So after Bali and a brief stop over in Singapore we headed across the border to Malaysia, down to the SE coast for an island called Tioman. It was the lure of good diving that took us there and it was pretty nice. We got a 2 hour boat from the mainland and arrived at a very majestic island with sandy beaches, surrounded by big hills covered in lush forests. We stayed in a village called ABC Bintang (not related to the beer). It was one long path that stretched the length of the village with home stays and a few restaurants dotted along it. We got ourselves a nice hut facing the ocean and settled in to 10 lovely days of our usual fare: snorkeling, diving, reading, eating and sleeping...........

The diving was pretty nice there: pygmy seahorses which are the size of your little finger, my favorites, bump head parrot fish, ship wrecks and lots of other lovely things. The other highlight of the island was the sunset cafe: happy hour with cold tiger beer sat in comfy loungers watching the sunset, followed by the best pizzas - with proper cheese! As you can imagine it was a tough 10 days :0)

From Tioman we headed to KL and had 5 days there. KL is a great city with lots of fantastic street food stalls, the specialty was laska soup which is hot spicy chicken coconut soup served which noodles or another favorite was eatherware pots cooked over a flame full of rice and chicken cooked with ginger and lemon grass served with chilis...Mmmmmmm. We were based in Chinatown so also had lots of Chinese food which was great and did a bit of shopping in the markets there. We also booked our flights home in KL, as i think you all know by now we are coming home so that was pretty exciting as well (back on 9th Dec)!

We decided from KL to head to Sumatra, i had read a lot about the great diving there and had been pestering Fred to go since we left OZ and finally got my way :0)

What we didn't realise was that you can fly direct to Banda Ache in Sumatra from KL for peanuts (about USD15) then it is a 40 minute boat trip to the island we were heading for. But of course in true backpacker style we got a 6 hour coach from KL to Penang, 6 hour boat to Sumatra then 12 hour coach to north Sumatra - a saving moneywise of ohhhh about USD10!!!

The bot trip to Sumatra was the worst, and i meant the worst boat trip we've ever done, 6 hours in a boat that resembled a sardine can in the roughest seas you can imagine. Luckily I took a travel sickness pill (as I get sea sick)....unfortunately the other 99 people on the boat didn't and all proceeded to spend the next 6 hours throwing up. The captain was thoughtful though and played the new movie, Terminator Salvation so loud it drowned out the puking noises, however, I had the pleasure of sitting next to Fred who chucked the entire way so it didn't help me much. On top of which, for any of you who have watched this movies can probably appreciate it is a load of tosh, but, I did have English subtitles which I think were translated by a shall we say "challenged person" and that kept me smiling ;0)

Once recovered from the journey we headed inland to Bukit Lawang which is on the edge of a national park and is famous for seeing Orangutans. We only had a night there but was a lovely place set on a river. In the morning we walked through the village heading for th feeding station to see the orangutans. To get to the platform you have to cross the river which was a pretty rough rapid style river. The locals had set-up an ingenious was of getting the tourists across......if a little hairy! It was a rope pully strung from one side to the other with a rope off the line tied to a small boat, so you climb in and the boat man literally pulled you across all the time getting pulled by the rapids in the opposite direction. I really thought we would be going in but miraculously it actually worked quite well and we got to the other side bone dry! Once on dry land we went to the feeding station passing a big snake in a tree on the way (yuk!) which of course everyone was looking at for ages, I on the other hand was pegging up the steps keeping as far away as possible! At the platform we sat waiting for about 10 minutes and no sign of any orangutans, Fred and I thought our usual bad luck for seeing land animals was back and then we heard cracking in the trees behind and turned to see a mother and baby swinging towards us. So we spent the next hour watching them swinging around us, it was amazing they were so close you could see their facial expressions.

After the viewing we packed up and headed back to the main city of Medan to get a 12 hour night bus up north. We had a few hours to kill so went to the fancy new shopping mall and hung out there for the afternoon. What we soon realised was that it was Saturday afternoon and as you get at home the mall was full of teenagers hanging out with their friends. We thought we would look a bit conspicuous, westerners with massive backpacks but thought we'd just get a few stares. In fact the minute we walked in the door we got mobbed ( no exaggeration) by about 10 teenagers, they all took photos with their mobiles and were all trying to practice their English. One lad asked me what i thought of Indonesian men, I was a bit horrified as I thought he was chatting me up and I wasn't quite sure what to say then I realized he actually meant what did i think of Indonesia people - phew! And of course all the while this spectacle was going on everyone else walking past was staring, it was hilarious. We managed to escape eventually and then Fred was accosted by a kid of about 10 who took our photo and then the cheeky b***** asked for our mobile number to call us in England! Our long coach journey was pretty uneventful, reclining seats and air con, and we arrived in Banda Ache and got the ferry (a quick and smooth ride, thank god!) to Pualu Weh. We have been here ever since.

The days have just merged into each other; breakfast with fresh baked bread, a dive, lunch with salads to die for, afternoon dive, little drink on the balcony whilst swinging on the hammock watching the sunset and then local dinner of bbq fish with rice various vegetable dishes, tempe and spicy salsa.....life doesn't get much better than this.

The diving here is great, quite strong currents but they bring a great variety of fish and there is a cool group of people we've met so its all pretty social. We also bumped into my dive instructor from last year in Bunaken and our dive guide in the Togeans so has been great to hang out with them as well. This place has barely been touched by tourism, the bungalows are all hanging over the sea but are pretty basic and the bathrooms are a 30 meter walk up the hill, and when I say bathroom we are talking squat toilets and a mandi, but the diving, hut location, good food and company more than make up for it. In the morning we can literally walk out of our hut into the sea for a swim before breakfast or just lie in bed or the hammock looking out over the sea.

Now we are back KL where we've meet up with Muk for three weeks in the Perhentians for more diving and beach antics................