Oi Hanoi

Am writing this having just arrived in Hanoi. We got here from Chiang Mai via a night in Bangkok airport. I would not recommend this, we essentially rested (not slept) on wooden benches with freezing air conditioning. Please excuse any spelling mistakes etc. as a result of that. Hanoi so far is impressive, but crazy! By far the hardest place to cross the road so far. Much noisier and quite a lot of pollution. However, we are about to go to Halong Bay followed by Sapa (hills), so probably can't complain too much! After that, Cat leaves to go to Nepal and I'll be in Vietnam on my own for a bit! Slightly daunted by this at the moment.

After elephanting, we did a cookery course in Chiang Mai. This was really good fun. We went to a market and learnt about different rices etc. then went to the farm and picked our own ingredients, most of which I can't remember the name of, but fortunately they gave us a book, then we cooked and ate an AWFUL lot. I now know how to cook green curry (and make my own curry paste), soup, pad thai, various stir fries, papaya salad, spring rolls and pumpkin or banana in coconut milk (both delicious!). I have to say, this whole trip I have been rather surprised by the amounts of chilli in Thai food, but with the fresh ingredients, it was delicious. I had been getting rather bored of similar dishes, but this reignited my enthusiasm! I now need to learn massaman curry... Was obviously a very coupley thing to have chosen to do judging by the people we were with, but they were quite fun and all round a good day.

Chiang Mai seemed to be a visit of day trips, because the following day we went hiking up a mountain and biking down again. Hiking up, whilst extremely sweaty, was quite good fun. We were faster than they predicted (always part of the fun), and it was nice walking through the jungle and then seeing bits of coffee growing, as well as lychees and macademia nuts. The region used to grow a lot of opium, but there have been a lot of efforts to replace this with coffee or other forms of income.

Biking down was a bit different. Anyone who has cycled/walked down Lynch Lane with me will know that downhill is not my strong point. Combine this with what was not beginner's mountain biking, the rain meant that we seemed to have to balance on tiny paths with lots of ditches, rocks and ridges everywhere. At first, we were spectacularly slow, but I reckon we did quite well by the end, and actually started enjoying it (eventually!). We did this in the predicted time... This was followed by food by a lake with lots of Thai swimmers in and wandering around markets in the evening.

Our final day in Chiang Mai was spent mostly museum chasing. Of the four that were recommended, two had closed (obviously the two that we had chosen first) and by the third one we arrived at we didn't mind that it was half closed, we went for it anyway. This meant we missed out on some tribal knowledge/arts/textiles but we learnt a bit about the early history of Northern Thailand just up to where it joined up with the South in the eighteenth century. We also found some more good temples. Unfortunately we were not skilled enough to spot the difference between Lannic (northern) architecture of temples and elsewhere, but still impressive and filled with monks waiting for their lunch!

After lots of stops for cold drinks and an amazing last Thai meal we made our way here, to Hanoi, via Bangkok. Both Cat and I have been surprised by how un-touristy Thailand has been compared to what we were led to expect. We were here in the low season, but have come across relatively few Westerners, which has been quite nice! I feel as though we've only really seen the three main tourist attractions (Bangkok, islands, Chiang Mai) but I have really enjoyed what I have seen and would come back for more. Much more laid back that I was expecting and a nice place to travel around.

Elephants!

Have somehow managed to fit quite a lot in since I last wrote this... After Phuket, we caught a boat across to Ko Phi Phi, a popular island about 40km away. I have to say I was expecting this whole bit to be overrun with tourists, but I was pleasantly surprised! It was absolutely picture postcard stunning, really weird islands and rocks that seem to come straight out the sea, turquoise sea, white sand and long wooden boats. We went snorkelling here - turns out, unsurprisingly, that I wasn't very good at it BUT we really did get to see lots of amazing fish! Mostly stripy yellow and black kind, but a whole mixture, very close. Also a snake thing along the bottom that was black and white that Cat spotted and rather put me off... It was a really relaxing, beautiful place to be and I wish we'd had longer. Only disappointments were the rude Australian who pointed out our sunburn and the lack of nice fresh fish to eat that we were expecting!

From here we flew up to Chiang Mai which is in the north of Thailand. It is quite touristy, but so much less hassly so it feels less so. It is not as cool and misty as we were led to believe, we still feel pretty sticky, but we are enjoying it so far! The first day was spent quite relaxingly after our journey, I am getting somewhere in sorting out school visits for later in the trip and Cat had a Thai massage. We also enjoyed our traditional Thai hotel, where we sleep on mattresses on the floor in a wooden building with lots of birds in cages. It turns out they're quite noisy at sunrise...

 Today, we went and were mahouts for the day! This meant we went a little outside of Chiang Mai and looked after elephants, we fed them (actually a bit daunting, they're quite big), learnt how to ride them, rode them through the jungle and then bathed them! Was really, really good fun, as was the much needed shower afterwards. The cutest was definitely the two year old who was born there and could not stand still! They very much emphasised how they rescued these elephants from abusive captivity and how well they were looked after. We believed this was the case, although we were slightly caught between raising money to look after them through tourists and how much human communication they really benefit from. We hope they're a bit like horses.

Brits on holiday

Having left Cambodia, we have indulged in a bit of Westerness... Not only have we had a lot of bacon and eggs for breakfast (not that we've ever been brave enough to have fish porridge...) we have also had spaghetti as well as sat in a very British eccentric tea shop. Still, we felt we deserved it at the time.

After a painstakingly slow journey back from Battambang to Bangkok, where we subject to the most extraordinary traffic coming into Bangkok, we enjoyed the bars of Khao San Road for one last time, as well as a rather grotty hostel. The following day we went to Bangkok Zoo, not overly imaginative but quite fun to see some animals in their actual home country (other than the Thai python, somehow the reptile house is much worse when you know that they are actually resident in the country you are in...), followed by the Royal Palace in Dusit Park. This had an extraordinary exhibition of artisanship. It all fell under the queen's SUPPORT foundation, so it was all made by Thai villagers and it included exquisite gold creations, like ships and thrones, all inlaid with green beetles wings, diamonds and gems, as well as some very detailed carving and silk hangings. Women weren't allowed to wear trousers, so having covered up in linen trousers to show respect we had to buy enormous sarongs, looking very odd. After this, we felt we should go and look at some of the more modern and developed Bangkok, so went and ate in Siam Square and wandered around the skyscrapers and extravagant shopping centres.

In the evening, we allowed ourselves the luxury of a flight to Phuket. This is a big island much further south where we went to see some beaches. We are staying in Phuket town, which is surprisingly un-touristry but yesterday went to Kata beach, and enjoyed the long white beaches and palm trees. Was very relaxing to enjoy the breeze and fresh seafood. Despite cloud cover and using sun cream, we still managed to get burnt. Extremely painful and annoying, as we felt we had been careful!

Today was spent recovering from said sunburn by going into the national park here. We wandered up through rainforest to find a waterfall and then experienced real rainforest rain. We got completely drenched in not very long at all and later got cold on the way back, a rare feeling so far on this trip normally limited to over enthusiastic air conditioning on buses. In the park we also went to a gibbon project, where they look after injured gibbons who have been abused in captivity and help return them to the wild where possible. Was quite interesting, and they were very sweet. Never have your photo taken with an animal - on average nine gibbons are killed to get one to keep for tourists!

Following this, we spent a very relaxing time in a cake shop. I had a strawberry crepe cake - layers and layers of thin crepes on top each other with cream in between accompanied by strawberry jam! Am enjoying reading the Cazalet chronicles as good relaxing read, shame it keeps making me weep in buses/cafes etc.

Cambodia

So, after an unfortunately brief stop at Siem Reap (although we felt we knew it rather well from all our cycling and market going) we made our way across to Phnom Penh. Fortunately, we met this girl on the bus who had been stuck there for 3 weeks and showed us all the best restaurants and an amazing hotel so we did very well here! It is very different to the rest of Cambodia that we've seen, very much like a capital and a lot of traffic.

Unfortunately, due to the type of touristing we did, this was quite a depressing stop. We visited both the 'Killing Fields' and S-21, the prison in Phnom Penh. The first was particularly moving, it was quite tastefully done with a very good audio guide, but it was pretty horrific listening. Without wanting to go into too much detail, bullets were expensive, so people were killed in shockingly violent ways. There was also a great deal of evidence of what had happened before, and it kept surprising me how recent this was. That and the fact that it entailed everybody in a country for three years. Cat and I are now keen to find out more about how Pol Pot's rule managed to come about and what exactly happened from 1979 to 1993 (Cambodian museums/guidebooks etc all very vague about this!). I found S 21 less distressing, although there were still some rooms left pretty much as they had been found, only without the bodies, and then photos that showed exactly how they had been found. All round a bit grim. Fortunately, Wat Phnom (small temple on the hill) and some excellent Khmer food cheered us up, but generally a pretty sober day.

From Phnom Penh we went on to Battambang, the second biggest city. This is a bit different because there are some French colonial bits still around. It also significantly smaller adn less developed than Phnom Penh. We tuk tuked a little out of town to the bamboo train that is about to close in 3 months for a real train, which is such a shame because it's really fun! You sit on a sort of raft of bamboo on top of wheels and with a little engine and whizz through some jungly bits at 20mph, which feels pretty fast when you're about a foot off the ground and there a loud clunks when there's a gap in the rails... Plus you're sat on a raft. When someone comes the other way, you get off, pick up the bamboo, take off the wheels and let them past! At the other end there were a whole bunch of kids playing with grass bracelets and enormous umbrella like leaves in the rain.

Following that, we were persuaded to go to a circus raising money for children in the area, performed by children in the area.  There is a school of 1400 of them and they get educated and trained in music, art or circus performance. The art was pretty cool but the circus was incredible! They did amazing things jumping off each other and standing on each other's shoulders three people high, balanced on four cylinders all at the age of 14-17. Plus they made enough little mistakes that it was really terrifying to watch!

Cambodia has been a bit of a quick loop in order to fit into Cat's plans, which is a bit of a shame as I have really enjoyed it. At one point I considered teaching here a bit, which would have been quite fun because the children are GREAT. I don't know if it's because they have nothing to play with and are therefore imaginative and amusing, or if it's because I can't understand them when they bicker, or if they just look cute, but they really are! There are also rather a lot of them as the mean age here is 22.

Anyway, back to Bangkok and then some Thai beaches...

Angkor HOT

So, we have made it to Cambodia, which was actually quite an epic journey. First we discovered that I really should take anti malarial tablets with food, and then several buses, two tuk tuk rides and one taxi journey later we arrived in Siem Reap, successfully resisting all Cambodian visa scams which is quite a feat. There were quite a few noticeable differences as soon as we arrived in Cambodia, they drive on the right (unlike Thailand), it appears much more agricultural (I am not just basing this on Bangkok, but also the six hour bus drive through Thailand), they have a few things in French and there is obviously more poverty and corrugated iron.
Last night we market wandered and enjoyed their amazing food - street food everywhere is delicious and I'm not sure I'm ever going to be able to eat substandard UK rice again, I don't know what they do with it but it's delicious! We are about to go back to the markets and I think I'm going to succumb and buy a Tintin in Cambodia t-shirt, but probably not any silks until later in the trip.

This morning we went to Angkor Wat. We got up early and cycled (in future I will hire bikes from a proper cycle hire place with decent bikes instead of the hostel, it was extremely uncomfortable) for a good hour to arrive for the 6am sunrise over Angkor Wat. It is worth all the hype and, despite the number of people, it is extremely peaceful and very impressive, largely because of its size. The surrounding moats add to this, but also add to the insects... We cycled around all morning and saw a lot of very different temples. Like elsewhere, the building has remnants of different religions, Buddhism and Hinduism swapping prominence over time. It was quite interesting how it was restored as well, it had been protected by large amounts of jungle, although Angkor Wat itself has been in use pretty much continuously. Downsides - almost unbearable heat, sunburnt wrists (!) and nasty biting ants. To recover, we found another incredible pool to ourselves. but after several hours of cycling this felt more than deserved.

Bangkok

We have successfully arrived in Bangkok! This is despite what is now an amusing airport story, where I discovered that STA had not, in fact, moved my flight as I had paid them to do. This was resolved relatively quickly, however. Ater a brief stop in Muscat where we decided NEVER to go again, as it was the hottest and most humid combination I had ever been to, we arrived in Bangkok.

Proudly managed to make our way into the city and to a hostel, but this included the most torrential rain I have ever seen and rushing out of a taxi only to fall flat on my face in front of a bunch of people. Good arrival.

Today has been beautiful - we've seen a lot of temples which are ridiculously ornate and very striking in the sunshine. They are covered either in gold or mosaics of colour. We also saw the emerald (actually jade) Buddha and the much more impressive enormous reclining Buddha which you cannot but be amazed by! We also saw a new museum of textiles all linked to the Queen. Was quite interesting, both her and her husband had grown up abroad and didn't see the rest of the country until after becoming king and queen. However, they have done a lot to sustain the population ( google SUPPORT weaving in particular) and she is VERY glamorous with some amazing outfits!

Other highlights: sunset in rooftop pool to ourselves, weird lunch noodle discovery followed by very successful Thai yellow curry supper discovery, catching the boat across the river with lots of school chilren (all in hot looking old fashioned British school uniforms) and going to bed - this is absolutely exhausting!

Vaccines, Kindle and Waterproofs

This is the first, somewhat self-conscious, post for this blog. I do not claim to be a budding travel writer, but hopefully this will be a good way of keeping people updated with what I am up to! Thus far, my 'wanderings' have got as far as various travel clinics (not pleasant), a 'crocs' shop and various outdoor shops. I am in the preparation stages for what I intend to be a six month trip via Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. Thus far I am seeing it as two months in South East Asia and am yet to get my head around the next stages!
Just about to enjoy my final English cream tea for a while and am jetting off in five hours time...