| Trip to The Bridge Over The River Kwai This was a great trip as Ive always wanted to see this bridge, I watched the film as well a few weeks before so I knew the story behind it. There was a museum with artifacts and you could walk all the way accross the bridge- it was actually quite scary as there were lots of holes in it which you could easily put your foot through. |
| Tour of Wats and The Grand Palace Dont get me started on Wats, by the time I came to Bangkok I was throughly fed up with them- yet I still had to see the grand palace and Im glad I did as it was a stunning place. Everything was so beautiful and decorated in so much detailed finery- it was spectacular. I also saw the biggest buddha, the gold lying down one with a 16ft smile. He was cool but that was the last one I could handle. |
| THAILAND |
| Land of Smiles? |
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| Thailand was OK, kinda crazy though and my time there wasnt as good as I hoped it would be. By the end of it I was dying to get back to Malaysia. I think I might go there again though, see some of the other provinces maybe. |
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| Chiang-Mai will always be memorable for one main thing- its where I had my 19th birthday, and it was a FANTASTIC birthday! It started by being woken up to James bringing in a big cake with 19 candles (I blew them all out in one go) which was delicious. I took it on the plane with me so I could eat the rest later though it got a bit squished on the way. He also gave me a really nice card with an elephent on to remember that I was in Thailand on my Birthday. When I got to the airport though I got a HUGE surprise. As I was checking in like I normally do I noticed the guy putting an executive class lable on my bag so I said "whats that guy doing that for?" to James and he was standing there with a huge grin on his face because hed gone and upgraded our tickets to EXECUTIVE BUSINESS CLASS as a special surprise for my birthday- how cool is that! I was so shocked and happy beccause I didnt have a clue he would go and do that. Business class is great, especially because our flight was cancelled so we got an extra hour in the club lounge with free tasty food, films and nice squishy chairs while all the economy people had naff plastic chairs and empty stomachs- hahahahahahaha. The flight was fantastic too because I had a window seat- a huge great big comfey seat at that- and saw loads of Thailand and some truely spectactular clouds. Once I landed in Bangkok, we found a nice hotel right near Khao San Road. After wandering round Khao San for a bit we went and had dinner in the hotel which was tasty, I had noodle soup with duck followed by crepe suzzette with ice cream, accompanied by a pineapple shake which was my favourite Thailand drink- It even had a cherry on (James gave me his cherry too, which was very nice considering the thing we both had about cherries!) Anyway, after that we went and watch TV untill midnight so I wouldn't miss any of my birthday and fell asleep one happy bunny. So what do you think? Cool birthday or what! I think it was probably the best ever for me (specially considering my last 2!) |
| I stayed at 3 hotels in total while in Bangkok; first was the wonderful Baiyoke Sky Hotel. Its the tallest building in Bangkok and like a palace. We somehow managed to the junior suite room for the price of a normal double which was amazing; it had lounge, bedroom, walk-in wardrobe, bathroom with a shower and a bath.. sheer luxery. Plus the breakfast was delicious and there was a revolving veiwing platform right at the top which had mavelous veiws of the city. All this for less than £30 a night- wow. When our flight to Phuket was missed due to the delay coming back from Vietnam we were put up in the Rama Gardens Hotel It was an ok place, with lovely decor but the staff let it down as they were extremely unfriendly and also took ages to sort things out, we called about a broken TV at 11pm and someone came to fix it at... 1.30am! Not only that but they banged loudly on the door, waking us up. They werent very accomedating when it came to giving us an early breakfast either as we had an early flight. It costs, not that we paid for it- Vietnam airlines did, £36 per night. Finally in the last week we stayed at the Royal Hotel. This was a backpacker hotel right near Khao San Road. It was ok, an ok price at £15 per night, but a bit skanky. We had lots of problems in the room, which took ages to fix, even a simple one like new batteries for the remote took at least 4 times for them to put right! It was in a conveinient location, but I wouldnt stay there again. |
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| Beaches I saw most of the beaches on Phuket and to be honest I was totally disapointed as they were, on the whole, populated by fat, old naked Dutch people- not a great selling point! Patong was the worst, where vendors pester you to buy cheap tat from them and the naked fat people are in their largest number. Though we did find a pleasent small beach, Nai Han, which had a lot less people on it and was a nice place to relax. Fishing I did 2 fishing trips in Phuket. The first was with a company and cost 1100TBT and was a disapointment as all that was caught was a small makeral. The second trip was much better as it was arranged with a local fisherman on a long tail boat for only 700TBT, and I caught 8 fish, one of which was pretty big, so I was pleased with myself. |
| My first time in Bangkok was for 2 days before flying to Australia- I loved it, the atmosphere, the prices (low having just come from Hong Kong). The second time it was a hell hole. After a week there you really do want to kill yourself and all the miserable people that inhabit the place. I realised it wasnt atmosphere, it was smog, that everyone was ripping me off and it didnt help that it was 40 degrees ++ while I was there either. However, there were things that redeemed it, mainy the tours we did away from the city, but also things like the massive chatuchak market (9000++ stalls!) which was definatly a great, if swelteringly hot, experience and the grand palace which was stunning, even though my desire to look at wats and temples had definatly vanished by the time I saw it. The giant lying down buddha was the last straw- no more wats after that. The trip down the canal was interesting, and the masses of fish which you could feed bread to were great fun. |
| Wats tour The first day I was here I did a half day tour of some of the many wats in the city (theres 60 in total!) It was a bit of a scary experience due to our guide being a very strange man. However the wats were very beautiful, if slightly boring after the first 2 or 3. In the morning we rented a motorcycle and rode around the city, looking at the wall and canal surrounding it and also going up a hill to have a look at the city from above. It was up this hill where we found a great little resturant, made of wood and had the food cooked while you wait, all made from fresh ingrediants. And it was good food too, shame I had to rush it as we was late for the tour booked for the afternoon. Cooking On the second day I was in Chiand Mai I went on a Thai cookery course. I learnt to cook green curry, glutinous rice pudding and spring rolls as well as a few other things. I was told all about the different spices and the best ways to prepare them. I was really pleased with what I did as I cant really cook to save my life. It was 700TBT for the days course and that included all things needed for cookery and a book with all the recipes done plus others and info on preparation. Doi Inthanon National park tour The Doi Inthanon National park was an interesting trip (despite having to go to 2 waterfalls- waterfalls get boring after the first few, and Ive seen a lot!) It was a good chance to see Thai forest which was strangely reminiscant of Aussie outback with dray looking ground and woody trees and we also went to the highest point in Thailand- 2595m, a bit lame since Ive been at the highest point in Asia! The highlight of this trip was seeing the hill tribe people, unfortunatly not the long-neck Karen tribe, but it was an experience anyway to see them living and working in the tradional way. We were also shown the two Royal Chedi, which were beautifully architectured and set amoungst some lovely gardens. |
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| Phuket |
| While in Phuket we stayed in the Atlas Dive Resort. A well run place and a good price at only £10 per night, including breakfast. Though the room was basic, it was pleasent and the staff were freindly and helpful. This place may be far from any decent beach (if you can find one in Phuket that is!) but they offer motorcycles to rent for 200TBT per day and many sawngthaew go past it so its easy and cheap to get around. It was also great fun trying to get to Thai locals to understand where we were staying due to our different pronouciation of atlas (At-lass vs At-lus) There were a few problems here however; one being that the water isnt safe to drink so everything has to come from bottles and the other being that the cleaner stole my pjamas... weird. |
| I stayed at the Chiang Inn Hotel, unfortunatly the place where the thai hos get brought but its right next to the huge night bazarre. The rooms are good, clean and spacious and the food is good, its ok value at £18 per night, including breakfast. Though we had a problem with this hotel as it charged us for a broken glass that was not broken by us, it was broken after we had checked out so I figured it was a cleaner being naughty. Luckily it was only 40TBT but the management was extremely uncooperative about sorting the problem out so I would think twice before going there again. Strangely, here too James pjamas got stolen by the cleaner. Do all cleaners in Thailand have pjama fetishes I wonder... |
| Trip to Phi Phi Isles The trip to Phi Phi Isles was good too, despite the food which gave both me and James food poisoning (and how! Ive never smelt anything so bad!) I saw Maya bay where The Beach was film- a disapointment as it wasnt half as beautiful as it was in the film, and the snorkling there was no where near as good as Malaysia. The actual island of Phi Phi on the other hand was lovely- like Phuket in the way it had beautiful sand and clear water but without the fat Dutch people. Thats definatly somewhere to go back too. |
| Chiang-Mai |
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| Bangkok |
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| Phuket was not the beach paradise I was expecting. |
| Trip to Ayuthaya Ayuthaya was a good trip too, I loved seeing all the ancient ruins, although to be honest it did get tiresome after a few hours as I was feeling ill. |
| Trip to the Floating Market The floating market was cool- floating around on a canoe, which we managed to get for only 50TBT each thanks to James' amazing bargaining skills- the usual price was 100TBT, looking at all the stalls, It was a very nice outing. On the way back we stopped off at a wood carving place where wood was amazingly carved into intricate designs, very beautiful stuff. |
| Some of the island peaks in Ao Phang-Nga National Park. A long boat like the one we travelled round the park on. (we sat at the front so had the best veiw) |
| The Viking cave and Maya bay |
| Me cutting my birthday cake. |
| The veiw from the hotel window at sunset. |
| The city wall and one of the wats we saw. |
| The highest point of Thailand (2595m, whoohoo! |
| Karen Hill Tribe women weaving |
| The Queens chedi amongst the gardens and the Kings chedi. |
| The best thing about this trip however was the snake. It was on the way back when I suddenly heard the woman behind me screaming blue murder and looked round and saw the her husband had a snake on his lap, having wriggled out from the boot of the van, and he was scared stiff too. Now, me and James having lived in the jungle knew it was only a green snake and perfectly harmless, so without batting an eyelid James covered in his hat in case it got scared and picked it up and took it out the van where we proceed to show everyone how tame it was by holding it like real pros, totally showing off really. Everyone was very impressed at that, and the snake was released later in some nice jungley place. |
| A guy carving wood- this ones taken 9 months so far and still not finished! |
| The floating market |
| A statue with a tree grown around it |
| One of my favourite Buddha statues |
| James with the cute snake on his hat- this snake was very photogenic, posing beautifully for all the photos |
| Shots of the Grand Palace |
| The giant gold Buddha A line of buddhas surrounding one of the Wats we visited- there was loads of them! |
| The last straw. "Can we go home now, PLEASE!" |
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| Beautiful- except fot the masses of people and deck chairs! |
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| James Bond Island. Nice. |
| A naughty maccque wanting a banana |
| The Bridge Over The River Kwai |
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| Trip to Ao Phang-Nga National park The trip to Ao Phang-Nga National parkwas definatly the highlight in Phuket. There was a stopoff at a temple which was entertaining because of the naughty makaques there was- one grabbed me and wouldnt let go untill I gave it a banana. But the best bit was seeing the tall islands rising out of the water were truly amazing to see, plus I saw James Bond island (Ko Phing Kan) too which I like as it added to my film-sets-Ive-seen score. Unfortunatly there was no denaying it was a totally toristified place with vendors who were violent in the way they tried to sell their not-so-nice wares. The islands themselves however were so strange looking and I loved travelling along in the long tail boat through the caves. And seeing the scenery on the way to Phang-Nga province was a beautiful bonus too. |
| One of the waterfalls, nice as it had a rainbow in it. |
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