Udaipur Day 14 & 15 of Rajasthan Tour The drive to Udaipur took us to a 500 year old fort, Kumbalgarh, yes I think every one of the old 25 kingdoms had a fort, but this one was quite interesting, it had 360 temples within its walls. Its wall is the second longest to the Great Wall of China. Lots of walking up hill, lots of huffing, but we got to see the Queens toilet, like this hole in the floor that dropped straight down like 3 floors to a concrete floor - splash! There is a village in the fort and the Muslim families were all dressed up in their bright colours and the children had been given money for sweets and chippies. It was an annual festival, the celebrations of which include sacrificing a ... read more

Jodphur Day 8 & 9 of Rajasthan Tour A 5 hour drive past countless open mines and hills where they are chipping away at the rock to make bricks for building, we arrived in Jodphur, population 800,000. Quite clean really, Lonely Plant says it is full of rubbish and open sewers but we are yet to see this, I mean there is always rubbish somewhere in every town in India, but here its not everywhere. We have thoroughly enjoyed the food in India so far and have been eating mainly vegetarian. At tourist restaurants you can buy a kingfisher, like NZ$3.00 for a large bottle but nothing else. I have had some Indian Rum at one local restaurant but it tasted horrible. We are not keen on trying their ice cream, as it is not served ... read more

Mandawa Day 1 & 2 - Rajasthan Tour The sights out of the car window on the way to Mandawa were made up of desert, huge carts piled high with bales being drawn by camels, goats being herded across the road by a women in brightly coloured saris, stray cows and dogs roaming the streets eating rubbish. Family homes being a mixture of tents, cloth held up by branches and concrete block houses. Riding towards us were 3 people on a motor bike, the only unusual thing about this was one was dead; stiff as a board lying horizontally across the seat. A man in his thirties, our driver commented - alcohol. Apparently in India ARAK kills thousands of men a year. The Government distilled Arak is safe, but obviously that is too expensive for some, ... read more

PHU QUOC I am writing this on the verandah of our beach front bungalow. It’s mid afternoon and has been a beautiful day in late 20’s - our 5th day on Phu Quoc Island. Our bungalow sits on white sand with just a few meters away from the waters edge. A few late sunbathers are getting massaged on white loungers, some are sleeping under the shade of the palm trees, others are swimming and fresh pineapples and watermelon are on offer for a dollar. You can hear beer can tabs cracking and European chatter in the background, all waiting to witness the pink sunset in a couple of hours before moving to the beachfront restaurant, with wine in hand, view of the beach at dusk and a plate full of great tasting food. Jealous! The 3km ... read more

PLEASE NOTE I uploaded 2 blogs within a few hours of each other last time, one for Han Oi with the traffic videos and one for Hoi An with the flood videos. Some people thought there was only the last one Hoi An, so you may have missed one. I am traveling with a laptop so I do them as I go and when I get good internet access I upload what I have done, so often I will upload more than at one time, like this time I am uploading this one and Saigon and Mekong Delta at the same time. Nha Trang Its only when we arrived at Nha Trang that we realized how different each region of Vietnam was. Han Oi was vibrantly busy, colourful with a mix of village atmosphere and city. ... read more