Journeys end

Greetings from the Lake District, England for my last blog of this journey.

I can't quite believe I'm back, this feels very surreal and is taking some time to get used to everything. I'm tucked away in a little village at Dave's parent's getting used to everything again and even here it feels like a fast pace of life. No-body said this would be easy...

Phnom Penh

After our trip from Phnom Penh to get our Thailand visa, we flew back into Bangkok in the early evening and the plan was to catch the midnight bus back to Koh Chang. On arrival at the bus counter the sign indicated that there was no midnight bus and that the next one would be at 07:50am! That meant a full 14 hours sleeping at the airport. Great stuff.

The night was long and I didn't get a single minute of sleep. The airport is noisy all night and all day with something always happening. I spent £20 through the night on hot dogs and pot noodles, chocolate and crisps which by Thai prices, £20 is a hell of a lot of money! The morning finally arrived and then it was a 7 hour bus/ferry/taxi ride back to the island. After 26 hours travelling we finally made it back to Koh Chang. To give you a perspective, it is only 178 miles (286 kilometres) from Koh Chang to Phnom Penh. You can travel around the world in that amount of time!

Rainy season

The month of September saw a change in the weather on Koh Chang. The rainy season runs from April to October however we were lucky because August was a hot and sunny month. September changed to rain, cloud and storms with an odd sunny day in between. The storms are something else on Koh Chang, it can rain for 4 days solid and the village floods, but life dosen't seem to even notice it and everything runs as normal.

Island life does not come without it's problems. Because of the rain, not a single piece laundry gets dry because of the humidity. Everything, and I mean everything is damp. Even the toilet roll is damp! The damp laundy also meant everything stunk like dirty socks and old man. NEVER have I every smelt so bad. It was embarrassing to go out because I was paranoid everyone could smell my supposedly clean clothes! To add to this, a tree had fallen over the power lines and cut the power off for the whole island. There was no water, electricity, internet or mobile phone signal. I don't think I have ever felt so isolated in all my life. Still, you make the best of it and get some candles, warm beer and a gathering of friends and chat the night away.

Dave on the decks at Om Bar

The month passed quickly and Dave continued his DJing at Om Bar. After a fantastic month of partying, we decided that it was time to come home, mainly for financial reasons. We had discussed 'going home' for some time but then moved onto something else so nothing was ever planned or acted upon. It just felt like the time had come and we booked our flights for the next day! This was quite a shock to our friends on Koh Chang but in a way, I'm glad it was that sudden because there was little time to dwell on everything.

Our last night saw some of our close friends arrive on our balcony at 4am with a bag full of cold beers, ready to see our last night off in style! We have made some great friends who know our love for beer all too well. There were some tears and it was one of the hardest times I think I have had in all my time travelling. Questioning your decision as to whether you have made the right choice casts a lot of doubt in your mind, but the decision was made so we had to stick to it.

At 8am, bearing in mind we had to be up at 11am, our friends finally left and we headed for bed. It's not the best idea in the world to be travelling for 2 full days on only 3 hours sleep!

Last night on the balcony

We left Koh Chang and headed for Trat airport, the cutest airport in the world. It is literally just straw roofed huts next to a runway. An hours flight to Bangkok then another 7 hours to wait until our next flight to Doha in the Middle East. We have spent so much time at Bangkok Airport, another 7 hours wasn't going to be an issue.

The flight was easy to Doha, surprisingly. Usually for me, in economy class it's hard work. We had 3 hours transfer at Doha then it was the final 8 hour flight to Manchester. I had very mixed feelings for this flight; on one hand I wanted to the journey over and done with, then on the other hand I was nervous about being back on UK soil. It was very draining on an already tired body.

Travelling friends

Just before descending into Manchester, we flew over the south coast of England, London and the Midlands; all viewed from 40,000 feet. I could see the heatwave in full swing and what an amazing perspective to view the UK from after being away for so long. Everything looked so tiny. It felt like quite a poignant moment at the end of the journey.

On arrival at Manchester, it was hot and sunny. Wow. After a month of rain and storms, it was nice to be back in the sunshine. The weather certainly helped ease me back into the UK. The tan I came back with was quite pathetic after so long on the road!

So here we are a week after arriving back. It seems like a dream when I look back but I'm so proud that I did it. I'm getting used to being back but I will be honest, it is hard. One minute I'm ok, wanting to get on with things then the next I feel like I'm grieving for a lost part of me that I've left behind. No-one could have prepared me for being back home, I'm just glad I'm tucked away in a little village in the Lake District finding my mind and my feet again. It's time to see friends and family and catch up with people who matter.

Lonely Beach

Well I hope you have enjoyed following the blog, I have certainly enjoyed writing it. This journey maybe over but life goes on, and I will be hitting the road again. Not sure where, when or how, but I've certainly got the travelling bug now.

Thanks to all the amazing people I have met along the way, there has been so many but you know who you are!

Until next time....

Our home on Koh Chang

The English Channel, France & the south coast 

Cambodia Tuk Tuk

Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh from the air

Over Thailand

Waiting at Bangkok Airport

Catching some sun

Lonely beach

Making my mark

Our travelling companions

Om Bar nights

Janina, our landlady

This is the life

Greetings from Koh Chang in Thailand! I'm sure I have been here before.....

Yes that's right, we have come back to Thailand. After our tour of China, and with time ticking on, we decided to come back to the place we love to end our journey with friends and good times.

Depressing Nanjing

Since my last blog, we had to endure the hellhole that was Nanjing in China. It was like the back end of the world and was generally just depressing. It was a relief when we came to leave and we headed for the bullet train again to Shanghai. We planned carefully this time after our experience of booking tickets in Beijing and we booked a few days in advance. This meant we had no hassle on the day of travel and the train journey was swift and efficient.

On arrival at Shanghai, we had to take a taxi to our hotel, which was about 20km to the city centre. This had to be done during rush hour and it took almost 2 hours to get to our hotel! On the way I could feel that Shanghai was different compared to the rest of China.

Shanghai skyline

Our first night was spent getting a feel for the place and we took a walk along the river front. The skyline is pretty impressive, almost like Hong Kong. Huge skyscrapers, landmark buildings all lit up in some amazing colourful displays. On our side of the river, you had the old financial centre buildings; the colonial 1920's and 1930's buildings that Shanghai is famous for and were very beautiful to look at.

After 3 days in Shanghai, we learned of a disaster on the bullet train as it had crashed then fell of the viaduct and killed about 40 people. It sent a chill down my spine as we had been on it just a few days earlier. The Chinese government had straight away tried to mount a general cover up and the state media was unusually defying the government’s rules on what they should broadcast. On the news only a few days before the crash, there was a report about the Chinese people feeling that safety had been compromised because of corruption in the government. The crash has since ignited a lot of fury in the Chinese people and I hope that something is done about it.

Old Shanghai

All in all I had a great time in Shanghai, it is very much like Hong Kong visually but has a more slightly relaxed feel than the rest of China I visited. Many parts of Shanghai are like walking through a European street because of the colonial buildings, but then suddenly you are back in China in the next street. Shanghai is somewhere I would definitely go back to again.

The time came to leave China and head back to Bangkok. The taxi ride to the airport usually takes about 1 hour, yet we did it in 30 minutes. How? Because we were being driven by a reckless taxi driver that was reaching speeds of 120 mph (yes, miles per hour) on the freeway. Jesus Christ I was terrified and never thought I would make it to the airport alive after almost being wiped out by a bus! With the bullet train crash a few days earlier and a near miss on the freeway, surely there would be no more bad omens in Shanghai? Well at check in we were given seat number 13A and 13B! It felt like something out if final destination.

Me at Cheap Charlie's in Bangkok

We arrived back in Bangkok and if I am honest, my first feelings were of sadness. I felt sad because I knew the trip was coming to an end and being back just reinforced that feeling. I had usually always pushed it to the back of my mind. Still, it was very comfortable being there again after the experience of China. Plus, we had some drinking to do!

The weather in Bangkok was grey and rainy, something I hadn't seen there before. We soon got back into our normal rhythm by visiting Cheap Charlie's, a bar hidden away in a kind of back alley on the street. It’s a great meeting place for tourists and ex-pats alike. And when Cheap Charlie's closes... you head for one of the many VW Camper van's that are street bars! In our week in Bangkok, 6 nights were spent doing this and I loved every minute. Bangkok is simply an amazing city.

Bangkok street bars

And then... for our next stop and after 8 months away, we headed back to Koh Chang. I always knew we would come back. It is probably one of my favourite places I have visited in my life, so far. Being back was like coming back home in a strange sort of way. It was great to see our friend Susanna again. We were meant to meet her again in Bali however she is still on Koh Chang after 11 months! Susanna was our neighbour last year and is again this year. It's like we never left.

Dave has been back on the decks at Om Bar again and I have even spent an hour behind the bar, my first time doing bar work. Although it is quieter because it is low season, the Saturday night parties have been packed, just like in the high season. Needless to say party nights involve a lot of beers, buckets and red bull.  Me, Dave and Susanna are a force to be reckoned with when we get on the buckets!

The Ferry to Koh Chang

Our good friend Nicci, who we met on Koh Chang on our very first visit 4 years ago, was still on Koh Chang after arriving earlier in January. We missed her arrival so it was great catching up and spending some time her and also her little one, Lotus. Nicci had to leave Koh Chang at the end of August and head back to Holland, so we had a sending off party that was the usual mixture of buckets, booze and cheeseburgers at the end of the night! It was very sad to see her leave, as it always is with people you meet then become friends with on the road. 

Me working the bar!

Because it is still rainy season on Koh Chang, the storms at night have been spectacular. Our hut is on the mountainside on the edge of the jungle, so when the storm clouds gather it is just above our heads, and when it thunders, our whole bungalow shakes. It was so bad on one night; I didn't get to sleep until 7am. It was pretty scary stuff!

Unfortunately, we never made it to my friend Leanne’s wedding in Sri Lanka. My plan from the start of this trip was to be there, but when I was in a position to look at booking flights and hotels, I simply didn't have the funds to go. This is one part of the trip that has made me realise how much I miss my friends back home.

Our month in Thailand has passed very quickly and the time has come to do our first visa run to renew our Thailand stay. The closest Thailand embassy is in Phnom Penh. If you read my blog in January, you will know that it is not somewhere I ever thought I would visit again. However, keeping an open mind we decided to come back and pick a better area than we selected before. This has paid off slightly; my stay in Phnom Penh this time has been better. However, Phnom Penh is not one of my favourite places so maybe this time will be my last. Sometimes first impressions can be wrong, so at least I gave it a second chance.

Nicci's leaving night

The rules on Thailand visa applications have just changed in the last few days, typical. The agencies are now saying due to management changes at the embassy they are making it stricter for foreigners to obtain visas. We submitted all the information we could and had a nerve-wracking 24 hours waiting to see if the visa would come through. Thankfully, it has, so that guarantees another 8 weeks in Thailand.

After Phnom Penh we are heading back to Koh Chang for what will most likely be the closing chapters of our travelling. I thought I would find this hard to accept but for some reason I don't. I think this is because Koh Chang is actually like a 'winding down' of the trip. After spending so much time and energy going from place to place, Koh Chang is allowing me time to settle mentally before making the long trek home.

So from me, it's bye for now!

Dave at a street bar

Back at Om Bar

View from my bungalow

Koh Chang sunset

Back to Om Bar

Kinky Gaga

 

Party nights

Bangkok street bar

Susanna, me and Nicci

Good friends

Dave back on the decks at Om Bar

Shanghai at night

Back on the road

Greetings from China!

This month's blog is a little later than usual, mainly because I had been in Kuala Lumpur for 2 months so not very much had happened on the travelling front. Still, in Rory & Dave style we went to party after party and continued to maintain our record of how many times you can get drunk in a week!

Pool parties in Kuala Lumpur

Well here we are in China, and this is something else. Never EVER have I seen so many people all in one place. On our arrival at Tianjin (just outside Beijing) we had to wait on the plane for an hour on the tarmac whilst the customs officer decided whether or not he wanted to open the doors of the plane! After not sleeping at all the night before and not sleeping on the plane, this was the last thing I needed.

Heading to China

Now, we had been warned that few Chinese speak any English so this was the part I had been dreading, getting from Tianjin to Beijing, a distance of about 80 miles. We headed to the arrivals area to get a shuttle bus to the train station. As predicted, the counter selling tickets didn't speak any English so we headed outside hoping to see some westerners. Luckily, the bus was waiting and they were selling tickets right by it.  We then had to buy train tickets at the station and again there were no signs in English so it was pot luck which queue I took. Dave managed to track an officer down that spoke some English and told him that I was in the wrong queue so finally managing to get to the correct queue, we bought our tickets.  Then came the navigation of the platform area and navigation to our train. This was a complete mission, with us looking at our tickets and trying to match the Chinese symbols to the signs on the wall. We managed to get the train and it was the bullet train. We had paid an extra £3 and bagged the VIP section, a tiny compartment right behind the driver cab, and there was just a glass wall between you and the driver, pretty cool for our first time on it. We arrived in Beijing and went to find a taxi, only to find there was a queue that trailed the whole length of the station and curled back around on itself. This was unbelievable; we would have had to queue for hours to get a cab. Instead, we went out of the side exit and headed straight to a rouge taxi that was parked outside the station. We broke all our rules with taxis and booked him at a ridiculously over priced fare, but that was worth it to avoid  queuing  for the rest of my life.

VIP cab behind the driver

We headed out to Tiananmen Square on our first day and it was manic. There were hundreds of thousands of people all filling the square. It was hot and the sky was cloudless so we were sweating the whole time. Tiananmen Square is huge, over 1km long from end to end. We wanted to visit the Forbidden City and thought we had found it, only to realise we were actually next-door at the Beijing Cultural Palace. How we managed to get the wrong place is a mystery; we can be shockingly bad travellers sometimes. So day one was not very successful.

Beijing Cultural Palace

By day two, we decided to take a day off because we were still hanging from the journey from Kuala Lumpur. We managed a lie in and had a lazy day watching movies and generally recovering. The Great Wall of China was next on the list and this is something I have always wanted to do since being a kid. We took the tube and it was the early morning rush hour. You have NEVER seen anything like it. It makes the London rush hour on the tube seem like nothing. 3 trains went by that were packed and we managed to squeeze on the 4th one. At Beijing North Station, it was a repeat of being at Tianjin Station; no signs in English and not one of the Chinese locals we asked spoke it either. One of the guards very vaguely pointed us to the police box just outside the station and there we bought our tickets to the Great Wall, quite an odd place to sell the tickets. Plus, the timetable we had worked from online seemed to mean nothing as we had a 2-hour wait for our train!

Dave and me on the Great Wall

The trains are a complete free for all with regards to seats, you have to literally fight your way past everyone or you will get left behind. Any morals us westerners have with regards to  queuing ethics are completely worthless here; you have to act as the locals do. Little old peasant women seem to enjoy pushing me out of their way so a quick elbow in the face seems to stop them in their tracks.

When we arrived at the Great Wall it was spectacular, just as you see it in the pictures winding its way up the steep mountains. We walked for about an hour to the top of the mountain before turning round and heading back down. The wall goes on as far as the eye can see and you could probably spend a few days just exploring this area alone. As with all things in China, the wall was packed with people, but oddly enough everyone seemed to follow each other on the wall and head in the same direction, so Dave and me headed in the opposite direction to avoid the crowds. This massively paid off as the walk was relaxed and we managed to get some fantastic pictures. Well, I say relaxed; the Great Wall is actually so steep in some places you are practically crawling up the thing! All in all it was a great experience and worth the journey to get to it.

Heading back into Beijing was just the same as leaving, hectic, pushing and fighting on the station platform to get in the carriage and grab a seat. It has to be said it is great being tall; pushing people out of the way is a doddle!

Scorpions on Wangfujing Street

Finally, 3rd time around we successfully made it to the Forbidden City and managed to get the right location! It was super hot and I don't think I have ever sweat so much just from walking around. The Forbidden City is a huge complex and is about 600 years old. On paper, it sounded really interesting but in reality it was just a lot of large court yards with huge gates over looking them. I think the heat probably played a huge part in us turning around after a few hours and heading back. Later that night, for a reason I don't know, I decided to head to Wangfujing Street and eat some scorpions! The scorpions are alive on a stick and are wriggling around. If you bang the counter they are on, they all start writhing around in tandem; it wasn't very nice to watch! You pay the guy behind the counter and he will dip them in hot oil and season them and away you go! They actually don't taste that bad, they are crispy and have a savoury taste. I think I'll get myself on next years I'm a Celebrity!

Bullet Train

The time came to leave Beijing and head to Nanjing. This meant another assault on the Chinese Railways. As predicted there were no English signs so I was queuing blind with all the locals battling each other to push in. When I finally made it to the counter I found out that all the standard seats had gone and I had to book first class, a total of about £150 for the 2 of us! Ouch. The beauty of the Bullet Train is that we covered over 1000km's in 4 hours. 

So here we are in Nanjing and there is nothing here! It has rained constantly since we got here and it is grey and misty. It is like being back in the UK in summer. There are very few attractions to see and it is just full of knock off electrical stores. It's not really somewhere I would recommend to anyone. Still, we are making the most of being here and seeing part of the real China. 

The Great Wall of China

After Nanjing we will be heading to Shanghai and hopefully there will be a bit more on offer for us there. We were going to head further south into China for the remainder of July, however the language barrier is huge in big the cities, so it will be almost impossible to communicate in the smaller towns. Therefore it looks like we are heading back to Bangkok. After that we should be heading to Sri Lanka and it looks like home is calling ever louder now. But you know what? After spending almost a year on the road, I think I'm almost ready to think about getting back to a bit of normality and some of my creature comforts.

On that note, it's bye for now!

The Great Wall of China

Tiananmen Square

Dave on the Great Wall of China

Birds Nest Stadium

Some random kid!

Me on the Great Wall of China

Me at Tiananmen Gate

Me at the Beijing Cultural Palace

Me eating scorpions