Day 28 of 100 Hanoi 1000-year celebration

It just happened when we were at Hanoi that the whole city was gearing up for the city’s 1000-year celebration. We noticed that the whole city was decorated by colourful banners, balloons and , of course, giant political propaganda posters and statues. Nightly laser night shows at the famous centre lake as well. Of course, the city was flooded with people walking around even at mid-night. This reminded me what Vancouver was like during the Winter Olympic in February 2010. I have never seen so many people during day and night in downtown Vancouver.

It just happened when we were at Hanoi that the whole city was gearing up for the city’s 1000-year celebration. We noticed that the whole city was decorated by colourful banners, balloons and , of course, giant political propaganda posters and statues. Nightly laser night shows at the famous centre lake as well. Of course, the city was flooded with people walking around even at mid-night. This reminded me what Vancouver was like during the Winter Olympic in February 2010. I have never seen so many people during day and night in downtown Vancouver.

Day 26 of 100: Halong Bay

We arrived at the kangaroo cafe very early in the morning for the halong bay tour. Pretty interesting group we had in the tour. In addition to Lynn and me, we had Robert & Rachel from UK, Joe from US, Jerome from France, a family of 4 from Melbourne, Oz and 4 friends traveling from Malaysia. Not much interaction at the beginning of the 5-hour coach ride from Hanoi to halong bay. The traffic was really bad and it probably took us more than 1.5 hrs to get out of the city. Of course, you would expect the normal washroom and shopping breaks the tour guide would take you.

Finally we arrived in halong bay and we are on the boat. First time we have to be face-to-face around a long table for lunch and it was a bit awkward at the beginning. Be honest, i havnt joined a tour for a long time so it has been a while that we need to “fight” for food with “strangers”...

Halong Bay

on the Junk boat

Famous Halong Bay

AMAZING CAVE

In the afternoon, the boat arrived at the Amazing cave. At the beginning, the cave was kinda small and nothing really amazing about it. When we moved to the 2nd and 3rd caves, the size are getting bigger and bigger. Even though there were color lights to shine on the limestones, it wasn’t THAT amazing. However, when i started to look at the pictures i took, wow....all the color came out nicely and I just cannot believe my eyes. See pictures below and i was really amazed with the pics.




Jumping from the boat..."if you jump, i jump.."
In the afternoon, the boat was staying in a relatively calm harbour. My tour-mates started jumping from the boat. They started to jump from the 1st (lower) level but they moved on to the top of the boat (3rd level). I’m a slow starter so I started low but eventually graduated at the 2nd level. It was very fun and people from other boats started to think we were crazy!...Seems like we were the only boat in the area that people kept on jumping.

My boat jumping buddies: Rob, Rachel, Joe, Jerome & me

At nite, the captained had to start the engine so that there was electricity overnite. My room was the closest to the engine room. However, I couldn’t stand the smell of the gasoline so i volunteered to sleep on the deck. It turned out to be a wonderful way to experience halong bay. It wasn’t hot at nite, it wasn’t humid. With the sea breeze, it was just perfect. Also, the junk boat was in the middle of the sea and far from civilization. I could see the sky full of stars at night. I didn’t really want to fall asleep as i felt amazingly good in the setting.



Day 25 of 100: Do you pay tips to Immigration Officer???

Floating Village

Our tour guide

It was pouring rain today so we need to change our itinerary again...originally, we had an aggressive schedule , visiti more temples, national museum and the floating village. However, we were forced to cut the temples today. After all, we have seen the most amazing temples in Cambodia,if not the world, already.
We checked in our flight to Hanoi and we thought we went through the normal immigration process...getting an exit stamp on the passport. When Lynn stood before the immigration officer counter, the officer asked Lynn for tips...yes , tips. Lynn didn’t know how to react because she never thought that she would need to give tips to immigration officer. Luckily, the immigration officer wasking asking for much, just US$1 but Lynn was just PISSED OFF!

Day 22 of 100: Exploring Angkor wat (Siem reap)

We left KL early in the morning. Usually i like to sit in window seat because i like to look out. Sometimes, i could see something totally not expected. Just like the heart-shaped reef island i saw on the flight from Tokyo to Singapore [link]. The sky was very clear today so i managed to take a few good shots of downtown KL.

We arrived in Siem Reap without knowing what to expect. It turned out that the airport is simple but very elegant. As a Canadian, i need a VOA (visa on arrival) so i filled out a form, gave me $20 and a pic. However, i noticed that the VOA counter, there was at least 12 officers sitting in a half-moon-shaped high table (just like the judges in the court). What? It took 12 officers to process my VOA..wow...

Lynn didn’t want to decide on the hotel so i made a decision and it was a surprise for her. We checked into the Victoria hotel..it is a colonial style hotel...wow...amazingly nice hotel..bright yellow matched with white frame and dark wood color.... It was very hot and humid in siem reap so we decided to take it easy before we headed out to see the famous Angkor wat sunset at around 5pm. We walked around and picked a boutique hotel which was a conversion of the house for the former French governor during the colonial period. Foods are nice and cheap...we spent probably $25 for two for drinks and good samplers of local food.

Former French Governor Mansion and now a boutique hotel

 

We hired a tuk-tuk (motorbike with a carriage) to take us to see the Angkor wat sunset. Our driver called himself Mr. 7. He took us to buy the Angkor wat pass for the next 3 days and to the bottom of a small mountain pass Angkor wat. We walked up the till and there was a temple ruin right in front of our eyes. This was just a small sampler of what we would see in the next few days but it was already pretty impressive. We waited and waited and waited. It was cloudy far in the west so pretty much there was no sunset.






At night, Mr. 7 took us to the old market and we had a cold drink at the Blue pumpkin cafe. It was all white with big sofa and cushion. Pretty cool. We ate there and the food was good. Then we walked out, we saw fish massage. WHAT? Fish to massage you? Oh...it is actually the fish that were fed with your deadskin on your feet. It was only $3 for 30 mins so we decided to try....very tigleish..

Blue Pumpkin Cafe

Day 21 of 100: TWO free birthday cakes!!

Today is Will’s birthday. We kinda took it easy. After an amazing breakfast at Doubletree by Hilton in KL, we went to Sunway Pyramid which is a shopping mall actually looks like the Luxo hotel in Las Vegas. You know, nowadays, most shopping centres in any major city look pretty much the same with global brand names and department stores. We then visited the KL Twin Towers. Twin Towers used to be the tallest building in the world. Even thought it longer is, the shiny silvery exterior together with the Muslim-inspired shape of the buildings make it very noticeable during day time. It is true that no matter where you go in KL, your eyes will always be on the twin towers because of the reflection of the sunlight. Don’t think the KL tower lost its sparkles at night. It became two huge spotlights that light up the whole city. Take a look at the pictures and you will understand what i mean. The skybridge linking the two towers are open but tickets will only be sold each morning. People started lined up early, like 6:30am even though the ticket offices only open at 8:30am. We didn’t have the ticket but i know i am going to come back and get up there one day.



Remember i said that Doubletree by Hilton in KL not only did all my laundry, they also allow me to order anything from the bakery/cafe and bar free of charge. And today is Will’s birthday so i guess it is perfect for me to get a birthday cake for him...free of charge... In theory, I could have every single cake and bakery from the cafe and then resell them for profits but i didn’t do that . :-) I only got 1 small cake for Will’s birthday.

At night, we went to an interesting restaurant at the basement of a high-end shopping mall in downtown KL. I causally told the manager that Will is the birthday boy today at check-in. Surprisingly, at the end of dinner, the French manager had ordered and prepared a birthday cake for the birthday boy. So we had 2 birthday cakes free of charge today....Lucky!

One thing about this shopping mall, one of the entrance is actually very sparkle-ly...check it out yourself.

Day 20 of 100: Arriving in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Arrived early in the morning and we are going to meet up with another friend, lynn, who will be traveling with me to Cambodia and Vietnam after KL. We checked into the new Doubletree by Hilton. I heard it is a refurbished hotel, meaning old building but all brand new renovation. It looks very nice. I am a diamond member for Hilton group but the executive lounge hasn’t been ready yet. Instead, they gave me a whole list of temporary benefits including free laundry, free breakfast, free drinks and food at the bakery all day and free alcohol drinks at the bar during happy hour...WOW...amazing isn’t it. Havnt been able to thorough washed my clothes in the last 19 days....my opportunity has come...i gave them all my dirty laundry to wash and they all came back nice and clean the next day hanging in my closet..amazing..
It is very hot in KL during noon time, therefore, we took it easy a bit before we headed out to Batu cave. It is actually a very important holyhand of the hindu religion. A huge gold statute was built in front of a limestone cave which was 4 million years old. Climbing the 272 stairs up and you will find a giant cave with more hindu statues and temples and of course, lots of monkey. Not far from the Batu Cave, there is a monkey temple with a giant colorful monkey god statue.

272 stairs up...!!!

After the up and down the stairs at the cave, we were determined to try all the good foods offered in KL. Lynn especially loves eating good food. We went restaurant-hopping...we would go into a restaurant only order their most famous dish to try on. After that, we moved on to the next...kinda like bar hopping..:-)