28th September - 6th October (The tropical storm)

There were a few people going to the same hotel as us as we got off the train in Hue; the older aussie couple who i'd met Monday and a young NZ couple, Oscar and Fleur. Daz and I arranged to share a car and driver to go to Vinh Moc tunnels, it cost us 10 dollars each and it was great to explore the tunnels in such a small group at our own pace instaed of being with a bus load of people in these confined spaces. Vinh Moc's tunnels are not as famous or extensive as those at Cu Chi near Ho Chi Minh city (HCMC) and they have more headroom despite not having been altered much to suit tourists (unlike Cu Chi). Some say Vinh Moc tunnels are better although having seen pictures from Cu Chi i wish i had gone there as well. In both cases, people lived for sometimes months and years underground, babies were born and raised here and resistance launched from here - it's pretty amazing to see.

On the way back, our car was stopped by police and we thought we might get a taste of police corruption and have to hand over money, we had no idea what was going on as they took our driver away for a few minutes, it turned out to be a speeding ticket.


The next morning we shared a car with the NZ couple again to visit three temples - the weather switching between baking sun, overcast, and pouring rain. We took the tourist bus to Hoi An and checked in to the hotel 'Hai au' that Declan had recommended. The Aussie and NZ couples were there as well. It was a little out of the town but the room and staff were nice. 13 dollars per room. Hoi an is famous for it's cheap tailored suits which Daz was keen to arrange, I don't wear suits as often as Daz and hadn't planned to get one but they were really cheap and looked great so I decided to replace my 'Suits You' suit that i have been wearing to all smart gatherings for the past ten years with my own tailored suit costing 45 dollars which Daz was good enough to take back to dear old blighty for me. Daz got 2 suits, one the same material as mine and we looked well smart. I hope i don't lose or gain too much weight before i go home or I'll end up looking like a sack of spuds for baby Casey's christening! During our time in Hoi an we checked out all the happening bars and restaurants and played a bit of pool. Silver tongued Daz soon got friendly with an American girl called Jess.

In the pouring rain, Daz and I took a bus to My Son, the site of ancient Cham relics from 8th to 13th centuries, temples living areas etc almost totally destroyed by US bombs which pissed me off a bit as it is something of a recurring theme! With news of a bad storm approaching, Daz and I had a nice steak and chips for lunch as there were rumours that everything would be closed later. Daz, Jess and I managed to find a bar with a generator and we stayed there until late. As we left the storm was picking up but the moped riders were still there to take us to our hotel.

The storm hit big time at about 02.00, the window shutters were banging in the wind and a little water was coming in under the balcony door. We fastened the shutters and got our bags off of the floor and with earplugs in I went back to sleep. We awoke at 08.00 with the bedroom flooded, the hotel was full of water, there was a big hole in the roof and a river running down the stair wells - there was no electric or phones. I helped the staff mop water for a while (I have a lot of training for this!) but it was pretty futile. Lots of people helped and the friendly staff were constantly smiling and helpful. I spoke to a girl who was desperate to get to her family home near the beach and was worried about her family - she later told me they were fine but there home was ruined. The hotel gave us noodles and by 11.00 it had died down enough for us to go and inspect the damage - lots of damaged roofs,

trees down and flooding but it was good to see how quickly the Vietnamese people went about sorting everything out and opening their shops again, most without electric. In the evening the hotel provided us with more free food, we went out for drinks at an excellent bar with good music and taught Daz and Jess 'shithead' which I ruled at, i also beat Daz at table footy which left him demoralised and wondering why i am so good at everything! The hotel was locked when we got back so I shouted up to Oscar's room and he came and let us in which was a relief as the streets were pretty wet!

Not surprisingly, our flight to Nha Trang was cancelled and there were no buses - we were forced to stay in Hoi An a while longer and revise Darrens carefully laid plans, booking flights to HCMC for 58 dollars each, but Hoi An is a nice place to be stranded and the sun came out for a bike ride to the beach. The sea was pretty rough and deposited loiads of storm debris on the beach in the afternoon which the locals went about sorting through and clearing up. In the evening the streets were noisier than before and all the restaurants were busy. Kids everywhere were doing the dragon dance to the sound of a loud beating drum.

At the airport check-in, the electricity generator failed and i expected massive delays to result but all was ok. We arrived in HCMC in pouring rain and flooding. The next morning Daz, Jess and I took a bus to Mui Ne beach where it was hot and sunny, we found a nice place by the sea (Hiep Hoa resort), went for a nice lunch (tuna steak), put on sun cream, poured with rain so sorted out my emails and banking. We all went for happy hour cocktails and played some doubles pool.

The next day the weather kept changing, we did boogie boarding, ate lunch by the sea (barracuda in spicy coconut sauce) and Daz tried to teach Jess and I the basics of surfing - it was hard work but we both managed to stand up on the board and i enjoyed it enough to want to try again in Oz. In the evening we went to a fantastic restaurant where i had BBQ seabass for 5 dollars. We went for happy hour cocktails and played pool doubles against some annoying drunk lads, one annoyed Daz by standing over the pocket he was aiming for so I finished off with a well cocky 'colour of money' shot staring straight at the lad - he wasn't amused.

I decided to stay a bit longer in Mui Ne, Daz and Jess were due to leave on an 09.00 bus for HCMC which was cancelled due to a breakdown. They ended up getting a 55 dollar taxi to make sure Daz could get his 14.00 flight. As soon as they left the sun came out and i had a sweltering day on the beach. Sampled some street food, stamed dough balls with a minced pork and egg filling, not bad.

20th - 27th September - (Mui Ne beach - Vietnam)

In Dien Bien Phu my money situation was starting to look a little low, with this in mind i managed to convince the hotel to change my 10 pound note into Dong for a les than favourable rate (they will only be able to change it in Hanoi). The bus driver from Dien Bien Phu to Sonla tried to charge me an extra 20,000d on top of my 55,000d ticket for my large rucksack - although this is about 70p, my funds are low and i have a suspicion that this is just a trumped up tourist charge so i stand my ground - the drivers assistant also tries but they give up when i go to get off saying i will ask at the ticket office - a small victory which i started regretting later when my bladder had got to the point where i had to ask them to stop the bus (usually they have stops every couple of hours). By this point i had made several local friends at the back of the bus as they all were fascinated by my mp3 player, i passed it around for them to hear Morrissey which they all seemed to enjoy. With these guys on my side the bus soon stopped much to my relief.

I arrived in Sonla in the early evening, checked in to a nice hotel and went out for some bia hoi (draught) at 2000d each i was soon a little tipsy, there were no food menus and my vietnamese efforts weren't working so i went hungry.

The next day was spent doing a lot of walking, using my nearly invisible photocopied lonely planet map to find an old french prison, virtually destroyed by wars, a war memorial garden and a very hot steep midday climb to a lookout tower.
Buildings here are usually 2-4 stories, very narrow and deep, usually with only the front painted - apparently there is some sort of tax based on house width. I went into the goat restaurant but with no English menu, decided not to risk it so ended up in a shabby cafe (also with no menu) drinking bottled beer (they didn't even have beer hoi!) and eating cold cuts of beef with rice. I was surrounded by friendly blokes who kept speaking to me in Vietnamese, undeterred by the fact i couldn't answer them, i didn't even have the lonely planet with me for some basic phrases!

My hotel didn't know the bus times so i decided to get to the station and wait. As my motorbike taxi got to the station the Hanoi bus was leaving so the timing was perfect. The bus was decent enough but the large briefcase under my feet made things a bit cramped. The bloke next to me spoke a little English, he also fell asleep and headbutted my shoulder on every bump and dribbled on me! I haggled a motorboke taxi from 40,000d to 30,000d to get from Hanoi bus station to the old quarter, the ride was scary and with nothing smaller i handed him 100,000d, he gave me some change and rode off quickly as i counted the bundle of notes, so i actually ended up paying 60,000 (great haggle!) I booked a decent 10 dollar room for the night, went out for bia hoi and some great food. I found my way to a bar with a pool table with the biggest roll i have ever seen where i lost a Baileys to the girl running the bar. I like the old quarter but it's a bit manic - the pavements are full of parked mopeds so there is nowhere to walk but the road where there are cars, mopeds, bicycles and people whizzing about - not good after a couple of drinks!


My mate Darren arrived on the 23rd so i moved across to the 45 dollar room he had booked on the internet (such decadence!) I spent some time watching premiership build up until Daz arrived at 15.00. The evening was spent with food and beers and watching Liverpool beat Spurs 3-0. I taught Daz a pool lesson and he pulled a New Zealand girl on his first night in town!

Here is a video of the Vietnamese electricity board...



Daz, jet lagged, slept until midday, then we went out to the Ho Chi Minh museum and the army museum. We spent some time admiring Hanoi women, who must be the fittest women in the world. Food drink and another pool lesson for Daz, a 03.30 finish and a 07.00 alarm for our bus trip to Halong bay. In the afternoon i phoned Carly who was making Sunday roast for the family - i could almost taste it!

On the bus to Halong city, Daz slept while i spoke to an aussie couple who ended up getting on to a different boat, but we saw them again several times over the next 2 weeks. On the boat we made friends with Declan and Edel from Dublin, about 27 years old, and we got on really well - there were only about 15 people on our big boat which had surprisingly spacious bedrooms with toilet and shower. Daz and i were next to the engine room which ran all night to provide electricity, my earplugs did the trick but Daz didn't sleep too well.
The weather was overcast and rainy but the views of the 1,969 limestone islands that surrounded us was impressive. We visited a massive cave with a ceiling worn smooth by water and large stalagmites/tites. The food on the boat was pretty good and as the weather prevented us from trekking or kayaking on the first day, Edel and i sampled some Vietnamese red wine which turned out to be good enough for a second bottle. Daz and Dec went for the beer.

The following day was again overcast with rain storms but we managed a little trekking as well as some kayaking and swimming while the sun was shining. Surprisingly, the 59 dollar tour 2 night tour included a very nice 3 star hotel on Cat ba island where Daz and I went for a 7 dollar massage with no happy ending which was a shame as the girl was cute! The massage was quite relaxing, followed by good food then we met with Dec and Edel for beer and wine and another excellent night.

The trip back to Hanoi seemed long. Our 19.00 train to Hue was now at 23.00 so we killed time by researching and booking a flight from Danang to Nha tran for Sunday for 48 dollars each - this flight was destined not to happen and we lost 12 dollars on the booking fee. Another pool lesson for Daz!

12th - 19th September (Dien Bien Phu - internet cafe undergoing noisy renovations!)

My early impressions of Vietnam are not great; I am dissapointed by the route from Mai Chau, the settlements we pass through are of scruffy concrete buildings instead of the beautiful bamboo hut villages i have been used to in Laos, there is rubbish strewn everywhere and the vehicles kick up dust from the roads. My first impressions of Hanoi are worse;
i get off the bus to a throng of motorbike taxi riders shouting, waving and pulling at my arm - at this point i don't know where in the city i am (as there are a few bus stations) or where i am going (my first priority is to find an ATM). I speak to a bus station official who points me towards the nearest bank, he says 1km so i start walking with my big rucksack on my back. I walk for at least 1km in the city heat with hassle from moto taxis every few seconds, and find a bank, they tell me i need Vietcom bank, 1 more km. After about a km i find another bank, they also tell me i need Vietcom bank, another km. Eventually i get there and to my relief get some money and by this time i know where i am on the map, and am resolute not to take a mototaxi, i have a lot of time to kill as i intend taking the night train out of here so i walk the remaining 4km to the train station hot and exhausted with an occaisional stop for food and cold beer. I arrive at the train station with three hours to spare sitting on a plastic seat reading whilst very loud Vietnamese tv blares out 'who wants to be a millionaire' among other things. The train is six to a cabin and the bunks are narrow and hard, i don't sleep too well.

The train arrives in LaoCai and a minibus takes us on to Sapa and drops us at the summit hotel, a little way up the hill from the main part of Sapa, the rooms are very nice and the view is terrific. 8 dollars. I explore the area, enquire about a trek up nearby Fansipan mountain but nowhere seems to be running this as a group trek, so book a less strenuous 3 day hill trek for 45 dollars and then walk up some nearby hills for good views of the town, mountains and valleys.
It's a lovely hot day but a nice cool breeze in the hills.

Sapa also has an abundance of mototaxis but they are not too pushy.

The trek group are made up of a Spanish couple, an aussie guy and an English guy - they are a decent bunch. Our trek guide is a 19 year old Hmong girl in traditional costume called Sisi, she speaks a strange cockney/aussie english and is very funny. There are several other small groups with young Hmong girls leading them. We do a fair bit of walking, beat some rice out of it's stalks, swim in the beautiful, freezing cold river and then stay with a Hmong family who speak no English but communicate via the medium of raising a shot of rice wine, i get through about 15 shots,
the old man of the family is drunk and can't stop laughing. Sisi cooked up some great food and we played cards into the night.

Suprisingly there was not too much of a hangover although the stomach felt a bit iffy. The rest of the group had only booked a two day trek and left about 2 o'clock in a jeep, leaving Sisi and I to trek some more and stay at another home where we ate and drank but a much quieter affair than the previous evening.

The final day started gently enough with a beautiful ice cold swim, but after that a two hour walk straight up hill in the sun. We ate noodles for lunch then had 17km mototaxis back to Sapa. I got a new hotel room in the centre and showered before phoning mum to wish her a happy birthday. In the evening Sisi took me to a dingy cheap restaurant where the locals eat, there are no menus, just a glass cabinet where the uncooked meat and fish sits looking a bit ropey. We had some fish, chicken and beans with rice and it tasted better than it looked. We watched some rather odd, unenthusiastic traditional dancing and music playing.

The following day was a Sunday so Sisi was off work, we hired a manual motorbike which took some getting used to. With Sisi on the back we went to Lao Cai where i hoped to get some money out of the ATM, apparently not for foreign cards on a Sunday! We looked around some shops and ate noodle soup with some horrible fatty, boney pork in another dingy locals restaurant. Back to Sapa for warm clothes and waterproof jacket before a ride to the waterfall - very cold and foggy, my toes were freezing as i was wearing sandals. In the evening i treated Sisi to pizza and pasta in an expensive restaurant, she had never tried either and loved the penne bolognese, at these prices i doubt she'll ever eat it again. Sisi is really sweet and i think she has a bit of a crush on me (well, she's only human!) I leave tomorrow.

According to Lonely planet, the public bus to Lai Chau takes 7 hours, in less than 3 hours the bus drops me off at a place called Lai Chau, strange! I ask a mototaxi rider for Lan Anh hotel (in the lonely planet), he double checks my request like this is strange then we ride for 40 minutes out of Lai Chau while i get more confused. The scenery on this stretch is breathtaking. Eventually we get to a Lan Anh hotel where i meet 4 aussies about to leave in a jeep with their driver and guide so i tell them about my confusion. Apparently this is the new Lai Chau, the old one (90km away) in the book is slowly being deserted as it will be flooded by the new dam. There is not much there and not much here either so i take them up on their offer of a ride to Dien Bien Phu as it is further south towards Hanoi but also west towards the Laos border. The ride in the boot is a little cramped and i don't see much of the pleasant scenery.
We stop at a village where the kids huddle around the cameras and giggle at the resulting pictures.
I've noticed that some of the kids are fascinated by my hairy legs and arms as men here are pretty hairless. The 10 dollar hotel room in Dien Bien Phu is very nice, i eat with the friendly aussies, 2 couples about 50 years old (you're never too old to travel!), they give me their details and say i am welcome to visit them in Oz.

In the morning the aussies leave for their guided jeep tour. I walk around until i find the war museum, cemetry and A1 hill where the decisive battle that sent the french packing took place. I'm not really that interested which is why i hadn't intended coming here but ther isn't much else to do.

After 3 months of travelling i have spent about 1900 pounds, 20.90 pounds per day, which with all the travel, diving, climbing and trekking i don't think is too bad.

10th - 12th September (Sapa)

The border crossing i decided on is fairly new to tourists and there is not much about it in the lonely planet, but i didn't want to head south when my destination is north so i risk it. I get to the border ok where i meet a couple going the other way and exchange my leftover kip for their dong (yes, dong, stop giggling Phil), they told me, as did the Americans that buses don't run from here to anywhere in Vietnam, they say i will have to hitch or get a motorbike taxi.

The immigration is fun; a row of 4 huts, i go to each one in turn, having passport, and visa inspected and stamped several times, filling out a form, going to another office to have it checked and stamped, back to another to check my baggage (not very thoroughly) and finally walk 200m to the Vietnam side where they check my passport and visa again. The official told me that the motorbike taxi is expensive and i should bus 100km east to Thanh Hoa, 200km north to Hanoi, and 100km west to Mai Chau (my intended destination), i am wishing that i'd taken the bus through the crossing to the south straight to Hanoi for 25 dollars which at the time seemed expensive. I haggled a guy down from 40 dollars to 30 for a 140km numb bum 100cc motorbike ride to Mai Chau. It took about four and a half hours. The villages are more concrete eyesores than the quaint little huts of Laos but all the kids shout 'hello' when they see the white bloke on the back of a bike, the young ladies seem excited to see me as well but that is nothing new! I arrive at Lac village in Mai Chau where the staff are friendly and one speaks reasonable English which is always handy. It's a small village of stilt houses with a few tourist guest houses surrounded by paddy fields and mountains with only tvs and motorbikes to detract from the isolation.
I watch some kids having great fun with a cardboard box, i come back an hour later and they are still loving it - who needs playstation? My motorbike taxi adventure has left me with only 45 dollars and i am worried that it will not be enough to take me on my planned route with three stops before i next get to an ATM in Sapa, especially as i want to do treks and see the sights of the places i stop in otherwise what's the point?

Hoa, the woman who runs the guest house telephones her sister and then assures me there are now ATMs in Hoa Binh which i could get to on a motorbike taxi for a 14 dollar, 140km round trip, i'm not too sure but she convinces me.

There is no ATM in Hoa Binh and the banks will only exchange dollars and euros, my plastic, baht and pounds are useless. A waste of time and money and now i have no choice but to take the bus to Hanoi and abandon my route. I fancied drinking but now every dong counts. In the morning i leave for Hanoi having not seen much of what Mai Chau has to offer.

6th - 9th September (from internet cafe in Sapa, Vietnam)

There is only one ATM in Laos, that is in Vientiene. On the morning i leave i take out the maximum amount of kip, approximately 70 dollars. Even if i got more i doubt i would be able to change any leftover kip as it's a currency that nobody really wants. I have about 50 US dollars, some thai baht and some uk pounds that i hope will be of use in Vietnam until i next get to an ATM.

The public bus to Phonsavan is fairly empty and no tourists, the next few places i stop at are not on as popular a tourist route as the previous ones. The journey is hilly and windy with beautiful green scenery, the villages are more frequent htan before but there are not so many satellite dishes but i did see some kids riding pretty decent mountain bikes. My 3 dollar room in Phonsavan smels of damp, there is no ventilation. The town is seriously quiet in the evening - there is nothing going on.

Phonsovan is not so quiet in the morning, my guesthouse is on the main road and the traffic gets going about 0500. I go on a tour with a Japanese couple to the plain of jars. There are several sites around this province with a total of over 5000 large stone jars scattered about the hills.
We go to the largest single site with about 340 jars, the reasons for them are uncertain but it is possible that the dead were placed in the jar so that the soul could rise up to heaven, the body would later be removed and cremated. I prefer the story that they are whiskey vessels for the gods!
Much more entertaining was our afternoon visit to Hmong villages where some of the kids looked like they had never seen a camera before, i took some great pictures of the kids and also my favourite one of an old woman.
We saw temples and stupas bombed by the U.S. Saw how rice is produced, how swallows are caught and fermented to be sold as a delicacy and some silk worms for silk production.

With no brekky, a real bone shaker of a public bus with uncomfortable bench seats to Sam Neua. The engine sounded awful, it drowned out my music and the driver kept stopping to repair something. The whole bus rattled and creaked. We were held up for 30 minutes by a broken down lorry in the middle of the road. The highlight of the journey was trying to communicate with Monica, a cute 20 year old Laos villager, her English was only a little better than my Laos. Again i was the only tourist on the bus. All the cows and buffalos live on the roads and grass verges and they look pretty healthy - i kept expecting a 'me, myself and Irene' moment!

I found a nice 5 dollar room from the lonely planet and spoke to four friendly Americans in a restaurant, they were going the opposite way to me so we exchanged information. 2 canadian lads showed up going the same way as me. We all drank beer and some shots of the rice wine that makes you blind!

While in Sam Neua, i got a bus to Vang Xai caves where i had a personal (as nobody else was there) guided tour of 3 caves converted into living accomodation / strategic headquarters where some of the top brass hid from the Americans during the Indochina war (Vietnam war as the Americans call it). The guide spoke little English and i would have been interested to hear more about the caves but it did only cost 3 dollars. Met the canadians back at the restaurant where we all had a great steak and chips for 25,000kip, bargain. Over several beers, i taught them shithead and they taught me a good game called Yanif.

1st - 5th September

In the morning i walked up Phou si hill to get a good view of Luang Prabang, it's bigger than i had realised and the view was clear, on the route down the other side there were several buddahs and a monk who i chatted to - he let me take his picture.
I wondered why there are no buildings here on the banks of the Mekong unlike in other parts such as Pak Beng. I checked my emails and found my mate Darren had booked his flight to Hanoi for the 23rd September for a 2 week holiday so now i am spending a lot of time thinking about how best to spend the next three weeks and arrive in Hanoi. However i do it i'll either spend a fortune on flights or a long time on the bus. An Aussie bloke told me there was a public bus that takes 26 hours from Vientiane to Hanoi which would most likely be pretty cramped. I'll see if i can make a number of smaller journeys but that may mean stopping off in some pretty remote places.

At 12.30 i got on the public bus to Viang Viene, a halfway point to Vientiane. The aile is knee high with big bags of sugar and there is no air conditioning, but everyone has a double seat (my luggage takes up one seat) and the wide open windows make it quite cold. The views from the roads through the mountains are so much more spectacular than from the Mekong. We could see for miles and miles of unspoilt green valleys and mountains, we stopped at the occaisional roadside village where the thais on the bus would buy fruit and veg, hardly any of it i recognised but i think there was sugar cane and tiny colourless corn on the cobs. Other villages we passed through filled with kids playing in filthy raggy clothes, people washing at the one communal tap or kids carrying back water along the road. It looked like poverty but the land had provided plenty of food, and they had huts with satelite dishes and the glow from the television inside and all the kids looked happy.

After about 7 hours the bus stopped and everyone got off so i checked into a hotel and went for food where i bumped into the Aussie from the bus who told me this was Kasi, just a food stop and we still had an hour to go. I fetched my bags and handed the key back to a bemused girl who spoke so little English that i didn't even try to explain.

In Viang Viene i had food and Lao dark beer whilst sitting in one of the many tv bars showing 'friends'. I slept well in my 3 dollar room smelling of paint. In the morning i looked around; Viang Viene is a cluster of guesthouses, travel agents, restaurants and internet cafes at a t-junction surrounded by mountains, a real blot on the landscape. Nothing great about this place but there are a lot of backpackers passing through. I booked a bus to go at 13.30 today to Vientiene but the chap for some reason booked it for tomorrow, he apologised and told me there were no more leaving today apart from a pick up truck where i would be standing the whole way, could have been an adventure but i booked an air con bus for tomorrow morning and checked into another hotel without the smell of paint. At least i have plenty of time to kill by catching up on my blog. I went to an internet cafe to burn a cd of my pictures but the computer had a virus and corrupted my memory card, i spent a lot of time trying to recover lost pictures but with no luck. Later i found a guy who copies albums onto mp3 so i now have 9 new albums to keep me happy for only 9 dollars.

The following day on the bus to Vientiene, i started reading 'A short history of tractors in Ukranian', listened to my great new music and met Angela and Emma, sisters from Sheffield who must get on really well as they do a lot of travelling together.

Vientiene is a lot more spread out than Vang viene and if you find the right cafes and bars is pretty chilled out but there doesn't seem to be all that much to do in the day.
I hired a bike for a day and cycled around in the scorching sun (with a bit of a hangover!) and sweated like a scouser in a idendity parade. I spent the evenings with Angela and Emma and had a very good time. The only problem was that the hotels have curfews so we went back to our hotel, took some beers and played shithead.

I found a fuji shop that managed to retrieve my corrupted photos which i was very glad of because they included the long neck women. I took a local bus, packed with locals to the Buddah park; a bizarre collection of huge concrete buddhist and hindu figures and a giant concrete pumpkin that you can walk around the 3 levels inside where there are more small strange figures; you'd just have to see it to believe it!

The girls left before me so i spent one more evening in a bar where i watched a 60+ rat faced, grey pony tailed man with a local girl on his lap maybe 18 years old - nice one fella!

31st August - The waterfall adventure!

Had booked up 2 trips for today. The morning boat trip was to some boring caves which had become temples filled with buddahs and concrete steps. The highlight was stopping at a small village on the way back where they make Lao whiskey. After some tasting i took a small 1 dollar bottle of the stuff that doesn't make you blind. The trip was due back at 12.30 but got back at 13.20, giving me just 10 minutes to find a street vendor for noodle soup which i scoffed down as quick as possible and a small portion of sticky rice wrapped up in a banana tree leaf to take away.


The afternoon bus journey was to a big waterfall, i took some photos from the bottom but there were steps to the top which i started to climb. People coming down said that the views were great and you could swim up there. I got to the top, where the path ran out and got to the edge of the big waterfall but couldn't see where the views were from or where to swim, so i tried to go around the fast flowing water through patches of mud, smaller streams and jungle, after a while i realised i was getting nowhere and a lot of the streams were too deep or fast and the mud too boggy so i decided to go back. I walked in so many directions that i got lost and the fast streams and mud kept stopping me from going where i wanted to. The straps of one of my shoes broke and i lost it in the mud. I tried to follow the flow of the water but i would get cut off and so many streams seamed to be flowing in different directions. I would listen for the waterfall but kept getting to smaller ones. I was starting to worry, i found a pomelo tree and picked one just in case i was stuck here for a while, i started calling out but nobody could hear me over the roar of the water. My minibus was due to leave at 16.00 and i wondered wether they would just go or tell someone. I wondered how long, if at all, it would take to send someone to find me. I started thinking about how to survive a night in the jungle. I know all of this must sound really melodramatic, but i was trying to think clearly whilst being scared out of my wits, and i felt like i was getting weaker with every step. I felt homesick. Eventually i got back to the edge of the waterfall and down the hill wearing my one shoe. I was 30 minutes late and the minibus was still waiting. I pulled off the leach that was feasting from my foot and went back to my hotel for a shower, where i found blood on my bollock, the cause of which was a hole a leach had left on the adjacent inner thigh. I went out for a drink in the evening and it felt like nothing had happened. I went to bed at 22.00 and went straight to sleep, at about midnight there was a knock at the door, Tom and Eimer had come to say goodbye as they were leaving the next day, they're a nice couple and i hope i bump into Tom in Oz.

25th August - 30th August

On the 25th i woke up thinking of leaving for Laos, but at breakfast i bumped into Janna and Cathy who i had spoke to briefly before, they were going to do a thai cooking class so i decided to tag along.
It cost 800B and was excelent fun, we had to eat everything we cooked, which was a lot, spring rolls,green curry, massaman curry, veg fried rice, ginger chicken and fried bananas in coconut toffee for desert which dad would love. I booked up a trip with the girls for tomorrow who, like me felt a little disappointed by the hill tribes, then went for a quick afternoon drink with them which turned into a bit of a session as we were al chatting and having a good time.

The next day we were picked up at 07.30 and most of the day was spent inside an air conditioned minibus with an eratic driver and a chinese sounding guide called Art. The main objective of the day was to see hill tribes, particularly the 'long necks', in traditional costume. We ended up in a tourist market where 3 diferent hill tribes, in traditional clobber had lots of stalls, all trying to sell us pretty much the same stuff (mainly hand woven scarves, necklaces, bracelets and shit).

Managed to take some good photographs but it was a pretty dull day really. In the evening i wanted to go to the Thai boxing but found it is on every night except Saturday.

Took the 13.00 bus to Chiang Khong, first class was all that was available, with air con and a really loud tv playing thai music videos and films the whole way, i could even here it over my mp3 player on full blast.
I met Tom and Eimer, both from Cork university. Spoke to them for quite a while, they are here on holiday and Tom will be going out to Oz around November as well so could meet up somewhere. We arrived at about 20.00 in the pouring rain where a woman persuaded us all to stay at her guesthouse. My room and shared bathroom was a bit dingy but it was only 120B. We ate there and the guy who runs it, a frenchman from Taihiti showed us a load of photos on his laptop. Taihiti looks like the nicest place in the world (bit of a honeymoon haven).
In the morning we paid 1600B for our Laos visa and crossed the Mekong to get the visa stamped, then with Tom and Eimer and a german couple, onto a long boat bound for Pak Beng. The boat was crowded with wooden benches seating about 100 passengers (mostly tourists) and it stopped at various places along the way where people
would either come on the boat to sell us drinks and snacks or load on cargo which filled the roof of the boat and gradually filled the aisle (big bags of rice or sugar). The Mekong is tea coloured with lots of swirling eddies littered with debris, mostly logs but we did see a bloated dead dog. The boat swings from side to side to avoid the debris. The scenery is nothing but green hills and the very occaisional village. Despite my blow up cushion (thanks for that piece of advice Richie B), my arse was numb and i was glad to get off in Pak Beng at 17.30 but geting the bags off was chaos and i lost my rag at a local when after waiting for ages and then searching the back of the boat in vain for my bag, found he had taken it off for me and wouldn't let me take it until i paid him - after some choice words i took my bag and he got nothing. During this time i had also been harrassed by blokes selling various guest houses and all kinds of drugs - amazing in such a tiny village. We all checked in at a nice hotel, and i haggled my room down to 250B while the guy who works here was still trying to sell me weed. Tom, Eimer and myself found an excellent Indian restaurant. The currency here is the kip, it suffers from massive inflation (from 11,000 to the pound in 2001 to 18,000 now) so the US dollar(10,000 kip:1 dollar) and Thai baht (260 kip:1 baht) are widely accepted and preffered, but whenever you get change it is in kip.

We were back on the boat at 08.30 the next morning bound for Luang Prabang, there were less seats this time but an empty space at the back where we could lean against the sides of the boat and stretch our legs. A couple of stops on the way and we were huddled into a tiny space with our knees under our chins. I was very glad to get off at 17.45, and this time i managed to get straight to my bag and the reception committee was much less intimidating. We found a really nice guest house 5 minutes walk from the main street for 200B - apart from some tiny ants making a constant march through my room this could have been a room in a 3 star hotel back home. Laos was colonised by the french (for most of the 19th century i think) and Vientiane has lots of french buildings. It was awarded a world heritage site status in 1995, has a very laid back atmosphere and has a night market which doesn't sell fake designer gear but mostly hand made fabrics, clothes, lampshades (made from the local paper with flowers pressed into it) etc. There is very little hassle from the traders here, just a 'Sawadee' (hello) if you show some interest. Beer Lao has given Tom and I both slightly dodgy stomachs, now I have discovered Lao dark beer which is more expensive and tastes like Newcastle brown ale, it's not available everywhere but it's bloody lovely.

The next day, i went walking around Luang Prabang with the sun burning my head and neck, loads of temples (Wats) and buddah statues. The place is swarming with monks and the younger novices all wearing orange shawls and often carrying umbrellas, i spoke to a couple of them. A popular game for the local boys is throwing flip flops at a stack of picture cards, whoever hits the stack wins, i watched this for a while until the boy who lost all his cards started crying and the others left counting their spoils. Had lovely tomato soup with french bread for lunch and watched local men play boules in the afternoon, there is lots of cheering, barracking and laughing and the games are played for money from about 6000kip (35p) upwards, doesn't sound like much but probably is to them. In the evening i ate a nice rare buffalo steak in garlic sauce (garlic is nothing like as strong as back home) and drank while watching Wigan beat Reading. Tom and Eimer popped in for a drink.

20th - 24th August (Changmai internet cafe)

Maybe i should have booked something with the travel agent a bit earlier. I could have taken a coach for about 300B or a cheaper train option for about 600B but because i left it until the day i wanted to travel my only option is the 1000B sleeper train. I checked out of my hotel and spent a lot of time putting new photos on the blog to keep you lot happy. Arranged vietnam visa (i only remembered that i needed to do it when i heard someone discussing it in the travel agent) which will be sent to me in Changmai, this cost 2000B. I was killing time all afternoon until at the last hour i found a bloke who could put albums on to any mp3 player for 50B - I only had enough time and memory to put the new muse album on but next time I'm in Bangkok i will find him again. My taxi to the train station cost 250B (should have got a tuk tuk). Met Sally and Rachael from Loughborough uni in my carriage, about 20 and quite chatty then slept very well in my comfortable bed (much more spacious than in India). On arrival in Chiang Mai, i took a tuk tuk to Sarah guesthouse which i found in the lonely planet. Clean and basic for 200B, just what i needed. There are 3 obese dogs that live here, most dogs in Thailand look scabby and malnourished. After getting some tourist information i visited a tribal museum which was fairly interesting and then booked a 3 day trek for tomorrow which should take me to some hill tribe villages. There is a huge street market every evening in Chiang Mai so i spent some time looking around that; there is everything from fake designer gear to local handmade ornaments, there are even massage stalls so i had my first massage, half an hour, head, shoulders and arms for 60B, about half the price of Bangkok. The massage was a little painful at times but quite nice. Looked for a nice bar but i only managed to find the seedy looking ones so went to bed.

The Trek:
Just my luck, met the rest of the group, 10 Irish 19-20 year old lads, nice guys, big drinkers and quite entertaining but obviously as they are all friends travelling together i am often sat listening to conversations about school friends, teachers,etc. A group made from smaller groups and individuals would have been better for me socially.

Joe, our 62 year old guide likes to sing Elvis songs and play the harmonica (not all that well), he's a bit of a character and the lads call him 'crazy belly'!!!

There was a two hour drive into the jungle and then we were trekking. We all set off up the hills too quickly for Joe who told us we needed to pace ourselves, he was probably right, it was very humid and the sweat was pouring off of us. We walked for four hours up and down slippery muddy tracks - i didn't have too much trouble keping up with the young'uns who didn't have an ounce of fat between them but i struggled with the slippery downhills where my ankle was still feeling less than 100%. We finished up at a hill tribe village next to the river where we swam and washed (it was brown with muddy sand but seemed fresh), then we had a lovely dinner played poker and drank warm Chang. I had pictured something much more 'tribal', the village was quite basic but the people didn't appear to be any different to any other part of Thailand (I think we were expecting a little bonfire and people in bizarre costumes dancing around it or something). It was pitch black by 19.00 and all we had was candles and our little torches. At the end of the night us 11 lads all shared a big room.

The second day was more walking only this time we had a young guide called Sang who set off at lightning pace. Joe stayed at the village to take Care of one of the Irish lads who was really sick (the 8 whiskies the night before last plus the heat may have been a factor!) and the plan changed so that we would be staying in the same village again that night. The upside of this was that we were carrying less stuff than yesterday. We visited another village of a different tribe and again it was not what i had expected, they had solar panels and satellite dishes (apparently supplied by the government to all villages) and we never saw anyone in any of the tribal dress that i had seen at the museum. Sang calls me Rambo because i am the biggest in the group (that tells you how skinny these Irish guys are!) and i managed to snap a rotten chunk of wood in two to use as stepping stones. He has singled me out as the raft driver for tomorrow! We walked at quick pace for about 4 hours altogether before getting Elephant rides back to the village.
The Elephants looked healthy and well looked after so i didn't feel guilty about riding them. We were sat two to an elephant on a wooden seat with a thai driver sat just behind the elephants ears stearing with his knees. It lasted about an hour and wasn't too comfy, most of the journey was along the river but it's amazing how they can walk up steep narrow paths when they need to. Good food again and plenty of it followed by a Chang session that went late into the night.

Day three was no trekking. We were on bamboo rafts - 5 on one, 6 on another with a Thai driver at the front and one of us steering the back of each using a bamboo pole as a punting stick - it was a lot harder than it looked and at one point we nearly went upside down on the white water ( all our bags with cameras etc were suspended in the center of the raft). It was excellent fun. We went to a snake farm with an entertaining snake show on the way back to Chiang Mai

15th - 19th August (Internet Cafe in Bangkok)

Unfortunately the rest of my stay in Railey beach was spent without further climbing - however, i am determined to climb again soon.

On the 16th i found out that my nephew had been born. I was pleased and relieved that everything was ok and also a little bit sad not to be there.

To start with moving around has been difficult and i couldn't even walk the 400m or so to the nice beach. As the pain eased the beach was in reach but every time i got there it would go from scorching sun to heavy rain, so I have been reading a lot. I like the relaxed night life here more than anywhere else i have been and my Thai friends are very nice (ze germans left on the 15th) but the days are getting tedious so I have to go. I paid 3000B for my two and a half days of climbing (about 40pounds which i thought was good value), got a free 'Cliff Man' vest and tipped Bong 250B just because i am a great bloke.

On the day i left, it was raining hard and i had to wade into the sea carrying my stuff to get to the longboat - obviously i took my bandage off for this and left it off for my overnight bus journey to the dreaded bangkok - this has caused my whole foot to swell up so it looks just like Carly's did when she was pregnant. The bus journey was ok despite some unexpected stops/bus changes (the usual crap) and altogether the journey took from 14.30 - 05.30 to get close to Khaosan road. I still had to walk for about 15 minutes and all the hotels were full at that time, so I had to hang around for a while and wait for people to check out, this was fine as i managed to eat breakfast while watching ESPN talking about the build up to the new premiership season for about an hour. Decided that to pay 650B per night like last time i was in Bangkok would be far too extravagent so found myself in the worst shit hole i have ever seen for 150B, shared bathrooms, loads of writing on the wall and something that could be coke (or maybe sick) on the wall. Slept for a while before going out to do a little shopping, getting info on the overnight train to Chang Mai, and getting my head shaved to guard one for 100B
(bit pricey compared to India but at least i got what i asked for this time!) Currently checking out the tatoo parlours in order to complete my new 'double hard bastard' image. The Liverpool and Arsenal games are on in the bars later so i am looking forward to that, possibly with a beer or two.

Bye for now,
Uncle Adam.

12th - 15th August (Internet cafe on Rayley beach with bandaged ankle)


Ralf, the german policeman, is about 6 foot 4 inches tall and reminds me a lot of Phil in looks and build - he is a nice chap and speaks good english. Ralf gave me a lift to Krabi, then we had to get a longboat across to Rayley beach where we met up with Ralf's rather iffeminate aquaintance Sam who looks uncannily like Jack Dee when he smiles.
Sam has a Thai friend who works here called Tam.
I have spent these few days mostly with these people and some other Thais (including 'Bong', our climbing instructor) from the climbing centre 'Cliff Man'. I am staying in a basic bungalow with no view and a spaniel that yelps in a high pitch for about twenty minutes from 06.30 onwards for 200B called Rapella, it has a nice powerful cold shower. I have done two and a half days of climbing and have loved every minute of it, unlike windsurfing i have taken to it pretty well. Ralf is bigger and stronger than me but he really struggled and gave up after one day. I have done eleven climbs so far and learnt some skills including belaying (where you control the safety line from the ground for the climber), and leading (where i do the first climb attaching the safety line as i go and then passing it through the anchor point at the top before being lowered to the ground).

I find the climbing really challenging which is probably why i enjoy it so much; when i really struggle to get past a point and my legs are shaking because i'm using so much energy but eventually get past it and on to a ledge where i can rest it is so exhilarating like nothing else i've ever done. Also, when you climb, you are thinking of nothing else, real escapism. Falling off is really depressing but if you try again and get past it that feels great. Climbing shoes hurt like mad because they need to be small so that they cup your feet into a claw shape. I've seen some excellent climbers including a japanese girl who was pretty much hanging upside down off of a rock - she said she had been climbing for two years. I hope i can carry on when i get home, using indoor climbing walls for practice. Today, i fell from just inches below the final anchor point, meaning that the previous tie off point was about two metres below me and i fell about four metres -
this wouldn't normaly be a big problem but i didn't manage to push away from the rock and somehow twisted my left ankle as i tried to stop from smashing into the rock, hence the strapping. My camera was strapped to me as i was planning on getting a nice shot of the bay from the top, luckily that survived intact, my ankle and my pride suffered more as i gradually got to the ground in an ungainly fashion. Rain stopped proceedings shortly after that anyway and i am hoping that i will be okay to climb tomorrow.

I have eaten a lot here and spent too much money mainly because the german guys are here on holiday (they are staying in a posh hotel) and always order loads of starters to share with every meal. My highlight has been spicey pizza at mom's kitchen. I have to keep reminding myself that it is still cheap by u.k. standards.

9th August - 11th August (internet cafe Rayleh beach)

When i bought my ticket i was a little unsure quite how i was travelling - apart from the boat part; the journey turned out to be quite an adventure. At 12.30 i was collected by minibus from my resort and after a few stops to let various people on and off and travelling at breakneck speed we arrived just in time for the boat from Nathon harbour. The boat to Surithani on the mainland was fine. I popped into the toilet at the Surithani harbour, came out and showed my ticket to someone official looking who spoke quite frantically in thai to someone else, who then pointed to the moped taxi. I hopped on to the back of the moped carrying my large rucksack and some hand luggage and was taken at high speed to chase the bus that i had missed, after some beeping and waving the bus stopped and i paid the moped man 40B. The bus travelled about 20 minutes and dropped me an indian looking chap and a japanese lad on a street corner where we got into another minibus and were driven for about 10 minutes, each dropped at different places, i was at a roadside cafe where i had to wait so i had some noodles. There were other travellers arriving here. I was sold my first nights accommadation at 'jungle huts' in Khao Sok and at 18.30 me and a few others who were loaded into 2 minibuses. I think something had been happening beforehand to do with one of the drivers who was apparently a bit of a psycho and a few of the travellers, and there were some very pissed off people on board. When our driver stopped for petrol, two travellers got off saying they had had enough and would get a taxi. They left and the pscho came over and started pointing, shouting and swearing. Everyone was a bit edgy now. Our driver raced ahead of the psycho but after a while he stopped because he didn't know the way! After some phone calls he went on and after a bit of searching around we found jungle huts, most of the others hadn't booked anywhere so they got off as soon as they liked the look of somewhere. I arrived at 21.30 in a basic hut with a bathroom and a bed for 300B.

I only stayed one night in jungle huts, after some looking around i moved to 'Baan Rimnam' at 200B per night.

Most of the jungle tours left early so i spent my first day just looking around and reading. This is rain forest and surprisingly it rains quite a lot, electric fails quite often as well. Met Kiam (a tour guide) who showed me where to stand for the 18.30 bat highway and sure enough loads of bats came flying through along the river. Kiam is a really nice guy and a good guide, he took me, a group of four young english girls and a 34 year old german policeman on the lake tour the next day.

The whole group was very nice and friendly and we had an excellent day on a long boat, walking through muddy island jungle tracks, wading through rivers, swimming in the lake and exploring a cave full of bats and big spiders.






I was surprised at the lack of wildlife, there were no birds but we did see 2 monkeys literally flying from one tree to another, colourful butterflies and dragonflies, leeches on our legs, and big lizards. We all met up later for food and drinks in a really nice place. Also spoke to some british people who work in Krabi, they gave me some really useful information and it sounds like a great place so i am looking forward to that. Coincidentally Ralf is driving there there tomorrow morning so he is giving me a lift.

6th August - 9th August (Internet cafe on Rayley beach)

Okay, so the boat came in to Buddah pier, on the north of Samui. We took a taxi south to Lamai on the east coast - this area is not as lively or touristy as nearby Chawen but my first impressions of Lamai and Samui (from what i saw on the taxi ride) are that it is not as nice as Phangan or Ko Tao, it seems to have been ruined by tourism. Thye cheapest bungalow i could find was 400B and it was one row back from those with the sea view. AS usual, it was quite basic but fine. I share my room with at least 2 adult and 1 baby gecco (cute little lizard that is useful for eating mozzies and bugs). The girls are living next door but they have met up with some friends in a posh hotel so i don't see much of them. I have shaved off my rather impressive 10 day beard!

The weather is changeable - the most annoying thing is that as soon as i lay on the beach there are big gusts of wind and i am covered in sand, so i spend a lot of time walking around the streets instead. There are a lot of uk style bars. Spent an evening with a canadian guy and four german girls, the girls have mopeds and they say that the rest of the island is no better than here - i am planning on getting away as soon as possible.

Each morning i am awoken by what sounds like a half throttled cockerel - thinking of going to finish the job!

The best part of my stay here was a duck platter that i had in an authentic thai roadside restaurant (no frills - looked like a kind of undercover market), 130B and delicious.

Sliced my pinkey on a rock in the sea, bled like mad, i was worried that it would attract sharks so got out quick!

In the evening i went to the lively bar area and was constantly offered massage in a way that suggested something more sinister, quite a seedy area, and no, i didn't accept.

Paid 550B for a journey to Khao Sok national park on the mainland.

29th July - 6th August (From an internet cafe in Haad Rin, Koh Phangan)

Hello again,

Some people who i met in Koh Tao (a couple of them were in our dive group) have turned up at cookies and they are my new friends for this section of my tour.

They are Simea, James, Maz and Sophia and they all know eachother from living in Dubai although they are a mixture of English, Phillipine and Lebanese origin. Later on James' brother Ben arrives and Simea leaves. They are all very nice and a lot of this week is spent with them, either sitting around chatting, eating, drinking, travelling about the island, whatever.

The weather has been strange, mostly hot but often cloudy and a few storms that appear out of nowhere. I spent about 3 hours on a beach one day without suncream because i could barely see the sun through the cloud - i turned very pink but eventually with a lot of aftersun i am back to my normal bronzed adonis colour.

While i've been here i've read 'The lion, the witch and the wardrobe' (it was the only english book i could find at the time) and 'Saturday' (can't remember the authors name but it wasn't great anyway). I am just starting a trilogy by Philip Pullman that Malachi gave me.

I have been hiring a 100cc moped for 150B per day (no helmet or anything - sorry mum) which has been great fun, whizzing about the island in a pair of shorts, sometimes on really dodgy dirt tracks, trying to find hidden beaches and stuff - sometimes on my own, sometimes with the others. We've made a couple of night rides to Haad Rin (the main party area of the island) which is quite a hairy ride even in the day. Sofia fell off the back of Simea's bike whilst trying to get up a steep hill, but she was ok.

We discovered a bar near cookies, run by an english bloke called Sam who is a bit of a character, there is a pool table and he introduced me to a drink called San Sung which i drink in large shots and tastes similar to vodka.

While i've been here, I have done a bit of snorkelling off the north at Mae Haad and saw a lot of fish in the lovely clear water, went to a half moon party (Koh Phangan is famous for it's massive full moon parties on the beach at Haad Rin but we weren't her for a full moon), and also tried a free yoga session with the others - i was a bit worried about you all taking the piss and calling me a hippy tree hugger if i ended up really getting hooked on yoga (some people stay here for years just for the yoga), it was interesting and the excercises were quite good but the whole spiritual side of it was a bit much for me (apparently there are 7 energy centres called Chakras in your body and the exercises are designed to absorb cosmic and earth energies into each of these chakras, with each exercise designed to bring different positive energies such as wellbeing, lucidity, harmony etc.) There was even some mantra chanting from the instructor. As i said it was interesting and worth a try.

Most importantly of all is food, as usual it has been cheap, usually fairly small, and tasty thai food and although meals are small they seem to be enough to keep me going, probably because i'm not doing much and also the rice expanding and filling my stomach. It's quite nice really to eat small meals instead of eating until i can't move like when i'm in England. My stomach still has the odd bad day but i won't go into that again. Last night we came to Haad Rin and ate in a very hot and busy seafood restaurant, it was expensive compared to what we were used to (300B about 5pounds), i had a nice seabass and also tasted some Shark which was really succulent and tasty.


James and Ben have left today - James needs to sort out a visa then they are meeting their parents in Bangkok. Maz, Sophia and I are getting on a boat in an hour to Koh Samui, the biggest island of the three on this side of Thailand. I'll let you know how i get on. Bye for now.

Okay - i'm getting a bit tired of the day by day account now so i'm going to try to do it in chunks. Hope you don't mind?

18th July - 27th July

During this time i have been on Koh Tao, the weather has been generally hot with a nice sea breeze. Saw a big red cock.
Koh Tao (Turtle island) is a very nice place, the beaches and the sea are beautiful. It's a very small island and almost everything here is geared to tourism, especially diving - lots of dive schools with lots of boats coming and going. The food is always good. I share a room with Liz which keeps the costs down and before you even think it, there's no funny business! Liz is also my dive buddy and during our stay we have done our open water course and our advanced open water course involving a fair amount of reading and 9 dives.
We have seen loads of fish but i managed to miss a distant grey reef shark that most of the others claim to have seen. The best dive was the last one which was a night dive with torches - there was no moonlight, pitch black and massive waves, the boat was all over the place but my travel sickness pill did the trick. We turned off the lights and waved our hands about while standing on the ocean floor - these weird green phospherous specks fly everywhere. I've seen rays, angel fish, clown fish (like Nemo), boxfish(pretty weird), batfish, barracudas, scorpion fish, trigger fish (that was scary because we had to swim slowly past - they can be aggresively territorial), cleaner wras (they nibble at you if you stay still for long enough) and loads of other stuff. Had really bad pain in my ear from the pressure on my first 2 dives but seemed to improve after that. One of the advanced dives went down to 28m which is the sort of depth that can bring on Nitrogen Narcosis which can make you feel giggly and drunk - the dive guide did some mental tests on us but we were fine - quite dissapointed really after we had heard and read so much about it. Craving ribena quite a lot. In between diving i've been mostly reading and lazing around in the sun and sometimes forcing down a beer - it's not been easy!!! Read 'Vernon God Little' strange but good. Eventually left Liz on the island with her dutch friend, and took a 1 hour boat ride to Koh Phanang...

27th July - 29th July (present)


Chose a bungalow resort called Cookies on the south west of the island because they advertise windsurfing (sounds like a challenge!) - my bungalow (a hut on stilts, made from mostly wood and wicker) is about 10m from the sea with my own little bathroom and a hammock on the porch. It feels like sleeping outside, sort of an adventure like when Carly and I used to camp in the back garden! This is the view from my hammock outside my bungalow

I can hear the crickets chirping and the waves washing against the beach. The resort is run by some nice Thai people, a lady called Bee is always very friendly. 250B per night for this paradise - fantastic.

The windsurfing is only on in the evenings and only when the conditions are right - eventually i have a lesson and can be seen falling off every 30 seconds as people eat in the restaurant watching the sun set - i am rubbish and the poor bloke with his tiny amount of English doesn't know how to tell me what I am doing wrong - he just shows me what to do - then i fail miserably. Oh well can't be good at every thing (or anything come to think of it!) I've spoken to several people while i've been here and took a taxi with Malachi to Haad Rin for an evening of drinking some evil stuff through straws from a bucket (regretting that today!)

That's all for now. Bye.

13/7

Explored Bangkok on foot for a few hours, found it very difficult to find my way around due to crap maps and crap street signs. Found little of any interest. Contacted Jon who lives in Bangkok (my brother in law's cousin) but he works in the week so i'll see him on Saturday. Feeling bored and a bit miserable. Looked at a couple of cheaper hotels as 650B is quite expensive for the area, they were around 300B but nowhere near as nice and i couldn't bring myself to take a drop in comfort while i am already a bit low. One thing that always cheers me up is good food and i'm eating plenty of that for about 75B a time - tonight was Thai red beef curry - fantastic! Got quite drunk and ended up talking to a nice german girl in Gullivers but she was leaving early the next morning (she probably just said that to get rid of me!) She was spending only 150B per night for her room so i am feeling far too extravagent now.

14/7

DO NOT DRINK CHANG BEER! I have the hangover from hell. Managed to go out about midday, saw Wat Phra Kaew, the royal palace and Wat Pho. I got drenched in a rainstorm then took a tuk tuk. I saw a huge reclining buddah, a bigger standing buddah and more smaller buddahs than you could shake a monk at. Now quite bored with Bangkok, temples and buddahs! I felt rough all day. Had some excellent spicey pork and even treated myself to ice cream, plus a coke for 135B. Can't drink tonight so sat in my expensive room and watched 'Cable Guy' and the middle east conflict on the news. I am planning on getting away from Bangkok straight after i meet Jon, don't know where.

15/7

A restless night with a bizarre midgit dream. I phoned Jon and got a cab to his house which was an adventure as the driver spoke no English and i didn't know where I was going. We chatted, i met his wife and daughter, we went to the mall and had food, then Jon and i left for Sukhumvit to meet some of his mates, then on to Nana where we saw some of Bangkoks characters - ladyboys, prossies, that sort of thing! Somehow managed to get back onto Chang and ended up a little tipsy!

16/7

Hungover again! Checked out at last and got a tuk tuk to one of Bangkoks two train stations. After several visits to tourist information i was yet to get any info on buses or trains as they don't speak much english (stupid bloody foreigners!) but i was hoping that i might get to Chantanaburi to see the bridge over the bridge over the river kwai. I found out i had picked the wrong station for that and the staff just laughed when i told them i just had to get out of Bangkok and asked where the next train was going to. One was going through Chumpon which is a ferry ride from Koh Tao island. I hadn't planned on heading south yet but then i hadn't planned anything much and i liked the sound of it despite the 8.5 hour train journey. The train was clean and comfy and pretty cheap. All the windows were open so the wind blew through as we went but it was still warm. The scenery was green an beautiful and i spotted some westerners further up the carriage. 4 young English kids got out at my stop so i asked them if they too were getting the early morning ferry which i had booked with my train ticket, unfortunately they had booked an overnight crossing but the bloke that came to pick them up took me as well and we all went back to his small travel agency. I chatted with the 4 young 'uns while we ate at a nearby restaurant (tom yum soup) and they were very nice. They left for their ferry and i hoped to meet them on the other side. I stayed the night in a very basic room above the shop for 150B. Feeling glad to have left Bangkok.

17/7

The ferry took 3 hours and the crossing was very calm (thank god). There were about 60 people on the boat and i spoke to an English girl named Liz most of the way - she had done some travelling and some volunteer work in Laos. When we docked there were several dive companies wanting us to come and see there accomodation, Liz had booked when she was in Chumpon so i went with her to Dive Buddah situated right on the beautiful south coast of the island. Liz and I ended up sharing a room which is basic but we have a private bathroom and a fan. I read and slept on the beach for a while and then we had a one hour dvd with another 14 people who were all to start a four day PADI diving course. Yet again i had fantastic food at lunch and some lovely steamed fish in the evening. I spent about 2 hours reading my new PADI text book then tried to phone Nan but she was engaged. I am loving it here already and it is nice to have someone to talk to.

Michael, Nicola and I took a tuk tuk back to the old city again (well there is not much else to do here!) Went to the main gaht again, fended off the hawkers with ease and looked in a few shops. Had a nice lunch at the hotel and spent most of the afternoon on the computer. On the advice of a lad i was chatting to earlier, i booked my 3 nights accomodation in Hong Kong online for 22 pounds a night. At 18.45 we boarded the sleeper for Delhi. The group were a lot more split up this time; Manu and I were in a compartment with an Indian family. I couldn't get comfortable in my bed - if my feet hung off the end they would get hit when the door opened, so I had a pretty bad nights sleep. The toilet was a lot better this time. Again we were delayed by about 2 hours and the train seems to spend as much time stationary as it does moving. I figured that we did 450 miles in 15 hours, so 30 miles an hour.

8/7

Not much happened. The tour is winding down now. In the evening we all went out for food and drinks at the upmarket DV8. Michael did a speech for Manu and gave him all of our tips in envelopes. I had a few to drink and got to bed at 0030.

9/7

I was up at 3.10 feeling bright and breezy (yeah right!) My taxi was at 03.30 and check in was at 04.00 even though the flight wasn't until 07.00. Landed in Hong Kong at 15.00 after putting the clock forward two and a half hours ( i am now 7 hours ahead of GMT). The airport is ultra clean and modern, all steel, glass and white. The tourist information girl gave me loads of info, her English was good but very quick so it was hard to follow - still, i walked away with a map with circles drawn all over it and a leaflet on things to see and do. My hotel area in Mongkok, Kowloon is very lively with flashing chinese signs everywhere. I eventually find my hotel - my room (on the 13th floor) is tiny but air conditioned, the bathroom is the size of a bath with a shower but no cubicle - the water just runs over the floor to a drain. I went into the first 'restaurant' i found and had chicken (skinny bits of thigh i think!) in blackbean sauce. All local transport and street signs have an English translation, other than that there seems to be very little English - trying to find my hotel was a struggle as everyone i asked didn't have a clue what i was saying. I remebered that the tourist information girl had written my hotel name down in chinese, showed that to a man and he pointed the way - why didn't i think of that earlier?

10/7

The weather was very overcast. There are plenty of McDonalds in Hong Kong so i had a mcmuffin for breakfast. I found out that Italy won the world cup so i won the green watch sweepstake. I got on the Metro which again was very clean and modern, there are steel seats with no cushions. Getting around is pretty easy either by metro, bus, ferry or taxi - there are very few cars about probably because everything is close together and the public transport is so good - the buses run exactly to the timetable. The ferry is fantastic and only costs about 2 quid. I went to Stanley market, Repulse Bay (a short sandy beach), Ocean Park, the zoological and botanical gardens and finally went on the peak tram on Hong Kong island, I stayed at the peak until it got dark so i could see all the lights on both sides of the river - the weather was still very cloudy so the view wasn't as good as it could have been and i think my photos were rubbish. Apart from all the travelling around i did a lot of walking so it's been a long day. I finished the day with a reasonable beef in chile sauce for 32 HKD. (14HKD to 1UKP)

11/7

Pissing down. This was to be my first use of the Johnny 'Extreme' Moulder monsoon proof, hurricane proof, earthquake proof and bomb proof jacket. I took the Metro to Tung Chung on Lantau island. From here on there are just a few light showers and i am left to carry this bloody jacket around all day - still, shouldn't moan. I use the buses to cover all the sights of this tiny island. The island is mountainous and covered in forest. There is a monastry with a giant outdoor Buddah (the head alone weighs 5 metric tonnes!), the wisdom path which has something to do with infinite spleadour, here i read 'Understanding the relativity of all standpoints will prevent one from becoming irrationally attached to things. In this way one will become free of all mental obstruction' - DEEP!

Went to a fishing village where the people live in tin houses on stilts. Found Hollywood road and Manmo temple but they were rubbish.

Finally got to the avenue of stars on the south bank of Kowloon to witness the symphony of lights - all the sky scrapers on the opposite bank lights and lasers dancing to music - very clever.

I went to a more upmarket pizza restaurant and had peking duck pizza (a small amount of duck peeking out from under the mushrooms, peeking - get it!) and a beer for 116 HKD. The bigest adventure today was on my walk to the wisdom path, i turned back half way and did one of those runs where you keep your knees together until i got to the toilet - this was to be my first number 2 in a squat toilet - after some precision bombing, some awkward wiping (the bin was too far away), i was just glad that this one had toilet paper as many of them don't, i was back on the path to wisdom. Hope i'm not going into too much detail for you but this was a momentous occaision!

12/7

Awoke at 09.00 with a case of the 2 bobs (sorry to get back to this subject). My plans to visit a Hong Kong history museum were scuppered as i stayed in my room. The episode passed fairly quickly and i checked out at 11.00 and took the metro to the airport. On the plane I was sat next to a young chinese couple who kept kissing, just glad i wasn't in the middle seat! If Grant had been there he would have shouted 'GET A ROOM!' It was pissing down when i arrived in Bangkok but after a 2 hour crawl by bus through the rush hour traffic to Khaosan road the rain had stopped. I was sat under a drip! I found the Hotel Sawadsee Banglumpoo without much problem. Nice room with air con, double bed, shower (with cubicle) and free breakfast for 8 quid (i had pre booked for one night on the internet but will stay at least for one more night). Went straight out. Khaosan road was not at all what i expected - not much atmosphere in the bars. I had a nice chicken green curry for 50Baht (65B to 1UKP) and after searching high and low for some atmosphere found Gullivers where i met Scottish Ed and Dan from North London - i chatted to them over several beers and found out that any Thai girl who shows any interest is a prossie which is a shame because there was a pretty one across the bar and there were several of them plying their trade in the pub. Drinks were 75B here.