Arrived in Bangkok for the last part of our holiday. Suvarnabhum Airport, the new airport, is so different from Don Muang Airport, which is a seething, chaotic and noisy experience. After collecting our luggage we changed some money, went out to the taxi area, collected a taxi ticket, then into the taxi to the hotel along a series of elevated freeways.
We’ve stayed at this hotel on the Chao Phraya River before and every time we’ve really enjoyed the views, the great accommodation and remarkable food, plus wonderful service. The hotel has its own ferry which runs regularly from the hotel to the Saphan Taksin BTS Pier, where you can catch the train, another ferry or go shopping. The traffic in Bangkok is slow and congested, the river is quicker and cooler, but far busier than it used to be with many more ferries. We had to wait in a queue to disembark at the Saphan Pier each trip.
The hotel pool area, overlooking the river. Very relaxing.
One of many pools with floating water lilies. Calm, cool and restful.
I think I’d feel like this if I did a headstand at yoga.
To the 35th floor for the views and, of course, yum cha! Delicious.
Steamed Mandarin Lava Bun, so pretty. I’d never seen it before, so had to try it!
Every time we eat in this restaurant I offer to take this ginger jar with the fish motif, and its twin, home. Lots of giggling, then my offer is politely declined.
These bright yellow boats are Municipal Garbage Vessels. There are six vessels, mainly used to control weed in the river, but their metallic “teeth” and robotic arms also collect other rubbish, although nets and colander type scoops are also used, too. Smaller boats are used in the canals.
Views from the ferry, contrasting the old and the new. The ferries along the river stop frequently, so it’s an easy way to visit most places of interest.
Ferry to a new shopping centre, Icon Siam. The ground floor was mostly food and local products, the other floors feature a dazzling collection of designer shops.
The lower floor is the Siam Sook, decorated with Thai motifs, part of six floors offering a total of 100 restaurants and 500 shops. Pleasant and cool way to get my 12000+ steps and lots of window shopping.
Enjoying the hotel gardens, en route to the ferry.
Dawn overlooking the Chao Phraya River as we prepared to leave Bangkok after another wonderful stay there.
Tomorrow, the 30th of March, is Take a Walk in the Park Day, so that’s pretty easy, enjoyable and cheap! I hope you have good weather for your walk.
Flew from Saigon to Dalat. Slowly climbed a steep, winding mountain road from the airport to the Dalat township, famous for flowers and old French architecture. Dalat was the hill town for the French to escape the humidity and heat of summer in Saigon. We stayed at a resort on the outskirts of the town.
Beautiful flowers but long, sharp thorns.
Lush greenery with flashes of bright colour. Gorgeous gardens everywhere.
This is the resort vegetable garden. Most of the fresh vegetables used in the restaurant comes from this plot, picked, prepared and served within hours. The food was so good!
Green papaya salad, one of many eaten by me in the last month. This one had some chicken pieces, too. Clean and fresh flavours. Delicious.
The resort looking towards a newly developed part of town.
Old Citroen at the resort.
To the resort spa and my reflexology session started with a long, lovely soak in a golden basin of cinnamon scented water. Meanwhile I sipped on a cup of strong, refreshing ginger tea. Lush, green garden outside the window. The resort was a French hill town resort in the 30’s and many of the buildings remain from that time. Our villa was in one of the many old buildings. Very special area.
After the cinnamon soak and reflexology, a hot stone treatment. So relaxing. I actually went to sleep half way through this process but woke in time to enjoy the hot stone massage. This session was truly luxurious and supremely relaxing. So wonderful!
Back to Saigon and interested to see a variety of posters in the lift at our hotel promoting water pollution awareness.
A Canadian artist, Benjamin Von Wong’s installation made entirely of recycled straws, 16 000 of them, in fact. Aiming to bring awareness to the problem of single use plastics, Von Wong’s Parting of the Plastic Sea is on display at Estella Place, in HCMC. Volunteers helped create the 3.3m art installation.
Parting of the Plastic Sea was recognized 22/10/2018 by the Guinness World Records as the largest straw art installation in the world. Starbucks had collection bins throughout Vietnam for six months to accumulate the straws which were cleaned and colour sorted by Zero Waste Saigon. A fascinating and thought provoking piece of art.
Like everyone else, I bought and used bottled water and there was no way I would refill the bottle from the tap. The untreated water isn’t suitable to drink. Everywhere I saw people with plastic bottles of water and plastic cups of fruit juices with plastic lids, plastic straws and plastic carry bags. The river was awash with rubbish, about half of it plastic. I tried to buy soda water in aluminum cans, which are easily and cheaply recycled, but that wasn’t always possible.
I don’t know the answer to the problem but making the local water potable or drinkable and educating the locals not to use the river as a rubbish tip would probably be a starting point.
Did you celebrate St Patrick’s Day, 17th of March?
After our great week in Hong Kong our son returned to Perth and we went on to Saigon, known as Ho Chi Min City since 1976. HCMC lies along the Saigon River, north of the Mekong Delta. During French rule, it was a major port city and metropolitan centre, with some imposing public buildings, tree-lined boulevards, a railway system and beautiful villas.
The hotel room number plates with birdcage images, which I loved.
Old Saigon changed enormously under Communist control, with a greater focus on local manufacturing, including exports made from local materials. The city is modern, vibrant and growing, including the construction of an underground train system.
The birdcage theme continued in our room, with these light fittings.
Wandering around the rooftop pool area and saw this new range of New Zealand cocktails, VNC Cocktails, being photographed. Gorgeous and sold in recyclable glass bottles and currently only in NZ, it’s available in four tempting flavours, Seabreeze, Margarita, Sundowner and Mojito. So pretty!
Arrived in Saigon with a head cold. Hotel staff were very kind and sent up ginger tea and honey and directed my husband to the hospital dispensary for cold medication. I added the chocolate biscuits. I think I became immune to colds teaching small children so was unprepared for this but will carry medication on future trips.
Aren’t these hotel flowers lovely? The climate means the parks are lush and green. They feel cool in such a hot, humid environment.
The local trucking company. The most common form of transport is the motorcycle and they are used to move an astonishing amount of stuff, not just boxes, but also entire families, father, mother, child and often a baby in a sling. Never saw in any accidents.
To Ben Thanh Markets, a swarming, enormous undercover area selling food and so many other things including many, many fake designer name bags, watches, wallets, sunglasses, scarves and clothing. Amongst it all, the market also had gorgeous lacquer ware, traditional clothing and fabrics and other local souvenirs. I don’t usually buy things when we are traveling but couldn’t resist this necklace. It got a good workout during the trip and since we have been home. Love it.
The other market we went to was in Chinatown, Cholon, another interesting but equally frenetic part of town. Also visited the Southern Vietnam Womens’ Museum, which focuses on the traditional contribution of women to the village economy, and their war and post-war contributions. Three stories but I didn’t linger. It was very, very hot that day and much worse in the museum with no air conditioning.
Front facade, Opera House.
The Opera House is one of the notable remaining buildings. Others include the Notre Dame Basilica, the Post Office and the Continental Hotel. Now the most impressive buildings in this vibrant city are glass and steel skyscrapers.
HCMC Museum of Fine Arts. Housed in a converted house originally built by a Chinese businessman, it shows both French and Chinese influences. Worth a visit to look at the architectual aspects of the building and to see the Art.
The Museum displays artifacts and artworks, all housed in wonderful rooms, showing the original features of the house.
The lift, a remnant of another time!
Interesting artworks but really enjoyed looking at the old villa, too. Rooms under the Museum and old buildings out the back house several private galleries, featuring the work of local artists. Worth a look.
Lovely old Continental Hotel close to the Opera House.
Notre Dame Basilica. The front facade is covered in scaffolding due to a renovation project.
Jumped on the local river bus and really enjoyed our trip. We got off at the last stop, walked around and then got on again. The fare is very cheap, the ferry is new and clean and it was a great way to see parts of HCMC from another perspective. There’s an interesting contrast between old, traditional river front buildings and the new skyscrapers beyond.
Buildings sites everywhere.
Towards the end of the tree-lined boulevard is one of the underground train stations under construction, marked by a crane, but it’s difficult to see.
The local shop. Next door was the local fruit and vegetable shop, both busy with people stocking up on their way home from work. Like traditional shophouses, the shop owner’s house is behind and above the shopfront.
We really enjoyed Saigon. We’ve visited Hanoi several times but the south feels really different. We found Saigon to be very vibrant and busy, and as usual in Vietnam, we loved the food (we’re going out today for a green papaya salad) and people, and all the usual things we do, looking at buildings, art, having reflexology, chatting to the locals and visiting the markets.
Today is World Sleep Day. Their introduction says, “World Sleep Day is designed to raise awareness of sleep as a human privilege that is often compromised by the habits of modern life.”
We spend one third of our lives trying to sleep, and we all know a good day starts the night before, so I hope you sleep well.
Look for sleep awareness activities on www.worldsleepday.org
Years ago, before we moved to China, my husband’s office was in Hong Kong, on the Island. We’ve just been on a nostalgia holiday, visiting places we knew so well. Our son traveled with us, too. When we moved to Guangzhou, in 1997, we still had to go to HK for business, visiting friends, some shopping and to fly anywhere. Returning from trips also meant a stay in HK as then the border with China closed at 7pm and so we’d have to stay the night and catch the train the next morning.
Those were exciting days, not only living in a very different culture but meeting new people, learning ( not very well) another language, understanding different business, employment and school systems but also being able to travel as we were much closer to everywhere than when we were in Perth, Western Australia.
If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll know our family celebrate birthdays, Lunar New Year, holidays and anything else with morning yum cha. So each morning we enjoyed breakfast at local dim sum restaurants.
We were the only Europeans in this place. The food was great. Lots of miming, guessing and laughing and we mostly worked out what we were eating. Enjoyed it so much.
Beautifully presented, elegant dim sum at M Restaurant, in the Mandarin Oriental. We knew this hotel well. It is in Central, the buzzy business area with lots of designer shops and beautifully dressed women.
Although we arrived 30 minutes before opening time, we had to queue on a week day to get a table at Tim Ho Wan’s dim sum restaurant in Sham Shui Po, considered the worlds cheapest Michelin starred restaurant. The menu changes regularly and there’s one written in English, if you ask. Enjoyed everything we ate. This is not a glamorous restaurant but the staff were great and the food worth the MTR ride.
Restaurant temple and delivery bay.
The food at Tim Ho Wan often has an interesting twist.
Celebrated the Year of the Pig with chocolate.
I’d never seen a unicorn playing a keyboard before, I’ve never actually seen a unicorn.
My favourite way to cross from Central on the Island to Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon side, is by Star Ferry. The fleet of 12 ferries carries more than 26 million passengers a year.
Cool, relaxing, scenic and very cheap, the staff still wear traditional sailor suits. Begun in 1888 all the ferries have “star” names, such as Morning Star ( built 1871), Evening Star ( built 1888), Rising Star (1890), Guiding Star (1896) plus Northern Star, Southern Star, Polar Star and several others.
The bell tower behind the ferry pier is all that remains of the original railway station.
Reflexology, some mediocre, some fabulous, all relaxing. The three of us visited several different spas both in Kowloon and on the Island.
Views from the Peak Tram, a very different experience from 20 years ago. So many more steel and glass skyscrapers. Now a popular tourist destination, we lined for ages for tickets, then shuffled forward slowly in a mass of people to get on the tram.
The Peak Tram is a funicular railway which carries tourists and residents between Garden Road and Victoria Peak.
The views across the harbour were fabulous. The railway began in 1888 and carries two million passengers a year. Try and get there early or late to avoid massive queues.
The end of the Lunar New Year celebrations is marked by the Spring Lantern Festival, informally known as Chinese Valentines Day, with hundreds of lanterns in parks, restaurants, shops, markets and hotels.
Visiting Hong Kong as a family was nostalgic with many happy memories and it was interesting to see the changes in this vibrant city. We really enjoyed visiting our old haunts and finding some new places, too.
The 5th of March was Shrove Tuesday, the last day before Lent, usually celebrated by eating pancakes.
Today is International Womens’ Day, intended to promote the rights of women. Adopted by the United Nations in 1975, it celebrates the social, economic, culural and political achievements of women.
Fabulous and famous enough to be recognised by her first name alone, Nigella is about to complete a talking tour of Australia. Called “An Evening With Nigella” she talked about her way of cooking and her beliefs about food.
I have always liked the generosity and flavours of Nigella’s recipes and was attracted to this recipe, ” Chicken and Pea Traybake” from my latest book of hers called “At My Table”. It’s full of gorgeous photos, wise advice and delicious recipes. Nigella’s food is for cooking at home and serving up to friends and family.
Another attraction was that I had all the ingredients to hand! I like watching her cooking programs, too, as she’s passionate about food and uses real ingredients, doesn’t follow fads and enjoys eating. Quite inspiring.
The first layer of this traybake is frozen peas, yes, frozen always on hand, peas. So easy. They actually become sweet and soft as they cook and absorb some of the flavours of the other ingredients in the dish. Then you add chicken, leeks, garlic, vermouth, oil, salt flakes and dill.
Straight from the recipe book!
My version after it came out of the oven. I served it with boiled potatoes to mash into the pea, leek and chicken juice. This recipe made two dinners for us.
An easily prepared, one pan dinner. Once it’s in the oven you only stir it once more, otherwise you leave it to cook while you get on with everything else.
Mine looks just like Nigella’s!
Today marks the beginning of Write A Letter Appreciation Week, so find some beautiful paper and mail a handwritten letter to someone. A nice change from a text or an email.
