littlewing

Mum was lying on a sun lounger reading when the 8.6 quake occurred, apparently a significant enough quakes to make worldwide headlines and generate mass panic..except for mum, who chose to just keep reading. She felt her lounge start shaking and thought..hmm..what's going on here. So she stood up, lifted the lounger to see if there were 'animals' under there moving around. Now think about this. Statistically, what are the chances that a couple of pangolins wandered out of the jungle and thought, yes, just what we need for our romantic interlude, an australian on a sun lounge, right at that moment. Like that would happen! Now statistically, the chances of an earthquake on the Sandra arc is pretty high, up there in the top places likely to make your lounge move. So mum stood up, ... read more

Bangka/Sauhong island lies just to the north east of Manado, across the banka strait from the Lembeh Strait. I went there to dive a particular spot which was as stunning as I had been told - I often ask dive guides there favourite spot and this one kept coming up, so I knew I had to get there. Bangka isnt the easiest of islands. There are three dive resorts and liveaboards do visit. Trips from Bunaken and Lembeh and vice versa are available. Your resort will arrange pickup from the airport and take you to Pantai Surabaya (which of course is nowhere near Surabaya) where your boat whisks you away to one of those rare places still largely devoid of bloody tourists. I spent a night on the mainland due to my Lion Air flight being ... read more

Spontaniety has always been a character trait that has gotten me into trouble but shown me some of the wonders the world has to offer, Which is how I ended up flying out 5 days after I decided I had an urgent and pressing need to go diving. My students were on study break, almost all of the puppies were on their way to their new homes and I was sitting on the couch feeling grey and chained to domestic beigeness watching a national geo doco about Wakatobi. In Indonesia. Awesome! So I ran out and booked a one way ticket to Bali a few days later and thought when my partner was asleep I would organise the finer details...which proved a lot harder than I thought. For a start, my contact in Bali couldnt do ... read more

Last weekend was supposed to be a quiet one. Just spent around the house preparing for winter. I had a big pot of pumpkin soup on the stove, Giant was sleeping after a long day cleaning the gutters on the roof when I got a txt msg about self check in times. I stared stupidly at my phone for a moment thinking I havent got any flights booked, and quickly logged in to check my email. Apparently I had six hours to get to the airport to leave on a very early flight to Bangkok, which I had no memory of booking at all and after searching back through several hundred emails I found it. There was no mistake - the flight left just after 1am and for reasons known only to the gods of champagne ... read more

We settled into our little earthy bungalow at Noppharratara easily with our now altered plans and giants new habit of humming the call to prayer falling into the mellow groove of Noppharratara and Ao Nang. Our days were spent waiting for the weather to be nice enough to let us go out for a dive which didnt look likely for the first few days so we decided to be tourists and check out some of the places I used to go to all those years ago. Getting out to the hotsprings and the emerald pool 27 years ago was a full day and night trip with lots of alcohol and a jeep songtaew, this time we booked a private taxi with the ultra cool Chan as our driver and visiting both took half a day. Both ... read more

Visiting Saigon is like going to a rave on serapax. You just cant keep up and your never going to. The entire giant city is on meth. Its like watching a dvd on fast forward and you're part of it. Arriving in communist countries is always a drama, especially when just a few hours ago you were swimming in the andaman sea trying to straighten up enough to actually get on a plane. When your first meal in a country is rubbery snails, a tub of smuggled yoghurt and half a bar of smuggled chocolate and your mini saigon hotel room is the size of a cell at pentridge jail but with the added view of a vietnamese laneway filled with 126,000 motorcycles busy doing something from dusk til dawn, you are forgiven for having misgivings. ... read more