Cambodia

The trip up the Cambodian side of the Mekong river took several hours, but it was fascinating seeing the differences in the landscape. The countryside was more open along the river banks except for banana and coconut trees planted around the houses. These are traditionally built on stilts and most are either made of wood or panels made from palm leaves. Every now and again we would pass large pagodas which were painted bright yellow and red. The last part of the trip was by bus and by the time we ended up at the Okay guesthouse in Phnom Penh it was dark. The guesthouse didn't live up to its name - there were some dubious goings on and the plumbing wasn't up to much. However, next morning we found somewhere better and spent the day looking round the royal palace and the silver pagoda. We also went to the so-called Russian market where knock-offs from Cambodia's clothing trade among other things can be bought for a song. The beautiful sunset over the river was enjoyed from the balcony of The Foreign Correspondents’ Club with a large G and T.

Phnom Penh is a beautiful city with much of its colonial architecture and wide avenues still intact. There's much less traffic than in the Vietnamese cities – fewer motorbikes except for those pulling tuk-tuks. Cambodia is noticeably a poorer country, and there are plenty of land-mine victims begging and people from the countryside looking for a better life living on the streets. But the Khmers seem to be a very open and relaxed race. And given their recent past it is amazing to us that the country has got back on its feet so quickly.

On our second day in Phnom Penh we took a tuk-tuk out to "the killing fields" of Choeung Ek and the Tuol Sleng museum, a former High School that the Khmer Rouge turned into the most notorious prison in Cambodia. In the course of three and a half years they killed an estimated 2 million people -15 percent were tortured or beaten to death and the rest died of starvation. It made an enormous impression on us walking round former prison and seeing the fields of Choeung Ek, where those of the mass graves that have been opened still have pieces of bone and clothing sticking out of the ground. Our guide told how his parents, both doctors, and the rest of Cambodia’s educated were beaten to death with clubs and farm implements in a mad attempt to create an agrarian state where everyone did as they were told.

From Phnom Penh we headed north by bus to Siem Reap, a town that is growing at a tremendous rate owing to the increasing popularity of the Angkor temples. Angkor was the capital of the Khmer empire and dozens of temples were built over a large area between the 9th and 15th century. We spent three days exploring the most important temples using various methods of transport – tuk-tuk, car and bike. Angkor Wat, the largest religious building in the world, is the one that is perhaps best preserved, and was a stunning sight at sunrise.

Many of the temples are in a ruined state but still have the most exquisite relief carvings. Others are being torn apart by enormous trees and have been left to their fate in the jungle. A glimpse of monkeys between the trees, elephants being led along the road and the sound of landmine victims playing traditional music to earn money, makes it all a mystical experience.

We also visited the landmine museum nearby that is run by a former Khmer Rouge soldier who was recruited as a child to lay mines. After being captured by the Vietnamese he was trained to use his skill to disarm mines, and has since spent his time making amends by trying to disarm as many as possible and looking after victims.

From Siem Reap we travelled north by taxi to the border, where we walked across into Thailand. Then it was a 4 hour bus journey to Bangkok, where we met up with Kirstin and Rory before travelling to Koh Chang. The “elephant island” is where we are going to spend Christmas.

Southern Vietnam

We left Hoi An on the "sleeper bus" - one of those experiences you can tick off and say you've done but don't want to repeat in the near future! We were assigned cotlike affairs with reclined backrests which were built for Vietnamese-sized people. The trip to Nha Trang took 12 hours and we had 3 stops (the third one was just 15 mins. from our destination - apparently he'd been driving too fast?). However, after finding a friendly hotel owner that let us shower and leave our bags, we headed for the beach. Nha Trang is one of Vietnam's big holiday spots and has a stunning beach. It was a sunny day, the first they'd had for a while as they are now heading into their rainy season. We spent a pleasant morning wandering along the front and in the market, before heading to the station to catch the afternoon train to Saigon. Time is beginning to run out and we have to get to Bangkok by the 19th of December.

The train journey was interesting as we got to see more of the countryside than when travelling by road. Vietnam is very built up along the roads. We were the only westerners in our carriage which also made a change from the tourist buses. We arrived in Saigon late in the evening both ready for a good night's sleep.

Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City) is Vietnam's commercial centre. It was the capital of the French colony and built up a lot of commercial contacts during the Vietnam war. It seems a more gracious city than Hanoi in many ways and despite there being about 6 million motorbikes on the roads here, the traffic is less overwhelming. There are lots of buildings from the French colonial period which have been restored, among others the main post office and the former "Hotel de Ville" which is now the headquarters of the Communist Party. And as in Hanoi and the other towns in Vietnam, life is lived on the street - people cooking, eating, meeting friends, playing games or doing business along every pavement.

I spent the next couple of days exploring some of the city on foot or by cyclo while Kevin struggled with a stomach upset. The Reunification palace built by the South Vietnamese government is pure 1960s architecture. They didn't get to use it much apart from when they surrendered power to the Vietcong. After that I went to the Museum Of HCMC, a gracious old colonial building which in addition to being an interesting little museum also appeared to be a favorite spot for couples to take their bridal pictures. I also visited the Emperor Jade Pagoda, where the chinese community in Saigon worship. It was very beautifully decorated, at least what could be seen through the clouds of incense. The main streets and shops in Saigon were busy getting their displays ready for Christmas - polystyrene snowmen, tinsel Christmas trees and "Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer" in Vietnamese!

From Saigon we took a bus to the Mekong river delta. It's an area that is heavily populated with lots of small towns and villages, some of which are actually floating on the river. The river divides into 9 tributaries and pretty much everything that's going on happens either on or around the river. We visited one small village by boat where they made coconut candy and rice paper and another which had a fish farm. We spent the night in Chau Doc near the Cambodian border.

It was an early start the next day to be paddled round one of the floating villages before setting off on the slow boat for Cambodia; a 10 hour trip in the sun - very pleasant watching all the activities being carried on along the river, although not exactly a comfortable journey. Much of the area along the river still bears scars from the war when much of the jungle was defoliated and then cleared with Napalm bombs to smoke out the Vietcong. The only large trees are fast-growing and hardy eucalyptus trees donated by the Australian government. We had one stop along the way to eat lunch before carrying our bags across the border, getting more stamps in our passports and continuing on to Phnom Penh.



We now have a week in Cambodia before we meet up with Kirsty and Rory in Bangkok and spend the last week of our trip on Koh Chang island in Thailand. I'll write the Cambodian instalment, but I expect most of the people reading this will probably be too busy with Christmas preprations to have time to read it. So thanks for all the comments and mails we've received - we've been amazed at all the interest. We don't have access to everyone's email addresses, so we would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a happy and peaceful Christmas and we look forward to catching up with you in the New Year!

Takk til alle venner og kollegaer som har vist interesse for reisen vaar. Vi oensker dere alle en hyggelig og fredelig jul med bra skifoere og masse familiekos. Naa gleder vi oss til norsk grovbroed med norvegia og selvfoelgelig til aa se dere alle igjen! GOD JUL!

Sapa to Hoi An: mountains and paddy fields

We took the night train from Hanoi up to Lao Cai on the Chinese border in north-west Vietnam. The early morning air was a chilly 3 degrees when we arrived in Sapa, which was a shock to the system. But it was great to breathe in after the fumes of Hanoi. The bus ride from Lao Cai to Sapa is 38 km of winding roads that climb steadily uphill. Halfway along the sun came up and the views of the mountains and valleys below were just breathtaking. The paddy fields are terraced up the hillside and there are small villages where hill tribes live dotted here and there. Sapa itself is a pretty little mountain town which thrives on taking tourists trekking in the mountains and selling the handicrafts made by women from the local mountain tribes.

I spent much of the first day in bed nursing a cold, shivering and admiring the view through the window, while Kevin did some walking. The next day we hired a guide and set off on a 12 km trek down to a couple of the local villages. There are lots of different ethnic minorities living in the area: Black H'Mong, Red Dzao, Zai (Chinese) and Thai among others. Our guide Dung (pronounced Zum) was a lively Thai wearing a green pith helmet! We were also accompanied much of the way by a couple of the women from the Black H'mong tribe. It was glorious weather and despite the air being cold it was fine walking in t-shirts. The women were wearing local dress like all the others, and they told us a little about their families.
Not all the children go to school as the parents can't afford to send them all, so the girls sell handicrafts and the boys help their fathers take the buffalo up into the higher pastures. On the second half of our journey we were followed by a couple of 6 year old minxes trying to sell us things in persuasive English, but they were eventually bought off with a packet of sweets each!

From Sapa we headed south to Hanoi on the night train again. We shared our carriage this time with 2 men, one Vietnamese and the other Japanese. The couple of hours before going to sleep were enlivened by playing a bizarre form of charades in an effort to communicate. The Japanese guy showed he had a sense of humour when the Vietnamese man told him he needed to shave off his beard and lose the scarf if he hoped to find a wife!

The express trains run mostly at night so we booked a sleeper from Hanoi to Hue, and spent the day visiting the ancient citadel of Hoa Lu and the river caves in Tam Coc in the Ninh Binh province. The landscape here is much like the rocky limestone outcrops in Halong Bay, and we had a pleasant cycle ride through the countryside from Hoa Lu to Tam Coc. The boat trip to the caves in a sampan was spoilt by the constant pressure to buy stuff, both from the couple doing the rowing and from sellers in other boats.

Hue in central Vietnam, our next stop, has an enormous citadel built mostly in the 18th century. Much of it was ruined during the Vietnam war as Hue is close to the former Demilitarized Zone (the border between North and South Vietnam). What's left shows that it must have been a stunning sight in all its glory. We spent the day walking around looking at the ruins and at the local market, which was tightly packed with stalls stacked high with wares of all kinds and people desperate to sell to us.

We took the bus the next day to Hoi An, a hundred or more kilometers further south past endless rice paddies. The road follows the coast and goes through a dividing range of mountains before going past more paddy fields. Hoi An is a charming little town which has been a major trading post for centuries. Its architecture is inspired by a mixture of Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese and French influences. Many of these lovely old buildings have green moss growing up them, a result of the almost annual autumnal floods which sweep river water into them. Nearly every other building seems to house shops selling silk and lacquer ware, and there are endless places to get clothes or shoes tailor-made at less than one would pay for clothes bought off-the-peg back home. So we did what most people do in Hoi An and ordered some clothes, which meant we had appointments for fittings to keep in between the sight-seeing. Hoi An is also known for its various specialities in the food line, and has a range of good restaurants to try out. Many of them also offer cookery courses, so being a good wife I've sent Kevin on one. I'm looking forward to tasting the results!

Tonight we head on down to Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon as most people still call it.