Day Nine: Halls Creek We headed on up WA to Halls Creek, to give you an idea of what this town is like, it was charmingly referred to as Hells Crack by the attendant at the petrol station at Fitzroy Crossing. With hindsight I have to say that I think this is very rich coming from a Fitzroy Crossmeister...even if I was living with George Michael I would be unhappy residing there. The only thing I can say about Fitzroy Crossing is that it is where the Great Northern Highway crosses the Fitzroy River. As we stopped at the petrol station [View Full Entry]

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Another retrospective blog, these things really are a labour of love. Hope your all doing well xxxxx There is an advert running in Australia at the moment that urges people to visit 'real Australia', in Western Australia. Indeed it is a shame that the majority of backpackers miss out this wonderful part of the country, focussing on the east coast, WA is a bit more untouched but maybe thats part of its charm and appeal.... Perth (population 1.3 million) I flew into Perth and with hindsight now I wished that I had stayed there much longer, I really did like the [View Full Entry]

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As I am always so retrospective with my Travel Blogs I thought that it would be a welcome change to get one that was hot off the press! I left Sydney on Saturday and felt very emotional to be leaving the City, the Freak Show (not my words) that is Kings Cross Strip and obviously my hostel: The Pink House. I have felt very much at home in most of the places I have stayed in since I have been away and haven't (touch wood) suffered with homesick, putting pay to my mums notion that "I am a little nomad"...This place [View Full Entry]

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I have severe Blog Lag as one of my fellow bloggers put it...this is my Blog from when I was in Cambodia in October... I travelled from Saigon through to Phnom Penh (Cambodia capital) on a local bus along with eight other travelling companions, people that I had met in Vietnam. Cambodia is a place where most people probably feel more comfortable travelling with a companion, however if you find yourself in the position of being a lone traveller it is a very simple country to navigate round. Not dissimilar to the rest of SE Asia where the logistics of travelling [View Full Entry]

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I have never spent Christmas away from home and was slightly apprehensive about how I would take to it. I wasn’t sure how I would feel for surf to substitute snow (not that I actually surf) and for Barbie to take the place of Turkey. However I am pleased to report that I coped with the adjustment admirably and indeed embraced it, but to be honest it just didn't feel like Christmas. When my friends at the hostel were in tears opening their Christmas parcels and messages from their parents and family, I was sort of looking on in bewilderment. Admittedly [View Full Entry]

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Camping is the way forward.... Even though you are well prepared for the fact that your money won't go that far in Australia after being in the cash cushion of Asia....it still manages to take you by surprise somewhat. For example the bus ticket that I bought for all my travels in Vietnam..from the North to the South of the country cost $20 USA...To travel from Perth to Darwin on a Greyhound bus cost in the vicinity of $600 aussie dollars, obviously the mileage is somewhat greater in the latter of the two but you get the idea of the disparity. [View Full Entry]

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As I was only in Singapore for two days I knew I had to make the most of it despite having had: one nights sleep on a porch in Phi Phi, followed by a night/early morning of drinking Whisky, followed by a night of sleeping rough in Bangkok Airport. So to say the least I was slightly jaded! Please Do Not Litter I made my first social faux pas within an hour (a new personal record) by drinking my bottle of water whilst on the MRT- Mass Rapid Transit: no food or drink to be consumed at stations or on the [View Full Entry]

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I entered the Long Bar at Raffles Hotel and have to say that at first I was slightly disappointed, I thought that I had walked into a downmarket Wetherspoons: Peanut Shells littered the floor and there was no manager hurriedly rushing around with a dustpan and brush. To make matters worse people were adding to the mess by throwing more on the floor! Totally inappropriate and ironic that in the poshest area of this 'no litter' metropolis people were living so recklessly-did they not know about the fines? The audacity!This is Raffles! It soon came to light that this was traditio [View Full Entry]

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Home Again There is a line in The Beach where Leonardo De Caprio's character snaps at his friend and says "You've got to forget about Thailand". Obviously this is a problem for many people and in my endorsement of this sentiment, I arrived back in my South East Asia home: Ko Phi Phi two months after I had left it. I was already well over two months behind schedule and so had decided that a mere ten days on Paradise Island was going to make no odds. Journey to Phi Phi I know I am digressing on my Phi Phi tales [View Full Entry]

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One of the less relaxing expereinces however was being on the public bus between Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng.. Reassuringly there have been no hold ups on this stretch of road, aptly named Route 13, for two years. However I have to say I was more than alarmed when the man sat directly behind me had a pistol in his back pocket and a rifle stacked up against the wall- what ever happened to a Pork Pie and a Puzzle Compendium to wile away a six hour bus journey....for obvious reasons I decided not to ask him this and strategically moved [View Full Entry]

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