Hua Hin, Chumporn and Ranong- 16th to 20th November

So, a night bus to Bangkok brings us back to the bustling city for all of 4 hours, where we decide to quickly move on and start exploring the South. A nice train is quite a relief, and we get some fish curry for lunch, much needed after the little sleep on the night bus.

Hua Hin Station is beautiful, and the town is a regular holiday destination for Kings of Thailand
for 100 years.

The town itself, however, has sadly these days become somewhat of a destination for what the Thai's call farang khee nok, (bird shit tourist) a term for poorly dressed white people with no manners who may or may not be looking for... company. However, if you ignore the disturbingly regular offers of a massage, the little laneways of the town are quite charming, and once we found somewhere that wasn't serving burgers or schnitzel, there are some lovely restaurants. Sun dried beef and freshly caught mackerel hot and sour soup.

Nice restaurant, terrible hair.

We visited the beach, and had our first dip in the Gulf of Thailand, which was warm and lovely. There were horses riding along the beach too, which was a little surreal. And quite a lot of half naked elderly white people.

The next day, we hopped on a train to Chumporn, which was, as ever, delayed, apparently due to the King arriving in town. Ben chanced the smoking area, which was just an open door on the fast moving train, and frankly was so terrifying, you'd need another cigarette to recover! We arrived very late- even the tuktuk drivers were going home, and dinner, by necessity was some crisps and cereal we had left in our bags, as all the food places were closed! It was only ever a little stopover on our way down (apparently the town's best feature is it's boats out to the islands!). But here's a picture of the hotel, and Jenny in a Tuktuk.

We got a bus from here to Ranong, a port town on the opposite coast, and a popular place for Burmese people to try to sneak into the country. We arrived expecting only a stopover in an bland port town, but found ourselves in the mountains at the side of town, with gorgeous views!

 

We were pretty much the only Westerners there (a lovely contrast with Hua Hin- I think we had become racist about ourselves), but lots of Thai tourists come to enjoy the rejuvenating properties of the natural hot springs. Everyone was really helpful and friendly, and we had one of the nicest and unexpected evenings of our trip.

After our nice dip in the red hot water (some brave/stupid people were dunking there whole bodies in!), we proceeded to drink a whole lot of Chang beer and eat 5 spice pork and shumai.

Yes. THAT drunk...

Vang Vieng- 31st October to 5th November

What better way to spend Halloween that with a drive through the mountains with a certified psychopath. 15 terrified tourists in a minibus taking corners that a man and his goat might struggle with at about 70mph! After 2 hours of unbridled terror, we arrived in Vang Vieng, a tiny town, nestled between enormous mountains, with a river running through the center.

The view from our room.

 The town is very chilled, with most of the bars laying out the tables as beds that you lie down on, with cushions and such, and nearly all of them show endless repeats of Friends, South Park or Family Guy to lure in homesick tourists! The town used to be more of a piss up paradise, with tubing- literally floating down the river from bar to bar in a tractor inner tube- being the town's main selling point, but the river front bars have been closed as a result of one too many drownings! You can still go tubing, minus the booze, and it was a great way to see the gorgeous scenery (sadly we didn't get pictures due to the camera not playing well with water!)

The last waterfront bar!

You can also walk out into the mountains and explore, in what is an incredibly wild and beautiful corner of Laos, although it is very easy to get lost before you even get near the mountains if you are an idiot. (Ben is).

YEAH COWS!

 Unfortunately, the week then took a turn for the worse, as the dreaded traveller's stomach struck- thank god we had a nice hotel, and a pharmacist who spoke good English! As a result, the following few days are probably a little unpleasant to report (and no, we took no pictures of the view...) but the smallness of the town was an advantage, as we could get takeaway when we needed it, and were never more than a panicked sprint from relief.

Even so, we ended with a gorgeous dinner by the river, with steamed chicken in banana leaf, lemongrass skewers and sticky mango rice.

As there are a lack of pictures, to finish, here are a couple of lovely bits of 'Engrish' from menus:

Never let me down yet...

Bangkok 8th to 11th October

 BANGKOK

So to start, Qatar Airways is AMAZING. A 747 with comfy seats, good films and a delicious green curry wrap! This was tempered slightly by Ben messing up at immigration...

Anyway, we got to Bangkok late as a result, and got a cab to our hotel. The cabs here are lurid pink, which is strange. The Khaosan Road is anarchic, but was subdued by an enormous downpour on our first night (we now know what monsoon season means!), so we spent time in our room at Buddy Lodge, an amazing boutique hotel in the middle of everything- the towels are folded into elephants!

Worth every penny for this!

The following morning, the weather had cleared up, and we went for a wander to Sanam Luang, the park leading up to the huge Grand Palace complex, it was surrounded by a million little market stalls selling every manner of trinket, and a fair degree of pirated DVDs and games!

We spent the evening wandering Khaosan and the surrounding alleys- people sell hard here, and the people selling trips to ping pong shows make hideously graphic noises to let you know exactly what that is... Jen had coconut ice cream from a coconut shell- it was delicious. The fruit stands sell bags of fruit for about 40p, and you can get pat thai (glass noodles, chicken, egg and chilli) for about 60p. At the end of the market, some kids were playing strange Thai autoharp type instruments- we saw them play Coldplay and Lady Gaga!

The next day, we explored Bangkok by boat along the river. There are so many temples and amazing buildings you lose track of what they are.

They know wat is wat...

We stopped in Chinatown for vases full of iced coffee, then headed home for dinner at Mai Kaidee, an amazing vegetarian restaurant hidden on a little back street. The spring rolls with peanut sauce were mindblowing!

MINDBLOWING

Next stop- Chiang Mai!