We love elephants. One of our best travel days ever was in Chang Mai, Thailand, caring for some. So when we found out Cambodia has elephant rescue NGO’s helping these gentle giants live in natural forests, we were ready to go to any lengths to see them. Turns out those are pretty long lengths indeed. Welcome to Sean Monourom in Mondulkiri province in Eastern Cambodia...
The ghosts of the Chu Chi tunnels are thick here. They linger in the dank, humid air as spirits of soldiers – spirits of men who were brutal killers and those who were brutally killed here on this earth beneath our feet. The killing happened during both the war with France in 1945 and later during Vietnam Civil War, which the U.S. took part in on the side of...
I, Tanner Croddy, went to four movie sets so far this trip. The first movie set was on Castaway Island in Fiji, where the movie Castaway, starring Tom Hanks, was filmed. The second movie set was the Hobbiton, in Matamata, New Zealand, where The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings were filmed. The third was in Halong Bay, Vietnam where King Kong, Skull Island and the...
I’m nervous, I’m conflicted and I’m unable to get more than a brief few minutes of sleep as I sit in seat 42F on our 10 hour flight from New Zealand to Singapore on our way to Thailand for a few days of scuba diving. We have left the natural wonders of New Zealand under our wings. It is now about 9:00 a.m. and we are flying northwest over the Java Sea. I know this...
Leaving Christchurch on New Zealand’s South Island by the Tranz Alpine train is a thrill. The cold morning air wakes you like no coffee ever could. The train cars have a domed roof so passengers can peer out at the farms that eventually give way to the Alps without having the squish your face up to the glass. There are two children sitting across the...
The procession of peaks are like endless crests of white and green dinosaurs marching into the horizons all around us with some wearing cloudy shawls on their collars under crisp winter blue skies. Heading South into the Fjordlands from Queenstown, you lose all sense of scale. On your right, Lake Wakatipu spreads calmly into the distance, bordered on the opposite...
Walking towards the very heart of the city, Cathedral Square, we don’t know what to expect. A New Zealander questions our desire to see the Cathedral, saying, “It’s a pile of rubble.” We circle the closed off church, finding most of it standing. Sadly the Western wall is gone, replaced by massive iron trusses preventing gravity from completing what a massive...
A step into a simpler time, an easygoing local culture as welcoming as the lushness of this tropical rain forest and as welcoming as the captivating beauty of the liquid blue sea. This is Taveuni, Fiji. We take flight in a small deHavilland propeller plane from the town of Nadi. We fly across the craggy green and golden mountains, dark rivers and small villages of...
I’ve always felt lucky if we can find some small experience that gives us a sense of the spirit of the places we visit. Mostly it’s a challenge. When we left Taveuni, we stopped off at Treasure Island in the Mamanuca Islands for a couple days, an overpriced generic island resort overrun by vacationers with small kids, which was a perfect place for Kimberly to...
To our family and friends, Last night we enjoyed our first sunset in yesterday from the patio of our Bure (guest house) in Taveuni, Fiji. The days, weeks, months and even years of planning have come to this, our beginning of Travelers 3. We have built a small blog for our travels, www.travelers3.com, where we will share our voyage. The site is now up, but please...