We can finallly tell you about Vietnam!

Biker Couple with no tatoos!!!

We left Phnom Penh on Feb 26 after a very nice stay in Cambodia. We had allowed an extra 3 days for processing of our visa at the embassy of Viet Nam, and were surprised when they had the processing done, and our passports back to us on the same day we applied! This gave us an extra 3 days in Phnom Penh for relaxing, shopping etc before bussing to Ho Chi Minh City (new name for Saigon but everyone still calls it Saigon).

The bus ride to HCMC was fine, including an efficient crossing of the Cambodia, Viet Nam border. HCMC is a large, prosperous, swept clean, busy city with cleaner air than expected. We found it to be a better "city experience" than PP in Cambodia but then it has come further with a lot more economic help .

One of the remarkable things about the city is the traffic. Everyone owns motorbike and they all drive like the crazy from every direction!!!! We found the city to be beautiful and green, and good for walking (check all ways before crossing the street, as they drive on the right, just like in the US)

After a few days in HCMC we bussed to the resort town of Dalat in the central highlands. It was a 7 hour bus ride to the town, which is situated in mountains that look a lot like north Georgia or eastern Tennessee, at an altitude of 5000 feet. We rented a motorbike for $4.50 per day and drove all over the surrounding countryside especiallythe coffee plantations. One of the main crops in this part of the country is coffee and it's some of the worlds best. The locals call it "Ca Fe Sua Doc", and it's served in a small drip strainer perched on top of the coffee cup and brought to your table. The coffee is as thick as syrup and VERY strong. Although strong, it is very smooth, and not bitter at all. We liked it a lot and now order "Ca Fe Sua Doc" sometimes when we want coffee. Dalat is the "California" of Viet Nam, because much of the available land is cultivated for growing everything from artichokes to zucchinni and all types of flowers. It is a lovely landscape, covered with small farms everywhere. Meals in Dalat, as well as in the rest of the country are VERY cheap, and highly nutritious with lunch for 2 was usually about $5 and dinner for two about $10 often including Dalat wine.

After a few days in Dalat we bussed to the town of Nha Trang on the South China Sea coast. Nha Trang is the best beach in the country and it has islands offcoast for diving. The beach front is the equal of any we have seen. It is clean, safe and beautiful. There are several high rise hotels on the beach (Sheraton, Novatel), and 4 new high rises going up along the main road. This is the beach capital of Viet Nam but we see our share of those types of towns.

Before our arrival we were concerned about how we would be received as Americans. We have been pleased and surprised that there is no anomosity in the Vietnameese at all. We were in a photo shop in Nha Trang and the operator offered to shake hands with Chuck and said "Viet Nam and America friends now. No more war".

Making Ca Fe Sua Doc

We took a dreadful overnight bus ride [had a flat and it had no restroom] to a wonderful centuries old port town called Hoi An and we really liked this location a lot. It had many restored merchant homes and trading buildings, temples, meeting houses and performance pavillion houses that were preserved and that could be toured.

We met a couple from New England that spend the winter in our hotel ever year for 5 years now and come back to the US with more money that when they left cuz it's so cheap to live in Vietnam for 3 months a year. The architecture and history was fascinating but we saw some traditional entertaining, folk dance, song and opera, that really was wonderful and so different and dramatic.

We took a tour to some historic runs built by the Champs, pronounced "cham", who originally came from Java and went back to very early man there. They were converted to Hinduism and built a series of impressive temples without mortar in the 1st through 5th century AD. Some damage was done during the war but much remains and is being preserved.

Some shots around Hoi An, one of our favorite places

Courtyard in traditional building in Hoi An

Fruitseller with new friend in Hoi An

A lantern maker in Hoi An


These temples are from the 1st through 5th centuries

We have more to come on Hue, Hanoi and Sapa in the next Blog.

Visit to Cambodia February 2010

We set out for our Southeast Asia adventure with Cambodia in Mid February meeting up good friends, Ray and Marilyn [from vessel Horizon] in Siem Reap. We'd heard nothing but great things about Cambodia, especially the kindness of the people, and we have found it an amazing and enlightening country. It really is like stepping back in time. Lynn was so excited to see that they still use huge clay pots...the size of washing machines...to hold and even filter river water in the country towns. She had read about the potters who make them way back when she was a potter. Few places in the world still do that.

We immediately followed our friends to Battambong for 2 days of country life in Cambodia and also because we may not see them for a long time and this is another good spot to visit. We all took a "tuktuk" ride around the dusty country. A tuktuk is a motor scooter pulling a covered cart seating 4. We got to see temples, a cave where hundreds of bodies were disposed during the Khmer Rouge Genocide and took a rickety ride on the bamboo railroad. This"railway" is just a bamboo slat raft sitting on 2 railroad wheel axles with an outboard motor connected to a fan belt running it. This raft thing was used to take crops to the city to sell produce and was disassembled when an actual train came along.

We returned to Siem Reap for several days staying in a nice comfortable $16 a day hotel. Siem Reap is the star location in Cambodia with many reconstructed temples from the 9th to the 12th century. The temples were built to honor Hindu Gods and commemorate favored myths of certain kings and are now for Buddist worship. These are massive constructions the size of cities with huge water reservoirs. Almost a million people lived all around this part of the country at this time and they have lived here since prehistory meaning 10's of thousands of years. That is amazing. Java man, one of the earliest cavemen, came from here in SE Asia.

We set off south to the capitol of Phnom Penh on quite an adventure of a 6 hour boat ride. It was overbooked so we rode on top for the first part and got soaked until some folks finally made some space below in the freezing air conditioning. We were glad to arrive, especially Lynn who had a mild cold anyway. In the city, it was still the celebration of Chinese New Year and a challenge to find a Hotel room so we had to pay $35 but it included breakfast if you like instant eggs, spam, hotdogs, orange koolade and noodles! We found a market for granola and box milk!!!! The fruit and veggies are great and overall the food is just yummy [except breakfast] and really cheap...and often FRENCH!!! Yea!!!

With their philosophy of Buddhism teaching tolerance and acceptance, these are really mild, polite, courteous people who really want to do a good job. We are so impressed with them. We are also crushed learning that Polpot's Khmer Rouge Regime wiped out 15% of the population in the early 70's in the Genocide that especially targeted the "intellectuals" who threatened his regime. That meant any man, woman or child who wore glasses or owned a book!!! We met some relatives of victims. So bitterly sad. See the movie "The Killing Fields". We visited the place that was turned into an interrogation and holding prison before execution in the city and we chose not to visit the killing fields themselves thinking we had seen enough. The city is slowly moving forward and rebuilding after being almost completely crushed. What really surprised us is that Polpot was allowed to live comfortably in Thailand until 1998 after murdering over 1.5 million people...astounding!!! They need Rambo here!!!

The King himself helped bury the significant number of crown jewels and gold statuary before leaving the country before the Regime and much was saved. We really enjoyed seeing the renovated palace and beautiful grounds that this country is very proud of. There is a strong bond between the king who is in his 50's and unmarried and the people. The country is a committed democracy, they did tell us, though.

We got our Vietnam visa here and leave on a 6 hour luxury bus for $12 for Ho Chi Minh City on Friday Feb 26. We'll see if it's better than the boat trip which wouldn't be hard to beat!!!

Malaysia

Shots around Malaysia in no particular order:

Buddist Temple in Melaka with offerings

Biggest buildings in Kuala Lumpur

Historic Fort in Melaka

Learning about how to make "Birds Nesr Soup"
It's sweetish and served for dessert!

Buying Batik artwork on silk in Melaka

Moslem school kids cut up with Chuck and Julia from Pacific Star, IP350

Malaysia is not as pristine as Singapore but a damnsight cleaner and richer than Indonesia so we are ready to like it here for a while. We plan to leave the boat in Langkawi while we travel and work on sprucing it back to shipshape!

We came to Johor the first of November, for the start of the Malaysia Rally but quickly went our own direction and pace, sailing NW up the Mallaca Straights, one of the busiest ship traffic locations in the world. We stayed in the barge lane missing all the fishing nets that are layed continously in 30' or less depth.

Our first stop was the historic town of Melaca with forts, museums, churches and old rebuilt squares to roam around. Next we stopped at Port Dickson where we left the boat for 5 days to visit the capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur...means "muddy confluence". We did the usual big city stuff: shopping, museums, architecture, gardens. It was pretty OK but quite cheap!

After that we sailed straight for Langkawi, a group of touristy resort islands in the Andaman Sea. They are dutyfree and the water is much bluer than the muddy Straights. There are several marinas and yacht services. First we get 7 new batteries, a charger for shore power, a "fixed" or a "new" fridge, canvas repaired, new cockpit cushions and lots of scrubbing of mildew from all over this tub!!! I'll call it by name when it looks "schoonery" again!

We plan to visit Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, China and even come home for a while, hopefully in spring. Good news is we bought a small AC unit cuz this weather is really hot and now we can sleep and work better.

We will also get physicals and renew prescriptions here, so hopefully we are in good enuf shape to keep doing this cruising stuff. We do have the net here at the Royal Langkawi Yacht Club, so keep in touch.

Back to making the maintainence list...haven't begun work yet.

Singapore

We can only hit the high points in Singapore. We stayed 3 weeks and just loved being in a big city again. We shopped....shopping is a marathon activity here...and saw all the museums. We toured around Little India and Chinatown with friends who met us coming in from Malaysia. We stayed in Raffles Marina, the most luxurious marina we have ever been in but very reasonable.

Singapore is immaculate and quite refreshing after Indonesia with all the polluted water.

We really loved the most wonderful tropical Botanic Gardens we have ever seen and the Bird Park was also quite remarable. The Zoo was just soso!

We had to get new passports so that's why it took a while but it was no problem...except the minor one...the heat...whew...quite warm here. Tried to stay gone until 6pm when it cools down.

In Nov we are on to Malaysia with the start of the rally that we really are just drifting with in the straights of Malaka until we get to Langkawi near Thailand. That's when the water gets nice and clear again and we look forward to it.

Kalimantan to Singapore

We gotta say, the last part of Indonesia was definitely the best!! We were so impressed with our visit to Camp Leakey where wild orangutans are cared for before being released back into the wild. What a great experience! Actually just imagine anchoring right on a river in southern Borneo. The Indonesian part of Borneo is called Kalimantan. We took this river boat for 2 days and one night through the jungle to see these amazingly intelligent "cousins". You know there is a lot going on when you look deep into their eyes.
There is more info on the website on the Kalimantan page but I just had to add some more photos here.

We arrived in Singapore on Monday Oct 5th and it's great to be back in the first world again. The 4 days it took to get here was when all the dreadful disasters were hitting this area and we kept getting email asking about our safety when we didn't really know what was going on. We will be at Raffles Marina in Singapore until the Malaysia Rally begins and we sail up the straits of Mallaca towards Thailand.

Keep an eye out on the website, Starsonthesea.com for a Singapore page as soon as Lynn fully recovers from a weird infection setback.

Pix of Indonesia/August '09

Here are a few pix of Indonesia and the adventure verbage follows on the next pages ...all about our time here.

After this we will post about our trip around Bali and we will get more photos on the net in Singapore. Internet is not readily available here and this is our first chance in 2 months.
Lynn and Chuck on CYAN

Kicking back!

Heading West to Bali/August '09

We are having trouble raving about this country. Compared to our other cruising areas this one is more challenging and we are not particularly enthusiastic about it. The anchorages are deep and rolly; not conducive to rest. The food is cheap but mediocre although the beer is good. The land is hot, dry and parched with lots of dirt and dust to collect on the boat….and no rain for over 2 months so there is salt everywhere. Many villages are pitifully poor and needy and we would like to help more than we can. Some actually rate as Fourth World!

We really just passed time until we got to the island of Rinca, near Komoto, and saw the giant Komoto Dragons. That was something impressive to write about. They actually can swim and climb aboard boats if they smell meat. We couldn’t get off the dinghy onto land because they looked so fierce.

We began enjoying this country a bit more when we arrived in Lovina Beach, Bali. We could have just skipped everything up until here if we had it to do over again. Also, this Boat Rally is the worst organized event we have ever seen…actually entertaining in its inefficiency! They keep cancelling things and changing the rules and the organizers quit halfway through it. We had taken off on our own away from the crowd of boats, anyway. We are waiting to renew our visas now and are just killing time before we visit the island of Bali. We have heard good things so are looking forward to improvement in our outlook.

We guess someplace has to be our least favorite!!! After here we go to Borneo to see the Orangutans and then to Singapore before another rally in Malaysia and then on to Thailand.

WE ARE ACTUALLY HEADED HOME AFTER THAILAND! In January we will head around India, through the Red Sea to Turkey. We won’t be back in the US on CYAN for at least 2 years but we are headed that way.

Lynn and Chuck on CYAN