26/28th Feb - Phuket

hello again!

As we boarded our night ferry, we were both thinking the same thing, 'Are we mad?!'. The night ferry is half cargo and half sleeping passengers. We were squished in like Sardines, we would say our beds were at best no bigger than 50cm wide and then the next matteress would be right next to you. As we set off, we made friends with our neighbours, 2 girls on our right from East London and 2 lads from Canada on our left. We ended up playing cards for around an hour until the crew switched off the lights so every one hit the sack. The ferry wasn't the most pleasant trip of our lives but it wasn't as bad as we thought it was going to be. We arrived in Surat Thani at 4.30am and had to wait for an hour and a half for the bus to arrive. Once we boarded our bus it took another painfully slow 6 hours to Phuket.

Once in Phuket, we came across a very cheap hotel for around 6 quid a night each. The room was nothing spectacular but it was only somewhere to sleep. Once settled in the room, we heading to European Speedo Central aka the beach. We wern't the best fans of the beach as it was far too busy, we kept getting hassled by people trying to sell us junk and it was full of sunbeds. That evening we booked ourselves onto a day trip which included White Water Rafting, Elephant Trekking and a visit to a Monkey cave. Later that night, we visited a bar to watch Man Utd spank Wigan 4-0!!

We were staying in the place 'Patong' which is commonly known for its 'Walking Street', this place has been on the TV programme 'Big Trouble in Thailand' and you could see why!!....Ping pong shows, Ladyboys, Hookers and Stripclubs seems to be the norm here! This is a very strange place, seeing 60 year old Europeans with stunning Thai girls.....something going seriously wrong there!!

The next day we got up seriously early to commute to our day adventure. It took around 1 1/2 hours to get there but as we arrived, Ross wasn't best pleased with the water level in the river as it was pretty low, but we went along with it. The staff got us into our rafts in groups of 4s. We then paddled down stream to a calmer bit of water were there was a dam. We then got out of our rafts and sat on the other side of the dam which was dry. Afet 5 minuets had past, the staff suddenly opened the dam and a wave of water pushed us down the river! It was amazing and we both now want to take it up as a hobbie back home!!

After the rafting, we got taken on a short drive down the road to the Elephants. Ross and Brad got the Bull elephant so it was the biggest. (YEAH BOY!) We then headed off into the jungle. After a short walk, the driver asked Ross if he wanted to sit up front on the elephants neck with him. Ross agreed nervously. As Ross reached the front of the elephant, the driver jumped off with in a flash and left Ross sitting, driving the elephant on his own. Looking back on it, it was hilarious but at the time it was pretty scary. After around 10 minuets, the driver jumped back on and continued the trek. We both felt a bit guilty riding the elephants as we are not the most lightweight of guys and because the elephants are pretty much slaves.

We soon headed back to Patong to watch Arsenal lose to Birmingham in the Carling Cup Final (HAHA). As expected, Brad went into a massive mood and was snapping at everything and everyone so we went to sleep pretty quickly.

x