The Islands of Indonesia

15th to 24th October - Denpasar & Gili Trawangan

Early into the evening we had arrived in Indonesia, after a minor panic about bringing alcohol/tobacco into the country we discovered it was alright and we headed through security with reasonable confidence. We split the tobacco between ourselves but even when it was clearly seen, nobody flinched. The first guy we saw attempted to hook us for a taxi and even after clearly stating “we’re ok thanks”, he followed us out of the airport, stood with us for ten minutes and then when we got in another taxi, for some reason he appeared shocked! I was placed with Ingham, Ronchetti and Jenny and we set off to our new home in Denpasar. I don’t think i’ll ever in my life have a more histerical taxi drive than that day, the driver instantly riddled us with questions which is quite normal but he continued to point women out on the streets and telling us how to pretty much hook up with people. He defiantly didn’t shy from details but the best comment from our new friend was that some Australian girls drink far too much beer, Bintang to be precise and because of this, they’re often ‘larger’. His words not mine. As you can imagine this conversation for over 20 minutes broke us up into laughter continuously. We didn’t even reply to much!

Denpasar was not quite what i was expecting at all, in some fashion it reminded me of Thailand, which worried me, it seemed like there was one large strip littered in bars, tourists and locals selling everything under the sun. We dropped our gear off at Pop Hotel and ventured to get ourselves grounded, luckily we discovered quite quickly the crowd was much nicer but hawkers were definitely in full force. After a few casual beers and a superb carbonara me, Paul and Jenny broke from the group and got an early night. It had been my graduation back in England the same day and i had a Skype call with the university group, it was brilliant to see everyone so happy and with that the next morning i had planned absolutely nothing, purposely. I wanted a day of just sitting on the beach, drinking some gin and eating fresh fruit. I did exactly that! Four of us sat there and watched the day go by pretty quickly, we spoke to some interesting people, one in particular that Paul for reasons unknown bought a blowpipe with darts from. This man told us about how it took him two weeks on a boat to travel from his home country Papua New Guinee where these ‘weapons’ are made by his uncle and sold to tourists as something for the mantle piece! Not a bad story at all. The rest of the group began to arrive into the late afternoon and we sat and watched the sunset on the beach, one of the best i’ve seen out here! The sun illuminated everything in an orange glow and its outline in the sky was visible as it disappeared over the horizon. The night continued with bars, pool and conversations before we arrived at yet another rooftop club, people opening doors for you, marble everywhere and Western priced drinks. I didn’t actually see much of the place before i needed taking home, i had enjoyed my graduations too much it seems! Thanks Ben for getting me back!

We wasted the next day with just relaxing by the pool at our hotel and heading out for a good meal knowing we had planned Waterbom the next day! It’s the third largest waterpark in the world, first in Asia. An early morning and off we set, we were far from disappointed when we arrived to see huge, spiralling slides across our peripheral. We started with the lazy river, something i’ve never given much time but they’re brilliant! Floating around a designed course on a tube where you bounce around gently through little water features and greenery. Afterwards we began on the larger attractions and almost all of them were brilliant but theres on in particular, Dan and Robin went on it first whilst i was busy on another, they came over afterwards and convinced me to follow them back up the stairs to this specific waterslide. Turns out it was a trapdoor kind of system where you stand at the top of the slide and after a countdown the floor opens up and you pretty much free fall into this ride! Obviously nervous i get in and prepare for the drop, i wasn’t disappointed! Apparently as it opened i screamed “like an old man” was just one of the quotes. You crash land onto the slide at good speed then thinking i’m about to come out the other end i began flying upwards from the momentum, around a slanted loop. Best ride there by a long shot, and literally zero people there all day! The staff there were also incredibly friendly, couldn’t do enough for you and actually had a laugh with you. I’d recommend the place to anyone else heading this side of the world.

       Travelling to Gili T was relatively easy with a travelling package bought at a tourism office, a quick taxi followed by a few hours on a ferry beached us on the island, we jumped into the shallow water with our bags and once again felt the horror of wet feet and sand combined. The island was nicely quiet with only horses and carriages going past us because engines are banned! I’m always most fond of the peaceful places we’ve visited on this trip. We booked our bungalows and headed down to the beach for a quick swim, snorkel kit attached and under i headed to have a look for some fish. Literally only 30 meters from shore the ground disappeared beneath where i swam into this infinite dark blue sea, it was an eery kind of emptiness that surrounded me! As i’m not incredibly fond on deep water that was enough  and back to the beach with an iced coffee i headed. 

Our next few days consisted of mainly late nights and zero sightings of the morning, well deserved! Finally we pulled our act together, stopped wasting our time and got a boat hired to take us on a few hours snorkelling trip. Alas not everybody woke up so just me, Robin, Paul and Jenny appeared at the docks ready to go. Once again the trip was brilliant! We saw yet more sea turtles including me managing to swim quite far down for a better look, it was great for Paul and Jenny who i don’t believe had done this before. Later on we were told to jump in before our driver pointed further down the coast and he set off, luckily we can bloody swim! It was a good 30-40 minute journey through the coral gardens  which was crowded in both fish and colourful coral before we reached a huge ship wreck that the driver spoke about at the beginning of the day. We saw loads of scuba divers swimming below us exploring the boat but even from above it was very interesting. 

We arrived back later in the afternoon and told the group of our trips success and with that we headed back to the beach and booked a longer, better sounding trip for tomorrow. Five hours of both snorkelling and fishing and we got it for a bargain as well! I’ve never tried fishing and wasn’t by any means fully committed to what the day would hold but the morning came and we began at first with snorkelling. Unfortunately the current was strong meaning staying in one place was very difficult, you could even see the fish struggling as the zig zagged between the coral but to top things off my goggles kept leaking and there was nothing i could do about it, our driver had moved the boat and he wasn’t brilliant with English so i got nowhere. But still, swimming around is not the worst way to spend the day.

We began fishing later on in the day which by all means started brilliantly, i got myself sat at the front of the boat in the baking sun and with a quick tutorial cast my line with a tasty chunk of tuna into the deep blue, my competitive streak instantly came through and i was game for catching the first fish. A good 20 minutes passed before my chance of victory was shattered by both Ingham and Jenny screaming out they had a bite, reeling it in to our amazement it was fairly big! The day went on and alas beginners luck didn’t kick in for myself and i ended up catching absolutely nothing, from my knowledge everyone else did very well and by the end of the day we had a good haul! When we arrived back at the docks we said our thanks to the driver and he bagged up the fish and left, guessing he was going to have a good BBQ later on at our expense. The next morning it was time to leave and we arrived at the beach nice and early, after a horribly long wait on my own with a very uninterested staff member he finally told me we couldn’t get on the boat as it was already full and we had to come back the next morning! I’ve been stuck in worse places so we spent our extra, unexpected day at the beach relaxing on bean bags and planning our next destination, Ubud. 

Paul & Jenny 

 Preparing for our first scuba drop

 The happiest photograph of Robin i've ever seen!

 The beach at Gili Trawangan

 One of our overly friendly bar staff

 Can't beat beanbags!

 Paul & Jenny highjacking my camera

 Biggest catch of the day by Ingham and Jenny. Rep Snapper i believe?

 Robin fishing

 My first and probably last attempt at fishing

From one side of our boat

Kuala Lumper - The Green City

10th to 15th October - Kuala Lumper

For one of the first times we arrived at a location during day time, this gave us an advantage we’d normally never have on finding our accommodation. A good mile walk or so and we arrived at Oscar Guest House, its a decent little place with incredibly friendly staff which is usually all a place needs. Our evening was spent at Reggae Mansion, a cool bar that other travellers had previously told us about, costing about £3 per drink was the most expensive we’ve had but it was worth the rooftop bar looking over part of the city.   Only a few of us rose early the next morning and eager to see what the city had for us we set off and wondered the local China Town markets arguing prices with vendors and laughing at some of the bizarre designs printed on the fake t-shirts. Upside down Nike ticks etc. We rushed back to our hotel just in time for the arrival of Paul and Jenny, they’d decided to come and visit us out here for two weeks which was a breath of fresh air in the group, even if we were now eight! We set sail after some long needed reunions back into the depths of the city and ended up in the largest, most confusing mall in what i imagine, the world. Think of Ikea and the difficulty of leaving the store, multiply it by a rather large number and you’ve got this place. Adding to the confusing just after some brilliant food in the mall we stumbled upon this huge opening where you could see down several floors, looking up at first i believed to be seeing an orange, metal structure most likely for holding the building together, turns out it was a full sized roller coaster! It came with an entire loop and several massive drops. How is that even possible? None the less like kids we ran to the entrance to the ride where a security guy met us and shared the bad news. It was nearly £5 a ride, which in England i’d of laughed at and thrown my money to him, however out here thats a full days food budget! We found several other things to do in the mall and decided we’d come back for them another day as it was well into the evening. 

The next morning after far too much free toast and jam at the hotel we had arrived nice and early at Lagoon Theme Park which had a variety of different areas like water and theme parks along with what appeared to be a small but well looked after zoo. The whole day was really good with a few little roller coasters, a zip line and some decent water slides, especially this one where you would shoot down on a three man dingy into this huge, half-pipe shaped tube and with decent momentum you could fly up and down the sides reaching a good twenty or so feet. The day ended with a torrential downpour and the group got split up for some reason, luckily we found shelter and waited it out before leaving, i guess it is expected in rainy season, Paul and Jenny stood there amazed at the sheer amount the sky opened up, i guess me and the others have become desensitised to it now! 
     The day after delivered more fun, not just because we had a well earned lay in but we headed to the mall for a more relaxed day of clothes shopping where i finally bought a new top and shorts, bowling, which is always a good laugh with sliding shoes and we had also booked for something we had considered previously, The Escape Room. Its an elaborate series of rooms that you must solve puzzles to move forward. Each game has a theme and after reading the different synopsises we chose ‘The Art Gallery Heist”, armed with a simple torch, eight young, intelligent minds and 45 minutes to complete the challenge we entered the first room which was reasonably simple, finding clues behind paintings to open a padlocked, hidden door. Our second room took longer after going under and over a set of motion detectors and solving two more combination locks through finding hidden numbers both in paintings and on the walls. Robin at some point went through one of the motion detectors setting off a loud alarm, we’re all in panic thinking we’ve failed, but instead it was just a constant noise putting us off and making it a struggle to hear people! We finally got somewhere using the torches UV light which illuminated a secret code on the wall and we entered our final room. The clock was ticking and with quite a while left we settled our eyes on 12 different colour framed prints across the walls. They were different in many ways and at first we struggled to connect the dots. With our final five minutes we began struggling to decide what the final code for escape could be. Only moments were left and we threw several combinations in and crossed fingers. Boom. The alarm sounds and we’re busted. Turns out the correct code was much easier to find than we thought. With all of us thinking we’re masterminds we had over complicated the situation! Gutted but it was a great laugh and definitely something different. 

That evening we took Paul and Jenny to Reggae Mansion for a few drinks which ended in me having a good amount of gin, several games of pool later i ended up in Mc Donalds with everyone, but for some reason i was sat separately, across from what seemed to be a more drunk local who i think really wanted to have a staring match, harmless of course but none the less i tried to hold in the laughter awkwardly, ate my food and we set off back home. Obviously without my new and interesting friend. Our final day was quite relaxed, the main temple in Kuala Lumpur is Batu Caves which i really wanted to visit so we got there after a short drive in the afternoon, in all honesty we had fun just walking up the stairs due to the monkeys wondering around, nicking things from tourists, bottles of water, plastic bags, literally anything they took a fancy to. The caves themselves were quite impressive, huge colosseums of rock descended from the roof whilst the temple was a short walk inside. I’m glad i got to visit the temple and see the huge golden Buddha standing outside, the photographs don’t do it justice. Our time in the city had come to an end and i’d go as far as saying it was the most interesting city yet. It was surprisingly green in terms of trees and parks along with the people being very friendly and warming. Our next stop is Indonesia, one of the countries i’ve looked forward to the most for photographic opportunities. The landscapes are scattered with Volcanos and rice fields, hopefully i’ll at least capture a few!

Walking down near our hotel

 Off to the mall

 Some fruit please sir

 Rob and urm.. Ingham

 China Town during the day

 And at night

 Batu Caves statue

 Mother and baby monkey on our way up the stairs

 Group shot V1

 Group shot V2

Batu Cave temple

The Islands we Craved

12th to 29th September - Phuket, Koh Phi Phi & Koh Phangan

As we flew into Phuket i was gob smacked at the beauty of the green islands scattered through the light blue sea, it looked absolutely amazing, that was me itching to get exploring! After a short taxi ride we arrived at the best accommodation we had yet, big rooms, comfy beds and a damn good pool, best thing was it was all below budget. With me being far from healthy and the guys just wanted to relax thats exactly what we did for several days, hanging out by the pool and eating at the hotel. Our second night however, we decided to go to a quiet bar and have a few drinks which i was just about feeling up for. After a cheap sweat and sour chicken we were directed to a place called Bangla Road, even though i'd researched Phuket i'd never heard of it and wow we were in for a surprise. The place was more hectic than Bangkok! Instantly we had 20+ vendors offering us ping pong shows, night clubs, you name it. We settled down in a bar on the far side where you get offered matches of connect 4 and jenga for free tequila shots from the staff which in turn made our 'quiet night' into a much bigger event. We spent hours going from bar to bar laughing with people and getting the main part of our drinks for free, i'd admit this was the best night we had in Thailand so far, much better than what Bangkok had to offer. For the next two days of our stay in Phuket i stayed in, trying to eat plain food and try to get back on track. Several of the guys headed out for yet another round of bars and told me of their crazy antics the morning after, at times i was glad i stayed in, not to mention how bad the weather turned, a tropical storm had come down from Vietnam and began battering the surrounding islands of Phuket.
     We set sail once more to Koh Phi Phi via a quick taxi followed by two hours on a ferry. If you've ever watched the film 'The Perfect Storm' you'll understand around how choppy and dodgy the ferry was. Waves were bouncing off both sides to the point where the window next to me began leaking! Ingham hates the sea and generally anything to do with it, he slept for the first half of the ferry thank god but woke up half way through and quickly went pail! I don't blame him, even i was a little on edge! We jumped off the boat into the relentless rain and quickly found our new home for 7 nights, it looks absolutely nothing like what we booked but it was a bed and air conditioning, got the basics at least. The first two days it rained again none stop and we struggled to do anything apart from eat and sleep but finally the clouds began to clear and we had the choice of two very different beaches within a 5 minute walk from us. Firstly an incredibly shallow and slightly murky water bay which was good to just lay in, where as the other side was deeper and very clear. I didn't drink a drop during my stay at Koh Phi Phi as i began to get even worse, one night whilst the guys went out to the parties on the beach i was getting stomach cramps and started to actually pass blood... Sorry for the information! But this obviously got me incredibly worried and the next morning i went straight to hospital, they took a blood sample and asked a million questions, thankfully i was told my chances of survival are very high and with some antibiotics for a stomach infection i was on my way and within a few days i was beginning to feel my real self again.
     Nearly two weeks of feeling horrible got me quite down in the dumps as i'd done next to nothing but we finally headed out and began sea kayaking which was awesome, i bought myself a snorkel kit and parked up our kayaks at a place called Monkey Beach which, you guessed it, had loads of monkeys on it, that was fairly cool but the actual snorkelling here was much better! I'd never done it before and to be swimming with these fairly large, colourful fish cheered me up no end, only panicked once about sharks as well! We did the same on another day because we enjoyed it that much and later on hiked up to Koh Phi Phi viewpoint, nice and easy hike with a cool view of where both bays almost meet in the centre of the island. We bought most of our food from this restaurant called Cosmic which did surprisingly, really great Italian food for damn cheap, it sorted me out in terms of staying away from spice and grease whilst recovering. It was a good place for a none alcoholic drink and a few card games. Our time, even with a week there passed very quickly and before long we had planned our trip over to Koh Phangan for the biggest party of the month, the full moon party!
     Koh Phangan mainly consisted of sitting around the pool and drinking beer, that was our aim for the island and it was definitely achieved, its not something i’d do again on this trip but with five of your best friends you’ll struggled to have a bad time! It was nice to chat to other people as well, they had mainly arrived just for the Full Moon Party but because of that they brought a different, fun vibe with them. The beach was littered with bars and loud music every night we went down but the best place by far was Mellow Mountain, a really relaxed place where everyone sat with cushions on the floor. After one of the nights we jumped into a pick-up truck for our lift home, about a 30 minute drive with crazy roads and fast speeds... It was once way to get an adrenaline rush! All six of us were bouncing around in the back whilst the driver couldn’t care less, great fun though, it was like being on a rickety roller coaster. The Full Moon Party itself was like any other night on the beach but with 10 times more people, getting anywhere became a struggle but the atmosphere was brilliant, everyone was in high spirits and there to generally have a good time. We sat on the beach and watched the sunrise in the traditional manner of the party, it was a good ending to a great night. 

 Sunset at Koh Phi Phi Viewpoint

 Enjoying the beaches for the day

Monkey Beach which was only a short 15min kayak away

 Leaving the islands and heading off to Malaysia

The Thai Mountains

6th to 11th September - Pai & Chiang Mai

We arrived in Chiang Mai and got ourselves onto the minibus heading to Pai, even further into Northern Thailand, we never originally intended on heading this far but with previously meeting up with Jenna and Josh, we wanted to continue with their route. The 3-4 hour journey was not only the best luxury public transport we've had so far but the views were amazing, mountains surrounded us whilst the clouds rolled through these huge valleys. This to me felt like the real Thailand, the Thailand i'd seen millions of photographs of and where i wanted to be. We jumped out of the minivan at the main market in Pai, i'd read about it being a great night time market with shops, food and bars. First thing we noticed was absolutely zero pestering. Not one person came and tried to sell us something, it was a far cry from Bangkok... Thank god. Jenna and Josh headed off to their own accommodation whilst Ben passed me his phone and i rang ours. To my surprise the guy was English! Turns out he's from Brighton so getting picked up was nice and easy. That first night we were starving and ventured down the hill where our new home was and into town, down the hill however, there must of been a pack of like 15 dogs. During the day they're harmless but at night time, they follow you, barking and at times its a bit unsettling! I kept thinking, just you wait, tomorrow we'll have scooters and you won't go for me then! The next morning thats exactly what we did and from then on, they stayed at a distance haha.
     The scooters here seemed great due to the vast countryside which was filled with little gems, the first day with them we travelled out towards a waterfall, where after a small walk we were knee deep in water exploring and then grabbed some food at 'Strawberry Farm', didn't have any strawberries but it was definitely the best pad thai i'd had so far! Getting towards the late afternoon we had heard of Thom's Elephant Camp, a local lady who's family had cared for elephants over several generations. I'm usually very wary of anything involving elephants as i think they belong in the wild, end of. However this appeared to be a well kept place that genuinely cared for the elephants. It was completely free to go stroke them and throw some bananas straight into their mouths, entertained us for a good 20 minutes before one of the ladies there told us that the elephant here, whilst pointing to one in particular, will pick you up. Surprisingly with not much peer pressure Robin decided he would volunteer as tribute and off he walked towards the elephant and within a split second it had wrapped its trunk around his legs, dragged him into the air and began placing Robin in his pen. All at the same time me and the guys had broken down in laughter as Robin furiously grabbed at anything in distance to 'save' him from impending doom. The elephant placed him down reasonably safely as the woman ran in to try and help and before long the elephant then tried to pick her up, it was all far too much for us and tears were almost shed on my part from laughter. I'll always remember that time when Robin almost got eaten by an elephant. The next day we relaxed a little more and simply drove around on the scooters for most of the day before trying to find somewhere to watch sunset, we struggled at first trying to find a good spot but finally settled on an open valley where you could see a storm rolling in across the distant mountains, not a bad view at all.
     The next day i began to deteriorate, i had a reasonably dodgy tasting chicken roti the night before and wasn't feeling great so sat around for the first half of my day, later on the guys had come back and decided to do nothing at all so me, Ingham and Robin headed off to do Pai Canyon, a walk everyone recommended doing if you're in the area. It was fairly awesome, the views were great and half of the hike was more like rock climbing as the path was incredibly thin at points and it dropped down then back up again. We watched sunset which was unfortunately quite underwhelming then shot back on the scooters as it got dark. That night i got worse and worse, turns out i'd got another bad stomach and it kept me in a horizontal position for the final two days of Pai. With our time there done we set back off in the air-con minivan back to Chiang Mai for our final day before heading South and with me still in poor shape we only went out for some food, but it was still eventful to say the least, we saw a sign for a buffet after a near 20 minute walk from our hotel and like eager kids we ran in, paid and got sat down only to realise that we had to cook everything ourselves. Challenge accepted. But it went wrong fairly quickly, all the meats, definitely cut off, were laid out with noodles, rice etc and we just picked up a tray of foods and began boiling our meats. Yes boiling. It was all we had, a pot of water and we had to make do. In all honesty i tried to stay out of the cooking but the guys pulled it off somehow and the food was reasonable. I pretty much just stuck to two bowls of rice since i thought i was dying from the inside out. I'd really enjoyed Pai but can't say i really experienced Chiang Mai, it seemed like too much of a built up city and thats why we didn't give it much more time.

 Having a break from the bikes at Strawberry Farm

 My interesting protection for several days!

 The walk down to a waterfall we found

 Finally a group shot!

 My favourite and only good elephant photograph so far

 Watching the storm come in over the Pai mountains

 Pai night market

 The dodgy, thin path up Pai Canyon

 A hike wouldn't be complete without some climbing

Not great light but at least we saw a sunset at the top!

Bangkok Has Us Now...

1st to 5th September - Bangkok

We arrived in Bangkok one night before Robin, Ingham and Ronchetti joined us on our travels so with one swift move of dropping our bags off at the hotel we shot out towards Khoa San Road, the main backpackers spot filled with food, drinks and live music. It had already hit 1:00AM upon our arrival the street was still booming where we met several interesting people, firstly a Thai guy who asked us where we were from in England, he then went on to show us a tattoo on his arm showing the hatred he has for Scousers! Odd but i’m not gonna argue with the guy! Our night only lasted a few hours as we had to get up early in anticipation for the others, so only a few beers down, we headed back. As we awoke we grabbed our things, laughed about the night before and set sail to find our new hotel and wait for their taxi to arrive. Sure enough within an hour here pulls up a taxi with three guys from the Ribble Valley… When you’re half way across the world and have been for near two months, seeing familiar faces is a very odd experience. Smiles and hugs everywhere to be reunited with our best friends and then we got straight out into the busy capital to show them the bartering, street food and generally colourful atmosphere that Bangkok has to offer. We spent the following two nights heavily intoxicated, I’m not going to lie. We travelled up and down the backpackers area meeting people, drinking, dancing and then finally doing something i’ve hugely wanted to try, eating insects! We bought a big bag and shared them out between us, the crickets are far too crunchy however the meal works are surprisingly good! Everything was soaked in soy sauce so the taste probably wasn’t how it should be. The one thing i’m still not to try are the tarantulas, this is a hurdle for another day i think. I keep telling myself to overcome my fear of spiders i must eat one, i’m unsure if this is good logic but you never know! 
     Bangkok was great fun and a brilliant catch up as we also met up with Josh and Jenna another two from Clitheroe who are travelling together but luckily we are doing Thailand at the same time. Then by sheer luck i saw on Facebook that Daniel, a guy i knew back from school was visiting Thailand and with a quick message he ended up joining us during the nights out. On the third morning me, Robin and Ingham decided that Bangkok obviously has more to offer and we set off in tuk tuk to see the local temples. Our first sighting was nothing great but we knew our driver had taken us to the wrong one! We asked to get dropped off at the Golden Mount and he thankfully obliged and we told him he can go. This temple was great, we set off walking up the steps and firstly saw all the large bells hung up along with a gong. We got slightly childish and starting ringing them all before moving further up the hill to the actual Golden Mount which was amazing to see but also the views from up here were crazy, we could see across most of Bangkok, i hadn’t realised the sheer amount of sky scrapers until this point. After this we got a new driver and headed towards Wot Pho, the temple of the reclining buddha which is build on a large area of land with loads of different things to see inside. The attention to detail across the complex was superb with monuments and large spears facing the sky everywhere. Then we finally got around to seeing the reclining buddha, i had seen photographs but never thought it was actually as big as it was! The thing was ginormous! Photographs just don’t do it justice. If i knew anyone visiting Bangkok i’d advise this temple, we spent an easy hour and half here and only left due to being starving. 
     The next and final morning we decided to do something where everyone talks about, the floating markets, its always a mixture of good and bad experiences at them and we hoped we would strike lucky but unfortunately the experience wasn’t great. When we arrived after the long drive our taxi driver told us we couldn’t walk around the markets and we had to pay for a boat, this is a lie and i knew it. We argued for a good 10 minutes before the other taxi driver came across and offered us the boat for a reasonable price, reluctantly we accepted just to get away from my driver! The markets themselves were too quiet and we spent hardly any time there before the boat heading back to shore. Not impressed to say the least! The taxi had waited for us and we jumped back in. He didn’t say a word for most of the drive home and i had fallen asleep during this time in the front. I woke up with this driver screaming in my face “GET OUT, YOU PAY NOW”, by far the worst wake up call i’ve ever had. We were 200m from our hotel and he refused to drive us forward and instead began grunting and screaming like a wild animal. I asked him several times to please stop shouting and it just didn’t seem to sink in. Even when getting the money out to pay him, he threatened to call the police! We did absolutely nothing wrong, he was simply angry because we didn’t fall for the tourist trap that he would surely get commission for. I’m very glad we didn’t encounter him again, could quite easily of put his windows through! 
     With that fiasco over and done with we had a small nap and then set sail for our last night in Bangkok where we met up with Megan, a friend from back in Sri Lanka and a few others she got to tag along. It was once again a great night full of laughter and i’m pretty sure at one point i started working for an insect selling stand, shouting out to foreigners telling them they’re ‘good’. “Step right up, step right up, best bugs in Bangkok”. With a couple of sales and my commission (a few crickets) i was on my way again to the next bar. Bangkok as a whole was so much fun but i felt like at times we didn’t do it properly, i wanted to explore much more than i did, hopefully i will make up for this on our next stop of Chiang Mai and Pai in the north of Thailand.

The bells at The Golden Mount (Wat Saket)

 At the top of Wat Saket

This huge, reclining Buddha is at Wat Pho, it totals 46m long!

 I also became quite obsessed with the temples attention to detail, including spears from their roofs

 The entrances are guarded by huge Chinese warrior statues

 Some of the guys in front on their boat at the floating markets.. Not that impressive of a place

The only passable photograph i captured whilst there

Sri Lankan Culture at Last

24th August to 1st September - Kandy, Adam's Peak & Negombo

After the amazing train journey that was Ella to Kandy we stumbled out of the train station and bartered a tuk tuk driver into taking us up the mountains to our new 4 person apartment. Our first impression of Kandy was quite expected, busy but yet full of greenery. We arrived at our new place and were greeted by a lovely couple who had only just opened up, tea was instantly served and we noted our own kitchen so decided for the first night Christine would cook something traditional from China, we both headed down to the shops in town and bought loads of stuff including breakfast however when attempting to buy sausages i was turned away by the Sri Lankan worker who explained due to the festival happening, no meat or alcohol could be served. No alcohol for me isn't a problem, but meat... None the less the meal was great and after a couple of games of yaniv, the card game, where i betted and lost my bed for the night, we decided to get some sleep. The next day was absolutely packed with interesting things which came by complete chance, we started our day quite poorly, rolling out of bed late morning and only getting into Kandy centre for turn 1:00PM. Our tuk tuk dropped us off at Kandy lake where we had a quick walk around, seeing loads of people, mainly families, already sat down awaiting the evenings parade of elephants and dancers. Within 10 minutes we had been asked by a local to attend a small ceremony where the different performances would be shown to foreigners in a bid to attract more tourism. Reluctantly at first we accepted but soon found out it was free and pretty cool! Around a group of 100 sat down as we watched and photographed these elaborate dancers with drums and got to see one of the elephants all dressed in gold and silk. It was interesting to learn about the festivals heritage and i believed we purely found this ceremony by chance. As the hours went on through the day we had visited one of the markets and bought a few new thinner pieces of clothing to keep the days heat at bay we bumped into this Sri Lankan guy who swore blind he knew us from our accommodation, i instantly thought this was a scam as he told us about a market for locals and that we should go there. He walked us down the road five minutes to its location, took us in and started to show the price differences. He wasn't wrong! It was so much cheaper from fresh fruits to clothing. After a few more minutes with this man we explained we wished to walk around alone and just like that he said thanks and headed off. I was expecting for him to at least ask for a tip, but thankfully we must of been in luck. We got the ingredients bought for tea and ended up at this small fruit and spices stand where the owner began feeding us a variety of different fruits.. Jack fruit, dorian fruit and papaya. It was far from a bad discovery and with a quick, friendly chat and a photograph together we went our separate ways. We had discovered that this local market meant near no haggling required and no pestering. Soon after the sun began to creep below the horizon line and the streets were getting bare, we knew everyone was off to watch the festival begin so we walked to the starting point and took a seat near the end due to it being so packed. Within 20 minutes the police had began closing the road we were sat on, turns out the festival doesn't head down this route! We grabbed our things and shot down the road trying to find a good spot for when the festival began, however so many of the roads had been blocked off we walked for a good 10 minutes before finding this smaller road which was already filled with locals. We decided to get settled here, moving forwards when we could to try and get the best views for the festival. As most things are in Asia, it started almost an hour late and with a poor standing area we saw very little and the festival itself went quite slowly. None the less i'm glad i saw a mixture of elephants, fire dancers and people dancing on stilts. For me, the best part was seeing an entire city come to life for this once a year festival and just how excited the locals got, a good comparison for our country is when the queen visits your local area and the masses appear from nowhere!
     The next morning we got up nice and early ready to push the journey forward to Adam's Peak, one of the most popular hikes for visitors. The hike is typically a pilgrimage for buddhists who would complete the hike for sunrise and begin morning prayer at the temple of the peak. Our train journey was not great by any means, even with second class tickets we stood up on the rickety edge of this train for three and a half hours before finally arriving at a town near by to the peak. From here we got a heavy walk ten minutes up the road to the bus station and luckily ours was just leaving so we jumped on and within a further hour we had reached our accommodation. Bags in our rooms and tea in our bellies the four of us headed out to grab something to eat, i was craving a large meal knowing our hike would be done with no breakfast so we went into a restaurant just down from where we were staying. I was optimistic about the food literally until the moment it was placed in front of me. Not completely sure what i ordered but it was some form of chicken with tomato sauce served with friend rice. The chicken was so dry it was tough and the rice had so much grease i'd expect it to be sieved first. By far the worst meal of Asia so far! Instead of making me feel ready for tomorrows hike i felt ill. Straight to bed i decided where i still only managed around two and a half hours before my alarm shattered my sleep, with a look outside whilst getting my hiking boots on we saw that it was raining quite heavily and knew it was only going to make the morning harder. At this time i was considering calling it a day and going back to bed, however, i knew that i wanted to challenge myself on this trip and it would be the largest hike so far! Rain coats on, we set off. It was a good 40 minute walk before we even reached the start of Adam's Peak where the steps began, when i was told it is a total of 10,400 steps all the way up and down i thought it was quite reasonable, considering a typical staircase. I was completely wrong. Every single step was different in both size and distance apart which meant concentration was a must, within an hour the rain became almost unbearable, i was drenched down to my boxers and my feet was squelching. We wanted to try and take shelter somewhere but the steps were just surrounded by dense looking forest and it was still pitch black. We continued onwards until we saw a group taking a break, they asked how long it had already taken and by the reply we realised how quickly we had done most of the hike, this gave us a new lease of life which was sorely needed when we saw just how steep and slippery the last 20 minutes was! Most of the steps were only large enough to fit your tip toes on and they spiralled left to right making it very difficult. The fog began to surround us and visibility was incredibly poor when all of a sudden another hiker coming back down said we're only 2 minutes away and sure enough we had arrived in no time! We could see absolutely nothing haha! But it was expected, with it being the rainy season i knew the odds were stacked against us but really wanted to do the challenge none the less. We cut up a pineapple for breakfast, took a few group photographs and got heading back down quickly as it became so cold, the coldest i've actually been so far. The walk up was breaking my thigh muscles but the walk down, my calfs were on fire! Thankfully cramp stayed at bay but i realised i was healthier than originally thought, tough mudder must of sorted me out in some way, shape or form. After the long stroll back to the accommodation we grabbed some well deserved breakfast and got to sleep for a good three hours before once more, waking up feeling rough and getting three buses and a six hour train drive to Colombo and to finish off, an hours tuk tuk drive to Negombo where we stayed for nearly a week! We had said goodbye to  during the journey as she went white water rafting but she reappeared on her last day in the country with a bottle of wine, we all relaxed playing cards and said our farewells once more. Negombo wasn't a great place but it gave us time to relax, regroup our plan and get ready for the hectic month that will be Thailand. Sri Lanka, you've been nothing but great to us!

 Young boy on the train from Kandy to Ella

 Everyone hanging out to see the mountain views

 Pulling up to a station

 I wanted his spot the whole journey, so instead i photographed him...

 Kandy Lake

 As the crowds began to arrive for the celebrations

 I'm photographing Ben but sure, a smile is always welcome!

 Dancers with drums

 Dancers once more

 Catherine photographing the photographer

 The local market filled with fresh fruit

 Our new best buddy

 One of the elephants during the festival

No views from up Adam's Peak but heres one of the temples near the bottom