Singapore is lovely. I landed in the evening and caught an airport bus to my hostel in Little India. On my way from airport to hostel, I saw: McDonald's, Carl's Jr., Burger King, a massive Ferris Wheel...civilization. I was amazed by the height of the buildings and the amount of lights. I ogled the city from department stores, to name brand fast food, to the narrowing streets with textile and rug sales of Little India, until I arrived at The Inn Crowd, my hostel for the night. I checked in quickly, dropped my bag in the room and headed straight back down to the front desk for a map and recommendations on the area. With help from the guy working the desk, I mapped out a very ambitious day in Singapore, beginning at 7am the next ... read more

We did have a great nights sleep, woke up late and booked an over-night bus to Chumphon, Thailand, including an early morning ferry boat from there to the island of Koh Tao. With our next travel plans in order, we enjoyed breakfast and a day of shopping in Bangkok, our last stop in this big, unique Thai city. That night, we boarded a night bus. We were seated in the front rows, which I was happy about, because that meant I could hang my legs over the railing in front of me, lean my seat back and have a better than expected nights sleep on a bus. So as I cozied in, the Thai bus drivers said something in Thai and a Thai lady sitting next to Cameron translated for me that I had to take ... read more

And so our tuk tuk picked us up and took us to #10 Happy, just as promised. It was a 6 hour bus ride North and luckily the road has been paved in the past few years, so it was a pretty breezy drive. Also, the bus wasn't full, so we each had two seats to ourselves, which always makes the journey that much better. We had one stop along the way. The rest-stops on bus rides in Asia are pretty standard. Toilets and people selling fruit, fried rice and some sort of chicken or fish being cooked, while the man or woman tending to it use a stick with a plastic bag tied to the end to shoo away the flies. This rest-stop however, was a bit unusual. First of all, Cambodia has the most ... read more

Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, is similar to Hanoi, but busier and much hotter. It was insane to see traffic at rush hour. The motor bike is like the Asian minivan...they get whole families and a weeks worth of groceries on those things at one time. It's amazing actually. We spent our first day at The War Remnants Museum and our second day at the Cu Chi Tunnels. The War Remnants Museum was shocking, depressing, amazing, frustrating, and enlightening all at the same time. The photos were absolutely graphic and many of the descriptions spoke of American soldiers who wanted nothing more than to torture innocent women and children. It made me feel defensive of America and depressed at the realities I was seeing in Vietnam on a daily basis. I had wished I'd known ... read more

The bus ride was brutal, as the bus driver felt the need to honk the horn approximately every 2 minutes, for 18 hours straight, and our longest break topped off around 8 minutes long. We were tired, hungry and a little bit grumpy arriving in Hoi An the next afternoon, but we knew we had nothing in our near future other than good food and the beach. So, we grabbed a bite to eat, found a hostel and laid on the beach to take in the last of the afternoon sun. After the beach we took some MUCH needed showers and decided to check out the town. We walked through the markets, where I was able to replace the black flip-flops I lost in Vang Vieng (not with any nearly as nice, but cheap and cute ... read more