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February 10-13, 2016: Luang Prabang

Now, Laos has a very interesting history, in my option, at least. And though I COULD theoretically type up a brief summary of said history to fill you in, I don’t want to, so just go to Laos’ Wikipedia page (I love Wikipedia so hard) and read about it yourself 🙂 What I WILL tell you is that Laos was under French rule for almost 60 years and thus you see a lot of French influence, particularly in the architecture of Luang Prabang, the old royal capital and seat of the government of the Kingdom until 1975. This makes Luang Prabang an especially interesting city to visit, as at times it’s difficult to remember that you are still in Asia and not walking the streets of Marseille! Continue reading →

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February 9-10, 2016: The Slow Boat Journey down to Luang Prabang

Like many others, we chose to journey down to Luang Prabang via the slow boat from Huay Xai, the Laotian town bordering Thailand’s unexpectedly marvelous Chiang Khong. Continue reading →

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February 7-9, 2016: Miracles in Chiang Khong

Chiang Khong, a tiny little one-street border town that almost entirely serves as a sleeping point for travelers intending to cross the border into Laos the next morning, turned out to be such a pleasant and pivotal point in our travels that we decided it deserved its own post. Let me tell you why… Continue reading →

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January 30-February 7, 2016: Hanging Out in Northern Thailand

As incredible as the islands of the Philippines were and the people we met, we were SO glad to be back in Thailand where, well, things just made sense again.  Continue reading →

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January 25-30, 2016: Coron + Ferry to Manila

Said goodbye to the stunning El Nido and took a 9 hour INTSENSE boat ride from El Nido to Coron. And when I say intense, I mean 9 non-stop hours of 20 foot waves, people throwing up, the works. Continue reading →

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January 20-25, 2016: El Nido

With much sorrow, we said goodbye to Alona Beach and Karim and took off for Palawan (voted most beautiful island in the world by Conde Nast Travel readers the past two years in a row)! Continue reading →

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January 13-20, 2016: Diving in Alona Beach

After parting ways with Olga and Aaron in Siquijor, we made our way back to Alona Beach to begin our PADI Dive Course! We were referred to a dive shop called Piratas Alona Dive Center and are SO happy that we were because we had the coolest dive instructor in the world. Continue reading →

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January 1-13, 2015: The Visayas (Mostly)

As amazing as Japan was, we were so excited to get back to warm weather!! But as soon as we stepped foot off the plane in Manila, we very quickly regretted it, only partially due to the fact that it was 93,572ºF and 100% humidity. We very soon came to realize how much of a shit-hole Manila actually is.  Continue reading →

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December 28, 2015-January 1, 2016: Kyoto, Part 2

We kept ourselves quite busy during these last three days in Japan, making this post our final and longest Japan post yet.

We got the hell out of Kanazawa and headed back to Kyoto. Checked in to our guesthouse and immediately took off for an excursion to Osaka. Continue reading →