A girl in...Siem Reap, Cambodia!

Bangkok to the Cambodia border
May 6, 2013 -- After spending a couple of nights in Bangkok, we made our way to Siem Reap by bus early in the morning, with pickup directly from our Bangkok hotel. The bus ride was roughly 4 hours and dropped us off at the Rongklua border market, shared by both Thai and Cambodian vendors.

The bus we caught in Bangkok was definitely an advantage over the buses we'd originally researched online which depart from the Morchit bus station and arrive at Aranyaprathet. If you arrive at Aranyaprathet, you'd still be in for more traveling since you'd need a tuk tuk or bike to transport you to the Rongklua border market/Poipet border crossing which is still 7km away. (Unfortunately, I don't have details on the bus transport we took from the Bangkok Loft Inn directly to Rongklua...the receptionist/owner at the Bangkok Loft Inn simply arranged it for us when we told her we were trying to get to Siem Reap.)

Welcome to Cambodia!

It was a chaotic, dusty scene at the border market with people everywhere and our little trio of travelers looking rather lost and dazed. Luckily for us, a kind soul was able to point us to the immigration line and Poipet border crossing. We tried to stick together as a group as we made our way there. At the turnstiles, however, a group of teenage girls squeezed their way in front of my brother, effectively cutting him off from me and my cousin. The girls then proceeded to surround my brother while crossing the turnstiles - an effective method when trying to pick his pocket!

Fortunately, he felt the intrusion and was able to clamp his hand over his pocket. The girls all scattered empty handed. He was understandably pissed and we had to keep reminding him that he was lucky he didn't have anything in his pockets to steal. Plus, we're in a poor South East Asian country after all. These things are to be expected.

After going through immigration, we boarded a shuttle (we were skeptical at first about getting in it, thinking we were being scammed), but we were assured the shuttle simply takes us to the taxi depot. It did. Thankfully. From the taxi depot, we secured a taxi for our 3 hour ride from the border to our hotel in Siem Reap.
Whew! Lots of travelling.

Cambodia entry requirements and miscellaneous bits

• You will need two passport-sized (4cm by 6cm) photographs and a passport valid for a minimum of six months beyond the date of entry into Cambodia. (I got my photos taken at a U.S. post office.)
• Visa entry into Cambodia is $20 U.S.
•  As you walk towards the border crossing you will be approached by lots of touts - ignore them, though they may get in your face a bit.

A girl in...Bangkok, Thailand (2013)

May 5, 2013 -- This is my second time in Thailand and it never ceases to captivate me. I'm not sure if it's the frenetic energy, crazy heat and humidity, or just the stark differences between life there versus my life back home that keeps me coming back for more. This time, our merry band of travelers (myself, my brother and my cousin), will be enjoying two days in Bangkok before heading to Siem Reap, Cambodia, coming back to Bangkok for one day, then heading off to Phuket and ultimately Bali, Indonesia.

For my brother and cousin, this was their first trip to the capital city and they were understandably excited. We stayed in a little budget hotel, the Bangkok Loft Inn located in the Thonburi area. It was simple, very budget friendly and clean.

Bangkok Loft Inn
55 (Near Soi Taksin 7, close to UOB Bank)
Somdet Phra Chao Taksin Rd., Bangyeerua

Near the hotel were places to eat to satiate any late night hunger pangs. On our first night, we heartily dug into some good noodles, Thai iced tea and some other crunchy snacks...

What we ate

 Fried meal worms, anyone?

Or maybe wok fried ants with scallions and lemon grass is more to your liking? Surprisingly, both these dishes were tasty, though we favored the meal worms more than the ants. They tasted like little french fries. :)















What we saw

We visited Wat Pho to see the magnificent golden Buddha and spent time wandering the grounds and sights in the immediate area, including the Grand Palace. We also took a nice ferry ride along the Chao Phraya river, which is a great and cheap way to get around while getting a feel for this busy city.

The ubiquitous tuk tuks.

Visa requirements and miscellaneous bits
Note: If you're a U.S. citizen tourist staying for fewer than 30 days, you do not need a visa when visiting Thailand, but your passport must be valid for at least six months beyond the date of your entry into Thailand.

•  Visitors will also incur a departure tax when leaving the country, which is 700THB or roughly $21.50 U.S. as of 2/12/14.

pre-vacation jitters

I recently read an article that said that most people experience pre-vacation euphoria for about 6 weeks preceding their trip while post-vacation "euphoria" was a measly 1 to 2 weeks. I'd say it's more accurate to refer to it as post-vacation blues than euphoria. I know I definitely feel more sad than happy after a trip is over.

In fact, I'm leaving on a trip soon — sort of a mini South East Asia adventure with my BF, brother and cousin — to Thailand, Cambodia and Bali, and am definitely feeling the excitement building. In fact, my BF and I, being the nerds that we are, have already done a dry packing run. What's that you ask? Well, it means we've packed our bags to see if all the things we want to bring with us will fit, which is really just an excuse to play out the pre-trip ritual of packing. While some people might hate packing, we actually love it as it gets us amped up for the trip ahead.

For this trip, we'll be packing light; we're basically only bringing a carry-on sized backpack to house all our clothing, gear and other necessities. I picked up the awesome Osprey Porter travel back pack at my local REI for this purpose. At $99, the price is right too.

So far, so good. It's pretty roomy with a main, easily accessed main compartment, top pocket for quick-grab items and cinching straps to keep everything tied down. I've also paired my pack with a couple packing cubes, which has made quite the difference.

A few other packing necessities for this trip:

• safety whistle - we'll be traveling overland from Bangkok to Siem Reap and well, you just never know. 
• door stop - a couple of our nights will be spent in budget places. While they've all received good TripAdvisor ratings, again, I'd rather be safe than sorry. The rubber door stop was an idea I actually picked up from reading the Legal Nomads blog and it's a good one as it's a fairly easy and inexpensive way of giving yourself added peace of mind.
• laundry detergent - for those dang-i'm-out-of-underwear days :)
• Med supplies: aspirin, band aids, neosporin, sleep aid, Imodium 

See you on the road (in Asia)! I'm looking forward to more of this...

Maui

The Maui in my mind was a lush, tropical place with waterfalls, clear blue water perfect for snorkeling and an abundance of friendly, "aloha" spirit. The Maui I encountered was very much the same, I'm glad to say.

BF and I took a short (5 days and nights) trip to Maui at the end of July. It was my first time there though I've been on neighboring Oahu several times.

Though we initially resisted, we couldn't help but fill our itinerary chock full of activities. Many of them were of the "must do" variety such as:

• Road to Hana drive: Loved it - so picturesque with lots of great waterfall spots
• Visit to Paia: Fun to walk around and shop in. Do stop at Anthony's Coffee Company to pick up lunch for your road to Hana drive.
• Molokini crater snorkel tour: Could've passed on this - there were free spots we found that had better snorkeling than what we experienced on our tour which wouldn't have cost us the nearly $90/person.
• Haleakala summit to watch the sun rise: Wish there weren't quite so many people as it takes away from the spiritual experience of seeing the sun rise, but it was still beautiful. We cycled down the mountain and made a stop at the Kula Lodge for a tasty breakfast.
• Pa'iloa black sand beach in Waianapanapa State Park. The sand, more like small pebbles were a little uncomfortable under foot but was still very cool to see. Waves at the small beach are strong, so exercise caution.
• Maui Swap Meet: Fun, lively swap meet. Many stalls selling a range of items. We brought home jars of Maui made jams and jellies. Yum!

Haipua'ena falls (on the road to Hana). Great for a dip!

Three Bears Falls - on the road to Hana

Sun rise at Haleakala

Biking down Halekala

Black sand beach

Honolua Bay

A girl in conflict...travel versus saving

I came across a recent post about "The Price of Luxury" over at Brave New Life that really struck a cord with me. As an avid traveler who is also trying hard to achieve her goal of early retirement (or financial independence) by age 38, I am often faced with the opposing forces of saving and spending in order to achieve my dreams. Therefore, I often think about what it's really costing me to indulge in trips to far-flung destinations.

On the one hand, I try to be very diligent with my monthly budget and even have a set amount of money that I automatically deduct from my paycheck - roughly $100 per pay period - to go into an ING travel fund. I use this money solely for vacations and mini trips I take throughout the year. This helps alleviate some of the anxiety I might feel when spending money on travel. On the other hand, I realize that by spending this money that could be better utilized padding a savings account or investing in stocks or mutual funds, I am only prolonging my path to retirement. (A $200 per month or $2,400 per year travel bill really translates into a savings cost of $80,000 assuming a conservative 3% return on investment.)* However, there are some things that are good for one's mind, body, and spirit. For me, it's travel.

I've always viewed travel as first and foremost, an adventure. I love to be immersed in new cultures, experiencing exotic tastes, smells, sights and sounds that both transform and transport me. There's no substitute for getting lost in a chaotic bazaar, weaving your way through narrow, unfamiliar streets, making a connection with strangers who don't speak your language, or coming upon a quiet, undisturbed place to take your breath away. Travel holds promise. Travel encourages me to learn from my past, to keenly look towards the future, but to always be aware and firmly present on the path I'm on. That way, I'll always appreciate where I am in life and where I'm going.

As I struggle with some of the guilt I feel about spending the money on travel, I have to remind myself that part of it is the price I pay for living in my hamster wheel. There is no way around it - I work to live, but in order to escape some of the realities of my cubicle nightmare, I use travel as an escape. Until the day that I can break out for good, where travel will be less of a coping mechanism and more of an immersive experience, I can only hold my breath and continue saving.

*In the world of early retirement, instead of trying to calculate how much you'll need in retirement based on a fixed percentage of peak income figures (i.e. I'll need 80% of my current income to live off of for the rest of my life), early retirees tend to calculate how much they'll need in retirement based on their current monthly expenses and aim to live off their investments. In my example, a monthly travel expense of $200 or $2400 per year using an ROI after inflation of 3% means that I'll need 3% of my nest egg to equal $2400.  $2400/.03 = $80,000. So I would need to save $80,000 in order to draw $2400 each year.

I've broken down the gist of the early retiree method in more detail below. Basically, the idea is that to retire early, you need low monthly expenses. If your monthly costs are low, you'll need a lower nest egg in order to retire. Conversely, if you use the conventional "percentage of my current income" method, you'll need a really large nest egg to retire.

Early retiree method:

• Bring monthly costs down as low as possible by doing such things as paying off your mortgage, living frugally, investing and saving early.
• Assuming $2000 in monthly expenses means an early retiree would need about $2000 x 400 or $800,000 to retire early. And by early, I'm talking mid-30s or earlier if you're diligent! The retiree could then withdraw $2000 per month or about 3% of his/her portfolio and expect that it would last the rest of his/her life.

Regular or conventional retirement method:

• Save the "recommended" 10 to 15% of income each year
• Live normally, don't take too many measures to reduce monthly expenses
• Aim to replace roughly 80% of pre-retirement income. Assuming a pre-retirement income of $80,000, a retiree would need $64,000 x 30 years or $1.92 million before retiring. And the retiree isn't leaving the work force early...he or she would need to work until 65 in order to accumulate the $1.92 million.

A girl in Costa Rica - White water rafting

Another item on our "must do" list in Costa Rica was river rafting. We signed up with Wave Expeditions for the tour and highly recommend it. The outfitter has an office conveniently located in La Fortuna.

There were roughly 12 of us in the group total, not including the tour guides so it still felt small and personal. We were picked up from our hotel in a nice, clean van and driven the short 1/2 hour or so to the Bolsa River. Apparently, the white water tour is dependent on when the dam flood gates are opened each day, which was a bit surprising to us, but nonetheless, made for good rafting.

Our group of 12 was split up into 2 and we were all provided with all the necessary safety gear - helmet, floatation vest, paddle - and were also given a thorough run-through of the various safety drills as well as rafting instructions.

It was such a thrill going down the river. We even saw a sloth (our first and only sighting in Costa Rica) while paddling. There are also lots of wild life and flora to gaze at when you're not battling the river and trying not to fall in, of course!

Wave Expeditions was a standout outfitter for several reasons, including:

• Provided us with a tasty, mid-rafting fruit break - fresh pineapple and watermelon taste great after an hour or so of rafting.

• After we finished rafting, we were taken to Casona el Rancho, a preserved farmhouse where husband and wife owners, Milton and Elieth were committing to running the farmhouse the way it had always been run - without electricity and with minimal environmental impact. It was such a great experience to not only learn about their work in safeguarding a piece of Costa Rican tradition but to also enjoy their beautiful property, flush with beautiful birds, plants and trees. We were treated to a very tasty lunch and invited to sample their special homemade wine and molasses. 

They even demonstrated how they use the traditional ox/bull method for squeezing sugar cane, which they then convert into brown sugar/molasses.

This cheeky little goat seemed to really want its picture taken, so I had to oblige.

A girl in Costa Rica - ziplining adventure

After our one-night stay in the Arenal Observatory Lodge, we drove a few miles away to where we'd be spending the next few nights: the Los Lagos resort. What the Los Lagos lacked in terms of seclusion and a sense of being cocooned in nature, which the Arenal Lodge had in spades, it made up for in terms of its convenient proximity to the La Fortuna city, and its own unique appeal.

The property is known for its hot springs, with water corralled from underground into a variety of man-made pools with ranging temperatures to suit your preference. Our room was in a standalone bungalow that houses two separate guest rooms and which backs up to the forest. The room was also halfway up a steep hill which made for a great calf and butt work out after a few days!

Zip lining was a convenient stroll from our room to the on-site zip lining outfitter. While the various zip lining/canopy outfitters claim theirs is the fastest, tallest, etc., it's hard to tell. All I know is the Los Canones zip lining tour was great. There are 8 different platforms with sweeping views of the forest from the top of the canopy. We loved it. Here's a view from the treetops with the zip line extending through the center:

Other highlights of staying at Los Lagos:

• You're surrounded by wildlife. On the property alone, we saw (and heard) howler monkeys in the trees outside our room, were joined for meals by large, skittish lizards and iguanas.

• The property also has a butterfly garden, crocodile farm, ant farm and frog farm. The word "farm" is used loosely to describe the single crocodile pen, small frog enclosure and somewhat sparse ant farm. However, we loved the butterfly garden; it was quite magical to be surrounded by so many butterflies and hummingbirds.

 

• Complimentary breakfast buffet was good; we ate at the restaurant several times during our stay as well and the food was tasty.
• Whether you're traveling with kids or are simply a kid at heart, you should go down the pool slide. There are three, and while the larger one looks tame, it does catch you by surprise. First you're thinking, "eh, no big deal." The next thing you know, you're slipping and sliding around curves and twists through tunnels only to emerge - suddenly - straight into the pool. Remember to hold your breath!