Erin n Devlin

It's been tough to get adequate internet access in India to post a new blog entry, and I apologize to all our readers who are eager to hear about our new adventures. This entry is old, summing up our time in our first three stops, but it's all I have for now and I've been trying to upload it onto a public terminal for over a week now. The owners of the internet cafes don't allow USB memory keys to be plugged into their computers, so I had to be sneaky and James Bond like in getting this entry and pictures uploaded. Fitting, since we are in Udaipur at the moment, and the movie Octopussy was filmed here. It's not hard to forget either, seeing as every budget restaurant in the city plays the movie nightly. ... read more

Being a Canadian in Thailand we are granted a 30 day visa free period. When this 30 days ends, you can hop over the border at any of the neighboring countries and re-enter, and be given another 30 day stamp in your passport. There are restrictions though, and you can only stay a maximum of 90 days in a 180 day period. Well, our 2nd round of 30 days was coming to and end and we needed to renew our stamps before our friends Kim and Andrew arrived from home. Tourist offices are everywhere in Thailand, offering any combination of tickets to get you where you want to go. Visa runs are no exception, and from Phuket the popular place to go is into Burma. This requires a painfully long day of traveling. The bus picked ... read more

True Island Paradise. No cars, no scooters, just palm trees waving in the breeze, waves crashing on the shore and the occasional "BEEP BEEP!" as a troupe of Thai's hurry past pushing a cart full of luggage from the newly arrived passengers. Welcome to Phi Phi. As I mentioned in the previous blog, we were kind to ourselves and opted to fly out of Singapore and back to Phuket. Singapore has one of the world’s best airports, so we figured it would be an injustice to not see it. Unfortunately since we flew Tiger Airways, Singapore’s discount carrier, we flew out of the “Budget” Terminal and didn’t actually get to see the other terminals (which I imagine contain the “worlds best” stuff, since our terminal was, as the name implies, rather budget). We set a New ... read more

MERRY CHRISTMAS MERRY CHRISTMAS MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! To be honest, it's kind of a blue Christmas over here for us (and not just because the sky is perfect and without clouds). It was strange waking up this morning and not being at home with presents under the tree, eating breakfast with our families and enjoying the holiday spirit. It certainly has shown us that although Christmas can happen anywhere in the world, it's just not CHRISTMAS without your family, your traditions, and all that love surrounding you. All of you are definitely in our thoughts more than ever today. If we could port ourselves home instantly to spend today with you and then return we would in a heartbeat. Here are a few photos of what we have been up to in this tropical paradise. Visiting monkeys ... read more

I have to apologize about the lapse of entries, we’ve been keeping ourselves quite busy here in Patong. Unfortunately the hotel we chose was completely full so we were forced to find alternate accommodation. It didn’t work out too badly though, we found a small family run hotel 15 minutes from the beach for a great deal. Rates can skyrocket during the Christmas peak season, sometimes doubling or tripling at the larger resorts. This was by far the lowest price we came across, and the increase from Dec 20 onwards was not too much. Plus, we received a 10% discount since we were booking for so many nights (3 weeks). Like I mentioned, it’s not beachfront, to get to Patong Beach it’s a 15 minute walk down the street. All this means is that our hotel ... read more