Petulia is one of these people. Traveling around the world for many months and many months left to travel. Grrrr, UNFAIR ! But my jealousy was put aside when I learned that Petulia was also a professional picture jumper, taking crazy j'pics in every place.

With Petulia, jumping in front of the Summer Palace

We shot too many pictures that day to have them all here. But I can tell that it was a hell of a day!

The Summer Palace is a big and peaceful area in Beijing. It is full of parks, lakes, ponds, and monasteries. In 1860, the place was attacked by an anglo-french army. Now, every 100 meters, you can see signs stating that this building was rebuilt after the English and French burnt it down. Ahem... i'm from Quebec right ?

Petulia levitating in the Summer Palace

Jumping on a pedestal

But it can get a bit boring as, after a few minutes walking around, all buildings quickly look the same. This is when being with an awesome gang with Petulia, JP and Sylvain can turn a boring visit into the greatest fun. The "mot d'ordre" was : let's make some stupid pictures !! And so we did. And many ! All of them are not jumping pics, so I cannot show them all here, for the sake of that album :-)

Zen Jumping

Meditation jumping

Freestyle jumping

Mirror jumping

That hommage to the Beatles below, had us getting quite some attraction from the locals.

Beatles hommage jumping

We didn't like the option of taking a direct flight to Shanghai. If we had to fly, we prefered to look for some fancy destination before going to Shanghai. We ended up finding a good deal going to Sanya and staying in a top notch hotel. Sanya is at the south of Hainan Island, south of China and under the tropics. Pictures we found on the web sounded promising: palm trees, long white sand beaches, luxurious spa-resort by the sea. A real tropical paradise.

What we forgot to do though, was to check the weather. When we arrived in Sanya we discovered it the hard way. The island was under its worse floods of the last 50 years !!

So we enjoyed the hotel, with some bed jumpings (and some amazing massages, and some amazing food and cocktails)

Bed Jumping, it's-gonna-hurt style

Bed jumping, relax style

It wasn't that bad because, even if it rained A LOT, it was a so hot that we had no problem in going for a swim in the sea or the numerous swimming pools (one of the pool had a restaurant. Ever ate a hamburger standing on a stool in a pool ? That's awesome).

South China sea jumping

Overall it has been a great and relaxing weekend.

written by  Sly on October 4, 2010 from Sanya, China
from the travel blog: Jumping Around
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Skyscraper jumping

Shanghai is very different from Beijing. It is much more of a western-like city with its impressive skyscrapers and very diverse population. It is also a perfect place to get some very cheap tailor made suits and shirts :)

written by  Sly on October 6, 2010 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: Jumping Around
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Jumping in Morocco pavillon

Jumping in front of New Zealand pavillon

Snow jumping in France pavillon

Special thanks go to Moldova, Estonia, Albania and Ukraine !

written by  Sly on October 7, 2010 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: Jumping Around
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On the way back to Paris we spent 3 hours connecting in Doha. Enough time get a picture in order to get that location pinned on the Blogabond map ! Even if it is with a crappy picture :-)

Jumping in Doha airport

Jumping in front of Alexandre-Nevski Cathedral

I really enjoyed Sofia, the city, the food and the people. The geographic location of Bulgaria makes that country full of many influences: eastern European and post Soviet area (they use wonderful Cyrillic alphabet) but including Mediterranean touches from Greece and Turkey: yogurt and cucumber sauce, pita bread and kebab like meat... so delicious!

Not to mention you can live there very cheaply. For 11 euros a day I stayed in a very peaceful hostel named Hostel Mostel, truly in the heart of the city. The hostel had a huge living room where you could meet many fellow travellers, many of them coming from western Europe and starting their Round the World trip, hence full of great conversations. Oh and did I mention that included in these 11 euros, was free wifi, free diner and beer everyday ? :-)

written by  Sly on October 30, 2010 from Sofia, Bulgaria
from the travel blog: Jumping Around
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Jumping in Rila Monastery

It took us 4 hours driving to find that Monastery. It seems that GPS maps of Bulgaria are not as accurate as they could be :-)

The monastery is lost in the mountains and I wouldn't like to spend a whole winter here!

written by  Sly on November 1, 2010 from Rila, Bulgaria
from the travel blog: Jumping Around
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Tromso at this time of the year is magic: no more sun, but just 3 or 4 hours of low light everyday. Snow everywhere, many islands, few people, good weather most of the time we were there. You end up sleeping 12+ hours a day (which in my case is nothing new, but for other people can be quite disturbing!) and enjoying the little light we had as a precious moments.

We did see and shoot some amazing Northern Lights. But by the time we figured out how to take a jumping pic under them (tripod, long exposure, additionnal flash synchronised with the jump)... they were gone. Next time we'll be ready !

The picture below was taken outside Tromso, in a Fjord where we spent a day in a Cabin along with some cheerful Erasmus students and couchsurfers.

Jumping in Tromso