This small town, population 25,000, five hours by bus from Vientiane, the capital of Laos, is famous for its scenery and its party scene. On our first evening we were entranced by the beauty, surprised by the partying, although we’d heard the stories – apparently it’s a lot calmer […]
You’ve already heard about our venture into the malls on New Year’s Eve. We returned empty handed – almost. Asia Books had a good map of Laos – one with both Laos script and Latin letters. Our day for exploring was more successful. Fai, our guide from Chilli Paste […]
It’s difficult to imagine a city more different from my home town. There are fourteen million people in the metropolitan area – Napier has 61,000. In fact Bangkok has more than three times the population of my entire country! It’s winter in Bangkok now. Some locals are wearing […]
I’d like to see some monkeys, not in the zoo, roaming free, I told my son during my visit to Thailand in 2013. Lopburi is the place for you, he said.
Route 52 between Weber and Pongaroa wound on and on. There was paddock after paddock, sheep, lots of sheep, flowering broom, the occasional farm house (rare but we did see one or two), very few other cars on the road (make that three), and no shops, no service […]
The long road home from Gisborne to Napier takes you through the boondocks. Tiniroto Road, also known as the Inland Road, between Gisborne and Wairoa is almost as far off the beaten track as it’s possible to get in New Zealand without going off road. It’s 104km of […]
Never heard of Douglas Cook? Me neither. Or at least not until I visited Eastwoodhill, the arboretum he established between the 1930s and 1960s. Cook was a little eccentric for his times. Gardening in the nude and reciting poetry, as well as loving trees, weren’t the usual preoccupations of […]
Snow has arrived in Minnesota already this year. My friends on Facebook are talking about it and two of my favourite Minnesotan bloggers are writing about it. Crooked Tracks has wonderful winter photos. littlelaosonthe prairie has advice on how to cope with snow for those from the tropics, especially Laos. […]
Gisborne. Where the surf rolls in and the surfies are always out, where the sun shines and the beaches are sandy. And where, the summer I was five, I stubbed my toe in a headlong rush across the road to get to the water. It was a beauty […]
The countdown has begun. It’s twelve months tomorrow since our last trip to Bangkok. And it’s seven weeks tomorrow until we leave on our trip to Laos, which includes a stopover in Bangkok. I can’t wait but I’m a grown up so I have to. As my Mum […]
Jill's Scene 
The korero