Ashes in Brisbane 1st Test

25/11/2010 - 27/11/2010

4.50am I'm up and go to meet Garfield (Tom) and Rob next door and head down to the train station. We arrive at the airport at 6am. Me and Garfield head to the desk after trying to check in on the computers and were greeted with the message 'your flight has been cancelled'....this can't be happening!! we're going to Brisbane to watch the 1st test of the ashes, it's supposed to be a lucky day! Rob is ofcourse flying with Qantas so off he trotts, no flies on this guy, check in a ready to fly at 6.30.
Me and Garfield rock up to the desk to be told it is true and the earliest flight we can get on is the 9am flight which will get us in to Brisbane at 9.25am (because of the time difference) so we agree to that, take our measly $6 apology reward to get a McDonalds breakfast which takes up around 10 minutes of the 3 hours we have to wait!...We decided to sit in the virgin lounge and try and get on the 7am if there are any seats....our luck comes back as we are told we can get on the 7am flight, to then be told we can't! so we decide to try the 8am flight, but again...no chance. so we have half an hour to try and sort me a hostel for when I arrive...no such luck, I ring about 4 different places and they're all full with no room...luck seems to be running out, a cancelled flight and nowhere to stay once I'm there!

WE get our flight at 9, arrive in Brisbane at 9.30, grab a taxi with 3 other english guys going to watch the ashes and head straight tothe gabba...we arrived at 10.15 somehow! but a guy decided to pay the $60 taxi himself, so we obliged and got on our way to our seats. We had missed the first ball but we were there, with Rob and Chris on the beers. We decided we needed a beer and got them in. Sitting in the heat watching the ashes with beers in our hand!....this was the life!!
The stadium was sweet! 40,000 capacity, atmosphere was amazing as we were sat next to the Barmy Army, singing and the other side of us was the Aussie Jarmy Army, all dressed in Pyjamas...they didn't have any songs though apart from...'you are a w**ker!!' or 'sidddddllllleeee, sidddddlllleeee'. Although we will give them credit where its due, the army were singing 'you all live in a convict colony' and we were put in our place with 'you all live in a poor economy' quite witty for the Aussies!!
All out by 4pm, so in the 1st day we also got to watch an hour of us bowling. 5,30 and they called it a day so we headed back to hostels. I still didn't have 1 so went with Rob and Garf to ask if there was anyway I could get somewhere to sleep!....my lucky day in the end....they offered to put me in their tv room with a mattress!! jackpot!!

We headed to the Barmy Army headquarters, an english pub to have dinner and a couple of beers, where they actually serve all the beer in pint glasses!!!this is more like it!! After a few beers we went to a bar where another live band was playing. After a couple we headed back for an early night and decided to live it up the next night.

The next day we headed back to the Gabba the next day to watch us bowl, after a shocking start we managed to get 5 wickets but struggled with Hussey and Haddin. I was sitting next to this aussie woman who couldn't decide if she wanted England to win or Australia. She claimed she was English and moved to Australia 32years ago but had no sign of an english accent. I think she was just trying to be nice as I was surrounded by Australian supporters!! and to be fair they were thrashing us!!!...but the Barmy Army were giving it their all. an early finish at 4pm that day meant we went back to the hostel and meet some of the army at the hostel. some blackpool supporters dressed up in union jack trousers and monty panesar beards were sitting in the bar so we joined them with a few jugs of strongbow! what a crazy bunch!! we met another Town supporter and a scummy Ipswich supporter in that time, whilst 1 of the panesar, Blackpool supporters was trying to tell us Blackpool were the richest club in the premiership and that Charlie Adam was 1 of the best players in the premiership.....course he is mate, course!!



We headed out to the headquarters again for a drink, and then went to Victory again where beer was too cheap! and skittle bombs were a must!!...our groove came out, we had met Ron burgundy too and that's when Rob and I decided Tom looked a lot like Garfield. That entertained us for hours that night! we evenutally decided to head home. Garfield met a friend at the kebab shop, spending about an hour trying to get this Aussie guy to admit that he was his little b*tch and that all Aussies are the English's little b**ches! anyone else would have smashed him but he picked on a little fat guy and wouldn't let go until he admitted it!....he never did!hahah a lot of fun..."you are though aren't you?" "welll just a little bit?"....haha A* for effort!



We tried to get some bikes out for a ride, but Garfield refused to ride them as he had something in his trousers, it was affecting his walking that's for sure...."he's definitely s**t himself!"...so the bikes stayed where they were..We got back. I went into my tv room to find out it was full and I had actually been upgraded to a bed!! Garfield got to the toilet and we got a few hours kip. Up at 9, we went to the Gabba to try and get tickets for the 3rd day, luckily we got 4 tickets together but we just had to sit and watch Hussey and Haddin smash us even more. Until 2pm, however we did get to see Monty Panesar, a highlight there! Then we headed to the airport back to Sydney. An awesome weekend!! The next 2 days we nailed them in the bowling and batting, 517-1. The cookie monster is a hero!.. Hopefully we can get some tickets for the Sydney test in January

Balmoral Beach :)

23/11/2010

Sar finally had a day off from her 2 jobs. After working non-stop for 10 days! This was in my 2 weeks of no work stint, so we decided to do something with our time...beautiful day, 33'C, so we got on the bus at the top of the road and decided to see what Balmoral beach had to offer. We had heard a lot of good things from Jess, Ange, Julz, Tracey and nearly everyone we have met! 15 minutes on the bus and we had arrived. It was beautiful, a long beach again with the rocky headland and houses all built into the hillside surrounding the beach. Then in the middle of the beach there was a bridge out to an island which broke the beach up into 2 parts. We sunbathed for most of the day, took a picnic consisting of pancakes and bread with an avocado dip...yummy! We went to the island to see the great view and get a bit of shade before heading back to the beach to get some more sun....the water was FREEZING! So cold that we chickened out of swimming and decided to paddle and then go back to our sunbathing. Another great beach, just 15mins away...Sydney is getting better by the day, we are living the dream in an amazing city! Definitely heading back once the weather gets back to it's best...possibly Christmas day
We revisited on 14th December...again we both had the day off and the weather has been amazing for the past week! 11am we arrive and lay there until 4. This time I have to take a swim and it's ice cold, sooo refreshing as it's wayyy hot! after 5 hours in the sun Sar has missed everywhere with he cream! red everywhere!! apart from a strip on her arm and 1 of her knees! the sun is leathel!

Melbourne Cup

02/11/2010

The Melbourne Cup came around on 2nd November. We didn't know much about it other than it was a big annual Horse racing event down in Melbourne but we decided to muscle in on it too and place a bet. Sar got told the favourites were number 3,8 and 11 so we decided we would bet $20 on 5 horses. I had heard good things about number 13 (surprisingly!) so we put our money on numbers 3, 7, 11, 13 and 21....We got back with our bet placed so all we needed was any of those horses to get 1st, 2nd or 3rd and we won, too easy....We watched it in our lounge cheering on the horses and...none of them won, number 3 came 3rd so we got a about $3 back! wooooo
13 was a terrible decision, hardly worth racing, and who won....number 8!!! we spent hours kicking ourselves!! we had got told to put money on 3, 8 and 11 and decided we knew better and left number 8 off!! we would have won $100!!!! just to run it in, we should have known...8 is my lucky number, not 13!!!...maybe next year. Tom had put his money on 8 and won $70 back...just to rub it in!

Jobs

2 1/2 months into our year stint in australia and we have gone through a lot of jobs! As soon as we arrived, I had the choice of choosing either an ice-cream man or a removal man. I went for the removal man and gave the boss a call....We had randomly got this number off a guy we met diving in Indonesia! Sure enough I rang him and he offered me work the next day. 6am pick up! It turned out the work was a doddle, filling containers with school tables, desks and chairs to send off to Papua New Guinea etc, and the odd house removal which was nothing the guns couldn't handle.
Although once we moved into our Flat, it meant I needed regular hours. The removal work was on a basis that if he needed me he'd ring me at 9pm the night before and say he'd pick me up at 6. So sometimes I never got the phone call or rang him asking for work and he had nothing for me, so I started to look elsewhere. Also the fact that we had a close encounter with 7 red back spiders on 1 job put me off a little bit, I hadn't signed up for that!
Me and Sar both registered with agencies within the first week hoping to find any job we could....Sar's got back with nothing...useless!! mine got back to me with a job in an airport trying to persuade people to sign up with insurance...I turned this down as I thought the chances are if someone is in the airport, the chances are they have already got their insurance sorted! Plus I think for the sake of the company it would be best if I didn't do a shitty job like that!!

So I held out the removal work for a bit longer, starting to get regular hours but then every week my pay would be wrong, so I'd have to chase it up and really hassle him for the money. So I continued looking. I got a text from this guy who asked me to do some call centre work for him...the ironic thing was he couldn't talk on the phone about it, it was all through text! so I did 3 9-5 shifts and to be honest....it was hell!! getting abuse on the phones all day ringing people in Victoria asking if there was a political election, which party they want to vote for...as you can imagined I got told to shove it everywhere possible!!
luckily, well not at the time, he then had no work for the next 2 weeks. So I had turned down the airport job, no work at the call centre and the removal jobs were about 2 jobs a week...It was time I got my amazing as ever CV out on the road, got my RSA so I could work in a bar and went on the job hunt...I handed it into about 10 bars, 3 cafes and a bakery. A week later I heard nothing back so decided to chase them up, and out of the blue the bakery offered me a job!! the local bar up the road is a possibility too, so 3 jobs later here I am working in a bakery with full time hours!...wearing white trousers, white top, an apron and a hat...this job is a real mans job...so much that when the removal guy rang me to do a job I couldn't tell him I was working in a bakery, instead.....a cafe!

Sar had no luck with the agency mallarky and her CV looks a lot better than mine, plus she's also added a picture of her face on her CV which has worked well! Sar had no work for around 1 month apart from the odd babysitting job, 1 of which she saw a huntsman spider and rang me to drive over and kill it!...I told Sar to smack and if not get the little Aussie kid to, she must be used to them living here...that didn't go down well, she started crying!! So I got in the car ready, and sadly we had a flat tyre!...turns out the spider was on the outside of the window anyways!!!...mr toad!!
So 1 month of sitting around, she got a call for an interview at a shop and nailed it!!
Sar soon got a job at Forever New, a womeswear shop and on her 2nd shift got offered to be jewellery manager! and also, meeting Tracey through our Aussie friends we met in Vietnam, managed to swindle her a role in a cafe up the road doing 3 days at each job! Sar also got offered a few jobs but had to turn them down as she already had too many hours offered to her!! So 2 1/2 months in and we are finally going well... I thought I'd post a blog if anyone is interested in what jobs we've done and what we're doing now, plus so we don't forget!...It's not as easy as it's made out well for us anyways!

Both getting ready for work in the morning, Sar calls me in the room to find a HUGE huntsman on the wall...As I have a duel with the spider, he wimps out and runs under the bed. Luckily he ran onto a box. Pulled the box out, Sar hands me a flip flop and I smash him...huntsman in the house count: 1 - huntsman surviving in the house - 0

Halloween

Halloween had come around and like usual we wanted a party for it, just like being back at uni. Jess had arranged to rent a village hall out and have a party there but that fell through, so instead we went over to julz's for pre-drinks before heading into King's Cross to a club where if you're dressed in fancy dress you get free entry. Elyse was also coming down from Newcastle to party so we got to see her again which is always good news. Once we have regular jobs rolling and cash flowng we aim to go up to Nelson Bay, home to Jess, Julz, Elyse, Ange and Chris to party!
We couldn't decide what to dress up as but last minute decided Sar would go as a doctor, I would go as a mime and Tom would go as a vampire. Being pretty skint it was hard to get a costume together but Sar found her kids costume for $5! I had bought a stripy t-shirt anyway so just needed some facepaint and a hat so we got by!
The night before we had gone out to the Oaks for Rob's birthday and Sar got pretty drunk! So she decided to drink water for the halloween party. That was a bad move as she got to realise how bad the club in Kings Cross really was being in a sober state! I decided to take a goon to drink (box of cheapo wine), which was a bad mistake. The next morning I had the worst headache ever!! We met the rest of Julia's housemates and many other of their friends which was cool and hit the club, which turned out to be, only girls dressed up get in free, not guys! $15 each for us! Ordering cider at the bar and the barstaff didn't even know they sold what we were ordering is always a good sign!...The club was a bit of a dive but we had fun nonetheless

Summer Bay - 20th October

Although I had work as a removal man, it wasn't guarenteed everyday work. Some days I would get a call and it would be a 3 hour job, other days an 8 hour job and some days, no work at all. It turned out I had no work at all, Sar still didn't have a job so we decided to do something with ourselves. Rob had lent us his car, a beast....Ford Falcon estate, automatic. The easiest car to drive in the world, well once you've hit the gearstick to start her up!!



We set off, Sar with the map in her hand and me behind the wheel. We set off north and kept going until we hit Palm Beach. The famous beach known as the 'Home & Away' beach where it's set, 'Summer Bay'. We found a parking spot, and decided to walk up to the end of the beach. A beautiful day, probably one of the hottest we've had since being in Australia, so it was all good. As we walked past, the home and away cast were out filming up on the top of the beach. We were going to head over to see the hero Alf, but decided we would stop off on the way back. We continued right up to the end of the beach and sat up on the sand dunes admiring the amazing view of the whole beach, as well as trying to figure out how to get up to the lighthouse....we were unsuccessful, much to Sar's delight!! 1 thing we did notice was the number of dead birds that had been washed up...that was a bit weird, but didn't dent the beauty of the beach a bit....Almost orange sand and the sea around Sydney seems sooo blue, as if we were back in Indonesia! After spending a few hours at the beach, we decided to slowly drive back and stop off at the many beaches we past on the way up. We stopped off to get some food. Sar found a nice restaurant, but it came with a price tag, so as we sat down and looked at the menu we decided maybe we should skimp out and go to the chip shop next door......Great move!! huge portions for $4! 2 pieces of fish and too many chips....now we're back eating real food!



We stopped off at Whale Beach, Avalon Beach and Freshwater Beach on the way back, which were all similar to Palm Beach but smaller versions. They all had the orange sand, the blue water, a few surfers surfing the waves and the rocky headland at each end with houses built on the edge of the hillside around the beach.. Driving round the winding roads admiring the views over the next beach and then winding down again to the front of the beach until we got back to Sydney. It was an awesome day, we couldn't believe what was so close by. A few miles out of the city and there was this paradise of beaches to take your pick from, and this was only the northshore beaches!

The Pommies hit Oz

We left Bali after wasting our last spends on cocktails by the pool and headed (both with a slightly muggy head) to the airport for our flight to Sydney :-) we were soooo excited!
After only a short flight of 6hours and after not much sleep...I thought I was about to faint, we didnt get any food, the guy next to Dom was watching topless girls on his TV. We hit Australia, Dom's friends Tom and Rob were picking us up and had offered us a place to crash for a few days while we got ourselves sorted, which was such a relief and so helpful for us. We met them after rushing through customs...I forgot to mention that I had coral and shells in my bag...so I am now a smuggeler! haha!
We headed towards the car..which turned out to be a beast named the 'falcon' it was huge and such a great car for travelling round! (Dom and I have even took it out for a spin around Sydney..obviously getting lost a few times, both thinking we knew the way...how wrong) So off we set through the city at 8am...rush hour! It was so amazing to see and after crossing the bridge (the one and only harbour bridge) we knew that our time in Sydney and the rest of Australia was going to be Swwweeet!!
For the rest of the day Tom took us sight seeing around Circular Quay and the city. We walked arcoss the harbour bridge, went for a good old Aussie Beer, walked around to the Opera house and took a stroll through the Botanical gardens which was amazing, especially after seeing all the huge fruit bats hanging from the trees. I had my first Aussie meal, which is just the same as anything you find in England minus the Kangaroo steak, of wedges with sour cream and chilli sauce...mmm mmmm!! I was hooked!!
For the rest of the day we walked around the city seeing all the shops mainly...it was a strange city as it didnt actually feel like you were in a city, there was gardens everywhere and not that many tall buildings, so it felt different, but still amazing!

The next few days were just so great, we job hunted for a lot of the time and took the bus and ferry around the city for the rest. We visited the Wildlife world and saw our first Koala bears and Kangaroos. Darling harbour was awesome and the weather definatley wasnt letting us down. The weekend came around and we went out to Manly, a beach side town, it rained...but it was a great atmosphere watching the rugby final in a bar. We had a few more drinks and of course the wedges and sour cream to fill us up...and drank the night away!!

We finally saw Jess and Julz for tea and had a great meal with them..which turned out to be a few great meals.

The following week Dom had managed to get a job doing some removals for a guy named Alistaire. Dom was getting up at 6am every morning and coming back at around 5pm...great for him and money but really long hours moving desks and furniture all day!! But hey it was a job which is what we needed, as Sydney was sooooo expensive!!
We managed to get a flat within that week, which was beautiful, I was in heaven as it was unfurnished...we hit IKEA that weekend!! On the Sunday we took at trip to the harbour on our side of the bridge, fishing rods in hand!! Yes a fishing day!! Rob and Tom were pretty much pro's and when Dom attempted it, well...it was a complete disaster, he lost his hook a lot!! But hey, I took over after telling him that I could actually fish, 5minutes later I caught a HUGE sole fish!! haha...take that one Dom!! Obviously we let him swim back in, but the competition was on!! haha!! The following week Dom bought a fish home with him after they had been out fishing, as you can imagine, not impressed as it stinks!! It is still wrapped up in our freezer!!

Diving and Island hopping

The boat from Lembongan to Gili, wasnt the best ride although compared to the boat from Bali to Lembongan, it was luxury. We all piled into this tiny fisherman's boat which took us out of the bay to the real boat for the rest of the journey. It started off all ok, until we got right out to sea. Sooo so rocky, sar got given 3 sick bags just incase...We needed Rach's wristbands!
We arrived a couple of hours later in the boiling hot sun. The beach looked amazing!!! Gili was so quiet, no motorbikes or cars, just bicycles and horse and cart which was cool. With our bags we decided we would stay off the main strip where it would be even quieter. Luckily this Indonesian guy, Montana led us down the beaten track and to his bungalows which were really nice. We agreed a price and made ourselves at home. We were right out in the country nextdoor to all the locals, we had a hammock, and a garden and to top it off we had a kitten to play with! Ki-Ki....she was a cool cat!

The first thing we thought we'd do on our way to the beach was to look for a good diving place to book 2 dives with. I really wanted to do Shark Point as I had heard it was the best site to do, and we thought Manta Point would be cool, to possibly see a manta ray. We booked up to dive the next day and take a camera again with the 1st dive place we found. Later we were on our way to the beach and we passed another dive place, Gili Dives, ran by an English guy and a few english instructors who seemed really cool. It turns out the guy we were talking to (and later diving with) was from Bury and knew Jodie!! small world! He recommended another site where we would be guarenteed to see turtles. This had to be a definite!...We booked up with these for the next day and went back to cancel the first place.
We finally got to the beach around 4 which was a bit pointless, and soon headed back to get ready for tea. Both of us were not hungry at all, purely because nothing on any of their menu's are very appealing anymore...We are just craving a chippy or some real pub food, not noodles, or noodles topped with a fried egg or noodle soup!!



We had to be up and ready for our dive at 8.30am where we got all our equipment ready and headed on the boat to the site. We did shark point first which was cool, although we didn't see a shark, (well we didnt see much really as both our masks had fogged up which was annoying, we had to keep cleaning our masks underwater!! not the best thing you want to be doing!!haha) but we did see a LOT of turtles, and 1 was HUGE! his head was literally the size of mine and he just swam straight underneath us, it was amazing!! We also saw a cuttlefish which was strange, they look more like an octopus than a fish and they change colour etc with their surroundings.....really cool!!
Also as we had the camera we were snapping away, I took a picture of a triggerfish and the flash went off, which set him off....the next thing I knew he was coming for me...and they have MASSIVE teeth!!!
Although we could see a little bit as we kept clearing our masks it was really annoying and ruined the dive for us both, but we were looking forward to our next dive at 12
This time our masks were perfect (before you dive, spit in your mask! sounds sick but works) and we were down for almost an hour as it was a shallow dive. We saw Hawkbill turtles as well as green turtles :-)

We arranged to do another dive the next day, deciding on shark point again and this time we saw a shark which was really cool. The next day we decided to have a day off and lay on the beach ALLLL day! We had a great lazy day and ended up going to watch the Man Utd Vs Liverpool game which was a great game! Even Sar was getting into it by the end! Until Man Utd got the 3rd goal!!!
The next day we decided to do another dive, I decided to go to Deep Turbo which was amazing, it was like being in a different world, the coral was all unspoilt and sooo surreal!..and we saw another shark :-)..Sar went with Max to do Halik again and had the best dive in the world....63mins, and saw lots more turtles, the REAL nemos!! Morays, a banded seasnake (if you get bitten by 1 you're dead in 6 seconds!!!...luckily they only have teeth at the back of their jaw!) and lion fish...I was very jealous when she came back!
As we had done 4 dives they said our 5th would be half price so we planned to have 2 days on the beach and then do our last dive. However when it came round to it, max lauren and Jamie had gone and Dan was busy so we had a french girl take us, who was really cool in the end. We thought at first, it was going to be rubbish but we had fun.

The 2 days in between we lay on the beach allllll dayyy and it was wayyy hot!!! we burnt our noses yet again every day! every morning we would get breakfast, have a lombok coffee (so good...dont drink them in the evening though, you won't sleep!) and lay on the beach. That's where we stayed until around 4-5ish! We even got lunch as a takeaway so we could eat it on the beach and not move!! We rented out snorkels 1 day which was a lot of fun, even though we felt really ill after!. You swim about 15yards out and you see soooo much, we saw a turtle swimming around, barracuda and lots of Dories!!! That made Sar happy!! every dive we have never seen a Dorie and Sar had found them!
After 2 lazy days we had our last dive which was at 3, so we lay on the beach until then and then did the dive, it was around an old sunken wreck/pier which was awesome. Once we had done the dive and got back, we mentioned coming back around February and maybe doing our advanced, and they invited us to do an internship and do our divemaster course with them over the course of a few months which would be really cool!!!
1 More lazy day and we were off back to Bali for our flight to Sydney!! Originally we had planned to go to Gili Meno but we decided not to as we had heard there was nothing there! besides, Gili T had everything, a great beach, dive, snorkel and our bungalow was pretty cool! We had read Gili T was meant to be the party Island but it was dead every night! it was soooo quiet!!! which was definitely a good thing...
As for Ki-Ki, we couldn't get her out of our room the first few days and everytime we woke up and opened the door she would come running in.....after those few days we haven't found her!! Nor has her owner Montana which is a bit worrying!

Nearly 7 months travelling, covering India, Nepal, China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Laos, Thailand and Indonesia, we are ready to arrive in Australia and have a permanent home for a while! An amazing 7 months and now for leg 2 of the trip!....Bring it on Sydney...

Island hopping

After leaving Thailand with our Diving Licences in hand, we headed off to Bali to hit the beach and dive the sites for 3 weeks before we finally reach Sydney and start working...after nearly 7 months of travelling, I suppose it was time we started to do some sort of work!
We slept for a few hours on the comfy seats in the Bangkok airport, a lot comfier than the Delhi airport!! So we managed to actually get some sleep before we had to check in at 4am. It all went smoothly until we went through passport control. Ofcourse as we came from Laos into Thailand overland, we only had a 15day visa, we were leaving on our 17th day so we were pulled aside by an officer and had to fill in some forms and pay a 2day fine. No doubt we are now blacklisted and won't be allowed back in!!!haha



We sailed on through and caught our flight into Denpasar, Indonesia. We had been looking forward to returning back to Bali after our last trip. The first 5 days we spent on Kuta beach, Tourist central!! but that makes Kuta what it is in a way. Full of Australians left right and center, I guess Bali to them is like Spain to us. The weather was Sooooo hot and we did nothing but spend 5 days on the beach, deciding against surfing this time and thinking more about where to go to dive, especially with the famous Mola-Mola sunfish. Luckily for us it is in season for Mola-Mola's to be around the coast of Bali between July - October so fingers crossed we would be in luck. We also found 3 ridiculously cheap restaurants that were selling plates of fish and chips for just over £1 and local food, (1 day I had 2 whole catfish, chips and vegetables) for about 80p!! awesome stuff!!
Our accommodation was cheap but horrendous!! definitely the worst we have ever stayed in!! at night you could hear rats running around above the ceiling and when we told the owner he just looked and agreed as if it was no problem!haha fair enough. Although, the place was ok, the owners were friendly and they had a pet monkey who was really cool, we had made a friend!
After spending 5 days on the beach, our tans had suddenly picked up!...after 1 day we could tell the difference, the sun is so different here to the rest of SE Asia...Sar was really happy, now she could carry on working on her tan!

5 days was enough and we decided we had seen what we were interested in seeing here on our last trip when we went around the South of the island with James and Hayley who showed us the beautiful beaches, the Uluwatu temple, and the famous surf sites such as Dreamlands and Pedang Pedang. Although there are Volcanoes and mountain villages which would be cool, we had come here to chill out and do nothing but hit the beach and dive.
The next day we decided we would get a boat across to a tiny island called Nusa Lembongan, which had a site called Crystal Bay which is the site to go to if you really want a good chance of seeing a Mola-Mola. The boat ride was a public boat and took nearly 2 hours, it was horrible!! From start to finish it was rocking everywhere, it had 2 floats either side which I guess is used to stabilise the boat but the sea was wayyy too choppy for these to even remotely help!! Sar thought she was going to be sick on multiple occasions and she wasn't sitting next to the side, instead if she was going to be sick it would be all over me or the bags, or herself!!!hahah luckily she wasn't sick and just felt ill, for a while even when we had arrived.

We arrived and we met with beautiful sunshine and the bluest water we had ever seen, it was AMAZING! quite a few boats mind you but we had been warned by Lonely Planet, because of the local seaweed farms. The seaweed was a big industry here as we later found out, it is used for their ice-creams!! oo errr!
We walked along the seafront and tried to find a cheap room. This proved impossible and we had to settle at the end of the beach at a place where it was about £10 a night...A little bit priceier than we thought but we figured that must be the island as a whole compared to Kuta. although we were paying more the rooms were pretty big and impressive, no rats and really really clean, luxury in a way that it was similar to the standards of Rainbow in Pha-Ngan which is, GOOD!!
That day we headed straight to the diving centre and arranged a day to do 2 dives and hopfully see a Mola-Mola. I still had 2 days left where I wasn't allowed in the water or in the sun because of my tattoo so we arranged it for our 4th day there to be safe!
The beach was awesome, the waves and the surf was all set about 100yards out and from there to the shore it was really shallow and no waves....paradise. We still couldn't believe how blue it was and spent most of the day on the beach. We headed out for tea and had Barracuda which was pretty good although I think my plate was the 1 that some people next to us had turned away because it was overdone, so I guess they just brought it to me, it was nice nonetheless but not compared to Rach's in Tao!
The next day we moved rooms where we paid the same but had an even better room and a balcony! it was cool and owned by some Australians who were really friendly.
We spent the next couple of days on the beach, and didn't move apart from to get food, from where we were staying. They did the BEST fish and chips and at a good size too! lots of chips and lots of fish...perfect.
There's not much to tell for the next couple of days as we didn't move from the beach, I was finally allowed to swim, and so we sunbathed and sat in the sea all day and would watch the sunset in the evening before getting a quick shower and having tea.

Diving came around, and bright and early we were up and at the diving school for 9 o clock. We got all our equipment and checked the sizes before heading on the boat. We decided to rent a camera too to get some pictures. We were joined by a group of advanced divers and a group of open water divers. It turned out our group was me Sarah and the divemaster which was great news! the bad news was, we had been told before we got on the boat that we were going to Crystal Bay only to find out once we were on the boat and on our way that we weren't :( so our chances of seeing a Mola-mola were pretty slim, still we kept hope.
Our first dive site was called Buyuk, and it was amazing, we dropped down around 23m and saw a lot, massive schools of fish, huge fish, and the highlight, was a Shark!! We had seen a black tip shark! It was awesome, it was coming straight at us which sent the heart going, such an awesome feeling. We had the camera too so were snapping away while this shark was coming towards us. It soon lost interest and headed away. We then saw some lionfish which were pretty impressive and then headed up to the surface. Sar had found her new hobby, playing with the camera under water, keeping her occupied for the whole dive!!

Back on the boat and we got a free lunch (if you can call a handful of rice lunch) and had an hour wait until our next dive. We set off hoping to be at Crystal Bay but we stopped too soon so it was official, we weren't going! We stopped at a bay called Toyapakeh which was an interesting dive, the current was sooooo strong, so most of the dive we were just floating with the current which was cool until you get too far away from the coral and it becomes hard to control and you're in the full force of the current!! still quite fun but we had no control over how fast we went and struggled to look for fish. We did see some Nemo fish which were cool to play with and ofcourse we had the camera so were playing around with that. A good day but sadly no Mola-Mola's, but still 1 amazing dive and 1 strange dive and 400 pictures to go through when we got back!! It turned out that they didn't charge us for the camera so we got it for free!! that evening we had tea and were met by an Australian couple and a guy from Belgium who we chatted with. They were on our boat from the open water dive group. The Australians ran a caravan park in Rode, between Adelaide and Melbourne and invited us to come and visit over Christmas so that's an option!!
The next morning we had booked our boat to go and see the Gili Islands. We both didn't want to leave Lembongan but at the same time were excited to see the Gili's and do some more diving

Koh Samui and Bangkok

We could all agree that we didnt want to leave Koh Tao...especially Sairee Cottages and the beach, but we were and we were off to Koh Samui. Rach and Mike wanted to do some elephant trekking and we wanted to show them around the waterfalls. So off we set on the 'high speed' boat...it was a very fast boat that was for sure. We arrived there in under 2hours and luckily I slept the whole way, after our busy morning of diving :)

We were greeted by rain...as per usually on Koh Samui, but we jumped into a taxi and arrived at New Huts around 45minutes later. We settled in and once the rain had stopped took a walk into Lamai town centre to check out the food markets and shops. It was so quiet around the town, we had a stroll and bought a few things (no change there) and grabbed a bite or two to eat at the market. The food was scrummy. Mike and Dom even found McDonalds (MikeDomalds hahaha) and bought a few cheese burgers (they later did sample the TRIPLE cheeseburger and DOUBLE BigMac!!! Crikey) We later turned in for an early night after far too many early mornings.

The next day Rach and Mike had planned to go on an elephant trek, so while Dom and I sunbathed they went trekking. They came back 2 hours later with huge smiles on their faces saying that they had an amazing time. They fed their elephant 'beer' with bananas and got loads of snaps taken by their driver, which was cool!! Many pictures on there for Josie!! :)
To finish off the afternoon we rented 2 motorbikes out and took a whizz around to the mumified monk...it was a little strange as this mumified monk sits in a glass cabinet with raybans on!!...But we did get our monk bracelets and we set off again to go to Namung Waterfall.
We parked our bikes and began the 'hour' walk to the top...(it wasnt actually 1 hour but the staff at the bottom where telling us it was so we bought a ticket to get a ride up in a fancy truck) the wolfpack being troopers opted against this idea and took the hike! So almost half an hour later we arrived at the top, where you couldnt actually swim (that came later) but admired the 80m view. We took a few steps down and came to the swimming pool, where we all jumped in and had a swim (I especially jumped in as I was desperate for a wee), Rach had even bought her 'sea shoes' (very funny indeed) so while she took around 15minutes to put them on and get in...and also take all the pictures for us, we were ready to leave! hahaha!! Only joking. We stayed there for a while and when it got a little nippy we headed back to get on the bikes. So after a fuel stop at KFC...much needed I'm sure...we set back off to our huts to get a change of clothes, do a little packing ready to leave tomorrow and headed out for another whizz around to Chaweng Beach.

We went straight to the first bar and grabbed some drinks...luckily for us it was happy hour, so we had some yummy cocktails :) We did yet more shopping, where we drove a hard bargain and had a little walk through the town. It was a lot busier than Lamai...full of lady boys really, we had to turn down the Thai Boxing since they were charging over £20 per ticket :( but to make up for the loss we headed to McD!! Cheesy chips were on the menu as well as the huge burgers which the boys opted for, McDonalds impressed us more when we saw the Singha bar out front!! The night was drawing to a close so we headed back and did our final packing ready for Bangkok tomorrow!!

So we were checked out at 10am and after another little walk around...a few more buys :p ...our pickup came and we were off...Goodbye beaches :(
We were dropped off at the ferry pier, where we randomly got onto another coach and then boarded a ferry...we didnt quite realise it was a car ferry we were going on, it was different but nice, we were across the ocean within 1 and a half hours and we set off in the coach to Surat Thani. 1hour later we were told to get off and wait...luckily we were at a restuarant, which was kind of them. We got the Uno cards out, of course, and played a lot of games, we ordered food, lots of tea and played with the two kittens that lived there. 2hours after we were dropped off our VIP bus turned up. The bus was empty and only about 10 of us got on. We got front row seats for the films (well film...after Dom told them to turn it off after already watching it once, only for them to miss hear him and presume he wanted to go to bed at 9:15!! hahaha!! Night then!!)

3:30am we arrived in Bangkok...we did find a room for us all and hit the deck until 10 the next morning. We had a busy day of spending lots of money shopping, Dom was getting his tattoo and Rach, Mike and I were going to get a final Peddy :) Dom got his tattoo booked for 12:30 and while he waited we all went to get our pedicure...they were addictive. Mike even had a foot scrub again, but no polish. Dom's time was up and he was waiting for the guy to start, he had to lie on the bed face down through a small hole. It was funny as Mike photographed him while he was getting it done, his face was all scrunched up, but it was worth it in the end, it looked so good. In between Dom getting his tattoo Rach and I went and shopped, we bought A LOT!! But returned to meet the boys who thought they had deserved a beer...Dom had got a tattoo and Mike had got a pedicure (he thought he had better restore some dignity, he did this by downing his beer) We grabbed a bite to eat before booking a taxi for Rach and Mike to get to the airport, we had a final drink and a few games on Uno and before we knew it, it was time to say our goodbyes :(
The wolfpack would be split in half, so it was an emotional goodbye, I cried after they left, off they went in their taxi to the airport....hopefully we would be back as a pack soon...Thailand in February?? Yeaaaahhhhhhhhhhh :)

Diving Adventures in Koh Tao

Sorry for the halt in blogs...Rachel Marie Wain and Michael Graham Humphreys are responsible for coming out to meet us and having too much fun to even think about the blog!

While we were waiting for our boat to Tao, we got chatting to a guy about Crystal dive resort. We could get a good deal as well as 2 rooms on the same site at the beach we wanted. once we arrived (Rach and Sar had survived the boat trip!...thanks to those wristbands!!haha) we were escorted to Crystal. It turns out there were no spare rooms on Sairee beach so we had to spend a night at mae haad and then move to Sairee the next day. We werent very happy about this as the only reason we picked Crystal was because the guy on the boat had guarenteed us a room. They decided to tell us once we had paid for our diving so we had to stay with them.
The beach itself wasnt too bad, it was just on the boat port, and not where we wanted to be. We had already had a poop morning with the passports so we werent in the best mood. Mike especially wasnt, after waiting all morning to get the passports and then to arrive on Tao and hear the bad news!! We made it clear that if we couldn't get a room at Sairee beach then we wanted a refund...we werent asking anymore, we were telling them!! haha...I think this got through to them and by the end of the day they were promising us rooms. We had even gone to Sairee Beach that evening, to eat at Sairee cottages...sooooo goood!! and stopped off at the Crystal resort on the beach to make sure we would get first pickings by speaking to their manager!...All seems a little extreme looking back, but we got what we wanted in the end!! hahaha!

The next morning we were ready at 10am to check out, and we had 2 rooms confirmed at Sairee beach :) WOOHOOO!!! we got some breakfast and then got a free taxi to the other resort. The rooms were bungalows which was good, but still no Rainbow on Pha-Ngan!! they would do, for free...Me and Sar had to get a taxi (free again) back to the other Crystal as that was where all the diving happened. Yep every day I had to get a taxi there and a taxi back in the evening...a bit tedious but we were on the good beach!!
We got some bad news when we arrived, all psyched up and excited to be doing our diving, only for Sar to be told she wasn't allowed. She admitted she had fainted in the past 6months and their medical guy said she wouldn't be able to dive for atleast 5 years!!haha! So Sar got another free taxi back to meet Mike and Rach on the beach.
That put a downer on the day and I really didn't want to be there. I wasn't allowed a refund as there was no medical complications so if I backed out to do it elsewhere with Sar, I would be throwing my money away, whereas Sar got a full refund so could look elsewhere on Sairee beach. It didn't help that the rest of the afternoon I was stuck in a classroom surrounded by french people watching videos and answering questions about what we had just watched (yep exactly like being at school again! not good!...6months of no work or anything so this came as a BIG shock!)....the other 3 had it easy just sunbathing on the beach....and to rub it in, when I got back at 6, I got a little message in the door saying they were having cocktails on the beach!! a hard day for them aswell hey!!..I joined for a beer.
We had an amazing evening, me and Mike went onto another bar to watch the grand prix and have a few changs while the girls got ready. We ate at the usual, Sairee cottages and got there in happy hour, ordering beer and kebabs. The girls went crazy and had a whole Snapper to share and 2 of the biggest prawns they could find!...So GOOD!!!
The next day I went off at 8 o clock to my class!! today we got split up into our groups of 6 and spent the day with our instructor. In my group were 2 guys from Birmingham, Matt and Tom, 2 french guys, Gary and Mikael and a girl Inbal from Israel. Our instructor was from New Zealand and his very original nickname was Kiwi..what a guy! He seemed a bit of a headcase, telling us how he fights with triggerfish by kicking them in the head and is MAD about sharks, which I guess is good for an instructor. So enthusiastic....at 8am I wasn't feeling the enthusiasm and as we were still doing theory all morning I wasn't going to! All afternoon we got the gear on and hit the swimming pool....at first I didn't like it, the beathing underwater was SO loud and I didn't feel comfortable, but it was ok! once we had done skills (such as taking your mask off underwater and putting it back on, breathing without your air supply etc) I was loving it! I left with some enthusiasm at last!! I couldn't wait to get in the ocean the next day...although my diving partner was Gary, a french guy...and a hero!! haha purely because he was either always lost in translation or didn't listen! He never quite knew what we were doing and I knew if I needed his help in the ocean I was screwed!



I came home really excited but didn't want to rub it in to Sar how much she was missing out so I said it was alright, told her about my day and then asked how hers was, on the beach all day!...Sar pulls out her PADI book and it turns out she went and got on a course at Sairee Cottages with 1 on 1 tuition!! I couldn't believe it! great news!! we were both finally doing what we had come to Tao to do, just unfortunatley not together!! Mike and Rach moved to Sairee Cottages as we no longer had 2 free rooms, and they were loving it aswell so everyone was happy....another great meal and evening followed.
The next day me and Sar both went diving into the ocean to do our dives, I did my first 2 dives, Sar did her 'confined water session' which was basically a dive and another dive. Rach and Mike also were off to snorkel around the island including shark bay. By the end of the day we were all on a high! The diving was AMAZING. As soon as we finished a dive I just wanted to get back in and explore to find different fish. The coral was so colourful and there were soooo many fish, 1 minute I would find myself in the middle of a school of fish!. Kiwi pointed out a triggerfish but luckily it wasn't mad so no fights were needed. Also we saw a spotted stingray which was awesome!
We did some skills 1 at a time, such as switching to our alternate reg, and breathing underwater etc.Just after we had got in from our 2nd dive, an instructor said there was a turtle and if you want to jump in and see it do so. We all jumped in but missed it by a minute!...DAM!! When we all got back, I headed to Sarie beach to find Sar and the others to hear about their day. Everyone had had an amazing day, Sar couldn't wait to get back in a dive the following day. Rach was adamant she wasn't going to eat and was going to be sick after the boat back!...2 hours later we did go for tea, and Rach had the biggest meal in the world!!haha



Our last day diving was cool, the first dive, Gary went off and we couldn't find him for a while! he was at the surface waiting!hah...the 2nd we had a videographer following us for the last dive, which caught us jumping in backwards etc. It also caught us doing forward roles and backwards roles underwater! this was all well and good until I attempted a backwards role and faceplanted the coral!...looked around and the camera was next to me! sweet!! After the 2 dives, we were officially qualified open water divers!! what a feeling!! I just wanted to go back and do it all again. I met the others and Sar felt the same, she wanted to dive again especially after seeing a turtle and swimming with nemo, How amazing! i was sooo jealous but hopfully in Bali we would see some more!! So we managed to set up 2 more dives for the morning before we got our boat to Samui. This way we could dive together, be buddies!!haha...That night me and mike went back to Crystal to watch the video of my group diving, and had a few drinks. By the time it was all over, we got back a bit later than expected, around 9. We picked the girls up and met the others from my group at a bar for a quick drink. Up at 5.30 the next morning a bit worse for wear, we got on the boat for 6.15 to go and do our 30m dive!! The deep water dive!...where we would see real fish!...It was amazing, we were on the seabed at 28m! it was so cool to look up and just see blue!...fish swimming above you!..The best feeling in the world, better than a skydive, paragliding or anything I've ever done. Swimming around and we saw a few box fish, stingrays, unicornfish, batfish, oh and just the 400lb grouper fish! he was HUGE!!! his mouth must have been atleast a metre wide!! awesome! before we knew it, it was over and we had our 2nd dive, at 16m which was a lot of fun, before heading back and catching the boat to Samui.

Thailand, Koh Phangan and Bangkok

So our two week stint in Thailand had come around wayyy too quick, and after 5 and a half months of being away from home, we had our first visitors :) YAYY. Rach and Mike were meeting us in Bangkok and after about an hour of waiting and some dodgy directions we met them on Khoa San Road. It was soo great to see them...finally some familiar faces.

We set our bags down and made our way to the main street to grab a Pad Thai...as this had been the main talking point for some time prior tho the trip ("Its a fruit" hahaha). I think everyone throughoughly enjoyed the street food, even Rach, who wasnt too keen, as she didnt want to upset her stomach!! haha! We spent the rest of the night drinking from the famous Chang Beer towers (although Dom and Mike got San Miguel as there was no Chang lady) and eating banana and chocolate pancakes :)
The following day we had some free time on our hands before we had to make our way on the overnight bus to Koh Phangan, so we treated ourselves to a fish eating spa...extremley strange, definitely not theraputic, but our feet felt great afterwards...well Dom's especially, ALL the fish enjoyed nibbling on his feet a little too much. We obviously had to top that off with a pedicure...even Mike. Dom wasnt too keen on the idea, Im not sure why, as it was sooo good!! So our feet were neatly cleaned and painted with small little flowers on too and now we were ready to shop!!!..well Mike didn't finish it off with a pretty little flower...Although it would have looked good!

We definitely shopped for the rest of the day...Rach and Mike probably spent the majority of their money...only joking!! They did buy a lot though throughout the whole 2weeks!! hahah. We hung around until 6pm when our bus was due to pick us up...Thailand being Thailand obviously it was late. We had to wait until 7:00 for the bus to turn up but we couldnt complain after only actually paying for 2 tickets, not 4, after the lady didnt count our money properley and Dom had actually short changed her by 500baht...£10!! hahaha.

So after a pretty sleepless night, two rubbish films...Independance Day being one...a lot of games of uno, a million bags of crisps, a VIP bus, a local bus, a mini bus, a boat and a tuk tuk we arrived in Koh Phangan Rainbow cottages at around mid-day!! The place was amazing, we were definitely spoilt by this one. The rooms were little bungalows in an amazing garden, right next to the beach....which was basically our own beach as no one else was there. It was heaven. We threw our bags in the rooms, grabbed some lunch, which again was beautiful, and ran straight into the sea. It was like a bath, we had to wade out quite far to get some depth and even then we were still only knee deep. But we couldnt complain, the sun was beaming and we were in the middle of Thailand :)

The next few days were spent sunbathing, eating lots of food, playing beach ball with the owners two dogs, Max and Roly (who Rach had willingly adopted for 4 days), playing Jenga and drinking Chang and milk....(not in that order) ..mmmm. It wasnt until the Full Moon party that we got dressed up and opened our cheap (75p) bottles of whiskey from Laos...the drink was suprisingly nice. We painted ourselves in neon colours and got our raving clothes on ready to experience the full moon!! We arrived around midnight and stepped out of our taxi to be greeted by a girl throwing up all over herself...lovely sight as you can imagine. We headed to the beach and took lots of snaps of our raving gear under the UV lights!! There was a huge mix of all different music kind of mixed into one, from one bar to the next. Everyone seemed to be wasted, we must have been late starters beginning to drink at 7pm, it was fun though. We had a bucket on the beach, while trying to avoid the drunken stumblers from falling over us. It was one of those moments where you could laugh at every single drunk person who walked past because they were all a mess!! Before we left we got some chips...it felt like we were in huddersfield again hahah, and headed back to get a taxi. Mike and Dom had other plans and finished the bottle of whiskey off back at the bungalows,staying up until 7am!! They were definitely the ones who were rough in the morning. hahaha!!

We had a few days left and rented some mopeds out, we took Rach and Mike to Koh Ma beach, where one strip of sand connected one island to another, it was soo amazing. The weather, yet again, was beautiful and we decided to rent out snorkels. The coral reefs were so coool, we swam around for about 1 hour looking at so many differnet fish. This definitely got me excited for scuba diving!! Rach and Mike had gone to get a aloe vera massage on the beach since they had burnt themselves for the last 3days while me and Dom sunbathed. We headed back around 6 just before the sunset and had amazing views over the island on the windy roads back to the hotel.

We were ready to leave the next day for Koh Tao...yayyyy!! and after attempting to give the bikes back to the lady who rented them out to us, the boys realised that her shop wasnt open, we stayed as long as we could before we had to be at the boat jetty and Mike opted to stay to collect the passports while me, Rach and Dom got the boat to Tao (turtle island)...we thought the lady had done a runner, as she charged two girls at our hotel £500 for falling off their bikes!! haha...apparently she had gone on holiday though.

So off we went to our second island...my favourite out of them all...Sairee beach here we come :)

Vang Vieng - Tudding (Rachel wain's reference to tubing)

We arrived from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng at 3ish with the eye(s) infection still intact, in the pouring rain. Possibly the most bizarre bus journey we have had yet. Our bus stopped off at a streetside restaurant for some lunch which was fair enough. As we got back on the bus to carry on, they decided the bus would stop there for good!..sure
That meant about 15 of us had to squeeze onto another bus which had 2 spare seats! 1 at the back in the middle of the 'boyz' (locals) and another well, half a seat next to some, how shall we put it....large Lao who wasn't going to make any effort to make space!...Luckily as we were first on we claimed those 'good' seats and the rest sta on plastic stools in the aisle way. Chickens and everything were on this bus, sqwarking every bump of the way and as I volunteered to take the middle seat on the back row... 1 of them slept on my shoulder the whole way....a little bit strange!
Anyway, we had arrived in the rain which meant getting on a tuk-tuk and heading to the centre of town, what a shock from 2 years ago!! Last time there was about 1 tarmaced street and the rest were dirt tracks. Vang Vieng had become this modern tourist town full of typical English f-ing and blinding every second. The only thing that was still recogniseable there was the Family Guy and Friends cafes (although there was about 10,000,000 showing these shows now). The only good thing that has come of the sudden tourism overload is the surrounding countryside...Still as amazing as we remember and this time we decided we would get away from all the tourists and head off on foot (ofcourse) away from the town to a nearby cave across the river.



We had 3 full days in Vang Vieng; the first consisted of us arriving and deciding how to spend the other 2 days, while we walked around, stopping off for pancakes and baguettes and before long we ended up watching family guy and having a pineapple shake and a beer Lao. We had found the cheapest cafe in the word with the most amazing food! 10,000kip for each meal, and I never thought I would say this but I found my new favourite dish that beats a Pad Thai...a Pad Lao (Original I know). It literally was a Pad Thai but with curry sauce on it....and the curry sauce was just like the 1 in the Golden Fry chip shop! We have been craving a chippy for 6 months now and the closest we got was that taste of curry sauce....soooooo good!



On our first day we contemplated going tubing but based this on the state of Sar's eye(s)....a slight improvement but decided it would be best to go the following day with hope that her eyes will have cleared up by then! (no chance, we are now 2weeks into our stay in Thailand and they're still there :-(). Instead we thought we would go for a walk to a cave, an apparent ex hideout from the Chinese. About a 20min walk away from the town and crossing the river via a suspension bridge we arrived. Just outside from the grounds of the cave were some springs, turquoise water - a dip was a definite, for free too! after a cool off we got into the grounds of the cave and were greeted by about 100 huuuge steps up a mountain where the cave was! Sar wasn't too happy!haha (usually I don't tell her if there is a climb in advance and she finds out as we arrive...that way it's too late to turn around! :-p).
Nevertheless the cave was pretty impressive, although a little bit flooded, but offered some amazing views of the cool surrounding landscape, the original draw to Vang Vieng. We headed back after another stop in the springs and got some lunch, another Pad Lao and a banana pancake!
The rest of the day was spent looking for an appropriate tubing vest for Sar to wear the next day whilst tubing. We were successful, and looking forward to the next day.



Tubing came around quickly and luckily it was amazing sunshine, a beautiful day AND Sar's eyes were looking better than the previous day. After grabbing a tuna baguette we headed down to the tubing station, got our tubes and were on the tuk-tuk to the drop-off point. Sar made some friends with 2 girls and their mum all safe in a life-jacket!! (just the place to take your mother!!) who were intrigued about the state of her eyes!
We decided to stop off at the first bar, with a slide and a good way to start it off!...sadly the girls and their mum didn't stop with us...
We had a beer, and a shot of lao lao before giving the slide a go and heading to the next bar. Floating down the river was pretty scary, the current was flowing wayyyyy fast! (Sar's comment: I like tubing but hate the actualy tubing part!!) we were pulled in by a bottle tied on the end of some rope and were at the 2nd bar. This bar we knew all too well, from our previous trip this was the first bar. After nailing another beer and a few more shots, I decided to climb a tree to the rope swing and let go at the highest point, landing on my testicles....OUCH! although I put on a brave face until I was sat next to Sar!...still it was worth it
On leaving that bar we bumped into a fellow Bollywood star, Jessy who was an extra with us....turns out he is now working in Vang Vieng for a bar...small world (he comes running after us, hey do I know you? nope sorry...oh wait a minute!, bollywood!...yeah you were the waiter guy!...ofcourse!)
We arrived at the next bar after floating about 5 yards to find out they were connected to the previous bar and we could have walked...ah well. This bar we decided to hit the Whiskey buckets and have another Lao Lao shot! good times. We got talking to 2 Australians, Bodee and Lauren. They were leaving Australia for 2 years to go and work in England, so we got talking about each others travels and decided to move on to the next bar.
Back in the tubes for a little bit longer and we stopped at a bar giving away free whiskey shots, free whiskey buckets, AND they had about 5 puppies which were the cutest dogs in the world! they all hid under the floorboards though but we managed to drag them out! Sar spent the rest of the time with the dogs and me and Bodee hit the free whiskey....The next bar we had a go at some mud volleyball but were seriously bad at it, I didn't get a touch so had a premature exit! Sar had met 3 girls who were also in love with the puppies and it turns out they were from Chester!!...so ofcourse they had lots to talk about!
The next bar had a massive slide which was AWESOME and then we hit the last bar....we stayed for about 5mins realising that we had about 10 mins to get back for 6, to get our deposit back!
By the time the girls were up and going, I had just got back with a full whiskey bucket. Deciding not to waste it I attempted to get on my tractor tubing and float down the river drinking it. The river went on for a bit longer than expected and Sar and the girls were out of sight. Struggling to get off my tube, swim with it and drink the bucket I lost my ray bans in the process....In saying that I arrived around 6.20pm and managed to still get my deposit back! YAY!

We arranged to meet the girls and the Australians for tea and then called it a night. A heavy day but a lot of fun!!
The next day we had a bus back to Vientiane where we stayed for a day and then caught the night bus to Bangkok where we would meet Rach and Mike!...
Laos was awesome! and we were eager to get to our beloved Thailand and Khao San Road!!!

Luang Prabang - The town of a million monks, waterfalls and barbequed fish

So the long awaited arrival to Luang Prabang has come by so quickly. It seems like yesterday when we were in India with Katrina and Rachel when they recommended the waterfalls at Luang Prabang and we were thinking, shall we go to Laos again?....sure

We arrived at silly o clock around 5am I think, way too early to speak and again getting dropped off away from the town, so after a short tuk-tuk ride and our lungs filled with diesel fumes we arrived at our guesthouse for £3 a night...That day we had nothing planned apart from to sleep! The night bus was a seated bus with what seemed like no suspension so again, no sleep! (since this we have purchased some valium to do the trick).
We walked around and down the river. Having followed the Mekong river all the way from 4000 Islands, Champasak, Pakse and Savannahket we feel like buddies now, he's always at our side.

We bumped into Adam who yet again has changed their plans, then we just happened to come across a bar that sold a large Beer Lao for 7500kip..bargains!! so that's where we settled for the rest of the day and were busy planning our next few days in sunny Luang Prabang.
We had planned to go to the waterfalls the next day. We deliberately bought our tickets from a guy who said under any circumstances we can change when we go, so we would definately go on a sunny day. 10am we got up and saw the clouds, and thinking that going on friday 13th might not be the best idea, we cancelled it and arranged to go the day after. This was a definite schoolboy error...They also did a trip there at 1.30pm and by this time it was beautiful sunshine and boiling hot! we got a swift pace on to say we would go then but arriving at 1.32pm we had missed it.....that's not the worst part. As we had now booked our waterfall visit for the next day it meant this would be the day where we would climb the mountain to see the view of Luang Prabang. Instead of swimming around we were now halfway up, climbing a mountain!!
Although the views were awesome, it was wayyy too hot for climbing...After kicking ourselves the whole way up and down the mountain we slowly got over it and tried to look on a positive side...."atleast now we're going tomorrow, we still get to look forward to it"...that was about it...

We had found some food stalls which have to be mentioned on here purely because they were amazing!...in all 5 months of being away I have seen more chicken feet and heads than I have chicken breasts...and there it was all boneless and freshly cooked on a bbq!!! I felt like we were back at the Wains' household having a bbq on a saturday night! That was lunch and tea sorted. That wasn't it either, it got better, they also had whole fish on the bbq for £1!

The next day I finally got up at 5.30am to go and see the monks receiving alms from the locals. I had planned to get up the previous 2 mornings but never made it, bed always seemed the better option. Ofcourse I went solo, Sar once again gave in to the bed option!
I was glad I saw it, there were sooo many monks about and so young, it's as if they are in hiding in the day, there was absolutely loads coming from everywhere! Some lady was giving 1000kip and some rice to every monk that passed her...more money than sense, in a few days she'll be regretting that decision...
After getting some snaps and monked out I returned at 6.30 to go back to sleep...




10 o clock came around way too quickly and we got up to go see the waterfall. So far the weather was holding out, we got our baguettes on the way and caught our tuk-tuk. We picked up a few others and just as they sat down and we set off, it rained!...poo!!
Turned out we had a Don Self (Prison Break Cop) lookalike onboard with us, who thought he was the big man. The whole 50minute ride he talked and talked about his work/business in Dubai...That's what you want to talk about when you're on holiday isn't it?...I was going to mention I used to work at M&S and we both decided to jack in our jobs and come travelling but I think he would have died....seriously

Feeling pretty ill from his lectures (We knew pretty much all about his new website by now) and the diesel fumes we had inhaled from the dear little tuk-tuk struggling to climb the hill, we finally arrived.
Luck was in our favour too....sunshine!!! It was beautiful, and dry! there had been no rain - perfect!!
We went to the large waterfall first which was sooo impressive and then made our way down to the smaller pools to swim in. 1 had a rope swing in it which was delightful and the other was ice cold!
Sar had a dip after being pressurised into going in and well, she thought she was going to die!...as Sar gets out of the water, teeth chattering and her arms flapping around her face, she says (deadly serious) "now I know how it would feel to freeze to death!"...haha...of course!!
As soon as we left at 3pm, the heavens opened! What timing! That night we decided to have a whole BBQ fish (the biggest we could find) and a bowl of noodles (all for £1.50) to share for tea back at the guesthouse on the balcony (sure). That's when our chopsticks we had stolen in China came in handy...sooo good - a great steal!



The next morning I got up to see the monks again, something about it amazed me, maybe it's how religion is so big over here compared to back at home. Although this time it wasn't as good as there were lots of tourists joining in, giving alms which ruined the authenticity of it. Nevertheless I got some better pictures.
We got bikes out after being inspired from talking to an Aussie guy who is cycling round S.E Asia, and decided we would bike to the bus station (3km away), no irony meant, (we refused to pay the prices the guesthouses were charging) to book our tickets to Vang Vieng. A lot of uphill and it was so hot but we were determined!
We had a bike round and then stopped for a beer...Before we knew it, time was up and the bikes were due back, it was good fun.
Our last day consisted of nothing apart from heading to the pharmacy for Sar's eye (it's all red and puffy), buying BBQ chicken, fruit shakes and baguettes (we have learnt, if you want a baguette with lots of filling, go to the largest lady's stall...she made the best sarnies) and finished it all off with a few Beer Lao's.



All in all Luang Prabang was awesome...our next stop on the adventure Tuuuuuubing!!

Si Phan Don - Paradise, hammocks and 4000 islands!

Leaving Pakse at 8 o clock in a minibus, we arrive opposite Don Khong, on the mainland ready to cross the river. We pay a local fisherman 10,000 each and climb aboard his long-tailed boat, no wider than a kayak but long enough to fit around 12 people in.
It only takes about 15minutes to cross the river, and before we know it, our bags are all loaded off on the side and we can hop off.
"Welcom to Don Khong!" We are greeted by the locals and we arrive in Muang Khong, the apparent capital of Si Phan Don. There we found our guesthouse for 2 nights. The Island consisted of 1 road that goes around the island, 1 road that goes across the island and our road in the "capital" which, about 600m of road consisting of no more than 10 guesthouses and a Wat at the end.
As for tourists, you could count them on your hand. We chose to stay on Don Khong as it was best for the most 'authentic' experience, and it certainly was.
The amazing thing about Si Phan Don was the lack of traffic and tourists.
The day we arrived we decided to go for a walk and see what was around. The street we were staying on was a small rural village, full of houses on stilts and each household owning atleast 1 boat. Once we walked away from the river, the surroundings were rice paddies, buffalo and again their stilted houses in the middle of their fields.



Every person we passed along the way shouted out 'Sabai dee' whether it was an adult or a tiny child. Some even ran up to Sar and kissed her hand!! Everyone was so friendly and almost proud to show us their countrylife! Hardly any traffic made it even better, being out in the sticks and everything being soooo peaceful and slow!..perfect
That evening we had a meal out on the river before turning in after a long day!
The next day we rented some bicycles out so we could go further into the countryside and stroll around on the bikes all day!...I started with a sweet bike, but Sar soon swapped them leaving me with the cranky one! we must have cycled for miles, along 1 road. There were tracks off from the main road, but these were mainly dirt tracks leading into the middle of the paddies and coming face to face with a Buffalo! We biked to a crossroad where there was a little village, with a few shops where we could stock up on water and shampoo! we forked left and we biking to the south of the island, much the same scenery, rice paddies for as far as we could see and houses on stilts. Random children walking around with sling shots and parents out in the fields working. It was certainly an authentic experience!

After 2 days on Don Khong we were ready to see what Don Det ('fabled the travellers Mecca') had to offer. That morning we got a 1 and a half hour boat ride down the Mekong to Don Det, a much smaller island, and more of a paradise! Lined with palm trees and no actual roads, it was soo cool. We got off our boat, made our way down a track and managed to find a little hut on stilts, right on the river! with a balcony and 2 hammocks!!! Heaven!! that was a done deal, for £2 a night!! ridiculous...the hut was a bit rough and ready, a massive hole under the door, cracks in the floor boards and every join had gaps in....Our first worry was mosquitoes...thank the lord we are on Malaria tablets...surely malaria would be guarenteed!! But we had a mosquito net which for once didn't have any holes in! we were safe.
(Although we had not noticed the shower...back to Delhi ways, no shower just a bucket and a smaller bucket to tip the water over you with....although Delhi was a bit more luxurious, this was cold water straight from the Mekong...the water was brown, the same colour as the river!!...yummy!)
We spent the rest of that day relaxing in our hammocks admiring the fact we were on the river soaking up the timeless Laos way of life on a paradise island!

That evening we decided to get a drink, a cup of tea and some chips (so English!) and we bumped into James and Joe who we had met in China and 2 of their friends from home . Of all places, we bump into them on a pretty remote island...how strange!!..anyways we went for a few Beer Lao's and caught up with each others trips, and it turns out they are going to the same full moon party, flying to Bali around the same time as us and also spending Christmas and New Year in Sydney, surely we'll bump into them down the way!...While we were having a drink a MASSIVE fight kicked off between 3 dogs, 2 ganged up on 1 getting him in the water, almost drowning him before 1 was biting his throat and the other was working on his leg. It was sick, truly a bloodbath. Luckily some Lao guy stopped the fight and let the injured dog limp off. No medical care on these islands for humans let alone dogs...we spent the rest of the night thinking about that poor dog.

The next day we got bikes out and decided we would bike down the island to the bridge which connects Don Det to another island Don Khon. Don Khon was notorious for seeing the irrawaddy dolphins but we thought we would give it a miss, afterall we had been swimming with wild dolphins in India, what could compare to that!?
The old railway bridge was left over from WWII but wasn't running any more, although they did have the train there still which was pretty cool.
We biked further down the island and reached the massive Li Phi Falls...Wow!!! they were amazing, you could see why 2 travellers died in it recently, you'd be a fool to try and go in, it was crazy!! We biked further down to a "beach"...a sheltered bit of water with a raised sandy bit, so I guess it resembled a beach in a way!
It was pretty cool and I was so hot I had to have a swim, even though the water was brown and the undercurrent was pretty strong....sure!!
After a cool off we got some lunch on Don Khon, on the river and had a cycle through the mini villages before heading back...our hammocks were calling!
We got some tea and then spent the night chillin' out in our hammocks on the river with 2 candles...definately a paradise!



We had 2 more days to relax with our hammocks and that's exactly how we spent those remaining days, Sar hasn't moved from hers since that biking trip!...oh actually we did go for a walk, into the centre of the island briefly which again was out in the countryside with rice paddies, stilted houses and lots of kids! One night we did go for tea at an Indian restaurant and had the usual, malai kofta only to find out the 3 waitresses/waiters were ladyboys but a poor attempt. These were dressed in women's clothing, speaking all girly and dancing all girly, but when you looked at them, definately blokes!!! a bit strange and definately put us off our food. I tried to steer Sar away from the subject just while we ate our dinner but still the conversation always came back to them!! the worst part was a foreigner was at the back of the restaurant, slaughtered! and was chatting up each one of them, putting his hand through their hair and on their lap etc....he's going to have to find out the hard way!!!....we never went back....food was great though!!

The last day I decided to go for a walk down the sunset side of the island, and met a friend. A local Laos country lady, who was working on her Rice paddies, she was going around catching fish with a basket!! it was genius!...she had a fish in 1 hand so I asked her where she got it from, and she showed me how she caught it and where! she couldn't speak any english and probably not a lot of Lao as she had no teeth but used the pointing technique and I got the message! She let me get a picture of her, although I'm not sure if she was happy...she certainly wasn't smiling in the picture...lovely old lady though...I thanked her, showing off with my bit of Lao and headed on my way back to my hammock...



4000 Islands was certainly a paradise! Away from the beaten track; the most chilled out place I've ever been, definately unspoiled by tourists due to the lack of them and easily worth the 3 days travelling down to them! 'Asia's most relaxing destination'....definately!!

Hello Laos, aren't you a pretty thing

An hour and a half after leaving Hue, our bus pulled up, our bags were thrown on the floor...we knew it was our cue to get off...so off we went without a clue what was really going on. Before we knew it we were casually boarding another bus (this one was the right one, we only knew this as it had Savannahket Open Tour Bus written down the side in huge letters) and then we were off to Laos (The land of the orange monks)...finally! 8 hours later and a Vietnam/Laos border crossing passed we arrived in Savannahket wondering where on earth they had dropped us off. We bargained down a tuk tuk driver with 4 other girls to take us to a guest house...which was full...obviously. We then set off on foot, they were refusing to pay for a 1minute drive round the corner, to another guest house. We only found this cheapie one after stumbling upon it on our walk. It was £3 exactly...Yess its cheap again!! It definately wasn't luxury...we had some slugs and some cockroaches...the usual..haha...but the staff were so friendly and definatley a big help, so we stayed put, we couldn't complain at the price after all!



Our first day...well we arrived at 6pm...was nearly over, so we all grabbed some dinner together and had a little walk around the town. We were planning on leaving the next day to get down to Pakse asap, there was more down there that we wanted to see but we just didnt have the energy to travel for another day on the trot, so after some deliberating...well me persuading Dom to stay for two nights...we planned to sight see (haha) the next day!




Savannahket definatley wasnt the type of place you could sight see...that was for sure! It was more of a place to walk around and see the place for what it is....We walked around for 4hours...visited nearly every Wat in the town, had a little walk along the Mekong River and realised that that was pretty much it!...It was fun though, the locals were so friendly, all the kids wanted to shake our hands...well they wanted to shake mine and I think Dom scared them..so they ignored him...they even wanted to pose for pictures with their puppies...Considering Savannahket is one of the main cities in Laos, its crazy to think, there are about 2 streets, and it's soooooo quiet! hardly any traffic anywhere!...I think this is what we loved about Laos from our previous trip, a complete contrast to Vietnam!




After a relaxed day wondering around Savannahket, we got some sleep ready for our early morning bus to Pakse....Early mornings for Dom and I are definately a no-go! We had got up, packed, got a tuk-tuk to the bus station (the price was bartered down by our landlady to 'Laos price'!) and put our bags on the bus before we said a word to each other! (both wayyy too tired) ...we got a local bus which was pretty cool...we had missed using the local transport in Vietnam mainly because it was easier to go on the tourist services. We bought our tickets and set off on the 5 hour journey south to Pakse...We decided that we would start taking malaria tablets, being in Southern Laos, next to the Great Mekong in the wet season!...so far everything was fine! We stopped at every corner possible and had a 30minute stop with the opportunity to buy some fried crickets. We passed on this and set off again....this journey was surely going to last forever...we were wrong, 5 and a half hours, and we had arrived...not quite in Pakse though, 9km outside of it! So off we went in a Sawngthaew (a kinda pick-up truck thing with two bench seats...they strap pigs and chickens to the roof...haha...and inside is crammed with people) 20,000kip each (Laos prices I'm sure) to Pakse. We found our guest house with ease...we were beginning to get good at this...and set up in our cabin of a room for the night. As it was only 1pm, we had the rest of the day to do the usual, walk around! So we grabbed some cheap lunch and set off...another large town yet it still only had the same old two roads...there was less to see here than in Savannahket, so after a beer on the Mekong and the talk on when should we leave...we agreed...the next day it was...4000 Islands here we come!!

Back to Hoi An...more whiterose, mopeds and amazing beaches

We got the bus to Nha Trang which took forever as we kept stopping... we had taken yet another baguette for the journey
("if you've never tried a Vietnamese baguette you've never tasted Vietnam" to quote Lonely Planet!) so we were ready to go straight there.
Having said that, 1 stop was at some Cham towers which were pretty cool.




We got to Nha Trang, had another baguette and headed to the beach until our next bus left at 7.30pm.
We saw a bit of genius in our short time there...the Vietnamese may well be awesome at fighting for their country but to me this was more impressive...
A guy walks out of the sea with a brick in his hand, and inside the brick he has caught a squid!!! That was awesome, how on earth do you catch a squid!?..with a brick!!
What a guy!!



Anyways, we got our sleeper bus at 7.30pm and arrived in Hoi An around 6am the next morning. We decided to try somewhere cheaper to stay than last time and ended up walking into old town. We found a fairly cheap place which would do us just fine!
That day was a designated beach day so we picked up some bicycles and set off on the 5km ride to the beautiful beach!! :-)
We stayed out in the sun until around 5 when we grabbed a freshly made doughnut from the street and you guessed it...another baguette with laughing cow cheese...yummy!
Cycling in rush hour traffic was fun...so busy, cut through a few red lights but thats fine! we're foreigners what do we know!Once we reached Old Town it was the opposite, so so quiet!



That night we planned to go back to Hoi's restaurant for the 3000 dong beer and the amazing local food (Whiterose...yummy!!) she served. It wasn't until we were about to leave when Hoi says to us that she thinks she has seen us before!!haha
We triggered her memory after reminding her that last time we were there, there was 6 of us and we had drank her dry of beer before the infamous beach party night!! (still nobody remembers anything of that night apart from me!)

The next day we decided we would get a moped out... requesting a manual now! It was so much cheaper to rent a manual than an automatic, hence why I was eager to learn how to ride one! We headed on our 30km trip out to the marble mountains...we had a bit of trouble finding the right road and asked a guy which way to go while we were filling up on petrol. Although we nearly started a fight between this guy and what appeared to be his mother! She was clearly unhappy about something, judging by the hand gestures it was about which way to go!! We just sood there until there was a silence and I chipped in "that way and then right yeah?" BAD MOVE u idiot!! Off they went again at each others throat, so we got on the moped and headed out of there!
We had gone around 30km surely (the speedo and petrol metre didn't work; also we weren't even sure if we were going in the right direction!!) and luckily passed some mountains with pagodas on top...that must be them! Nothing is signposted...that would make it just too easy, so we had to go on our instinct, jsut as we did with the petrol..."how much petrol do you think we have?" "we'll be fine!"...sure

We pulled in and were greeted with "hello, marble mountain, marble mountain!" not a bad job hey!! this navigation mullarkey was too easy!
The mountains were awesome apart from the giant steps and how steep it was to get up there!! Not as bad as Cat Ba so no need for a sweat rag!
Once we got there, there were loads of HUGE caves, pagodas and views of the beach and the surrounding villages...it was amazing and definately worth the ride out!
Each cave led to another one if you managed to scramble over the rocks and made your own path...which ofcourse our flip-flops, once again conquered! (Although mine are held together with cellotape and Sar is on her 2nd pair!..Abercrombie though this time!...all the real brands in Vietnam!!)




After having lunch at a roadside cafe with possibly the best pho we have ever had, for £1.50...2 phos and 2 cokes, we headed to the beach...
We ended up finding a sandy track heading off the main road and took it...riding through a little village getting some funny looks we carried on and the sand got thicker, enough for us to slide everywhere. Sar opted to get off and walk. I planned to push the moped over the dunes and onto the beach but this proved to be a bit harder than my guns could handle!
Luckily a local fisherman saw me, started the engine and told me to get on and while I revved the baby, he would push!! good man! He made sure I was on the beach before running off into his boat (which was more of a tub) and went out to sea!!...
That was the last we saw of any people!! The beach was deserted, just the 2 of us on the whole beach, accompanied by some fishing tubs and our moped which we brought right onto the beach with us! cus we could!
Easily the most amazing beach we have ever been to, white WHITE sand, bright blue sea which was shallow and calm so we could lay and sit in the water without getting smashed by waves, and it was sooooo hot!!!....Paradise!!

We stayed until around 5 when we thought we had best head back so we managed to get the bike over the sand eventually!...I think I had burnt out 1st gear though... Since then I could only get neutral or 2nd geear!...sometimes i'd give her a kick and we found 1st
After stalling it a few times trying to pull away up a slight hill in 2nd, we set off...As we passed each small village it was awesome to see the locals riding their water buffalo on the side of the road!...This changed a few kilometres further down... it was prime market time where on the roadside dozens of foodstalls set up and people on their bikes just stopped in the middle of the road to buy a bag of rice etc! This created a huge traffic jam! We had to try and weave in and out of pedestrians whilst trying not to knock any cyclists down!...utter chaos!!
We arrived about an hour later, again using our instinct to get back. We made a few wrong turns but got back all ok,,,surely we had earned ourselves a few beers and some whiterose for tea! :-)

The next day was another beach day with the bicycles again and the following day was a complete surprise!...It had been red hot but during the night we had a power cut due to a storm. We had a fan room and at 2am the power cut off, so within minutes we were sweating!! Well I was absolutely drenched! Sar once again slept through the whole thing! At about 3.30am it was getting ridiculous so I got a cold shower which was sooooooo good!...20minutes later I was wayyy too hot again, I was sweating that much I decided to sleep in my towel! this worked until around half 5, 6 and I gave up and went to sit in the lobby with a breeze
That day was a laugh, it rained all day! This wasnt rain like in England, this was proper rain...terrential and intimidating!! we got our raincoats and umbrella and made our way to breakfast...sure I'd have a beer and Sar went for a coffe...with the intention to last a while...the coffee came in the most pathetic excuse for a teacup I have ever seen! (more useful as a shot glass)...that lasted a mouthful.
The rain got pretty high and it was literally knee deep in some parts, so we spent most of the day playing in the rain!ha
When it stopped we ceased the opportunity to see the rest of Old Town

Our last 1 and a half days consisted of 1 full beach day including lunch at a local food spot under the palm trees on the beach where you can order some local Hoi An food like Cau Lao or Mi quang (noodles with egg and prawns) for 50p...tasted tip top!
Our last half a day was spent walking around the Old Town, along the river and to the main market, it was pretty!
That night we said goodbye to Hoi who had fed us great food and beer for the past 5 days and were reluctant to leave..we loved Hoi An!

At 1pm we caught our bus to Hue and arrived at 6pm to be greeted by some polite Vietnamese guy asking us to stay in his hotel for $7...that was easy enough! We didn't see much of Hue as our bus for Laos left every other day so we could either go the next morning or spend 3 nights in Hue then go...Excited for Laos we decided we would rather be in Laos for a few more days so although we missed the Imperial City, we weren't bothered to be leaving the next morning...We walked down to the perfume river in the evening and around the city before having tea and planned our route for Laos....

Goodbye Vietnam, you have treated us well and we have had a great time staying with you...all the best xoxo