by Jan Welcome to Thailand After a good night sleep on a comfortable bed on a sleeper train from Kuala Lumpur we reached the Malaysian – Thailand border. The beds on the train are comfortable enough to get a good night's sleep and for 55 RM (11£) you really can not ask for much more. We did get woken up a few times during the night by a little girl on the lower bunk as she was sick and coughed all through the night. I dislike kids as much as the next guy, but still there is no reason for the nasty "shut up" comment aimed at this little kid by a Spanish girl sleeping a few bunks down the cart. I hope she got sick shortly after that, mean p@@a! The border crossing was easy ... read more

Gili Trawangan by Polona Gili Trawangan is filled with tourists, who come here for a short holiday and with a single intention – to party. The island itself is small and on the beach, as you walk along, there are so many bars, you could go to a different one each night of the year. But although the streets are busy, as soon as you move to a side street you get away from all the hustle and bustle. It was a tourist mecca, but we enjoyed it still, as you don't have to be a part of it if you don't want to be. Also, what we noticed on the first day, not only is there enough drinks, but everyone openly advertises magic mushrooms, although they are illegal. So if you want to “fly to ... read more

By Polona Taking advice from fellow travelers, we decided that when arriving to Indonesia we would skip Jakarta and go straight Jogjakarta. We actually prepared this time and we decided it might also be a good opportunity to use the CouchSurfers site and see if we could stay with a local and see what life in Yogya is like for the people living there. This is how we came across Ganjar. He replied immediately and welcomed us to his home, saying he might not be able to dedicate that much time to us on account that he was getting married the week of our arrival. He also invited us to attend the wedding to experience what a traditional Javanese wedding is like. Of course we could not say no to that. We arrived to Jakarta in ... read more

EL NIDO Well, as the only apparent option to leave Coron for El Nido was to take a boat, which costs almost a fortune for budget travelers like us, we didn't really have much of a choice. I bought the tickets a day in advance and then kept my fingers crossed that the boat will actually leave Coron the next day, as a couple have already been canceled due to the heavy rain. Murphy's law came to my mind when I woke up on Tuesday morning and it was raining, but we were lucky, the boat was there and we were still “on schedule” to leave. When I say on schedule, I mean we left with an hour and a half of delay, which in Filipino terms is on time . I expected something like a ... read more

Goodbye Malaysia (at least for now, no worries Yean Yean, KL is still on our "need to revisit" list) and hello Philippines. Arriving to Clark airport we had to take a 2 hour bus, to get us to our first destination in the Philippines - Manila. As we were leaving the suburbs and getting closer to the city itself, I thought to myself "great, a couple of more minutes, and I will be enjoyin my well deserved shower, put my feet up, get some food..." Yeah sure, Manila is big people, BIG. The population in the capital of Philippines is 16 million and according to wiki it's the most densely populated city in the world! So, instead of arriving shortly to our destination, it started to look like we were never going to get to our ... read more