andyandelli

We left crummy Dalat behind wishing we’d never bothered and headed straight for the Vietnamese coast to a town called Mui Ne. The bus journey was much like all the rest, long, hot, the bus driver trying hard to travel at the fastest speed possible and no toilet stops. On arrival we were greeted by the bluest of sunny blue skies and tallest palm trees beautifully placed along the seas edge, wonderful. We quickly came to realise that Mui Ne is a holiday resort and one that is aimed at the wealthier traveling westerner. As such there is an abundance of nice restaurants, spas, dress shops and bars, the streets are also lined with a nicely laid pavement unlike much of the rest of Vietnam. We chose a hotel at the budget end of the scale ... read more

Be prepared this is a biggie! So I'll pick up where I left off and that is in a small town called Phonsavan in North East Laos where in lies 'The Plain of Jars'... Across dozens of sites these ancient 'jars' are scattered with no particular design, they vary in size and shape and only a few of their lids remain - the others presumably destroyed one way or another. The jars themselves are interesting enough, dating back 2500-3000 years, there has been no discovery of their use. A few guesses are that they once contained human remains, or were perhaps used to store water or whiskey. They remain an archaeological mystery to this day. Once you've seen one site, you've pretty much seen them all although the 3rd was probably the best with fantastic views ... read more

Since leaving Kanchanburi and our last cultural excursion it's been full steam ahead across Thailand via lots and lots of ruins: First we headed further west to Sangkhlaburi, which felt much like an end of the road town, not surprising as it is on the border of Burma, it's very quiet compared to our previous places of interest and kind of like a scene from texas chain saw masacre. After a scenic bus journey through the hills of Thailand and past the banks of the river Kwai we arrived and commenced the 2k march in the blistering midday sun at the end of which we found ourselves at lovely place of lodging on the edge of the 74k long lake Vajiralongkorn with an amazing view of the lake itself, the huge wooden bridge across it and ... read more

So we made it through Indonesia's many forms of transport and meetings with Orangutans and here we are in Bangkok, we've been here for a week so here is the run down of the major points of interest: Storms - Its the wet season here in south Asia and from the bus journey into Bangkok and every night following there has been down pours, deafening thunder and lightning that lights up the whole sky. Last night the Khao San Road was about two feet deep all the way along and all the surrounding streets and bars were almost the same. Its ok for us, something of a spectacle really but the poor street vendors have to run for cover and lose a nights takings and we miss out on pad thai, corn on the cob, kebabs ... read more

11th Aug We were a bit anxious about our 15 hour journey today especially as we'd also booked this one with our friend 'Jake', the Indo Del Boy/Con-man. Before we set off we booked out flights to Bangkok setting off on the 27th for the next leg of our adventure in Thailand. Back to the journey.....We were hoping to leave a little later in the day so that we could arrive at Lake Toba in time to get the ferry rather than be stranded in the middle of the night but when the driver turned up at 12 with a car full we had little choice but to begin the journey. The journey began at the usual pace but was relatively comfortable with air-con that actually worked! About an hour after setting off we stopped for ... read more