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Published: October 12th 2010
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So we left Laos after 7 days of craziness!! Travelling with me now was Louise, the mad nut; Marianne, that crazy Norwegian and James, the drunken English. Travelling partners change frequently as people often decide they want to go stay longer somewhere or move on to somewhere else sooner but it’s all good because we generally all meet up somewhere else further down the line.
First to stop over in Vientiane to get Thailand visas sorted out, we missed the deadline by 1 minute at the visa office so we had to stay a day longer than expected. But it was ok we found a bar surprisingly enough 😊 and we got introduced to "laogria” the Laos equivalent of sangria, fabulous stuff so the extra time passed pleasantly enough!! Got visa after plenty of hanging around and we were off to Phuket... or so we thought!
So we were off on another bus journey, bought tickets for an overnight bus that was taking us to Phuket, we knew it was going to be the next day before we arrived morning, afternoon or evening was anyone’s guess. Here I will just point out that the bus companies in the whole
of SE Asia are a bit of a joke, actually an absolute joke. If you are told the journey will be 4hrs usually it’ll be around 6hrs, they say 12hrs it’ll generally be about 18hrs, we came up with the rule that it’s usually time and a half of what they actually tell you. Secondly if they say direct bus expect to change buses 3-4times with 1 or 2hour stopovers in between. Thirdly VIP bus means nothing. Fourthly a sleeper bus means anything from a slightly reclining chair to a proper bed with a blanket. Lastly you really never know if you are going to actually get to your desired location. Ok now that my little rant about the buses is over (don’t even get me started on Chinese trains, that’s definitely a whole other blog entry....) back to the story in hand.
The first dilemma on the journey was at the Laos/Thailand border. Louise’s passport had no arrival stamp for when she arrived into Laos. When we entered Laos we paid our bus conductor to get our visas sorted off he went but came back with one stamp missing and obviously pocketed the money which until now we
Laogria mmhhh....
....James clearly concentrating so as not to spill a drop! hadn’t realised. Anyways this missing stamp was causing a problem even though she had a visa and it was all dated same as ours because she was missing that stamp she was being told to either pay, I think it was roughly €50 (which when travelling is a considerable amount) or go back to the border where she entered Laos and get the stamp! Neither of which we were willing to do, so she was taken away into an immigration room meanwhile the 3 of us were left standing outside and had to pay a fee to LEAVE the country as does everyone. We weren’t allowed to see Louise or find out what the story with her was and we were being told we had to get onto our bus because it was leaving now the panic was staring to hit in??!! However Louise emerged from the little office smiling had sorted the whole thing out with her charm and a kiss on the cheek for the immigration officer and she even got away without paying the fee to leave the country!!
So finally back on to the bus we were in Thailand now to Phuket, well that didn’t
Sunset from the bar...
... we only popped in for lunch?! exactly happen. At 6am the bus dropped us at a random roundabout in Bangkok and told us our journey had ended. SO we argued and told us that we had paid to go direct to Phuket. After a lot of confusion we were shown new tickets that we had been issued telling us our continuing bus to Phuket wasn’t until the next day. The bus took off and we were stranded at this roundabout, tired, hungry and seriously pissed off!!
So after a lot of bitching and moaning and cursing the bus companies up and down we thought we may as well make the most of it. So we wandered the streets of Bangkok in the early morning finally found a hostel checked in, got some proper sleep and then went out and explored all Bangkok had to offer. We did some shopping as is customary in Bangkok, cheapest prices in SE Asia and attacked the nightlife on Khaosan rd (the hub of all travellers in Bangkok) had to offer and ended up having a pretty good time!!
Finally it was on to Phuket; of course this again was not a simple bus journey but will not go
into details again. We left James behind for a bit in Bangkok and we three girls travelled onwards. Got to Phuket, this was only really a stopover on our way to Koh Phi Phi, thankfully. We stayed in an area called Patong for one night and it was all definitely not for us. At night the bar street was full of ladyboys and hookers parading the streets, people offering you all kinds of sex shows and in general just a really sleazy area! Why it has such a popular name among the tourists is beyond me. However us girls as usual landed on our feet and found this bar paying a live rock gig and meet some really cool aussie guys! Hung out with them and then met a gay aussie couple called Tiny and Des, these guys looked like YMCA biker dudes and they were sipping margaritas! We had great fun, look at the photos for proof 😱
After Phuket it was on to the amazing Phi Phi. Myself and Louise decided at this stage that it was time to actually have some “holiday time” on our travels. We had been moving around a few nights here
At one of the many stopovers on our way to Thailand...
... we witness this, loading motorbikes onto the roof of the bus! few nights there, it was getting exhausted lugging our backpacks around on and off buses, looking for hostels etc. So we decided to settle in Phi Phi for 2 weeks, and we had an absolute ball, had a proper little home properly unpacked our suitcases for the first time in nearly 6 weeks. We meet back up with Meabh who was now with her boyfriend Conrad and Ida the other Norwegian and randomly bumped back into Emma and Kevin so the 8 of us had a great time all hanging out together again! I’m just going to document what happened with a running commentary under the photos, as if I tried to write two full weeks of stories I surely think my computer would crash before I'd get to finish!!!
Afterwards it was on to Koh Phangan for a full moon party (renowned the world over with travellers for being a must do thing when in Thailand!). Me and Louise were now travelling with Ryan and Nick from England who happened to be leaving Phi Phi and going to Koh Phangan on the same boat as us! The full moon party happens once a month on the island when
around 30,000 people gather on the beach to watch the full moon.... eh I think not most people don’t even look into the sky on that night, it’s just an massive excuse for a gigantic beach party where everyone gets covered in illuminious clothes and body paints and drinks and parties all night long, it was fantastic, again see pictures for more details!!
Then sadly the travelling of South East Asia had to come to an end, we headed back to Bangkok for our last nights before our flights. Louise left me to go back to work in London and after spending a solid 7 weeks together, day and night I felt like I was losing a limb😞. But it was okay because I was off on another adventure.... teaching in China, what lay ahead was going to be a whole different life but one I have definitely accustomed to very quickly!!
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