So finally back on dry land a day later than planned and realising that being on the ocean was easier than being on land as serious sea legs are kicking in. We are pleased that we still have time to get to the bus station to catch the long bus to Bangkok on schedule. We cross our fingers that Shereen has survived her time in Phuket alone and wonder if we will be on the same bus, but as a 5 with have a plan and a base to find each other the next day.

Travelling the hour back on ourselves to Phuket pays off to get the cheaper bus that ironically drives the hour back to Khoa Lak, I will never understand S.E.A and their money.

The journey went smoothly and we had front row seats of the treturous drive, but worth it for the extra leg room. Arriving early into Bangkok and very behind time schedule not that we are suprised we jump in a taxi to our redevous hostel on Kho San road.

Sat in the resturant of hostel is Shereen with all her fingers and toes and a pass in her Padi course. We catched up and then head out for some shopping down the famous Kho San road. This street is the main backpacker street in Bangkok and if you can't get it here you won't get it anywhere. You can buy t-shirts of all sorts, electrical gadgets for everything, tacky tacky souvieners, every kind of illegal book/CD/DVD and of course university degrees or any kind of official documentation (I'm considering becoming a doctor with a press pass!!). We get a little carried away and buy some gringo clothes to fit in better which later resorts in dumping of more of our Westen clothes. With the girls arriving in the afternoon we decided to smarten ourselves up with a hair cut for less than £4!! They had all their qualification on the wall but I must say it's hard to believe them when you are in Koh San.

Back at the hostel we tried our clothes on dance around a bit and nearly forget the time.... Arrgh the girls will hopefully be arriving soon. We sit waiting in the resturant in easy view I look up and see what I think is them but a bus passes in front so I shake it off, but with a second glance I realise it was and shout to the others. Hana takes off running to greet them going completely the opposite to the others but we all finally join and jump and laugh, so much so a local lady starts jumping and getting excited with us. It must of been a good sight for those watching, we always enjoying having a little bit of home come find us.

We waste no time introducing them to there new home for the next couple of nights, but there is no time to waste we are all super excited and want them to see everything. So we rush to the famous road for some great street food and then plenty of 'Chang' beer. Rachel nearly falls in love when she sees the tower of beer before her. After a lot of beer and a few jugs we are all very happy but must head back to the hostel to for some, however some of us made some enemies with our next door neighbours.... Not sure they enjoyed our singing to S club 7 at 2am.

We had a lazy day, maybe some nursing a hangover others suffering jet lag so we just soaked up the Bangkok atmosphere. Spud and I went and enjoyed some massages while Shereen tried out Muay Tai boxing. We did make a plan for the following day and decided on our plan of attack for the next couple of days. It was an early night for a busy day the next.

The girls suffering some time diffence problems were up nice and early and took to the streets to see the true nightlife of Bangkok of prostitutes and very drunk tourists. That did mean we were all ready and packed ready for our day out at the famous floating Market. We were picked up and I was suprised it was so far out of the city, I knew it was on the river which runs through the city but it was a good 1 1/2 hours outside. We had to take a boat the rest of the way, weaving in and out of the narrow passage ways watching all the locals go about their daily river lives. We had been on boats like this before but I think the girls where a little shocked on the lack of safety and stability of the boat. We arrived at the famous floating Market and were given our orders, we were thrilled by the opputunity to see the "world's greatest show" something we obviously couldn't miss. Wondering a long the board walks that lined the narrow but very busy water ways, we watched the local ladies and gentlemen selling all kinds of goods. You had stalls on one side and boats on the other. You could buy loads and loads of tacky souveniers on the stalls and some boats but most boats were selling food. Hana & I determind to be more adventurous this time round were fansinated by the foods, their was lots of fruits some we had never seen before and then you had the ladies who's were cooking lots of different exciting things. Hana saw here opputunity to try something from a boat three rows out, they were like taco shells with a White substance and orange strips on the top all cooked from scratch even the taco shell. We all assumed it to be a cream cheese thing but it actually was a sweet desert and very very nice, she used a long rode with a bucket on the end to put the sweets in and in return you put your money in. I then had some spring rolls and Spud tried a random drink pointing to a local that had just been served asking "same same"!! Again time and whizzed by and we had taken lots of pictures and had got stuck in but we had our show to catch so we ran back so not to be late.

We were transported to the famous Cobra show, the greatest in the world and joined the other husselling busselling tourist all talking about this exciting show. Now i am not a massive animal activist and I do like seeing these shows to see what animals can do but I was horrified and upset by this place. The cages were so small and there were too many animals in some cages, I was so upset by the crocodiles it was a long long way from my exciting trip to Australia Zoo. I didn't want to stay and neither did Hana but we felt we should see the show. I tried to forget about the animal cages as we found our front row seats to the show. It was again upsetting to see the snakes tied in the bags all wriggling about, but I didn't really want them to escape. The show began and a funny looking man, a snake tamer who looked the part unleashed the deadly cobra from the bag. The commentator was the funniest thing, he informed us only 1 man had died and that these were very deadly snakes that are in Thailand. It was remarkable what the tamer could do, but I'm not too sure bout it. He never took his eyes of the snakes and continued to agravate the Cobra until it would attack which of course the tamer would dodge, it was impressive but the Cobra did tried to just run rather than fight but that would make for a show. The tamer did show the Cobra off for one of it's beauty and even managed to give it a kiss without it even moving. Then they brought it through the audiance for pictures as the Cobra is very lucky in Thailand and to rub it brings you good fortune. They joked that Cobras are lucky because the male ones have two male parts!!! After the Cobra they brought out more snakes and it was very impressive to see the huge python coiling up and then realising as a spring trying to attack the dodging snake tamers. The power was awesome and they did it so quickly, one man had three snakes again all deadly attacking him. He caught two with his hands then the third one with his mouth. I didn't like the part of the show when they dropped a Cobra into a cage with a mongoose so we could see how they attack each other. The commentary said it was a fight to the death but it was ok not here only in the wild, still it was interesting but too much for me. The show finished and although it was impressive and interesting the way the animals was treated was enough for me to leave straight away, I wouldn't say don't go but if you see these things in the wild you feel sorry for these guys.

However we were fully of spirit and still very excited it was still only day 2 and we had the afternoon to play with. We had our first long bus journey booked together but that wasn't till later, having already seen the palace and temples in Bangkok we left the other to venture on their own. However as it is believed they even after instruction took a left out of our hostel and not right so didn't quite find the right temples but they still saw a budda statue. They still returned on time exhusted from early starts and a long day ready for our bus journey to Chaing Mai.