We arrived in Hong Kong late in the afternoon and caught an airport bus to our hotel - the YWCA - which proved to be a comfortable and reasonably priced place to stay. It was also on the main bus route to the harbour and the Star Ferry Terminal. It took an hour to reach our hotel from the airport - it was endless views of skyscrapers all the way! After settling in we braved the streets, trying to orientate ourselves but got hopelessly lost. Thankfully there was a odd shaped building near the hotel so we were able to find our way back eventually. We had trouble finding somewhere relatively inexpensive to eat - but I guess we had to expect that everything would be so much more expensive here. Next morning we found the ... read more

It was a long trip from Laos into Thailand! We were now on the homeward trip, albeit our arrival in Australia was still a fortnight away. As air fares from Laos were very expensive and entailed a long drive back to Luang Prabang to catch any flights we decided to overland it to Thailand instead and fly to Bangkok from Chiang Rai. We were up early to catch the bus - we had been dropped off by the bus company outside the hotel on our arrival to Luang Nam Tha but our departure started with a half hour tuk tuk ride to the highway 10 klms out of the town where we were left to await the arrival of our bus. We only hoped that the bus driver knew we were to be collected! Three quarters ... read more

We both loved our few days in the gorgeous city of Luang Prabang! After leaving Vang Vieng by bus, a 5 hour winding trip through beautiful mountain scenery took us to the UNESCO listed city. This city was placed on the World Heriatge list in 1995 (only 6 years after Laos opened to tourism) and this has played a large part in preserving the traditional architecture. Enroute we passed dozens of tiny roadside villages, each one full of bare bottomed kids, hairy black pigs and palm leaf houses. We were dropped at the usual edge of town bus station where we caught a tuktuk to the tourist area of the city. Leaving Jerry in a cafe I started wandering the narrow cobbled side streets (once all dirt paths), which led down to the Mekong River, in ... read more

We arrived in Vientiane at 5.30am feeling very tired from a sleepless overnight bus trip. A tuktuk from the bus station left us standing (coincidentally) next to a fountain in the town centre. It was here in 2001 that we asked a tuk tuk driver to take us after pointing at the diagram of a fountain on the map of the city in our guide book. Today the fountain isn't even marked in the guide book - in 2001 it was the main feature of the town centre. The city has changed so much it's almost unbelievable. In 2001 there were barely any hotels and most of the roads were still unsurfaced. Today it looks like any city in the world, though there's not a lot of really tall buildings. Brand name shops everywhere though! ... read more

Originally on crossing the border into Laos we had planned on catching a bus to Champasak (or at least the edge of the river so we could cross over by ferry to the village which until 30 years ago had been the seat of Lao Royalty) but after a language communication problem with the bus driver we decided to head for Pakse, further north and also on the Mekong River. It proved to be a wise decision as what we though was going to be a short day turned into a rather long one. With bus changes at the border - and then a Lao bus that then only took us half an hour up the road where we were left in a dusty little riverside cafe for a couple of hours to await yet ... read more