The Determined Traveller

No BS solo female travel

  • Travel
    • Asia
      • India
      • Laos
      • Malaysia
      • Sri Lanka
      • Thailand
      • Vietnam
    • Caribbean
      • Cuba
    • Europe
      • England
      • Italy
      • Poland
      • Ukraine
    • Middle East
      • Turkey
    • North America
      • USA
    • South America
      • Argentina
      • Chile
      • Uruguay
  • Food and drink
  • About Me
  • Need an editor or writer?
  • Privacy Policy
  • Travel
    • Asia
      • India
      • Laos
      • Malaysia
      • Sri Lanka
      • Thailand
      • Vietnam
    • Caribbean
      • Cuba
    • Europe
      • England
      • Italy
      • Poland
      • Ukraine
    • Middle East
      • Turkey
    • North America
      • USA
    • South America
      • Argentina
      • Chile
      • Uruguay
  • Food and drink
  • About Me
  • Need an editor or writer?
  • Privacy Policy

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  • Travelling around northern Laos on the ‘vomit bus’

    February 7, 2021 /

    When I was dithering about whether or not I should travel to Pai, a small hippyish town in northern Thailand favoured by Western backpackers, one of the marks in the ‘no’ column was the fact that the bus ride there was pretty hairy. So much so that there are plentiful reports of hapless tourists becoming extremely sick during the journey, thanks to being crammed into a minibus that’s speeding around multiple hairpin bends. When I did eventually make the journey to Pai, I was amused to see sick bags tied to the back of each seat of the bus. Fortunately, no-one needed to make use of them. However, the same…

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  • Lanna food: the flavours of northern Thailand

    January 19, 2021 /

    I thought I was already familiar with Thai food. You know, green curry, pad thai and all those kinds of delicious things. Then I actually travelled to Thailand and found that I was so wrong. Yes, there’s plenty of green curry and pad thai in Thailand. But there’s so much more. I spent the vast majority of my time in Thailand in the north of the country and it’s there that I discovered the joys of Lanna food. This is the regional cuisine of northern Thailand, named after the ancient Lan Na kingdom. It’s hearty food with bold, punchy flavours and is one reason why I’m pretty much always counting…

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    Monk chat and the pursuit of happiness in Chiang Mai

    April 26, 2018

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    November 13, 2017
  • 14 Ton That Dam Street: Ho Chi Minh City’s hidden cafes

    February 16, 2020 /

    I struggled to enjoy my time in Ho Chi Minh City. I found the combination of unrelenting humidity and traffic all a bit too much, plus I was in the grip of a depression which made everything that much harder. So I decided to take it easy and focus on things I enjoyed, rather than forcing myself to be a tourist. I had been looking for some (quite literally) cool cafes where I could escape the heat and throw myself into my work, so I was delighted when my Google research threw up a whole load of gorgeous-looking places. Then I noticed that they all had the same address –…

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    What to do in Sri Lanka: A two week itinerary

    October 28, 2019

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  • Why you need to visit Pondicherry

    January 15, 2020 /

    Delhi. Rajasthan. Kerala. Goa. It’s a safe assumption that pretty much all of these places are on the “must see” list of most visitors to India. And rightly so because they’re all incredible in their own unique ways. I’ve been to India twice, spending just over three weeks there on my most recent visit, and I’ve still only seen a fraction of what this vast and wonderful country has to offer. So I completely understand why first (and second) time visitors gravitate towards the big names, the places they’ve already heard of. But I want to tell you about another part of India that you might not have considered visiting…

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    Monk chat and the pursuit of happiness in Chiang Mai

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    Six unmissable bars in Kuala Lumpur

    November 13, 2017

    The Grand Hotel in Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka

    August 26, 2017
  • What to do in Sri Lanka: A two week itinerary

    October 28, 2019 /

    Let’s be real. Two weeks isn’t long enough to experience all of Sri Lanka. However, it’s certainly possible to cover a fair bit of ground in this amount of time. This itinerary means you’ll get to experience tea plantations, beaches and even a safari – making your two week trip feel like a lot longer. Isn’t that what we all want from our holidays? Days 1 – 3: Negombo Here’s a not very interesting fact: Colombo airport isn’t actually in Colombo. It’s in the town of Negombo, just to the north. It’s worth knowing this not very interesting fact because Negombo is actually a much better place to stay than…

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    Why you need to visit Pondicherry

    January 15, 2020

    Three historic bars in Ho Chi Minh City

    April 11, 2018

    Searching for wild elephants in Munnar

    November 19, 2017
  • W15 Escape: A Sri Lankan escape from the rat race

    May 14, 2018 /

      Sri Lanka was the first country I visited after I quit my job, my house and my life in London, and I’m sad to say that I probably didn’t do it justice. A two week dash through half of the country while trying to get my head around what the hell I had done was not exactly conducive to a fun time. But when we arrived on Sri Lanka’s sleepy, surfy south coast and checked into the gorgeous W15 Escape for a few days, I finally felt like things might just be ok. As a backpacker, you don’t often get to stay in luxurious hotels. Of course, there’s the…

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    Primates and pirates in Borneo

    July 17, 2019

    What to do in Sri Lanka: A two week itinerary

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  • Three historic bars in Ho Chi Minh City

    April 11, 2018 /

      I really didn’t love Ho Chi Minh City. It was my first experience of Vietnam, a country I’d heard was a slow burner, so maybe I should have started somewhere that was less of a brick to the face. But I was sucked in by my romantic ideas of Saigon…a town full of history with a seedy, decadent underbelly. The reality was the polar opposite. Obviously things have moved on and the name change isn’t all that’s different about Saigon these days. Ho Chi Minh City is a sweaty, traffic-choked, ostensibly unwelcoming, modern metropolis. It’s deeply pedestrian-unfriendly which, for someone who likes to walk, was often frustrating to the…

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    The Grand Hotel in Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka

    August 26, 2017

    Searching for wild elephants in Munnar

    November 19, 2017

    Why you need to visit Pondicherry

    January 15, 2020

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Recent Posts

  • Chiloe: witchcraft, mermaids and saltwater
  • Travelling around northern Laos on the ‘vomit bus’
  • Lanna food: the flavours of northern Thailand
  • Steak, sunsets and the magic of Montevideo
  • 14 Ton That Dam Street: Ho Chi Minh City’s hidden cafes
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