191 Saturdays (May 17/09 - Vancouver, BC, Canada)

May 17th. It's the day we've been giving for the last six months when a fellow traveler asks when you have to go home. And when you give that day, the response is almost always "awww, so soon." Yup, the day is here already. Today we woke up in New Zealand and will be sleeping in our own bed at home tonight. It will be wonderful to see family waiting at the Vancouver airport and to walk in the door of our cozy little apartment, but we can't help but wonder how long it will be before we start to miss the freedom of traveling, the excitement of seeing new places and meeting new people, and the adventure that comes along with wandering around exotic places with everything you need on your back.

The nonstop party going on outside our hostel in Auckland all night had barely quit at 8am, when we packed up for the last time and hailed a bus to the airport. The flight back to Fiji was short, and we scanned the waves far below for any chance of spotting a speck of a sailboat. The warm, humid air greeted us on the tarmac in Nadi, but without enough time to leave the airport, it would be our last taste of the tropics for a long time. The Air Pacific flight heading for Los Angeles was the biggest plane we had ever seen - a 747 with 70 rows, 10 people per row, and an upper level. It still amazes me that they can even get off the ground! Ten hours later, we were landing at LAX, oddly enough at almost exactly the same time that we left Auckland (1pm on May 17th - thanks to the time change and crossing the International Date Line). Suddenly surrounded by english speaking people, we boarded the last flight of our trip, bound for Vancouver. We expected to have mixed feelings upon seeing the familiar city lights coming into view, but the waterworks that started when we touched the runway were unexpected - our trip was officially over. My whole family was waiting for us at the arrivals area, and it was of course wonderful to finally see them again. As true Canadians, they welcomed us home not with a bunch of flowers, but with a box of Timbits! And just like that, we were home. Familiar streets, familiar buildings, and the not-so-familiar rule of driving on the right hand side of the road! Let's hope that doesn't take much getting used to!

It was strange but comforting to get home, and it took a while to marvel at all the great things about such an easy life here. Clean, drinkable water right out of the tap that you don't have to pay or waste plastic bottles for, clean showers, a comfy bed, and the convenience of a whole kitchen to cook up whatever you want to eat, any time, with no menus or translating or sketchy results. These are certainly a few of the things we've taken for granted on a day to day basis, and that (among other things) is one of our greatest lessons from experiencing life in so many other parts of the world. We are truly lucky to live in such a privileged society where we have more than enough to nourish us, adequate shelter, employment to provide income for our families, and the freedom to go for a hike, vote for your government, drive a car, or even to dye your hair blue if you want to. We saw so many people in so many countries who have nothing more than the clothes they're wearing, a tiny dump of a house, barely enough food, polluted water, and very little hope for a brighter future despite having little mouths to feed. And yet somehow these people seemed content. Little kids played with a stick in the dirt all day long, and they always seemed to enjoy it. People work so hard to bring in enough food for their families, even if it means slaving in the hot fields every single day. Although the only way we could relate to many of these people was with a smile and a wave, sometimes that seemed to be enough for each to gain a little bit of understanding and respect for the other.

We have now traveled all the way around the world, and the incredible diversity of cultures, landscapes, people, and wildlife we've experienced is almost hard to comprehend. If we thought doing a trip like this would "scratch our travel itch" (and we did), well, we were definitely wrong. The travel bug has wiggled its way under our skin, and I don't think there's any chance of getting rid of it. Now that we have experienced the freedom of backpacking to amazing places with everything you need on your back, we are hooked. If you haven't ventured far from home before, GO! Make it happen, There is an incredible world out there to explore, where every day is Saturday.