The itinerary is still malleable and a lot of things might change, but my flights are now booked, so I'm happy to start a thread. I will be travelling for a number of weeks this spring, starting in April. Although the trip will actually cover three continents, the biggest part is my first ever trip to Mainland South East Asia. I will begin by spending a couple of weeks working in Egypt. Other plans include a few days in Singapore, even fewer days in Malaysia, and the rest crossing some of Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam (as well as a few days[/weeks] working in Bangkok). After a week back in the UK, I'll be flying to Istanbul for a weekend (via Zurich). If all goes to plan, it'll be a lot of fun! I'll be travelling mostly with a group of friends, so zoo visits will be fairly limited, but there are a large number I'm itching to visit. If I can obtain permission, I'm hoping to visit some private confiscation/rescue and breeding centres in search of some creatures which are very rare in captivity. Big zoos are already on the itinerary - of course. Please feel free to offer any tips, any ideas or any contacts you'd like to share.
Not quite - I'm not brave enough for that yet. I'll be sticking mostly to big cities and main roads. Lots of tourist attractions too.
I shall look forward to this. Are the travel companions also wildlife people or will you have to just make do?
Unfortunately they're not really wildlife people, but they don't mind joining for a couple of zoo visits, aquarium dives, or dolphin swims. Otherwise I'll be venturing alone a fair bit.
I'm having a bit of trouble getting replies to emails I send in English to zoological people in Thailand. Before reverting to internet translation which might destroy what I'm trying to say, does anyone have any tips? I'm also having a fair bit of trouble looking at cheap transport, particularly in Thailand and Vietnam. Is it really that expensive to get off the beaten track? Again, please get in touch if you think you might be able to help. Thanks!
I haven't been to Vietnam yet, but in Thailand there is always something going somewhere, so cheap transport isn't usually a problem. In general, you can get anywhere with a combination of local bus, songthaew (basically a truck taxi), and motorbike taxi. (I prefer not to use motorbike taxis but often there's no option, and they are almost literally everywhere). There are tourist buses to the usual places as well; they aren't expensive but you are more likely to lose your stuff through theft than on local transport!
Thanks! Looking at some of my potential day trips I had worried that I'd need to arrange expensive private transport.
I guess it would depend where you are going. Some places you may need to, but in general you can organise anything on the spot. What places were you worried about?
Mostly day trips from Bangkok in case I get extra time. If I'm lucky, I'll get to do one long day trip. I was mainly looking at Nakhon Ratchasima Zoo or Khao Pratubchang Centre. I know there are buses to the centre of Nakhon Ratchasima but I will probably be travelling alone on these trips with (next to) no knowledge of the language. Other trips I was considering in Thailand (if there was time) were from Pattaya to Chanthaburi, Chiang Mai to the Thai Elephant Conservation Centre, and a selection of little trips around whichever archipelago my group decide to visit. In Vietnam, I'm aiming for a few daytrips in the South, and if I include the North in my individual plans (still dubious), then getting from Hanoi to Cuc Phuong NP cheaply without hassle, or to Ha Long Bay without a tour group. Once the itinerary is finalised I'll be able to give a better outline of the plan.
And it begins! Further plans still to be confirmed, but I arrived in Cairo this evening and I'm sitting in a hotel lobby. Tomorrow I start a busy work placement in Alexandria. I'm generally quite open-minded about the zoos I visit, but this trip I feel I may need to be even more so. I therefore planned to visit a theme park this evening which has a dolphinarium and a few animals. I was able to establish very little from the internet, but when I called I was told that there are no longer any dolphins. I might visit another Egyptian dolphinarium in the coming weeks.
Today I visited my first two Egyptian zoos of 2013: Omar Oasis and Cairo's fish park (a.k.a. aquarium grotto garden/gabaleya park/ cairo aquarium/ zamalek aquarium). A good day. Photos (hopefully) to come.
Thanks guys. I'm struggling to get decent internet + computer access at the moment so I'm wondering about the most efficient way to proceed. It seems most photos will have to wait for my return, but I'm thinking of posting brief summaries on this thread in the meantime. Open to suggestions. In other news, I visited Giza zoo this morning. Nice to see a few small improvements since my last visit, but nowhere near enough yet.
I usually just post text, and the photos wait till I'm back home unless there's something really cool I want to share. What you'll find in most of southeast Asia is that internet speed is mind-numbingly slow most of the time which, coupled with regular power failures (depending on where you are), means uploading more than a few photos is almost impossible. I remember one time in West Timor where it took me 20 minutes just to sign in to Zoochat and open my thread*. The most frustrating is when you spend an hour typing up a massive post, editing, etc, and then the power goes and you lose it all! *This is what I wrote then: "At the moment I'm in an internet cafe in Kupang where the fan doesn't work, it must be about forty degrees celsius, half the letters are worn off the keyboard, and the connection is so slow that its taken me twenty minutes just to log-in, go to the Asian forum, open this thread, then post this reply!! "
I've been struggling a bit in Egypt too, so I'm relying mostly on wifi and my phone. I came back from Cairo this morning via Master zoo. Because there's so little information on these places, I wrote brief accounts on my phone which I'll post here, and I'll post extended versions on the relevant threads when I get back to the UK.
Omar Oasis Omar oasis is a rest/service station on the southbound side of the Alexandria-Cairo desert road. Facilities include restaurants, a few shops, a petrol station, and a mini-zoo. The zoo has had a new entrance built, but since my last visit it has deteriorated overall. Former inhabitants included lions and monkeys, but now the highlights of the collection are probably a small group of ostriches and a herd of fallow deer. Other animals on display include doves, goats, ponies, horses and a lone flamingo. I was disappointed to see that some of the animals appeared to be in poor condition, but without relevant experience, I'm unable to assess them properly.
Fish park Cairo's fish park, or grotto garden, is known by many names and online information is scarce. Many Cairenes believe the garden to be closed and dilapidated but a large area has recently been refurbished. A nice garden in Cairo's Zamalek area, on an island in the middle of the Nile, it turned out to be a popular retreat for couples. A pond contains some Egyptian freshwater species, but the main collection of freshwater fish is housed in a series of tanks in a cave system within an artificial mountain. A number of taxidermied specimens including a sealion, guitarfish and Nile perch are on display throughout with some dioramas and wet specimens visible. A pair of young Nile crocodiles are on display, but there's little on show which can't easily be found in the pet trade. A very pleasant collection nonetheless, other highlights of which include a fascinating and large colony of active Egyptian fruit bats in the main cavern, and a well-labelled botanical collection.
