Hey! So i probably havent spoken to you since Auckland so i will tell you about that first!...
Basically i met up with my friend Emily and stayed with her for a few days which was nice. On my last night i went to bed at about midnight and thought id better just double check my flight times for the next day. I was thinking my flight was at 1.25pm so i had the morning to get the bus across there. When i looked my flight was actually 9.25am!! I had to bang on Emilys door and tell her the situation, so she had to sit with me bleary eyed while i booked a direct shuttle bus for 6am! Lucky i checked eh?!
I finally got to the airport and took my connectng flight to Sydney-i had to stay there for 7 hours due to my next flight not bwing until 5.30pm or something. It was quite exciting though because there was a big storm in Sydney (luckily not while i was flying!) but it looked really good out the big windows! I actually saw a bolt of lightning hit the observation tower at on point! (p.s some of you will find this quite funny....but i watched a program about storms on the aeroplane...i cant get enough obviously!). I was not happy when i left Sydney aiprot though-Emily gave me some real English Marmite to take away with me but customs took it away!!
So i arrived in Bangkok airport about 11pm, and made my way VERY slowly through all the security etc-i was met by a nice Thai lady and a guy called Brendan (also a tourist going to the same hotel as me) so that was nice to have someone to chat to on the journey to the hotel. When we got to the hotel about 1am we decided to take a walk down Khao San Rd-our hotel was only the next road! As it was Friday night there were some lady boys, but there was also some nice food and drink-you can easily get a plate of noodles and a big bottle of beer for about 2quid-bargain!
So the next day Brendan and I took a walk to find the Grand Palace-but along the way we were stopped by a nice Thai l;ady-Bangkok does have loads of people trying to sell you things and lying to you so they can con you etc, but this lady was telling us that we could get a tuk tuk (like a bike taxi) all around Bangkok for the day for just 10BHT (20 pence!!) It worked though-we got taken round to all the temples, they waited for us to go in and look around then took us to the next one, we got taken to other places as well and shown attractions etc-was a cheap but interesting day! Even got free beer in one fot he shops. Apparently its the Kings birthday soon, so the government do loads of deals for the local people-eg Free petrol (which is why transport is so cheap).
So that night i left Brendan and made my way to another hotel to meet my tour group. We had a meeting with our leader and went for a meal in a nice place called 'In Love restaurant' it was really nice food and overlooke the bridge. We then went for a couple of cocktails in the bar-but the tour leader said that he wasnt allowed anything to do with us drinking becausd apparelty he gets in trouble for leading all the groups astray!
The next day a couple of us went to see the Grand Palace (we had to hire awful sarongs and shirts to go in!) then went for a Thai massage. I have to say ive never been in so much pain in my life and i actually cried! (although no one saw!) The man in the cubicle next to me was practically screaming and the woman massaging me kept leaning over to me and saying 'Pain??...Pain??' I kept saying Yes but apparently its normal for it to hurt-thats the point! After the massage we went down some traditional Thai markets-complete with fried pigs ears and some whole fishes-some of them still swimming in the buckets and the smell was awful.We also went down Khao San Rd during the day-Kate bought s few bits but you really have to barter them down on prices-its dirt cheap anyway but they try to get as much as they can for stuff. Apparently they have codes in the way of carrier bags-one colour of carrier bag means you are bad at bartering (so the other market people know whether to con you!) and another means you are good.
Last night we caught a sleeper train (far less stressful than China!) and made ourselves comfy. Me and Kate got into our PJs straight away (at 6pm!) but then everyone decided to go to the bar ion the next carriage! We went anyway and just partied in our PJs-was the most random thing ever-they had disco balls and lights, and the music was so bad but the Thai people knew all the wordxs to our boy band songs! Actually slept quite well and arrived in Chiang Mai about 7.30am today.
Today we have been up to another Temple and been to Tiger Kingdom. As you can see from my pics we could lay with them and touch them-was amazing! Also held a snake but that wasnt quite as exciting. A couple of people went in with the baby tigers and they were pouncing and chasing people.
Tonight we are meeting up for a chat about the next couple of days-we ard going up into the jungle for a trek-very basic apparently! Hopefully get to ride elephants there.
Will try to update when i get back. xx