Today is the day my tour officially starts. We'd all met the night before in the hotel and had dinner together, I had the best chicken and cashew nut I've ever eaten. We had a jam packed day ahead of us and first stop was a visit to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum or as the locals like to call him, Uncle Ho. We're picked up by the tour bus and driven to the mausoleum in about 10 minutes, it had taken me close to 30 when I walked it the previous day in the 37 degree hea...

My time in Bangkok ended today with an early morning flight to Hanoi. Flight time of 06:45 and being an international flight I need to be at the airport 2 hours prior. Being up before 04:00 was not pleasant however I did manage it OK. I flew Air Asia to Hanoi so it was quite cheap, about $60 Australian including 20kg of luggage. Somehow I managed to pick up about 2kg but unsure how. I didn't buy anything weighing that much. I grabbed some breakfast at the air...

Arrived in Hanoi around 08:30 and feeling alright considering I'd been up since 03:30ish. Made my way quickly to the immigration desk and joined the queue. Took around 20 minutes to get through, fingers crossed it's that quick when I arrive in Heathrow but I'm not holding my breath after the recent horror stories (e.g. 1km long, 2 hour waits). Get through to the Arrivals hall and start looking for the tourist information and ATM as I hadn't arranged transfers n...

Day two in Bangkok started early with a trip out to the River Kwai. My tour bus driver picks me up not long after 0700 and we scurry across the street dodging traffic as we go. I seem to be the only person who speaks English as a first language but it's all good. Seems to be a habit of mine. Last time I was in Thailand I went white water rafting with a raft full of Russians but that's life overseas. The first stop on the tour was Kanchatburi war cemetery [inse...

As you know, my flight to Bangkok was delayed by about 2 hours due to "engineering problems" that took longer to rectify than expected. Turns out these problems were hydraulic problems. Rather essential parts of an aircraft. 3 stars to Qantas for identifying the problem and fixing it. The flight itself was nothing really out of the ordinary to be honest. We had some turbulence but nothing to leave claw marks in the arm rests or the arm of the person next to yo...