Down Under (Sydney)

After a 9 hour flight in which I slept for approximately 18 seconds and our plane travelled through lots of quite gigantic lightning storms, we arrived at Sydney's Kingsford Smith airport. Tom had his photo frame from Thailand confiscated because they claimed it was made from elephant dung. This was literally bullshit. I kept quiet about mine and still have it now so am probably violating international law. Bearing in mind that we arrived on the 29th December, our decision not to book a hostel was to prove near suicidal.

At the airport we bumped into Justin a lawyer from London and all round nice guy. Turned out that he was in a similar situation to us and needed a room for the night before he met his mate Owen. After lots of grovelling to the women in charge of accomodation at the airport, we ended up in a Novotel at a place called Brighton Le Sands. Not really near to the city. Unfortunately, we had to pay quite a lot for this room and whilst it was really nice, with a balcony, 2 double beds, tv, bath and TWO types of toilet paper, we had to cough up prices that we didn't really want to pay as backpackers. Not dwelling on this, we had a massive nap to try and get some energy back and headed out for a wander and some food. (Justin, went to the beach, fell asleep and literally got more sunburnt than any human being ever)

That night we all decided to venture into Sydney city centre for a few bevvies and a look at our home for the next week. Sydney by night is proper cool to look at and we enjoyed taking in the sights that were very different from Thailand. After a couple of beers we went and got a Mcdonalds. This was not a good idea. After waking up from an amazing sleep in a really comfortable bed, I realised I had a very violent stomach ache. Thinking nothing of it, as I usually have a pretty strong stomach, I got in the shower only to be violently sick for about 10 minutes! I can only come to the conclusion that this happened because of a mixture of the burger I ate and my body still being hammered from what Thailand had thrown at it.







A significant event that happened in Sydney was I discovered my old mucka from Uni Katie was there at the same time. After a facebook message we met up and hung out for a few days whilst we were there. Was weird seeing someone thousands of miles from home that I had previously only seen in Leicester. Reppin' Liberty Park. We went out on a few nights out with Katie, went down to the famous/infamous Bondi and went to watch Australia v Pakistan at the SCG.

Thinking back over our time in Sydney, me and Tom didn't really see enough of it. We spent most of our time pretty central, ignoring areas like Manly and Coogee that I'm definitely checking out when I return. (As I write this I'm actually preparing to be flown to Sydney with work for a week)









The real story of Sydney for us, was the difficulty that we had getting a place to stay for the period over New Years. JEEEESUS CHRIST. Having woken up feeling awful and with chronic food poisoning, I had to walk miles carrying 20kg of luggage. How I didn't pass out was a miracle as I was unable to eat or drink at this point. Things were getting really worrying at this point as New Years was a day away and we had nowhere to stay. Justin was proper helpful and came along to try sort us out before he went off to meet his pal. The only room we could find was in a hotel just outside the city centre. This was going to cost like 60 quid a night so we really weren't up for it. The fella behind the reception was one of the nicest people in the world and actually offered us a sofa at his missuses if we were still stuck. God bless Nigel! Luckily, two girls from Bristol that we had met the previous night sorted us right out by getting us a room where they were staying. Was WAY more expensive than it should have been but we took it. After all, it gave me a place to be really ill for the next day and a half!

This wasn't ideal preparation for New Years in such an iconic city. I literally was unable to move other than to run to the bathroom for 24 hours. Had to take some medicine and try to sort myself out so I could go watch the fireworks the following day.

NEW YEARS- In truth, this was a bit of an anti climax. Whilst it beat being in Norwich, my lack of health, the cost of everything and the crowds meant it wasn't half as good as it should have been. After hitting Kings Cross for a few bevvies, and an ogle at 2 of the most attractive women I've ever seen in my life, we headed down to the harbour to see some fireworks. Was really cool being there and there was a great buzz about the place. Fireworks being fired from massive skyscrapers and off the harbour bridge kept us entertained for a while, but I was still feeling pretty rough and so didn't get massively into it. Beer prices were astronomical and me and Tom's lack of knowing what we actually wanted to do, threw a bit of a spanner in the works.





















The rest of our time in Sydney was spent doing a combination of things. All of these things involved spending money, so my bank balance was taking a hammering. Shopping, eating out (as we had no kitchen) and drinking with Katie/Justin etc were all enjoyable activities, however, upon leaving Sydney I was NOT happy with how much money I had spent. Being as I do enjoy animals (particularly dangerous ones), the trip to the aquarium was pretty good. A noticeable improvement on Great Yarmouth's Seal Life Centre I might add.

















Sydney is a wicked city from a touristic point of view. The harbour complete with Opera House, bridge, flashy restaurants and massive cruise ships really make an impression on you. It's a city that is very in your face, at times this is a good thing. Everyone looks like a model, the buildings are huge and the city never sleeps. However, the attitude of people is much different to that of those in Melbourne. (my current hometown, and a place you will be hearing a lot about)Sydneysiders have a bit of an unpleasant arrogance and attitude about them which makes it difficult to fall in love with the place. Having said that, I will be returning as I fly out of there on my way to New Zealand. This time, I fully intend to visit the Blue Mountains, Manly and a few of the lesser known gems of Australia's most well known city.

Riiiiiiiight lazy so and so

Basically, I've been quite a lazy boy when it comes to updating this. This will not come as a suprise to family members. However, I have actually been quite busy and have been too concerned with enjoying myself to update this regularly. As a result I'm quite behind. I have a fair number of photos that I need to update the blog with as well, so I will get on the case soon!

Thailand DONE

Whilst sat here in a internet cafe in Melbourne surrounded by Koreans screeching at some ridiculously nerdy computer game, I thought I should really do a reflective little post on all things Thailand.

This was my first time to Asia and I can safely say that I will be returning at some point. Thailand was a HUGE amount of fun. The country is so diverse that one month wasn't near enough time and literally flew by. Bangkok will live long in the memory for its smells-good and bad, friendly people, cheap street food, massive shopping centres, culture, non-stop night life. Bangkok is a city that never sleeps and never ceases to amaze. One day I will return and give it the attention it deserves. (Hopefully not as a middle aged man having a mid life crisis and looking for a Thai bride)

The beaches and Islands were also ridiculously good. It's hard to do anything better than sitting on a white beach, eating an ice cream and looking at the stunning scenery. The islands also left us with so many stories to bring up later in life. Stories of near death experiences, full moon parties, monkeys, strange characters and much, much more. One day I will return to the Andaman coast and do the islands that I wasn't able to hit this time around.

Finally, in a real contrast to the other two areas of Thailand, we had the north. This was where we saw some of the more spectacular scenery and had the self proclaimed "Best Day Ever' in Pai on the mopeds. Elephants, cooking courses, chilling out with a few beers under a sky of lanterns floating off into the distance are things that I will always hold close. Soooo until we meet again Thailand, Asta La Vista.

Koh Phangan (Christmas)

Koh Phangan, Koh Phangan, Koh Phangan. After a 12 hour plus journey to get somewhere, you hope that it will live up to expectations. The 5 nights we had booked here definitely delivered. And some. I was really looking forward to this part of the trip as it's one of the top party destinations anywhere in the world. Also, we were going to be here over the Christmas period, a world away from the turkey, snow and crappy television of back home. (Although I must add I did miss family and friends) Awww that's enough of the soppy bollicks.

We stayed at Coral Bungalows, a place almost exclusively populated by British and Irish. This was good in a way as it meant that communicating was easy, but it would have been nice to have a bit more diversity. First night was a write off due to the late arrival time and us being knackered from the various boats, coaches and minibuses we used to get there. We basically just threw our stuff down, whacked on a Ricky Gervais podcast, did a bit of laughing and then slept. Our second day (23rd December) saw us do quite a bit of exploring of our surroundings, checked out the beach close to us and the beach where the full moon parties is held. We also stumbled across the biggest, most frightening ants I have ever seen. There was literally tens of thousands of them on the bannister across from our room. They didn't dare cross this imaginary border though and this meant that we spent a bit of time seeing whether ants like a variety of foodstuffs. They are not fans of mars bars which suprised us all. Anyway, back to the more interesting stuff.

That night saw us decide to head down to the pool party taking place in our hotel. We'd read a bit in Lonely Planet about them being well worth a look and my god it was. Tons of people were shipped in from surrounding hotels and the pool was packed full of people. After strolling down from our room and having a bucket to kick the night off, we quickly decided that we were all going in the pool. The alcohol obviously gave us a fair bit of misguided courage as we spent hours throwing ourselves into the pool. Dives, bellyflops, backflips. You name it, they were going down. At this point, I must say that looking back it is a miracle that us or someone else didn't kill someone. I escaped with just a rather large bump on my head after getting Tom and Rob to flip me in much too shallow water. Ouch. This I could live with, but what occurred next I could not. Just as I was planning on heading to the beach for a couple more, I got rugby tackled into the pool, along with my wallet and phone. This is a hilarious story for Rob as he continued walking and talking to what he thought was me, not realising that I was under water with my flipflop flying through the air. I was more worried about my flipflop than my phone to be fair, as during my trip to Thailand I had already kicked one over a wall by accident and then been forced to steal a girls pink one to get me back home, after losing another at a beach party. After this incident we wrapped up the night and I trudged off soaking wet. To this day, I do not know who rugby tackled me but they can rest assured that I will have my revenge. If you have seen the new Rambo, it will be something along those lines.











Christmas Eve saw Rob and Aun reunited,(awwwww)as she was in Koh Phangan for the full moon as well. This was good as Aun has lots of local knowledge, and she showed us a cool place a bit further down the beach which was really chilled out, with cushions on the beach in front of a big fire where you could eat and drink. Whilst in there we also came across the man who started the full moon parties, basically very few people know who he is and there's loads of mystery about when and how they started so this was quite a spot.

The eve of Christmas Eve saw us go to a warm up party at the beach. However, this was not until after we had a few buckets at Coral amongst one of the strangest human beings I have ever come across. The first thing to say about this fella was that we couldn't put an age on him. The age group at Coral was I'd say 18-35, but he seemed older. If someone held a gun to my head I would maybe have a stab at him being 38. He obviously loved the gym. We never saw him in a tshirt the whole time we were there. And I was actually staggered to see him in a vest at one point. We also only heard him speak once. Instead, he used to sit at a table and text, what I can only assume were all the women he has met around the world. He was quite a catch, looking a bit like a muscly beavis or butthead, we only ever saw him drunk, staggering around with a santa hat on. I miss him a lot.

Anyway, back to Xmas Eve. It will remain an infamous night with the three of us because of the vast amounts of carnage that took place. We all went missing at some point, due to the massive amount of people on the beach and the inebriated state we were in. All kinds of stuff went down, I got propositioned by a ladyboy (after approximately 1.5 seconds of thought I politely declined), we got covered in foam, Tom got a tattoo. We went on a late night drunken trip to a tattoo parlour, I drew one of the best tattoo designs the world has ever seen, only stopping short of getting it as I didn't have the money. Tom however, did have the money on him so got what I can only describe as a slightly bizarre tattoo for a 23 year old man. Check out his facebook! After making it back to Coral (I think on the back of a motorbike?) , we took some pics of a bloke asleep on a bench outside his room even though the door was clearly wide open and then got some zzzzzzz's.

















Christmas Day. My first away from home and one that will forever stay in my mind! It's very hard to explain how weird it is waking up to 30 odd degree heat, throwing on some shorts and heading to the beach. We had booked ourselves in for a Christmas dinner the day before at a pub in the centre of KP. This proved to be a MASSIVE mistake. It was quite literally the most frightening meal I have ever eaten. I didn't get turkey like I ordered. Instead I got the skin of a duck, no meat whatsoever, a gravy with soy sauce in it, couple of potatoes, rock hard carrots and a yorkshire. I'd rather have had a curry in fairness. However, I'm quite glad we had this experience as it was hilarious at the time. After this debacle, we strolled to the beach and did some sunbathing. Whilst we were down there, we were greeted by a team of middle age men that take volleyball wayyyyy too seriously. This was quite funny to watch because volleyball is a girls sport/soft pornography for men, and these guys genuinely thought they were athletes. Also, at the beach we saw the coolest guy I've ever seen. He was literally the colour of varnished mahogany and was wearing some black speedos. I'd put his age at 40-50, nationality definitely Italian and name probably Fabricio. He was the sort of man that ALL middle aged women have a crush on and is basically what I aspire to be when I'm older. The way he posed on his sun lounger was quite something.

That evening, we took a stroll down to the sunset bar I have mentioned previously and sat on the beach with our dinner. Big fire, sunset, some little nutcase Thai kids shooting fireworks and the lads, what more could you ask for? After a couple of Singha shaped liveners, we headed back to Coral to UV paint ourselves up and do some more drinking. With the ipod whacked on to get the party vibe going, we actually spent a long time sorting ourselves out for the evening. Aun, it turns out is a bit of a wizard with a paint brush so we generally just let her decorate our torso's. Making our way to the beach, we were pretty excited about what could possibly occur in the next few hours. After some initial panic, when we passed about 200 people, none of which were wearing uv paint and all who had clothes on, we soon blended into the scenery and got to work on some buckets. The night was another one filled with absolute mayhem. I fell off a chair twice, we fell out with a pro Canadian snowboarder dickhead, did lots of dancing, Rob went missing for quite a long time, leading Aun to believe that he was actually dead. It was heartbreaking/amusing to hear her calls of "Robby, Robby come back". I am unsure what time the others went home but I returned the next morning at midday. The reasons for which will forever be a mystery :)

















Our time in Koh Phangan was a massive highlight for me. We had a lot of fun messing about, enjoying the sun, ate some good food, drunk and enjoyed some of the best nightlife in the world, and had one of the more different christmas day's it is possible to have. I was quite sad to be leaving Koh Phangan as there was many sides of the island we didn't get to see in the short time we were there. On the other hand, I am glad I got to experience the fire, buckets, beach party, people walking around in bandages because they had fallen off motorbikes, chilled out sunset bar, crap christmas dinner, pool party and the rest. One day I reckon I'll be back.

Koh Lanta

Using the one sensible bone we have between the three of us, we decided to have a chilled out few days in between the 2 party stops in Phi Phi and Koh Phangan. I'm going to change the usual structure of my blog by starting with the best bit about Koh Lanta. THAI LEWIS. This fella was an absolute riot. We met him halfway through a horrible 3 hour boat journey without air conditioning, nursing horrible hangovers and feeling like death. Out of the darkness emerged the white loafer, oversized sunglasses clad god of a man. After spending a while doing the usual trying to get us into his accommodation, he got onto his favourite subject.. football.

Now you would expect that a man from a country with a very poor international team, not a single well known player, miles from any decent side in the world, wouldn't have much knowledge of the beautiful game. You would be VERY wrong. Lewis loves football more than Kerry Katona loves Iceland party food and clinging onto any semblance of fame. He spent a good 10 minutes running through all the teams in his head, this included such powerhouses as Forest Green Rovers, Altrincham and Dagenham and Redbridge. We were also blessed with a lecture on his favourite players, why he supports Man Utd and what position he plays for Koh Lanta Beach Resort (a very big team he assured us).

Lewis was definitely a brilliant hangover cure and bless him didn't speak brilliant English but was trying to learn it from his friend. We were in awe of this superb human being and so decided to stay at "his" resort. Interestingly, Lewis also referred to having a bar, football team and restaurant. Consider him the Thai Richard Branson.

The little resort we stayed at was pretty nice, made up of lots of little bungalows and only 50 m from the beach. The overall vibe of Koh Lanta was definitely laid back. The style of seating they go for here is basically cushions inside a raised wooden hut. This meant that the majority of our time was spent horizontal sipping lemon juices (remember this is our detox period!). As ever with Thailand the sea was well nice and warm and we often spent long periods playing a game Rob invented which involved laying dead still like a bit of driftwood and letting the sea keep washing you up onto the sand. The only minor drawback of the sea here, like the other places we had visited so far, was that you are constantly being stung by little bits of dead jellyfish. It doesn't hurt at all but it's a constant itch that you have to get used to.



Many of you (I'm still not sure if I'm writing this to many people outside of my immediate family!) will have noticed that me and food get on very well. I eat a lot, talk about it a lot and often plan my meals WAY in advance. Well, the food in Thailand is very, very good. However, on one occasion in Koh Lanta we were well and truly let down. Firstly, we broke one of our rules by going in the first restaurant we came across. Secondly, the food took absolutely ages to come, with the waiter disappearing for a while to talk to his mate on a motorbike. When it did come it was absolutely awful! A starter of mixed vegetable tempura was absolutely mental. The chef/couple of kids employed had managed to deepfry bits of onion, mushrooms, green beans pretty poorly and make them taste not very nice but he/they had also deepfried tomatoes. This absolutely blew my mind as I thought that surely a tomato would explode when dropped in hot oil. Needless to say it tasted like battery acid. The curries we requested also turned out to be soups, and literally when poured onto a plate, flooded the whole thing. Luckily, Lanta is pretty cheap and we weren't left too out of pocket by the worst food ever.

Unlike a lot of the other areas of Thailand, Lanta is not particularly commercial, or a 'party' island if you like. We found that this meant that there was a number of family resorts nearby and the general age of people in the area was older. This wasn't a problem during these 3 days as like I said we were basically recharging our batteries before the intensity of full moon and Koh Phangan. For me, recharging my batteries involved me getting properly addicted to Solitaire on my ipod and playing it for hours on the beach with some dubstep on. Not a bad life aye?