Arrived In Magnetic Island, Australia

We've had enough of the rain and left Cairns this morning in search of sunshine. We took the Greyhound coach  around 6 hours south of Cairns to Townsville where we could catch a ferry to Magnetic Island. On the way down we stopped off in Cardwell for a lunch break and got to see some of the damage from the recent Cyclone Yasi. Most of the way down from Cairns you could see damage such as buildings' roofs ripped off and strewn down the road and flattened rainforest. The driver of our coach gave us a bit of commentary on the way down, and was saying that part of the rainforest near Cardwell was so dense you could only see about two metres into it, but now it is completely flattened, even the leaves and branches have been ripped off the trees that were still standing.

In Cardwell many of the buildings, including people's homes, were totally destroyed. The cyclone stretched several hundred kilometres along the east coast from Cairns to south of Townsville, with the eye of the storm tearing straight through Cardwell. Some of the buildings in the town were 50 years old and had stood up to years of storms and cyclones, but had been flattened by Yasi.

By the time we got to Townsville the sun was shining with a small amount of cloud, which was so nice to see! The ferry left about 30 minutes after our Greyhound coach giving us just enough time to sort out the tickets and our accommodation on the island. We chose somewhere on the recommendation of Rich & Sara (who we met at our hostel in Cairns), that to our surprise came with a free collection service from the ferry terminal in a classic Rolls Royce Silver Shadow!

A lot of the island is best explored by 4x4 because many of the roads are dusty tracks, so after having dropped our bags off to our room we hired a Suzuki Vitara 4x4 to go for a drive. Apparently you can sometimes see wild koalas along a stretch of track heading north, though we didn't see any this time so we are going to go for another drive there in the morning.

Geoffery Bay, the beach opposite our guest house, is famous for its wallabys that visit the rocks near the shore at dusk. Our resort kindly gave us some wallaby pellets and said that quite often they will eat out of your hand! They were surprisingly tame and friendly, when you hold your hand out with food it would gently lick it off your palm.

Raining in Cairns

We've been in Cairns for a few days now hoping that the bad weather was going to blow over, but it doesn't look like it is! I didn't go snorkelling the other day because there were torrential storms and although it may have been better out to sea, it still wouldn't have been sunny and when I'm paying $150 to go snorkelling I want it to be sunny and colourful, not raining and grey. We will have other chances further south in places such as the Whitsundays so fingers crossed it will be better there.

All the rain is right over Cairns!

Tomorrow morning we're taking the Greyhound coach about 6 hours south to Townsville and Magnetic Island. I'm unsure if the weather will be much better there, but hopefully there will be some more things to do if it's not. An English couple we have met here in Cairns recommended that we hire a 4x4 on Magnetic Island, I can imagine that would be even more fun in the rain! Townsville also has a huge aquarium so there should be enough things to keep us busy for a few more days until the sun comes out.

Arrived In Cairns

So we've completed our Asia part of the trip. According to google we've covered 3684 miles, mostly by plane but a large amount by coach. My two favourites have got to be Chiang Mai and Ko Lanta. Chiang Mai had loads to do and see. The food and the markets were amazing, not to mention the elephant trekking at Patara. Ko Lanta was equally amazing for different reasons, it was such a great place to chill out, although a lot of this is down to the people we met. We couldn't have asked Lek and Malay to be more welcoming to us so I really hope we get to see them again. I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you go to Ko Lanta stay there and you will learn more from the about Thailand then anywhere else. Blue Moon bar was a great place to chill out at night in the hammocks, helping ourselves behind the bar all because of the trust of the owner, who had some great stories to tell us! Lanta Welfare centre also was a key part of Ko Lanta for us with the people there and the dogs they look after, miss them loads!

Now we're in Cairns and onto our next adventure. The climate is really different here, it's still just as hot but a lot more humid. We could live without air conditioning in southern Thailand but here it is a must! I haven't got any photos of Cairns as yet because it's a really uninspiring place for photography (after having spent months in Asia it is anyway!). But, I'm off on a snorkelling trip to the Great Barrier Reef in the morning and I'm armed with a waterproof camera again so I should hopefully see some interesting coral and wildlife. Fingers crossed I don't see any big jellyfish or sharks!

Singapore Zoo & Sydney

I had dragged myself out of bed to do some shopping with Izzy, Jean & Valerie, but the next day it came back with a vengeance. Unfortunately the 20th Feb was the last day we had left to go to the Zoo, so I would have to put up with feeling sick if I wanted to go. It would also be our last chance to catch up with Jean & Valerie before they go back to Thailand for the rest of their travels. I had heard so many good things about the Zoo (it's also number 1 thing to do in Singapore on TripAdvisor!) that I really didn't want to miss out. The 30 minutes on the train and 30 minutes on the bus were torture, but when I got there I wasn't so bad I just had to walk at a snail's pace. Not many good photos either I'm afraid as I was really not in the mood for it.

Just as we walked past the lion enclosure it was 'Snack Time' as they called it. One of the park rangers had a bucket of meat chunks he was throwing in for the lions while another member of staff gave a commentary. We got chatting to the guy (called Mcroy) who was throwing in the meat and he took us aorund of few of the other big cats to tell us some interesting facts (none of which I can remember!). He even fed the jaguars and leopards especially for us to watch. He must have liked us because he said it was not their feeding time, he just wanted to show them jumping into the water to find the big chunks of meat.

We left in the early afternoon as Jean & Valerie had some things to sort out before their morning flight the next day and I wanted to go back to bed as I was feeling worse by the minute. The next morning, at around 4am I woke up with a strange feeling about our flight to Sydney which was meant to be a 7:55pm that following evening. I got up to check the tickets and it turns out the flight was on the 20th Feb not the 21st Feb! We had missed our flight, and in a couple of hours would be about to miss our connecting flight to Cairns. Not sure how I made that mistake but I blame it on me being sick. The company I had booked with had a 24/7 helpline which was busy. I checked the flight prices and it was looking like it was going to cost hundreds. I got straight on the phone to Qantas and told them what had happened, and fair play they got us on a flight within 5 hours and another connecting flight within 24 hours of that... For only £99 each! Outstanding customer service!

We got straight up, packed, checked out and straight on the MRT to the Airport. The plane we were to board turned out to be the new Airbus A380! It was amazing inside, even in economy the seats have a fair amount of leg room and as the seat reclines the lower half slides forward. It was kitted out with fancy carbon fibre seat backs holding 10" (I would guess) touch screens. There was a great feature built into the screens where you could choose a camera mounted on the back of the planes tail facing forward, so you could watch take-off, flight and landing.

We landed in Sydney at about 10pm with nowhere to stay in this unplanned overnight stop. Luckily for us the travel concierge was still open and helped us find a 'cheap' hostel to stay in for the night near the train station so we could easily get back in the morning for our flight to Cairns. I don't think $105 (£65) is that cheap but it is for Sydney. I think when we revisit Sydney it will be a flying visit beacuse it is very expensive. £2 for a small 300ml bottle of water!

Shopping in Singapore & Marina Bay

Well yesterday was a complete write-off. I think I must have caught a bug or something because I was being very ill and couldn't get out of bed. Luckily today I was feeling well enough to to drag myself out of bed and meet up with Jean & Valerie to go to Orchard Road for some shopping. Me and Jean left the girls to the clothes shopping and went to all the camera shops looking for some good deals. Jean wanted a Panasonic and I wanted a new lens for my DSLR. We found one shop that seemed to be quite cheap for these, but while there I was distracted and quite attracted by a Panasonic waterproof camera (my Fuji waterproof broke in the waves in Nha Trang).

I really should have checked the price of this camera in some other shops first, but I just assumed if we are buying a lens and two cameras he will do us a good deal (which he was to some extent - the lens and Jean's camera were the cheapest prices we've found). Jean's camera he was going to have to source from another store so he would have to go back later for it, I didn't have the cash for the lens so I was going to go back later as well for the lens. We made the mistake of going into some more shops and I quickly found out I had been ripped off with other shops offering that camera cheaper without negotiation. In summary, if you go camera shopping in Singapore, don't go to lucky plaza, go to Scotts road (where the better deals are with less negotiation) and go round as many shops as possible before buying because the price can vary massively.

After a quick shout at the man who ripped me off (and no refund as a result) followed by a freshen up we went to Marina Bay to see the light and water show outside the fancy Marina Bay Hotel.

Bit of a short blog post today, but it's gone 2am and I need sleep... busy day tomorrow as we're off to the zoo with Jean & Valerie!

First few days in Singapore

P.P.P.P.P.P. - Prior Preperation Prevents Piss Poor Performance.

I think we had gotten lazy from having such a relaxed time at Fevrier Resort in Ko Lanta. We completely forgot to organise a hotel in Singapore, and our hotel in Phuket didn't have wifi or a computer with internet meaning we didn't even look into the best areas in Singapore to stay. Our hope was that the Airport would have internet or that the Tourist Information would help us. I got my bag back from the luggage claims, only to open it and find a nice cockroach waiting for me... This is the second time I've had a cockroach on this trip!
At Tourist Information they told us to go to the hotel booking desk, who told us to go to the visitors help desk, who eventually told us that the cheap hotels were in either Chinatown or Little India. Our bags are pretty heavy so we wanted to avoid carrying them around for too long. The first hotel was Chinatown Hotel 81, which looked really nice but was expensive... $139 (about £70), the second looked average and was still well over $100. Finally we found a fairly average looking hotel which was still $90! We couldn't be bothered to keep carrying our luggage around any further so took it, with the plan on finding somewhere cheaper for the next night. We got to our room and it was pretty gross, really dirty walls, fag end in the bin and baby cockroaches in the bathroom.

After leaving our bags in the room we went for another walk further south to see what we could find. It was the same situation, they were all still out of our price range. We did find a really nice looking place that was only a touch more expensive, but gave us free wifi. So we have booked that for tonight. Next, we took a train a bit further east out of town to Geylang (red light district) to find a really budget hotel for our last few nights, but still no luck. One hotel we went into had more expensive prices at the weekends because they allowed prostitutes into the premises. It was proving difficult to find somewhere that's good value without the internet, and wifi is hard to come across too! The government control it, so you have to have a Singapore telephone number and register online to get a username and password. Sounds simple, but to buy a phone/sim card you have to have your passport, and then have to find an internet cafe to register. Eventually we got this sorted so went to Mcdonalds for breakfast to use the (government's) wifi.

Today we went to Vivo City Shopping Centre, which is only one stop away on the train. It was pretty large, with maybe 200 shops or so. I didn't buy anything, but Izzy bought a few things. I want to see if I can get a good deal on a Nikon 18-200mm lens while I'm here, so I can have the Vibration Reduction, and the extra zoom. Most of the shops want to know what price you have been quoted before they give you theirs, it really is that competitive here!

After having got internet access, we have found a few backpackers hostels near us so this evening went to check them out. The first one, Beary Nice Hostel was really nice and clean with friendly staff (and hundreds of cuddly toys everywhere) although they are full for the next five days. The guy on the reception there helped us by ringing and recommended some other local hostels, but when we got to them they only had female and male seperate shared dorms which didn't really suit us. Well, I will let you know how that goes but looks like it will be an expensive few days!

A building was on fire near our hotel!

Our last few days in Ko Lanta

Knowing we only had one full day left, on the 14th we took the 'Four Islands' tour. It was a trip on an awesome speedboat (that had three 225hp Honda engines!) around four islands just south of Ko Lanta, giving us two snorkelling stops, a beach/lunch stop and the Emerald Cave. The first snorkelling stop was great, the water was really clear so we got to see plenty of fish and coral, although most of the fish were quite small and a lot of the coral was quite bleached. I was even more gutted at this point that my Fuji underwater digital camera had broken in Vietnam because I could have got some great shots, so I had put up with taking ones from the boat.

Next stop was for some more snorkelling, this time there were even more and even bigger fish. The few guys running the trip started chucking in pieces of banana into the water, which I know you're not really supposed to do, but it meant that hundreds of brightly coloured fish swam right in front of our faces. I grabbed hold of a piece of banana, and the fish were swarming around my hand nibbling at the fruit and my hand.

Lunch time! We parked up on a beach on Koh Hai and had a couple of hours to chill out on the beach and eat the food provided. Chicken, rice, veg with some fresh fruit, all washed down with a Coke. The last stop was to see the Emerald Cave. The boat pulled up near a small cave enterance, and one of the guys jumped in the water armed with a torch and told us to follow him. We all jumped in the water, and starting swimming into the pitch black cave. At one point you could not see the enterance we had just came in through or the exit at the other end, it was just total darkness (apart from the pathetic light coming from the tour guide's torch up ahead). Luckily this wasn't for long and I could soon see the exit and swam towards it. As I swam out of the cave, it opened onto a small beach and the Emerald Cave. It is almost like being inside a volcano, you are completely surrounded by rock, with the cave being the only way to get in and out. They did offer to take my camera in a waterproof case through, but I didn't want to risk it so I've added a photo I found on Panoramio.com.

Emerald Cave enterance

Taken from Panoramio.com

15th Feb would be our last morning in Ko Lanta, so as we had a bit of time before heading to Phuket we went to say goodbye to some of the people we had gotten to know. First we went to the Welfare centre to take Pepsi and Lanta out for one last walk down to the beach and say goodbye to all the staff there. Pepsi came in the sea this time for a swim! This was becoming a pretty sad morning!

Then we went to Blue Moon to say goodbye to Gang and his eagle. He gave us our last drinks on the house which was nice! So we're going to get some prints of the photos we had taken there and post them to him, he said he is going to start a new photo album and put them in it! The eagle, who was rescued by Gang, can't fly yet because its feathers were too damaged but on our last day it decided to try so was jumping around on the ground right in front of us and gave himself a bath. Lek was nice enought to give us some little presents on check-out and drive us to the bus station. Lek is really creative and makes miniture models out of clay, so she made me a tiny monkey and made Isabella a bracelet.

The five hour coach drive to Phuket was pretty horrible. The first part we were on the back row which has an annoying hard bar underneath the whole back bench, but after being on the road for a couple of hours some of the other travellers got off, so we moved into some more comfortable seats. We were going to spend one night in Phuket because our flight was quite early in the morning, Lek offered to call a hotel we had found the details of online, although they were full and recommended another place. There was a slight lack of communication, and Lek thought the next place she had called was 'Nai Yang Beach Resort', so we got a taxi from the bus drop off point to it. Unfortunately, the place we were staying in was called Nai Yang Cottage! So after some confusing discussions with the staff at the wrong hotel we realised what had happened, and they kindly called Nai Yang Cottages for us who promptly came to collect us.

Clearly we were in luck with all the nice people we had been meeting and helping us because the guy at Nai Yang Cottages, Kitty, was also extremely helpful and friendly. He didn't want any money for collecting us in his own car. A bit later on when we had got back from dinner he offered us some food he had just cooked with what I assume was his family (his house was only across the road!) but we were full so had to decline. He then took us to the airport in the morning at around 7am, in time for our 09:50 flight to Singapore.

Sea fishing

Yesterday I was invited to go fishing by Pae, one of the workers from Fevrier Resort. His english isn't great, but I understand this is his first boat since the tsunami took his last one. We left at about 7:30pm once it was dark, down to the beach across the road where his boat lives during the day. Him and Peter (who despite the name is 100% Thai) attached the small 2-stroke engine to the back of the boat and pushed it to the waters edge. We were probably a good 1/2 mile out to sea, which felt a lot when sat in a boat barely big enough for the three of us and in the dark. It must have been begineers luck because I caught the first fish, and later on managed to catch a barracuda! I couldn't believe how strong the barracuda was pulling, I thought it was a shark or something, although he was still a fairly decent size. I'm not sure on the english names of the fish but we also caught 'tamat', 'sicaou' and 'khao'. At one point, Pae thought he had caught a fish and started pulling in his line, only to find it was a big blue crab, which he put straight in the boat in front of me. Obviously the crab was going crazy and starting running around the tiny boat with its claws up. I jumped back in shock and nearly toppled the boat, bringing in loads of water on board. Luckily Pae and Peter found it hilarious, and were pleased to have caught a blue crab as they are expensive in Thailand.

Not long left in Ko Lanta now, so tomorrow we are off on a trip around the '4 islands' of Ko Lanta to do a bit of sight seeing and snorkelling. I don't have my waterproof digital camera because I broke it in Vietnam, but hopefully I'll get a few good pics above water with my SLR.

Last Beach, Ko Lanta

It's been a while since we'd spent the day on the beach, partly because Izzy got a bit ill and partly because it's so hot! Yesterday was no exception, with the temperature reaching 38°C at about 2pm. DJ & Anna (a nice German couple we met at our resort) recommended we try out a beach further south, known as 'Last Beach' because they have hammocks on the sand that are tucked under some trees in the shade. I'm nearly on first name terms with the woman at the bike rental place now, as we hired a bike again and made our way along the terrible roads in the south of the island to find the last beach. DJ and Anna were already there lying in the hammocks with some drinks they'd bought from the reggae bar nearby. You can't beat a paradise beach, with clear blue skies and Bob Marley playing in the background coming from the bar. In typical reggae bar fashion the staff all sit around smoking spliffs listening to music. If you ask them for a drink you have to talk very slowly and say each drink one by one as they write it down otherwise they'll just guess and bring you something completely different.

We agreed to meet up with DJ and Anna again later for dinner because it was going to be their last night in Ko Lanta. DJ wanted to go back to Richey's Restaurant as they have amazing BBQs. We tried to go there ourselves once before but it was so busy that they had no spare tables. A Swedish couple from our resort were kind enough to go down there early and reserve us all table. I had 4 massive ribs, a corn on the cob, a jacket potato and a large Chang. Izzy, not having quite as big an appetite as me went for ribs and a corn but decided to leave out the jacket potato. The guy who owns the bar/restaurant, Richey, is actually Thai and so of course the food was amazing, cooked on a BBQ right in front of us on the sand. They also have all sorts of fish like barracuda and red snapper, and by the end of the night every last rib and fish had been eaten. Standard end to the evening... onto Blue Moon Bar to see Geng and his Eagle.

Blue Moon & Crazy Food in Ko Lanta

Nothing new to report really, we're still in Ko Lanta and have no plans to move on yet (until Singapore). We were initially thinking of going to Ko Phangan, but how different can another Thai Island be to the next? We are enjoying Ko Lanta so much, mainly because of Lek and Malay's amazing hospitality and you don't meet people like them every day, and surely Ko Phangan will have a beach just like the one we have here. If we do go there it will cost us time and money and not make it any easier to get to Singapore. So I'm pretty certain in saying Ko Lanta it is until we go to leave in about a weeks time.

There is a bar just down the road from us here that we go to most nights, especially before Jean & Valerie left Thailand because they really liked it too. 'Gangster' (I think his name is Geng), the guy that owns Blue Moon Bar has lived in Ko Lanta his whole life and gives the place a really chilled out atmosphere. A few nights back he showed us a photo album of his from twenty years ago when he and his friends used to row their boats to the surrounding islands and camp out on the completely deserted beaches dressed as aboriginals and make spears out of sticks. Before doing some travelling of his own he had the only bar on Klong Nin beach called Blue Moon, which he reopened when he got back. Now the beach is pretty packed out with bars along the whole stretch. When it gets a bit later in the evening he comes and sits with us and other customers and lights a fat one. If you want a drink you have to go behind the bar and make it yourself, that's how laid back this place is!

Happy Chinese New Year

In most Asian countries, they celebrate Chinese New Year and Ko Lanta has been no exception. CNY runs for three days, 2nd, 3rd and 4th of February. Lek and Malay started off by making a shrine to their parents. Lek's parents passed away some time ago, and out of respect, buddhists make offerings of food and drink and pray to their relatives. In the early afternoon Malay took us and a few other guests to a local fish market to buy some food for our BBQ that evening. It was pretty fun jumping in the back of his Toyota Hi-Lux, which is obviously totally illegal in England, but in Thailand is a common sight. Lek and Malay have been really generous buying plenty of fish to feed all 20 or so guests and spending a few hours preparing and cooking for us. My favourite was definitely the Barracuda!