After my visit to the Elephant Nature Park(ENP) in December last year, I had promised myself I would go back and work as a volunteer. So here I was arriving day 1 in the Chiang Mai office, being handed my volunteer T-shirt and setting off for the park. I was looking forward to what I knew would be a truly fulfilling experience and if I'm honest, liking the idea of staying in one spot for more than a few days, in fact, for 2 whole weeks. The ENP was the brain child of a Thai lady called Lek. She has made [View Full Entry]

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I'll admit it, I'm a cheat. The thought of spending in excess of a day travelling by bus from Hanoi to northern Laos was just to much for me. So, me and my latest travel buddy, Rachel, hopped on an airplane and 2hrs later we were in Luang Prabang. Walking from the air terminal I had prepared myself for the usual barrage of taxi drivers, each trying to coerce me into taking their particular vehicle at a "very good price". To my complete delight, not one single person pounced on either me or my bags. It was at this point, that [View Full Entry]

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It's hard to even think where to start this blog. Obviously the beginning would be good. But, I think that one of my fellow travelers summed Vietnam up by saying it is a marmite country. You either love it or hate it. For me, much like my thoughts on marmite, I generally I hated it. But, there were moments when I thought I could come to love the people. Unfortunately, these were few and far between. So, this journey begins with me traveling from Cambodia to Vietnam on the Mekong. Leaving hectic Phnom Penn one sunny morning,I arrive in Chau Doc, [View Full Entry]

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It begins, the 11th Jan 2008, 5pm and I'm in an Irish bar. Celebrating the fact that it has only taken me nine and half hours! to get from Bangkok to Siem Reap. I've managed to avoid all the scams and haven't been badly ripped off by the Cambodian transport mafia. I am a lucky one. Having not given much thought to what Siem Reap would be like, I was taken aback by how "western" it was. But, with the Khmer crown jewel of Angkor Wat just 3 km down the road and 2 million plus visitors a year, I guess [View Full Entry]

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After a great break in Chiang Mai, I finally get off my butt and leave. Heading for Taton, even further north. Fortunately, this time the bus trip was a respectable 3 hours, just as well, as my good old British cold was actually fast turning into tonsilitis; oh lucky me. Taton was a lovely little town, with few tourists, except the luxury bus loads of Thais coming to visit the temple of course! The temple, Wat Taton, is built over 7 steps, as they call it, going up the mountain side. So, the next day, which was very hot and sweaty [View Full Entry]

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Well my travels have finally begun again. I will admit I left the UK with a little trepidation. Thinking, here I go again, potentially heading off for a year on my own. God knows why, but your mind suddenly comes up with the most negative of thoughts; can I do this, will I make any friends..... I really shouldn't have worried. Within half an hour of checking into my hostel in Bangkok, I was out on the piss with an Irish girl, Paula, who quite fortunately had a drinking capacity to rival my own! So day 1 arrives and I have [View Full Entry]

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I have been so remiss in keeping my blog up, sorry.... Rather than try and update the end of my africa travels I thought I'd just post a few photos. These are from travelling overland between Zambia and South Africa. I will put in another section covering Malawi, which has to rate as one of the top countries I visited and most definitely chilled in. (Mazzy, when I saw the Lions and Cheetahs I thought of you and how much you would have loved them, even though it was at 6 in the morning!) I'm now on my travels again, this [View Full Entry]

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I should start by explaining that Dutchy is really called Marchien, and as you might guess she is from Holland. Marchien and I worked together on Manta Camp and like me she had some time left on her visa. So going sightseeing together seemed the right thing to do. After some not so studious planning, largely a lot of drinking and talking, we decided that’d we'd like to travel south of Tana, heading overland to Tulear and Ifaty on the SW tip of the island. Being the intrepid explorers we are, we packed our bags and, needless to say after [View Full Entry]

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I can safely say, that I well and truly landed on my feet with this little jaunt. As luck would have it, not long after I had decided to come back to Madgascar, I got an e-mail from the boss asking if I fancied doing something different for 3 weeks. The different being accompanying a group of 5 University students around Madagascar. This was an expedition the group were undertaking as part of their degree and I was to go along to be a responsible adult!!! Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, and what else could an [View Full Entry]

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So, to round 2 of my Madagascan adventure. Getting to our camp from Diego Saurez took us an hour and half by boat. The camp had 2 boats we used for getting us around, whether it be to go diving or to head back to town to pick up re-supply. The boats themselves were typical Madagascan fisherman boats and not the easiest of things to get back into after a dive. I will admit, there were occasions when my fellow divers had to unceremoniously haul me onto the boat using my boardshorts; images of a beached whale come to mind. When [View Full Entry]

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