Adventures of Boo

Gallery: Philippines

thibaut — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 22:47:00 GMT

A month in the Philippines with Cathy

Gallery: Thailand - Chiang Mai

thibaut — Tue, 27 May 2008 17:58:00 GMT

mountain biking, motorbikes, laid-back city

Gallery: Laos

thibaut — Sun, 18 May 2008 14:26:00 GMT

Couple weeks in Laos visiting Vientiane, Vang Vieng, Luang Prabang, Pak Beng and Huay Xai

Gallery: Cambodia

thibaut — Sat, 17 May 2008 20:58:00 GMT

Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Temples of Angkor

Gallery: Vietnam - South

thibaut — Sat, 17 May 2008 18:02:00 GMT

HCMC and Mekong Delta

Gallery: Vietnam - EasyRider

thibaut — Sat, 17 May 2008 17:16:00 GMT

Three days motorbike trip in central Vietnam

Vietnam - Central

thibaut — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 01:26:00 GMT

Vietnam – Central

Bus trip to Hue

I’ll start with the bus trip. We departed from Hanoi around 7pm on a sleeper bus. What is a sleeper bus you might ask? Basically it is a large bus fitted out with seat-like beds that recline right back to near horizontal, (actually some do go right down, just have to be quick to get them before other savvy travelers). There are three rows of these beds with two levels, hence a bottom and top bunk. Just to make things interesting, the beds aren’t all the same length and don’t accommodate the taller than average tourist. By pure subconscious brilliance I managed to pick the longest one, with the only down side been that it was situated over the rear door and toilet. That would’ve been fine as a compromise apart from the fact that this toilet was not functioning quite right and at random intervals would release a really foul stench for all to enjoy. I believe that it may have been related to the rough patches of the road where the bus would slam into potholes and over humps to stir-up the unspeakable from the depths of the buses bowels.

Then the bus driver puts on a DVD which turns out to be Rambo: First Blood Part II. This is the one were Rambo parachutes into the Vietnam jungle to search for American POWs and in his usual style annihilates the Vietnamese and Soviet forces pursuing him, and flies back to Thailand with the rescued POWs. Well I know that it is just a movie but it puts it in a different perspective watching it on a bus in Vietnam. It didn’t help that these two American guys, who’d had a few beers and vodka, were cheering Rambo on his killing spree. The other disturbing aspect of the movie is that the language settings had been changed to Vietnamese and the same FEMALE voice was doing all the characters! I know Rambo is just a script full of one liners but this was disturbing and close to unbearable. So I grabbed my trusty ipod and selected some ‘Heavy Metal’ tunes as my soundtrack to the movie…..ahhh much better! Fourteen hours after departure we arrive in Hue at 8am safe and sound, tired and hungry.

Hue

Checked into the Hotel called ‘Binh Doung II’ and after inspecting a number of the available rooms picked the one all the way up the top on the 5^th floor. It was huge with 2 double beds, bathroom, balcony and a 270 degree view over the city of Hue, all for $10 a night. As you most likely have guessed it was cheaper as there was no elevator in this hotel and climbing up and down those stairs sure got the old heart pumping!

Later on I visited the sight to see in Hue, the Citadel which is surrounded by 10km of defensive walls 6m high and 21m thick, and a moat to top it off. And that’s just the first layer of defense, as there is a further two enclosures to protect the Imperial City and Forbidden Purple City which was reserved for the private life of the emperor.

During the 1968 Tet offensive there was heavy fighting in Hue, and much of it was concentrated in the area of the citadel. Consequently much of it was damaged and awaits restoration but there are still a lot of impressive and beautiful sites to visit, namely the Thai Hoa Palace. As I sense many of you are falling asleep at this history lesson, I’m going to fast forward to the next site of interest.

While visiting the Thien Mu Pagoda just 4km down the road from the Citadel and on the bank of the Song Huong River (lovely spot), I was warmly greeted by two charming young ladies. This was at the far end of the temple grounds near the pine trees, might sound dodgy but there were other people about so don’t worry. They claimed to be medical students doing fundraising for the Red Cross to help the poor people of Vietnam selling little bags of toothpicks. They were from Hanoi University and in Hue for a few weeks doing internship like training at the local hospital. One of them produced a laminated sheet with a few details of the fundraising and a notepad with names, nationality and donations of previous tourists. When I mentioned that the sums were quite significant and that I wouldn’t be surprised if a few numbers had been added here and there, they giggled and smiled and didn’t deny my suggestion. Nice little strategy putting pressure on the tourists to see if they’ll donate as much as ‘others’, as they were most happy to show me all those from Australia many with donations of around 500,000 dong (about AU$34). I know that I’m tight with money at times but I wasn’t convinced of the legitimacy of this operation so I paid 100,000 dong for my little bag of toothpicks and thought it better to distribute donations directly to the poor in the streets, many of them victims of the war. I just couldn’t help but think that the funds might go to financing their social life, as I know medical students like to party!

Hoi An

Located four hours by bus south of Hue is the city of Hoi An. I found this place to be more pleasant and interesting as a city than Hue. This place is well known for its architecture, nearby beach and gastronomic treats. A great combination in my books! Plus there are tailor shops everywhere, so many that I’d bet that this small city of 76,000 has more tailor shops than Tasmania altogether. This was ideal as I was after a suit for the weddings I’ll be attending in France during the summer. I already have three weddings on my list so I wanted something nice but different. A suit that stands out just a little bit, in contrary to my usual grey suits. After choosing the design, material and colours, my personal tailor whipped up this suit (jacket, pants, shirt and tie) in just 24hrs and at the fitting no further changes were necessary. Great quality with amazing efficiency and service, just awesome! I’m really happy with how the suit turned out. They even commented that they’ve never had a suit request like mine before which is just what I was after, something unique. I have a feeling I’ll be back to Hoi An.

My Son

While in Hoi An, I visited the ancient Cham city of My Son on a day tour booked with the travel agency. Sometimes I join in with the bus loads of tourists and visit these sights too! My Son is a Unesco world heritage site with the ruins located 35km inland in a lush jungle valley surrounded by hills. It became a religious centre in the late 4^th century and occupied until the 13^th century, so fairly ancient and steeped in history.

Our bus load of cheery tourists pulled up on location just a little before 9:30am and it was already sweltering hot. Maybe it was just me being a softie as I’d acclimatized to the milder climate of Northern Vietnam. In any case, it was all quite spectacular to see and walk around the ruins of this ancient city, hopping from one patch of shade to another with the other tourists like we’d all grown afraid of direct sunlight. I can tell you the drinks and ice-cream shop conveniently placed on the return route made a killing in business.

Major restoration is underway at My Son (part of the $4 entry fee) and yet a great mystery remains. These monuments were constructed by the Champa civilization using baked bricks with no mortar between them. Apparently, nobody in this high-tech world has yet managed to work out how the Chams were able to get their baked bricks to stick together. I made sure to closely inspect this phenomenon myself and have come to the conclusion that they must have used super-glue!

For the return trip I’d chosen to take the boat back to Hoi An along with the majority of my fellow tourists on the tour. This added extra promised us lunch on the boat and a stop at a government funded carpentry village to display how the furniture and crafts get made. I was most impressed to see how they embedded the pearl from sea shells into the wood to create amazing scenes from Vietnamese life. Lets just say that it is a time consuming process with many different stages to achieve the end result and I’m glad that my Father never employed similar design with his furniture as I would have spent the greater part of my childhood chiseling away majestic scenes traced out on the timber.

As with the boat trip, lets just say that the ‘good boat’ that the tour guide told us we were waiting for wasn’t so flash. This open-aired boat was spewing diesel fumes like the green-house effect wasn’t an issue and I’ve never tasted stir-fried rice that had that extra special flavor. Once the boat did get out into the middle of the river it broke down and we had to flag down another to give us a tow. With the sick and sputtering engine turned off the remainder of the trip was much more peaceful.

Gallery: Vietnam - Central

thibaut — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 16:29:00 GMT

Hue, Hoi An, NhaTrang

Vietnam - still the North

thibaut — Tue, 1 Apr 2008 18:44:00 GMT

Vietnam - Still up North

Sapa & Lao Cai
Decided it was time to chill out so I headed for the mountains. Sapa is a town of 37,000 people and lies at 1600 metres of altitude. This lofty hill station was established and built by the French in 1922 so no wonder it reminded me of France in winter. Lofty mountains tower over the town on all sides and while I was there it was frequently shrouded in mist and a little fresh shall we say.

So to get to Sapa I caught an overnight train from Hanoi to Lao Cai (which is a busy border town with China). The train journey was 8 hours long and I'd made the mistake of going on a Friday (which is busy weekend time) and only getting my train ticket the day before. The only tickets available were hard seats, as the soft sleepers and soft seats were sold out! Hmmm... I decided to do it rough and take a hard seat which I discovered was a hard wooden park bench with another facing the opposite direction so close that one had to intertwine knees with the person sitting opposite. Needless to say, it was close to impossible to get any sleep that night. Not only was the train full but they had sold more tickets than seats so people were sitting in the aisle on little plastic stools and some laying down on mats wherever they could find room. Lets not discuss the hassle of getting to the toilet and the state it was in. At least I was sitting next to a pretty young girl, who spoke just a few words of English but we had fun going through my phrase book picking out sentences to say to each other.
Once in Lao Cai, it was straight onto a mini-bus and up the mountain to Sapa which was 38km away. I was so buggered that I slept the whole trip up there and once I'd checked in to a Hotel I went straight to bed a slept through till 2pm. I made a mental note to get a soft sleeper on the return trip!

The following day I rented a motorcycle/scooter from the hotel and went exploring for the day. The first stop was the petrol station as the buggers had given me a bike with the fuel gauge right on empty. Now the needle was in the green I headed further up the mountain to find this waterfall (Thac Bac) I'd been told about. It was about 15km from town and it was slow going on these rough mountain roads but it was nice to get above the cloud cover and admire the views. Surrounding Sapa are the Hoang Lien Mountains, including Fansipan (3143m altitude) which is Vietnam's highest peak. The trek to the summit and back takes several days which would have been great to do but my foot is still not up to this kind of challenge.
The waterfall was fairly high but the volume of water was not significant at this time of the year. After climbing back down the steps from the base of the waterfall, I sat down at one of the roadside stalls selling the usual combination of meat, sticky rice, sugar cane, sweet potato, eggs and of course Vietnamese tea! While having a bite to eat I was joined by a local called 'Kien' who is a mechanic and lives just at the corner 200m away. His English is quite good while we talked I asked him about this curious tent like structure on the other side of the muddy road, suspended over a steep and rocky gully. He gleefully informed me that his friend and work collegue who is a labourer lives there and asked whether I'd like to visit. It is unlike me to say no in these situations so off we went and woke the poor bugger who was asleep so I could take a peak at his tent-like hut. One had to walk up a narrow plank to get to the entrance and then crouch to get under the tarp. It was small of course but amazingly cosy, like a cubby house in the back yard. He had been living there for 4 weeks already and I'm not sure how he managed with the cold but he seemed content and had some thick blankets to rug up in. Check out the photo gallery to see the pics of this humble house. I wandered back across the road and fetched a bottle of the local rice wine alcohol (strong stuff drank from shot glasses) and some pork pieces cooked on skewers. Back in the hut, the alcohol did a great job in warming us up and we had a merry few hours before I jumped back on the motorbike and headed back down the hill to explore more of Sapa, feeling a little tipsy and singing out loud to myself!

Hoa Lu & Tam Coc
Back in Hanoi, I booked myself in for a day trip with a tour group to visit Hao Lu and Tam Coc. The bus departed around 8am in the direction of Ninh Binh for Hoa Lu which was the capital of Vietnam under the Dinh dynasty. It has mostly been destroyed but there were some interesting temples and tombs not to mention the bizarre landscape. Our English guide was fairly new to the job and had limited knowledge of the history so I found myself following this well spoken French guide who seemed to know what he was talking about, giving extensive historical background of the place. Back on the bus, crammed to the roof, we headed off to Tam Coc which is known as Halong Bay on the Rice Paddies. The scenery was indeed breathtaking and even more so from the rowboats which we boarded in twos. Down the river we went with one woman rowing and the other pushing along with a long bamboo pole. The Spanish guy I was with and I had picked a pair of speed demons as the 2wp (woman powered) boat was soon out front and leaving the others far behind! It was fantastic as we could take photos of the scenery without annoying tourists getting in the shot, plus it was much more peaceful. Part of the trip actually goes into a cave which goes straight through a huge mountain of rock, very impressive, just have to watch your head as the roof gets very low in some areas. On the return leg I asked the girl if I could have a go at rowing the boat to which she willingly agreed. Well I can tell you that it is not as easy as it looks but after I little while the boat was moving forward with reasonable speed and in the right direction. It caused much laughter amongst the locals, I just wish I knew what the heck they were saying!

Gallery: Vietnam - still the North

thibaut — Tue, 1 Apr 2008 16:56:00 GMT

Sapa, Hanoi, Hoa Lu & Tam Coc

Vietnam - North

thibaut — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 00:42:00 GMT

Arrival

I arrived at the airport in Hanoi, Vietnam on the evening of the 13^th March and the adventures started from word go. While going through immigration I met a well travelled French guy called ‘Oliver’. We decided to share a taxi into town which was to be a good 45min trip. Once we made it out of the airport we headed towards the taxi rank to be mobbed like rock stars by eager drivers. Before getting into the vehicle we were sure to confirm the set fare into town of 180,000 Vietnamese Dong. Earlier in the airport I’d exchanged a US$100 note for 1.55 million Dong. It was nice to finally be a millionaire but I knew it was going to take some time to get used to all these zeros!

Already 10pm we asked our taxi driver to take us to a Hotel listed in the ever trustworthy travel companion, the Lonely Planet. Apparently the ‘Old Quarter’ was the place to go for foreigners, Hanoi’s historic heart pulsating with life and heaps of Hotels. Once in the city it became apparent that we’d got ourself a driver who barely spoke english and didn’t really seem to know where he was going. He tried to drop us off at an alternate Hotel stating the famous phrase ‘same, same’. As if I hadn’t heard that enough times in Thailand already. It didn’t look like the Old Quarter at all and we made it clear (via gestures and angry looks) that we weren’t going to budge from his taxi till he took us to our pre-arranged Hotel. Our mate seemed to understand this so he made a few calls (presumably for directions) and was finally on his way again. We finally got to the Hotel and disembarked from the taxi and towards the reception only to be told that it was FULL. Great! We got our backpacks and started drudging through the streets of old Hanoi looking for a place to stay at 11pm. It soon became clear that it wasn’t the only full Hotel as the same response lobby after lobby was starting to wear thin on our travel weary feet. At one Hotel we came across an American called Pat who looked as if he was about to pass out on the bench along with his backpack. Funnily enough he was also looking for a Hotel with vacancy. The guy at the reception informed us that this Hotel was also full but that he’ll make a few calls to try help us out. Well a few phone calls later he had managed to locate a room with 3 beds for $25 a night in total so we decided to bunk up together. A few blocks later down the road we checked in to the ‘Friendly Hotel’ and were prety quick to settle down for the night as it was already after midnight and it had been an adventure in itself.

Heading out of Hanoi

After a few days of strolling around the scenic Hoan Kiem Lake, dodging the motorbike congested streets and going mad from the constant blaring of horns (which is perfectly normal here) I decided to head out of town to Hai Phong. This is one of the stepping stones to Halong Bay and Catba Island. On the 2hr bus trip from Hanoi to Hai Phong I was sitting next to a University student called Dinh returning home for the weekend to his parents place. He was keen to practice his English which was fairly limited and I took the oppurtunity to learn a few words in Vietnamese. He invited me to come to his parents place, and since he looked harmless and nice enough I accepted the offer not knowing fully what I was getting myself into. His Father is a furniture maker and they live in a narrow 2 storey house besides a busy road. His parents spoke maybe 2 words of English so effective communication was somewhat limited. They were happy to look at photos I’d brought along with me on this trip for these very occasions. Dinh informed me I was welcome to stay and accompany them on a shopping trip to ‘Lang Son’ the next morning on a bus (at 4am mind you) 300km north at the Chinese border. Many goods manufactured in China are available here in this border town for a cheaper price. I would only discover the next day that it was also some sort of pilgrimage with the bus stopping in many different towns on the way to Lang Son to visit the temples and give offerings and prayers to the gods. That evening after spending some hours going through phrase books with Dinh teaching each other our respective languages and was time to go to bed that it dawned on me that I was to share a double bed with him! Well, this surely put me out of my comfort zone as I’d only just met the guy and with the language barrier it made it difficult to properly understand the situation. Well I can report that it went fine with no body contact involved. So how nice was that, a stranger offering you a place to sleep next to them in the same bed. I wonder how many of us would do the same back home?

Day trip to Lang Son

As I’d mentioned, this bus trip was an early start. Got up a little after 3:30am and was on the bus before 4am to be greeted by a sea of curious faces who spoke no English. Still half asleep I smiled and took a seat at the rear with the men (woman were at the front of course) and was promptly handed a beer! That was my breakfast, drinking beer on a bus full of Vietnamese at four in the morning. After stopping at many temples on the way and going through the ceremonies at each one, we reached Lang Son at about noon and had a huge lunch. They love to eat and the food is varied and very good. One very noticable cultural difference is that they throw all the food scrapes during the course of the meal UNDER the table on the floor. So before long there is a pile of chicken bones, used napkins and unwanted food accumulating under the tables. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it, just went against my principles of table manners.

Then came the shopping at the markets buying Chinese goods. They went nuts buying blankets, food, whitegoods (hair dryers, rice cookers, hotplates) and cramming the bus full. I branched out big time and bought some batteries and a set of new underpants, nothing too bulky and extragavent hey!

The Vietnamese are very proud people and Dinh and his family wouldn’t let me pay for anything. They were very generous and friendly and by the end of the trip apparently were very fond of me, giving me food and a warm parting hug as I left for Catba Island the following day.

Catba Island

I’d caught the slower ferry to Catba Island, the largest island around Halong Bay, and after a few hours docked on the rugged jungle-clad rock and immediately was to discover this quieter and more relaxing place. Being the low season the hotels were practically empty so I had my pick of hotel and room! What a luxury after the first night in Hanoi. For just $5 a night I had a room on the 5^th floor with my own bathroom and a view directly over the harbour. The hotel was called ‘Phong Lan’ and the owner Mr Tung was a friendly guy with good english who was born on the island and also conducts rock climbing tours.

The next day I embarked on a day boat tour of Halong bay to check out the amazing sites of these limestone vertical cliffs rising out of the sea. We stopped and visited a large limestone cave which at sometimes had been inhabited. It was unfortunate that the boat captains torch was low on battery and we had to navigate the cave using the flame from lighters and light from mobile phones but we had fun and managed not to fall down any of the excavation pits. There were constant money making scemes along the trip where they try charge you for entrance fees and the short row-boat trips from the big boat to the shore. Bargaining has to become second nature in Vietnam and asking for prices beforehand is a good idea to avoid surprises.

The south of Catba Island has a number of good beaches which are apparently packed out during the high season in the summer months. It was overcast for most of the time I was there and the temperature fresh from the sea breeze, but still warmer than Tassie!

Gallery: Vietnam - North

thibaut — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 23:16:00 GMT

Travels in northern Vietnam

Gallery: Bangkok

thibaut — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 20:06:00 GMT

Week in Bangkok...

Bangkok

thibaut — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 19:57:00 GMT

The mad rush and smell that is Bangkok, not to mention persistant tuk-tuk and taxi drivers, tailors and stall owners. That is the nature of many Asian countries and it will be interesting to be able to compare them at the end if it all.

The main aim of my time in Bangkok, Thailand was to get the LASIK operation on my eyes to correct my near-sightedness. The actual operation took place on the 5th March in the early afternoon and was very successfull. The facilities and service at the clinic were definately
world class and I would not hestitate to recommend them to anyone seeking to have the procedure. I can still see and much clearer than before! The operation itself took less than 10min, just don't let the burning smell while the laser is in operation put you off!

I had eyeshields covering my eyes for the first day and have been taking it easy recovering during this last week regularly using eye drops to prevent any infection. No water contact or swimming for 2 weeks. Well those lovely beaches will just have to wait. My last and one week post Op check-up is tomorrow, fortunately I have no negative side effects to report.

I have applied for a Vietnam Visa and hope to make it to Hanoi later this week via air. At the moment I plan to join an organised tour to travel south down the cotowards Ho Chi Minh city. Stay tuned to see how that pans out...

Gallery: Singapore visit

thibaut — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 19:20:00 GMT

One week stopover

Singapore

thibaut — Sun, 2 Mar 2008 04:35:00 GMT

Singapore 27th Feb - 02nd March

Arrived safely in Singapore at 4am on the 27th Feb 08. Finally on the road again, it feels good. Caught the taxi to my Uncle's place who kindly got up to greet me and let me in. I'm happy to admit that I slept in late that morning to catch up on some beauty sleep.

It was great to see my Uncle Laurent and Auntie Benedicte again, and just in time as they were moving back to London the week after. A couple of laps in the pool and days later my cousin Thomas came by to pick up the cripple(me) after work and introduce me to his 9 month old son Eloi. It definately is his as there's an unmistakenly striking resemblance. Was also great to catch up with his now wife Astrid who'd I'd previously met a number of years back in France.

Still have been wearing the cast on my foot for most of my stay in Singapore, a bit swollen but getting better. Did a bit of hobbling around the city and browsed some of the many electronic stores, not to mention tested out some massaging chairs in the store.

Days went quickly and before I knew it I was back at the airport on a plane to Bangkok. Have my laser eye operation booked for early March. A big thank you to the family in Singapore who were so welcoming and hospitable. Stay tuned for more...

Cheers,

Thibaut