A Home Free Global Life
We were warned Japan was crazy hot in June so we left a month earlier than originally planned and flew to our home town of Calgary, Canada where we spent the summer. The 15 hour time difference between Tokyo and Calgary was brutal to get over Read more
Tokyo is the capital city of Japan and one of the most populous cities in the world with a population of over 14 million residents. The greater Tokyo area is the most populous metropolitan area in the world with 40.8 million residents. Read more
Riding the bullet train in Japan was on our wish list of things to do. Using The Man in Seat 61 website we researched Japan trains and purchased our tickets one month in advance, the maximum allowed, on the Shinkansen high speed train from Hiroshima to Tokyo. Read more
Hiroshima was the first military target of a nuclear weapon in history and was arguably the most devastating historic event in modern history. Why did the USA drop an atomic bomb here and one in Nagasaki? Read more
After 36 years of Japanese colonial era rule, Korea was liberated on August 15, 1945 at the end of the second world war. However, no decision could be reached about who would control the country. The USA and the Soviet Union agreed to arbitrarily divide the country Read more
Ninh Binh, a mesmerizing area known locally as ‘Ha Long Bay on land’ thanks to its magical landscape with sheer limestone mountains rising from the rice paddies. In addition to its natural beauty, Ninh Binh also has a rich history dating back thousands of years. Read more
Rugged, craggy and jungle-clad Cat Ba is the largest of 367 islands in the Cat Ba Archipelago, and 25km from the UNESCO Heritage site of Ha Long Bay. The region is famous for its karst topography featuring thousands of towering limestone islands and islets, stunning caves and white sandy beaches. Read more
Sitting at an elevation of 1,600m or 5,200ft Sapa is situated in the NW region of Vietnam, close to the Chinese Border. It is surrounded by mountains that are part of the Hoang Lien Son range, with nearby Fansipan mountain being the highest peak in Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia). Read more