Wednesday 31 December 2008

Day 7 – Siem Reap

December 31st 2008

Feeling much brighter today, we've arranged to meet our driver at 10am to take us to Angkor Thom, the fortified city, so a light breakfast at the hotel and we're on the road. The heat of yesterday has definitely dropped a little too so as we make our way along the bumpy roads the breeze could almost be considered cold – well not quite but it's a relief all the same.

Passing Angkor Wat for the 2nd time we head into Angkor Thom through the southern gate and about a mile or so later stop at Bayon, the main temple in the exact centre of the city. While it's showing it's age – at 800 years old we'll let it off – this is beginning to feel more like it, a labyrinth of passages and steps with, so the guidebook says, 216 faces of the King staring down at you everywhere you look. As we walk round can't help thinking that one day they'll stop people doing what we're doing now, they'll have to just to stop the stone from being worn away, feel lucky and guilty all at the same time...

A short walk passing by a huge stone Buddha and we're at Bauphuon - “the world's largest jigsaw puzzle”. On a much smaller scale, the layout of Bauphuon is similar to Angkor Wat, only problem is that during the mid 1900s the whole place was taken apart as weather/vegetation was steadily destroying the buildings, work stopped during the civil war and all records of the stones were lost. The task now is to rebuild the whole site from stones that were scattered over 10km sq. The French are backing it and according to their sign work will be completed in September 2009, hmmm, je ne croix pas.

Back to our driver, who seems to be able to pick us out of a crowd at 50 yards, and a short hop to 2 terraces – Terrace of the Elephants and Terrace of the Leper King, the former of which is 300m long and would've been where the King watched parades from, all very impressive.

Driving again and out of Angkor Thom, passing by Ta Keo, to get to Ta Promh. Apparently used as a set for Tomb Raider, this place is remarkable by the ravages of nature that have taken such a tight hold on much of the masonry. Like Bayon, another labyrinth of passageways although without the steps, we find a quiet corner to study the guidebooks and have a rest. Being a bit slow on the uptake it hits me that this whole area is simply a vast city with all the non religious buildings taken out. In Bangkok, the Wat's were on almost every corner, if you took out all the hotels/shops etc then you'd be left with something like we have here in Angkor, and as only the religious buildings were made of stone these are the ones that were left. Angkor was apparently a thriving metropolis of 1m people when London was a town of 50,000, so it's all making sense now...

We ask our driver to take us to the museum – without being specific this could've meant 1 of 2 places, the Land Mine Museum or the Angkor Museum, and we get the latter. Unfortunately our driver can't park right outside so we have to fix a time for him to collect us and ultimately we don't really give ourselves enough time to enjoy this place properly, but the gallery of 1,000 Buddhas is worth the entrance fee alone.

Back to the hotel and we bid farewell to our driver. $20 for today, a 5 hour personal taxi service, excellent.

As it's still only mid afternoon we head down to Bar Street for some late lunch, which is at the other end of this small town so is a good excuse to simply see what goes on here. We have tickets for the Hotel's New Year's Eve party tonight, which appear to have come as part of our booking, it's going to be a toss up between here and Bar Street (the band are murdering Europe's The Final Countdown while soundchecking so maybe it will be Bar St) either way I'm expecting a more subdued New Year's Eve than normal as we fly off to Vietnam tomorrow.

Day 6 – Siem Reap

December 30th 2008

Woken at 8am by someone wishing to make up our room – will give him the benefit of the doubt today, maybe the Do Not Disturb sign had fallen off – have a snooze before heading down for Breakfast which unusually, but very welcome, for this trip is included in our stay.

As I'm still feeling a little fragile we decide to limit our movements today so as to see much more tomorrow. So around lunchtime we venture out of the hotel to head for Angkor Wat itself.

We immediately flag down one of the official Tuk Tuk (not quite the same as Thailand, more of a motorbike towing a small carriage on the back) drivers and are heading off on some of the worst roads imaginable to Angkor Wat.

When it does level out though this is a great way to travel. Again, nobody's going too fast so it's just a case of allowing the cooling breeze to wash over you. Our driver, who's English, like most people we've encountered here, is incredible, points out various things on the way and helps us get the correct ticket from the booth.

So, Angkor Wat. Well, it is of course spectacular but... The but is that given all the guidebook and general hype we're expecting something that could never actually meet our expectations and so while it seems almost crazy to say this we're perhaps a little disappointed. Angkor Wat is vast, and given its age that alone is incredible. What's left of the carvings etc are fascinating and you can only imagine what it must've been like when it was built. Unlike the Golden Palace of Bangkok though it isn't a feast for the eyes and while I'm taking photos of course there isn't the variety of things to actually look at.

We managed to come during the quiet part of the day so when we do leave a few hours later the whole place is teaming with people. Remarkably we find our driver almost straightaway and it's back to the hotel. Different route, slightly better roads! Before he goes we book him for tomorrow.

Evening in the hotel to catch up with journals. Big day tomorrow going to Angkor Thom and perhaps some other places, we'll see. Oh, and it's New Year's Eve of course so hopefully we'll be able to party a bit too.

Day 5 – Bangkok to Siem Reap

December 29th 2008

Alarm goes off at 9am to go to the gym in our hotel – do we? Erm, no, back to sleep for a while.

Simple morning of packing up ready for our pickup at 11:45am. Our driver is early and we're away from the hotel into the heavy Bangkok traffic. While this driver actually inspires confidence, he's perhaps the most miserable person we've come across in Bangkok which is a bit of a shame but no complaints as we get to the airport in good time.

The whole checkin experience is incredibly efficient. I don't know if this is due to a lack of people travelling or this is how it always is but we're checked in within 5 minutes and through passport control in 10.

With 2 hours to kill then within the airport – which is also vast, think T1, T2, T3 all put together – we settle into a cafe for lunch and catch up on our journals. After we finish our sandwiches and I'm typing away, with no prompting one of the serving staff walks over and hands me a piece of paper with a wifi username/password – these are really nice people the Thais.

We're flying Bangkok Airlines, “Asia's Boutique Airline” - well not sure what that means but the service is efficient and we leave on time.

It's only a short hop to Siem Reap, no sooner have they handed out the (unexpected) lunchbox than the captain is announcing 25 minutes to landing. On approach we fly over a huge flooded area, is this a delta, I think so but did give up geography in the 3rd year so not sure – it's certainly not an unexpected flood as we can just pick out houses in there, people are living on the flood plain with houses on massive stilts.

Siem Reap airport doesn't get that much traffic, yet. We land, get to the end of the runway, turn round, and taxi back down the same runway to get to the terminal building! Hong Kong used to be like this but at least you taxied alongside the runway not actually on it. There is 1 other active plane on the tarmac with 2 others that look like they're in for a good while.

The e-visa we got at the last minute certainly pays dividends as we avoid a queue comprising of about 2/3rds of the people on the flight who have to buy their visa before passport control, we're through in 5 minutes.

Our driver is waiting for us, another phew moment, and we head for the hotel. This is definitely backwater Asia we've just hit. At least 10 or 20 motorbikes for every car on the road, seemingly no rules of the road other than everyone has right of way, but thankfully nobody is actually going fast enough to cause any problems.

Or hotel, the Somadevi Angkor, is well placed just back from the main street through Siem Reap and is excellent. The air conditioning in our room is powerful stuff so when we do head back out in the evening for a bit of a wander it's like walking round with a bonfire permanently in front of you, the heat hits you in the face and there's a constant smoky aroma in the air. The “hassle” from outside the oasis of our hotel is nowhere near as bad as I was expecting. The Cambodians take no for an answer it seems. We get as far as Bar Street, to check out possible New Year's Eve venues – a banner proclaims that the whole street will be the biggest party in town so that's promising but unfortunately I'm not feeling so good so we head back and call it a night.

Top tip, don't even bother with the local currency – while it's of course accepted everywhere, all pricing is in US$ so you find that you're constantly having to multiply all the prices by 4,000 to get to the price in Riel.

Day 4 – Bangkok

December 28th 2008

Nice lie in this morning, combination of beer and exhaustion from the night before but either way this is definitely a late start.

Leaving the hotel around 12:30 we took advantage of the hotel's free shuttle bus to one of the shopping centres approximately 2/3rds of the way to the main temples of Bangkok, which is our ultimate destination today.

Drop off at the MBK centre, first priority is to get something to eat so where else this festive period but Santa's? Yes, there is a fast food eatery – chain perhaps, who knows – in Bangkok called Santa's, complete with jolly picture of the man in red as their logo. Contemplate having the “Cheese with Cheese” baked potato, but go for one of their burgers instead – not quite McDonald's, which is round the corner and twice the price, but tasty enough.

Taxi to the Grand Palace which on the map appears to be just down the road. I'm forgetting though how vast this place is and it takes us a good 15/20 minutes to get there – and no funny business from the taxi driver either, following the route on the map, it simply takes ages to get anywhere in Bangkok.

The Grand Palace is just about the major attraction in Bangkok so it's busy but not in the same class as Chinatown. When we get into the central section though all thoughts of other people just disappear. This place is amazing and, so far, just about the most amazing man made place I've ever seen. Everywhere you look is just intricate works of gold, ceramics, the detail is incredible. I've probably taken about 100 photos here alone (they'll be edited by the time we get home!) simply because you feel you have to.

Shoes off, because this is also the home of the Emerald Buddha – unsurprisingly was also covered in plaster once and discovered to be green only after some of it flaked away. (These plaster coverings appear to have been security precautions so they weren't stolen in earlier invasions). This Buddha is quite small but no less impressive as it's carved from a solid piece of jade. Dressed in one of it's 3 seasonal costumes, presumably summer, it sits at the top of a huge throne. No photos allowed inside this one though I'm afraid.

Leaving the grand palace we head for Wat Pho the home of the reclining Buddha. The guidebook doesn't prepare you though for the scale of this one though, it's absolutely massive. Shoes off but photos allowed, have tried to do it justice but will probably have failed miserably. No time to go round the rest of this Wat complex as we need to get to Wat Arun, the Temple of the Dawn, which is across the river before it closes.

Just 5 minutes from WAT Pho is a pier where a water taxi/bus/whatever you'd like to call it takes people across the river. The fare is a wallet busting 6p each! Having taken the short hop over to the pier nearest to Wat Arun we're within a very different Wat complex which if I'd have been a betting man I'd have sworn was Hindhu, with it's “Prangs”and not a Buddha to be seen, but apparently it isn't and is indeed Buddhist. The central Prang is what we're all here for. 85 metres high and with incredibly steep steps to get up about 2/3rds of the way. The view from the top is great with the sun low in the sky behind us reflecting the light off all the gold elements from the Wat's on the other side of the river. A nice cooling breeze too make this a good place to stand for a while – that and the slightly scary prospects of having to get back down the steps!

Having been relieved of a further 6p to get back across the river we decide to try and get further down the river, back to River City – the place our dinner cruise left from – so we can get a Tuk Tuk the short hop to the Skytrain and therefore cover off 2 more Thai modes of transport not yet experienced.

Instead of waiting for the slow river bus, we end up sharing one of the long tail river taxis. Sharing because we refused to pay the 500bhat asked for (the bus was 15bhat), but there's always a deal to be done so others were found to share the price and we end up paying 80bhat each. This turns out to be a good move as in no time we're back at River City. The Germans who we're sharing with fail to understand the concept of the boat though and immediately try and jump out on arrival, one gentleman almost goes in as the boat lurches back out to the river on their momentum while a rather large lady manages to dive off the boat onto the quayside falling unceremoniously on my right foot – dear me...

Unfortunately, or fortunately depending which way you look at it, we can't get a Tuk Tuk. The usually over keen drivers don't seem to want to take us, firstly because we make it clear we don't want to swing by one of their “sponsors” - read a shop – and then another one we try to get just point blank refuses, which is all very strange. Oh well, it's only 20 minutes walk and with the sun almost down it feels quite cool.

Sky Train to Sala Deng and we're back in the Patphong region again, this time though it's to seek out a specific restaurant that's in all the guidebooks, the Mango Tree. The food is good although I think I was more fortunate with my choices than Sarah who didn't have such a great experience.

A short walk skirting the edges of Patphong to the nearest underground station and we're back at the hotel Amari Atrium for the last time. Might've started late but another day with lots crammed in and we're very tired, early to bed as we have a travelling day tomorrow.

Monday 29 December 2008

Day 3 – Bangkok

December 27th 2008

(Bit War and Peace this, we did do a lot this day but will be compressing things on later days, got a holiday to enjoy!)

Well the sleep that could've wiped the jetlag slate clean didn't quite materialise, wide awake at 5am but did manage to get back to sleep after a while. Up at 8:30am to meet “Miss Jenny” who I suppose was the equivalent of our holiday rep, an unexpected side-effect of booking aiport transfers. However, none of the hard sell here, Jenny turns out to be very pleasant, helpful, and is only interested in the tour we request to go on – more about that later.

We decide to give breakfast in the hotel a miss, £16 each is crazy money in Bangkok, and instead head off to Petchburi underground station for our first foray into Bangkok.

Bangkok's underground system only has 1 line, but it's very modern, air conditioned, has mobile phone transmitters in the carriages and our ticket, good for 7 stops and I reckon about 7 miles cost a whopping 50p each.

Stepping out at Hua Lamphong, Bangkok's main train station, you're immediately into what you think is the mad chaos of the city. Taxi and Tuk Tuk drivers all immediately offering their services. To escape, and conscious we still haven't eaten, we dive straight into Kafe Kafe, ultra modern Thai take on a western coffee house, cue pictures of Venice and the like on the walls etc – except I don't know of anywhere like this so it's very nice but a bit odd. Breakfast is egg, sausage, ham with (sweet) toast and butter, Sarah more adventurous with Pork Congee (a soup with rice and pork) – add in some drinks and for the sum total of £5 the £16 each at the hotel screams of daylight robbery.

Fed, watered, and armed with a plan we stride off stopping only for Sarah to have the first of many Asia style interrogations from a very friendly local who wants nothing more than to take an interest and practice his English.

First stop, The Golden Buddha, one of those Thai quirks, was apparently covered in plaster until they tried to move it, dropped it, the plaster split and they realised for the fist time that it was actually gold underneath! The Buddha is certainly very impressive, larger than life. We have to remove our shoes before going in, this turns out to be the norm at all such monuments and I'm certainly glad to have worn sandles! Looks like they're building a new home for the Golden Buddha, or perhaps it's in a temporary home at the moment, either way it'll be a more fitting place as at the moment the room is quite small.

Two more conversations later, the first a dentist from Chiang Mai, the second the local community policeman, a quick visit to a Chinese Buddha (another conversation) and we're walking into Chinatown. This is where the chaos of the train station seems like a tranquil stroll in the park. It is madness. The main street is crazy enough, thousands of people forced into single file as market stalls are setup on both the inside and street side of the pavement so perhaps best to get onto one of the side streets for a break? Not a chance, they're even crazier. More people, more market stalls, only this time there are still vehicles – including vans – crawling through spaces that are no wider than the vehicles themselves. We step to one side to let them through but nobody else seems bothered and we end up feeling like we've held the pedestrian traffic up! The whole thing is hillarious of course and we get back to the main road to carry on our slow journey. There does come a point where you start to wonder if the whole of Bangkok is like this, and if it is, how will we see any of it? Thankfully though it isn't, wouldn't have missed this bit of it but no desire to go back in a hurry.

We get to a clearer bit of road as Chinatown makes way for the Indian market area. Step into Wat Liap, which is incredibly pretty but is actually being used as a car park. As Wat novices you can't imagine anywhere would be nicer than this but of course there's a Wat on just about every corner and the really grand ones are to follow...

As the scale of our tourist map becomes clear we change direction and aim for the Golden Mountain which has been recommended to us a few times today and the guidebook points out that it has great views of the whole of Bangkok.

We walk past Wat Suthat to the Giant Swings which I can imagine is an impressive sight when they do make a swing out of it, which they do apparently, but is a bit of an anti-climax when we get there. As we sit and look at the map another friendly local comes for a chat, another itinerary is described in great detail, this gentleman is an English teacher which while reminding me that my Thai is non-existent does make me wonder whether his students actually learn anything useful, his English is pretty poor it has to be said. When he eventually leaves, and gets a safe distance away, we duly ignore his well meaning advice and head off in the opposite direction to the Golden Mountain.

The Golden Mountain is about as good a descriptive title as it gets. 300 or so steps around the outside of a small hill taking you up to another shoes off site with a huge gold dome on the top. The views from the top are extensive but you actually realise that Bangkok doesn't really have a spectacular skyline. There are the Wat's which are all low-rise, with some small skyscrapers in the distance. What you do get though is a real sense of just how incredibly vast Bangkok is. Much bigger than I was expecting, I don't know why, the population's more than London, but somehow I was still expecting something that would be easy to walk around.

Descending the Golden Mountain we head back to the main road with the intention of flagging down a taxi, our hotel is at least 6 miles away, perhaps more. Enter English teacher number 2, a wonderful older lady who simply walked up to us while looking at our map and asked what she could do to help. She runs us through our options and advises we get a canal boat – something we didn't even know existed. We walk with her for a while and she points us in the direction of the pier. This is real locals travelling and hasn't made it into our guidebooks for sure. Everything's in Thai with very few English words scattered around and it takes a while to get our bearings but somehow we figure out where we are, where we're going, and manage to pay the 25p each to travel the full distance directly back to within 150 yards of our hotel – it's a revelation and we're the only westerners on the boat.

Late snack lunch at the hotel, shower and change for our evening excursion. Pickup from the hotel and down to the river for our “Bangkok best seen by night dinner cruise”. Our driver drops us off an hour early but given the hit and miss traffic congestion this probably wasn't a bad idea. Gives us time to rehydrate – I was beginning to feel a bit wobbly at this point – in the River City shopping complex which is also air conditioned of course, which helps too.

The cruise itself is good. Buffet meal is better than usual for events like this we've been on previously and certainly some of the views are fantastic. The entertainment is, well, entertaining with a hilarious saxophone player who I genuinely think believed himself to be the most talented guy in Thailand. Maybe he was, who knows, but times must be hard... The lottery of who we'd be sitting nearest came out pretty well, we were placed next to a newly wed pair of Aussies who were pleasant conversation through the evening.

As the cruise was over by 9:30pm we had arranged for our driver to take us to the Night Market at Patphong rather than back to our hotel. Anyone who knows their Bangkok suburbs will be immediately familiar with the infamous Patphong and from the sheer horrendousness of it all we weren't disappointed. What was fairly shocking was that I thought I'd be insured against the constant pestering of the gentlemen trying to entice me into a “ping pong show” by having Sarah with me but no, we were both approached pretty equally. As quickly as we could we escaped down the next street which seemed much more friendly. Always a sucker for a cheap beer we entered The Balcony, where Chang (nice Thai lager, not quite Singha quality but good stuff) was 69bhat a bottle – about £1.40, not bad at all. Having been shown to our table Sarah eventually realised that we were the only mixed couple in the whole place (which was busy). Yes, the friendly side street was in fact the main gay bar street in town, from Canal Street to Soi 2 – it's a small world. Moving on we hit an Irish Bar imaginatively called O'Reilly's till closing time.

Haggled with a taxi driver to take us back to the hotel, got him down from 150bhat to 100bhat, then realised that was about £2 for a journey of 10/15 minutes, felt cheap, so tipped him anyway, and after a very long day indeed, finally to bed...

Saturday 27 December 2008

Day 2 – Dubai to Bangkok

December 26th 2008

Of course one of the things about travelling distance from West to East is that the day you're travelling becomes shortened so, while special as it was my first taste of Thailand and Sarah's first taste of Asia, this was predominantly a day of getting from A to B

Another full flight on Emirates – no credit crunch problems there I don't think – and a bit annoyingly placed in the middle 2 of the centre 4 seats. Stayed awake for 99% of this one, watched Ghost Town, a documentary on the battle between Netscape and Microsoft (yes yes, incredibly sad I know) and another film called The Happening with Mark Wahlberg, a bit like 'Survivors'...

On time into Bangkok airport, bit of a concrete jungle but pleasant enough, and mild panic as firstly I saw someone with a British passport that contained a Thai Visa, then we walked into the airport to pass the “Visa on Arrival” stand. Hang on a minute, we don't need one do we – that's what the guide books, internet, and travel agent all said? Well as it turned out, yes, correct, but when you've been travelling for 18 hours things do take on a slightly different perspective.

First transfer worked like clockwork, very friendly Thai gentleman (this is the land of smiles don't forget) to meet us and after some fellow travellers appeared we were ushered into a small minibus to take us to the Amari Atrium – which is very nice indeed thank you very much, no backpacking here! We even get our own “rep” in the morning, Miss Jenny will meet us at 9am to no doubt try and sell us as many excursions as possible during our whole 2 days here.

A good shower on getting to our room livened us up sufficiently to venture out of the hotel for something to eat rather than take the easy option here. With no real knowledge of the area just yet though we didn't venture far stopping at a Thai seafood restaurant where, as you'd probably imagine and it's all true, the fish is all laid out and you literally point to the ones you want. As we both had sea fish we didn't have to suffer the heartache of actually pointing to live fish in a tank – not after 2 hours in the country anyway, perhaps tomorrow :-) Beautifully fresh Sea Bass for Sarah and Red Snapper for me. First Asian cliché of the holiday on the first night too, the lack of “courses” when it comes to bringing the food – not that we ordered in courses, there wasn't even a menu, but soup (that really hot and spicy Thai fish soup that you keep your fingers away from your eyes or else), fish with rice and side vegetables seems straightforward. What came was rice, side vegetables, then soup and finally the fish – when it's ready it comes, this stuff's fresh!

Back in room, blog written, 11:15pm local time and I'm shattered. No immediate wifi in the room so this one will have to keep till I can upload it. Good night's sleep now I hope to clear the jetlag...

Friday 26 December 2008

Day 1 – Manchester to Dubai

December 25th 2008

15 months since the first idea, then 6 months planning and booking, we're on our way.

But first, the small matter of Christmas Day! Early (for us) start to get the last packing and planning sorted, finally cracked getting 1Mb of tunes onto Sarah's phone but as usual technology tries to get in the way and a couple of failures in transferring the data sees my blood pressure going through the roof – small things suddenly take on gargantuan proportions... Skiing lessons from Sarah at the Chillfactor e for me, so no prizes for guessing what type of holiday will be coming up in the next 12 months!

So, slightly later than advertised we're off to Dukinfield for the first visit of the day. Stephen, Louise and Amelia. Yummy sausage and bacon butty (when will we see food like that again??), excellent surprise activity adventure to look forward to and Amelia in good form showing some of her huge array of presents off to us. Lovely start to the day.

Brief stop off at the cemetery then it's on to John and Betty's in Stockport for more pressie exchanging and more activity stuff – what, don't we get out enough?? - this time taster session at the Velodrome, excellent. Sarah on a bike though, that could be worth selling tickets for :-)

Round to mum and dad's for, you've guessed it, more presents – my headphones worked amazingly on the flight – then all back to John and Betty's for Christmas dinner. Dinner lives up to expectations of course, starter, main, pudding, cheeseboard – hmmmm, the stuff that curling up in front of the fire and falling asleep is made for... But no! 5pm, a quick change into traveling clothes and we really are off on the first leg of our journey, a lift to Manchester airport T2.

Christmas Day is certainly the day to avoid the queues! Only 3 flights showing on the board when we arrive. Checkin immediate, no queue at security, we're through the whole process in less than 10 minutes!

Most shops shut of course, but for future reference the food court, duty free, boots and whsmiths are all open (Boots/whsmiths close soon after we arrive) so there's enough distraction to pass the time. Pretty much everyone at the airport is getting on our flight, which is full, and you get some idea of the volume of people they can fit on these things. In its half open state the terminal actually looks quite busy.

Boarding is early, although departure isn't thanks to a broken jetway (ah, Manchester...) but this doesn't ultimately affect our arrival time.

My 2 previous long haul experiences to the far east have both been with Emirates, back when they were a new airline in the early 90s and both experiences were excellent. More recently flying to Dubai, not so good. Perhaps the plane was old, but the seats were uncomfortable and the whole thing just didn't live up to expectations. So far today though we're back to form, new Boeing 777. We had a bulkhead behind us which I was dreading wouldn't allow us to recline, but there was plenty of room and nobody behind us to kick the chairs. Even the 4(?) year old next to us was remarkably well behaved, hats off to the parents traveling to Australia(?) with 4 children alongside us, hardly a peep.

In flight entertainment just amazing, 500 channels to choose from, all starting on demand so no waiting for the next loop. Sarah and I synchronised watching Get Smart, I stuck with it but Sarah switched from the US Ricky Gervais, Mr Carell, to the real one in watching Ghost Town(?). She laughed a lot so perhaps I'll watch it on the next flight if the options are the same. Food good, really does set Emirates apart from my usual airline experiences, didn't have my first choice but the Lamb dish I ended up with was probably even better. Stuck with the water, although Sarah sneaked in some red wine.

Reckon I got about 3 hours sleep in 30 minute bursts so not feeling too bad at time of writing, considering the clock on my computer say 4:43am at the moment.

2 hour transit at the airport. After an incredibly long bus ride to the terminal from the plane Dubai airport is as you'd expect, new, airy, busy, but our gate is at one end of the terminal building so is nice and quiet here.

Anyway, they've just called us for boarding so one last thing. This new Burj tower they're building in downtown Dubai....Outrageous!

(This was free wifi at first attempt, don't expect everywhere to be like this!)

Wednesday 24 December 2008

Holiday Itinerary

The countdown is on, not packed yet but heh, that's what the night before is there for isn't it?

Thanks to the nice people at Dopplr, here's the rough itinerary...



Time and WiFi permitting, I'll be blogging my way round S.E. Asia, and with any luck there'll be pictures with it.

If I'm having such a good time that I can't be bothered, then apologies in advance, don't take no news as bad news :-)