Thailand

Apologies for it being uneditied... needs to be continued...

This November I travelled around beautiful Thailand for a month with my best friend. I absolutely loved it, and particularly loved that it's a world away from home. Some people I spoke to before my trip said that they have no desire what so ever to visit a country in south east Asia due to the living conditions and complete difference in lifestyle and culture, but to me this view is absolutely bizzare. Why wouldn't you want to explore countries different to your own? Thailand is relaxing and welcoming. Whilst its a world away from home, there are many western backpackers in the country especially in the most popular locations, so you do feel comforted that if you need advice you can get it from someone who speaks better English than a Thai.

The first place we visited was of course Bangkok as we flew into the capital as most do. (Phuket, where the second main airport is located, didn't take our fancy at all. We knew from day one we wanted to avoid it due to it's reputation for being Thailand's answer to Ibiza. Not very cultural if you ask me.) Bangkok is rather hectic, but not as packed full of people as preconceived. Kao San Road was our location throughout our time in Bangkok. It is known as backpacker's paradise - boasting endless hotels, guest houses, restaurants, bars, market stalls, and of course the convenience store 7/11s. Bangkok is extrememly easy to get around. You have the choice of a Tuk Tuk, taxi, or sky train. Taxi is the easiest though and often ends up costing the same as a Tuk Tuk, but provides you with the joy of air con which is always needed in the muggy heat of the city. Although saying this, a Tuk Tuk ride is something different and is definitely something that should be on your to-do list. During our first four days in Bangkok we visited 2 temples, enjoyed sitting in bars and restaurants trying out the local food (which is delicious), took a day trip to Kanchanaburi and visited the floating market, a zoo and sarafi, and The River Kwai.

Next stop was Chiang Mai and Pai. We got to Chiang Mai by night bus which took 12 hours. Here we took a truck journey to for 3 hours to get to Pai and endured the 2 days of hell which was the jungle trek! I'm trying to stop myself from moaning about it now because I have definitely forgotten just how miserable I was and am focusing on the positives of the experience, as it was actually incredble. I am so proud of us for doing it and despite it being not quite as easy as we had anticipated (hardest thing I've ever done) it was definitely worth it. We walked for over ten miles over the two days in the muggy heat of the Pai jungle, but we can now say that we saw incredible views, slept in a tribal hut over night, rode elephants through the thick of the jungle, bamboo rafted, and walked up and down hills I never knew possible to walk up and down and survived! It really was extraordinary in so many different ways.
In Chiang Mai we also visited the local market, and watched Thai Boxing with some english people we met at our guest house.

The eastern island of Koh Phangang was our next destination. This was quite a journey that consisted of getting a night bus back to Bangkok, flight to Suratarni, 2 buses to the boarder, a ferry to Koh Phangang and truck ride to our final destination, our lovely hotel. We treated ourselves to something a bit nicer to what we'd been staying in so far as we were told we'd need air con on the island which meant paying quite a bit extra due to the price rises with it being around the time of the full Moon party. During our 5 days on the island we of course sunbathed of our almost private beach. We stayed in Haad Rin Nai, sunset beach, and indeed we saw some incredible sunsets. The beach was very small but we liked it this way as it was so much quieter than the heaving Haad Rin Nok beach. We also enjoyed the restaurants, the food and dilms the resaurants had to offer, we bonded with stray dogs, met some Australians, had a crazy time at the Full Moon party... before heading over to Koh Tao on the most hellish boat ride. (We should have known that whatever time we stopped drinking the night before, drinking anything at all the night before taking an hour 1/2 boat trip on the rough seas of the west coast would end in disaster. Well just a lot of sickness really.

To be continued!