So where were we........ We decided the best way to cross the Cambodian border was as part of an organised trip, half by boat half by bus. This meant a hassle free crossing and a bit of fun along the way. The trip included a tour round some local "factories" where we saw them make coconut sweets, rice paper and rice crispies, the best part was getting to try everything - really tasty stuff. They also make rice wine at the same 'factory' and we of course sampled this too - not so nice. Paul and I also got to try [View Full Entry]

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So the day after David's birthday we packed our bags again, this time cramming everything we'd need for 3 days trekking into our day packs as we were off to Sapa in the far north west of Vietnam. After spending the day walking round Hanoi we caught the overnight train to Lao Cai, a few miles from the Chinese border, and arrived just as the sun was coming up. We then got the tourist-packed minibus to our hotel. The hour long journey to Sapa (1650m) took us on windy roads past some great scenery - hills, paddy fileds - all covered [View Full Entry]

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So, Vietnam.... We love it! We arrived at Ho Chi Minh, aka Saigon, airport on the 10th of October (yes we're a tad behind on the blog updates) and stepped out of the airport to find our transport to Phan Ngu Lao St., the main backpacker area. Immediately we were swamped by a hoard of taxi drivers all saying that the buses had finished for the night and that it would cost 120,000 Dong (4GBP), which was about twice what we were expecting by taxi. We got talking to a french couple, Matt & Pascal, who were in the same situation [View Full Entry]

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Whilst waiting for the World Cup Final to start, sitting at our own personal PC with free internet (hence the numerous emails some of you have received) we just thought we'd say that we really appreciate all the messages and comments that you leave for us. Every time we check the blog we're excited to see what's waiting for us, so please keep them coming. Come on England!!!! [View Full Entry]

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So after India we flew to Hong Kong for 3 nights. Our room cost almost 10 times more than our rooms in India and was half the size, but we had hot water and a great cosy air con/duvet combination, which meant a great night's sleep! It was dead easy, and cheap, to get around and we felt completely at ease straight away. After sorting out our visas for Vietnam (Jose - we ended up paying 500 HKD each to get them in 15 mins, rather than 300 HKD for 3 days which we didn't have) we headed for the peak [View Full Entry]

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While we're avoiding a mega thunderstorm in Ho Chi Minh City, here is the last entry on India......... We left Palolem after a few days, and headed to Kerala. Kerala is much lusher, cleaner and greener than Rajasthan and the only cows we saw tended to be tied to trees and eating grass not litter. First stop was an overnight stop at a bizarre Government Guest House in Kollam, an old British Colonial building. Had a great review in the Rough Guide, but was such a disappointment. Huge room and bathroom, but spooky & run down. In it's hay day I'm [View Full Entry]

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So we're now in Palolem, Goa. Described in the book as "lined with a swaying curtain of coconut palms, the bay forms a perfect curve of golden sand" it wasn't quite what we expected. The book didn't mention the cows ... and where there's cows, there's cowpats......... Anyway, let's backtrack. We arrived in Jaisalmer from Jodhpur (where you couldn't even see the station floor due to people sleeping everywhere en route to a religious festival) and had a free bus waiting as we'd booked accommodation and camel safari by email. Jaisalmer is very much a tourist town and there are now [View Full Entry]

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We're now in Jodhpur after skipping Japiur...heard it was another hectic, congested city and after Delhi and Agra we couldn't face another straight away. The journey was fun though.... We got a second class sleeper train from Agra to Japiur, which was crammed, very smelly and had nowhere to sleep. We headed straight for the tourist office when we arrived at 11.30pm to see how fast we could leave. The ex-army major (now village farmer who invited us several times to go and visit him) managed to get us tickets for a train that left at 2am, but without specific seats, [View Full Entry]

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Oh my god! Never thought we'd get out of Delhi. On more than 3 occasions, the local hawks, fronting for dodgy travel agents where you get the pleasure of paying at least twice the going rate, tried to steer us away from the foreign ticket office where we wanted to buy our train ticket to Agra to get the hell out of Delhi. Most tried the 'you don't want to go down there, most dangerous. Full of crooks and prostitutes.' route and told us it would be far better to travel with a personal driver - but we were quoted 300 [View Full Entry]

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