Nevadagirlamber

This month my friend Bekki and I took a road trip up into the northwest part of the state of Arkansas - into the beauty that is the Ozarks. Our destination was the War Eagle Caverns, a set of privately-owned caves with a lakeside entrance. The tour was beautiful as was learning a little about the Corp of Engineers project that created Beaver Lake to fuel industry (think Tyson chicken) in the area. This was Walmart country and their presence is felt throughout the area. Crystal Bridges, a beautifully designed museum with American Art, was fantastic to visit and was free due to the Walton's largesse. In addition, we stopped to see the first Walmart and the Walmart museum. There is also a Native American museum in the area that had some interesting pieces and was ... read more

I'm in Cambodia and it is much different than Vietnam - they might share a border, but they are very different as far as I can tell. The language is one of the first major things you notice - in Vietnam they use the Latin alphabet and apparently words are phonetic once you learn the different tones and symbols, but the Cambodia alphabet is a series of letters that I cannot even begin to understand. My first stop (after a whoops at the customs desk) was to Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples of Angkor Thom (tomb-raider!), Bayon and Ta Prohm. The sites were fairly close to each other and the construction was fascinating. The heat was oppressive though, so we paced ourselves, and were able to see all of them in a very good day. ... read more

Just a quick stop over in Hue to see what the city had to offer. We saw a couple Royal tombs - Tu Duc and Minh Mang and the Hue Citadel. We also saw the Thien Mu Pagoda, which is a symbol for the city and took a ride on a dragon boat. Lotus flowers were present throughout the city and are the Vietnamese national flower. We stopped at an incense and conical hat making collective and I've discovered a new talent - I'll go into incense making if this whole prof thing doesn't work out!... read more

Just outside of Saigon are tunnels used by the Vietnamese people to fight the French and then later the Americans and Allies during the Vietnam war. The tunnels were used extensively, and have been widened to allow for the passage of tourists (even local Vietnamese, with more nutrition and different lifestyles, need wider tunnels than those used in previous time periods). We saw several of the traps used and learned some more about guerrilla warfare. It's quite strange to look at war through the eyes of the other side.... read more

Today we left the city and checked out to Ben Tre so we could enjoy the Minh Cong Delta. It's part of Vietnam produces a lot of the agriculture rice and fish that the country eats. Water is everywhere, the humidity makes me sticky, and I'm a tad bit burnt - not a bad day at all. We visited a nice farm where we were treated to some local music, fruits and honey - we even got to hold the beehive! We then moved on to a quick float down the river before seeing how coconut candy is made. Creamy, not too sweet, delicious! We moved onto lunch after another longer trip down the river on a bigger boat. We were served what looked like a carp type of fish, a pancake filled with noodles and ... read more