Greetings -  While recovering from "Plague '09," we got a little behind on the blog, but here we are, reporting on our two week run through Xian, Beijing, and Shanghai. Transitioning from Yunnan province to China's big cities was a little rough.  We went from blue skies and gorgeous countryside to cold, imposing and gray cities.  But once we settled into our winter gear and our eyes adjusted to the smog and cityscapes, we found there was a lot to enjoy.    First, we hit Xian, pop. 3.25 million, formerly the terminus of the Silk Road, now the famed location of legions of unearthed clay soldiers, the "Terracotta Warriors" (touted by China as the "8th Wonder of the World").  Expecting Xian to be all Terracotta Warriors, all the time, we were pleasantly surprised that the city ... read more

Greetings!  Here's the rundown on our time in Hanoi and Northern Vietnam, before we crossed the border into southwestern China late last week.   When we arrived in Hanoi, the city was immersed in Tet New Year preparations.  We spent most of our time in Old Town, where traffic in the already narrow, scooter-choked alleys was regularly brought to a standstill by Tet shoppers cruising the storefronts at a mall-shopper's pace and leaving their rides in the street while running in to buy presents (knee-high boots and rip-off "Ligos" were hot commodities) and buffalo-themed red and gold decorations.  We also kept seeing the holiday's principal home decoration--either a blossoming peach tree or fully-fruited orange tree--speeding past us, usually with the scooter it was strapped to obscured in a scrum of other scooters--giving the impression that the ... read more

Greetings & happy year of the buffalo! We are holed up in Hanoi for a few days while Vietnam essentially shuts down for Tet New Years celebrations--seemed like a good time to blog about our week in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) and the Mekong Delta. We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City via bus from Cambodia. The ride was uneventful except for (1) the pronounced change in scenery that occurred immediately upon crossing the border, as the fallow fields and bony cows of eastern Cambodia morphed into the emerald-green rice paddies and au jus-y heifers of western Vietnam; and (2) the fact that we fell victim to our second scam of the trip, after the meter on our taxi from the bus station somehow shot from 16,000 dong ($0.95) to 160,000 dong ($9.50) as we ... read more

Greetings! We made it to Vietnam via Cambodia on New Year's Day, after two weeks taking in the culture, temples, and small-town life of northwest Thailand. Still braised from the southern beaches, we arrived in the north's largest city, Chiang Mai, via train from Bangkok confident that the packs of sweater-clad dogs we encountered en route to our hotel were a good sign that cooler temperatures would prevail. Chiang Mai (pop. 150,000) is a university town and center for Buddhist learning, with over 350 temples crammed into its city center. We strolled around a half-dozen ornate, beautifully preserved 13th and 14th century specimens on our first day in town, including Wat Chiang Man, where we also dropped some Baht buying and releasing a wide assortment of birds (allegedly) purchased from the city food market by locals ... read more

Greetings! We are currently lapping up the sun and green curry in far removed, far southern Thailand, following a nine day trip through the bustling cities and bucolic highlands of peninsular Malaysia. First up: Kuala Lampur, whose reputation as a sprawling metropolis we confirmed early on, during the hour it took us to drive four miles from the bus station to our hotel. Once we arrived, however, it was easy to get our bearings because downtown KL is dominated by the massively spectacular 88 story Petronas Twin Towers. Lured like mosquitoes to Anna--more on that next blog--we spent the morning exploring the whole tower complex, including the surrounding park (where we admired the looming towers until our necks hurt); the seven story basement mall (which was apparently designed as some sort of retail Noah's Ark, with ... read more