Friday in Costa Rica

Today we started the day with a jungle hike, at a place called Rainmaker Park.

We had do drive up this crazy road with so many holes and hills (I thought we were going to get stuck) to get to the park in the mountains.

It was a hike through the jungle with some bridges through the canopy, and you pass several different waterfalls, which was pretty cool. We saw some poison dart frogs, some huge lizards and other cool jungle flowers. No tucans though, to Joseph's dismay.

Following the theme of this leg of the vacation, we were the only people there so it was nice to be able to take our time and take it all in.

After the park we headed back to the Villa to hang by the pool.

Have I mentioned that we have made friends with the gardener who totally thinks we speak Spanish, which is funny to me. Well we have, and he is all about chatting it up. Today when we were at the pool he was showing us the different fruits that were around the grounds, and he would just cut them open with his machete and give them to us to try. He gave us two different kinds of limes and grapefruits and coconuts.

He was really funny because he was obviously using a multi-purpose machete, and he just looked and me and rubbed it on the grass and said "it was clean" (in spanish, but I cant remember) it was hilarious, but I thought it would be rude to point out that it wasn't actually clean.

He also cut up a bunch of coconuts and put them by the pool and called in a bunch of monkeys. Within a few minutes there were tons of monkeys running for the coconuts, at one point we counted ten different monkeys, it was so cool, and they were so close to us. He kept trying to get me to feed them out of my hand, but I wasn't going for that.

It was really neat to see the monkeys walk on their hind legs, grab as much coconut as they could handle and then jump from tree to tree.

Thursday in Costa Rica

Today we thought we would take a little trip to check out some of our surroundings. We headed to Manuel Antonio National Park, where you can go to the beach and also hike around in nature.

We were more interested in just going to the beach. We had reports it was very lovely.

Getting into the park was frustrating because there are a bunch of locals who have taken over the side of the road, dressed up to look like official park rangers and then try to scam you into paying for parking, a tour, and tickets to the park. After not being able to find any other parking we ended up just paying some guy who wasn't being too annoying.

After paying the legit park rangers to get into the park, we walked about 30 minutes through the jungle to the beach.

On our way to the beach we saw some deer, an amazing huge bright blue butterfly, and a sloth in a tree, along with other plants. But let's be honest plants aren't that exciting, but the sloth was.

The beach experience today was not as enjoyable as we had been anticipating. The beach itself was beautiful and not very crowded, which has the makings of a wonderful day, except for one small problem. Since we were in a national park we had the problem of wildlife, mainly overly aggressive raccoons, that weren't scared of us at all. So someone had to be on guard at all times. At one point I was laying on the mat and Joseph was in the chair and we had admittedly let our guard down, when one of the raccoons walked right up to the mat and grabbed one of our bags. I almost surrendered the bag until I remembered it had our camera, Joseph's phone and Joseph's kindle in it (I had removed my belongings from this bag but had left Joseph's to fend for themselves), so we had to run after the raccoon throwing sticks at it and hitting it until it finally dropped the bag and ran off. It was unbelievable. After that we were really careful, but we still had to be ready to scare them off every 5-10 minutes, which just made the whole morning less than relaxing. We spent the rest of the morning watching for the raccoons and watching them get into other peoples things who weren't paying attention. I think there were only 3 adults and 2 babies but they just stalked up and down the beach all day, and usually they would split up and so it felt like a lot f raccoons. I am obviously slightly scarred from the experience.

Plus since someone always had to be on raccoon watch, only one of us could go swimming at a time which is pretty lame.

We called the day a little early since we just weren't feeling it, which worked out in our favor, since it started raining shortly thereafter and that would have just been too much.

We headed back towards our town. But first we drove around from 30 minutes trying to find the church so that we could go on Sunday, but apparently it is either hidden or it doesn't actually exist because we couldn't find it. Although, in a funny little coincidence, the address and directions that you get from Mormon.org do lead you straight to the Kingdom Hall of JW's. So there's that option.

On the way back, we tried to find an ATM without a line of 10 people but failed at that as well, so we cruised on to Parrita. When we got to Parrita we had to go to the ATM and that one had a line too, which is crazy. I have never seen a line for an ATM before. Joseph waited in line. I sat in the car with the AC and listened to Spanish radio.

After showering and getting dressed we headed back to town to try and find a Restuarant that was showing American football, or had the capacity to show American football. That didn't work out either, although that didn't stop Joseph from scrolling through everyone's channels.

So to make up for not getting to watch football we went back to our favorite place, Soda El Tucan, which was delicious and the lady there totally thought we could speak Spanish which is fun.

Today was an adventure that's for sure.

Wednesday in Costa Rica

After sleeping in like a bunch of teenagers on the weekend, we acquired some bikes from the friendly property manager Patrick, for a morning ride along the beach. We ended up riding for two hours on a gravel road and my hands hurt from the vibrations by the time we were done. It was a nice bike ride though, and the beach is beautiful.

After returning home and having lunch, we took it to the pool to work on our suntans. We saw some of the biggest lizards walking near the pool today, and there was a friendly little monkey that was hanging out right next to the pool and jumping between the palm trees. So that was pretty neat. I was a little nervous the monkey would jump down on us but thankfully he wasn't interested in that.

We hung at the house tonight making dinner, and of course making more flan and watching more BBC.

We also played cards, the game Speed, where after Joseph won the first two games, I ran off a streak of 4 in a row. Joseph was not thrilled and we didn't talk for about an hour afterwards. As it turns out, 1-on-1 games aren't very good for our marriage. We already knew this though, because of the Great Scrabble Prohibition of 2008.

Tuesday in Costa Rica

We figured we wouldn't do anything too crazy today. Instead, we would stick to the pool and the beach at our villa.

We went first to the beach and were surprised to find, that one: the sand was black, and two: there wasn't a single other soul on the beach. The black sand actually looks really cool even though it gets really hot, and it was nice to have a beach to ourselves.

After a little while, when we got hungry, we packed it up and headed back to the villa for some lunch. Leftovers from dinner since we hadn't gone to the store yet.

After lunch we decided to just hang out by the pool, so as to avoid getting totally sandy twice in one day.

Apparently it is the rainiest of the rainy season right now (even though it hasn't rained at all, which the Gardner told us in Spanish was because of El Niño) so there is no one else here except for a couple of people who live here full time. So we had the pool to ourselves too, which is awesome.

Tuesday night we ventured into the town to find a grocery store and some dinner. The grocery store was small and you can't be too picky about what you get since everything is in Spanish, but it worked out. All of the American brand items were so expensive so we stuck with the local goods.

After the grocery store we headed to dinner for some traditional Costa Rican food, we found an awesome place that sells "casados" which just means a plate, which comes with rice, beans, meat, and salad. It was delicious. For some reason I was expecting to find burritos on the menu but am happy that there weren't.

The villa that we rented has a bunch of BBC movies on DVD that we have been watching at night, I have been enjoying them more than Joseph.

We have also been making Flan each night with these instant Flan mixes that we bought a the grocery store, so that is pretty much as exciting as it gets around here.

On to Costa Rica

On Monday morning after an overnight flight, and a short layover in Panama, we arrived in Costa Rica.

We were pretty tired, after getting very little sleep on the plane. Joseph slept way less than me. After we arrived we took the shuttle to the car rental place. That's right, we decided to rent a car while we are here because it would be much easier than the buses and our hotel is kind of secluded so we were worried about getting taxis all the time. Anyways, we rented the car and started the drive to the coast where we would be spending most of the 13 days we are here. We had rented a one bedroom villa on a beach and planned mostly to sit around and take it easy as much as possible to hold us over for the next little while, aka years.

We missed one of our first exits and had a really long detour trying to turn around, that was made longer when we discovered that there were toll roads and we hadn't gotten any Costa Rican money yet because, amazingly there were not any in the airport. Couple that with the fact that we only had two American dollars on us, and we were off to quite an adventure right off the bat.

After we got the money situation sorted out, the drive was pretty smooth no other major detours, thankfully. It helped that it was just mostly a straight road that ran through all the towns along the coast.

We stopped at a grocery store on the way in and picked up some food for dinner, pretty much just some lettuce, a tomato and a rotisserie chicken and pita bread because we were both too tired to think straight, so we just had chicken salads for dinner and went to bed before nine. (Joseph went to bed before 8, but that's a secret). We were exhausted from the flight and from the drive.

Our place is nice, and on the beach, we considered going outside for the sunset but decided we didn't care enough.

The rest of the week in LA

Thursday: Mike decided he could go to work late on Thursday, so we all went to breakfast in Hollywood, where we commenced eating the largest pancakes in the world. We had three orders of pancakes, but we could have easily just gotten one and had plenty to eat. But they were so delicious, they are the type of pancakes dreams are made of.

Breakfast was fun, and we drove back the scenic route through Beverly Hills, which is always entertaining.

After breakfast (and a pancake/jet-lag induced coma/nap) we felt the need to move around a bit, so we borrowed the beach cruisers and headed towards the Santa Monica Pier, and rode along the beach for awhile. When we needed a break we hopped off, drug our bikes across the sand (since we didn't bring locks), and sat on the sand and looked at the ocean. It was lovely. Riding back was more dangerous as there was a lot of traffic at that time which was terrifying.

Friday: Friday morning Britney had a doctor's appointment so we volunteered to watch the kiddos so that Mike could go with her. We took the kids to the park, where we hung out and played, after Joseph and I got bored we headed back with the promise of ice-cream from McDonalds, which was way messier than I had anticipated, but the kids lover it. I have to say it is nice being the aunt who can curry the favor of little children with promises of $1 ice cream cones without a single thought to the consequences. After ice cream and an impromptu Jehovah's Witness lesson inside the McDonald's to which we were made unwilling participants, we headed back to the house watch some shows and wait for Mike and Britney so that we could go to lunch. For lunch we went to Tacos Por Favor. Joseph had been dying to "go to there" for weeks. Seriously, we would be in some random Southeast Asian place and he would say stuff like "You know what? I can't wait to order like 14 tacos from Tacos Por Favor." He didn't go that overboard in the end, but the tacos were as good as we'd been dreaming. After lunch, Britney and the kids had to leave for Arizona, so Joseph and I headed up to Malibu to Zuma beach, for some beach time where we relaxed until it got too chilly to justify sitting around in our bathing suits.

That night I finally ate at Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles. I always think about going when I am in LA but had never been, and it was delicious. Totally worth it, even though Joseph and I both had stomachaches afterwards.

Saturday: Saturday morning we woke up and headed straight to the beach with my brother to try and surf. None of us were very successful and the water was freezing but it was so fun. I almost didn't get in the water because it was so cold, but I am so glad I did. It was a blast. For some reason you just feel cool sitting on a surf board, even if every time you attempt to ride one you nose dive and get pummeled.

After a quick wardrobe change we headed down to Anaheim to meet up with some friends for a late lunch and Angels game. We met in downtown Disney, which I had not realized was actually a place you could go hang out and not only the amusement park. Then we headed over to the baseball game. The game was fun, the Angels won, and it was fun to catch up.

All in all a great Saturday.

Sunday: I slept in later than I had in years, I think the time change was finally catching up to me. We went to church, made burritos for dinner, watched tv, napped and got packed to go on to Costa Rica. It was a little weird leaving the country again, after we had been back. Our flight left at 2 am so we had to leave the house around 11 pm. Worst flight time ever, we were tired, plus the flight was only 6 hours so you didn't get very good sleep on the plane.

Next we went to Los Angeles

Oh have you been wondering where we are? Probably not, but in case you were I will now continue my regular posts, to regale you with the stories of our travels.

We left Hong Kong at 4:30 pm on Tuesday, and after a 13 hour flight we arrive in LA at 2:15 on the same Tuesday. It was kind of weird. Joseph said the best way to beat the jet lag was to stay up the whole flight, which I mostly did, and it actually worked really well. I was sick of watching movies by the time we got there though.

After arriving in LA we got our rental car and headed over to my brothers house, where we were staying, to take it easy.

We spent the rest of the night hanging around, playing with their kids and trying really hard to not go to sleep.

We didn't really have big plans for LA, we just wanted to take it easy, so the next day we hung around and headed for lunch. I was in desperate need of a hamburger. We went to a delicious place called Hole in the Wall, that fulfilled everything I had been missing while we were in Asia.

After lunch we needed to mail our tailored clothes home so we headed to the post office, then walked around the 3rd street promenade and down near to the beach to look at the ocean. We were both feeling pretty slow from the jet lag, so we didn't really want to push it to hard.

Hong Kong - Day 4

Day 4 in HK was all about the panoramic views. I wasn't feeling very well, so we figured we would just take the day nice and easy.

We started the day by going to "The Peak" which offers pretty impressive views of the city from the top of one of the mountains in the center of Hong Kong Island. We rode the city bus up which was actually pretty cool because you got to see a lot from the upper deck on the way up and the way down. We really wanted a good picture of us from up there and we asked three different people to take our picture and they were all pretty bad, so that was disappointing, but oh well, what can you do. Apparently operating an automatic camera is to much for some.

Some people who live in Hong Kong told us that the sky was as clear as it ever gets so we felt fortunate for that. It was sunny and beautiful from the top of this mountain. After hanging out for a bit we headed back down to the hotel to cool back down and relax.

After a short stop at the hotel we walked around until we found the Star Ferry which will take you across the harbor, and gives you some good views of the city from the water. We had to go back to the tailor for Joseph's final fitting. Going to the tailor is always stressful leading up to it, hoping that the changes were made exactly as you hoped. I guess I should clarify; it is stressful for Joseph, not everyone. Of course everything was perfect except for a few minor changes.

Afterwards we walked around through some of the malls, because there is a lot of amazing shopping here. So many stores, and a lot of them we have never seen before, so it was fun to wander through the goods. Beyond the actual shops, the malls themselves are nearly works of art - air conditioned works of art with free, clean bathrooms.

We had an early dinner and then headed back to the harbor to see it at night when all if the lights on Hong Kong Island were on, and it was really pretty. We rode the ferry back in the dark and it made the harbor really pretty.

We called it an early night with some ice cream bars, since we needed to pack, because the next day we flew to Los Angeles. We are excited to be back in the states for awhile.

Hong Kong - Day 3

Day 3 was a Sunday, and luckily there is a pretty big English speaking branch here that we were able to go to. It lacked some of the unique cultural attributes of Cambodia, but it was still church so it was good. Everyone kept asking us if we were new, and I kind of wished we were new and were staying to work there.

After church we went home for some naps and relaxation, before heading out to Chi Lin nunnery and the Nan Lian Gardens. These seemed like appropriate Sunday activities so off we went. We were too late to go into the actual nunnery but we spent quite a while walking around the grounds and the large park, which was beautiful and immaculately groomed and tended. It was one of the highlights of Hong Kong.

After the gardens we went in search of the Hong Kong Temple. The temple here is really small, but really pretty. I am glad we went to see it.

After the temple we called it a night and went back to the hotel to relax. If you can't tell we are big into the relaxing right now.

Hong Kong - Day 2

On our second day in Hong Kong, we decided that a beach day was in order. You know, since it had been a solid 2 weeks since we'd relaxed at the beach.

We read about a beach close by that was supposed to be nice called Shek O beach. After a little research we figured out we could easily get there via the subway and a short bus ride. So we put on our bathing suits and headed out, and it did not disappoint. When we had woken up in the morning the day looked like it was threatening to be overcast, but we pushed on, and were treated to a beautiful day of blue skies and sunshine.

We rented an umbrella and some chairs and commenced our day of beach lounging, where we alternated between sitting in the chairs, laying on the beach mat in the sun, and swimming in the water. It was glorious. Lucky for us we got there early enough that there weren't very many people yet. Around 3:00 it started getting more crowded (even though that seems like an odd time to go to the beach to me), and we headed back to the city around 4:00. We managed to get some sun without getting burned, which for our white skin, is something of a miracle.

The drive on the bus to and from the beach was pretty cool too, since you pretty much have to drive up one side of a mountain and them down the other side to the beach, you get some really awesome views from the upper deck of the double-decker.

We needed to get back to the hotel and shower to make it over to the tailor for Joseph's second fitting.

After the fitting, went back to the same place for dinner, since both of us are pretty tired of trying to find new places to eat, and there were these rice dishes that other people were eating the night before that we wanted to try, and they were delicious as expected.

We ended up wandering around and buying some souvenirs before heading back to the hotel to call it a night, and watch our nightly movie on Fox Movies Premium.

Hong Kong - Day 1

On our first full day in Hong Kong we got up bright and early to track down a tailor for Joseph. He really needed some new suits, and he is really particular about his clothes so getting a custom suit was really appealing (read: the only way to satisfy a man who likes to pretend he is easy to please, but who, when it comes to a few things, might be the hardest person to please in the universe - no exaggeration).

After walking around for awhile and talking to several different places that we had heard about we finally settled on one that seemed the best, and Joseph got his measurements taken.

They wanted us to come back a few hours later for another fitting so we decided to walk around the area and check out some of markets close by.

We walked around the Hong Kong harbor, which is really amazing. They have an area called Avenue of the Stars, with the same general idea as LA, but we didn't know any of the people on the stars. I just liked walking along the water looking at the city. The funniest thing about the Avenue of the Stars was that everyone of the stars' names was written with their Chinese name and then, after a coma, they had their English name like, Steve or Jack. It was funny.

While walking around a market up near the tailor we found a delicious and really cheap noodle house, where we ate to our hearts content in noodles. I am also getting pretty good at using chopsticks with noodles. Or at least I like to tell myself that to make me feel better (Joseph says I need to use the kiddie training chopsticks). He might be right because I am still failing at using the chopsticks to eat dumplings. As evidenced by the tsunami of soy sauce that slashed up onto Joseph's shirt when I dropped a dumpling all the way from my mouth back into the dipping dish.

All in all, a great start to our time in Hong Kong. I am obsessed with this place.

On to Hong Kong

Our flight for Hong Kong left at 1130, so we had time in the morning to go back to the tailor to check everything and pick everything up.

I was so happy, with all of my things I wanted to hug my tailor. Instead I just asked if I could take a picture with her.

Luckily, the flight was only two hours so we were in Hong Kong in no time. Plus, since it was an international flight the plane was big and nice.

Once in Hong Kong we checked into our hotel and into the worlds smallest hotel room. The hotels in HK were so expensive and if they weren't expensive they had really scary reviews, so this place was the best we could find. It is clean, safe and in a good neighborhood, but it is tiny. There is basically only room for a bed. It is actually hilarious.

That night we walked around and rode the worlds longest escalator, that they call the Travelator. It wasn't as cool as I was hoping since it wasn't continuous, just a bunch of them sort of in a row, but it was a really cool way to see the city.

We found a delicious dumpling place for dinner, where we ate way too many dumplings. We just couldn't help ourselves, they were too delicious.

Hong Kong is an amazing city. I can't really figure out what I was expecting from it but it much different than anything I was expecting. Joseph says it is the only city he's ever been in where he forgets where he is. I think he's got a point. Even New York City, which is awesome, is still totally American. But Hong Kong is different. One street will feel English or European and the next street over will feel Asian. We've decided this city is totally awesome. It is clean, unique, safe, and the public transportation is incredible.

Ho Chi Minh - Day 3

Today was our last full day in HCMC and it was a lot of fun. We signed up for a full-day Mekong Delta cruise/tour, and it was awesome.

We got picked up at 8 am (much too early) and had to drive about two hours out of the city into the countryside. We had some really nice people in our tour from Australia, so we had some good conversations on the way down there.

Before we got to the Delta we stopped at a local temple, where the people practice a local religion that is a mesh of all the major religions into one which is pretty interesting. The altar in the church even has a statue where the images of Buddah, Christ, Confucious, and Lao are all stacked on top of each other.

After we left the temple we finally made it to the river and got into a nice boat that we had for just the seven of us in our group. We cruised down the Mekong Delta for a while and up some little canals. It was awesome.

After cruising for a while we stopped for a little pit stop. We had some traditional honey tea and tropical fruits, along with some traditional music performances. The honey was really good, and they brought out part of the the bee hive and let us hold the bees.

After our morning snacks, we had a little tour of a coconut factory where they make this delicious coconut candy. We of course had to buy some, and then continued to eat it all day.

Next, we took a little horse trailer ride to another part of the river, where we got in smaller boats for a canal ride. Sadly at this point it started raining and little, even though up to this point in the day we had had beautiful weather. Thankfully the rain didn't last long and we were taken to our lunch spot.

I was totally skeptical about lunch, because with these day tours you never really know what you are going to get. We had paid a little more for this particular tour to have a nice one, and it really paid off throughout the day and lunch was so different. They served us a whole fried tilapia which was the craziest thing. They just dropped the whole fish in a deep-fryer. It was awesome. We used the fish to make spring rolls. They also had a ton of other food that was delicious. But the fish was just so interesting. Neither Joseph or I had seen anything like it before.

After lunch we rode some bikes around some rural towns.

After bikes we rode the boat back to the bus. By this point it was getting late in the day and I was exhausted.

But we made one more stop at a temple where they had some gigantic Buddha statues that were hilarious. We felt a little bad because everyone was totally into the Buddha statutes but we just thought they were funny.

We finally made it back to our hotel and were pretty beat from the day, but we had to go back to my tailor for one final fitting. Seeing my new clothes mostly finished was really fun.

This was one of the best days of the trip so far for sure.

Ho Chi Minh - Day 2

Today we took an excursion into the jungle a little bit, to the sights of some of the areas where they fought the Vietnam War/American War.

We went to a town called Cu Chi, which was a stronghold for the Viet Cong during the war, in large part because they built a very extensive tunnel system under ground. Our guide told us there were 200 km of tunnels where the people lived and were able to hide from the bombings. Our tour guide told us that it was possible in Cu Chi because the ground had so much clay in it that the tunnels were nearly impossible to break.

They let us go down into a portion of the tunnels and it was so small and slightly claustrophobic. What's more, the tunnels they let the tourists go in have been widened by 20 percent because tourists kept getting stuck. They showed us some holes for the original tunnels and they were so small, it is hard to imagine people living down there.

You can also still see bomb craters in the area, which seems nuts.

Overall the tour was pretty interesting, and we really enjoyed it. Although, it is unnerving to listen to all of the America-bashing Communist propaganda.

After the tour, we wet back to the city to take it easy before heading to the tailor again for a fitting. It was so fun, and you can tell that they are good, because everything is turning out how I wanted it even with a slight language barrier.

We tried Pho today for the first time, and it was pretty good. It is a very traditional dish, with beef, and broth and noodles and different toppings. I am a fan of Asian soups, although I am not getting any better at eating with chopsticks which is unfortunate.

Ho Chi Minh - Day 1

Today was our first full day in Ho Chi Minh City, and it was a lot of fun.

Bright and early we went to meet the tailor to talk about designs and fabrics and to take measurements. I am so excited to get clothes made for me, and they are an amazing deal. Being on the short side, I struggle sometimes with clothes. So I am excited to have clothes made just for me.

After the tailor, we went to the War Remnants Museum, it used to be called the Museum of American War Crimes, so, needless to say, it was pretty interesting. It is fascinating to see how their narrative of the Vietnam War differs from ours. It is also interesting to see the way we are/were perceived by others.

After hearing all about how the Aggressors were defeated soundly, we went to my favorite activity of the night - Vietnamese Water Puppet Theatre. It was so cool. They had these puppets in a pool of water that they controlled behind a wall, with different people playing traditional music and singing. I loved it.

Afterwards, we went back to the French Restaurant we couldn't find the night before, and with a little more research we found it. It was delicious. We went all out, it's fun to feel like every night is a celebration since you are on vacation. Plus, going "all out" is always fun when the most expensive thing on the menu is 10 bucks.

It was a great day, and we are continuing to love Vietnam and wish we had more time here.

Hello Vietnam

Saturday morning we were up bright and early to catch the bus to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. We were both really excited to hit the road and check out a new country. We were kind of tired of Cambodia.

The bus ride was in three parts: first, a four hour ride back to Phnom Pehn; second, a two hour break in Phnom Penh, and; third, a 7 hour ride to Ho Chi Minh City. Needless to say, I had to prepare myself mentally for this leg of the trip. The bus was actually really nice, and it was nice when we got to the border, because the bus guy acted like a tour guide and got all of our passports stamped for us and everything so all we had to do was get off the bus and walk through their little entry gate with our luggage. It was much less of a hassle and much less nerve racking than when we crossed from Thailand into Cambodia.

When we got to Vietnam, we got totally ripped off by our first cab driver, which they warn you about in the books. It still makes me angry when I think about it. We had just gotten off of the bus and it was dark. We went into a tour agency to get some directions and she recommended we take a taxi to the hotel and she told us that it should cost about 40,000 Dong (about 2 dollars). So we walked out into the main street an hailed a cab. We put our stuff in the trunk got into the can and he started driving around. We knew we were on trouble when the driver went down one street, turned up to the next street, and then basically backtracked. Then we noticed the meter. It was ticking up faster than one of those ridiculous national debt counters. Once we felt we were reasonably close to the hotel we told him to stop and let us out. Joseph yelled at him for a few minutes and then refused to pay the whole fare (although he still seriously overpaid). I asked him why he didn't just pay less as walk away. He said that he didn't want to end up in a physical altercation with the guy, but that he wanted to make sure the guy knew that we were wise to him and not happy about it. I think that's silly, we still got ripped off. But that type of reasoning is very Joseph. Anyway, lesson learned, now we are much more careful about the taxis we use, and haven't had any other problems since then. Actually, it is really cheap to take a taxi here if they aren't ripping you off.

Overall, we really really like Vietnam. I have found myself wishing that we had spent more time here. We spent our first day here wandering the city, looking for a tailor to make some clothes for me, and checking out the local sites. The city is really impressive, Joseph says it reminds him a little bit of Taiwan. The buildings in the city are really interesting because you can definitely see the influence of the French. Some areas seem very European and others seem very new-world Asian. We tried to find a French restaurant that we had read about in Lonely Planet, but it apparently no longer exists. We think Pizza Hut bought it out, since there was a legit Pizza Hut where we think the restaurant is supposed to be. Americans.

Also, I have included a picture of Joseph in his 50 cent rain jacket we bought on the street.

Sihanoukville

Wednesday morning we woke up and took the bus down to Sihanoukville, a small tropical town on the coast of Cambodia.

After our bus experience on Monday, we took a larger bus down to the coast and had a much better experience. The bus was more comfortable and they played a movie, just like on airplanes back in the day.

We arrived in Sihanoukville in the early afternoon, went to our hotel to check in and relax for a bit before heading out for a walk of the beach. Our hotel sat right on the beach which was pretty nice especially since we had a sea view room.

Shortly after our walk it started raining, so we opted for a restaurant close to the hotel for dinner. The place was called The Snake House and it was pretty cool actually pretty cool. It had big huge poisonous snakes in glass caged in the center of all the tables and in cages all around the restaurant. They also had a crocodile farm behind the restaurant, but they told us it was too dark by the time we got there so they wouldn't let us see any of the crocs.

Thursday it rained most of the day, which was kind of a bummer since we were hoping to get some serious beach time in, but it worked out okay. We just hung around the hotel, went to the gym and watched movies. One consequence of the rain though is that Joseph and I have taken to eating the early bird special, since we want to get out. It's pretty funny because at home we usually don't eat dinner until 7:30 or 8, but on this vacation there have been times when we roll into the restaurant at like 5:30 and we are the only souls in the place. As a consequence of the rain ruining the beach for us, we thought we deserved a really nice seafood dinner, to make ourselves feel better. Fortunately for us, the most expensive thing on the menu, the seafood platter for two, was still less than 20 dollars so we felt pretty good about that.

Friday, it had stopped raining but it wasn't particularly sunny so we hung around the pool for fear that we would go to the beach and it would rain on us. Eventually we decided we had had enough of being scared of the rain so we ventured into town to another beach for a little change of scenery. The beaches here are nice but they don't even come close to the beaches in Thailand. Lesson learned.

Phnom Penh - Tuesday

We weren't really expecting much from Phnom Penh (it is mostly just a rest stop) and for the most part the city managed to meet those low expectations. The problem is that Phnom Penh has been ravaged by civil war, neglected, and underdeveloped for so long. It is actually kind of sad. There are places where you can tell it is getting itself figured out and there are still some charming areas of the city where you can still see the influence of French colonization, but most of city is less than spectacular.

We took the morning slow and got a late start on the day since we knew we weren't going to be trying to do a lot. We hit up the Central Market, where I picked up a pair of fake Ray Bans for 2 dollars because the glasses I had brought with us where on their last legs. I feel kind of bad about buying fakies, but fake Ray Bans are literally the only brand of glasses sold in this entire country.

Mostly the market was tourist kitsch so we didn't stay long, and we headed out to a temple in town, Wat Phnom. Although, after spending three days looking at the fantastic ruins in Siem Reap, this temple left a lot wanting. It could also just be that our enthusiasm for Wats has greatly diminished. We also tried to get into the US Embassy to check it out and maybe get some American snacks, but they told us we are only allowed in if we have an emergency or an appointment (which we suspected but figured we'd give it a try anyway). Since we didn't have either we just kept on our merry way.

Next We headed to another market on the map Oursey Market since we had heard that the best thing about Phnom Penh was the markets. This market was awesome. It was a market that is for the locals, not for tourists, and you could find anything in there. It was like a Cambodian Costco. It was so cool. I walked away with an Asian lunch pail that I love, and Joseph walked away with a months supply of fruit Mentos. The market was such an amazing cultural experience. There was a whole section of dried fish and sea food (it is crazy what they can do with fish over here). I also liked the bulk rice/grains section. It was cool. Another remarkable thing about this market was that none of the vendors were catcalling anyone. We didn't hear a single "Yes, please, you like t-shirt/scarf/glasses/booty-padded panties (not a joke)." This must mean that the locals hate it just as much as we do and it is not an effective strategy with them either. This whole time I had thought that catcalling was a cultural difference. But it is not, it is just a tactic to annoy you into submission.

After that we were pretty hot and sweaty from walking around, so we went back to the hotel to cool off and get ready for dinner.

Tonight we took a tuk-tuk to the river for dinner, too traumatized from our experience last night to walk. Plus we were tired and transportation around here is cheap. The riverfront was really nice and dinner was good, but soon enough it started raining (of course) so we just headed back to the hotel for the night feeling like we did everything of interest in Phnom Penh and were more than ready to get on the road in the morning.