While travelling across Indonesia’s Banda Sea on a liveaboard earlier this year, we stopped off at the Banda Islands, a tiny speck on the map that once was one of the most bitterly fought over pieces of land anywhere in the world. The reason was that the Banda Islands were the only known source of the spice nutmeg, which was believed (wrongly) to be a cure for the plague. At one point nutmeg was worth more than gold pound for pound. The Dutch and the British committed terrible atrocities trying to gain dominance over the islands, and eventually they agreed on an exchange: the British would hand over control of the Banda Islands to the Dutch, who in turn would give the British an insignificant island in the new colonies called… Manhattan.

Above is my Banda Island breakfast, freshly picked from the trees and prepared right in front of us – Fried Banana, Cinnamon Tea, Nutmeg Jam and Taro – absolutely delicious.

You can read more about what else we saw on the Banda Islands on my dive blog Divehappy.com as well as more stories from the same trip about diving across the Banda Sea – it’s one of the most amazing trips I’ve ever done, and certainly up there as one of the very best places to dive in the world.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Breakfast In The Banda Islands

A year ago I wrote about the arrival of tiny and cheap eeePC laptops pioneered by Asus. These laptops were the first wave of netbooks, inexpensive computers that were perfect for people on the move – and also for backpackers and travellers who wanted a notebook with them but without the potential heartbreak of losing or breaking an expensive laptop. (See my Seven Tips For Taking A Laptop Travelling for some other tips on travelling with a laptop).

Netbooks have evolved rapidly since the eeePc first came out, and recently I finally bought one myself because I found a particular model that fits all my requirements. It’s the Samsung N110. I’ve been using it extensively for a couple of months now and I have to say it’s an excellent machine – here’s why:

Samsung N110

Small and lightweight – the Samsung is exactly half the size and nearly half the weight of my previous travel laptop, a low budget Toshiba model that was released in Thailand four years ago. This is a real godsend as it’s made my carry on luggage less weighty and bulky 0 and the Samsung is small enough to comfortably fit on an airline seat tray as well.

Cheap – the Samsung is currently $319 on Amazon.com – that is staggeringly cheap for what you get

Full sized keyboard – despite its small form factor, the Samsung N110 has a full-sized keyboard. This was probably the most important thing to me – as I can touch type, I need a keyboard that my fingers can fit on without feeling scrunched and where the keys are located in their traditional places, not shunted around to fit in the available space. As I have chunky manfingers, the keyboard will probably have enough space for everyone else too. The best thing to do is go to a store and physically try different keyboards, (Open Notepad and type a few sentences to see how it feels). It was the keyboard that in the end made me choose this model over the latest Asus eeePC range (insert model names) and several other Samsung models that have different styles of keyboard.

Long lasting battery – the Samsung N110’s battery lasts up to 8 hours – and that’s not a spurious manufacturer’s claim. Besides the keyboard, this was the other important thing for me – it’s increasingly easy to find wifi these days, but finding an electrical socket to power your laptop can be a pain – much more convenient to be able to start up the laptop and use it without concern the battery will run out after a couple of hours.

Good sized screen – the 10 inch screen is fine for writing documents and answering emails, and is adequate for downloading and organising photos. I wouldn’t do any heavy photo editing on the Samsung – that can wait til I get back from a trip. The screen brightness can be easily adjusted too and it gives a crisp, sharp image.

Big hard drive – the Samsung N110 has 160 gb hard drive – which is more than enough for storing all photos shot during a trip plus movies, music and documents.

Easy mobile internet connectivity – the Samsung N110 comes with Bluetooth which is easy to enable – with Nokia PC Suite software installed, I’ve found it’s easy to connect my Nokia E51 and laptop to each other using Bluetooth and from there be able to go online on my laptop using the Nokia E51 as my modem. This gives me internet access anywhere. For more info on mobile internet access in Thailand, please see my previous article which gives step by step instructions on how to connect your phone to your notebook using a Thai SIM card.

Speedy processor and memory – The specs for the Samsung N110’s processor and memory are an Intel chip and 1024 megs of memory, which makes it quite zippy even with taxing graphics programs like Adobe Lightroom. It’s wise to only have a couple of applications open at a time to avoid slowing the machine to a crawl.

WindowsXP – with Windows 7 just out, this is possibly not quite so important, but I much prefer having Windows XP rather than Windows Vista installed on my netbook. It takes up less space and memory and is tried and trusted enough to just work.

It’s worth noting that most netbooks – the Samsung included – don’t come with a DVD or CD drive built in, so if you want to install stuff from CD or DVD you’ll need to buy a separate drive to plug into the netbook. The Samsung does come with 3 USB ports, microphone, speaker and monitor outputs, so the lack of a drive is the only real drawback.

In short, I’m very pleased with the Samsung N110 – I’ve found it a pleasure to use and very convenient. It’s definitely helped my productivity, as its small, lightweight size means I carry it virtually everywhere and with its fast bootup time and long battery life, I can use it pretty much everywhere too. Netbooks have definitely come of age and if you do a lot of travelling and need computer access, the Samsung N110 is certainly worth considering.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Samsung N110 Netbook Review: The Ultimate Laptop To Take Travelling – Part 2

Over on my other blog Divehappy.com I’ve just posted a trip report about diving in the Maldives on the MV Orion, a new and very posh liveaboard boat that’s just begun operations. We did a seven day trip around northern Male and Ari atolls, as well as heading to Hani Faru, which is the home of some of the most incredible whale shark and manta ray plankton feeding – watch the Nat Geo video to see what I mean. We also got a rare encounter with hammerhead sharks too – see the video clip from my friends SJ and Roald on the Orion trip report along with some vids and photos from me of manta rays and Maldives’ amazing fish life

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Hanging Out With Hammerheads

One shop I missed off my list was Orchid Books, which is located in the Silom Complex on Silom Road – it is the home for Orchid Press and has a fantastic array of Asian-related books. They stock not only their own Orchid Press titles, but numerous other local publications too, as well as a wide selection of international titles.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Bangkok’s Best Bookshop Gets Bigger

Australian carrier Jetstar are also increasing their flights to Thailand. Their Sydney to Phuket flight route will have more planes during the Thailand high season on January and February 2010. Jetstar are also launching flights on their Singapore to Phuket route and adding extra flights to their Australia to Bali route. Check Skyscanner for Jetstar prices.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Phuket to Hong Kong Budget Flights With AirAsia

IMPACT is a celebration of the significant developments in Cambodian mine action since mine clearance activities began in the early 1990s. Ten Cambodian artists were engaged to create artworks portraying these issues after visiting two of Cambodia’s most mine-affected provinces, Battambang and Banteay Meanchey. Four young landmine survivors also collaborated to create a work of art representing both their past experiences and their hopes for the future.

Art works consist of sculptures made out of free-from-explosives landmines, paintings, and installations. The exhibit will be open to the public from 1 October to 10 October (8 am to 6 pm, closed Sundays) before traveling to Cartagena, Colombia, to be shown at the Second Review Conference of the Anti-
Personnel Mine Ban Treaty.

IMPACT is at Bophana Audiovisual Resource Center, 64 street 200, Okhna Mén, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Landmine Art Exhibition In Phnom Penh

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Bangkok to Taipei Budget Flights With AirAsia

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Travel Thailand For Free

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Travel Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia For Free

Up until a couple of years ago, the temple of Beng Mealea was hard to visit – it lay down a rutted dirt road sixty bonejolting kilometres from the main Angkor temple complex where the likes of Angkor Wat, The Bayon and Ta Phrom are located (See my Angkor Wat: A Brief Guide for more info on the main Angkor temples). Recently, however, a properly constructed road has been completed and now Beng Mealea is a fairly easy half hour drive from Siem Reap, the town nearest to the Angkor temples.

Beng Mealea Temple

Beng Mealea is special because it’s one of the Angkor temples that’s been left to be reclaimed by nature, unlike most of the other temples which were restored by the French in the 1800s after centuries of neglect. Beng Mealea is also impressive despite lying in ruins due to its sheer size – from the 1860 drawing by Louis Delaporte (see below) you can see that it was built in a similar style and size to Angkor Wat itself, which remains to this day the largest religious monument on the planet.

Beng Mealea Temple, as imagined by Louis Delaporte in 1860

There’s something very picturesque about walking through the ruins, similar to Ta Phrom in the main Angkor complex, although Beng Mealea is far bigger and has several levels giving different vantage points down into the temple’s heart. Whereas Ta Phrom has its foliage regularly pruned to keep it being completed taken back by the jungle, Beng Mealea is the real thing. Local guides can take you scrambling through the complex to show you the most interesting parts of the fallen masonry and sculpture, many bits of which are hidden away from view. If you want a sense of what it was like for the first French explorers when they discovered Angkor, this would be the nearest you’ll get to it.

Beng Mealea Temple

Like Kbal Spean, Beng Mealea is considered one of the minor attractions of Angkor and yet for me it’s one of my favourites – partly because there’s few other people visiting (if you get there early) – and partly because the journey out through the Cambodian countryside is a great leadup to arriving at the temple.

Beng Mealea Temple

If you’re interested in finding out more about Beng Mealea, there’s an excellent and exhaustive account of a visit to Beng Mealea in 2004, when it was still off the beaten track by Willard Van De Bogart on his own website. Bogart took lots of great photos and has clearly researched Beng Mealea’s history thoroughly.

Beng Mealea Temple

Over the last five years, Angkor Wat has become incredibly popular – it’s very easy to get to Angkor Wat from Bangkok and there is a huge range of hotels to stay at in Siem Reap to suit all budgets. My favourite is the Foreign Correspondent’s Club or FCC Angkor.

Cambodia is also relatively cheap for travellers, as you can work out from How Much Money Do I Need For Cambodia. If you’re looking for a quick, pictorial guide to the Angkor temples, I recommend Angkor: Heart Of An Asian Empire or watching the Angkor Wat documentary on YouTube.

This article was originally posted at: Travel Happy Get Backpacker Travel Insurance from World Nomads, as recommended by Lonely Planet

Beng Mealea – The Lost Temple Of Angkor