Runnin on Rice

Northern Vietnam and the journey home

msoleksy — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 16:05:00 GMT

Hello Everyone.

Sorry for not writing very much lately, but the combination of few internet cafes, an action packed schedule, and the common occurance of Vietnamese power outages made writing a BLOG very challenging.

We are back in Hong Kong already and will be flying home tomorrow. The funny thing is that we'll be home only two hours after we leave!

Anyways, the last time I wrote was from Hoi An and was rudely cut off by an over aggressive bus company tourist wrangler. He got their a half hour early and rused us onto the bus.

We took the bus north almost all the way to Hanoi to the rural town of Ninh Binh. We arrived to a terrential down pour and were about to call it a complete loss when the rain lightened up around 2pm. We hired a taxi and went to see the main attractions, including beautiful karst landscape looking over miles and miles of rice fields. We first floated for 2 hours through the landscape on a row boat and then climbed 500 steep steps up one of the towering rocks to see an awesome view of the area. The day turned out to be very action packed so the next day we decided to catch a bus to Cat Ba island. This island is located just under the infamous Halong Bay and is a base camp for boat trips, kayaking, and hiking in the area. Halong Bay is a Bay (obviously) filled with tiney islands that are also Karst and steeply rise out of the water. While on the island, we booked an overnight trip through the bay on an old Chinese Junk Boat. During the trip, we were given kayaks to explore the local floating fishing villages and some of the many caves in the area. We were in a group of eight people all of similar age so we finished the evening off with some stronger beverages.

The next day we were brought back to the island early and met up with some Irish friends we met earlier to go motor biking around the island. This was a great time. The island does not have a very large population so when you leave the main town, its you and the local farmers on the road. The scenery on the island was amazing. I heard someone compare it to Hawaii?? Anyways, we did a nice hike to some frog pond and called it a day.

After our Halong Bay experience, we took a boat and a bus to the Vietnam capitol city of Hanoi. This city was nice, but unfortunatly, we are a bit "citied out" at this point and dodging speeding scooters while crossing the street has long lost its appeal. We spent two days in Hanoi just walking around, shopping, and drinking with our Irish friends who also came to Hanoi with us.

The trip back to Hong Kong was actually not as bad as we had expected. A full 24 hours was spent on a bus, but the night bus had huge beds to snooze luxuriously in. The border crossings were painless and now we're back where we started. Traveling full circle back to the city that we started in brings back memories of the excitment and anticipation we felt at the start of the trip. This is a bit sad. We are very excited to return home and see everyone again and eat a good burger or steak.

Anyways, this will be the last BLOG of the "Runnin on Rice" mini saga. Thanks for reading and we'll talk to everyone soon.

Sara and Michal

Hoi An, Vietnam

msoleksy — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:09:00 GMT

We are now in Hoi An, Vietnam!

This town is on the coast of central Vietnam. It is a town that the French built as an administration center during the time Vietnam was their colony. It is a very beautiful town with... you guessed it... French architecture. I find it funny that tourists tend to flock to these former French towns in SE Asia as if the real France didn't exist anymore or something! This is the real irony of Tourism: People leave their familiar and boring lifestyles to go to exotic and interesting destinations, but when they get their, spend alot of their time searching for the comforts of home. Its really funny, but everyone does it to some extent. You try eating chicken noodle soup for breakfast for three months strait!!

Anyways, this town really is worth sharing with many other tourists. The architecture is beautiful as it blends in with the tropical surroundings, the local cuisine is probably my favorite so far, and their are many small museums and cultural sights to visit. We spent the first day here just walking around the town and visiting some local sights where we got to watch a traditional local music, dance, and theatrical performance.

That evening, we ran into a couple that we had met all the way back in Laos in the beginning of December (Small world). We met them the next morning and biked to the local becah through some nice countryside. This beach was very big and there was almost no people there! In the evening, we met our friends again and had dinner at place that allowed us to go back to their little kitchen to see how these local cuisines are prepared. This restaurant kitchen was about the size of an average sized kitchen back home. Their was five Vietnamese women back their already so it got tight when four westerners squeezed their way in. Bus is here, gotta go!!! will write later.

Mekong Delta, Vietnam

msoleksy — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 19:35:00 GMT

Hello from the Delta!

We are now in the fertile lands of Vietnam's Mekong river delta. We originally saw the Mekong river near it's headwaters in the Chinese himalayas (Deqin) and have passed by it in Laos and Cambodia. Now we are in the area where it finally spills into the ocean in southern Vietnam. This area is very unique to what we've seen so far and is definitly one of our favorites places already. The river branches off into about five legs before it hits the ocean and, over many years, the local farmers have dug an elaborate canal system that links the legs together and provides for great irrigation of their rice fields and fruit plantations, as well as creating a great floating transportation system within the area.

We started off in the town of Ben Tre. There we rented bicycles and got our introduction to the area's unique lifestyle. Narrow concrete paths lead through local villages that are immersed in tropical forests and cross narrow canals where locals row their boats from one place to another with their big cone shaped hats on. Every local that we passed yelled out "Hello!", sometimes with great enthusiasm. Other than the concrete paths, the area doesn't seem like it has changed much over the years. People seem to live a simple life farming the rice fields near by or picking fruits like coconuts or pineapples. Every house has a few hammocks on the property for the locals to relax after a good day of work. The farmers here can harvest their crops four times a year because of the consistant moisture in the soil and warm weather.

The next day we took a bus to another Mekong city named Venh Long. This city was even more authentic than Ben Tre. On the bus ride there, we met two other travellers and decided to sign up for a day long boat trip and a homestay. The four of us went with this guy named Nam on his boat. He first took us to a floating market. A floating market is where farmers load up their big boats with all the fruit, rice, vegetable, etc. that they grow and cruise around different locations in the Delta selling their goods strait off the boat to the local merchants at a wholesale level. It was really cool to see this. Nam arranged for us to buy only two pineapples and hang out on one of the boats for a while. We then visited a place that made rice paper, rice popcorn, and coconut candy (All very delicious). After that,we docked the boat on a river island and did some more bicycling before having spring rolls and elephant fish (Mekong Fish) for lunch. We also drank some local whiskey fremented with snake. We then spent the rest of the day on a boat floating through the network of canals by both motorboat and row boat. This day was awesome already, but then Nam brought us over to his little home (homestay) in the middle of the forest along a small canal. His whole family lived there and his wife prepared dinner for us. We slept inside his house in a spare bed, and after breakfast the next day, we got on the boat and he took us back into town.

Though we wanted to stay in this region longer, time is not on our side here in Vietnam so we had to move north that same day.

We have just arrived in the beach town of Mui Ne, Vietnam. Our guesthouse is on the beach and has a swimming pool. This will be a great place to relax and get some sun before moving further north.

We will write more and post Mekong photos soon!

Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) , Vietnam

msoleksy — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 13:50:00 GMT

Hello everybody,

We flew into Saigon, Vietnam last Monday, the 11th. As soon as we got on the airport bus, we realized how crazy and fast paced this town really is. Its hard to explain, but imagine the roads you drive your car on being swarmed by hundreds of scooter drivers weaving in and out of themselves hauling everything from babies under thir arms to furniture strapped to their seats . This was a constant attraction while walking the streets (and trying to cross them). Saigon is a very busy city and is pretty commercial for having communist leadership. Their economy is on the up and up with western investment increasing, but the majority of the people still seem quite poor.

While there, we visited the "Vietnam War Remnants Museum". This place was very informative, but everything there highlighted the horrible things that the Vietnamese people experienced during the war. It was an exhibit of how THEY saw the war so it was quite interesting and very Anti-America. We did do some serious damage to this country. I was searching for ways to justify our fighting here and came up with nothing that is worthy of the losses that both sides experienced. This was also the case on the next day when we visited the Cu Chi tunnels on the outskirts of Saigon. This was an area with heavy fighting and is significant because of the network of underground tunnels and living quarters that the Viet Cong had built there to stay out of sight from U.S. soldiers. We got there and immediatly watched a video that highlighted a 12 year old Viet Cong girl and her "heroic" achievement of killing 18 Americans. (Weird) Then we heard our guide speak of how much craftier and better prepared the Viet Cong were from the Americans as he showed us gruesome traps that were placed around the jungle forest to kill Americans. We don't feel that these war exhibits were misleading or not accurate. They were very factual actually and we learned alot, but it was hearing about it from the Vietnamese point of view that made the experiences a bit strange.

What we have sadly realized on our first few days in this country is that the massive sacrifices of the Vietnam war were made for nothing in the end. Obviously, the communist government to the north prevailed and took control of the whole country. But now, only forty years later, the communist strong hold here is dwindling every year and capitalism is naturally growing stronger. Unfortunatly, this country would probably be in the same position now if the war never took place.

The people here in Vietnam are very friendly. Not the "Thailand friendly" that usually disinigrates when you use the word "NO", but an authentic kindness. Especially impressive since only 40 years ago the only westerners here were killing everything in sight. Either they are very forgiving here or just very forgetfull!

Our next destination is the Mekong River Delta!

Kuala Lampur, Malaysia

msoleksy — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 20:55:00 GMT

We are now on our last day in Kuala Lampur. This is the city that houses the Petronas Towers. Those towers that beat out Chicago's Sears tower as tallest in the world. Not the case anymore, but still very cool to see. Honestly, they don't look taller!! I call shananigans!

Anyways, a bit About Malaysia: This is a Muslim country with a Muslim Government, which means expensive beer and no halter tops. Everything else is pretty similar to your run-of-the-mill non-muslim country.
People are very nice here and it seems like the wealthiest place we've been to since Hong Kong. Its very easy to get around because their roads are quality and have many mass transit options in the city.

Kuala Lampur is a city which is very diverse. There are many Malay people, but Chinese and Indian people make up about 35% of the population. The food is awesome. Take the traditional foods of all the ethnicities I just mentioned and fuse them into pure mouth watering goodness and you'll get Malaysian food! The city isn't a site seeing extravaganza, but just immersing yourself in the multitude of cultures and eating food is very cool. We visited the Petronas Towers and checked out some cool markets in China Town and Little India on our first day. Yesterday, we took a bus to the outskirts of town, where we went to the Hindu shrine that is within some huge caves. In about three weeks, a festival occurs there. Hindu devotees drag wagons of offerings up about 200 steps towing them with ropes attached to their backs by skin pierced hooks. To bad we won't be here! The cave was impressive enough and there is a massive statue of a Hindu god in front of it. Today we checked out the National Monument in the city park where bus loads of Chinese tourists proceeded to take photos of us. (We're very use to it at this point). Now we are killing time and researching places in Vietnam on-line. (We originally thought our flight left today and not tomorrow..Shhh) Anyways, thats about it from Kuala Lampur. Its been pretty easy living here, but we are now ready to experience the craziness that is Ho Chi Minh City!!

Untill next time...

Oh yeah! So last time I mentioned sleeping in this "Hide" in the Jungle... We were there alone and it was creepy, but awesome. The sounds those jungle critters make are a beautiful orchestra that can put you to sleep, but when you hear something suddenly screaming on the roof of your "hide" ..... Holy Shit!!

Photos: Welcome to the Jungle...

msoleksy — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 20:12:00 GMT

Teman Nagara, Malaysia

Photos: Beaches

msoleksy — Fri, 8 Jan 2010 13:59:00 GMT

Photos: Phnom Penh

msoleksy — Fri, 8 Jan 2010 13:42:00 GMT

Photos: Angkor Wats

msoleksy — Fri, 8 Jan 2010 13:17:00 GMT

Teman Negara Jungle, Malaysia

msoleksy — Tue, 5 Jan 2010 22:37:00 GMT

Hello everyone.

We made it to Malaysia! This will be as far south as our journey will take us. Originally we had planned to visit Indonesia, but it turns out that this would be impossible with the time we allowed ourselves. Anyways, the trip south from Thailand was good (no border difficulties), but very long for the distance we actually travelled. We got to the city of Trang, Thailand and found out that there is serious unrest near the southeast border crossing. (Muslim minority insurgent group wants their own country and blows things up and be-heads Buddhist monks). We wanted to take this border because the town in Malaysia we wanted to go to was right on the other side, but because of this unrest and the the time of day we left Trang (We were gonna risk it), we had to cross on the western border crossing. At that border, we met this nice Malay guy who helped us get to his hometown and got us on a night bus across the peninsula to the town we actually needed to be in. Blah blah blah... sorry. Long story short, it took us 6 buses, one really crappy old " "jungle train", and about 36 hours to get to this National Park. Its really beautiful here, and they claim that this is the oldest tropical forest in the world. Today we did a little hike to and through a canopy walk way (wood plank bridges suspended up to 150 feet above ground on really tall trees) This was awesome and reminded me of guiding on a similar attraction up in Montana. Tomorrow we head deeper into the jungle to sleep in a "hide", which is a little chalet that people sleep in to hear the crazy jungle sounds at night and to possibley see some animals. There's many crazy critters that dwell in this area: Tigers, bats, teranchulas, monkeys, wild elephants, cobras, vipers, pythons, etc. Leeches are almost inevitable on the trail so we will definitly become blood donors tomorrow. Anyways, this place is strait out of the Jungle book with vines hanging everywhere, lush green plants blanketing everything, and crazy noises all around you. The forest is so dense with plants that getting around without a well maintained trail would be almost impossible. After tomorrow, we take the bus to Kuala Lampur (the Capitol). We'll write from there!

2010 in Ko Lanta, Thailand

msoleksy — Fri, 1 Jan 2010 23:03:00 GMT

Happy New Year!!

We are now on the island of Ko Lanta in Thailand. We have spent the last three days here and its been great. The island has a very long beach that pretty much runs along its entire western shoreline. This beach is loaded with restaurants and bars so it was perfect for the New Year celebration. Two days ago we went on an organized trip where we spent the day snorkeling and hanging out on other uninhabited islands. We really have taken to snorkeling. Its amazing what goes on down there! We also went to this island and swam through a dark cave that opened up into a huge "crater like" oasis in the middle of the island. This was really cool, but unfortunatly we were not the only group there. The only thing that sucked is that we got stung by a bunch of little jelly fish. Now we've got itchy little marks on us for a few days.

Last night we drank cocktails for the sunset and ate some delicious Thai barbequed squid. The celebration here was better than we expected. They shot off fire works and people were releasing hundreds of glowing lanterns into the air. The lanterns sybolize good luck for the coming year, unfortunitly ours plumited into the sea shortly after take off. Lucky for us we aren't as supersticious as Thais. We finished up the night with some serious dancing. Speaking of which, Im still recovering from the night so this one is short. Hope everyone had a great new year!

Tomorrow we leave for Malaysia!

Ko Phangan Island, Thailand

msoleksy — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 19:57:00 GMT

Merry Christmas form Ko Phangan island, Thailand!!

We are finally on the beach!! Our arrival couldn't have come at a better time because being away from friends and family for the holidays is a bit depressing if not distracted by a completely "non-christmasy" setting.

After a long journey from Phnom Penh, Cambodia on the bus and yet another altercation at the Thai boarder (involving a Polish passport), we have finally arrived to the island of Ko Phagnan.

This place is very laid back and currently free of the large resorts and sex tourism that makes other islands like Puhket suck. We are staying in a beach front bungalow and have rented a scooter to get around the island. For the last five days, we havn't done much other than sitting on our asses, swimming in the ocean, or eating and drinking. Paradise! We really did need this as moving around so much can get very very exhausting. Not that we are complaining.

This island is infamous for these huge partys that they throw on the beach during the full moon when the tide triples the beaches size. Because these "Full moon parties" are so popular, they basically have one for every occasion now. Last night we went to the "Christmas moon party"...Wow!! A few thousand international tourists dancing to techno music, drinking "buckets" of mixed drinks, watching flame throwers, and being mesmerised by the many strobe lights blinding them from every direction. (Basically a huge rave) We definitly took part in these festivities all night long and had a great time!

Tomorrow we are moving up to another beach and will be trying out some snorkling. After tomorrow, we wove to Thailand's western coast to another island.

Though this has all been very fun, but as I mentioned above, we have been very sad to be away from all our friends and family over these holidays. Being away during these times makes us really appreciate all of you and miss you even more. We hope you all had an awesome Christmas and we'll write later on.

Michal and Sara

Cambodia

msoleksy — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 23:48:00 GMT

Hello from Cambodia!

We are now in Phnom Penh, the capitol of Cambodia! This country is very cool. A mix of beautiful scenery, but a very sad and depressing recent history that you can still see and feel in the people. A quick history lesson: after the U.S. bombed the hell out of the South east border of this country due to the fact that Viet Kong rebels were hiding there during the Vietnam War, a extremist communist insurgent party named the Kmer Rouge gained popularity and took over the country. They evacuated this city plus others and forced everyone to the rural areas to farm rice. They then proceeded to exterminate thousands of educated Cambodians: Doctors, teachers, lawyers, businessmen, etc. This I guess was the attempt to create a complete communal society where everyone is equal and nobody is clever enough to question the "new" society. This period of unrest and holocaust lasted from about 1975 to 1980, but uprisings existed till about the late 90's. There are beggers everywhere with missing legs and arms... Its really sad. The worst thing about this is that Sara and I never even knew about this till now. If you wanna get more info on this, rent "the killing fields" on DVD or google "Khmer Rouge". Prepare to be depressed!

Anyways, the city of Phnom Penh is small, but really authentic. Today we saw the Royal Palace, climbed to the highest point of the city(a small hill), and checked out a market. Yesterday we went to a museum that was originally a high school and later turned into a execution camp by the Khmer Rouge. The sights are nice, but seeing the city itself has been very interesting.

Our first stop in Cambodia was the infamous Ankgor Wat temples. These were very cool. We saw a total of 11 temples in one day. It was amazing seeing these beautiful structures that were built ages ago. The best was a temple that is completely overgrown by tree roots. Its hard to explain in words, but it looked like something out of an Indiana Jones movie. We will post photos of these soon.

We have learned alot here, but we are ready to hit the beach now and vacation from our vacation. We are taking a bus back to the Thailand border tommorow, and after tomorrow, another bus to the tropical islands of Thailand. We will write more from there!

We will most likely write before Christmas, but if not, Merry Christmas!

Bangkok!!

msoleksy — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 19:56:00 GMT

Hello from a sweltering Bangkok!!

We are on our fourth day in Bangkok and we love it! It’s been hot as hell, but there is so much to do to keep you busy. We've checked out a pretty good portion of the city already including a massive statue of a reclining Buddha, A solid gold Buddha, and some other less famous Buddhas. (The religion here is predominantly Buddhist if you haven’t figured that out yet!). The temples and Watts that they build here are beautiful! The city itself is crazy. There are so many people and so much going on at every hour that it is sometimes exhausting just walking from one place to the other. Some parts of the city are old and sometimes slummy, but others are built up with modern malls, skyscrapers, and movie theaters (We saw a movie last night). We went to a HUGE market yesterday on the outskirts of central Bangkok. It is said to be the largest outdoor market in the world! We were expecting to find more gross food like bugs and rats there, but I think modernization has taken effect in this place. I (Michal) have eaten a grasshopper though... Anyways, for the last week or so, there have been constant celebrations in honor of Thailand's beloved Kings Birthday. I think the actual b-day was on Dec. 5th, but then there was constitution day, and then yesterday there were parties in the streets again! We heard from a local that because the king is 83, they are getting as many celebrations in as possible! This has been a cool experience because there are all sorts of extra activities to do. Last night we were on our way back from our movie and the bus just stopped and everyone was told to get off. (Convenient in a city you aren't familiar with and don't speak Thai) We started walking back from there and noticed that the whole major street was packed with people, crazy Asian parade floats that each had a portrait of the king, and stages with Thai people rambling stuff about the King and how great he is! This was very cool to see and be immersed in. Today we took a river ferry to a big Dragon boat race. (For those not familiar, Dragon boats are very long and narrow boats filled with probably 70 or so Asian dudes paddling their asses off.) They even had a "Cheerleading Squad" of old ladies chanting and drinking something that must have been very potent. All in all... Long live the King!! Anyways, tomorrow we are going to see the old royal palace and then taking off towards Cambodia (Angkor Watt) on a bus. We are excited to see these temples. They are said to be the 7th wonder of the world!

We hope everyone is doing well back home and we can't wait to see all of you. We will try to write next from Cambodia!

First taste of Thailand

msoleksy — Wed, 9 Dec 2009 18:24:00 GMT

You may or may not have noticed that the voice behind our stories have been strictly Michals thus far, well it's finally my turn. I guess I enjoy updating the blog as much as I enjoy long phone conversations, haha.

Last you heard from us we were in Laos, a wonderful, laid back, peaceful place with the most delicious food ever! Unfortunately we had to move on pretty quickly considering our super ambitions itinerary. We are now in northern Thailand. From Laos we took a "slow boat" up the Mekong River from Luang Probang to the boarder of Thailand. The trip took two entire days with an overnight stop in a small town situated on the bank of the river. The boat was nice, not too crowded, open air, room to walk around and of course really pretty scenery.

Just less then a month ago we were at the headwaters of the Mekong where the river begins to trickle out of the Himalayas near Tibet, we will end our trip in the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, so I guess its appropriate to have spent time floating on the river.

Our first stop was Chiang Mai, Thailand's second largest city. We had heard great things about the town from pretty much everyone we met. When we got there I felt like the Chiag Mai I had heard about was an illusive part of the city that we couldn't find no matter how long we roamed the streets. Well turns out its just really over rated. So we left early and headed a bit south, to the smaller less known city of Lampang. Today we went to an elephant conservation center, we watched a show which was pretty impressive and feed some babies bananas.

Tonight we are taking a night bus to Bangkok!

Stay Posted:)

Luang Probang, Laos

msoleksy — Wed, 2 Dec 2009 21:01:00 GMT

Hello ( Sabai- Dee) From Luang Probang, Laos everyone!

Last time you heard from us, we were joining a three day hiking trip through the northern Laos jungle. This was a great trip! We hiked the first day, the second day, and then we kayaked on the third day. Our guide was named Toe and spoke pretty good English. We had awesome meals prepared for us by the locals at the villages we stayed at. They were all local cuisines made with ingredients grown at the villages or from the forests. They served most meals on top of huge bannana tree leaves (Table clothes) and we all ate with our bare hands. Sanitary?.... probably not, Authentic? ... Yes! Some food highlights were: They cooked a soup all from plants found in the forest over an open fire inside a piece of fresh bamboo. They also served us a Duck they killed (inside the hut we slept in) and cooked it for us on the second night. On the morning of the third day, some others woke up to the sound of a chicken getting its throat cut(once again in our one-room hut). We were with a group of six other travellers: An American couple , a British couple, an old Italian dude, and a Polish girl. Everybody was fun to be around. We interacted with the locals and drank some local homemade village whiskeys. We didn't see any wild animals, but saw remains of a cow that had been eaten by a tiger along the trail. Yesterday we took a local bus here to Luang Probang which took nine long hours on a dusty and very bumpy road. Luang Probang is a very cool city that has alot of French influence. The architecture and the food is very French. Today we spent the day walking around the city and checking out a few Buddhist temples. Today is Laos National Day so we will be celebrating with "Beer Laos" and local whiskeys tonight!! After tomorrow, we are taking a two day boat trip up the Mekong river to the border of Thailand. Thats all for now. Hope everything is well and we'll probably write next from Thailand!

Luang Nam Tha, Laos

msoleksy — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 12:49:00 GMT

Happy Thanksgiving! and Hello from a much warmer and tropical Laos. Yesterday we arrived in the northern Laos town of Luang Nam Tha after two days of overnight buses from the northern reaches of China's Yunnan province. Ofcourse it was a great experience, but one we don't wish to have again anytime soon. We stopped in the city of Kunming again and saw that it was a pretty managable Chinese big city. We went to the city park that was loaded with people feeding thousands of seagulls and walked through some cool bird and flower markets. We also walked about 3 miles to a Laos Consulate that we found out had moved to another location 10 miles away. Then we boarded a bus at 5pm that was to take us to the Laos border. Once at the border, the Chinese immigration proceded to detain me (Michal) for an additional 40mins or so because they weren't sure about something (I still don't know what) Anyways, after searching my stuff and observing my vitamin tablet bottle for about 10 minutes, they let me pass. Can't trust us Polish people i guess! China was a great time and it was awesome to see the positive and negative effects of the economic changes we hear about. It was great to experience and learn about the Chinese culture and the diverse cultures of the many minority groups that still reside there. Last but not least, the landscape and scenery along the way was awesome. We have already noticed quite a bit of social differences here in Laos: People are a bit more laid back and friendly here and seem way more excited to see a westerner around than in China. We have joined an eco-travel company and will be trekking through the jungle, visiting local villages and also kayaking for the next 3 days. It should be a great experience. Today we are renting bikes to cruise the country side.

We hope that everybody had a great Thanksgiving. We will post more photos soon!

Gallery: Yangshuo

msoleksy — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 16:54:00 GMT

Yunnan Province (Dali, Lijiang, Tiger Leaping Gorge, Shangri-la, and Deqin

msoleksy — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:35:00 GMT

Hello!

First off... I'm glad I'm not around to watch the Bears suck this year!!

Since last writing, We have travelled north of Dali and visited the towns of Lijiang and Shangri-la. On our last night of Dali, we took a gondola up to a mountain top and stayed at a hostel there. It was cool getting away from the city noise for a while and we got to enjoy great views and good traditional Bai foods with the hosts. We then moved north to Lijiang for one night. This is a historic town that was rebuilt in a way that makes it look very fake. It was a town that Chinese tourists love to visit. It was very beutiful but literally was swarmed with tourists and very cheezy all in all. We stayed for the evening and then took an early bus further north to "Tiger Leaping Gorge" The deepest gorge in the world formed by the Gangzi River. It was a beautiful two day hike with massive mountains towering over us from each angle. The river had some enormous rapids ripping through the gorge! We slept at a guest house in the middle of the Hike. It was a great experience and very beautiful. We have since moved to the town of Shangri-la. This place is very cool and though is not actually in Tibet, it is home to 65% Tibetans and really screams with Tibetan culture. We climed to some beautiful buddhist temples and checked out a very cool city overlook that was covered with Buddhist prayer flags. This is a town that westerners love to visit and sometimes seem to stay for awhile. It is far from the crowded cities of most of China, has an unbelievable culture, and is surrounded by beautiful mountains and valleys. The one down fall here is the Cold! Most of the guest houses have no heat and it probably gets down to 20 or so at night. Good thing we brought some sleeping bags! Anyways, we are now waiting to hop onto a bus that will take us 6 hours to the furthest northern city in the Yunnan province. It is called Daxin and is located on the border of Tibet, India, and Burma (Myanmar). We hear that there is a beautiful mountain range near the town with peaks that are up to 20,000 feet high. We had only planned to go as far north as Shangra-la, but not suprisingly have been intrigued by the scared and massive mountians a bit further north. So why not, right? After two nights there, we are taking a 2 day bus trip to the border of Laos and joining this eco-tour through the jungle there. We will have to fill you all in on that a bit later. All in all, it has been a bit more relaxing in these smaller northern mountain towns. We have been enjoying this trip alot but miss everyone at home.

Also with photos, We decided to catch everyone up on photos through kodak.com. We sent a email to all the email addresses we could remember and asked others to forward them on. So expect to get them soon. We are still working on getting them on this blog, but it may have to be only a few at a time.

Anyways, we will probably write next from Laos!

Dali, China

msoleksy — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 00:26:00 GMT

Hello from Dali China.

Because it was cold and rainy in the eastern part of China's south, we took a 24 hour train ride towards the west to the himalayan foothill town of Dali. The train ride was a bit miserable with Chinese people hocking loogies everyewhere, smoking cigarattes, and talking very loud on their cell phones in the middle of the night, but it was well worth it. Dali is a beautiful historic town with only about 40,000 people living here. this is tiny here!! Its considered a village. Anyways, it is sunny and dry just like the colorado foothills here. It almost reminds me of the landscape in colorado springs!! Today we rode bikes around the countryside and tomorrow we hike up to some buddhist temples and then we will continue north to some other towns with tibetan influences. So the picture downloading process is very tricky and risky it turn out! We almost lost all of our photos last time we attempted. I think we are going to upload them on to a different site like shutterfly. We will inform you all of the link as soon as we can. We are glad to be in the "less populated" region of China. The cities are dirty, crowded, and hard to manage at times. Chinese people love to shop. everywhere you go there are shopping centers. People love to spit everywhere and make sure to prep for them very loudly. (use your imaginations). Anyways, we are having a great time and enjoying learning and experiencing all these cultural differences no matter how nasty some of them are. We hope everybody is doing well and will write again soon.