i got off the night bus and just wanted to find a bed, it was 5 in the morning, on my own and didnt have a clue what there was to do in KL. Got a taxi to chinatown where id worked out most of the guesthouse places are so rekoned that would me my best bet. as the taxi pulled up, i got swept off to a guesthouse by the owner with another english girl who after a few minutes relaised we'd already met in thailand, small world eh! he said  i could have that night fr...

the bus journey there set us up for the most beautiful place ive ever seen, well in terms of sand and sea at least. as it turned out, it wasnt his friends car, more of an air condition mini bus to ourselves. the journey was about nine hours that took us right over the highlands. at one point the van screeched to a halt and the driver shouted elephants. rite at the side of the road was a herd of elephants with a couple of calves, amazing, not what you expect at al...

considering it was a late night i got up fairly early to makethe most of the last day in penang and see some of the temples etc,. we ended up spending most fo the day at the oldest mosque in malaysia. what was supposed to be a fleeting vist turned into a lengthy debate with a women in the information centre. she sat us down while we waited to be taken into teh mosque and said to ask if we had any questions about islam and she would like to answer them because ...

so another day was spent travelling. we had to get a mini van from our hotel in Ko Lantre across to the main land. we stayed on the bus the whole time as Ko lante is a group of islands so through a series of bridges and barges we somehow made it to Trang on the mainland. here was another wait for a bus to hat yai. another lengthy wait and we were finally on the bus to penang in malaysia. Crossing te border went without any problems thankfully, other than i left...

got the boat across to Ko Phi Phi which apart from Ko Lak, was the worst hit by the tsunami, its almost completely rebuilt now but you do get the sense its been quickly thrown up and there is still a large amount of construction. Phi Phi is two islands, Phi Phi Don where the toursism, diving etc is and Phi Phi Leh which is uninhabitated as was the setting for filming 'the beach'. In fact i think the pic i have used for this blog is the bay they used and t...