Destination 10: Thailand - Full Moons, Diving and the Obilgatory Buckets on the Islands

''UP UP AND AWAY''

As told by Chris Hammond, late edition to our team.

I arrived in Bangkok on the 6th of February as I'd arranged to meet Buns and Julian there and the plan was to then head on down to the islands to spend some well deserved quality time on the beaches and and some equally well deserved time at the full moon party in Koh Phang Ngan, which was the first stop...

After a successful rendezvous in Bangkok the three of us scrambled to catch the overnight bus down to Surat Thani in time to catch the early morning ferry to Koh Phang Ngan the following morning. Three of us is actually not entirely true as Julian and Buns had managed to pick up a stray Norwegian girl by the name of Anne on their trip down from Laos. Anne was a rather interesting specimen who, much to our annoyance at 4am on the bus, seemed to thoroughly enjoy the sound of her own voice to the extent that it felt to me as though she never once shut up in the five days that she tagged along with us. This might have been bearable if she'd actually had anything of any interest to say but the last I can remember she was rambling on about her favourite contestant in 'America's Next Top Model' for the fiftieth time and I ended up buying her a drink in the desperate hope that she wouldn't be able to suck through a straw and speak
at the same time...I was wrong.

At any rate we made it to Koh Phang Ngan and checked into our luxury (everything is relative I guess...) apartment at a half completed resort called the 'Drop In'. The 'Drop In' was actually really nice and I think we all agreed that it has great potential. The problem however, lay in
the fact that it is as yet only half complete and workmen are literally working around the clock to finish it off. It is not an exaggeration to say that the rooms were being let out the day after they had been finished! Not that it mattered much as we hadn't planned on doing too much sleeping in Koh Phang Ngan and we spent our first day leisurely exploring the island on scooters. We managed to find some lovely beaches and ended up cruising through patches of tropical jungle and small rural villages, definitely a highlight. Unfortunately, as with most things in Thailand, you have to take the good with the bad and it was Buns that managed to come off his bike (thankfully not seriously...) and ended up having to pay a grossly inflated damage fee of 400 Pounds to the scooter rental company! Certainly not ideal!

After that we all felt as though we needed a few beers (or buckets as the case may be...) and we headed off to the Full Moon party looking for a bit of fun. I'm not sure that I had fully grasped the extent of the Full Moon party and I for one was completely caught by surprise at the sheer scale of it all. Essentially its a massive beach party held once a month with the full moon but what I hadn't registered was that the beach was about 2km in length and just about every inch of available space was occupied by like minded partiers! I remember at one stage looking out from a bar to my left and right and being amazed at the heaving sea of people seemingly moving as one in rythm with the music. We all enjoyed the party but inevitably we were seperated and I think that if we were to do it again we'd probably go into battle with more of a solid game plan. A few more days of partying in Koh Phang Ngan and it was time to head across to Koh Tao, a slightly smaller island about three hours ferry ride from Koh Phang Ngan.

''SWEDISH PARTY ON KO TAO''
(MOMENTS BEFORE CHRIS EATS A CHICKEN FOOT)

After the frantic pace of Koh Phang Ngan and the full moon party it was nice to find a slightly more chilled out island and Julian and I took advantage of our time off the sauce to do our Open Water scuba course. The course was great fun and we met some good people, Koh Tao supposedly has some of the best diving in the world and the course was without a doubt one of the highlights for me. Whilst Jules and I were concentrating on not breathing too quickly underwater Guy was holding the fort above sea level, practising his handstands on the beach and honing his pick up lines on the hordes of Swedish backpackers that seem to converge on Thailand in February and March. Obviously the techniques needed a little more refinement as Julian and I resurfaced only to find Buns sitting on his own chatting to a squirrel and claiming that we'd just missed the gorgeous blondes that he'd been talking to for hours...hmmm...

Having completed my dive course Guy and I thought it was a good idea to take a guided tour of the island that included a decent hike through a bit of jungle terrain, a series of high rock jumps into the sea on a secluded part of the island and some snorkelling through underwater caves finished off with a chance to snorkel with the increasingly less common black tipped reef sharks in a small little bay on the unpopulated side of Koh Tao. The day had been going perfectly and we had all been jumping off the rocks for an hour or so when I heard Buns shouting rather rantically that he had cut his arm quite badly on a rock...he wasn't joking either! Somehow Buns had managed to swim into what must have been the only rock in an open stretch of water that must have been as deep as it was wide! At any rate the cut was very deep and we spent the next hour pillaging the first aid kit of some germans that happened to be in the area and organising transport to the nearest clinic, which was an hour's drive away by 4x4 through some pretty rough terrain! Anyway, we managed to make it there in one peace after I'd spent the better part of a bumpy hour trying to convince Buns that he wasn't going to die! The cut, as it turned out,was dead straight, almost as though it had been cut with a razor, and the doctor that looked no older than 16 did a very good job of stitching Buns back together again. (Is there any coincidence in the fact that Guy went travelling through Africa only to return with badly blistered feet, went skiing in Aspen only to return with frostbite, went to Croatia and returned with a broken jaw, went cruising around Thailand only to return with 25 stitches in his arm? I think not!)

''C, BUNS AND MUZ IN PHUKET''

After Koh Tao it was on to Koh Phi Phi, the famous island on which much off the film 'The Beach' was shot and also an island that had been completely decimated by the tsunami in 2004. Its easy to see how the island was so badly ravaged as the development is literally on a stretch of flat land between two beaches on either side of the island. By all accounts the wave hit the southern side of the island and washed right across the flat stretch to hit the water on the Northern side, destroying everything in its path. Phi Phi has largely been rebuilt now but that doesn't necessarily mean that it has been improved. Our dive instructor pointed out to us that the new hospital had been built only a few metres back from the shoreline on a site that would be instantly wiped out in the event of another tsunami! As Africans we were all rather glad to find out that ours is not the only continent in the world where logic is not a pre-requisite for the allocation of public funds! Phi Phi was great though, a beautiful island where its possible to do as much or as little as you like. I'll never forget running the gauntlet each day along one particular street that happened to have about seven massage parlours all in a row with about 35 masseuses standing outside at any given time shouting, "you wan massage, cheap cheap, vewy good, wan massage?" They reminded me of a murder of crows sitting on a telephone wire making an awful noise, but thats Thailand for you really, completely unique in its own whacky kind of way!

Unfortunately Jules had to leave back to SA from Phi Phi and I left him and Guy alone for a few minutes as they said their tearful goodbyes and wallowed in self pity knowing that their world tour had come to an end! I was just getting started so didn't feel quite as sad but I must say that I was extremely grateful of the opportunity to meet up with them both and we had a superb time in every regard, plenty of memories that we'll be able to look back on over the years with great fondness...And that is pretty much where the adventure ends! I've spent the past two weeks in a Thai muaythai (kickboxing) camp in the middle of nowhere, but thats a story for
another time and another blog!

Love you long time
Chris

Destination 9: Cambodia - Pol Pot, Beach Time and Angkor What?????

''OVERBOARD''

We arrived in Cambodia after a long border crossing. We were greeted by our 'chariot' (clapped out old bus) that was going to whisk us quickly away to Phomn Penh. There wasnt too much wrong with the bus, pretty standard 'old school' yankee looking school bus. It didnt excatly have aircon but hey, it was manageable! We were pretty happy with the bus that Mr Mo at 4000 Islands had sold us. Only problem was ........every friggin other Mr Mo on Don Det had sold their hostel dwellers the same ticket. What this means is that the bus was grossly over-packed. Sardine and tin are words the come to mind. The isles were literally piled waist high with all the big backpackers that us backpackers lug around. On top of this mass pile sat all the people who had been late getting up to cross the border and hence didnt have seats. It really was quite comical how overbooked it was. The show had to go on and so we set off into the hot Cambodian wilderness........a great start. Lucky we had seats!

After a few hours of driving we stop for the obligatory sandwich/pit stop. Some people were getting off here.....awesome. Little did we know that for the 10 people that got off another 15 had paid to get on! Cambodia....no idea of how to run a bus company.....lasting memory!

On the bus we met some cool people which was the only positive could take from the trip. One group of girls, the Norwegians (Kari, Sofie, Line and Ida) were going to be ''those people you keep bumping into'' ...........we saw and jammed with then in Phomn Penh , Ko Phangan, Ko Tao and Phi Phi.....

After a very long journey we arrived, knackered, in Phomn Penh (referred to as PP from now on). EVENTUALLY found a place to stay and decided that was us as we had to get up the next day to go to the S21 museum and the 'Killing Fields'.

In the morning we woke up and organised a tuk-tuk driver for the day. He took us wizzing around PP in style......driving well but aggressively. He literally drove us against oncoming traffic, showed us how to push into a wall of fast oncoming traffic by simply having the balls to do so....he really was quite phenomenal! He would have been a clear winner in the game chicken! He went and didnt gave a rats abouth the others! In between fearing for our lives we were able to take in some of PP's sights, sounds and smells. Let's just say that the smells are the first thing that hit you and they were definitely the most enduring memory for me. Even more so then driving up the side of a road against the traffic. PP is VERY polluted and has that strong open drain smell! Very far from ideal. All the people driving around on scooters wore face masks to protect themselves from the pollution. Sordid place, but apparently not as bad as Indian cities....which was nice to know!

The S21 museum was pretty a haunting experience. It was an old school that was transformed in an interrogation and torture barracks when Pol Pott and his Khymer Rouge regime set about setting back the clock. This setting back the clock to time zero was new beginning for Cambodia and involved cleansing Cambodia of anyone against his views (basically the educated elite). Anyone who was educated, wore glasses etc was to interrogated, tortured and killed. The old class rooms are now empty par the occasional old iron bed where the prisoners were strapped to and tortured. On the walls hang black and white pictures - a few spooky reminders of how dark and twisted the human heart can become. The pictures of what they did to some people are truly horrific and are easily comparable to what you would see in Auschwitz or Dachau.

Lots of Cambodians were tortured here before being lorried off a few miles to Killing Fields where they were brutally killed and thrown into mass graves. We wont go into detail as to the methods...we will let you read that for yourself when you hopefully go there. The place is something that we would recommend seeing and experiencing if you are in Asia. A very sobering experience, amidst all the hedoism. Especially sobering cause as you can tell by our pictures on facebook Asia it is mostly about buckets, parties and good times. It gave us a good (yet brief) perspective of what has happened to this country. We couldn't believe this happened only 30 years ago.....Again it just made us think of our troubles in this world. A credit card, an unrequited love or a fight with your mate all seem stupid when compared to he fate that some of these brave people had to endure!

After a full on day we explored a few of PP's food markets. They can be compared to South Americas....they sell and eat pretty much anything. We saw a basket of freshly skinned frogs with heads chopped off. The hearts were still beating....GROSS! After a pleasant dinner we hit town by the river and then later a more sketchy place called the Heart of Darkness. Quite appropriate after what we had seen that day. Had a good night though.....despite the clubs name it was actually VERY COOL!

Wham, bam and thankyou mam PP, now it was time for the relaxation of beach life! Sihnoukville, or SV from now, on was to be a few days of bliss.

Again on the bus we met a couple of cool peeps, two Swedish sisters, Kaysa and Stina. We had a great few days..............eating well, sleeping well, having good chats, reading book , driving around on scooters, sun tanning, exploring an island just off SV, long walks on the beach (forgive the cliche) ..................in terms of the rushed Cambodia experience this was the most relaxing. We had almost a week in SV just soaking up some rays and catching up on some rest as the last part of Laos and the initial part of Cambodia had been super full on.

''ANGKOR WHAAAATTTT? WITH 3 OF THE CRAZY BEER CHUGGING CANADIANS''

After SV, it was to SR we headed....SR is short for Siem Riep. Siem Riep is where the magnificent temples of of Angkor Wat are located. Now, as you all know by now the trip consisted of an over prescribed bus to PP, then a change and another packed bus north west to SR. A long journey!

We arrived in SR shattered and had a good sleep as we needed to be up crack of dawn to see the temples at first light! The next day was truly exceptional.....we had fantastic weather and a good driver that took us all around the temples! Lets just say that the temples were spectacular and we were dying to take loads of photos but you will never guess what? I thought my camera had half charge and would be fine! Well, it wasn't quite half and the battery died around 11 in the morn! Aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh well, just means another trip to Cambodia hey? That is sometimes a good thing - if you miss stuff it always gives you a reason to go back. South America - Columbia, Ecuador and Chile/Argentina's Patagonia region are things we didn't do so we will simply have to go back there. Okay, where were we.....Asia, yeah, right.

After a of walking around and climbing ancient temples it was time to quench the big thirst we had mustered! We went to the well renowned Angkor Wat club, sat down (at a large table) and ordered a couple of bevvies. The next thing a group of Canadian guys and girls come up and ask if they could share out large table. Now let me tell you these French Canadians weren't light drinkers by any means. Think they must have been tree fellers or something equally as hardcore. They liked to 'chug'/down beer and they weren't half bad at it! Anyways a night of heavy drinking ensued! Beer and music......2 things that can really cross barriers in connecting people! Thanks Beer....good night! In Cambodia the Beer is called Angkor Wat by the by.

In fact if you drive around most things have Angkor in it. Angkor Wat Grand Hotel, Angkor Wat Cigarettes, Angkor Watt Guesthouse, Royal Angkor Wat Hotel, Angkor Wat loo roll, Angkor Wat everything! Crazee! Enough Angkor Wattage for now....

As usual we got home around 5 in the morning, only to have a couple hours sleep before we had to get up and pack. Jules, in quite a messy state, wakes Guy up, in equally and unhappy place. Guy gets up and packs and goes to the front reception where our tuk tuk is supposedly meant to pick us up. Tuk Tuk is supposed to taxi us to our bus, where we embark for Bangkok. Guy comes though and Jules is rapping to this bird called Anne from Denmark. Anne will get mentions in the Thailand part of the trip.....be ready...she is a beaut! Anyway Anne is on our bus to Bangkok as well, a travel partner! We supposed to be leaving at 8......all good......so far!

Anyways 8 rolls by so Guy takes the bull by the horns and says lets get our own tuk tuk to the bus station otherwise we gonna miss our bus. Everyone concurs. We go to 2 different bus stops and soon figure we have missed the bus! We stop, speak to some dudes at a petrol station and they phone the agency we booked it through on their mobiles. Thai speaking follows. The random dude that helped us call the travel agency says 'jump in the car'. He will apparently take us to the border so we can catch up with the bus. Weird, but we agree when we find out the price is free. Still skeptical but at this stage we don't care. So we climb into the back seat: Jules, Anne and Guy. Then a little Thai man jumps in the back next to Guy (Poor little man). Then a woman and child climb in the front seat, then 2 fully grown Thai men jump into the drivers seat and off we go. We spent most of the first half hour trying to figure which one of the men was doing what with respect to the brake, clutch and accelerator! Fun Fun Fun...but we made it to the border! Relief!

We find the people we were supposed to travel with on the other side of the border waiting for new transport to Bangkok. We are stoked and sit down and relax. A couple mini vans rock up and our people start get on. Being polite guys we let other people get on first presuming another mini van would be just round the corner! How wrong we were......cause we were polite we had to wait 5 hours at the border for the big big bus to come through and pick us (and a million other people from other Cambodian destinations who were all behind us) up! An interesting day from hell.....the way we like to travel. Always more fun hungover! And so it was to Bangkok we went to pick up Guys friend, Christoffel Jacobus Hammond. Chis is aka ''C'', aka ''Chris No buoyancy control Hammond'', aka ''Chris High 5 Hammond''.....ask ''C'' for explanations.

So the big bus arrived on BKK and the last page was turned on our Cambodia chapter! In terms of chapters it was happy and sad, fun and fast, slow and mellow! An interesting little chapter in both our lives! Thanks Cambodia!

Destination 8: Laos - Slow boats, 'In the Tubing' and a 'few thousand islands'

We were happy to touch down safely in Bangkok....but at the same time we were VERY nervous about Asia! Could it be as good as South America? We didn't think it could be, surely not....South America had treated us too well.

So, after arriving after another very long travel day we crashed down at a hostel called Lub D! Really worth a mention, if you are ever in Bangkok it is well worth the stay. Reasonable and super modern! Our first evening we decide to hit the infamous Pat Pong are (or red light district) just to see what it is all about! So we head for a restaurant....any restaurant. We had been thinking cheap tasty green curry for about 3 months!

So we find a decent place and the guy at the restaurant starts chatting to us....usual spiel, where you from etc etc. We ask him if there are any normal bars where travellers and normal locals hangout around (as the places we had popped our heads into seemed very dingy). Dingy as in girls approaching us and saying you want ''boom boom'' dodgy! Sure, no probs, he know just the place. He walks us to an okay looking restaurant place (not what we wanted but we sat down). Before you could whisper ''Thai Hooker'' a line of literally 30 beautiful Thai ladies are lined up outside our table. They all have numbers. The dude says take your pick. Jules and Guy just look at each other, too embarrassed to do anything! Eventually after much pushing we decide on 2 ladies! We sat and chatted to them for about 30 minutes asking them what they do (as if it weren't obvious...apparently only massages), what nationalities they like/dislike (they hate the Japs by the by), where they were from etc. We actually had a decent conversation with the gals....we bought them a couple of drinks and conversation flowed as well as could be expected. Everything was fine till we decided enough chat was enough and we wanted the bill. Sure...the bill comes.....1000 Bht (20 pounds for 2 beers and buying the girls 2 cokes...the most expensive round/drink we have ever bought....beating Ibiza and Sweden for price per drink! Ha, a cheek but anyways! After that we checked out a real ''Go Go'' Bar.....a real experience! We were flocked to as we were the only guys under 30 who looked half decent. Everyone else was 40 plus and looked like any of the following:

* a giant walking tattoo
* Ron Jeremy on a particularly steamy day at the office
* most likely to become a paedophile

Go Go Bars explained: Go to one for yourself.

After a single beer at the Go Go bar it was to sleep! Woke up the next day and explored Bangkok a bit....took the Sky train etc etc. We then caught a train up to the north that evening....a train to Chang Mai area. Obviously we had not booked ahead (not our style) so we had to settle with 3rd class non-sleeper! Not advisable for comfort or speed! After the overnight train and 2 buses we made it up to the border where we had a night in preparation of the boat down to Mekong to Luang Prabang! We had an early start (b/fast, border crossing etc etc) and then did a little waiting around for our boat. Initially we booked the ''fast'' 7 hour boat down, but having spoke to several people (who highly advised against it) we chose the more sensible 2 day ''slow'' boat.

Anyone ever doing this trip should defo do the ''slow'' boat! It is large boat with a couple hundred people we reckon, quite cramped and full of backpackers and interesting types! We met some really good good people on the boat.....people that we kept on bumping into all the way in Cambodia (as people are often on the same route as you). Notable mentions were

* Raj and Sandra
* The Yanks (Caitlin, B and Andrea)
* The Argies (Lara and Denise)

and many more!

Anyways, the trip was slow, as the name ''slow'' boat suggests, but a lot of fun! Beer was drunk, cards were played, friends were made......all whilst admiring some of the finest scenery you could possibly hope to see! 2 days well spent and then we were in Luang Prabang!

Luang Prabang, a little gem of a place that you could easily spend a week in......full of old school French architecture, fine dining, colourful markets and ''monky'' monasteries! It is a place you could fall in love with quite literally! Once we had settled our belongings and went out an Indian dinner (superb) with team America. After dinner Jules and I decided to find a spot to indulge in a couple of cold ones! Much to our disgust we discovered that Laos had a curfew of 12. The only place that opened past 12 was the bowling alley They sold booze and apparently it was a gas, so we hit the bowling lanes! in the end we had, as usual ''too much fun''......after all we are travelling, why not have a good time!

Outside of Luang Prabang there is a vast range of seemingly untouched beauty! Tiny authentic Lao Villages, the smell of burnt wood (very African in a way), fresh air and clean rivers! There is a lot one can do.....and in our 2 days there we did a few of the highlights! We randomly met up with team Argentina after a breakfast and decided we wanted to do the Kuang Si Waterfalls! These waterfalls were epic.....we rented bikes and drove the 20km on windy roads out there with the Argies on the back! That was one of the best days of the trip so far....the smells, the views, the little villages, the wind our faces....quite spectacular! It was almost ruined when we decided to let the gals drive the last 5 km home. They had never ever been on bikes before but because they were automatic we decided to trust female drivers! Needless to say Jules and Guy both came within inches of their lives a couple of times! Argentines are really not good drivers....don't ever drive with one, especially not a female one!

The next day we were elephant riding and ''waterfalling'' again! This time we did the Tad Sae Waterfalls! If you want to do elephant riding in Asia we would recommend you do it here in Luang Prabang. Other Asian elephant riding companies have been known to be really cruel to the ellies. This elephant centre is haven unwanted and mistreated ellies and apparently they are really looked after here. From elephant riding and waterfall it was straight onto a bus to Van ''in the the tubing'' Vieng!

We heard from reliable sources (Lying Planet) that this route, route 13, was a dangerous route to ride and has been hijacked by Laos pirates before. We didn't think much of this rumour till we sat down. Waiting for the bus to arrive a little Laos dude jumps on dressed pretty normally par the giant AK47 strapped to his shoulder! Okay, so maybe it is a little bit of a dangerous route! Arrive in Van Vieng pretty late at night and sort accommodation....pretty lucky as most things were very closed! The next day we were greeted by perfect day. It would be rude not to have a few beers and go tubing!

On our time budget we only allocated 3 days to Van Vieng! Lonely Planet neglected to tell us how much fun it actually would be! It is the most insane party place in the world I reckon. It is simply an open air night club, with people running around in bikinis and boardies, swinging and jumping into the river, dancing and getting drunk on Asia's infamous buckets.....all to the tune of MGMT, Kings of Leon, and songs like ''Infinity!'' What a way to spend a day! Along the river there are slides, swings, fires, mud baths, people writing all over each other in markers (refer to some facebook pics).....people are basically running amuk and going 'bos' wild. A very hedonistic place where everything is done in the name of fun!

Julian once again reaffirmed his camel mans status on the trip with some good backflips off the high swing (quite a feat)! He was feeling so confident that he thought he would attempt the double.....bad mistake Julian. Jules was flying through the air like a flying goat, one flip, coming around for the second, people had their breath held, is he gonna make it, SLAP, Jules lands on his back! The crowd go absolutely bazurk.....you get more cheers for totally messing up and hurting yourself then you do for doing a flawless triple backflip!

Quick aside on buckets: Buckets......Buckets are quite literally small plastic buckets that you buy as you would a spirit and mixer in a club. Only difference is the volume of booze, in a bucket they simply open a half jack of spirit (usually vodka, Asian rum/whisky {if u feeling budget}) and pour that into the already ice filled bucket. You then simply mix the half jack with whatever you want.....usually m150 (Asia's Red Bull) and Manoa soda (a lime lemonade mix....very nice). Buckets get you very intoxicated.....and very quickly!

Tubing was a bit like Ground Hog Day, everyday feels a little like the same. Wake up, go tubing, get a tuk tuk back, fight for the shower (as u freezing cold by the end of it), get an Indian Curry from Nazeem, go to Smile Bar. Wake up and press the repeat button! In the end we did tubing for a week.......and we would have done it for longer had our exhausted chassis not started to strongly disagree with what they were having to do everyday!

If you were to be stuck anywhere in the world an experiencing ground hog day, Van Vieng would be the place! We partied hard with a many fab people.......Some of the people who really made our time in Van Vieng so cool were:

Raj, Sandra, Team Aussie (Scarlett, Alanna, The Hoff and Kate) and the 'Great Danes'/our volleyball oppo (Helle and Henriette) just to name a few.

The week in Van Vieng was awesome but it also put some time pressures on us for the rest of Laos and Cambodia! Doing what we wanted to do meant we would have to put the pedal to the metal if we were gonna make full moon by the 8th!

So the race begun! We caught an overnight sleeper bus (literally the biggest bus I had ever seen) down to 4000 Islands. We cycled around Don Det, checked out the waterfalls, had a few drinks, took in the village life and then we were off......

Adios Laos, Cambodia here we come............