Last day in Phnom Penh

It's our last day in Cambodia and we are both sad that our holiday is coming to an end but also looking forward to catching up with friends and family back in Perth. We are both super keen to see one particular puppy :)

Our adventures have been a lot of fun, and now its time to return to work and get back into the swing of the real world.

As many people can relate to this trip has opened up other travel destinations that we'd like to visit in se asia in the future.

Now we have a 2 hour flight to Kuala Lumpur, a 5 hour lay over in the crappy air asia terminal, and finally a 5.5 hr flight to Perth. So we should be touching down in Perth around 5 am ish on Saturday. Hopefully we can both get some sleep on the plane.

It will be nice to unpack our bags and use our wardrobe again :) its amazing how little clothes you actually need!

Anyways I hope your all doing well and we are keen to catchup for a beer and share a few stories.

We aim to do one last post when we return to Perth to write up our experiences in Phnom Penh and siem reap and share some photos.

Happy trails!

Luang Prabang

Luang Prabang was beautiful and chilled - exactly what we needed after the craziness that was Vietnam.  We arrived at My Dream Boutique Resort on Friday 17th, with the plan to stay the entire week.  Bliss!



For the first few days we just got ourselves acquainted with the area (ok, and the pool) and then at night we'd hop into town to check out the night markets of local handicrafts and partake in some bbq.

Monday saw me heading to Ock Pop Tok for a workshop in the art of natural silk dyeing and weaving.  It was extremely interesting to learn how each colour was made with barks, roots, leaves and stems.

I tried my hand at making yellow, orange and red.

Then it was time to hit the loom.

It was a little tricky at times but my teachers were fantastic and I loved every second. Definitely worth doing!

Tuesday saw us kayaking down the river...

... and visiting the Buddha caves.

Craig also took the opportunity to bathe and ride an elephant ...

... and try the local rice whisky, known as lao lao.

After all that activity we took the chance to relax on Wednesday (it's tough, I know), before an awesome cooking class with Chai of Tamarind on Thursday.

We wrapped fish in banana leaves...

... stuffed chicken and herbs into lemongrass ...

... made a buffalo salad, complete with tripe and buffalo bile ...

... as well as steamed two types of rice - sticky white for the mains and purple for a pudding-ish desert.

It was an absolute feast and, as we were the only two in the class that day, we got to pig out. Yum!

So... who wants to come to a dinner party when we get home? Promise to leave out the tripe and bile! ;)

All in all, Luang Prabang was awesome. We both loved every second and would love another opportunity to further explore Laos. The people are extremely friendly and chilled out and really helped make our stay enjoyable. If you're interested you can find a few more pics of our adventures in the Photos tab, above.

Our last week is being spent in Cambodia, before we fly home this Friday (ahh!). A blog post on what we've been up to in Siem Reap will come soon (sorry, technology has become a little crappy since leaving Vietnam so we've slackened off) but until then I'll leave you with a little something that we found amusing on our recent Lao Airways flight.

And, believe it or not, all that money they save on life jackets means they can offer the beer for FREE. Winner! ;)

E.

Tales of Halong Bay and Goodbye Vietnam

Erin and I both had a lovely time in Halong Bay as you've probably gathered from the photos that we've uploaded.

We started out with a 3 hour bus journey from Hanoi to get to Halong city. The bus ride was pretty good but as we've mentioned before the roads over here are pretty bad and road travel is slow going.... We arrived into Halong city around midday and boarded a little boat to get taken to our junk.

After about 10 minutes we boarded our larger boat, the "Vega". The boat was lovely with 3 stories, a bar, a dining room (with karoke...) and a upper deck for lounging and sun bathing. Erin and I thought we would splurge a bit and got the deluxe room with a balcony and all the bells and whistles (including love heart twisted towels)

We cruised out to the islands while sitting down to a sumptuous lunch consisting of fish, pork, spring rolls, wok fried greens, rice, corn, and chips. It wasn't long till we caught site of the dreamy rock formations typical of the Halong Bay area.

The first destination we were bound for was "Surprise Cave", which we arrived to after approximately 2 hours of cruising. The caves were fantastic and consisted of 3 large chambers which had formed in the limestone karsts. There were many strange shapes which have formed over the years of calcium deposits, some which our guide described in detail that had caused ladies to have a heart attack....

We continued our journey deeper into the islands and soon stopped for some kyaking. Erin and I were very keen to hit the water and we weren't dissappointed. The guide led us into a massive enclosed lagoon which was only accessible at low tide by paddling through a cave. It was soo peaceful and beautiful in the lagoon.

Before we knew it the sun was setting on our first night in Halong Bay and we paddled back to the main boat. Dinner that night was delicious and the chef did an amazing job carving flowers our of carrots, chillies, and other vegetables. The food again was amazing!! It turned out to be our guides birthday that night so the crew threw a celebratory party for him and a seafood feast with lots of rice wine.... It wasnt long before celebratory cheers turned into an excuse to skull rice wine, some of which was extra potent stuff brought on board by a traveller who sourced it from markets in the mountain village of Sapa. Ohh how it burnt....... In Lao style the shots of rice wine needed to be skulled in one shot and the glass turned upside down on the drinkers head, unfortunately for the Italian fellow he couldnt drink all of his and had a rice wine shower..... And not long afterwards the Karoke machine got fired up for some challenging singing in both English and Vietnamese.......

Our second day on Halong Bay started off a little rough, which I directly blame on the rice wine...... We started our day with a hike up Tee Top mountain to get beautiful 360 degree views of the bay. The hike to the top was a challenge in the 40 degree celcius temp with 80% humidity, but the effort was worth it when we got site of the views.

The afternoon was spent swimming around, jumping off the boat and generally having a great ole time in the water. In the late afternoon Erin and I were dropped off at our beach bungalow on a small beach. Unfortunate for me when we left the boat I snapped off the metal door handle to our room when retrieving our luggage. This caused a bit of panic amoungst the boat crew but eventually got sorted out.... The bungalow was fantastic and was perched above the water, so we could hear the water lapping underneath us. We had a relaxed evening sat out on our balcony having a few local beers.

The following day the boat picked us up at 8:00 and we started our cruise back to the mainland. To my peace of mind the door handle had been fixed over night. After a long drive back to Hanoi in a packed bus we got back to the lovely Holiday Diamond hotel in Hanoi. We met up with friends (Sally & Chris from Melbourne) that we had met on the trail in the hotel and headed out for a final dinner and drinks in Hanoi.

Hanoi was a fun place, full of action, scooters, and general madness of busy life. We were sad to leave Vietnam as it had provided some fantastic food, great sites, and a very happy and warm people. But Laos called and we were soon on a flight bound for Luang Prabang.

Picasa Link for Halong Bay

Hey guys

I just popped some pics up of our Halong Bay trip - click on the "Photos" tab above to check them out.

We'll write a post soon to explain it all (and brag!) but right now we're about to head to the airport for our flight to Luang Prabang, Laos.  The plan is to stay there for 6 nights before our final leg in Cambodia.

E.

Back in Hanoi from Halong Bay

Erin and I have just arrived back to Hanoi after spending 3 awesome days cruising around Halong Bay.

We've noticed that a few people have been having technical difficulties posting comments, so to make it easier I have removed the word verification step before submitting comments. So feel free to try and add comments, we do love reading your thoughts :)

We will endeavour to upload photos and a blog regarding our adventures in Halong Bay in the next day.

We are off to Laos tomorrow at midday for a week of relaxing in Luang Prabang.

All The Best

Hanoi

Hanoi is one crazy city!  We flew in on a Saturday night and were greeted with a multitude of scooters, bikes and cars whizzing through the streets... and a million and one people sitting on the roadside tucking into various local delicacies.  It was a lot to take in.

Thankfully, though, we survived the night (with help from navigator extraordinaire, Sally) and then were able to properly get our bearings during the daylight hours.  Here are a few shots taken whilst we wondered around yesterday.

Before you continue reading, a small word of warning - we seemed to spend the whole day just lurching from one meal to the next.  I am still full and have skipped breakfast this morning!

The streets are crazy and, literally, anything goes.  It is quite amazing to watch and seems to work even though sometimes I can't figure out how.  For those of you who have given us hints and tips re: crossing the road - thank you!  It is hard to imagine the chaos until you are amongst it but we think we've got it pretty sussed now.  :)
 

Craig found a bakery and with a custard cone for about 45c he couldn't resist.  He was a little shocked to find that it wasn't vanilla flavoured - but coconut.

The fresh produce market stalls here are amazing (even if the photography isn't so much).  I sometimes wish I had cooking facilities to use so we could buy up big and experiment.  We'll have to make do with a cooking class in Laos instead.

For lunch we found a little cafe on the 5th floor, over-looking Hoan Kiem Lake.  As one of the few "green" places in Hanoi it was definitely worth the walk and seemed to be a popular place with locals enjoying their Sunday afternoon with an ice cream.  It was pretty spectacular scenery, though the amount of smog did put a slight dampener on it all.

After lunch we just wondered around the shopping district and I got my craft-on visiting a few embroidery stores and the like.  Some of the things they can do with a needle and thread are amazing!

Craig finally couldn't resist and had to have a pork skewer in a roll from one of the many, many street-side vendors.  It was delicious and as I type this Craig is drooling down my back looking at the pics.  I suspect we might be stopping at another stall sometime today.

As day started turning into night the streets started to really rev up again with people flocking out for a feed...

We thought we'd join in the fun and enjoy a few drinks...

And, as it so often does, a few drinks turned into a big night and before we knew it...

... I was scoffing a doner kebab - Vietnam-style. Yum!!

Today will no doubt be more of the same and then tomorrow (Tuesday) we'll be heading out to Halong Bay for 3 days of spectacular sights, kayaking, swimming, trekking - and possibly more eating and drinking. Ahh it's a tough life. ;)

E.