When we landed in Shanghai, the weather was so bad, there was sideways rain and menacing clouds set against brown-gray skies—not the kind of conditions in which you want to be bopping around the city, all tourist-like. The pouring lasted the entire four days we were there, and thus, we didn’t really see much of [...]
Photo Friday: Lantau Island, Hong Kong
December 9, 2011 By 28 Comments
While in Hong Kong last month, we went on a Semester at Sea FDP with Professor Jim Huffman and took the hour-long bus ride over to Lantau Island, the biggest of the Islands District isles and home to the Hong Kong International Airport, as well as Disneyland. Our first stop was to the ancient fishing [...]
A Hotel with a History
December 8, 2011 By 26 Comments
We haven’t stayed in a whole lot of hotels since setting sail with Semester at Sea, primarily because the ship often occupies a better location in the city in which we’re docking than any hotel we could afford. But when I had a weekend off while the ship was sailing between Hong Kong and Shanghai—a [...]
Photo Friday: Phnom Penh, Cambodia
December 2, 2011 By 10 Comments
We hadn’t been on the ground in Cambodia for an hour, when our bus whisked us away to the Mekong River for a sunset cruise. At first, I wasn’t so keen on being on a boat again when we’d already been on the Semester at Sea ship for two full months at this point. I [...]
Templed Out in Cambodia
December 1, 2011 By 14 Comments
After Ta Prohm, we then headed back to the hotel to check out and eat again—I feel like we’re always eating on these Semester at Sea trips; it’s definitely hard to go hungry while traveling with the program!—before returning to the complex for the final time and viewing Angkor Thom, of which my personal favorite [...]
Angelina Jolie Was Here First
November 29, 2011 By 23 Comments
Angkor Wat may be the most known of the temples, but there are dozens of others within the complex in Siem Reap worth exploring. Following our sunrise and post-breakfast visits to the main attraction, our Semester at Sea group went to what is likely the second most famous of the local sites: Ta Prohm. Look [...]
Relics of the Khmer Empire
November 27, 2011 By 29 Comments
After an early morning viewing followed by breakfast at the hotel, we headed back to Angkor Wat again, this time to view it under a high sun and blue skies. We had a full day of temples ahead of us, too. Because Semester at Sea docks in each port for such a limited amount of [...]
From the Mouths of Babes
November 24, 2011 By 15 Comments
While in Cambodia, our Semester at Sea group did more than just visit the temples. Our first stop in Phnom Penh was actually to an orphanage that takes in children whose mothers have died of HIV or who no longer can care for them because of the disease. Nearly 100 children live at Palm Tree [...]
Siem Reap by Night, Angkor Wat by Sunrise
November 21, 2011 By 20 Comments
From Phnom Penh, we traveled further into Cambodia and took a propeller plane a half an hour to Siem Reap, home to the temples of Angkor. We arrived amid a typical Southeast Asia afternoon shower and went straight to our hotel, the Allson Angkor Paradise (Semester at Sea does not skimp on hotels, y’all), where [...]
Photo Friday: Hong Kong, SAR
November 18, 2011 By 32 Comments
After Vietnam, we sailed to Hong Kong, where many of the students took a ferry directly across the bay to do a little Macau gambling at the likes of the Venetian, MGM Grand and the Wynn. While I had just done the Macau thing two years ago, SVV and I opted to kill some time [...]
