Hi all, We are heading off on Sunday (6/1/2008) at 2:10pm. Heres our plans: We arrive in Bangkok at about 7:40pm local time on the 6th of January. We are staying the night in a hotel near the airport because our flight to Yangon in Burma leaves the next morning at 7:15am. We will arrive in Yangon at 8:00am local time. Burma/Myanmar - 7th January - 21st January *Yangon (7th Jan - 8th Jan): meet up with Bianca's friend Marek and explore the city. Visit Shewadagon Pagoda etc. *Fly to Bagan on the 8th at 4:10pm *Bagan (8th Jan - 10th [View Full Entry]

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Today we booked our tickets to Bangkok! We leave the 6th of January and arrive in Bangkok at 7:40 local time. From there we are intending on staying the night at the airport (and hopefully recovering from our jet lag) and hoping on the 7am flight to Rangoon (Yangon) in Burma (Myanmar). In Burma/Myanmar we are going to: - Yangon (Capital City) - Mandalay (See the Moustache Brothers, climb Mandalay Hill and the Mahamuni Paya (Pagoda/Wat)) - Sagaing Hill, Inwa and Amarapura (Zeids/Wats/Temples) - Catch the boat from Amarapura to Bagan - Bagan (Temple Ruins - Archaeological Zone) [View Full Entry]

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Bianca: Yesterday we set off for the Mekong Delta. We got up nice and early so we were ready to be picked up at 7...at 7:30 Scott decided we should get the hotel to call the tour company and see where they were...a car turned up for us about 15 minutes later. We met the rest of our group (who were all much older) at the dock and hopped onto a boat, only to find out that we were short a seat, so Scott spent the trip (the whole 3 hours) sitting on a step. After about 3 hours we arrived [View Full Entry]

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Today took us first to the Reunification Palace, the home to the pre-Communist government until its fall at the end of the war. At the front of the palace are two tanks from the famous photo of the communists crashing through the palace gates and another fighter jet which apparently dropped a bomb there. The palace itself is a bit disappointing to look at, it sort of looks like an aging hotel from the 60's or 70's that needs a bit of doing up. The inside of the palace was also very dated (obviously) but has a lot of big open [View Full Entry]

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Bianca: Today we went on a day trip to the Cao Dai temple and the Cu Chi Tunnels. We were picked up from our hotel at 8:15 by the snazziest mini-bus we've seen the whole time we've been away. After picking up everyone else we set off to the Cao Dai Temple. We arrived at about 11:30, which gave us enough time to look around the temple before the ceremony started at 12. Cao Dai is a religion which is unique to Vietnam...its a combination of all religions so their beliefs are quite interesting and tolerant. The temple its self is [View Full Entry]

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Last night was Tet (Lunar New Year) and we were invited to a party in our hotel lobby. At 10pm we made our way down (about a million flights of stairs) to the lobby for a huge dinner. Dinner was really nice...we shared it with an American (and his Thai fiance...about 40 years his junior...he was 73), a German commercial pilot and his girlfriend and a lot of other hotel guests who sat at different tables. Unfortunately the hotel staff didn't eat with us, which was quite a shame. I think they were still in staff looking after guests mode. It [View Full Entry]

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Nha Trang was exhausting and not really the greatest city we've been too. We both agreed that the place was very touristy, and that if it didnt have a beach it wouldnt even rate a mention on the tourist map. Bianca and I enrolled into a four day Open Water diver course at one of the many dive centres there. The course pretty much consisted of 2 days of classroom style learning (watching instructional/propaganda videos) and then diving in a Navy pool in the afternoons. Following those two days were two more days consisting of 2 dives per day out in [View Full Entry]

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After 5 and a half days in Hoi An we were very happy to leave, given the states of our wallets...e.g. we don't have any wallets anymore because we had to trade them for food after buying so many clothes...ugh! To fly to Nha Trang from Hoi An we had to get a taxi half an hour to Danang airport. Danang airport seems to be an ex-US Air Force base, and possibly now a Vietnamese Air Force base as well, as across from the terminal they still have the original concrete hangars from the war. So after a flight in a [View Full Entry]

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Since we last wrote we have left Hue and moved to Hoi An...and spent all our money! We left Hue on Sunday at about 8:40...and arrived at Danang train station about 3 hours later. The train trip was...interesting. We had been told to take food cause once you're on theres nothing to eat. Apparently whoever said that took a different train because not only were there plenty of snack carts, we were also served a full meal of rice and 3 different (gross) sauces. The trains in vietnam dont have the nice robotic voice telling you which station was next, nor [View Full Entry]

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Friday morning we arrived in Hue by plane at about 8.30am after leaving our hotel in Hanoi at 4.45am! Because of our short time in Hue we had to make the most of it and we went straight out to the Citadel on foot. The Citadel is an enormous square built in 1804 and surrounded by 10km's of walls, 4 metres high and 2 metres thick and surrounded by a 30 metre wide moat. Within the Citadel is another mini citadel that was the royal residence. The citadel area was interesting and we took a cyclo ride around for an hour. [View Full Entry]

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