What about...

Food
As I've mentioned a couple of times, we've loving the food. So many delicious, fresh, bloody hot curries and noodles and things we've had no idea what they are but have smiled along and put them in our mouths. We've found we've had better, and cheaper, food the further we've gone away from places that look set up for tourists - everywhere there are little make-shift resturants with a couple of fold-out tables and plastic outdoor furniture on the sides of the roads and with only the vaguest of guidebook thai and some hand gestures 9 times out 10 we've had amazing meals on our tables in minutes (even if its not quite what we thought we were ordering). My chilli tolerance has reached all new heights.

Transport
Man I seriously think we've caught just about every manner of transportation possible: bus, car, motorbike, pushbike, back-of-ute, back-of-truck, ferry, rubber dinghy, long boat, speed boat, dive boat and every other boat in between. Now that we've worked out how to use the local buses it's heaps cheaper and more fun than getting taxis everywhere.

Design
In my old job in Melbourne I had a little poster over my desk that said 'Design: it's not what you put in, its what you leave out'. Obviously the 'less is more' philosophy never reached thai designers - these guys sure go for gold! Their philosophy seems to be as many colours, as many fonts, as many clip-art pictures, as many layer effects and filters as you can possibly cram on to everything at all times. Then times that by 8. And that philosophy seems to be everywhere - a New Zealand long-haul bus, for example, gets painted a sensible and professional colour like forest green or navy blue with possibly a stripe down the side for a stylish flourish. To the thai the side of a bus is a perfect chance to paint a sick dayglo airbrush picture of an crying eagle with a hooded skull coming out of its back against a background of lurid pink and green Batman logos. No wonder they love 80s metal so much here. More is more baby! (Guitar solo)

Cold Showers
Yep, love those. Actually only once in the last three weeks have we had a warm one, but its so hot here you get used to it pretty quickly. Along with the strong coffee its a good wake-up every morning!

Well thats enough, I better go. We're in a place called Phitsanulok - we'll travel today to visit the ruins of Sukhothai and begin the north section of our trip. I think Sonya will want to write a post about our second Bangkok expedition (much more successful than the first - lots of market shopping).

I'm waking up every morning buzzing and feeling excited and healthy ready to explore - and every night we hit the bed utterly shattered. Let's go! (Guitar solo #2)

Dive, Dive, Dive!

Yesterday we dived at the Simillan Islands. I wish I had an underwater camera. Diving is quite surreal. It's like entering a giant underwater room. It's a weird balance between a feeling of freedom and exploration versus remembering the limits and rules of what you can do. These photos don't do the place any justice. Looking up from about 20 meters below the surface and seeing huge schools of rainbow coloured tropical fish. Swimming along with a Banner Fish as if we were buddies. The intricate patterns and never ending variations of coral. It was pretty cool. We got up at 5.30 am (that's a shot of the sunrise) and spent about 8 hours travelling to spend about 1 1/2 hours in the ocean. It was totally worth it.

No In Surance!

We arrived in Phuket today after 3 nights at 'Sanctuary' Guesthouse in Ko Lanta. Ko Lanta was super relaxed. We had a cool day on a schnorkelling trip to Koh Rok and then on our last day we hired a scooter and did a lap of the island. It was super fun burning around, avoiding goats and the mad tuk tuks. I don't think I'll ever be as relaxed as some of the women though who ride side saddle and don't hold on to anything and drink banana shakes at 70 kph.

Phuket town is bigger and dirtier and a bit mental. But then we ventured out to Patong Beach. That blew us away. Patong is like being hit in the face with the wet thong ripped from a euro-trash woman's leathery derriere! I saw real life walking human leather. It looked at me and was digusted by my pale skin. It turned it's head in disgust at my sensible t-shirt covering me from the roasting sun, stretched out on it's sun lounger and closed it's eyes. Ew.

There were jet skis going up and down the beach and the Thai guys who ran the operation were driving them onto the shore as fast as they dared- which is really fast. One guy flew right off the back when he hit the sand. The main difference between the different operations was the "No In Surance!" signs painted on the jet skis. Why that was a good thing, we couldn't work out. Cheaper, maybe?

We are staying in On On guesthouse- which is where they filmed scenes from 'The Beach'. It ain't too bad- it looked worse in the movie. Tomorrow we are getting up at 5.30am to head to the Similan Islands to go diving- it's one of the top ten dive sites in the world. It will be our last ocean/beachy time for awhile. We head to Bangkok on Friday. We are prepared this time!

All night happy hour

Ao Nang was pretty crazy. Its the first time we've seen the really full on mega-tourist-resort side of Thailand and I've got to say it was pretty scary. Wealthy European yuppies and retirees, and sunburnt bogan British families - hundreds of them. The reason, of course, that they're all here is that the scenery is jaw-dropping - turquoise water on white sand beaches surrounded by sheer limestone cliffs. We caught a longtail boat out to a beach called Rai Leh which was a bizarre experience - the most stunning beach I have ever been on but at the same time we're surrounded by hundreds, maybe thousands, of loud, tacky, brash European holiday makers. Its the most inspired and repulsed I've been in the whole trip all at once. That night we drank Beer Changs on the beach and later hit a couple of 'all night happy hour' bars and rekindled our love for Aerosmith and Bon Jovi. 80's metal seems weirdly appropriate here.

Next morning we're waiting for the bus out of town and a giant leather-brown german-looking guy waddles by wearing nothing but a nazi moustache, a huge beer gut and a fluoro-yellow pair of speedos. Sonya turns to me and in a moment of pure hungover grumpiness says 'Where's my glasses? I need to see these people so I can hate them better'.

We caught a ferry out of there to Ko Lanta which is much more relaxed. We're staying at a lovely place called Sanctuary (again, appropriate) and today we went for the most incredible snorkeling mission at an island called Ko Rohk. Tough life this.

Stop. Hammock time.

As Sonya is writing right now beside me we spent the last week on a beautiful island off Malaysia called Pulua Perehentian Kecil. Its a pretty sleepy place, no cars or roads and the place was even quieter as the island doesn't officially open to tourists until March so half the places were still clsed and cleaning up after the monsoon season.

Sonya spent the week learning to dive and I got into a leisurely routine involving walking around, swimming and lots of lots of time in the hammock reading and watching the island spring to life. Beautiful. Towards the end of week I went on a few dives with Sonya which was awesome and we're going to try and dive again at the Similan Islands in a week or so which all the dive instructors on Perehentian said was the best place to go.

I better go, we're off to Ao Nang today, more beaches and islands and awesome thai food. Did I mention I'm loving the food?

Schnorkelling

6 nights in the Perhentian Islands. No cars, phones, internet. Just beaches, bbqs and diving. Maybe a little too much diving- I just finished my Open Water PADI dive course. I am now certified to dive. It was a little scary at first and then as I got more confident- it ruled! All set to tackle the Similan Islands next. While I spent 4 days doing the course, Toby lay in a hammock the entire time.

We met some cool people- Rutger, Matt, Cleo, Lewis and Louise. We all stayed at Ideal Guesthouse in Kota Bahru and then caught the ferry out together. Ended up all staying at Maya Chalets. Good times. Lewis has become our inspiration in hard times. When confronted with any situation- just bitch untill you get what you want. We ask ourselves- what would Lewis do?
We also met some Dutch girls who amused us no end with the way they prononced 'schnorkel'.

It was hard to leave. We got pretty comfy there. Spent 13 hours yesterday on boats, in taxis, buses and mini buses and on our first songthaew. It was a long day and I've never been happier to crash out in a spartan hotel room.
I feel all nostalgic for the Perhentians already.

Love Lane, Georgetown

We flew out of Bangkok yesterday. Couldn't see anything from the plane- the smog was so thick. Bangkok was full on. I quite enjoyed it but think I'll like it more once I'm not so green. We flew into Penang yesterday evening. The island looked so beautiful. It was so clean and green. However, the city isn't quite as pretty, but it's really interesting.

We are staying at SD Guesthouse on Love Lane. There is a reason why it's called Love Lane- lots of lovers about- not all so savoury! Georgetown in a bit crazy- open sewers and no footpaths and you are constantly watching out for mad motorcyclists. Little yellow lizards scurry everywhere.

Tonight is Chinese New Year. Kids were letting off fireworks in the street last night. Toby was jumping! We've been told to stay put and party tonight. There are big celebrations in Chinatown tonight, not far from our lovely guesthouse.

I woke up very early this morning. Still adjusting to the jetlag. The birds outside our room were so loud, the fan thumping above me, the heat, the humidity. Totally disorientated. I really need to buy a watch!

Last Day of Promotion

We arrived in Bangkok two nights ago in the middle of the night. It was raining and the lights and the signs on the wet streets made the place look just like Bladerunner.

We got talked into a tuk-tuk tour by a new best friend yesterday. A few temples, some really hairy driving and a lot of laughs later it all turned a little sour when we got dropped, against our wishes, at a tailors where about 8 guys were lined up ready to start taking our measurements and start making us suits before we could talk our way out of it. We flicked our now-former friend some money and told him to stuff his tailor, walked off and had a fun couple of hours working out where the hell we were and how to get back. I don't want a suit thanks.

The food is awesome. We had the most amazing meal from a little roadside stall last night near our hotel and spent an awesome evening drinking cheap beer and cocktails and doing some serious people-watching.

I'm looking forward to coming back to Bangkok when we're a little more experienced SE Asia travellers in a month or so, I think we'll get more out of it when we're a bit less green. Today we're flying to Penang in Malaysia and starting our mission towards Palau Perentian where we're going to do some diving.