BootsnAll Travel Network



Days 190-211: Vietnam

October 10th, 2005

We have to apologize in advance here. We spent way too much time working on a blog entry for Vietnam but lost the whole thing in an internet cafe incident. (Ironically, it was a ‘save’ that lost the entire blog post.) So we’ve opted for mostly pictures.
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Days 170-189: Laos (and a little more Thailand)

September 18th, 2005

Spent a week in Thailand before heading to Laos for 11 days. We can see why the French liked the place.
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Laos Map

September 13th, 2005

Here’s a map of Laos.
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Days 158-165: Kalaw & Inle Lake

September 2nd, 2005

This is our final entry from Myanmar about the Shan State town of Kalaw and the Inle Lake region.
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Days 153-170: Myanmar Critters

September 1st, 2005

We were very impressed by the critters in Myanmar – particularly the bugs. In particular, we found THE GREATEST BUG EVER!
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Days 153-170: Myanmar Politics and Conversations

September 1st, 2005

This entry includes general info and observations on Myanmar. Part of it is a bit political, and thus, not all may be inclined to read it. All names have been changed (other than ours) to protect the kind people of Myanmar who took us into their confidence to discuss ‘The Situation’ (on the off chance that the generals get wind of this blog site). [No pictures – we took no pictures of people who confided in us.]
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Days 155-157: Bagan

August 31st, 2005

The ancient capitol of Bagan is what initially drew us to Myanmar. The area is covered with thousands of temples built between the mid-9th through the early-14th centuries.
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Days 153-154 & 166-170: Mandalay & General Myanmar

August 30th, 2005

We weren’t sure what to expect from Myanmar. We hadn’t heard much about it since they do a good job of keeping journalists out of the country. What we found will take a few blog entries to convey. Since we’re pretty sure that many of our readers are equally unfamiliar with the country, we’re going to be a bit liberal with descriptions and pictures of this beautiful country full of friendly people.
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Mingalaba from Myanmar

August 20th, 2005

Inle Lake, Shan State, Myanmar

Mingalaba from Myanmar (pronounced like slurring together “me an’ ma”). Some enterprising folks have figured out how to get around the government controls on access to the internet. So it’s available (but pricey) in the larger towns. We had thought that the name “Myanmar” was introduced recently by the government. But, in fact, it dates back to the time of Marco Polo at least. The name “Burma” is a bastardization of the word “Bamar” (the largest ethnic group here) by the British colonizers.

We’ve spent our time visiting many of the temples at Bagan, hiking and sipping Burmese milk tea in the cool Shan state highlands, and smoking lots of opium (just kidding). They’ve let us past all of the military checkpoints so far, and assuming the border at Tachileik is open when we get there, we’ll walk back into Thailand on the 28th. Better post this before the power goes out.

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Myanmar Map

August 11th, 2005

A map of most of Myanmar. We are heading to Mandalay, Myanmar on 11 August. We hear that the government has clamped down on internet access, so it’s unlikely we’ll be able to update the blog or read email until we leave the country.
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