After two days of eating and shopping my way through Hanoi, I set off for my highly anticipated tour of Halong Bay, the natural wonder located about three hours drive from the city. Halong Bay is a collection of over three thousand islands rising from warm emerald waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. The area has twice been designated as a Unesco World Heritage Site, once for its status as a natural wonder and once for its geological significance. On the drive to our port of call in Halong City, I got acquainted with my small and friendly group of fellow [View Full Entry]

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Via a one-hour flight from Laos, I arrived into Hanoi, the cultural and political capital city of Vietnam. I arranged for a hotel prior to my arrival which, for an extra ten dollars, included a driver to meet & greet me at the airport and take me to the hotel, located thirty minutes into town. When entering foreign countries via air, having a smiling driver waiting on the other end has been the way to go. It’s like falling into a big ocean, and having a life preserver to grab onto while the sharks nip at your ankles, making things at [View Full Entry]

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The Road Less Traveled Sometimes leaving the guide book behind and venturing off the well trodden tourist path can bring unexpected pleasures and reveal more about a country and its people than one could ever glean from being a follower. Putting fears aside and heading off on bike into the countryside with no maps, no sense of place and only the sun to guide my way provided me with one of the more enriching and enjoyable experiences thus far. I set off in the morning and pedaled out of town toward the not too distant mountain range tucked behind Luang Prabang. [View Full Entry]

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A Few days in Chiang Mai Hundreds of miles to the North of Bangkok lay one of the cultural gems of Thailand, the city of Chiang Mai. Where Bangkok is the flashy and fast paced city firing on all cylinders, Chiang Mai is it’s more authentic and sedate sibling, and the heartbeat of the kingdom in the North. Many travelers make the trip through here to embark on multi day treks to the “remote” hill-tribe villages situated throughout the surrounding mountain ranges. For me, Chiang Mai was more of a passing through point, with no big activities planned duri [View Full Entry]

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Like many travelers who have come before me, I chose to get reacquainted with Bangkok by heading straight for Khoasan Rd., the backpacker Mecca of South East Asia. With an abundant selection of affordable lodging, block after block of restaurants, bars, street vendors and cheap tour agencies, Khoasan provides an excellent home base from which to explore the city. It’s a transient place, where the Thai people mingle alongside hippies, backpackers, and an international twenty-thirty something set. The tightly packed five block area ebbs and flows against the backdrop of street peddlers, [View Full Entry]

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Never staying more than two nights in one spot, I’ve gotten pretty damn good at packing my bag; it has become a ritual at this point. Everything has its own place and it takes me all of about ten minutes to go from having everything completely strew out across the hotel room to packed and ready to go. Saturday morning, my trusty bag and I boarded another flight and landed in a city quite different from the one’s I left behind. A city with sprawling freeways, countless mega malls, theme parks, gleaming steel and glass skyscrapers and hundred if not thousands [View Full Entry]

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On Friday morning, I joined up with the Ingall's again and headed out to visit the various historical Christianity sites a stones throw from Amman. Our first stop was Mt. Nebo, the Memorial of Moses, the presumed site of his death and burial place, and center for pilgrimages since early Christian times. The site was located high above the Jordan Valley on a cold windswept hill with sweeping views of the valley and Dead Sea. From here, we cruised down the hillside to an important place associted with Jesus and John the Baptist, the settlement of Bethany where it is presumed [View Full Entry]

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Spanish Beer-Pong For my last night in Egypt Tuesday night, I met up with Rosa and Juan Carlos on the Dahab beachfront promenade for a night of drinking, pool, drinking, crazy ping-pong games, and some more drinking. Our night of fun drifted on until the wee hours, me trying to understand their English, and them trying to understand my feeble attempts at Spanish. By the end of the night, we were all speaking that third international language which you can only understand if you have had six or seven beers. I bid them a fond farewell, exchanged emails and we parted [View Full Entry]

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Stuck in Horghada Leaving Luxor, I took a five hour bus trip across the Eastern Arabian desert and through the Red Sea Mountains to the coastal port town of Hurghada. This was to be a jumping off point for me to get over to the Sinai Peninsula, destination - Dahab, Egypt. I arrived into Hurghada Saturday evening and hoped to pass through quickly but unfortunately learned that the next high speed ferry across the Red Sea would be early Monday morning. I checked into my $7 per night hotel room and bided my time exploring the local bazaars and visiting the [View Full Entry]

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Nile Cruising Leaving Aswan, I boarded the splendid Thebes Nile cruiser (imagine a floating box) for our two-night journey up to Luxor. Compared to my accommodations in Aswan, the cruiser was a big step up. This baby was no Queen Mary, but the cabins were clean and nicely appointed with awesome views of the Nile River. After checking-in, I quickly acclimated with some sunbathing on the astro-turf covered top deck. With so few passengers on the ship, it was easy to determine there was a large contingent of French, some Germans, a few Asians, English, a couple of Americans and a [View Full Entry]

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