December 2005 - Christmas Trip to Cambodia/Vietnam

We spent Christmas 2005 traveling to Cambodia and Vietnam. This was our first trip to this part of Southeast Asia.  Both countries have only recently opened up to mainstream travelers. As such the tourist infrastructure is still being developed in many areas, although the areas we visited receive a relatively high volume of tourists so the infrastructure was fairly good.  If you get into the more remote areas, particularly in Cambodia, the infrastructure gets a little antiquated. Location map How we got there We flew Malaysia Airlines from Jakarta to Vietnam.  This was the second trip we flew with this airline and it confirmed our experiences on the first trip.  The airline offers very competitive fares but the planes are rather dated (at least on the two trips we took the interiors of the planes looked dated) and the service is mediocre, especially if you compare it to our preferred airline of Singapore Airlines.  As this was a relatively short flight in the region we went economy class on this trip, however, on our last trip we flew business class to the USA and the level of service still wasn't up to our expectations.  Supposedly the airline is in the process of upgrading their business class seats which should improve service.  Needless to say we will not consider Malaysia Airlines for future long-haul flights unless we are ensured that the business class seats have been upgraded. The flights between Jakarta and Ho Chi Minh City aren't the most convenient so on our way up we needed to overnight in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.  We stayed at the Pan Pacific Kuala Lumpur Airport hotel which was very comfortable but we had an unfortunate experience the following morning while trying to check back-in for our onward flight to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.  We had a casual breakfast the following morning and walked to the terminal about 75 minutes before our onward flight was scheduled to depart.  Well, if you haven't been to the Kuala Lumpur airport let me tell you it's a brand new modern airport.  In fact the airport is very large and much bigger than current traffic would warrant as it was built to try and complete with the Singapore airport as an Asian hub.  Upon arriving at the departure hall we were confronted with a swarm of people trying to check-in.  Being that Kuala Lumpur is Malaysia Airlines hub there were many check-in counters open for its various flights, however, the lines wrapped around and at the pace they were moving it would have easily taken us well over 2 hours to reach the check-in counter.  Fortunately we were finally able to get assistance at the help desk but this required several queries and shuffling between different desks. The moral of the story is that if we ever need to do another overnight transit in Kuala Lumpur we will have our baggage checked through to our final destination and simply keep a change of clothes in our carry-on luggage.  In this way the following morning we can avoid the unreasonably long check-in lines and go straight through to immigrations (or better yet simply stay at the airside transit hotel and avoid immigration altogether, although the Pan Pacific is a much more comfortable room than you'll get at the transit hotel).  If the Kuala Lumpur airport hopes to compete with the Singapore Airport as a regional hub it will need to get its act together. Trip Video Click on the below picture to view a short video compilation (approximately 30 minutes/34 megabytes) of our trip which includes the temples we visited, a Cambodian cultural show, a visit to a silk factory and a trip to the Cu Chi tunnels outside Ho Chi Minh City. Cambodia Click on below photo to read about our trip to Cambodia. Vietnam Click on below photo to read about our trip to Vietnam.