The Last day. Hard to believe how fast 15 days goes. The contiki tour officially ended at 6 am this morning, but a group from the tour had late flights so we stuck together to explore. We got the hotel to organize a van for us to go our to see Banteay Srei, or the Pink Lady Temple. This temple is only major temple at Angkor not built by a monarch. It is constructed of red sandstone. It was a smaller temple then the ones that we saw yesterday. I’m not sure if I would advise other travellers [...]

So today we were checking off another big bucket list item, see the sunrise at Angor Wat (which means “Temple City” or “City of Temples” in Khme)r. Angor Wat is the largest religious monument in the world. It was cool to see something that was made by hand in the 12th Century stand the test of time. We got up at 5am and took a bus from our hotel to the Angor Wat parking lot. From there we walked in pitch black (no stars, no city light air pollution) with only our flashlights to guide us. W [...]

We found a tour outside of Contiki to take us to a Phnom Penh morning market for breakfast. We took Tuk Tuks to the market at 6 am, and met with our new guide Duckie. She introduced us to the best Cambodian doughnuts I have ever had. I still crave them, they don’t put icing on their doughnuts they top them with hot toffee. Yum. Then we went and tried noodle salad for breakfast. Not my fave for a breakfast option but when in Cambodia. We then proceeded to jump on a plane an flew for an h [...]

Another thing to note, going through customs into Cambodia was terrifying compared to Thailand or Laos. They scanned each of our finger prints and checked if we were flagged for any travel alerts. Just be prepared. Today was also going to be another heavy history day. First stop was The Killing fields. In 1975 to 1979, the Khmer Rouge regime arrested and eventually executed almost everyone suspected of connections with the former government or with foreign governments, as well as profes [...]

Today was another driving day – so lets skip that part because I don’t remember it. We arrived at Vientiane I think around 1 or 2, and went to the Laos equivalent of Williams coffee for lunch. I point that out because after recently discovering a dish called laap, all of us were disappointed by western food. After that we went to the COPE centre to learn about the bombings that happened during the Vietnam War. Laos sided with the Americans during the Vietnam War so the Americans used La [...]

Yet another long day of driving. Today was 6-7 hours of driving. With most roads looking like the ones in the photo above (aka lots of twists and turns up and down the mountains.) We used the time wisely and realized that you could make lots of great Laos puns. No puns a-Laos You win some you Laos some These puns a Laos-y I am at a Laos Alls fair in Laos and War OK – you get it – if you spend some time thinking about it you can come up with a lot of puns. We stopped on the top of o [...]

Day 8 was a big day. One of the optional excursions on our trip was to give alms to the monks in Luang Prabang. As a monk, you spend your day devoting yourself  to Budda, you are not allowed to cook. So in order to eat, the monks walk the streets every day at 6 am with big gold urns, looking for alms. The people of Laos give alms daily. For them it is part of their routine. They do it of the good karma it makes. The women of the family get up at 4 am to make the sticky rice for the monk [...]

So we were told that we might be able to wake up and see elephants drinking in the river if we got up early. So we bought croissants the night before, and got up at 5:50 am to see the elephants. We watched the sun rise, but still the elephants were hiding. They finally showed up at 7 am. Which was amazing – but wish I had a little more sleep. Luckily we had a boat ride to nap on. We took the boat until we arrived at the Budda Cave, also know as the Pak Ou Caves. The legend is that as lon [...]

Another big travel day. However very excited to see the rice fields in Northern Thailand. The drive from Chiang Rai to Laos was beautiful. While most of the bus was seeping off a late night, I enjoyed seeing what the far corners of Thailand were like. It something to check off the bucket list. Reaching the Thai boarder and checking into Laos was an interesting experience. We checked out of the Thai boarder, boarded a boat, and crossed the Mekong River to Loas. It took about 6 minutes [...]

We left Chiang Mai early in the morning. This was going to be a big bus day. The purpose of today was basically to go north enough so that we could cross into Loas tomorrow. But that did not mean that we did not do anything. For example, we went to Cabbages and Condoms, a public health outreach centre which wants to make sexual health as common as buying cabbages at the market. Or we went to visit Wat Rong Khyn, also known as the white temple. It is a contemporary unconventional Buddhi [...]

Day four already. This hotel was awesome. We got a full breakfast buffet. And I got my first taste of Thai Coffee. Man this will definitely become a life long obsession. They only put condensed milk into their coffee. Which is delicious, but sure its a billion calories. So we set off on our bus (which by the way was Finding Nemo themed) to this crazy temple on a mountain top. The bus ride is not for those who get bus sick. The roads to this temple are full of hair pin turns and you are [...]

  Today was a busy day in Bangkok. It is amazing how helpful it is to have a guide to help you around a city. We started off walking down our hotel street to the Ferry Docks. We had no idea we were so close to the public ferry. Also you had to go down a hidden side street, so not knowing how to read Thia, I’m not confident I would have found it. One thing about Thai Ferries, they boot it. They are not the slow ferries that we have in Canada.   The Ferry took us to The Grand Palace. [...]

Good morning Thailand. Hello Jet-lag. So I always thought that Jet-lag was a myth that lazy people made up. Well I’ve learned I am wrong. And 12 hours difference is rough. After scrapping myself outta bed, me and Andrew forced ourselves to go find some lunch and explore the Thailand markets. After realizing we were out of our element we settled on a “Paris cafe” restaurant and watched the world go by. We also watched a lot of Monks go by, mostly drinking Starbucks. On the way back, we s [...]

Welcome to Bangkok. After 26 hours of flight, Andrew and I arrived in Bangkok just after midnight. We jumped into a taxi, and hoped that our cab driver was indeed driving us to our hotel and not taking us to a crazy place. I was amazed to see that they have highways equal to those in Canada. They had condos going up beside the highways and flashing lights every where. There was definitely a moment of panic when our taxi turned down a street that was filled with people. We drove through [...]