The Life and Times of KJ: A post at last.....

Sorry Guys, that it has taken me so long to post since Northern Vietnam. Its very slack on my behalf.

While over there it became very difficult to find good places with the net, and good PCs for me to sort out the photos. A right pain in the backside. After a few weeks I began to forget about it and could nto be bothered. The other reason was spending ages in doors while there was so much to see and do did not seem like the best use of time. Our holiday seemed to get busier and busier as we went on.

So to run you down quickly (well not so quickly actually) of what we got up to after the Trekking we took an overnight bus to Hue (an old imperial capital). Next was a few days in Hoi An (best place for tailoring in the world). Quy Nhon was next and is a large coastal town well off the beaten track. Very odd walking round a large town being the only western people. Everybody would stare. a good experience though. Dalat was next after a vicious 10hr (meant to be 6hr) bus ride from Quy Nhon on a local bus. It is the local tourist spot with a few similarities to Queenstown without snow, ragged peaks or amazing mountain biking. In saying that I did go mountain biking on a the hardest tour they had and it was great. Managed to break a chain hehe, but as a consulation for the guide I taught him how to wheelie and bunny hop. Go figure aye...

After all the above witch took a couple of weeks and involved lots of walking and zooming round on both push bikes and motor bikes we headed to Saigon. (Ho Chi Minh City). The largest city in Vietnam but not the capital. That is Hanoi. Saigon was a great place. A lovely city with many ex-pats living there. Food was fanatastic and there were many museums and such sites to look at. The War Remnants museum was a pretty sombre place. Once again the Americans were in the spot light. History aye...

Like Hanoi the traffic was incredible. There are atleast 5 million motor bikes in this city. Thats the same number as in the whole of America. One looks at the intersections in wonder that there are no crashes or deaths every other minute. They are not super human however. 35 people per day die on the roads in Vietnam. We checked out the Cu Chi tunnels used by the Vietcon during the war and a lovely temple in the South Vietnamese countryside before we took a 3 day tour on the Mekong Delta to Cambodia.

The tour was great, the first day was very touristy but the rest was good. They lead a very relaxed life in these river/canal based societies. We had a homestay similar to that in Sapa then sleep on a boat while cruising up the Mekong. Once we crossed the 'water border' and cleared customs we were off up the Mekong for 5 hrs sitting on the top of the boat. The poverty of people living on the river banks was amazing. Vietnam is poor but this (Cambodia) is at another level yet again. They were however very happy waving at us like we were the Queen (well Bridget that is). I think they know that once a day a boat full or strange looking people cruises up the brown murky waters where they bath and do all mannor of other things.

35Kg Python - Pretty scary and feel nothing like you imagine.

After 1 night in Phnom Penh (Capital) we headed to the beaches of Sihonoukville in Southern Cambodia. The beach was great with bars and restaurants littered down the length of it. Food and drink was good value and the swimming was very nice. We had many a good night on the beach. We also did a large walk in 35 degree temps round the outskirts of the town and a day trip on dodgy little boats to do snorkelling and swimming on an island, called bamboo island. Again a lovely spot, and managed to play beach volleyball with some locals. Water temps were about 30 degrees :-)

After Sihounoukville Bridget and I ventured yet again off the beaten track further along the coast via private taxi to a riverside town called Kampot. The main reason for coming was to go to the Bokor Hill Station. A Nat Park. Of course Murphy was on their side and for the first time in decades they had closed the Nat Park to visitors, this day being the first day of the closure. Murphy was not even on the side of a great Irish couple we meet in Kampot who also arrived to do the same trip. The next day we all did a day trip to the country, pepper plantaions, Kep (Old Seaside resort for the kings) and another offshore island aboard a very leaky boat.

Not a happy chappie all chained up :-(

Back to Phnom Penh on the dusty roads packed into a Camry (Taxi) passing by the local 'Cambodian Taxis'. We were told that in and on one van that as many as 35 people can be transported. The spots on the roof though the coolest due to the breeze were the most hazardous. Especially if you missed seeing a large branch from and overhanging tree while bounching down the potholed roads at speeds which are ludicous.

In Phnom Penh which is a pretty dirty place overall we vistied a number of museums and historical landmarks including the S21 Prison of torture during Pol Pot's regime not to meantion the 'Killing Fields' where they brutally excuted thousands of people with clubs and threw them in mass graves. They would not use bullets as they were too valuable to the regime. Over his 4yrs at the helm the country lost atleast 2 million of the 8 million inhabitants. He was as bad if not worse than Hitler many say.

The Bone Momument at the Killing Fields (6000 skulls are in here)

Siem Reap was next. Here is the richest town in Cambodia due to the world famous attractions that are the Temples of Angkor. The most famous of course being Angkor Wat. We spent 2 days exploring countless ruins. The ruins were much more interesting to me due to the fact that fewer touurists were there. I feel sorry for the many tourists that fly in, stay in a flash hotel, get driven round on a big flash bus, see just a couple of temples including the circus that is Angkor Wat. The best temples personally for me are those where the jungle has take over the constructions. It was so cool climbing up impossibly steep stairs and exploring thousands of temples, rooms and passgage ways.

After a 3hr ride zooming to the Thai Border we hopped on a bus for Khao Yai Nat Park. Of course there were no buses so we hopped that the driver would drop us off in the right spot. He did not and we were lucky to find a 'Nana Couple' that could get some local guy in a beat up ute to drive us to the place we wanted to stay. What a mess aye, he said it was 30 mins drive so 200baht sounded resonable. 6 mins later we were there and after lots of arguing I reluctantly paid him the equaivalent of 8 bucks. At this stage were were pretty savvy at knowing if we were getting ripped off, but truth be told we simply limited the ripping off. There are always people fleecing you. Thats how travel is though in these parts. Its all part of the expeience, a part I never really got use too. Nothing is face value, there are always altaria motives where they are only interested in your wallet. One gets a little tired always being on gaurd, always considering the motives of nearly anyone you talk too.

Anyhow we did a 1 day Safari into the Khao Yai Nat Park. I was sceptical at first but it would have been difficult to do it ourseleves and we paid the money. It was a great day as it turned out. Hanging on the back of a ute we saw the lovely moonsson rainfoest and many creatures. In the wild we saw gibbons, monkeys, lizards, snakes, crocs, heaps of cool birds, large deer things, big insects and massive trees. It was a fantastic day and I wished we had more time here to do more trekking and wildlife watching.

After a few days in Bangkok chilling out and shopping we went to Kanchanaburi for a couple of days before we were to head back to civilisation. I say this but Bangkok is a very large modern city with more shops and establishments for the rich than all of NZ put together. At Kanchanaburi we rented a bike and zoomed round the countryside checking out the Death Railway, the Bridge over the River Kwai, some temples, lovely mountain vistas and the Tiger Temple. A very touristy place but the only place in the world where for cheap you can get a series of photos of you touching and being with real tigers.

One last big night was had in Kho San Road in Bangkok with Zoe and Nick (pomms we had meet at the islands of Thailand then Saigon). A great night was had, though I finally once and for all worked out that Thai Wiskey and myself do not mix.

We got to Brisbane on the 7th of Feb and were met at the Airport by my Brother and his girlfriend. Lance and Vanessa were great hosts and for a week we did all the fun touristy things the Gold Coast is renown for. The Australia Zoo, Movie World, Dream World, Brisbane Internation Car Show, Sea World, shopping, chilling out Etc. In a weeks we spent not much less that a whole month of travel in Southeast Asia. Still it was a great time and we had tonnes of fun.