JoBrown
Jo Brown and Trevor Dyson Joined: October 14th 2006
Logged in: August 29th 2008
Logged in: August 29th 2008
It was a blast, but now we are home and read this blog just for fun. Sad. We know.
Travel Blog Posts
Bike trip
For some reason unbeknown to me, I agreed to do a six day motorbike tour of the Vietnamese countryside with Trev. I do not know how this happened, but it turned out to be one of the best experiences of our trip to date. It was of course kept 'top secret' until after the event, so that we could report back home with all limbs intact. Our tour around Dalat by motorbike was a dry run, just so I could get used to being on a motorbike without being in a blind panic at every corner/roundabout. We booked it with OffRoad Vietnam, a company which we can highly recommend if you are considering something similar. Trev rode his own bike, and I went as the passenger on the guide's bike, and we were accompanied by another ... read more
Halong Bay
Vietnam is home to Halong Bay, which is a UNESCO world heritage site. It is a couple of hours away from Hanoi, and is a stretch of coastline with over 200 limestone karst islands. It is a stunning place, and we spent two days cruising around the islands on a traditional Chinese Junk. Some of the tours sell in Hanoi for a little as 30 USD, but those trips are usually accompanied by rats on board, so we splashed out on a more salubrious boat and got the VIP treatment (and no furry friends). The first day we stopped off at 'Surprising Cave', which was, well, surprising. It was a huge cave full of stalactites and stalagmites and was refreshingly cool which made a nice change from the hot humid air. We climbed through the cave, ... read more
Nha Trang
We arrived in Nha Trang anticipating our last bit of Asia's sunshine and a nice beach, to be greeted by Asia's torrential rain storms. I think we were just a little unlucky with the weather, but it certainly put a dampner on our last beach trip. After a month on Thailand's beaches, we probably shouldn't complain. When we arrived a local guy followed us into the hotel and started chatting in Vietnamese to the owner. We stood there a bit bemused that this guy follwed us in then seemed to be talking about us to the owner. He looked a bit confused, then asked us if we knew this man- he was trying to get commission for 'bringing us there', even though HE follwed US! The cheek! We soon got rid of him by advising the ... read more
Dalat
Dalat is a small town in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, the important word in this sentence is high, high as in cold and wet and mountainous. Travelling around SE Asia does not condition you well for cold and rain, in fact being cold was a feeling we had forgotten, this said we enjoyed Dalat immensley. As we got close the palm trees of the low lands gave way to connifirs, the road became twisty and the clouds were suddenly below us instead of above. The town itself looked like an Austrian Ski resort (minus the snow) the buildings were very 'European Chalet' and people were wrapped up in jumpers and coats. Due to the cold we did very little the first day beside shelter in cafes drinking hot drinks and hiding from the rain. The ... read more
HCMC
Next step along the way was the border crossing into Vietnam. We took a coach from Phnom Pehn (pausing only to purchase more photocopied books from the street kids) and were pleasantly suprised at the uneventfulness of the journey. The border crossing was one of the easiest so far and as soon as we entered Vietnam the relative prosperity of the countries were apparent. Ho Chi Minh City (AKA Saigon or HCMC) was cleaner and more modern than anything seen in Cambodia and had obvious French influences, that said buildings were of an odd constrution, all very thin but tall and the abundance of Communist flags and propaganda posters made it clear we were a long way from home. On our first full day in HCMC we went into the countryside for a tour of the ... read more
Krati market
After a brief stop back in Phnom Penh (most journeys in Cambodia have to be done via the capital) we were on the road again headed to the town of Kratie on the Mekong river. Our purpose, to search out dolphins. All though by this far into the trip we have seen more than our fair share of marine dolphins, these are different. Found only in the Mekong river these small and exceedingly rare river dolphins (approx 86 left in the wild) are well worth the 14 hour round trip by bus. We arrived in Krati late in the afternoon to find a typical, dusty and dirty, Cambodian town. Rather tired we booked in to the first guest house we found (having fooled the touts waiting for the bus by hiding in a restaurant). The room ... read more
secret island
After the harrowing history of the capital we decided to see a lighter side of Cambodia and hit the beach. We headed to Sihanoukville, just about the only seaside resort in Cambodia and the one place to dive. The bus ride was fairly uneventful (though we never got the piece of cake we were promised). We were, however, entertained with the sight of our coach being loaded with mopeds. On the doubledecker the bottom deck was reserved for two wheeled cargo! Our initial impression was that apart from being a bit ex-pat dominated S'ville was not dissimilar to Thai beach resorts, unfortunatley a visit to the beach soon changed this. The sand was strewn with litter, children pestered you with post cards and beads for sale and beggers and mangy dogs follow you everywhere, we very ... read more
S-21
We had a hellish bus journey to get to Phnom Penh so were really pleased to have arrived after sweating on a crampt bus for 5 hours. Initially it was a big disappointment- we walked out of one guest house in disgust at the state of the rooms that they actually expected us to pay to stay in, and the next one wasn't much better as it was full of drunk/stoned people making a nuisance of themselves. We found a better place eventually, and got a TV and air con for 10 USD so we were happy. We arrived knowing very little about the horrific history of Cambodia, but the small children selling (illegally) photocopied books on the streets have filled the gaps. One of the most evident reminders of the genocide here is that in ... read more
Angkor Wat
A trip to Cambodia would not be complete without a visit to the ancient temples of Angkor. We decided (perhaps foolishly) that the best way to visit the site would be on bicycles and set of on the 7km ride to get to the ruins from the town of Siem Reap. The temples are scattered over a large area but our first stop had to be at Angkor Wat itself, by far the most famous, this temple is huge and impressive, built between the 9th and 11th centuary much of it still remains intact (though some of the statues were beheaded by the Khemer Rouge), with sculptures and basreliefs showing gods and battles. Next was the complex of Angkor Thom which is larger but less well known and in a worst state of disrepair, by this ... read more
poipet
We had heard some good stories about crossing the border between Thailand and Cambodia, and our experience lived up to the expectations. Our mission was to do it in under 10 hours, and not to be the victim of any scams, of which there were many to look out for. We set off from Khao San Road in Bangkok at 4.30 AM, voluntarily I might add, so as to get a few hours head start on the hoardes of backpackers on the tourist busses and Thais coming for the casinos on the Cambodian side that would hold us up at the border. We had a kamikaze-taxi driver (who obviously was colour blind as never stopped at red lights) who took us to the bus station. Got there in one piece, and stood in line for a ... read more
