Chiang Mai

We've had a very active four days in Chiang mai! Nikki has just returned from a jungle bungy jump! She was very brave and jumped first time from the 50metre crane, (Unlike the guy who followed her who spent 15minutes at the top of the crane to come back down without jumping). She had a fantastic time and has now been able to tick it off her top things to do before she's 30.

We had a busy day yesterday. We set off at 8am to go on an elephant ride through the jungle, lots of rivers and mud! Nikki and i went on one unreliable elephant whilst Joel went on another. Of couse Nikki and I got on the unpredictable elephant who want to walk through trees and off cliffs. It was a bit scary! It wasn't the most fun experience and we were glad to get off the damn thing.

After lunch with the elephants we went on the most difficult jungle trek in the 35degree heat and mid day sun. We were a bit hot and sweaty to say the least. At the end there was a waterfall, thank goodness, which we were all glad to jump into. It did start to rain when we got there though, typical! But it was nice and refreshing. After our waterfall dip (no snakes this time) we had to do the horrible trek back over rivers and rocks and bamboo bridges...it was hard work!

Look at us looking all adventurous, ready for the rapids!

Later we went white water rafting which was so much fun and then we got to swim in the river (the dirtest river in Thailand!) before jumping on a bamboo raft to finish the day off in style.

We were absolutely shatterd when we got back and finished the night with a few games of pool and an aggressive game of air hockey which resulted in Joel and Nikki throwing the pucks around the bar whilst i ducked.

We are off to Cambodia now on a long 24 hour bus journey, oh the fun!

See you in Siem Reap xx

Back in Bangkok

We left Koh Samui on wednesday afternoon to make the 20hr journey to Bangkok, as laura is a lot better now. We met up with Joel who we met in Koh Pangan and he is going to travel with us for a while which should be a lot of fun ( i really dont think he realises what he is letting himself in for!).

He happened to be staying in villa cha cah which is where we stayed last time we came to bangkok, again we missed all the cny holiday crew! Yesterday we got a tuk tuk to a big shopping centre in Bangkok and ended up going to the cinema! We then had some street food on Khao San Rd and went out for one or ten changs!

We have both been to Bangkok twice before so we have only stayed here one night and will be heading to Chang Mai, to do some jungle trekking and buddhist talks from monks, later this afternoon!

xxx

Koh Tao - Hospital - Koh Samui

Hi everyone! Sorry I've been crap at keeping you updated.

We were in Koh Tao For three nights nights which is a beautiful island with crystal clear waters. This makes it very popular with divers and lots of backpackers that want to do diving courses. We decided not to do a course becasue of the money and the fact that you cannot drink the night before!! We met the people there who we met in Koh Pangan so we had fun chilling by thier pool and going out with them, having more buckets and watching more fire shows!

Unfortunately. Laura got ill while we were there. She went to the doctors and rested in a nice aircon room that we got. However, she had a kidney infection, did not get any better and realised that she was going to have to go to the hospital like the doctor suggested.

The hosapital was in Koh Samui so we had to get a two hour ferry over while laura was on a drip! Bless her, some of the look she got were funny! The hospital turned out to be really nice, better than the rooms we have been staying in! The nurses were really nice and I also played nurse Nikki for a while! She was able to leave last night and is feeling better. We are staying in Koh Samui for a couple more days so she can go back for a check up and rest before we move again. We are staying in a nice place again which is great!

Koh Samui is also nicer than we expected. We were not going to come here because we heard it was very touristy and not worth it. However, the beach is beautiful and the water is clearer than some of the other islands we have been on. There are many bars, shops and restaurants (even a boots!). It is quite busy too, though it is more people on holiday in couples than backpackers.

We will probably be heading to Bangkok on wednesday night so will update you then!

xxx

P.S we sorted out the problems we were having with getting pictures up so we will get some up asap (well laura will when she is better because its too much work for me to do!!) xx

Koh Pangan

Koh Pangan in one word...fun! The full moon party last night was great, thousands of people dancing away on the beach with their glow sticks, samsong buckets and mushrooms shakes.

We're staying a really nice resort just 15minutes from the main beach. We have our own pool right on the beach (we are really living the life of luxury now!) Its actually the cheapest place here because its a bit out of town but there are loads of backpackers staying there and theres a really great atmosphere. We've met three crazy irish girls and a Ben replacement who will hopefully be travelling the rest of thailand with us.

It's a non stop party here so we've completely overloaded on the Samsong buckets and barely slept in the pat few days, so it will be nice to have a bit of chill out time in Koh Tao on Wednesday.

xx

'The Beach' beach.

We woke up yesterday to torrential rain which meant the camping trip was definately off! As it was terrible weather we decided to have a walk around the town and found that one of the bars was showing 'The Beach' so, we thought we would watch it before we visited it. Ater sitting and watching the first 20minutes, we were just getting into it, when they turned it off and told us everyone to leave because the police were coming and it was illegal to show copied dvd's. Great! So, we decided to go to the viewpoint, the highest point on the island. It was a really difficult walk, up what seemed like ten thousand steps but it was worth it as the view was amazing.

Luckily, today was much better weather, it was dry and we even had a little bit of sun so, we booked ourselves on abot trip to some of the other beaches around Phi Phi. We started on monkey isalnd, which was actually pretty scary. As soon as they saw us coming on our little kayaks from the boat they all started running on to the beach. I stood at a distance taking photos because i know they can be aggressive little things. And of course, once the food ran out they started getting nasty and chasing everyone around the beach. We knew this would happen and were long gone in our kayak before any monkeys could catch us.

Next we went kayaking on gorgeous lagoon, the water was so clear that we could see all the fish. There were lots of lovely parrot fish which we have now decided are our favourite. Nikki went snorkelling and found some pretty angel fish too, i was a bit scared because there were lots and lots of huge fish, so i just chilled on the boat.

Finally, we went to Maya bay 'The Beach' beach. Of course, it couldnt be a simple process of swim or kayak or walk to the beach. Oh no, we had to swim through a choppy sea to the cave and crawl through a hole whilst holding on to a rope. 'Easy peasy', i hear you say. well, it would have been if the waves weren't huge, absolutely huge! (and many of you know this is my biggest fear) Nikki along with most of the boat decided to put on a life jacket. I thought that i would be okay because the guy on the boat said 'if you're a strong swimmer you'll be ok with no life jacket'. luckily, just before i jumped in, i decided it was a bit too choppy so ran back for a life jacket, while Nikki had already jumped in. Surprisingly, i was the last one off the boat and Nikki was long gone by then. it was impossible to swim in the sea and the waves were getting bigger and bigger. We were supposed to grab onto the rope so that we could pull ourselves to the cave, however, i got swept away by the huge waves along with another girl and we were unable to get away from the rocky area were all the waves were breaking on top of us. I could hear the guys from the boat shouting, 'you have to get to the rope, you have to get to the rope', which seemed like mission impossible i knew there was no way they were coming to help me because they would get stuck too. So, i had no choice but to swim as hard and fast under the waves as i could (another trick i learnt from JT). After getting knocked back a few more times by the massive waves and swallowing a gallon of sea water, i managed to reach one of the guys at the rope and grab his hand. I was so relieved to finally get to the rope and moved as fast as i could along it to get through the cave (which was pretty difficult as the waves were still strong and coming in fast). Finally, we all made it, all with cuts and grazes on our feet and legs.

The beach was amazing, turquiose sea and silky white sands, completely secluded by the huge green mountains. We spent an hour chilling there and thank god, went back via small boats so we didnt have to risk our lives again! Because that would not have been an option, i would definately have had to live on the beach!

Whilst on the beach Nikki noticed a lovely sign that read 'tsunami hazard area'. Pretty scary! I took a photo just for you, mum.

Despite the near death experience, we had a great afternoon and the trip was definately worth doing if you're in Phi Phi.

We have five days of full moon partying in Koh Pagnan ahead of us now. Wish us luck....

Koh Phi Phi

The weather was a lot drier the next day in Krabi so we got a ferry over to Koh Phi Phi. We were glad to find out that is was actaully a proper ferry and not a tiny speed boat as it was a little choppy!

The island is bigger than we expected and very busy so there are a lot of bars, shops and restaurants which we like! We are staying in the cheapest place which is a bit of a mission to get to. It is up in the hills with a lot of jungle around. There are millions of centipeads (Laura recently found out that they are poisonous and if you step on them, they can paralyse you - why were we never taught that in school or something?!) which makes the walk home pretty scary! It does have a green looking swimming pool though! The other bonus is that it is right by the tsunami evacuation point with a box of emergency supplies!

We have been to the beach a couple of times, which would be lovely if it wasn't full of rubbish. Im sure it was one of the mnost beautiful beaches in Asia until us tourists came and ruined it with our beer bottles and crisp packets. The weather is not great as it rains in the afternoon so we have found ourselves going out, drinking three sangsom buckets and staying in bed all day the next day until it is time to start drinking again! This is a lot of fun but after three nights of doing this, we have decided to have a night off and go on a trip tomorrow.

We are thinking of camping on maya bay (where the beach was filmed) for the night. You have time in the day to go kayaking and snorkelling then there is a bbq and party at night - with some more sangsom buckets of course!

xxxxxx

Thailand

We left the beautiful beaches of the Pehentian Islands yesterday, we had a wicked time there but had to leave before Nikki completely melted. We were supposed to go to Thailand a couple of days ago but some of the girls we were with on the island got message from the UK to say there was alot of trouble in Thailand. We did our research and sure enough there are riots, bombs and a British murder or two happening in Thailand. We were getting a bit stressed, especially as all international flights to all Thai airports had been cancelled. We were also very surprised that we hadn't heard anything from friends or family at home (both HK and england!) Anyway because of all the trouble we weren't able to cross the border into Thailand on the East side near the Pehentian Islands so we had to go west to avoid the chaos. So, we went back to Penang on the west side of Malaysia. We returned to the banana hostel in Georgetown were we stayed in February (but we missed the rest of the Georgetown crew!) We got up early this morning to head to Thailand. Unfortunately we had to stop off at Hat Yai, which is a bit of a war zone but we managed to miss all bombs and riots and get out alive.

We did, however, gain a stalker. We had an hour to wait in Hat Yei so went for a KFC (no this is not on the travel budget but we thought we desereved a treat seeing as we were in a warzone). They obviously don't get many white people n KFC in Hat Yei because as soon as we walked in everyone stared at us, the girls at the till ran into the kitchen to tell everyone to come and look at us...and they did. It was very wierd. We orded our food and sat down whilst being watched by all the staff as if we had just landed from Mars. A few minutes later one of the staff came over and asked me for my email adress and phone number for her friend. I nicely explained that seeing as i dont know her or her friend, i didnt want to give her my number or email address, (I think thats a good enough reason to not give my phone number out to a complete stranger in the middle of a warzone!). She continued to ask, i continued to say no. She then started to beg and bring over drinks for us. She then stood at the table at stared at me whilst we finished lunch. It was very bizzare, and a little uncomfortable to say the least. We were certainly glad to leave Hat Yei.

We arrived in Krabi a few hours ago. Its monsoon season here so you can imagine the rain! it makes last year's Sheffield floods look pathetic. So, we are staying in Krabi town tonight as there wasn't much point heading to the beach huts. Hopefully it will be a little drier tomorrow so we can go to Koh Pi Pi. We'll keep you updated on all travels and riots...

The Pehentian Islands

We left the freezing cold of the Cameron Highlands to heat ourselves in The Pehentian Islands. We arrived at Long Beach on Pehentian Kecil on Saturday evening after a long bus journey and a very scary speed boat ride. Luckily we met a girl on the boat who works at one of the dive shops on the beach so she was able to get us into one of the beach huts there so we didnt have to do the long and agonising hostel search. The beach here is very small with only about 10 bars/resturants here but it is the most beautiful beach that we have come across in Asia. All the bars are on the beach (so nobody wears shoes anywhere) and beyond the beach is just jungle!

After we'd arrived and sorted out the hostel we decided to go out for a beer, only to find that not one of the bars or resturants sold beer! We were very confused (and a little distressed) at this point.
But, in the distance we could see a man clutching an ice box and a cardbord sign that read "cold beer, 8RM", he was our saviour! We made our way over to the make shift bar which consisted of this guy's ice box on small table, two candles and the cardbord sign. Later on we managed to find another bar. When I say bar I mean beach mats and candles on the floor and a guy selling cans of Tiger beer and bottles of vodka. It soon got busy though and they made a bonfire and it there was a nice chilled out atmosphere.

Yesterday, we chilled on the beautiful beach in the morning then decided to have an active afternoon Kayaking. We have both done it before in Vietnam and we knew it would be fun and pretty easy...how wrong we were. It took us about 10minutes to get the kayak into the sea then a further 15minutes to get in goddamn thing whilst everything we owned got soaking wet! We set off aginst the waves (which seemed to get much bigger the second we got into the water). We stayed in the kayak for about 20 minutes, got just far away enough from the shore to take a photo with our soggy cameras then we made our way back to the beach, realising that kayaking was neither fun or easy! I think we'll stick to the sunbathing.

Today we went on a snorkelling trip around the islands. The water is so clear so we were able to see right to the bottom of the sea. There were 8 of us on the boat with a crazy driver, but it was a good group which made it fun. We saw lots of beautifully coloured fish and coral, two huge turtles and even saw a shark! We had lunch at a litte fishing village and then ended the day on a gorgeous beach called turtle bay. It was completely secluded with us being the only ones there. It was the most beautiful beach we've seen and probably will see in Asia.

Apart from the guy with the ice box and the bar with the bottles of vodka, we've been told that there is a party scene here on the island (somewhere on this tiny beach) so we are going in search tonight, with our bottle of vodka....

xx