We are excited to have a guest blog post from one of our travelers, Vaychan. Vaychan just returned from an amazing trip with her husband to Vietnam and Cambodia. Thanks Vaychan for sharing your travel experience with us!
When we were deciding on the countries for our next international trip, I figured it was time for me to make it to Asia. Other than work trips to the Philippines & Japan, Asia was an unexplored continent to me. It wouldn’t be that odd other than the fact that I’ve spent a great part of the last decade backpacking through other parts of the world and second, I was born in Thailand to Chinese parents. We left when I was three- many stories passed on and a few pictures but no memories. Probably, the biggest hesitation with going to Asia was that I prided myself in being a traveler who plans her own itinerary and finding her own way around. But with Asia, I knew I was going to need some help planning and executing, if we were going to spend more time doing things rather than being in transit to somewhere.
Two weeks, two countries - we picked a Vietnam tour as our first country since my friend was born there (our husbands were game for whatever we decided on). For our second country, it was a toss up between Thailand and Cambodia, since China was too vast. My birth country or my parents’ birth country-Thailand seemed more fun with its beautiful beaches, but I was curious of how much of my upbringing was influenced by the Cambodian culture. My parents had been one of lucky ones who had escaped Cambodia to Thailand when Khmer Rouge took over in 1975 and made it to the States in 1979. To be completely honest, I wasn’t sure I was ready to face that history since this was supposed to be a vacation, but curiosity won this one...
After an awesome week of hiking, kayaking, learning how to cook and sightseeing in Vietnam, we flew to Siem Reap, the city where Angkor Wat is located. Siem Reap has one of the quaintest airports in the world, with its slanted temple roofs visible from the tarmac.