Thailand - Phuket night out on 6th

Now qualified to dive and also the last night with Lewis, Toby and Steve a night out on the town was a must! Unfortunately Steve had sunstroke and Joel our diving instructor who was going to join us had put his back out during the day so couldn’t make it, instead Joels partner Rachel met us for a quick beverage and gave us some tips for our night ahead. We headed down to Patong – the most touristy/chavy place in Phuket and were not surprised to bump into some boys from our home town of Bexleyheath (small world!). They joined us for some of the evening but when we took them to a bar where all the staff are ladyboys who don’t leave the men alone they didn’t seem too thrilled!! Toby also got ‘lucky’ when one of the ladyboys thrusted her/his bare breasts in his face – lucky Toby! The boys from home went and got on with their night out whilst the 5 of us headed to another bar and then a club to dance the night away, arriving home at the early hours of the morning to find the boys were locked out of their room we were all forced to have a sleepover!

Thailand - Phuket 2-6 January 2009

The 2nd, as expected, was again overcast. We packed our belongings, bid farewell to Emma and Michelle, and the 3 of us headed for the pier to our boat to the mainland. The rest of the day is best not blogged, as we have already blocked it from our minds. A horrible day of swapping from boat to bus to mini bus and lots of waiting on the roadside in between (Lucy coped very well!) Arriving in the middle of the night, it was at least some comfort to be greeted by our friends Toby, Lewis and Steve with a nice apartment already sorted for the 6 of us and cold beers in the fridge.
From the 3rd to the 6th we completed our openwater diving course on Karon Beach, Phuket. A friend of Toby’s, the wonderful Joel, had accepted the fateful task of teaching us to dive... a decision I bet he regretted at times. It was a great few days, with just the 3 of us in the class and not a swimming pool in sight we had definitely made the right decision not going to Koh Tao. On our first day, we managed to get into the sea for some skills and a 40 minute dive, most people would still be in the swimming pool at this point. After a hard day of diving came the even harder afternoons of lazing around on the beach, the odd game of bat and ball, or Frisbee and burying Toby in the sand kept us entertained. Day two was similar to day one, we all found it quite hard to equalise the pressure in our ears today though which made things slightly more stressful but we managed and it was so worth it for all of the amazing fish we saw at the local reef, coming and back and discussing which fish we had seen in the sunshine was loads of fun!! The evening wasn’t as enjoyable as although we went out for a lovely meal we also had homework due in the next day so we all sat in our living room in our pj’s and crammed it all in as quickly as possible!
Day three of our course we had to mark our homework and do our test to see how much we had listened to the theory stuff – we all passed with flying colours and could go out for our third dive joined by Toby and Lewis who hadn’t dived in years! After a few rounds of thumb war at the bottom (Zoe used dirty tactics of trying to remove my air to win!) we were off to the reef for our longest dive so far – well for us anyway, Lewis hadn’t put his mask on properly which meant he was constantly having to clear it of the water and then his air ran out!! So he bailed out and let the rest of us enjoy the world under the sea. It is so amazing seeing what lives down there and although i thought i would be terrified it is so incredible and takes your breath away that there is no time to be scared!
Day four we went to Kata beach to go out on a boat for our final 2 dives, we were all much more confident today and this made for a much longer, deeper and amazing diving! Joel was a legend and brought out his underwater camera to record our antics under the sea (see Facebook or email us for the links) which meant we could capture the moment Zoe was looking forward to since the diving course began; finding Nemo! At the end of the last dive Joel took us to a massive anemone which was full of about 10-15 clown fish – WOW! What a way to finish our course!

Koh Phangnan - Thailand 1st Jan 2009

2009.... what an end to the year we had... and lots more adventures to come in the months ahead.
So, the first day of the year on our island paradise... and it was again overcast. Due to head off to Koh Tao tomorrow for our openwater diving course and with a bleak weather forecast it was time to take action. Lucy’s natural requirement of a winter holiday in Thailand was to return to London with a tan and so, after a few white lies (one of us cutting our foot on nye and not possibly being able to dive which meant we got our deposit back) we changed our plans, cancelled our diving trip and instead headed over to Phuket where, thanks to some informants who were already there, we could still complete our diving course, they had sorted accommodation for us, and it was SUNNY! Happy and content, we all tucked up for our last night as a fivesome as Lucy, Kathryn and I were to embark on our adventure to the west of Thailand in the morning.

Koh Phangan New Years Eve

Hi All,
Firstly I have to add to the previous post – It seems it took the mushrooms for Z and L to realise just how funny I really am, unbelievable!!!
So NYE was finally here, we had been looking forward to it for so long, especially me as Emma who I used to sit opposite to at Marie Curie was coming out with her friend to play with us! We weren’t expecting them until late afternoon but at 10.30am i was awoken to a call from Emma who had got an early flight and was half an hour away! This meant i didn’t get my routine wake up dip in the sea and instead had to get ready and make sure the bungalow we had booked for Emma and Michelle was ready before going to collect them from the pier – in true Thai style the bungalow which we had booked weeks and weeks ago and reminded the owners about everyday had been rented to someone else and the only option was to have 2 extra beds put in our spacious bungalow for a big sleepover!!
On the way to the pier to meet the girls the heavens opened and they were welcomed by torrential rain – the weather had been pretty rubbish up to that point but this was something else!! Unfortunately there was hardly a break in the rain and after our new guests had showered and eaten there was nothing else to do on this miserable afternoon but get a massage! So we all bundled into the local massage parlour for some pampering – little did Michelle know when she walked in that her oil massage would result in her having a full frontal breast massage in front of her new room mates – well it broke the ice at least!
After some R&R we all got ready for the big night ahead and with our glad rags on (including some beautiful glittery glasses we picked up in Bangkok and some earrings to match courtesy of a night market in Vietnam) we were ready to line our stomachs and get the buckets flowing! We headed down to the beach where the party was well under way – the beach was packed full of travellers and holiday makers excited about sharing this amazing experience! There was hardly room to dance as there was so many people, although after we all got our must-have neon tattoos (I went for an extremely stylish 7 Eleven logo on my arm) we found some space to bust some moves and throw some shapes!! The rest of the night was full of fun, dancing and maybe a new year kiss or two!!
We finished up our night in the early hours of the morning with post alcohol snacks – fried rice/falafel and Zoe went for the local delicacy of lamb fajita which helped prevent our hangovers for the next day.

Koh Phangnan - Thailand - 26-30th Dec 2008

Post Xmas and our first visitor!!
Ok, so as is usual of any xmas festivities, the food and drink intake was slightly excessive. As Keith is still suffering from the celebrations and has lost his voice, we (as in Kathryn and Zoe) thought it was about time we blogged to tell you all what’s been going on. So, first up it’s Zoe’s turn.
Firstly, apologies for the lack of blogging, the time since xmas has flown by and we’ve simply been having too much fun!! We will try harder from now on!
So... boxing day, we treated ourselves to a lie in (well deserved-this travelling life is soooo tough) and then we headed to the local pier where Kathryn waved me off (SATC moment – “Go get our girl”) as I crossed the seas to the neighbouring island of Koh Samui. Kathryn spent the day chilling out, hitching rides to the local town and meeting up with Toby, Lewis and Steve (our new extended family). I, stranded on the other island for the night, walked around Koh Samui airport waiting the arrival of our first visitor.... Lucy! Having made it on a wing and a prayer (nearly crashing on landing) me and Lucy had a brief emotional embrace Hollywood style before jumping in a taxi and finding some accommodation for the night... Lucy’s first taste of the travelling life... a luke warm shower (that’s luxury I tell her) and a bungalow with a door that almost shuts. To aid Lucy’s first night of sleeping, alcohol was a necessity. We headed to the beach and grabbed a beer... before making some new friends and heading to a busier part of the island. Much to our surprise, there was a party on the beach with fireworks... and Lucy and I enjoyed our first Samsong bucket together. A good catch up and we made it back to the bungalow in the early hours of the morning, ready to catch the boat back to Kathryn and Koh Phangan. We woke the next day to Lucy’s next Thailand experience, pouring rain!! Having found out that we couldn’t get a return boat until 5pm that day, we had no choice but to spend the time having massages and pedicures and a glass of wine. Back to reality (a paradise island, haha) and, after a pleasant boat trip, we were reunited with Kathryn on Koh Phangan . The arrival of one friend and time to say goodbye to some others, as 2 of our new crew members, Lewis and Toby, were heading back to the mainland for NY in Phuket, a farewell party which Kathryn even washed her hair for!! After some ice-breaking drinking games and a casualty (Steve + samsong rum = left to sleep on our balcony) we headed out to Haad Rin... the beach where all the parties go down. Just your usual night out on the town, more buckets of alcohol, beach, fireworks etc etc and a good time had by all! A sad farewell to the boys... but perhaps our paths would cross again on our travels...perhaps sooner than we thought.
Following a day of recovery and some brief sunbathing, another day of grey skies followed. In true British style, we spent the afternoon lying on the beach...wishing the sun to show it’s face. Given no other choice, we turned to alcohol!! As the afternoon progressed, and the beers went down, we were joined on the beach by some fellow bungalow residents. With about 12 of us sitting around we were joined by Pat our guitar and as some of us jammed, some of us fished and others chatted the sun set and a fire was lit. It was a truly travelling moment and a really great afternoon/evening. Now drunk and refusing to let the night end, we all agreed to head to the jungle that evening, for a Jungle rave!! Trance not being our first choice of music to party to, we went along and after getting neon tattoos we picked a spot near the DJ and..., well,raved! A new experience for us and one which Kathryn embraced completely. Lucy and I found her jumping up and down on her own (at one point wondering if her drink was spiked, which she told us was definitely not the case and she just loved it!! Rave on!), an action which she may have regretted in the morning after a suspect stomach muscle injury, haha!!
So... the 30th of December, and almost 2009. Having decided to take it easy in preparation for the events of NYE, we chilled all day and headed into the town to book our diving course for after new year, grab some dinner and a spot of shopping. As Kathryn completed some web based chores, Lucy and I thought we’d grab a quick drink, a nice refreshing shake .... mushroom flavour?!? If it’s natural and grows from the ground and they sell it on the beach it must be nice... mustn’t it, perhaps even one of our 5 a day?! Poor Kathryn. We returned home in hysterics... and continued to laugh for hours. It seemed like everything Kathryn said or did was hilarious, the guitar played itself and Lucy became posh! “Kathryn, what must you think of us?”
Back on a normal level now and really enjoying this travelling life. We’ve had such an amazing 4 weeks, and seen so much so quickly it’s been hard to take it all in. Hope you are all well reading this, and absolutely, ridiculously jealous!! Over to Kathryn to finish the antics of the last day of the year.
Happy New Year! Zoe x

Koh Phangnan - Thailand 24-26 December 2008

The journey was long, boring and pretty sleepless (more so for Zoe!) but we finally arrived at our bungalow in Koh Phangan that the girls had booked from England and were very sceptical about – How lucky we all were to be taken to a newly built group of Bungalows on the beach with hot water and everything! The girls soon made their mark on the spotless bungalow and unpacked all of their things onto the floor!!
As it was Christmas Eve we all put our glad rags on (including Santa hats beards for the girls – they couldn’t get any to fit me!) and we met up with Lewis, Toby and Steve who we met in Laos so we could celebrate in style! After working our way down some of the beach, having a few cheeky drinks and creating some xmas themed ‘shapes’ to throw at the party we headed down to the full moon beach where we all danced the night away – throwing lots of snowflakes and xmas trees!! What a fab night, the best way to spend xmas eve – buckets of Sangsom, fireworks and dancing on the beach!!

Kathryn was really lucky the next day to find that Santa who had run out of stockings had left a pair of tights at the end of her bed with a beautiful trinket charm in (Zoe you are a darling J) however she then realised what a bad friend she is as she obviously disturbed Santa on his way to Zoe’s bed and she will now have to wait until she is least expecting it to receive her belated Xmas gift (those Dwarf strippers just wouldn’t fit in a stocking!!).
The girls wanted to have a traditional Christmas day, so after a dip in the sea they hired a moped and took a trip to a waterfall where they had a swim in the pool, unfortunately just like at home it started raining so they got back on their bike and headed back to get ready for Christmas dinner – on the way they stopped to feed a poor tied up elephant a few bunches of bananas and then they set off on the very wet ride home!

A hot Ovaltine and shower later the girls went and met Lewis, Toby and Steve for a slap up turkey dinner in an English pub (apologies to Steve who was the only one who remembered the drunken xmas eve pact to get a secret santa present to open at dinner!) where they played Christmas songs, wine and good puddings – a game of charades over dinner sorted the men from the boys and Steve also demonstrated his Pictionary skills when he resorted to drawing on his chest with is finger the word he was struggling with (anchor) – wrong game!
How all good Christmas days end – the girls watched a film and ate some sweets back at their bungalow!
Merry Christmas to everyone!
Love Keith xx

Thailand - Bangkok quick stop

When we finally arrived in Bangkok at around 10pm we headed for a guest house that we had heard about where the rooms cost less than a meal from McDonalds! We all realised why when we had to share a bathroom which had no hot water and the room was exactly like the one Leonardo Di Caprio was in at the start of the film The Beach!! Only for one night, we embraced the travelling life and stayed, however we did put our bags down and head straight for a bar on Koh San Road! A full day in Bangkok before heading down to the islands the girls decided to really embrace the culture and learn as much as they could about the lifestyles of the Thai’s – we all did a spot of toiletry shopping at Tesco, had a quick bite to eat in KFC! We then arrived in the shopping district and after long and hard search (during which time we stumbled unknowingly into an IKEA!) Kathryn purchased a little laptop as an xmas present from her Dad (nice one Mr Betts!). To finish off their day of experience and education we all went for an amazing Indian curry for dinner to line our stomachs for the night bus and boat to Koh Phangan!

Cambodia

The girls enjoyed the 6 hour bus ride to Phnom Penh in Cambodia, full of locals and quite comfortable. Unfortunately when they arrived at the lake where they wanted to stay the only room that could be found was one that smelled of wee due to the ‘bathroom’ in the corner of the room which only had walls about ¾ of the way up and didn’t have a lid on the toilet seat! To help us all sleep in this disgusting room we went out and enjoyed some beverages with some pretty dull young guys from Oz!
As soon as we opened our eyes the next day we went straight out to find a more suitable vacant room around the corner – although pretty expensive in comparison the aircon, hot water and tv were worth it!!
Once we all moved all of our stuff Kathryn chilled out and enjoyed a long hot shower whilst Zoe went to Tuol Sleung Museum (S21 Prison) which was another very harsh visual record of a country at war. On the back of a small moped Kathryn and Zoe (and the driver) went to the killing fields about a half hour drive away – not the most comfortable mode of transport! This was a camp where Cambodians were taken under the regime of Pol Pot to be executed, usually for reasons like wearing glasses or being able to read. In the centre of the excavated fields there is now a temple which has been built to house the skulls of all of the thousands of Cambodians who were murdered here.
Excited about meeting up with Zoe’s friend Kieran and his girlfriend Holly who live in Cambodia the girls got their glad rags on and along with Pat squeezed back onto the moped to go and meet them. Whilst waiting for Holly, Kieran took the opportunity to tune Pat the guitar, have a play and even show Zoe some chords!
Kieran is volunteering for an organisation in Cambodia who work with local people who need a loan to help them improve their life – they have a website (http://www.kiva.org/) where they post all of the applicants from all over the world with what they will use the money for e.g. to buy a cow and anyone can loan them the money which they will repay over the course of 1 year plus - the minimum amount you can loan people is $25 and they only have around 2% of people unable to make the repayments – a great idea if anyone wants to support a great cause!!
(back to what we did with Kieran and Holly)
The night out with the ‘locals’ was great as they took us all to the best places; a market, some good bars and Cambodian night clubs where we could let our hair down and bust some moves! Unfortunately Holly was poorly and having fed the fish ;) made an early exit so the rest of us partied the night away and the girls had the latest night since leaving the UK!
The next day we had to get up early to get a very cheap local bus to Siem Reap – luckily the bus was empty (except for about 4 travellers, 4 locals and a monk) so we could spread out for the long and extremely bumpy road across Cambodia!
We could tell what a fantastic place Siem Reap was as soon as we arrived! Just the right mix of busy, quiet, modern, old, culture and fun! We found ourselves a lovely place to stay right in the centre of town and went straight out to dinner to meet Sophie who we’d met on the bus at the ‘Dead Fish Restaurant’ which was amazing – the whole restaurant was a mish mash of different level platforms, most with chilled out seating on the floor and traditional Thai dancers on a platform in the middle of the restaurant. The food was great and the atmosphere was brilliant – even though we knew the whole time that in the basement was lurking at least 20 crocodiles that have been there since the restaurant was previously a crocodile farm!!
The next day we went to see one of the 8 wonders of the world – Angkor Wat; a collection/city of ancient temples built a very long time ago!! They were amazing! Our driver took us around the main ones and we got to explore these loads – Zoe and Kathryn both agreed their favourite was Tar Prom which had trees growing from within the walls and ceilings – it is the only temple that they have not done any reconstruction to and they have just let nature take it’s course – also featured in the film Tomb Raider this temple definitely had an action movie feel to it! Zoe and Kathryn might have had a few Lara Croft moments inside!!
After looking at the temples we asked our driver to take us to see some monkeys – they have monkeys living wild within the grounds and you often see then along some of the roads. Soon enough we had spotted 4 monkeys on the side of the road and our tuk tuk stopped so we could take some photos! So excited by this Kathryn jumped straight out and started crossing the road to get closer – the monkeys however had another idea – they started running across the road towards Zoe and jumped straight into the tuk tuk to join her! To say Zoe was petrified at this point would probably not even come close!!! The monkeys proceeded to sit next to Zoe and ‘play’ with her for a while during which time our tuk tuk driver offered Zoe some comforting words ‘I’m scared’!!! after a while we realised the monkeys wouldn’t actually hurt us and when they let go of Zoe she jumped out of the tuk tuk to let Kathryn have a go – by then they weren’t interested in any of us as they were being fed some bananas by a passer by!
A perfect end to the day – we all tucked up in bed for the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy on Star Movies!
The next day was an early start (well not as early as it was meant to be as Kathryn set the alarm for 6pm instead of 6am which meant when we woke up at 6.53am we only had 22mins to pack our bags and get ready to leave!) as we travelled on the long and bumpy road to Bangkok, due to Thai Airways stopping the road to the Thai border being resurfaced to encourage people to fly. We had a 5 hour bus trip to the border along a road FULL of pot holes – good job Kathryn can sleep anywhere! After crossing the Thai border and bringing some joy to some street kids with Pat the guitar we all carried on our long journey to Bangkok...
Speak soon, and remember...2 brushes a day keeps the dentist away!!
Keith xx

A Vietnam continued

A short flight later the girls arrived in the Southern city of Saigon. Expecting a far busier city than Hanoi we were pleasantly surprised at the modern metropolis and the polite mannered people (meaning they stop trying to sell you things after only 3 no’s!). After checking out the local area the girls had an early night in front of the TV. The next day saw the girls, after finally sorting out their Thai Visas (phew!), check out what Saigon had to offer; a pleasant tour around the Reunification Palace was followed by a harrowing visit to the US War Remnants Museum – a disturbing look at a collection of photos and quotes depicting the experiences of both sides of the American War, a very interesting history lesson!
The day had a lighter finish with some yummy Vietnamese food (including a stow away bottle of 2 quid rum which found it’s way into Zoe’s bag and sneaked out whenever there was a glass of coke on the table! – a trick learnt from Jane Shuffbum J!) and a walk around the local market.
All in all a great, although brief, experience of Vietnam – here’s to the 6 hour bus journey to Cambodia, one week until I can get into my speedos and on the beach with the girls and Lucy!
Forever white...Keithxxx