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It's still a good couple of weeks before I leave for China on my travels, and I've been thinking of the best way to keep in touch with my friends while I'm actually away...
Elaine at work suggested a good way to do this might be via a personal webpage, rather than sending out loads of emails to everyone everytime I have something new to say. This also means I don't need to remember umpteen email addresses while away and you don't have the hassle of downloading my emails if they contain a few pictures!
So I was going to do this using the now very popular MySpace.com website, but it turns out everyone would have to sign-up and become a member of MySpace just to view my pictures, etc – and I didn't like the sound of that :-(
So here we are then. I've now created my own webpage on Fotki (using the nickname most people know me by) and this should now be fairly simple for me to log onto and update whenever I can.
The "plan" is to add to the My Journals section when I have something new or interesting to say while on my travels, and if you're now reading this will have found it and got the idea. Assuming I can find internet cafe's easy enough I imagine posting updates every fortnight or so – maybe less, maybe more.
If at all possible I'll also upload any decent photos I may have taken to the Photo Albums section when I can, so feel free to check there too.
Of course if you have some news of your own that you want to share with me (and everyone else to this page!!!) feel free to add a comment in my Guestbook so I can read these while away. You can also try reaching me by my NEW regular email address: aaronireland@tiscali.co.uk although I don't really plan to use this much while away – afterall that's the whole point of setting up this webpage.
In the meantime feel free to bookmark this page if you want to find out what I'm doing: http://journals.fotki.com/ARI-Boy/
Anyway that's way too much written for now. I'll give a brief run-down of my plans and where I hope to be going nearer to my departure on September 3rd.
Wow! Where do I start?
I'm curently sitting in an internet cafe 10.30pm in Xi'an (actually pronounced Shyann if you want to be pedantic) having just risked my life to get here! Crossing any road can be a feat in China as there appears to be no traffic laws whatsoever - the bigger car/truck has right of way over everyone else: pedestrians, motorcyclists with no lights, and the traffic lights themselves! Anyway I've found this huge hall on the 3rd floor of this building stacked out with computers and young Chinese playing games on them. Nobody seems to be surfing the net.
Beijing was no great cultre-shock for me and is probably similar to most other major Asian cities - Bangkok, etc. It was good but not great, although this might just have been because I went to the awesome Great Wall of China (located just north of the city) before seeing what the rest of Beijing had to offer and found it an anti-climax. Tianamman Square is huge and unfortunately I'd have preferred to have spent longer there than some of the other places I visited.
For those that don't know I'm on a small-group tour, and at the minute I feel every bit the tourist - which I don't like. I'm craving a little bit of independence. I don't think I'm alone in this thinking and we are confident it will all loosen up a bit when we reach the Yangzee River for a 3-day cruise through the Three Gorges.
I can say I've now been to the actual Shaolin School & Temple - birthplace of Kung Fu - and I'm now ready for some more chock-socky movies when I get back home ;-) Watching these young kids training in the arts and seeing a full-on exhibition of Kung Fu is something to behold...
Xi'an, where I now am, looks to be a fantastic city (I already prefer it to Beijing) - and today has largely been a free day before we go and see the Terracotta Warriors tomorrow.
I think I'm still finding my feet on this trip - and even they are knackered already (climbing up pagodas, and up and along the Great Wall, etc) - but this is a fantastic experience. I'll post again when I reach Shanghai and try and upload a couple of pictures either then or maybe even sooner.
Take are everyone, and please don't worry about me because I'm having a great time!!!
I'm sitting at the airport now waiting for a plane to Shanghai. Shanghai promises alot, but for me the highlight so far has been the Terracotta Warriors at Xi'an.
The sheer scale of this hidden buried army is amazing. All are housed under roof - 3 pits in separate buildings and pit 1 is absolutely huge. And archaeologists think there may be thousands more still undiscovered in the surrounding countryside.
Our second night in Xi'an was great too where I led a small group of us to a restaurant I had spotted late the evening before. We have generally been eating as a group of 16 with our tour leader but I wanted to break off from that and do something different. It turned out I made an excellent choice as the restaurant also had a stage with show and we were shown to a front row table for our meal and the show. After successfully ordering our dishes we watched the show which became a huge laugh when I got dragged on stage for a small dance routine!!! We finished off an already great night at an extremely modern/stylish nightclub where we were happy to drink beers & cocktails on the roof bar ;-)
On our last day there before flying to Chongqing we hired some bikes and cycled on top of the old inner wall - great fun. I didn't know what to expect with Xi'an, knowing nothing about the place, but found it had almost everything.
After a short flight and coach journey we arrived for our 3-day cruise of the Three Gorges section of the Yangtze river. In truth, I didn't find this anywhere near as interesting as I thought it might be but going through the short gorge sections themselves provided better scenery. The Yangtze river has already been raised quite significantly (over 100m) and is due to rise another 40 metres. Consequently nearly all of the riverside housing we saw is now well over this mark and any towns situated below have long gone.
This morning we finished the cruise at the giant Three Gorges Dam project, one of the biggest construction projects in the world. The dam itself is huge but obviously not yet finished, which is why the water-level has not gone up further. I did take some pictures of it (on an extremely hazy day), but whatever way you look at it - it's just a concrete dam!
The weather on my entire trip so far has been very good, in the high 20's celcius, and we haven't seen any rain yet. However, I was fully aware this is around the best time of year to visit China :)
I think it's about time I finally told you about my travels from Shanghai to Hong Kong - as I'm now in Bangkok and Shanghai is starting to feel like along time ago now.
Fortunately I have been keeping a written journal (thank you Amanda & Gareth for this present - it was a good idea!) on my travels and this is quite useful to refer back to...
Shanghai's a proper modern metropolis by any standards, but in China it really stands out. Where as some Chinese cities seem fairly drab or ordinary with no obvious focal point (bar the old ancient capitals with their city walls and temples, etc) Shanghai has its amazing skycraper skyline overlooking the river to the more traditional buildings of the "Bund". At night the city has a real buzz and vibe and there are lots of trendy bars, restaurants and clubs (with prices to match those in London). Shanghai also has the rather beautiful "Yu Gardens" which is mainly lots of pools and lakes set amongst rocks - good to stroll around for an hour or more. However, I could have down without the 'hawkers' in Shanghai trying to sell you anything from sex to fake rolex watches or cheap plastic toys (actually a bit like Bangkok then!).
I finally left Shanghai after 2 weeks in China and said farewell to a few friends made on the trip who weren't going any further. Hi Peta, Ben and Andy if you are reading this!!!
We then flew to Kunming in Southern China and visited the Stone Forest at Shilin. From here we went to the far more relaxed town of Dali which has a bit of a backpacker vibe to it - a great place then to find somewhere to get your laundry washed! We again hired some bikes for the day (having previously hired bikes to cycle along the city walls at Xi'an) and cycled to the Three Pagodas. These pagodas stand quite tall (the middle one in particular) and having previously climbed the "Iron Pagoda" at Xi'an I had no intention of climbing another one just yet! It turned out it wasn't an option anyway but we found plenty more walking to do when wandering around the newly re-created temple complex that sits behind the Three Pagodas. i think an earthquake demolished the original ones! Temple after temple (each gained by climbing a series of steps and walking through to the next) until you reach the top of the last one to get a magnificent view across the whole thing.
After Dali we ventured on to Lijang and a mountain trek to "Tiger Leaping Gorge". If I'd known how hard the trek was going to be I would have definitely given the temples a miss the day before!! The itinierary said a light-moderate trek but our afternoon hike up the mountainside to our overnight guesthouse gave me a good idea of what to expect - I must get fitter!!!
The views from our guesthouse were pretty spectacular (even if the facilities weren't!) and after an early start we started the trek up the mountainside. Fortunately I only had to carry my daysack not my full backpack or I do not think I'd have made it. After "28 bends", a series of very steep upward paths and turns, and about 3 hours later we reached the top (about 2500m high - 1000m higher than Ben Nevis) for some truely spectacular views of Tiger Leaping Gorge. On the opposite side of the ravine, and above the snow line at over 4000m, is Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. The river running beneath is the early beginnings of the Yangtze river starting from Tibet (which is little more than 100km away). In the centre of the river is a large rock called the Tiger Leaping stone where legend has it a tiger jumped crossed the river using the stone. After finally having the courage to stand on the edge of the rocky outcrop I pose for a few pictures (see my photo album) and have a chance to take in the stunning views the climb has afforded. After this we trek for another 3 hours or more around the mountainside to our next guesthouse in the hills - which at least had a better bathroom/toilet!
The trek was tiring but rewarding and after this we went back to the town of Lijang for a couple of nights. Lijang is a proper tourist city with a very picturesque old town - mainly full of Chinese tourists! Apparantly Lijang will have over 5 million tourists this year(!!!) and over 95% of them are visiting Chinese. Consequently the narrow cobbled streets are very busy, especially at night where they sit in adjacent bars singing taunts at each other! We managed to find a quieter bar, but after sinking some beers and rice wine tried to join in - but the locals weren't too impressed!
From Lijaing we had a day of flying (via Kunming) to get to Guilin only to move very quickly on to Longsheng and the "Dragons Backbone Rice Terraces". Here we were staying in another guesthouse high up amongst the rice terraces. We had enough time in the afternoon for a 2hr trek around the hills which I was starting to get used to!
After Longsheng we returned back to Guilin, where I couldn't help humming the tune to the Italian Job as our coach made its way down the steep hills (cue lots of Michael Caine quotes). I may have already mentioned that the driving standards in China are appalling with the pedestrian literally having to take their life into their hands when crossing roads. On these steep windy roads some cars think nothing of overtaking on blind bends!!! I later read in a Hong Kong newspaper that 100,000 people a year are KILLED (not injured) on Chinese roads! I'm not at all surprised by this but you could argue it helps to keep the population down I suppose ;-)
Again we only briefly stop in Guilin before going on to Yangshuo. This whole area is dominated by lots of giant limestone karsts that tower over both towns/cities like some strange alien landscape. There is plenty of opportunity to walk up these if you care (or rockclimb the steepest ones if you really want) but with a reported temperature of over 34*C and 85% humidity in our town I didn't bother! Even more than Dali, Yangshuo is a real backpacker place and there is no shortage of places to eat or drink with some imaginatively titled places like The Stone Roses bar and Twin Peaks cafe! In all honesty we didn't do very much here except chill out and have the odd night for some beers mixed with Tequilas :)
Finally (after another overnight train journey to Guangzhou) we got on a morning train to Hong Kong and left China. I have plenty of great memories of China to keep and feel I have seen so much - visiting so many cities and seeing so many different parts of the country with their differing cultures and even climates (fortunately we had excellent weather throughout our whole trip). They say it has changed alot in the last 10 years or so but I'm willing to bet it will change even more over the next 10 years. Perhaps then I will want to visit parts again, but for the moment I feel like I've seen an awful lot.
Hong Kong then...
I'm sure some of you have been here already but I found it a good place to spend 4 or 5 days - an ideal stopover city if flying longhaul. I managed to see the city skyline (day and night) from both across the bay at Kowloon and also on top of Victoria Peak which overlooks everything. They have built a massive viewing tower here (complete with shops and restaurants underneath) that gives you the best views. The star ferry which takes you from Hong Kong island to Kowloon on the mainland is also a great way to get a feel for the city or just to view it. Kowloon (like most of Hong Kong) is full of places to shop and I have to admit to buying a new digital camera that was just too cheap to ignore! (Plenty more photographs to come then ;-) And if I'd bought this a night or two before then I'd probably have been able to better capture the fantastic fireworks display over the bay on National China Day (October 1st). It was in my opinion not quite as good as I've seen on Independence Day in New York, but the finale was pretty spectacular.
There's more than a fair share of British style bars aiming to serve both the tourists like me and the large numbers of British people who still live and work in Hong Kong. And who can blame them - if you don't find it too hot and humid it could be described as like an Asian Monte Carlo with a little bit of New York thrown in too. Every car is a swanky German or Japanese model, with the Mercedes S class easily the most popular car amongst the other Lexus, BMW, Porsche or Bentley's!!! Except the taxis which are 1980's style Toyota Crown cars, but very convenient all the same.
I didn't make enough time to go to Macau or see the giant seated Buddha on Lantau island, but did squeeze in a "Sampan" boat trip around the harbour in Aberdeen (the other side of Hong Kong island) and a trip to Ocean Park which is basically a theme park along with dolphins/sealions and lots of aquariums - although I also missed the pair of giant Pandas they have here too - Doh! And also one night before hitting the bars I went to Happy Valley to watch the horse racing.
They say if you like somewhere you should leave enough to go back for, and with Hong Kong I think I have!!!
I've finally found some good computers (in both Hong Kong and Bangkok) and enough spare time to upload a selection of photos taken so far.
I thought everybody could see these when I first uploaded some pictures in Hong Kong, but it turns out I didn't have the correct settings so nobody actually could see them!!! However this has all been sorted now.
Finally, please keep posting comments (I love to hear from you all) or feel free to email me at my tiscali email address ;-)
Having previously been here 3 or 4 years ago I had a very good idea of what to expect with Bangkok and nothing much has changed...
Ok, so there was the well publicised military coup about 2 weeks before I arrived and Bangkok opened a brand new international airport for me to fly into 5 days beforehand (rushed in by the new leaders I understand!), but apart from that very little has changed - the streets are still dirty and the bars are very busy or that might be the other way around!!!
Sadly there were no tanks on the streets around the palace or other monuments to snap and hardly a soldier in sight. Everything seems to be exactly as before and I don't think half of the locals even realised there had been a coup!
I based myself in the Sukhumvit Road area (not the main Kao San Road backpacker area) because I knew this already and wanted only a few days here before moving on to Siem Reap in Cambodia. Had I known before, I could have flown directly to Siem Reap from Hong Kong, but I didn't find this out until I was actually in Bangkok.
There's plenty to do in and around Bangkok, but I just really wanted to stop and catch my breath from China/HK. Consequently, I found myself sleeping in late and then hitting the bars at night. The very close and fairly lively "Nana Entertainment" district was quite a good place to do this and it's not at all difficult to find a place to drink here - or a nice girl to share it with! Any single (dare I say good-looking) bloke, like myself, is quite literally pounced upon as soon as you walk in - it's funny but that never happens back home!!!
I visited the absolutely huge "Chatuchak" weeked market (it dwarfs Wembly market) and was tempted to buy a fake watch, designer t-shirt or even some of the very latest DVDs but didn't bother in the end. Besides, I picked up a couple of very cheap t-shirts while in China. It just seems strange to me that lots of people are buying the fake goods, yet Bangkok itself is still building ever more large and very plush shopping malls which are full of designer boutiques - with not many people in them! Other than that the malls are full of mobile phone shops.
I went and saw the Royal Palace again (having done this the last time I was here) and once again saw the "Emerald Buddah". I also found time to see the very, very large "Reclining Buddah" which I managed to miss last time! Ditto, the wonderfully named "Wat Arun" which is a giant phallic shaped temple that stands on the side of the river.
Recharged, I was now ready for Cambodia...
Obviously that means hello over here ;-)
I'm feeling very much the independent traveller at the moment - deciding when to move on and when to stay put, depending on my mood really. I've met lots of people on the way, but none that are sort of travelling in my direction and at my pace. Nearly everyone I've met so far is travelling for no more than 4 or 5 weeks, and some are going back to Thailand from Cambodia rather than onto Vietnam which is my next destination. That all said I may try and meet up again in a couple of weeks with a guy called Joe when I reach northern Vietnam and into Laos. I met Joe first in a bar in Siem Reap and then by chance bumped into him again on a boat trip in South Cambodia! Consequently we had a few very boozy nights together with a Californian and Kiwi he himself has been travelling with.
Anyway, I flew into Siem Reap over 2 weeks ago now having decided not to do the marathon (and quite torturous) overland thing. Siem Reap is the base point for visiting the temples of Angkor and I needed 2 days to visit all the temples I wanted to see, but this was only really scratching the surface of what is actually there. The Angkor ruins are basically a huge complex of different temples spread over a very large area (about 30km to cover the main central ones) that were built by successive kings of the Khymer Empire over around 800 years.
"Angkor Wat" is the world famous one which is pictured in all the travel brochures and is obviously stunning - I too now have the obligatory photo infront of the temple with the lake in the foreground! I don't think the pictures show how big it actually is though and the main temple in the centre with the 5 large, corn-cob shaped towers is approached by a very long causeway which sets the whole thing of - very impressive. I left in the knowledge that I have now seen one of the ancient arceological wonders of the world. Right up there with the Great Pyramids of Giza and Machu Pichu.
My hired tuk-tuk driver for the day also took me to Angkor Thom which was an ancient walled city with the Bayon temple in the very centre. Today the "city" is really jungleland surrounded by a square city wall and giant moat. Within the walls are a smattering of other ruins together with the Bayon temple ruins. I learnt thiswas the last temple to be built under the empire and is quite different to most others. The temple features giant square pillars that have a carved face of the king/buddah on each of the four sides which like the temple and the city walls all align to the points of the compass.
The next day I searched out more, including the photographically stunning Ta Phrom where the stone ruins have been left to be taken over by giant tree roots from the rampaging jungle. It's very cliched but it is indeed just like the video game and movie Tomb Raider!!!
Siem Reap itself is now a thriving, if quite small, tourist town which I imagine will become much bigger as more tourists choose to visit Cambodia and see the Angkor temples in particular. There is no shortage of places to stay (I found a basic guesthouse for $10/night) and it's even less hard to find a bar or restaurant in the imaginatively named "Pub Street". The Angkor beer (another imaginative name) is quite good and it's easy to get wrecked on the stuff, it's very strong, if not drinking Tequilla slammers!! Most bars stay open until the last person leaves so quite often it was gone 3 or 4 in the morning before I stumbled back :-D
After Siem Reap I made the journey to Phnom Penh by a 5 hour "torpedo" express boat and arrived in the capital. It was actually quite a bumpy ride skimming down the "Tonle Sap" lake-river towards the capital. In the current wet season, which is now ending, the lake is huge and it actually looks like you are at sea as you can't see land either side beyond the horizon. It got a little scarier an hour in to the ride when during a brief monsoon shower we all spotted a typhoon (water-based tornado) in the far distance that we were heading to!
The poverty in Phnom Penh was probably more apparant than in Siem Reap. Throughout Cambodia there are lots of beggars and many look extremely deserving (not least the obvious victims of landmines), but in truth you'd soon be very skint if you gave to everyone. There are plenty of kids on the streets trying to sell you books or beads on the beaches and it's quite hard to keep saying no (so I have a few bracelets and things now!)
In Phnom Penh I visited the infamous "S21" school which was used as an interrogation/torture prison by the Khymer Rouge before sending men, women and children to the killing fields away from the city. Obviously I could write heaps about this and the attrocities and suffering endured by millions of Cambodians at the hands of Pol Pot and the Khymer Rouge, but that can be soureced elsewhere. The school itself has been left largely untouched since it was discovered by the invading/liberating Vietnamese army in 1979 and has now become a Genocide museum. I found it very moving and settled on seeing this rather than go out of the city to one of the "killing fields" where now just stands a simple memorial monument.
I decided to visit Cambodia's own royal palace, but it was very similar indeed to that I'd seen about a week before in Bangkok (even down to the Emerald Buddah) although not as grand and lots of it was actually shut off to the public.
I should also tell you that if you ever go to Cambodia you might decide on one of their infamous pizzas. Think carefully if you want it "happy" or not (or even extra happy!) as I did in Phnom Penh, together with a newly married couple from Chester I'd met on the boat down. To say we were smashed after the pizza and just a few beers was a bit of an understatement!!!
From Phnom Penh I took a 4 hour bus journey south to Sihanoukville. I didn't plan to spend as long in Sihanoukville as I did, originally thinking only 3 or 4 days, but found it a charming little beach town and I hadn't been on a beach properly since last year - which was Copacabana beach no less in Rio De Janeiro I should add! ;-)
The people here were particularly nice, as I have found all over Cambodia - if you can just ignore the all too persistent moto drivers looking to earn a buck or two and constant beach sellers. The place has a very nice chilled atmosphere and after spending all day on the beach you can easily spend the night there too drinking or eating barbecued seafood at the more lively beach shacks, if the bars in downtown don't appeal. Some shacks even have giant screens erected on the beach to show movies and/or football games!
So having spent a week relaxing at the beach, and now back in Phnom Penh, I move on again tomorrow to Vietnam via a 3-day trip through the Mekong Delta to Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City as it's now called).
I'll report on "Nam" in due course (cue lots of quotes from Vietnam war movies).....
I had a simply wonderful time in Vietnam, and like Cambodia I would recommend it to anyboady as a place to visit....
I entered Vietnam from Cambodia through the Mekong Delta where I saw how the people lived and worked on the river - including a proper floating market at Can Tho - and took the opportunity here to eat curried snake! I also found good company in a French girl called Julie who was travelling back from a weeks holiday in Cambodia to her job as a teacher in Ho Chi Minh City.
From the Mekong I arrived in Ho Chi Minh City and soon discovered everyone calls it Saigon. Saigon could also be called motorbike city (or more acurately moped city) as half the population seem to own and ride bikes! Rush hour here is simply amazing and you cannot believe so many people can be on the road at one time. I was based in the main backpacker street and found a really friendly guesthouse to stay in. From here I was able to explore the main sites including HCMC Museum, the Reunification Palace, Notre Dam Cathedral (yes that's correct!), and a few other places too. At the end of one afternoon I wandered down to Cholon (or Chinatown) and found a great street cafe for some fried noodles and fresh beer poured over ice. As the only westerner around the locals seemed impressed by my presence which I enjoyed and we chinked our glasses over a few more "bia hoi".
I also took the opportunity for a day trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels where the Viet Cong 'guerillas' hid out from the US and South Vietnamese Army during the war. I was able to go down into these very crampt tunnels (actually now made bigger for western tourists ;-) and see how they must have lived for weeks at a time. They also had small camps outside the tunnels and I saw some examples of the traps they created for the "enemy". I also had the chance to go on the firing range they have since created for some extra tourist money, and after buying some rather expensive bullets (about a dollar for each one!) I fired off a few rounds from an AK47 "Kalashnikov" rifle and then even better let rip on an M60 machine gun!!! I quite literally had a blast :-D
From Saigon I flew to Da Nang and travelled on to Hoi An, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site of which there are now many in this part of the world. (Basically this means it's a designated place of natural or cultural beauty.) Hoi An is a perfectly preserved old-fashioned town with no big buildings to spoil the place. It sits on a small river a few kilometers inland from the sea. The streets are made up of two storey buildings with wooden shutters that look simply charming. Amongst the restaurants and bakeries there are plenty of art shops selling wonderful paintings or tailors and dress-making shops where you can easily have a tailormade suit or silk number runup for just a few dollars.
Hoi An has a fantastic beach a few kilometers away which I found was best reached by simply hiring out a bicycle for the day. After 20 minutes ride I was able to park my bike next to a coconut tree and then sit on the white sands of the beach and try and avoid the inevitable beach hawkers trying to sell you drinks, snacks or small jewellery. The waves on this beach were huge and it was great fun diving through them and occasionally getting caught out and 'whitewashed'!
Close to Hoi An is a place called "My Son" which I decided to visit to see the ancient "Cham" ruins. As interesting as they are (an ancient burial site for the Hindu worshipping Cham kings around the 10th century) lots of it has been destroyed by bombing in the Vietnam war and it's nothing compared to the ruins at Angkor.
After a few days I dragged myself away to my next destination of Hue which was an ancient capital of Vietnam. It is also supposed to be an attractive city but I found it a huge anti-climax after Hoi An and in truth was keen to get away, and particularly from the more persistant than normal moto and cyclo drivers touting for business. I found time though to visit the Citadel which is the old walled city containing the "Purple Forbidden City" which was a smaller scale version of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China until the Americans destroyed virtually all of it with their bombs in the Vietnam war. I also paid a visit to the "Thien Mu Pagoda" which was the home of the Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc who in 1963 burned himself to death in Saigon in protest at President Diem (of South Vietnam) and America's actions during the Vietnam war. There is a famous photograph of this, and the car in the photo's background (used to drive the monk from Hue to Saigon) is now on display close to the pagoda, however it was not there when I visited.
Outside of Hue I went to the DMZ (demilitarised zone) whch was effectively the border between north and south during the war. Consequently, this place was carpet bombed by America on a massive scale with napalm and all sorts of chemicals. Nothing would grow there for years but now it is green again and they are successfully growing coffee beans. In truth there was very little to see apart from the Khe Sanh US military base and Vinh Moc Tunnels which was an even bigger tunnel complex than those at Cu Chi - a virtual underground village with small rooms underground that some people lived in for months at a time! The battle at Khe Sanh was a crucial turning point in the war diverting US attention away from the North Vietnamese plan to attack Saigon and the south in the "Tet Offensive" in 1968. I have obviously learnt a fair bit more during my visit about the war and Vietnam's struggle for independence and a united country which France then America successively denied them. I now have my own thoughts on this whole issue and I can't help feeling the issue could have been better resolved by the United Nations in the later 1950's without America entering the fray in 1965 due to its overbearing anti-communist stance. But let's not get too political eh?.....
I arrived in Hanoi after taking the train from Hue and had plenty of time to admire the scenery as I traveled up the coast aboard the "Reunification Express". Hanoi is another big city, but despite all the bikes and horns it has a gentler pace than Saigon. I base myself in the Old Quarter which was a former merchants area. Here there are whole streets selling only one kind of item which is a tradition carried on from its origins. So today if you want to buy a pair of sunglasses you have to walk all around the Old Quarter until you find the right street where you'll find at least a dozen shops all selling sunglasses!!! There is a fair smattering of restaurants and bars and a few more selling CDs and DVDs at around a dollar a time (about 50p!). I actually have to work quite hard though to find a decent bar with some fellow travellers in who are willing to spark up a conversation but when I do it's easy to lose all track of time ;-) There is also the charming "Hoan Kiem" lake which is nice to stroll around in the sunshine or stop for a coffee before deciding to venture further and seek out Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum (which was closed for the annual rennovation of his body!) and his old stilted living quarters within the palace complex that now stands.
While in Hanoi I sign up for a couple of local tours - the first going to Tam Coc. Tam Coc (like Hoi An, My Son, parts of Hue, and Halong Bay - more of later) is another UNESCO World Heritage site. Giant limestone karsts like those I had seen in Guilin and Yangshuo in China rise out of the land amongst the rice fields and river that flows through it. We are rowed through this by men and women on small boats and the scenery is fantastic passing through caves in the limestones rocks - much better than the River Li boat trip I did in Yangshuo.
My second tour is a few days in Halong Bay which like Tam Coc is littered by literally thousands of small limestone islands which in its emerald green bay setting provides a simply stunning sight. The boat leaves the quite manic harbour side of Halong City where the wooden vessels fight for a space to moor up. A few hours later and you're drifting among the limestone 'islets'. We have lunch aboard the boat and then stopoff at one of the larger islands to see some magnificent caves (with the usual stalagmites and stalactites) discovered nearly a 100 years ago. we return to our boat after stopping at a beach on another bigger island for some dinner of fresh seafood followed by a few beers. The bay at night is amazingly tranquil and after an early start to the day and the fresh sea air I'm soon ready for bed aboard the boat.
The next day we have the opportunity for some sea kyaking and I found this great fun paddling through the waters and under a narrow opening in the rocks to a totally secluded bay within the giant karsts. This is also provided a great place to jump off the kyak for a swim in the calmer waters. We returned to the main boat after a brief stop on a small sandy cove in the middle of nowhere. But even here a woman rowed across in her boat from only god knowswhere to sell us some pringles or fresh fruit. I paid her for some food - just for her efforts to make a living. We then transferred to Cat Ba island where I had hotel acommodation for 2 nights. I found good company with those on my tour but they were all leaving a day earlier than me. We had the opportunity to work up an appetite for another fantastic meal of seafood by taking a short trek through Cat Ba's national parkland which was quite hilly in places. The nightlife in Cat Ba was particularly good and I had no problems meeting other travellers for a "bia hoi' (freshly made beer) by the waterside or more regular bottle of Tiger beer in any of the bars. After a lazy day on the beach (and not much else) I returned the following day by boat to Halong City through the amazing scenery againand not before we were able to take another short swimming break. It was a fantastic few days.
I arrived back in Hanoi late afternoon, in time for a couple of beers in a different part of town (why oh why couldn't I have found this area beforehand?) and enough time to pack up my main backpack for an early morning flight to the next destination of my travels - Laos......
PS: I should probably explain all this "same same" jargon: Everywhere you go in Vietnam people nearly always explain things by comparing them with other things, so you constantly hear the phrase "Same, same..." or "Same, same - but different..." i.e. a guesthouse is "same, same" as a hotel, while having to sit on the backseat of a moto instead of the bus you thought you had paid for is "same, same - but different"!!! Consequently, the whole expression has become a big in-joke, with fellow travellers, and between travellers and the locals themselves. (Needless to say T-shirts are plentifully available sporting the phrase)
Just before leaving on my travels, I had a few people say to me "You must visit Laos" and virtually every traveller I've met enroute who has already been there has said the same. However, it's very hard to explain why Laos is a must-see destination.
Yes the scenery is absolutely stunning, but it is also in parts of North Vietnam and South China too. I think it has more to do with the fact it is only in the last 10 or 12 years that tourists have been allowed to visit this very sleepy country (that often gets bypassed in favour of Thailand or the Angkor ruins in Cambodia) and so is only just developing as a tourist destination.
I have found all the people of South East Asia amazingly friendly wherever I've been, but in Laos this seems even more the case. You cannot walk down the street without a local welcoming you with the phrase "Sabaydee" :-D All the kids smile and wave as you walk by or whizz past on a tuk-tuk, and they just seem so happy with life despite their own hardships....
To give you a little background info on Laos, it is the poorest country in SE Asia (alongside Burma) and nearly half of its GDP - national income - comes from foreign aid. It also has a very tragic recent history in that it was caught up heavily in the Vietnam War between 1964 and 1973. The North Vietnamese used the "Ho Chi Minh Trail" (which ran down the border of Vietnam & Laos) to move troops and supplies from Hanoi in the north to Saigon in the south, where they were mounting their guerilla attacks on the US led South Vietnamese. The Americans tried to break this trail with bombings in the so-called "Secret War". Despite Lao's supposed neutrillity in the Vietnam war it became a mere pawn in the whole sorry mess as the US were given permission (by the Laos government being kept in power with US help) for 'armed reconnaissance' flights over Laos. This effectively meant the US could bomb wherever it liked and in 9 years ran 580,944 bombing sorties (a planeload of bombs every 8 minutes around the clock) dropping over 2 million tons of bombs!!! This gives Laos the dubious honour of being the most heavily bombed country in the history of war. Parts of eastern Laos supposedly look like the moon with mile upon mile of bomb craters and unexploded bombs making life hard for people in this area even now. (*Having left Laos I should also now like to point out it has quite a bad human rights record under the Communist government, which the country really needs to address if it wants to encourage more people to visit it or to invest in it - I didn't feel like saying this when I was still actually there!)
Laos (pronounced 'la-oww' with no 's') is also known as the "Land of a Million Elephants" and a 3-headed elephant features heavily on Laos insignia. The Lao people also like drinking "Lao Lao" which is like a moonshine whiskey ('lao' seems to translate as alcohol ;-) although I prefer the only beer you seem to find in this country called - you guessed it - "Beerlao"!!!
Anyway, to get back on track, I flew into Vientiane the capital of Laos from Hanoi, and after hearing about the long, hard overland trip (over 24 hours) I'm glad I chose to fly. As far as capital cities go, I don't think I'll visit a quieter one for a long time. I met "Egil" a Norwegian guy on the same flight and after getting a visa for my stay in the country - 3rd communist country of my trip! - we shared a taxi into town and found a place to stay. It's quite nice to have some company when you're finding your way around a new town and country.
Vientiane has a strange charm, because it doesn't have lots of bars or restaurants from which to choose and everything closes around 11pm - so it's not that different from the UK in this respect! However, I had a great dinner in a makeshift cafe of barbecued ribs & sticky rice sitting alongside the Mekong river watching a stunning sunset and getting severly bitten by the mosquitoes!!! There aren't a great many sights in Vientiane, but I visit the "Patouxai" (Arch of Victory) which is basically a concrete Arc de Triomphe built with concrete donated by the US for construction of an airport! I also glimpse the Presidential Palace through the gates and Wat Sisaket which is the only monastry to survive the city's sacking by the Siamese (Thai's) in the early 1800's. Next day I visit "Xiang Khouan" or Buddah Park as it's known to see the strange collection of Buddah statues - again built in concrete. Before leaving the city I also stop by "That Louang" which is a gold Buddhist Stupa that is Laos's most important religious building (appearing on nearly all their banknotes or 'kip' as they are called).
On the minibus from Vientiane to Vang Vieng I meet up again by chance with some Canadian guys that I found myself drinking with back on Cat Ba island in Halong Bay, Vietnam. It was also on this bus that I met an English couple Louise and Stuart (currently working in Laos) and travelling with another friend. In talking about whereabouts we came from and what we did for a living we stumbled upon the fact we all knew Dean at Aitch Creative - it really is a small world sometimes. The bus ride went much quicker too thanks to the inane and quite hilarious chatter of the Canadians ;-)
Vang Vieng is definitely a fun town. To look at the actual town it's not much at all, and first impressions really suck - the bus drops you off at an old disused airstrip and you wander down to the T-junction of what appears to be half constructed streets. The restaurants/bars in town I found quite depressing as they basically revolve around people slumped in bed/chairs with a table watching endless reruns of "Friends" or other TV programmes. There's little bar areas from which to strike up a conversation with others as people sit glued to the TV - very anti-social. :-/
Happily on day two in town I find a great guesthouse to stay in (overlooking the river) and things get much, much better. The town itself maybe tacky but it sits amongst the most beautiful scenery. Once again, giant limestone karsts (mini-mountains) rise up beside the Nam Xong river giving a simply glorious view as you look from the town side of the river and affords yet more wonderful sunset images.
I arrange to go "tubing" with Johnny and Shaun (the Canadians) and have a fantastic time. Tubing is a glorified daytime pubcrawl where you float down the river on giant inflated inner-tubes. For a liitle less than 2 quid you are given your tube and a tuk-tuk drives you 4 or 5km upstream of the river. You then plonk yourself astride your tube and gracefully(!?) float down the river until you see a riverside 'bamboo bar' you like the look of. They invariably play loud music, sell large (650ml) bottles of Beerlao with free Lao Lao if you want it, and offer you the chance to have a jump in the river by way of a giant swing they've erected using ladders and platforms constructed by bamboo and adjacent trees. If you find yourself floating by too fast or far from the riverbank the bar owners will helpfully stick out a bamboo pole for you to grab hold of. (Unfortunately I have no photographs of all this as I wasn't stupid enough to take my camera on a river-based pubcrawl - so you'll have to make do with my description!). After the last proper bar on the river (almost a dozen stops) I was properly wasted and rather unsurprisingly passed out in my tube for the final 1.5km stretch to the finishing point ;-) I know I probably could have drowned but I wasn't alone in doing this!!! However, there always seems someone on hand to help you - normally someone who did the same thing themselves the day before. I hit my bed around 6 or 7pm that night, but I was still up for going again the following day although I took things much easier :-) To coin a phrase: "Carlsberg don't do pubcrawls (Beerlao however do), but if they did this would probably be the best pubcrawl in the world!"
After two days of tubing I needed to do something different, so arrange to go on a kayaking and caving tour. We go much further upstream and kayak through similar waters to the tubing with the occasional (minor) rapid. Having kayaked in Halong Bay barely a week before, I find this quite easy. What is hard though, is resisting the urge to just stop paddling and admire the scenery around you. The caving is a little more tricky as it involves a short trek and then steep climb to the large cave in the mountainside above. Water still flows through this and another cave we visit in the afternoon and on both occassions we wander (and wade) deep through the limestone with only a couple of torches and some candles to guide us. There are a few alternate paths, often climbing up banks and rocks within the dark caves but our guides point us the right way and we end up emerging at a different point before descending back down the karst.
Fed up with the 'bars' in the main street (which close before midnight anyway), the best place to head is 'bamboo island' which is pretty close to the strip of guesthouses where i'm staying. Here the music keeps going and the Beerlao keeps flowing around campfires until the small hours and it's a lot more social. Alas you can't burn the candle at both ends so I don't end up staying til the end.
On my last day in Vang Vieng before I have to push myself on to the next destination I go to the so-called 'blue lagoon' which in reality is a small brook of water, complete with obligatory tree and swings to jump into the bright emerald water, with a small grassy field to laze about with drinks or food (available at the small bar/kiosk). It's all very civilised and the tuk-tuk drivers are more than happy to take out 8 or more people at a time (10,000 kip there and then another 10,000 kip back for each person - so no wonder!) if you don't fancy mopeding it, which I didn't.
I'm up early for my next minibus trip to Luang Prabang - the old Royal city and my last destination in Laos. I'd loved to have seen the mysterious "Plain of Jars" but it's just too far out of the way for me to get to (on very uncomfortable roads) and my 15 day visa is close to running out. Only after arriving here do I learn that the "Route 13" road had a pretty fearsome reputation a few years ago for banditry and some tourists were killed on it. My own experience was of more stunning mountain scenery with the occasional small roadside village and the usual smiling and waving kids.
Luang Prabang has much in common with Hoi An in Vietnam. It's yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site and I find it's a charming city/town on the banks of the Mekong river with very atmospheric streets and French colonial style buildings all complete with wooden shutter doors. Like Hoi An, there's little in the way of bars for travellers to meet but there's a long row of French style cafes/bakeries to eat or meet - until I find a couple of livelier places around the other side of the old town.
Luang Prabang is the spiritual home of Laos. Its name is taken from the Pra Bang, which is Laos's holiest Buddah image and is kept within the old Royal Palace - now a museum after the communist government deposed the monarchy. It's one of the better palaces/museums I've visited since the Grand Palace in Bangkok and allows you to see very close up the throne, the living quarters and personal effects of the old king(s).
Not quite 'templed out' and trying to balance the culture with having a good time drinking and doing more adventurous activities I do the rounds of the more important Wat's (Buddhist monastries), including "Wat Xiang Thong" that is considered the most historic in Laos. Before sunset I climb the 400 odd steps of Mount "Phou Si" (or Sacred Hill) again passing more Wat's and monks quarters to see the golden Stupa that tops the hill. This Stupa can be seen from all around Luang Prabang (it's also lit up at night) and therefore gives great views of the old city when you reach the top and even better views of the sunset.
I'm up very early the next morning to catch the famous sight of the monks walking in procession to collect 'alms' (or small gifts of food). After this I have a full day lined up of mountain-biking to an 'Elephant Project Park' (caring for abandoned elephants) and a side trip to see the "Kouang Si" waterfalls. It's a great day, spent with a guide and a 3 young Americans (who are all working for a health organisation in Vietnam), despite the quite tiring bike ride through some fairly tough rocky roads! The tour company has a lodge close to its own elephant park and I feel they are actually helping the elephants and not just using them for profit. Before the actual elephant ride we go to the waterfall which literally runs through the trees and down the hillside again making for a beautiful sight. Even better there's an opportunity for a swim in the fairly shallow and bright clear waters with the small series of waterfalls cascading around you. It was with great reluctance I left the fairly cold waters, but we were then treated to a fantastic one and a half hour elephant ride through the parkland. Our elephant seemed to make slow progress but given a bit of encouragement from the handler she soon got into a bit of a gallop that really had you holding on! We watched them being fed bananas, gave them a good pat on the forehead and then cycled back to LP. I was knackered and had a coule of hours 'siesta' before heading out to the 'hive bar' for a well-earned beer. :-D
Heading on to Chiang Mai in Thailand the next day, it is with great disappointment that I have to leave this country....
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