After what seemed like an unusually long flight we made it to Bangkok and spent the first day doing practically nothing other than a dip in the hotel pool and sitting like zombies in a street bar!. After a second nights rest we were recovered and ready to go. We took a walk to the pier by the wide river that runs through the city of Bangkok. The river offers a brilliant way to get around, avoiding the traffic congested roads and it's quite scenic too. The public boat stops every few hundred metres or so, zig zaging across the river dropping people of. A fare to anywhere is just 14 baht. ( around 25p) We cruised past the Grand Palace without stopping off as we'd been there before and instead got of at Wat Arun ... read more

The morning dawned bright and clear and by 7am we were stood in the queue waiting for the cable car to take us to the summit of Kasprowy Wierch. By 7.45am we were at the summit drinking in the amazing views. Half an hour later the whole group had made it to the top and we were ready to start the long walk down. Although the aim was to go down the mountain there was also a lot of paths going up that we had to encounter, some trickier than others! At one point there was an opportunity to take a detour and take in another peak, Giewont. The path was known to be very steep with chains at the very top to help your ascent. However as we got closer we could see a long ... read more

Five years ago was the wedding in Poland of Gary and Milena. After the wedding, Stan and I took a short trip to Zakopane in the Tatras mountains. We promised ourselves that one day we would return but with Gary and Milena. Well the perfect opportunity popped up. Katarina and Nathan, 2 friends of theirs were getting married in Krakow and many of the wedding party were then moving into Zakopane. We arrived in the lovely old town of Krakow Friday lunchtime and after spending the afternoon exploring the castle met up with Gary and Milena for drinks and an evening meal. Milena's parents were there too. It was a sweltering 29 degrees that day and still very warm throughout the evening but as we left the restaurant around 11pm we noticed a dramatic drop in ... read more

It's funny how life has it's ups and downs sometimes. All the time we'd been in Kuala Lumpur Stan had been off colour. Feverish one day then fine the next. We figured a spot of island time would put him right. We took the 3 hour bus ride to Lumut which turned out to be 4.30 hours! The bus was highly air conned - in other words - freezing. When we got off it was a stifling 34 degrees C. We found the ferry and boarded it to the island of Pulau Pangkor. Once there we jumped in a taxi and arrived at the accommodation we'd booked. It was awful and we'd paid two nights up front as Booking . com said it was fully booked later in the week. Annoyingly this was a lie the ... read more

This is just a quick selection of photos for my friends and family who don't do Facebook. Sorry to those who have already seen these photos for boring you. We visited the orchid gardens and butterfly park in Kuala Lumpur today. That's one good thing about this city. There are plenty of places to escape the traffic and general city noise. There were also exibits of the insects and spiders that live in this part of the world. We've experienced some but it was scary to see others even bigger, hope I never see them in the wild!! From the gardens we then visited the National Mosque of Malaysia. I now know what it's like to wear a headdress like the local ladies! It's hot! ... read more