New York, USA

Back to the world of hostels (noooooo!), and to be specific the 5th floor of a hostel with no lift, this was to be our base in New York (no nice hotels anymore :( ). Teddie and I were also joined by her sister and her ex boyfriend so we had a nice little crew to get up to mischief with.

Our first dinner was, of course, at Hooters where I managed to get my final, and to be honest my least favourite, pic with the Hooters girls:


“Just smile girls…he’ll be gone soon”

Spent a day sightseeing and saw the sad void that once was the World Trade Center. The last time I was here I remember looking up at the World Trade Towers and feeling dizzy by how tall they were. Looking up at the sky its quite disturbing to see the blank space that these massive buildings once occupied. Its difficult to appreciate how huge they really were and what carnage it must have been being here back on 'the day the world went tits up'. For all the rememberance (and conspiricy theorists handing out theyre pamphlets) there is also hope, with displays of the new, even bigger, 'Freedom Tower' that will replace it. You cant help but wonder if they might as well be building a giant bullseye instead. Lets hope not.


"Nearly finished..."

Other highlights of the day trip were the weather (16C on the 3rd of January in New York?!? I'm so glad I bought a massive coat!), and these street performers being camp and playing the race card in front of the nice white middle class audience:


"Wheeeeeee!"

Also managed to get an identical photo to one I took last time I was here (when, again, I also couldnt be arsed to take the Statton Island ferry to see the Statue of Liberty so I took a long distance photo instead)


"I krrrush your tiny head!"

The evening was spent out at comedy club followed by a bout of attacking old Christams trees left on the sidewalk for collection.

"Damn you Christmas!!"

More booze followed until it was me and Teddies sister, Frida, left to get home by ourselves. For some reason I got the strange urge to try my hand at some petty theft in a shop (I slyly placed a single Ferraro Rocia in my pocket). The guy behind the counter sighed and said to me "are you gonna pay for that?". I gave him a funny look and slowly said "No" and put it back. My life as a hardened criminal ended there (Well expect for trying to nick a flower on the way out but Frida made me put it back). Not really sure where we got all these other trincits from but these things happen when you're drunk:


"We come in peace...but we want your grapes"

More sight seeing in central park the next day but nothing worth mentioning. And that was it. Packed my rucksack for the last time, said my temporary goodbyes to Teddie and jumped on my Air India flight to London. Thats your lot. Holiday over. 14 months of round the world back packing nailed.

So how the hell do you end something like this?

Well I initially only intended to go away for 6 months. So I guess I must have enjoyed the whole-not-working-and-bumming-around-everyday thing enough to hang on to it for a while. I could bore you with all the highlights and great things Ive seen and done but you may as well read all the previous posts for that. You could ask how Ive changed as a person but its not something I can instantly recognise in myself.

I think doing this all on my own has made me face up to being comfortable with who I really am (Sparm), and accepting my weaknesses (selfishness, low tolerance to arseholes or slow people) and focus on my strengths (being fantastic, having hairy elbows etc). If anything i've gotten a lot out of my system (literally, arf!) and I'm feeling a little more prepared to enter the next stage of my life (attempting to be a mature adult). Im certainly more focused and know what I want out of life, if not exactly sure how to get there just yet.

I've been a very lucky person to be able to have the opportunity in life to do something like this and for that I am glad. It's certainly not for everyone but I would recommend it to anyone just to try jumping out of their safety bubble.

I don't think I have the 'travelling bug' like many others have said they have after doing backpacking, as Im quite happy to stay in one place for now. But I cant help but think I will probably be living in another country yet again in the future sometime. Who knows. When that day comes, I'm sure you'll read all about it on these very pages (unless the bloody thing crashes like my old one).

So after all that, you’d think I should end this behemoth of a blog with a nice meaningful and thoughtful picture, maybe something like this one I took way back in New Zealand:



Hmmmm. yes. But I think we all know that this one is far better:



Thanks for reading blog fans, see you all soon.

Peace and Love X

Boston, USA

I suppose I should give you blog fans a little background on me and the Teddie. We hit it off one night in Perth way back on St Patricks day. Then I left for Sydney whilst she went traveling down the East Coast of Oz. A few weeks later she came and lived with me in Sydney for a month (not bad for a second date). Then she went back home to Sweden for 6 months before joining me in LA where we have spent every minute of the last 2 months together (even better for a third date). So I suppose with such extreme dating it only seems fit to spend the fourth date and New Years Eve with the entire set of in-laws (I don’t do things by half, me).

Boston was where we were heading (and not ‘headed’ which is another strange bastardisation the Americans have snuck into the English language – note MS Word changed ‘bastardisation’ to ‘bastardization’ automatically as I typed this…oh the irony (hmm that should be underlined as an unrecognized word)) we drove and after an exorbitant amount of toll roads (we drove across the USA and paid one toll. Drive from Washington to Boston you’ll hit about 15!) we were homing in on Teddies Auntie and Uncles house. It would appear that I spent more times with Swedes in America than Americans, but that is in no way a bad thing. This would also be a great chance to try out all the Swedish I learnt from my linguaphone CDs Ive been driving Teddie nuts with on this road trip.

After arriving and meeting her family I quickly realized I was in a unique position I hadn’t been in before; I was in a social situation where everyone I knew around me was speaking another language and I couldn’t join in. And it taught me a great lesson of empathy for anyone in the world who has tried to learn another language by placing themselves in the middle of it.

Of course I tried my new found skills out, although unfortunately the CDs I had bought only really taught me how to invite girls to come round my house for a drink whilst in Stockholm. As you can imagine, my vocabulary ran out pretty quickly. It was encouraging though having 11 people all hanging on every Swedish word you try and say only for them to all burst into hysterics when you have finished your sentence. I took it on the chin as it was all good fun but it was a harsh step in my first ‘live’ language lesson. More practice needed methinks.

Swedish is unfortunately, from a global perspective, a pointless language to learn as it’s not used anywhere outside Sweden, and most people in Sweden speak good English. A bit like Welsh. Similarly though I can also justify learning it simply to be able to better yourself and also immerse yourself in another culture. I’m not going to lie though, its going to take a Jurassic era for me to get any good. It’s a good job I’m immortal I suppose.

Luckily Teddies family are great. Very friendly, very generous and also very similar to people back home (i.e. they like to get pissed and have a laugh). Apart from the strange songs they sing between drinks, it was all very comfortable. And, very kindly, they did all make an effort to speak English at the dinner table which helped me no end. I remember speaking to my parents on Xmas day and mentioning to them that I was meeting the in-laws and they both reminded me to have a shave. Being a lazy bastard I took this advice lightly and was quite amused to hear Teddies Grandfather saying I fitted in well to the family but would score more points if I had a shave! I guess old people just don’t get how cool it is not to shave (no offense, old people).

I even (foolishly) suggested that I should cook for everyone one night. Why on earth I decided to do this I have no idea, but being invited to stay for free at someones place for a week whilst being cooked for each night made me think I should give something back. Lord knows how, but I managed to pull off my random traveling cook-off special of chicken in a chinesey marinade with plain rice. They said they liked it and no one got ill or died so I guess that’s a result. Cooking for more than 4 people is highly stressful though and best avoided until you really know what you’re doing is my advice.

New Years Eve was a hoot. We organized a load of team games for during the day for the whole family to play. Got some fantastic rope burn from tug of war and failed miserably at my own contribution of quickest to eat a load of cream crackers (I actually came last out of 11). It even gave me (yet another) excuse to wear the superman outfit as each team needed a uniform (although I did spare them the splendor of the underpants). We also indulged in a strange stick throwing game:


“Spot the ball?”

And hitting eggs with golf clubs:



Come the evening, it was a rather splendid affair where everyone dressed up smart. Luckily I had bought a nice shirt back in the outlet stores in Orlando but still had to borrow some strides from Teddie’s dad as my backpacker wardrobe didn’t really stretch to ‘formal’. Look how smart the turnout was though:


“Skol! (That means ‘we love you Spencer’ in Swedish)”

The night proceded with drinking (of course), singing and dancing:


“Jush like tha’”

It was actually a relief not to make a complete tit of myself on New Years Eve and actually remember it in the morning. I stayed very respectable and in control yet well sozzled. So I managed to wake up in the morning and still feel accepted by the family if not wildly hung over.

Along with the award winning hospitality, we also had little days out in and around Boston. Stopped off at a very quaint little sea village which did not feel like America at all. Found a shop that sold marbles so me and Teds bought a few and did some reminiscing of older days when we used to play in school. I also managed to win one of her galaxys off her as well. There was also a chance to sample New England Clam Chowder which I had heard a lot off but never had. It’s a sort of fish and potato soap in a bread bowl. It sounded interesting but I didn’t order in case I didn’t like it. Unfortunately it was bloody fantastic after having sampled some and I regretted my lame chicken burger.


“Your not in Kansas anymore (I never was)”

Also squeezed a visit to a basketball game (to watch the mighty Boston Celtics – Go Tigers!!!!) which I enjoyed immensely even though I thought it would be a case of “we score a basket then you score a basket. Repeat”.


“Go Gorillas!!”

Wasn’t such a fan of the game stopping for ‘Timeouts” so that they could broadcast adverts on the TV. Football (soccer) and Rugby players run around solidly for 80 to 90 minutes with only one break. American sports constantly have stops and timeouts. Maybe they’re players aren’t as fit. But Im no man to talk about fitness what with my strict burger diet and strenuous sitting down sessions. They do however fill these breaks with some good entertainment such as zooming a camera around the crowd with a special effect on the screen to make people look like they have massive heads, or throwing t-shirts into the crowd with a massive bazzoka like gun, or cheerleaders or, my favourite, the lepricorn doing a somersault slam dunk off a trampoline:


“Ah bejeezers!”

The game was a nail biter and was just barely lost in the last tense few minutes (they should have played the penalty off the back board and gone for three out on the wing – but then what the hell do I know).

Boston was great as it gave me a bit of time in one place and was accompanied by a lovely friendly family. Plus, from what I saw of Boston, it’s a very beautiful city. And, far more important than anything else, I didn’t fuck up with the in-laws. Score!

Righty ho, off back to New York spend the last weekend of my 14 month bender.

New York, USA

The original plan for me was to come to New York for Xmas and spend the day helping out at one of the shelters for the homeless. However upon looking at organizations on the internet that do this sort of thing it would appear that they were all fully booked and had all the helpers they needed. If I was feeling ultra generous I suppose I could have roamed the streets to maybe find a shelter that needed help but considering I had enough trouble finding motels in a big city I decided to leave my charitable Xmas day to another day and see what the Big Apple had to offer me for Jeebers’ birthday.

So apparently Jesus was actually born on the 24th of December and the 25th is when all the wise men and other band wagon jumpers came round. That’s why the Germans and the Swedes (amongst others) celebrate Xmas on the 24th. History over with, for Xmas this year I got 3 (count ‘em), 3 bottles of A1 Steak Sauce from Teddie. A bit like HP sauce but actually better. Our many visits to IHOP had cemented it as my favourite sauce. It tastes a bit like Frankincense, mixed with Mir.

After an exchange (of gifts you saucy lot!), we headed out to Central Park and Manhattan to wander around. The trouble is, lots of other people had the same idea. I honestly under estimated the amount of people I expected to be out. Don’t they all have families to be with? It turns out that this place is rather popular with the tourists around Xmas. I still managed to have Turkey though in some sort of deli. It was, however, possibly the worse meal I had had in 12 months of traveling. Yo Ho Oh No! (Not John Lenons wife you understand.)

Not a lot else was to be done. The queue for going to the top of the Empire States Building was 2 hours long and 20 dollars (the last time I went up there it was free and had no queue – this could be due to the fact that my friend with me at the time worked there and he probably had some sort of pass. I don’t remember this though), the weather was turning pretty shit, so went to the Rockafella center instead. I had the idea of me and Teddie having a romantic skate at the rink by the big Xmas tree all alone on Xmas day. I think I watch too many films sometimes and have my head in the clouds as when I arrived there, there simply couldn’t be more people. It was heaving. People queuing up to look at the massive load of people queing up to go on a very crowded ice rink. And this was when it was pissing down and freezing cold. Got the obligatory snap though:


“I gotta go wee wee”

So in a last ditch attempt I tried to maybe get some tickets to go see Saturday Night Live (as this is where the studios were). Unfortunately though you have to camp outside the building on Thursday all the way through to Saturday to stand a chance of maybe getting a ticket. Even a live incestual 4-way sex show starring the royal family isn’t worth that much queuing time so I decided to call it quits and snuggle up in bed. Xmas is about being inside with (and being inside – arf!) loved ones not being outside in shit weather in crowds of unknowns.

Not the best Xmas ever. More something that didn’t live up to my expectations. Which is kinda summing up the USA for me. Never mind, next stop is Boston…to meet the in laws. Gulp!

Washington DC,

Foolishly we end up driving into a major city yet again when its dark, meaning tourist information is closed so no decent maps of cheap places to stay. We did have an address of a hostel to stay at but it was a bit over our budget and we would have had to pay extra for parking. Seems kinda strange that for all our budgeting and worrying about going a few dollars over our limit, we eventually decide “oh fuck it” and stay in the Hilton for a few days after a few pointless hours driving around the city. But big sweaty man balls to it all. Its near the end of the trip and I wanna splash out and treat myself. And how! A magnificent suite with separate living area and gianourmous comfy bed. The perfect place for bloody marys, sushi and a fine selection of cheeses in bed after a hard days sight seeing.

What did we see though? Well the weather was, for want of a better word, gay (sorry to any gay blog fans out there but Im taking that word back, you’ve had it long enough now. I mean, whats next? Soon you’ll be taking ‘rimming’ for Atenboroughs sake!). The weather hasn’t stopped me before and I was armed with a deadly new winter coat so heres some grey landmarks:


“Can George come out to play?”

Hows this for being naïve; I thought we should be able to just rock up and have a little guided sniff around the White House, see a few paintings, you know the sort of shit. Oh no. These days you need to apply 6 months in advance, with the embassy in your own country before even setting foot in there. Ouch! Who said 9/11 made the American government paranoid? So in disgust we threw rocks at the windows and I could clearly see George standing at the window shaking his fist and muttering something about “Pesky kids”. It was either that or “God damn’ towel heads”. Im not too sure.

Anywho, checked out the memorial statue:


“Mmmm. Long, thin and pointy”

Along with the Lincoln Memorial building which I mistakenly believed to be the one that Rocky runs up in the film until Teddie pointed out that it was set in Brooklyn:


“Bow down and feel my wrath you peasants!”

Onwards from there and its on to the Aldershot? Cemetery. A vast and sacred burial area where Americas ex-presidents and fallen soldiers are laid to rest. Its so large you can even do a tour. Yes, a tour bus drives you around with a guy on the bus happily pointing out various graves with his chirpy, insightful commentary. I guess even here in the nation’s capital they fail to see the tackiness and somewhat inappropriateness of a guided tour around a cemetery. Maybe it was just me. I think the part where our driver said “And now for my favourite part of the cemetery…” did it. I mean, how many people have a favourite part of any cemetery? It was in actual fact the area where he proudly pointed out the endless (and they were literally endless, you couldn’t see the ends of the fields head stones) amounts of graves for troops that died during the Vietnam War. Graves caused by an unnecessary war. We were also lucky(?) enough to drive pass a funeral in progress caused by another, more current, unnecessary war. I suppose it’s a good job America like celebrating their dead.



To top off all this morbidity we went to the holocaust museum for a classic bit of misery revival. The usual offenders were all here, Hitler, Stalin, Cliff Richard but I think its good to have a brush up on the old history now and again just to make sure you don’t forget about it.

So what to do to lift this rather somber mood? How about get drunk and pose like a group making an entry for a 1980’s Eurovision song contest?



Yup, that’ll do it!

Orlando,USA

This place has always excited me everytime I came here, probably because I know Im in for a slice of cheesey tourist fun and loads of theme parks. However, this time it didn’t feel so good. I think having spent a year being a tourist and doing an obscene amount of cheesy touristy things has taken its toll on me. Perhaps its also because Ive been here so many bloody times that there are no more surprises left. I think this will be the last time I come here until I have children (well providing ,that is, all my sperms haven’t gone boss eyed and can still swim straight after all the abuse Ive given my body!).

One surprise it did reveal for me was a fantastic test of my patience. After a morning of crazy (and I mean a few slight inclines and bends, not really crazy) golf, we decided to take advantage of the half day discount at the Wet N Wild water park (Universal Studios seemed a bit of a rip off compared to Bushe Gardens as it was more expensive and had less rides). As I was driving, only one block away from Wet N Wild, I found myself in a wrong lane. Unable to go straight on, I was forced to take a turn left. In a desperate attempt to find an exit road or somewhere to turn I blundered onto a freeway with no exits for miles. Then a toll. Then I drove passed a place to do a U turn. Then desperate and blind exits were taken, driving onto different freeways. A few more tolls paid, 10 miles of driving and a stop in a petrol station to ask directions to a place I could actually see 30 minutes ago before being forced to make a disastrous wrong turn, and I was a nice simmering pot of rage. Luckily, Teddie had the common sense to point out that I should stop driving more and more aggressively and actually slow down in case we miss it again. Or kill a small child. Amazingly an argument along the lines of a man being too stubborn to admit he was wrong and a woman making a comment like “Well, if you’d have taken that turning like I said” was avoided and a great day out was had at the water park. I still blame the American road design. Now if they had roundabouts like normal people……

Theme parks aside, there was time to pick out a few bargains at the outlet shopping center, such as a big bastard thick coat for the winter weather that awaits us further north. I also got something I probably should have got a long long time ago:


“From zero…”


“To hero! Well…pinhead”

That’s right! After growing my hair solidly for an entire year I did the right thing and got a bloody hair cut. I suppose it wasn’t really fair for Teddie to be going out with Worzel Gummage. It wasn’t just a curiosity to see what I looked like with long hair (ridiculous), but it was also a symbolism for me being able to stick to something without giving up when it gets hard. I did what I planned and grew it for a year, and for me it looks better shorter, but I cant help feel that maybe I should have stuck to it and kept on growing it even more. What do you think blog fans?

Tampa, USA

After a mildly disappointing Miami, there was no doubt an injection of roller coasters would heighten the USA experience. The bad timing by me when taking this whole trip meant that the theme parks in Florida were pretty much the only major ones open in the USA at this time of year (You have no idea the how hard its been driving past so many 6 Flag theme parks and seeing that they’re all closed – glub!). So the plan was to drive up to Tampa for Busche Gardens then across to Orlando for the evening for further theme parkage.

After our monster 800 mile, 18 hour drive down to Miami, the drive up to Tampa would be a veritable slide down the Dutchman’s pole. However it just took forever and we didn’t get to the theme park until 2pm. It was at this point I was close to a child, sulking at the pure frustration at the thought of not being able to go on all the rides.

But we gambled that 4 hours should be enough to cover it all. And thank Bellamy it was! Me and Terry were pretty much running around from ride to ride, making up for lost ground. Suffice to say all the coasters (and there were bloody loads of them) were all fantastic especially the hang-you-over-a-vertical-drop-before-dropping-you-into-loads-of-loop-the-loops one and surprisingly the old fashioned wooden one. Probably because it felt like you were about to come off at anytime so you laugh like a madman on acid (not that I know what that’s like or anything).

A great theme park and filled with a surprisingly large amount of people going around on electric buggies provided by the park. Not that they were disabled (disabled people have the common sense to bring their own transport), no these people were simply too fat to walk so they buzzed around the park with they’re spewing mounds of excess flesh resting in the basket. Delicious eh? Why they paid 60 dollars to go around looking at rides that they would have no hope in hell of riding is beyond me. I guess they were there to see the pink flamingoes. Beautiful, but not worth 60 bucks.

Off next to my 4th visit to Orlando.

Miami, USA

We drove here in one day from Talladega. Get a map and look how far that is. Its about 800 to 900 miles. In one day. We left Talladega at about 1pm and arrived in Miami at 4am. Only stopping for fuel and food. We consumed 4 energy drinks which really are ridiculously potent because it kept us bouncing off the walls up to 7am as it took us a further 3 hours to cruise Miami Beach looking for a hotel that wasn’t ridiculously over our budget. Also had a scary moment driving through Everglades at 2am in dense fog with the petrol light flashing on the car and no idea where the next gas station was. Luckily we found one but could have made this monster journey a little more interesting.

Miami!! The last place I’m probably gonna get some sun before going home. And it rained. All weekend. Damn it I should’ve gone to Chicago! Miami is a very pretty place as Ive been here before, but in the rain it doesn’t half look miserable (as do most places I suppose). At least it was warm though. You get the impression its very much up its own arse here. Lots of expensive clubs billing themselves as ‘upscale’ so you don’t get in with Tshirt or jeans (pretty much my entire wardrobe for the last year). But if you avoid that you can find some decent drinking holes like, surprise surprise, an Irish bar. Had some Strongbows, which were nectar, then met some locals who said they’d take us to a really ‘cool’ bar where the locals go. It turned out to be a cheesey pick up joint. I left before they played “Love Shack”


“I’d rather be done up the butt than listen to…..”

Spent the next day cruising around. Drove into downtown Miami which looked like an absolute shit hole and dodgy as hell. At least I got a big ‘wave off’ on the drive back when a cruise liner full of passengers set sail. Then looked at some of the posh shops around Ocean Drive where Teddy tried on a $2000 dress. She looked bloody stunning in it and as the shop assistant told her, it was a guaranteed ticket into any VIP club. Shame I wouldn’t be able to join her with my scruffy gear on.

Headed out again that night to a big club in downtown. Took the bus to save cash which took forever to arrive. Then halfway there we had to get off for a piss stop. Then wait another 40 minutes for the next one. Back on the bus, it started filling up with the usual weirdo’s you get on American public buses. One Peruvian guy kept talking to us although I could only understand about 10% of what he said. He told us what stop to get off at and it looked like the dodgiest area possible. Everyone just started staring at us. And this guy wanted to take us some place even though I was trying my best to get a taxi the hell out of there. Managed to get one to the club but after all the weirdos and waiting around I really wasn’t in the mood. When the ATM denied me cash it was clearly a sign it wasn’t meant to happen and we bailed to get home, spending a small fortune on Taxis. What a great night out. I think this picture of Teddy waiting for a bus in the rain sums it up:


"Haaaaarumph!"

The next day was better spent with some nicer weather and a chance for some nice pics:






“Yes, I am wearing a head band”

And better weather is predicted for tomorrow (25C hopefully) where we shall be heading for a 2 day theme park bonanza. After that the plan is to head to New York for Xmas then Boston for New Year. Can you believe I’ve been away for 13 months now blog fans? Amazing I know. Ill be touching down in Heathrow on the early hours of the 10th of January courtesy of Air India(!). That’s 3 weeks from now.

Boo Hoo blog fans.