This, plus the ones in the original blog, is ALL of our photos… but they are compressed to low resolution so if you want any in high res format, let me know!

Hope everyone’s, travels went (are going?) well,  we are back in Boise enjoying the snow.

Come visit!

Shawn

We are very ready to go home, see friends and family, sleep in our own beds, cook our own food, play with Alty.

We will, however, miss many things from our Asia sojourn:

We will miss tuk-tuks, the ubiquitous motor cycle-based three-wheeled, and often colorful, public transport of south Asia. This open air conveyance is the perfect way to explore the cities and towns of the tropics.

We will miss Soey and Boon at Tubusa, the managers of the small restaurant where we ate many of our meals while the kids attended PREM. We will miss our primitive communication, their humor and, of course, their food (blog archive)!

We will miss waterfalls. We visited many, but the kids favorite was the Si Lanna waterfall outside of Chiang Mai (blog archive).

We will miss our friends at PREM. Both Sierra and Orion made some close friends while at school and they are already missed (blog archive).

We will miss the Gibbons Experience. This was, with little doubt, one of our Top 5. Spending three days hiking through the jungle, screaming along ziplines and sleeping in tree houses was amazing (blog archive).

We will miss Halong Bay. Also on our Top 5, this place was incredibly beautiful (blog archive).

We will miss kao neow mamuang. Sticky rice with mango and a coating coconut milk is really one of the best desserts… or breakfast… or whenever you find it! The best kao neow mamuang is generally found on the street, but Orion (as the most obsessed) has decided the best was found on the southern Thailand island Kao  Yao Yai.

We will miss the slow trip down the Mekong. OK, let’s be honest, I will miss it, everyone else wont. But it was a great way to see a lot of country (blog archive)!

We will miss motos! These scooter-style motorcycles were such a great time exploring rural haunts, searching for hidden beaches on Yao Yai, looking for caves outside of Vang Viene.

We will miss street food. Arguably the culinary heart of south Asia, the food stalls serving barbeque, stirfrys, and noodle soups provide the characteristic smell, color, and of course food, that make walking on the streets so much fun.

We will miss the Gecko Hotel in Hanoi. Love it (me) or hate it (everyone else) exploring the old quarter of Hanoi requires a good base and the Gecko, with its great rooms and amazing service, was our unanimous choice for best place we stayed on our trip. Here is their web site: http://hanoigeckohotel.com/

We will miss Paradise Lost on Kao Kradan in the Trang Islands of Southern Thailand. This place, run by the great character Wally, allowed us to explore the amazing beaches and coral reefs of this idyllic isle (blog archive).

I (and Orion) will miss cruising Thailand with Alan. Lots of driving, but there is no better way to get to know a country then conducting hydrologic research projects.From northern Thailand rubber plantations to southern islands, we got a lot done and we got to see a side of Thailand to seen when traveling as a tourist. (blog archive) (blog archive).

We will miss (a little bit) blogging! It has been fun, thanks for coming along with us!

Angkor Wat is quickly becoming a very popular tourist destination; I would estimate 10 times the tourist numbers from my first visit 5 years ago. Still pretty cool, just have to time your visits to avoid the 100′s of tour groups swarming the temples. We actually had our best visit at the biggest temple (Angkor) because we arrived at noon and everyone was eating. It was almost peaceful as we visited the amazing carved murals for which Angkor is known.

Rather then return for another day of touring the temples, we visited an orphanage outside of Siem Reap (Post Coming).

Then off to Bangkok!

Halong Bay off the coast of Vietnam is amazing, photos speak for themselves.

We are now in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) preparing to go overland to Cambodia to visit Angkor Wat.

The sights, smells, noise and chaos of Hanoi drove most of the family bonkers, I loved it. We stayed in a great hotel on an alley smack in the middle of the old quarter of Hanoi surrounded by the craziness. Walking the streets takes a certain amount of trust (or fatalism) as there are so many motor cycles parked on the sidewalk that the walkers are pushed out into the maelstrom that is the thousands of motor bikes flowing like a river at flood stage through the streets… ….people eating amazing food sitting on little stools in gaps in the clogged sidewalk, street hawkers aggressively offering everything from slices of pineapple to Halong Bay cruises and then top it with the constant din of honking and a cacophony of smells from stir fries to the pungent fish…. an intense experience.

We arrived in Luang Prabang in the evening, dirty and tired from our slow boat trip down the Mekong and this beautiful, quite town was just what the doctor ordered. Luang Prabang has been declared world heritage site, primarily for its abundance of wat (Buddhist monasteries) and French colonial architecture nestled on a peninsula where the Nam Khan joins the Mekong. The setting has attracted some upscale tourism; great French bakeries and cafes included. We mostly lazed around but did get out for a great waterfall hike and we rented bicycles to cruise the city. With 24 wats, the town is positively crawling with monks; the burnt orange of the initiated and bright orange robes of the novices punctuate the scenery. The colorful Lao and common red hammer and sickle flags hang from the front of most businesses as a declaration of allegiance to the communist dictatorship that runs the country. We managed a short float down the Nam Khan, where we watched villagers gathering algae, which is later dried with sesame seeds, garlic and tomato to make a popular thin wafer. It was hard to leave what was probably the nicest town we have visited on our travels in Asia.

We departed by bus over a very curvy and scenic mountain road to Vang Vieng. Vang Vieng is nestled along a small river in a beautiful valley flanked by dramatic karst scenery. It has traditionally been a bit of a backpacker outdoor adventure destination and we did spend a great day motor bike exploring, including a great swimming hole and some caving. But the town has recently become famous on the backpacker circuit as the place to order ‘happy shakes’ loaded with pot or hallucinogenic mushrooms and lounge around on cushions watching ‘Friends’ reruns on multiple TVs for hours on end…. I must be getting a bit old because it didn’t make much sense to me either. The other main attraction is a tubing float that is famous for bars jutting into the river with names like ‘Brownie’ and ‘Trippy’ bar…

We escaped via a nice kayak trip along our way to Vientiene, the quite capital city of Laos where we await our visas and flight to Hanoi.

Sierra:

I seriously don’t know how to start this blog because it’s so hard to explain what the adventure I went on was like. Let me just start out with the drive.

10 people crammed into the truck didn’t really suit those with long legs. After the paved road we came about a dirt road that would be flooded in the rainy season, and we would have to walk the 30 km. Very bumpy road indeed. But we got to our destination 2 hours, 2 stops, many bruised heads later.  After we got there, we started hiking. Now I won’t bore you with the details of walking up and down hills through the rainforest, even though it sounds very Indiana Jones. The ziplining- When we got into our harnesses we would first clip the safety clip, then the thingy that went on the zipline and made you go fast. Then you would push off the platform.  Then, we would be suspended in the air going 30 miles per hour thought the branches then BOOM! The world below was 500 meters down and the wind was in your face and the feeling of flying was the closest it would ever be. We ziplined the first day about 6 times and then into our tree house. It was pretty amazing. Through the blanches and then BOOM, a treehouse. It was actually pretty scary ziplining in because when u got out of your harness. If you stepped back, you would fall. AND DIE. We spent about an hour settling in and getting our beds set. We ate really good veggies and rice that was ziplined in from the guides from the kitchen. Then played an intense game of spoons and then settled into bed. I made Orion sleep near the edge. But he didn’t fall.

Orion: I woke up in the treehouse by the sound of ziplining, I got a sweatshirt and pants on. And the first thing i had to ask my parents was, WHERES BREAKFAST?! It was very chilly in the morning, so I made my self a cup of Ovaltine, and sweet milk. It didnt taste good but it was better than nothing. Finally after a lovely breakfast of eggs and veggies, we ziplined out. Ziplining was more than I expected. I thought it was going to be slow and kinda lame. But it wasnt. The fact we were gong 3o mph and we were 500 meters off the floor below, made it pretty fun. In my opinion the second day was the hardest hiking day. The trail up was VERY steep. When we got to the waterfall, everyone jumped in the ice cold water. But my sister didn’t really. Me and dad were the first ones to get in. I thought i was going to die. after a lovely lunch of veggies and rice, we hiked up to the zipline to the treehouse. Ate dinner, played card games, and went to bed.

Here are some more random pics from our time in the south, not in any particular order.

 First in was dad, he came back out and said we were going to need our flippers. We got them on and then mom went in. I probably would’ve been before Sierra, but I was very slow getting into the flippers. I jumped in. It was weird and kinda slimy swimming thru millions of wormy jellyfish.  After that we started swimming into the cave. The only part I was scared of was when it was pitch black. We had to flash the waterproof camera a couple of times so we could see where we were going. Finally, we got to the prettiest cove! The first thing I saw was the beach, which was totally pristine. Then I looked up, and around us, were cliffs with trees and bushes growing around it. We hung out there for a few awhile and Dad took some pictures- which didn’t turn out that well compared to the real thing and we can’t show you till we find the cable.

We swam back through, got on the boat and started riding toward the pier. Near the end of the boat ride…Sierra spotted a bloated dolphin-aka a sea cow. I saw the head, but that was all. That cave was probably one of my most favorite experiences I have had at the beach.