31st May 2008

Got up, went to a nice coffee shop then headed to a chinese temple by the edge of the beach. Quite nice. Wandered along waterfront road in the blazing heat, to fishing pier, then a bit of road tomfoolery and I got onto the beach, which I decided not to walk along as it REALLY stank. Next, I thought that a nice walk to Klai Kangwan Palace, in the searing heat, would invigorate me, as it didn't look too far on the map.

Curse my stubborness. And not reading: "Not To Scale" on the map. So after walking the entire length of Thailand, realising you can't really see the palace and getting a smoothie/frapp, I marched back towards the centre of Hua Hin. On the way, I got "Watching The English" from a book shop and checked out the Chat Chai Day market. I trekked more insane distance to the Hua Hin Market village, where I bumped into the couple I met yesterday, and I failed to go to the cinema as it was all in some strange foreign language, so had a mid arvo lunch.

Returned to central Hua Hin, I think I booked my bus tomorrow, and played on the net before finding The Time Traveller's Wife, in a book stall and scampered home to read it all night.

30th May 2008

Time to leave Koh Tao today, took taxi with girl, who had apparently only just remembered she had fallen off a bike the night before, to the ferry pier, where I got chatting to a really nice couple who were also going to Hua Hin, for about an hour. Gon on ferry and I spent the whole boat ride reading Pillars Of The Earth. Hour wait in Chumpton, then half empty bus to Hua Hin, took 4+ hours, finished Pillars of the Earth, woo! Got dropped off outside a very pretty shopping centre, tried to get a tuktuk to my hotel, but no one had heard of it, as normal, so I tried to find a net place, but failed in that as well, so just retired to a starbucks and pondered my options. After obtaining a useless map, I remembered it might be near the Hilton, so I got a tuk tuk there and fell into an internet cafe, found the address, and asked a helpful lady where it was, turns out it was basically on the road behind. Excellent.

Less excellently, the guest house is situated in the "entertainment" district of Hua Hin and the staff are all lunatics. Room is nice though, with TV and double bed. I headed straight out and wandered around, past a few 24 hour western fast food "centres" and found the night market, which I wandered through, quite busy, same old wallet/watch/jewellery type stalls you see everywhere and some interesting food stands. At some point on my wanderings I got handed a leaflet to a thai boxing match (Muay Thai), and decided it was a good bet. After the long trek there, and exploring a night market by it, it was time to go into basically a hall with a ring in and tables + seats for foreigners, as I suspect we pay loads more. Had cheap beer table service though.

6 matches in total, each 5 rounds. 1) Two 10/12 year old kids, very tough, one seemed to have a special punch-to-the-stomach move which did well. He won, and I liked him because he was less cocky. Though they both then came round asking for money. 2) Older guys, 20 or something, guy got randomly knocked out, no idea how 3) Older still, but very boring as they were too friendly and smiling 4) Tiny tiny kids, 7 years old? After a whole one appeared to give up/get bored 5) Half English dude won, no idea why, other guy just decided not to continue. 6) Good fight, lots of aggression, filmed lots of it.

Entire time some awful high pitch music was playing and announcer kept saying "ladies and Germans". I had an awesome time though, even if it wasn't exactly how Ong Bak portrayed it, probably for the best, KAPOW!

Walked back and collapsed in bed, after avoiding lunatic staff.

29th May 2008

Up early again as we couldn't get enough peeps to do an afternoon rib dive. Had an awesome BLT baguette at cafe next to dive shop, same old boating scenario etc. Next dive was mega deep dive, which was really annoying a my equalisation went so we could only get to 35m (still very deep) and didn't have much time there (or death) and we had to do a simulated 8 min (at 5m) decompression stop for the course, including 1 min of breathing from an emergency air source. Deco stop ended up at 12 min as just as we were reaching the emergency air source, the damn boat people pulled it up and the boat drove to a new position, so we had to chase the boat!

Anyway, next dive was fine, in fact I use 20 bar less air than Rich, which I was quite proud of. We say moray eels, devil scorpion fish, HUGE groupers, squid, panda clownfish and a vast array of other things. Completed paper work with Rich and then had thai for luncheon again. That evening, and the afternoon, I used masses of internet and tried to find more books but still failed to find any I wanted.

Started reading Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet again, and began to get back into it after being all monked out.

28th May 2008

Up at a very silly hour, and had some form of cooked breakfast, which may have been overkill. Met up with Rich(my dive dude) for a quick chat and to check equipment before we marched down to beach and overfilled a tiny boat, so water was very close to spilling in,m and then went out to clamber, in a very undignified manner, onto the bigger dive boat. Took about an hour to get to the south west pinnacle. Dive was similar to the deep dive in my Advanced course, did a timed task above and below water and looked at the effects of narcosis, if it affected my reciprocal heading nav skills or not. It didn't apparently, though I found it harder as he put it on my left wrist. All the while I had the same air consumption as Rich, which I was most chuffed about. After a surface interval of 1.10, during which we briefed on next dive site, I ate some pineapple (which was really nice and it proves it's quite easy to force myself to like something) and swapped tanks. Next dive we looked at what the pressure does to a packet of crisps, a bottle and a squidgy ball. Well the well inflated crisp packet turned to rock, bottle was cranched up and ball was less inflated. Saw trigger fish. Returned to land, had a nice lunch from the Thai place from yesterday and met Rich at 1.30 where we spent 2-3 hours chatting about the knowledge reviews, which I got all right. He told me some cool anecdotes which I won't go into, but basically I REALLY don't want decompression sickness or extreme narcosis. Apparently the world record for deepest dive was set by a group of people who had to recover their friends body who had got so narked he was too disorientated to do anything.

Anyway, in the afternoon I was totally and utterly shattered. Dosed a bit, got a cheapish Italian and then listened to some Flight of the Conchords on my nokia, while dozing, and got my passport photos, photocopies and couldn't find any good books to swap.

27th May 2008

After a nice breakfast and some net usage, I caught my 10.45 bus, which got us to the ferry pier 1.5 hours early, so I read more of Into The Heart of Borneo, which is really a very good book. Clambered on the boat, all got ordered to stand at front of it for some odd weight balanced turned manoeuvre , and then settled down to trying to drown out Superbad, with Death Cab For Cutie, while reading my book. Found enough coin to buy a roll as no where can change up 1000 baht bills, which makes them redundant money.

Trip took about 1.5 hours, at the Koh Tao ferry port I was harassed by 25000 people,but just got a taxi to the Rex-recommended Davey Jones' Locker diving centre. Only rooms left were huge double bed and single bed ones, had little choice and wasn't too bad price really. Dumped stuff and attacked the dive shop full on. Pondered options, deflected her suggestion that I stay here forever and decided to do the deep dive speciality. 2 days, 4 dives, one down to 40 metres to get narked! Does mean I will have lots of homework now though. I finished Into The Heart of Borneo, got dinner at a nice Thai place, though got eaten alive by mossies, used the interwebs and then worked lots on the deep diving manual, finally completing the entire book and settled down to sleep as I had to get to dive centre by 7.30am! Unfortunately, not only was there the thumping bass of the club to sleep through, but mother nature threw a party of her own with a HUGE thunderstorm erupting, I drifted off eventually.

26th May 2008: Evening

There were lots of books, but none right for the Tom, so I headed back and foolishly swam in the pool for a while, which resulted in eye blindness and pain for rest of afternoon. Chilled in eatery/bar from 4-8 in a bleary state, much to the sympathy of the waitress. OR she was mocking me or she thought I was a lunatic on drugs. Koh Tao tomorrow!

In other news, I'm running out of space in this book, so I need to get a replacement in Bangkok, as the one I told Rex to get was wrong. Curses. I also need to decide how long I should stay in Hui Hin, 1 or 2 nights, it all depends if I want 3 or 4 nights in Tao, depending on what diving lunacy they rope me into. ARGH, huge hornet in toilet, I hear they turn you to stone if you look into their eyes. As I was saying, trip to Koh Tao seems like it will take quite a few hours. All these islands would be way cheaper if I was travelling with someone rather than getting a whole crazy bungalow to myself. Really looking forward to Hue in Vietnam as the LP map looks like a UO map, must show Ruffle. Vietnam in general looks awesome, mainly as I can fit most of it in and I know the places already. I need to find out if I Can buy China LPs in Hong Kong, as I've heard that they don't like maps without Taiwan on, or something, and they get confiscated at the Vietnam/China border. I also don't know if I can blog past the great firewall of China, perhaps though some cunning proxy server using a blah blah blah jargon blah, hats blah blah blah flux capacitor.

Number of Times I've been Semi-Concussed So Far: 2

Apart from the Byron Bay incident, I have now just walked directly into a large shop sign, thanks to my ever tall height and the sweeping generalisation of Thai height. Upon removing hand from said head, and assessing the amount of blood, I thought it pertinent to return to the resort post haste before I looked like I'd been hit by a moped. One shower late, I'm not sure it had stopped bleeding, and it was stilling hurting, but it was pouring everywhere, so it's all good. My vision is fine as well, and I don't feet drowsy, just annoyed. I'm about to munch on a cheese and ham baguette though, so that'll solve all. It's MASSIVE.

Last night I finished The Road by Cormac McCarthy, which wasn't great and nearly sent me into a death-fearing spiral, but I started reading Do Andriods Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K Dick (or Blade Runner if you so desire). When I woke up, after a cool thai style brekkie of rice and pork soup, eges and fruit, I swam a bit but made sure I Washed out my eyes after, and finished Blade Runner at some point, possibly during brekkie. Went for a walk to fin dthe post office, which is about 1 km away, stopping off at net shop quickly en route. Sent off a parcel of goodies, walked back, brained myself on low flying signs etc etc.

I saw a book exchnage so I may check that out.

25th May 2008

Woke up at 6.30am, no one around so just dropped key on a random ledge. Got over priced transport (probably) to airport and checked in pretty easily. Had an awful burger king, no idea why I chose it, and then leapt on your tiny prop. plane, just 75 people, and very ornately decorated. We had a tiny brunch type package and before I knew it we landed at Samui airport where I was shunted to a hotel booking desk, chose somewhere called Hutcha Resort, which was cheap enough and on Mae Nam. After a moderate mini van ride I got there and was very impressed, and it would appear I was one of the very few guests there. Have a little fan cooled bungalow, with double bed and ensuite. I dumped stuff and went for a wander to take some photos while it was sunny. Resort is very nice, and only 2 people at the pool, beach is 20ft from the bar and the sand was scorching hot so had to scamper to sea while deflecting a massage request. Wandered back, got pool stuff, chilled by edge, went in and splooshed around getting sued to forcing myself not to breathe underwater. Got out and sunbathed while reading The Road, which is a bit odd and a tad boring. I'm sure it's poignant or something. Headed back and collapse on my bed for a while, dreamt of superheroes, woke up with blurry vision from chlorine and its still not fixed at 9pm even though I washed my eyes out! Bit worried/annoyed.

Went to explore town, saw a cool Chinese temple, and walked down the main street which is made up of restaurants, massage parlours and internet cafes. Found one and did some interwebs for quite a while, including blog and listen to the latest russell brand podcast, very funny. Walked back and grabbed a thai green curry, extremely yummy. Now chilling in restaurant/bar, only guest in here, very odd, couldn't communicate it to the waitress though. Sounds like the kitchen fell on someone and they sounded like a cat. Wish my vision was alright. I can focus close range, but everything else looks like when they do a really band dream sequence in Sunset Beach or Hollyoaks. With James Blunt playing in the background.

I'm not sure what I plan to do tomorrow, I guess the normal sun, sea and sound combo, but I don't fancy boiling to a crisp or burning to a hot liquid mess. Or something.

24th May 2008

Woke up at 7, and got down to dive shop surprisingly chipper. After a variety of busses we got on our huge boat with hot showers. Seeing as there were only 5 of us diving, much awesomeness. After our briefing and light breakfast, I spent the 3 hour journey to Koh Phi Phi finishing The Beach, very good book. Turned out I was diving one on one with dive instructor. Had a very good dive, got used to it straight away, saw some cool nudi branches, shrimpie things, puffer fish and the usual moray eels and clownfish posse. Had a really nice lunch between dives, then went to a new dive spot and I saw a bright yellow and very cute sea horse.

Boat ride back to the mainland was pretty boring as I had nothing left to read, but we had a HUGE platter of fruit. When we got back it was pouring down, and as our bus had no sides, we got soaked, so went back, changed, and bust out to Andaman Coffee to print out my flight info for tomorrow. Then had Thai from "the best Thai restaurant in town". Was realy nice actually and saw some guy fall off his scooter, which is why I won't get one. He looked fine though, as it was slow, but he had no helmet and was just in a t-shirt and shorts. Muppet. Headed back very stuffed to packed for an even earlier start tomorrow.

23rd May 2008

Holy moly, pudding and pie, I needed that sleep (until 10.30!), didn't get of hotel till quite late and had a nice Thai meal for lunch, black pepper pork y'all. Then found an awesome coffee shop called Andiman Coffee Shop, that gives you 15 minutes of free net time with every drink. Wrote some blog and journal and had a mocha plus a coffee. Then went on the beach (after visiting my DVD selling friend) and chilled on a sun lounger for the arvo until the sun set. I read vast amounts of Alex Garland's The Beach, which is something I really should read, especially if I'm going to Koh Samui, and it's really good. Smug that no one charged me for using a lounger, though the beach was mostly empty anyway. I got a smoothie from the coffee shop but it was far too sickly sweet. I saved money on dinner by eating what I had in fridge and bag. Watched Epic Movie, nicely didn't use brain power, was better than Date Movie, but still awful. Also saw some kids hero type film with the guy from home improvement and he was training a group of kids who had power, was quite enjoyable. Sleep for diving tomorrow.

22nd May 2008

Woke up, breakfast, packed and got to Karon beach surprisingly quickly, at least by 11 or something. Place I planned to stay (who didn't actually email me back), not only looked a bit meh, but it also failed to have a reception desk. So I perambulated to a nice looking place, though the crazy shouting woman made me sceptical so I asked to check out the room. Twas a paradise, so I was like:

Yes.

I desweated and chilled for a while, watching tele and noting my A/C, DVD player, wardrobe, fridge, kettle, ensuite and double bed before taking a stroll around my room. Oh the tribulations of a backpacker. I then actually ventured outside, melted, had a chat with a dive dude, found the beach, walked along, tried to buy 2 t-shirts, and some boardies, but failed to have any money, or at least enough. So I then broke my rule for thailand and went on the back of a girl's scooter to the atm and back. I survived, bought said merchandise, then bought Indian Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark off of a rather sketchy man, but I'm sure it's legit considering how cheap it was. Ahem.

I bought some sandwich making supplies from the next door supermarket. Returned in a pool of sweat, and couldn't stop myself watching it while rehydrating myself. Ventured out again, internet, booked a Dive excursion for Saturday for Ko Phi Phi, which is nice and wandered around.

Showered, tele, blah blah, went out for dinner. To an Indian restaurant, yeah I have it in for my stomach, that I could see out my window. Only person in there at 7pm? Low season apparently. Chef cooked me up Lamb samosa even though it wasn't on the menu, very delicious. Had a lamb biryani and mixed veg curry for main. To which the waitress remarked "lamb lover" to which I didn't reply with "Don't phrase it like that Lady". And we didn't all laugh merrily. Food was great, a crazy Indian guy stared at me the entire time and I had to order a beer at the end to allow me the time to finish this. The things I do for the love of writing....

21st May 2008

Up earlish and had brekkie while some girls watched Sex in the City, not really a morning show. Then mostly been trying to organise what I'm gonna do next, and decided I'm not really well enough to do a live aboard so may just chill on Karon Beach and get some trips to the Similian Islands. Then fly to Koh Samui, then boat to Koh Tao then off to Bangkok. You really need 3 months for Thailand, it's foolish doing it this quick.

My stomach still hates me though and everything in the Juice Bar is very loud.

The greatest idea I came up with, since mixing water and electricity, was to try and walk to an outta town shopping centre that I was told could supply me with DVD/VCDs. This was quite an epic walk. Probably took 45-60min, though I'm not sure that the passage of time was consistent and I ended up drenched in sweat. Wasn't that bad though, better than trying to walk home from a random place in Orlando, Florida with my Dad. Anyway, the most contrasty thing was that after this walk of dodging diseased dogs, strange nauseating smells and mainly walking in the road, I came across a huge out of place western haven. A pristine shopping centre, with Starbucks obviously, over priced goods, people who open doors for you and then salute you (note: how do you politely acknowledge a salute?) and a 7 screen multiplex cinema. I sauntered around the shops, tried to dry off in starbucks, bought cloverfield, beowulf and rouge assassin VCDs on the cheap (but legal) and decided to catch Iron Man for 100 baht (1.66pounds according to my drastically revised exchange rate).

Seats were extremely comfy, I even remembered you had to stand up to honour the king before each film! (Thanks Rex). Film was really good and I saw a trainer for a weird film that stars the huge wrestler guy that Tony Jaa beats up in a temple that is on fire in The Warrior King, and it was actually advertised as such. After the film I had the worse pseudo-chinese meal ever, that was so sweetly sickly that I could have developed diabetes while sitting at my window cove.

Due to my unwillingness to walk back the way I came in case of dog attacks or moped attacks, I got (probably) swindled by a tuk tuk driver but it was very comfy and she didn't drive like a lunatic, like a certain Rex I know. Twas pretty late so just watched Rogue Assassin, which was generic actiony. Indy Jones was better.

20th May 2008: Phuket Town

One of the issues with my crazy dutch posh accent is apparently ordering Americanos in Asian cafes. Mainly that I pronouce it "uh-meri-carn-o", and they expect "ah-meri-caaan-o". Or something. It's totally tipping down and today's supercharged possibly unsafely high strength ibruprofen is wearing off a bit. Surely 1 tablet shouldn't be 400mg. You're allowed to take 3 a day apparently, after meals, while under doctor supervision. Well maybe not the last bit. But 1 of those, a strepsil, and vast quantities of water semi-repaired me this morning, as well as a cheap breakfast by the hostel.

A note on cheapness: Everything here is silly cheap. 1.5l of water is 16bht (20p). This coffee in a swanky coffee shop was 50p. My ensuite, fan cooled, double room with TV and DVD is 6 quid a night AND this is a touristic place.

Anyway, after my miracle recovery, I ventured out and soon blasted a path through to the post office, which was far too busy to attempt any sort of business deal, with so I wandered off. Up Phuket Road found Juice Internet where I blogged a bit, had lunch and a huge smoothie for less than 1 quid. Checked out Ocean Shopping and Robinson's shopping centre, batting away tuk tuk and bike dudes at every step. I also perfected a fearless technique to cross the roads with little difficulty. Haven't been offered a massage or a suit yet. Bought some trainer socks for 1/200th of a penny. I kid, but still cheap. Also got billabong and DC shirts in a random shop, where a woman was literally throwing t-shirts in my general direction for me to buy. Anyway, they cost as much as a gram of lint and I now have some t-shirts after foolishly giving far to many to Rex to take back with him. Damn you rex.

I meandered back to the hostel, added another night to my stay, dumped off my stuff, and explained the issue of my shower filling up like some houdini-esque escape trick. Went for a walk around to see some shrines and then had to scarper away from some crazy dogs. The skies fell and here I am in a cafe with some crazy singing girls and an english guy drying his shoes with napkins.

Apparently I can successfully order a croissant in a pseudo-french accent. Which costs 25p. And is huge!

Note to self: Check actual exchange rate and not use one you possibly made up in your head.

19th May 2008

On awaking today I discovered I had a combination of man flu and dolphin. Very groggy, no strength, aching, dehydrated, sore throat, and massive headache. After vegetating for a bit and eating some cold 7-11 nasi rice or something, I felt even worse. Decided that I had to take a taxi as I was too weak to do any complicated train tomfoolery, and it turned out train goes to wrong terminal anyway.

Hour taxi ride was a bit hellish, couldn't understand driver and was far too warm in there. Eventually, after passing the Malaysian F1 track, we got to the airport and I staggered around until, via some fortunate and random series of events, I found myself in the cramped departure lounge. Dying slowly. Eventually I got some Hersheys dark chocolate, which partially recovered me a bit, and I got some more food and lots of water from a cafe while walking around in circles. Plane was delayed, but when we did board, as I got priority boarding for $1, I got choice of seats, so sat near front for a quick exit. Flight went very quick (just over an hour) and I had some weird chicken, ham and liquid cheese sarnie. Bag was first off conveyor belt!

Shared a really really nice taxi with a random guy, so only cost 2.50 quid, for the 30min journey or something. Checked into hostel, really nice room with ensuite, TV and DVD player. Spent evening dying in bed, watching southland tales. VERY weird film. Fell asleep in a delusional state.

18th May 2008: Min Valley Mega Mall

Using varying levels of skill I succeeded in getting to the min valley mega mall, which included changing from the Sentral line to the Kommuter line. Well the LP was definitely right about the size of this mall, it's epic huge. But still their entire "IT World" section, of 20 or so shops, failed to supply me with a female to female USB adapter. The book shop also didn't have what I wanted, but I perused the mall for a while before catching the train back home and chilling. I plan to use some form of express train to get to airport tomorrow, which should prove interesting....

18th May 2008: More Weirdos

What, may I enquire, attracts crazy people to strike up inescapable conversations with me? After various wanderings, I spent far too long in the large bookshop here, got thoroughly lost and bought The Beach and Into The Heart of Borneo for travel related research purposes. I had a late lunch of rice, beef, spice, long beans and some other green veg I apparently chose and cruised into a net cafe to upload some photos and blog a bit. Within a few min a rather large snotty spluttering American gentleman heaved himself, via the back of my chair (which we all know I hate people disturbing when I'm sitting down), and into the chair next to me. After a short while he noticed I had a blog and it turned out he was a blogging government conspiracy nut that I had trouble escaping from. Especially after he found out I did a Comp Sci degree and therefore I spent some time showing him how to use blogger. To top it off he said he didn't like London.

Well then I flipped and drove his face through his monitor.

Course I didn't, I was nice, courteous, made informed comments, made exasperated facial expressions to the cashier, and supplied my contact details to him so in 6 months we could see if some government had intercepted and blocked our communications.

They were face details.

I'm now recovering over a mocha, sad in the knowledge that I barely caught up with my blog at all, and only in bullet point format. I also need a female to female usb adapter. Still it's all good fun. Looked at KT and KTs photos of their South American trip and realised I need to do more activities! For now, I'm off to Mini-Valley, or something.

18th May 2008

Ah, the curious intricacies of solo travel, which I am once more in the furry depths of. Waking in my windowless room, I showered under a warm trickle of water and pondered the day ahead. After which I bust up to get my free brekkie and booked my next hostel in Phuket, after some obligatory facebooking. Still catching up on birthday messages and photo uploads. Tried to work out a general time plan for Thailand, and failed, so gave up and decided to just wing it crazy style. Though I'm tempted by a live on scuba diving boat. I may just make Thailand a scuba diving hol. A bit like Malaysia. I got the fever.

Anyway, talking of cultural ignorances, once entering the central market, I was accused of such by a random Malaysian guy who initially chatted to me with a friendly tone. He then proceeded to deflame backpacking in general and specifically British backpackers, and on a strange tangent, my internet research skillery. This obviously led onto the natural course of civil conversation and he said he'd take me to the butterfly house. I said "No" and sauntered off after distracting him with an abstract witticism.

In real life I may not have appeared so eloquent.

I wandered through the vast collection of indoor market shops/stalls, which are far too organised and clean for a chinatown market. I settled on a maraca type musical instrument with the idea to collect musical instruments from around the world. Dropping it off back at the hostel and found out the post office is shut today (sunday) and tomorrow (public holiday), which sucks.

Made my way to the LRT, not before witnessing a guy who was about to get hit by a bus, leap majestically into a martial arts pose. Luckily, the bus driver didn't follow suit and just applied the brakes in a more practical solution. After a close shave with a train door, I made it to the KLCC, where I've wandered around trying to find things on my vast "to buy" list. Unfortunately, most of it is not available in Gucci or Rolex. On the plus side, by entering an empty coffee shop I have somehow made it popular and fill up. Must be my hair.

Rex and Ad currently in Doha, Ad still with his acoustically orchestral souvenir. Turns out this regular coffee is nearly half a litre and 7 times the strong.

17th May 2008: Farewell fools

• Got up early
• Nearly missed coach thansk to a gross locational misunderstanding
• Quite luxious coach this time, thankfully.
• Got to the big KL around 12 and got a taxi to times square.
  
• Based ourselves in Starbucks (after a horrendous KFC at Ad's request)
• Performed shopping shifts, wrote journal, used free net in SB
• Took Taxi to hostel
• Very nice and friendly, let the fools dump their bags in my room and it's very close to central market
• Hit up central market. Ad bought a stringed monstrosity.
• I got a magnet.... more stuff for rex to take back.
• Had some weird tea, meant to help boost brain and immune system.
• Dropped stuff off and worked out it only costs 160RM to get to the petronas towers. Did that.
• Went around shops, and found a funtastic bookshop
• Ate mixed grill kebab awesomness in a persian restuarant.
• Ad didn't feel like throwing up for once.
• Wandered outside, took LRT back.
• Chilled in room/tuned guitar.
• Said sad farewell to Rex and Ad.
• Used free wifi in room till late. Naughty.
• Decided Nokia N810 is greatest gadget ever made. So slept.
  

16th May 2008

• Faffed. Bakery: blueberry pancake and croissant.
• Went to golf course
• Rental shop shut. Stranded.
• Taxi back, got collars. Went in Galaxy Cafe and had a really bad salad and they put evaporated milk in my coffee :( Took taxi back to golf course.
• Played really bad. Lost lots of balls in rivers and the sea. Climbed cliffs to try and retrieve them. Was good fun though
• On way back we found little england, but the food was very expensive.
• Cheap taxi back
• Had Steamboat for dinner, which made Ad want to vomit his insides out, but me and Rex soldiered through, though it was all a bit slimy
• Used the internet for an extended period of time.
• Packed and slept.
  

15th May 2008: Alcohol strikes

Travelled back to Cameron Highlands. Had a croissant in the bakery on arrival.
In the evening we drank beer in a nice bar and watched some awful Divas DVD they were showing involving Tina Turner and Cher. Adam hates Brandy and thinks Tina Turner is a bloke.

That is all.

14th May 2008: Relaxtion Maxation

Relaxing day for Rex and I. Ad's last 2 open water dives. Faffed around a bit and then went kayaking in 2 person kayak. Rex crashed us viciously into a rock, similar to the time he drove me into a tree in a dune buggy, but he confounded matters even more by grounded our vessel on some rocks later on. He's a menace I tell you. All good fun though. Booked our boats, coaches and flights to a variety of travelling destinations.

We grabbed luncheon, I fed my cornetto addiction and we watched a bit of a really bad film. Spent the afternoon in hammocks ready The Complete Robot by Asimov.

In evening we walked down to the only bar on the island and had a few tigers as well as some very yummy food, and free birthday cake as it was one of the employee's dad's birthdays or something.

Wandered back past the film crew again and tackled our huge bill, splitting everything and the such like. Whole stay, diving, food and transport back to cameron highlands cost no more than 330 quid!

Packed and slept.

13th May 2008

My toes are half destroyed from crazy flippers, not much skin left to lose! Pain, Anguish + Happiness all rolled into a cute little ball.

Dup #1: Really bad! My bouyancy was totally off, and so not relaxed and ran out of air quickly. Pants.

Dup #2: Way better, muchos awesome, fun, even though photography is surprisingly insanely difficult underwater.

Had an extremely yummy Flora Bay Resort special burger, then my toes came back with avengence and it was hard to walk. Analysed our photos, and they weren't as bad as we previously thought. I showed Zamani a bit of photoshop tomfoolery and fixed some of Zamani's photos that were really good, just very red with the power of a magic filter, or something.

Tired. Dinner. Sleep. Adam encroaching on my soul in bed.

12th May 2008: More diving dives

Breakfast early again before diving activities. Ad being screwed over as couple doing his Open Water course still aren't here yet. We did (with crazy 1000+ dive couple, the woman wearing VERY bold lipstick for diving?!?! and two dutch lads):

• Deep Dive
• Wreck Dive (went down with performance panda and Zamani took some photos with him)

After doing some theory, I'm now an advanced PADI dive. Woo.
Rex and I wandered down the beach, and there was a camera crew filming some soap or something. Ad got some diving in finally. We decided to do the entire theory and questions for the Digital Underwater Photography course. Which took about 15 minutes and I wrote some unflattering notes regarding the foolishness of some of the questions.

Had dinner and various humourous events may have occured. Read and Slept.

11th May 2008: My Birthday

• BIRTHDAY!
• Got cards and had brekkie.
• Did 3 dives
• Peak Performance Buoyancy
• Navigation (underwater.. duh) - Where I was awesome
• Digital Underwater Photography
• Ad not really get a chance to do stuff because his fellow divers not on island yet due to delayed train/plane/elephant
• Walked down beach to nicer restaurant for dinner and chocolate cheesecake
• Huge tropical storm hit, and we were trapped at end of beach.
• Rang mum, possibly dangerously with the vast amount of lightening
• Watched part of Invasion but then walked back in rain break, crashed out.
  

10th May 2008: To The Perhentian Islands

Up early, got nice mini van with the same couple from tour yesterday. Lots of room. Cool ride. Stopped for change over of van for an hour. No decent food, so had a lunch of crisps and biscuits. Arrived. Waited for ages for boat, got involved in some food fiasco where it took far too long, so we just had to leave money on table and run to boat, but then boat didn't come, and she chased us with food, and we didn't have time/the desire to eat it.

Took the awesome fast boat to our island resort, a very nice bungalow room, though I'm sharing with Ad in a double bed. Went to the dive shop to sort ourselves otu, and I got roped into doing an Advanced Course. Rex was also conned into lots of dives but less qualifications. The resort/island is muchos nice, and the dive people are very cool/professional so we happily signed every human right away. Got huge book and lots of homework to do, so this is how learning to dive is meant to be... While chilling with rex outside, a gecko leaped from a great height, rex headbutted it onto my chest, where it sat for a while, and rex was like "take it off or it'll go in my pocket". After this it promptly dived into my pocket and hid behind my wallet, then after wallet extraction, it hid in the creases in my pocket, until eventually leaping to my hand and then the floor to my surprise.

For din din we had a slightly overpriced (in hindsight) bbq, but was all you can eat, which I hear is good. In the evening had to read loads and do questions. Ad also has homework with open water course, though his buddies aren't here yet.

9th May 2008

• Got up early. Had hotel brekkie.
• Got in 4x4 and went to butterfly farm.
• Held butterfly that was tired and non flappy because of no sun yet. Our guide showed us various beetles, stick insects, scorpions, frogs and moths. Went loo...
• Drove up tea plantation road/hill to highest point in Cameron Highlands. Mist. Watchtower.
• Trekked. All moss and roots. Guide knowledgable. Pitched flowers with sticky liquid inside to catch flies. Good fun.
• Down hill to tea factory, world's shortest tour. Had tea, scone, cookies and tuna sarnie. Good balcony view and panda photo. Bought tea. Very nice.
• Strawberry farm, and had awesome strawberry milkshake.
• Got rid of everyone else from tour.
• Tried to get to waterfall, Chinese mafia stopped us.
• Went to aboriginal village, gave crackers to kids. Learnt to use blow dart tube/gun. Was awesome at it. Ad tried to swallow the tube and got various tropical diseases from it. We laughed.
• Went to pretty crappy waterfall.
• Home
• T Cafe for dinner. Was okay, bit hyped up in Lonely Planet, but apple pie was nice.
• Got 3 (obviously legal) films for 20 rm
• Got more kickapoo
• Watched Rambo 4 with couple from tour. Gory. Funny. Cool. Necks ripped out with hands. Jolly good family fun.
  

8th May 2008

• Early up for Toast and Coffee
• Paranoid Bed Bug Insomnia
• Pinball between Kok Academies
• Cockroach infested Bus
• At back, near loo, with backpack, seat of concrete read Tuesdays with Morrie, very moving, stopped for 7up, met random dude from Preston.
• More travel on insanely windy roads and bumpyness
• Saw a guy with a random butterfly/fishing net and lots of very thin people
• Arrived in torrential rain, guy from hotel waiting for us.
• Upgraded for cheap to ensuite, chill in TV lounge, nice to have windows.
• Out for curry, on banana leaf, ate too much, guys got crappy chinese doughnuts, kickapoo drink, back to hotel.
• Try to watch Indiana Jones and some other film but failed.
• Settled for Next. Not totally bad even with N-Cage in it.
• Booked full day jungle tour
• Death and crashing. Wrote lots of journal
  

7th May 2008

• Walked to Times Square
• Couldn't find spa
• Found spa. 60 minute, foot bath and aromatherapy massage.
  
• Pain and Anguish.
• Ginger tea. All good. No swimming.
• Shopping, bought book (Tuesdays with Morrie). Starbucks and huge croissant. 7-11. Taxi(fixed rate?) to Central Market.
• RAW
• Bought a flute of wooden design
• Ad and Rex had a blow dart gun demonstrated to them. Ad pondered buying a 16 pound guitar.
• Went to Chinatown's street market, bought Jaguar aftershave. Haggled AFTER rex told em how to, i.e. type on their calculator. 8 quid.
  
• Walked back to hostel. Watched Hot Fuzz. Had nice Indian. TV, beer + sleep.
  

6th May 2008

• Bed bugs in Rex
• Got up quite late. Got out 13:00.
• Odd food in small cheap place.
• Taxi to Batu Caves, infinite steps. Wet. Jandals: stupid.
• Monkeys playing.
• Batu cavearium... Very colourful fish played.
• Art gallery, reptiles, birds, bunnies, sculptures.
• Taxi to KL tower. Went up and saw the sunset, very pretty. All 3 of us got lost walking around in a circle on top unable to see the other 2.
• Walked to twin towers, went in swish Thai restaurant, yummy.
• Starbucks, wifi, coffee, chill.
• Skin disease
• Sleep.
  

5th May 2008

• Up. Brekkie. Pack. Ad sucks.
• Too early, changed money, bought biscuits. Very luxurious bus.
• Watched Apocolypto on it, had no choice. Starred Ronaldino. Gory.
  
• More passport stamps at border.
• Got to Kuala Lumpur. Rain. Taxi ripped us off.
• No 8 Guesthouse full. Other hostel: Green hut lodge. Cheapish. Tiny, not much room.
• Carlos the Swedish man in there as well. He boring.
• Walked to twin towers, Pretty. Fountain. Rex made me do silly photos. Shopping Centre.
• Thai, yum, cheapish but posh. Looked at towers in dark. Frolicked.
• Went to a bar disguised as some form of brothel. Turn out it was very similar to a brothel, moved to another bar with crazy DJ and cool live band. Beer expensive, No ATMs open at night. No KFC open. Cheap rice from 7-11.
  

4th May 2008

• Very late. Tired. Got out of place at 1pm
• MRT to Lavender St. Bought bus ticket, apparent luxury.
• Little India. Interesting. Like India. Smaller. Got naam bread in strange food hall.
• My naan had questionable meat content.
• Went to Bugis Market. Cheap awesome t-shirt, there was a fan the size of Lake Taupo.
• Very posh Bugis Shopping Centre
• Raffle's hotel, vastly overrated... by rex.
• war memorial and photo with Indians who made light of our racial differences with humour related racial profiling.
• Suntec: Coffee. Tea. Ad -> Chocolate heaven.
• Walked to ferris wheel
• Went on ferris wheel, travelled 360, saw F1 pit and them building the night time track
• Got off. Back to suntec for food. Korean, awesome spicy pork.
• MRT to Night Safari, mini bus anti-scam.
• Straight into animal show, very funny, animals. Ad sucks.
• Took tram, lots of dark animals, got off halfway, had ice cream, walked the leopard trail, growling lion, Back on tram, lots of Deer and we got off
• Got stranded, missed bus, took shockingly cheap and very fast taxi back.
• Had beer at carribbean bar, rubbish music. Medical/Hospital bar was too expensive so we stole. idea.
• Slept.
  

3rd May 2008:

• Up a bit late, Breakfast
• Orchard St, Huge amount of shopping centres
• Food court bustly
• Many shops still closed.
• Not many good clothes shops, wandered generally
• Walked through park and reservoir
  
• Down to boat quay
• Hot
• Raffle's Statue
• Wandered across bridges.
  
• Ad thought I was mad and trying to get dudes to kill me when I just pointed out that there beer was more expensive than the place 2 shops down.
• Had chinese food.
• Jazz Bar, expensive but good music
• Then failed to go to Ministry of Sound
• Crazy Elephant, band stopped, annoying jokes on TV screens
• Hooters for beers and pondering the world
• Cashew nuts and no burger king.
  
• Sleep. Late. 3am?
  

2nd May 2008: Fool explosion

Fools arrived, wandered through Chinatown after checking in our windowless understairs cupboard. Found the MRT with surprising ease and got a tube/train to the Harbour Front so we could get to Sentosa Island.

• Cable Car Shinannigans
• Luge straight away. Fun. Rex and ad were shit, or in actual fact Rex drove a family off the track by throwing water bottles at children and Adam had to sacrifice his racing stance to clear the wreckage
• Went to a very crap beach
• Had an ice cream and Ad say in baby vomit
• Southern most point of Continental Asia, was a mockery of a sham and a sham of a mockery. But free
• Animal show, a bit panties.
• Took ski lift up to summit again.
• Cable Car back
• Walked to Clarke Quay, had balanese (sp? tbh I can't remember what it was) food. Yummy.
• Breworkz. Had golden ale, very very expensive, possibly queue cut.
• Home. Sleep. Blam. Killed Adam.
  

2nd May 2008: Fool waiting

I escaped the mall eventually, after watching some crazy dancing water dance to a song from Juno (Anyone Else But You by The Moldy Peaches). I wombled under and over ground for a while to get to the esplanade and emerged at the theatres on the river. Took some photos and then my camera totally broke, with some help from me, so I swapped to my new camera, which is soooo slim and awesome. It has face recognition. I don't know why. Or how. Or what it really does and why it would be useful to me. But it has it.

I crossed the river, enjoying the view and walked along the boat quay past a London pub called The Penny Black and then was harassed by every restaurant owner along the river. I arrived back at the hotel and spent a while writing up half of march on my blog as well as acquiring a few cheeky bits of music for my Zen. Finally my stomach wrestled me down to the boat quay and a guy from an Indian restaurant tried to get me in his place by offering me a free girlfriend. Though it eventually turned out he said free beer, so I happily entered, and had a very suspicious lamb rogan josh, that was a bit gooey. But I had a great table looking over the river, right on the edge. After eating my fill I went back, did more hardcore blogging, showered and watched some tele while finishing About a Boy by Nick Hornby, starting The Complete Robot by Asimov and listening to the Hilltop Hoods. Multi task bonanza.

This morning I lazily packed my bag, checked out, checked in across the street, dumped my bag, got a coffee and cheese 'n' ham croissant and wrote this. 3-4 hours till the world of Orpington crashes head long into Singapore.

Blam.

Things I have learnt in Singapore already...

• I'm still addicted to BUYING books
• Books are a sensible price, i.e. I do not have to spend the GDP of Switzerland for a 60 year old out of copyright book
• It's hot and humid. It's not the sun that's just hot, EVERYTHING is hot. Buildings, on the same scale, are freeezing (inside them that is)
• The Suntec City Mall has over 75 billion shops.
• My trousers are too loose
• Apparently it's labour day.
• Some malls sounds like techno clubs
• Electronic goods are not stunningly cheap and there is a lack of unknown brand rip offs I was hoping for.
• Bartering involves the shop keeper lying, not including GST and being mean.
• There are very few white people. Which is cool, though no one seems surprised I'm around.
• VCDS are common here
• Everything is English.
• I am suspicious of how they measure millilitres.
  

1st May 2008

So after landing, I successfully navigated my way to the shuttle, and chatted to a couple from Birmingham while waiting for it. Only $9 and the ride was far longer than I realised, good tour of the city. Arrived, checked in to my very nice, though tiny single room. Own tele and DVD player and kettle. Went on the free internet for a while, then watched some tele before passing out. Woke up at 3.30am, shaved, then passed out once more. Woke at 10, showered, prepared myself, asked receptionist about places to buy cameras and then soldiered outside. Where I instantly melted. Had a croissant and coffee, then walked over river to digital mall, where I spent a while browsing everywhere and buying a micro to mini SD adapter. I then ventured out, aiming for Sin Lin Square, which I eventually found after some how losing all sense of direction, which I only seem to do on my own. Eventually found it, used a disgusting loo (which surprised me for SP) and began bartering with various shopkeeps. Learnt a few of the scams and eventually got the exact camera I wanted (Casio Exilim S10) for a decent price. ish.

I did some more wandering, before finding a quiet food area and chose a Korean/Japanese restaurant, where I told the waitress to get me whatever she liked. And some spring rolls. And a DC. She got me Beef teriaki, which was yum and quite cheap. The slogan of the restaurant was "Original Good Taste, Lingers Your Heart" which I thought was excellent. I then trekked to Suntec City Mall, which is the size of Australia and have spent ages in here perusing many shops and places. Bought an Asimov book (The Complete Robot) and just had a mocha so I could write this all down with a pen that is far to thing to be practical. I may aim for the boat quay now.

Love Tom.

30th April 2008

Hey there, how's it going, what you been up to? For the first time in ages, I'm writing in real time, by which I'm writing about now. Now consists of waiting in a brisbane departure lounge for my flight to Singapore, which has been delayed for an hour. After this information became available I panic bought 2 books, The Road by Cormac McCarthy, because a 360 magazine recommended it, in relation to the general feel of Fallout 3, AND, Deep Simplicity by John Gribbin, as I wanted to help my brain stay alive. Apparently via Chaos, Complexity and the Emergence of Life.

Today has been filled with the normal mind numbing early morning checkouts, airport shuttles, check ins, lift offs, landings, waiting 30 DAMN MINUTES for a train to leave the station for a 3 minute journey, rushing, checking in, eating and now waiting. I also just accidentally drew on my leg.

I began trying to reflect on my time in Oz, but discovered I have run out of brain effort. Luckily my flight has begun to board, though I'll wait for the hub bub to die down.

29th April 2008

Explored a bit with Joff, found a cheap 2nd hand bookshop, where I got 'the ring' for a dollar and we chilled around the fake lagoon by the water front, as the beaches at Cairns are mud and probably croc infested. Got some food from an Irish pub, where Joff went to the loo and an aborigine tried to get money out of me. Joff went off and I got my culture on in the Cairns art gallery, pretty interesting but a bit small. I wandered around, checking out lots of shops and stuff before heading back, going to the supermarket with Joff, making dinner and then relaxing in the evening as I fly out early tomorrow!

28th April 2008

Joff left early and failed to die after falling out of a plane so we rejoiced, ate breakfast, chilled, then caught minivan to greyhound station. Randomly, Daniella and Barry were there so we were like "hey". Barry did sky dive yesterday as well, which explained why we was looking a bit rough... as he'd been drinking ever since. We leaped on to our greyhound bus, and took the 2 hour ride to Cairns where we got dumped off somewhere random and everyone thought we were crazy that we expected there to be a mini-van from our hostel, even though every other hostel had one... Turned out Gilligans was only round the corner so we went there, checked in, and WOW, it's like a hotel but 4 bed-dorm style, really nice. Met a guy called Nick who went for dinner with, though he was a bit odd, but quite chipper for the list of horrendous things that have happened to him. He was in hospital for 2 weeks in sydney because all he ate was KFC and McDonalds... his fault really, he got mugged at knife point in Brisbane, and escaped by leaping into the river?! Something else horrendous happened as well, can't remember what though, he was a bit of a young naive lad, and when we found out he'd come from boarding school we thought that may account for it. He went back to the room and Joff, et I went for 1 drink in the hostel bar, which was HUGE, posh and quite empty, but then there was a free drinks hour and it descended into anarchy and we ended up in a very popular and packed bar/club that I can't quite remember the name of, wool shed? Something like that, was a bit jank in there and I was tired so headed back.

27th April 2008

Got out lateish and took free mini van to Mission beach itself. We did the normal hacky sack then spent about an hour breaking open a coconut, fibris exterior and all, to drink milk and eat. Then back to town for lunch then grabbed van back after I broke the village cash machine.

Had pasta in evening, after joff had carried it across half of Australia. And relaxed, played scrabble and caught up with journal (though obviously not very well as I'm writing this 4 weeks after it happened). Joff also booked his suicide attempt for tomorrow.

26th April 2008

Took a long Greyhound to Mission Beach, got picked up, long way to Treehouse hostel. Mostly open and in the middle of a forest. Relaxed, board games everywhere, music etc. Bumped into london/indian girl from Eureka II. Joff and I were epic tired, collapsed on sofas and then slept with many insects.

25th April 2008

Once more, up freakishly early and went for a sneaky early morning snorkel, where I had loads of fun playing with schools of fish. We then travelled back to the harbour, very very slowly (4mph?) as there was no wind and the sea was calmer than tarmac, but more soft. After saying bye to the peeps we met up with Daniella and Debora outside their hostel, went for pizza with them at our hostel (we paid I might add) and then fish&chips as I was STARVIN'. Re met up with D&D to relax by the lagoon (due to Airlee Beach's lack of actual beach) and got a new hack sack. Dangled feet in water, then got bored and went on a drinks run for peeps but got distracted by mega cheap 2nd hand bookshop and got Foundation by Asimov and Time MAchine by HG Wells (though turned out it was abridged so chucked it). Played some Hacky Sack then back to our hostel, where we had an awesome twin room. Had a shower for the first time in 4 days, which was nice even if I did share it with a tiny cute frog.

In the evening we met our boat gang for dinner at an awesome thai place that Max was in cahoots with and was quite drunk in. Had a nice thai prawn curry and chatted for a while before we decided to head out to meet D&D. The lads followed us to beaches, the 2 girls showed up already plastered on goon, we all drank to our health. Went on to another bar that was a bit jank, then I wasn't allowed in a club when I was clearly the least drunk person in a mile radius. Eventually got in, dancing occured, soon it was 4am and we were like "Argh, gotta get up early". May have got food, sounds like something I would do. I wonder what my entire lifetime calorie is? Probably about 7.

24th April 2008

Got up early (7) and had a nice breakfast before leaping into the icy depths to snorkel. Me and Joff swam all over the shop, saw some cool coreal and fish. Sailed a bit more, though not much wind to push us along. Went to whitehaven beach, and did 20/30 min hike barefoot through a forest to viewpoint above the beaches, very awesome, perfectly white beaches and all that. Charged back down to the actual beach, played hacky sack with Joff and Steve, then paddled before heading back to boat (and forgetting hacky sack...). Nice lunch made by Sam.

Went to another spot, HUGE wrasse by boat, Joff stroked it. Also saw the paw/foot/flipper of a huge turtle before it swam off at high speed. In the evening we rafted up with the Broom Stick and Eureka II. After intial inspecting of boats, only Joff, Fritz and I really intermingled, even after the boastful predictions of the Dartford lads. Met a nice london family (proving once more that everyone comes from North London) and chatted to 2 italien girls and a spanish girl for ages. They were most impressed I'd noticed they were from Italy and not Spain. I wasn't. I over heard them saying it to someone else...

Somehow all our beer got finished and we suspect the captains stole it. Probably for the best, we called it a night and when we clambered back to our boat, we found everyone else asleep.

23rd April 2008

Arrived in Airlee Beach at around 7am in the morning, possibly earlier, and I smelt quite horrendous. Got some food and drink in the bakery next to our sailing shop, and then skipped over to our hostel to be and used their net, and booked our room for after our sailing trip, though as it will be Anzac Day (and as usual we didn't know) when we get back, we could only get a twin, but it meant we could use two vouchers at the same time, and so using up our random free hostel vouchers. Randomly bumped in Amie and Rachelle who were off to catch the bus, and we were all like "whoa! hey!", which was cool sticks. Returned to the sailing shop, picked up our tickets, checked in our bags and then went on a hunt for some food. After waiting quietly in the thickets we pounced on a pizza each from a random pizzeria, and worried about the weather with the waitress. Wandered to the marine and got convinced into getting a crate by the guy there, sneaky sneaky. Realised with 5 minutes to go we were at the wrong marina, which was a bit of a blessing as we looked like alcoholics compared to the other people who were waiting there. To we ran to the correct arena, Joff carrying the crate, dumped it on the boat and then had to go back to land for our briefing.

Turns out most people to be on the boat with us are guys, 4 ladish guys from Dartford, Fritz: German colonel sanders, Paul: oldish photography dude from "up north", a weird german couple, 2 dutch girls (one, the captain Max's partner), and first mate/chef Sam. Very cosy boat called the silent night, Me, joff basically on the same bed, sort of, and one of the guys about 5 cm above my face on a weird jutting out matress bit. Joff and I helped pull up the sails with our manly manly muscles, ahem, and then our boat bust off at a crazy 45 degree angle, which was much fun. Travelled along at about 13 knots and got to a small bay by around dusk, and had a nice dinner of nachos followed by "chicken surprise". Had a few beers, played a few games and then went to bed moderatly early as we were shattered. Still wasn't sure about the lads.

22nd April 2008

Bid farewell to Jamie and Lucie who had an early Oz Experience bus, and we recovered slowly in the lounge. Fi and Joff went to the beach while I continued to chill listening to some music and falling asleep with my journal on my face. Classic. They returned after not too long, and we spent most of the day mainly chilling, as you do, apart from when Fi and I got more baked goods from our baked goods merchant. Had dinner of pesto pasta before our overnight bus came. I suspect it was a good journey. Or a bad one. Either/or. At one point we were left in the middle of nowhere with only the stars to keep us company as we waited for our next Greyhound bus. Was pretty though so we swayed in unison with the cosmos as our world span wildly through the universe to its own cosy dance....

Sunday 20th April 2008

Most of the guys left at some crazy hour, and we checked out and stored our luggage so we could go down to the laundromat and dry/wash our clothes. Wandering along the waterfront, we bumped into Susanne and Barry, and grabbed a hearty breakfast with them, though Barry just had a beer, unsurprisingly. Susanne left to sort things out and Joff and I went back to the laundry room, suddenly remembering we had forgotten to pay for breakfast. A quick jog back sorted that, and revealed Barry was drinking more with another Irish guy that had appeared. The next 2 hours before our bus I spent drying my clothes 3 times, and getting more and more angry as they were still wet at the end of all the palava. Anyway, we bid farewell to Susanne (Barry was no where to be found) and got on our Greyhound towards 1770 with no hint of accommodation booked. Hardcore.

The trip was uneventful, in that I don't remember it in the slightest, except that we were extremely excited to be going to a town named numerically, with no inkling of what was there. On arrival we realised the slight error, when the only hostel with a bus to meet us said they were full up. So we wandered across the road to the only other hostel in town, and as we strolled in we saw Jamie, Lucie and Fi. We explained our predicament, and with bemused expression they explained they had booked us in, which was awfully nice and cool that we had to rely on some fresh school leavers to look after us. Anyway, the hostel was fantastic, with a cool attitude and easy going nature that didn't require dorms to be locked. We dumped our bags and went down to an outside beautifully kept court yard, outside the kitchen, where every night a really cool guy cooks a meal for everyone for just $5 each. We were a bit late but he let us have his own personal bread with the yummy beef stew he had concocted.

The rest of the night we chilled out at a table with a few cheeky beers, and a guy called Charlie joined us, who was cool, and we reminisced about fraser, possibly to the detriment of Charlie's evening as he had a crap time. In fact, he had the group we wanted to be with, and apparently after poor camping skills on the first night, resulting in Van sleeping, they all stayed in a $50 hostel the 2nd night! Anyway, we called it a night and went to bed as is the done thing, and we had excellent plans for tomorrow....

Saturday 19th April 2008

On awaking at 6.25 in a rather chipper mood, I discovered the tent had transformed into a sauna-esque explosion of heat, so I equally evaporated to the outside. As people began to wake up it was soon discovered that Lucie had slept entirely in a massive puddle in her tent and Barry had slept in a tent on his own with no sleeping bags due to Daniella somehow using 2. After lacking in effort we managed to pack everything up and Joff drove us off inland towards Central Station campsite. Progress was slow due to mad wack roads but we arrived successfully, cleaned ourselves and the dishes and headed back on towards Lake Mckenzie. And Whoa. Lake Mckenzie is an amazingly beautiful, 2 tone, perfectly clear and blue lake, with the finest white sand that you can use to wash yourself and even brush your teeth with, if you so desired. Apparently. We played in the lake for a while, then a dingo ate our football. And it began to rain. We grabbed a lunch of tuna and peanut butter sandwiches before it was my turn to get us back to the barge. Now we all thought we were late, so I rallied Taloola around the roads, mighty safely I add. Unfortunately, we arrived an hour and a half early, and the only time anything dangerous happened was at the very last hump before the tarmac road, and I was going about 5kph, and the right sand of the track just dropped away without warning. After much screaming and heart beating we realised we were upright and pulled into the petrol station, where Joff and I pumped the tires back up, we all got ice creams, a random tour bus driver gave us loads of free spare cookies and muffins, and we headed to the barge queue. On the barge we mostly passed out in really uncomfortable positions and I woke up with a non-functionary arm.

We then went through the motions of unpacking and returning Taloola to palace, checking into our rooms, awesomely most of us were in the same apartment. That evening we enjoyed all you can eat Dominos pizza, and I won the challenge by eating 12 slices, then there was no more left. No alcohol tonight though, just far too much Lift, an old school lemonade drink. We retired to our room, and Jamie, Joff and I chatted rubbish for a few hours while half asleep. Extremely funny though.

Friday 18th April 2008

Woke before everyone, in a heat explosion floppy tent. I scrambled outside and surveyed the rising sun, recalling how I poured water throughout the van in the middle of the night trying to fill my bottle from our extremely heavy tank of potable water.

I took some photos of the morning sun glistening off of Taloola and our over exposed camp, and then folks gradually began to wake up. 2 rainbows appeared to the south, which we marvelled at, then pondered the incoming rain. In an hour or two we managed to eat a breakfast of brekkie bars and apples and packed the van up with all manner of camp equipment melded with sand. Twas my turn to drive awesomely down the beach, and as we were so efficient we left a bit early and still had to dodge the sea a bit. But soon we were free to drive manically along the beach within sensible guidelines. We stopped off first of all at Dunarabu camp site to wash all our cutlery, user their facilities and the such like. Viewing the amazing coloured sands and the beach wreck, surrounded by crazy dangerous jellyfish or something. Our final target for the day was Lake Wabby, where we would camp nearby. We had to trek 45 minutes along a random path through the forest until we emerged at an amazing site. A huge sand dune that plummets straight down in the lake's edge. Surrounding the lake on all other sides is rainforest and the water itself gets infinitely deep very quickly. The water and the air was very cold but we all kept in anyway. We group swam across it to a small bank the other side, where we were happy to find out Fi was a lifeguard. Although fresh, the lake wasn't as clear as we thought it might be. Once we swam back it started to pour down and we waited under a tree till it passed, a few photos up the dunes later and we walked back. I chatted to Jamie about Asia and travelling in general. As we approached Taloola the heavens opened and we made a mad dash for cover and waited like predatory pandas. Eventually we drove along slightly, to an amazingly perfect tent pitching area, shielded by a sand bank and expertly placed trees. With ease and practiced wit we constructed our tents far better than last night, Barry fashioned an awesome rain cover and the girls began cooking pasta. The end result was insanely yummy and we wolfed it down like hungry monkeys. A group of peeps arrived nearby really late on their first night and were panicking with the difficulty of their night time task, so the 4 of us lads bust on over there, and if you were there, you would have witnessed the greatest and fastest tent erection in history. So much so that all the girls swooned and the other guys became dejected with our manliness. Following this, a night long issue occurred involving the disappearance of our mallet, possibly due to Jamie's absent mindedness. No biggie or 2pac though.

The night once mroe descended into a goon and drink fest, initially via an over compelx game that involved drinking every 30 seconds. Though with no watch available, we were forced to count, somewhat innaccurately, ourselves. This in itself descended into random shouts of "Drink". Good fun. Later in the night I discovered Fi was from Honiton, and we had a lengthy discussion about every Exeter pub and club, as well as Ottery St Mary. The night also involved sporadic dives into tents to avoid the rain, which left sand everywhere. Fantastic night.

Thursday 17th April 2008

Woke up insane early, checked out, and threw our big bags in lockers. Watched a video detailing how not to die instantly and not to sleep in the road on Fraser Island. Also, avoidance of dingos, but to fight back aggressively should you have to.... Got in our groups (no choice) and ours seems really good. Signed all our lives away (me and joff only drivers), paid $1000 for bond, got sleeping bags, then met our 4x4 for the next few days, soon to be named Taloola. Joff expertly drove the old 4x4 to the garage and we utilised some excellent team work packing Taloola extremely snuggly (3 tents, gas, stove, sleeping bags, mats, eskis, cutlery, etc). Drove to woolies to get group food, which, thanks to Susanne, was highly organised and only cost $10 each for 3 days! This included a meat BBQ for the first night. We then bought vast quantities of goon (boxed cheap wine) and beer. In the end we were the last to leave the supermarket, but 2nd out of 4 to get to the dock, and bust out some hacky sack car park action. Before boarding our Barge of wonder, we lost Barry, our token irish guy. This was partially due to a toilet hunt and his commencement of alcohol consumption. Needless to say some Oz dude threatened him with a $27,000 fine later on in for the escapade of existing in close proximity to an open beer can.

Anyway, Joff reversed with great skill onto the barge. As the 2nd driver I had the front seat, which was cool as the other 7 were crammed in the back with all our bags, where as I could stretch out comfortably. On the barge I bought a Diet Coke off a guy who seemed convinced I was to blame for every stupid car accident on Fraser Island. Apparently 3 4x4s roll a month, to much calamity. On arrival, Joff and I let down the tires in preparation for some serious off roading, and nearly got lost trying to obtain our camping and vehicle permits, though my nav skills saved all mankind. What followed was a grueling x miles of driving for Joff, through the middle of the island an crazy uneven tracks through forest. Eventually, we bust out to the eastern beach and on up the beach towards the champagne pools, and Indian point. We reached Indian Point quite late, just about at the time when we weren't meant to drive on the beach after due to the tide. It was pouring at this point and we took a short inland track to the champagne pools under my driving skillery. The weather cleared so we walked down the cliff to the disappointing champagne pools, where you can normally swim in really hot water. But there was no sun and tide was far too high. Still, having a great time even though we realised we were stranded far from our suggested camping area.

After a discussion with a bus driver, it turned out the beach was fine as long as we (read I) were careful and stopped if waves were close. So I busted along the beach for a while, dodging waves and rocks, one eye on the ever creeping sea. In the end, we just had to choose a bumpy area to build our home for the night, with no one else in sight. It was quite exposed to the crazy wind and sporadic rain but after much confusion we got all the tents up, though one had suspicious structural integrity. The meat got cooking and we all chilled, mainly hiding in Taloola, with beer and goon. Barry manned our temperamental gas stove for the first batch of sausages and burgers. Foolishing, I was left in charge of the next batch of sausages, which turned out surprisingly good, for half meat half sand sausages, and we kept them wrapped for tomorrow. Fiona was unfortunately ill for the entire evening :(.

The rest of the night involved moderate drinking and then crashing out before 12, much to Jamie's dismay. Barry, Jamie and I shared a tent which was awesome, except it was our "special" tent, so kept flapping against our faces and halfway through the night Barry woke up, had a panic attack, and trampled me trying to get out. Quite humourous.

Wednesday 16th April 2008

• Checked out and played hacky sack in the Botantical gardens
• Went to virgin and got an Oz phone.
• Greyhounded and arrived late in to Hervey Bay
• Awesome bear fueled mini van journey from bus depot.
• Nice hostel, rooms connect to cool lounge and kitchen. Nice group from an Oz uni (international students from Americas and Asia)
• Wandered around a dead Hervey Bay, wanna do the 4x4 safari with the group.