January 2013
1 post
Halong Bay
After a few lazy days in Hanoi, we were off to Halong bay, a UNESCO world heritage site and probably the #1 tourist attraction in Vietnam. These tours were as common as scooters, especially in the tourist district, but we took one recommended by our guesthouse hosts for two nights. Ours was all inclusive of 6 meals, 2 nights and an activity on the second day.
Early on our appointed morning...
October 2012
2 posts
Hanoi
The morning after that fateful bus ride, we woke up and I decided I was definitely sick. That day all we did was find some food (which promptly decided to exit via the shortest route possible) and discover the wonder that is Vietnamese coffee. That would be a special roast of finely ground Vietnamese coffee beans with (sweetened) condensed milk. We were a bit skeptical when we dipped our spoon in...
Getting to Hanoi...
Hanoi was a bit dull for us.
To be fair, it was probably our fault—after enduring a grueling 21 hour bus ride (laying down, no less) and us both catching colds, we were not too excited about exploring. (Side note: isn’t it interesting how completely your experience in a place depends on your mood and emotional context? It’s all relative.)
But the bus ride to get there was quite...
September 2012
3 posts
The grass is greener...
The next day, we set out earlier to try to hit up the Plain of Jars sites two and three. After only a few wrong turns we made it to site 2, parked our bike (there was only one other bike there, presumably that of the desk guard) and approached the extremely bored looking desk attendant. He didn’t speak any english but no matter, it was pretty obvious what we were there for.
We wandered...
Legacy of the "Secret War"
Our first stop in the plain of jars was the creatively named “Site 1”. It is the closest to Phonsavan and has the largest number of “jars”. We took our sketchy rented motorbike out and wandered around the site for a bit. When we went, it was nearing dusk, and the most impressive cloud formations lumbered through the sky.
Just before we left, we stopped by one of the...
Fond of Phonsavan
So actually we didn’t go to Vietnam right away. We went on to Phonsavan, Laos for a few days where there wasn’t a consulate, so we couldn’t get our visa there.
Phonsavan is a town in the north of Laos that is known to tourists only for being close to the Plain of Jars site. We planned to stay there for a few nights as a base for exploring this ancient and mysterious landmark.
...
August 2012
4 posts
BAG DRINKS (part 2)
Remember when I praised putting drinks in bags and promised an even AWESOME-ER idea??
Well that time is here and though I’d been wanting one since Bangkok, seeing all kinds of folks toting one around, we finally found a place* to get one in Luang Prabang.
Yes, that is Coca Cola and ice in a plastic bag with a straw. The reason they do this is because all of the drinks come in glass...
We decided to take a guided kayaking trip along the Mekong to the Pak Ou Caves which were supposed to contain some huge number of thousands of Buddhas, a popular trip from Luang Prabang. We were sure to book the half day trip because, due to an unfortunate combination of Vietnamese week long national holidays, weekends, and our travel plans, we HAD to get our Vietnamese visas THAT afternoon.
The...
Luang Prabang, Laos
Luang Prabang was our second destination in Laos. We arrived at 7am from an overnight bus and wandered around the bright, awakening town trying to find our guest house.The main tourist drag was right on the Mekong riverfront and was scattered with guesthouses and al fresco tourist cafes, each tantalizingly promising fresh baguettes, thanks to their previous French occupation. The cobblestoned...
oh en ee
August 6th dawned chilly and rainy in Ebersbach an der Fils, Germany, but for us it was a special day—our one year wedding anniversary. That’s right, the big OH EN EE.
While this isn’t as impressive as anyone who’s ever been married longer than a year, it’s been a good year and full of A LOT of things. That day seems both like yesterday and a thousand years...
July 2012
2 posts
The main cities (or towns really) of Laos are often described as “sleepy” and immediately upon arriving, we could understand why. There was no need for drivers to weave through traffic because there was only a couple of other cars in sight. The roads and sidewalks were wide, but they were almost empty. Coming from “megacities” like Delhi and Bangkok, the scarcity of people...
June 2012
3 posts
It's not always fun
Well, Jason and I have finally settled down for longer than 3 days and so I’m going through kajillions of photos and reading through my notes trying to compose new stories out of quickly fading memories.
After Thailand, our first stop was Vientiane in Laos. But our arrival in Laos was not a happy one.
The overnight train was perfectly fine, and was made more amusing by the waitress...
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Songkran
It all started with a trip to the hospital.
Jason was feverish again (now, over one month fever free! cross your fingers!) and so we went to a Bangkok hospital (over here, hospitals are where the general populous go to get medical attention. I don’t think there are PCPs) to try and get it sorted out again. By the time we left the hospital, and coincidentally coinciding with our visit to Au...
May 2012
7 posts
Useful travel websites and apps
In light of one of my favorite friends possibly coming to visit us in November, AND because I am in Myanmar and I am unable to access Flickr to post pictures, here are some helpful websites and phone apps I’ve found to assist in the copious amount of planning that goes into traveling long term.
For flights:
Skyscanner.net
This lets you find cheap flights on airlines you’ve never...
Food in Bangkok
So, I’m not sure if I have written/shown a proportional amount of content on the blog to reflect how much time we spend thinking and tracking down food in these cities.
It’s a lot.
And the food in Bangkok has been, by far, our favorite. Not only is it readily available everywhere (that was the case in India too), there is lots more variety (not everything has turmeric), and normally...
More sunsets
Near the end of our time in Bangkok, we decided to check out the Sky Bar. It’s famous and is on the 63 floor and they filmed Hangover 2 there, so really, how could we not?
We planned our visit for sunset so we could watch the sun slowly disappear behind a spectacular wall of big-Asian-city haze.
At first the actual Sky Bar was closed so we were shepherded out to a terrace on the other...
BAG DRINKS (part 1)
Umm, hello, this is a BRILLANT idea. Every other country I’ve ever been to, you are way behind. If you put your drink in a drink sized bag, you can keep your other fingers free to carry other things AND the ice condensation doesn’t drip all over you (super handy on the train, especially in Bangkok when you’re not allowed to have drinks. Oh well).
Also, when we were at Au Bon...
Update
Well, right now we’re in Joma Cafe (Chocolate croissant and lemon mint smoothie highly recommended) in Hanoi, Vietnam taking a much needed computer/veg break from hectic traveling and touring. Since I’ve last updated we’ve accidentally overstayed a visa, gotten ripped off at the border, had maggots in our soup, fallen out of a kayak, found a restaurant serving deer feces, taken a...
Sunsets in Bangkok
We had a pretty nice view of the sunset in our Bangkok apartment. Here’s a couple.
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Well, I don’t know how much there is to say about this. We went fishing and obviously we are the best fishers in the world*. We were accompanied by Mickey, an awesome Bangkok native whom we met at Startup Workaway. Mickey is the best and patiently explained to me what a bunch of street food was (sausages made of fish, chicken, beef, pork, you can tell by the color; papaya salad stall...
April 2012
23 posts
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And they were all....
In Bangkok we finally got comfortable enough to have a night on the town so we had tapas at a proper restaurant (should have stuck to Thai food) and went to a well known tourist show called Calypso Cabaret.
We arrived pretty early so we spent a while wandering the streets.
We were near Nana station which is a pretty heavy tourist spot (and is also known for it’s *ahem*...
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Lumpini Park
Lumpini Park is in the middle of downtown Bangkok, sort of on the scale of Boston Commons. It’s a lovely, peaceful oasis in the middle of bustling Bangkok.
There was an entire outdoor gym with ripped dudes pumping and nearby, a public section of the park with workout equipment sprinkled around.
Great idea! Are there similar things anywhere in the US?
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Koh Samui night market
After eating a delicious meal, we zipped on our trusty motorbike over to the Friday night market at Fisherman’s Pier on the Island. It’s a popular tourist destination and filled with lots of restaurants catering to tourists and shops with kitsch souvenirs. But we love night markets for their festive atmosphere, plentiful food and varied wares (including free samples of Thai wine made...
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Snorkeling
A few more pictures. This time from our snorkeling trip (Ok, there are not any pictures of anyone snorkeling, but camera+water = sad camera). You can see the big Buddha from afar giving a better sense of scale. And some fishermen. And some rocks and stuff.
The snorkeling trip was OK. There was a 2 hour long, extremely rough boat ride out to some reefs that the more experienced divers said...
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Big Buddha
So we actually got to the restaurant in the last post a bit early and so had about an hour to kill before they were open.
We decided to go to one of the famous monuments on the island, the “Big Buddha”. Here’s some pictures.
Offerings at the foot of the Buddha, and snakes/dragons to guard the stairs up to the Buddha.
This figure peeking out over the tops of the trees is...
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Orgasmic
Well after all that seriousness yesterday, here’s something a bit lighter…
We had heard that sunsets can be really nice on the island but our resort was facing east, resulting in a slow fade from blue to grey darker blue. We made a mission of finding a nice place to watch the sun set and combined it with finding a nice place to eat. Because what is better than watching the sunset?...
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Reflections...
It’s the 100th post here on CadeParade. In honor of this high and round number, here are some introspective thoughts I’ve had about our travels so far.
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Back when Jason and I were discussing the possibilities of this trip, I had an idea that there were two ways of experiencing a country. First, there is the two week vacation, entered...
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In the middle of March we left Bangkok for about 10 days and headed down to the island of Koh Samui for a Startup Workaway meetup. Neither of us really have start ups but Jason was keen to go and talk to 1)tech people and 2)people other than me. Plus he really loves beaches. So off we went!
We stayed at the Jungle Club which was very nice overall, but I would recommend staying in something other...
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Houseboat stay
When we were planning the trip, I wanted to book a houseboat in advance, but Jason (after reading horrifying stories in the guidebook) wanted to look at several boats in person to make sure we weren’t getting ripped off. I agreed with the stipulation that he would have to pick one.
Well when we got there and saw how many boats there were, Jason changed his mind pretty quickly and we ended...
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Exciting developments
We have to leave Thailand at the end of April due to our visa restrictions so we’re planning our next moves.
Right now, we’re thinking we’ll go to Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Myanmar, then head west to Prague (I know, right) where we’ll meet my parents in June.
Here are some pictures that make us excited….
Angkor Wat in Cambodia
Photo via whc.unesco.org
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Vacation from Vacation Vacation
When we figured out we had an extra day in Alleppey and there was not much to do in Alleppey, this happened.
Also, I figured out how to make animated gifs…
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Sumatran earthquake
Several people have inquired about our well being after the 8.6 and 8.2 earthquake in Sumatra after hearing it could effect parts of Thailand and perhaps Bangkok.
We are ok! And everything seems to be fairly fine.
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Ft. Kochi
From Rajasthan, we flew down to Kerala, a small province way in the South of India known to tourists for tropical weather, nice beaches, and most of all, houseboats.
Kerala is also one of the most educated areas in India and the most developed. It was very exciting driving to our homestay from the airport and seeing modern buildings and people following general traffic laws. There are also lots...
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Snake farm
A few weeks ago, on the advice of Tripadvisor, we ventured to the Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute Snake Farm.
Besides having lots of snakes on display, the institute studies venomous snakes and prepares antivenom with the Thai Red Cross Institute. I think they said they were also the second snake farm founded in the world. Cool!
I think snakes are awesome animals, and I just love looking at...
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Thailand is for mushroom lovers...
In the supermarket nearby there is a huge stand devoted to what must be the most types of mushrooms I’ve ever seen in one place.
This post is dedicated to my mycophliac friends, Kjersten and Meghan back home!
Come to Thailand, it’s full of mushrooms!
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Camel Safari
Our second day in Jaisalmer we headed into the desert for the Jaisalmer special—a camel safari.
We were hustled into the back of a Jeep with another woman, Angelique, who was in India doing volunteer work.
Our first few stops were at tiny villages. Our guide explained that the men mostly worked in a nearby quarry and then drove the stones over the border to Pakistan where they got a...
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Eat quick then go home.
“Eat quick then go home” was the advice we were given after eating at un-named Thai sidewalk eatery #1340239528034.
We had glimpsed this strip of dinner places while wandering around the neighborhood so we decided to try it out one night. We surveyed all of the options and decided on this place because it was the most crowded.
After eventually getting our menus, we discovered there...
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No, no I do not.
Bonus picture:
Apparently Thailand is still in the 90’s where denim on top is cool…
March 2012
17 posts
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Rainy in Bangkok
We moved to a new apartment in Bangkok, on Sukhumvit soi 77. It’s about to downpour, so I stepped out onto our balcony and snapped a few photos. For you, internet friends!! Don’t tell Lindsay her lens got some raindrops on it.
The photos below, by the way, have nothing to do with what we did today. Instead, I wrote about our daytime adventures, so the writing below has nothing to...
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Jaisalmer
Our last stop in Rajasthan was Jaisalmer. Jaisalmer is based around a fort also, but the fort is still active. Our hotel, in fact, was inside the fort (which apparently is a terrible idea, conservation wise….oops).
The fort is full of tiny, winding streets and intricately carved facades left over from the original construction.
Jaisalmer is fondly called the “golden city”...
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Jodhpur
Our next stop was Jodhpur, the blue city. The blue houses originally signified that the elite brahmin class lived within, but as the caste system relaxed in India, other people decided to paint their houses blue as well. As the Indians say: “Please, why not?”
Since we had basically run out of touring steam, we decided to see one attraction in the city—Mehrengarh Fort.
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A dock in Fisherman’s village in Koh Samui. Thought the colors were nice.
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Oh noooooo
Snorkeling gone horribly wrong! D:
