Greetings from Danang and another edition of Where I’m At – my monthly summary of where I’ve been and other site news. Where I’ve Been Penang View this post on Instagram A post shared by James Clark ✈️ (@nomadicnotes) on Feb 4, 2019 at 6:58pm PST The month began in Kuala Lumpur and from there […]
The Brooklyn of Penang – Seven Streets Precinct / South George Town
I’ve been a frequent visitor to Penang over the last decade, being one of the few places I visit on an annual basis. I spend most of my time wandering the streets of the UNESCO World Heritage area of Georgetown, as it’s undisputedly the main attraction. In the last few years though I’ve been lured […]
The rebirth of Ipoh Old Town
Ipoh is a city on the west coast of peninsular Malaysia and the capital of the state of Perak. Ipoh experienced a tin mining boom in the early 19th century, and today there are many remnants of the colonial era. The train station at Ipoh’s old town, known locally as the “Taj Mahal of Ipoh”, […]
Notes on Pattaya: The beach of Bangkok, and thoughts on retirement
I’m usually immune to click-bait listicles, especially when they just arbitrarily rank cities. One list that I will always stop to read though is Mastercard’s Global Destination Cities Index. For the 2018 list Bangkok was number one again, which was not a surprise. What was a surprise was to see Pattaya checking in at #18. […]
View Bangkok from the King Power MahaNakhon Tower
King Power MahaNakhon is one of the most visually distinctive buildings in Southeast Asia. Up close it looks like a jumbled mess with pieces of the building missing. From a distance though it all makes sense. The missing pieces resemble pixels that are spiralling around the building. The building was completed in December 2016, and […]
The remote mountain magic of Mae Hong Son
Mae Hong Son is in the far northwest of Thailand. So far northwest that it’s just a few kilometres from the Myanmar border. There’s no way to get to Myanmar from here, and it’s not on the way to anywhere. It is though on the way through to somewhere via the Mae Hong Son Loop. […]
Pai – The Shire of Thailand
Pai is in the mountainous northwest of Thailand, about 140KM from Chiang Mai. As a frequent visitor to Chiang Mai I’ve heard all about Pai, yet I had never been. I can trace my reluctance to visit down to the arduous road journey by minivan, and by hippies. On one of my early visits to […]
Chiang Mai trip report – the provincial powerhouse of Southeast Asia
Every time I return to Chiang Mai (which has been often) I marvel at how hard this inland provincial city punches above its weight. After thinking about this I looked at a map of Asia, and I can’t think of a non-capital city (and not a port/coastal city) that has as much to offer as […]
Notes on Macau – Where US casinos and Portuguese heritage meet
When I was in Hong Kong I visited the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, which meant a trip to Macau. I was in Macau unexpectedly last December so I didn’t expect to be back again the following December. I like visiting Macau, even though I’m not into casinos. The UNESCO World Heritage Site of the Historic Centre […]
Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge – 3 bridges and an undersea tunnel on the world’s longest sea bridge
The Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge opened in October 2018, making it possible to travel directly by car or bus from Hong Kong to Macau. The HKZM bridge is an overseas highway with three cable-stayed bridges and an undersea tunnel, so it’s not technically a continuous bridge. However you classify it, at 55-kilometres long it’s the longest […]
