Ali arrived jetlagged, tired and looking fantastic in Singapore. She was only an hour late (the airline's fault not hers) and we spent the next 12 hours in a whistle-stop tour of the best bits of Singapore as I knew it thusfar. I was so happy to see her and I couldn't quite believe that she had flown halfway around the world to see me. Pretty impressive in my eyes. We also discussed the fairly breakneck schedule which I had pruned considerably already and as the...

And so I left Taman Negara on my little journey around the Malaysian Peninsular and headed off on a 12 hours bus journey (albeit 3 hours of it was waiting around) and looked forward to the new sights. I had been told that the Cameron Highlands were like stepping back in time into England and I suppose in a way (a very Asian way) it was. The first thing I saw as we pulled into the town was a Tudor pub and that was followed by the new bus station which overlooked t...

Right then, several people have complained that these entries are getting too long so I shall aim to try and shorten them a bit to appease the readership and also, to give my weary (and not particularly capable) creative side some respite! This leg deals with the trip up to and including Taman Negara National Park via Singapore, KL and onward! I got back to Singapore, overjoyed to be out of Indonesia and decided to spend a few days recovering in civilisation bef...

The next leg of the journey turned out to encompass both the best and worst times of my travels so far. Indeed, I was SO happy in one place, that looking back, I wish I hadn't left and had stayed there longer instead of wasting my time (and lots of money) trying to get somewhere else. But I'll get to that. I flew from KL to Bali on the remnants of a hangover and when I arrived, I was collected by the people from my hotel who kindly (but expensively) took me to t...

I left Vietnam happy and satisfied that I had experienced more than most as part of the Intrepid tour. Along the way, we had come across so many people travelling independently who said that they weren't enjoying the country because the people were unfriendly (or on occasion, downright rude) and that all they seemed to face was hostility. I think Chinh saved us from this trauma and we only had limited exposure to the population. I also think that the language tha...