Duncan & Alice Go RTW!

This week we hired a car and did the Great Ocean Road (a famous stretch of the coast not far from Melbourne built by returning soldiers after WW1), the Grampians (national park with impressive rock formations) and the Mornington Peninsula (peninsula south east of the city).

We picked up some travelling buddies on gumtree to share the cost so Simon, a 28 year old Aussie joined us for the Great Ocean Road and Chris, a 19 year old German joined us for both the Great Ocean Road and Grampians. We met them at the car hire garage and thankfully they both turned out to be normal and fun. Alice successfully negotiated the Melbourne hook turn and we made it outside the city without getting lost.

We blasted down to Torquay, the starting point of the Great Ocean Road and the weather wasn't as good as it had been. It was quite cloudy and very windy. There wasn't much to see here so we moved on quickly, stopping for a photo under the memorial arch across the road. At Airlie's Inlet we saw the lighthouse featured in the kids programme Round the Twist and then drove to Teddy's lookout for great views of the road winding along the coast. We also saw our first rain drenched koala - it wasn't doing much but cute nevertheless. In the afternoon we looked at the dry Erskine waterfall and then found some more koalas including one which was actually awake. As we arrived into Apollo Bay it started to rain again so we decided to sleep here for the night. We were the only people in a huge hostel so we could play pool all night on the free table. It was also our first taste of a timtam, a famous Aussie choccy biccy - bit like a Penguin but better.

The weather was better on the second morning so we got up early and did a quick walk in a rainforest near Apollo Bay with some massive trees. We also spotted a bandicoot (maybe?) before moving onto Cape Otway where drove down dirt tracks looking for views of the nearby lighthouse. On the way back we saw a koala by the side of the road climbing up a tree - most active one we have seen so far. We timed our visit to the Twelve Apostles well, arriving for sunshine between showers. Having seen photos of this, to see it in real life was spectacular and our photos just don't do it justice. We also saw Gibson's Stairs and Loch Ard Gorge which were impressive rock formations but not the same wow factor as the Twelve Apostles. Just past Warrnambool, the end of the "Road" we visited Tower Hill Reserve, a national park within a volcanic crater which was a stunning location. We saw our first wallabies, kangaroos and emus - Alice couldn't stop taking photos. We stayed in Warrnambool, watching our first AFL game on TV which was a close entertaining match but helpful to have an Aussie with us to explain some of the finer points.

We left Simon in Warrnambool and the three of us continued inland towards the Grampians, stopping at Dunkeld where we met a very old lady in the tourist info who must have been near 100. She had no idea about our touristy questions but it was great to chat to her, especially once she had worked out how to turn on her hearing aid! Onto Halls Gap, the main town in the national park we visited a cultural centre before trying to drive up the tallest peak. It was too cloudy at the top and freezing so we didn't bother scaling the last 2km. Next stop was Mackenzie Falls, an impressive waterfall with great mountain scenery. The cloud had lifted by the afternoon so we went to the hilltop lookouts - fantastic views across the Grampians and surrounding plains but again our cameras couldn't quite capture the view. It was a short walk to the Balconies, an overhanging rock formation, where we jumped over a fence for pictures of us on the rocks to be labelled "rebels" by local school kids! Final call was to the Grand Canyon, an awesome short walk along / up a towering rock canyon. We decided against continuing on up to the Pinnacle, the peak of the mountain, and saved that for the next day, arriving back at the car just as the rain started again.

Final day in the Grampians started with drizzly, windy weather, but we headed out for our walk up the Pinnacle nevertheless, leaving the car at the hostel and walking from Halls Gap. Despite the weather this 10km walk was still enjoyable, with lots of interesting rock formations to see - the best one was walking up 'silent street', a narrow gully between rock faces. We got very lucky at the top and arrived at a gap between the clouds and had good views from the Pinnacle. Took a few quick pictures before finding somewhere to shelter from the freezing wind! It was a much shorter route back (even with a short detour when we lost the path!), straight down the hillside into Halls Gap. After a quick lunch we were on the road back to Melbourne, a 2hr drive along the highway for 250km, then another 1.5hrs negotiating rush hour traffic in Melbourne for the last 20km - not much fun in the rain and spray!

We had the car for another day so decided to do a day-trip down the Mornington Peninsula on Thursday. Picked up two new passengers for the day, German girls who were sightseeing in Melbourne for a few days. The girls were really friendly and gave us lots of tips from their travels around Aus and NZ. Yet again the weather was wet and windy, so in the morning we just had a brief stop in Mornington and at the top of Arthur's Seat to look at the grey views. Stopped in a town called Sorrento for lunch. This was a really nice place with interesting shops and cafes leading down to the harbour. We were both jealous of the enormous pile of nachos the German girls had in a cafe for lunch - our packed lunch of cheese sandwiches just couldn't compare! First stop after lunch was Point Napean National Park, at the very tip of the Peninsula. Unfortunately it started bucketing down with rain as we arrived at the car park so we abandoned any idea of the 6km round trip to the very tip, and moved on. We did brave the weather for the nearby 'London Bridge' rock archway, which was only a 300m walk instead, and got some classic windswept photos. The sun appeared as we arrived at Cape Shank, so we managed a longer walk to see the headland and lighthouse, with amazing views of stormy seas and skies. Final stop of the day was the Darling Park vineyard for some wine tasting. Alice was disappointed to be driving, as she only got a tiny sip of each wine and I finished them off. Some really nice ones, but a bit too pricey unless you were planning to buy by the case...

All in all we have had a fantastic road trip, despite the weather. Would be great to do it again in Summer though and make the most of the beaches and get better views from the mountains.

We arrived in Melbourne early on the 2nd May. Despite having to declare some food and muddy boots (which were cleaned for free!) we weren't exciting enough to be filmed by the Border Force camera crew! We took the exorbitantly priced bus to the town centre and then a tram and bus to Steve and Louise's (friends from Edinburgh) where we happily spent a couple of hours on their balcony catching up. We then went into the city centre to organise bank accounts, sim cards etc and to walk around the CBD. The house is a 3 storey townhouse with 3 balconies and we were lucky enough to be able to stay in the en-suite guest room with an amazing power shower! Definitely one of the better places we have stayed at so far.

We both took to Melbourne immediately and the weather in our first few days definitely helped - it was sunny with no humidity which was a welcomed change from sticky Asia. The city is very relaxed and seems to offer everything...parks in the city centre, great public transport, close to mountains, beaches and sea, amazing bars and restaurants. Sport plays a big part in life here with cyclists and Aussie rules footy pitches everywhere.

Originally we planned to stay here for a couple of months, find some work and settle in one place however plans quickly changed...Alice got a bar job trial on day one and thought she had it in the bag but almost as quick as she got the trial she was told she was no longer needed. I applied for some office jobs but failed to get any so we cut our losses and decided to move onto plan B. We'd loosely thought about working in the countryside before arriving here and after the challenges of getting a city based job for such a short time we found a small organic farm about an hour and a half outside the city happy for us to do some work in return for board and food for a couple of weeks. We're quite excited about doing this adventure as we would never do this at home! We'll update you on this and how it goes in a couple of weeks!

Back to Melbourne, having changed our plans we intensified our sightseeing to cram it all into a few days. Despite Melbourne being in late Autumn the weather for our first week was mid 20s so we took advantage of this to do several self-guided walking tours, exploring the CBD, waterfront, botanic gardens and sport precinct. They were really good tours with enough info about the city to keep you entertained. We also hit some of the museums in town which were interesting. Our favourites were the immigration museum and old gaol but the Ian Potter Centre (art museum) was also very good. We happened to time our visit with a free guided tour so a lovely old lady took us through Aboriginal art and more modern Australian art explaining it. It only lasted about an hour which was enough for us but was nice to get a bit more background about a few paintings.

We've loved the contrast of the Queen Victoria market to Asian markets which we had had enough of by the end. Here you can buy fresh fruit, veg, fish, meat etc and we've had fun shopping there for a couple of meals.

Last week we did a road trip outside the City (see next entry) and yesterday, our last day in Melbourne, we cooked Steve and Louise an Asian extravaganza and then went to the MCG to see an Aussie rules game between Collingwood and Geelong. The stadium, which holds 100,000, was amazing and was over two thirds full. The game proved very entertaining with only one goal between the teams and the lead changing numerous times in the last quarter. Definitely a sport I could sit and watch for hours and hours and wouldn't mind giving it a try!

We're both sad to be leaving Melbourne as it seems like an amazing place to live, definitely one of our favourite cities.

So we are yet again very much behind with the blog...apologies to all of our readers! Also, sorry no pics at the mo, we are having problems uploading them again, but will try to add some at a later date. We are now in Melbourne, which is a fantastic city. But more of that later, first of all I had better update about another fantastic city and our last port of call in Asia...Singapore.

We spent a great two days in Singapore. Really liked the city, which had a very relaxed, modern atmosphere compared to other Asian cities. We arrived on the 30th April late morning and a short hop over the Causeway from Johor Bahru in Malaysia. Spent the first day exploring the colonial area of the city. Checked out the Raffles Hotel, walked down the Padang to the riverside and along to Clarke Quay and then relaxed for a while in the park at Fort Canning. Then we headed across town for a short tour round Little India before heading back to the hostel.

Went back out into the city in the evening, and had a lovely night down by the river. The buildings looked impressive lit up at night, and there was a great atmosphere with lots of people out and about. We both felt a little underdressed though, next to all the Singapore ladies out in dresses and high heels on a Tuesday night! The restaurants along the river looked fantastic, unfortunately our budget didn't quite stretch that far so we ended up with a pretty decent meal in a mall food court for a fraction of the price!

Second day in Singapore we started out with a trip to the Changi prison museum. The museum gave a good history of the life of POWs under Japanese rule during WW2, but I didn't find it as emotive as some of the other similar museums we have visited, such as the Death Railway one in Thailand. Back into the city for the afternoon, and a wander round China Town, with lunch at the 'Hawker market'. Then we finished the day with a trip to Orchard Road to see the infamous shopping district...there certainly were a lot of malls! Didn't buy anything, but it was nice to wander round in the AC for a little while.

Then off to the airport for our evening flight to Melbourne, goodbye Asia...hello Aus!

We are nearing the end of our trip around Asia, currently in Melaka in Southern Malaysia before heading to Singapore in 2 days time for our flight out to Australia. We have had a fantastic couple of weeks travelling through Malaysia. Neither of us knew much about this country before we arrived so had few expectations, but we have both been impressed by the different mix of cultures, interesting places and fantastic food we have found here.

Penang (11th April -13th April)

Our Malaysian adventure started with a couple of days in Penang, a small island on the East coast. We spent our first day in the city of Georgetown, wandering around the old Fort, commercial district and Chinese areas. There is an interesting mix of cultures here, with Chinese and Hindu temples next to mosques and churches. The city in general had a fairly run down appearance, but it also has an authentic, charming atmosphere. We also found some cool street art around the city, thanks to a 'art walking tour' map we found in the tourist information. One highlight of the day was definitely when Duncan finally decided to get a beard trim...in a very old school barbers shop! We also had a fantastic evening meal in the Indian quarter, at a place called Kapitan's. The food was fantastic, and it was a really nice change to have an Indian curry!
Our second day in Penang we headed out of the city to the national park, and had an enjoyable (but very sweaty!) walk to Monkey beach - where there were monkeys. Then stopped at the spice garden on the way back, and were amazed by all the different plants there with medicinal uses. We ended the day back at Kapitan's for another delicious Indian meal.

Cameron Highlands (14th April -16th April)

Next stop the Cameron Highlands, for some refreshingly cool weather. I even got my jeans and jumper out for the evening, it was bliss! The first day we followed one of the local trails from Tanah Rata (the town we stayed in) up a nearby hill. Unfortunately the view from the top was pretty poor as the cloud level was quite low, but there were lots of pretty orchids and plants to see on the way up. Next day we joined an organised tour to see more of the highlands. The tour started with a drive to the highest point in the highlands. Thankfully no cloud this morning, so we had fantastic views across the hills. Then a visit to the Boh tea plantation, one of the largest in Malaysia, and a strawberry farm. The amount of agriculture in the highlands was impressive, almost every scrap of land was covered in greenhouses growing veg, strawberries and flowers.

Perhentian Islands (17th April -19th April)

After a long trip across the country and by minivan and ferry we arrived at Perhentian Besar. We were the only travellers going to Besar (as opposed to the smaller island Cecil), and arrived at a quiet white sandy beach with only a handful of other people there already, a true tropical paradise! We spent our 3 days in the Perhentians doing our advanced dive course, and are now certified to 30m deep. The water was really clear, and we had some good dives. The best ones were the 'wreck dive', around 3 sunken police boats, which were full of schools of barracuda, and had sting rays swimming beneath the bows, and our final dive, which we did not have to practice any skills on, so we just got to see the fish and corals, including a school of pipe-fish and a reef shark, very cool!

Taman Negara (20th April -22nd April)

Next stop, the jungle! Having picked up a map at the national park head quarters, we decided to go for a self-organised 2 day jungle trek, walking 12km to stay in a hide overnight. We have been doing a lot of walking while we are away and thought 12km would not be a problem for us...we completely underestimated the trek! We set out with 7 litres of water, several packets of curry and rice and samosas from the stalls in town, and a torch and roll-mat we had hired in town. The path started out as a board walk, but after about 1.5km the board walk ended at a sign saying 'do not pass this point without a guide', which we ignored, continuing on the path into the jungle proper. After the first hour we were soaked through with sweat and already feeling tired. We stopped for lunch after 3 hours, absolutely exhausted from the continuous up and down, climbing over and under trees, and constantly watching our feet as we stepped round tree roots and mud! Even at this point we were thinking we should have brought more food and water with us. After 6 hours we finally reached the hide, just as the rain started - a wooden hut on stilts, with 12 wooden benches for beds, no water and no electricity, not exactly the comfort we were looking for after a long day walking. We were sharing with a French family and their 2 guides, who looked a lot fresher than we did. It was also a little unnerving that the guides said they had heard a tiger twice just as we arrived at the hide!
After a change of clothes and some food we felt a lot more human, and settled down to a quiet evening, playing cards and staring out of the hide window looking for wildlife, in the rain. Didn't see much, a couple of glow-worms, and a civet cat, which was quite cool.
Up early in the morning for round 2 of trekking. Took a different route back, which thankfully turned out to be much easier, with far fewer ups and downs, although still a fairly tiring, very sweaty trek. Unfortunately though the rain had brought out the leeches, and our ankles were soon covered in them, by the time we got back to the park entrance I had 12 bites and Dunc had 9, eurgh! We both felt a sense of achievement from out jungle trek, but definitely not something we plan to repeat anytime soon. Bumped into the French family back in town, who told us their guides had found tiger footprints only 8m from the hide in the morning...shame we didn't see the tiger from the hide, but I'm glad we didn't bump into it walking back!

Kuala Lumpur (23rd April - 26th April)

Back to civilisation in the fantastic city of KL. Spent a nice couple of days here, again doing a lot of walking around the city. Chinatown was particularly interesting, and we even got a free lunch from one of the Chinese temples. Also had a look around the National mosque, dressed in attractive purple robes, and had an interesting chat with a Muslim lady at the mosque about Islam in Malaysia. Lots of cool architecture in KL, with a mix of colonial buildings in the old centre, Chinese shop houses and modern buildings. The Petronas towers were impressive, although unfortunately our budget didn't stretch to a trip up to the sky-bridge.
We also did a couple of trips out of KL, first to the Batu caves, a selection of Hindu temples inside caves about 30min from downtown KL. Although this is meant to be a major tourist attraction, we found them a little disappointing, and they only kept us entertained for about 30min. Our other trip was an overnight stay in Kuala Selangor, North of KL, to see fire-flies. This area is one of only 2 in the world with such a large population of fire-flies, and they made an impressive sight. We took a boat trip along the river at night, and all the bushes along the banks were lit up and flashing like they were covered in Christmas tree lights, I thought it was amazing! In the morning we went for a walk in the nature park at Kuala Selangor, spotting macaques, sliver-leaf monkeys, a hawk, stork and monitor lizard before our bus at 10am...not a bad start to the day! I think I enjoyed it more than Duncan though, who was not very comfortable with our close proximity to the wildlife!

Melaka (27th April - 29th April)

Which brings us to our final stop in Malaysia, Melaka. So far this city seems pretty cool, with a wide mix of Chinese, Indian, Muslim, Portuguese, Dutch and British history and culture. Spent this morning in the old colonial district and went to some interesting maritime and history museums, and the afternoon in the Chinese quarter over the river. Tried the infamous chicken and rice balls from Chop Chung Wah for lunch today. The food didn't look much, but tasted good, and seems to be the Melaka version of Nando's! Also was brave enough to have a taste of durian, the famous Malaysian fruit which smells awful and the taste is questionable (see photos below) but apparently gets better with repeated tasting!

Only 3 days left in Asia now, so we are starting to plan our time in Aus. In the internet cafe writing this before updating my CV and starting to look for jobs, eek, back to reality!!!

Finally back in a hostel with a computer so this is going to be an huge blog filling you in on the 3 weeks we spent in Thailand. Alice did northern and southern Thailand.

Northern Thailand (17th March - 24th March)

The trip to Chiang Mai from Luang Prabang was very long and very surreal. Starting off with a 14 hours bus ride to the border overnight. Almost every single Lao person on the bus was being sick on the windy roads and we had to stop every hour for them to recover and throw their bags of sick off the bus. For some reason the driver thought that playing a video of Korean techno music all night would keep them occupied and stop them being sick so much...it didn't but meant a sleepless night for the rest of us! When we finally got to the border it was a quick 5min boat ride across the river to Thailand to meet another bus. Eventually arriving in Chaing Mai after 22 hours, our longest journey yet.

We spent four days in Chiang Mai with my friends from Cardiff (Holly, Rachel and Sonia). Was really nice to see them, and gave both me and Dunc a little break from just speaking to each other for a few days Spent the first day wandering around the old town of Chiang Mai, not a huge amount to see, but a lot of Wats, then had a very painful Thai massage and did a cooking class. We can now make proper Thai curry, Pad Thai and papaya salad, so can look forward to trying that again when we get back. We did a big day trip with the girls, including elephant riding, trekking to a waterfall, orchid farm, white water rafting and bamboo rafting. Really fun (and busy) day out. The elephants were really cool, but our elephant didn't want to go anywhere though and it was quite sad to see the guide dragging it along. I think it would have been better to spend more money and go to one of the proper elephant farms where they are treated better. Final day we spent cycling round the outskirts of Chiang Mai, although not a lot to see. Overall Chiang Mai did not live up to my high expectations, it was not as charming and interesting as other places we have visited or as other travellers had told us.

From Chiang Mai we headed further north to Mae Hong Son, a small town up in the mountains. Had a fantastic day trip up there, hiring motorbikes and taking the road up towards the Burmese border along mountain roads. It was nice to have our own transport, stopping along the way at waterfalls, a cave and a palace. The town at the top of the road, Ban Rak Thai, was beautiful, bamboo houses around a blue surrounded by mountains. The village had a strong Chinese influence, set-up originally by anti-communist Chinese immigrants, and a lot of the buildings had Chinese artwork on the plaster, bringing back memories of Yunnan province. We stopped for lunch before heading back on the bikes.

Next stop was Pai, a hippy town between Chiang Mai and Mai Hong Son. The town was nice enough, plenty of cafes and bars set alongside the Pai river. Full of Western hippies who were into yoga, meditation and chanting...I quite liked it but I think Dunc felt a bit out of place. Hired bikes for a day to explore the surrounding area. I didn't really enjoy this as was feeling pretty rubbish, but the stop at the Pai Canyon was good. Didn't quite live up the claim of being the 'Grand Canyon of Asia' but impressive none the less.

Central Thailand (25th March -31st March)

Sukhothai (25th March - 26th March)

The journey from Pai to Sukhothai took 10 hours with a stop in Chiang Mai. We only spent two nights here so only really had one day to explore the place. The main reason for coming here was to see the ruins from the Siam and Khmer empires as Sukhothai was an ancient capital of Thailand. We hired bikes to ride around the central area, deciding not to venture to any of the outlying areas as the central was the best and we are "templed out". On the way back we went for a nosy in a nearby temple where there was a large party happening with two live bands playing music while circling the temple with groups of people following and leading them, dancing as they went - very strange!

Ayutthaya (27th March - 28th March)

Ayutthaya is another former capital of Thailand however unlike Sukhothai (where the ruins are 15km away) the modern city has been built around the temples which gives a nice feel to the city. It took us a whole morning to arrive and then we had a fleeting visit to a Tesco Lotus and large shopping centre (we were dropped by the bus beside them) so had lunch here. The one memory we have of Ayutthaya is the heat and it was 36C+ the whole time so an afternoon of walking round temples was more sweaty than we would have liked! At night we had an amazing BBQ'd fish from the night market which you ate within a piece of lettuce with some noodles and sauce - amazing! I am also grateful Alice is fond of dogs as twice stray dogs came and barked at us but she managed to ward them off! On the second day we hired bikes to explore the floating market and temples further outside. In the searing heat it was very uncomfortable. Moreover, the floating market wasn't open when we arrived and we never found any of the temples we had hoped to see as a result of a poor map. By mid morning we decided to cut our losses and head to Kanchanaburi.

Kanchanaburi (28th March - 31st March)

Another stinking hot place as Alice described it - over 38C all the days we were there. On our first afternoon we went to the War Museum which documented the building of the Death Railway which was constructed by the Japanese in 1942/43 by prisoners of wars and forced Asian workers. It was a very well documented museum which put this part of the war into context which we had never heard of before. It was a shame we only had an hour to spend there but the day after we took the railway as far as it went and then a taxi to a memorial built by the Australian government at Hellfire Pass, the section of the line with the highest death toll during construction. This wasn't surprising given the men had to dig 25m through solid rock with few tools, being in the middle of the two terminuses (the men had to walk here), and lastly the heat! For dinner we tried a Thai BBQ which was similar to a Cambodian BBQ but at the bottom there was a lip where you made a broth and boiled veg and noodles. The bonus here was it was buffet BBQ! The next day we spent at Erewan falls which is a 7 tier waterfall full of clear turquoise water. We had the opportunity to experience an "authentic" fish spa as the fish would nibble on the dead skin on your feet while you dipped them in - very strange ticklish experience! Our last day in Kanchanaburi we spent by having a look at the extremely well looked after war cemetries and the railway bridge was very touristy (tacky). In the afternoon we caught a bus to Bangkok where we had planned to take a night train down the coast. The bus was supposed to take 3 hours to Bangkok and then we had planned for an hour to get us to the train station by another bus so we, in theory, had an hour cushion. It soon became apparent to us both that the first bus would take a lot longer than 3 hours and we found ourselves at the bus station in Bangkok only 40 mins before our train. Luckily there was a taxi rank with an English speaking attendant who told us it would take 1 hour in a taxi. That wasn't going to work but he soon called over 2 motorbike taxis who offered to take us on a "high speed" trip to the train station in less than 40 mins! We both quickly nodded realising this was our only choice if we were to make the train. Once we had found helmets to wear we hopped on the back and sped off into the city leaving the bus station by some side exit, going the wrong way down a dual carriageway, pulling several U turns etc etc. Within 2 minutes I had lost sight of Alice as she had gotten the more aggressive driver. It took my driver 30 mins to get to the station, weaving in among traffic, going through red lights, going the wrong way down streets etc etc. Worst case scenarios were going through my head about where Alice could be but thankfully I arrived at the station and saw her straightaway. If I thought my driver had been quick, Alice had already been at the station for 5 mins and bought some drinks etc. We ran onto the train (which incidentally left 10 mins late) and spent the next half hour comparing notes on our journeys, adrenaline still running through our bodies!!!

Southern Thailand (1st April -10th April)

Koh Tao (1st April - 4th April)

Finally arrived in Koh Tao for our open water dive course with Big Blue. The course took 4 days, although the first day was just a short intro session. The second day we did a lot of theory in the morning, with a lot of physics and biology, then spent the afternoon practising with the equipment in the pool. There was a lot to remember, and the equipment was pretty awkward, even breathing properly took a lot of concentration, and I had problems with my ears even just 2m deep. Finished day 2 thinking that diving might not be the sport for me as I hadn't really enjoyed being in the pool. Day three started with more theory and an easy multiple choice exam. Then the real diving began, with our first two open water dives in the afternoon. We went out on the dive boat to 2 sites near Koh Tao: Mango Bay and Twins. After struggling with equalising the pressure in my ears to get underwater we made it down to the bottom and I finally started to feel the fun and excitement of diving. The corals and fish were incredible, so many of them and so colourful! We saw all sorts of cool stuff, schools of baracuda, anglefish, butterfly fish, banner fish, clown fish (Nemo!), parrot fish, trigger fish, Christmas tree worms and loads of other cool unnamed fish. Still not so keen on the actually diving, it is a lot of effort getting in and out, but the funky fishes make it all worth while! The next day we finished the course with 2 more dives, at Green Rock and White Rock. These dives were even better, the water was clearer and we went down to the deepest depth for open water course of 18m. I took some decongestants before diving which really helped my ears equalise so it was a lot more pleasant going up and down as well. Saw loads more cool fish, which I couldn't get enough of, and the highlight was following a turtle swimming across the dive site...amazing! Our final day was filmed, and screened in the bar in the evening. It made the dive look great, and we even looked quite cool so we had to buy it. So now proud to say we are qualified divers...and have caught the bug so will hopefully be doing our advanced course in a couple of weeks in Malaysia, can't wait!

Koh Phang Nang (5th April - 6th April)

Moved on to Koh Phang Nang next for a couple of days relaxing. We stayed in a quiet fishing village (Chalok Lam) at the north of the island. There was a beautiful white sandy beach and hardly any people. Spent the first day just chilling out. Had an amazing meal that evening, all you can eat BBQ buffet, in a restaurant run by a South African couple. Not local cuisine, but really tasty. I had 5 types of meat, and loads of salad, including pasta for the first time in 4 months, absolutely stuffed ourselves! Next day we worked it off with a walk along the headland to the next beach, called Bottle Beach after the bottles marking the trail. This turned out to be a more arduous walk than expected, a tiny path going up and down through the jungle requiring hands and feet to scramble along. The map had suggested it should take 1hr, but took us 2.5 and we aren't that unfit! Bottle Beach was lovely when we finally made it, very secluded (no road access) with just a couple of bars and bungalows. Had some lunch and a well deserved rest before taking the taxi boat back round the headland.

Khao Sok National Park (7th April - 9th April)

Next stop Khao Sok National Park, halfway between the two coasts. Went a 2 day tour in the park, spending a night on the rafthouses on Cheow Lam Lake. The lake had stunning scenery, turquoise waters surrounded by karst rock formations and jungle. It was huge, took us over and hour to get to out raft house by boat, and apparently is 150m deep in places. Unfortunately the rafthouses were not as idyllic as the pictures showed, they were in a great secluded location in the park, but could have done with some TLC. There were nails and wood sticking out all over the place, and a guy on our tour fell through the rotting walkway between huts. Also the toilets were miles away over the most precarious bit of walkway and up a steep hill...too dangerous to go at night in the pitch black so off the side of the raft house was the only option! Did do a great trek to Namtaloo cave as part of our tour. The cave is home to hundreds of bats and spiders and has a river running through it, which we had to wade through up to out necks to reach the exit! Very wet, but a lot of fun. The tour also included a night safari - we saw nothing, and a dawn safari - we saw monkeys and gibbons but so far away they were just black spots, a little bit disappointing Overall we had a good time though, and it was amazing to stay in a place with such breathtaking scenery.

Krabi (10th April)

We left Khao Sok for our final stop in Thailand, Krabi. The town is pleasant enough but not much here. Went to Ao Nang beach in afternoon, but soon got bored as we couldn't go snorkelling as we had planned...Dunc and I have decided we are not really beach people as neither of us likes to sunbathe much, so not going to go to any more of the islands. Next stop Malaysia........