Sharing rooms with lizards and having fish nibble your toes.....

---

Ok- so mega update time!
We made it back to Bangkok from ChiangMai with no hiccups (another delightful sleeper train) and said goodbye to the Australians, our lovely tour guide Chai and our now good friend Helen!
We had another night in air con heaven in Bangkok and met our new group for the remaining two weeks. There's now 7 of us plus our Malaysian guide Jepp. All friendly people and a nice crowd so far!
We left the chaos of Bangkok via yet another sleeper train (although our last until India), which wasnt quite so comfy as it only had fans so didnt sleep as well, but still could have been worse! This took us south to the region of Khao Sok National Park, and we had a truck ride to our accomodation in a jungle setting just outside the park. We had a small hut room for two nights- all the sounds of nature! It was a really nice spot with a treehouse restaurant.
On our first afternoon we went Tubing down a nearby river- so much fun! You basically float down stream sitting in an inflatable tyre-inner, taking in the scenery and watching out for water snakes (one passed by us but he didnt look too menacing!). It can be interesting trying to steer youself away from branches by the side and getting out at the end is amusing! Pretty much have to throw yourself out, catch the ring and stand against the current (I -Izzy- did all this successfully but fell over in the mud walking back to the truck! typical! I blame it on carrying a big rubber ring......).
The next day we went on a tour of a massive man made lake in the national park. They built a damn and flooded a valley and it makes for wonderful scenery. There are many small bamboo huts which you could rent for the night which actually float on the water, but we just had lunch in the floating restaurant and then used these as our base to swim and kayak- the water was sooo warm and fresh. We also took a walk then a bamboo raft to see some caves that were discovered only 3 years ago- there are some amazing crystal formations and shapes in the rock.
Yesterday we continued south to Krabi where we are spending three nights. Not so close to nature this time, we have a nice simple room in town where we are less likely to wake up to snails on the bathroom wall and lizards on the ceiling!
Krabi is a beach town and is mainly a base for exploring the surrounding islands. We took a longtail boat out to a nearby one yesterday and did some more swimming- the water is warm-bath-like! Perfect beaches round here- mostly smooth sand. We had dinner out with the group last night and looked out over the sea and the stars. Today we went on a speed boat to some of the other islands further out- there are so many lovely lagoons and beaches to see. We stopped at a few and got in some more swimming. One of the main beaches is actually the one used as the central set in the 'Beach' movie. For those who've seen it- there were no scary shark spottings and yes, I did hum Moby as we approached! There were loads of people there (big tourist spot obviously) but it was still very idyllic and impressive.
We also then had a lot of time to perfect our snorkelling technique! The boat stopped out to sea a few times and we jumped off the back to look at coral reefs. Getting better at controlling my breathing now! Saw so many beautiful fish (our guide was throwing bread in and they swarm round you!) Many of the fish are actually quite sharp if they hit you and it can be fairly intimidating if they dont disperse! Much fun was had anyway, and it was fantastic to see fish in the wild that weve seen in aquariums up till now.
On the way back to the mainland it began to rain and we actually saw a typhoon today! It was back out towards the far islands and we watched it for the whole journey back- it swelled and shrank but never disappeared! A storm has moved in here and we just watched some lightning from the roof of our hotel- all very atmospheric, it has calmed down now though (thankfully dont think we need to use the Tsunami evacuation route signs weve been seeing everywhere!).
So that brings us up to date, off out for dinner again shortly then a free day tomorrow. We are going to hang around the local area, maybe go look at a fossil beach and a clown fish rehabilitation centre!
Not much longer left in Thailand- thursday Penang, Malaysia here we come!
Lots of love from Izzy and Katie xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

---