The lorry dropped us of, literally, in the middle of nowhere and we started our trek. After about three hours, which were not particularly strenuous we arrived at the small Karon village in which we would spend our first night. The meal was basic but filling. We thought up ways to keep ourselves entertained (there was no TV or electricity out here) until we all settled down on the floor to sleep, shitting ourselves at the slightest sound which could, potentially, be some huge great creepy-crawley coming to get us. Just before we all settled down a guy staggered in, off his head with a half empty bottle of whiskey. The villagers whispered to us as he arrived, "Mr Whiskey, he drinks Whiskey!" We were all woken up at half five by a cockerel giving it ... read more

Next we wanted to head north which meant going via Bangkok. This time, we found a guest house which did not turn its fans off at night. Tiny and I set off for the American Express office as they have a service whereby they will accept mail for anyone who has American Express Travellers Cheques. Tiny had fourteen letters from his girlfriend back in England, which considering how long we had been away was pretty good going. That brings me to my next travel tip, although email has probably made it obsolete now. Your parents may not be very impressed about you turning down a job to go off round the world and your girl/boy-friend might be all bitter and twisted about being dumped for a year, but there is a chance that somebody somewhere might ... read more

The boat back to Phuket made a couple of diversions and took four very tedious hours. Again, we arrived to be met by crowds of people touting for business, and we eventually found one in our price range near Karon Beach. It was still basic by most people's standards, but positive luxury compared to Koh Phi Phi. The shower was just that, a real shower! With the money we were prepared to spend, a hotel with a swimming pool was not an option, however there was a big posh hotel called the Phuket Arcadia down the road and it was quite easy to sneak in and use theirs. It took them until our last day to work-out that we were not actually guests at the hotel, by which time we had befriended an American family who ... read more

Despite the lack of sleep we had the energy to do the tourist bit and visit the Grand Palace. To get to there, we took a ride in a glorified three-wheeled lawn mower called a tuk tuk. The combination of this being seriously overloaded and the psychotic tendencies of the driver meant that it was a hairy ride. Two of us had to hang out of each side of it and then grit our teeth as the driver swerved between traffic on both sides of the road. We learnt the hard way that you agree the cost of the journey before you travel as it saves a lot of arguing. That was only our first mistake of the day. The second was to try and get into the Grand Palace in shorts and tee shirts. A ... read more

We arrived in Bangkok and got reunited with our luggage (always a relief) and then proceeded through customs unhindered (always a relief, but then who in their right mind would smuggle drugs or anything else for that matter into Thailand). There were a lot of very stern looking guards with very big machine guns in the airport, but that didn’t stop you being accosted by people offering you everything under the sun. It was basically a case of "spot the foreigners who have just got off a plane and are therefore disoriented, tired and haven't got a clue about the country they've just arrived in." This was one point where a backpack comes in very useful - one of its many benefits. We all got a taxi to an area known as Khao San Road. This ... read more

Well, not exactly Moscow. Aeroflot was the cheapest way of reaching South East Asia and consequently we had to change planes at Moscow, spending six very, very dull hours in transit. The day got off to a bad start at Heathrow when the computer erased several of the passengers, including us. It was sorted out eventually, but Andy was very unimpressed and continuously compared the (quote) "shocking state of affairs" to the "high levels of professionalism and efficiency at Gatwick" where he had worked. Mind you, when the bus took us to the wrong plane, on top of all the computer problems, I had to agree with him. My cousin, who works for customs, came by to say hello while we were waiting for the computer to be sorted out. I tried to get her to ... read more