Well, I wish I had read the following paragraph before I decided to
book myself a hostel slap bang in the middle of the Patong strip! It was an experience to say the least...

'There's well over 100 bars here -- most of them of the sleazy 'girlie
bar' variety with flamboyantly costumed bar girls (and some,
technically, bar boys) -- and a few clubs offering more, uhm... err..."intimate" performances'.....

... Not exactly what I had had in mind when I booked into what I thought was a hostel on a quiet beach!! Well, that will teach me to do some research on places before I book them!!

I stayed in my hostel here for two nights, spending most of my time on
the crowded and not particularly nice beach just having a wonder around in
the evening. I didn't feel all that safe here but it was impossible
to sleep with the racket from the clubs- might as well have been
trying to sleep on a club floor! It was a shame really because I
booked into a dorm of 4 girls but was given a room on my own so wasn't
really able to meet anyone especially as people seemed to sleep all
day here and then go out at night..I don't think it would have been
half as bad if I hadn't been on my own! Anyway it was only two days
and then I was off to Phi Phi, an island about an hour and a half away
by ferry for four days.

Here I stayed in a 10 bed dorm (when I booked it said 18 so was pretty
relieved when I arrived!). 10 people in one room with one bathroom is
a lot tho, I was woken up constantly and the bathroom was gross- had to
walk through a cold puddle of brown water to get to the toilet..not
nice!! Thankfully a girl in my dorm who has just come from Australia
said that the hostels are much nicer there and that this was the worst
place she had stayed. The people in my dorm were also pretty
unfriendly which I didn't expect..apparently that is also not the
cause in Australia so thats good!

Luckily there was a friendly american guy staying in my dorm who works
in one of the clubs. He has lived in that dorm for 6 months- no
idea how!! Anyway, he took me out to dinner on the first evening before he went
to work and him and his friends introduced me to two really nice girls
who were also travelling alone, one from London and the other from Boston so I spent the rest of the week with them!

In the day we spent quite a bit of time on the beach and went on a couple of trips, a shark dive (although I didn't see any sharks!!) and a boat trip around the nearby islands. There is quite a good nighlife here so we ended up going out every night- so was back in bed for a nap by about 4pm most days! This was probasbly the best few days of my trip so far - very tired now though!

I came back to Phuket yesterday (a day early) so I could get the ferry back with my friend and also stay with a friend I had met in Phi Phi who had left a few days earlier. Quite sad now though as I have now said bye to a second group of friends I have made! Now flying back to Bangkok this afternoon to start 14 day tour from there through Malaysia and back to Singaopore where I will then fly to Oz ..should be good!

Missing everyone back home loads! Sorry I have been so bad with contact this week! Will reply to all your messages now : ) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx