Malaysia: Kuching, Food, Festivals and Fun
Travel Blog | September 12, 2012 | 8 Comments
Kuching has been the perfect base for us to explore Sarawak’s beauty and wildlife. A population of around 660,000, made up of the now familiar mix of Malay and Chinese people. What makes this area more ethnically interesting is the presence of the Dayak indigenous ethnic groups (can be categorized into Ibans, Bidayuhs, Melanaus and […]
Malaysia: Jungle Trekking in Borneo at Bako National Park
Travel Blog | September 6, 2012 | 6 Comments
National Parks in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo There are four main national parks located in the Kuching area. Each offers a distinct nature experience in the South West Sarawak region of Borneo. The Gunung Gading Park is located west of the city and its main attraction is the sightings of the giant Rafflesia flower, the largest […]
Malaysia: Visiting Wild Orangutan in Borneo
Travel Blog | September 2, 2012 | 2 Comments
Visiting the Orangutan in Kuching for less than US$5 Using Kuching as your base in Sarawak, will give you the chance of meeting lots of wildlife. We spent a week based in Kuching and ventured out into the nearby jungles to witness first hand some of the exciting and interesting creatures that have inhabited this […]
Dive Sites around the Perhentian Islands
Travel Blog | August 29, 2012 | 3 Comments
My Diving Experience in the Perhentian Islands If you want to know more about the Perhentian Islands see our previous Malaysia travel blog post before reading this summary of some of the best dive sites in the Perhentians. My dives were split across three days, two a day for the first two days and final dive […]
Diving in Malaysia: Perhentian Island Life
Travel Blog | August 25, 2012 | 8 Comments
From Mountain Highs to the Depths of the Sea The Cameron Highlands were a real treat in terms of the lovely cool weather, the great scenery and the relaxing fresh mountain air. This crisp air was about to be replaced with something out of a compressed tank as we headed east through the mountains toward […]
Cameron Highlands: High in Malaysia
Travel Blog | August 20, 2012 | 2 Comments
Journey to the Cameron Highlands With the flavours of Penang still swirling round our taste buds we boarded our minibus and spent the next four hours slowly winding our way eastwards and upwards into the Cameron Highlands. The Cameron Highlands get their very British name from the surveyor who charted the area in 1885. The […]
Malaysia: What to do in Penang?
Travel Blog | August 16, 2012 | 5 Comments
Penang Past to Present Penang has an interesting history from its days as part of the Sultanate of Kedah, through to the ‘leasing’ to Captain Francis Light and the East India company in the 18th century, Japanese occupation in the Second World War, its dominance as a Freeport and eventually its independence to become the Penang of today. One of Malaysia’s […]
Travel Blog | August 11, 2012 | 8 Comments
A Flashpacking Train Journey Train travel is always our preferred method of transport. So we booked ourselves onto the 14:45 from Bangkok to Butterworth, a 24hour train journey taking us south through Thailand, across the border at Padang Besar, and then into Malaysia for the final three to four hours of our journey. We have […]
Burma Travel Blog: A Flashpacking Experience
Travel Blog | August 4, 2012 | 28 Comments
Burma Travel Blog You may have read our previous blog posts relating to our recent tour of Burma. If you didn’t or haven’t got the time, this is a summary of what two ‘flashpackers’ thought of our Burma experience. We had a strange affair with Myanmar. It’s a bit like the first time I ate an olive, […]
Myanmar Travel: Inle Lake Reflections
Travel Blog | July 31, 2012 | 9 Comments
How to Get to Inle Lake We said a sad goodbye to Bagan, leaving behind the temples and horse carts, to set off by coach for our final destination in Burma, Inle Lake. Inle lake is located in Eastern Myanmar and is nestled between some impressive hills and mountains. On our 9 hour bus journey we travelled through […]
India Car Rental and Driver Hire
How to Rent a Car and Driver in India We’d like to share our experience, and a few of the stories we learned about renting a car and driver from our two week tour of Rajasthan. Like arranging other things in India, it is not always as simple or easy as you may first imagine. […]
Photo Flashback – Kerala Kathakali Dance
We are not really ones for the cultural shows that you regularly find in travel destinations. Often they are a thin representation of the actual song or dance traditions of a community, overpriced and leave you feeling a little bit cheated. This was certainly the case in Waitangi doing the Haka with some actors. Sometimes […]
Goa Retirement, Revamps and a bit of Home Cooking
We hang about in Goa for our remaining time in India sampling foods from home and join the large expat community and retired folk enjoying what is on offer. We had decided in Udaipur that it was time to invest some time doing some work on the blog. Our traffic has been growing steadily over […]
Udaipur And A Break From Travel Blogging
For those arriving at this travel blog post hoping to find out detailed information about our experiences and things to do in Udaipur, leave now, as you’ll need to look elsewhere instead. The hectic schedule of our last two weeks on the road with our driver had wearied us a little. The thought of seeing […]
India Rajasthan and Golden Triangle Itinerary
Two Week Itinerary for Rajasthan and the Golden Triangle You can get to see some of the top sights in Rajasthan and the Golden Triangle in India in fourteen days or less, it will not be a restful experience, but you will gain a lifetime of memories and images from the magnificent Taj Mahal to […]
Jodhpur and the Road to Udaipur
Jodhpur – The Blue City It was a long drive to Jodhpur, our second to last destination in Rajasthan, before waving off our driver. The three restful days in Jaisalmer and our separation from each other had allowed driver and passenger relations to be restored to more friendly less tense mood levels. So we set off […]
In our last travel blog post I mentioned that I had done another diving course. I’ve included some underwater photographs and videos taken whilst I was on this course. We stayed in Bohol, longer than anywhere else in the Philippines, because of the excellent diving sites at very reasonable prices. Bohol is a magnet […]
A delay in this post has been caused by very slow internet connections throughout the last part of our travels in the Philippines. Apologies. However, it now means you have a fun packed bumper blog of travel frustrations, cute monkeys, the chocolate hills and a small slightly disappointing beach. Weather Retreat Given the weather we […]
Donsol, Whale Sharks and Legazpi
Reluctant as we were to leave the beauty of Saud beach we had a lot more Filipino treasures to explore. From the relaxing, serene shores of Saud beach, we headed south towards Donsol in search of some whale sharks. The weather proved challenging, but the wildlife made it all worthwhile. From Pagudpud we reversed […]
Ilocos Norte, Pagudpud and Saud Beach
The ‘Borocay of the North’ is the strapline trying to attach itself to this beautiful part of Ilocos Norte in the Philippines. While I cannot make the comparison yet, I believe Saud Beach in Pagudpud really is a little hidden gem that may eventually give its more famous southern cousin a run for its peso. We […]
Manila and the road to Pagudpud
We arrived in the Philippines on board another Jetstar flight at around 8pm on a Saturday. Having left Bali we had a brief layover in Singapore before our arrival in Manila. The immigration, customs and baggage pick up went like a dream and we were out of the airport within half an hour of touching down. This […]