Pat and Norm's World Cruises and other adventures

October 22

We had dinner last evening with Kim and Brooke, her daughter.  Brooke is the one who played soccer against the elephant in Thailand.  They are from Toronto, and Brooke is a marathon runner, having her 32nd birthday this week.  We really enjoyed meeting them and had a lovely dinner.

We sailed into beautiful Halong Bay today, arriving around noon.  We needed to anchor in the bay and go to shore by tender.  But our excursion this afternoon was a junk tour, so the junk boats picked us up right from the ship.  They put a pontoon boat on the opposite side of the ship as the tenders were leaving from, and the junk boats came right up to that to load us.  Many people on the ship were going on the junk boats so it was a busy time.

The bay itself is gorgeous, with many large rock formations that must look even more spectacular when there isn’t as much of a haze.  The guide, Churn, said that is in the spring.  Right now it is hazy in the distance.

They call these chicken and rooster

Ha Long means Dragon.  There are almost 2000 islands here and it is one of the world’s outstanding natural wonders.  It is a UNESCO World Heritage site.  There are tiny islands with rock arches, sheer cliffs, many peaceful coves and white beaches.  The islands have fanciful names – Heavenly Gate, Tortoise Rock, Man Head Rock, The Isle of Wonders, Tea Pot Rock and Devil’s Face.  Half of the islands have not been named.

We cruised around the bay, and of course, there were things for sale on the boat which is run by a couple with an adorable son and the grandmother. And women in boats came up to us either begging (always with a cute child aboard) or selling fruits or typical souvenirs.

He’s got a banana in his mouth!

This one is to show the scale of the rock formations

Some of the fruit for sale, These tiny bananas are delicious

Norm enjoyed a local beer

Some of the merchancise for sale

“window shopping”

They live on the boats, here is the laundry

We made a stop at a spectacular cave and climbed the 120 steps to enter.

People leave money in the caves, I have seen coins in a fountain, but not paper money in a cave!

View from just outside the caves

Pictures just can’t do these formations justice!

When we returned to the ship, there were women with a child in boats asking passengers to throw money to them.

Again, for scale, our ship with a junk boat beside it

October 21

Last night, some people were affected by the ship’s  motion, as we are on the edge of the typhoon that is near the Phillipines and the swells were 12 feet.  Didn’t bother us, though. We had a lovely dinner in Polo with a couple from Calgary.

This morning, as we pulled into the port in Da Nang, we saw very small circular fishing boats, the first of this type we have seen.  They are small enough to go under the port structure!

We traveled to Hue (pronounced hway) on a tour called Imperial Hue.  Our guide was Quoc, which he says is pronounced like the sound a duck makes!  He was great,  His background was after university for 4 years as a history major, he taught in secondary school, but it was far from his home.  So he went for a tourist course for 6 months and decided to be a tour guide.  This history background makes him especially effective.  He is married with 3 children and his wife is a lawyer.  He says that lawyers don’t make much money in Vietnam.  Doctors earn about $600/month and bank clerks about $800. Lawyers are not used when you buy a house or get a divorce, so there is little that they can do.  A company CEO may make $3000/month and they are considered rich here.

Since the war days, they eat cats, dogs, mice and water buffalo. Food was scarce then so that’s why it started, but he says it continues because “they taste good”! They do not eat whale or dolphin, though, they are considered special and if one dies and washes to shore, they have a ceremony and actually bury them and install a shrine.

When we were in Vietnam before we learned that the women all cover up completely because they don’t want the sun to make their skin any more brown.  So they masks they wear aren’t for pollution (which isn’t bad here).  He says it is hard to identify criminals though.

Most of the time the people eat breakfast at restaurants, not at home, and they enjoy pho (pronounced fuh) which is a noodle soup.  I love it!

This is monsoon season here but we had a beautiful day.  Not as hot as some of the other days.  It was a 1 1/2 hour trip to Hue, so we had lots of time to learn more about Vietnam.

We saw rice paddies, but the rice has been harvested already here,  They have two crops a year.  In some of the rice fields, we saw graves which had been buried but are now on the surface.  They are like a small shrine, which is because the people believe the grave is like a house where you wait for your next life.

The drive to Hue took us along the coastal road bordering the brilliant blue East Sea.  The town itself is like a massive open air museum with hundreds of temples, pagodas, palaces and tombs. Very clean too.

This is the area of the DMZ during the war. Quoc mentioned that the Viet Cong took over the Forbidden City here and it was hard to tell the Viet Cong from the other Vietnamese people, causing lots of loss of life.  He called it the game of “Tom and Jerry”.

When we got to Hue, which is the old imperial capital and cultural treasusre chhest, we first visited the Craft Hat village where they make incense and the traditional conical hats. There was some beautiful art work here.

Papaya tree

Dragon fruit

One of the colorful paintings

Many kinds of incense sticks

They number every piece before restoring, number is upper left. We saw this in all of the historic temples

Working on the restoration

The tomb

There are a lot of pottery shards that were used. These are the originals, just cleaned

The statues are small because none could be taller than the emperor

We went to the Tomb of Tu Duc, the empporer of Vietnam for more than 35 years.  The grave is surrounded by a paviliou and temple and guarded by stone sculptures of elephants, horses and soldiers.  Lots of restoration is going on here.

Following that visit, we went to the remains of the Citadel, the court of the Nguyen emperors.  It was completed in 1832 and occupies more than 1000 acres of land with the ramparts over 20 feet high.  During the Vietnam War, some of the most intense fighting occurred in this region and many buildings were destroyed or damaged.  Now it is a UNESCO World Heritage sight and is being restored. This site also contains the Thai Hoa Palace of Supreme Harmony, the Imperial Library and the Forbidden Purple City.  This was once the inner, exclusive domain of the emperors.

More pottery shards, you can actually see the bottoms of cups

Before lunch, we went to the Thien Mu Pagoda, one of the most beautiful architectural structures in Vietnam.  It has an octagonal seven-story tower and adjacent prayer hall perched on a hill overlooking the Perfume River.  It is Buddhist design.

We boarded Dragon Boats to cross the river to the Pomelo Restaurant where we had a fabulous lunch, including pho.

The boat captain and his son

We were entertained by these dancers at lunch

Along the ride home, Quoc explained that the yellow liquid in THESE bottles is eucalyptus oil (not gas).

Tomorrow we head to Ha Long Bay, arriving about noon.

October 18 and 19

We landed at the airport in Ho Chi Minh City (many still call it Saigon) around noon, and the ship wasn’t due to dock until 1 PM.  When we were here in 2011, we were on a bigger ship and it had to dock well outside the city as it couldn’t come into the river.  This required a long bus ride.  One of the wonderful things about the size of the Insignia is that it can come in to these ports.  Our ship is walking distance from the city.

Ho Chi Minh City is large and sprawling. This shot is taken from the airplane before we landed.

Since we had some time before we could board the ship, we went to the Notre Dame Cathedral, which was built during the time that the French were in control of Vietnam.  10% of the population is Catholic, 75% are Buddhist and the rest don’t practice any religion. The Cathedral is in the same square as the Central Post Office, one of the oldest buildings in the city.  It was designed by the French architect Gustave Eiffel and the interiror has remained essentially untouched since its construction between 1886 and 1891.

A bride outside the cathedral

We arrived back at the ship in pouring rain.  This is the rainy season here, through the end of the month, and they have downpours almost daily.

After lunch and unpacking, we went out to find a shop that we went to on our last visit here.  Here, young women painstakingly hand embroider exquisite works of art.  We were on a tour last time – to the actual workroom which had a shop – and we were too time constrained to make an intelligent choice.  Ever since, Norm has been looking at the shop online – it is called XQ – but we didn’t want to buy online.  We found the shop and after quite a while comparing many items, we purchased a Vietnamese scene.  This picture doesn’t do it justice, it is simply beautiful.

We spent time in the amazing market place.  Then, Norm got a haircut for $5 while I had a pedicure.  $2.50 if you just wanted a simple soak and pedicure, $7.50 if you wanted the bucket soak with exfoliation.  I opted for the $7.50 version and it was about 90 minutes of pampering.  On the ship, I don’t even want to tell you what they charge – it is a Canyon Ranch Spa, after all!  Som’e of the ship crew arrived while we were there, upstairs, massages are $11, and they all had their massages there.

Our silk purchase is very large, so we decided to take a taxi back to the ship.  You do have to negotiate a price and the driver said “15”.  Norm asked “15 dollars?” and the driver laughed and said “no, 15,000 dong”.  Well at 22,000 dong to the dollar, that was about 68 cents!  We gave him $5 and he almost jumped out of the cab for joy.  We also gave nice tips to the barber and nail people (and more than one worked on me!)

There are 9 million people in Ho Chi Minh City and 5 million motorbikes, the preferred method of communication here and in most of Asia.  And watch out, they will run you over.  We saw whole families on one bike, and also the things they carry on them – you can’t even imagine!

After dinner, the ship was showing “Good Morning Vietnam” so we went to the movie as it has been years since we saw it.  Seeing it in Saigon and without Robin Williams in our world was really eerie.

October 19

Our tour today is a trip to the Mekong Delta and a cruise on the Mekong River.

On the way to the port, we visited the 150 year old Vinh Trang Pagoda.  It is a combination of Vietnamese Khmer and French architecture.  There are three large Buddhas here, standing, sitting and lying.

On the way to the port, our guide, Mr. Tuan, shared a lot of information about Vietnam. Rice is a huge product for them, they are second only to Thailand in rice exports.  There are 100 different kinds of rice seed.  Rice grows for 3 months and most farmers grow two crops a year, but in really rainy areas or seasons, like Cambodia, they have 3 crops.  One of the societal problems is that after the rice is sold, the people have a lot of money.  The men use it to drink, and our guide says it causes a lot of problems including death at young ages – 30’s and 40’s.  In the country, you also see a lot of trash around, Mr. Tuan says that is due to lack of education.  In the city, trash is picked up every day, but in the country, the people need to properly dispose of it and they often don’t do it.

Lady Buddha with many arms

We proceeded to the port of My Tho and boarded the riverboat.   The Mekong is the 6th largest river in the world. It  begins in the Tibetan Plateau and tumbles 2795 miles to the Mekong Delta and the South China Sea. In Vietnam, the river divides itself into dozens of tributaries and becomes the Cuu Long or  Nine Dragons that fan out into a rich delta, covered with green rice paddies and orchards of coconuts, mangoes, pineapples and bananas.  We passed stilt houses, fish and shrimp farms and all manner of boats.  Many of them have eyes painted on to ward away the evil spirits. The fishing boats don’t though, because the farmers are afraid it will scare the fish.

Our guide on the boat was Hoa (which means flower).  We went to Unicorn Island, one of four in the delta.  The others are Dragon, Phoenix and Turtle.  We don’t really know why.

We visited 3 different places on the island, walking between them.  One was to taste local honey – the bees get the pollen from the longan tree flower.  At another we sampled all of the fruits, jack fruit, dragon fruit, mango, pineapple and other local fruits.  At the third, we watched the coconut candy making, from the cracking of the coconut, to the squeezing of the milk, to the churning, cutting and wrapping. We also tasted!

Norm checking out the honey in with the bees

You can see the eyes on the boat

One of the fish farms

Our guide, Hoa

Tasting various fruits

Local performers

During part of the trip, we boarded these small boats to navigate a small area of a river tributary.

Making coconut candy

Flower of the longan tree (kind of like a lichee fruit comes from this tree and the flowers are used by the bees to make great honey

Here’s where we had lunch

Mango tree

Elephant fish, that the waitress took the fish and wrapped it rice paper with pineapple and cucumber to dip in a tamarind sauce. Yum!

That mound is sticky rice which was cut into sections.

Pork

Having refreshing coconut water on the way back to the bus

On the way back, Mr. Tuan talked about the war, the aftermath, the change in name from Saigon to  Ho Chi Minh City after the North became in control and Vietnam became one communist country. There is the one party, but like China, there is a lot of capitalism here.

Dinner tonight was a special one for the around the world passengers.  We had duck and watermelon salad, a shrimp soup, pork belly Vietnamese style and we had the lobster pad thai as a main dish (beef terriaki was the other choice and it also looked delicious!)  There was a kind of cream with ladyfingers for dessert.  We had the cruise director, Leslie, as our table host and had a wonderful time.  The show with a New Zealand singer, Chris Powley, was really great.  He has a wonderful powerful voice.

Restful sea day tomorrow and we are looking forward to it.

October 16-18

After breakfast on the ship, 22 of us (plus Nancy, one of the destinations staff who also accompanied us to Bagan), headed for our next adventure – Siem Reap and the temples of Angkor Wat.

We traveled on Bangkok Airlines, and they sure know how to do things right. They have a private lounge to wait in, with fresh popcorn, drinks, sandwiches, chips, cookies, etc. Then they served us a lunch on the plane!  It is a little disconcerting to see fish (those orange things towards the front) painted on the side of the plane, but oh well, it was a very colorful plane.

After a short flight of 1 1/2 hours, we were met by our guide for the trip, Sam Kim – he said it is his nickname and never told us his whole real name.  We headed first to the Artisans Angkor Fine Arts and Crafts Center, a workshop where disabled children/teens (mostly deaf and mute) work on all kinds of carving, painting, weaving, lacquer work, etc.  They are really good, and the work is amazing.  In fact, some of the reproductions in the temples are made here.  We made some purchases there and really enjoyed the shop and the mission it represents. It is supported by the European Union.

This part of Cambodia is very different from Sihanoukville – it has all the beauty of the surroundings but much less of the poverty and garbage.  It has been named a world heritage site by UNESCO, so that may account for it.

We then went to our hotel, Le Meridien, for a rest before dinner at the Sokha Hotel. Our hotel was simply beautiful and the beds are not king sized, they are emperor sized – like two double beds together.  I never saw a bed that big.

And here is just part of the pool

Our dinner was terrific, lots of Cambodian foods, and we were entertained with an Apsara traditional show.

The next morning, we were off on our temple adventure.

The first one was Angkor Thom for the Bayon Temple complex, Terrace of the Leper King and the Elephant Terrace. The elephant terrace is a sandstone wall covered with carved hunting scenes and three-hea

There are 1080 temples in Siam Reap.  They were built between the 9th and 15th centuries.  In the 1860’s a French Explorer, Henri Mouhot, set out into the depths of Cambodia in search of what he has heard locals talk about – ruined temples.  What he found decaying beneath layers of roots and trees, is absolutely incredible.  Over the past 100 years, teams of French experts and archeologists have reconstructed much of what was ruined into the imprressive Angkor Archaeological Park.

Bayon has 216 faces in the big monuments, pictured below (9 is a lucky number in Cambodia) and you see 9 things a lot, or numbers that add up to 9, like 2+1+6 or 5+4.

The smaller heads are the ones leading into the temple complex, on one side are 54 (5+4 = 9) demons, and on the other side are 54 gods.

The carvings are amazing!

Next, we visited Ta Prohm Temple, which some may recognize as being the setting for the film Tomb Raider which starred Angelina Jolie (I guess I will have to see that one now!)

It is a quiet and sprawling monastery and its most distinguishing features are the trees that spread their gigantic roots over stones, probing walls and terraces apart as their branches intertwine to form a roof over the structures.  The tree is called the sprung tree.

Amazing carvings here too

For scale – these trees are gigantic!

We also visited Preah Khan temple before having a wonderful lunch of the local foods at a restaurant in Siem Reap. This temple is largely unrestored and has 72 (7+2=9) nagas (the many headed serpent).

One of the things that our guide told us along the way is more about the Killing Fields during the Khmer Rouge.  Pol Pot killed so many people and they specifically targeted the intellectuals (doctors, teachers, lawyers, etc) Millions were slaughtered and most of the schools, hospitals, etc were destroyed, Everything had to be rebuilt. The Khmer Rouge stole many of the treasures in these temples and others to sell and buy weapons.  The country still has many land mines and they say it will take about 10 more years to find them all.  They have trained dogs and rats to detect them.  Out of every 350 Cambodians, one has lost limbs due to land mines.  That’s an incredible number and we saw people with no legs or missing an arm or a leg.  The country is slowly recovering from the horrors of that era.

After lunch we visited Bantey Srey temple.  This is known as the pink temple or women’s temple because of the carvings of the devatas carved into the pink colored sandstone.  It is the only one not built by a monarch and was originally dedicated to the Hindu god, Shiva.

Along the way we passed many rice fields and learned that most families have their own small rice field.  If they are farmers they have bigger ones, and most have a few oxen or water buffaloes to help them with their work.

Here’s what the rice looks like, when it is yellow, it is ready to haarvest

Our final stop of the day is the Angkor Wat Temple.  This huge temple was built by King Suryavarman as a Hinduist temple, his tomb is in the top tower.  There are five lotus like towers rising 65 meters into the sky.  It is one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world, and no wonder!

We spent two hours here and explored the complex, climbed up into the towers and generally enjoyed the tranquil setting as the sun slowly set. We were taken back to our bus by electric vehicles, they are trying to be environmentally aware here, and in years to come, that is what will be allowed in to the complex.  For now, there are motorbikes and even elephants.

Our guide, Sam, was a wealth of information

A view from the top

one of the nagas here

Unbelievably intricate carvings.

Authentic costumes

My typical capture of local people.

Along the way back to the hotel and on every roadside in our journey, we saw these bottles filled with yellow liquid, we thought it was some type of lemonade or liquor (many of the bottles were whisky bottles), but no, it is gas, rebottled by locals for sale at these markets for the many motorbikes.

Captured from the bus, the bottles are all the way on the left of the picture

We were very hot and sweaty – it is humid here – so after a refreshing shower, we had a Cambodian dinner at our hotel.  I never tire of the Asian noodle dishes, morning, noon and night!

Nancy made her way to Pub Street where she did a lot of shopping, but the rest of us were too tired.

The next morning, we flew to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon).  More about that in the next post.  Of course, every Cambodian must love Dairy Queen??? – we spotted this one in the airport!

October 8

We arrived in Phuket this morning around 7 AM and noticed right away that it was very hazy.  While we were at breakfast, Leslie, our cruise director, made an announcement that the haze was smoke due to a volcano eruption and fire in Indonesia and that we would likely experience it all day.

Many people chose to go to Phuket’s beautiful beaches, we decided that we will have many chances to go to beautiful beaches and opted for another excursion.

We left early for our excursion – our first stop was the Kinnaree elephant camp where we had our first ride on an elephant!  We loved it.  We are big elephant lovers and contribute to the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, so we were pleased to find out that this is a family owned operation and they treat the elephants well.  One highlight was watching the 5 year old elephant do her dance and twirl a hula hoop around her trunk.

One of the mahoots created these palm figures while giving one of the couples on our excursion their ride.

Elephants are an important part of Thai history and culture and are regularly featured in Buddhist art and architecture.  Wild elephants used to roam Phuket Island but as rubber plantations and mining changed the natural environment, the elephants slowly disappeared.  Elephants were used in Thailand’s logging industry hauling heavy logs our of the remote forest to roads not accessible by truck.  In 1989 most elephants and their mahouts (handlers) were forced out of work when the Thai government banned virtually all logging of its quickly dwindling teak forests. Families took care of them and treat them almost like we treat our pets.

Satit, our guide, told us that elephants are like dogs and if they wander off or get lost, they will show up in front of the owner’s door in a day or two.  They are loved in Thailand, and when they die, the local people bury them like they do people.

At this same camp Satit, showed us how the rubber is harvested from the rubber tree.  by rubber tapping. Bark is cut off on alternating sides of the tree, only one side at a time, and the resin only flows during the night, so people are out there from 1 AM till daybreak.  It takes a lot of the resin to make the rubber products.

We then visited the Chalong Temple.  The Thai word for temple is “Wat” so this sight is referred to locally as Wat Chalong.  It is the most famous temple on the island of Phuket and the most ornamented of Phuket’s 29 monasteries. It enshrines a gilt statue of Luang Por Cham, the monk who became a hero when he helped the people of Phuket put down the Chinese Coolie Rebellion in 1876.  He is said to have formidable healing powers and to this day, Thais from all over the country flock to Wat Chalong to pay homage to the monk and regain their physical and spiritual powers.

There are 4 very different structures on the grounds, one made of wood with wax figures of monks inside, one that is 3 stories and full of gold Buddha statues and beautiful paintings, and one that is more like the other temples we have seen.  Outside of the temples there are beautiful plantings, and a brick structure in which someone sets fireworks to ward off the evil spirits.  I jumped every time they went off! Satit also explained that Thai people do not marry in the temples, they marry at home.

They set the fireworks off inside, the smoke is coming out of the top

Buddha in beautiful garden

Behind me are some of the beautiful paintings

We often see what looks like a small temple, these are called spirit houses.

After leaving the Chalong Temple, we went to a cashew nut factory, curiously named Sri Bhurapa Orchid Company.  We saw the trees, the workers who prepare the cashews for sale, and had a chance to sample (and buy) delicious cashew products.  We enjoyed the plain ones and the sour cream and onion flavored ones the most and bought them along with a cashew and sesame brittle that was fantastic.

Last, we stopped at the largest jewelry store in the world, Gem Gallery.  They have a tram ride, much like one you would find in Disney World, that demonstrates how gems are formed, harvested and made into stunning jewelry.  Then you get to walk through the workshop and see the artisans at work.  Once you go into the showroom, which is huge, there are aquariums with all kinds of fish, including small sharks.  I took a picture before I knew that it wasn’t allowed.

a small part of the showroom with one of the aquariums in the middle

Looking at the workshop from the end, workers on both sides

I bought a gold and pearl necklace and bracelet.  You cannot believe the number of pieces of jewelry they have on display.  Very impressive.

There was a p0rtable market set up at the port and there is a Royal Caribbean ship also here.  They need to anchor and send people by tender to the shore, our ship can pull right up to the dock.  An advantage to a smaller ship.