A View from the Hammock

So, over a week in Laos. I must have loads to say right? Right? Nah, things move slowly in Laos and after Vietnam we aren't feeling to speed them up at all. So in that spirit, here is a post of photos what I took from my hammock in the exceedingly beautiful Si Phan Don.

Not bad for under three quid a night eh?

And finally,  here's a picture of me eating sticky rice.

I like sticky rice.

Vietnam

It's a bit unfair to give as incredible a country as Vietnam just one summary post, but that's what's about to happen. Such a fast paced country doesn't give you much time to stop and gather thoughts as you go along. What's more, Blogger doesn't seem to want to get pictures off my camera, so instead you will have to conjure them up with your own imagination from the evocative prose which I hereby present to you.

We spent just over 3 weeks in the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, moving from south to north and err...then back to the middle again.

Unfortunately, we start on a bit of a negative. Vietnam is a country with a great deal of variety, though it is tied together by a thread of staunch nationalism. From Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) to Hanoi, we had some wonderful experiences and saw some amazing things. Either side of this however, lay not much. Our time in Vietnam was much like a sandwich, with delicious cured ham, fine Italian cheese, the freshest salad and just a smidge of tangy pickle, unfortunately laid between two slices of stale Hovis. Or some non-brand sliced bread. It's not a bad sandwich, it's great, but you know it could have been better with some fine bloomer either side, or discard the bread altogether and make a nice salad. Or, to give this convoluted, already overlong sandwich metaphor a local flavour, it is a filled baguette where the processed pork has some flavour, the pate tastes like it could legally be sold in the EU, the chilli is sweet rather than burning and the fresh coriander is minimal enough to not be overpowering (why anyone would put fresh coriander in a sandwich remains mystifying to me), but the baguette itself is cold and stale.

Our first slice of stale Hovis came in the form of the Mekong Delta. Having crossed the border from Cambodia into Ha Tien, we intended to meander through this region before heading to Saigon. Expecting to find a peaceful, beautiful countryside of quaint villages, endless rice paddies and divergences of the mighty Mekong River, we instead found a series of towns that could be best described as brown, all of them boasting identical markets amongst their main tourist sights. The countryside wasn't even that pretty, paling in comparison to eastern Cambodia or, as we would later learn, Vietnam's own Central Highlands. By Chau Doc, only our second stop, we both realised this was not a lot of fun. We took one last roll of the dice in the form of a town called My Tho, regretted it the moment we were off the bus, and headed for Saigon the following day.

And what a decision it was. As we took the local bus from the outer bus station into the nucleus of this dizzying city, we were bombarded by colour, noise and energy just radiating through the windows. We watched as our bus cut sideways through swarms of motorbikes like a boat through water and ended up in the Pham Ngu Lao area, a backpacker and tourist area for sure, but one that retains a healthy number of locals who have nothing to do with the tourist industry. We spent the day wandering around, absorbing the city, eating a few delicious treats and generally sorting ourselves out.

The next day we took in the central sights. Though large, most of Saigon's main sights are in central area of District 1 (the area still officially called Saigon, it's confusing but don't worry). Walking about we visited the War Remnants Museum (fascinating), Notre Dame Cathedral (beautifully kitsch) and the Reunifcation Palace (erm...what?) amongst others. Nothing in a day made a dent in the love that was growing for this city. Exhausted, we hit the evening for some good Vietnamese style fun.

In the morning, we rose early to take a tour to Cu Chi, where there is one of the famous networks of tunnels used by the Viet Cong to hide soldiers and local villagers from American troops. We combined it with a visit to the Cao Dai Temple, home of a religion that seems draw in every major religion to a kind of ceremonial Buddhist existence, all overwatched by a symbolic eye that bears a strong resemblance to the one crazies on Youtube claim is the symbol of the Illuminati. No idea what they would make of Cao Dai. The author Victor Hugo also has the honour of being one of the religions three most revered saints...

Cu Chi itself surpassed all expectations. On top of crawling through a stretch of the tunnels as we expected, we also got to see learn a lot about the tunnels systems in terms of booby traps, how they hid evidence of their presence and even sampling what they ate underground (tapioca root dipped in sesame, peanut and salt; tasty but not something I'd care to eat for 6 months straight). There was also a wonderfully Communist video which contained the line 'he received a medal for killing the most Americans'.

We then moved on to Dalat for Christmas. Up in the hills, it was strikingly cold, a theme that would return for much of our stay in north of the country. We got some average food from a place called Art Cafe, coupled with an awful covers band and a just-plain-wrong mojito. Christmas Day itself involved getting a pedalo out on the lake, eating a thoroughly non-traditional Christmas Dionner then enjoying The Kings Speech on telly with a Toblerone and bottle of Dalat red wine - just to make it feel like home.

Onwards and upwards, we headed to Hoi An. On the way we saw some incredible scenery from our sparesly populated minibus, driven by someone who doesn't see dense fog as a reason to slow down. In the end we arrived in Nha Thrang 2 and a half hours early, a word not normally used in a sentence describing Asian bus journeys. This gave us time to see the place before we got on our next bus. Although a popular beach town, December is not a great monnth for it and the scene resembled The Perfect Storm much more than The Beach. Had I had my swimming stuff to hand I might have gone to take closer 'measurements', but I'd estimate the waves were comfortably over 10ft high.

Hoi An then, and after a good night's lack of sleep thanks to being laid next to a woman on the sleeper bus who was able to snore audibly even over the music in my headphones (not Connie I hasten to add), we collapsed in the nearest hotel. Luckily, it doesn't take much of a day to see Hoi An. Beautiful though it is, the Old Town is largely two roads of beautiful buildings and a lovely river which has little candle lanterns released over it each night. It also has some amazing food. The local specialty, Cao Lau noodles, takes the hearty substance of any fried noodle dish but somehow make it as fresh as a green salad. Coupled with some white rose, open steamed shrimp dumplings, it makes for a fine lunch.

Not that there is a shortage of fine lunches in Vietnam. Food in the country is delicious and deliciously cheap. $1-2 gets you a good bowl of pho (pronounced more like 'far' or 'fah', no matter how amusing the popular 'iPho' tourist T shirt may be), the warming soup of rice noodles, fresh veg and herbs and a pile of meat in a strong broth that most embodies Vietnamese cooking. An alternative is com, rice, served with something from the platters laid out front. Along with fried noodles, this covers the bulk of Vietnamese meals. Regional specialties are everywhere though, some almost as popular nationally as in their town of origin. Bun bo Hue is a chilli noodle soup made with rice vermicelli and beef. It can be found across the country, but in my experience could be anything from a really bad pho, up to a decent pho with chilli sauce. In Hue however, it was a dish of divine simplicity that made your mouth water with anticipation at each spoonful.

Good snacks abound at every corner too. The aforementioned filled baguettes are a good way to fill your belly at any time of day. Banh xeo are a tasty rice pancake folded in half and stuffed with pork shrimp and...frankly I don't know what else was in it, but it was delicious. Or banh bao, a tasty steamed dumpling filled with pork, quails eggs and onion. Two of those bad boys for a dollar made for a fine NYE meal.

On the liquid side of things there are two Vietnamese offerings worth mentioning. Ca phe sua, milk coffee to you and me, resembles no cafe au lait you might get at home, but is a short strong drink floating on top of a layer of condensed milk. Stir them together and you've got yourself a deliciously sweet caffeine kick.

In the evening, it's brew time. Now beer is cheap in Vietnam, about 10,000 ( about 50 cents, you'll have to excuse my use of American currency but it's the easiest way to keep track out here) dong for a 330ml can of Bia Ha Noi, Bia Saigon, Huda or whatever. But if you're really stingy (me), or actually prefer the taste (me again), you can opt for Bia Hoi, meaning fresh beer. Brewed daily across the country on a small scale, it is made with no preservatives and a barrel is intended to be finished quickly. For this reason it comes in at about 15p for a glass from a little stall with plastic chairs stretching out into the road. It's typically associated with Hanoi, but our favourite place was in Saigon.

But let's return to the actual trip. After Hoi An we went to Hue, which was nice but frankly the highlight was the bun bo Hue and we've covered that already. The old citadel is interesting but actually took surprisingly little time to take in before we were to catch yet another overnight bus to Hanoi. Lacking any loud snorers around me, a half decent nights kip was had and we arrived in good spirits. Ready for the assault of hotel touts as we got off the bus we pushed past, grabbed our bags and proudly strided off. In the exact wrong direction. Wondering why none of the seemingly major roads seemed to be on our map, we eventually accepted the help of a moto driver who tooks us where we wanted to be (surprisingly, in a country that actually follows it's few traffic laws quite keenly, he took us both on the same bike and no one wore a helmet, but who ever had an accident crossing going against the traffic on a busy flyover eh?).

Hanoi is, unsurprisingly, often compared to Saigon. Both are major, busy cities with a good line in atmosphere, sights and dangerous traffic. We side with Saigon on this thoroughly unimportant issue, but Hanoi is still a great city to explore. The Old Quarter is bustling with life, tourists and, yes, more motorbikes. It's more the kind of city you just happily exist in, wandering around until you need to eat, drink or buy something. That said, we did go to see the body of Uncle Ho, former president of North Vietnam and de facto deity of the country. Having seen him smile cheerily from our banknotes, it is a strange experience to enter the grey cube that is his mausoleum into a sombre atmosphere of silent, white unformed guards and walk past his preserved body. Around the mausoleum is the Ho Chi Minh Museum (there's one in every city, almost uniformly tedious) and the One Pillar Pagoda, a sight made less impressive by the fact that the pillar is almost as wide as the whole pagoda.

Also greeting us in Hanoi was extreme cold. So far, Dalat aside, our hoodies had lay unloved at the bottom of our bags for most of this trip. Now they became not only essential daywear, but pyjamas as well. T shirts were doubled up, socks were combined with flip flops in a moral dilemma that must surely be similar to what survivors of a plane crash go through when they decided to eat the less fortunate. Not that this abated the northern winter. We watched with envy as other, better prepared tourists, donned North Face jackets and Goretex shoes. In short - Hanoi is cold.

We were in Hanoi for New Year Eve, an event that seems to get a good bit of attention locally as well as from tourists. We went to see a concert that was happening down by the lake, which turned out to be an American techno DJ coupled with live drums, live violins, dancing girls and an MC who just rapped in English then yelled 'Sin jow Hanoi!' whenever he remembered. The Vietnamese kids loved it though and went pretty hectic to the tunes they loved. Then at 12.30 everything was shut down and the fun police proceeded to wander the city telling anyone who appeared to still be celebrating to stop, including a woman who was selling chips and fried chicken.

We took a trip from Hanoi to see Halong Bay and spend the night on a boat there. Halong Bay is, as expected, incredible. Although it was foggy, this gave it a very eerie atmosphere which made up for the slightly diminished visbility. The Amazing Cave is fairly amazing, though our guide's only information was what he reckoned different rocks looked like (ice creams, bread and butter, turtles etc). The night on the boat was also lovely, and made a welcome change from the Hanoi dorm room where you would be routinely woken up by the owner's kid watching Cartoon Network at 7am.

After a couple more nights in Hanoi we headed south, with the intention of crossing into Laos from Dong Ha. We took the train to Ninh Binh, an experience in itself as we found the train was one of the old Soviet-built ones used in the 90s. When you can see your breath as you sit in a rigid, straight wooden train seat, that's Communism baby. Was fun for the 2 and a half hour trip, any more than that and you're going to think maybe $2 is a little cheap for a train journey.

Ninh Binh itself is uninspiring, but nearby Tam Coc is gorgeous. Described as an inland Halong Bay, here the limestone karsts leap out around a river, which you can get a rowboat up and through the caves. Like Halong, visibility was low but it was stunning and made a good match for it's big brother any day. A bike ride around the area took us through serene countryside and eventually to a series of pagodas embedded in the rock of the one of the karsts. It would have made a beautiful ending to our Vietnamese journey.

Unfortunately though, we had bitten through to our second slice of stale bread. Dong Ha. Dong Ha's two strengths are 1) not as cold as the north and 2) it's bus station wasn't as far out of town as some places. Leaving the following day, and unfortunately foregoing a tour of the DMZ in the process, we took the bus into Laos.

So, that's Vietnam. It feels a bit mean ending on Dong Ha, so to reiterate, Vietnam is an incredible country, and one I imagine I shall return to (in the summer). Luckily, Laos has been great so far as well. As we head south we are now genuinely warm, and basking in the relaxed slow pace of the Lao people after the hectic Vietnamese experience.

See ya.

Cambodia at it's Greatest and it's Worst

Cambodia is a country with a deep and rich history. From the 9th until the 15th century, the Khmer Empire had its ups and downs but could generally be regarded as one of the world's great civilisations. Most symbolic of this greatest history are the Temples of Angkor. Hugely ambitious in both scale and design, they are now a a symbol of national pride in Cambodia. On every can of Angkor beer there is a picture of Angkor Wat and the slogan 'My Country, My Beer', a rather trite marketing idea that nonetheless shows how central Angkor is to the modern Cambodian identity.

We spent three days around the Angkor Temples, and whilst neither of us are exactly into archaeology or architecture, there is still a great wealth of discovery to be made there. The temples have not always been the tourist attraction they now are, and over the years some have been severely neglected, losing the detail on their carvings or in some cases completely falling apart. The most well preserved is Angkor Wat, the most recognisable of the temples as well as one of the most mysterious. Whilst most temples face east, Angkor Wat looks to the west, which is believed to make it a temple to death.

Oddly, it's not Angkor Wat that either of us will take away as our main memory of these temples. It is certainly impressive, particularly it's intricately carved bas-reliefs around the side depicting wars, elephants, wars, dancing animals, wars, gods and then more wars. But other temples have so much more atmosphere and unusual, interesting detail, that they simply stick with you much more.

One such temple is Ta Prohm (or 'Tomb Raider temple' if you ask a tuk tuk driver). Ta Prohm is a temple that was nearly lost to the forces of nature during years of neglect, and still it has trees growing out of it, their roots and the temples walls mutually supporting each other, inseparable now if the temple is to stay up. Ta Prohm is a fascinating, atmospheric mix of architecture and nature.

Another temple that is difficult to forget is the Bayon, in the walled city of Angkor Thom. As you approach, it looks rather unimpressive, but climb to the third level of this late-Angkorian structure and you find yourself surrounded by over 200 faces looking down on you from a great number of towers. Thought to be depictions of Jayavarman VII, the Angkor king of the time, these enigmatic faces smile down on you, an overawing effect of a ruler attempting to show both total control and total compassion for his people.

The Angkor Temples are powerful relics of a bygone age. They speak of a realised ambition for these self proclaimed 'god kings' to be remembered long after they are gone. This is all the more incredible when you consider how much of Cambodian history was lost in the 1970s. If Angkor is Cambodia at it's greatest, the Khmer Rouger is certainly one of it's darkest periods.

The Khmer Rouge ruled Cambodia from 1975 until early 1979. They set the calendar to Year Zero and attempted to destroy all traces of Cambodia's former governments and history. Only Angkor survived as a symbol of Khmer greatness, though the temples were neglected and conservation efforts set back many years. The Khmer Rouge believed in a form of Maoist communism and the regime was characterised by mass evacuations of cities, sending people to work on forced labour camps, and the swift execution of all enemies, both real and imagined. Around a quarter of Cambodia's population died during these years through starvation, disease and execution.

There are two main sites in Phnom Penh that speak of the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge: Choung Ek (commonly referred to as The Killing Fields although in reality there were around 300 such fields in the country) and the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. At Choung Ek, you are handed an audio guide in your native language and invited to walk around at your own speed. As you follow the path, stories of the atrocities committed in this site ring in your ear, jarring strangely with the peaceful green meadow you find yourself in. A tall glass stupa in the centre serves as a monument to what happened here, grimly filled with the skulls and other major bones that have been dug up since the site was discovered. You are guided from one of the first points, the truck stop, only a short walk to the killing field, mimicking the short stay prisoners faced here. Unlike similar historical sites such as Auschwitz, Choung Ek held few prisoners and no one who entered survived. Most people were executed the night they arrived, and unceremoniously dumped into one of the many mass graves which are still evident in the many dips in the ground. Having heard of the horrors in the abstract, we were now about to see them up close.

The Tuol Sleng museum is housed in the the old S-21 building, a former school turned into a prison and torture centre. Prisoners could be brought here on the most spurious of reasons, even wearing glasses or having soft hands marked you out as an intellectual and therefore an enemy of the revolution. They would then be tortured into confessing that they, their friends and their families were working for the CIA and/or the KGB (the Cold War evidently meant very little to Pol Pot's men). We are very used to describing violence as 'senseless', but in the case of the Khmer Rouge it is terrifyingly accurate. The Angkar, the Khmer Rouge's central administration, were intensely paranoid, seemingly unable to slow down the momentum of their killing. There was no final aim for these killings, just a continual purge of enemies that did not exist. Eventually they turned on their own. The original prison guards at S-21 were killed and replaced with new ones and even one of Pol Pot's closest officials was imprisoned and executed.

Within the bare, run down walls of Tuol Sleng lie cramped cell after cramped cell, all seemingly haunted by their former inhabitants. In the former torture rooms, the old metal bed frames remain with photos on the wall of those found on them when the prison was liberated. In other rooms, wall after wall displays photos taken by the Khmer Rouge of their prisoners. Only 8 people survived S-21, some of their stories are written on the wall in one of the spaces. Coincidentally, as we left, we noticed a TV crew in the grounds, and realised the man they were filming was one of these survivors. Unsurprisingly, it seems these 8 are treated like heroes in Cambodia, people whose lives are never to be forgotten.

Keen to learn more about this darkly fascinating time, I looked for some relevant books on the matter. There is no shortage of these in Cambodia, in a country where many remain in poverty, national tragedy is a precious resource. I ended up with The Gate by Francoiz Bizot. Bizot was a French researcher working in Cambodia during the 60s and the book describes his two substantial encounters with the Khmer Rouge. The first came in 1971, when he was kidnapped by them when they were still a guerilla army, attempting to start a revolution against the American backed, right-wing Lon Nol. Because of his larger-than-life character and, for a Westerner, deep understanding of Khmer culture, Bizot forms a fairly friendly relationship with his captor, Duch. Although his conditions remain agnozing, they are better than some of the other prisoners. In one fascinating moment, Bizot and Duch sit around a campfire and discuss the Khmer Rouge's revolution. Bizot puts to Duch many of the questions and criticisms that modern observers would want to ask - questions regarding the legitimacy of educated communist academics romanticising the peasant classes, or how the aims of the Khmer Rouge can justify their methods. Bizot describes his captor not as a monster, but as a confused idealist who is on a dark path. A valid assessment: Duch is the man who was placed in charge of running S-21.

The second encounter comes when Phnom Penh is 'liberated' by the Khmer Rouge in 1975 and Bizot ends up as the official go-between for the French consul and the regime. Again, it is his personal experiences with historic figures, as well as the horrendous decisions he is forced to make, that make it such a powerful book. If you do want to read a subjective account of the period that also does a decent job of covering what was happening politically at the time, The Gate is well worth a read.



Sorry for the rather long post but hopefully it was informative.

It's tough kid, but it's life

You like my krama?

Hello

Well, Connie and I have been in Cambodia for about a week and a half now, and we love it. Phnom Penh is a great city. Aside from constant offers of tuk tuk rides you're largely left alone, and there's plenty to see around town. Mostly though, it was all about the food. Whole calves roasting over an open fire outside, and beer girls supplying $2 jugs of draught beer, refilling your glass whether you want it or not. But beware, eating in Khmer establishments puts you at risk of being toasted. If a Cambodian raises his glass to you, it is an act of savage cultural insensitivity not to reciprocate. And because Cambodians generally drink as if they don't want to live, toasting often means downing your glass. At a nearby table, a Cambodian who was with a couple of friends and some Westerners (we later learned he had been their driver for the day) raised his glass to me, so I jovially raised mine and sunk my remaining beer. But a few minutes later, he raised again. I politely pointed out that our jug was empty, but rather than accept defeat, he came over with own jug and filled up both our glasses, which were promptly sunk. I won't bore you with the rest of the story, but the moral is not to drink with Cambodians.

From Phnom Penh, we slowly headed east, stopping off in Kampong Cham and Kratie before finally ending up in Sen Monorom, Mondulikiri province. Mondulikiri was lovely, although it looks a lot like the British countryside. We stayed in a place called Nature Lodge, which was a large open place with a few bungalows dotted around, and cows and horses wandering around. We went on a one day trek with one of the guides there, ending up at at a waterfall, where you can jump from the top and swim and generally lark about. As an added bonus, Connie got to go in the river and wash an elephant which turned her into a giggling little schoolgirl. On the way back we were accosted by some Pnong villagers who invited us to drink some rice wine with them. Failing to heed lessons from Phnom Penh, we joined them, although I think our guide may have found it a bit tiring having to translate for five people.

Yesterday we took a looooong bus journey to Siem Reap, which was dull but very manageable because after our scheduled change we somehow found ourselves on a VIP bus. So for the first time since coming out here I was afforded something I cherish above all: legroom. Siem Reap is a fun place, with bars that actually have atmosphere. Tomorrow we'll be off on the first of three days to the Angkor Temples, so we're excited to see what they're really like.

Adios.

The Most Important Meal of the Day

This is a blog post I wrote a while ago but was unable to post because of computers too weary to peer into my camera and grab a few pictures. I can only apologise for what must have been a distressing wait. But now allow me to present in all it's multi-megapixel glory - Tim writing about some stuff he ate.

Thailand offers the discerning traveller a number of ways to start the day. Traditionally, Thai cooking doesn't particularly differentiate between which foods are suitable for the morning or evening like we do. A typical Thai breakfast would be something like rice soup, a good example of which looks like this:

Delicious. But that's not what I want to talk about. Because alongside these tasty authentic new delights lie another culinary sensation: the Thai approximation of a Western cooked breakfast. Typically labelled an English or American breakfast, these offer a slightly more expensive but not-terrible value way to kick your stomach into gear. Unfortunately, lack of ingredients, experience and interest for these hallowed Western dishes leads to some interesting 'plates', as the guys on Masterchef would put it. Consider this the good, the bad and the downright strange of Thai breakfasts.

This tasty morsel is the cheese omelet served up by The Rock in Ko Phi Phi. To be fair that is a very literal combination of a Thai omelet and the only cheese they have on that island, so maybe I should have seen it coming. The fruit was an unexpected bonus.

The American breakfast served at Bamboo Bar in Ko Lanta takes top place in this not-too-official survey. All the essentials included (plus ham), with the bacon being just right, and all for a decent price. The second one of these wasn't as good, because our minivan came an hour early and I had to have it cold out of a takeaway box. Still good though.

This was served at Dicko's in Ko Samui. Whilst the fancy grey-slate plate is a nice touch, it frankly could have been better considering it was an English expat place. You also had to choose between bacon and sausage, although I realised too late that Connie ordering one too and being veggie meant I could have had both, so I ended up with a double helping of sausages. This was the disappointing student of breakfasts, a respectable B, but could have been an A*.

Mr K's attempt in Ko Phangan is...well look at it. That thing at the bottom there is a sausage, apparently. The bacon had the texture of chewing gum you find under a bus seat and the beans appeared to have been overdone by about half an hour and a few thousand kilowatts. All in all a sorry affair from an institution whose chicken schnitzel sandwiches I greatly admired.

The Holiday Breakfast, served up by Coral Bay on the north side of Ko Phangan, believe it or not, is the most expensive breakfast of all these breakfasts. Your eyes will have immediately been drawn to the salad on the right hand side of the plate, which is fair enough. Lettuce, cucumber and onion are not traditional accompaniments to the cooked breakfast, they're not even cooked. But bring your eyes over the right hand side of the plate, and take a glimpse at what are, I kid not, cheese toasties. Cheese. Toasties. Pretty good cheese toasties at that, but nevertheless a good 2/3rds of that plate is filled with things that have no place there, That is what the BNP think a Full English will look like in 10 years time.

And with that, my ode to gluttony concludes. As does my research into this important field. Ultimately, this enterprise cannot be sustained by either my wallet nor my waistline.

Full Moon; or, on the benefits of napping

Good day

You'll be pleased to hear it's raining in paradise. The heavens have opened up in a bid to wash away the sins of Full Moon. Though all anyone seems to want to do today is veg out with food and episodes of Friends that are on all the screens.

Full Moon Party was good fun. Not nearly the night of decadent debauchery that we expected, actually seemed pretty good natured although we did hear a couple of horror stories. I don't know about you but I find that early drinking tends to lead to early sleeping, particularly when the island's drink of choice is buckets filled with rice whisky, super-concentrated Red Bull and coke. So between 7 and 10, whilst others hurtled themselves towards premature drunkness, Connie and I were in blissful slumber. We then went out to the reggae bar near us (there's loads all over Thailand but this one is definitely the best so far), before heading to the bar previously mentioned that's been opened up by the English guy. Had beers and some delicious Pad Thai, then hit the beach at about 3, by which point I assume most of the proper wastes had crashed, there were certainly enough people adorning the sand. Went to the drum and bass bar, which played surprisingly decent stuff, then wandered about a bit later. Slid down a slide, caught a view of the action from a bar high up on the rocks, and took a selection of photos with unwilling snoozers. Connie crashed around half 6 whilst I opted to go and find the afterparty. Realising I didn't actually know where it was meant to be, I settled to bring the night to a close with a delightful chicken sandwich from Mr K, who as far as I can tell seems to be the head of some kind of fried chicken cartel.

So, if you want to go to Full Moon Party, have a good time and remember doing so, try pre-napping rather than pre-drinking, stick to delicious beer rather than buckets, and in the name of all that is holy don't turn up asleep on some stranger's blog.

At the Koh Pacabana

Hello all

Me and Connie are now in the Gulf of Thailand on the notorious Koh Phangan. Enjoying it a lot, very laid back and although it's swarming with Western tourists, I don't really see it as any more than in bits of the Andaman Coast. At least here it's pretty up front about what it's about. Where we're staying is great, lots of cool people and a pig called Diamond, and spent last night at the 'grand' opening of a bar which has been set up by an English guy from our resort and his Thai girlfriend. It was pretty bare, they don't have a bin or a bottle opener and we had to help them take their fridge off the truck when it was delivered! However, they only decided to open a bar a week ago and they had to completely gut and refit the place entirely, so the fact they've got anything at all is impressive. Most refreshing is that the guy is cool for you to play whatever over the speakers off his ipod so you can actually listen to decent stuff instead of trance remixes of chart hits. Full Moon is tomorrow so it's getting busy, looking forward to seeing what it's really like after hearing so much.

Between now and previous post we've taken a bizarre bus ride from Hat Yai to Koh Samui, where the bus was fully booked so we were given plastic stools so we could sit in the aisle (make your own aisle seat joke). Then a very early morning ferry over to the island, which turned out to be going to a minor port which is hardly used, so we had to make our way round the island, not the simplest task when Samui taxi drivers have decided to just make up insane price for a lift, which don't even seem to be consistent with each other. Across the island? 600 baht. Down the road? 500 baht. Maybe they're just afraid of small change.

Samui itself wasn't all that. It's more of a holiday destination and expat settlement than a backpacker place, and consequently a bit more expensive and with little to do. We went for a wander to find a place called Elephant & Castle which was reportedly a matching replica of the same pub in London, but it had closed down very recently.

Been in Phangan since Monday now, will probably leave where we are Saturday, either to Koh Tao or to another bit of Phangan which isn't as built up. Then it'll be off to Bangkok to fly to Cambodia. That certainly flew by.

Well Connie's paying up for her computer now so I can't be bothered to go through and edit/check/make this interesting. Chao.