Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Bali

So we've been neglecting the updates a little bit. We're in Bali right now so needless to say its hard finding motivation to sit infront of a computer and write about Cambodia and Vietnam. We've tried putting up pictures with this post a bunch now, we'll try again tomorrow. For now, just text. Anyway...

We last left you all on our way to Da Lat which turns out to be a quite large city in the hills of Vietnam. There was an informal agreement between the north and south not to fight/bomb the city so it was in very good shape. We walked around the city for most of the first night, found a Pho restaurant and headed to find a hotel. It turned out to be a big school holiday for the country so the city was packed with Vietnamese trying to get away from the heat of the rest of the country. Unfortunately for us that made finding a place to sleep somewhat difficult so we ended up staying 5 floors above a tour group restaurant with a window to the street and no A/C. Since everyone in Vietnam sits on their horn while driving (or squeezes homemade noise making devices incessantly outside your window) and the horns are adjusted to make extra beeps instead of your standard, single obnoxious sound, it was a pretty long night.

The next morning we went on a tour of the countryside. We went to a few waterfalls, a silk factory, a rice wine distillery (we found out most people dont' take shots of rice wine after our guide's reaction to Matt's "taste"), a "crazy-house", and a giant Buddha with someone living inside of it. We heard the tragic news about MJ and tried to find some fellow Americans to grieve with but ended up having to consol each other until we could cry ourselves to sleep. The next day we went on a gondola ride over the city and mountains surrounding it, went to some more falls and got on a plane back to HCMC. We went back to our old hotel who had kept our room for us (because Vietnamese girls dig Colin... until they find out he has a girlfriend) and got a few hours of sleep before a morning bus ride to Phnom Penh.

Cambodia is a bit of a blur because we did it in 3 days (and I did most of it on extensive amounts of cold medicine). We took a 7 hour bus trip into Phnom Penh where Matt and Colin got to see the Killing Fields and shoot of shotguns (different locations... they aren't that sick). The next morning we took a 6 hour bus ride on to Siem Reap to see Angkor Wat. We spent the next two days at the temple including a 5am sunrise at the main complex. It was breathtaking/aweinspiring/beautiful... just look at the pictures theres no way I can narrate looking at temples and make it exciting.

We flew out of Siem Reap back to Bangkok, drove to get our suits checked out and made it just in time for our train to Chang Mai in the north of Thailand. The ride is 13 hours on paper but closer to 15-16 in reality. Luckily we all got some good sleep and woke up just in time to start our three day trek through the jungles of Northern Thailand. This part of the trip was really cool, so I'll try to go into as much detail as I can.

We started off into the jungle with 9 other backpackers (5 Irish girls, 2 Dutch girls, 1 Swiss girl, and 1 Brit) and our guide Ping Pong. For those of you who know the region... this wasn't a reference to the ping pong shows in bangkok. I guess Pong means smell, and he didn't smell great, so thats what his friends call him. We went on an hour elephant ride (which is about 55 minutes longer than sitting on an elephant is comfortable) and each had to sit on a different elephant's head. Colin's elephant was the only male and was completely out of control... that or he lacked the inate elephant handling abilities of James and Matt. He went off pathes, and spent about 10 minutes spraying everyone onboard with water.

We then hiked to a waterfall which Matt and Ewan (the other guy) tried climbing up to in boxers... this began what turned out to be a long series of the two playing chicken with their personal safety. We spent the next 2-3 hours hiking through incredibly steep terrain, getting poured on and finally walking through some extensive rice paddies. We finally arrived at our first camp and had a miserable dinner, swam in the waterfall nearby, and started a campfire. It turned out they had a guitar at the camp so everyone got to hear some American classics for July 4th eve day. Unfortunately I think our 5 new Irish friends were most impressed by attempts at Miley Cyrus than real music. After breaking two string Matt stopped playing though and we all went to sleep in a bamboo hut with bug nets.

The next day we continued on to some pretty incredible waterfalls and spent most of the day swimming in those. We had brought some noodles tied in some of the leaves near the camp and ate that for lunch once we couldn't swim anymore (mostly due to fish bites and screaming from whoever was on the receiving end). We got to camp early that night and took a bath in the nearby river. We were in a camp of about 200+ Karen (a tribe from Burma) people who knew the river very well. They taunted Ewan and Matt into jumping from absurd heights into the rock filled river. Nobody died. July 4th was approaching, however, so after a long night sitting on some rocks overlooking the river, tension had risen between those ungrateful colonists and the imperialistic, overly-confident, snotty Brit. Fighting commenced. Everyone involved lost. We all then went to sleep on some flea infested blankets on another bamboo platform in the jungle.

The next day-the 4th- (after an appropriate wake up for the British) we walked through the village and headed on to where a driver could pick us up. We drove to lunch and then got ready for some bamboo rafting. After decorating himself with mud Matt took the helm of the USS Abraham Lincoln, Colin the USS Thomas Jefferson and James the USS Barack Obama. The rafts were about 15 bamboo polls latched to each other. You steer it by using another piece of bamboo to push off rocks and the bottom of the river. Most of these polls were used for putting other rafts into rocks though. The British navy suffered numerous defeats that day.

We finished rafting and went back to Chang Mai to take some showers and go out to a reggae bar. The reggae music was terrible and sounded closer to some sort of polka. Across the street, however, there was another bar with a sick band that played the most face-melting songs of the 90's and today (think Curt's Tomatoes or the Civilians). Colin sang Killing in the Name and Under the Bridge with the two bands that played during the night and everyone rocked appropriately. Just a taste of their set lists (Queens of the stone age, artic monkeys, kings of leon, RHCP, blink, Green Day, Skynyrd, Radiohead). When Colin and Matt got home (James was still recovering from being sick for most of the trek) they thought they'd been locked out of the hotel. They both climbed the front gate (about 10+ feet tall) and when Matt jumped off the gate swung open... nice work you two.

We caught the overnight train back to bangkok the next day and had a much less pleasant ride thanks to some snoring. We were supposed to be picked up at the train station and taken to a Buddhist temple filled with tigers. The travel agency decided not to wait for us though, so we had to take a taxi over there, look really upset, and get a private car to take us. Unfortunately our driver's stereo was set to repeat songs until he hit the next button. He didn't hit it very much. We have all heard Careless Whisper 7 times in a row now. If you think you know how horrible that is... try it once. I would share details about the tiger temple but there are two rules about the tiger temple. One, you don't talk about the tiger temple, and two... don't ever go to the tiger temple, its lame, they put you in a cage instead of the tiger, and when its raining (which it was) the tigers get too "active" so you can't see them. The day would have been lost had we not gotten checked in at a great guesthouse and had some delicious pizza.

The next morning at 3am (if it seems like we don't ever sleep normal hours, its because we don't) we went to the airport to fly to Bali. We met up with James' old roommate from Singapore, BK, and his two friends from home, Lasse and Chris. After some milkshakes in the airport in Bali we settled in at our hotel and checked out the beach. The beach is great, but you do get pestered a lot on the way/once you're there by people trying to sell the most vulgar t-shirts/bumper stickers/towels you can imagine. We all went to a nightclub near our hotel after hearing a very good cover-band playing songs we knew.

The next two days were more of the same and now we're heading up to a different part of Bali looking for some diving/snorkelling. We may stop by some of the volcanos on the island too... plans are uncertain. Just 4 more days left here so we'll be seeing you all in the real world soon.

Until then, you stay classy... world.

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Part of trip: Bali

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