Meo Vac in northern Vietnam

Ha Giang in northern Vietnam.

Boat man in Halong bay, Vietnam.

Heavenly Valley, Mt Hotham, Victoria

Looking towards Mary’s Slide, Mt Hotham.

My beautiful daughter Jasmine at Mt Hotham.

Rome, Italy (okay, I wish it was Rome – it’s Lygon Street in Carlton, Melbourne)

The Mansion Hotel, Ubud, Bali.

The pool at Okiwati’s Guesthouse, Ubud, Bali.

Port Phillip Estate, Red Hill, Victoria.

The Marina Bay Sands Hotel, Singapore.

The I’ve-Forgotten-The-Name Bridge, Singapore.

If you’ve taken some good Instagram (or Hipstamatic) shots I’d love to see them. You can post them on my Facebook page here.

I booked my ‘cruise’ online and I really didn’t have much idea what the cruise or Halong Bay would be like. Busy, is what it is. My ‘transfer’ bus was packed, the monolithic souvenir store selling monolithic marble statues we stopped at halfway there was packed with tour buses and Halong Bay harbour was packed solid with tourists waiting to get on their boats. And there were plenty of them. They were all queueing up to load passengers and crates of beer.

Our 16 berth boat however only had nine passengers. Four couples on a romantic getaway and me. This is our boat…

…and this is my rather salubrious cabin…

Most of the first day was spent ‘cruising’ around the towering limestone islands lounging about on the sun deck…

… visiting a cave and doing a bit of kayaking (we kayaked in the bay here…)

…with the other fleet of tourist boats. We did, however, get away from the hordes and had views that looked something like this…

After a sunset swim (jumping from the boat) and a banquet dinner it was time for my favourite part of the trip – karaoke! I even got the Norwegian couple to sing ‘Take on me’ by A-ha. The next morning, after a big sleep (the cheap bottle of Vietnamese win and the beers might have helped there) we transfered to Cat Ba island, where we were dropped off at various hotels in Cat Ba town. Except me. I was left on the bus and the driver motioned for me to jump on the back of a passing scooter. I was then taken down to a small harbour and he promptly rode off. I had no idea what was going on or where I was. I had paid extra to stay in a ‘beach bungalow’, but there wasn’t a bungalow in sight. A lady with a large bag of groceries, who seemed to be just walking by, told me to get on a small wooden flat boat that was piled high with with bags of  clean laundry. She spoke no English and the boat driver spoke no English, but I jumped aboard anyway. I do love an adventure. Although, after 30 minutes of chugging out past a floating village and seemingly towards the ocean I was getting a tad worried (the pic at the top of the blog is my feet hanging off the front of the Laundry Express).

Finally, 45 minutes later we rounded an island and in front of me was a small perfectly idyllic resort and my perfectly idyllic bungalow on the beach…

…and this is the view from my balcony…

Not bad. eh? I’m so glad I didn’t stay in noisy, built-up Cat Ba town and paid the extra $10. There were only two other couples staying in the resort and, amazingly, one of those was the lovely couple from New York that I did the cooking course with in Hanoi.

Our first stop was the village of Pac Ngoi on Ba Be lake where we stayed in a homestay (that’s our ‘house’ on the far left in the pic below). For $3 a night you get a comfy bed with a fan and lovely balcony overlooking the river and a fridge full of cold beers.

This is the lovely balcony (not bad for $3, eh?)

And how’s this for a scenic setting for a volleyball game. This was just below our balcony…

On the way out of Ba Be Lake we stopped at a small village for the weekly market and it was like stepping back in time with scenes like this…

and this…

and this…

and a modern twist walking past a huge sign…
.

We spent most of our time in the province of Ha Giang, which was home to one of the most spectacular drives I have ever done. The road between the charming towns of Dong Van and Meo Vac is known as ‘Heaven’s Gate’ and winds it way precariously up steep, lush green mountains that somehow are filled with rice terraces and corn fields.

This is our driver Truong halfway up Heaven’s Gate…

This is the poorest province in Vietnam, but the mountain folk are a friendly, sturdy lot who walk for hours up and down steep roads to the weekend market. Along the way we passed lots of curious locals like these kids lugging piles of some sort of leaves…

I loved the town of Dong Van. The ‘old quarter’ was filled with, well, old buildings and what I loved the most was that there were rice paddies smack in the middle of town – that looked something like this…

And the other thing I loved is that in these parts of Vietnam the pith helmet is in fashion. All the men wear them. Bring back the pith helmet I say – it would work a treat with my safari suit…

After Ha Giang, we had a big presentation in Yen Bai then it was back to Hanoi to whip up lots of work (I’ll show you some of the work when I get the final artwork). When I finished in Hanoi I took a few days off (although it wasn’t really ‘days’ off’ because the trip and work was so much fun anyway) and did a 3-day cruise in Halong Bay. I’ll post some pics from that Chinese junk junket on my next blog…

The Balé Hotel, Nusa Dua, Bali
Fluffy slippers, private pool, cookie jars, breakfast in your own private garden and an on-call 24-hour butler. There’s nothing like a bit of indulgent opulence to make you feel indulgently opulent. I ‘won’ a bunch of nights at any one of the Small Luxury Hotels of the World (it was part of my prize for ASTW Travel Book of the Year) and we also stayed at the The Viceroy in Ubud (which was just as terrible).

Byron Bay, New South Wales, Australia
I was in Byron for the Byron Bay Writer’s Festival and not only was it up there with the best writer’s festival that I’ve been to (along with the Ubud Writer’s Festival), but gee it was nice to escape a Melbourne winter. I actually got to walk around in a T-shirt and didn’t have to wear socks to bed.

Walking Tour of Hanoi, Vietnam
I do love Lonely Planet. Yes, I admit it. I followed exactly step by step the ‘Walking Tour’ of Hanoi thats in Lonely Planet’s Vietnam guidebook and it was marvelous. It took me three hours and the walk took me down little side streets that I never would have found with hidden pagodas and markets and shops. I even had snacks and drinks at all the recommended places to stop and it was wonderful. I’ve followed the ‘Walking Tours’ of cities a few times now particularly when I don’t have much time in a city and it really is a great way to ‘discover’ a city.

Yarra Valley, Victoria, Australia
Less than two hours from Melbourne is our major wine growing area. It’s full of rolling vineyard covered hills, boutique hotels and resorts, wonderful restaurants and, best of all, lots of free wine tasting. And even better still is staying the night at one of the boutique resorts (at Balgownie Estate to be exact). The day goes something like this: wander around vineyard, try some wine, swim in the pool and spa, try some wine, sit on the balcony with a view, try some wine, dinner at a fine-dining restaurant, try some wine, stagger back to your room. What a perfect holiday.

Swimming with turtles, Gili Islands, Lombok
Our guide on our full day snorkelling tour promised that we would see a turtle. He was wrong. We saw about twenty of them –  and lots of brightly coloured fish and coral. Plus, the boat ride was beautiful and we had a fantastic lunch on Gili Air and it didn’t bother me at all that I had silly-looking goggle marks on my face all day.

Mt Buller Chutes, Victoria, Australia
It’s very rare that you get a real ‘powder’ day in the Australian ‘Alps’. Often it turns into glug not long after its snowed. But, I scored one of those days and it was a beauty. It had been snowing for a few days and even when my day of skiing began at Mt Buller you couldn’t see a metre in front of you. Then, magically the cloud lifted revealing untracked powder everywhere. I spent the the day in Mt Buller Chutes (double black diamond off-piste area) skiing soft, dry powder. You could have heard my hoots of joy from Melbourne.

Campuhan Ridge Walk, Ubud, Bali
This tranquil and stunning walk on the edge of Ubud has a special place in my heart because it is where I met my girlfriend Beth. Eighteen months after we met we did the walk again. It was perfectly romantic and, best of all, not once did one of the snarling stray dogs try to tear me to bits.

Pelican Beach, Queensland, Australia
I put this beach in my list of the Best Beaches in the World. It’s a little island between Harvey Bay and Fraser Island and we had the entire island to ourselves. Heaven.

Dining with locals, Son La, Vietnam
I was in Vietnam doing some volunteer work for an NGO and part of our job was to travel around the stunning and mostly untouched regions in the north west. But the best part was dining with the locals. We had lunch in a family home in small mountain village and a huge banquet (with a dance show) with local dignitaries in Son La and noodle soup (Pho) with a bunch of locals in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere that had probably never even seen a tourist.

Somewhere above Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Okay, I didn’t travel very far out of Melbourne, but boy what a way to do it. I flew upside down in a 1942 Tiger Moth biplane for 30 minutes and as well as loop-de-looping we skirted the city before climbing above Port Phillip Bay for ‘more than mild’ acrobatics. It was such a buzz even if I did almost wet my pants and vomit at the same time.

I don’t know what is in store for me travelling wise in 2011. There will be a trip to the U.S. and… who knows where else – that’s what I love about travel!

Happy New Year everyone and I hope there’s lots of wonderful travel experiences for you out there

Our first stop was the somewhat touristy, but charming village of Moc Chau before stopping for lunch at the less charming, but very un-touristy village of Yen Chau. We had lunch in a local’s house that is also a home stay. As part of SNVs wide and varied program to help tourism in the region they advise locals on how to set up and run home stays. This one, like many in the region, was a stilted house with a large open-plan area for sleeping and eating. I wasn’t exactly sure what I ate for lunch. Here’s a photo. Can you recognise anything…

Actually, the food was delicious (although the five shots of strong rice wine may have killed a few taste buds along the way). Our host was incredibly friendly (hence all the shots), although he did look a little grumpy (or perhaps a little drunk) when we arrived…

Next it was the large and rather dusty town of Son La, which isn’t that exciting, but does have a lovely meeting room…

We gave a presentation there to government and tourism officials from the Son La region. We talked about things like Brand Personality which translates as Tính cách thương hiệu. The problem is that sometimes the translations can be a little misinterpreted. Phil used an example for ‘destination brand personality’ as the ‘romance of Paris’. Except the translator misheard him and told the gathered luminaries that ‘a good example is the romance of parrots’. They all looked rather puzzled until one asked the translator what lovemaking parrots had to do with promoting their region.

Parrots were soon forgotten when we were then whisked away to a formal dinner (well as formal as you can get when you sit on the floor, drink copious amounts of rice wine and eat smoked pig’s intestines), This was the spread before we sat down for our pig’s guts…

Following our dinner we were entertained by Phil standing up in front of everyone singing a Scottish ditty. I was also dragged up, although my rendition of  ’I Can’t Help Falling in Love’ sounded very strange because the keyboardist was playing a totally different song. We also got a local dance troupe that danced around for a while then dragged us all up to dance in a big circle and drink from a communal wooden vat of rice wine…

The next morning we hit the road early for the long drive to Sapa through stunning countryside that looked something like this…

On the way to Sapa we had another presentation in Lai Chau, which I dubbed ‘Kookytown’. The small provincial outpost of a town of Lai Chau (formerly Tam Duong) was recently made the capital of the region and gigantic (and very empty) government buildings were built. As well as empty four-lane highways, massive hotels and a lake. It looked just like Canberra…

We had a couple of days in Sapa, where our biggest presentation to the heads of each eight provinces was held at the ‘Light Club Disco’. And rather aptly halfway through the meeting loud music began blasting from the street so we couldn’t hear a thing. The scenery in Sapa was lovely, though…

That’s the rather spectacular view from my hotel room!

After Sapa we headed back to Hanoi where we worked out of an ad/design agency for a couple of days. We managed to get all the work done in time and, I have to say, it all looked really good. I’ll show you when it’s all finished. I was really happy with our ‘taglines’ as well. My favourite was the one we did for Sapa: ‘Find yourself in the clouds’. We do have some stiff competition, though. I don’t understand Vietnamese, but I love this local ad for KFC (although the Colonel does look a bit strange)….

The NGO I’m doing the work for is SNV, which is a non-profit organisation established in the Netherlands in 1965. They have been on the ground in developing countries for over 40 years, and now operate in 35 countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Balkans. SNV has 900 advisors in the field who come from a variety of cultural and technical backgrounds. So what do they do? I’ll let them explain:

Our aim is to alleviate poverty by enabling those on the lowest incomes to be part of social and economic networks and so increase their income and employment opportunities. More than half of our work focuses on economic and private sector development. Alongside this, we contribute to improving people’s access to basic services like water and sanitation, energy and education. We achieve both by strengthening local organisations.

They are also heavily involved in helping developing nations promote and build tourism. Again, they explain it a lot better than me:

According to the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO), tourism is the primary source of earnings for 49 of the world’s least developed countries. SNV works in the field of sustainable tourism, as it can make a considerable difference in alleviating poverty. SNV focuses on all aspects of sustainability: economic, environmental, cultural, and institutional (good governance). SNV is currently promoting pro-poor sustainable tourism in 23 countries. SNV helps to create jobs for the local communities by supporting:

-enterprise development, such as product innovation and promotion;
-improving services such as accommodation and restaurants;
-protecting cultural assets, highlighting local events, and improving the production of souvenirs and handicrafts.
We also build capacities to empower local people and their communities to make their destinations more competitive.

I probably won’t get a chance to blog while I’m away, but I’ll fill you in about all the Pho I’ll eat on my return.

I got back yesterday from another magical trip to Bali (sorry I didn’t blog when I was away, but I really don’t like sitting in internet cafes with other travellers updating their facebook status). Last year when I won Travel Book of the Year I also ‘won’ a bunch of nights at any one of the Small Luxury Hotels of the World and I chose to stay at the The Viceroy in Ubud and the The Bale in Nusa Dua (plus we threw in a few nights on the Gili Islands in between). Both hotels (I’d call them hotels rather than resorts although they have all the resort facilities) were luxurious beyond words (or any words I can think of at least).

We (my girlfriend Beth and I) began our extraordinarily extravagant escape at The Viceroy in Ubud. Our villa (there are only 11 very private villas at the Viceroy) overlooked a deep ravine thick with jungle (and monkeys). It was all those little ‘touches’ that made it extraordinary, though. There were the usual luxurious touches like monogrammed bathrobes, chocolates on the pillow, fluffy towels and slippers, but there was also indoor and outdoor showers that could fit four or five people, a private (heated) swimming pool, personal driver and a telephone in the toilet. Oh, and there is a helicopter pad next to reception (pity my helicopter was in for repair last week).

Next we scummed it in the Gili Islands (our room didn’t come with a ‘turn down service’). But, it was just as magical with breakfast served in a little hut right over the water and we rode bikes around the Island, swam in the crystal clear waters, went snorkelling, ate great fresh seafood and got offered to buy magic mushrooms a lot.

We ended our tropical treat at the The Bale in Nusa Dua. I knew we were in for some serious luxury when our chauffeur picked us up from the port. First he handed us a flower scented wet towel followed by ice cold water and a bowl of gourmet nuts served on a silver tray. Our ‘pavillion’ was seriously bigger that my apartment – even our private pool was bigger than my apartment! Our ‘deluxe pavillion’ even included a 24-hour butler. A butler! We did feel a bit strange calling on our butler, though (we could shine our own shoes). I could go on and on, but it will just make you jealous when I tell you about our free massages, breakfast and dinner in our private villa, beach club with sunbed service, personal driver and, best of all, a cookie jar that was replenished twice a day.

So, it’s a bit depressing now – we’re back to cold wintry Melbourne and the next time we travel it will back to cheap guesthouses with no slippers… or cookie jars.

And here’s a few pics to make you even more jealous:

Our own private pool and ‘breakfast hut’ – The Viceroy, Ubud

The main pool – The Viceroy, Ubud

Lunch with a view – outside of Ubud

The lunch – Nasi Campur

Another lunch in Ubud – we didn’t eat the head, though.

The boat to the Gili Islands arrives ’some day’

Our ‘breakfast hut’ – Coral Beach 1, Gili Trawangan

The view from our ‘breakfast hut’

Horse & buggy and bicycle are the only ‘modes’ of transport on the Gili Islands.

Gili Air (there are three ‘Gili’ Islands in the group – Gili Trawangan, Gili Air and Gili Meno)

Lombok (a fleeting visit)

Our room at The Balé, Nusa Dua

Our own private garden and pool at The Balé

Breakfast served in our private garden (yes, what an indulgence!)

Dinner in our own private garden (yes, that’s just way too much indulgence!)

Although I don’t consider myself a ‘great’ photographer here are some of my favourite shots from my travels (well, my most recent travels with a good digital camera at least because I can’t be bothered scanning all my old 35mm print photos).

Baucau, East Timor

Baucau, East Timor

Vientiane, Laos

Mürren, Switzerland (and my daughter Jasmine)

Bagan, Burma

Bedugul, Bali

Rangoon, Burma

Yogyakarta, Indonesia

Hervey Bay, Queensland

Peterson, Minnesota, USA

Chicken fighting, Baucau, East Timor

Dili, East Timor

I started my Thailand leg in Patong Beach. Back in 1975 there was only one place to stay. And that was the Patong Beach Restaurant, which offered you ‘a patch on the floor for 11 cents (and a mat to put on it for another 8 cents!). The 1975 Lonely Planet guide says: ‘The two sure signs of a freak centre have already gone up, the “no nude bathing” sign and fruit salad on the menu.’ Well, it sure is still a freak centre (and they still have fruit salad on the menus). The most freakish thing is the sleazy men who watch Thai girls perform tricks with intinate parts of their anatomy.  My travelling partner Beth and I strolled down the street past lines of Go Go Girl bars and we were accosted every few metres by men holding up cards with the ‘entertainment’ provided by their prospective ‘club’. On the list were the usual ‘tricks’ involving ping pong balls, cigarettes and marker pens. But there were also ‘tricks’ involving catfish, swamp eels, mice and even ‘knitting’. I talked Beth into going to a show (we were both keen to see the swamp eels) , but she only lasted 8 seconds before we both ran out in disgust. Mind you, watching a woman ‘knitting’ would have been interesting.

After a few days on Phuket we headed to Bangkok where we stayed in two of the original hotels from the 1974 guidebook. The Malaysia Hotel was the No. 1 travellers hotel back in 74 although you had to ‘fight to get toilet paper and your sink may fall off the wall’. The sinks stayed firmly attached when we were there although most of the clientele would have liked to get hold off my pipes. It is now pretty much a ‘gay’ hotel. It was full of men with large moustaches wearing tight little shorts with deep brown tans. I got winked at quite a few times and I caught one guy checking out my bottom.

In  Chiang Mai we went a restaurant that was listed in the original guidebook, but it seemed to have moved – and changed it’s name slightly. We asked a tuk tuk driver if he knew where Pat’s restaurant was and he didn’t know but called a friend on his mobile phone who did. The Pat’s from 1974 was ‘near the moat’. We drove over the moat and out of town past the airport and somewhere between Chiang Mai and the Laos border we stopped at a restaurant called ‘Pat Restaurant’. We were the only diners, but the food was nice (and nice and cheap). We did have a bit of trouble getting back into town, though. There were no taxis or tuk tuks in sight and we had to walk along  the side of a dark freeway stepping over rubbish and dead dogs.  When we stumbled across a taxi driver having a rest in a large supermarket carpark I almost hugged him I was so excited.

So, there are lots more stories from Thailand, but I can’t tell you all of them or you won’t need to buy the book!