FarEastAdventures

Now back in HCMC for 3 days ---- Time for: Shopping, Shopping, Shopping and Eating, Eating, Eating Then a short 3 day break Mui Ne: sun, surf and relax. See separate blog Back to HCMC --- Last day 4 April 2012 And just to be sure more shopping, hair cut, manicure and pedicure and one last Vietnamese meal before heading to the airport. This is my last blog for Far East Adventures - 3 Amigo's We have had a very exciting time, seen so many interesting historical structures, spoken with many people, eaten some real crazy stuff, walked our legs off, climbed some very steep hills and monuments, slept on some very hard beds, travelled over near non existing roads, ridden some awsome little scooters, been for a swim in ocean water hot as bath water ... read more

It's a bit of a bus shuffle this morning, two changes within a small distance until we reach the bus station. Expected ETA is 4pm, so far the road has been comfortable traveling. Not much has changed in scenery, still dry rice fields and small one room houses on very long polls. The bus hits it's brakes and we, very narrowly miss colliding with a rider on a scooter, it appears he just turned out in front of the bus, he goes flying across the road side ways trying to keep control of his bike, dust everywhere, looking back through the window I can see he is OK and back on his feet. Thank goodness! Our bus driver is a horn tooting demon speeding along. Phenom Phenn is a mix of new and old style buildings. ... read more

Our 10 am VIP bus to Vientiane finally leaves 10.45am it's suppose to take only 3hrs, the road is very rough, the bus speedo os not working, the odd speed sign suggest 30km, the other instrument lights are flickering on and off. Just imagine traveling on 50mts of tar then 100mts of red rocky dirt road all the way, and takes 6 hrs instead! Not only the bus is rattling so are our teeth and wobbly bits. It must be hard for the people living on the road edge in small villages much of what I can see through our dust covered window is also covered in thickly in red dust. This is the main road from Vang Vieng to Vientiane. The Vientiane bus depot is about 10 mins from town and requires separate transportation into ... read more

Our flight number for Luang Prabang is now calling us to the boarding gate, 8.30pm departure. We pass through 2 main gates down a few flight of stairs and boarded a shuttle bus. Looking towards the tarmac we see one small lonely Lao plane, surely this can not be for us!!! it's less than 100mts away! Finally the shuttle bus moves. It seems so funny as we pull up along side that exact plane. All aboard, it's not long before we're in the air, 1 hr 30mins, dinner and drinks provided. I'm so glade we took this option, I'm starting to get calluses on my bum. A tuk tuk delivers us to our next hotel, family owned. This is in the old section of town, there is a 11.30pm night curfew, no drinking or drunken behavior ... read more

It"s 11:45 pm touch down at Hanoi Airport, so very deserted as we are the last flight in for the night. Our hotel transfer is surpose to be waiting for us, but is no where to be found. An airport security personal comes to our aid, he promptly rings the hotel, telling them to get someone to us pronto, eventually sleepy eyed taxii driver turns up finally. The temperture has dropped, a slight coldness in the air, damp roads and the streets are quite. After checking into our room, its straight to bed. The beds have been a interesting mix of hard, harder and concrete hard with the odd coil spring bed that is more like sleeping on raw wire coils. Most of the time we are so tired that all of the above are gratefully ... read more