Avensis

I arrived back in Auckland last Tuesday. Dad had arrived back from his trip to the UK. I am staying at Mum and Dad's. After three weeks in Thailand I have been finding it pretty darn cold. As well as spending time with Mum and Dad I have had lunch or dinner with Nana most days. So life has been pretty quiet. I have managed to unpack, mostly. My main goal over the last week was to buy a new car. I have been to a lot of car yards and done a lot of internet searches. I have spoken to many used car salesmen. A few I liked. But the majority do make you feel like they're the lions on the savanna and you're the limping gazelle in the herd. Anyway, I found a car I liked-

I know, I know!  I don't like white either.  But it was right in so many other ways.  It is a Toyota Avensis, 2004, 2L, automatic.  I wanted a manual but they were hard to find. 

Now that I have bought a car I can start to focus on other pressing matters, such as catching up with friends and family and watching TV...

Ko Chang

Ko Chang is a small island in the andaman sea and should not be confused with its much larger namesake on the east coast. One of my visions of Thailand was a small hut on a quiet beach. Ko Phi Phi was not that sort of place, at least in my pric range. Ko Chang fitted the bill perfectly; there is no mobile phone coverage, no internet and no mains electricity. I stayed at "Cashew Resort" a collection of small bungalows and a restaurant on the beach. It had only reopened in the last few days, in preparation for the dry season tourists. As a result it was still very quiet, with only a few people staying. I stayed for four days, walking from my bungalow to the beach, reading in the hammock, thinking about things and enjoying the great food in the restauant. The generator would kick in for 3 hours at night, providing flickering light that was just bright enough to allow you to find your way round. Cashew Resort is owned by a Thai couple but was mostly staffed by Burmese, as Ko Chang is very near Burma. The other permanent resident was David, a 70-something resident who has lived there for 10 years with his cats and a local Burmese guy. The sunsets were sublime.

I travelled from Ko Chang to Bangkok yesterday, which involved a long boat trip to Ranong, a motor scooter ride to the Ranong bus station, a 10 hour bus trip from Ranong to Bangkok and from there a taxi ride to my accommodation. A fun day. I may have been better off flying...

I am flying back to Auckland today. I have had a great time in Thailand. I will be back.

This marks the end of almost six months of travel. I do not know whether this also marks the end of my alternate reality. I have done almost everything that I had in mind to do back in April. I love it when a plan comes together.

Ko Phi Phi

From Siem Reap I returned to Bangkok by minivan, which took about 8 hours. The next day I travelled to Ko Phi Phi. Realising that it was a 12 hours bus trip to Phuket, followed by 1 1/2 hours on a ferry from Phuket to Ko Phi Phi, I instead flew from Bangkok to Phuket and took the ferry from Phuket.

Ko Phi Phi is an island in the Andaman Sea and part of a national marine park. Nearby is Ko Phi Phi Ley, the location of the beach in the movie "The Beach". The islands are famous for their spectacular scenery. Ko Phi Phi has some beautiful beaches but it is a lot busier than I had imagined (perhaps wishful thinking on my part that it should be otherwise). However, it is very laid back, with no vehicles and an island vibe. It is still rainy season so it has rained on and off. Nevertheless, the rain has had very little impact on what I have done. I spent my first day at the beach.

Ko Phi Phi is packed with outfits offering diving and scuba courses. I decided to take the literal plunge and signed up for a two and a half day PADI dive course. This involved quite a lot of reading and an exam (which was a cinch). The hard, and scary part, was the diving. In most respects it was all a lot simpler than I had imagined and I was comforted by the "safety first" attitude that appears to apply to diving. I had a total of four dives, all of which included learning drills as well as "sightseeing". The deepest dive was to 18m, which is part of the requirement for the diving qualification. It was amazing to be able to go under the waves and to view the coral reefs and multi-coloured fish. The instructors were great, being patient and very helpful. My first instructor was Cliff from New Orleans. He looks and sounds a lot like George Bush! It did not seem fair to mention it. Cliff had to pull out after a day and half because of sinus troubles. My new instructor was Julien, a young Frenchman. I really wanted to say that New Zealanders had had bad experiences with French divers (an allusion to the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland by the French) but I held my tongue.

I have stayed at a basic but adequate guesthouse- cold showers are not a problem in this climate. I went on a long-boat tour today out to Phi Phi Ley and had a great time snorkeling and chatting to fellow travellers.

Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat and the other temples in the vicinity really have lived up to the hype. They are quite amazing- enormous and seemingly out of place in the middle of the jungle. I have spent four days in Siem Reap, the town close to Angkor Wat. I bused here from Bangkok, which took most of a day. Siem Reap was suffering from quite bad flooding when I arrived. When the tuk-tuk driver told me that he might have trouble getting to the hostel because of flooding I did not believe him, thinking it was one more scam. But he was right.  It took two days for the water to recede.  For the first two days of my visit I only visited the temples.  Getting to and from the hostel required walking through some very murky water so I did not venture into town in the evening.  This is the a view from the hostel a day after I arrived... and then two days later.

I hired a tuk-tuk and driver for two and a half days to take me to the many temples around Angkor Wat.  Visiting every temple is an interesting experience as you are assailed by adults and children selling water, books, bracelets, cloth and postcards- "For you only one dollaaaar", "You only buy from me", "You buy when you come back, ok".  The Cambodian people were very friendly though.  It would have been nice to be able to buy something from everyone.

 

A couple of photos.  Sorry, no captions, as I am running short of time.  

Bangkok

I arrived in Bangkok on Tuesday and stayed till Friday. Bangkok is an experience. I really only started to get a handle on it, and my bearings, after two days. The highlight for was the abundant, cheap and very tasty food. My afternoon at the "Grand Palace" was great-

I had two Thai massages (the legitimate kind) while I was in Bangkok. A very painful but hopefully beneficial experience. I stayed in a very nice hostel just off Sukhumvit Road, one of the main tourist hubs in Bangkok. I had my own room, so did not rough it. I certainly did not feel out of place as an unaccompanied older male. One example of the male sex tourist was the Australian and his Thai girl sitting next to me at a restaurant charging about 50 Baht (about £1.00, $2.30) for a main course. He would have been about my age. He was talking to her about himself in some sort of Thai accent, presumably so that she would understand him better. There are lots of things that I could say about what is wrong with sex tourism. But what really struck me was just what a f**king cheapskate he was! He could at least have taken the poor girl out somewhere a bit nicer.

My bargaining skills have started to improve although I suspect that I am still pretty easy prey. There are plenty of transport options in Bangkok. I have used just about every type of transport in Bangkok, including the metro, skytrain, tuk-tuk, taxi and one terrifying ride on the back of a motor scooter (I do not why that seemed liked a good idea).