Bonjour! I must say I was half-dreading Cambodia! I had head mostly unnice things about Cambodia-children begging, lots of people missing limbs and a lot of filth. During our "mere"week there, we did witness all of the above but so many positive things too. I must admit that we did find ourselves handing over a lot of our "dollars" in the form of hefty tips and buying things that we don't need for inflated prices. The Cambodian people, very friendly, polite and smiling, have a way, sometimes unintentionally, of tugging at your heart strings. They have been through so much and [View Full Entry]

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Hello! We flew from Hanoi to Danang and then got our hotel taxi to Hoi An-took about 1.5 hrs-really nice flight. It's so cheap here so we decided to forego the sleeping bus and took the quicker option. Was very glad when I heard after that you are not allowed use the toilet on the bus and it's a 14 or 15 hour journey to Hoi An plus the seats/beds are very tight( really made for the smaller Asians). Hoi An is such a lovely place-a far cry from the madness and business of Hanoi. The people are very friendly but [View Full Entry]

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Flew into Hanoi-what a crazy place! We stayed very near the Old Quarter. Pretty late when we got in so everywhere was closed down. Got a bit of a shock after coming from sweltering Bangkok-it was really wet and cold-just like a winters day in Ireland. Just realised then that it's the end of rainy season here. We were woken up early the next morning to the sound of horns ( of all different tunes and pitches) and traffic-chaotic! Realised then that the earplugs I had saved from one of our flights would be coming in very handy in Vietnam. Venturing [View Full Entry]

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Heh! We started off in Bangkok. Stayed in the Royal Asia Lodge, Sukhumvit-decided to stay away from the madness of Khao San Road. Pretty nice place and reasonably priced. Knew there would be a lot of Westerners in Bangkok but was still surprised by the amount-seemed to be outnumbering the Thais. Went to see the Grand palace, the Lying Buddha (v impressive and huge), the Emerald Buddha and some pretty nice temples. The transport system is really efficient so we avoid the dreaded "dodgy" tuk tuks and opted for the skytrain, metro and river taxi. Came across a couple of dodgy [View Full Entry]

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The Philippines, from the tiny part we saw, a great place with the friendliest and most polite people we have met. People address you as "sir", "mam" and everybody greets you from the security guy on the door to the cleaner. It's actually quite unusual at first but then you just get used to it and in turn always have a smile and a greeting ready too. As I was told by my make-up guy( for the wedding), the Filipino people are very resilient; they've had so many knocks and hard times but they will always smile and keep going. "Heh [View Full Entry]

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Hi guys, Singapore is a shoppers paradise-malls everywhere;lots of sky-scrapers; a very well kept subway; very clean-substantial litter fines in place; and a very spacious, futuristic airport. We stayed in Little India-a great place-buzzing with energy. Sunday night seems to be the big market night-it was packed on the streets-everyone stocking up on their vege and spices or just standing around chatting. The food was great-eating off a banana leaf with your fingers-nothing like Indian at home-much nicer and lighter! The Ancient Civilsation Museum was well worth a visit-we learned a bit about [View Full Entry]

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Heh there, At the moment we're kinda stuck in Airlie Beach due to the really bad flooding up North between here and Cairns. Seemingly it's been raining up here since New Years-bit of a nightmare as it's something like 95% humidity so it's just so sticky. Decided to give the Whitsunday islands a skip as the weather is just so bad that we reckon we wouldnt be able to see much-might regret it though later as it's supposed to be fab. Arived into Sydney about 2 weeks ago. Stayed in Bondi with Enda and Angela (pals of Pearse's from college) for [View Full Entry]

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Heh everyone, Loved the South Island but actually preferred the North Island..think the weather may have had an effect as it wasnt great for much of our visit... On Sunday 11th caught the Interislander ferry from wellington to Picton-took about 3.5 hours-some fab scenery as we neared Picton. Drove a beautiful scenic route by the coast "The Queen Charlotte Way". haeded up through Nelson towards Abel Tasman National Park, where we stayed in Kaiteriteri. Very nervous start to Monday for me as we had booked a half-day kayaking along the coast of Abel Tasman ( ashamed to say, I cannot swim [View Full Entry]

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Here are more photos of the North Island... [View Full Entry]

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Kia Ora (Mauri) from New Zealand, Arrived here on New Yrs Day at 4am from Chile. New Yrs on the plane was a non-event so we missed that one! Picked up our bright green juicy camper and headed north to Whangerai (after re-enacting the malteser ad for a while). Visited the Whangeral waterfalls and slept off our jetlag. The following day we headed further North to Pahia, which appeared to be the equivalent of Tramore/Courtown for the New Zealanders but very pretty all the same. Early start the following morning brought us further north to 90 mile beach, which u can [View Full Entry]

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