Great Ocean Road - Victoria, Australia

So i've been very lazy in posting since I got to Australia, simply because I am having the best time. But i have done some things worthy of note which could be useful to anyone travelling over here. In terms of getting out of Melbourne I have only escaped the once so far between working and playing and that was to do the Great Ocean Road in one day a pretty hefty task especially when you don't drive, luckily one of my friends volunteered as driver and we set off on my first Australian road trip. It is one of the most beautiful routes i've ever driven down and there was so many stops to see but this is the route we did if your interested in taking a day and doing it yourself, The time to drive the whole route and back including stopping time and wandering around took roughly 15 hours and my poor friend had to drive all of it as i've been too lazy to get my drivers license.

First of all we missed out Torquey somewhere I definitely want to go see but we thought it would be better to get the first stretch of road out of the way, the first 'landmark' was the gate of the Great Ocean Road a memorial to the workers that built the road itself and of course I had to get a super cheesy picture under it.

after we went past Lorne where we went to Erskine Falls, it took around 20 minutes to walk down to the falls from where you could park and it was beautiful, pictures do not do it justice.

After Erskine falls we travelled on through down to Wye River, where we walked up Grey River road a popular place to spot Koalas (which we did) and also the birds there red and green lorikeets were super friendly and would come and sit on you. As you can probably tell by the pictures I was super happy by seeing some Australian wildlife after being in the city for so long.

After this we drove through more of the national park (Ottway) in the hope of spying some kangaroos but no luck although we saw more koalas in the trees which was pretty cute, and a kookaburra. We then drove through to Cape Ottway where we stopped for a break and walked to the lighthouse, but it was 20$ just to go look at it so we skipped and walked to the view point instead which was great. After a few more walks and minor waterfalls along the way the sun started to get pretty low so we decided to drive through to the 12 apostles.

while it was great to see something so famous, I thought the 12 apostles weren't that mindblowing, pretty sure there also isn't 12 anymore, for something that is built up so much it was a little disappointing but the coast line of the cliffs is still impressive to look at. After this it got dark so we started the journey home along the quicker route towards Geelong, we had such good weather all day which was lucky as I don't think the journey would be worth it unless you had blue skies and a bit of sun. 

Playing fashion designer - Hoi An tailoring

Quick post back to one thing in Vietnam I found that should be unmissable is to experience Hoi An's expert tailoring scene. The women there are absolutely incredible, you literally point to a picture of an item of clothing like off of ASOS or something, or if you want something different you draw a scribble out of what you want, pick a fabric and they literally make it from the picture and exactly how you picture it. They measure every part of your body so they can make it to fit you perfectly so you have a one of design made custom to your body, I loved my dress I got made so much (which was at Peace Clothing link below in post) that I got more clothes made, I tried another store and got a dragon print two piece I designed made out of silk which cost me around £45 but if I attempted to do something like this in England custom made custom fit it would have cost me over 100 it was so worth the price. That store was called Bari (link below also) heres some photos of the clothes I got made and also the ones my friends did.

dungaree sketch for the design I wanted

The finished dungaree dress from Peace, and the outfits my friends got made at Bari

Two piece sketch 

The beautiful fabric I chose 

another of the silk fabrics

the finished two piece 

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g298082-d4211296-Reviews-Ba_Ri_Tailor-Hoi_An_Quang_Nam_Province.html

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g298082-d2717876-Reviews-Peace_Tailor_in_Hoi_An-Hoi_An_Quang_Nam_Province.html

Batu Caves - Kuala Lumpur

I only had a day or two in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia while I wait for my flight to Melbourne to start the next part of my adventure. I heard the Batu Caves were unmissable so thought I would go check them out and see if they compared to other places I had seen on my trip like Marble Mountain (previous post) The Batu Caves were incredible the most sacred Hindu temple in Malaysia, the ornate statues and the size of the cave itself was like nothing I have ever seen, like a whole other world. The temples themselves are Hindu temples protected by statues of their Deities, the largest being a 140ft statue of the Deity Murugan whose sheer size is mindblowing. The caves are definitely worth a visit the biggest cave and the one worth seeing above the others is free entry which is a bonus! One of the smaller temple caves is 5 MRP to get in and was worth paying to see the statues inside of the cave. Outside the caves are monkeys hanging about, you can buy bananas from the nearby stall holders to feed them if you dare but they do jump and they will bite if they feel threatened not that it stopped me going and hanging out with them but consider yourselves warned! if your in Kuala Lumpur for a day or two get to Batu Caves there only half hour away by train and was the only thing I found worth doing in my time here.

Ha Long Bay

Our last stop in Vietnam was to the world famous Ha Long bay, a Unesco world heritage sight and one of the 7 natural wonders of the world. It was so incredible to see in real life and the pictures look terrible compared to how beautiful it actually was like stepping into the film Avatar. We booked a 2 day 1 night sleeping on a boat with Golden Dolphin Tours, the first day we went from the harbour out into Halong Bay for around four hours cruising around all the islands and then went to a small village on the water and borrowed some kayaks from the locals and kayaked around the amazing limestone cliffs it was very surreal after we went back to our boat to watch the sunset and have some drinks, followed by karaoke of course, we then went to our cabins which had air con and were really cute and old fashioned, waking up on the water and seeing Ha Long bay out my window was probably one of my most incredible moments of this trip the next day we sailed around the islands and stopped at a pearl farm where they showed us how they cultivated the best pearls and the process behind it. 

pearl farm - Ha Long bay

Ha Long bay - at night

 

view from our cabin on Halong Bay

Pearl farm worker

I thought the tour we did was pretty great and I loved sleeping on the boat, it was around 70USD but I had friends that did their own thing minus a tour and said it was pretty easy to get around on your own, we didn't manage to get to Cat Ba island as we ran out of time but i'd recommend spending 4 days doing both.

Sa Pa Trekking

Went up north into the mountains to Sa Pa, probably the most beautiful place I have ever scene, although the weather still isn't great as it's monsoon season it didn't dampen the spectacular scenery for us, our two day tour booked through Sinh Cafe Tourist, was a bit of a rip off as we were supposed to do two days of trekking and because of 'weather conditions' which wasn't that bad we only ended up doing one but I think it was literally because our guide couldn't be bothered. Day one was amazing we were met by local village women from the Black Hmong tribe and they trekked with us 14km through the mountains down the paddy fields to the village where we were staying. The trek itself was really difficult especially as it had been raining the night before so it was pretty slippery, also someone had thrown away my shoes so I only had flip flops to scale down the mountain in which wasn't very useful. Anyway heres some photos of the amazing views on the way to the village.

This was my guide Sho (on the right) and her friend from the Black Hmong tribe who saved me multiple times from falling down the mountain. 

We stopped for lunch in a village about 5 hours into the trek where we met the two other tribes in the valley, all three tribes have their own language and their own traditional dress, the one annoying thing is people are constantly harassing you to buy bags and bracelets especially the children, who are incredibly talented at making you feel terrible, be warned once you buy something off one person they will all gather around you, but tourism is their main income so fair play. I went to Sa Pa to get some great portraits so I ended up bargaining with some of the children that I would buy a bracelet if I could take their photo, here were the results. 

The kids were so beautiful and such great saleswomen after having lunch and driving some bargains we then trekked onto the homestay whose name I can't actually remember,  It was amazing a cabin in the middle of the jungle with mattresses on the floor and mosquito nets, and out of the makeshift window (hole) you could see the whole mountain view and listen to the crickets and the rain. I could easily live somewhere like that for months it was so peaceful, I would 100% recommend visiting Sa Pa, and doing the trekking, just check the weather beforehand.

HANOI MONSOON - HALONG BAY TYPHOON

A picture says 1000 words, its raining it hasn't stopped the monsoon has hit us and a typhoon has hit Halong bay, were currently about to escape to the hills of Sapa and go live in the village for a few days, more posts coming soon when were back in the city.

Hoi An to Hue by bike - Marble Mountain, Hai Van Pass, Elephant Springs

Inspired by my brief ride on the back of someones motorbike, I decided it was about time I tried to drive my own. Clearly a massive error of judgment considering I don't have a driving license and haven't even had one lesson but hey its Vietnam what could go wrong? Paying a woman outside our hostel 300,000 Dong (£10) I was able to borrow a bike from her from Hoi An and drop it off in Hue (8 hours by bike with sightseeing) and they would take my luggage up in a bus for me and meet me there which was a great deal. A little bit put off that they just asked for my name, no identification or proof I could drive just a demonstration of how the breaks work and handing me a helmet. So with this information understood, we joined a group we'd met in our hostel and started the journey to Hue (I'd recommend making friends and doing it in a group especially if you have no sense of direction like me). I'd already driven a little of the distance by bike the previous day to see the beautiful Marble Mountain next to Da Nang which I would massively recommend going to see, the stairs are really steep and you will sweat buckets but the temples and caves in the mountain are incredible.

on the edge of the mountain

the view from the top

Buddha garden

The White Buddha  

Back to our roadtrip, the way to Hue from Hoi An is so beautifully scenic driving through paddy fields coastal roads and up through the mountains, its crazy how diverse the scenery is as you go along. I didn't take that many pictures as I was driving the whole time and was already a bad enough driver but we made a few stops along the way. The best part of the journey which was towards the end of the trip was Hai Van Pass which is a long winding road up into the mountains quite steep but easy to navigate, it was the best view down into the bay with loads of viewpoints to stop off at, again not many pictures as we wanted to keep going to Hue in good time. 

new friends

Hai Van Pass

Clifford the big red bike  

Hai Van pass viewpoint 

we got pretty lost after the coastal road trying to find a place called Elephant Springs, eventually we found it but had lost most of our group and ran out of time there but it looked really fun and if theres tours running there from Hue I reckon its worth a day trip.

Elephant Springs was basically a collection of pools going down the mountain with wooden shacks built alongside where the locals would cook food or lay down on mats they had brought with them, it literally looked like a place out of the Jungle book.  

Not my photo but a better view of Elephant Springs, after we left here it was pretty much straight motorway to Hue for an hour and a half all of us pretty tired and not looking forward to navigating the city traffic..