We spotted a Cambodian cookery book at Siem Reap airport: ‘From Spiders To Water Lilies – Creative Cambodian Cooking’. I didn’t buy a copy, only because I’m not sure if I would be able to source any fat spiders or fresh water lilies for the ingredients ….. And then it was all over, a
They’re everywhere in Asia. In Thailand, Laos Cambodia and we’ve also seen plenty of them in Vietnam, Singapore and Hong Kong; sights and signs that make us chuckle, giggle, scratch our heads and even laugh out loud. It always adds to the joy of a journey, it always leaves a smile on our
When spending time at major sights around the world, the first day can seem like “Wow, amazing”. The second day is then “oh, this is quite interesting” and then the third can deteriorate into “Hmm, another lot of much the same” and then the whole experience can be dulled. So after having spent nearly
We had seen the Happy Painting Shop in Phnom Penh and Rodney had fallen in love with the brightness and happiness of the subjects. So when we wandered into the sister shop in Siem Reap, Rodney was ready to buy. The colourful pictures in our lounge have hung on the wall for 25 years
After nearly a month of travelling in Asia in a range of vehicles: bikes, taxis, tuk-tuks, an ancient Toyota Crown, metal open taxis, minibus, jumbos, buses, rót daang, and even an elephant, all in a variety of conditions and cleanliness (especially the elephant), it was then rather nice to be picked up and safely
The King Grand Boutique Hotel afforded us the tiniest, least ‘grand’ bedroom of this trip around Asia. I guess the operative word was ‘boutique’, not the word ‘grand’. The swimming pool in the lobby area and the swimming pool on the roof, were also, not grand at all, they were tiny; you couldn’t really
There we were sitting at a table outside a small restaurant in Phnom Penh, trying to have a conversation and waving away every street hawker who tried to peddle their wares. Even after all the times I’ve travelled in Asia, I still find it difficult to ignore, or say “no” to the constant stream
Wat Ounalom is the HQ of Buddhism in Cambodia. We expected big things, but discovered a muddle of buildings and temples spread over a whole block in Phnom Penh. The guidebook didn’t say much apart from the fact that there was an eyebrow hair, just one, belonging to Buddha, in one of the stupas.
Vientiane, the capitol of Laos……….. a curious place. The guide book said it was ‘languid to say the least’….? A friend told us that we really only needed to stay there for one night, but we had already booked for three. So we stayed for three nights and calmly looked for places of interest
The town of Luang Prabang, or at least the bits of the old town that we walked around, came as a pleasant surprise in Asia. There were real pavements, which made it easier to walk around and look at things, other than your feet. Constantly avoiding mud, puddles, lumps of concrete, drain holes, bits
The written sign next to the fruit bowl had the helpful words “Banana is for service”. Hmmm, we won’t go there…..? We were verbally informed that there were two toilets on board, one for men and one for women, but there was a complete lack of a signage to say which was which. Hence
In contrast to the previous day, an ancient Toyota Crown Royal saloon, circa 1970s, with red plush velvet seats and a driver who continually fidgeted for nearly two hours, turned up to take us to the Thai border. He dropped us off around 11am and we wandered through an archway, had our passports stamped
On Thursday a brand-new Hyundai eleven-seater minibus turned up on the hotel driveway, and it was all ours. Trouble is, it came with a young driver who thought he was in a Formula One Grand Prix race, all day. He certainly didn’t like having anyone in front of him, but he smiled constantly; though
The Chayadol Boutique Resort in Chiang Rai, or to be more accurate, on the outskirts of Chiang Rai, had signs in some of the very best of strangled English. In the ‘dinning room’ you could get ‘all day refreshment and snacked’. It even had rooms that were ‘air conditional’; not sure on what? Our
After being bedridden for a couple of days, I woke up feeling a bit better today, but not really tough enough to do a full-day tour to numerous places around Chiang Mai. So we decided to grab a rough red metal ‘taxi’ to take us out to just a few places that interested us.
Rodney was up at 6:15am and therefore, so was I. He was picked up at 7am for a much-anticipated trek into the hills of Northern Thailand. Being a card-carrying, non-rucksack carrying wimp, I passed on the experience, but I had my own agenda plotted for the day. After a slow, quiet breakfast I wandered out
The taxi took a longer (though faster) route right around the airport, yes literally right around the airport and that’s a big area! We passed the runways, the warehouses and the terminal buildings from every side. When we finally arrived at the entrance, it was a quick check in and not too long a wait
Now I’m not sure why, but for some crazy reason, maybe a lack of serious consideration, or maybe the potential for something exciting, I agreed in January to trail around three countries in Asia for four weeks in November with my constantly travel-restless husband. After our six months trip in Europe, we only arrived in Sydney
Now I know I called the last entry ‘The Last Blog’, but we’ve decided to keep a little bit of scribbling going, along with some photos, so that you can see where we’ve been and at least we’ll know where we went. But it won’t be such a daily diary, just postcards or snippets