We seem to bring the rain with us wherever we go. We've been in Vietnam for 15 days, and we've had 2 days of pure beautiful sunshine. They were the first 2 days in Hanoi. Ho Chi Minh City (they only use Saigon when speaking of the city verbally) is a massively dense city full of short shanty-type dwellings squeezed between taller townhouses and tourist accommodations, with an ecclectic blend of French colonial architecture and the stoic, grand over-sized government buildings that reek of a Communist flavour. The city has a continuous soundtrack on loop from dawn til dusk, with the tooting of zig-zagging motorcycles, the shrill tinkering of pushbike bells, the hustle and bustle of rushing pedestrians, and the beckoning cries from street store-keepers armed with "good morning, vietnam!" t-shirts, coconut candies, pho soup ladles ... read more

Dogs heads, Village badgering and a rolling fog bank straight out of a Stephen King book…. Welcome to Sapa! Our second back-to-back tour and man are we feeling it. After another horror of a train and scary bus trip up a mountain we came to Sapa- a place so stunningly beautiful it blows your mind. When we rocked up at 6am in the bus, there were local Village women (who live in the surrounding valley but who work exclusively selling home-made souvenirs) fogging up the windows- just waiting to get to know us! It’s all fun at first- but you soon realise the technique- they get to know your name and where you are from and hunt you down the rest of your stay. The constant badgering of locals is the only minor drawback of this ... read more

We're alive. Just have had really crap internet access and have been really busy. We've been doing a lot of tours around northern Vietnam; about to go on another one in an hour for a few days. Vietnam is crazy, absolutely nothing like Thailand. So much traffic, honking, motorcycles...it's too freakin busy for us. Lots to write about and many photo's to upload, but will wait til we get to a city with WiFi access.... Anyway just a note to say we're alive. We'll report back soon, promise!... read more

Welcome to Bangkok- a strong dose of modernised thinking and noise after delving into the Thai countryside. Wow. This is an insane, traffic-congested city. The energy here almost throws you into epileptic fits- but in a good way. A lot of travellers we have met on the way say: ‘yep- one night in Bangkok is enough’- but I disagree! There is so much to see, although much of it is seedy and unclean and polluted- there is still the Thai flavour in every over-crowded street corner- with a temple only ever a stones throw away. Through the smog the culture still shines. We stayed in a lovely dorm- the only drawback was our room-mate who thought that showering at five am- repacking his bag at five thirty, dressing at six, playing with his safe until seven ... read more

Sorry we have not been in much contact, we have been up the north-east of Thailand in a small town called Khon Kaen, population 100,000 so in Thai terms it's about the size of Ararat (sorry Mabel). The north-east is wonderful for a few reasons- there are no tourists, it is rich in Isaan culture, and to rent a 4-star boutique hotel room cost about $12/night each. We spent a few nights just winding down from the past few weeks of travelling around, and to re-charge for Bangkok. We were so lazy we didn't even go to only 2 tourist sites near Khon Kaen - a dinosaur park (which would have been awesome but the 40+ degree heat and the 4 hour round trip was a bit of a turn-off) and some ruins down south, but ... read more