Singapore, after arriving from Pulau Tioman in Malaysia, was big. And tall.

Highlights: Singapore flyer (trumps the London Eye by 10m), a posh brunch at the Fullerton Hotel, cheap food at hawker stalls, gorgeous colonial architecture, Dubai-esque highrises, rain (highlight?), a rather nice hotel to stay in for the last two nights, and a lack of energy to write anything more on the blog. Enjoy the photos!

Rooftop pool, Singapore (with Raffles just below us!)

Sir Nigel and Squire Stamford

Oh my god - cheese galore at the Fullerton

Nige at the F1 track in Singapore

National museum, Singapore

Fran Chinawoman - Singapore

Fran at the Fullerton Hotel

This is now the end of the end. See you soon!

British remains in Georgetown, Panang

First stop – Georgetown on Pulau Penang. Founded (or stolen?) by good ole Francis Light of Woodbridge, Suffolk, of all places, Georgetown was a charming mix of Chinese shop houses, English colonial architecture and an accompanying blend of Malay, Chinese and Indian. Muslim, Buddhist and Hindu. Remarkably, if our experience is anything to go by, it seems to work.

Monkeeee!

Go Karting, Penang

The surreal but humerous Umbrella Girl 2010

The food is as diverse as the population so we had high hopes. Unfortunately, we ate cold curry most of the time. Or cold chinese. They tend to prefer to cook everything up canteen style early in the day – still, who can argue when it cost $1.50 for dinner?!

Highlights included the botanical gardens – monkeys and plants, the National Museum – very interesting in a geeky way, and a karting championship with an accompanying “Miss Umbrella Girl 2010″ beauty pageant.  After laughing at the misfortune of the prettier but less intelligent models, we head inland to the highlands.

Did I mention it was hot here? Well the highlands were blissfully cool, if not calm. The holidays had started and the Cameron Highlands were full of tourists from the coast and neigbouring Singapore. (imagine the number of digi-SLR cameras…) Still, it’s easy to have full days here without breaking a sweat – tea plantations, rainforest walks, strawberry farm, insects, butterflys,strawberries, ice cream, strawberrys. Oh, and some strawberries.

Nige in BOH tea fields!

Kuala Lumpur was surprisingly civilised and interesting. A good bus tour, some interesting sights, a great museum, good food and we were beginning to realise the Malaysia really has it all. So far, island life, highland life, rainforests, cultural diversity without a sign of tension and a pleasant capital city were all positive.

Old British cricket clubhouse in Kuala Lumpur's city centre

We head to Malaka on the coast – once the main town of the peninsula, dominated by Portugese, Dutch and then English was a nice and tranquil place. (once the tourists had left on Sunday night). Predominantly Chinese, the food specialities included chicken rice balls (at A Fomosa) and satay fondue (at Capitol Satay). The latter was a messy mix of skewered raw meat, fish and veg, with a boiling vat of rich satay in the centre of the table. Mmmmm. So good. Mind you, eat so much that you never want to see a peanut again…

Satay mess

Fran and trippy trishaw

With some time on our hands, we managed a little last minute chillout time on Pulau Tioman on the east coast. We spent three days in paradise. Cooler weather (but still hot and sunny), a small mountain island covered with monkey and monitor lizard inhabited rainforest, a handful of small bars and restaurants, a few dive shops and a row of accomodations, and that was the town. We spent the time snorkelling from the beach, where there were world class corals and fish – simply breathtaking. This certainly ranks as one of the nicest places we’ve been on our travels. Infact just to polish it off, the island was duty free so the beer was cheap too!

Pulau Tioman (ours is the hut in the bottom right!)

Tropical accomodation - Tioman

Having said that, Malaysia itself is one of the best countries we’ve visited on our trip. It was such an unkown entity at the start, but the mix of modern transport options, diverse cultures (indigenous plus the three dominant local populations) and amazing scenery makes it a traveller’s favourite. But there’s hardly any travellers here! OK, Thailand does offer beer a LOT cheaper (Malaysia is primarily a Musliim country so beer though not hard to come by, is expensive.) But I feel that Malaysia has a lot more to offer than Thailand. And Malaysians of all background are a friendly and English speaking bunch. The only  person I met that wasn’t friendly was an ex-pat. Man, I should work for the Malaysian tourism board.

P.S. Malaysia does, however, have a reputation of ecological blunders such as deforestation and exploitation, so it’s not all good. Just don’t dig too deep.

P.P.S. We only visited peninsular Malaysia. There’s another half on Borneo which would be fantastic to visit sometime.

Pai-radise

Both Fran and I had visited Thailand on previous occasions so it’s difficult not to have preconceptions of the place. (Drunk teenagers, hi-rises, old men with young Thai girlfriends) Fortunately we did pretty well to steer ourselves away from that scene and spent our first few days in a lovely little village in the far north of Thailand called Pai – much to the delight of t-shirt makers and their corny puns.

Even our hotel owners had a stab and called their place Pai-radise. It did well to live up to our expectation. Super chilled out a nestled on the side of the valley with some lovely bungalows around a central lake. Waking in the morning to the sound of fountains and Yogic meditation (Why do people actually need to go Hmmmmmmmmm?)

Pai has become a mini-retreat for the affluent Bangkok weekenders with their t-shirt procuring Thai baht and their super 8000000x zoom lenses to take photos of, er, everything. Preceeding them were the lost Americans from the 90s who ffound themselves, in more ways than one, in Pai but have yet to really wake up. You can practice different types of yoga, standing meditation, sitting meditation, walking meditiation (I prefer the sleeping meditation) – you can drink green tea, black tea, red tea, blended wheatgrass super-tonics, Aura of Defence +3 potions, all sorts.

WELLIPHANT!

Fran and I amused ourselves for 10 minutes riding an elephant and then enduring the remaining 50 minutes getting sore thighs. However the swimming with the elephant at the end was hilarious and well worth the agony getting there. If not a little scary when the elephant begins to lose his footing when you’re right beside him. Oh, and when it decides to shit in the water. And trust me – elephant dumps are BIG.

Swimming with elephants in Pai

Anyways, touristy but ultimately very relaxing and beautiful, Pai was left behind us as we crossed the mountains to Chiang Mai. Great Thai curries and huge markets kept us occupied in the capital of the north. Fran lost herself in beads and I got excited by the prospect of learning Chinese Chess. We paid a visit to Thailand’s most auspicious monuments – Doi Suthep.

Gates to the old city, Chiang Mai

After a failed attempt at reaching Sukhothai, the old capital of Thailand, we found ourselves at Ayutthaya, the even older capital of Thailand. We took a lovely sunset boat trip around the “island” – a world heritage area of old temple complexes and experienced our first feeling of being very, very, very hot. A taste of things to come me thinks.

Most photographed buddha? - Wat Mahathat

Postures of the Buddha, Wat Phra Boromthat

Boat trippers in Ayuttaya

Ancient Wat Chaiwatthanaram

And yes, Bangkok was hot. The IMAX cinema was cold though and Alice in Wonderland 3D was cool. With no energy to visit more Wats (Buddhist monastries), we took time to check out the weekend and night markets – both really worth a visit. I guess we were too excited about the prospect of heading to the beach to do much more.

IMAX goon

Thai curries near Chatuchak weekend market, Bangkok

The night train south was a mini adventure (Fran almost freezing herself in the top bunk) and made our journey to Koh Lanta somewhat pleasant after the tortuous night buses of Asia.

Koh Lanta was to mark our last bit fof “Chill Out” before heading home. A holiday from holiday if you will. A relatively undeveloped island in the far south west of Thailand, a decent distance from the tourist ridden islands of the Gulf on the east coast. We spent a decent amount of time here doing very little. Snorkelling at Koh Haa was amazing – pufferfish, triggerfish, corals, anemone fish (nemos to the kids) – a great day out on the boat. In the evening we took time to cross the island on our Honda Wave and soaked up some of the atmosphere at the Lanta Festival – yummy street food and cheap beer at the open air stage.

Street food at the Lanta Festival

Snorkelling at Koh Haa

It was a pleasure to spend a few days in Koh Lanta and we had some spankingly new accommodation just a few yards from a gorgeous beach – a bargain at the price we paid. So for anyone visiting Koh Lanta, get in touch for a recommendation! Thanks to Fran (and parents) for paying for it out of her christmas fund

Thailand is what you make of it – there’s enough for the history hunter, the party planner, the beachcomber or the barefoot hippies – and most people, rightly or wrongly, keep themselves to themselves. (Why is it that where you find more tourists, you meet less people?) It was certainly a different experience from our previous visits. For once it wasn’t same-same.

Sunset from the balcony, Ko Lanta

The Cambodia-Laos border

Our next bizarre encounter was Stef from Boston, seemed normal enough until we realised that everything had to be whispered (in case ‘they’ hear us), he was on a mission, a mission for delivering good.  However as it was so top secret we never found out exactly what this was.  We were apparently very lucky to cross the border that day though, because as he informed us, no whites were allowed through, it must have been our tans that fooled the officials!  Entertaining as it was though, we were left hoping that there may be some normal people in Laos!

Fran 'n' boats, Don Khon

4000 Islands consisted of a great bike ride around our island – Don Khon for waterfalls and little villages, but it was time to move on and time for the next travel adventure.

Liphee falls, Don Khon

We were assured our bus would have air conditioning…. well it was certainly breezy.  4 hours in the back of a truck on benches on very bumpy roads, straddling baskets of fish that had a tendency to try a break for freedom every now and again – not the comfiest but an adventure and a realisation that Laos was basic on the travel front.  However everything was done with a smile , and when there were 20 people in that truck, there was always room for one more!

VIP bus to Paksie

Next stop was Vientian, the capital city which consists of just over 250,000 people – we were not expecting much but it was incredibly pretty.  Due to its french history the buildings were all french colonial style and gorgeous. 

Vientiane

Sites included the ‘Arch de Triomphe’ (Patuxi) and the Lao golden national monument. 

Pha That Luang, Vientiane

 Vientianes French influence meant it was time for some more flashpacking and time for a french meal of steak and cheese – yum!!

French wine and French cheese - parfait!

Vang Vieng in the north of Laos has a reputation of a party place, and that it was.  Hundreds of bars and tourists and the most bizarre concept of sitting in an inner tube and floating down a river from bar to bar.  We didnt indulge in the tubing but did a kayak trip instead through beautiful scenery, then went to experience some of the bars, fully equiped with mud volley ball, tug of war and swings into the river – Very Bizarre but great fun!

Tubing Bars in Vang Vieng

Kayaking the Nam Song, Vang Vieng

Luang prubang was as far north as we ventured and was the old capital – and again so so pretty , the buildings were amazing, as was the market – seriously about a mile long and every stall the same !

Colonial architecture, Luang Prabang

So all in all Laos was totally different to what i had expected, it was clean, beautiful, friendly and has a lot going for it – maybe why it was probably the most touristy country we visited!  Still though the transport was terrible!!

Angkor Wat, Cambodia

Nothing was going to stop our boat’s progress over the border from Vietnam into Cambodia – unchartered territory for both of us and a hope that we can explore more of the unexplored after the throng of tourists in Vietnam.

Phnom Penh greeted us with its dust and its smells and its begging families but was ultimately rather pleasant and I imagine has done well to rebuild its character after being cleared just over thirty years earlier under the Pol Pot regime. (Khmer Rouge Year Zero). After spending Australia Day getting drunk with Australians, we spent a day visiting some sites important to the history of Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge regime – namely Choeng Ek (Killing Fields) and Tuol Sleng (Security Prison S21), both a harsh reminder of the atrocities of the late 70s in Cambodia. For us, to be honest, it was a well needed history lesson in a country that we previously knew nothing about.

Tuol Sleng

In the city there are, of course, more pagodas and temples worth a look in and the Royal Palace / Silver Pagoda combo deal (pricey at 12 bucks when half of it is closed and it’s another 15 bucks for a guide). Anyway, see for yourself – it’s pretty and impressive.

Nige the king and his Royal Palace

Taking a less travelled route, we paid a visit to Battambang – the religious heart of Cambodia, with more temples, monks and monks in temples. Meditiative.

What was most fantastic was the oppotunity to learn Khmer cooking! Fish amok has to be one of the tastiest dishes we’ve had – even more so when it’s made from scratch by your own hands! Both our amok curries tasted great, which is more than I can say for my hot and sour soup, which tasted more like hot and sour riverwater. With floaty bits. And sediment.

Fran cooking up an amok

After a few days relaxing – an easy thing to do in Battambang – we took a not unusually crusty bus to Siam Reap, tourist check-in terminal for the obligatory tour of Angkor. Siam Reap in itself is pleasant enough. It’s certainly embraced tourism and as a result has made sure that its kept clean, well patrolled and with nice coloured lights at night-time. We like that.  We weren’t so sure about the guards at either end of the tourist streets which stop local peddlars from trying to sell their wares to winers and diners. I thought that was a bit over the top and sad.

The Norwich bar in Siam Reap

So, willing to inject dollars into the Siam Reap community (you know they have seen over 8000 tuk tuk drivers in Siam Reap?!) we hired a driver for the day and took a whistlestop tour of the ruined city of Angkor Thom and some of the surrounding Angkor temples – Pre Rup (Sunset Spectacular), Angkor Wat (Sunrise spectacular), Angkor Thom (lots of big stone faces), terraces (elephants and lepers), Ta Keo (high and mighty), Ta Prohm (jungle madness) and Prasat Krawan (Stupa-endous)

Eastern entrance to the city of Angkor (Angkor Thom)

Really it was great to see something that I head BORED myself to death reading about (I read “The civilisation of Angkor” during the two weeks before Siam Reap). It definately trumps the other ruins we have come across (makes us sound like explorers?) and we can cross off another UNESCO World Heritage Site from our list. There are almost 700 and maybe one day I can say that I have seen them all. Though that does involve travelling to Greenland and almost to the Antarctic. Still, after Uyuni in Bolivia that shouldn’t be too bad.

Anyway, where was I? Oh, temples. After some R&R we took off from Siam Reap and head up river to Kratie to check out some rare Irrawaddy dolphins. You can see a photo of them online – it’s probably better than my photo.

Dolphin hunting (not literally)

Dolfin phin

Also worth visiting in Kratie was the lovely island of Kph Trong, where we cycled round an almost untouched rural community and recieved lots of welcome smiles and hellos from over excited children. One of the mums even glammed up her two year old for us. (Not upon request I hasten to add).

Nige the tuk tuk driver

From the lovely Mekong sunsets of Kratie, we spent the best part of a day travelling to VERY dusty Ban Lung to stay in a Tree Top Eco Lodge. It wasn’t clear what was particularly Eco about it (built of wood fram the nearby protected forests?) or Tree Top (bunglaows on stilts) but it was a seriously amazing place ond probably one of the nicest we’ve stayed in to date. For ten bucks anyway. The town of Ban Lung lies in the Ratanakiri district, not yet connected to the main road system and has plenty of character. Despite its charm, most people arrive and then leave on a trek in the jungle (more like half dead forest in the dry season). On our two day hike we experienced MONKEYS!, a great curry cooked in a bamboo pipe over a camp fire, loud frogs, scorching heat, lying tour guides and a dusty return journey – evidence below. And a couple of lovely people from Germany who had some great stories about hiking parts of the west to east silk route through all sorts of places ending in -istan. And russia. But not China. Hi Guys!

Camping in the jungle

Battered from the journey

After the initial hostility of parts of Vietnam, Cambodia was pleasantly heart warming. The food was great, though perhaps lacking in variety after a while (you can always add opium or weed to it for an extra dollar though!) Laos remains a mystery to us, so with visa and passport in hand, we head to the Land of a Million Elephants.

Nige defying the law of gravity

Vietnam

The journey from the airport to the historic old quarter in Hanoi has the potential to be pleasant, if only you could see anything through the smog. The combination of Hanoi’s eight million motorcycles, the humidity and the still air means that even at four in the afternoon you can look straight at the sun without flinching.

And then you hit Hanoi – a writhing tangle of one way roads that are two way, motorcycles carrying fridges, cabinets, entire families and overcharged tourists – and wish that you had have booked accommodation in advance. Oh well, welcome to Vietnam and welcome to the high season. Once we’d checked into our rather luxuroius “mini-hotel” (the places to stay for flashpackers in Asia) we plucked up the courage to brave the roads. Anyone who has been to Hanoi will know what I mean. With only 3 feet of pavement, priority seems to be given to motorcyles and hawkers – Human traffic is expected to take to the road.

Fran and I did not take to Hanoi (did you pick up on that?) and so paid a quick visit to the Lake, the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum and a floating visit to Halong Bay (having been there nine years earlier with Gary, I can confirm that the water is definately not blue anymore…)

Fran at the citadel in Hue

Next stop was Hoi An – a lovely little riverside town only a few kilometers from the cost. It appears to be home to the country’s tourist tailoring business but neither Fran or I were inclined to purchase. The suit I bought nine years ago at $25 was great, until the moment that the trouser fly\zip broke, in the down position, while I was at work. When someone discreetly informs you that you’re flying low, you then have to discreetly inform them that you know and then explain why, while trying not to bring attention to your pants.

Fran at the Japanese bridge Hoi An

Where were we… after Hoi An, Nha Trang – a seaside resort with no appeal in the rain save a giant buddha who in his enlightenment still smiles in the rain.

From there, aim toward the heavens and go to Dalat – an affluent mountain town with a cooler temperature and considerably less tourists. The locals were happy to welcome you, and the surrounding area made a great motorcycle tour, again despite the rain. The area is the agricultural centre of vietnam (perhaps more vegetables than fruit, which belongs to the Mekong)

Our rather camp guide, Tien

Deep fried crickets with chilli sauce

Coffee plantation in the rain

Elephant falls

Down in the south, a few hours from the Mekong delta is Saigon – a bustling tourist haven and within easy reach of the Cu Chi tunnnels – a tourist destination where you can take a peek into some of the Viet Cong tunnels that they used to resist the Amercian troops in the area. You can also watch some communist propeganda (read made to watch) and you can fire some guns. Come get some.

Fran in the VC tunnels at Cu Chi

Saigon’s sights included the rather one sided “War crimes against the vietnamese people” museum and the Reunification Palace. At the time I understood what it was all about but I fail to remember now so you’ll just have to google it if you’re interested. Here, I’ve done it for you. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reunification_Palace

Reunification palace, Saigon

Dinner in District 3 Saigon

From Saigon, we took a three day tour through the steamy Mekong delta and up the river to the Cambodia border. The many sights that we saw included an orchard (fruity), a river market (floaty), rice paper production (a bit thin on the ground), coconut candy production (sweet), rice wine production (boozy), a bassa farm (fishy) and a Cham muslim village (holy). We also had the opportunity to have a great fish and shrimp BBQ in a riverside town whose name eludes me, and just escaped our fish being live on the skewers like the poor couple next to us who I don’t think were quite ready for it… or at least from the look on her face she wasn’t.

Sunrise over the Mekong

Pinapples at the floating market

Huge cock

So there you have it folks – it’s cheap (50 cents for a litre of draught beer or a noodle soup), it’s moody and rainy in the North, it’s welcoming and steamy in the South and it’s next to Cambodia which is where we’re going next! See you next time.

Cambodian border securityCheap beer!

After finally finding an alternative accommodation (probably the best we stayed in for the whole travels) it was time to explore Hong Kong and get past the fake rolex’s, Handy bags and leather jackets constantly being touted at us.

Hong Kong Trams

First stop the longest escalator in the world – now i was imagining one non stop escalator all the way to the top of the mountain, but no, its a series of mini travelators so not as impressive as first thought but still a main sight seeing attraction!  This took us to an area called Soho, very touristy and set up mainly for the Ex-pats living in HK. 

Foggy view

Night View

Following this, a trip to the Peak for amazing views of the city, star ferry across to the mainland to watch the nightly light show in the city.  How very bizarre!  All the buildings with cheesy lights to very cheesy music and laser beams jetting from the top – I have never seen anything like it and probably never will again!  Food time and the bit we were most looking forward to (as you can imagine) , goose and sweet and sour pork followed by people laughing at us….not sure why and Hong Kong food was a hit!

Nige on the Avenue of Stars pre light show!

light Show

The Dim Sum hunt now begins, and my god we found it!  Maxims Palace, one of the few places that still has trolleys going around a huge banquet room serving dim sum – god it was good and the atmosphere was great and the very moody trolley ladies even put a smile on our faces.

Dim Sum

A trip to the Hong Kong museum and science museum was followed by an evening out with Nige’s cousin, Chris and his girlfriend Alicia. Was great to have someone to take us out in such a big city and the wagyu burger, jelly shots and great company certainly made for a great evening – thanks guys!

Nige and Chris

Jelly shots

A quick trip over to Lamma island finished our Hong Kong adventure with a walk over the island – with the majority of the view of a power station but was still great to get out of the city for a day and out of the manic-ness!  Hong Kong overall did us proud and got us back into the swing of things that we have ahead of us, great cheap street food, different cultures and some great sites…. off to Asia we go!

Beautiful View?!?!?Great Markets...

Newtown Sydney

Roasted vegetables ravioli

Salmon and tuna sashimi with shrimp

Tatziki and hummus

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Marinaded rump steak, pork and leek sausage

Grilled haloumi, gormet veggie sausages and burgers

Cold ham and sliced turkey

Baked vegetables and roast potatoes

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Traditional english christmas pudding

Chocolate brownies

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Selection of international cheeses with Tasmanian pickles:

English stilton, Australian gouda, French brie, Spanich Manchigo

Wine list (Hunter Valley NSW)

McLeish estate sparkling semillon

Tyrells Lost Block semillon ’09

Iron Gate Estate oaked semillon ’05

Iron Gate Estate unwooded chardonnay ’06

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Black Label (McGuigan) sparkling syrah

Tyrells pinot noir ’08

Saddlers Creek 3 Wheels shiraz cabernet merlot ’04

McLeish Estate shiraz ’07

Iron Gate sweet shiraz ’07

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McGuigan Tempranillo ’07

Christmas dinner

Sashimi and shrimps