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Today I had a well-deserved lie-in.  In the morning my Mum and Uncle Quentin headed off to the silk farm.  I decided to give this a miss but got up for the afternoon trip to the bamboo floating village.

The name was a little deceiving as the bamboo wasn’t that heavily featured.  I had an image of a village clustered floating around in a bamboo forest.  It turned out that they were more or less rafts or boats with long bamboo poles used to keep them afloat.

It wasn’t anywhere near up to the splendor of the temples of Angkor, but still worth a visit.

Tomorrow we’re catching the bus to Phnom Penh and on Sunday March 4 we’re flying to Beijing, China.

Once in Beijing we’ll be visiting the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven and making a trip to the Terracotta Warriors in Xi’an before flying on to Shanghai for a day before our flight back to Manchester.

I’ve no idea about Internet in Phnom Penh… maybe I’ll have it, maybe I won’t.  Either way, we’re staying at a Home Inns hotel in Beijing, which is fully equipped with a (filtered) connection.  I’ll finally get a chance to give my Tor router a shot.  BBC here I come!

Well, today was my last day in the Angkor temple area. Our three-day pass is up and tomorrow we’ll be heading somewhere different. On the cards right now is a trip to the floating village nearby.

Quentin and I got up at 7AM today to head out to a few of the smaller temples. We picked the Roluous group and visited a monastery first. Later on we headed to a temple that was under heavy reconstruction and watched a group of ladies crushing bricks to be used in a mortar made up of brick dust, palm sap and water. The women had been doing the painstaking work for six years on just $40/month!

After heading back to sleep over lunch I arranged for our driver to collect me at 2PM from the hotel for a final trip to Angkor Wat and the Bayon. I was very fortunate to meet a group of five novice monks who were taking in the sights at Angkor Wat. As I had a taxi to myself I was able to offer three of them a trip to their next destination for the sunset.

In the end I spent about three hours with the novices, one of which was as young as 17 years old. He’s the one in the photo at the top of this entry.

I collected an address and email address from them, so I’ll pass on a few photos when I get back. The sunset from the top of the mountain was truly incredible, but my photos unfortunately don’t do it justice.

It’s about time for me to be getting to bed. See everybody in about two weeks.

Just four days ago we were multi-millionaires.  We had 2.6 million rial in our pockets, but recently we spotted it was going down awfully quickly.

This morning after our 5AM start at Angkor Wat we headed to another temple for an early-morning viewing.  On the way out my Mum stopped to pick up a pineapple from one of the road-side sellers.

It was only after we’d bought the pineapple when I asked for 2,000 rial ($0.5) for a can of coke.  My Mum handed me two 10,000 rial notes… around about three quid.  When I queried this she said that’s what she paid for the $1 pineapple with!

In the end it turned out that we’d paid about twenty times more than we should have!  A pineapple should cost about $0.5, but my Mum isn’t much good at bargaining so she got it for $1 or 4,000 rial… but what she paid was 40,000 rial… about $10 instead!

The seller lady kept very quiet about it but once we realised she did admit it and offered us a “refund”.  Instead we picked up a second pineapple and let her keep the change :)

Everybody stood around found the whole thing pretty funny… no doubt it will continue to be a source of much amusement for weeks to come!

Well, we’re well and truly in Cambodia now. Our hotel is pretty nice and does provide an Internet service… at a price.

For USD4 I can get wireless Internet access for one hour. I’ve yet to actually try it, but it should be quite enough for me to post a new entry, read/reply to emails and generally keep up-to-date.

This morning we were collected by our airport taxi driver at 7AM. We visited Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom and towards the end of the day, the Bayon.

Angkor Wat really is incredible… I sort-of knew what to expect, but the photos I’ve seen are really not preparation for what the place is truly like. The only comparison I can think of is Tintin and some crazy jungle adventure.

This photo is one I took at the Bayon… as it was towards the end of the day the light was much improved. Overall I’ve not fared very well with my camera… after using an OM-10/OM-4 for such a long time, coping with a tiny dim D70 viewfinder is really hard work.

On that note, it’s interesting that while in China I had my first hands-on experience with a Fuji S5 Pro. Unfortunately it wasn’t switched on so in reality it might as well have been a D200 with a different logo. Very interesting stuff… the opening price was about 1.2k. More than I have.

Here’s a shot from Angkor Thom… this has got to be one of the most famous shots from Angkor going. I’ve really struggled so far to expose properly to capture both highligh and shadow detail. I’ve been spot-metering in manual quite a bit… the D200 no-blowout mode would be really handy here.

Tomorrow we’re meeting our taxi driver at 5:15AM to get to the Angkor site for opening time at 5:30AM. We’ll visit a temple or two with the good (cool) morning light before heading back to the hotel for a nap over lunch. In the evening we’ll go back around 3PM when the sun brings out the best in the huge sandstone blocks.

Today I’m wearing a stupid-looking pair of cotton baggy pants and Chinese-style cotton top. Quentin and I both picked up a pair of the trousers after a quick wander around Angkor Wat in the morning. Jeans, 36C+, camera bags and sweat don’t go together well. The baggy-pants are pretty stupid looking, but are infinitely more comfortable than the jeans I set off in.

In other news, we’re officially millionaires. Almost three times over.

Last night at the airport we changed GBP400 to the local currency, which is the rial. The look we got from the girl cashier was well worth it, even if we are rapidly getting fed up of carrying around 2,670,000 rial around with us. So far the largest note is 50,000 rial.

Time to prepare for some dinner. Hope everybody is doing well and the France move is almost complete!

Things have been pretty busy… I’m sat now in the Leela Inn off Sukhumvit Soi 3 in Bangkok.  I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned that already…

Travelling with Quentin, my Mum and Xiaoxiao is pretty different from what I’m used to.  Yesterday we visited Ayutthaya, which was my favourite destination last time I was in Thailand.  Unfortunately the day before I burned quite badly… last time I was travelling I got burned just once, and that was after plodding around on a beach.  Obviously going from very cold in China to around 36-37C in Bangkok wasn’t the best move.

We’re about five minutes off catching a taxi to Bangkok airport for our 7PM flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia.  Tomorrow may be Angkor Wat and/or some of the other temples in the area.

Today I bought a Case Logic camera backpack… the info is at www.caselogic.com/slr_computer_backpack/product_detail/index.cfm?modelid=57080—my camera bag was getting a little heavy to carry so I’ve had to switch to something a little easier to carry, even if it isn’t as accessible.  On the plus side it has a dedicated slot for my laptop.

If I’d figured out that there was wireless four days ago I could probably have got some more info online… but now it’s about time to pack away and catch the taxi.

Hope everybody is having a good time :)

I’ve still not managed to reach an Internet cafe, but I’m hoping to get this, and the last entry, uploaded this evening from our hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 3.

We’re all in Bangkok now and Chinese New Year was a few days ago… many hotels are packed and we were lucky to end up staying where we are.

We flew to Bangkok airport via Guangzhou in China as there were no available flights from Shanghai.  Both the flight to Guangzhou and that to Bangkok were very good, although both were a little turbulent.  Yesterday evening we arranged a hotel for two nights at the airport… this later turned out to have been a bad idea as we’d not properly looked around before checking in.

This morning we moved from the old hotel to a new one called Leela Hotel, which is near the Nana skytrain station.  Unfortunately when we first set off to do some touristing we got the direction wrong and walked for 15 minutes in the wrong direction.  No biggie, except for the 30C+ heat and humidity.

As the start was late we didn’t manage to see as much as we’d hoped to do today… we travelled on the BTS Skytrain, had some lunch at Pizza Hut and travelled to a small Wat called Chaimongkhon, which was a 50B tuk-tuk drive from Siam station.  Amusingly four people can fit onto the back of a tuk-tuk, even if the overall experience isn’t an entirely pleasant one.

I’ve been looking for (yet another) new camera bag without any luck.  My current one (a Lowepro Stealth Reporter 400AW) is proving to be just too heavy to easily carry around all day long.  The problem isn’t the weight, but the weight distribution.  I’d probably be okay if it weren’t for the fact that we’re not going anywhere fast… if I was on my own I’d probably be going at a much faster pace, which seems to be more comfortable.

So far my new super-rucksack and super-shoes are doing well.  The Merrell shoes really are water-proof, so Gore-Tex obviously isn’t the big scam I sort-of thought it was.  Not had too much wandering with my rucksack yet, but initial test have been good.

Tomorrow we’ll be heading to West Bangkok, probably doing some boating down Chao Phraya river to get from Saphan Taksin skytrain station to Wat Po and the temples and palace around there.  The aim is to be out for aroud 8AM while it is not too hot.

Back in China we didn’t do too much: Chinese New Year really wasn’t what my Mum or Uncle Quentin expected.  I think I was a little closer in my guess, but probably still a little off.

We had a couple of nice meals with Xiaoxiao’s parents at Western-style restaurants in their district (Jiaojiang).  The rest of the time we visited Xiaoxiao’s father’s factory and watched loads of fireworks set off.  Unfortunately we were stood right next to them so we really couldn’t see them at all.  Next time they should send a gopher a mile down the road with the fireworks and a box of matches.  That said, at midnight the sheer volume of fireworks was incredible… I’ve never seen anything like it.  The whole sky was absolutely full of them… many far bigger than we can even buy in England!

If you can imagine the impressive sort of show that Sydney put on on New Year’s eve you’ll get an idea for the number of firecrackers… double, triple or quadruple this and you’ll be closer to what we experienced in Xiaoxiao’s small city.  I can’t even begin to imagine what it must have been like in Hangzhou city (capital of the province), Shanghai or Beijing!

On New Year’s day Xiaoxiao and her family went to visit her grandfather’s grave to bai-bai (pray).  Instead of going and watching we opted to have a quick look around the village… the first people we met went all out to offer us a cigarette from their wuling (a Chinese brand) van… the next quite literally bombed us.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so close to a firework going off before… one minute there was a little van opposite us on a bridge, the next it was gone to be replaced with an explosion that could be felt from the other side.  The noise it made was equally impressive.  This would be a bit upsetting if we thought it was a serious gesture, but I think it was just kids mucking about and having a laugh.

Anyway, we’ll be ready to head back downstairs for some nosh.  As far as I can determine, the option is fresh fish or peanuts… peanuts it is then!

I’m back in China, after being away for about a month.  Right now I’m sat in the passenger seat in Xiaoxiao’s Dad’s car with Xiaoxiao driving the four of us from Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province, to Taizhou, Xiaoxiao’s home city.

Our flight from Manchester all went pretty well: Quentin arrived at our house at some ridiculous hour in the morning, giving me a matter of minutes to get washed and into the car for the short drive to Doncaster train station.  We grabbed a quick bite to eat before getting the train direct to Manchester Airport.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so early for a flight before… I can be a bit late for other things, but on the whole I always get to an airport three hours before the departure time (for international flights).  Anyway, we were so early that we had to wait forty minutes before they’d let us check-in.  Once we’d done this we waited in the First class lounge, while was a first for me.  It’s all very nice: plenty of space to properly relax, grab a few “free” drinks and prepare yourself for the flight ahead.

We flew Manchester to Schiphol and then on to Shanghai.  The flights were both fairly normal, although on the way to Shanghai we made excellent time and arrive about half an hour early.  I don’t think I’ve been through immigration quite as quickly, either.

Once we’d grabbed our bags we met Xiaoxiao’s aunty and she drove us to her newly decorated flat where we had some classic English food: Pizza Hut.  Unfortunately we were a bit late for our train to Hangzhou, but the mad rush we had to try and get on the train was quite amusing: I ended up dashing off with Xiaoxiao’s aunty to the correct platform, but my Mum and Uncle followed another crowd to a different platform.  In the end we caught a later train and spent the two hour trip standing up at the end of a carriage near the hot-water boiler.

You quickly realise that pot noodles are the big travel food in China.  They’re very practical: a noodle with some meat and flavour in a tub that you need only add hot water before eating.  The Chinese obviously love these, backed up by the fact that every two minutes another Chinese cool kid wanders up to the hot water tap to top up their pot.  The two hours standing was really hard work, by the end my feet were thoroughly sore and I was ready for Xiaoxiao to drive us to our hotel.

In Hangzhou we stayed two nights in the Home Inns hotel, which is more of a Travelodge: spartan, but very clean and practical.  We stayed here purely by chance, although when we stay in Beijing, we have arranged to stay at the Home Inns in Qianmen, which is very close to Tiananmen Square.  So far I’ve been very impressed with Home Inns.  They’re not the cheapest place to stay, but they are certainly very reasonable… a room with a double bed is about 14/night.

That evening we ended up in a student bar near XiHu (West Lake).  My Cokes cost a lot more than a bottle of Asahi… about 70p a bottle.

Yesterday we visited the three main sights I had planned: Lingyin Si, a Buddhist temple with an impressive number of buddha statues and buildings; Liuhe Ta, a six-sided pagoda over a thousand years old.  On the Liuhe Ta grounds we also walked around a Legoland of replica pagoda from around China.  Some of these were very impressive, although I didn’t find a replica of Liuhe Ta, which would have made a really interesting photo.  The last place we visited was the West Lake… unfortunately we ended up at the wrong side of the lake and spent a good twenty minutes figuring out how to get across.  We almost ended up on a rowboat, which would have taken almost an hour and 100RMB (about 7 pounds).  For dinner we had a really good (although slightly too spicy!) curry at an Indian restaurant on the lake edge.

As I’ve mentioned, right now I’m sat in a car on the way to Taizhou city.  This morning Xiaoxiao’s alarm clock went off at 7:50… somehow Xiaoxiao was the only one that hadn’t figured out we had aimed to leave the hotel at 8:00 to get to her flat in Taizhou before lunch.  Anyway, we set off a little late but we’re at least half-way there now.

Today we’re planning to spend a little time with her family, maybe visit the toilet factory and tour the city.  Tomorrow is Chinese new year, so this evening we will be sitting down to some sort of family meal… we’re not yet sure if this will be out at a fancy restaurant, or at home.  Either way, the food will be funny and I’ll have to hope that McDonald’s is open so I can top up with nosh :)

I went back to Reading today and return my £65 shoes for a pair that cost just £55!  This is pretty incredible.

The new ones look more or less the same as the ones I returned (so I won’t bother with a photo), but they’re a size larger (12 now), come in a funny purple colour nad have Gore-Tex.

The only downside is that the tongue isn’t quite as comfy as the pair I returned, but overall they’re a nicer shoe.

This time next week I’ll be in bed.  But this time next week tomorrow (?) I’ll be jetting off to Shanghai with my Mum and Uncle.  It’ll also be my first visit to Schipol airport.

This will be my fourth trip to China and the second this year.  I’ve already covered the itinerary in an earlier post, but to quickly go over it we’ll be visiting Xiaoxiao’s parents for the New Year, before flying to Bangkok; then we’ll be off to Siem Reap/Angkor Wat in Cambodia, shortly followed by a flight from Phnom Penh to Beijing.  In Beijing we’ll be doing the usual touristy sites, before flying to Xi’an in Shaanxi province for the Terracotta Warriors; the two flights will be to Shanghai, and then home.

I spent today working from home, and took this opportunity to knock off a little early to allow myself some time in Reading to gather necessary items.  (once I got back from Reading I made up the hours I’d taken off :)

The result is a nice new shiny bag, and a pair of Merrell shoes.

The bag is a Berghaus Freeflow 35+8.  Why is this so good?  Well, it has one of those funky mesh-back thingies that holds the back of the bag away from your back, which hopefully means you don’t get as sweaty as you otherwise might.

That’s a photo of the back of the bag… with any luck you’ll be able to make out the back of the bag, the mesh panel and the rigid pipes that hold the bag away from the mesh.

In addition to the mesh back, the shoulder straps are specially designed to allow airflow… here you can see that instead of being “solid” fabric, there is a honeycomb foam.  In fact, there are two overlapping layers of this foam, this provides extra padding but still allows airflow.

Above is a stock image from an online website… I think this is the model I have, if not then it looks very similar.  Mine is a slightly different colour scheme, but not by much.  According to the staff at Blacks these bags are brand new and they literally got them in a week or so ago.

This is the second bag that I’ve bought recently… the last was a LowePro SlingShot 200AW (a camera bag).  I try and research my major purchases, but no amount of research can stand up to a good field test.  Unfortunately the SlingShot didn’t really meet my requirements: it’s a great bag, but I find it too limiting in terms of accessing equipment.  For the next trip I’ll likely be going back to my trusty LowePro Stealth Reporter 400AW… this is a traditional shoulder bag with all the benefits and drawbacks they bring.

Of course, a travel backpack and a photography backpack are entirely different things.  I think that a camera bag is a more personal choice as it really does have to fit in with the way you work.  But with any luck the features of this new bag will work well next week.

The bag has a 35l capacity… this is well down on the bag I took last time, which was a whopping 70+15!  In addition to the 35l it has pockets that boost it up another 8l.  Needless to say the capacity is one thing I’ll have to work with… it is a shorter trip (by two months!) so hopefully I’ll get away with carrying less stuff.  I think this will be the biggest problem I have with the bag, but I need some experience—I met a travelling photographer in Laos that had a single backpack: it held his camera kit (a body and a couple of lenses) and one change of clothes and pair of shoes.  That’s all the guy had for his travels.  Obviously travelling as light as this requires certain sacrifices (washing clothes in the sink every day), but the benefits are enormous!

My other purchase was a new pair of Merrell shoes.  Again, this was something I’d researched on the Internet, but none of this was any use.  Once I tried a few on I quickly found what was and wasn’t comfortable.  In the end I’ve come away with a pair of shoes I don’t even know the name of!  These were a little cheaper than my last pair of Merrells… they also seem more comfortable.  These are bog standard light walking shoes… no fancy GoreTex (which I don’t think really brings that much benefit).

Here’s a fairly shonky photo of one on my foot.  They look okay, but for my tastes are a little fancy.  I bought these with practicality in mind, so I’ll have to let that pass.

They’re a snug fit and provide plenty of support.  My main issue with the last pair I had was the seam created by the tongue and the shoe… unlike all other shoes I’ve worn, the tongue is sewn in all the way up the shoe, instead of towards the toes only.  This is great for keeping water out, but the way it folded over was unfortable (for me, at least).  This new pair has a much-improved seam that I cannot feel: good job Merrell.

I’ve bought these shoes on the understanding that I can return them if I decide they’re not for me.  I’ll be wearing these around the house until Saturday, where I’ll make the decision to make a return trip to Blacks/Millets to swap them for another pair.  I was looking for something that was reasonably light but allowed my feet to breathe.  So far they seem to be doing a reasonable job… but I have a nagging feeling that I may well be able to find something better if I make a return trip.

I came across a really great blog written by a travel writer now based in China. He seems to be mostly around Yunnan province, but has a few entries in Shanghai, Tibet and other cool places.

It’s a refreshing change to see real writing, unlike the stuff I come up with, which is mostly for me to record what I’m doing, as well as to share with friends and family.

There’s plenty of stuff that I could happily quote, but so far I think this is my favourite bit:

“An American was filming a pedestrian crossing, whispering a commentary into his video camera’s microphone: ‘one billion people… a sea of humanity… crossing the road.’ There weren’t one billion people crossing the road, but there were certainly far more than could reasonably be expected.”

This causes me quite a bit of concern: our holiday is all planned around the Chinese New Year festivities, and we’re expecting to visit all of the big tourist sites in Beijing, Xi’an and Hangzhou at just the same time as all of the locals. I’m seriously considering changing our itinerary such that we visit Thailand and Cambodia before Beijing… at least that way we’ll be well away from the crowds.

But I digress, do yourself a favour and head over to www.simonlewiswriter.com/blog/ for some really great writing.