bennybee20

Firstly sorry for the big gap between the last blog and this one! I place the blame squarely with the Great Chinese Firewall which randomly blocked various websites including this one and now in Australia where wifi and internet access seem to be either absent or really expensive.  The last blog was written whilst relaxing post trek and resting weary legs. We were aware at the time of a nationwide strike called by the maoist party in Nepal in attempt to get the prime minister to resign. This was similar to the one which held us up at the end of our trek but it was an 'indefinate' strike this time. It was due to start a week before we flew to China and when we asked any of the locals how long they thought it ... read more

Whilst we are on a fairly quick connection i thought i would put on some photos. Apologies if any are duplicates as i can't remember which ones i put up last time. ... read more

Incredible India- That is what the advert on TV proclaims which seemed to be on TV every time we switched it on when planning our trip...... After previous experiences of flying into Delhi and Mumbai in the middle of the night and being hit with serious culture shock, it was good to fly into tiny Trichy airport in Tamil Nadu on the only international flight of the day landing there. The day before we had sat in Margaret and Swithin's house with the LP phoning the hotels in Trichy trying to book a room. Everywhere seemed to be 'no room at the inn' so i asked the last one on the list why they were full and the bloke said there was an election on in Trichy and all hotel rooms were booked out by party ... read more

Apologies for the long gap until this blog entry after my last one, Cambodia has sporadic internet but we always seemed to pack too much into our days to spend an hour at the computer! When i last wrote, we had just arrived in Cambodia and were trying to work the place out. Not sure if i wrote about the ex-pat chap in Hoi An who filled us with dread about Cambodia being a wild west town and full of guns, grenades and scams out to part you with your dollars faster than anywhere in the world. Well, it was all tripe and we both had a wonderful time there and felt very safe (apart from on the roads!). Kampot was an old french colonial town which had seen better days but had a charm about ... read more

Our last 2 weeks in Vietnam have been full of contrasting places. If i cast my mind back to Nha Trang from where i last wrote we seem to have done loads despite it only being two weeks. We left Nha Trang having waited long enough for the sun to come out properly and decided to head south to Ho Chi Minh City ( AKA Saigon) and then on into the Mekong River delta. People we met traveling the other way up the coast had warned us of the incessant traffic, smog and scams and when we arrived at the outskirts at 5pm, we were impressed that the bus had made such good time. 3 hours of crawling nose to tail traffic later and we were relieved to have booked a room for the night in ... read more

Vietnam Continued! Hoi an was a great place. Very much set up for tourists now however. Tailors shops galore all vying for business. Very French but yet very Vietnamese too. On arrival the hotel tried to push us in the direction of their chosen tailor but immediately after, a Canadian couple caught us and said they had just had some really good clothes made up buy a bloke round the corner. Now on our strict budget, i was thinking maybe a shirt or 2 but once in the shop, you just can't say no to a suit once they have measured you up and Alex is there saying 'You would look really nice in that one!' 24 hours later i was sporting a tailored Cashmere suit and a shirt all ready for the interviews when I ... read more

So it has been 10 days already but we have packed things in pretty tight! Got a feeling we need to take our foot off the accelerator a little bit but we have some less busy days lined up. The flight from Heathrow was pretty good and i think we set off in the only non-frozen couple of days for a while judging by the weather at home now. The stopover in Bangkok is a hazy memory of jetlag and humidity but all was well and caught the short hop flight to Hanoi. It was a nice feeling to step out into the private arrivals hall with someone there with our name out to whisk us off to a basic but clean hotel in the old quarter (Alex has been a positive influence on me- I ... read more