Perth - Kuala Lumpur - Phuket � 16 August - 26th August

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August 22nd, 2011

And we're off! Left a few days ago to head to Thailand before my epic journey begins, having a little r & r with my big sister!



Sending big cuddles to Lisa and Josh for seeing me off, it was devastating to say bye but so nice to have people there... and thanks for Jen and Katie for putting up with my wailing for the next hour or so!



No dramas at the airport as my over paranoid brain told me there would be. We bugged the crap out of the other passengers with our rambunctious game of online trivia (which i won a round of thank you very much...) landed in KL and managed to find my baggage AND hotel all by myself! Hurrah!



So after a super refreshing four hours sleep I dragged my sorry ass back to the airport, trying to convince myself that I’m a super savvy traveller but mentally culling every non-essential item in my ridiculously heavy backpack... i mean really... do i need to wash my hair? Who needs shoes in the long run? Clothes? Pfft… perhaps i can just head to a naturalist reserve... tempting...



Welcome to Phuket! Arrived a few hours before Sarah did and the room wasn't ready yet so did what most people would do... ordered a cocktail and jumped in the pool fully clothed! Ahh I love Thailand...



Very emotional (on my side) reunion with Sezum... after saying goodbye to so many people it was quite nice to say hello, checked a very excited and bewildered big sister in, then we proceeded to chat each other’s ears off for the next few hours over stupidly large servings of food and even more ridiculously sized cocktails (:



I later had the extreme pleasure of introducing Sarah to fish spas… for those of you who don’t know, a fish spa is where you put your feet into a tank full of tiny fish who eat the dead skin off you, kind of feels like pins and needles… well Sarah screamed so loudly I think she scared most of the tourists out of Patong… what was even funnier was when a forty year old Indian man did exactly the same thing and let out an even louder girlier scream then her! After that every masseuse in the shop took turns at finding out how ticklish she actually was… I just realised how bad that sounds… and should correct it… but won’t (:



Since then we have been equally touristy and lazy! Have been to the beach, spent an entire day in the pool by the swim up bar... bless the wondrous person who invented the pool bar, who was sent down from heaven and spoke forth:

"There will be a pool! A glorious pool! Where one does not have to leave the water to quench thy thirst... one will not even have to leave to stifle thy hunger! And one will certainly not have to leave when the supply of the smoking tobacco runs low... no... One will stay in this pool all day until thy skin is wrinkly like a decrepit old man..."

And there was much rejoicing (:



After a couple of days of eating enough food that had the potential to feed a small country and doing a whole lot of bugger all, we ventured of out the resort to Phi Phi Island... where we proceeded to eat too much and do bugger all... no just kidding (: Went snorkeling at a few different sites, the water was so beautiful and warm! It is THAT shade of blue that you see in all the travel brochures and just go.... ahhhh.... i wish i was there... well we were there, so ner! Ahem sorry about that. We went to the beach that the movie 'The Beach' was filmed... remove the two thousand tourists and boats, chuck a bar by the water and they may have something going on there! Lol no it really was beautiful (: We jumped off the boat (well flailed off if you're Sarah) swam, relaxed, swam... oh and on the way back to the mainland stopped at an island for, yup you guessed it, COCKTAILS!!! Oh but funniest moment of the day… I was bitten by a bloody fish! Yup… still have the bite mark on my leg!



It was on this tour we met two crazy bloody kiwi girls who we have adopted as our travelling friends. Lauren and Julia, both as mental as each other and a whole lot of fun! After we hit them up on the tour for money and their camera they decided that we were all right too so decided to cap off an awesome day adventuring by partaking in a tradition that dates back centuries in Thailand.... MEXICAN AND MAGARITAS!



Then off to Bangla Rd for another proud Thai tradition... the ping pong show... let’s just say i will never look at a fish bowl the same way ever again... and that is NOT what you do with a budgerigar!



After the show we took ourselves off to bed for some quiet reflection.... haa haa none of you bought that! I love Bangla Rd! Soooo many pubs! Was like a kid in a candy shop! Made lots of new friends, partied till the clubs closed, lit lanterns on the beach then swam there until the sun came up... did i mention i love Thailand?



Saw the Phuket Fantasea show (Sarah, Lauren and Julia if you are reading this i hope that song is stuck in your head for the rest of the day! "phuket fantasea... phuket fantasea...") lmfao.... great night out! Wasn't sure what to expect considering they transferred us there about a year before the show even started... but this place is like Disneyland on crack... with no rides. You walk about looking like you just got slapped in the face by a riot of colour and noises and wonder why you have shopping bag full of crap and all your money is gone. The show was amazing, the elephants were so adorable and clever! I didn't really understand what was happening but you have never seen four grown women more excited by chickens running across a stage!



As Sarah now had a full blown elephant addiction we headed to the Elephant Camps for a trek through the jungle, now we have been pretty lucky this whole trip with the weather considering it's the wet season, not today... bucketed, and i mean bucketed down the whole 45 min ride. We found this highly amusing, especially since all the photos we took are pitch black as you can't see through the deluge, i don't think some of the other passengers were too impressed, especially when we started busting out 'Raindrops keep falling on my head' and 'The sun will come out tomorrow'... oh well we kept ourselves entertained! We got to feed them (the elephants not the cranky tourists) and watch them perform tricks… they are sooooo freaking cute!!!



Now just having a bit of a rest, of course it wouldn't be a holiday without a trip to the doctor... yeah we all saw it coming... Emmy has tonsillitis, doh! So it's a good thing we drank the hotel out of cocktails as it looks like i have to stay off them for... oh at least fifteen minutes (:



We are having an absolutely brilliant time, meeting great people, eating EVERYTHING and just taking it allllll in (:





August 24th, 2011



Ahhh coming to the close of our trip ): Did a little shopping today, realised I may have been a little drastic with the culling of t shirts so bought a couple… well come on I had to do some shopping!!



Went on an adventure day yesterday! Hired a tuk tuk for the day with our lovely kiwi friends, It was such an amazing day! The tuk tuk for one was hilarious, played dance music nonstop so you can imagine four daggy as hell chicks dancing their asses off in the back of this thing… probably suitable at 1am… not so much at 10am… we had fun though (:

Went to a snake show which was too funny! Poor Julia is terrified of snakes and sat on the highest seat, we were giving her crap until the snake handler lost control of one of them and we all scream like little bitches and jumped up to join her… ahhh the awkward moment when a snake show gets out of control… (: Got pashed by an elephant too! She was sooooo cute!



Then we went to the giant Buddha which was just breathtaking, it is enormous and sits on one of the highest points on the island. The views from up there were out of this world, pictures just don’t do it justice at all. It is still under construction and we got to write our names on one of the tiles that will be used to build it! We got blessed by a monk too so should have safe travels from this point… not that it’s been dangerous so far… but anyway you get the point… went to a temple which was beautiful… then decided we had enough culture for one day and headed to lunch where we stuffed ourselves with amazing Thai food and yup, you guessed it, more cocktails! The restaurant was overlooking this amazing beach, was so relaxing. Stuffed and satisfied we headed to Kata beach to relax after a very busy day!



25th August, 2011

Beach day! Headed down to a quieter part of Patong Beach so we didn’t get molested by the vendors. It was such a beautiful day. We made some friends with the local Thai people (by friends, I mean they liked us because we were buying their beer and the crap they were flogging!). Sarah went parasailing which was pretty funny to watch… I mean brave Sarah… yeah that’s exactly what I meant… at least she didn’t scream as loud as when the fishies were nibbling her toes (:



After one… two… three… well who was counting?! After a FEW beers we all decided it would be a fantastic idea to get henna tattoos! Lauren was the henna whore and got three doggy prints on her foot as well as, I think it was ‘seize the day’ (sorry if wrong!), I got ‘eh se ra’ (I’m sure epic spelling fail there) which means ‘freedom’… Sarah and Julia took it a little less seriously (: Julia got the Thai word for ‘awesome’ which was pretty funny considering there ISN’T a Thai word for awesome! I think they settled for ‘good’ he he… I still think it says I like lady boys… Sarah got ‘No thank you’ in Thai to show to anyone who asks her to buy something… I think that would have been more helpful at the start of the trip before she bought an extra suitcase worth of crap! (: Sorry Sez but you know it’s true!



It was such a cruisy day, kicking back drinking beer on the beach listening to tunes… very happy Emmy moment! A shame it had to come to an end but our lovely tuk tuk driver promised to take us to this ‘amazing place’ he knew for dinner! A restaurant floating out on the water, where a boat has to take you out, has great views even better prices… how could we resist?! What a special last night in Thailand this would be! All excited we jump into the disco tuk tuk and head off for…



….EPIC HOLIDAY FAILURE!!! After he drives us into what feels like the middle of nowhere and we have convinced ourselves that we are going to be killed/turned into sex slaves/have organs harvested/insert alternate horrible outcome here/ we finally reach this pier where the "traditional boats" are waiting… seriously these boats roofs were made up of old promotional posters and looked like would sink as soon as the tide changed… but as adventurers on we pressed as we were told sometimes famous people ate here! Not sure what passes for famous in Thailand but I doubt Hugh Jackman would be dining there anytime soon, the glorified raft which looked only marginally sturdier than the boat that took us out there, stank to high heaven, was so dark you couldn’t see anything at all to say "oooooohhh" at and the menu would scare Bear Grills… oh and then rained so hard they had to roll down the walls so we couldn’t even pretend to be excited about the nonexistent view!



Trying to find a funny side of it we hastily scoffed down the most edible things on the menu (not an easy task) and get the hell out of there! Back to the safety of Patong we tried to redeem the evening by heading to Bangla Rd to find that, much to our disappointment, the US Marines had shipped out the night before… hee hee… just kidding 😉 I think the torrential rain kind of spoiled the party vibe for many so we donned our super sexy ponchos, declared the night a fail and headed back to the hotel… to be told of by security for splashing around in the puddles in the car park and to go to our rooms…. BAAHAAA!! After a few muttered ‘sorry dad’s we did as we were told.



Final day in Phuket! ): Wake up to find it is still raining as steadily as it was the night before, head out the front of the hotel to pick up my laundry to find that the whole road has flooded and become a river! Pretty friggen cool!!!

We had to say bye to Lauren and Julia who had an earlier flight… I think we were all quite surprised at how sad we were! Honestly those girls were so much fun and just made the trip so much more than we could have imagined! If y’all reading this ladies I can’t wait to hang out with you again! Julia, see you in NYC and Lauren you better have a couch waiting for me in Wundy Willington! Thanks so much for all the laughs and random experiences… I love you long time… for 100 baht… (:



Had some nice one on one time with by big sis and solved the world’s problems… and then another farewell… gotta say those aren’t getting any easier and liking them less and less! Thank you Sezum for an amazing time, I’m so, so glad we got to do this again! I hope you weren’t too sad… it looked like a nice lady was giving you a hug… I just got weird looks from the Air Asia staff as I blubbered by way on the plane… ahh the compassion of budget airlines (:



So all in all declaring Phuket a big Charlie Sheen WIN, now one more night at the luxurious Concorde KL Airport hotel before flying off to see Unky Wunky and Hilary!



LONDON HERE I COME!!!

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