Old Town, Dubrovnik

Zabid

There's nothing like a big travel bag to attract anyone in sight who speaks English. This guy was a teacher keen to ask me about Australia. Like most who asked he couldn't believe that Australia only had 20 million people. He bought me a juice, helped me find the taxi stand for Zabid, asked if there was anything else he could do for me and went on his way. The drive to Zabid was another of those 'anywhere to Port Augusta' drives. The hotel was pretty basic and was the first on this trip to have the cold water only shower directly above the squat toilet. Zabid is the second UNESCO world heritage site in Yemen but walking around the streets you wouldn't guess it. So this was one those occasions I was glad to have a guides approach me. Again with the 'ask you like' payment. I knew where it would end but atleast it would work in my favour. With a guide you got to see inside some of the court yards and they were truly impressive. You even got to see inside some o...

Aden

I caught a shared taxi to Aden without hassle though again it stopped on the outskirts of Town. For the first time in Yemen I was mobbed by taxi drivers as I got out of the car. I played quiz show host trying to ascertain who was going to be the least hassle. The winner was a fraud. The only English he knew was "I know that Hotel, only 500 rials." He was also a liar. We had to stop twice for directions and he asked me for 'only' 2000 rials when we finally got there. I stayed at the Rambow Hotel. Named after the French poet Rimbaud not the fictional Vietnam Veteran Rambo. It might have been quite grand once but now you would say it had character. It wasn't too bad but became uncomfortably hot the second night when the electricity failed to kick/be turned on. Aden was a lot less interesting than I thought it would be. Once occupied by the British I was expecting they would have made left more of a mark on then town than a store that sold Argos products (seriously) a...

Strung Treng

Strung Treng was an unexpected stop over, more a hospital visit then the usual tourist stuff. I was waiting in a guest house restaurant for the bus to Laos when i was rather suddenly overcome with a fever and fatigue. I rented a room and slept for almost 24 hours straight. The manger was understandably concerned, he thought it might have been Malaria, and sent me to the doctor for tests. It wasn't Malaria but was probably Dengue Fever but I needed a 10 hour bus trip back to Phnom Pehn to confirm this. Either way the 'cure' was Panadol, plenty of water and rest. I was going to do this in Laos anyway so decided against the bus back to Phnom Pehn and caught the bus to Laos the next day instead.

the blue horizon

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