Hannah and Jase's World Tour

Singapore: 23rd - 28th April.

h1annah — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 15:47:00 GMT

Hello guys

Hannah and I have just arrived in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia in the evening of the 28th after spending 5 great days in Singapore. Relaxing and slowly working out our next route.

We both loved Singapore. For such a small island country there was so much to do. As life in Singapore is relatively expensive for south east Asia, it was here that Hannah and I experienced our first mixed dorms at the Betel Box Hostel. Lovely place despite being located in a lively red light district.

After the likes of south India it was a pleasant change to walk the spotlessly clean streets of Singapore, where everything was so pristine. Beautiful parks everywhere, even the traffic seemed clean, in a weird way. All dealt with by a draconian hand though, with signs everywhere that spitting, litter and chewing gum will attract hefty fines. Good.

Hannah and I spent our first two days (24th and 25th) visiting the museums and botanical gardens before having a lovely dinner at the Boat Quay, Singapore River. Impressive scenes.

On the evening of the 25th, Hannah and I went on the betel box weekly pub crawl, which was great fun but. Unfortunately, alcohol in Singapore is so expensive but Hannah was able to have lots of fun as it was a Wednesday night and therefore ladies' night whereby all their club admissions and drinks were free!

Taken in by the speal that Singapore Zoo is supposed to be one of the most beautiful zoos in the world, on the 26th and for Hannah's birthday on the 27th we bought a Combi Singapore Zoo and Singapore Night Safari ticket to cover the 2 days. It was great, a certain highlight to be able to see all the nocturnal animals, tigers etc, lively and up close and personal. No cages in sight. All the animals are in their own habitat as much as they can be thanks to the tropical climate. Good fun and very scenic. The zoo covers such a large area that tourists can in a way be absorbed, which is great.

Now in Australia and 10 hours in front of the brits, it seems our cheaper days are behind us so more hostels and self catering required! Our plan is to remain in Brisbane for about a week and make a plan for the next 2 months.

Cheers

Jason and Hannah

South Thailand: 9th April - 23rd April.

h1annah — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 15:42:00 GMT

Hi guys

Hannah and I have just arrived in Singapore after 3 great weeks in Bangkok and sun tanning South Thailand, where we have had great fun experiencing Songkran (the thai new year) and lazily sunbathing on the very impressive tropical islands just off the west coast of south thailand, the andamon sea.

As it had been arranged that Hannah and I were going to meet up with some of her friends, Ray and Sarah who were both our for a thai 10 days holiday, we left Cambodia on 9th April and headed straight to Bangkok where we stayed until the 15th and got totaaly drenched constantly for 4 days as a result of the Songkran festivities. Literally, the whole of Bangkok had shut up for the new year and everyone was on the streets like a huge dance floor chucking iced cold water over everyone, no surviviors. The drinks vendors had their fridge freezers parked on the road making a killing and hundreds of people constantly paid money to get their 'ghostbusters' water gun packs refilled with water ready to squirt all living 'dry people'. Good fun. Great photos. Hannah and I got totally drenched, teaming up, runningf around squirting lots of old ladies with really cold water, he, he, he.

On the evening of the 15th, the 4 of us, took an overnight sleeper train down tyo south thailand and arrived at Krabi early on the 16th. Krabi is on the west coast on the Andamon Sea and victim to the tsunami. We decided to head to Krabi because we had heard that as a port it had perfect access to all of the tropical islands just off the coast, including Mayo beach, location for the film - "the beach".

As Ray and Sarah were with us for a few days and on holiday mode we all made sure that we did lots of activities and tours to make up for all the travelling we had been doing. So, from 17th to 20th we did 2 boat day trips to the islands allowing us to visit the Phi Phi islands (18th) and the 4 islands (Poda island) on the 20th and do some really impressing snorkelling in white sands, turquiose clear warm seas! Brilliant. Great photos with an underwater camera of happy faces, coral and some funky fish! Although the scenary was first class at Mayo beach, it was slightly ruined by the fact that as a victim of its own success, it has become so busy. We have sent back some really scenic postcards for you all!

On the 17th, we did some kayaking and sea caving in the infamous Krabi sea caves and paddled through the overgrown mangroves. Amazing location. Thankfully it was only after the kayaking when we were having lunch on the river having moored the kayaks that we could see the crocidiles swimming by! crazy. On the 19th we did some sunbathing on the local beach - Ao Nanang and did some horseriding on the beach in the sunset, which was lovely but slightly crazy as the very young horses were clearly too lively for us novices.

So after saying goodbye to Ray and Sarah on 20th, Hannah and I travelled 150 km up the coast to Phuket ready to get our flight to Singapore on 23rd, alas we are now here. The plan is to remain in Singapore for 5 days and do the sights and research Australia in full preparation for our much anticipated flight to Brisbane on the 28th. Bye Bye South east Asia. End of another chapter....

Cheers

Jase and Hannah

Gallery: Siem Reap

h1annah — Mon, 2 Apr 2007 00:11:00 GMT

Angkor Wat and the Temples

Cambodia: Phnom Penh - Siem Reap: 28 March - 1st April. .

h1annah — Sun, 1 Apr 2007 01:11:00 GMT

Hannah and I are currently (1st April) in Siem Reap, central Cambodia, recovering from our first full day of exploring the amazing Angkor temples, Angkor Wat and the like. We have been in Cambodia since 28th March and we have thoroughly enjoyed it and the sights have been very impressive.

We arrived in Cambodia on 28th March after a tiring 7 hour bus journey through the Mekong Delta from Vietnam's Saigon. We decided to bypass a boat trip on the Mekong as it would have taken a whole day to get to the capital of Cambodia - Phnom Penh and also cost 35$ instead of 4$ bus trip.

We spent 3 full days at Phnom Penh, which was great. The western influence is only just starting to creep in. Again, grappling with another currency. Although it is 8000 riel to one pound, the main currency used here is very much the US dollar which ironically seems to make Cambodia more expensive than Vietnam or Laos,
something that we were not expecting. Generally a drink is 1$. Saying that, since our arrival in Cambodia we have been doing the sightseeing circuit so naturally it will be more expensive.

Whilst in Phnom Penh Hannah and I visited the S21 genocide prison museum, an old high school taken over by the Khmer Rouge where they detained thousands of people between 75-79 and tortured them before
transporting them 15km to the killings fields where they were executed. They did some horrific stuff to the prisoners, who were tortured and given only three spoons of porridge to live on, No water! I’m not gonna go into the other stuff they did. Visiting this S21 prison and the killing fields was certainly a very humbling experience.

It was great to visit the national museum holding various Khmer sculptures and Hannah enjoyed
visiting the many art galleries set up in Phnom Penh resulting in us buying some Cambodian art! We also took a look at the Russian Market and Central Market. Both eye openers.

On our last evening we went to a local art theatre and watched a traditional Cambodian show with shadow theatre, acting and dancing in great costumes, it was brilliant. Tourism here is so wrapped up with the dark side of genocide museums and execution sites of the past that it was really nice to enjoy some fun traditional culture.

Yesterday, 31st March, Hannah and I took another long 7-8 hour bus journey through Cambodia to Siem Reap, the home of Angkor Wat and many other impressive temples that are just as majestic. Today we
hired a tuk tuk driver to take us around the first part of the temples for 7 pounds and bought a week pass to explore the temples. As there are temples everywhere over such a large area there is no real method to route of exploration, so in a week we hope to cover them all. Wanting to see Angkor Wat at sun rise, this was an ideal start so we had a very early start this morning, 5.00 am! THE most amazing temple and saw another five temples too. All very exhausting as its reaching 40 degrees here. It must have been about 28 degrees at 10am
- I'm not exaggerating.

Approaching Angkor Wat was very impressive. Through the gates, walking down the walkway with Angkor Wat imposing everywhere! Must see the photos. With our week pass Hannah and I intend to visit all the temples and see the more impressive ones at various parts of the day. We will certainly re-visit Angkor Wat in the noon sun and for sunset. Certainly a case of a picture (photo) paints a thousand words. So we intend to remain here for another 6 days and indulge on some Angkor civilisation before making our way through West Cambodia
and back into central Thailand towards Bangkok.

Cheers

Jason and Hannah.

Gallery: Vietnam

h1annah — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:15:00 GMT

Vinh, Hue, Hoi An, Dalat, Mui Ne, Saigon

Dalat - Mui Ne - Saigon: 16th - 24th March.

h1annah — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 01:38:00 GMT

Hello guys,

Hannah and I took our night sleeper bus down to Nh Trang, arriving there for about 6.30 am. As it seemed like just another big noisy city with a beach, still on the bus we made the decision to continue on our trails straight away and hop on to another bus to take us further south by 4 hours to the so called vietnamese honeymoon spot up in the highlands, being Dalat in the central highlands.

Dalat was alot bigger than Hannah and I expected but the scenery was great up in the hills. As I fell ill for a while we ended up staying there for 5 nights and on our last full day (20th March) we rented some easy riders to take us on the back of their bikes and give us a day tour of the surrounding area, which was great. The highlight was certainly visiting a local silk worm factory where they bred silk worm in a factory and whilst the worm is dreaming of becoming a butterfly, they take the cocoons and boil them alive whilst this machine unweaves their silk, apparently 100 metres worth usually. Impressive.

Dalat had a great lively market where you could see all the fish jumping out of their market bowls bouncing to the roundabout for freedom, I guess. I was very intrigued as I watched these vietnamese woman selling live frogs to a customer in the local market and then kill them by cutting their heads off with a pair of scissors and then slit them open and skin them completely as the headless bodies were jumping up and down. Trying to follow the fish I guess.

Hannah spent this time taking some great photographs of vietnamese life and doing some great minature art work - a new niche for her it seems.

Finishing off the 'Quiet American' and starting the book 'Chickenhawk', on 21st March Hannah and I took another bus to Mui Ne beach, renowned for its spectacular sand dunes. We stayed there for 2 nights, allowing us to rent some bikers and bikes on the 22nd to take us on a tour of the sand dunes and the canyons in the local areas. The sights were impressive. Literally, 20 km in land from the sea you were transported to an area of miles and miles of sand dunes - in the middle we could honestly beliveve that we were lost in a desert. The photos look great. We hired some sand sledging boards from some local kids. We climbed some bigs sand dunes and whizzed down them, great fun. One of the local kids was getting a bit trigger happy with our camera so there are some great in action shots of hannah and I crashing down this sand dune, a certain highlight so far.

On 23rd we took another bus and headed further south to Saigon, where we have now been for 1 day. We have already hired some cyclos (bycycle with a seat on the front) to take us through the crazy street of Saigon for the day whilst we visited the attractions, such as the War Museum. Although the coverage of the museum was very one-sided, its photographs of the vietnam war victims was certainly very powerful. Tomorrow we are off to visit the Cu Chi tunnnels used by the north vietnamese against the amercians and the french in their respective wars and then on the 26th we hope to take a 3 day boat trip into Cambodia through the Mekong delta, which should be a great end to our Vietnam chapter and a start to 2/3 weeks in Cambodia.

Cheers my dears

Jason and Hannah

Hoi An: 9th - 15th March.

h1annah — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 01:31:00 GMT

Hello all,

After spending two days in Hue, on 11th March, Hannah and I took an early morning safe option touristy bus from Hue, down south 4 hours to Hoi-An. We had already been briefed by the Lonely Planet info that Hoi-An was the place to come for cheap tailor made clothes, art and great french architecture so obviously Hannah was looking forward to this stop over.

We have stayed in Hoi-An for 5 days and we have both really loved it! A lovely dainty little town on a scenic riverside oozing hundreds of tailor shops and markets strewn in great french buildings with a long and pretty white sands beach just 5 km away. Unlike Vinh, the weather here has been great, easily early to mid 30s now we are south enough to be in the tropics. The food has been excellent. A great taste sensation for 100,000 to 150,000 dong - 3-4 pounds. Great. Big bottle of Larue beer for 8,000 dong - 20 pence. A big steamed crab for 80,000 dong.

Overall, after 3 days tailor shopping and getting sized up and re-adjustments, Hannah spent not a lot on a great new wardrobe displaying some great red leather boots, leather white sandals and leather work shoes; the clothes ranged from 10 tops, numerous skirts, linen trousers and headbands. On the whole she is very pleased with her purchases. As you are having to pick out the materials and designs from scratch there are some tops more funky than even she expected! All good fun though. Impressive clothes considering they are made within 24 hours. Certainly cheaper than Bangkok.

On the whole, our tailor shopping experiences was very good once the sly scamming vietnamese realised that Hannah was not one to mess with. Trying to pass off leather for plastic and glueing things that should have been stitched! - we found them all out in the end. It is true that the vietnamese seem to be more intelligent with the scamming than the indians but at least they give us a big smile when we finally catch them out with their dodgy receipts, crazy exchange rates and threatening to take them to the 'tourist police'!

Initially, as I am an impatient shopper, I was reluctant to start shopping but thought it would be a crime to come and go from a place like this without something tailor made so I had a nice evening shirt tailor made for me. On 14th March, whilst we waited for the remaining clothes to be made, Hannah and I hired some bikes and rode the 5 km to the local beach. It seems that in Vietnam everyone travels by bike, with hardly any cars on the road. Even large load deliveries are done by some poor soul heaving it all on a bike. It has certainly made for a few funny sights. Bamboo sticks and guttering on the back of a bike taking up entire lanes! On the beach Hannah paid an 80 year old Vietnamese woman to pose for her as she painted: smiling with her gummy mouth and in her Vietnamese attire and hat. A nice sight that certainly attracted a crowd.

Walking the markets we have seen the locals eat cooked duck embryos straight from the egg. I have thought about trying it, not yet though.

This evening (15th) Hannah and I will be taking the night sleeper bus to Nh Trang, further south on the coast. The journey should take 12 hours with us arriving for 6.30 am. Nh Trang is famed for its clear sea waters so more sunbathing and snorkelling will be on the cards before our trip inland to Dalat.

Cheers

Jason and Hannah

Vang Vieng / Vientiane: 26th Feb - 4th March.

h1annah — Sat, 3 Mar 2007 01:22:00 GMT

Hi guys
>
>Hannah and I are now currently in Vientiane, capital of Laos and
>back on the thai border, on the Mekong River. As we are using this
>as a stop over, we will be staying here for one more day and we will
>then be getting a night bus to Vinh in Central Vietnam. Setting off
>late tomorrow night to arrive at 5 in the morning on 7th March.
>
>We arrived in Vientiane from Vang Vieng yesterday. We ended up
>staying in Vang Vieng for 6 nights because we loved it so much.
>Literally 2-3 streets out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by
>fantastic limetone peaks and brilliant views of the Nam Song river.
>We went tubing twice down the Nam Song, which was fantastic and we
>stayed in a nice bunglaw on the riverside for 6 dollars a night.
>
>Tubing - hired a tube (35,000 kip each - 2 quid) and a dry bag,
>dropped off by a tuk tuk up stream and just floated down the Nam
>Song in amongst these great limestone peaks - fantastic photos. As
>you floated, down stream there was various bars to stop off at and
>have a beer or two. Easily a 5 hour float down the river and such a
>great way to get a tan and keep it cheap. Some great currents made
>it an enjoyable ride whilst in the calmer waters, Hannah liked to
>hold onto my tube as I tried to paddle for two! We went tubing
>twice, on the 27th and then on the 2nd March. Hannah and I both
>tried the water swings, whereby I came off with a bruised rib or
>two!
>
>As we allowed the paddling muscles to relax, on alternate days,
>Hannah and I did some art on the riverside. We met a group of nice
>people on our second day whom we then spend most of our time with
>and Hannah taught a few of them how to paint. We loved it here but
>the dark side to Vang Vieng was that all had to close at midnight
>and it was often the case that the plain clothed police would wave
>their AK47's in your face and politely ask you to 'party tomorrow
>night?'. Apparently, bandits are rife in these areas of Laos and
>Vang Vieng has been scared into shutting up early, by one local
>murder in the last few weeks. Interesting though.
>
>On the 4th Hannah and I packed our bags and on leaving Vang Vieng
>did a kayaking trip down the Nam Song to Vientenne rather than just
>take a boring bus all the way, it was great. There were 3 kayaks
>with Hannah and I sharing one with 2 guides in their own respective
>kayaks and we were probably on the water for about 4 hours. Fantasic
>scenery. Very funny as Hannah and I found it incredibly difficult to
>get the Kayak to go in a straight line at times which meant that we
>crashed over some rocks twice. The guides made us all stop up stream
>just before a grade 2 rapid in order to explain and advise us on how
>to manage them - we were both really nervous as the guides kept
>emphasising to us on what we must do if we capsize. So back in the
>kayaks and down the rapids - wow. It was really wierd watching
>Hannah fly out of the Kayak and into the water as it seesawed up and
>down. Her lifejacket ensured she had a good ride.
>
>So here in Vientiene it seems a lot quiter despite being the
>country's capital. We have been to the national museum which is very
>much like a victorian museum, hannah says. Badly painted scenes,
>pcitures from the 70's and everything in glass cases. However, its
>coverage of the french rule in the early 19th century and the wars
>in the 60's and 70's, we have found really interesting.
>
>Cheers my dears.
>
>Jason and Hannah.

Gallery: Amazing Scenery to Vang Vieng

h1annah — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 19:44:00 GMT

Gallery: Luang Prabang

h1annah — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 19:40:00 GMT

Laos: Houay Xai - Luang PraBang: 21st Feb - 25th Feb.

h1annah — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 22:11:00 GMT

On 21st Feb Hannah and I left Chiang Mai and headed north to the Laos border. We had been staying at a lovely guesthouse called Libra. In return for the flowers we bought them (all sisters), Hannah and I were chuffed to receive a great present - an electic killing mosquito/fly tennis racket - great fun! It makes a great execution sound when you hit the bugs - therapeutic.

Hannah - I love that guest house and think they are the best place we have stayed at. Dow was the one in charge it seemed and she was almost nine months pregnant, but couldn't sit still. She really took an interest in what we were doing and her catchphrase was 'Beeeuuutifuuul'. Now Jason and I have adopted the expression. Jason Loves the bat thing and gets it out to show everyone! It is good though.

We had paid 1200 Bhat each for a Laos package which includes taking you to the thai / Laos border in North Thailand close to the golden triangle at Chang Khong, a small ferry boat ride over the Mekong river border into Laos, one night accommodation in Houay Xai and then a 2 day slow boat trip down the Mekong River to Luang Prabang with a one night stop over in Pak Beng, so that is what we did. 6 hour mini bus ride to Chang Khong with a stop at a Cashew nut factory, where we bought lots of food we should eat if we want to stay slim. Talking of that, Jason is putting on weight, can you believe it. where we were then ushered to a very scenic riverside restaurant (the immigration office) to fill in the necessary paperwork and receive our Laos visas. Our travel plans have been based upon the assumption that we could only get 15 day visas but it turns out that for the same price we were able to get a 30 day visa, which is great. It will not change our plans that significantly but it is nice to have the flexibility.

A 3 minute ferry ride saw us in Laos at the little of village of Houay Xai and instantly having to come to terms with their interesting monopoly money. 17,700 kip to one sterling pound. Mmmm. As things are so cheap here I thought that best way to get round this little headache is to think in 5 pence pieces! 5 pence is a 1000 kip, sorted. Now fluent in Lao 'hello', 'thank you' and 'bye' we checked into our guesthouse provided through the package and drank 10,000 kip worth of beer. Yum Yum. Most annoyed that they don't do wine, or anything like an alcopop. So I have to keep drinking beer!

We had been warned that transport in Laos was extremely slow and laid back, very much the 'hurry up and wait syndrome'. We had been warned that the 2 day slow boat trip would be very uncomfortable sitting on wooden seats with no leg room so hannah bought some kid cushions to ease the aches. The 2 day boat trip was fantatsic. 70 people all squashed onto a thin little rice boat with everyone's bags all thrown in the back in some ordered random mess. No real stops and great scenic views. 85% of Laos is supposed to be uninhabited and in our 2 day trip we didn't see any port civilisation other than sparse huts strewn across these beautiful beaches carved by the tides. Nice. They really were beaches too. Sanding dunes all along the Mekong. But I'm sure they have a few mines thrown in for good measure.

Halfway through the boat trip we stayed the evening of 22nd Feb in Pak Beng, an idle and lazy place where no effort seems to be made as river tourists are fed to them on a daily basis. A lovely hillside village where there was only electricity from 6.00 to 10.30 in the evening. The boat was moored against some rocks so everyone had to get off the boat in a single file and literally do some serious rock climbing just to get on land. Where is the disabled access, I say? Our bags were last to be off loaded onto the rock and Jason thought he had lost one of them, because the locals like to pick them up and offer to carry them for a fee. I was waiting at the top, because their was no room to move and it was so steep and dangerous. Got a good guest house, with a small cabin room and it looked right out over the Mekong. Wow. what a view in the morning. BeeeeuuutifUUl. Not having been told what time to arrive for our onward journey, we headed down to the 'rock' to board our boat to find that we were late. Virtually everyone was on the boat, leaving no space or seats for us stragglers behind. There was a crazy 5 minutes where one of the crew was telling us to sit on the floor and others were advisng us to jump onto the next boat moored alongside and simply wait for that one to fill up! More and more people were boarding this already overcrowded boat with nowhere to go. Hannah suddenly makes the jump to the next boat as it began to drift away leaving me with the bags. For a couple of seconds I was resigned to the fact that we were going to be spending the day apart in separate boats so threw her bag to her so at least she would have had some food. By now the crew were trying to stop more and more people from jumping ship where there were seats. Thankfully, at last, Hannah's boat drifted back enough for me to throw my bags over and clamberr aboard! Phew! IT was all a bit crazy, but I was told to get on the other boat. Poor Jason. Although we had to wait a further 30 minutes for the boat to fill up, we later found out that our original boat had broken down with engine failure and their 6 hour trip down the Mekong river to Luang Prabang became 10. He, He, He. I am sure that there is an old chinese proverb that can be learnt from this...'The early bird never catches the worm if its is sailing a flawed boat.' We passed them on the river and gave them a good wave.

As a result of our jumping ship, Hannah and I met some great swedes and we ended up spending a couple of days with them in Luang Prabang when we finally arrived. They were great fun and they taught us some fab card games. Drinking games too. We have now been in Luang Prangbang since the afternoon of the 23rd. Our accommodation is 2.70 quid.Bargain and hot showers too! 2 full days. A very laid back village on the river where as the locals accept the dollar, bhat and the euro, we are having to >constantly get the calculator out to keep on top of things. Certainly more relaxed than thailand and a country still quite naive in many respects, it would seem. I like that. They have a great night market and its nice and cheap, but a lot of the same stuff on offer. We have booked our bus tickets to start our route down south in Laos and across to Vietnam. Tomorrow we will be going to Vang Beng, about 150 km south towards the capital. The plan is to stay there for a couple of days and try some 'tubing'. Floating down the Mekong river at our own pace in a tractor's inner tube, apparently. Stoppng off when you want and having a drink. Why not? Beats work. Hannah and I are off now to go and have a 10,000 kip sauna, massage and bath spa and possibly off to watch some ballet in the local Lao theatre. Lovely.

Cheers my dears.

Gallery: Mekong River Trip Day 2

h1annah — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 19:35:00 GMT

Gallery: Mekong River boat trip.

h1annah — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 09:37:00 GMT

Gallery: Chiang Mai

h1annah — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 03:01:00 GMT

Gallery: Ayuthaya: 3rd Feb - 5th Feb 2007.

h1annah — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 02:56:00 GMT

Gallery: Khao San Road, Bangkok: 28th Jan - 3rd Feb 2007.

h1annah — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 02:54:00 GMT

Gallery: cookery course on valentines

h1annah — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 01:30:00 GMT

Gallery: Silversmithing: Chiang Mai.

h1annah — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 14:31:00 GMT

Chiang Mai - Nova

Chiang Dao trek and Chiang Mai

h1annah — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 01:06:00 GMT

13^th February 14, 2007

Hi guys

Hannah and I have been in Chiang Mai, North Thailand since 7th Feb. We took a 5 hour comfy bus ride north from the cultural hotspot of Sukothai and we are loving it. We have just returned from a fantastic 3 day, 2 night jungle trek in Chiang Dao, further north, on the Burmese border. We have now just finished our first day of a 5 day silver smithing course and we are looking forward to a full day of Thai cooking tomorrow and then we will revert back to the silversmithing. Great. Thought we would hang our hats here and try out a few things. The plan is to stay in Chiang Mai for another 4/5 days and then we will think about crossing over into Laos. Chiang Mai is great and very arty and cultural for Hannah, which she loves.

Our trek costs us 4400 baht (65 pounds) and that included all travel, 2 tour guides (aka chefs), admission into the Chiang Dao wildlife Sanctuary, 2 nights with local Hill Tribes, elephant trek in the wild, lots of trekking and an afternoon of bamboo rafting. It was great.

There was 8 of us and 2 guides. We left early on 9th Feb and took a 4 hour jeep ride into the mountains, further north into the Burmese borders and straight away began a very unforgiving 3 hour inclined jungle trek. We were knackered! Hannah did well with her short legs!!! We walked into the middle of the mountains and stayed the night with a local hill tribe. The great thing is that the locals just carried on with their every day life so it was not touristy, which is what we were obviously looking for. We stayed in a really basic hut, apparently only 90 in this village with all imaginable livestock just running around freely. It was really nice and relaxing.

On the second day (10th feb) we did some more jungle trekking in the morning towards Mae tang river and then took a bamboo raft down the river for a couple of hours to the second hill tribe. For the second tribe, we were advised to bring some presents as they do not see people often as they are off the beaten tourist trek track. We were told that the kids can only go to school if they have pens or pencils, so Hannah and I bought pencils and notepads thinking that we would be helping. After the initial madness of receiving their new gifts, rather than using them in an educational way (which we hoped) we later found the (most of the) kids burning the paper to make fires and rolling it up to smoke ash! - oh well, we tried. We sat them down and tried to draw them pictures and teach them some English, but for some the curiosity was just not there. The fires were good though.

On the final day of our trek (11th Feb.) we visited a local cave with in the wildlife sanctuary park and then had an hour elephant trek in the wild, Hannah and I shared an elephant, and it was amazing. It was great to have a ride on the elephant as it was ripping banana plants down and ripping up bamboo plants and spraying us with water. Wow. We arrived back into Chiang Mai that afternoon and relaxed as we were knackered!

Today, 13th Feb, Hannah and I had our first day on our silversmithing course. You pay for the course and then you pay 20 Baht per gram of silver that you take away with you. As it was our first day, we made some pendants from scratch. Mine was more basic than Hannah's, but I am so impressed with it. We ended up paying 350 baht for the silver used in the 2 pendants - only 5 pounds, bargain! On the following days we will be able to make rings, bracelets and if we have time, some stone setting. I thought I would have a go - why not? - new skill and all.

Apparently Laos is cheaper than India, so look forward to that. Plan to cross the border in the next week and then off to Vietnam from Laos on 5th March as dictated by our visa. Two of Hannah's friends are coming to south Thailand in the middle of April so we plan to meet them in Phuket, south Thailand. Obviously by then we would have down Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia so lots to look forward to.

We are staying in a lovely guesthouse for 250 Baht a night - 4 pounds and having good cheap street food, so all is well.

Cheers my dears.

Jason and Hannah
xxx

Gallery: Hill tribe trek + elephant ride: Chiang Dao. 9th Feb - 11th Feb 2007.

h1annah — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 14:16:00 GMT

9th Feb - 11th Feb 2007

Ayuthaya - Sukothai: 3rd - 7th Feb

h1annah — Wed, 7 Feb 2007 16:36:00 GMT

After spending 6 days in Bangkok as we waited for our Cambodia / Vietnam Visas and our tailored made suits to be finished, Hannah and I then headed north by train to Ayuthaya for the start of our culture trip. After 2 days we then took a 5 hour bus trip to Sukothai even further north as we are en route for Chiang Mai.

Ayuthaya and Sukothai were once capitals of Thailand and between them boast impressive temples, buddhas and wats. So Hannah and I hired bicycles to roam around the old cities and took photographs and did some paintings.

I have been dropping the camera one too many times so I may need to buy a new one! Hannah and I have just completed a tiring 6 hour bus trip to Chiang Mai and we are staying in a nice basic guesthouse with hot water for 250 Baht - 4 pounds a night.

We are planning to do a 3 day trek up in the very north of thailand on the border to myanmar (burma) this friday. Really looking forward to that as we get to go elephant riding and rafting. We will be staying with the hill tribes. We chose this route as apparently it is off the beaten track and not so touristy.

We are planning to stay in Chiang Mai for about 10 days and then move further north towards to the Laos border and probably stay in Chiang Rai for a couple of days. We can only be in Laos for 15 days so the plan will be to cross over in around 22nd.

Floating Market - Damnoen Saduak

h1annah — Fri, 2 Feb 2007 01:05:00 GMT

2^nd February

We are still at the

Khao San Road

and have been here for a week nearly. Its fantastic. Loads of shops and bars all in one area. We have rested and explored a bit too. We took a bus for two hours two nights ago in order to go to the floating market early in the morning. It’s a bit of a tourist thing and we decided to get a hotel near by and get up at 6.30am in order to be their before the rush. The hotel was the cheapest and one of the nicest so far. 350B or about 5 quid. We got the boat early in the morning and it took us to a lovely Buddhist monastery first. Very ornate. We fed a throng of beautiful fish in the canal near by, then off to the market. It was great to see all the boats with goods, but things were about 3 X the normal price. So we didn't buy anything, but had a good trip all the same. Sampled our first sticky rice, hhhmmm lovely. It’s like pudding rice, but without cream sauce. and all sticky.

Then back to Bangkok by bus for two hours! Perhaps not the best value excursion we have had.

Jason was poorly when we got back, so he went to bed and I spent a few hours shopping!! Hehe. Thoroughly enjoyed that and he is letting me have a bit of a free reign at the moment.

Gallery: Floating Market: Damnoen Saduak. 1st Feb 2007.

h1annah — Thu, 1 Feb 2007 14:51:00 GMT

Bangkok: 28 - 30th Jan.

h1annah — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 16:33:00 GMT

After a couple of days in Mumbai and via Singapore, Hannah and I arrived in Bangkok very late Sunday night, 28th Jan. As we thought it would be a good idea to wait until we were in Thailand before we bought the lonely planet guide, we arrived blind, which was fun. Straight into a taxi and asked for th Khao san - where all the western travellers seem to hang out, and infamously known by the opening scene in the movie "The Beach" whereby Leonardo Di Caprio arrives in Thailand to Khao San Road, stays in a flea pit ridden appartment before finding a man murdered next door...mmm? It is a great place, full of life and a good way to start our Thailand chapter I guess, although quite touristy. Lots of bars, massage parlours, street food and lady boys!

Hannah and I took a day to settle in. As the thais are well known for their tailor skills at a good price, we have already had ourselves measured and suited up for some new suits for when we get back. We have had to return to get a second fitting and I am really impressed. Should be completed by tomorrow night and then we will be sending it back in the post. I decided to get some work shirts custom made too, which is good.

Hannah has been busy exploiting Thailand's markets and cheap prices and I have just had my first swedish massage, good fun. Tomorrow Hannah and I are going to do a swedish massage course for a couple of hours in one of the parlours in Khao San Road. Looking for to that. Once finished and having collected my course certificare we will then check out the museums, galleries and buddihism part of Bangkok and then head off to the floating market.

We have just submitted our passports to get our visas for Vietnam and Cambodia, this should take 3 working days. With Vietnam we have had to state when exactly we will passing their borders so we had to do a bit more forward planning that we would like.

Plan: Stay in Thailand until about 24th Feb. We travel to north Thailand and do a 3 night elephant trek in Chang Mai. We will then cross over to Laos from north Thailand where we will spend about 10-12 days in Laos travelling down the river south and then enter Vietnam for the 5th March. We will then spend a couple of weeks in Vietnam and then doing a clockwise tour, enter Cambodia and travel through back to Thailand. Having covered cultural stuff, once in Thailand, we will then head straight to the south and do some sunbathing on their beaches until our time is up - will find the beaches in the "The beach" - majestic. It will be when I am in this area that I will hopefully get to meet up with Loel Guinness and hang my hat in his palace for a couple of days.

Cheers

Bangkok

h1annah — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 00:52:00 GMT

29^th January

We arrived yesterday in the late evening at Bangkok. We took what we now realize to be rather a luxury cab into Khoa san Road, (850 baht, but well worth it) the main English tourist haunt. I LOVE IT. Having a bit of a mad shopping spree at the moment. Three tops and a pair of beautiful slipper type shoes and a bracelet. Jason doesn't mind though, but he may have got a bit fed up of shopping by now as we have been looking all day. Loads of great bars and music I recognize. No beeping of horns constantly.

Cheap as chips........ We are considering taking a trip to the Philippines during this three months too. Maybe. Or Bali.

Jason is eyeing up all the beautiful Thai Women. ........ No one is staring at us.......... good.

Speak soon

Hannah