TravelStream™ news feed for member bassalleckj on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/bassalleckj en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Mon, 02 Mar 2009 02:30:41 -0500 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1231167600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1231167600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1231167600/tpod.html Mon, 02 Mar 2009 02:30:41 -0500 Bonaire - diving and and exploring

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Kralendijk, Netherlands Antilles

This was the primary purpose for our trip, and we thoroughly enjoyed the diving. There are unspoiled reefs teeming with life, no crowds, perfect weather, 80oF water, calm seas, and no current to speak of. The best thing about it is the easy diving access. Shore diving is very rare most places, and it makes Bonaire very special. You can dive all up and down the west coast, and reach almost every dive site by driving up, walking a few steps (over sharp coral - need good footwear), and swimming out a few yards. The reefs start at about 20 ft and go down to 80-100 ft.

We took advantage of Buddy Dive's "Dive and Drive" package - a good deal. It includes unlimited shore diving (i.e., unlimited tank refills), and a truck with a wooden rack in the back, so you can just throw ... OK, place ... your tanks in the back of your truck and head out for a dive or two. We also paid for 6 boat dives. There's an uninhabited island not far offshore called Klein Bonaire, with dive sites all the way around, and the boat dives generally go there. The diving is no better, however, and we generally preferred doing our own thing to diving with a larger group. It was nice being there for 13 days; we didn't feel we needed to make 2-3-4 dives every day, yet we certainly had plenty of opportunity to see and do what we wanted to.

We got Nitrox certified while we were there - convenient and cheaper to do it right on-site. Nitrox is a gas blend with relatively more oxygen and less nitrogen than normal compressed air. It allows you, within limits (the increased oxygen level has its own set of problems), to make longer, deeper dives, and more dives in one day. We didn't really need Nitrox on Bonaire, but it will come in handy in the future.

We had tremendous fun with the new underwater camera and housing Bernd bought just before this trip. We played with it and took lots of photos - the best of which are included here. It is non-trivial to take these underwater photos, even though we know a decent amount about photography and studied up on various aspects of using this camera and underwater photography in general before we left home. We're not the most experienced divers, either, and it's very difficult to deal with tricky lighting considerations and macro or zoom settings while also photographing a fish that's swimming away from you while you're swimming, trying to maintain your buoyancy, and see what you're doing through your mask and camera housing. This last aspect was particularly difficult for Bernd, who is very near sighted. He has corrective lenses in his mask, which work beautifully for looking at purty things in the distance, but make it difficult to read smallish indicators right in front of your face.

Still, out of the large number of pictures we took, a few of them turned out very well. Thank goodness this is a digital camera and we're not using film and flashbulbs for all these photos! We were happy with the results of our first attempt. Hope you enjoy them, too. I've uploaded LOTS of photos for your viewing pleasure - though not nearly as many as we took. :-)

Night diving is quite a unique experience. The colors look very different at night, as your light illuminates a lot of very intense red and orange colors that you rarely see during the daytime. This is because the water filters out these wavelengths from the sunlight and you see primarily blues and greens. It's a whole different world at night. It was a little disconcerting, but fun, when a huge ~5½ ft-long tarpon, affectionately named Charlie by the Buddy Dive staff, and his 4 ft-long buddy swam along with us ... and between us, close enough to touch ... for 20 minutes or so. (Divers tend to flush out smaller critters with their lights, which make easy pickings for the tarpons.)

Most of what we saw and photographed were small, colorful reef fish, corals, sponges, gorgonians, and anemones or worms (stationary objects are easier to photograph!). There were lots of very colorful parrot fish, which tend to stay pretty shallow and scrape algae from the coral with their "beaks". We also saw a couple of small sea turtles, some squid, eels, and one sea horse! I saw a small stingray and a 2-ft long barracuda, but we didn't get photographs. We didn't see any sharks, dolphins, or really large fish (except Charlie the tarpon and a mongo 3½-ft long porcupine fish). We also didn't see any octopus, although others did. Every place I've been diving, has both many similarities and some marked differences. Hawaii these days has lots of turtles and rays; I've been diving with sea lions and seen a tiger shark in California; the south pacific had giant clams and impressive lionfish; Belize had really cool Caribbean lobsters; we saw several sea horses off of Saba further northeast in the Caribbean; and Ko Phi Phi in Thailand had amazing bubble coral and clown fish (Nemos). It's always fun and interesting. It's hard to pick a favorite dive spot, but Bonaire ranks right up with the best dive and snorkel spots I've experienced. I highly recommend it.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230822000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230822000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230822000/tpod.html Fri, 27 Feb 2009 01:12:22 -0500 Bonaire - diving and and exploring

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Kralendijk, Netherlands Antilles

We stayed at Buddy Dive Resort just north of the main town of Kralendijk. It's a nice place, though not fancy, and reasonably priced. Bonaire is not a particularly cheap place to stay or eat. They have to import everything, and there isn't a lot of infrastructure. When we were there 5 years ago, we stayed at the Plaza Resort, which is the largest on the island ... still not huge at 250 rooms. Many accommodations specialize in dive packages. They have other activities, but the whole island is geared primarily toward divers. Buddy Dive has a lot of family-oriented activities and larger accommodations, so there were may groups of extended families and friends. It would be fun to go with a larger group.

It was obvious that the place had been repainted recently and the outside fixed up. The room and furnishings were fairly old, with faucets and appliances that had seen better days. Still, everything worked and it was comfortable and spacious enough. We stayed in a "studio"; though next time we'll spring for a 1-bedroom apartment. Our biggest complaint was that there was no covered front porch or screen door. Because the door was the only way to create a breeze through the room, we had some problems with mosquitoes. It wasn't terrible (this isn't a very humid climate), and mosquito coils helped, but somewhat annoying. The apartments had nice covered porches with tables and chairs, sliding glass doors with screens, and more windows.

There was a very nice pool (3 pools total), deck chairs, restaurant, and a pool bar with great sunset views, good ½ price happy hour drinks every evening, interesting slide presentations/talks, and good food several nights a week. The best thing was the long dock/pier area over the water, where you can take a boat or dive straight off the dock. The reef directly offshore had some of the best diving on the island. Oh yeah, and they had a drive-up SCUBA tank fill station!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230649200/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230649200/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230649200/tpod.html Sat, 21 Feb 2009 01:30:58 -0500 Bonaire - diving and and exploring

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Kralendijk, Netherlands Antilles

Being from New Mexico, we have a definite affinity for deserts. We like the desert itself, but also the clear air and blue skies that go along with that type of environment; this is also the case with Bonaire. Bonaire is covered with cacti. You can't walk 10 feet through the native landscape without your way being blocked by VERY spiny vegetation. They make fences out of cacti ... it's about the only thing that keeps out the goats. It's remarkable to look out across all the cacti and see the ocean. I'm pretty sure there are not even any native palm trees.

There are some mangroves. The mangroves are especially important as a fish "nursery", where the young fish can hide out in the shallow protected waters. When we were there 5 years ago we kayaked and snorkeled in the mangroves. It was neat to see little 4-inch long barracuda and other miniature fish.

There are many colorful and interesting birds (guidebook says 130 species). The caribbean parakeets were really fun to watch and listen to. They were very difficult to photograph, however. We didn't have the appropriate camera and tripod for such shots. There was a bird called a troupial, which looks like a large baltimore oriole. They have a type of parrot as well, but they are very rare and we didn't see any. The most interesting birds are the flamingos! Bonaire has the largest nesting colony in the western hemisphere (10,000-15,000). They love the remote, shallow salt ponds. We haven't seen huge numbers of them; for that you need to be there in March-April, and you still mostly see them from a distance. They're extremely shy. We did manage to get relatively close to some a couple of times. They're fascinating birds.

The entire northern third of Bonaire is a 13,500-acre national park, called Washington-Slagbaai. It's a wonderful, remote place with dirt roads and very little traffic. We only drove up there one day this trip, and one day during our previous visit. It requires most of a day to make the trip. I'll enclose some photos from that outing.

There are a lot of lizards throughout the island, but they're especially prevalent in the national park. The particular variety they have on Bonaire (Bonaire Whiptail Lizard) are large (10-14 inches long) and often have very bright turquoise color on their tails. They're absolutely fearless, and you have to be pretty careful when eating your picnic lunch, or they'll be carrying it ... and you ... away! There are also some pretty large iguanas - really neat beasties.

I think the only native mammals are bats, but the early settlers brought in donkeys and goats, which have gone wild and wander all over the island. They have a wild donkey rescue center where they try to provide food and water for some of the wild donkeys. I don't care for the goats, but they're the only livestock that can survive in that harsh environment, and some of the local people still rely on them for food and milk.

Then of course there's all the underwater life ... subject of another blog entry. We never saw any large fish or sea creatures. A few sharks and dolphins are spotted periodically further offshore. We did see some flying fish from the dive boat, which are really cool ... they look to me like giant dragonflies, zipping along just above the water. (No photos, sorry!)
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230463800/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230463800/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/3/1230463800/tpod.html Mon, 16 Feb 2009 01:14:03 -0500 Bonaire - diving and and exploring

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Kralendijk, Netherlands Antilles

Bonaire - Bonaire is a fairly small (116 square miles), sparsely populated (15,000 people) island in the southern Caribbean. It's part of the "ABC Islands" - Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao. It sits 50 miles off the coast of Venezuela. The island is very dry (~18 inches of rain per year) and is covered with cacti and thorny plants. It also has no real sand beaches; the shoreline is covered with large chunks of coral. There's only one small casino, and while the pier can accommodate 2 cruise ships, the passengers tend to only go ashore in the main town for 1-2 hours at a time and maybe take a driving tour around the island. There's very little to do, not much shopping or entertainment, and they get few tourists. Have I made it sound unappealing? Good! We like it the way it is.

We love the place. It's best known for diving and snorkeling. The conditions are awesome, and the coral reef is in very good condition. The surrounding waters have been a protected marine reserve since 1979. The variety of hard and soft corals, sponges, and gorgonians is fantastic, with a huge variety of colorful fish. We made this trip specifically for diving. We went to Bonaire 5 years ago and thoroughly enjoyed it. Bernd was not certified for SCUBA at the time, so I went on 2-3 dives, but mostly we snorkeled and explored the island. This time we stayed at a dive resort and went on at least one dive every day. Bernd bought an underwater camera, housing, and external flash just before the trip, so we had lots of fun taking underwater photos. See the separate entry for photos.

Bonaire lies south of the hurricane belt, so the weather is pretty ideal and they experience few destructive storms. 99% of the time, the steady trade winds blow from east to west across the island. The east, windward coast is extremely rugged and constantly pounded by surf. The west coast is always calm, with no waves and little current - ideal for swimming, snorkeling, and diving. Unfortunately, last year Hurricane Omar, while it didn't hit the island, caused a huge storm surge for several days as big waves pounded the normally calm west coast. It damaged some buildings that sat close to shore (the water came up as high as the deck on the second floor of our hotel restaurant), and damaged some of the coral near shore.

Bonaire is part of the Netherlands Antilles; they recently voted to strengthen their ties to the Netherlands and are basically regular Netherlands citizens (as I understand it - their status has changed recently). There are direct flights from Amsterdam. The official language is Dutch, many people speak Spanish, and almost everyone speaks English as well. The local language is a Creole language called Papiamento - a combination of Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, and African languages from former slaves. The people are very laid-back and friendly. There is very little crime.

The island's physical environment is pretty unfriendly to human habitation and development. It doesn't support much agriculture or industry. There used to be a couple of larger "plantations," growing aloe, divi divi trees (the seed pods were used to tan animal hides), and goats. There are no good fresh water sources on the island; they primarily use desalination to produce drinking water. The biggest export over the years has been salt. There are large, shallow saltpans that flood and then evaporate, leaving behind salt. Originally they used slaves to work the saltpans and load the salt onto ships. They still "mine" salt, and you can see huge mountains of it. They also have a large complex of oil tanks. Oil companies from Venezuela and Mexico store oil there, and then buyers load the oil directly from the storage tanks into their tankers. Apparently it's cheaper and easier for the purchasers to reach these islands (others do the same thing) than travel to the different mainland ports.

We had a wonderful time. We were there 13 days and stayed in one place the entire time. I was asked whether we would get bored (compare this to our 2-month trip where we moved to a new spot every couple of days). It worked perfectly for us. We were there long enough that we didn't feel pressured to dive, dive, dive multiple times each day. We could take it easy, enjoy a leisurely pace, do some exploring, some hanging out, and still get in a lot of our favorite activities. We had some great food, too! There were a number of very good international restaurants.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/japan_se_asia07/1190908800/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/japan_se_asia07/1190908800/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/japan_se_asia07/1190908800/tpod.html Sun, 13 Apr 2008 01:55:04 -0400 Jerry Sue & Bernd's adventures in Japan

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Tsukuba, Japan

First, let me introduce myself and my husband. My name is Jerry Sue Bassalleck, and my husband is Bernd. We live in Albuquerque, NM, in the US. Bernd is a physicist, collaborating with Japanese colleagues at KEK, the Japanese high energy accelerator facility. He will be spending two months in Japan, and I'm tagging along for the trip. I am able to work part-time via the Internet while we're here in Japan. At the end of these two months, we're taking the opportunity to thoroughly explore a part of the world we've never visited before ... SE Asia and Bhutan. We love to travel, and take every opportunity afforded to do so.

We arrived after a very long flight, followed by waiting at Narita and a 1.5 hour bus ride to Tsukuba followed by a short taxi ride. We're staying in a small furnished apartment provided at a very reasonable cost by KEK. It is a bit cramped and is nothing fancy, but is certainly sufficient. It has a nice big refrigerator, a combo convection oven/microwave, a small washer/dryer, a comfortable bed, and most importantly, a good high-speed internet connection.

Fortunately, there are translations of most of the instructions for operating appliances ... with the exception of the rice cooker; I think I'll just cook my rice in a regular pan.

An interesting observation is that, while food in the grocery stores is VERY expensive, from any perspective ... e.g., fresh fruit of any sort is typically > $1 each piece ... it is not very expensive to eat out. We have the impression that many Japanese people go out quite a bit. You can cook and eat reasonably well if you stick to rice, noodles, locally produced produce, and just enough meat or fish to provide flavor. It is refreshing to eat healthy, smaller portions, and not encounter all the obesity we have in the US. The Japanese are acquiring the fast food habit and are gradually gaining weight, but not to the degree that much of the world is.

We're managing pretty well, in spite of some language barriers :-). Many people here do not speak any English, nor do we speak Japanese, and most of the signs are not in western script. I'll tell you what - grocery shopping is quite the adventure!!! There are a lot of things that are totally unrecognizable. We're taking a free Japanese language class, but it's a very difficult language, especially the writing. We're learning the hiragana and katakana characters (71 characters in each from our first lesson), but it doesn't help much because most words are written at least partially in kanji - Chinese characters!

We were able to borrow bicycles from Bernd's group here at KEK, and we also rented a car. Driving is something of an adventure, as they drive on the left side of the road, and the signs are not always written in western script. We're getting better at navigating, however, and even I have braved the streets of Tsukuba.

Tsukuba (pronounced like SCUBA diving) is a modern "science city," built from scratch in the 1960's. There are approximately 200,000 inhabitants and a number of scientific, university, and national institutes. It is not a typical Japanese city, but has wide, well-signed streets, plenty of land and parking, etc. This is by no means a tourist area, and there are many traditional farms in the area. Mount Tsukuba (Tsukubasan), 877 m (2,877 ft) - we're at about 100 m here at KEK, is a few kilometers away. It offers good hiking and sight-seeing opportunities. We drove up there one day and will go back for hiking sometime soon.

We get out and explore as much as possible. Last weekend we went to the pacific coast north of here and then to Kasama, a town known for its pottery and arts and crafts. This weekend we'll venture to Tokyo (NOT with the car - we're not stupid!) and perhaps go hiking up on Tsukubasan. I'll post separate entries for these trips.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1200351600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1200351600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1200351600/tpod.html Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:43:14 -0400 Viet Nam, Cambodia, Bhutan, and Thailand

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States

Because of the length and complexity of this trip (2 months, 21 hotels, 13 airline flights, 2 train trips, and 10+ boat trips, not to mention travels by car), we worked with a tour agent to set everything up ... and pay for most of it ... ahead of time. We worked through IExplore.com, and would heartily recommend them to anyone; they were wonderful! Without exception, the logistics worked flawlessly; the accommodations were clean, comfortable, and hospitable; and the tour guides knowledgeable and helpful. Some of the guides were outstanding resources, and I've mentioned those individually in my blog entries.

With the exception of some beach resorts where we chose to spend free time and made our own arrangements, we had a personal, local tour guide and driver at each destination. We did not participate in group tours, but rather got private tours of various sites, mixed liberally with free time to explore on our own. The mix worked well for us, but IExplore will customize any trip according to the client's preferences.

If anyone has any questions about arrangements, costs, accommodations, sights to see, or things to do, We'll be happy to share with you our thoughts and impressions. Please just comment on this blog (I'll receive an email notice) or email me directly.

Thanks for your patience. It's been nearly 3 months since we returned from this trip, and I apologize for taking so long to get the blog up to date. Still, at least you'll have an opportunity to read about and look through some pictures of our adventures. Thanks again for joining us!!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1198616400/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1198616400/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1198616400/tpod.html Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:41:09 -0400 Viet Nam, Cambodia, Bhutan, and Thailand

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Bangkok, Thailand

We flew back to Bangkok from Bhutan on Christmas Day. Bangkok´s new, modern airport is impressive, the largest in Asia. As a side note, every airline we flew on - Bangkok Air, Thai Air, Vietnam Airlines, Siem Reap Airlines, and even tiny Druk Air - had wonderful service and served food and free alcohol even on very short flights of an hour or so. It was a stark contrast to American carriers in recent years; on American Airlines they charged for wine even on the long overseas flights to and from Japan.
Bangkok is a very modern city of 10+ million with highrises, wide, divided highways, drivers who obey stoplights, motorcycle riders who wear helmets, etc. In other words,
boring! ;>) They have plenty of big city problems - rich/poor divide, traffic congestion, etc. However, on our visit it seemed to be a relatively clean, very modern place that ran pretty well. We´ve heard and read that traffic is horrendous, but our hotel was in the middle of the financial district, and we didn´t experience traffic nearly as bad as in Vietnam, for instance. They´ve also clearly done a good job over the years of reducing pollution. The flip-side of Thailand´s modernity and connectedness was that it was more global/generic and not quite as interesting/different to us as tourists. Everything is relative, of course, and it was nice to be back in the modern world as well.
Our hotel was very modern and comfortable. We especially enjoyed the easy, free, fast internet access and the broad choice of international TV stations. I also enjoyed the Starbucks down the street, where I could get a decaf. We caught up a bit with our e-mail and current events in the rest of the world. It worked nicely because we stayed in the same hotel three separate times and left extra luggage, e.g., our beach and diving stuff when we went to Bhutan, or our warm sweaters and boots/hiking sticks when we went down to the beaches of southern Thailand.
We thoroughly enjoyed walking around, exploring Bangkok on foot and via river taxi as well as long-tail speed boat. We went to the flower market (amazing and colorful variety), the enormous weekend market with hundreds of stalls, numerous Buddhist temples, the rabbit warrens of Chinatown, street markets and street kitchens serving up wonderful smelling Thai curries, fresh fruit, and other delicious offerings.
The Thai food was fantastic nearly everywhere we went. It was my favorite before this trip (there are many wonderful Thai restaurants in Albuquerque - my theory is that this is because of our appreciation of spicy food), and our trip simply reinforced that opinion. Our favorite dish was a spicy duck salad at a little restaurant in Bangkok, called Ban Chiang - named after a district in NE Thailand. We went back to that same place 3-4 times.
Our guide took us to Wat Arun (Temple of the Dawn), a Khmer-style set of stupas/ "chedis" and towers, then across the river to the Royal Palace and the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. It was all fascinating to see and crowded with tourists, a dramatic contrast to Bhutan! The whole compound of the Royal Palace is incredibly colorful, elaborate, and ornate....generally overwhelming and over the top. It is beautiful, but made us appreciate the understated Japanese aesthetic sensibilities.
Ayuthaya: We also made a day trip to Ayuthaya, 86 km north of Bangkok. We drove there in the morning and took a riverboat back in the afternoon. Ayuthaya was the old capital of Siam, from 1350 to 1767, when it was sacked by the Burmese and burned to the ground. It´s a fascinating place, surrounded by three major rivers, with remains of wats (temples), royal buildings, and ancient walls everywhere. I would like to spend a few days exploring the town sometime. We visited ancient wats built in the Khmer style - much of modern-day Thailand was part of the Khmer empire, and the Thais eventually overran and defeated the Khmer in 1630. There is still some remaining animosity between the Thais and the Cambodians. We also visited the current royal family´s summer palace, a beautiful set of buildings, ponds, fountains, and manicured grounds, built by King Rama V, Chulalongkorn, the prince in "The King and I." Interestingly, that musical and related films are banned in Thailand because they´re seen as compromising the dignity of the monarchy. King Rama IV is revered as the king who reunited, modernized, and strengthened the nation, and opened up ties to the rest of the world.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1197397800/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1197397800/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1197397800/tpod.html Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:40:25 -0400 Viet Nam, Cambodia, Bhutan, and Thailand

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Tonle Sap, Cambodia

South of Siem Reap, Tonle Sap is the largest freshwater lake in Asia, part of the Mekong. We went through the last permanent village, above the high water line. Then we saw the rice paddies they were starting to plant as the water level dropped. The make-shift houses on stilts are picked up and moved up to 8 times per year (!!), following the water level. It's a fascinating sight, as the lake is surrounded by floating villages. Due to the swelling of the Mekong river and the reversing flow of the Tonle Sap river, the area covered by this lake changes from ~3,000 square km at the end of the dry season (Apr/May) to ~13,000 square km during the rainy season (June - Oct).
We got to see a little bit of how people live in the countryside. Everyone farms, mostly rice. In 1991 each family was given one hectare of land. They have bought, sold, and traded since then with property values in the towns skyrocketing. Out in the countryside they have huge fields, and neighbors and community members work together to plant and harvest. They have lots of sugar palms. We got to see how they collect the juice (7-8 liters per tree per day!) high up in the tree, boil the juice/syrup, and make sugar out of it. They also make palm wine, eat the fruit, and make and sell baskets made from the leaves - a very useful tree! Interesting side note: our car (a Toyota Camry) had the steering wheel on the right side, even though they drive on the right side (same as in Viet Nam, left side in Japan, Thailand, and Bhutan). We were told that this configuration costs about half as much as the other one - seems very odd and very hard to believe. Maybe they're donated or sold cheaply from Japan?
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196960400/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196960400/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196960400/tpod.html Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:39:35 -0400 Viet Nam, Cambodia, Bhutan, and Thailand

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Chau Doc, Vietnam

We had lots of good food during our time in Viet Nam ... it still can't begin to compare with Thai food though - the best!! The soups are very good, and in fact we had Pho (the traditional noodle soup they eat for breakfast) from a street kitchen at 6 AM one day. We tried to go for fresh or steamed food rather than fried to avoid some of the grease. You have to be careful, though, of the fresh veggies and the water.
We weren't able to drink the tap water anywhere on this trip (since Japan), which is pretty unusual for us ... reminds me of traveling in Mexico as a kid. We bought a neat gadget called a "Steri-pen" that sterilizes drinking water using UV light. It's quick and easy, saves on plastic bottles, and I only got sick one time briefly. I still don't know if it was the hot HOT Cambodian peppers or something else.
The meals in Viet Nam were very inexpensive, even at posh restaurants. We paid between $7 and $23 (for both of us) for all of our meals, including beer. Of course, $7 = 112,000 Vietnamese dong (VND), so it was very difficult to remember or figure out how much things cost. Keeping track of many different currencies was pretty tough - while we were there it was approximately 117 Yen:$1; 16,000 VND; 4,000 Cambodian Riel; 40 Bhutanese Ngultrum (tied to Indian Rupee value); and 33 Thai Bhat. I relied heavily on Bernd, for whom mental arithmetic and memory of numbers is second nature. I felt like a total idiot half the time. Other than in Bhutan, where the locals are very poor but they cater to wealthy tourists (can't blame them, we were happy to contribute to the local economy) and Japan, everything in SE Asia was very reasonable and often dirt cheap.
The Vietnamese really like their beer and make some pretty good varieties - all light lagers, but fairly tasty. We also enjoyed lots of fresh coconut, mango, watermelon, pineapple, and mandarin/orange juice and shakes, smoothies, ice cream, etc. Yum ... we'll miss those. Bernd also enjoyed the Vietnamese coffee; I can't handle the caffeine in regular coffee, so had to go without most of the time, as even the fancy hotels and restaurants rarely served decaf. Tea was always available and good.
We saw some amazing things that people eat in Viet Nam, meaning they eat almost anything and everything. One problem is fishermen using electric shock to kill fish. It's illegal, but they still do it. Many fishermen have moved to Cambodia and fish are disappearing. Vietnamese eat bats, horse, dogs, snakes, rats, insects, and many other grosser animals. They also eat every part of each animal. I'm not sure where they get the dogs, as there are millions of them everywhere - tolerated and/or loved as pets.
One day in the Mekong delta, our guide stopped to buy rat meat - a delicacy his uncle loves. He quickly pointed out that these are rice paddy "vegetarian" rats - they would NEVER eat dirty city rats. We had no idea these would be live rats that they selected, killed, skinned, and gutted on the spot ... in ~3 minutes flat. Whew. He invited us to try some at a restaurant, but I couldn't quite bring myself to do it. (I'm generally pretty adventurous and tried guinea pig in Peru, but didn't care for it.) We did have horsemeat once, which was quite good.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196946000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196946000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bassalleckj/se_asia_07-08/1196946000/tpod.html Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:38:53 -0400 Viet Nam, Cambodia, Bhutan, and Thailand

Jump to the full
entry & travel map

Can Tho, Vietnam

Our next stops were Can Tho and then Chau Doc, both on the Mekong. It was fascinating to see life along this important river and in the delta. Many people rely almost exclusively on the river - they live on it, fish, move around by boat (typically long-tailed engine boats or the traditional sampans, where they stand and row), grow rice and vegetables, etc. We particularly enjoyed the floating markets, floating villages, and fish farms we visited. In Can Tho the government is moving people from their stilt houses (no sewage system) into apartments and giving them jobs in industrial plants. Our guide indicated that they're looking forward to this, but of course it does represent a huge change in lifestyle. Overall we really enjoyed the Mekong Delta.
We took a speedboat up the mighty Mekong to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. It struck us to be an amazingly huge river. Millions of people's lives and livelihoods depend on it, which makes it very worrisome that China is planning so many massive dams way upstream.
]]>