Adventures By Design

View Larger Map

Wonder where we’ve been? Each of the icons on the map above shows a special place on our travels, and the green line shows our route. Click on an icon for a name and description too. You can also use the zoom buttons on the right side, and click and drag to move around the map.

Here are all our photos, arranged by country.

• Thailand (April 2-?)
• Malaysia (dates?)
• Indonesia (dates?)
• Singapore (dates?)
• Cambodia (dates?)
• Vietnam (dates?)

If you have any questions about, well, anything, leave us a comment. Enjoy!

Ric and Gin

In which the travelers begin the long journey home (wherever that is!)

We arrived at our hotel, but had to wait an hour for someone to check out before we got a room. We checked in to our room, and slept for a few hours. Eventually we got up, ate lunch, and went to coffee shop where we checked our email and updated our blog. We left and (unsuccessfully) looked for a new camera bag for Ric’s Canon. We did however find souvenirs for our nephews, and even successfully bargained the vendor to a fair price. Returning to the hotel, we packed for our final flight of our Asia Tour 2008. Purple clouds formed on the horizon, and bathed Hanoi in an impressive thunderstorm. We slogged our way to our taxi to airport (and for the first time ever, didn’t get cheated by the driver!). Hanoi’s airport isn’t well designed. Clearing immigration took longer than we expected, and cost more than we liked, but at least all the officials we spoke to were polite. We paid $60 (2 people x $10/day x 3 days). The chairs were plastic and more fitting with a visa violation than Thailands cushy sofa. Finally we boarded our flight to Incheon.

In which the travelers maim a cow (or worse)

Today we left Phnom Penh, and headed to Siem Reap, the city that hosts the Angkor temples. After breakfast our faithful tuk-tuk driver, Sony, took us to the bus station. We’ve had a great time with Sony driving us around and so when he suggested that his friend could meet us in Siem Reap to drive us to a hotel we took him up on it. We needed to give his friend a name so that he could meet us at the bus station in Siem Reap with a sign. At first we were just going to give him Janelle’s name, but then we decided to go for a team name. After a brief discussion we chose to honour our national heritage and went with “Team Maple.” With that settled we got on the bus for the six hour drive across the country.

The drive was fine, on paved roads the whole way. Occasionally the bus attendant (like a flight attendant for a bus, not sure what to call her) would give us some information about the towns and provinces we drove past. The only problem with the ride came when Gin was just drifting off to sleep. Suddenly the bus driver braked hard, and started honking the horn like crazy. We looked up to see another bus trying to pass us, a truck hurtling towards us, and a cow grazing on the shoulder of the road. We braced ourselves, but heard only a small thump. The cow was the loser in that interaction, but we didn’t hit it very hard, so hopefully it’ll be okay. (Ric doesn’t have a lot of hope that the cow was okay.)

We arrived in Siem Reap at about 6pm, and as promised a driver was waiting for us with a sign reading “Team Maple.” This was Ty (pronounced Tea) and he had brought a car to drive us into town. The first hotel that he took us to was very close to the bus station, and was apparently quite new, and owned by his friend of course. However, when we went into the hotel and asked the price the proprietors didn’t want to tell us. “See the room first” they urged us, all the while looking out the window at our driver, Ty, in the car. There was something fishy going on, and when we pushed them for a price they said $20 or $25. Hmmm… Ty had told us $15, and the men from the hotel were still looking out the window. Unwilling to deal with such sketchyness we walked out of the hotel and back to the car, with the hotel guys in pursuit. After a quick discussion with Ty they changed the price to $15, but the damage had been done and we asked Ty to take us somewhere else.

The next hotel we went to seemed more upfront about their operations and offered us rooms for $15 (apparently a discount from the usual $18 we were told later). This place seemed nice and clean, and had huge rooms. It’s also right next to a lot of great-looking restaurants, and a market that’s supposed to be good. Unfortunately, after we had checked in, while Gin was taking a shower, the air-con in our room started pouring water out all over our stuff. Ric saved the day and caught most of the water with a garbage can. When we asked the staff to deal with it they fixed it right away, and it seems to be fine now.

We had dinner in our hotel’s restaurant while watching “The Killing Fields.” This is a pretty famous movie (though not necessarily a good movie) set in Cambodia during the time of the Khmer Rouge. It’s a true story about a Cambodian journalist and translator, Dith Pran, who works with an American journalist, Sidney Schanberg. Although Schanberg gets all of Pran’s family out of Cambodia safely, Pran himself stays behind to help translate and witness what happens to Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge. Unfortunately the situation gets far worse than anyone foresaw and all the foreigners are evacuted. Schanberg tries to get Pran out too, but he fails and Pran has to deal with the Khmer Rouge himself. He is resourceful and lucky however, and in the end he finds his way to a Red Cross refugee camp in Thailand and there’s a happy ending. We’re glad we saw the movie, but we’re also glad we saw it after we had learned about Cambodia’s history because the movie was rather disjointed and confusing.

Tomorrow we go to see the Angkor temples, so it’s off to bed now!

In which the travelers find Jesse and Janelle

All of our worry about finding Jesse and Janelle vanished when we checked our email this morning. Turns out that Jesse and Janelle had arrived a day early, and had found a place to stay that was about two blocks from our hotel! We reckoned that we were both wandering around looking for a hotel at the same time and we could have even crossed paths. We headed over to their hotel (through a busy market and a construction zone that Ric almost wandered into the middle of) to find them. After a little confusion at the reception desk about who Jesse and Janelle were, and what room they might be in, we finally got the guy to call their room and Jesse came down to find us. It was great to see Jesse (and Janelle when we got upstairs); we’ve been traveling on our own since we left Andrea and Phil in Koh Lanta, Thailand back at the end of April. While traveling with just the two of us is great, it’s really fun to travel with company too! We’re especially looking forward to spending the next while with family, so Ric and Jesse can spend lots of time gossiping about other relatives.

After seeing Jesse and Janelle’s chosen hotel, we decided to go get our stuff and move there. This place, the Angkor Hotel, is off the main street so it’s $10/night less than where we stayed last night but the room is a bit nicer than our last place. The four of us set out to go pick up our bags, then we carried them a few blocks and stopped for lunch before heading to our new digs. We had lunch at a restaurant called “Friends” which is run by an NGO that helps give street kids vocational training and opportunities to turn their lives around. Lunch was delicious, but a little expensive for the small portions.

Later in the day, after checking in and dropping our bags at the hotel, we headed out to see some of the sights of the city. We went to the Royal Palace where the king of Cambodia lives and checked out some of the buildings, as well as the Silver Pagoda where the whole floor is covered in silver floor tiles and there is a plethora of Buddhas of many shapes, sizes, and materials. The big draw here is the Emerald Buddha, who looked pretty cool but wasn’t very big, about the size of a cocker spaniel. (Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take photos inside the Silver Pagoda, so if you’re really interested you could try looking it up on the internet.)

Tired and sweaty from our tour around the palace grounds, we decided to look for dinner. Our guidebook listed yet another restaurant that helps employ former street kids, this one run by the French Cultural Center. We decided to walk, since according to our map it was only ten or twenty minutes away. Once we finally got there, we learned that tonight a Guinean circus was in town, and to enter the restaurant we’d have to buy a ticket for $6. This was not welcomed news, as we’d just risked death walking the streets of Phnom Penh and were hot, sweaty, and tired. Frustrated, we left the Center and found a slightly sketchy local restaurant just down the street. The four of us shared a few plates, including a Ginger and Chicken Bones, which although unique, cannot be recommended on account of the bones.

Our bellies full, we reconsidered the circus. Of course $6 wasn’t that much, considering they had traveled all the way from Africa to entertain us. We walked back, and we’re glad we did. The circus was fantastic! There was juggling (clubs and balls), acrobatics, and stilt-walking. And of course there was music, mostly drumming and wooden xylophoning. The narration was conducted in French, although Jesse and Janelle pointed out that their accents were so strong, the narration was mostly unintelligible to them.

The circus concluded, complete with ovation inviting a second all-cast and crew bow, we stopped at a market, before hailing a tuk-tuk and returning to our hotel. We spent the remainder of the evening telling stories of teaching in Asia (Taiwan for them, Korea for us), and talking about Jesse and Janelle’s upcoming wedding. Yay!

In which the travelers try to find the perfect hotel

Leaving Singapore was almost as easy as checking out of our hotel. We didn’t even have to to break stride as we walked past reception. We said “checking out”, and they said “Ok, thank you. See you next time”, and that was it. We soon hailed a taxi and drove to the airport. By the way, taxis in Singapore all use the meter, all have air-con, plus they all have seatbelts for all the seats! What a treat!

The Singapore airport is huge, spanning three terminals. We wandered around aimlessly as we had a couple hours before we could check-in for our flight. We discovered that the entire airport has WiFi wireless internet access, although you need a mobile phone to register. When we told the information counter that we didn’t have a phone, the woman looked at us incredulously, probably trying to figure out if we really were that Luddite, or if she were the hapless victim of a hidden camera gag show. Nonetheless, she politely issued us a temporary login name, and we spent the rest of our time sitting in a coffee shop browsing the web.

On the flight to Cambodia we met an older man who had lived and worked in Cambodia off and on for the past few years. He gave us some suggestions for traveling in Phnom Penh, such as where to stay (he suggested three guesthouses in Sisowath Quay), how much to spend on a room ($18-27), and how to arrange transport from the airport (tuk-tuk or taxi). He also described how tourists can easily miss the grinding poverty and accompanying lawlessness that exists in Cambodia. Crime is rampant, and thievery is common; when flying out of Cambodia, any valuables will be stolen from our luggage, “guaranteed, there’s no question, it’s a guarantee”, he said. Walking at night, he continued, is an invitation to be relieved of your belongings, although if you don’t resist, you probably won’t be killed. We’re thankful for his advice, and will heed his warnings, but we wonder if his opinions are tainted slightly by burn-out and homesickness? Surely this place can’t be as bad as he describes or not even the allure of the Angkor Wat could attract tourists.

We arrived at Sisowath Quay, which is a section of tourist-oriented restaurants, bars, internet cafes and guesthouses along the river. We visited several guesthouses, looking for the perennial combination of cheap and clean. Jesse and Janelle are coming into town tomorrow, and we wanted to find the perfect place for the four of us to stay.

The hotel we chose wasn’t the cheapest, but it was clean and close to the amenities we require, principally internet and food. Actually, when we were shown the room, we were told the hotel had wireless access in the room: we were sold. Convenient access to the internet was critical so we could send an email to Jesse and Janelle telling them where to come to meet us. Hopefully they could check their email tomorrow before they left Vietnam, or at least before they checked-in to a hotel in some other neighborhood. We remembered how in Thailand Andrea and Phil didn’t know where to look for us and checked-in to a hotel on another beach. That was Koh Lanta, a relatively small and well-marked place where it is easy to meet friends. This is Cambodia, with randomly named streets and addresses.

Our hotel found, we attempted to use the internet to email Jesse and Janelle. It didn’t work. Aaargh! It was now pouring rain, and far too late to go wandering around the city looking for an internet cafe. We decided to leave it until tomorrow, and email them as soon as we woke up. Somehow, we’ll find each other.

In which the travelers search for Hanuman

This morning we visited the Sacred Forest Monkey Sanctuary. Although this is a Hindu temple complex, the main attraction seems to be the macaque monkeys. We walked down the path into the forest, when suddenly a series of gray blurs exploded out of the forest. The monkeys had arrived. Although they weren’t very big, the biggest ones were maybe the size of a cocker spaniel, we were a little afraid at first. They were so assertive and demanding to those who had food, routinely climbing up people to get at the bananas they had bought on site. They also tried to get water bottles, or just about anything in people’s hands, including a little boy’s stuffed toy, much crying ensued but he never got the toy back.

The monkeys were greedy too. People were feeding them masses of bananas, along with sweet potatoes supplied by the temple, and the little gluttons would be stuffing one in their mouths while holding onto one or two more with their hands and feet. The temple staff are pretty careful to not let people feed the monkeys anything other than fruit though, so the monkeys did look pretty healthy.

We wandered through the temple grounds, looking at the buildings and taking photos of the monkeys. Many of them had babies, which would hold on to their chests and bellies as they ran around. The babies were pretty cute, and not so intimidating as the adult monkeys. When we got close to the exit of the temple grounds we came upon a large group of tourists buying incredibly over-priced bananas to feed the monkeys. With all these bananas around there were a lot of monkeys too. At one point Ric sat down for a rest, and within a few moments was being climbed on by three or four small monkeys. He was a remarkably good sport about it, until one of the cheeky little things bit his arm (it didn’t break the skin so no rabies shots necessary). Gin also let a monkey climb on her for the sake of the photos, but she was a little more freaked out about the whole affair (especially since the monkey was all wet and mangy-looking).

After we left the Monkey Sanctuary we walked around for a while, had an ice-cream, and then found a place for lunch that also had free wi-fi. Today was a momentous occasion because it marked the first time since we arrived in Thailand on April 2nd that we have been caught up with our blog posts. Unfortunately for our loyal readers, this means that we posted about 10 entries in the course of two days, so everyone had a lot of reading to do. We figure it’s worth the effort to get caught up though, because it will be more interesting and exciting to read about things as we’re actually doing them. Plus, folks like Ric’s mom won’t be so confused about where exactly we are. Hopefully we can stay current with the blog, but if we go somewhere with crappy internet, or if we have more problems with the computer, it’s possible that we’ll fall behind again. Our apologies in advance.

After a high-five and pat on the back for our hard work, we set off to walk around town for a while. Ubud is considered the cultural heart of Bali, and so has a lot of artists and artisans. There are many beautiful shops and boutiques here selling gorgeous clothing, fabrics, jewelry, paintings, and other decorative stuff. We figure Gin’s mom, Janet, would love it here (especially when we saw a woman with a loom weaving some lovely fabric just inside the entrance of her store). Sadly for the artists and shop-keepers, we’re not really interested in carrying anything around for the next month and a half before we head back to Canada. We’ll see tomorrow though, if there’s something particularly special we might splurge on something to remember this place by.