While we were in Bangkok I spent a lovely morning at May Kaidee's learning how to cook some vegetarian Thai food. May certainly is a character. First off for the day, in full traditional Thai dress, she took us for a walk round the back streets of Bangkok to visit her local shops where we gathered some ingredients for the day's class. A small street side stall provided most of the main key ingredients - galangal (Thai ginger), lemon grass, Thai basil (more aniseedy tasting than the usual Italian type flavour we tend to have at home), chili and kaffir limes leaves. The lime leaves were fresh. It's unbelievable how much of a difference it makes to use fresh leaves. I looked into the possibility of buying/growing kaffir fresh at home. To buy the fresh leaves are £5 for 10 leaves! , although possibly worth it, definitely out of my budget. Or a 18" tall plant could cost you £30 then of knowing my luck it would die as soon as the winter came. Hmmm. Ah well. Next stop was the rice paper lady where we bought some fresh rice paper to make spring rolls. As a real treat we ...

If  Hoi An with its lantern lit streets and colourful candles floating down river is the Shambala Festival of South East Asia, then Pai, in northern Thailand is what would happen if the people decided not to leave the festival, stayed put and set up shop. This is a very special place. There is very little to do other than sit in relaxed cafes and bars, read books, be inspired, have a massage, do some Tai Chi  or maybe go for a trek in the hills. It is great. We've already stayed here twice the amount of time we planned to (lets hope the guy we left our big bags with in Bangkok hasn't sold all our stuff!). We're staying over the river from the main part of town, it's very peaceful. We have only the noise of the geckos,birds and the occasional downpour of early monsoon rain on the roof of our little bamboo hut to listen to. [caption id="attachment_1390" align="aligncenter" width="449" caption="Bridge to our hut"][/caption] We've discovered a few things while we've been here, the first of these discoveries is that we both have an amazing ability to sit in a cafe for over 5 hours without really realising an hour ...

After nearly a month in Hoi An sadly the amazing contract on our flat stating that we should resolve any conflicts with the "spirit of comradeship" had come to an end and it was time to move on. We packed up our bags, said our goodbyes, hopped on a train and waved farewell to this friendly place that had been our home for the last few weeks. Spending a little more time there allowed us to get to know people just that bit better. The lady down the road who did our laundry, the smiley lady and her daughter on the market who made our breakfast fruit shakes and all the other people from places we frequently cycled past who always had a smile and a wave for us, we'll miss them all. But most of all we will miss the people from Karma Waters who were so good to us while we were there. It really was a treat to meet them and to spend so much time chatting, sharing stories and ideas. [caption id="attachment_1185" align="aligncenter" width="450" caption="Karma Waters"][/caption] We did so much during our time there. Kayaking, cooking lessons, speed boat trips and an exciting, though unsuccessful trip out on ...

I am almost reluctant to write this post as it seems we have uncovered a secret Veggie Com restaurant in Hoi An. This place is amazing and yet we'd not seen it on any of the usual listings. It's a great place to get away from the crowded tourist streets and enjoy top-quality vegetarian Vietnamese  food with not a single person hassling you to buy a book, packet of peanuts, newspaper etc etc. The restaurant was recommended to us by our landlord. We'd arrived home one afternoon shortly after moving in to our new house in Hoi An to find two monks sat at our dinner table having lunch with the landlord. It was a bit of an unexpected sight! We found out that the people we were renting from had fairly recently bought the house and so were having it blessed. By the front door there was also a table of food laid out as an offering. I'd imagined that all the food was homemade, that they must have been slaving away all day to put together this impressive feast for the visiting monks. It turns out however it was a take-away! Ha. Apparently the restaurant has quite a reputation ...

A little while ago our lovely friends John and Helen Kiff surprised us with a gift of 500,000 VND with instructions to treat ourselves to a hotel upgrade/swanky meal out or whatever treat took our fancy. After some deliberation on what to do with our new found wealth we eventually decided to use it on a night out on the town to celebrate moving into our new house in Hoi An. What a lovely night we had! We got all dressed up, Andy even wore a shirt, and we started the evening with a pleasant stroll into town. Our first port of call was to be River Lounge, a very fancy restaurant/cocktail bar on the edge of the river in the old town. We spent an hour or so relaxing in their 'beach' area sipping mojitos and enjoying the scenery. Hoi An is a very pretty town. There are lanterns everywhere which light the streets like a magical techni-coloured dream. The protected Old Town is a unique mix of Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese and European architecture and it's beautiful old ocre coloured buildings line the riverfront. Housed in one of these buildings was our chosen restaurant for the evening, the aptly named Café Des Amis (-that's Friends' ...