I finally figured out why we are always waking up so early and heading out to visit temples or palaces. It is so cool in the mornings and our guide does not want us overheating so he schedules outdoor activities during the morning and tries to schedule museums or indoor activities in the afternoon. I am very grateful for that as it is so hot here. It actually is only in the mid 90's but with high humidity and no wind it is HOT! Our first stop this morning was the Royal Palace in Cambodia. The architecture of this Palace was definitely the prettiest I have seen so far on this trip. The buildings were just so beautiful I could not stop taking pictures. I may have posted too many of the palace but I was ... read more

We are now half way through our tour and I still can't believe it. I really have to keep telling myself that we are in Asia, and especially in Laos. I never thought I'd ever come here, but it really is amazing. The food has really been incredible and the people are so friendly. I knew I would enjoy myself and find Asia interesting, but I never knew I would be having this much fun and learning so much and having such a great time doing it. Today is our only full day in Vientiane, Laos so we started a day with a tour of the city. Of course our first stop is a local temple. Our guide joked with us that OAT does not stand for Overseas Adventure Travel, but stands for Oh, Another Temple. ... read more

We took most of the day off from the tour today. Drury and I were pretty tired so we decided to stay in town and relax and do a little sightseeing on our own. We slept in and got a little breakfast at the hotel before taking a tuk tuk into town. We walked a little through the town and decided to have lunch at a bakery. After lunch we decided to go get massages. Margo and Drury both got a foot massage and I decided to get an oil massage. It was a pretty good massage even though it was hot and the only thing dividing the rooms was a thin curtain. We did some shopping on the main street and Drury and I found some great wood art pieces we wanted, but we couldn't ... read more

This morning we are off to Laos. Our tour met in the lobby and we left the hotel about 7:15am and headed to the Bangkok airport. The Bangkok airport is a massive airport, apparently a plane lands on average every five minutes 24/7. After everyone received their boarding passes Drury and I saw a Post Office and decided to mail a package home that was filled with things we had bought the past few days in Thailand. Our tour guide helped us and what we thought would only take a few minutes wound up taking over a half hour. Our tour guide started to get nervous as we till had to go through security as well as immigration. Immigration line was very long and the rest of the tour was already waiting at the gate. After ... read more

Today was an incredible day in Bangkok! We really had a great time and were completely overwhelmed by the beauty and just everything about this country today. We had to wake up early to head for the Royal Palace and we are glad we went early as the temperature really is not that bad in the mornings. By mid-afternoon it is hot, but for the most part it hasn't been that bad. When we got off the bus outside of the palace we were immediately part of a very large crowd of tourists (mostly Chinese) as we all headed to the palace with our tour guides. There were so many people touring the palace it was amazing. It really started to feel like we were in Asia as the crowds were unbelievable. The Royal Palace is ... read more