We woke up hardly able to walk and cursing the mountain! Luckily the springs were on our doorstep so we hobbled down for another much needed soak! We met the staff from Manukan Island, which was our valentines day destination, in the hot tubs and they told us we needed to be at the jetty by 3.30 to catch the last boat to the island! Up until entering the mountain park we had had no problems at all in Malaysia and everyone is so helpful and smiley, but from entering the parks we had been stung quite a lot with cost [View Full Entry]

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We booked ourselves into a pretty swish hotel in a massive shopping mall in KK for the night so we could spend the day wandering before we set off for our mountain climb! We were bother pretty shattered after the early starts and moving around so treated ourselves to lamb and went to sleep in our ‘five star room for a one star price!! Next morning we made our way over to mount Kinabalu. On the descent into KK the pilot said to look out of the window and to my dismay we were eyeball to eyeball with the top of [View Full Entry]

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We had a few hours to pack our bags ready for our early morning flight into Kota Kinabalu before we were off to see the fireflies. A local called Askme arrived to pick us up and took us to his village which his grandfather was the first occupier of. He took us to his house and introduced us to his family and gave us coconuts from his tree to drink and eat. Then he took us down to his village, when we arrived at the closed down charcoal furnace there were kids plating along the river everywhere. There was a little [View Full Entry]

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We got back to the hostel ready for our trip into the jungle to be greeted with the news that because of the bad weather the bridge on the main road had collapsed so we wouldn’t be able to go until the next day! So, the weather was gorgeous so we took ourselves to a posh hotel to use their pool for the day, £5 total bargain!! We had lunch there and then fell asleep on the loungers, when we woke up we asked one of the staff what time it was and he said 6.30 so we figured we better [View Full Entry]

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We left the hostel at 10.00am to be taken to the jetty where we would be whisked off to seligan, turtle island for the day and night. The journey started off pretty grey and overcast but as we got closer the clouds broke and the sun almost came through. On arriving at the island we could see the turtle tracks up the beach and were hopeful of some sightings later. We spent the afternoon on the beach and got ready for the evening's excitement. We started at 6 with a film on the life of green and hawksbill turtles and the [View Full Entry]

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We made it to Borneo!!! On landing at sandakan we were so excited about seeing the orang-utan's in a few hours! Unfortunately it was absolutely chucking it down on arrival and we checked into the hostel all ready for meeting my genetic family!!! We drove over to sepilok so excited, luckily they sold dreadful poncho's we could wear and we waited for the beautifuil orange creatures to appear!! They slowly swung over the ropes into view and they were just breathtaking, they really are so incredible, and virtually the same colour as me!!! The photo's aren't so great as it was [View Full Entry]

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Another City, another 36 hours! we arrived slightly dazed and confused and decided to get the bus and monorail rather than pay the extortionate taxi prices, i didn't realise how far away the airport was from the city! After an hour on a very kitsch coach driven on two wheels at about eighty miles an hour we arrived at the monorail station. we then successfully navigated our way to the right stop for our very posh 3 star hotel! Unfortunately we were befriended by a very over familiar aussie guy who wanted us to see his hotel room and to have [View Full Entry]

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Singapore is the exact opposite to India, the place is so clean and so tidy and all the sky scrapers are incredible!! We had 36 hours in singapore so decided just to wander about and get a feel of the place, the prices were a big shock after india, £15 for two beers!!!!!! saying that it was worth it just because the toilets are so clean!!! Everything is in giant shopping malls, i was very well behaved and only bought a fridge magnet, the bags are already way too heavy!!! I wussed out of going on the singapore flyer and decided [View Full Entry]

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Well, we finally made it out of Goa although we thought something was trying to stop us! After a five hour delay, we reached chennai with a 6 hour wait before our next flight! The airport was pretty basic and obviously you couldn't smoke inside so tel and i decided to do the only sane thing we could think of............play rummy on trolleys in the car park for hours! It started to get a little difficult when all the taxi drivers were helping tel by telling him what cards i wanted! We will move on to some slightly more sophisticated games [View Full Entry]

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So two weeks later and we are still in palolem! We almost managed to leave, we got to the station ready to board the train to Agra to see the Taj, we got on (and off about 10 times!) our seats had been booked wrong, we were offered two seats in different carriages for the 36 hour journey and the romantic images of Indian trains weren’t quite what we thought!!!!??!! It was a bit of a shock to the system and after about 2 seconds of deliberation we decided to do one!!! So we arrived back in palolem just in time [View Full Entry]

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