the festival was over we started sailing around Croatia. It was an epic week of partying, sight seeing, and making new friends.

Right now I am writing this from my bed in Split, where I’ve resided from after leaving the yacht. I swear I’ve just been sleeping for the last 3 days! Tomorrow we head to Zagreb (Northern Croatia) for 2 nights then off to Austria woohoo!

So that’s basically what I’ve been up to so far this year. And the second half doesn’t seem to be slowing down either…

Here’s what’s lined up:

• Austra
• Germany
• Netherlands
• Belgium
• Austin, Texas
• London
• Italy
• France
• Ireland for a blogger’s convention
• Portugal road trip!
• London
• Somewhere else unknown at this stage
• Prague for Christmas
• Somewhere for New Years
• And then do something else until making our way back to NZ for February.

If you have any suggestions for the above travels do let me know! I am a Europe novice so advice is welcomed 🙂

FITNESS

I always have such grand plans with my fitness when on the road. I like to think I’ll workout all the time and eat healthy. But let’s be honest, I like wine cheese and Europe has this in abundance.

Montenegro was a good month of working out 5 times per week and also trying out fasting. I was having eating windows of 6-8 hours and fasting for 16-18 hours. Plus trying to keep a calorie deficit each day. I definitely saw progress within this month, but we all know, one month of this is just not long enough 🙁

The workouts I do while on the road are the p90x workouts which you can get from Beach Body. Basically I would do 2 x cardios, 1 x leg/back, 2 x intensive yoga sessions per week. The p90x program actually has a good library of options to choose from. I do travel with resistance bands but a travellers yoga mat would also be ideal!

If you have any tips on ways to keep fit and healthy while travelling, please let your girl know! I need some motivation and some fun ideas to work with. God knows with all the European deliciousness around me for the rest of the year, I’m going to need to step my game up!

WORK

When in Taiwan, things started exploding for both Nate and I. We were even featured on Daily Mail here  and I recently got a Magazine cover interview with a New Zealand magazine here.

As you may or may not know, we launched our Behind Closed Doors (BCD) membership at the start of the year and it’s really taken off. Which means admin duties are in full force! And also we are working hard at creating helpful content for our members. Add this on top of my blogging work and my odd freelance jobs, it’s become full on. I am really having to learn the balance of work and travel this year. Though, being pressed for time, does make me work more productively.

I remember writing down some goals at the start of the year. One of the goals was to read one personal development book each month and so far so good! I’ve actually been sticking to it. I use the Audible App so I can listen to the books while I’m on a bus or a train or a flight (as I don’t like reading while moving- it’s a sure fire way to get motion sickness).

Well that’s about it! I guess I can say its been a busy first half of the year. That’s probably why it feels like it’s gone so quickly. But guys, I am so stoked to finally be in Europe and to be about to kick off this Euro trip for the next few months. If you see we’re in the same spot, holla at me and lets meet up! Wine and cheese date?

How has your year been so far and what do you have lined up?! Have you been sticking to your goals you set for the year?