The story so far.......

Sorry for such a delay in getting something posted up here but internet and time has been the main constraints followed closely behind by my laziness! Anyway, everything is good here. We left Bangkok and went south about two weeks ago to an island called Koh Pha Ngan which off the east coast in the gulf of Thailand. Here we met up with some lads from college to bring our group up to a total of 9....(Dave, Chris Kitchin is here with us at the moment)....We had this beautiful hostel (or hotel even) with a pool, own beach and beautiful views of the sea. Koh Pha Ngan is a bit touristy but we decided to stay there for little over a week for the infamous full moon party and just to relax a bit. First few days mainly consisted of getting up around noon, lying by the pool or in a hammock for the afternoon, maybe going for a massage then off for dinner and out to beach parties for the night!! We did take a bit of a look around the island and even ventured a bit into the jungle a few of us on our own. It turned out to be a bit more of an adventure than a leisurely stroll!! We kinda 'wandered' off our track and was a little lost when the next thing Malcolm screamed (like a big girl!) that something moved in the grass ahead so he stood back for a secon and then moved forward again only to see a snake scurrying on ahead which later we found out was a very deadly snake! Next thing coconuts started falling from the trees missing one of the other guys by about an inch! Who'd have thought coconuts could have been so dangerous!!! Eventually we made it back safely with lizards, mosquitos and monkeys annoying us alll the way down! We also took a day trip to Ko Samui which is another island in that area. Nice island too but very touristy. We'd the full moon party last Saturday night and that was awesome. All night dancing and drinking on the beach. Everyone dressed up in psychodelic bodypaints and just general madness. I have loads of photos of all this but the internet cafe here wants to charge me to plug in my camera into the USB port and then charge me for every photo I upload.....so going to leave it for today. Monday we moved to another island called Koh Tao (Turtle island cos it's shaped like a turtle!)....all 9 of us. It's really nice here, quiet, beautiful beaches and famed for it's diving and snorkelling. So we started a diving course straight away and it's been long and busy days. Were out diving all morning and it was truely amazing all the coral and tropical fishes we seen. Tomorrow we go on a few more dives then have an exam and hopefully I will then be a certified diver so i can dive anywhere in the world (up to 20 metres). Hoping to leave here on Friday and go south to Malayasia where we might do an advanced diving course in the Parenthean Islands, check out some national parks and tea plantations (sure been Irish, have to see where our tea comes from!!) then on to Kuala Lumpur to see Petronas towers and then finally to Singapore for a few days. Hope to get some photos up soon. Take care,P

Massages, Elephants and more Thai Whiskey.....

Just spent 4 days up north in Chiang Mai and what a great city! It's so less intimidating than Bangkok, cleaner, lots of tourists and just not as intense. I guess it's the Galway of Thailand! It's a walled city and there are lots of great markets all over the place where you can buy any food you want, any brand of anything you want or even all stuff from the hilltribes, a lot of it probably fake but who knows! So just chilled out there for a few days going around the markets and getting our Thai massages. It was very enjoyable and a whole new experience. You are on a mattress on the ground (see malco right!) and you have this Thai woman sitting on you while she massages you! There are so many of the massage places around and some of them are brothels so you gotta be careful! Speaking of brothels......so many prostitutes in the bars in Chiang Mai trying to pick western men up...very strange too! Yesterday we went on this trek into the jungle. That was really great - spent the day elephant riding (as from the pic below!), white water rafting and visiting some of the different tribal villages.

It was a great day all in all apart from two very annoying French girls (desole aux francais qui lisent cet blog!) that did nothing but complain and give out constantly and then gave our poor guide who was the coolest guy loads of hassle at the end of the day.......
Last night we took a night train back to Bangkok which took us 15 hours. For fear of not been able to sleep for the duration of the trip we decided some help might be needed so we got a bottle of thai whiskey, thai red bull and coke and made our own home made "buckets" on the way back! It was very effective for me and I was sleeping like a baby for a solid 10 hours! Unfortunately Malcolm wasn't quite so luck and ended up staying awake most of the night.......unlucky! So now back in Bangkok and we've met up with some friends of Malcolm's that arrived here yesterday. All off to see some Thai boxing tonight then heading down to the islands tomorrow for the full moon party which is on the 22nd I think. Hope everyone is having fun wherever you are and hope to have some more news up here soon.

Ripped Off Number 1.......

Well, I think I spoke too soon in the earlier post about us being so clever and not getting ripped off!! We got a little bit conned with a travel agent in Bangkok but not bad at all in our terms. They have all theses travel agents everywhere whom are in cohoots with the tuk tuk (taxi) drivers who get a percentage off them if they take tourists to their office. They had the whole 6 weeks planned for us for what in European terms seems very reasonable. Thankfully we only booked the first week as far as chiang mai with them! Everything worked out fine for us but we paid a small bit more than if we at just paid as we went along. Not to worry, we've been meeting lots of ppl along the way who were seriouly worse screwed than us!

We left Bangkok on Thursday and headed north to a small town called Ayuthaya which used to be a the capital. Lots of old temples (or 'wats') to see but to be honest once you've seen one wat, you've seen them all! So, spent one night there and then headed further north on a long 6 hour train journey to a town called Sukhothai which used to be the first capital of Thailand. Nice town with a cool park again with loads of temples and sitting buddas. We met nice German and Danish people there and had two nights of some good food and relaxing. We left there this morning and are now in Chiang Mai - Thailand's capital of the North. gonna hang around here for a few days and see what it has to offer. we're near the mountains so lots of trekking, hill tribes and what not. Off now to look for a thai woman to run up and down my body.....yes you read right but don't worry that's what a Thai massage involves!! I'll let you know soon what it's like. Thanks for the posts and mails, keep them coming!

Bangkok bound.....

Arrived in Bangkok yesterday and what a mad city. Avoided the usual number one tourist mistake of paying loads for a taxi and got the bus. All went ok. Hostel was grand we were staying in. Went on a walk around Bangkok and turns out there ain't a whole lot to see. Mad drivers here...No law and order but the tuk tuks are cool. They just follow the tourists trying to take us somewhere and they insist on bringing you to travel agents, tailors and all sorts of places. Think they are all working together to con us! It's a fairly polluted city too. Last night went to this bar to try their "buckets" (Thai whiskey, Thai red bull and coke)......Lethal stuff. We were so messed up after 2 of those (between us). Went wandering with 2 English guys and ended up in some undesirable places! Also, went to a karaoke bar with just Thai people and decided to get up and join them dancing.....We got free t-shirts for our efforts! Today was a hungover day....Shopping, eating and that's it really! We're going up North tomorrow to Chiang mai and a few places along the way. Gone do some elephant/jungle trekking. Everything dirt cheap here and u can get anything you want for next to nothing. They are even selling builds of Longhorn and Office 12, weird eh?! Got to go now but will try keep this up to date and hopefully with some more interesting tales and adventure (and scandal on malcolm!) with a few pics too.

Last goodbyes......

Just one day to go now until myself and Malcolm arrive in the Kingdom of Thailand. What a busy week I've had......finishing up work, moving out of my apartment, last minutes things for my trip and of course the obligatory last nights out with work and friends from college. Must say was sad leaving Microsoft after a whole 12 months. I've made some good friends there, what a crazy gang! This photo is of my last night out with them when I also got presented an honorary (joke) certificate for outstanding performance as their Computational Linguist......Carl Vogel would be so proud! And everyone got their exam results this week and i think everyone is happy, well done guys. I'm jealous now that I'm a year behind you all.

The next thing I write on this will be of my Thai adventures! take care,P