SE Asia '25

A 98-day adventure by Meg Read more

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Trip start
January 1, 2025
SE Asia '25 Traveler
Seoul
January 2, 2025 in South Korea ⋅ ⛅ 1 °C
Landed in Seoul, decided to stay downtown for a fun night out. It was a looooong metro trip in, a cold evening with Korean BBQ, then to bed because jetlag. Up early to head back to the airport. Not sure we made the right choice going all the way in, we may have been better off staying near the airport.Read more
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Arrival taipei
January 3, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C
Landed early afternoon, and took the MRT into town. One of the prettiest metro rides, through jungly canyons.

Settled into our room, then hit a nearby night market for street food dinner.

We went to bed early, because we are still pretty messed up timewise.Read more
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Walking tour
January 4, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ 🌬 20 °C
We started our day waking up super early, thanks jetlag! But then we headed out on a walking tour of Taipei Old Town. Learned much about the history of this island, including politics.

Afterwards we rambles through a few neighborhoods, including Ximen which was popping! We had a few restaurants in mind, but they had huge lines. So we went to sushi express, which is the "McDonald's of sushi", conveyor style. It was just fine, just what we needed.

We then walked north to Dihua street, the oldest street in Taipei. Super crowded, cute.

After a siesta (nap!!) we found a great dumpling place just a few blocks away. Ordered four dishes, total cost was 7 bucks. Amazing. Then in an alley around the corner we spotted a cocktail bar. As we entered, they mentioned a minimum spend. So we had two cocktails each. They were great! Cocktail bill was just about $60. We were laughing so hard that we spent so little on dinner, compared to drinks.Read more
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Gondola!
January 5, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C
We took the metro to the outskirts of the city, then a very long gondola 🚠 ride to a high peak. We walked through farming areas and tea plantations, went to a tea museum, had a tea-themed set lunch. Then back down the gondola to the Taipei zoo. And amazingly, we ran into an old friend of Jess's, Martin and gf Angela, so random!!

The zoo was fun but SOOOOO many strollers and little kids running around. A bit exhausting.Read more
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Jiufen and Shifen waterfall
January 6, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 17 °C
Daytrip! We started off with a fast train east, followed by a slow local train, to Shifen. A small town with train tracks running right through the middle, famous for folks writing wishes on lanterns then setting them alight from the tracks. We watched but didn't participate. Cool idea, but there was littered old lanterns all over - in the trees, the river, sidewalks. Shifen also has a cool waterfall, so we took an hourish walk round trip to the falls. Lunch was several snacks from street stalls, including a stuffed chicken wing, and a crepe with crushed peanut brittle, ice cream, and cilantro. Surprisingly good.

We then took the local back to the connection town, and caught a bus up a winding mountain road. This is a tourist town with many tea houses, winding alleys, and loads of people. Reminded us of like place market. We strolled through, had a beer, and strolled back to the bus station. Fun to visit, very glad we didn't spend a night here as many tourists do.Read more
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Birdwatching and taipei 101
January 7, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 17 °C
Morning was doing laundry at our hotel, although the dryer didn't seem to be working so we have laundry draped all over our room

We metro'd over to the chiang kai shek memorial, then walked to Da'an park to see some birds. We passed the first din Tai fun restaurant, long lines.

Walked to Yongkang street for lunch, had some hand shaved noodles, yummy but quite messy 🤣

Checked out the tall Taipei 101 built, but decided not to pay the $$ to go up.

Then we wanted to find a supermarket, so we went to the Q mall, but it took us forever to find the market down on level B4.

Later we are going to dinner with some nomad friends, should be fun!Read more
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Museums
January 8, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C
This morning Bill went on a bird walk, while I worked on Airbnb for our Spain trip with P&K this fall.

Late morning we went to the national museum - nice building with many good artifacts and interesting items, but it felt very jumbled.

We went to a katsu place for lunch, then decided to take the red metro line to the end, to the old town of Tamsui. We found a "museum of curiosities" walked through street vendor stalls, and then back along the waterfront.Read more
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Miniature museum
January 9, 2025 in Taiwan ⋅ ☁️ 14 °C
Another morning working on travel planning. Then we walked across town to the museum of miniatures. Very nice and quirky, it was a fairly extensive collection of miniatures - houses, doll houses, vignettes, castles, fairy tale themes, etc. Some were incredibly intricate. Most of the models were created by a handful of Americans)Canadians/Brits. Got me curious about why westerners are making these for a museum in Taiwan.Read more
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Travel day
January 10, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
Long day of travel - left our Taipei hotel at 6:30 am, walked to MRT station, train to airport. Flight to Manila. At Manila we had to go through immigration/customs, then recheck bags. We found a lounge that qualifies as the worst lounge we've ever been to.

Then a flight to Cebu, and a long taxi into Cebu city/our hotel, rush hour traffic and tropical rain.Read more
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Vans and boats
January 11, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☁️ 28 °C
We caught a van in Cebu city headed northwards. We were pretty smushed in. It was technically a 3.5 hour drive, but took more like 4.5. That got us to the Maya port, where we caught a ferry (boat). We had to board by walking across a precariously balanced plank (did not enjoy).

The boat ride was only 40 minutes, but the water was rough, and we got drenched in several squalls.Read more
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Malapascua
Jan 11–17, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☁️ 28 °C
Days of relaxing, snorkeling, and exploring Malapasqua. We loved it!
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To another island
January 18, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
Today we left Malapascua to head to another island off of Cebu. So we walked to the ferry dock, again navigated the gangplanks. The water was much smoother than last week. Back at Maya port we wandered around looking for public transportation. We could've taken the bus, but a shared van offered us a ride (and a relatively expensive price tag), but we went with that option. I think we were scammed for being white tourists, oh well.

After a drive across the island of Cebu, we arrived at Hagnaya port. After a short wait we boarded a much bigger vehicle ferry.

We didn't want to lug our bags up to the top floors, so we settled on a bench in the lower area. Maybe not a great idea, it was loud and we saw rats scurry in and out of the life-veat cabinet we were sitting in front of.Read more
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Bantayan
Jan 18–24, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C
A relaxing week (almost) on the island of Bantayan. Bigger than the first island, but missing some of the charm. Our resort had a great pool and nice beach, so we mostly just swam, chilled out, and planned future trips. One day we rented a scooter and went around the island - was a fun way to see more of the place, but not many tourist attractions of note.Read more
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Transit day
January 24, 2025 on the Philippines ⋅ ☁️ 30 °C
Breakfast at our resort, then time for the ferry. On the other side, it was easy to find the big green bus headed to Cebu city. I was hopeful it would only take a few hours, but no, it was 4 hours. We like the bus better than the 15 person vans. Then we got a taxi back to the same hotel that we stayed before. And they had Bill's hat he had left behind, huge win!! Traffic in Cebu is crazy, and we're glad we didn't spend time in Manila because we have to believe it's even worse.Read more
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Transit day #2
January 25, 2025 in Vietnam ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C
Grab to Cebu airport, flight to Manila, lounge, flight to da nang, hang out near the hotel
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Hanging out in Da Nang
Jan 26–Feb 3, 2025 in Vietnam ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C
Low key week hanging in Da Nang. It's the week of lunar new year/ Tet, so it's great fun to see so many people dressed up and enjoying the holiday. Downside, many things are closed.

In our week here, we've walked out to the beach, had two meetups with other nomads, went to the giant Buddha and pagoda.Read more
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Travel day
February 3, 2025 in Vietnam ⋅ ☁️ 25 °C
Flight to Bangkok
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Koh Chang
Feb 4–11, 2025 in Thailand ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C
Lovely resort and beaches. We've been mostly hanging out - walks on the beach, swim in the ocean, hang by the pool. We did a morning kayak around a little island out front of our resort, as well as a birding tour. The beach down the way from us is good for long walks, and also has elephants brought there daily.Read more
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Koh Chang to Koh Mak
February 11, 2025 in Thailand ⋅ ☁️ 28 °C
Travel day! Picked up in a pickup, drive to the pier. About an hour long catamaran, then another truck ride to our new lodging/resort.
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Koh Mak
Feb 11–18, 2025 in Thailand ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C
A week of absolute chill on Koh Mak. Had a scooter for a few days, so we could see the rest of the island. Also took a boat to an even smaller island (Koh kam) and enjoyed some good snorkeling
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Travel day
February 18, 2025 in Cambodia ⋅ ☁️ 35 °C
Long day of travel - first a relatively short ferry ride to the mainland. Then a long and boring bus ride.....first we spent an hour or two backtracking to other pickup spots to get more passengers. Then we head to the Cambodia border. We all get off the bus, and muddle through exiting Thailand and entering Cambodia. We thought we were being smart to buy e-visas a few weeks ago, only to discover that they didn't take them at this land border. So we had to pay again, and thankful I had US dollars on me.

Then we walked across the border, and got on a different bus for the remainder of the journey to Battambang. We left our hotel at 9 am, and arrived at our new hotel at 6.Read more
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Tuktuk tour
February 19, 2025 in Cambodia ⋅ ☁️ 35 °C
We hired a personal guide/tuktuk driver to take us to the major sites today. Sam was a wonderful guide, and guy. We saw old style Khmer raised wood houses, temples, the bamboo railway, loads of tropical fruit plants, hand-making rice noodles at his families house, the bat cave, and the killing cave.

All in all we were with him for close to seven hours. Along the way he shared a lot of Cambodia's history, as well as his own personal stories of childhood during the Khmer rouge regime, trying to escape to Thailand, and many other personal stories.

Well worth the time and (not much) moneyRead more
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Bummin around battambang
February 20, 2025 in Cambodia ⋅ ☁️ 35 °C
We went to the small provincial museum (archeological) and saw cool sculptures in what seems like a bit of a preview to Angkor wat.

Then we walked across town to a very interesting gallery that was primarily the works from four artists. These artists were sold into child slavery across the border in Thailand, where they became friends. They eventually were rounded up by migration police and dumped back over the border in Cambodia. A local NGO found them safe placement and also connected them with an arts organization. Turns out all of them are insanely talented.

Later we enjoyed our pool, relaxed in our room (AC!!). Then we met up with fellow nomads Bill & Julie for dinner.Read more
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Travel day
February 22, 2025 in Cambodia ⋅ ☁️ 35 °C
After another lovely buffet breakfast at our resort hotel, we finished packing. A tuktuk picked us up at the hotel, and the concierge told him where to take us. We are hoping it's the right bus station. After what seemed like too long, he drops us off on the side of a dusty road that is definitely not a bus station. When we try to ask if we're in the right place, he nods, then takes off. A shop owner lady tells us to sit in the plastic chairs, so we do. Have we screwed up? Nope, a few minutes before our 10:30 bus time, a big bus pulls up near us. A random tuktuk driver across the road yells to tell us this is our bus. Driver gets out to stow our bags, then shows us which seats.

It was an uneventful 4.5 hour drive to Siem Reap, and we remind each other to just trust in the process.

When we get to the outskirts of Siem Reap, we watch on our Google maps as the driver turns on a ring road and starts going farther away from the town, then to the far other side. Should we've gotten off early? But no, eventually we pull into the station and disembark. A tuktuk driver is happy to drive us all the way back across town to our condo, after using Google translate and maps to communicate. For the 25 min ride it was all of $2.

Trust in the process. I'm SOOOOO much less anxious about these things than I used to be 😁Read more
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A week in siem reap
Feb 22–Mar 1, 2025 in Cambodia ⋅ ⛅ 35 °C
Spent a week in Siem reap. We spent three full days touring the many temples in this area - Angkor Wat is just one of dozens, and while cool, there were others I liked even more. We also had a meetup with other nomads which was funRead more
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