Travelfish newsletter Issue 251 : Kanchanaburi & Laos updates + By the river
Hi everyone,
We're all about Laos and Thailand this week, with more Kanchanaburi material online along with some Lao island research. A book set in Malaysia and a highlighted film in Thailand, plus a few new techie things on the site round out our offerings.
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The week that was
Online we have the rest of Kanchanaburi now available for a read, with in-depth rewrites of all our suggested sights and activities, including some new cave and temple ideas. Over the border in Laos we have two similarly named and similarly sleepy islands, Don Khong and Don Khon. South of the equator, we've (finally) finished our update of Sanur in Bali (except for food, which is coming shortly, promise).
On a more sombre note, partly in response to the news coverage of an Australian woman’s recent scooter accident on Ko Lanta in Thailand, we’ve got a new feature on the travel insurance implications of renting a motorbike in Southeast Asia. If you are planning on scootering in the region, it is essential reading. Short version: Get a license yesterday.
For premium members, we have new PDF guides online for Kanchanaburi, Don Khon and Don Khong. Not a premium member? It costs A$35 per year, gives you access to more than 180 guides (among other things) and you can find out more here. The more premium members we have, the more we can keep our coverage up-to-date on the site.
On the site we also have two new features, available for logged-in members only (basic membership is free—you can then upgrade if you like).
First, we are revamping the mapping entirely to make it more useful. Using Kanchanaburi as an example, you can now click on a mapping icon on the main location page, and you’ll get a pop-over map showing where everything is. Click on the position marker at top left, and we’ll show you right where you are (best to do this while you’re in Kanchanaburi rather than Sydney). This positioning follows you in real time, so it should be helpful for those using the site while they are wandering around the destination they are reading. We’ll be rolling this out to more sections of the site this coming week.
Secondly, we’ve added a five-day weather feed for all destinations. Scroll to the bottom of any location page and you’ll see the weather for today and the next four days.
Both of the above work only if you are logged into the website as a Travelfish member (it works for both regular and premium members). As there is a significant cost in serving the mapping in particular, we wanted to keep that under control by making it available to regular readers of the site only. It is open to all for Kanchanaburi for now though, so you can take a peek without logging in.
Feedback for either of these new features is welcomed!
Thanks to all for the emails about your favourite bad hotel. The hands-down winner was reader S.L. who was less than amused when her room in Bangkok included a cat and kitty litter in the bathroom. When she asked about having the cat “repositioned” she was told not possible because she was “in the cat’s favourite room”. Oh, Thailand we love you.
Our soapbox is about having your wits about you in Southeast Asia while the film we are highlighting, “A lonely trip”, is our 201st featured travel film. There goes a morning or two!
This week’s theme is By the River, as all the inputting this week about the islands in Laos had us dreaming about the slow-flowing, muddy waters of the Mekong.
On a sad note, Gill Daley, the co-founder of the Soi Dog co-founder on Phuket, Thailand, died today from cancer aged just 58 years old. The Phuket News has a good obituary up for her. We covered the Soi Dog Foundation a year or so ago here.
As always, please feel free to forward this newsletter on to your friends, family, strangers in bars, bus drivers and somtam ladies.
Good travels,
Stuart, Sam and the Travelfish team
Soapbox
Safety third?
I was doing a travel consultation the other week and mentioned to the client that when they go to arrange a car and driver for their family to drive from Phnom Penh to Sen Monorom that they try and get one with seat belts.
“What do you mean ‘try’” she asked.
I explained that seat belts are not a legal requirement in Cambodia, and so more often than not there would not be seat belts in the back seat. She was quite taken aback by this—and we hadn't even got to the ferry part of their trip!
When you're coming from more safety conscious countries, travelling in Southeast Asia can be a bit confronting. Yes, in some cases safety can be a bit over the top back home—a fake photo I saw the other day suggested it was now law to wear a helmet when jogging in Australia, but it was, at least for a full minute, believable!—but generally speaking, it is far easier to main or kill yourself by accident in Southeast Asia than back home.
You're often expected to see (and walk around) the hole in the footpath, and watch where you're going so you don't bang your head on, well, anything. Electrics can be dodgy, zebra crossings are meaningless and safety regulations are often treated as optional advisories.
A friend in Bangkok the other day put up a photo of a canal boat whose petrol tank was tied immediately above an uncovered engine. I'm no engineer, but it struck me as a less than ideal arrangement.
Likewise drivers may be drunk or stoned or both (and not wearing a seat belt, obviously). Those footpaths are for motorbikes—an aunt who visited us in Bali years ago still regales people back home with tales of how the motorbikes “just rode on the footpath!” Amazing!
Ferries sink, planes crash, cars explode and motorbikes spin off the roads. Food safety isn't always happening, the booze may blind or kill you, the police don't always have your interests first off the rack. Your rafts may be unseaworthy, the tour operator unlicensed and the bungalow veranda a death trap.
And so the list goes on. (Don't get us wrong: Of course, things go wrong back home, too. Just, a bit differently.)
In Southeast Asia, it pays to have your wits about you. Some things are simple: watch where you are walking, for instance, and don't get on a boat/bus/bike/plane/anything with wheels with an obviously drunk or stoned driver. But also, use your common sense. The $1 gin and tonics being sold on the Gili Islands are not going to have real gin in them. Wear a helmet. Look before you cross the road.
And watch yourself on Balinese footpaths.
Good travels,
Stuart
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Travel insurance: World Nomads
Featured
Don Khong
The largest island of Si Phan Don (4,000 islands), Don Khong is nowhere near as popular as backpacker hotspots Don Dhet and Don Khon. There are no cheap-as-chips bungalows, banana pancakes or river bars here. Instead, Don Khong offers real Lao life paired with a languid pace and sensational river views.
Film of the week
A lonely trip
A young boy from the Mekong river doesn't want to leave his home and goes to the university in Bangkok, but his father wants to teach him the best values he had learned and how to face his new life. Film by Harry.
What we're reading
My Life As a Fake by Peter Carey
Set mostly in Kuala Lumpur in 1972, My Life As a Fake, by Australian Booker-prize winning author Peter Carey, is at its heart the tale of an Australian literary hoax and its reverberations into the present.
Notes from the road
BURMA: Take a Yangon sunset cruise
Boating down the bustling river at rush-hour with views across the port to distant Shwedagon on one side and the mangroves and shanties to the south while tossing tit-bits at passing gulls and sipping a cold one is a great way to spend a few hours in our books.
CAMBODIA: Tatai River and Waterfall
The Tatai River meanders through the Cardamom Mountains, for the most part with a gentle flow that belies its 20-metre depth, and in some places with a thunderous roar as the riverbed drops away to form cascading waterfalls.
INDONESIA: Hidden Canyon Beji Guwang
Hidden Canyon Beji Guwang may be hidden, but it’s definitely no secret. This rugged and deep rocky gorge along a section of the Oos River between Ubud and Sanur makes for an adventurous two- to three-hour trek.
ISLANDS: Mata Jitu
There are waterfalls and there are waterfalls, and then there is Moyo Island’s Mata Jitu Waterfall, one of the most beautiful waterfalls we have seen.
LAOS: Don Khon
Far larger than Don Dhet, Don Khon offers the laidback riverside vibe without the unruly development and general trashiness that has befallen Don Dhet.
MALAYSIA: Kinabatangan River
Known for its remarkable wildlife, you are almost guaranteed to see one or several of Borneo’s endemic species in the wild on the Kinabatangan River.
SINGAPORE: Yes, Singapore has a river
Whether you’re on a tight schedule or just have aching feet, a cruise along the Singapore River is a great way to sit back and soak up Singapore’s sights.
THAILAND: Roll your own Kanchanaburi
Given the vast scope of things to see and do in Thailand’s third largest province, it pays to do some prior planning. How much time do you have?
VIETNAM: Exploring the DMZ
Sightseeing the former Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) is revisiting an important chapter of Vietnam’s history. As the dividing line between North and South Vietnam, the area along the Ben Hai River saw some of the heaviest fighting of the entire war.
News from the region
BURMA I: When a newly independent Burma thought it had found peace
“They think that’s the first one, but it wasn’t, it was the second. The first was convened in 1946, between just the Shan, the Kachin and Chin.”
BURMA II: Chainsaw injuries in Burma tied to illegal logging
"May Thu and Myint Swe live in a tiny village north of Mandalay, the country’s second largest city; a two-hour drive along bumpy roads plied by minivans and trucks, some carrying cut logs on their roofs. Their logging work is illegal."
CAMBODIA: With war-era debt demands, US on shaky moral ground
“The US government has never accepted legal responsibility for the tremendous damage it inflicted on civilians and the country of Cambodia during the war,” said Elizabeth Becker, an American journalist and author who covered the war—including the bombing campaign in 1973.
INDONESIA I: Chinese-Indonesian Governor’s struggles worry some in his ethnic group
"Indonesia’s Chinese population has a long history of being persecuted. For three decades during the Suharto years, Chinese-Indonesians were accused of being in league with the Chinese government and forbidden to study at Chinese-language schools or publicly celebrate Chinese holidays."
INDONESIA II: Ethnicity and Jakarta’s election
As Jakarta heads to the polls to elect a governor on Wednesday, will ethnicity, religion, race, and other social divisions play a major role in determining the outcome? Yes, but despite massive protests led by Islamic groups, it’s not about religion, writes Nathanael Sumaktoyo.
MALAYSIA: Images reveal three more Japanese WWII shipwrecks torn apart for scrap
"Scuba diver Monica Chin said local fishermen called her late last month to say a large Chinese vessel with workers on board was using a crane to tear apart the Japanese ships."
THAILAND I: Free tourist visas extended through August 2017
Tourists from 21 countries can obtain free visas until the end of August, the interim cabinet decided last Tuesday.
THAILAND II: More boats to boost canal tourism
Odd story, as the KSR to Pratunam route is already served by local boats which don't cost anything like 200 baht for a day pass.
THAILAND III: A ferry from Pattaya to Hua Hin
VIETNAM: Numbers they are a changin’
This is happening this week ... unfortunately! We'll be updating Travelfish listings this coming week to reflect the new numbers.
Travel writing
Do our ethical convictions need to go on holiday when we do?
The latest mutation of Western capitalism is a kind of experiential capitalism. Fuelled by our need to ‘capture’ our lives on social media, experiential capitalism is all about indulging in memorable – which is to say, sharable – experiences that frequently boast an ethical dimension.
Life after death in Vang Vieng
The back of the converted pickup truck this day was a microcosm of what Vang Vieng has become. No longer Laos' unbridled, gap-year party stop, this day it attracted a retired Australian couple, a middle-aged Canadian photographer, two South Koreans office women and a 21-year-old backpacker. She looked a bit thunderstruck at the company she was keeping. With a few quotes from Stuart.
How Natural World Heritage sites are being spoiled
When a place is designated a Natural World Heritage Site, it is a recognition that it has “outstanding universal value” and must be protected. But a new study shows many of these sites are being severely damaged by human activity and are deteriorating rapidly.
Interesting site
Redesigning the Paris Metro map
Travel shot
Walk the haunting trail at Hellfire Pass.
Till next time
That's it from us for now. As usual, enjoy the site's new additions and drop us a line if there's something in particular you'd like us to cover in Southeast Asia.
Travel light!
Stuart, Sam & the Travelfish team
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