ciaraeandterry

Our time in Vietnam has now come to an end after 2 and a half weeks in this amazing country and our flight to Hong Kong will be leaving early in the morning. Picking up where I left off, we went to a local place for some Bun Bo (the place is called Bun Bo Nam Bo and is on Hang Dieu) which was an interesting experience. As soon as we sat down and held up two fingers (only one dish is served here so there's no need to order) Terry realised that he'd forgotten to bring his fork from the hostel. This place is 100% Vietnamese. Chopsticks only. He had no choice but to get by without his fork which the little girl on our table found funny. Lack of cutlery aside, the food was ... read more

After our amazing stay at Halong Bay we went back to Hanoi which meant a 3.5 hour bus ride. We’ve done such immense journeys lately that 3.5 hours actually counts as a quick trip! Me and Terry headed out in Hanoi to find lunch and ended up with beef noodles for £1. I’ve forgotten to mention what an absolute chopstick master I’ve become recently. I’m going to be “that showoff person” who eats their Chinese takeaway with chopsticks when I get home. Avatar was on star movies, the best Asian movie chanel on the planet, so we watched some of that then met our group for dinner. Our hotel is quite a walk away from the main part of Hanoi, called the Old Quarter so it took a while to get to our restaurant. We got ... read more

On Wednesday night, we ate in a seafood restaurant in Nha Trang but both me and Terry just ate fried rice. We had to catch an overnight train to Da Nang which was supposed to leave Nha Trang at 22:10. In typical Vietnamese style, it arrived at 23:00 and for some completely unknown reason, didn’t leave Nha Trang till 00:45. Vietnam is huge and Da Nang is 12 hours away so instead of arriving in the morning, we actually arrived at 2pm. Despite feeling like we’d just spent half our lives on a train, we slept well because the mattresses were thicker and although we didn’t have a mouse, we did have a baby cockroach. Da Nang is the fourth largest city in Vietnam but we were driving right through it and onwards to Hoi An, ... read more

We crossed the border to Vietnam where we actually had to cross the border by foot. Cue more stamps, arrival cards, forms and visa’s. The border crossing broke up the bus ride a bit and it took about an hour more to get to our hotel. We stayed the night in Chau Doc, which is a town on the Mekong Delta to break up the journey to Ho Chi Minh City a little. However, we had an awesome evening in Chau Doc! We all got motorbikes (don’t worry, we had a driver each and just sat on the back) and rode up Sam Mountain to sit in hammocks, drink beer and watch the sun set. It took 40 minutes each way so we had a great time on the bikes. On the way we saw loads ... read more

Welcome to Cambodia. As soon as we crossed the border from Thailand to Cambodia, the contrast between the two countries was immediately obvious. The crossing was quite tough. You had to que for Thai immigration, do a Cambodian medical form and then que for Cambodian arrivals. If we’d been alone, it would’ve been really hard because there’s just no signposts and no English but luckily we had our guide, Chenda to help. My passport is now very interesting with it’s various visa’s and stamps! After the crossing, we drove to Siem Reap, which is the nearest town/city to Angkor Wat, the main attraction we are here to see. Unlike Thailand, Cambodia is very rural and 90% of the population live in the country. You see just rice fields, traps for catching crickets, cows, water buffalo and ... read more