Aoife Luke and Rory
Aoife Joined: August 7th 2007
Logged in: March 21st 2009
Logged in: March 21st 2009
Travel Blog Posts
How many kegs can you fit on a motorbike, Hanoi
After the bus ride to end all bus rides, we arrived in Hanoi. The city bustled with people (and mopeds) and was quite a contrast to sedate Laos. We based ourselves in the Old quarter of town. It has tiny narrow streets with streets stalls on both sides about 3 feet gap for people to walk through which is usually occupied by a motorbikes, still i enjoyed the fast pace of it all. One of the first things to strike me in Vietnam was the unbelievable heat combined the crippling humidity. I got used to stares after a while as people watched my sweat literally pouring out of face. Several old ladies stopped to fan me. It was not pretty. We spent a day wandering around the place, taking in the markets and visited the Hoan ... read more
Monks on the Mekong
So when I said non-jet plane I really did mean it. Not only do Lao airlines have a very questionable safety record (which they don't release), they also have no jet planes at all only propeller ones. In fairness to Lao airlines the flight was actually quite smooth (though I was very alarmed just before take off when only one propeller was moving). The staff even managed to serve and clean up a meal within the ten minutes between ascending and descending. We were glad we flew in the end as the views flying into Luang Prabang were spectacular. Luang Prabang is little more than a town, very french in design but a nice place to spend a few days. We were able to catch up with Sandra who was there for a few days, over ... read more
Chiang Mai
Decent Internet connections are not one of South East Asia's strong points so apologies for the delay in this one. From Bangkok we went north to Chiang Mai. It's quite a nice little town, although very touristy. After some of our recent very questionable tours we sought out a recommended eco-tour. We ended up booking through the eagle house hostel on one of their private tours, as the guide was actually living with the tribe we were to stay with. In Chiang Mai we checked out a number of temples, well we had to really as you couldn't walk five minutes without passing one! There were a few notable but the best temple we visited was Wat Chieng Man which had some really cool elephant sculptures outside. There were just 6 people on our tour- three ... read more
Grand Palace
It's not often I have praise for an airline, but our Cathy pacific flight from Singapore to Bangkok was superb. Ok, I'll admit I was more than a little alarmed when the wing of our plane was the same size as the planes we usually travel on, but after a three course meal, glass of wine,a Hagen diaz and 30 different TV channels I was very content. All this on a two hour flight! Our first introduction to Bangkok, was probably seeing bangkok at it's craziest. We arrived mid afternoon so we went on a walk to acclimatise. Unintentionally ( I swear!) we ended up on Patpong road, home to ladys or were they boys?...ah lady boys. Patpong is also home to a good night market, selling knock off versions of everything you can imagine- Ipods, ... read more
Orangutans
We decided that before we hit the main Asian leg of our trip a few days in Singapore to acclimatise would be an excellent idea. We has decided to stay in the Little India area of Singapore. Being a lover of Indian food myself, I couldn't resist and Rory and Aoife will tell you that I didn't. There was restaurants and street vendors galore, I was in heaven! All of us being new to Asian we thought a trip to Asian Civilisations Museum would be a good starting point. There we learnt all about the cultures, religions and practises from India to Vietnam and from China to Indonesia. We were shown an overview of vast differing aspects of region. Singapore itself is a melting pot, there has and continues to be a lot of immigration, ... read more
Lake McKenzie
Our travels have made us very blase about flights. At 1am the night before our 7am flight we found ourselves sitting in Transport bar after a farewell pizza with our housemates- not our greatest move considering we still hadn't packed fully! Thankfully we made the flight to Brisbane, Rory had decided to stay an extra week for more fun in Melbourne so we were to meet him a week on in Sydney. Five minutes after our arrival we had stripped of our hats, scarfs, jackets... it was so hot compared to Melbourne! Our first destination was Hervey Bay, to catch the ferry to join our Cooldingo tour on Fraser island. Fraser Island is the largest sand island in the world, though we forgot that fact when standing in the middle of a rain forest growing there. ... read more
Melbourne City
So after many emails enquiring into whether we were still alive, I realised it may be time to update everyone on what we have been up to the past few months ... On arrival in Australia we had a quick stop in Sydney before we headed to Melbourne. We managed to checkout all the touristy sites - the opera house, the harbour bridge and even attended the Sydney St Patrick's Day parade! 15,000 attendees was quite a high attendance for such a rubbish parade - the highlight was when the "float" (a.k.a a crane) crashed into the monorail! Our journey from Sydney to Melbourne gave us a wake up call onto how big this country- 12hrs bus ride, and they look right beside each other on the map!!We intially based ourselves in St Kilda, home to ... read more
Franz Josef
It's been a long, long time coming but here it is.... We arrived in safely Christchurch, New Zealand after a touchy landing in Wellington (Aoife was unconcerned). We settled ourselves into the english speaking environment of New Zealand. We could read signs, ask for directions and have normal conversations with native people without wild gesticulation. We had hired a spaceship, for those who don't know what a spaceship is, it is a converted toyota estima painted bright orange and called Padwan. Yes, our car had a name! The car is converted so that two people can sleep in it, it also has a small fridge, a two ring stove and a dvd player. Not too shabby! The driving in New Zealand is fine as they drive on the same side as home but oddly they also ... read more
Vulture, Iguazu
Last stop of Argentina was in Puerto Iguazu from which we visited the Iguazu falls which lie between Brazil and Argentina border. On the Argentinian we hopped on a speedboat which brought us up close and personal with the falls and left us completely drenched. The boat trip only lasted 12 mins, but getting so close to the power of the falls was an amazing experience. We followed the walks along the platforms which offered different views, above, below most just short of being in the water. The last platform of the day was by far the most impressive, where you stare directly into the gushing water at the Devil's throat so powerful you cannot see the bottom of the falls through the spray. We booked our trip to the Brazilian side from Argentinian as it ... read more
Sunset in Colonia
Reluctantly we left the nice cool ten degrees Celsius of Patagonia for the scorching summer weather of Buenos Aires where we were reunited with Rory. Typically we arrived right in the middle of a heat wave, even the locals were glowing. Our hostel was located in the very nice area of San Telmo famous for its antique shops and Sunday market. The market had a fantastic array of vintage clothing, bric a brac and jewellery, well fantastic if you´ve the funds and the backpack space to hold everything!!Despite the 36 degree heat, there was oddly a large amount of real fur coats and jackets for sale. Later in the evening the sqare emptied and we were treated to an outdoor milonga. Milonga´s are places where people go to tango. Fun to watch, but there was one ... read more
