Khao Sok national park

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Sorry its been a while but we've had a pretty busy schedule and a few times i've arrived at internet cafes trying to update you but it's been closed or not workng.
Not a whole lot more happened in Hong Kong apart from our day trip to Macau Casino where Huw again won a substantial amount of money (over 100GBP) playing 3 card poker. It had the same name but was really different rules and we had no idea what was going on but they kept handing him chips so we kept smiling.
We got the plane and hotel transfer in Bangkok fine and it is much hotter here. We found the main backpacker hotspot pretty easily, its just 1 long road called Ko San with all the market stalls and bars along it. We didn't stay out too late the first night and we had an unfortunate experience with a rickshaw driver who ran off with some of our money!
The next day we did a kind of tourist rickshaw tour where we seemed to be hopping between buddhust temples and suit tailors shops as whenever the taxis take you somewhere they beg you to go in the tailors so the drivers can get there coupons stamped and get free petrol. Its something like a government scheme to get more tourists buying the suits. We stopped at a few and just sat in the air conditioning flicking through brochures til they asked for our measurements but even this got tedious. The many shiny buddhas we saw were impressive and the grand palace was cool.
we had a really good night that evening the best one so far. We were on the main road and stopped in a really funny place where you put your feet in a little tank and these tiny fish come and nibble all the dead skin off!! sounds gross and feels like someone is tickling and pinching your feet at first but it was pretty funny and really cheap. They sit you right in the shop window and as we looked up we saw Chris Curry walking straight past!! he was a boarder at KC in our year but left a few years ago. It was really good to see him and he joined us for a catch up drink when the fish had finished cleaning our feet.
He lives in the British embassy and we knew he was there but hadn't expected to find him. The we were in a bar later drinking a special thing they do called a tour of beer, like a long narrow keg that stands on the table and you pull your own pints from when we spotted Micky Wells walking by! He was with two friends and we all spent along time swapping stories and it was great to see them all like we'd hoped.
The last day in Bangkok we got a tuk tuk into the centre to see central world (the shopping mall that got blown up). Everything was going on as normal all around the city with hardly any evidence of unrest outside the main protest site. We didn't see one red shirt and only a few armed soldiers strolling about.
The bombsite was cordened off but you could see the side of the building which was blown off and it looked like a dolls house with the front missing, it was pretty humbling to see that much destruction.

That night we got the sleeper train down south and it was much better then the indian ones, like the first class section of those trains, you actually got bedding and a curtain on these ones. From the station we took a jeep to our rainforest hotel where we are staying in little chalets on stilts right in the forest. Theres quite a few weird bugs but i haven't been bitten by anything worse then a couple of mosquitoes yet.

Yesterday we went tubing down the river where you just sit in a big ring and float down the river, there was a really good rope swing there aswell. On the way back we stopped at the monkey temple and hand fed some peanuts to the friendly monkeys there.

Today we went into Khao Sok national park which is truly amazing and took a boat trip across the lake. It looks so much like the planet in Avatar, theres really big limestone cliffs and properly dense jungle. Its a man made lake which was flodded by a big dam so there where lots or trees sticking out the water. We climbed one of them which was about 20ft up and jumped off it which was really fun. We had an amazing
lunch there and the food is good, mostly noodles but rice and thai green curry has also featured alot.

Hope everyone is well at home!
Love Joe

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