Spent 2 nights in Mui Ne.. not really much to do other than kite surf (if you're into that sort of thing.. was way too expensive for us to give it a go at this stage in our trip).. although there are some really cool sand dunes nearby.. the place looks like a mini Sahara desert! Photos to come soon.
Today we've completed our grand circuit and have made it back to Saigon! Would have loved to have had twice the time to do it, but we've done pretty well with the time we've had, I think! Tomorrow morning we fly over to Bangkok, and then the following day down to Phuket where we commence the final stage of our trip: lying on a beautiful beach and doing as close to nothing as possible. Have started to try and come to terms with the fact that we'll be home soon.. but trying not to think about it toooo much as it makes us sad... except for the fact that going back to Australia means seeing friends and relatives, of course ;)
Amiee xx
Showing posts with label Vietnam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Vietnam. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Hue, Hoi An, Nha Trang!
Just realised it's been about a week since my last post so I thought I should probably update!
After Hanoi, we arrived in Hue via a sleeper train and spent a night there. Hue was the imperial capital of Vietnam at one point, so we spent the morning visiting some of the monuments, mainly the Citadel. The architecture is a lot more 'oriental' here. We found the Citadel a bit underwhelming; most of it had been demolished, demolished and rebuilt at some point in history, or was currently being rebuilt. Inside the Citadel was a forbidden city where the Emperor spent his personal life (and which housed the Emperors' concubines; consequently only male servants who were eunuchs were allowed to enter - which we found amusing). We thought the Emperor's Reading Room was nice, but we were disappointed to find that you couldn't actually enter the building. We snuck a peak inside and saw a few shoes, clothing etc.. it looked like one of the employees were living there!
Next we took a fairly short bus ride (only about 4 hours) to Hoi An. Most beautiful town we've visited so far.. AND home to hundreds of tailors and cobblers! AND a gooorgeous quiet beach. Perfection! The lovely old buildings around Hoi An have been beautifully preserved and refurbished and it just creates such a great atmosphere. The streets were decorated with colourful paper lanterns ready for the Tet (New Year) celebrations, and there are countless little restaurants and bars overlooking the river. Ah I just can't describe well enough how amazing it is! On the first day I went a bit crazy with getting clothes and shoes made (Steve was off exploring Hoi An by bike hehe).. but hey, it would cost at least 3x the price in Aus AND everything fits perfectly (except for 1 pair of shoes but that's a long story!). We took the lovely 4km bike ride to the beach, which is a gorgeous wide stretch of sand with hundreds of palm trees and enjoyed a fresh coconut.. ahhh the sererenity :) I love palm trees. We were sad to leave Hoi An but we were running out of time and had to get back on the road.
After a rather (thankfully) uneventful sleeper bus journey (on which we actually got some sleep!!!) we arrived early yesterday morning in Nha Trang, a the beach city of Vietnam. We spent the morning catching up on some sleep (even though we slept on the bus, the many times we woke up during the night tends to reduce the quality of the sleep!), and then did some sight-seeing. The highlight of our stay here is definitely our visit to the Thap Ba Hot Springs; we had so much fun there! For $5 each we went through a huge process of various treatments. First, a hot mineral spring shower before soaking in a mineral mud path for several minutes. We both agree that the mud bath was definitely the most fun.. and you could float on the mud so easily! Next we had to lie in the sun for a few minutes (for all the muddy goodness to absorb into our skin??) before taking another hot mineral spring shower to rinse off. We then had some hot spring 'hydrotherapy' which involved walking through a 'hallway' of high pressure water jets. Not sure what that was supposed to accomplish really. Then we got into a hot mineral spring water bath.. it was so hot we felt like lobsters. After we couldn't stand the heat any longer, we had a shower under the mini waterfall. I could see a group of Asian men watching us and giggling amongst themselves. Steve jumped into the hot spring pool while I spent a bit longer in the waterfall, at which point I was approached by one of the giggling Asian men (the spokesman??).
Spokesman: "Your boyfriend is very handsome!"
Me: "Uh.. yes he is.. you like him??"
Spokesman: "We all like him!"
Looks like I've got some competition here! Steve couldn't work out why I was giggling so much when I joined him in the pool! Hehe.
Today we visited an amusement park called Vinpearl Land on an island off-shore. They've built 'Vinpearl' in giant white letters on the top of the island (Hollywood-style) that can be seen clearly from the mainland. Very subtle. The cable-car ride over to the island was very scenic.. it's supposedly the longest cross-sea cable-car? We got to Vinpearl Land at about 11am and practically had the place to ourselves! We spent the first hour-ish in the Indoor Games area.. a giant arcade where all the games were free! There were some super-ridiculous arcade games! There was one that was a racing game, but instead of pressing buttons like normal.. you had to scream into a microphone to make your player accelerate.. although I found that hysterical laughter works just as well as yelling! We rode fake horses, threw coloured balls at a game-screen (it was part of the game!), went on a '4D' virtual rollercoaster ride, and got zapped by dodgy pistols in a shooter-game. Having developed square eyes, we took a stroll down to the water park section. It looked just like an Australian water-park.. except there is no way in hell that some of the slides would be approved in Australia! Most of the slides that you went on without tubes acted a bit like a grater, taking skin off your back! And a lot of the slides dumped you into a kiddy pool at the end, rather than one that is actually deep enough! My favourite was a slide called the 'Tsunami' in which you were dumped (in a double tube) into a half pipe (so steep that we actually 'got air' at a point!) and then slid up and down the sides until you lost momentum and were dumped (literally) into a kiddy pool... except we didn't lose momentum quite as quickly as we were supposed to (thanks to Steve pushing us off the sides!) and we slammed into the side, narrowly avoiding concussion. I think the fear of death definitely added to the thrill of the rides... because although part of you knows that the rides are fine.. another part says.. "well.. this is Asia....... what if...".
Unfortunately we have to leave tomorrow morning to spend a couple of nights in Mui Ne. This whole 'limited time' thing sucks. We're definitely coming back! Seriously.
Goodnight!!
Amiee x
After Hanoi, we arrived in Hue via a sleeper train and spent a night there. Hue was the imperial capital of Vietnam at one point, so we spent the morning visiting some of the monuments, mainly the Citadel. The architecture is a lot more 'oriental' here. We found the Citadel a bit underwhelming; most of it had been demolished, demolished and rebuilt at some point in history, or was currently being rebuilt. Inside the Citadel was a forbidden city where the Emperor spent his personal life (and which housed the Emperors' concubines; consequently only male servants who were eunuchs were allowed to enter - which we found amusing). We thought the Emperor's Reading Room was nice, but we were disappointed to find that you couldn't actually enter the building. We snuck a peak inside and saw a few shoes, clothing etc.. it looked like one of the employees were living there!
Next we took a fairly short bus ride (only about 4 hours) to Hoi An. Most beautiful town we've visited so far.. AND home to hundreds of tailors and cobblers! AND a gooorgeous quiet beach. Perfection! The lovely old buildings around Hoi An have been beautifully preserved and refurbished and it just creates such a great atmosphere. The streets were decorated with colourful paper lanterns ready for the Tet (New Year) celebrations, and there are countless little restaurants and bars overlooking the river. Ah I just can't describe well enough how amazing it is! On the first day I went a bit crazy with getting clothes and shoes made (Steve was off exploring Hoi An by bike hehe).. but hey, it would cost at least 3x the price in Aus AND everything fits perfectly (except for 1 pair of shoes but that's a long story!). We took the lovely 4km bike ride to the beach, which is a gorgeous wide stretch of sand with hundreds of palm trees and enjoyed a fresh coconut.. ahhh the sererenity :) I love palm trees. We were sad to leave Hoi An but we were running out of time and had to get back on the road.
After a rather (thankfully) uneventful sleeper bus journey (on which we actually got some sleep!!!) we arrived early yesterday morning in Nha Trang, a the beach city of Vietnam. We spent the morning catching up on some sleep (even though we slept on the bus, the many times we woke up during the night tends to reduce the quality of the sleep!), and then did some sight-seeing. The highlight of our stay here is definitely our visit to the Thap Ba Hot Springs; we had so much fun there! For $5 each we went through a huge process of various treatments. First, a hot mineral spring shower before soaking in a mineral mud path for several minutes. We both agree that the mud bath was definitely the most fun.. and you could float on the mud so easily! Next we had to lie in the sun for a few minutes (for all the muddy goodness to absorb into our skin??) before taking another hot mineral spring shower to rinse off. We then had some hot spring 'hydrotherapy' which involved walking through a 'hallway' of high pressure water jets. Not sure what that was supposed to accomplish really. Then we got into a hot mineral spring water bath.. it was so hot we felt like lobsters. After we couldn't stand the heat any longer, we had a shower under the mini waterfall. I could see a group of Asian men watching us and giggling amongst themselves. Steve jumped into the hot spring pool while I spent a bit longer in the waterfall, at which point I was approached by one of the giggling Asian men (the spokesman??).
Spokesman: "Your boyfriend is very handsome!"
Me: "Uh.. yes he is.. you like him??"
Spokesman: "We all like him!"
Looks like I've got some competition here! Steve couldn't work out why I was giggling so much when I joined him in the pool! Hehe.
Today we visited an amusement park called Vinpearl Land on an island off-shore. They've built 'Vinpearl' in giant white letters on the top of the island (Hollywood-style) that can be seen clearly from the mainland. Very subtle. The cable-car ride over to the island was very scenic.. it's supposedly the longest cross-sea cable-car? We got to Vinpearl Land at about 11am and practically had the place to ourselves! We spent the first hour-ish in the Indoor Games area.. a giant arcade where all the games were free! There were some super-ridiculous arcade games! There was one that was a racing game, but instead of pressing buttons like normal.. you had to scream into a microphone to make your player accelerate.. although I found that hysterical laughter works just as well as yelling! We rode fake horses, threw coloured balls at a game-screen (it was part of the game!), went on a '4D' virtual rollercoaster ride, and got zapped by dodgy pistols in a shooter-game. Having developed square eyes, we took a stroll down to the water park section. It looked just like an Australian water-park.. except there is no way in hell that some of the slides would be approved in Australia! Most of the slides that you went on without tubes acted a bit like a grater, taking skin off your back! And a lot of the slides dumped you into a kiddy pool at the end, rather than one that is actually deep enough! My favourite was a slide called the 'Tsunami' in which you were dumped (in a double tube) into a half pipe (so steep that we actually 'got air' at a point!) and then slid up and down the sides until you lost momentum and were dumped (literally) into a kiddy pool... except we didn't lose momentum quite as quickly as we were supposed to (thanks to Steve pushing us off the sides!) and we slammed into the side, narrowly avoiding concussion. I think the fear of death definitely added to the thrill of the rides... because although part of you knows that the rides are fine.. another part says.. "well.. this is Asia....... what if...".
Unfortunately we have to leave tomorrow morning to spend a couple of nights in Mui Ne. This whole 'limited time' thing sucks. We're definitely coming back! Seriously.
Goodnight!!
Amiee x
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Halong Bay
We got back to Hanoi yesterday after visiting Halong Bay for 2 nights. Halong Bay itself was very beautiful even though the weather wasn't perfect for it. It was the first time on the trip we've actually done part of an organised tour and we struggled a bit getting told what to do and how long to do it for! Our buddy Stu came with us for the last few days of his trip before flying home to Manchester yesterday :(
On the first day of our Halong Bay trip we got picked up by the cruise company in a mini-bus and taken to our junk boat. We were a bit shocked to find that the 3 of us were the only Westerners on the boat with us; we had a Vietnamese couple who didn't speak English and a father and son from Malaysia who were lovely. We cruised around the islands a bit, before arriving at 'Surprise Cave'. It's called 'Surprise Cave' because of the bits of stalagtite/stalagmite formations that supposedly look like various things like a penguin, a turtle, buddha, a Vietnamese King, Romeo & Juliet, a lion...... to me it just looked like a cave but I could see the resemblence in some of them if I squinted a bit? The biggest surprise of all was the penis shaped formation.. which would look less like a penis and more like someone pointing their finger at something, had it not been suggestively illuminated with pink light. After all the excitement of Surprise Cave we went kayaking around for a while, stopping/beaching ourselves at Bonau cave and having a look around and then continuing to aimlessly paddle around the islands.
The night-time activities on the boat involved the crew singing karaoke (loudly), so the 3 of us decided to opt for a game of cards in our room.
The second day we were taken to Cat Ba island (the biggest in Halong Bay and the 2nd biggest island in Vietnam) for some hiking. I was thanking God I'd decided to wear proper shoes rather than flip-flops after slipping and climbing up very steep and slippery muddy paths and over and around rocks. The hike took us to the top of one of the island's peaks where there was a 30m viewing tower. The tower (which we fondly nicknamed the 'Tower of Tetanus') was completely rusted and despite the sign at the bottom stating 'Max. 5 people', the guy in charge was letting 10 or more people up at a time. After our brush with death, we were surprised to find that we had to slide back down the way we came, past people that were still trying to clamber up. Very safe! :)
We were then taken to Cat Ba town for lunch and a bit of a stroll, and then back to the harbour to be picked up and taken back to our boat. While we were waiting at the harbour I was put to work by one of the local hawker ladies and carried around her snacks for her, hassling my fellow tourists. She was schooling me in what to say and everything.. very entertaining, and a great way to pass time! It was nice to find a hawker with an actual sense of humour! I ended up making 40,000d (about $2) in sales for her ;)
When we got back to the boat we had new company (the others decided to stay on Cat Ba for the night), a group of Thai women. They had had a bit of a bad run so far; they only got to kayak for 30minutes, and were even more pissed off when the boat crew commandeered the only sofa-booth on the boat and refused to let them sit there to play cards, even when asked politely! So we all decided to keep away from the rude boat crew and play cards on our back balcony. Steve got sick twice on the boat from the food, and they tried to make me pay US$3.50 for breaking a glass!! Left a bit of a sour taste in our mouths (literally for Steve.. haha) but we enjoyed Halong Bay itself.
We're leaving Hanoi on a sleeper train tonight for the old capital of Hue. The staff at the hotel here have been so absolutely amazing.. the best service I have ever encountered! They come and sit and talk with us while we wait for our complementary breakfast to be cooked, they let us leave our luggage here while we were in Halong Bay, they booked our train for us and let us check out late at 5pm, and soon they are going to come with us to the train station to show us where we need to be so we don't get confused by all the people grabbing us! I highly recommend this hotel to anyone visiting Hanoi.. it's called the "Hanoi Boutique Hotel" on Bat Su Street. Amazing.
Amiee x
On the first day of our Halong Bay trip we got picked up by the cruise company in a mini-bus and taken to our junk boat. We were a bit shocked to find that the 3 of us were the only Westerners on the boat with us; we had a Vietnamese couple who didn't speak English and a father and son from Malaysia who were lovely. We cruised around the islands a bit, before arriving at 'Surprise Cave'. It's called 'Surprise Cave' because of the bits of stalagtite/stalagmite formations that supposedly look like various things like a penguin, a turtle, buddha, a Vietnamese King, Romeo & Juliet, a lion...... to me it just looked like a cave but I could see the resemblence in some of them if I squinted a bit? The biggest surprise of all was the penis shaped formation.. which would look less like a penis and more like someone pointing their finger at something, had it not been suggestively illuminated with pink light. After all the excitement of Surprise Cave we went kayaking around for a while, stopping/beaching ourselves at Bonau cave and having a look around and then continuing to aimlessly paddle around the islands.
The night-time activities on the boat involved the crew singing karaoke (loudly), so the 3 of us decided to opt for a game of cards in our room.
The second day we were taken to Cat Ba island (the biggest in Halong Bay and the 2nd biggest island in Vietnam) for some hiking. I was thanking God I'd decided to wear proper shoes rather than flip-flops after slipping and climbing up very steep and slippery muddy paths and over and around rocks. The hike took us to the top of one of the island's peaks where there was a 30m viewing tower. The tower (which we fondly nicknamed the 'Tower of Tetanus') was completely rusted and despite the sign at the bottom stating 'Max. 5 people', the guy in charge was letting 10 or more people up at a time. After our brush with death, we were surprised to find that we had to slide back down the way we came, past people that were still trying to clamber up. Very safe! :)
We were then taken to Cat Ba town for lunch and a bit of a stroll, and then back to the harbour to be picked up and taken back to our boat. While we were waiting at the harbour I was put to work by one of the local hawker ladies and carried around her snacks for her, hassling my fellow tourists. She was schooling me in what to say and everything.. very entertaining, and a great way to pass time! It was nice to find a hawker with an actual sense of humour! I ended up making 40,000d (about $2) in sales for her ;)
When we got back to the boat we had new company (the others decided to stay on Cat Ba for the night), a group of Thai women. They had had a bit of a bad run so far; they only got to kayak for 30minutes, and were even more pissed off when the boat crew commandeered the only sofa-booth on the boat and refused to let them sit there to play cards, even when asked politely! So we all decided to keep away from the rude boat crew and play cards on our back balcony. Steve got sick twice on the boat from the food, and they tried to make me pay US$3.50 for breaking a glass!! Left a bit of a sour taste in our mouths (literally for Steve.. haha) but we enjoyed Halong Bay itself.
We're leaving Hanoi on a sleeper train tonight for the old capital of Hue. The staff at the hotel here have been so absolutely amazing.. the best service I have ever encountered! They come and sit and talk with us while we wait for our complementary breakfast to be cooked, they let us leave our luggage here while we were in Halong Bay, they booked our train for us and let us check out late at 5pm, and soon they are going to come with us to the train station to show us where we need to be so we don't get confused by all the people grabbing us! I highly recommend this hotel to anyone visiting Hanoi.. it's called the "Hanoi Boutique Hotel" on Bat Su Street. Amazing.
Amiee x
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Back in 'Nam...
We spent the last 2 nights in Luang Prabang, Laos. The bus ride from Vang Vieng was very scenic and quite enjoyable, even though it took about 7 hours to travel 230km. The jagged mountain ranges in the North of Laos are just so beautiful. We were lucky enough to meet up again with our dearest travel buddies in Luang Prabang, which made the place even more fun. There is an amazing bar on the riverfront called Utopia, and, unlike other 'Utopia' bars we've been to on this trip (there seems to be one in every town..) it wasn't seedy at all! Darts, foolsball (spelling?), beach volleyball, giant Jenga.. all under a giant thatched gazebo with landscaped tropical garden. You can probably tell that I'm in love with the place! Megan and I were talking to the manager the day before Aus Day and convinced him to have a big Australia day party and put up flyers around the town, which he did! Smart man.
On Australia Day, Steve & I + our dearest Melbournite travel buddies, Megan & Lewis, plus Stu from Manchester, our token English buddy who we trained to say "I'm from Sydney" in an Australian accent for the day, all met up for breakfast and then headed out to Kouang Si Waterfalls. THE MOST amazing waterfalls I've been to! They were so gorgeous! There was the main huge waterfall, and then many tiers of small waterfalls spilling into turquoise swimming pools. The place looked like a landscaped very-flash tropical resort's swimming pool. PLUS to top it off.. there was a rescue centre for Asiatic Black Bears there, so we got to have a look at them too. Afterwards, we all met up for for drinks and nibblies in the courtyard of our hotel, and then went to Utopia. The manager let Megan and I 'DJ' for the night + we got a couple of free drinks, because the whole Aus Day party had been our idea! Unfortunately there is a Laos-wide 12AM curfew so Utopia shut, but we found a bowling alley on the outskirts of town that stayed open until 3AM... so that's where we finished off the night! An amazing Australia Day, even if we are in Laos!
We all woke very tired this morning, met for breakfast, and said our goodbyes to Megan & Lewis. We were all a little heartbroken. We do get to keep our token Englishman, Stu, for a bit longer though, as he flew with us to Hanoi in Vietnam this afternoon, where we are currently. We decided to pay the extra and get a flight to Hanoi rather than taking the 3-day bus trip, as we are quickly running out of time! Our plane was tiny and even had propellors, but the view was absolutely gorgeous, and despite it only being a 1-hour flight, they fed us! :D
We'd heard a lot of stories from people about Hanoi being a bit unfriendly and full of scams, and within an hour of arriving we'd already found that to be true. The airport is waaaaaay out of town, so you have to get the bus or share a taxi. As there were 3 of us, we decided just to share a taxi. We agreed with the 'taxi pimp' (the guy who organises the taxi fare, and then takes us to the taxi) that we would pay a total of 250,000d between the 3 of us, but when we got into town, the taxi driver demanded another 20,000d. As he didn't speak a word of English, we couldn't establish what the hell the extra fee was supposed to be for, but despite our protesting, we were made to pay it anyway. On top of that, he didn't take us to the hotel we had asked to be taken to (which had been recommended by Meg&Lew), but another hotel in a parallel street. The hotel guy then tried to tell us that his hotel was in fact the hotel we had wanted to go to, despite being on the wrong street, and having a completely different name. When we pointed this out, he tried to tell us that it was owned by the same people, which is a load of crap, so we made the taxi driver take us where we had originally intended. Sheesh.
The recommended hotel was full, but we found another really nice one with amazing customer service. Our hotel guy spent ages with us helping us go through the different companies that offer boat tours around Halong Bay and then booked it for us (he used to be a tour guide apparently), + he gave us a free drink each, free breakfast in the morning, and is making sure that they have a room available for us when we get back from Halong Bay. Oh and we get to keep our increasingly heavy luggage here, and just pack a backpack with a couple of changes of clothes. He also recommended a Vietnamese restaurant for us, which was AMAZING. Mmmmmm! Cost us about $13 between the 3 of us. Such good value.
Anyway, very tired now so I'm going to bed; just thought I should do a bit of an update before we leave tomorrow. We'll be in Halong Bay on a 'junk' boat for the next 2 days doing kayaking, caving, hiking etc etc. It's going to be amazing! :D
Amiee x
On Australia Day, Steve & I + our dearest Melbournite travel buddies, Megan & Lewis, plus Stu from Manchester, our token English buddy who we trained to say "I'm from Sydney" in an Australian accent for the day, all met up for breakfast and then headed out to Kouang Si Waterfalls. THE MOST amazing waterfalls I've been to! They were so gorgeous! There was the main huge waterfall, and then many tiers of small waterfalls spilling into turquoise swimming pools. The place looked like a landscaped very-flash tropical resort's swimming pool. PLUS to top it off.. there was a rescue centre for Asiatic Black Bears there, so we got to have a look at them too. Afterwards, we all met up for for drinks and nibblies in the courtyard of our hotel, and then went to Utopia. The manager let Megan and I 'DJ' for the night + we got a couple of free drinks, because the whole Aus Day party had been our idea! Unfortunately there is a Laos-wide 12AM curfew so Utopia shut, but we found a bowling alley on the outskirts of town that stayed open until 3AM... so that's where we finished off the night! An amazing Australia Day, even if we are in Laos!
We all woke very tired this morning, met for breakfast, and said our goodbyes to Megan & Lewis. We were all a little heartbroken. We do get to keep our token Englishman, Stu, for a bit longer though, as he flew with us to Hanoi in Vietnam this afternoon, where we are currently. We decided to pay the extra and get a flight to Hanoi rather than taking the 3-day bus trip, as we are quickly running out of time! Our plane was tiny and even had propellors, but the view was absolutely gorgeous, and despite it only being a 1-hour flight, they fed us! :D
We'd heard a lot of stories from people about Hanoi being a bit unfriendly and full of scams, and within an hour of arriving we'd already found that to be true. The airport is waaaaaay out of town, so you have to get the bus or share a taxi. As there were 3 of us, we decided just to share a taxi. We agreed with the 'taxi pimp' (the guy who organises the taxi fare, and then takes us to the taxi) that we would pay a total of 250,000d between the 3 of us, but when we got into town, the taxi driver demanded another 20,000d. As he didn't speak a word of English, we couldn't establish what the hell the extra fee was supposed to be for, but despite our protesting, we were made to pay it anyway. On top of that, he didn't take us to the hotel we had asked to be taken to (which had been recommended by Meg&Lew), but another hotel in a parallel street. The hotel guy then tried to tell us that his hotel was in fact the hotel we had wanted to go to, despite being on the wrong street, and having a completely different name. When we pointed this out, he tried to tell us that it was owned by the same people, which is a load of crap, so we made the taxi driver take us where we had originally intended. Sheesh.
The recommended hotel was full, but we found another really nice one with amazing customer service. Our hotel guy spent ages with us helping us go through the different companies that offer boat tours around Halong Bay and then booked it for us (he used to be a tour guide apparently), + he gave us a free drink each, free breakfast in the morning, and is making sure that they have a room available for us when we get back from Halong Bay. Oh and we get to keep our increasingly heavy luggage here, and just pack a backpack with a couple of changes of clothes. He also recommended a Vietnamese restaurant for us, which was AMAZING. Mmmmmm! Cost us about $13 between the 3 of us. Such good value.
Anyway, very tired now so I'm going to bed; just thought I should do a bit of an update before we leave tomorrow. We'll be in Halong Bay on a 'junk' boat for the next 2 days doing kayaking, caving, hiking etc etc. It's going to be amazing! :D
Amiee x
Monday, December 21, 2009
Ho Chi Minh City!
FINALLY up to date with my blogging thanks to free internet at our hotel! Steve has had a bit of a bug so I've been blogging away while he sleeps it off.We are currently in Ho Chi Minh City and absolutely loving it. The people are so friendly, everything is so so cheap. Last night we found a Mexican place (that also did Italian, Vietnamese, +anything else really) and I got the Spag Bol I'd been craving!! Steve had BBQ pork ribs, and we shared 3 cocktails.. all for a grand total of $16AUD.
The traffic is even crazier than KL. Thousands upon thousands of motorbikes, and everyone uses a horn as a substitute for an indicator! We both went to the Blind Institute and had hour long massages for about $3AUD yesterday, which were OK..
Meeting up with the brother of our friend, Ka, this afternoon and he'll show us around the city a bit. Tomorrow we'll take a bus across the border into Cambodia! (Of course, we'll be back in Vietnam later for a proper exploration).
Photo taken on the rooftop of our hotel in Ho Chi Minh City!Amiee x
Friday, December 11, 2009
International Calling
I've bought a prepaid sim card from the local travel agent that will work overseas (fingers crossed).
The sim is run through BackChat Mobile.
Below are the rates for each country, per minute, so you can understand if we don't talk for very long...
Singapore
Malaysia
Vietnam
Cambodia
Laos
Unavailable (using Steve's mobile here)
Thailand
The sim is run through BackChat Mobile.
Below are the rates for each country, per minute, so you can understand if we don't talk for very long...
Singapore
| Cost to Call Landline: | $0.99 | ||
| Cost to Call Mobile: | $1.37 | ||
| Cost to Receive: | $0.79 | ||
| Cost to Send SMS: | $0.75 | ||
Malaysia
| Cost to Call Landline: | $1.49 | ||
| Cost to Call Mobile: | $1.87 | ||
| Cost to Receive: | $0.75 | ||
| Cost to Send SMS: | $0.99 | ||
Vietnam
| Cost to Call Landline: | $1.49 | ||
| Cost to Call Mobile: | $1.87 | ||
| Cost to Receive: | Free | ||
| Cost to Send SMS: | $0.99 | ||
Cambodia
| Cost to Call Landline: | $1.49 | ||
| Cost to Call Mobile: | $1.87 | ||
| Cost to Receive: | $0.87 | ||
| Cost to Send SMS: | $0.99 | ||
Laos
Unavailable (using Steve's mobile here)
Thailand
| Cost to Call Landline: | $1.99 | ||
| Cost to Call Mobile: | $2.37 | ||
| Cost to Receive: | $1.52 | ||
| Cost to Send SMS: | $0.99 | ||
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Slightly more detailed itinerary...
Dec 14: fly BNE -> Singapore, O/night train to KL, Malaysia
Dec 15 - 18: KL, Malaysia
Dec 18: O/night train to Singapore
Dec 19: Singapore
Dec 20: fly Singapore -> Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
Dec 21&22: Vietnam/Ho Chi Minh area
Dec 23 - Jan 12: Cambodia
Jan 13 - Jan 26: Laos
Jan 27 - Feb 7: Vietnam
Feb 7: fly Ho Chi Minh -> Bangkok
Feb 7 - 15: Thailand
Feb 15/16: fly Phuket -> Singapore -> BNE
Dec 15 - 18: KL, Malaysia
Dec 18: O/night train to Singapore
Dec 19: Singapore
Dec 20: fly Singapore -> Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
Dec 21&22: Vietnam/Ho Chi Minh area
Dec 23 - Jan 12: Cambodia
Jan 13 - Jan 26: Laos
Jan 27 - Feb 7: Vietnam
Feb 7: fly Ho Chi Minh -> Bangkok
Feb 7 - 15: Thailand
Feb 15/16: fly Phuket -> Singapore -> BNE
Friday, November 27, 2009
FYI
This is a **very** rough guide to where we're heading in SE Asia, my scribbling is not at all accurate, but you get the idea.Starting in Ho Chi Minh City, heading clockwise around Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam before flying to Bangkok and down to Phuket for some R&R before we fly home again.
Prior to Ho Chi Minh City we'll have flown into Singapore, o/night trained up to Kuala Lumpur for a few days, back down to Singapore, and then have flown from Singapore to Ho Chi Minh City.
We're not having a set itinerary, but rather a rough idea of the places we'd like to see along the way so that we're not 'locked in' to staying places we might not necessarily enjoy, and so that we can spend longer in places that we do really enjoy! The only things set in stone are our flights from Brisbane -> Singapore, train from Singapore -> KL & back, flight from Singapore -> Ho Chi Minh City, the flight from Ho Chi Minh City -> Bangkok, and then from Phuket -> Singapore -> Home.
17 days to go!
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Vietnam Tourist Visas
Vietnam is the only country we're going to that requires you to have a visa before arrival, so we thought it was probably about time that we organised it.
We went to the Vietnamese Embassy website to check it out, but found that we had to ring them as well to find out the visa fees before we could post off our applications. Due to the way we arranged our trip, we need multiple-entry visas with at least a 2 month validity. After a couple of tries at ringing the Embassy, we got through using the 4th number they listed on the website. Turns out that we have to get 3 month visas, and they are going to cost $150 each! Eeeek!
Had we realised earlier, we probably would have planned our flights/itinerary differently, but it's a bit late for that. We're just putting it down to a learning experience! Getting some photos taken today for the visa and hopefully posting the applications off tomorrow.
We went to the Vietnamese Embassy website to check it out, but found that we had to ring them as well to find out the visa fees before we could post off our applications. Due to the way we arranged our trip, we need multiple-entry visas with at least a 2 month validity. After a couple of tries at ringing the Embassy, we got through using the 4th number they listed on the website. Turns out that we have to get 3 month visas, and they are going to cost $150 each! Eeeek!
Had we realised earlier, we probably would have planned our flights/itinerary differently, but it's a bit late for that. We're just putting it down to a learning experience! Getting some photos taken today for the visa and hopefully posting the applications off tomorrow.
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