Dad decided that he'd make the most of the sun and go running on Monday morning while Mum and I headed back to Madame Tussauds. We got there shortly after opening and were shocked that there was still a crowd out the door! Luckily the queue only lasted half an hour, but it was still incredibly packed inside. The wax models were exceptionally life-like as you'll see in the photos and we laughed and screamed our lungs out in the 'Chamber of Horrors' section! After lunch Mum had a final look around Hammersmith before we missioned it out east to the [View Full Entry]

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London: July 20-22. With Ryan and Nic now in Calgary, Todd and Rach in Aberdeen and Joel and I in London, Mum and Dad took the perfect opportunity to come and stay with us all in three unique parts of the world. We were all lucky enough to travel with them, and for me visiting the graves of my Great, Great Uncles who lost their lives in WWI in Belgium, was a special experience. They began their month-long trip in Canada, which timed perfectly with the 'Stampede' and as well as spending time in Calgary, they camped with Ryan and Nic [View Full Entry]

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Day 3: City tour. Our half day city tour kicked off the next morning with a drive from our hotel through Karon and its neighbouring beaches Kata and Patong. While some elements were similar to the tour in Bangkok like the gem factory stopoff, it was worth doing to see the more distant attractions on the island. We began by checking out the postcard-perfect scenery at Kata Viewpoint and Phromthep Cape, where there was also hundreds of carved elephants - said to be guarding the Lord Brahma statue at the top. The next stop went one better than the wooden variety [View Full Entry]

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Day 2: Day trip to Phi Phi Island Unfortunately Mr Di Caprio had long left the Phi Phi Islands, but I wasn't about to forego the chance to visit some of the most picturesque islands in the world. We did find monkeys that could swim though. As with all our other ventures, we were picked up bright and early with a number of other couples, and after sorting out our snorkelling get-up, departed from quite a luxurious marina. The weather was stunning, so it was quite scary when we got about 30 minutes offshore and were hit by a massive rain [View Full Entry]

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Phuket: May 19-24. We left Bangkok at 9.30pm with Air Asia. Word of advice: If your travel agent scores you a bargain flight deal, check the company's baggage allowance before you book. We got stung with a $40 charge each way as their limit was 15kg - unlike the 20kg allowance of most NZ companies and the limit through Asia. They pointed this out to us at check-in...it was printed in line 900 of their 'font-size 5' Ts and Cs!! Anyway, when we arrived in Phuket we got greeted by the local rep of our tour company, who on the 40 [View Full Entry]

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Day 3: Day tour of Floating Market and Rose Garden Our next day was a big one. We booked a full day tour that kicked off at 6am with a one-and-a-half hour drive to the Damnern Saduak Floating Market, located 110km from Bangkok. It was neat to get out of the city to see rice paddies, salt fields and farms. On the way we also stopped at a coconut farm where we saw (and more importantly for me, tasted) sugar being made. Once we arrived at the jetty our tour group boarded a motorised long boat which took us down [View Full Entry]

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Day 2: City tour and Patpong markets We had a guided city tour for five hours the next morning, which was included with our transfer costs in both Bangkok and Phuket, and well worth it. At 7am Willy picked us and another couple up in an air conditioned van then guided us around three temples, government buildings, a flower market and gem factory. It was a great chance to see a selection of sites that we might not have otherwise. In the afternoon we had the chance to get dropped off anywhere, so we chose the large NBK shopping centre - [View Full Entry]

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Bangkok: May 16-19 Wow, what a place! Loved every moment of our action-packed four days in Bangkok, with its rich culture married with bustling streets, millions of motorbikes, lovely people, cheap but fantastic food, magnificent markets, heat, air con and even the con artists kept us entertained. We arrived at 3am local time on Wednesday after a nine hour flight, so had a long day after leaving Patonga early the previous morning. Where's your Berocca when you need it!? Thought they had lost my pack when we went to collect our bags, but luckily about 20 people were in the [View Full Entry]

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Patonga: May 12-15 Patonga is a sleepy fishing village situated 90km north of Sydney. It's also a place where people have snakes for pets and dogs the size of small horses!! We had a lovely three days relaxing there with Joel's aunty Margaret and uncle John who fed us like kings with all the local delacacies. On our first night, after we got picked up by Joel's cousin from Woy Woy train station, we had a big reunion and birthday dinner for John. Joel hadn't seen many of his relat [View Full Entry]

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Manly: May 11-12 Our first stop after the ferry over was to find a hostel. Luckily Manly had several central options to pick from and we found one reasonably quickly. Wearing 30 kilos on my back on the walk there was not the easiest thing in the world though, and from the stares I got I must have looked like the Hunchback of Notre Dam! The reason we went to Manly was to catch up with one of my really good school mates Clare and her boyfriend Joe. Late afternoon he picked up Joel from the hostel and took him [View Full Entry]

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