We had to spend 4 days in Hanoi to await our visa extensions - yes, that's how long it take and it costs USD20 each, and you have to go through your guesthouse - there is no option to arrange it directly with Immigration. So we thought we'd make the most of it and explore by foot, as is our wont. Hanoi is a lovely city with a beautiful lake and parks - some of them you need to pay an entrance fee to enter. We found sanctuary from the noisy streets in a little roof terrace restaurant whose staff we [View Full Entry]

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Ask Steve how to get from the Ninh Binh Railway Station to the Xuan Hoa Guesthouse, and he wouldn't be able to tell you. It wasn't because he was really boozed getting off the train, nor was it because my sense of direction is better than his (no deleting that Stevie!), but because he was practically delirious from a fever that suddenly came on whilst we were on the train. Our train journey from Hue to Ninh Binh was to take 12 hours. So we settled into our soft seats amongst a carriage full of Vietnamese. As usual, we were more [View Full Entry]

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After spending a couple of days catching up with Roxy and Mark in Mui Ne, we felt that we still hadn't really experienced much of Vietnam, and indeed didn't really feel that we were in Vietnam - or the Vietnam we had expected to experience at least. So we jumped on a bus to Nah Trang to see what that was like. We drove into Nah Trang city and found a guesthouse called the Perfume Grass that had lovely rooms for the bargain price of $10 a night. The guesthouse was right by the seaside and the long stretch of beach [View Full Entry]

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OK, first up, let me apologise for not having posted anything on the blog for several weeks. I am tempted to blame Stef but I have to take full responsibility here. Up until now, Stef had been doing most of the writing whilst I was in charge of the photos and other 'techie' bits of running the blog. I did promise Stef that I would write about our first parts of Vietnam and I have been procrastinating constantly. Whilst this is entirely in Character, part of me thinks that I have been delaying it because, to be totally honest, Vietnam has [View Full Entry]

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The three hour drive from Phnom Penh was definitely one of our more interesting journeys. There are apparently no scheduled buses to Kampot so we had to make our way to a market square in Phnom Penh where we could pay $4 to join a minibus that drove through Kampot on the way to somewhere else. When we got to the market place, the minibus was jam-packed. However, miraculously, two seats appeared at the back. The back turned out to be where bags are usually stowed (think of a mini-van - the luggage stow area is actually very small) with a [View Full Entry]

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We had a rather civilised journey down to Phnom Penh from Siem Reap; the road was tarmacked all the way down, so it was smooth sailing. However, Phnom Penh was a whole different story. As soon as we were off the bus, we were jumped on by touts offering rides to guesthouses. We have learned to expect this from everywhere we have been, but in this case the bus company shuttled us into their office pronto. Luckily we had been recommended the Top Banana Guesthouse by a Geordie fella we had met in Siem Reap, so we headed straight there. It [View Full Entry]

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Well actually, we had already decided to fly to Siem Reap from Pakse on 30th April as we had heard some horror stories about crossing the border by land. So we flew Laos Aviation, which we had also heard horror stories about, but it seemed the lesser of the two evils. In fact the stories were unfounded; we had safety belts, and the plane did remain in the sky for the duration of the 50 minute flight. We were quite impressed really. So, we began my birthday in Laos, and ended in Cambodia. We arrived early in the morning in Siem [View Full Entry]

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Hands down, this has been our favourite place so far. The relaxed culture, the stunning and ever-changing landscapes, and the wonderful people, all made this a place we want to return to. Our favorite foods were the rice soup for breakfast and the amazing riverweed (like sea weed but thicker and lightly fried in garlic and sesame seed, usually eaten with fresh chilli and sticky rice), both of which were our main staple in Laos. Other memories include: *- paying for dinner at restaurant in any combination of currencies including kip. dollars, baht and euro. All are accepted. *- da [View Full Entry]

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We had a bit of a treat travelling down from Vientiane to Pakse - we travelled in relative luxury on an overnight VIP bus! It was perfect until they woke us up at 5.30am with blaring loud Laos Karaoke videos - argh!!!! Also, poor Matt didn't get much sleep as an older French man decided to take the seat next to him and was getting a bit too close during the night.........we've never heard Matt get angry at someone before! Anyway, after breakfast at the local Pakse curry house (very yummy Murtabak), we set off to the local bus station to [View Full Entry]

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First of all, a big "G'day" to the friends and families of Phil & Millsy, and Karen & Helen who are now tuning in as the aforementioned found it was easier to link our blog site to their respective ones rather than write their own account of Pi Mai (guys... we're flattered ;). After 10 wonderful days in Luang Prabang and 4 days caving and floating down the river in tubes in Vang Vieng, it was time to continue our journey to the South of Laos. There was only 2 weeks left before Matt had to get on his plane back [View Full Entry]

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