Day 63 - 18th Apr 2009

So at 2:15am on day 63 we boarded our very last flight and 9 hours later at 6:30am we landed back in England. Jeanette and Duncan were there to meet us off the flight and give us a lift back to Finchley. It was great to see them again and good to be back home. It's strange how you appreciate things which you usually take for granted, like people driving on the correct side of the road; and pavements. And especially seeing and being closer to friends and family, just being in the same country is great.

Day 62 - 17th Apr 2009

So our last day. It's hard to believe that we've been away for 9 weeks, although it does seem ages since we were in England. It's also strange thinking about everywhere we've been to and all the things we've seen and done. We have another quick check of our email at the hotel and also have a quick look at some of the pictures on our website, it is so weird seeing America and Australia pictures again! We ordered the same breakfast of French toast but to be honest when it comes I am not convinced it has ever seen an egg! Perhaps it serves us right for not having the buffet!

We check out and leave our big bags with our floor man to look after. Adam gave him a big tip in the hope that means he'll not nick anything or loose anything!

We walked to Connaught Place again but this time via the main tourist shopping street, there's shops selling all sorts. Adam bought me a nice bag from a nice shop where the people didn't hassle us.

I'm afraid we did another lunch vote and McDonalds won again! There's only so much Indian food you can face and our stomachs were not yet fully recovered from last night's Indian meal with beer. We should perhaps write a book on McDonalds of the world! After a quick walk by the Tibetan market we got a moto to the Red Fort. This is really nice and has some great buildings inside. It was strange though because several groups and young men kept asking to have their picture taken with us or just me. We were almost like celebraties, it was really weird and some people would just take a picture without asking!

We got another moto back to the hotel and had a drink while we waited for our taxi. The floor man brought our bags down and was pretty happy to get another tip from us, so he hung about and helped to get our stuff in the taxi, he didn't get any more tips but I think he was still happy as he waved us off!

The traffic in Delhi is truly crazy and there is no way I would drive there. We arrived at the airport with bags of time to spare but you can't even go into the main building unless you have a ticket for a flight leaving within the next 3 hours. There is however a small food court and a smallish seating area. So we got some dinner at the food court, a member of staff wanted to move our bags away because they were apparently blocking the aisle, we refused, surely an airport and an Indian one at that is not the kind of place to let your bags out of your sight!

After a couple of hours waiting we were allowed into the airport and we checked-in no problem and it was time for some more waiting...

Day 61 - 16th Apr 2009

We had a leisurely start to the day and began with checking our emails. The hotel is a little bit strange, I think they mean well but it sometimes comes across as weird. We thought there would be wifi and there was a complaints form which said if wifi was unavailable they'd give you 100 rupees but when we asked they just said it wasn't working yet as they didn't have the security installed. They also kept asking if everything was ok with our room and then asking our room number. We decided to use their internet cafe which was also slightly strange, but the computers worked so I guess it didn't matter. We then had breakfast at the hotel which was also slightly weird, they have a menu with breakfast items on but you have to really insist to see it as they seem to just want to sell the buffet. Anyway we were insistant and managed to get what we wanted.

We thought we'd have a walk to Connaught Place. This was ok but we spent awhile saying no to rickshaw drivers and then telling people we didn't want to go to their shop. It got a bit tiring to be honest. We ventured into an underground shopping mall which was kinda interesting but we didn't stay down there for long! We also walked round a small market where I ended up getting really annoyed and pretty much shouted at a tiny Indian man selling wallets. He just wouldn't take no for an answer and when he started tapping my shoulder I lost it! We also called into a government run shop which was very odd as nobody hassled us at all, in fact they really didn't seem bothered in helping at all! Once we had chosen our purchase we had to take it to a counter, the lady there gave us an invoice which we had to take to the payment counter, after paying we had to take the receipt they gave us to the collection counter where we could pick up our purchase and then when we walked out security had to stamp our receipt. It was all kinda complicated.

After a fairly short debate about where to have lunch we choose the not very adventurous option of McDonalds! At least you know what you're going to get and you're pretty sure it won't make you ill.

We then headed to the National Museum. This was interesting and we got an audio guide which was quite good. It was definately good to be out of the heat.

We then went back to the hotel and decided to have dinner on the roof terrace, well some tables and chairs that they'd put on the roof. As we headed for a table we were asked in a hushed voice if we wanted any beer we said we'd have 2. After placing our food order, which was slightly complicated but we eventually got ourselves understood, and waiting for quite a while our beer came. It was presented to us in big coffee mugs! The food was really good and we ordered 2 more beers. Two local looking people sat on a table next to us and all beer talk went quiet, eventually our next 2 came in our same mugs. Later when Adam paid we found out that the hotel isn't allowed to have alcohol and they don't offer it to Indians becuase they get too lound after a drink but foreigners can handle it. So if anyone asks they say we've got fruit juice!

Day 60 - 15th Apr 2009

The day started as yesterday with another unwanted wake up call at 5:15, great! I thought I had solved the problem the night before by unplugging the phone, but no of course there was a second phone in the bathroom, which is of course what everybody needs! This time I phoned the operator to complain straight away, but still got no apology!

Today we were catching our final train to Delhi our last stop of the trip. We left our room at 9 and luckily had allowed ourselves plenty of time to get to the station as it took over 20 minutes to check out. First a queue and then very slow staff. The chap at the desk asked me how my stay was and I said not great as I kept getting woken up at 5:15, for a moment he seemed concerned and asked if I had not wanted a wake up call and then wandered off to (I presumed) check what had gone wrong. I thought to myself at last someone who is interested and might apologise, but no I think he had just gone to hide as he never came back.

We got a moto to the train station as the hotel had been unable to book me a taxi and arrived about half an hour before our train was due to leave. We found our platform and would you believe it the train was on time! (Well ok technically it might have been ten minutes late but the woman on the load speaker kept telling us it was on time.) By the time we got to Delhi 4 hours later we seemed to have managed to be an hour late, oh well...

We dodged all the taxi touts at the station and managed to make it through the huge sea of people. Our hotel was just a short walk down the road and round the corner. We checked in and a friendly chap showed us to our room, which biazzarly was still being cleaned, I think the chap was in charge of our floor and said to let him know if we needed anything.

We ate lunch of an Indian curry at the hotel restaurant which was very nice and then headed out to look at Delhi. We walked from our hotel through Paharganj which is the budget accomadation part of Delhi, it was pretty busy and the dirt and pollution isn't really very pleasant. We saw some cows in the street which stank!

We then headed to Connaught place which we had read was the 'nice' part of Delhi and to be honest we weren't greatly impressed. Ok it is cleaner than the streets we had just left behind, but it still wasn't particularly nice and we were still bothered by rickshaw drivers and people trying to give us advice that we didn't want.

We had a look at the Tibetan market which was kind of interesting though we didn't look too closely at any of the shops as we couldn't be bothered with the hastle.

We had dinner at McDonalds! Not very adventurous I know, but we were ready for an easy option. Though obviously a McDs in the land of the holy cow is not quite the same as in the good old US of A and seemed to us to have most of it's menu missing. I resited the urge to order a big mac and see what reaction we got and instead we both went for chicken burgers. We got a moto back to the hotel and we were going to our room the chap was still there and again asked us if everything was ok and if we needed anything, he then muttered secretively that he could get us some beer if we wanted! I declined and we went to our room to relax and read our books.

At about 9 O'clock there was a knock on the door and there was another chap who introduced himself as the night attendant for the floor and again wanted to know if we needed anything: towels, tea, coffee, beer... It all seemed quite strange.

Day 59 - 14th Apr 2009

We decided we would get up early today to go and see the Taj Mahal before it got too hot. Unfortunately we didn't intend to get up as early as 5.15am which was when the phone rang in our room! Surprisingly I was not happy. We got up slightly later and tried to ask reception why we'd been rang up and if they could make sure it didn't happen tomorrow, I'm not sure they understood and offered us a wake up call!

We decided to walk to the Taj Mahal just becuase we couldn't face the hassle of using the rickshaws or motos. It was perhaps a 20 minute walk but as it was early it wasn't too hot. We got our tickets and eventually made it through security, you're not allowed wires in the Taj Mahal! First there's a big kinda of court yard and the Taj is behind a huge gate so you can't see it. As you walk through the gate you get a full view of it. It is amazing, so big and so white. It is quite hard to comprehend the size and it was only really later when there where loads of people round the bottom of it you could see how big it is. We walked up to the bottom of it and you can go inside and see the inlaid marble and carvings all quite impressive. I think that the pollution is maybe getting to it though and you can see yellow patches appearing where it should be white.

After spending some time in the grounds, it was nice to have some peace and quiet, we headed out again. We thought we'd walk back but try and find a different way. There are loads of marble and souvenir shops all trying to get you in. We wanted a drink and asked the price at a place, it was double the normal price so we carried and about 400 metres further down there was another shop selling drinks at the regular price. We decided as they weren't ripping people off with the drinks we'd also get poatcards and a couple of souvenirs from them, the chap was friendly and we had fun haggling with him. I think both buyer and seller left happy.

As we were walking back we ended up in a not so touristy area, which was really interesting to see but at a point I did wonder if we should have just walked back the way we knew! A couple of local kids decided to follow us for quite a long way. It was really hard as they just kept pestering us and I felt really mean ignoring them but I'd read about kids just wanting money and stuff from westerners so we decided it was best to not get involved. Eventually we hit the main road and knew where we were, it was a bit of a relief, it was good to see another side to Agra but I wouldn't want to hang around there for too long. Some of the smells were revolting and the conditions people were living in were disgusting. The place is just so dirty with so many people just going about their daily lives, living in it.

To be honest I felt pretty bad as we ate our pizza hut lunch, the amount we were spending in there compared to the amount of money some of the people must have is obscene, but it was good pizza. We felt bad about not eating from local restaurants but with the things we had read about illness and the state some of the places looked we decided it wasn't worth it.

After a short rest at the hotel we decided to head out to see Agra Fort. On the way out we called into the hotel shop, this was a mistake as we were shown loads of elephant ornaments and kept being told he would give us a good price. Eventually he offered us an elephant for about £15! We left fairly quickly.

The fort is pretty impressive if not slightly similar to yesterdays visit to Fatehpur Sikri. from the fort you can look across to the Taj, which was still hard to tell its size. There were some interesting carvings and marble work and architecture so it was good to wander around and look at it all. Obviously as we left there was the usual bombardment of sellers, with postcards and necklaces and ornaments. We had taken to just ignoring people unless we actually wanted to buy something. It felt kinda of rude ignoring people but it did seem to work as they soon gave up asking you to buy stuff.

Back at the hotel we tried out the swimming pool and decided to eat dinner in the hotel restaurant. Whilst we were waiting for the restaurant to open for dinner Adam went across the road to a shop he'd been too a couple of times for water. The shop was also an internet cafe, which Adam told me was actually just a computer in the basement! Ad also bought me a marble elephant from the shop and seemed to make friends with the owner as he ended up giving him his email address and the guy asked if Ad had anything he could give him as a present to remember him by! When Ad said he only had a hotel pencil the guy said perhaps the hotel had some other good stuff Ad could give to him.

As we walked into reception to go dinner we saw there was a puppet theatre set up, kinda strange, we declined the offer to watch a show and went for some food.

Day 58 - 13th Apr 2009

So the day started at midnight sat on our bags on platform 1 of Lucknow train station. It's probably worth mentioning that the train station didn't particularly look like you might expect a train station to be like at midnight. It was very well lit, which made it hard to tell the time of day, and there were people everywhere! Some coming, some going, some selling things, some pushing huge trollies stacked with sacks of I don't know what, and like us loads of people sat waiting.

After it was about an hour after our train was due to arrive we thought we would head across to the platform where it was due to arrive and wait there; for a change of scenery if nothing else. On arriving at platform 5 we soon realised that this perhaps wasn't such a great idea: platform 5 was much dingier than platform 1; spelt of something rather nasty (probably urine) and after spotting a rat and a different train pulling into where we were expecting ours we decided to retreat back to platform 1. Once there we discovered by looking at a different board that it appeared our train was actually going to be 2 hours late, great! I was beginning to feel pretty tired and I think that Liz was too so when an annoucement came over the tanoy to say our train was arriving on platform 4, after over 2 hours of waiting, we were both pretty relieved.

So next challenge was to find our seats/beds. We spotted the only 2nd class air conditioned coach on the train as it pulled in to the station so we thought that must be our one even though it wasn't labelled up with a coach number. On boarding we found that the narrow corridor down the centre was pretty busy and we were struggling to get down with our big bags. Also all the seat numbers were pretty high and we had low seat numbers, so we decided to get off and get back on on the other end. This time we made better headway down the carriage and made it to the four person berth where our seats were, I felt pretty relieved and pulled back the curtain only to discover it was already full with 4 indian men! One of them asked what seat numbers I had and when I said he said yes this is right these are your seats, so we squashed in the 6 of us and our 2 big bags. I guess I should have been a bit annoyed, but to be honest I was so tired and pleased that a train had actually turned up that for the moment I really didn't care. It turned out that 3 of the men were just sitting there while they "sorted out some confusion" and after a few minutes the conductor arrived and took them off to some different seats leaving just the three of us in the berth. Unfortunately for us the man who was left behind was the loudest snorer we have met on the trip yet! So as it was my silly idea to catch the overnight trains I leant Liz my iPod to block out the noise and tried to sleep the best I could.

We arrived at our next destination, Agra, at about 9am and managed to dodge the initial taxi drivers trying to get us to go out a side entrance and made it to the pre paid taxi counter. We paid our fee and our driver took us to his car and we set off to the hotel. He took us straight there with out any messing around, trying to take us to other hotels or shops where he got comission as we had read might happen in the guide book, which in our tired state we were quite pleased about. We also booked him to take us to Fatehpur Sikri in the afternoon as we figured he seemed alright, although we weren't sure whether his price was over inflated...

This time we didn't get to have our room straight away but had to wait about 45 minutes. Once there we had an hour or so sleep to try and catch up and then headed to the hotel restaurant for lunch.

At 2 O' clock we met our taxi driver outside, who had brought his friend with him to keep him compnay while he waited for us. It seemed a little bit strange, but we went along with it. It took us about one and a quarter hours to get to Fatehpur Sikri which is an old abadoned palace which used to be the capital. The friend was quite chatty and about our age and spoke very good english.

We arrived at Fatehpur Sikri and decided to catch the bus to the palace. As we walked to the bus stop someone approached us and asked if we wanted a guide, we said no but he just didn't want to take no for an answer and followed us all the way to the bus, he was really very annoying and we ended up having to be a bit rude to get him to leave us alone.

The palace itself was pretty amazing, it had been sat empty for 400 years since the water supply dried up, but from it's condition you never would have guessed. It was a huge complex with elaborate carvings and arcitechure. It was definitely worth the journey.

On the way back the friend started talking about some of the carvings that Agra was famous for and asked if we wanted to see some on the way back. It sounded like the beginnings of a marble shop commision scam to us so we politely declined. Then a bit further on he started asking us if we liked tea or spices, I guess he had a different shop in mind, but again we said no. Then his next attempt was asking Liz if she wanted to wear a Sari when she went to the Taj Mahal to have her photograph taken wearing it, but surprisingly Liz wasn't keen! And his final attempt was he wanted to take us to a restaurant for dinner, we got out of that one by saying that we had already paid for our meals at the hotel (technically a lie, but a change from just saying no thanks) so eventually we made it back to our hotel without any unwanted side trips.

We were pretty tired so had room service for dinner which was pretty cheap by western standards.

Day 57 - 12th Apr 2009

We started the day with breakfast at our hotel then headed out to see some sights. The first one was a temple which was within walking distance of our hotel. As we emerged from our hotel lobby two rickshaw drivers spotted us from the end of the road and started running towards their rickshaw then raced to get to us first. Unfortunately for them after yesterdays experience's we had decided we weren't going to use the rickshaws today. One of them followed us all the way down the road while we walked to our first stop. It was quite intertesting but seemed to be in a bit of a state of disrepair. When we came out of the temple the rickshaw driver was there still waiting, but after we ignored him yet again and started walking he got bored and gave up on us.

Our next stop was the botanical gardens, but it didn't seem that they were particuarly open to the public except for some sort of walk early in the morning, so we carried on to the main road to find another moto to take us to our next destination.

We arrived at Bara Imambara, which I guess was a kind of palace. It was built by the nawabs (kings I think) of Avadh which was the kingdom which was here before the British took power in 1857. It has one of the largest unsupported vaulted halls in the world which was pretty impressive. We then hired a guide who showed us round the labyrinth which was built above the palace. It was pretty cool with lots of corridors and stairways and we felt that we might have got lost if we didn't have someone to show us the way.

We then headed down to the Hussainabad Clocktower which apparently carries the largest clock in India. Next was the Picture Gallery a rather odd musuem which occupied one small room of a larger building and had pictures of all of the Nawabs. We spent about 5 minutes before moving on. Last stop was the Hussainabad Imambara another small palace.

After this the weather was getting very hot and we decided to find a moto to get us back to near our hotel. When we had walked out of our hotel earlier we had seen a shopping centre with a MacDonalds, KFC and Pizza Hut, so we decided to have a break from Indian food and get a pizza! Walking into the restaurant from the bustle of the streets we had just left was like walking into another world. It was fully air conditioned and looked like a very nice western pizza hut. It was completely empty apart from us and I think our waiter thought he was working in a five star hotel with the amount of attention he gave us. It was just what we needed to regain some energy and cool down, Indian streets can be quite tiring!

After lunch we had a look round the shopping centre. Again this felt like we could have been in a western city and felt quite out of place compared to the rest of the city. The strange thing was the amount of security there was, presumably to keep out undesirable people, but there were several guards on the entrance (some with shotguns) and metal detectors.

After lunch we headed back to our hotel and had a bit of a rest before dinner. We had a night train to catch that evening so we had decided to get some rest so we weren't so tired as the last one. We had also paid extra at our hotel so we could check out at 11pm.

So we checked out at 11 and caught the taxi to the station. Got there at about 11:05 so with plenty of time to find our train which was due to arrive at 11:25 and depart at 11:50. Unfortunately it turned out we had even more time as a screen said that our train was going to be 1 hour late! So we found a spot just near the entrance to put down our bags and sat down on them to wait.

Day 56 - 11th Apr 2009

Thankfully I woke up feeling much better and slept surprisingly well on the train. We arrived into Lucknow, thankfully the last stop so it was easy to know when to get off, at about 6 am. We got off the train and joined the flood of people heading in a direction we hoped was the exit. We decided to get a motorised mini vehicle to the hotel, I would have called it a TukTuk but they seem to be called moto or auto's here. To our delight the hotel let us have our room early so we checked in and cleaned up, I don't think I've been that grubby since I was a kid and didn't know better! As I was removing all the dirt from me I felt something on my back, I asked Adam to look and he tried to brush it off but said it was attached we then realised it must be a Tick! At least there was a reason why we'd brought tweezers with us!

We ate some breakfast at the hotel which was great as we hadn't had a proper meal since yesterdays breakfast! We then headed out so got a rickshaw to the Residency, unfortunately all the drivers wanted to take us round for a whole day which we didn't want. We thought we'd managed to agree a price with a driver to take us just to the Residency but as it turned out he didn't think the same as us! Our driver once we arrived went to the ticket counter and started saying stuff, we didn't understand, so in the end we just gave him the money we'd said and bought our tickets. There is a two tier ticketing system so if you ar Indian you get in very cheaply but foreigners have to pay a lot more, although it's still cheap. We had a wander round, it's basically buildings that British lived in when they governed the town, it has been left how it was after a seige in 1857. Whilst walking around we met a group of men who wanted their picture taken with Adam! It was very weird, we were celebrities for about 2 minutes.

When we came out of the place to go back to our hotel the rickshaw driver was waiting for us, he produced a piece of paper which seemed to list all of the Lucknow sights and at the bottom it said that we had taken 220 rupees from him because we had bought our own tickets. I think he had wanted to get us tickets at the price for locals and then pocket the difference for himself. At this we decided to walk away from him as communication was obviously not going very well. So we walked up the road and of course the bike man followed, luckily there was a auto nearby which we jumped in and got away from our rickshaw driver!

We had lunch at the hotel and used their computer to put some pictures on the website, then decided to head out just for a bit of a walk around. This is harder than it sounds because all the rickshaw drivers wanted to take us somewhere. We found some shops and had a browse in a few, I decided to buy a top from United Colours of Benneton, the staff where very attentive and helpful. As Adam was paying using our Visa card he somehow entered an amount when he should have been putting in his PIN and ended up paying about £1000 for my top! The staff found this pretty funny as it was such a huge amount, they quickly voided the sale and put it through at the correct price! It was almost a very costly shopping spree! We headed back to the hotel stopping en route to buy a Pepsi which I think you have to drink at the stall because they use glass bottles which I think get reused.

We ate dinner at the hotel and had some Indian dishes, not too disimilar to Indian food back home really. Then crashed out at about 9pm!

More Photos!

We've managed to upload some more photos so check them out in the photo section!

Day 55 - 10th Apr 2009

We needed to leave the lodge by 8am this morning but this still gave us time to have a bird watching walk and have breakfast. (Things start very early in the jungle.) So we said goodbye to our home for the past 3 days and heading to the town to get the bus. We made it to the bus office and waited for our bus to arrive, When it did arrive it made the bus we had previously caught from Kathmandu to get to Chitwan look positively luxorious! I guess it wasn't too bad but it certainly wasn't comfortable, well at least not after the first 20 minutes of the 5 hour journey! And the driver drove as though he were practising to be a racing driver but just didn't quite have the vehicle for it! There was a quick 15 minute lunch stop which was a welcomed relief from sitting. When we finally made it to the final destination, slightly ahead of schedule, we then had to get some transport to take us to the border. We opted for a cycle rickshaw. The guy seemed confident he would be fine with us and all our luggage. I felt so sorry for him as he put all his effort into moving us along. Plus it was really hot. But he got us there and the only slight problem was we thought we were going to pay in Nepali money and he wanted the same amount but in Indian money, surprisingly his maths was good and he knew which was the better deal. After exiting Nepal it's a short walk over to the Indian Immigration office. Although it really isn't clear where to go and you feel like you're just walking along the high street and then one of the shops is the Indian immigration office. However the guy helping us fill in the immigration form was the friedliest immigration officer I have ever met. He got chairs for us to sit on, helped us to fill in the form and then adviced us on where to get the bus and how much it should cost.

We walked a short distance towards the buses but decided to see the alternative transport options, the buses loooked perhaps even worse than the mornings bus! We ended up hiring a jeep to drive us to Gorakphur, about a 2 hour journey. We decided to pay extra and hire the whole vehicle for oursleves. This meant the luggage didn't have to go on the roof and we had some space which was a welcome change. So we set off, this driver obviously fancied himself as a competitor to this mornings driver and was not going to drive behind another vehicle for any length of time. This made for a slightly hair rising journey as I held on for dear life! We stop at a road side cafe for some snacks, which was probably owned by his uncle or something because he was very insistent that we got out and bought something! Anyway we eventually made it to the train station, unfortunately about 6 hours too early so we found a seat and camped out at the station. This seemed to be a popular pastime as the place was buzzing with people, generally much more prepared than we were with blankets to sit on and picnics to eat. However we found we were quite an entertainment for people as they starred at us as though they hadn't seen Westerners before. Well to be honest we only saw 3 others the whole time we were there! When Adam got his book out to read this caused quite a lot of interest with several people asking to look at it, I'm not sure if they don't have many books or liked the look of it or thought it was a way to start conversation. Anyway we chated to a few people, although we were always half worried they were planning some great robbery attempt, a bit sad I know to expect the worst from people but then later we had the train staff telling us to be careful when we put a bag on the floor.

Unfortunately the train ended up being about an hour late, which in some ways was good as we wouldn't get to Lucknow quite so early but we were pretty tired. By the time the train was half an hour late I was feeling kinda ill, we had taken our malaria tablets earlier in the evening and they never seem to sit particularly well in our stomachs. So I was almost doubled over with stomach cramps when the train finally did arrive. Thankfully the toilet in first class wasn't anywhere near as bad as the toilets at the station! Luckily we had been allocated a cabin to ourselves, so Adam took the top bunk while I collapsed on the bottom.

Day 54 - 9th Apr 2009

Another early start for our elephant safari at 6 am, although we missed the morning tea and biscuits as we weren't up early enough. We boarded our elephant along with our dining companions and headed off into the jungle. Riding an elephant isn't really the most comfortable mode of transport but it does give you a good vantage point to see things from. Although it also means you're at about the right height for branches and stuff to hit! We saw a rhino sitting down resting and some nice birds and the usual wild boar. And then as we were getting fairly close to finishing our safari we saw a sloth bear! It also had 2 cubs with her which she was carrying on her back. It was amazing and made the whole uncomfortable elephant ride worthwhile.

After this exciting sighting it was time for breakfast. Word got round that we had seen a bear and some people were a bit jealous. Our next activity was a village visit, this meant a jeep ride out of the national park and then we walked round the village and got the jeep back. It was quite interesting seeing the houses and it was a bit like going back in time as it was all pretty basic. But to our surprise there were quite a few places with electricity and some had television. In some ways it felt like we were the show for the locals as everyone seemed to come out to look at us as we walked round. I guess it's not everyday they see 5 westerners wondering around. It was so hot that we were really glad to get back on the jeep to go back, but about 5 minutes up the road there were so,e roadworks Nepali style. This involved 1 man watching as 3 others shovelled sand off a trailer onto the road in and atempt to level out the potholes. There were 2 problems with this, firstly the blocked the whole road to do it so we had to wait in the full sun for them to finish unloading the trailer, second in the process of unloading the trailer they had manage to get the trailer stuck so we also had to wait whilst they figured out how to un jam the trailer! Needless to say we were roasting by time we got back to the lodge.

We decided we should pack all our stuff for tomorrows departure after lunch whilst it was light as there is limited lights allowed on after dark, which is about 7pm. So we are provided with a keresone lantern which is ok but doesn't really provide much light.

At about 4 pm, so it was getting less hot, we went with 2 guides to an observation tower. This was really good as it was just Adam and I with the 2 guides so we could ask whatever we wanted and they were really good at pointing things out. We saw a monkey again as we walked through the forest. The observation tower overlooked a bit of a lake and there were birds sat in the trees and some on the lake. Herons and Storks were sat in the trees and Moorhens and another pretty bird which I can't remember the name of were feeding from the lake. There were also 3 crocodiles sat around sun bathing! And as we sat watching the birds come and go and listening to the noise of the jungle a rhino came along to have a drink from the lake! It was amazing he was so big and I guess had no idea we were there as he just went about his business oblivious. Although at one point he almost looked like he was posing for pictures! It was a much more comfortable way of seeing a rhino as opposed to the elephant riding. Eventually he went away but then after only a few minutes 2 rhinos appeared, I think one was the same one. Then a couple of wild boar turned up to join the party. It ended the day nicely, so we walked back to have dinner, saying hello to the lodges baby elephant as we went past.

Day 53 - 8th Apr 2009

Got up at 5:30 for our first activity of the day: an elephant safari. This involved riding through the jungle on the back of an elephant in search of wildlife. It was good fun but a little bumpy. We saw a few different birds and a deer, so not loads of animals on that trip, just quite a lot of staring into the jungle looking for them.

Then it was time for breakfast before our next activity: a nature walk. This was a 2 hour guided walk through the jungle where we learnt about the different trees and plants.

Then it was back to the lodge for a break from the now very hot sun, where we spent the time reading our books.

After lunch it was: elephant briefing and bathing. Here we learnt more about the elephants and got to bathe with one of them. Which actually involved me sitting on the back of one while he sprayed me with water and Liz photographed me!

Then it was time for our second elephant safari. This time we saw another deer, a rhino and an eagle which was pretty big.

Tonight instead of the movie we had a slideshow. Which was actually a lot more interesting than it sounds and we learnt a lot about the park and the animals in it.

Day 52 - 7th Apr 2009

Yet another early start as we left our hotel at 6:20 to get the bus to Chitwan. Taxi driver who took us to our bus didn't have any change so we had to mess around while he tried to find someone to give him some. Found the bus no problem, a little bit older than the one we took in Cambodia and the luggage went on the roof of this one. But the seats were comfortable enough and it went ok. The journey out of Kathmandu was slow. At times we just stood stationary for 5 minutes, I think because of the road being so windy that at places 2 buses couldn't pass. After 6 hours we arrived at Tandi the pickup point for the Chitwan jungle lodge which was to be our accomodation for the next three nights. We were met by a friendly guide and took a Landrover to the lodge. It was about another half hour along the road and then half hour off roading to get there. Lunch was waiting for us when we arrived which we were very ready for.

The lodge is quite unique in that is one of only 6 lodges which are actually inside Chitwan National Park which is a protected natue area. The accommodation was simple but nice with limited electricity (one small light in our bathroom until 10pm).

After lunch we got a briefing from the lodge manager and then it was onto our first activity: a jungle drive. This involved going out looking for wildlife in the jungle in the back of an open topped Landrover. It was only me and Liz on it along with 4 guides! We drove for about 45 to 60 minutes along bumpy tracks through the jungle and got to the point where we needed to turn back. By this time we hadn't really seen any wildlife apart from a few birds flying about.

Luckily on the way back we saw quite a bit more. First some monkeys with a baby, then 2 different types of deer, then the most exciting a baby rhino! Then a bit further up the road we saw 2 full size rhinos. At this point the guides said we could get out of the jeep and walk closer to them. This was a bit scary as they had previously just been telling us how dangerous they were. It was great to get closer though as you could really appreciate how big they were. They gave us a health and safety talk briefing about what to do if the rhino charged: run back to the landrover quickly!

After that it was back to the lodge for popcorn and a movie! Though when I say movie it was actually a tourism video for Nepal and in Nepali! Then it was dinner time where we met another English couple who were sat on the same table as us and who we got on with very well. The food was all pretty good and quite a lot of it, lunch was 3 courses and dinner was just 2 but you could help yourself to the main so no danger of being hungry!

Day 51 - 6th Apr 2009

Started the day early with a breakfast at our hotel and then headed out to explore the immediate vicinity of our hotel. The streets were really busy with people, motorbikes and cars and similiar to Georgetown everyone was sharing the same narrow strip of road. We were in search of an ATM machine to get some money out but with the streets looking so different to home it wasn't so easy. We spent about an hour wandering round and decided to head back to the hotel and take a breather.

We had seen a couple of ATM possibilities on our travels and so I headed back out to try one of them while Liz took a bit more of a sleep. Luckily the second ATM I tried worked and we had some money.

Next we needed to phone up the people who we had booked our next three days accomadation with and get our tickets and pay the balance. This involved walking to their office which was about 15 minutes away. We found it without any problem and got our tickets.

Then we stopped in a cafe for lunch, where interestingly all the waiters were deaf... Luckily we didn't want anything more complicated than what was on the menu, so some pointing sufficed.

After lunch we headed down to Durbar Square, yet another UNESCO World Heritage site. It's quite interesting in that it contains lots of different temples from different periods of history and in keeping with the rest of Kathmandu wasn't actually very square. More of a crazy 20 or so sided maze of an open space dotted randomly with the temples. By the time we had looked round them all we needed a break again from all the bustle so headed back to the hotel.

We asked the freindly manager's of the hotel if they could reccomend anywhere for dinner and they directed us to a Nepalise restaurant owned by the hotelier's uncle and told us to show the hotels card and ask for the 'special'. What we got was a taster of lots of differnt Nepalise food, we'd eat one thing and they'd be on the way with something else! Some of the courses were nicer than others and a couple were a little odd, but overall it was a great experience.

On returning to the hotel we found that there was no electricity on. It seems that there is some sort of power issue, which we never quite got to the bottom of, that means there is a schedule of when your electric will be off each day. Not something you could ever imagine back home. So the hotel was lit by candlelight until partial lights came back on at 8 which was enough for us to pack by ready for our early start the next day.

Day 50 - 5th Apr 2009

Today we're heading to Nepal. Our flight isn't till 6.55pm though so we have another day round Hong Kong first.

After packing our stuff for what feels like the billionth time we catch the underground train to the airport express. At the train station they have a cool system were you can check in for your flight anytime during the day, so we got rid of our bags and headed off.

We decided to try and go up the peak on the tram, so we bought a sandwich from subway to take with us as a picnic. When we got to the tram though there was a really long queue and anyone who knows me will know I'm not one for standing in a queue so we changed our plan and went to the park instead. At this point we were really hot so decided to get ice creams, Adam went to purchase them and came back with a vanilla cornetto type thing and a lolly which he wanted to be orange flavour. It looked pretty red though so we thought perhaps strawberry or cherry, it turned out on closer inspection of the packaging to be red bean flavour! Kind of like a kidney bean flavour ice lolly! Surprisingly we soon threw this away. The park was actually really good, there's a walk through aviary which in many ways was better than the one we paid to go round in Kuala Lumpar. The walkway is elevated so you can watch the birds as they sit on branches and fly about. It was a nice change from the usual busier Hong Kong and also gave us chance to practice photographing wildlife before our time at Chitwan in Nepal. Also in the park there's a tea museum which is also free so we thought we may as well look round, we learnt how to make a cup of tea and how tea is produced. I also managed to spend some of my birthday present money in the gift shop!

Surprisingly it was now time to get the train to the airport so that's the end of our Hong Kong experience.

The flight to Nepal was longer than I thought and weirdly their time is 2 hours and 15 minutes difference to Hong Kong, I've no idea why it's 15 minutes but that's what we were told! On arrival we had to apply for a visa which is really just a case of filling in a form and paying some money. As we tried to collect our bags a man come over with a trolley to help us, he looked like he worked at the airport although I suspect not as he then said we needed to tip him. It's weird how up front he was about it though he was just like you have to tip me! He picked the wrong people though as we didn't have any Nepalese money! We then meet a man holding a card with our name on so we went with him to a car and then he said we had to tip him so this time we gave him a $1 note, him seemed fairly happy and left. Our driver got in and said that he was also going to take another person to a different hotel first, this seemed kind of weird as he was meant to be from our hotel so I'm not sure why he was taking someone to a different one. Anyway it all worked out fine and we eventually made it to our hotel, after driving down some very dubious looking roads and at one point I was sure we were driving across a building site! I'll never complain about English roads again. When we got to the hotel we greeted by the owners who were really friendly, almost suspiciously so, they gave us a beer each and we sat and had a chat with them. Went to bed exhausted and were woken at about 3 am by loads of dogs barking!

Technical Issues

Regular followers of the blog will have noted that the website has been down a bit recently. I can only apologise and say if it doesn't work just try again another time. The reason for it is that I use a free service to host the site and like most things in life you get what you pay for...

Day 49 - 4th Apr 2009

Decided to skip the hotel breakfast today and instead headed to MacDonalds for something a bit more appetising. Unfortunately both of us had upset stomachs this morning which we think is down to the anti-malaria tablets which we are taking for Nepal and India. Liz had felt a bit funny the two previous days.

We looked for some shops which were mentioned in our guide book, but they didn't seem to be where it said. Luckily for me the toilets were as I still wasn't feeling very good.

Then it was back to the post office with our things to post home. But when we got there it was closed! We heard some people in front of us talking and apparently it was a public holiday! This wasn't great news as we didn't really have space for the stuff we were going to post home. Luckily we dicovered that there was a downstairs section of the post office which was still open, although the que was huge. We eventually got our box packaged up and Liz filled in all the paperwork to send it on it's journey home.

I still wasn't feeling very well so Liz thought we should go and have some lunch to get some energy into me. We found a Chinese fast food place and I sat at a table while Liz negotiated the again slightly confusing ordering process. I was very grateful for the help!

After lunch, with my energy supplies somewhat replenished, we headed to the Hong Kong Museum of History. This has an interesting display which traces the story of Hong Kong from prehistoric times to modern day. It is very well done contains some impressive full scale replicas of differnt types of buildings and at one stage a whole reproduction street complete with a tram! We really enjoyed looking round and learnt a lot about Hong Kong.

For dinner we went to pizza hut near our hotel. Not so adventurous I know, but with our funny tummies it was just the ticket!

Day 48 - 3rd Apr 2009

Started the day with a bit of a strange breakfast in, with keeping with our room, a very small restaurant.

We then caught the underground to Hong Kong Island where we had planned to go up the peak and see the views, but the weather seemed rather misty so we thought we'd leave it till another day.

So first stop was the Post Office to investigate postage costs for parcel number two back to the UK. Luckily they are a little bit cheaper than Austarlia.

We took a ride on a tram, which are quite interesting in that that are double deckered and very narrow. Got off near the Happy Valley race course and had some lunch.

Then we headed to the Bank of China tower where you can go up to the 43rd floor for free and get a nice view over the island. Then we took the Star Ferry in the opposite direction to the day before to look at some shops and we brought some headphones and a splitter cable so now we can both listen to my iPod at the same time.

We browsed a few more shops before heading to a Chinese restaurant which was in our guide book. So we asked for a table for 2 at the door and were given a piece of paper with 2 written on it and told to go upstairs where we were seated by someone else who didn't really seem very interested in our piece of paper. We got the menus which had english tranlations (good start) and a piece of paper and pencil which was to put our order on. So you put the number of the meal you wanted and how many of each one. So we went through the menu worked out what we wanted, filled in the piece of paper and... now what? Nobody seemed to be paying us any attention and we were the only westerners in the place. So we waited and waited... Eventually the lady who was sat at the table next to us helped us out and said that we needed to be a bit more forecful in getting the waiters attention and give the order to him. So we did and everything we ordered turned up. We had some really dim sum, a beef satay noodle dish and some sweet and sour prawns. All very nice. Luckily we had watched other people paying and realised that you had to get up and pay on your way out. So no more waiting.

We then started to walk back to our hotel and on the way looked at the temple street night market. You can buy all sorts of things here from knock off hangbags to Mahjong sets. Liz bought me a new wallet and I bought her a cuddly toy and a Mahjong set.

Then Liz headed back to the hotel while I went to a cake shop to get Liz a birthday cake. I also stopped in to the supermarket and managed to find some cake candles. So we had a slightly belated birthday cake in our hotel room which was very tasty! (Comment from Liz - it was perhaps the best chocolate cake I've ever had, and we shared a nice strawberry french style cake. Hong Kong has good cakes.)

Day 47 - 2nd Apr 2009

It's my birthday! Although it feels kinda strange to be spending it in Cambodia and then Hong Kong. Adam has been carrying cards for me from home so we start the day by opening them and some presents. To be honest it makes me miss everyone, but only 2 weeks left now so it'll soon go.

The hotel in Phonm Penh is really nice and they do a good breakfast, nothing fancy but the eggs are cooked well. Plus the have free computers to use so that's great for emailing. We then got our taxi to the airport, it's a bit weird driving around the city with motorbikes, cyclists and taxis whizzing all around whilst we're feeling really safe in the car. Adam had some issues getting through security, on the bag scan they thought they'd seen a knife so searched his bag only to find there was no knife, however they did find his sellotape which they confiscated for being dangerous!

Arrived in Hong Kong at about 3pm, decided to use the airport express train to get into town and then use the MTR to get to our hotel. Only problem with this was that it meant changing lines twice and the last train was pretty busy, anyway we managed. We started walking to the hotel and turned down the road which it's on only to find a busy fruit and veg market going on, plus we're not sure which along the road we need to go. Luckily we picked the right direction and manage to negotiate the crowds of people.

When we get to our room we discover it is the smallest room there could possibly be! It is basically the width of a double bed, with a tiny space down one side, not really big enough to walk down. There's a wardrobe, well a tiny cupboard on the wall which you can hang shirts in, but 90 degrees to the way they would normally hang! Anyway I guess you get what you pay for...

Whilst deciding what to do with the rest of the day I received a birthday phonecall from Duncan. It was great to hear from England, I'm looking forward to getting home.

We then headed out, first we took the MTR to the last stop in Kowloon. As soon as we got out of the subway station people were hassling us about getting suits made and shirts etc, we soon decided to turn off the crazy busy road. We walked around a bit a then watched the light show. We looked over to Hong Kong Island from Kowloon and they played music whilst some the buildings did a light show. It was kinda entertaining although I think seeing it once is enough. We then took the star ferry over to Hong Kong Island. It's crazy how cheap it is, about 23p one way!

For dinner we eventually found a weird pizza bar. The beer was pretty nice although fairly pricey and pizza was good. The street it was on seemed quite 'interesting' some nice ladies trying to get business in some bars! We finally made it back to our hotel, fairly late and pretty tired! Unfortunately by time we got back to our tube stop the nice cake shop was shut so no birthday cake for me today...

Day 46 - 1st Apr 2009

Breakfast at the hotel before we checked out in time for our 7:45 pickup from our hotel for the bus to Phnom Phen. Slightly concerning in that the hotel staff had never heard of the company on our ticket and when they tried to phone up to find out where the coach was they couldn't get through. So we waited nervously wondering if we had been sold wothless tickets...

But at 8am our bus arrived. Phew! However it looked nothing like the shiny new bus on our ticket and was quite old with hard seats and no air conditioning. But to be honest we were so glad that a bus had actually turned up that we didn't bother to argue and just got on. And off we went, though after about twenty minutes we pulled into what must be the Siem Reap bus depot where our actual bus was waiting; it turned out the first one was just the shuttle bus. Now the second bus still wasn't exactly brand new, but it would have been a top range luxury bus when it was and it had air conditioning that worked. Although strangly some of the seats were obviously from different coaches.

And so started our long journey to Phnom Phen. At one point we stopped in a town somewhere and were told we had to get off off the bus; we were slighlty concerned but it turned out it was just a toliet stop. After about 7 hours of travelling and having watched 2 films where I didn't understand a word that was said we arrived at the outskirts of Phnom Phen. Now if there had been no traffic it probably would have taken another 5 minutes but as it was it took another hour. The traffic was crawling and the reason was down to the unusal approach the Cambodians have to roadworks. Whereas in the UK we would have properly coned off areas, reduced speed limits and diversions where needed; in Cambodia they don't bother with any of that and just get going digging up whatever bit of road they need to. It is then up to the traffic to work out how to get by. In Siem Reap we saw a place where they had dug up the whole street and the traffic just went up over the pavement. Here we had to negotiate around diggers and the traffic fighting to come the other way.

Eventually we made it to our destination and were immediately met by the throngs of tuk tuk drivers, decided to just go with the first one who latched on to me, which in actual fact wasn't the greatest move as he didn't actually know where our hotel was. But I managed to knock his $5 down to 3 which was quite cheap and with some initial help from his friend and later from my guide book we made it to the hotel. He then tried to insist that he would take us to the airport the next day, but with his navigation skills we declined...

Had a very late lunch at the hotel bar, during which it poured with rain, then headed out for a quick look round the vicinity. We walked past the Silver Pagoda a big temple which is one of the main tourist sights, but didn't go in as it was closed. We then walked past the Cambodia-Vietnam friendship monument and down towards the independance monument. It is quite nice paved area around here and there were lots of Cambodians out playing badmington and football and other games.

Headed towards some restaurants which were in our guide books and met an Australian chap who claimed to have had his wallet stolen and needed to borrow a few dollars to phone Australia to get some money transferred. Unfortunately it sounded like the beginnings of some sort of con, so we symphasised with him then said we had no change!

Had dinner at a Thai restaurant before heading back to the hotel where Liz went for a swim while I wrapped some presents ready for tomorrow...

Day 45 - 31st Mar 2009

Today we had arranged for a tuk tuk to take us around the Temples of Angkor. (Technically speaking it's not a tuk tuk but that's what everyone seems to call them round here, it's a moterbike with a trailer attached and the trailer is a kinda carriage, you can fit up to 4 people in them but it's fairly comfortable with 2.) We had a nice breakfast at the hotel, the hotel has been finished very nicely with lots of cool statues and ornaments. The tuk tuk picked us up at 9am and we had arranged for him to take us round for the whole day, which I think can be up to 8 hours! First we headed to the ticket booth to buy our passes. This is extremely hi tech as they take a photo of you on a web cam and print it onto your pass. There was quite a queue but luckily for us only for the 3 day passes so we were straight through. We then went to the first temple on the tour, Angkor Wat, this is the biggest and probably most famous of them all. It is huge. We were dropped off at the entrance which is a causeway over the huge moat that surronds the grounds of the temple. Then there is a wall which is the first part of the temple, which was pretty impressive but as you walk through this you can then see the main part of the temple. It is so impressive, words can't really describe it. There is quite a distance to walk between this first wall and the main part and it is quite exposed so the sun is beating down with no relief from any shade. Thankfully the inside of the temple is cooler. Hopefully we will be able to put some pictures onto the website soon so you be able to see for yourselves as it is hard to describe the place, but it is definately a major highlight of the trip.

Next we went to Angkor Thom which is a much smaller temple but still impressive in a different way. This temple is made up of lots of bricks of stone which to start with just look a bit of a jumbled mess but as you get closer you can make out faces carved into them. Around the Angkor Thom site there are also several smaller sights to see including the Terrace of Elephants. Across the road from here are loads of souvenoir stands and stalls for food so we decided to eat here. Everytime you get near to these stalls people start shouting at you to try and sell things, so as soon as we started to cross the road a lady came across with a menu and starting talking to us. We went with her to eat at her restaurant/stall. It was all pretty cheap and the food was very good considering their kitchen is a tiny area and it's kind of like a camping kitchen. In total we had a rice dish each, 2 cans of coke and a 1.5litre bottle of water to take with us, all for $8 (US dollars). I'm not sure if we've mentioned this but the countries main currency is US dollars, except when something is less then a dollar and they use riel.

It does get kind of tiring always saying 'no thanks' to these people consistently trying to sell things, but the kids are worse. Generally speaking once you've said no to an adult they will leave you alone but the kids keep trying to put the items in your hand and follow you. Mostly this only happens outside the temple so at least you can enjoy the inside in peace.

We went to a couple of smaller temples on our way to Ta Prohm. At Ta Prohm they haven't cleared away all of the jungle so there are still trees growing from the walls of the temple. It is really weird how the buildings and the trees are joined together. Quite a bit of the temple is closed off as it is too dangerous to walk around it but some is still accessible. I think it was this temple which was used in Tomb Raider.

Like the first temple there is quite a walk to get out of the temple grounds and at the gate where our driver said he would meet us there was loads of people selling stuff. The gate to walk was pretty narrow and everyone was ready and waiting on the other side to try and sell things. Two kids even came to the Tuk Tuk and kept trying to sell us stuff as we drove off. We decided that we were all templed out after this so we got our driver to take us back. We drove a different way back to the hotel and saw some interesting sights on the way.

We were pretty tired after our days temple sight seeing but headed out to get some dinner. Adam headed into the market to buy a surprise birthday present for me while I had a beer at the cheap beer place we went to the night before. We decided to try the food there as well, and learnt that fresh spring rolls are nowhere near as nice as the fried ones!

Day 44 - 30th March 2009

An early start today to get our 4:30am taxi to the airport. We had booked it the day before with the hotel and when we checked out the taxi was waiting for us at the kerbside. Slightly worryingly the taxi driver was fast asleep inside his taxi and it took some banging on his window from the hotel staff before he emerged looking rather sleepy. On the plus side he got us to the airport quite quickly (though Liz thought perhaps a bit worryingly so and there may have been an incident with a level crossing which seemed to have flashing lights...) and his meter wasn't 'broken' so the fare was about a quarter of what the first chap was asking and half of what we actually paid the first chap.

So we got to the airport about 5am and headed to the Air Asia desk to see if anyone had handed in Liz's iPod and DS. There was a lost and found counter which seemed promising but the chap there said we needed to come back in half an hour to see the right person, then after half an hour he said another 15 minutes and when eventually we did get to see the 'right' person he said it hadn't been handed in so there wasn't much we could do :-(.

So with 90 minutes till our flight we headed towards our gate. The queues for passport control were huge and the staff seemed to be in no hurry about what they were doing. There were a few people who were getting agitated about missing their flights.

Eventually got thorugh and Liz got some breakfast at Burger King before we boarded our flight. The gate was one of these where you have to get on a bus which takes you to the plane and we had a nice chat with a couple from San Francisco who were also on their way to Cambodia.

After our shortest plane journey yet on this trip of just 40 minutes, during which time they managed to serve breakfast, we arrived in Cambodia at Siem Reap. The airport there is very small, but quite pretty in a traditional Cambodian design. Took us a little while to clear passport control as we had to apply for a visa on arrival, which was no problem just time consuming, then it was a taxi journey to our hotel.

The hotel was right in the centre of Siem Reap and was a very beautiful building set in some pretty gardens. It was only about 10am but luckily our room was ready for us and we took the opportunity to get a bit more sleep.

After that we headed out to find some lunch. As in Bangkok there are lots of Tuk Tuks which are constantly trying to give you lifts to places. One chap even followed us down the road and I must have said no to him about 4 times! We found somewhere from our guide book for lunch which was nice food and a good price too. (Plus the had air con which was a major plus point!)

After lunch we thought we would go and have a look round the old market and although it wasn't really that far by this time the midday sun was baking and we thought we might be better to give a tuk tuk a go. So on emerging from the restaurant who should we find outside but the Tuk Tuk driver who had chased us down the street. We negotiated his fare down to $1 and in about 5 minutes were at the old market.

Our first task was to arrange onwards travel to Phonm Phen where our next hotel was booked and where we would catch the plane to Hong Kong. We found a small shop which sold bus tickets and decided to go for the so called 'VIP' bus for an extra $2 each, the bus in the picture looked very modern and claimed to have free water, toilet and a hostess service!

We then wandered around the old market which sells all sorts of things from fruit and veg and meat to rows of souvenior stalls. Again we felt like there was an awful lot of stalls and not so many tourists, so all the stallholders were very keen to try and get us into their stall.

After a while we had had enough and feeling quite warm decided to stop for a drink. We managed to find the cheapest beer which I have ever had in a pub/restaurant. The local Angkor draft for an amazing 50 American cents (about 35p).

We headed back to our hotel and went for a very refreshing swim in their pool and then sat in the loungers by the side in the shade and read some of the guide book.

At the airport we had been handed a leaflet about the night market, which claimed that there was free wifi, so we decided to head over there and take a look. We didn't manage to find any free wifi but the market was interesting to wander round and we bought a few souveniors. They also had a rather strange 'fish massage' where you could put you feet in a big pool full of fish, which would then come and nibble at your feet. We decided to give that one a miss...

Then it was dinner at a mexican restaurant we had seen earlier in the day which again was very reasonably priced and back to our hotel and bed. At our hotel we spotted some local wildlife in the form of 2 geckos; which Liz says she would have quite liked to see, except for the fact that they were running around on our hotel room's ceiling!

Day 43 - 29th Mar 2009

Firstly Bangkok is a hot city, It must be the warmest place we have been to so far.

We had breakfast at the hotel which was a mission in itself, we couldn't find the breakfast room, even after asking the receptionist. It wasn't untill a man sat on the street fixing radios pointed where to go that we figured it out! We then headed to the Grand Palace, our guide book said to get there early to beat all the other tourist so we were there by about 9am. It seemed everyone else had the same plan. We started heading for the wrong gate and meet a local who told us that the Grand Palace is only open for Thai residents in the morning, I think he wanted to take us someone on his Tuk Tuk, but we just carried on and surprise surprise he was lying. It seems a shame that people here seem to have to lie to try and make money from tourists, we found this different from Malaysia (well, except the taxi driver who said there wasn't a ferry, perhaps everywhere is the same after all).

So we headed into the Grand Palace, I almost got turned away for not having long enough trousers, even though they were well below my knees! The buildings inside the Grand Palace complex are amazing, so ornate and so many of them. It's kinda expensive to get in, but worth it. We even looked round the coin museum which was pretty dull but had air con so worth it for that!

We found a really nice little cafe for lunch, it was tiny and I was amazed that the managed to serve people in there at all. I tried the green curry which was delicious and Adam had Pad Thai which was also excellent. It was also pretty cheap which is always good!

We then headed for amulet market, you never know when you might need one... We didn't actually explore the whole amulet market but we saw plenty from the stalls lining the main road.

Adam decided we should try to go on a boat, however he didn't want to do a tourist boat trip but use the public boats. We stood for quite some time trying to figure it out, a main problem being that our guide book seemed to have different boat routes marked on than the one at the jetty. We eventually decided to just got for it and see what happened, after it was only about 20p per journey! We soon realised that from the stop we were at the only way to go was simply across the river to a stop on the other side and then from there you could get a boat the went down river to various stops. It was pretty fun riding the boats and they got pretty full with lots of people standing in the middle.

We got off the ferry at the stop for Wat Po, the temple with the giant reclining buddha. And it is giant. There's also some other decorative buildings but with the heat it gets tiring very quickly so we only did a quick walk around.

As it was so hot we went back to the hotel so we could cool down with the air conditioning. We were going to buy a beer each from the 7 eleven on the corner but they have weird times when you can buy alchohol, 11 - 2 and then 5 - 12! Soft drinks for us...

After our rest we went back out to buy some dinner. We'd seen an Indian restaurant the night before which looked ok so decided to head for that. On the way we saw some fire fighters trying to put a fire at a terraced shop. I think it looked under control but one fire fighter almost fell through the roof as it gave way when he walked across it. We wandered around the markets and bought a couple of t-shirts. We also spotted some lanterns which Bee had asked us to look out for, so we asked the price and then went to have dinner whilst deciding how many we could fit in our luggage. The food was very nice, not too disimilar to the curries we get in England. We headed back out in search of the lanterns, we saw them on a different stall and bought all the ones she had in the suitable colours, this involved taking the display ones as well. We then went back and bought the ones from the first stall. We must have looked slightly obsessive about lanterns! Getting them back to the room I realised they took more space than perhaps I'd intended but I guess it's all in the duty of being a good bridesmaid! (I think we might need to send another parcel home!)

We packed up our stuff ready to leave the hotel at 4.30 to catch our flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia. Unfortunately it was a bad end to the day as I realised I had left my Ipod and Nintendo DS on the previous flight. I remember taking them out of my bag but not putting them back. I guess worse things could happen so I should be grateful it's just replacable stuff which isn't essential anyway, just I'll have some long train rides with no music to look forward to now.

Day 42 - 28th Mar 2009

We had a lazy morning and just stayed at the hotel. We had breakfast and then went for a swim. I finally managed to do a length of the pool doing front crawl, I usually do breast stroke so this was quite an acheivement for me.

We slowly packed our bags and got ready to leave, although we were pretty sad as we bothed really liked our hotel and Penang. Oh well there's more things to see so we had to get packing and move on. We left the hotel to get lunch from a local cafe and then got a taxi to the airport. We arrived with plenty of time to spare and checked in, just making the weight restrictions. This was the first flight that we didn't get seats together. The flight was with AirAsia a kind of Ryan Air for Asia. The flight left on time and we arrived in Bangkok at about 6pm. The airport seemed pretty new and looked quite modern. We decided to get a metered taxi to our hotel. There's a weird coupon system although you don't pay or agree a price, just say where you're going. Anyway we set off only for our taxi driver to let on that he didn't know where our hotel was. He phoned them up and seemed happy about getting there. We had a couple of communication issues with him not knowing much English and us not knowing any Thai. We started getting concerned as the meter kept going up and up and soon it was more than we had money to pay. We had to pay for a couple of road tolls so we were getting a bit concerned that we didn't have enough to pay for the taxi. Although we had checked how much it should be in our guide book so we knew we should be able to afford it. Adam hoped the figure we would be charged was the small top figure where as I had a horrible feeling he was going to try and change us the extortinate bottom number. So we finally got the hotel and he said the price, he also tried to say he was doing it cheaper than he should! The figure was about 3 times the price guide book said, and more than we actually had. So we started to negotiate. Eventually we paid about half the amount he quoted, which was still quite expensive, but we weren't too sure what we could do. We checked with the hotel how much it should cost and they said about half of what we had paid! Oh well, you live and learn I guess. Lets just hope that the return journey doesn't cost so much...

After checking we decided to head out and look for some food. The hotel recommended going to Kan san road, which is the main tourist road in Bangkok. We arrived there as they were taking part in Earth Hour which meant there were hardly any lights on. It was still really busy but kinda dark. We got some pizza from a stall and called into the local Boots store, yep the Nottingham based Boots! We then headed back to the hotel exhausted and ready for a good nights sleep. (We managed to get slightly lost on the way back, it's hard navigating in the dark!)

P.S. - Thank goodness the room has aircon...

Day 41 - 27th Mar 2009

We started the day with a great breakfast at the hotel, you could get eggs cooked to order with a selection of items you could add in. Or pancakes and waffles. There was also the usual baked beans and hash browns, along with eastern style breakfast dishes of curry, rice and noodles. I tried a small amount of chicken curry with rice which was very nice but slightly bizarre for breakfast.

We then headed towards the bus station by the ferry terminal, along the way we saw more temples and interesting buildings. We decided to get a bus to Penang Hill, where you can then get a furnicular railway to the top. As we waited for the bus we meet so people from Australia so we chatted with them. They were also going to Penang Hill. After a while of waiting, they don't seem to have a timetable so it's just a case of waiting till the bus you want comes along. The buses all seem pretty new and modern so they the journey to Penang hill was very comfortable. A single journey costs about 30p, so also very cheap.

We got the train to the top which cost a whole 80p for a return ticket! The view from the top is pretty good and it's actually a long way up. We got some food from a stall and looked at a temple and a mosque. It seemed weird to bother building a temple and mosque when there isn't really a lot else up there.

We decided to walk down the hill to the botanical gardens, the guide book said the walk would take about an hour and you can then get a bus from near the gardens back to Georgetown, where we're staying.

So we walked, and walked and walked. In total it must have taken us about 2 hours! Plus the road was really steep so it was hard work walking down. Also just over halfway it started raining and I don't mean a light shower, it really rained! We got soaked. We did however see some wildlife, a small red snake, monkeys, giant ants, a few butterflies and a couple of big spiders. Looking back it was fun to do but to be honest at the time I was wishing we'd just got the train down!

We didn't really look round the gardens but we did find out that there wasn't a bus stop there. We decided to walk to the main road where we were sure they'd be a bus. Obviously there were taxis we could have got but that would have been the easy way...

So we started walking and it started raining, again. Eventually we got to the main road and as the rain got heavier we sheltered under what we hoped was a bus stop. We wrong about this, it wasn't a bus stop, a helpful lady pointed this out and told us were we could get a bus from. However the shelter was good for not getting wet so we waited for the rain to pass. The puddles on the road though were getting bigger and bigger so every time a car came past we were worried we would get soaked. A man also offered to take us to Georgetown for about £2 but he was waiting for his son so we didn't take him up on the offer. When the rain had stopped we walked down the road to the bus stop the lady had said and after only a few minutes a bus came, we weren't completely sure which bus we wanted but figured it was going in right direction so it would do. This bus though was nothing like the mornings bus, it was old and hot and packed. We got seats next to some people, well we sort of perched on the edge of a seat, and then more and more people got on at various stops, until it was completely full, people stood anywhere they could. The bus had obviously seen better days but it seemed to do the job, even with it's wooden floor! Eventually we ended up back in Georgetown and began to recognise where we were. We got off not far from our hotel and walked back, stopping to buy a couple of samosas en route.

When we went to reception to get our key we looked really out of place from the colonial surroundings. I could see the receptionist wondering if we were really staying there! We went for a swim and then had dinner at the hotel, it was a buffet with free wine or beer. We took full advantage of the free drinks and also got our money's worth of food, this included a chocolate fountain! Which we were sat pretty close to, perfect...