21st February- We've arrived in Hanoi after a 30hour bus journey (the longest yet) with the driver continuously stopping to pickup locals who gave him bribes. We got here and found a hostel in Hanoi Old town. 22nd February- Today we got up rather early and went to see Ho Chi Minhs Masoleum which closed at 10am. Ho Chi Minh was the Vietnesmese leader who died in 1969 and his body has been there, embalmed, ever since. They take him off for a 2month holiday to Russ...

We are now saying goodbye to Thailand for 3 weeks and moving on to our next destination Laos. The 4 of us (Frederike, Joe, Sarah and I) got a mini bus from Pai to Chiang Khong where we arrived at a guesthouse at 2am and then had to be up at 7am to go across to border and catch the 2day 1 night slow boat to Luang Prabang. The boat was mixed with tourists and locals and on our way down the Mekong River we kept on stopping and picking up more locals who appeared ...

We'd heard a lot about how great Pai was from people that we'd met in Chiang Mai. Most of them had made a round trip on motorbikes and back to Chiang Mai. We decided to take the safer option of a 3hour bus ride along the most constant winding roads ever (762 bends). We had a massive breakfast and just missed the bus by about 5seconds. Whilst waiting an hour for the next we met a crazy Dutch girl called Frederike :). We stayed in Pai Circus school for the first ni...

After being told that the train was booked up for the next 4 days the only other option we had was to get a VIP bus from Surat Thani bus station which took a total of 22 hours...we dreaded the thought of this as we didn't know what to expect....as we got on we were shocked, leather seats with a built in back massager, lots of leg room with the seats reclining into beds at night, tv with English films and snacks and drinks!....Chiang Mai here we come!!! We arrive...

Wow Khoa Sok National Park! What a place, we've loved every minute. For the last 3days and 2nights we've spent life in the middle of the jungle and sleeping in a floating lake hut. On our bus journey to Khoa Sok we met a lovely couple called Tanja and Christian who were planning on doing exactly the same trip as us, so we agreed we'd do it together to save money! The trip started when we were dropped up at the peir and greeted by our tour guide "My names two l...