gross [inter]national happiness

I've never seen anything quite like the number of scooters you see in Hanoi, Vietnam. As we drove towards the old quarter from the airport their number increased. It felt like every single one of Hanoi's six and a half million inhabitants have got one and they were all out riding them at the same time! Add to that a seemingly blatant lack of road rules and you got yourself a pure urban atmosphere, yet absolutely no road rage. Every second there is an infringement of what we would call driving rules, yet no one reacts. It's their own set of rules and they work. Well, sort of, we did see two accidents and one near miss... Here's a video I took to give you an idea of the organised chaos: Nonetheless, we liked Hanoi! Yet again we were both enjoying being back in a big city, a running theme by now on this trip. And we were staying right in the old quarter, in the thick of things. The old quarter is steeped in history. Boasting elegant architecture, hidden cafes, s

Welcome to the next instalment of this here blog , our little labour of love. When we decided to write it we couldn't have comprehended quite how much time it was going to take us. Each post seems to take the best part of a day to put together, and then it can take the same again to upload on some of Asia's dodgy wifi connections. We're proud of it though, and that we've kept it going... even if we are always seemingly 3 or 4 weeks behind. So with that in mind, welcome to the-rest-of-Laos catch up post! Watch as we speed through our travels from Huay Xai (post Gibbon Experience) to Pak Beng, Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng and Vientiane. Hold onto your hats! That said, the first thing we did certainly wasn't speedy (so please feel free to loosen that grip on your bonnet), as we embarked on the 2 day slow boat down the Mekong river to Luang Prabang, with an overnight stop at the fairly nondescript Pak Beng. The scenery was breathtaking, the traveller company was fun (

It was a 6 hour bus ride to Chiang Khong , the border post on the Mekong River that separates Thailand and Laos. Then a 2 minute boat ride across to Laos (see video below), the seventh country so far on this amazing adventure which is now into it's seventh month! We had chosen this route into Laos as Huay Xai (the border town) was the base for The Gibbon Experience - an eco tourism project that funds forest conservation and community projects in the Bokeo Nature Reserve. Guests stay in tree-houses and use a zip-line cable gliding network to scour the primary forest in search of the illusive singing Black Gibbon. Illusive being the operative word. We did see some gibbons once in the three days for about 7 minutes, far off in the distance. Well, we saw their silhouettes jumping through the canopy. We heard them very well though, by George are they loud! Here's a video of me filming our wonderful al fresco tree-house shower. The siren-like noise in the background are t

From Koh Phayam we bussed it up to Bangkok, overnight, a relatively short 10 hour trip to our home from home. This was our 4th stop in what has become one of our favourite cities. And then we cheated and flew to Chiang Mai. And my oh my did we notice the change in temperature. Koh Phayam and Bangkok were hot, probably 33 to 35 degrees and humid. In Chiang Mai it was about 37 degrees but with a feel like factor of 43!!! So we decided to take it pretty slowly. We hired bikes but didn't go far on them , just into the old walled city for a mooch at some temples and then it was just too hot so we didn't venture out again til dark. Conveniently the market, aptly named The Night Market, doesn't open til, you guessed it, night, so we perused that and resisted buying more useless tat. I did however purchase a very useful hat. My new tit-fer-tat. Day 2 in Chiang Mai = cooking lesson day. Masterchef here we come. Look out Greg and John. We signed up for a full