Hi guys, sorry for the delay in updating the blog, since we last posted we've been busy, traveling has become a bit of a full time job :0) Cairns We arrived in Cairns early in the morning, via a quick stop in Darwin, after our mad rush down from Malaysia. After collecting our baggage we ran into a spot of bother at the customs desk due to a little souvenir we'd picked up in Chiang Mai! Apparently you're not allowed to bring anything made from endangered animals into the country, and what did we have?..only a picture frame made out of elephant poo haha! After a lot of joking the item was eventually seized and we had to hang around while a lot of paperwork was prepared..what a load of shit haha! We'd booked into the ... read more

We arrived in Cameron Highlands after a painful (for Steve) fourteen hour journey, to a place called Thana Rata. Cameron Highlands is the largest hill resort in Malaysia and is 1524 m above sea level. Its famous for it's tea plantations, terraced flower gardens, orchards and strawberry and vegetable farms. The cool climate, 10-20 degrees, makes Cameron Highlands perfect for cultivation, and for cooling down hot backpackers! A fantasy-like Mossy forest is also located at the peak of the highlands, at 2032 m above sea level. I felt like the Cameron Highlands was a mixture of India, the alps with a old traditional British culture, and of course a bit of malay. The restaurants here are mostly Indian, serving south indian food on banana leafs and rotis with dahl for 20 pence. Many of the cafes ... read more

Koh Tao From Bangkok we took another night train down to Chumpon, on the east coast of Thailand. This time we were not so lucky and all the sleepers had been sold out, as well as all other decent seats on the train. We got seats in third class, one up from cattle class. The journey was a very uncomfortable, cold and dirty experience, not so good when you've got bronchitus! We arrived at Chumpon early the following morning and jumped straight on a ferrry to the island of Koh Tao which took about three hours. The first couple of days on Koh Tao we spent in the south, which is the more quite part of the island, in order for me to get well. After two days recovering, we hired a moped and relocated to ... read more

So after a comfortable (but dirty) overnight train from Surathani we arrived at Bangkok Central Station at 6am. We headed off to our hostel in a taxi and after dumping our bags we took a walk to the nearby Lumphini Park, the largest park in Bangkok. The first thing we noticed about Bangkok was how clean and orderly it was, this completely took us by surprise as we expected something completely different! Bangkok was more like Hong Kong than what we'd come to expect, perhaps from our time in the Philippine Cities! The park was lovely and we couldn't believe how busy it was at 7am, full of joggers and groups of old Thai people practicing Yoga and Tai Chi on every corner, it was a real nice introduction to the city! The lake and streams ... read more

Additional photos from Ao Nang. ... read more