In Laos

I am now in Laos! It took a nine hour bus ride and then a 2 day boat ride to get here though. There were some good points and bad points about the trip.

Good: I slept most of the way on the bus

Bad: We arrived at the Laos border at 4am and checked into the worst motel room ever. I thought bedbugs were a myth till I woke up with the bites all over my legs.

Good: We crossed the river from Thailand to Laos to get our visa with no issue.

Bad: A man on the otherside tried to scam us by suggesting we take a minibus to Lurang Prabang in Laos, (Luckily we went with our gut and took the slow boat)

Good: We saw a wild elephant drinking in the Mekong

Bad: The boat nearly tipped over once or twice when it was very full. (the captain was getting people into the middle of the boat)

Good: We made it in the end!

We are now in Lurang Prabang. More info soon!

bx

Elephant Pai

Things you should know about riding on an Elephant:

1. Whatever amount of time you think you want spend on the back of an Elephant with no seat. Half it then you will save yourself some serious muscle aches.


2. When climbing onto an elephant with no seat, you stand on its knees, grab its ear and pretend your climbing a big tree


3. There is no way to look graceful when climbing an elephant


4. If the elephant goes into water and is in a playful mood prepare to get wet

(Jen was not hurt in the last picture)

We are leaving Pai in about 4 hours and going to Laos. Getting to Laos means a 8 hour bus journey and a 2 day boat ride! I will update the route map soon!

bx

Wat Wat Wat!

"There is an elephant in the road", Jen remarked with astonishment.

"What?" I replied over the sound of cars, taxis and other people shouting

"There. is. an. elephant. in. the. road." Jen said again, but I still could not hear her and was looking back at her.

"Sorry?" I shouted. I then caught something out of the corner of my eye and finally looked ahead. There was a baby elephant less than a meter away from me and it was strolling past without a care in the world.

Chiang Mai is an amazing city. It was built in 1259 and to protect it from invaders the designers also included a sodding big moat into the blueprint. We are staying towards the top right hand corner of the square moat. (To look at a boring map click here.) The moat never fully worked though and the city was invaded and taken over by Burma for a short while.

Within the area of the moat Chiang Mai is a spiderweb of streets and alleys with amazing cheap Thai restaurants, Monks in bright orange robes, coffee shops and Wats. You have to avoid the taxis, motorbikes, mopeds and Tuk Tuks as you go adventuring through the old city though and this is no easy task when they keep stopping and asking if you want a ride! The best part about exploring the city for me though is the Wats. What's a Wat? Well a Wat is a temple. So if someone asks what's a wat you know what a wat is because it's what's written here. (Jen and I have been trying as many Wat related jokes and sayings as possible).

At one stage we wandered into this huge temple area and into a sectioned area with a sign saying 'monk chat'. I sat under a tree and chatted to monks. I wanted to ask them if they have a choice to become a monk? Do they like the routine? Can they tell me a little about Buddhism? Instead they wanted to know all about England and the different accents people have. It was still fun to chat to them though.

I have also now just returned from a Thai cooking course. We were picked up from the hostel and taken to the local market where we learnt all about different herbs, vegetables and fruits. We then went to the kitchens and were instructed by a very patient thai chef how to cook a variety of different dishes from scratch. I really felt like I learnt something from it and am looking forward to getting home and trying to cook some Thai Green curry, papaya salad and coconut chicken soup sometime!

Jen showing that asian size aprons are not good for the western woman.

We are planning on staying in Chiang Mai for another night and going to see some hill tribes in the countryside. One of the tribes have the women who elongate their knecks by using metal rings which should be really interesting. We are then travelling four hours outside of the city to a place called 'Pai', because we want to get slightly off the beaten track for a while and have been told this is the best way to see some elephants that are not just there for the sake of tourism. Should be interesting!

bx

In Chiang Mai

We are now in Northern Thailand in the city of Chiang Mai. Getting here involved taking a plane from the east coast of peninsula Malaysia to the capital Kuala Lumpur, then another plane the next morning from Kuala Lumpur to Chiang Mai.

I was talking about this route to Jason in Australia and mentioned that I would be staying at the airport. "Awesome, your staying at Kuala Lumpur International Airport hotel? It's amazing!"

I'm sure that KLIA Hotel is amazing but no, we did not sleep the night there.

This was where Jen and I made our beds for the evening.








And it was surprisingly comfortable. We found a small corner of the airport where no one was walking around and I got seven hours of good sleep. Staying the night there saved the expense of traveling an hour into the city, finding a hostel then travelling an hour back again the next day.

When we arrived in Chiang Mai we found a hostel after sweating around the city for about 45 minutes with our backpacks on our shoulders. The first handful we tried were either too expensive or did not have any rooms but eventually we found an amazing hostel called 'Nocky', which is only 200 Baht per night (about 4.40p per night between us) for a twin room. It is only 6 months old and the rooms are clean, have hot water and Western toilets! No more crouching over a hole for me!

Our plans for the following few days are.

Day 1: Explore the city
Day 2: Take part in an all Day Thai cooking class
Day 3: Go swimming/riding/spend the day with Elephants
Day 4: Possible trek to see hill tribes


bx

Long way from home

I saw this sign above and realized how far away I am from home. It's going to be a long journey!

bx

Left the islands

We have left the islands of the east coast and I found just enough internet to upload the pictures below.

Boat taxi waiting for a customer

Picture of Jen contemplating why the hell we walked over the mountain and did not take a boat taxi (she fell and really hurt her knee on the way down too)

The palm trees over our beach. You really have to watch out for falling coconuts, one girl had one fall about a meter away from her whilst she was sunbathing.

Slightly overcast shot of longbeach.

bx

Sea creatures

Other than the cool sea breeze, golden sands, coconut trees and secluded beaches the islands off the east coat of peninsula Malaysia are famous for diving. The water is so clear that if feels like you are swimming in a fresh water pool.

Because of this, I have spent most of today face down in the water wearing a mask and swimming with the fish.

Because of this, I now look like a half burnt slice of toast with my back half being red and my front half looking like it belongs to an albino.

When I saw my first shark it was quite exciting, till I realized that it was really small and really close to me, rather than really big and really far away. I have been surrounded by thousands of multicoloured fish and swam above huge coral reefs watching the weird fish filled city below. The best part was getting to swim with turtles, they sit and eat at the bottom of the water and you wait above for them to come up for air, when they begin to surface you can dive down and then slowly swim side by side till they reach the surface. They are pretty big creatures and it was amazing to swim with them so close. We had a briefing before we went to swim with them and it consisted of this "Do not ride the turtles, they do not like it", it was stating the obvious, but still some idiots in my group looked a little let down that they would not get to manhandle a giant sea creature.

Two nights ago I had a confirmed sighting of a large rodent in our cabin. It shot past me and scrambled under the door, I made the decision not to tell anyone else about the sighting because there was nothing we could do about it. This was a good plan till last night it decided to pop round for another visit and everyone saw it make a mad dash across our bags and out of the door. Jen said she kept thinking about it throughout the night, I had a dream that it crawled into my mouth.

We made some new friends who came with us for this part of the journey but they have now gone onwards on their own adventures. Krisitine has gone back to Hong Kong and the Irish Pharmacist has gone to go hiking in the jungles. We will likely adopt some new people on the next leg of our trip though, it seems to be a habit!

We are having an amazing time here in our little hut so decided to stay here for a couple of extra days. I am currently sitting in the beachside cafe looking out to sea. Jen has just gone on a diving trip and today I am going to swim and read and then do some sunbathing (just the front half though).

I have updated the map showing the next leg of our journey, we have made the decision to fly back to Kuala Lumpur and then up to Chang Mai in Thailand. We are doing this because we have decided to leave South Thailand till the end of the trip as we need to return there for our flights back to Hong Kong anyway. We also have heard amazing things about Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam so want to start that part as soon as possible.

Pictures are really hard to upload here but will try to add some when I return to mainland Malaysia. The resort we are staying at has a pet monkey that they rescued as a baby. It launched itself onto my shoulders and scared the hell out of me, which explains the photo below.

bx

Paradise found

We left the Cameron Highlands and travelled 4 hours by bus and then half an hour by speed boat to arrive in what can only be described as paradise. It's actual name is Perhentian Islands but I seriously think they should change the name.

We were really lucky to find a place to stay on the islands as we were getting reports that up to 30 people a day were being turned away and having to return to the mainland after arriving on the sandy shores with heavy backpacks and not finding any hostels with rooms available. Because it is high season the hostels also don't take any bookings, so we made the decision that we would not stay on the most popular stretch of the island and instead book a hostel on the same island but one beach up.

It turned out to be the best decision we could have made. We are staying at a place called 'D'Lagoon' and it is a series of beach hut/cabins placed back into the jungle of the island. Our cabin has a small balcony with views out onto the private beach and crystal clear ocean. Our cabin also has spiders, cockroaches, cold showers and possibly a rat that has eaten some of our bread. But this is besides the point.

Click here for the view from our cabin

Click here for a picture of our cabin

bx

Cold showers

When you are biting down on your teeth and at the same time screaming inside whilst stepping into an ice cold shower what you need is a poem on the wall called "don't quit".

Funny hostel owners.


bx

Tea at the Highlands

We went on a tour to a tea plantation, strawberry and honey farm, rose garden, Buddhist temple and butterfly farm. The tea plantation was the best in my opinion as the views were amazing over the hills.

I am leaving to the east coast islands today and will likely have limited internet and electricity so there might not be any new pictures for a few days. My time in the Cameron Highlands has been really fun but i'm looking forward to getting away from this cold weather and getting to a nice warm beach.

Click here to see the pictures from yesterday.


bx

The Cameron Highlands

In 1885 William Cameron was working as a British surveyor when he stumbled across the Cameron Highlands. It is an area of jungle 1800 - 2040 meters above sea level and surrounded by mountains. The patch of jungle soon became popular because the temperature is cool all year round. It was this drop in temperature that I noticed first when stepping off the bus, I could not believe that four hours earlier I was sweating through the crowded streets of Kuala Lumpur and now I was cold and reaching for my jumper. It felt like I was back home in England.


Our first evening in the highlands was quite relaxed. We went for some tasty local curry which was very cheap and just spent time talking and taking a look at the area.

The next day though the relaxing nature of the trip was shattered when I took part in the most difficult hike I have ever experienced. It started off quite relaxed and easy but we soon found ourselves looking at a wall of jungle, then doing a 360 degree turn and not being able to spot anything that remotely looks like a trail. I could see the newspaper reports now "backpackers found 5 years after being lost in the jungles", or "Jen eats Ben out of necessity to survive".







When we finally found the trail it would go from slippery mud to steep mountains. At one point it was so steep that I was on hands and feet and clambering at vines. "This is rock climbing not hiking"! I recall shouting/panting at one stage. I fell over about three times, but finally after two mountains and some amazing views we reached flat land and the Orang Asli Village, this village contains the descendants of the native people of the highlands who were here far before William Cameron stumbled across it with his maps and colonial ways.


I'm having trouble uploading pictures so i'm going to try and put the photos in a slide show. It will either be below or click here to view it.

bx

You know you are in Malaysia when...

You know you are in Malaysia when there are lizards the size of small children roaming round the place like they own it.

bx

Leaving for the jungles

I got back to KL and have met Jen. I might have also adopted an Irish pharmacist who I met in Melaka to join us on our travels too. Leaving for the Cameron Higlands today!


bx

Eating ear in Melaka

I have been in Melaka for the past two nights and am leaving tomorrow to meet Jen in Kuala Lumpur. It took two hours to get from KL to Melaka and I arrived just as it started to rain. I am trying to always take public transport over taxis so my first mission was to wade through the taxi touts and work out the Melaka bus system to take me to my hostel.

I finally got to the hostel quite wet and having walked a fair distance with my big bag on my back. I met Howard the hostel owner and he gave me a tour of my new home for the next three nights. No hot water, no air conditioning, no place in the room to store valuables. My first bad feelings about the hostel though were quickly dissolved when I realized how much of a character Howard was.

"The problem with hostel guests," He remarked as he gave the tour "is that sometimes you have guests who talk to each other, and sometimes you have guests who are shy, and sometimes you have guests who just don't want to make new friends. Why is this? Everyone should be friends! Life is too short!" Howard then took me to the main foyer of the hostel where a big group of backpackers were sitting on big cushioned seats and chatting. Howard made the introductions, remembering everyones names and I joined them, within half an hour I felt like I had known everyone for years.

The first night I was there Howard went rushing round the hostel asking if anyone want to go to dinner. A small group of us jumped into his car and he took us to this local food place where you sit on the street and eat. He did the same the following night which is where this picture below was taken.

You can just about see me behind the giant German girls head.

The food we were eating here was Satay and the restaurant is famous in Melaka. In the center of the table was a boiling pot of satay heated by gas and you would cook all your food in the pot. I had chicken, vegetables, seafood of unknown origin and ear. I don't know what animal owned the ear but I want to try as much new stuff as I can on this trip and eating an ear fell under this category.

Melaka itself is a very chilled out place. Through the ages the city has been taken over or influenced by so many different countries that it has British, Dutch, Arabic, Malay and Chinese heritage. There are old ruins, temples and mosques dotted round small winding streets with lots of cafes and restaurants you can sit in and watch the world go by. You sometimes find yourself thinking your in Europe somewhere rather than Malaysia.

I am leaving Melaka tomorrow feeling very relaxed and chilled out after watching sunsets from the roof garden and meeting some interesting people. I'm looking forward to meeting Jen and then heading into the jungles of Malaysia but will be a little sad to leave Melaka and am sure I will return to stay at the 2 quid a night hostel again someday. The hostel is called Ringos Foyer and the owner is a legend!

bx

Monkeys of Batu Caves

A 40 minute bus ride out of the city takes you to some interesting Indian temples hidden within massive caves. The entrance to the main cave is guarded by a pretty formidable gold statue, and if that was not enough, you have to climb 273 steps to get there. This was all a test of faith in itself.



But just as interesting as the caves were the monkeys that surrounded them.





The monkeys would run up to the Indian temples and raid the offerings of fruit, then make a runner before the priests would through stones at them. Priests are pretty good shots with stones by the way, with one shot sailing between a group of Chinese tourists and hitting a monkey on the head.

The monkey below was sliding down this staircase on its stomach trying to make a grab of a mans drink. It missed its target and only got more stones thrown at it.




Oh, the caves and the temples were really interesting too. Monkeys get my vote though.




Tomorrow I go to Melaka! Then back to Kuala Lumpur where I meet Jen who is travelling here from China.

bx

My route

On the right hand side of this blog towards the bottom I have created a link to a map showing where I am travelling. I am keeping it because my old company have asked me to do a travel presentation to the staff when I return to Hong Kong in October. It will also be a useful way for the parents to keep track of me should I fall of the face of the earth. For example, I was nearly hit by a flock of scooters whilst crossing the road today...

bx

The buildings of Kuala Lumpur

Chinese style buildings


Next to 120 year old churches



Next to old colonial buildings



Next to giant mosques.

bx

Malaysia Day 1

I am staying in a hostel dorm with two Irishmen, an Englishman, an Egyptian, a Pakistani and a Bulgarian. It sounds like the start of a complicated joke.

The Egyptian guy is studying in Malaysia but his course has been put on hold because his university has been shut down with Swine Flu. The Pakistani is from Perth and is here for a holiday. The Irish guys are surprisingly boring, with one being an accountant and one being a computer technician. The Bulgarian speaks no English but seems to be nice and the English guy is a parachute instructor currently living in New Zealand.

I'm not going to inroduce the characters in the dorms everytime I write but it just shows as an example that it's a good way to meet some random and interesting people!

My first day in Kuala Lumpur was spent exploring the city and getting to grips with the public transport systems. About five minutes walk north of the hostel is the famous Petronas Towers which used to be the tallest building in the world till the Taiwan 101 building was finished. I walked there and had a look at them, you can go up to the bridge that connects the two towers together and I will probably go back and do that tomorrow.

I then headed on a train to little India and Chinatown. I spent the day exploring the markets and getting lost down all the side streets and looking at the architecture. I'm not normally very interested in buildings but it was amazing to walk past skyscrapers, 120 year old churches, colonial buildings, mosques and old arabic buildings all in one city. I eventually found myself at the Reggae Bar which Nikki suggested I check out. It was nice but drinks were more expensive than in Hong Kong so I did not stay there long. I am now back in the hostel and having some trouble uploading pictures from my day onto the blog. I will upload some soon!

In Kuala Lumpur!

I have arrived in Kuala Lumpur and checked into the hostel. Can't say anything else as I only have 3 minutes of internet!

bx