The Australian Newfoundland?

Well we made it safe and sound to Hobart, Tasmania, Australia yesterday morning bright and early. The island's a fairly rural place with the capital Hobart sporting about 250,000 people; it's Australia's second oldest city. It reminds me of what I imagine a Canadian maratime city to be. The things you would expect of a city, but a slightly more relaxed pace, friendly people and a small town feel - but what do I know? I've never been. Yesterday we shuttled to our hostel (don't use the microwave) then headed out for a walk around the harbour, to see the historical buildlings, fun boats, markets, etc. We ate a deep fried seafood "bag of treats" sold right off a houseboat looking thing and my stomach is still punishing me. In the evening we headed to a pub that was playing blues/jazz music, which was pretty great. We were in a fairly local place sticking out some and when I tried to order a cocktail I got a quizzical look. Apparently it's a beer only establishment, unless you want a $10 margarita. The environment was great though, young and old, casual and dressed up.

This morning we got our car rental sorted out - a surprisingly new two door echo and headed to THE CADBURY CHOCOLATE FACTORY. I am a terrible person but this may be one of the highlights of my trip. We got samples, good scents, a comical tour and the best gift shop I've ever seen! Unfortunately we couldn't buy gifts, except for for ourselves, because we have 3 weeks to melt everything before we come home. The factory is the 2nd ever, built in 1921. Kev's working things out with driving on the other side of the road, but Hobart's intense one way streets really make things complicated. We then went to the botanical gardens, and drove through Battery Point, a historical area where the original village was. Now we're planning for tomorrow's visit to some caves, hot springs, and a national park. Looking forward to it, especially since our last hot springs visit Kev wasn't quite up to.

Until next time...

Sydney Time

After almost a full day of booking, sleeping and catch up time, we went to China town a couple nights ago to see what we could see. Yesterday we spent AGES booking a rental car for the last 10 days of our trip. They said that they'd never had someone question the contract in such detail before. What do you really mean by "negligence" anyway? Deb, I know you love those people.

After that we took the ferry from the inner harbour (getting a good view of the opera house and so on) to a place called Manly Beach - and boy was it manly, not really. We then did a 10K walk around the bays and inlets through city, bush, and beach that was quite beautiful and a little exhausting. We got back, had some dinner and headed out in search of live music. We found an Irish cover band in their 40s with an attitude and a love of heckling the audience. It was pretty entertaining. I'm starting to feel less like a grandma, everyone in my hostel dorm was asleep when I got back!

Today's our last day here but it's raining quite a bit, not sure what we'll do. Tomorrow morning we fly to Tasmania - the land of the devil!

Whirlwind

Well it feels like it's been ages but a lot has happened to keep us busy and preoccupied. For those of you who may not have heard, Kev's grandpa Bell passed away suddenly late last week, pretty crappy news to get anytime, and while being away it leaves us feeling a bit stranded - a little better now that we've talked to family though. Sorry we couldn't be there and thinking of everyone...

We didn't receive this news right away because we were off email due to illness. After my last post, Kev was feeling quite sick. We won't get graphic here but after an hour of "fluid loss" we decided it was time to head to the hospital. Our hotel was kind enough to get us there. The emergency room was quick and Kev was on a stretcher within a couple of minutes. He received an IV and some prescriptions after they determined it wasn't malaria or anything else and told him he could spend the night. I played translator since I'm better with accents, and when I suggested to the nurse that I would go back to the hotel in the morning she thought it better that I stay. Kev slept mostly, which is great of course and I slept some in a plastic deck chair by his bed. The mosquitos got bad though at one point so I got up and resprayed. The geckos had gone off shift for the night. I thought the mosquitos were just coming in through the open window but after walking I realized that the hospital was practically open air (with the exception of actual rooms) with entire walls missing/open. We've agreed that the hospital was a good experience (besides Kev being sick) getting to meet some locals, see what local health care is like, etc. The resorts we stayed at were generally much cleaner than the hospital though hospital staff spoke much better English - thankfully! I paid for Kev's prescriptions (4 in all, very thorough indeed) but the night's stay was free, which we couldn't believe but appreciated of course, especially since I hadn't been able to call our travel insurance company - let's not get me started on phone issues again.

The next day we left, Kev stayed in bed mostly though he was feeling better and I went out for food and other provisions. The next day we flew from Krabi Thailand to KL Malaysia, then rushed to the bus station to take a bus to Singapore. The border deal was a little less panicky this time since we were on a "Super VIP bus" that wouldn't leave us in the lurch. We didn't know where we were dropped off and where it was in relation to where we were staying. It was 11:30 pm, we'd been in three countries that day and in the hospital two days earlier, but all was well. We got a cab to a hotel with the same name as ours (there's 30 in Singapore) and the manager there was only too happy to drive us to the hotel we had booked, and give us a speed of lightening tour all the while. He was incredibly enthusiastic about Singapore and recommended some things to do.

The next morning I woke up sick and spent most of the day in bed with gut pain of some unknown sort. It was Kev's turn to run around looking for food, etc. We watched a couple of movies on TV - yay for being sick in a nice hotel - and went to sleep. The next day before flying out we managed to go to a mall for lunch and Sentosa island, a tourist wonderland, to see a Butterfly and Insect place and we rode a luge-type deal. Only after getting to the airport did we find out about Kev's grandpa. It was the middle of the night in Canada so we couldn't call until we arrived in Australia the following morning. We had hoped to sleep the night in the plane but had difficulties sleeping. Between the two of us we got about 45 minutes of sleep. I played about 20 games of electronic backgammon and we watched "Ali" on our personal screens.

Finally, we arrived at our hostel in Sydney exhausted. We ate, bought a few groceries and called home thankfully. We then had a nap on the beach and woke up freezing, the wind was blowing and the sun was very much hidden. We hit the hay pretty early. Today we came to downtown Sydney and have mostly just been taking care of bookings, etc. We're flying to Tasmania on Sunday and renting a car there for a few days before flying back to the mainland to Melbourne.

Our thoughts are with the family, sorry we couldn't be there.

Picture Cranky

(Some diving photos - Ko Phi Phi, Thailand)

If you're wondering why the pictures are so few and far between it is because I am having extreme technical difficulties loading them, and I promise I have tried numerous times. It's a costly and time consuming venture that's driving me crazy. Sorry. I'll move on though.

We're in Krabi, Thailand the mainland finally. We successfully completed our scuba diving certificates and had a great time doing it. We will definitely be diving again in Australia. We saw 2 leopard sharks (harmless), octopus, a turtle, barracuda and countless other things all in a couple of dives and the feeling was incredible. Loved it! Tomorrow we are going on a private taxi tour around Krabi of some hot springs, a buddhist temple and a lagoon and the next day we fly out and make our way to Singapore to get to Australia. It will be a couple of days heavy on travel but we're excited to move on. Hopefully we will be better at using phones in Australia than we've been here and in Malaysia. We have two phone cards that we can't get to work from payphones to save our lives, at times we are furiously dropping coins into phones to book a place only to be hung up on. We've started sucking it up and paying a place to allow us to make a call, but it's not great for calling Canada. We'll try again soon!

That's all for now, we're having a catch up on errands day and the like. Oh, we had our first hot shower in weeks and even though we were technically too hot to need a hot shower it felt good all the same. Aaaah!

Ko Pi Pi and the Beach

Our time on Ko Lanta was good but relatively uneventful. We got some rain the second day and so spent it in town doing some shopping and looking for a book. The changerooms were quite funny, ranging from a hidden corner of the store to a curtain you pull around yourself leaving you with room to do more or less nothing,especially not change! The next day was a full beach day - no shoes allowed! We walked the 2 km beach back and forth for each meal, with Kev kindly running back to our room as needed. We played in the waves quite a bit and managed to avoid a burn, which always feels like success. Also, I almost forgot, we had Thai massages - amazing! Just before dinner we were in this open air hut, lying on mattress, shaded by hanging sheets, listening to the waves roar as our bodies were contorted. Incredible.

We took a taxi (pickup truck) to the pier the morning we left Ko Lanta. There was a couple already in the back and we stopped to pick up four Swedes, all of us had backpacks, who knew you could hold that much stuff in the box of a truck. Our boat ride to Ko Pi Pi was good. On the way we could see Pi Pi Leh, the island where the movie "The Beach" was shot. Ko Pi Pi is easily the busiest place we've been. You walk the streets accosted by offers for accomodation, thai massage, pedicures, bathing suits, flip flops, thai pancakes, buckets of alcohol and pringles. Bikes ride by you at crazy speeds on the very narrow roads carrying everything from bird cages to entire families. There is no motorized vehicles, which is nice for noise especially. Cyclists ring their bells or yell "beep" before blasting by. People easily speak more English here than anywhere else we've been in Thailand. The nightlife is also much more evident (ie. the island doesn't shut down after the sun goes down and everyone has eaten dinner). Kev and I still pathetically go to bed completely wiped at 9:00pm. Some British boys beside us don't seem to realize the no windows concept and we hear every colourful conversation and party tune but mostly it just makes us feel like we're not THAT old.

We went on an amazing snorkelling trip yesterday which allowed us to see the whole island from a long tail as well as Pi Pi Leh. The limestone cliffs are insane, with overhangs, caves and beautiful colours. Pi Pi Leh, is quite uninhabitable looking with the exception of the very famous beach. Our boat took us into one narrow bay with cliffs nearly surrounding us, the greenest water you've ever seen and we were able to swim there. It was beautiful and strangely reminded me of Canadian natural hot springs (to be fair the water is 29 to 30 degrees C). Our boat driver threw out watermelon rinds - often hitting us in the heads but we think his main purpose was to reduce the garbage on the boat which is probably not the best - while we snorkelled in the middle of nowhere and fish surrounded us nibbling away. If you held a piece they would feed from you directly. Not that I'm too excited about this composting technique but arguing would probably not have been appropriate. We went to a beautiful island called bamboo island as well and visited "Monkey Beach" which appropriately enough had a number of monkeys. They were fun and all but Rose started to pout once she realized that people were feeding them chips. Despite the beauty Thailand is not necessarily the environmentalist's dream. I'm learning just how clean Canada is. Not that it's only locals, tourists don't appear to be much better in many instances. Anyways, otherwise the beach was beautiful with some of the nicest sand and water we've seen.

The only other news (I'm sure this is plenty anyways) is that we decided to do our PADI open water dive course and had our first day today. We've successfully scubad to 3 metres or so and are going out on the ocean tomorrow for two dives. I'm ecstatic as this is something that I've wanted to do forever and we're getting to do it together. We have an instructor for just the two of us, which is great and makes for quick learning.

Once we finish we'll leave Pi Pi and go to Krabi, which is on the mainland. We're hoping to manage a couple of inland things like trekking and waterfalls before flying down to KL, Malaysia and taking a bus to Singapore for our flight to Australia. We're almost half way done all of a sudden. Wishing everybody well. Happy birthday Theresa!

Ko Lanta Rain

We took a much less insane boatride yesterday from Ko Lipeh to Ko Lanta. This is the busiest island that we've been to so far and it's much bigger and more well developed. For example, it boasts an ATM! Actually there're 20,000 locals on the island so really it is quite big. After checking in to our place, the cheapest place we've stayed yet and besides the ants everywhere we're not sure why it's so cheap. Oh right, there's the sounds of a dying jackal outside our room at night. They didn't bother us much though.

We walked along the beach past the resorts to the more local food stalls. They're cheaper and have better food. We enjoyed yet another set of Thai pancakes, we get very strange looks when we order four but they're just not that big. Our plan was to swim after breakfast this morning but the walk back was enough to soak us in rain and the waves are pretty rough for a swim. I was planning to put up more pictures today but the computer tried to eloctrocute myself and the camera, so it will have to wait unfortunately. We're staying here too more nights and then are off to Ko Pi Pi, where the movie the beach was shot. It's supposed to be pretty touristy so we'll see what happens. Clearly not much to report.

I hope all's well. Happy birthday to Mark and Jeany.

Getting to Ko Lip-eh - the clothes are STILL wet

Well, our speedboat (capacity 25 or so) journey to Ko Lip-eh started off relatively well considering having to board the boat by way of a one by six and a helping hand. I have never been on a boat so fast (3 X 225 hp motors). I could have sworn we were on a water roller coaster with continuous stomach tickles that left me gasping for air. I thought that I was the only one noticing this as everyone else stared blandly forward. One woman ahead of us actually read the entire time, even when the boat caught big air. Once the rain started, everyone helped up their lifejackets, which no one was wearing to sheild themselves from the drips. A woman behind Kev opened her umbrella and continually poked him with the pokey thing. When the water started coming on heavily, her umbrella nicely bathed Kev's entire back in water. We arrived at the boats first stop, the opposite side of the island to where we were staying and were told that everyone would have to get out here because the water was too rough. In groups of 15-20 we transferred into longtails again with a hand to help as you straddle boats in rough water (I'm really getting my sea legs these days). The rain started coming down in buckets - no joke - and we were absolutely drenched as we made our way to shore. When we arrived on shore, we were dripping from head to toe, so the best way to get out of the boat was to jump into the water, which I did. However, my flip flops (which despite what you might think are actually the best thing to wear because you have to take them off 84 times a day for every building you go in, etc) did not like this. My feet buried in sand, I took one step and broke a flip flop, pulling it off my foot, holding it up in the air and laughing, I took another step. The second one broke too. By this time, I'm laughing uncontrollably, trying to get my second shoe and drawing a fair bit of attention to myself as Kev tried to shut me up. As we made our way up the beach still laughing, a waiter ran down with a beach umbrella to sheild us from the rain. This was our breaking point - we couldn't have more water on us if we tried. The cackles continued.

We then waited at the resort we'd arrived at to await news about a boat to our side of the island. None came, eventually we all decided to trek across the island (about a half hour's walk). Three German couples and us started our journey once our bags were delivered, half soaked. At least we were able to put our rain jackets on and change shirts before we left. We jimmied a garbage bag over Kev's bag but mine had no cover. We waded through knee-deep water, mud, sand and garbage through a village and past 6 resorts or so before reaching our own half an hour later. Coming around the corner to ours was breathtaking though even in the rain. The sand was so white and the water so green we couldn't believe it. Our resort up on the mountain side was a spectacle (simple in accomodation just beautifully set) to be sure. Too bad we had to climb 80 stairs with a waterlogged bag to get there. Thank goodness for handrails.

We checked into our room and set to the task of checking for wetness. Nearly everything in our bags was wet and we spent an hour hanging clothes inside and outside, scouting for the best vantage points. Only now, two days later after many rotations, two loads of laundry and finally some sun today are most of our clothes dry. Though the laundry we received this morning was still wet, as they had no sun to dry it with either. This morning I was cranky about it all, but we since had a six hour snorkel tour that was incredible. I've never seen anything like what I saw today, and playing with fish is almost as good as cats and dogs. We came back to a beautiful evening and are about to have some dinner on our last night here on Ko Lip-eh. Tomorrow we make our way to Ko Lanta, a little more of a hotspot. Another speed ride away.

Still peeling...

Ko Bulon Leh and Castaway

We spend three nights on Ko Bulon Leh, a very quiet island quite near the southern coast of Thailand. Despite having arranged accomodation in advance, the reception man looked incredibly confused to see us. After some bows and apologies, we were taken to our bungalow, then asked for ten minutes for the beds to be made, etc. We found this confusing ourselves but amusing as well. The employees at our resort, the Pansand, were incredibly friendly and charming though we were learning quickly that in Thailand there was much less English to be spoken.

The island had very few tourists on it and after a day or two we learned that we were known as the Canadian couple. We crossed the island on foot, checking out a couple of bays and crossed through a village or two in the process. The children were shy but would shout hello after we'd passed with incredibly cute pleased looks on their faces. The adults were only slightly more reserved and all responded well to greetings though unlike in Malaysia they didn't try to sell us anything. We passed a rubber plantation as well as some incredibly flowers including a huge bush of birds of paradise.

Among the guests there was a man that we called "Castaway". This man wore a half loin cloth, half thong and was a deeply tanned westerner. He had incredibly long dreadlocks and had set up a shelter made of sticks for protection from the sun and also for drying his clothes it would appear. He would spend his days clearing the beach of garbage and bottles, as well as burning a huge pile of driftwood at all times. Rest assured he was not sending signals for helps as we're quite sure he was well fed at the kitchen of one of the resort owners on the island. One morning some of the tourists were helping him tidy up, as we attempted to kayak around the entire island. 3/4 of the way around we had to turn back because of turbulent waters, so we went 1 1/2 times around the island instead! It was incredible and we saw many fish and caves. We snorkeled too the day before.

We left the next morning on a longtail with a Swedish family who was itching for action. Back at the port city, waiting for our speedboat we ate incredible Thai pancakes (chocolate and banana). The next leg of our journey was the craziest to date!

Transportation Disasters

My my my...

We left the Cameron Highlands after killing a half day eating pancakes (ie. sumptuous, cheap crepes with all kinds of tropical fruit goodies) and wandering around. The bus ride was a little less interesting than the one on the way there, except for the incessant water dripping on my pant leg (on a perfectly dry day), the crazy bus driver and the slippery seats that kept trying to throw us out the windsheild. We arrived in Ipoh, where we would be taking a bus to Thailand, as soon as we could buy some bus tickets. No one at the bus depot could sell us tickets but they called a travel agent who came to the station, arranged us a taxi to his agency and we bought tickets there - we weren't sure if we should believe him or not, but as has been the case every time during the trip, these things seem to work out. Unfortunately, the bus would not be leaving until 1am, about 8 hours from the time we arrived in Ipoh. As a first measure to kill time we attempted loading pictures online at an internet cafe packed with gamers. This was not a fun adventure as you can tell by the few pictures I managed to get up.

We then made our way to the "Ritz" and had dinner. The air conditioning was so cold we both ordered mochas - you know how we love our coffee. After dinner, we found out about the deck, which was where all the normal people were eating. We went out there and after an hour, had cheesecake desert. It is necessary to stretch these things out when killing 8 hours. Another hour later, Kev had a cappucino. An hour after that, we went in for foot reflexology! We were very much looking forward to this experience. The place was quite packed with men beating people's feet and legs in rhythmic fashion. We started with a foot soak and quick shoulder massage then had our own private room with two reflexologists (of the Taiwanese school). It was one of the most painful experiences of my life. I looked over at Kev noticing that he had put on his man face and assumed that he was in pain too. The 45 minutes were hellish. I did not tell my guy to ease up because I figured the pain meant I was getting my money's worth. When we walked out I discovered that Kev had in fact thought that reflexology was wonderful and had almost fallen asleep. We both got a laugh out of that. Satisfied that we had both done up Ipoh, we made our way to the bus. As an overnighter, it had very reclining seats, gross towels for blankets and people snoring all over the place. At 4am it stopped at a duty free place that also has breakfast which was great timing because I was starved (go figure). Kev stared at me blankly while I ate rice, noodles and a fried egg but eventually didn't think that I was so crazy and had some too. The meal cost all of 60 cents and was amazing.

Another hour later we reached the Malaysian exit border. Everybody had to wake up, get off the bus, and shuffle towards the immigration officers. It was still dark. After about a half an hour and a race to find our bus we were through. Another 10 minutes later as I was finally starting to fall asleep again we reached the Thai crossing. There we waited even longer as some guy ahead of us was detained for 15 minutes or so. Poor guy. It was starting to get lighter out finally. A half hour later, some guy on our bus who fancied himself a travel agent, told us to get off because we'd reach the bus station that would get us to the port we were looking for. We arrived at this station at 8:00 on the dot. Interestingly, Thai bus stations play the national anthem at 8 and everyone stands completely still. We had been in the middle of a conversation and froze. As soon as it was over all activity resumed, quite a moment.

We took a motorcycle taxi to another bus station that actually could help us. The mini-van bus was leaving in ten minutes, which barely left us enough time for the washroom, ticket buying and loading. The van was packed with us and 11 locals and 3 children on laps. By the end of the two hour ride I was starting to feel quite confused and disoriented. Lucky for that breakfast.

We arrived in the port city, arranged travel and accomodation to an island, Ko Bulon Leh and waited in the agent's living room for 3 hours for our boat - a longtail, which was eventually arranged by standing at the pier and having our agent pick a fisherman to pay. The ride took an hour, in this incredibly loud but interesting boat which is commonly used as a water taxi in Thailand. After some dinner that night we slept like babies.