22 March - Monday We woke about 9:30 am to another nice day...so much for the 10-day forecast with rain every day. Our new room was located on the fifth floor away from any road or alley so the only noise to disturb us was the birds...cackling in this case. Will heard from his friend that we wouldn't be able to get tickets for the Vatican until the afternoon. I was puzzled about this, as I was not aware from any guidebook that there were limits on the number of tickets...wait in line and you get a ticket. Nevertheless, we decided to take a taxi to the Villa Borghese and then walked from there to the Piazza del Popolo, after which we would go to the Vatican to get tickets. The Borghese Gardens were ok, but ... read more

You will recall that my first entry for my May 2009 trip to Asia was similarly titled. That's because getting anywhere when there my party is taking different airlines to get to our destination, something always goes wrong. Of course, I would prefer to book everyone at the same time, but lately there have been reasons this didn't happen. So for the latest trip to Europe, it started in early Fall 2009 when I booked a round trip ticket for my son on Orbitz to Rome, with a stop over in London on the return, departing in mid-January and returning in May for his Spring semester at university in Rome. In December, my eldest daughter graduated from college. Her present was a trip to vist relatives in Northern Ireland. As we didn't know when she would ... read more

10 June (Wednesday) - We started the day with an American breakfast at the restaurant where we ate the evening before. By 10 AM we were ready to explore areas around Dalat. Our first stop was "the peaks" or Langbian Mountain which we had climbed as elementary school kids. I remembering racing to see who could get to the top first. Fortunately, today they have built a road to the top where there is a restaurant and tourist stuff...the ubiquitous horse rides and vendors selling knitted bags. We had to pay to ride a Russian built jeep the fifteen minute ride up the mountain which sure beat hiking! I met several Vietnamese students from Hanoi who wanted to practice their English and have pictures taken with me. After a half hour or so we returned down ... read more

8 June (Monday) - We departed Saigon about 8:30 for the 300 km drive to Dalat. At 100 km/hr that should have taken 3 hours. However, with the heavy traffic getting out of Saigon, the poor road conditions enroute, and stops along the way to take pictures of things we had remembered from our last drive up this road in 1960, the trip took until 5:30 PM. Out first stop was to take pictures of the rubber tree plantations and the harvesting of the white rubber sap. Then it was th large boulders near the half way point. Then it was for late lunch in the region where they grow coffee now. Not being a coffee fanatic I didn't buy any, but Barb did. Finally, about 10 km before arriving in Dalat we stopped at Prenn ... read more

Breakfast was at 9 AM and we said farewell to our friends from Manchester, England who were headed to Phi Phi and then on to Malaysia and Indonesia on their honeymoon. We caught our longtail at 9:30 AM whicch met a taxi at Ao Nang to take us to the airport. The 12:05 PM flight was uneventful, and on time, which got us to Bangkok at 2:15 PM. We picked up ouir baggage and then checked it in immediately for the 3:55 PM flight to Saigon. We had just enough time for lunch...spagetti and mangoes and sticky rice, what a combination. I was a bit concerned whether the advance approval letter we obtained from Vietnam-visa would work, but the Air Asia agent told us that many passengers used this document to get a visa when they ... read more