Arden & Melissa Travel

06/25/2026

05/14/2026

And like… of course a hug from our family and friends 🥰(and a visit to my hair stylist, lash tech, nail tech, etc 🤪)

The list 👇🏼

▪️SPICY FAT Caesar with dill pickle juice (and preferably some Montreal steak spice on the rim)
▪️A good drip coffee with International Delight Canada creamer 🤤
▪️Mild Buffalo boneless bites from Pizza Hut
▪️Tim Hortons French Vanilla (Half Coffee)
▪️A noodle bowl from Thien Vietnam
▪️Chicken fingies and fries after a massive Costco Wholesale Canada haul
▪️and finally for Arden, a Brewhouse Pilsner 🍻

05/13/2026

📆Day 232
🗺️ Country 32

📍Kyoto, Japan

You know this emoji ⛩️? Well we saw the real thing! Thousands of them actually 🥰 and we both drew great fortunes 📜

📍 Fushimi Inari Taisha

Also nearly burned our faces with flaming ramen 🍜 🔥

📍Fire Ramen Menbaka

05/13/2026

📅 Day 231
🗺️ Country 34

📍Kyoto, Japan

I wish I could tell you the name of the Ramen restaurant but it was literally just called “Ramen” 😅 and they were bang on with the name because they just had ramen (and it was incredible) 👌

We found a chopstick making class on and because it was for the same day, we got 50% off 🙌🏻 it was a lot of fun and something different to try! Plus our chopsticks came in handy for the rest of the trip as we eat a lot of ramen 🍜

05/13/2026

Not us with the bacon wrapped asparagus and mayo 😩

05/12/2026

📆 Day 330
🗺️ Country 34

We have landed in our final country of this trip around the world- Japan! 🇯🇵

Today we are in Osaka, and we are only here for 1 day so we did a lot!! 😮‍💨 it was a wet one, but we still had a blast!

Here is the list of everyplace we visited:

📍 mipig cafe 大阪店 (pig petting experience)

📍 BASEMENT coffee&sandwiches (sandwich and claw games were right next door)

📍 (Ltd.) Shimada store sake (sake tasting)

📍 Robatayaki Mizukakechaya 力丸 法善寺横丁 炉ばた焼 水かけ茶屋 (grilled scallop, chicken & corn)

📍 Takoyaki Wanaka Dotonbori たこ焼道楽わなか 道頓堀店 ( takoyaki fried octopus ball)

📍 Chao Chao Gyoza チャオチャオ餃子 新世界店 (pork gyoza)

05/09/2026

📆 Days 200-229
🗺️ Country 33

The country Arden has been looking forward to the most- the Philippines! 🇵🇭

We flew into Manila, and then headed over to our first island of Boracay. We had a beautiful stay at Fairways & Bluewater resort (loved their private beach) and then transferred over to the main public beach (White Beach) where I proceeded to trip and split my toe open 🫠

Then after a quick transfer from Cebu, we headed over Bohol. We went to see the Tarsiers (which is one of the worlds smaller primates at only 6 inches), the Chocolate Hills, and saw a giant anaconda that they tried to make me touch 🫣

And finally we visited Bantayan Island, my favourite island! Bantayan was much quieter than Boracay & Bohol, and for a small fee, the Sandra Beach had a gorgeous white sand beach with clear water and no vendors 🙌🏻 also the restaurants on the islands were delish 😋

All in all this was a great month laying on beaches and eating delicious food, despite splitting my toe open 😅

🇵🇭

04/26/2026

📅 Day 196
🗺️ Country 32

📍Day 4 of the Ha Giang Loop, Vietnam

Big Day! Arden turned 32 in our 32nd country of our trip around the world 🎂🎈🥳 thank thank thank you to our easy riders for surprising him with an amazing birthday cake! 🎂 this was so so sweet of them and made his birthday even that much more special 🫶🏻

This was an amazing experience and we had so much fun! If you are looking for a unique way to see Vietnam, we would definitely recommend giving the Ha Giang Loop at try! It was scary but so worth it to get out of my comfort zone and experience this! And of course we felt very safe with Road Kings!

04/24/2026

📅 Day 195
🗺️ Country 32

📍Ha Giang Loop, Vietnam

Day 3 of the Ha Giang Loop! Today was much less bike and much more climb your b***y up a mountain (and if your Arden climb to the very tippy top) 🏔️ good thing he got his protein in by eating a chicken foot 🤪