Nha Trang and Hoi An

I took a windy bus ride to Nha Trang where rain was the name of the game. There was a half day of clouds where I fit in a boat ride and snorkel with a few other travelers. The boat ride was alright and the snorkeling was pretty mediocre (there was a trash bag on the reef and minimal visibility) but the company was good.
My second day in town was spent catching the hour of sun that appeared and avoiding the rain for the rest of the day. I took an overnight bus (yes, another crowded 5 to a bed bus - and it was raining and I was under a leak - fun) to Hoi An. As I was getting off the bus I noticed that Katia, a girl I had grabbed coffee with in Saigon, had been on the same bus. We set off to explore the town, made our way through the bustling daily market and walked along the river admiring the old, french style buildings. We found a cute little restaurant for brunch with a table looking out at the river - very picturesque. Katia and I hung out for a few days, tried some amazing regional specialty dishes, had fittings for a tailor-made suit, and enjoyed the holiday weekend in a town of lanterns and candles floating on the river. Katia had a flight back to Australia but I got stuck in Hoi An because all forms of travel were booked up for the holiday weekend. Luckily I met Laura who was staying in the same hotel and had been in Hoi An for a few months. We had a blast hanging out and were even invited to an amazing local lunch by our tailor and her sister (they were awesome and it was a great way to learn about about the 'real' Vietnam).
Laura was dating the star of the regional soccer team so we got second row seats for one of the big games. The stadium was packed but the game was a draw which was too bad but very exciting. We went out for drinks after but didn't stay long because there were rats crawling all around the restaurant - we had to keep banging chairs so they didn't run under our feet.
The next day I finally found a way out of town and took a bus from Hoi An to Hue. I explored the town, went to a market and hopped a plane to Hanoi the next day.

I'm Home!

I arrived home on memorial weekend surprising my Mom and Grandma. My blog was behind so I didn't give away the surprise. I will be updating it over the next few days and will also include a link to pictures when they're up.

Easy Riding

Dalat has lived up to its coolness factor in both the weather and the amazing scenery. I took the midnight bus which arrived at 6 in the morning - I was so grateful to have met two other travelers on board who led me through the winding and hilly streets to a recommended guesthouse. We dropped our things and headed to a local spot for breakfast. I tried the Bahn Mi, Vietnamese fillings on a French baguette - very popular here. Something inside (not sure what it was since I couldn't identify many of the ingredients) didn't agree with me and I hung out for the rest of the morning and watched BBC (it was thankfully the first room I've had since January with a tv, only 2 English channels but still quite a novelty).

Having recovered by afternoon I hopped on the back of one of the motorbikes the guys had rented and we went around the lake and up to a viewpoint to check out the town. The weather was a bit rainy but the temperature was amazing; I even needed a sweatshirt on the bike!
The next day I went on an incredible canyoning trip. Our small group, four Brits and me, were driven through the hills and dropped off on a random roadside. We trekked for half an hour down narrow trails, through streams and over slippery rocks (I mean really slippery, I fell a couple of times, luckily not down any cliffs but this was the scariest part of the day). We arrived at the practice cliff where we rappelled (or absailed, depending which country you hail from) down a small drop to make sure we had the technique down. Two rapels later and we were heading down a huge cliff face; so much fun! On the next descent I really got in my stride and even started doing little jumps down the wall. In between rapelling we did some more hiking, cliff jumps and got to slide down natural waterslides.

The next absail wasn't a cliff at all but a huge waterfall. It was more than a little bit intimidating with slippery rocks and water that pounds your legs and sprays your face. When you get about 15 feet from the bottom you just let go and fall into the water. Little did we know that this huge falls (literally the size of ones that tourists swarmed to in Laos - not too shabby) was just practice for the next fall. While not comparable in size, the finesse needed in this absail made it a perfect last of the day (although the big one was more fun). We stood on top, not able to see the cliff or the people at the bottom. The directions that we received were something to the effect of, go down a bit, the wall will end, go through the air, then you will be in the falls, go a bit more but you won't be able to breath and at some point you have to let go and be pulled under the rapid for some amount of time before you will be spit out downriver - sweet! This was all in not quite accurate English so we just went and hoped we'd figure it out. It was awesome and scary (mostly because we had no clue what we were doing) but we all definitely felt like we had conquered something when we emerged at the bottom. One more cliff jump and 20 minutes of wading down the river in the pouring rain and we were at the end of an incredible day.
That evening the five of us met a few other travelers and took over a restaurant for dinner followed by a pool bar - I guess this was the great end to the incredible day.

Da Lat, in addition to being known for it's cooler weather, is famous for its Easy Riders. A decade or two ago, there was a group of ex-military guys and some younger men who liked to ride motorcycles and were looking for employment. They formed a tour company called the Easy Riders and take tourists around the countryside. I hired an Easy Rider original with shoulder length grey hair, a huge bike and tough guy exterior. He was an absolutely amazing guide and pointed out parts of the landscape that I would have missed, answered my questions about life in Da Lat and Vietnam and took me to some great sites. We saw a huge waterfall (yes, it was bigger than the ones the day before), silk worms and then the factory where the silk was processed, rode in a cable car across the valley and he even showed me a little hike to the top of a mountain with amazing views! We were going to visit a minority village but when we arrived at we were told that it wasn't a good time since the husband was drunk... oops. I ended my day with a strawberry shake and dinner with friends and am off to the beach for some more heat tomorrow.

Tourist Crossing Guards

I left Cambodia a little nervous about my arrival in Vietnam. I had heard mixed reviews from other travelers about being swindled on every corner and the notorious unfriendly nature of the Vietnamese. I have found neither to be entirely true. I have had hotels try to overcharge me and a few unfriendly interactions but have also met a lot of great people; it has been a much more pleasant experience than expected. I began my Vietnamese adventure in Ho Chi Minh City, still referred to as Saigon by the locals. The bus stopped in the middle of town and the first task after sleepily disembarking was to cross the deathtrap that is a Saigon street. I found a local to cross next to and learned that the technique is to walk steadily across while paying no mind to the hundreds or motorbikes, cars and buses that are zipping straight towards you.
I met two girls from New Zealand after surviving the streetcrossing and joined them at their guesthouse. We turned off the main street and down a small alley followed by a turn into a smaller alley and then another turn - it was so narrow that I could reach out and touch both walls. We arrived at a house that rented out three rooms to travelers. Staying in a home was a fun experience besides their fondness for durian which was consumed inside the house - this is a fruit with the scent of rotten onion and feet that seemed to always waft into my fourth floor bedroom. After escaping the Durian, the Kiwis and I headed to the market to explore and find something a bit more appetizing to eat. On our way, we were dismayed to find the widest, rush hour crowded street we had ever seen. Luckily, the city of Saigon must know how daunting this intersection is for tourists and our expressions of dismay were spotted by a tourist crossing guard (who knew) who escorted us safely across! In the market we were pushed and pulled and yelled at to the extent that we were extremely grateful to find ourselves expelled back to the motorcycle laden streets.
We found a restaurant (down an alley of course) and I decided to be brave and order a combination plate. It ended up being a combination of foods that either tasted or looked unappetizing... mostly both. The highlight of gross/interesting food was two whole shrimp (shell guts and all) encased in a strange gelatin substance that could neither be chewed nor dissolved therefore forcing me to swallow each bite whole.
The next day I explored a few of the city's parks and museums. Two of the more interesting sights were the Reunification Palace which housed a war command center in its basement and the War Remnants Museum illustrating American war crimes through photography. It was really interesting to watch videos and read about the Vietnamese perspective of the 'American' War. The Mekong Delta was my next destination. I took a package tour, an experience which reminded me why I don't do packaged tours, but there are not a lot of options in Vietnam (and the tours are cheap). We boarded a bus and rode three hours to a boat. We island hopped from the rice paper factory to the fish market to the bee farm to the coconut candy/carving location and ended the day by riding a horse cart (while wearing traditional Vietnamese hats) and listening to local music. I enjoyed the day but am glad that I haven't spent most my days being ushered through sights and factories.
The following day I boarded another bus bound for the Cu Chi tunnels. This 200Km system of multi-level passageways was used by the guerrillas in attacking and escaping from the Americans and their allies. We were able to see some of the traps and the forest was laden with the hidden doors that the forces could use to appear in the middle of the path. I was very glad that I wasn't exploring 40 years ago. We went through a tunnel and it was one of those times (there are more in Asia than anywhere else I've been) that I was glad to be short. Everyone else had to crab walk or crawl and I could just walk bent over. The funny fact of the day was that they had to widen the tunnels for tourists because they kept getting stuck.
Next stop: the highland town of Dalat where there are rumored to be cooler temperatures! We'll see.

Hot Wats

The long and steamy bus ride from Laos to Cambodia was a good introduction to the heat and sweat that comes along with everyday here... it is HOT! I spent a few days getting to know Phnom Penh which is a city that seems to combine my Asian city experiences: it has the winding back alleys and poverty of Kathmandu, the posh(er) riverside and city center - not to Bangkok scale but reminiscent, and the quiet suburbs similar to Vientiane. I spent a morning at Tuol Sleng, the high school turned prison/torture center of the Khmer Rougue. I saw the small cells where the prisoners were shackled and the mechanisms of torture. There was also a video and some displays discussing the history, chain of events, key players and survivor accounts; these provided a great background and a stepping stone for understanding a small part of what Cambodia has gone through in the past four decades. I got chatting with two girls from Boston and we shared a tuk tuk to the Killing Fields a few kilometers out of town. After a tough day, we splurged on pizza (western style with cheese... amazing) on the riverside and then fruit shakes on the lakeside - a nice water-side evening.This past weekend I took a bus out to Siem Reap - a sleepy, riverside town. On the bus, I met two Swedish girls and we shared a tuk tuk to a guesthouse and then another to the temples the following day. They were very nice besides constantly speaking Swedish when they were both fluent in English.
Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples were incredible! We stumbled through the gates and the towering entryway in the predawn darkeness while thinking of all the people who had walked in and out of the temple in the past centuries - very spooky and atmospheric. The sun rose over the temples not as magnificently as we had hoped but it was beautiful to see them gradually light up. We escaped the early morning tours and went to the smaller (this is relative, it was huge) temple complex of Ta Prohm. The temples here were being left to nature which had let to some structure collapse and several huge trees growing over and around walls. This was by far my favorite temple - I'm not sure if it was the morning light, lack of tourists, or drama of ancient architecture and nature but it was fantastic.
The next temple will be remembered for it's amazingly steep steps. They were probably three or four inches deep and eighteen inches high. This was not too bad going up, although we were all holding onto the steps in front of us. Going down, if you were six inches back from the first step, you couldn't even see the stairs, it looked like a cliff. I am not afraid of heights and I had a hard time of it so I comend the girl I was with for doing it despite her fear (although it took her a half hour to get down).
The complex of Wat Thom, the second most touristed, was next on our list. We walked around the Elephant Terraces and a few temples before arriving at the crowning jewel of the complex - Bayon. The temple itself wasn't huge but the intracitely carved towers of faces surrounding the top of the temple were amazing. There were probably 100 large faces with eyes everywhere you turned (somebody's watching you...).
We saved our Angkor Wat visit for the heat of the day when all the tourists would be back in town. The complex was incredible but unfortunately the towers were under construction so we weren't able to explore the upper levels. The most memorable part of Angkor Wat wasn't actually the architecture (although it was pretty spectacular) but the intracitely carved stone murals covering the lenght of the four perimeter walls. There were scenes of heaven and hell, war, and gods and godesses. To think that this ancient empire not only transproted the stone, cut it into pieces, and assembled the temple without modern tools but also took the time to produce artwork on such a mass scale is mindblowing. I would definitely love to find time to spend a few more days exploring the periphery temples because I am sure that there are some amazing and frequently overlooked complexes that would be worth a visit (if only it weren't so hot). The three of us returned to town for Cambodian food and ice cream - a happy end to an absolutely amazing day.

Tastes like bubble gum

My travels in Southern Laos were indeed more successful in terms of being able to get out and see things than my time in the capital. I took an overnight bus with beds down to Pakse. This sounds like a really nice way to travel but as we found our beds, the only other westerner on the bus and I realized that these twin size mattresses were for two people, not one. We asked to be put together but there were no changes allowed so we spent the evening sleeping with strangers. This is not a recommended bus experience but we arrived in one piece at our destination and I suppose that's all you need.
In Pakse, four of us met up over breakfast and decided to rent motorbikes for the day and drive around the countryside to some nearby waterfalls. Two of the other travelers had experience with motorbikes so they drove the other two of us around. The scenery was spectacular and the waterfalls ranged from narrow falls with amazing height to wider and wilder falls. We stopped for mangoes at a fruitstand and escaped an afternoon shower by dining at a local roadside restaurant. I felt that I really got a taste of Southern Laos which is just what I was looking for.
My next stop was the 4,000 Island area in the Mekong. I took a ferry across the river to the island of Don Det - a mecca of relaxation with hammocks abounding, 3 hours of electricity a day and no cars or roads. There were, however, paths for biking and six of us headed out to explore another waterfall. The falls were great but seem like they would be at their grandest during the wet season. We found a swimming hole on the side of the river and took a dip before riding back to town. The afternoon was spent tubing down the river; the second time in Laos I was able to spend an afternoon on the river, - I think I need to find an appropriate tubing locale at home. The island is so relaxed that I managed to miss my boat since all the signs say 11am when it really leaves at 8am, oops. An extra day in a hammock by the river wasn't such a hardship.
Also, I just wanted to report, I finally tried the green fanta that I've been seeing everywhere and it tastes like bubble gum! Yuck!!! If you see green fanta, stay away.

Luck of the Lao

Well, my travel luck seemed to run out about halfway through Laos. It was all going fine - the people are friendly, the landscape is stunning, the food is good (generally), and the travel buddies are plentiful. I had a wonderful few days in Luang Prabang and sadly said goodbye to my Gibbon/slowboat crew as I headed up to the small town of Nong Khiaw. I met Kim and Johanna on my way and upon arrival we set off through town to explore the nearby caves. The village and surrounding area was breathtaking - set on a river and surrounded by dramatic limestone cliffs and deep green jungle - absolutely spectacular. The people in the small town were extremely friendly, showing off their baby ducklings and chicks and giving us smiles as we passed. We stopped to try to figure out what was drying on racks by the path when the woman came out to show us. Apparently it was Mekong seaweed, a regional specialty; they make it into a paste, add tomatoes and garlic, and spread it thinly to dry in the sun. We wanted to try just one piece but the lady brought out three bags (each containing about a dozen of these large squares), thinking we each wanted our own. After lots of gesturing and laughing, we were on our way with our single piece.
We arrived at the cave in the side of a cliff surrounded by a small stream with rice paddies and a peaceful grove of trees. We dined on seaweed (not particularly good - although we found out later that it is supposed to be sauteed which greatly enhances its edibility) and checked out the cave which served as home/protection to the local people during the Indochina war. We found a fruit shake stand on our way back and spent the afternoon relaxing by the river.
After the downpour the next morning (it is supposed to be dry season but it keeps raining!) we boarded a small boat and traveled upstream to the small outpost of Mung Ngoi Nuea. This town had similar idyllic scenery to Nong Khiaw and we took it all in from tubes on the river (there's really no better way to spend an afternoon).
Following a restless night's sleep (the locals were having quite a party with drumming and singing), Kim and I struck out to find the town of Huay Bo (or Hoy Bob or Ho Ba... I don't think they've quite standardized the English translation). I was feeling more than a bit under the weather and was miserable on the trek - although this gave us lots of opportunities to walk slow or sit down and admire the scenery. We nearly got lost in a buffalo pasture (it was huge with many many paths) and had to follow the local kids through rivers (who knew that's where the path went) before stumbling upon the lovely village. I was a definitely party pooper and went straight to bed. I had a short-lived second wind and walked to a local viewpoint, learned a game from the kids, chatted with the 'mama' of my guesthouse/homestay who was so incredibly kind and friendly, held and dressed her grandbaby, and wandered around the town. One amusing moment was when all the kids suddenly went running in one direction. I followed them and saw them clustered around a TV outside a home. There was a man tinkering with a generator and another had to hold the large satellite dish and make continuous adjustments during the hour of cartoons - priceless.
My evil tummy bug lasted throughout the night, throughout the trek in the POURING rain the next day, throughout the boat ride back to Nong Khiaw and bus ride back to Luang Prabang. Throughout my harrowing minivan ride around clothespin turns bringing me to Vang Vieng in 4.5 hours (it usually takes 7-8), and throughout 4 days in Vang Vieng.
My tummy luck got better as I arrived in Vientiane but my tourist luck was down for the count. I have checked everywhere and not a single tour, not a hike, not a kayak trip, not a caving adventure, is running in the entire province for the next week. There are supposed to be beautiful waterfalls and caves that are near impossible to reach via public transportation and all the tourists seem to have vacated the capital city for Luang Prabang which is hosting a huge party next week.
So in conclusion, I have seen the lovely but not too exciting Vientiane and am heading on the night bus to Paske; another home to beautiful natural wonders, and hopefully, if I'm lucky, to a few tourists who want to see them.