Onward and upward to China
We’re about to leave on a flight to China this evening. Saying goodbye to South East Asia is a mixture of ‘thank-god’ and sadness. Thailand has some of the smiliest and friendliest people we’ve met, those beaches must keep them happy 
. If you look lost they flock towards you to help and don’t even ask for money for doing so!
This may be the last update for a while as we’re not sure how much access we’ll get to our blog when in China, there’s mixed reports about access to these journalistic sites!
Add comment Sun 29 November 2009
Koh Lanta & Railay Beach, Thailand
It’s been a hard few days lazing on the beach, but we’ve tried our best and I think we managed to get the hang of it. After leaving Phi Phi we headed by ferry to Koh Lanta, a slightly larger island in the province of Krabi. The boat trip was a little choppy in places but generally fine. On arrival we checked into our basic accommodation by the beach.
Koh Lanta is a nice little place, but basically there’s just a beautiful beach and that’s about it. So we made the most of it, with the usual tough decision of “beach or pool this morning?” keeping us occupied and our keeping our brains active. We planned to stay 3 days, but decided to only stay two and instead head off to Railay Beach and stay there the extra night.
Our boat trip to Railay Beach (no Koh in front of it, as it’s technically on the mainland) was lovely, as we passed a few remote islands on route and it hardly felt like we were moving on the calm sea. Railay is a beautiful place, with two fantastic beaches showing the true beauty of southern Thai beaches. We transferred to the beach via a local longtail boat and were soon sitting by the pool waiting to check-in our little bungalow.
Over the last few days we’ve lazed around and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We’ve been kayaking around the headland and some of the islands – although we’ve decided kayaks made for two were not necessarily intended for couples! Railay (East) is truly gorgeous and we’ll be sad to leave the beaches tomorrow, but Bangkok calls as we need to shop for some general tat and warm clothes as we head north. 
1 comment Fri 27 November 2009
Koh Phi Phi Don, Thailand
We are doing some relaxing on the beautiful island of Phi Phi at the moment. It’s full of rocky crags and lovely little beaches. It’s not exactly the place to come to if you want to learn about Thai culture – there are very few Thai people here, just western tourists and their bars. However, at the moment, it’s just what we need – a little relaxation after all the dashing about we’ve done lately! It’s also a cooler, welcoming retreat from the heat of everywhere else in south east Asia.
I (Carly) am lying by the pool as I write this, while Dave is off on his PADI scuba diving course. I love swimming in the sea, but big fish scare me (especially ones with teeth), so I gave the diving a miss. Dave seems to be really enjoying it though and has seen loads of different things under the sea, including turtles and nemo fish! He says nothing can compare to the barrier reef, but it’s still really cool. Tonight he takes his final exam and then he can go diving anywhere he likes. We plan to celebrate by visiting the local backpacker bar and drinking one of the bucket of alcohol drinks they advertise heavily – classy!
Yesterday, while Dave was at his lesson, I decided to go on an expedition of my own and climbed to the top of one of Phi Phi’s lookouts. It was quite an isolated walk through some forest and at one stage I was thinking of giving up, feeling a little unsafe all on my lonesome! Nevertheless, I didn’t give up on my challenge and made it. I was greeted by gorgeous views of Phi Phi, despite the drizzle.
Island hopping begins tomorrow and we head to Koh Lanta. Photos to follow, if this slow connection ever allows them to.
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- It had the cheek to drizzle on me, but it still looked lovely
1 comment Sun 22 November 2009
The Temples of Angkor, Cambodia
After a very brief stop in Phnom Penh, mainly to take a small overnight breather and see a 90kg diamond encrusted gold Buddha, we headed off across Cambodia to Siem Reap – the home of Angkor Wat. A couple of things we noticed about Cambodia on our excursion across the country was how rural, flat and wet everywhere was; we weren’t really sure what to expect, but it was quite pleasant.
As we’re a little crazy and felt we had to conquer all of Angkor in a day we decided that it was a great idea to be there for sunrise; what we didn’t know when we made this decision was that that meant a 4:15am start. It was good fun though, as we made our way down the unlit, pitch black roads in the back of our tuk tuk to Angkor Wat (the main attraction). After getting our entrance photo cards we stopped and were pointed toward the Wat. Our driver had given us a torch so we could just about see as we headed for the recommended spot to see the sunrise. Obviously we were a little early, but it did mean we got a great spot a the edge of the little pond. As the sun rose we were awestruck by the magnificent building emerging from the darkness. Our first sight of Angkor Wat was really something.
After this we wandered around Angkor Wat for a few hours. It is amazing, absolutely every piece of wall, ceiling and balustrade inside and outside the buildings is covered in carvings. Some depict events back in the 9th-13th century, others mythical creatures – all are in great detail. Apparently at the height of the Khmer (Angkor people) Empire, there was a population in the city of 1 million people, while at the same time London had on 50 thousand.
After a spot of breakfast and chatting to some local school kids (which you find everywhere trying to sell you one thing or another) we headed off on the ‘Grand Circuit’. It’s a tour of about 35km around some of the temples nearby to Angkor. We saw absolutely loads of temples and mini-cities of all sizes, shapes, heights, with and without pools. Even though we had all day we only saw about a dozen of what must have been about one hundred. Our favourites were:
- Angkor Wat – just fantastic (biggest religious building in the world!)
- Bayon – 216 stone faces looking down on you.
- Ta Prohm – the jungle reclaiming the temple
- Pre Rup – great climb to the top
We also saw (in anti-clockwise order round the circuit!) – Banteay Kdei, Sras Srang, Eastern Mebon, Preah Neak Pean, North Gate of Angkor Thom, Terrace of the Leper King, Terrace of Elephants, Phimeanakas, Baphoun, Phomn Bakheng.
By sunset we were exhausted, and unfortunately the weather was starting to turn ugly. At our last temple, where we could have stayed for sunset, it started to pour with rain. So that was that – we dashed back to our tuk tuk, which was transformed into rain mode (plastic raincovers round the sides) and we hurtled back to base for some sleep.
We could have spent more days at Angkor taking it a bit easier and seeing some of the further afield temples. We were really surprised by the number of people who come to Cambodia just for Angkor, especially Americans (it seemed like the greatest population of them outside of the States!), but if you’ve come as far as South East Asia you’ve got to go and see the spectacle of Angkor.
1 comment Wed 18 November 2009
The Mekong Delta, from Vietnam to Cambodia by boat
We had a great few days travelling from Ho Chi Minh city to Phnom Penh in Cambodia. As usual, we set off extremely early last Friday and got on board a little boat to cruise out of Ho Chi Minh City. It was great to see all the tiny little houses along the river side, yet also quite sad to see how much rubbish was floating around. Then, as we went further out of the city, it became noticably richer, with houses 6 times the size of the other ones! The divide between rich and poor is very obvious.
We continued to cruise along for a few hours before visiting some of the Mekong Delta islands. This was the highlight for us. We visited a little honey place and sampled the food, as well as a little fruit place. A tiny wooden boat took us down a weedy little stream to the other end of the island, which was pretty cool – something we haven’t seen anywhere else. Then, after a long bus journey, we got to the ferry crossing. This was very odd… it involved getting off the bus and standing amongst loads of motorbikes (revving at our ankles) waiting to get on the ferry. Once on the ferry, the locals were all looking at us and trying to take photos with their camera phones! Again, the other side, we battled our way off with the motorbikes and hiked down the road to find our bus (easier said than done).
One thing we have noticed after careful observation of other Brits (and too much spare time ourselves), is that British people love systems. I know I’m generalising here, but it seems that we don’t mind if things are a little late, as long as there is a system in place. While the Germans on our tour were questioning the time of arrival of the bus, we were questioning why we had to get off the bus, why it went on a different ferry and why all the ferries left the port at the same time. Anyway, I’m going off track here!
So we eventually got to our hotel and grabbed some food. We can recommend a restaurant that you should not visit in the Mekong Delta region, as it left us throwing up all night!!! Unfortunately, having both been up all night feeling ill, we were unable to visit the floating markets the next morning and just joined the others on the bus later on to get to our floating hotel. It was pretty basic, but cool – a hotel which is like a boat really!
Finally, the following day, we got our ‘fast boat’ to Phnom Penh in Cambodia. It certainly wasn’t fast, but the scenery was lovely. We went passed some lovely little villages, particularly on the Cambodian side of the border. This made the whole journey worthwhile. The locals must see that boat go by every day, but they were so excited to see it and all jumped up and waved as we came passed! It was our first river border crossing as well, so that was cool. Oh and we got another 1 hour bus after the boat as well, to get to the centre of town. Exhausting, but well worth it!
A chocolate digestive would go down a treat right now with a nice cuppa tea, but I’ll have to wait a little while for that won’t I?!
Add comment Mon 16 November 2009
Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam
After an interesting flight from Danang, which involved people using their mobiles on the flight (???) and Dave physically fighting with a tiny old Vietnamese lady (who decided it was not appropriate to queue to get on the plane and wanted to push everyone) we made it to Ho Chi Minh City!
It’s very different to Hanoi and noticably richer. Although there are still millions of motorbikes on the road, it has been pleasing to find that they actually stop at traffic lights occasionally and I don’t feel like I’m going to die every time I cross the road!!
On our first day here we visited the war remnants museum. As you can imagine, it’s an extremely moving place. We came out feeling quite shocked and depressed, particularly after seeing the replica concentration camp they have made for us to see. However, it is interesting and we would recommend that people visit it. We had been hoping to go to the famous Reunification Palace on our way back, but it was closed due to a conference, so we went for tea, coffee and cake instead! Yum! (Well… yum after I took back my ‘tea latte’ and asked for a black tea with separate milk).
Today we went on a tour to the Cu Chi tunnels at Ben Dinh. It’s not far way, but took 3 hours to get out of the city! Nevertheless, it was well worth the journey. The tunnels are extensive and unbelievable. They are 280km long and tiny – it is amazing to think that the Viet Cong soldiers and civilians lived in and fought in these tunnels. We were given the chance to go in them. I lasted about 10 seconds, but Dave went a bit further. It was extremely hot inside and everyone came out looking really bedraggled!
Tomorrow we set off on our 3 day boat trip along the Mekong Delta into Cambodia. Should be interesting!
Add comment Thu 12 November 2009
Halong Bay and Hoi An
We’ve been busy over the last few days in Vietnam, squeezing in both the beautiful Halong Bay and Hoi An. It was only about an 800km trip between the two, so relatively close compared to some of our journeys across the vast nothingness of Australia.
We decided the best way to see Halong Bay was to take a 2 day tour from Hanoi. Halong bay is about 4 hours away from Hanoi so we were pleased to see the sea and arrive at Ha long city after our early rise and long drive. We had seen nothing like it when we arrived at the harbour to board our junk for the next 24hours. Basically, the large port was full of tourists and there were literally hundreds of junks dropping off and picking up tourists for their trips around the thousands of karsts. We knew it would be touristy, but this was something else!
Soon after departing the port we started to lose the other boats as we gently cruised through the protruding rocks from the still water seas. We were lucky it was really clear and sunny, so we made the most of it by sitting on deck. Later we kayaked around some of the karsts, through some caves into small inlets. The sea was at low tide so we occasionally grinded along some of the rocks and had to push ourselves off, which made it a little harder than normal, but our efforts paid off as we saw some monkeys around the hills.
Meals on the boat were interesting as we had seafood most of the time. Carly had already opted at an earlier point for a no seafood dietary requirement, but I thought it couldn’t be that bad! We’ll I’ve never had so much whole crab to crack, prawns to peel, fish to debone, squid to chew, octopus to untangle and so on. It was really tasty though and I survived to see the next day which was a bonus!
After more cruising and viewing we disembarked and headed back to Hanoi to get the overnight train to Hoi An. This train was a little less jolty through the night, but due to the typhoon that had hit Vietnam earlier in the week the train couldn’t go all the way to Danang (nearest train station to Hoi An), so we had to change trains in Hue adding another 3 hours to our already 15 hour trip. (A long, crazy story of disorganisation!).
Hoi An was a really nice change from the noise of Hanoi. Even though it’s about as busy as an average British town, it sounds and feels lovely and quiet. The setting close to the sea and along a small river is really nice. Much to Carly’s glee, Hoi An is famous for its textiles. Every shop here is either selling tailored clothes of all descriptions or hand-made shoes. Obviously we’ve picked up a little something, but you’ll have to wait and see what creations we’ve had made!
Today we went to My Son, a set of ancient ruins dating back to about the 7th century. The temples were quite overgrown by the jungle, but they were interesting to see and wander around in the heat of the morning. Hoping to go to the beach tomorrow before heading to Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) in the evening.
2 comments Mon 9 November 2009
Dave
Carly