http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Lee----Dovey/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Lee Dovey en-us Wed, 16 Dec 2009 22:58:51 +0000 Wed, 16 Dec 2009 22:58:51 +0000 To be honest at the start of the trip Lee and I were going to give Saigon a miss. Turns out though that Andrew Lloyd Webber already did it 30 years ago. Thangyouverymuch I'm here 'til Thursday.Due to our extra time in Hanoi waiting on our trip to Halong Bay we had to miss out a few of the delights that lie on Vietnam's coastline and we decided to fly south to Saigon straight from Hanoi. Given e http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Vietnam/Southeast/Ho-Chi-Minh-City/blog-302800.html This is the place that James Bond Island in Thailand wants to be. If you don't know the name Ha Long Bay then you'll definitely know the place when you see it. It's featured in a couple of JB movies and probably countless others and I reckon Judith Chalmers has been round here a few times when she was doing the Holiday programme. It's one of the most distinctive looking areas anywhere in the wo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Vietnam/Red-River-Delta/Halong-Bay/blog-302778.html I think it's about time we realise that no matter how much you plan something there will always be a spanner lying about just waiting to lobbed into the works. Now normally Lee and I just rock up at immigration say Sawardee Kap G'Day Sin Chao or however else you say hello and they welcome us with open arms to their lovely countries no rubber gloves necessary. We're not used to having to b http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Vietnam/Red-River-Delta/Hanoi/blog-295251.html I think Lee and I have gotten travellazy since we've been in Australia. You get used to not having the backpack on and you get comfortable because you know how everything works and it's all cool. Coming back to Thailand we appeared to have forgotten everything we had learned on our last trip here. The taxi from the airport to the hotel cost more than it did last time for a start and it appeared http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/Central-Thailand/Bangkok/blog-295155.html Here it is our final week in Sydney and in Australia. Now we don't want you all to get offended or anything when we say this but we don't really want to go Don't get us wrong it'll be great seeing everyone again and we've missed you all heaps while we've been away but you know how it is it feels like we're leaving home again And you don't leave home again without having a leaving do agai http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-291408.html And that was that. Our time in Sydney was almost over. Rosie Phil Lee and I basically started making plans for leaving Australia and the next stage of our journeys. Rosie and Phil were heading off to New Zealand for a fortnight then back to Melbourne and would be heading back to Ireland in October via Hawaii and Los Angeles and Lee and I would be making our way home via Vietnam Cambodia Laos http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-289490.html Now as previously mentioned in our other blogs we have of course been keeping up to date on the pantomime sorry football season back home. We have checked the scores of our beloved Hearts each week and comfort from the fact that we have not been there to witness some of our performances and yet more comfort still that we have been spared the many ingenious and witty comments from the Wee flai http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/Olympic-Park/blog-288669.html Everything we have done for the last three months has been the last time we will see this or the last time we will do that before we leave. This month it would be the last time that either of us would have a birthday in Australia. It was to have been a joint birthday party as Claire has the same birthday as Lee however Claire was leaving us to go to New Zealand a few days before the big day bu http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Blue-Mountains/blog-288666.html There werenrsquot many of us left by this stage. Liam and Jim had returned from the far reaches of Victoria where they had been working and playing cricket for about 2 months and had saved not very much but were determined to go home with pretty much nothing. Their idea was to spend their remaining cash supplies in their final 3 days in Sydney and to honest they made a fair bash at it. Lee and I http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/Sydney-Harbour/blog-287866.html The other thing that happened this month was our 7th anniversary. Our actual anniversary was back in February but we celebrated it this month. Now I donrsquot know if there is a precious metal significant material or even a name that is attached to this important milestone but for the purposes of this blog we shall call it our ldquoLOUDrdquo anniversary. Lee and I had chatted about how we w http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Melbourne/Albert-Park/blog-276094.html There is an invasion of Sydney every year during March. Tens of thousands of people make their way to the city of villages booking out all the hotels packing out the pubs and generally making the place lookhelliphelliphellipfabulous daaaaahling Yep thatrsquos right folks itrsquos Mardi Gras. Sydney becomes the home of one of the worlds largest Gay and Lesbian festivals for a weeken http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-287820.html Finding somewhere to stay shouldnrsquot be this hard. Sydney is huge and wherever you turn in the city there are adverts plastered all over the lampposts on hostel notice boards and in internet shops all over the city. Wersquod been looking for somewhere near where Rosie and Phil were staying as they were going to be staying almost as long as us and it would be good to be nearby. Problem was http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/Kings-Cross/blog-286361.html The other big event to happen in January is Australia Day. Every 26th Jan the country has a day off and celebrates being Australian. Therersquos no St. Brucersquos Day or anything like that just a plain old holiday so that everyone can have a drink and be glad that they are in Australia itrsquos quite a cool concept and one that should be adopted back home to be honest. Last yearrsquos http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-276070.html So that was the year that was. Our first full year in Australia had passed and to be honest it had completely flown by. When we left Scotland back in 2006 it seemed like we would be away for eternity but it doesnrsquot seem like we have been away for long at all. Phone calls to our parents also confirmed that they too had felt that the time had passed quickly since we had left. Going by the old http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-276085.html After the excitement and liverpounding mayhem of Christmas and New Year the plan was to rest and recuperate and start the saving. As New Years resolutions go it wasn't the most unachievable of personal goals but here's the thing you can't put the kidneys in dry dock and put all the spare cash away in the bank when you have a little sister arriving from Scotland during the festive period. Tha http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-275738.html We had invited the guys round for Christmas Eve at our lovely flat complete with pool jacuzzi 2 tennis courts golf practice nets putting green and barbecue area and we were having a great time. By this time Angel had come down from Darwin with Charlotte and Craig Fran Liam and Jim were all there and we had told the guys that everyone was coming round. No probs we thought. When the guys ar http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/Bondi-Beach/blog-269583.html Sydney is about the same size as Melbourne. Roughly the same population and roughly the same passion for sport. As soona s you get into Sydney though you definitely know you are in somewhere different. There's a different atmosphere to the place. Melbourne is all gridlines and blocks it looks and feels like a planned city. Sydney feels like a city that has just gotten bigger by itself without r http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-269556.html And so it was we returned to Australia our minds and bodies refreshed and thankful to be off that plane. It's weird to think but we kind of felt like we were returning home though we've gotten so used to being in Australia now that it doesn't have the same sense of wonder what's going to happen now that you get from flying into a new country. It's like coming home from holiday and landing in G http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Northern-Territory/Darwin/blog-234512.html Ao Nang was more like it I think this is what we'd imagined that Krabi was going to be like when we arrived there. It's more lively not so dull and boring and the weather was nicer also. Ao Nang was where we had arranged to catch up with Claire and Emma two out of three of the maddest girls we've ever met. Sinead Claire's cousin had headed back home to Britain a few days earlier so it was ju http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/blog-222269.html Part of the fun of travelling is getting to and from your destination. Thailand is a mad place to travel around. Everything is pretty much organised chaos. There are no proper travel agencies or anything like that all the trips and busboat services seem like theiy are run by evryone else's brother in law or cousin but you always seem to end up where you wanted to go. We had booked our ticket to http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/South-West-Thailand/Ko-Lanta/blog-222256.html