Once more the travel Gods have smiled upon me and granted me an extended leave from work. Just 4 short weeks this time, long enough hopefully to stop and draw breath, try and recapture my appreciation of life. Have been looking forward to this trip pretty much since I returned from my last one but don’t think I’ve ever been this disorganised. Hope it’s not an omen of things to come…. Eeek! 1st off I booked myself a barganeous flight from Edinburgh to KL, leaving Feb 12th and returning Feb 13th (thought I was booking March 13th obviously) giving me a long and luxurious 4 hours on holiday – probably not even enough time to make my way through customs and book in for the flight home. Of course it was non refundable, (with my luck ... read more

Gosh, who'd have thought three months would go by so fast? Also, who'd have thought I could accumulate so much stuff in such a short space of time? Honestly, even with posting things home along the way I find I have had to purchase a rollie suitcase thing in order to transport all my gumpf home. Ack! A backpacker with a rollie suitcase, what is the world comming to? Anyway, my last two days have been spent in Kuala Lumpur, a city I was not expecting to like (on the advice of fellow travellers met along the way) but it's actually alright here. Big bonus is that the city centre in quite compact so you can traverse it easily enough by foot, the traffic is a bit hairy (3 months and I still haven't mastered the ... read more

It would seem I am to end this trip the same way I began it. Wet! No sooner had I arrived in Melaka than the heavens opened wide and spewed forth a deluge of water. In 10 seconds I was soaked through, no pathetic drizzling out here, when it rains, it rains! In between storms there are periods of blazing sunshine, but it so muggy here that I just never quite manage to dry out completely. Melaka certainly offers plenty to do, it's a very pretty town chock full of grand buildings and charming shop houses. For some reason there are also an inordinate amount of museums here, I kid you not, from Nonya history, to torture through the ages, to stamps. Something for everyone as they say (although who wants to pay to see a ... read more

The last few weeks having been particularly difficult it felt good to back with the plan and winging my way in a comfortable train to Koh Adang, remote and beautiful island in the Turatao national park. Alas, I should have known this contentment could not last. Alighting from the long tail I was a little perturbed to clock the vast array of people frolicking upon my deserted beach. This was most certainly not part of the plan. Neither was the discovery that the island was fully booked (thanks to the national holiday to celebrate the King's birthday - DOH!), salvation did lay to hand however. The park authorities were quite prepared to lend lend me a tent (for a ridiculously small fee) so I could camp on the island. However, if one look at the hoards ... read more

Alrighty, upon my return to Thailand I had one more day in Bangkok, primarily to allow me to post home all the outsize and unwieldy souvenirs I had purchased in Myanmar. This done in remarkably good time I headed out to indulge in more of the fantastic street food which is on offer everywhere. Tummy bulging, but unable to resist buying everything I saw, I took refuge in a nearby massage parlour (with no food in view). This one had a slight twist though, the massage was performed by fish! Having cleaned my feet I tentatively placed them into the water. This took nerves of steel let me tell you, the massage almost began before my feet even hit the water as the fish were practically jumping out of the water to get at them. It ... read more