Oh my, yes we know it's been a while since our last blog (but I expect you're used to that by now!). Tracey here by the way. Linds is hoping to download some photos while I'm updating the blog... she says Hi :-)

So the last you heard from us we were almost completing a full circle of Koh Phangan. Well since then we've been all over the shop! We moved on to Koh Tao which is the 3rd Island of the group and the smallest. Every Island seems to have completely different vibes and set-up. And every time we arrive on an Island we think we're not going to like it as much as the last, but we usually do and are then sad to leave!

So Koh Tao was a very exciting week for us. As I'm sure you must all know by now, Lindsey completed her PADI open water certificate - well done Linds!! And I did the advanced. Linds was really brave and I remember how scared I was when I did it. But she did brilliantly and had a really nice instructor called Jim from Enfield (New Way Diving, if anyone ever goes to Koh Tao - they're really good). Our first dives were in really poor visibilty (which was great for my navigation dive!), but the next day the diving was much better and we saw lots and lots of fish... brilliant. Lindsey passed her course and then came on my last dive with me which was a night dive - very brave and we were both pretty nervous about jumping into the sea at night! Obviously we had torches, but still... scarey!! It was a really good experience, although the visibility (aside from the darkness) was pretty poor, so I imagine it could have been better. Needless to say we celebrated our achievements with a large Chang or two after the night dive.

We didn't hang around after our diving, but we were sad to leave Koh Tao and the fish. We caught the night boat to Surathani and then a coach overland to Krabi. The night boat was an experience in itself - I can tell you!! When we got on the boat, there were two floors, both covered in mattresses which were numbered. We had 32 and 33... however, 31 and 32 are one mattress and there was already a fella sprawled out... these mattresses are approx the size of a large single! We were a bit worried about the sleeping arrangements, but luckily the boat wasn't completely full so we had a bit more room bewtween us - phew! No offence to the poor guy, I'm sure he was nice and all, but def not my type! I actually slept on and off for the whole 8 hours, but Lindsey didn't. We then had a 2 hour coach journey across country to Krabi.

Krabi was a big town (for us having come from the Islands). It was OK, but nothing special, so we decided to only stay the one night and cram in a few sights. We went on a longtail boat trip into the mangrove where we got eaten alive by the mozzies! We also took a tuk tuk to a Wat (Temple) which had a viewpoint and buddha at the stop of a steep climb up 1237 steps! Oh my buddha! Did we sweat climbing up there... but as everyone told us that we passed coming down, it was well worth it. The views were amazing! Dinner in the night market which was really good, and then bed - ready for our next move.

We went from Krabi to Railay beach which is only accessible by boat. Railay was a funny little place with 3 beaches. The one we stayed on was pretty much a swamp/mangrove beach (nice!). However, just a short walk through the limestone kasts and you come out onto 'one of the best beaches in the world' as described by lonely planet... they were right! It was stunning. We stayed a couple of nights on Railay and watched a Muay Thai boxing match - which confirmed that neither of us enjoy watching boxing!

We caught another boat over to Koh Phi Phi Don (and got sunburnt along the way). Koh Phi Phi was hit really bad in the 2004 Tsunami and is still recovering and building. It was quite eery when we first walked around the main area, to still see some of the devastation. However, Phi Phi is a beautiful Island and lots of hard work has gone into building the tourism back up again. We did a boat trip around the Islands including Koh Phi Phi Leh which is where 'The Beach' was filmed... such a shame that the beach is ruined by all the tourists (us included of course), but mostly by all the bloody rubbish people leave behind!! Me and Linds are turning into Eco-terrorists! The snorkelling was good, we saw lots of marine life, and we were sorry we didn't get to dive there.

Almost up to date!

Two days ago we caught a boat across to Phuket, which is also an Island but attached to the mainland by a road bridge. We stayed 2 nights on Patong beach, but as expected (lonely planet is once again right) it is very sleazy and the sex tourists are everywhere - kinda puts you off your Phad Thai! So we spent yesterday looking for new accommodation on Karon beach (just down the road).

And here we are. It's been a rainy day today, so we've been making the most of our 5 pound (pp) hotel facilities - english tv, gym and free internet! Hopefully tomorrow will be better weather and we can explore more of Phuket.

All in all, we're still having a great time and we're excited about our next move to Bangkok (where we hope to both get haircuts!!! watch this space).

Missing you all... lots of love,

Tracey and Lindsey

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