http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/AlandShell/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from AlandShell en-us Fri, 25 Dec 2009 09:04:20 +0000 Fri, 25 Dec 2009 09:04:20 +0000 Our last few days in Cairns were spent chilling by the lagoon we also met up for a night out with Shari Kael and had a good trad session in Willie McBrides Irish bar on Paddys weekend. So after a busy week we got the plane back to Brisbane and rented a lovely ocean view apartment in Surfers...I know treating ourselves again but we deserve it The night we got back there was a huge storm w http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/New-Zealand/South-Island/Franz-Josef/blog-386940.html HEYjust a quick entry about our scuba dive school...we completed our PADI open water course so were both now qualified to dive anywhere we want We bought an underwater camera to play around with so please see these photo's attached SLAN http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Queensland/Surfers-Paradise/blog-385139.html Well we finally made it to our last destination on our travels up the east coast and good aul Joey got us there safe sound When we left Surfers we headed up to Brisbane for a few days. Went to the Outback show with Bruce Mavis had lunch with Roddy MacDonald went to the Irish Club with Keith Sarah and even took in a band practice with the Queensland Irish Association Pipe Band Hadnt eno http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Queensland/Cairns/Cairns-City/blog-380975.html So Next on our hit list was a place called Ballina Only good thing we really have to say about it was that it's the same name as an Irish townOh and the fact that it houses about 6 billion ants and they all happened to live in the camp site we camped in....Typical. So after a very short stay there we headed up to Beautiful Byron Bay.. This is one of the towns where the Australian Hippie move http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Queensland/Surfers-Paradise/blog-374431.html Well Palm Beach was fab..... didnt see any HA filming which I was hugely disappointed about but I did get to see the surf club with Alf Stewarts name on it bonus I did want to do some replays of some HA scenes but Alen wasn't so keen so I didn't push it too far We also took a trip up the Blue Mountains for a night camping and decided to bring Emily Conor with us they had never been campi http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Coffs-Harbour/blog-369826.html Some of the photos are a bit mixed up cause were using two cameras...the first few are from our last week in Thailand and then the rest of OzEnjoy http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/blog-361377.html G'day so after a few days camping we arrived back to the Barrett household it was lovely to get back to a nice comfy bed and get to wash our clothes...again got all our xmas shopping done and then collected mick and lorna from the airport on xmas evethey flew in from perth. Christmas day was great...very different from home we got up at 6am my cousins Emily 9 and Conor 6 werent allow http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Sydney/blog-361334.html so after we got organised we got a flight down to melbourne staying in the Miami hotel hostel... it was cheap and cheerful first day was spent sight seeing lovely city and then we went on the hunt for a camper van we were dissapointed a few times but after a few days we made a deal with this guy and bought our campervan...JOEY.. we left melbourne with JOey packed to the brim on TUesday a http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Melbourne/blog-355490.html So after Phuket we went back across to Koh Samui to meet up with mick and Lorna. When we http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Singapore/Bugis-Village/blog-355487.html So today is our last day here in Karon Beach Phuket Have to say that we have had a really good time here doing all the tours. Our first day here was pretty normal didn't do very much only took a walk around and got a good feel for the place We spent the evening looking aroung at what tours we were going to do and where we'd get the best price..First tour was the James Bond island tour.. this w http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/South-West-Thailand/Phuket/blog-348454.html We left Samui today and left the lovely luxury of the Imperial Boat House Hotel We were up at 5am to get a boat and bus to the other side of Thailand...thanks to Pete Gina a lovely english couple we met in Samui...I know you'll be reading this Gina thats why I said that We were out with them in the Garland restuarant till 1am so only got 4 hours sleep the boat was soo rocky even though http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/South-West-Thailand/Phuket/blog-346863.html 3rd day in and we're still having a ball caught up on our jet lag so were in Thai time 7 hours ahead for all you suckers at home in the rain Still finding our way around met some really nice people an english couple last night in late 60's told us about this fabulous restuarant in Bangkok called Cabbages Condoms defo going to see that on our way back Spent loads of time in our boat http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/South-West-Thailand/Ko-Samui/blog-345303.html Flight to bangkok was great really long but comfyfor Al as he had the window seat with all the leg room Shell was not happy First fight of the trip........NOTOur hotel in bangkok was lovely kinda dingy road we were on but everyone was extremely friendly there was a national festival on like their new year carnival which was class Flight to Koh Samui was grand til the landing and sh http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/South-West-Thailand/Ko-Samui/blog-344760.html