Backpacking South East Asia 2014

As 2014 was drawing to a close, I realised that I had a large amount of annual leave at work that I hadn’t taken. With the office closing over Christmas and some time off in lieu I figured that I had around 6 weeks to use.

I had received an invite from the CRP in Dhaka where I had previously volunteered to join them for a conference in early December and just like that an idea was born.

There was a gap in my calendar and a plane ticket to Bangladesh, so not wanting to waste an opportunity I started to look at how many other places I could get around locally.

So started my whistle-stop backpacking tour of 2014 covering 6 countries in 6 weeks.

Back to Bangladesh and beyond

November 19, 2014

Back in September I was recovering from surgery, twiddling my thumbs and wondering what I was going to do with my 3 weeks of annual leave that I still had left to take off work before the end of the year. It’s been a few years since I did any...

First couple of days in Dhaka

November 29, 2014

It was the night before I was due to leave and lying on the floor in front of me were two packed rucksacks and my old wheelchair, solid tyres fitted and footplate held together with duct tape and cable ties. I was a bit worried. I felt a little too...

Bye bye Bangladesh

December 1, 2014

Every morning at the CRP I’m woken up at 5:30am by the morning call for prayer at the mosque that’s located next to me room. As much as I don’t like waking up that early in the morning, I have to say that the low rumbling of the voice that is...

Creatures of the night

December 4, 2014

Other than the flight being delayed, leaving Dhaka was a smooth operation. I got on a small plane with wider aisles going through first class so I managed to take my chair all the way to my seat. Tricky transfer but definitely preferable over getting...

Off roading

December 7, 2014

I had an 8:30am train to catch from Hua Lamphong station in Bangkok and had arrived with plenty of time after I had accidentally hailed a cab instead of taking the metro as I had planned. As the other trains pulled in I could see the complete lack of...

First impressions of Myanmar

December 13, 2014

Before leaving Thailand, there was one last spanner to be thrown into the works when my debit card was eaten by a rouge ATM. It’s not an issue right now as I’ve got enough dollars (the universal currency) to keep me going for a while and then I’ve...

Central Myanmar – Bagan and Inle Lake

December 15, 2014

I’d booked three days at the Yaga youth hostel before getting to Yangon and because of their cancelation policy I couldn’t get the money back for my last night, that’s thirty bucks down the drain but on the plus side it meant that, still feeling ill...

Kayaking down the Mekong River

December 20, 2014

Fitting Inle Lake into my travel plan was going to be a tight squeeze and it was. I had to be in Yangon for 6am on Monday for my flight to Laos. My first choice of getting there was by bus, but with only night departures I’d have to leave on the same...