Hi everyone! Sorry it's been so long - Indonesia is crazy but amazing. We spent the first three weeks in Sumatra, which just has everything - mountains, jungles, oceans, lakes, rivers, volcanoes... even the most cramped and terrible bus ride is made amazing by the scenery.

We arrived in Medan at the start of the month totally worn out, and the city itself is hot, busy and frantic - not really what we were after. We spent a 'day off' there hiding out in one of the huge shopping malls and went to the fanciest cinema I've ever seen - giant reclining leather seats, blankets, and waiters to bring you food and drinks - a far cry from the Terrible Train Ride to Yangon.

From there we headed to Samosir, an island in the middle of Lake Toba (the biggest crater lake in the world), and rented our own little blue-roofed cottage by the lakeside. All the locals are super chill - everyone plays guitar and there are very few tourists. We spent our five days there swimming in the lake, reading on the porch, drinking palm wine with the owner of the guesthouse and touring round the island on the back of a motorbike. The owner's girlfriend made the most amazing coconut cookies which we naturally ate about 5 plates of per day - we were sad to leave Toba behind but much, much sadder about saying goodbye to those cookies.

From Toba we caught the bus to Berastagi, a small dusty town in the shadow of two volcanos, Mt Sinabung and Mt Sibayak. Sinabung had just erupted and we could see the mushroom cloud of smoke at its peak from our guesthouse - the dust from the eruption still coated everything, and anything left outside would acquire a thin layer of beige within minutes. We got up at 4am the next day to climb the other volcano with a Dutch couple we'd met on the bus and a guide. We drove up part way and hiked for two hours to reach the peak by sunrise, then climbed down via the natual hot springs (not a good idea to go in with sunburned thighs - I nearly cried.)

Then we set out for Ketambe, a village in the jungle and probably the most beautiful place I've ever seen. It felt like we were in paradise - stayed at a guesthouse with a stunning garden, our own wooden hut, an outdoor shower, and monkeys swinging around on the trees opposite our porch.

After a couple of days there we caught two buses, a boat and a tuk tuk to get to Pulau Weh, an island off the north coast of Sumatra, which we'd heard had the best diving in SE Asia. When we arrived it was still Ramadan so the place was a ghost town during the day - it took us an hour just to find somewhere to eat. We ended up renting a little wooden hut on stilts by the beach from Mama Mia, the loveliest old lady who hopped around her kitchen in bare feet and a flowery dress & served 'family dinner' every night for just about every traveller on the island (about 25 of us - apparently not many people make it so far north).

On our second day we hopped on a boat to the nearby Long Beach to meet Steffan, The World's Chillest Guy, to do an intro dive. He was about 65 with long hair and the kindest face and we both just wanted to hang out with him all day. We were going to take our PADI diving course but Isabel had problems with her ears so I'm going to take it by myself in Fiji - I'm hooked! I've never had so much fun in my life - the coral reefs are so colourful and there are shoals of fish swimming around you as thought you're one of them - we saw a sting ray and a big eel thing and blue starfish and it was just so beautiful. Steffan said I was a natural and that my 'eyes were sparkling' the entire time - they must've been if he could make them out behind that mask...

Our friend Raja who worked for Mama Mia took us out on his friend's boat for a day and we went to black sand beaches (with not a soul on them!) and snorkeled above an underwater volcano which blew my mind. It's unlike anything I've ever seen - streams of bubbles as far as you can see rising from the ocean floor - it's like swimming through clouds of pearls. You can float above them and it feels like a bubble bath in the middle of the ocean... basically heaven.

We spent six days in Pulau Weh, the rest of the time just swimming and snorkelling and relaxing on the beach (and hunting desparately for food for the last day of Ramadan when nothing would be open - although Mama Mia did sort us out with an omelette and fruit salad because she's a living saint). It was the first place we were really sad to leave - we'd gotten used to family dinner every night and listening to everyone's travelling stories and playing cards with Raja. Mama Mia looked after us all like we were her family and when we left she told us to stay safe and 'I love you, dahling!'

We'd been off the beaten track for so long that last week we decided to go straight to Bali - apart from some tentatively-sipped palm wine (which tasted like bile) neither of us had had anything to drink in almost two months at this point and were excited to be able to have a glass of normal wine with dinner and go to a bar. We came straight to Kuta which is basically Magaluf for Australians & and had a few nights out on the strip there, then headed to the Gili Islands to sweat out the hangover in peace and quiet. Gili Air was lovely - no cars, beautiful restaurants by the sea and a lot of dancing at night on the beach. We rented glass-bottom canoes to see the fish and coral but it couldn't compare to Pulau Weh.

Today, I'm back in Bali - Isabel left for Stockholm this morning and I'm about to catch my flight to Melbourne in a few hours. I can't believe it's already been two months... and that I'm now on my own! Expect more regular updates on here now that I'm no longer in the jungle/on a tiny island. I'm staying at Barkly Backpackers in St. Kilda for the next week but after that I've got no real plans - I'll need to end up in Sydney in 3 weeks for my flight to NZ but that's pretty much my only responsibility right now. It's a good life.

I've finally gotten into my emails so you can email me at [email protected] if you need me or just for a chat! Love and miss you all xxxx