My first night in Bangalore was pretty much just spent sleeping in a hotel then returning to the airport in the morning to catch a flight to Nagpur. With the new airport in operation there's not really any hotels that near to it. You have to be a bit careful when booking a hotel in Bangalore as a lot of them still advertise that they are 7km away from the airport, which is the old airport. I booked into Shreyas Residency which is about the closest I could find to the airport, about 20km away, along the main highway. Not a [View Full Entry]

---

---

Thursday 6th November After spending a night in Bangalore, I caught a taxi (flat fee of 500 rupees), to the airport. Once I landed in Nagpur I was immediately assaulted by taxi and auto (3 wheels, 2 stroke vehicles) drivers. One taxi driver asked me for 700 Rs to which I just laughed at him and asked him if he was serious. I ended up taking an auto for 300 Rs (still way too much), to the Saurabh Hotel near the VCA cricket ground. The ride took about 40 minutes and it pulled up in front of the Heritage 2001 Hotel. [View Full Entry]

---

---

Thursday 23rd Oct After arriving at the airport the usual tuk-tuk drivers start mobbing you as you make your way outside. They produce a laminated official price list of common destinations around town. The 5km journey into town is listed down as 55,000 Kip (USD$6). Despite their price list we bargained the ride down to USD$2. We got dropped off at along the riverside and ended up staying at the Orchid Guest House for $16/night. Not a bad hotel, clean and the hot water worked. After settling in we went to a nearby travel agent to organise our flights to Phonsaven [View Full Entry]

---

---

Wednesday 10 Sept I caught a Cebu Pacific flight from Manila to Puerto Princesa on Palawan Island. It was the first time I'd seen an airline play a game on board. It was just of the kind; first to produce a particular object wins a prize. We landed at the Puerto Princesa airport which was quite small to say the least. There was a single guy sitting at a wooden table with a sign for foreigners to present their passports for checking. It was a bit hard to spot and most people just walked past him. I only saw him because [View Full Entry]

---

---

We caught the bus to Phnom Penh outside of the Penh Chet Guesthouse at around 10am. The bus was your normal run of the mill aircon bus, although the seats were a little small. The trip was about 4 hours long with two stops in between. Along the way we managed to try some barbecued frog and bananas. When we arrived we decided to check back into the Paragon Hotel. We originally stayed here when we first flew into the country. The hotel is basic but clean, and in a good location along the riverside. Balcony rooms are USD$25 but other [View Full Entry]

---

---

We set off from Battambang just before 8am. Our goal today was to travel the 100 or so kilometres to Pursat on a norry. A norry is a bamboo train basically consisting of a frame made up of strips of bamboo, two steel wheel axels, and a 2 stroke fanbelt driven motor. Strictly speaking, they are illegal in Cambodia, and there is talk that the government may take measures to eradicate the use of these trains. As well as myself and Chris, there was also a crew of three aboard. You might be asking yourself why does it take three people [View Full Entry]

---

---

Wed 6th August We decided to travel south to Battambang from Siem Reap by boat. We bought tickets from a travel agent which cost US$15 each. We were told it would leave at 7am but a van would come to the hotel and take us to the pier. We waited until about 6.35am and there was still no sign of the van. The guy at the hotel said not to worry and it was normal to be late but we didn't want to take any chances. So we decided to get a tuk-tuk instead of risking missing the boat. We started [View Full Entry]

---

---

Koh Ker was briefly the capital of Cambodia during the 10th century. It was mainly inaccesible until several years ago when a new tollroad was built. Our guide, Mr Ouk Sophearin told us that the Cambodian people were very proud of the road when it was built. Hard to fathom a road could cause such nationalistic sentiment. I doubt many people were shouting "Ozzie, Ozzie Ozzie" or singing Waltzing Matilda when the Bruce Highway opened in Queensland. Anyway we set off via car around 6am. The drive took about 2 hours. We had to pay 5USD to enter Boeng Mealea and [View Full Entry]

---

---

Sunday 3rd August Our Cambodian trip started in Phnom Penh where we spent a couple of days. I haven't included a blog for this period of time as I really didn't do much. Having been here last year I already did all the tourist things like the Killing Fields, S21 prison camp etc. This was Chris' first time to Phnom Penh so he did all that stuff while I just wandered around the markets and took it easy. We booked the 8am Mekong Express bus ($US13) up to Siem Reap, having decided it was the better way to go than the [View Full Entry]

---

---

I went to Hong Kong for a couple of weeks to visit a few friends, and besides I had nothing better to do. On the plane over I was reading about the Bun festival held in May on Cheung Chau island. I had been to Hong Kong a number of times but had never heard of the bun festival. Also I didn't realise that Hong Kong had other islands besides Kowloon and Hong Kong island. As luck would have it, the bun festival was on the next day, which was also a public holiday for Buddha's birthday. The next day we [View Full Entry]

---

---