After recommendations from a few travellers who had been in Thailand for months, we decided to head to Ko Lanta next, just south of Ko Phi Phi. We checked in to the Ko Lanta New Beach Resort and tried to book ourselves onto a snorkel trip, but speaking to the English girl who ran the dive shop we were told that the South Thailand islands are not great for snorkelling, and that they are basically all geared up for diving. Generally you can only go on an island ...

Arriving in South Thailand was a bit overwhelming, as it seems that there are so many islands to choose from, all of them supposedly idyllic and with some of the best beaches and diving in the world.Speaking to other travellers though we'd heard the best ones were Ko Phi Phi on the West Coast, and Ko Phangnan and Ko Tao on the East Coast. Ko Phi Phi was our first stop, a couple of hours by boat from Krabi (after being crammed onto the back of a bus with peopl...

Leaving the Perhentians we began another mammoth day's travel, starting with a taxi boat from the island onto the bigger boat (this time minus the 30 villagers), then a shared taxi with an Irish fella from Kuala Besut to the Thai border, then after border control a two kilometre walk (in midday heat carrying 20-plus kilograms) to the minivan station, then an uncomfortable minivan ride for a few hours to Hat Yai (tourists seem to have to sit in the back seat w...

We arrived in Wakaf Bahru after our overnight train from Kuala Lumpur early the next morning. The train was safe and comfortable, though a guy did signal to his friend and start following us in the station at Kuala Lumpur the night before, but he was about as subtle as haemorroides and just as ugly, so we saw him off with an "I know you're going to try to rob me" stare and he left us alone. Once they know you're not an easy target they generally...

After Kuching our time in Borneo had ended. We had seen some amazing sites but had to leave for Peninsular Malaysia to continue our travels through South East Asia.Again we used Air Asia and our flight to Kuala Lumpur from Kuching was delayed by about 5 hours. Never mind we did get a free KFC for our troubles, it all counts when you're on a budget!Kuala Lumpur was a huge city. The Petronas Towers looked quite spectacular, probably the most beautiful high rise...