Yogyakarta

We arrived at Yogyakarta airport and it was the hottest place we've been to, but luckily we had a pick-up to our hostel. Within 10 minutes of driving it started to rain, and again this was the heaviest rain we'd seen, the streets were like rivers of water.
Yogyakarta is a lot bigger than we thought. We booked a hostel outside of the centre thinking we could have the best of both worlds with not too many tourists, but close enough to walk around. In the end there weren't many tourists anyway and we were too far to walk, but the hostel was really nice. Because of this we stayed in for dinner and ordered take-away Chinese food and it was nice not having to go out for dinner for a change.
The next morning we had an organised trip to Mount Merapi, an active volcano that last erupted only in November 2010. You'll probably pick up that we really didn't do our homework about Jogja, we didn't realise there was a volcano here, but had heard on the news about the eruption without knowing it was this one. We're really pleased we went up there, it's unbelievable to see the damage and the smoking volcano over the city looked amazing. We walked up as close as we could get, but we'd already been warned by our driver to listen out for the signal. Colin wanted to go a bit closer, but I managed to persuade him that a better photo is only worth it if you come back with it.
We also saw where the cooled down lava flows and the damage to some of the local houses. Some people were rebuilding as we were climbing up. We spotted something amazing and I've added the photo to the post... a single red poppy in the middle of all the destruction.
In the evening we got a taxi into the centre of town to see the Sultan's Palace where there was a fun fair and lots of food stalls. We went to a restaurant nearby and had really good Indonesian style chicken satay.
Next morning we went to the bus station and headed to Bali.

Singapore

We arrived in Singapore and only had 2 evenings and 1 day here. On the first evening we went for a walk around the area we stayed in, which was quite far from the centre, but it didn't matter too much as we got the bus in easily.
The next day we got up early to explore the city, we went around Chinatown and Little India and saw the Ruffles hotel. Unfortunately it rained quite heavily on and off all day, so we spent a lot of time ducking in and out of malls and shops. By the end we gave up and just walked in the rain and enjoyed the bit of cool it brought with it.
That second evening we went to the Singapore Zoo to do the Night Safari. We weren't quite sure what to expect, but we really enjoyed it. We had a tram ride through the rainforest and at times drove so close to the animals that if we couldn't have seen the trench between them and us I would have been very worried.
After this we were allowed to explore on our own down little walkways and got really close to the animals (behind a window of course, but when you see that tiger's head right next to yours, window or no window, it's pretty scary). We tried to take photos, but no flash was allowed and the photos didn't come out great. So we packed it away and just enjoyed the experience.
From here we head to Yogyakarta in Indonesia and this will be our first flight since South Africa in October.

Melaka

We arrived in Melaka after again dropping locals outside their houses, but we arrived at the main terminal and had to take a local bus to our hostel.
Our first impressions of Melaka as we walked through little alleyways and along the river to find our hostel were really good. On our first evening we went for a local speciality dinner, chicken rice balls, which was really enjoyable, although there wasn't much to it for a speciality, really just balls of rice with a different texture, almost like potato. Afterwards we wandered around the weekend only night market and found they had better quality of goods here, and we ended up buying a couple of things. Sunglasses for me, I've already broken three pairs and I hardly wear them, and Stacey has been nagging me for chopsticks for when we ae back home, so we finally got some here.
We also saw a man who was breaking world records. Malaysia are obsessed with world records and this guy's record was something to do with breaking in to a coconut with one finger. It sounds quite bizarre, believe me it was very strange to watch. He made quite a performance out of this and after we saw him break it once, hung around for a bit, only for 20 minutes later nothing more to have happened. We're not quite sure what the point of this is, but we can see he'll have a crooked finger for the rest of his life. After, we walked back to our hostel.
The next day was really warm so went for a few short walks, always sticking to the shade, and explored the old and historical part of the city. There were quite a lot of old buildings from when the Portuguese, Dutch and British settled in this area.
On our final evening we went to a satay restaurant where you get to pick the raw food you like, and then cook it yourself in a pot of satay in the middle of the table. We'd heard you can queue for an hour or more to get a table, but luckily we managed to get one in 15 minutes. We mostly stuck to chicken as we weren't sure what most of the other things were. It was really nice though.
We really enjoyed our two days in Melaka, and the whole of Malaysia in fact. It's somewhere we would really like to come back to one day. We've found the people really friendly, the food good and cheap, and it is less touristy and has more character than Thailand.
The next morning we got up early and got a bus to Singapore.

Kuala Lumpur

We arrived in Kuala Lumpur after a decent bus journey and got dropped at a bus stop that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. Colin had looked up the trains and knew that there was a station nearby, but the taxi drivers weren't very helpful about telling us where the station was as they wanted us to travel with them instead. We wandered 2 minutes up the road and found the train to our hostel for a fraction of the price of the taxi.
The hostel we stayed at was only recently opened and everything was very nice, but particularly the staff were very friendly and helpful.
On our first evening there, after dinner, we walked to the Petronas towers and took some photos of these amazing structures. We'd read you have to get to the towers really early to get tickets, so decided we'd sleep in the next morning and save it for our final full day in KL.
The next morning after a late breakfast we headed to Chinatown and explored the streets and stalls around here and also found our way to Little India. By the afternoon it was too hot for us to be out in the sun, so we headed into a few of the malls in KL. The whole city was really busy and we later found out that it was a public holiday and the Petronas towers were closed. By late afternoon we'd got back to our hostel and it started to rain. Within minutes the streets were flowing with water and everyone was ducking for cover. Sitting by our hostel looking through the window we saw the lightening and heard the thunder at the same time and had to wait quite a while for the rain to ease off for us to go to dinner.
On the Friday we got up early and headed straight for the towers, only to find out we'd just missed out on tickets, so decided that though we were leaving the next day we would get up even earlier and try for tickets again.
So on our final morning we were awake very early and again made the trip to the towers with high hopes of getting in this time, only to be thwarted by even more people. We realised it wasn't meant to be and I guess this just gives us a reason to come back one day.
We made our way back to the bus terminal and bought tickets to Melaka.

George Town / Penang

We left Koh Lanta early on Sunday morning and decided to make the long journey to Malaysia in one go, rather than stopping off in a random town in Thailand and wasting a night and 2 days travelling. We were told it would be a 10 hour journey which would get us to Penang for about 6pm. As it turns out we were 3 hours late and had to change bus 4 times. I have to say though that the journey wasn't too bad and we had some time to grab lunch, which was quite interesting. We ordered hawaiian pizza, what we got was a blob of dough with peas, carrots, sweetcorn, mushrooms plus chicken and cheese and the only regular hawaiian ingrediant was pineapple. It tasted better than it looked and it amused Colin and I.
We got 20km away from Penang and were excited to be so close to our stop, but from the time we saw this sign to when we arrived took over an hour, as the driver first dropped off all the local passengers right at their front doors and then had to go back on himself to drop us.
On the way to one of the local girl's house, a young Western guy on a moped drove up to the window where the girl was sitting and gave her a big cheesy smile. She tried to ignore him, but when he smiled the second time and knocked on the window she wound down her window. Without saying hello, the guy asked her where she was going and the rest of us in the bus thought this guy was trying to chat her up and couldn't believe his cheekiness. In actual fact he was lost and when he saw foreigners in the bus he cleverly thought it would be a good idea to follow us back to the main area where all the tourists stay.
So once we got off the bus it was 10pm and we had nowhere booked to sleep and hadn't had dinner. Luckily the town was still very lively and we found a hostel pretty easily and then went to the closest cafe for food.
We've spent most of the time walking around, seeing the beautiful, old buildings. On the second night we went to the night market for food and had a really tasty chicken biryani in a clay pot and the whole bill for both of us came to less than four pounds. We went back there the final night and had the same again. The only thing I haven't liked so far are the big ass rats that we've spotted at night. They are the biggest rats ever, the size of my face... Colin says I'm over exaggerating, but he didn't get a proper look at them like me. These rats are a real problem, because I'm petrified of them and just a glimpse of one and I run for dear life, which makes Colin very nervous as a few times I've run across a busy road without looking.
One evening as we'd come in for the night there was karaoke going on in a building next to our hostel, right by our room. The lady on singing was murdering every song and seemed to be hogging the mic as we didn't hear anyone else. This carried on till at least 1am, but once we stopped laughing we managed to fall asleep.
We were hoping to go up Penang Hill, but the cable cart isn't running at the moment, so we'd have to trek up there by foot for 3 hours and then come down too and in this heat we just didn't have the energy for it.
Next we head to Kuala Lumpur.

Koh Lanta

We left Koh Phi Phi early on the ferry and either it was too early for most people that probably would have been drinking all night or nobody wanted to go to Koh Lanta. There were only about 10 of us on the ferry and two of these people were a South African couple that are family of people I know well from my hometown.
Once we got to Koh Lanta, we decided not to venture too far from the pier and stayed at a hostel along the sea. We went for a walk along the beach and hoping to cool down, went for a swim. But though we thought the water in Koh Phi Phi was warm, the water here was like a hot bath and even shallower than before. We managed to walk across to a sandbank which meant we were in the middle of the ocean.
The next day we went to another beach just on the other side of where we were staying and it was lovely here. The water was refreshing, but still not ice cold and the waves were pretty good too. We didn't find much shade though and ended up crouching behind a sign board just to get out of the sun for a few minutes.
Koh Lanta was a great place to end our time in Thailand, as we finally got the good swim and beach we were hoping for.
Although we enjoyed our time in Thailand we have been disappointed by some things. We'd be interested to know what it was like coming here a few years back, when things wouldn't have been as touristy. We also constantly felt like we were being ripped off and had to be on our guard, we were hoping to buy a few things that we'd seen along our travels and were planning on spending the rest of our Thai money on these, but the prices we were quoted were always more than we'd pay in London, so we didn't bother. It's not somewhere we feel like we'd rush back to... and I still think South Africa's beaches are better!
Next we head to Malaysia.

Koh Phi Phi

After Krabi we got the ferry to Koh Phi Phi and the weather kept getting hotter and hotter. We went here thinking it was going to be a really chilled out, relaxing place, but instead it seemed like party central as it was the  week before full moon party in Koh Phangan. After finding a hostel, we headed straight to the beach and what we hoped would be a cool and refreshing sea. Unfortunately the sea was very shallow and the water was warm, like bath water. We walked out in the water for a few hundred metres and it was only shoulder deep... waist height for Colin. Here the water got a bit cooler, but the speedboats told us to swim back, as they needed the space to turn round in the bay.
Our first night here wasn't very pleasant, as we had a group of "Brits Abroad" in our hostel who insisted on waking us up every hour on the hour because they couldn't handle their drink and unfortunately our room was right across the bathroom.
First thing we did the next morning was get our money back for the next night and find a new hostel, only to hear that the noisy group were leaving that day. The new place we found was nicer anyway and slightly closer to the beach.
We spent the next day on the beach again and though the weather was lovely during the day, by the time we went for dinner it was raining hard and we got drenched walking around after 10 minutes.
So we booked tickets for Koh Lanta for early the next morning.

Krabi and Ao Nang

We arrived in Krabi in the evening after leaving Koh Tao and found out Krabi is just a jumping off point for the beaches in the area and the islands nearby. So after one night we headed to Ao Nang, which according to our lonely planet guide was meant to be a really small beach town with not much for shops and restaurants. In actual fact, Ao Nang was really busy and had loads of shops and bars and we struggled to find somewhere to stay at first, but eventually found some decent bungalows just away from the centre. The weather finally cleared up for us and we spent most of our time here on the beach, making up for lost time. The scenery here was a lot different to the other coast of Thailand, hillier, more cliffs and even some wild monkeys.
From here we headed to Koh Phi Phi.

Koh Tao

We got the ferry to Koh Tao and were hoping to do some diving there. On our first day it rained non stop and on day 2 it was still raining. On the third day the rain had stopped, but it was really overcast and the water wouldn't have been clear enough to see much had we gone diving. We had lunch on the beach on this day, as although it's not sunshiny, it is still warm. On the fourth day it rained in the morning again, so we decided to give up on Koh Tao and diving and headed to Krabi. But as our luck would have it, once we got on the ferry the sun showed up and caught us unawares... Colin looks like he's wearing a permanent white t-shirt and I look like I've been skiing for 2 weeks. We both look ridiculous and are in a bit of pain.
We really hope the weather will get better for our last few days in Thailand.

Koh Phangan

We had a decent journey this time and arrived in Koh Phangan at about 5pm. We'd booked somewhere to stay which turned out to be little bungalows on stilts in a forest. It was away from the centre and the closest shops and restaurants was a 20 minute walk away.
On the first night we settled into the bungalow and then left to find a bite to eat. The road didn't really have any sort of landmarks to look out for to find our way back and to be honest Colin and I weren't concentrating on where we were going either. So it's no surprise that on the way back, by which time it was dark (pitch black, you couldn't see a hand right in front of your face) we got a little lost, but after a 10 minute detour we found our place.
The next day we walked along the beach and then back to the bungalow to relax in the hammock on our balcony. There was a pet monkey at the reception at the place we were staying that kept screeching for attention, so it wasn't quite as peaceful as it could have been, but still nice. That night we got harassed by more stray dogs, but luckily they didn't bite us, just scared us. I hate these dogs!
On our last day in Koh Phangan we hired a moped so that we could get to some of the other beaches on the island. We paid for the bike and then had to give in Colin's passport as a deposit. This might sound ludicrous, but it's the norm in Asia (they know you won't run off with their bike as you need to come back for your passport). You'd think we should be used to handing our passports over to random strangers, but we're not and still feel nervous every time we have to do this. Anyway, we took the bike and drove around the island, went to nice beaches and sat eating lunch until it started raining too hard for us to ignore it and then headed back to our room.
The rain didn't stop till later and we weren't going to use the bike again, so decided to return it and get Colin's passport back as we were leaving early the next morning. We were told to wait 20 minutes for the motorbike guy to come... an hour later and he still wasn't there. Finally after another 10 minutes of sitting around watching the sun go down and the darkness come, the guy got there. The next few minutes are a bit of a blur, because the guy was mumbling and all I caught from what he was saying was that he'd lost the passport. Colin was keeping his cool, I had already gone bananas and thrown the man's helmet on the floor. He tried to give us a long story which we didn't want to hear (especially as he'd already made us late for dinner). Colin told him he didn't want to hear any more stories, just find the passport and bring it back. So off we went for dinner, both feeling really nervous and not wanting to think about what we'd have to do to sort this out. Half way through our pad Thai he spotted us as he drove past and showed us the passport, safe and sound in his hands. He had the cheek to tell me that I didn't need to get upset and worried because he is secure... have you ever!!
That night the rain really came down, we both woke up when we first heard thunder and there was a point where the thunder and the lightening came at the same time. The entire bungalow and valley lit up and we were both a little bit scared, but eventually it passed and we went back to sleep.
It's a shame the weather here wasn't great, but we got a few hours of beach time in and really good food at a little restaurant. This morning we left and headed to Koh Tao.

Koh Samui

After another nightmare journey (I won't go into details this time), we arrived in Koh Samui. Having left the Greeners in Bangkok for a day we met up again here. Spent most of the time on the beach and in the sea, as you can see from the photos and evenings out with the Greeners.
The hostel we stayed in was quite nice, just a 10 minute walk from the centre which meant the beach was quieter where we were. The owner was very friendly and had a little daughter that was also very chatty, even though she didn't speak English... except when she did an exact impersonation of me saying "careful", complete with South African accent. It was hilarious!
For New Years we had a delicious meal and then headed down to the beach. As soon as we got down there we were offered fireworks, rockets, sparklers, Chinese lanterns and drinks. It was a really nice atmosphere and fireworks were being fired off every few seconds. We were a bit scared at times, as some of the rockets were not firing into the air and were exploding on the beach, but everyone was fine. As New Years came the sky was alight with fireworks from all directions on the island... although there was no countdown. We really enjoyed spending New Years on the beach, a first for all the Greeners.
We'd like to thank Les, Eileen and Kelly for coming to meet us and spoiling us while they were here. It's been really nice meeting up with family when you're half way round the world, especially for Christmas and New Years. Kelly also treated us to Dr Fish, this involved hundreds of little fish in a tank eating away at the dead skin on your feet. It didn't hurt, but the funny vibration feeling all over your feet and legs took some time to get used to, it was quite ticklish as well. We enjoyed it though and our feet are better for it.
We said good-bye to the Greeners and headed off to Koh Phangan.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all our blog readers. Here's a photo of us celebrating the New Year on Cheweng beach in Koh Samui.