The Last Leg Of The Journey
Trip Start
Jan 07, 2009
1
22
Trip End
Dec 18, 2009
Hanoi, Vietnam
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
INTERESTING FACTS – 1) Singapore is only a small 30km x 30km island! 2) Ko Phi Phi, just off Phuket, is where The Beach was filmed. 3) A chemical plant in Elmira actually produced Agent Orange for the US Army to use in the Vietnam War. It was one of only seven companies in North America to supply Agent Orange to the US Government.
THIS IS HOW CHEAP WE ARE – 1) We both sandwiched onto a small moped behind a driver to get around the city instead of hiring a tuk tuk or 2 mopeds. 2) We walked 20 minutes to an airport shuttle at 5am with our packs on instead of getting a cab.
TYPICAL IN THIS REGION – Great food (noodle soups, pho, pad thai, spring rolls, fresh fish…), cheap beer, delicious fruit shakes, safe cities, squat toilets, cheap hotels/hostels, strong Vietnamese coffee, masses of mopeds and no rules as to where they are driven, women wearing pajama sets all day, "fish massage" where fish eat the dead skin off your feet, EVERYONE wears face masks, Excessive nose picking, mirrors and shower heads all about 1 foot too low, men with long fingernails.
SOUTHEAST ASIA
Stepping off the plane from India into the vast and spotless airport in Singapore was like warping back to the future. We accessed the impressive transit system and marveled at the modern city as we found our way to The Brown’s house. Through a complicated chain of friends and relatives, we were introduced to Don and Patty Brown, and they invited us to stay with them and their three daughters at their home in Singapore. Upon arrival to their beautiful high rise apartment, Don’s first words were “would you like a beer and some steak?” He had us at beer. Chad was further enamored when Don set a laptop on his lap that magically played Canadian television, including Sportscenter. We thought we were dreaming when he invited us to watch a Leafs vs Canucks game with tinned Tim Hortons coffee on our last morning. We had an incredible time with the extremely gracious Brown family, and thoroughly enjoyed touring around beautiful Singapore. These three days were invaluable for recharging our souls and giving us the strength to move on. We even splurged on a $15 drink, the famous Singapore Sling at the Raffles hotel, and we played Wii ping pong at a big Nintento exhibit on the street! Technology!!!
Our visit to Malaysia was brief, starting with a wonderful bus ride to the capital Kuala Lumpur. The delicious and cheap street food, including fish, meat skewers, huge prawns and pad thai, left us constantly wanting more. We toured the city, explored the tacky but interesting Batu caves, and marveled at the impressive Petronas towers. Steph delighted in buying a $10 Coach knock-off handbag (Chad tried to ask why she would want the word “Coach” written on her bag…men). We felt safe walking the streets, thrived with the cheap local buses, and found the locals extremely friendly. This would be a delightful trend throughout the rest of South East Asia. However, due to extreme travel warnings issued by the Canadian Government, as well as time constraints, we decided to move on to Phuket, Thailand by air, and booked a cheap ticket online.
Though disliked by some, Phuket for us was just what the doctor ordered. We stayed at the more remote Kata Beach, and for a few days enjoyed the gorgeous white sand beaches, clear warm and calm ocean waters, and cheap beer on the empty beaches. The disturbing trend we did notice in Phuket, however, was an abundance of beautiful Thai girls doting over creepy, fat, old, ugly white men…be it for money or for hopes of being taken back to north America/Europe...we’re not too sure.
A bus/ferry combination brought us across the Southern Thai peninsula to the eastern island of Ko Phanang. Arriving at night with no chance of reaching our desired destination on the northern tip of the island, we surrendered ourselves to a tout with a hotel as far up the coast as possible. That night we slept in a stark wood hut, under a mosquito net, with every description of bug climbing and flying around us…not quite like the picture the tout had shown us. The next morning, we rounded up another couple of travelers and shared a longboat ride to the remote Bottle Beach. Here we found basic but comfortable little individual huts, right on the beautiful beach, for $6 per night. It was heaven. We spend a few days reading, eating and drinking, and laying in the sun. After a few days of paradise, we begrudgingly wound our way back to the mainland where we caught an overnight bus to Bangkok
The bustling streets of Bangkok , with its T-shirt vendors and food carts appealed to us. We ate springrolls and pad thai on the street for $1 each, until we thought we would be sick. We would return to Bangkok later in the trip, so we did a quick turnaround and headed east for Cambodia the following morning.
We avoided a major Visa scam at the border by wisely splitting from our bus group and trudging through the busy border on our own, acquiring our VISAs at the border for a much cheaper price than the other tourists from our bus who were coerced into buying them from travel agents. Once in Cambodia, we found a local bus from the border into the city of Siam Reap. The city was fun, with more great food and even cheaper beer. Here we braved a Cambodian BBQ consisting of a small charcoal BBQ brought right to the table, and dined on prawns, beef, chicken and PYTHON! Steph loved it but Chad, not a fan of snakes in any capacity, was not so sure.
The main attractions from Siam Reap are the fabulous Ankor temples, including the world famous Ankor Wat. We rented bicycles and peddled from temple to temple along shaded streets, enjoying them at our own pace, although the 40 degree heat did make it a tiring day. The 1000 year old towering temples were unique and impressive. We particularly enjoyed one of the temples, untouched by excavators, which demonstrated 1000 years of takeover by the Cambodian jungle. Huge trees grew from crumbling rock walls and roots weaved through windows and doors. This is the temple featured in the movie, Tomb Raider.
From Siem Reip we continued east to the capital city of Phenom Penn. The tragic recent past of Cambodia was impossible to ignore upon our arrival in Phenom Penn. This capital city was the center of the horrific genocide carried out by the Khamer Rouge, led by Pol Pot. It all started in 1976, when the communist regime took over, and early one morning the entire population of Phenom Penn were ousted from the city and forced into the countryside with only the clothes on their backs. Any person believed to be educated, of non-Cambodian decent, or with ties to the previous government, was brutally murdered for fear that they would organize a rebellion. The aim was to produce an obedient, uneducated communist society of peasant workers. Unspeakable and horrendous murders of hundreds of thousands of innocent people followed throughout the country, and those remaining lived in extreme poverty, many starving to death or dying from lack of medical treatment. Approximately 1/3 of Cambodia’s population was eliminated during the '70s (estimates range from 1.5-2.5 million people). The city is still reeling and recovering from losing almost an entire generation of educated people, and those responsible for these horrors have yet to be convicted. On one depressing day we visited the Killing Fields, where many murders occurred and mass graves have been uncovered. A monument was constructed, housing 3000 human skulls, many bearing traumatic evidence of their deaths, reminding all that visit of their tragic and much too recent past. We also visited the S-21 museum, a converted school that was used as a detention center and torture facility, and is now a shocking museum telling the stories of the war and its many victims. We both read the book “First They Killed My Father”, a true story of a girls shocking experience during this time.
On a humorous note, one of our more classic “this-is-how-cheap-we-are” moments was illustrated in our choice of transit to tour the city. After a 20 minute ‘discussion’ about whether he should get 5$ or 6$ (1$ difference!) for the day, we hired a guy with a little moped, and the three of us sandwiched onto the small machine puttering from place to place.
Unfortunately, time was running short if we were to include Vietnam, so, despite Chad having a full passport, we ventured to the Vietnam embassy to inquire about our chances of getting a VISA into the country. We smoothly acquired what we needed, with a small extra charge to get a separate page clipped into Chad’s passport. The Indian embassy sure could use a lesson from this slick crew!
So now, it was off to our 25th country on the year. We started our Vietnam journey in the capital, Ho Chi Min City (formerly Saigon). This city was slightly more modern than neighboring Cambodia’s and we were able to find an excellent hotel. We were looking forward to Vietnam to learn about its history, in particular the Vietnam War, and to see the beauty of the country that we had heard about from many other travelers. From the city, we took a day trip on a series of local buses to the nearby Cho Chi tunnels. 100kms of underground tunnel networks include houses, kitchens, hospitals and of course, bunkers. They were built many years ago, to fight the French war first, and later used to fight during the Vietnam War. We duck-walked through the tiny tunnels, and marveled at their extent and detail, as well as the viciousness of their traps! It was apparent how the communist Vietnamese regime were able to defeat the South Vietnamese and their American allies from these well concealed fox holes. Their expertise in the jungle was astounding.
With the horrors of Cambodia fresh in our minds, our visit to the War Remnants museum was almost more than we could bear. The atrocities of the Vietnam War were well illustrated in the informative museum, and much space was allocated to actual pictures showing the repercussions caused by the relentless bombings and use of chemical warfare on the innocent populations. Napalm bombings caused large scale death and burnings, and the ongoing horrific birth defects from widespread spraying of Agent Orange are still affecting the population. Steph read a book on this subject called The Girl in the Picture, a true story of the girl in the famous Vietnam war picture of her running from burning wreckage, terrified and naked, after her clothes were burned off by a napalm bomb. Chad read a more technical book called “The Bright Shining Lie” about the war, recommended by a US war veteran that we met in Saigon. We struck up a conversation with him over a beer on a street side patio, and learned that he was a paratrooper in the infantry for the US army during the war. It was his first trip back to Vietnam, and he was obviously struggling with the realization that so much of the war should never have happened, and so many people, both his friends and the innocent civilians, died in vain.
Again, in Saigon, the heat was a force to be reckoned with. Temperatures in the high 30’s with high humidity made eating and moving generally uncomfortable. Making matters worse, was that the traditional delicious Pho noodle soups were best enjoyed piping hot and extra spicy. At one meal in particular, we noticed our soup bowls were actually ‘bottomless’ as our sweat dripped from our brows quicker than we could slurp back the noodles!
From Saigon, we continued north to the beach town of Nah-Trang. Though the beer was REALLY cheap, approximately 50 cents a pitcher, we were unimpressed by the dirty and windy beach, and stiffer atmosphere. A day on the beach and a day biking the city and its sites were enough for us. We booked an overnight “sleeper bus” for our next journey to Hoi Ann.
A “sleeper bus” sounds comfortable eh? It wasn’t. The bus contained three rows of bunk beds, each consisting of a regular seat which had an extended lower portion to elevate the legs. We ended up in 2 of 5 bunks that lined the lower portion at the back of the bus. They were evidently made for small Vietnamese children, as the short seats left our knees bent at an uncomfortable angle. The cramped conditions worsened with the heat rising well over 35 degrees in our unventilated quarters, and with frequent stops where the lights were flicked on and the A/C was flicked off, causing the heat to rise even more! Anytime we started to dose, we inevitably hit a large bump and were catapulted out of our seats, stopped only when our heads connected with the seats above us. We sweat and swore all night without a moments sleep. When we finally collapsed out of the bus in the morning, we were happy to stretch our legs on a lengthy walk to find a hotel. Our advice to travelers is to avoid the sleeper buses and take a regular seated bus, or at least get a bunk near the front, with better ventilation.
Hoi Ann is famous for its hundreds of tailors. Here, one can get a custom made suit or ball gown for $40 USD, and many other custom made clothes for much cheaper. For the experience, Steph ordered a pair of custom jeans for $15 and Chad got fitted for a white dress shirt for $10. Upon receiving them, we wished that we had ordered more clothes, as we were extremely impressed with their fit and quality. We really enjoyed the riverside city, and roamed through the markets eating more cheap food from stalls lining the water’s edge.
We warped north when, uncharacteristically, we decided to splurge on a cheap flight to Hanoi instead of enduring another sleeper bus. Hanoi was a busy and enjoyable city, and we did a bit of gift and souvenir shopping. From here we organized a two day, one night tour to the Unesco World Heritage site, Halong Bay, where huge limestone islands with towering cliff walls pepper the ocean. We travelled with a small group on a traditional wooden “junk” boat, with large yellow sails. We explored some caves, and had an incredible kayak around the islands and through a cave into a small bay. Halong Bay is becoming well known for its ‘party’ boats where the tourists drink all night and day, so we were ready for some late nights with other travelers. But unfortunately (?) it was again just the two of us. Our boat had two other couples only, one a 65+ pair from Turkey who enjoyed a drink or two but were in bed by 8 pm. The other couple was closer to our age but chose not to even have one beer, and they too retired early. I guess when you spend every single hour of every day together, what’s a few more eh?
The mountain village of Sapa, in Vietnam’s far north close to the Chinese border, offered a drastic change in climate and scenery. Our train from Hanoi left with the temperature in the 30’s and upon our arrival in Sapa 10 hours later, a cold winter blast greeted us. Due to Sapa’s elevation and the time of year, the temperature hovered around 0 degrees. Good thing we sent all of our warm clothes home with Joe and Darienne!
Our wise Turkish friends from the ‘junk’ boat highly recommended a local hotel in the village. We were skeptical at first glance but by this time we were using traveller’s recommendations as a ‘can’t miss’. The room was acceptable but also very cold with open air vents to the outside along the wall, and no heaters of course. After three attempts to get the hot water working, we approached the manager of the hotel with an ultimatum, “Have our hot water working while we eat dinner, or we’re leaving.” He apologized and said that if he couldn’t fix the hot water he would help us find a new place. After a great dinner we returned and to our disappointment the water was frosty. Frusturated we gathered up our belongings and headed out the front door through a jam packed restaurant full of locals. We informed a woman working there that we would not be staying or paying for anything as discussed with the owner earlier. To our shock a different employee overheard this and came running up to us yelling in Vietnamese (?). All of the restaurant patrons and some people on the street stared in disbelief as the young man became more and more angry. We kept telling him that his owner had agreed to let us go and we would not be paying. He poked his long fingernailed finger in our faces and physically blocked us from leaving. As Chad stepped by, he grabbed Steph’s arm and said she does not leave. Chad stepped towards him and said yes she would and Steph bravely stepped by. As we hurried away, the same guy broke free of his friends’ restraints and actually ran down the street towards us, yelling the entire time. We ducked into a hotel where the manager quickly closed the door as the psychotic man’s co-workers tackled him in the street. The manager of our refuge hotel insisted we call the police as the crazed worker was peering in to see if we were there. The police showed up with a translator and were actually very nice throughout our explanations. They smiled and assured us that they ‘owned’ that restaurant and the employee there would no longer be harming anyone. As we continued to our new hotel at the end of the street, we wondered if we just had someone ‘erased’ in this communist country…
Over the next two days, we went on a great hike through the mountain villages where the slopes were covered in rice patties and the locals worked at their daily tasks, and followed that up with a trip to a local market like we had not encountered anywhere else on our travels. The market was teeming with colourfully dressed women selling everything. Naturally we made our way to the back of the market where buffalo, pigs, and even dogs were bought and sold for meat! One guy had a cage on the back of his scooter, full of live chickens and dogs, with a hog tied squealing pig fastened to the outside of it. It was crazy and we decided not to try any of the local food that day.
Time was quickly running out and with just over two weeks remaining on our year, we headed back to Hanoi. Here we took advantage of Vietnam’s extensive and famous pirating industry. We toured around the city for the day before purchasing a few CD’s of TV shows that we had missed during our time away for pennies. These stores had everything you could think of and the quality was quite good.
From Hanoi, we boarded a plane again for our return to Bangkok, Thailand. In our final two weeks we wanted to travel to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. The region is lush and mountainous yet still warm. Arriving at 2 am by train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, we were informed by our ‘reserved’ hostel that they had not heard of us and were full anyways?! So we wandered the streets until about 3 am when finally we found a place that would take us. We’re still learning I guess.
From Chiang Mai, we booked a tour that involved a 6 hour hike through the mountains to the north, a dip in some scalding hot springs, and a traditional meal and overnight stay in a local village. We slept on the floor of a hut in a remote village and were awakened early by the sounds of elephants in the surrounding forest. Our trip was to end with a ride on elephants along and through a river followed with a spirited bamboo rafting trip on a raft made that morning. These huge elephants are left to roam the forests on most days, but when a tour comes through, two men head out from the village at 4 am to find the beasts and bring them back to be saddled up. Riding the elephants through the river with mountains and pristine forest all around was definitely a highlight of our entire year.
Returning to Chiang Mai the next day, we wasted no time and signed up for a cooking course. Our experience with Thai food was so good, that we could not pass up the opportunity. Unfortunately for Chad, he may have consumed one too many beers the night before, making for a long day in the kitchen. We learned to make pad thai, tom yam soup, and other tasty curries, eating everything at the days end.
On our final day in Chiang Mai, with visions of Lloyd and Harry in our heads, we rented a moped and decided to drive through the mountain roads for the day. It was crazy to be a part of the madness that is Thailand’s city streets, but our drive through the country side was fantastic. There was beautiful scenery around every bend and just before returning home, we stopped for lunch at a small home/restaurant in a small village. Chad even let Steph drive for awhile!
All in all, Chiang Mai ended up being one of the best cities we have visited on our trip and it was a great experience so close to the end of our travels. We returned to Bangkok on our last overnight bus ever!!! And we mean ever. We spent two more days in Bangkok mainly shopping for souvenirs, eating cheap street food, and indulging in the cheap beers throughout the day and evening…hey, we realized these were the final days so give us a break eh?
The morning of our departure to Hong Kong, we asked our hotel how much a taxi should cost to the airport and how long it would take. They told us the approximate price and we headed out into the street s at 7 am hoping to catch a quick taxi in lots of time for our 11 am flight. We talked to a group of taxi drivers who were hanging out on a corner and when they gave us a ridiculously high price, we said no, our price or nothing. They mumbled something in Thai and broken English about tolls on the highway resulting in their increased price. We stuck to our guns and finally one of the guys shrugged and we boarded his cab. About 20 minutes into the ride, we had moved about 1 km. Traffic was an absolute disaster and it left us wondering where the heck this highway was that should have got us to the airport in 40 minutes. Suddenly it dawned on us that this idiot cab driver was going to take us through local roads in rush hour the entire time so as to avoid the tolls! We asked nicely once what time he thought we would get to the airport with his current path and he replied, “Don’t worry, your flight is at 11 am, I’ll have you there at 11 am.” Well that was enough for us, we demanded he get us on the highway, pay the tolls, or we were getting out that instant to get a different cab. He begrudgingly obliged after a few minutes of heated back and forth. It just goes to show that no matter how comfortable you get somewhere, cabbies aren’t to be trusted anywhere!
Hong Kong is a bustling city, with a setting and skyline only rivaled by Rio de Janeiro (or maybe Vancouver), and we couldn’t have picked a better place to ease back into western society. As expected in this incredibly populous region, we acquired a shoe-box sized room at “Mirador Mansion”, a highrise full of cheap hostels. The bathroom was literally 2 feet x 2 feet and contained sink, shower and toilet…very efficient!? However, we lucked out in acquiring one of the nicer hostels, so we couldn’t complain unless we wanted to pay $100+ per night.
With only 3 days left until we boarded our plane back to Canada, we really had to concentrate on enjoying the time we had in Hong Kong, despite our excitement to get home again. We hiked to The Peak on Hong Kong Island, and were rewarded with an incredible view back at the gorgeous highrise city. We strolled the busy streets, visited a small zoo, enjoyed the night markets, sampled delicious local foods like dim sum, and took a great day trip and hike on a nearby island.
These final days passed quickly and we were ecstatic to wake up on the last day, realizing we were heading to the airport where our next destination would be Canada. An 11 hour sleepless flight with the nice folks of Air Canada was a walk in the park for us now. The moment we touched down and the plane stopped, Steph’s face was pressed up against the glass as she was waving and smiling at the luggage guy down below. Nothing we say can begin to describe the feeling of stepping back onto Canadian soil. Never have we understood more, how lucky we are to have been born to fortunate loving families in an incredible, beautiful country like Canada…the best country in the WORLD!
We travelled the world for one year. For five years, we had been dreaming of this trip, planning this trip, saving for this trip and for one year, living it. Our experiences have been incredible, indescribable, and life-changing in so many ways. Over the years, we will be able to share some of these experiences with our friends and family, but most importantly, they are a gift that we share with each other, and will hopefully shape how we live out the rest of our lives.
