Colombia

We flew from Panama City to the beautiful Medellin where we took a short taxi ride to our hostel, Arcadia, which is Greek themed and Greek owned. We booked the 12 bed dorm online and were shown to Hades, the appropriate name they had given the hell room down in the basement. Luckily after seeing the horror on our faces, they offered us a much nicer room, Olympus, on the first floor. They had free salsa lessons starting just after we arrived but we had to give it a miss since it was getting late and we hadn't eaten yet. 

The next morning we made our way to a place where we could go paragliding. It was really cheap, only 100k COP which is roughly £25 for half an hour. We had a bit of a faff trying to find an ATM which would accept our cards and so that, coupled with heavy traffic, meant that we arrived at the place in the afternoon. Kay went up first, we had both paid extra to get the use of a GoPro while up there but when she landed, her pilot informed her that the memory card was faulty and that no pictures had been saved, which was a bit of a gutter for her. 

I went up next with a different pilot, and thankfully, a different GoPro. The view from up there was amazing, a birds eye view of the city and all the hills surrounding it. We were up for about half an hour when he asked if I wanted him to do some tricks? I instantly agreed and he immediately started swooping and twisting to the chorus of my screams. 

We tried to land after that but, the wind had died down so much that my pilot, Alejandro, was struggling to gain the height again to land at the top of the hill. We stayed out for another hour and a half before he finally decided to try and land half way up the hill instead. I definitely got my money's worth and I also got to help pack up (and carry back) the parachute which was an experience.  Poor Kay had to wait all that time for me and had only been told that I would probably be landing in the city instead. We had made plans before that if this happened to either of us, we would just make our own way back to the hostel, but luckily for me, Kay decided to wait it out - she had my bag with all my money in it! 

We went for a few drinks that night with some people from our hostel. We started at a hostel close by for a couple, where we also met up with some American guys we'd met at the paragliding, before heading to a club. We later went to a bar where they were playing salsa music, and I got free salsa lessons from some locals. After the clubs shut we went back to the 'park' to carry on drinking. Every city in Colombia seems to have a square in town where everyone, locals and tourists alike, congregate to have pre and post club drinks. We stayed there until the very very early hours of the morning. 

The next day was the inevitable write off. 

We booked a tour to a place close by called Guatape, it's a lovely colonial town with a lake and also a huge rock that they've made into a view point with over 700 steps to the top. We started out day bright and early as Guatape is a couple of hours drive away. We were first to be picked up and found out very quickly that we had inadvertently booked ourselves on a tour with a Spanish speaking guide who had little to no English. She gestured that we would just need to look at the things she pointed at but it was obvious we weren't going to be able to get any information, which was a shame. She did luckily mange to find someone on the tour who could speak some English and he was then forced to be our interpreter for the day. 

We started the tour by going on a boat trip around the man made lake. I know that they flooded the town in order to create this lake but I have no idea why. There are a lot of nice houses up on the hills surrounding the lake and, again, I can't be sure, but I think she was pointing out famous people's homes. A bit like lake Como or something...kinda. 

We then went to have lunch, and after lunch, we climbed the 700+ steps to the top of the rock/view point and were greeted with a wonderful view of  the lake. ( see pic below)

It was then off to Guatape town where we were given some time to wander around and our lovely interpreter did his best to keep us in the loop. 

We managed to book ourselves onto what has been described as the best walking tour in all of South America for the following day and we weren't disappointed. We spent 4 hours waking around medellin where we were shown the sights but also given loads of interesting information about the history of Colombia and medellin which used to be the most murderous city in the world but you would have no idea of that now. 

We left Medellin that evening on a very expensive, albeit very luxurious, night bus to Cartagena. It wasn't until after this bus that we found out that it is usually cheaper to fly in Colombia than taking the bus. 

We arrived at the bus station in the morning and took a local bus into Cartagena. We managed to get to the hostel using the sketchy directions they had given to us and also getting a bit of help from some Mexican guys who were on the bus with us. They did abandon us at one point but thankfully, and weirdly, we bumped into the couple who had helped us in our hour of need all the way back in Panama City airport. Our guardian angels it would seem! 

The hostel was lovely, clean and modern, they also gave us a refreshing cold beer to have while our beds were being made up. We spent the day with an English guy from our dorm walking around the wall which surrounds the city. 

The next day we went and did a walking tour of the city with an Australian couple and a German girl who were staying at our hostel too. It was really good but not a patch on the one we'd done in Medellin. 

We decided the next day to get out of the city and go to a beach called Playa del Blanca which wasn't too far away by local bus. Myself, Kay and the Australian couple spent the day lounging on the beach, having some drinks, and being harassed by local ladies who wanted to give us massages or put braids in our hair. We managed to catch one of the tourist boats back to the city and on our way back to the hostel we saw an amazing dance competition going on. We went out for drinks that night with some people from our hostel, we all started at the park/square for our pre drinks and got to see some of the dancers from earlier in the day strutting their stuff and also a voluptuous drag queen who was belting out Mariah Carry songs for us.  We then all headed for the famous salsa bar called Havana Club, who claim to make the best mojitos in Colombia. The place was cram packed with people trying to get their salsa on, and the mojitos weren't all that, so after a while we decided to head to another club. We danced the night away at the second club and then finished our night where it had all began - in the "park" with everyone else in Cartagena. 

The next day was quite quiet, we spent the day with the German girl from our room, Dominika, and wandered the lovely streets of the old town in Cartagena. 

Myself, Kay and Dominika left the next day and made our way up to a small village outside Santa Marta, called Taganga. We left bright and early but waited over an hour for one of the shuttle buses to the bus station. We eventually gave up and walked back a bit and got a local bus in a few seconds. When we arrived at the bus station we were ushered off our bus and straight onto another local bus which would take us to Santa Marta, or so we thought anyway, but it actually only took us half way before we were chucked off, and onto another bus. We did arrive in Taganga  around dinner time thankfully and checked into our hostel. Kay and I had booked a private room which turned out to be in a different building  a wee bit up from the main hostel, the wifi didn't work, but it was nice to have our own space for a few nights. We had some cheap but delicious Mexican tacos from a street vendor for dinner and then had a quiet night. 

We met a nice American guy while having breakfast at the hostel and he later came for lunch with the three of us. We all went for the grilled fish set lunch, which was soup for starter, a different type of tasty grilled fish each, coconut rice, salad, plantain and homemade lemonade, all that for about £2.50. We then all walked over the hill to another beach which was supposedly nicer that the one in the village, but I personally couldn't see any difference. We spent the day there and then wandered back over to the village to have more yummy street food for dinner and then helped the American guy drink a bottle of rum that he couldn't take on a flight with him the next day. 

Myself, Kay and Dominika went to Tayrona national park the following day and spent the night there in hammocks. We had hoped to use our now expired student I.D's to get us into the park for cheap but the guy behind the desk was the first person ever, to really scrutinise them. He was having none of our "it's only the credit card that has expired, we're still students" chat. The park was absolutely stunning, we had our pick of beautiful white Caribbean beaches which were only a short twenty minute walk from each other. We spent our first day at the closest beach that you were allowed to swim at, and only ventured back to our accommodation when the sun set. Myself and Kay had a bit of a mis communication which resulted in us only taking half the money we had planned to. Luckily, we had brought a load of food and water with us so we managed on what we had...just. 

We ventured a bit further the next day and walked about an hour away to one of the most spectacular beaches I have ever seen. I could have lived out the rest of my days on those beaches but my back wouldn't have taken another night in a hammock so we left late afternoon and made our way back to Taganga. 

Now that we knew that flights were so cheap, Kay and I took a flight the next afternoon from Santa Marta down to the capital, Bogota. What a temperature shock that was! It had dropped to about 10 degrees at night which was not nice. We shared a taxi from the airport with two English guys who it transpired, were fresh out of high school. One of them was asking us for tips on getting a job in the corporate world. I'm not entirely sure what he thought Kay and I did that we could help in that matter, maybe we just seemed very old to them?!

We checked into our hostel and they made us a lovely cup of sugarcane tea and showed us where we would get really good pizza for dinner. We were invited out for drinks with some Koreans that were staying in our room but we were pretty tired, and freezing, so decided to get under the covers and watch programs on YouTube instead. 

We went on a graffiti tour the next day which was really good! The graffiti artists there are so talented. After the tour we had some lunch and then retraced our steps so that we could take pictures without having 30 people in the way. When we were heading out for dinner that night, we bumped into Dominika, she had arrived that morning and was staying in the hostel next door to ours. 

The weather in Bogota is so annoying, one minute it's clouded over and freezing, and the next minute the sun is out, 3 layers of clothing are striped off and sun cream is needed, but 5 minutes later the layers will be back on because it's clouded over an freezing again. 

We took the cable car up to the top of Monserrat hill where we got an amazing view of all of Bogota. We went for a really nice Middle eastern meal that night which consisted of chicken shawarma with rice, falafel, hummus and paprika chips...yum!! 

The next day was Sunday which meant that everything was shut and there was nothing to do.  We had a nice lie in and then did a bit of shopping in the afternoon. We left for the bus station about 9pm for our bus to Armenia where we would get another bus to Salento in the morning. 

We arrived in Armenia at 4am which was a bit earlier than expected. I went for some breakfast and got speaking to a nice Colombian guy who had come off our bus too. He kindly showed us where we would catch the bus to Salento and we were on our way by 5am.  We were thankfully able to check into our hostel at that time and after a second breakfast and some lovely coffee we were able to have a wee nap. We just caught the owners leaving when we arrived but they left their 3 very capable sons in charge. The one checking us in was hilarious, it's quite a feat to not only speak another language fluently, but to have a sense of humour in that language too! We slept until lunch time and then went to a cute wee vegetarian place for lunch. We walked around the lovely town in the afternoon and then walked up some steps to a view point. We got chatting to a Colombian who had moved to Germany and was just back on holiday to visit family and friends. He tried to engage us in some conversational Spanish so that we could practice but our Spanish really wasn't good enough for that. We can get by with what we have but that's about it. We went to a place called Brunch for dinner, it had been highly recommended to us by Zoe, who we'd met at San Blas. She told us that we had to try the peanut butter milkshake but by the time I finished my enormous burger and chips there was no way I was going to fit anything else in. 

We took a 'Willy' the next day to a national park close by called Cocora. The trek was only 13km but it took us 6 hours to complete the whole thing. We stopped for quite some time at a hummingbird sanctuary where we had some hot chocolate and attempted to take pictures of the beautiful hummingbirds. Probably over 100 photos were taken and I only managed to get one or two decent ones. The only difficult part of the trek was the the last 1km to the top of the hill where it suddenly got very steep! The walk back down the other side was nice and easy since it was all down hill, this was the part with all the huge rubber palm trees. We took a Willy back into Salento and went for some dinner and well deserved early night. 

We did a coffee plantation tour the next day after checking out. We walked the 3km down into the valley to the plantation. The tour was really good, they showed us the whole process from planting to roasting. I even got to plant my own coffee seedling and we got to try our hand at picking the cherries. We got to have a cup of the coffee at the end of the tour but I actually didn't enjoy it very much, I think it was too smooth for my taste. After leaving the plantation we saw some horses tied up, presumably the transport of someone on a tour. We asked if we could take them back to Salento because we couldn't be bothered walking all the way back up the hill. It was a really great hour long ride which was made all the better by the fact that both our horses wanted to be in front. Any time Kay's came near mine it would start cantering away. After getting back to the hostel we found out that the journey to Cali only took 3hrs and not 7 like our book had told us. This scuppered our plan to do an overnight bus and so we just stayed put for one more night. 

The next morning we were up with the birds to catch the first bus to Armenia and from there managed to get a bus quickly to Cali. It wasn't a long wait there either before we were on our final bus to Ipiales which is the small town at the border. It was only supposed to take 8hrs from Cali but it ended up taking almost 12 hours which meant we arrived at midnight. We would be crossing the border the next morning into the 12th country of our trip, Ecuador. I was very sad to be leaving Colombia but I had already decided that I would definitely be back, and soon!

Panama

Some people are just not suited to staying in dorms and I can't get my head around why, if they can't sleep through a little noise, they don't just do everyone a favour and get a private room. We encountered one of these types on our first night in Panama. We had landed in Panama City quite late and it was probably around 10pm when we were checking into our hostel. The guy showing us our room, switched on the lights so that he could point out our beds to us. Almost as soon as he vacated the room some very rude 'gentleman' popped his head out of the fortress he'd made for himself on the lower bunk using towels and sheets, and started gibbering away to us in Spanish. Having only spent a mere couple of hours in our first Spanish speaking country, he was given a couple of perplexed looks from Kay and I, who had not one clue what he was going on about. Not to be put of by this, he continued to talk to us in Spanish until I remembered one of my only Spanish phrases, "No hablo Español". He quickly switched tongue to English and told us to switch off the light. Ok, I told him, and then turned towards my bag as he disappeared back into his fortress. Less than 30 seconds later his ugly little head was peering through again demanding that the light be turned off. I understand that people need to sleep, and particularly if they are getting up early, which he wasn't FYI, but people also need to be able to get ready for bed when they've just checked in. This wasn't our only encounter with the man unfortunately, he would also tell us to be quiet if we had the audacity to speak in our room at 3 in the afternoon. I mean, how very dare we?! Get a room to yourself or invest in an eye mask and ear plugs, which are priceless commodities to anyone travelling and staying in dorm rooms. 

Panama

We spent our first day in Panama City figuring out a plan for our time in Panama and also deciding how we would get from Panama to Colombia. We had been told that the only options were to take a sailing boat, which took you first through the Caribbean San Blas Islands and then another two or three days sailing to Cartagena in Colombia, or to fly. We were told that both options would cost roughly the same and so before we arrived we decided the boat trip was a better option.  We got talking to some fellow travellers at our hostel who told us that there was actually a third option, this would be to do a two or three day trip to the San Blas Islands and then take a flight with the new low cost airline Viva Colombia. This sounded ideal because with it coming into the winter, there was a high enough chance that it wouldn't all be smooth sailing, and I didn't much like the thought of 5 days of rough seas. 

The next day we went to see the world's greatest shortcut, the Panama Canal, and spent some time walking around the old town. 

From Panama City we took an overnight bus to David and from there it was a short bus ride to a small town called Boquette which sits about 5000ft above sea level. While there we trekked to the top of Volcano Baru which is an active volcano (it hasn't erupted in over 500 years) which stands at 11,000ft. We started our trek at midnight so that we would be at the top for sunrise. We set of as a group of 9 but it wasn't long before we'd split into three smaller groups. We walked the whole way with an English guy and another guy from Germany. We spent the whole time swapping stories and keeping ourselves entertained for the 13.5km to the top. I stupidly wasn't drinking enough water and so by 8km I started to get cramp, and by 12km I was in agony with it, but I carried on none the less and we made it to the top for sunrise and were rewarded with an amazing panoramic view. We had the Atlantic sea to the East of us, the Pacific to the West and Costa Rica to the North.  If we had thought that a six hour uphill walk was tough, we were in for a treat with the 13.5km back down. The horse riding we had planned to do the following day had to be cancelled so we could spend the next day resting our weary legs. 

We spent our time in Boquette relaxing, horse riding, shopping at markets and generally just having a lovely chilled time. 

We went from there to Bocas del Toro which is a collection of islands on the Caribbean side of Panama.  We decided to stay on an island called Bastimentos which doesn't have any roads or vehicles, only one small path along the sea front.  The weather had turned a bit wild, the first night we were there it rained all night long.  It had thankfully cleared up by morning so we decided to walk over to Wizard Beach and do some sunbathing.  What was supposed to be a thirty minute walk along a dirt path turned into a slip and slide that lasted over an hour.  The heavy rain the night before had turned the path into a mud bath, we ended up taking our flip flops off and just walking through the mud in our bare feet.  We finally made it to Wizard beach, drenched after being caught in a down pour and covered in mud, to find that the tide was too far in for us to be able to walk around to the next beach, Red Frog Beach.  Wizard beach doesn't have any bars or restaurants on it and we hadn't brought any food or very much water with us, so after a quick walk along the beach with a dog that had adopted us, we had to take off our flip flops and get muddy again.  

There was an amazing thunder storm that night, the lightening was so bright and the thunder so loud, I've never experienced anything like it, it was right over our heads at one point.

We had to leave Bocas the next day having only been there for two nights, we took a taxi boat back to Isla Colon which is the main island in Bocas del Toras.  We arrived nice and early so we could spend some time there and also get to a cash machine so we could pay for our bus.  We dumped our bags at the dock and then went in search of the one and only cash machine on the Island.  We arrived at the cash machine and were greeted with and Out of Order notice, we entered the bank hoping that they could give us some cash using our bank cards, they told us that they could not issue us with any cash but assured us the ATM would be fixed between 3 and 4pm. Our boat was leaving for the main land at 5pm, where we would get a bus to Panama City.  Without any cash we wouldn't be able to pay for our bus but they told us the cash machine would definitely be fixed before then.  We headed off with the last of our money and had some lunch and a wander around Bocas town, after spending some time there we had wished that we had just stayed on the main island and taken day trips to the other islands instead.  There is no beach on the main island which was our main reason for staying elsewhere but the town has a really nice feel to it and it seems to be quite lively. We went back to the bank at 3pm sharp and when we tried to put our card in the machine, a booming voice told us "No!" from the other side of the machine, I guess they were still fixing it then.  We decided to sit outside the bank and wait patiently for it to be fixed.  We were running over our options of what we could do if they didn't fix it when sure enough, the ATM engineer came out and told us, and everyone else that had started to congregate, that the ATM wouldn't be fixed until the next day.  We were told by another backpacker that one of the local shops could give you cash back at a 10% charge and so we dashed off there, trying to beat the crowds of others needing money, but somehow took a wrong turn and ended up back at the dock.  We nipped in to the office quickly on the off chance that they would accept a card payment from us instead of cash.  They were very good about the whole thing ( I'm sure this happens a lot with there being only one cash machine) and allowed us to pay once we got to the main land, they said the taxi to the bus station would take us via an ATM...crisis averted.  

We arrived back in Panama City at the crack of dawn, got ourselves a taxi to our hostel, checked in, and then crashed out on the couches in front of the tv.  We spent the day getting ourselves ready for our trip to the San Blas islands.

The following morning we were picked up at 5am, collected 4 more Brits, all from London, and made our way to where we would get our boat to San Blas.  San Blas is a collection of 378 islands in the Caribbean and is in every way an unspoilt paradise of crystal clear waters and palm fringed white beaches. We arrived at the Island we were to spend the night on, dumped our belongings in our rooms, met some other guests who had arrived the previous day, and set off on our first island trip.  The first stop for us that day was a gorgeous uninhibited island where we all got to know each other while sunning ourselves and drinking rum. For the next stop, we were taken to an amazing sand cay where we could have a bit of a swim to cool ourselves down and there was, of course, more rum drinking. We had a nice lunch at yet another island before heading back to our own island so we could relax for the remainder of the day. The evening was spent with the four lovely Londoners, listening to music, playing drinking games and yes, you guessed it, more rum guzzling. 

The next, and our last, day was spent on yet another stunning Caribbean island where we sun bathed, had lunch and if you wanted to partake, more rum drinking. I was unfortunately feeling a tad worse for wear after all the rum the day before and so opted not to get involved. 

We left late in the afternoon and took a boat and then a very overcrowded jeep back to Panama City where we would spend one last night before flying to Colombia. 

We used Colombia's answer to Ryanair, Viva Colombia, for our flight to Medellin, Colombia. Although the flight was dirt cheap, it was one disaster after another which resulted in us almost missing our flight. Cancelled tickets with no notification, no english speaking staff at the tiny airport, no option to pay by card at the airport, a rush trip to the nearest ATM, joining the wrong queue and finally, no announcement that our flight was about to leave without us.  Yes, we were those idiots having to peg it over the runway to our awaiting flight.  Phew! Leaving beautiful Panama for one of my most highly anticipated destinations of our trip, Colombia! 

Los Angeles

We arrived at LAX in the afternoon and Nosh, our friend who you might remember we met on a train in Thailand, collected us from the airport, we were going to be staying with him and his lovely family during our stay in LA.  The two of us, Nosh, his wife Kio and their cute son Zelzen went out for dinner at a great Italian place close to their home.  When we arrived though, they advised that they were shutting soon so we ordered some very tasty pizzas to take away with us.  We ate dinner and then hit the sack, myself and Kay were exhausted after flying from Singapore and very jet lagged since we had crossed the date line and gained 15 hours during our flight.

The next morning Kio dropped us off in downtown LA where we had a nice breakfast and then took a bus to Santa Monica where we spent the day enjoying the sun at the beach. We made our way back to Downtown and Nosh collected us from there and the three of us went for dinner.  We had some awesome burgers which were enormous, none of us could finish them. My burger was sandwiched between two cheese toasties! Amazing but just too much, I had thought that because LA is so image conscious that the portion sizes wouldn't be as bad as the rest of the US but I was 100% wrong.  We had another early night as we were still very jet lagged and so neither of us had slept very well the night before.

The next day was one for being proper tourists in LA.  We started our day by doing a tour around the Hollywood hills, Beverley Hills, Rodeo Drive and West Hollywood.  I wouldn't recommend these tours as we spent most of our time being shown the houses of celebrities, which neither of us were that interested in.  We then walked around west Hollywood where we saw the Walk of Fame and also the Chinese theatre which is where all the hand prints are.  We spent the afternoon doing some shopping and then had burritos for dinner at a small Mexican place near Union station. 

On our last full day in LA we went for an amazing breakfast with Nosh and Zelzen in the morning, again, the portion sizes were so huge that Kay and I couldn't eat any lunch - we were still so full.  Myself and Kay then took a bus to Venice beach which was my favourite place in LA, there is so much to see and do, lots of cool wee shops, surfers, skaters and street performers.  

That night Nosh took drove us out to see Pasadena which is such a cute looking place, it has the look and feel of a small town even though you're in LA.  We went for dinner at The Cheesecake Factory where Penny works in The Big Bang Theory, the food and drinks were amazing.

I'm really glad that we got to stop in LA for a few days and we were very lucky that we got to see places that tourists don't normally get to see.  I won't be in a huge rush to return though, LA just isn't for me. 

Singapore

After touching down at Singapore airport and taking the underground out to our accommodation, we checked in and tried to make the most of what was left of our day.  We went to see a local market but there was a big thunder storm while we were there and so we ended up staying a lot longer than we had planned.  We had our dinner there and then decided to have an early night and get up early the next day to try and see as much of Singapore as possible. 

We headed for The Gardens on the Bay in the morning, they have huge beautiful gardens along with a cloud forest which was very impressive.  They have built some very tall flower like structures in the gardens and you can go up to a canopy walkway which connects two of them.  It's all very futuristic looking.

We spent most of our day there and then went to China Town for some dinner.  We went back to the bay side after the sunset so that we could watch the light shows that they put on every night.  When we arrived, everyone was sitting outside the shopping centre but we thought that it would be a rubbish place to stand for a good view.  So, in our wisdom, we left the crowd and walked further around the bay to where we thought we would get a good view, we were wrong...very wrong.  We walked through the shopping centre to the second light show of the night, at the gardens, and then made it back in time to watch the first light show again, this time from the right place!

Singapore is such an amazing city and it was a shame we only had one and a bit days there.  It's not anywhere near as expensive as people say and so I would recommend to anyone travelling in that area to spend a few days there.

Malaysia - Borneo

We arrived in Kota Kinabalu, the capital of the state of Sabah, and had a bit of a lazy day.  We hadn't gone to sleep until 2am and were up at 6am to pack our bags that morning.  We checked into our hostel, lazed about and then went for dinner and a cocktail with the Turkish guys.

The next morning we all made our way to a tribal village where we were shown the skulls which are still hanging in one of the long houses.  These skulls were 'collected' by the last head hunter of that tribe.  They told us that when you wanted to ask a girl to marry you, you first needed to go into the jungle, find a rival tribesman, cut of his head, and then present it to the parents of the girl to show that you were capable of looking after her.

We all got to try using a blow dart, I was even allowed to shoot it at a balloon which the guy was holding between his legs.  Luckily for him, I didn't miss.  We got a musical show and were invited up to play with them.  They also taught us how to make fire before we headed back to town.  The guys had to head back to KL and so after dinner they headed to the airport while myself and Kay went back to our hostel to try and make some plans for our short time in Borneo.

We decided that we wanted to go to turtle island and stay the night at a turtle conservation but the next day we couldn't find any agencies that could offer us the trip. We booked a bus over to Sandakan, which is close to turtle island, in the hopes that we could book something over there.  There was plenty to do in Sandakan and around so even if we couldn't we would still have plenty to do.  We arrived in Sandakan pretty late and checked into our accommodation, lucky for us, we had a whole 8 bed dorm to ourselves.  We must be the only lunatics that opt for a fan only room in that heat.

The next morning we went in search of somewhere to book the turtle conservation.  The first place we went to were looking for over RM700 (£140) each to spend one night there.  We were a bit hesitant and told the lady that it was a bit much and we would need to have a think about it.  She, very kindly, told us that if we went to the pier we would be able to book the trip directly with Crystal Quest, who run the conservation, and we would be able to get it for much cheaper.  She was not wrong, we managed to get both of us staying for one night for about half of what the agency wanted.  

We went to a nice Chinese place on the waterfront for dinner and spoke to a lady who had been travelling for 18 years (jealous!) and she gave us loads of tips about booking cheap hotels and flights. 

We made our way the next day to the orangutan sanctuary which is just a short bus ride outside Sandakan.  Twice a day they leave food on platforms for them and if you are there during these times you'll get to see loads of oranguatans.  After we'd had our fill of the amazing creatures, we went across the road to the Sun Bear sanctuary.  It wasn't so easy to spot these tiny bears, but a nice lady that worked there pointed some out to us and also showed us some on a telescope.

We went for a walk along a canopy walk way in a huge big forest close by after lunch and then caught the last bus back to Sandakan.  

There were only 12 of us taken to turtle island the following morning,  they only allow a small number of people of the island at any one time, which is nice.  The island was like paradise, the sand was soft and white and the water crystal clear.  We had some free time after lunch to lie on the beach or go swimming, so we rented some gear and went snorkelling.  After dinner we were shown a video about the conservation centre and what they do which was really interesting.  Then we played a game...the waiting game.  We were called a little after nine to go down to the beach so that we could watch one of the turtles laying their eggs, they only disturb one turtle each night.  The ranger takes the eggs away straight away, but the turtle isn't aware that this is happening and still tries to cover them over once she is done.  After this we were taken down to the water to release the baby turtle that had hatched at the centre that morning.  What an amazing experience that was!

We woke up early the next morning to have breakfast and then we were ferried off the island and back to Sandakan.  We caught a bus back to Kota Kinabalu that morning and from there a flight down to Kuching which is in the state of Sarawak.

When we booked our flights to Borneo, we booked one flight into Kota Kinabalu in Sabah and the next flight out of Kuching, Sarawak.  What we didn't know at the time is that there is no way to get from Sabah to Sarawak overland without going through Brunei.

Thankfully, the flights in Malaysia are super cheap!

Our first day in Kuching was spent walking around the town and doing some shopping. Even when my bag is bursting at the seams, I still always manage to find room to squeeze one more thing (or two) in.  

We took a local bus the next day to a place called Bau, from here we were planning to catch another bus to the fairy caves but when we got there the next bus wasn't leaving for another two hours.  This wouldn't give us much time at the caves if we wanted to catch the last bus back to Kuching so we opted for a taxi instead. It didn't really cost much, about £8 for him to drive us to the caves which we twenty minutes or so away, and then wait an hour for us to explore the caves and then take us back again.  The caves were so pretty, well worth the million steps up to it!

We caught a boat ride down the river at sunset which was also very pretty.  A stunning orange and red sunset was a fantastic backdrop for all the unusual buildings in Kuching.

We took a bus and then a boat to get to Bako National Park.  The boat ride there was very good, the guy driving the boat pointed out a proboscis monkey sitting in the trees and also a crocodile. I was glad we saw those things because we didn't see anything on our trek.  It was a lovely, albeit tiring, trek through the rain forest. 

On our return, we showered and packed our bags ready for our flight to Singapore the next morning which will be our last country in South East Asia.  These last 5 months have a flown in.  I know time flies when you're having fun but I just wish I wouldn't go quite so fast.

Malaysia - peninsular

We left Railay around 10am and were put on a long boat to Krabi, from here we got a mini bus to a place called Hat Yai which is close to the Thailand / Malaysia border.  We had been told that there was a lot of trouble going on in the very south of Thailand.  A bit of a civil uprising of sorts,  but it seemed nice even if we did have to go through an airport security type process just to get into a shopping centre.  

From Hat Yai we got our overnight bus through the border and onto Kuala Lumpur, where we arrived around 5am.  Thankfully we were dropped off close to our accommodation and after more or less pleading with taxis to take us the short distance with our bags, we finally took their advice and just walked.  We were able to check-in almost as soon as we arrived and went for a wee disco nap since we'd not much slept on the bus.  

I woke around lunch time and found a million small bites all over my back! We were thinking this must be bed bugs.  We usually sleep on a bed bug sheet just to be safe, but we had been so tired that we'd just collapsed on the bed.  This had been, thankfully, our first experience of bed bugs while being away.  We put our clothes in to get washed and asked to be moved to another room.  We saw later that they had put someone else into our old room! 

We took the monorail to Little India which is an area of KL where I'm sure you can guess is full of Indian restaurants and shops.  We had some lunch here and bought some lovely Indian sweets from a stall.  From here, we took the monorail again to see the Petronas Towers.  We had decided against paying the £20ish to get to the top viewing platform and instead settled for taking photos from the bottom and thought we would come back that night to have a drink at one of the sky bars close by which would give us a great view of the towers at night.  Unfortunately though, I had been feeling not very well after waking from our nap, and by this point in the day I was feeling very unwell.  We headed back to our accommodation and shortly after I started to be sick.  I spent the rest of the evening back and forth to the bathroom hugging the toilet.  Sorry, I'm sure that was too much information.  Thankfully I woke the next morning feeling better which meant we could spend the day shopping in china town.  We had only been in Malaysia for two days by this point, but I was already sure I was going to love the place.  The people are by far the nicest we have met.  They are unbelievably friendly and so helpful without wanting anything from you in return. 

That night we took another night bus to Kuala Besut where we got a speed boat in the morning to Perhenian (small) Island.  We were dropped of on Long beach and Kay set of to find us some accommodation.  After checking in, we spent the rest of the day lying on the beach or swimming in the crystal clear turquoise waters.  One of the restaurants at Coral Bay, which is a few minutes walk from where we were staying, shows a film every night on a projector.  That night they were showing Horrible Bosses 2 and so we settled ourselves down on the couches and watched our first film in over 4 months.

The next day we did a snorkel trip around the island.  We were taken to Shark Point first, where myself and Kay unfortunately didn't see any sharks, but everyone else on the boat had! Gutted!  One girl said she saw one so big that she freaked out and came back to the boat early.  We stopped at another place after and saw some amazing fish, so big and colourful, it's times like this that I am so unbelievably thankful that I bought an underwater camera.  We were then taken to a spot where we saw turtles which was such an amazing experience.  Lunch came next which was followed by yet more fantastic snorkelling sites.  We had dinner and then want back to the restaurant showing the films so that we could have dessert there and watch The Hobbit 3.

The following day, I had a very relaxing day while Kay did another scuba dive.  

We then arrived in George Town very early, having 'slept' on an overnight bus.  We headed straight for our hostel, dumped our bags and then went in search of some breakfast.  George Town is famous for its hawker stalls and it wasn't long before we found one selling Roti Canai which is Roti with eggs.  Some nice local men, who were also having their breakfast there, helped us to order this and also a hot chocolate each.  We sat with them and they spoke to us about the Malaysian economy, which was a bit deep for 7am.  When they went to leave, they told us they had paid for our breakfast.  Our breakfast was so cheap, about 40p each, but even so, it was very nice of them to do that.

Even though we hadn't really slept, we decided to take a map from the hostel and walk around the area we were staying in to see what there was to see.  We stumbled upon a festival sight and after talking with some guys who were working there, we found out that it was a world music festival that had been on the previous night but that was also on that night too.  They told us that we should take the train to Penang Hill to get the panoramic views over the city.

We needed to make the most of our couple of days in George Town, so we went back to the hostel after that so we could make a plan for the day.  We decided to go on the Hop On Hop Off tourist bus which would take us to the bottom of Penang hill and other sights in the city.  

From the bottom of the hill you need to take a short train ride up a very steep hill to the top which is 700m up.  The views of George Town were amazing and the breeze up there was very welcome.  We made it back down to the bottom of the hill just in time to catch another bus.  We only went one stop to a massive buddhist temple which was up on the side of the hill.  On the way up the many many steps to the top, we stopped at a bit where they had hundreds of tortoise in a pond.  There was actually far too many of them for the size of the pond, but it was fun getting to feed them.  We decided our last stop of the day would be a bit out of George Town where there was a market, the traffic was really bad though, and by the time we got there, it was shut.  We headed back to the hostel and had a BBQ for dinner and then opted to have an early night.  We were supposed to go the the festival with the others from the hostel, the guy running the place had told us not to buy a ticket and that we would all just go with some beers and sit outside and listen to the music, but we were just so exhausted by this point that we couldn't bring ourselves to go.

The next day we went to a mall close by hoping to get the lens on Kay's camera fixed.  We finally found a shop that could fix it but he was looking for quite a lot, so Kay decided to wait and see if they would do it cheaper in KL.  We planned to go to the National park that afternoon but the traffic was so awful because of the Thai water festival that by the time we got there on the bus it was starting to get late.  Kay went to a beach close by to do some sunbathing and I went back to George Town to do some sight seeing in the area where we were staying, which is a UNESCO world heritage site.  

We ate some lovely food from the hawker stalls for dinner and then watched the first episode of the new series of Game of Thrones back at our hostel.

We woke up super early the next morning to catch the first bus back to KL as our flight to Borneo was leaving the following morning.  

We arrived in KL about lunch time but had so much to accomplish that we just dumped our bags at the hostel and headed straight out.  First stop was try and get Kay's camera fixed.  We went to a massive electrical mall and asked every shop there, but none could fix it, none of them even had a new lens she could buy.  We went to another mall to the Nikon shop to see what they could do, but they advised that she would need to send it away and it would take two weeks to fix.  We eventually found a place that had one in stock that she could buy, it cost almost as much as the camera, but needs must.

We went back to china town, not before getting on the wrong bus and going in the wrong direction for 15 minutes, and then got conned into buying some iPads.  They were crazy cheap (£130) but we thought they were fake which was why they were so cheap.  Turns out, we had actually signed up for a mobile phone contract and it took almost two hours to get them to cancel the transaction and give us our money back, all this eating into the very little time we had already.  

After finally getting our money back, we had a very quick dinner and then we went to our hostel to get showered and ready to go out to yet another sky bar for a drink and a view of the patronas towers lit up at night.

All this had taken so long that we made it to the bar at 11.30pm, last orders was midnight.  It was just as well anyway with the drinks being £10 each!

We met some lovely Turkish guys and ended up going for a couple of drinks with them after the sky bar.  We told them we were headed to Borneo the next morning which drew blank stares.  Even though I'm not convinced they were entirely sure where we were going, they asked if they could come with us?  Thinking they were joking, we told them that of course they could.  

They actually came to the airport the next morning, bought tickets and came to Borneo with us!! 

The first of many very cheap internal flights in Malaysia! 

Railay Beach, Krabi - Thailand

I wasn't hugely upset to be leaving Pai.  The place is so pretty and has a definite charm to it, but we had been so unbelievably sick, I don't think I've had a bug like that since I was a child, that I was starting to get a bit fed up with Pai and the four walls and uncomfortable bed that had been my home for too long.  

We left Pai and did all 762 turns in reverse to get to Chiang Mai, and from there we boarded a sleeper bus to take us to Bangkok.  We had hoped that once we arrived in Bangkok in the morning, we would be able to get a train to Surat Thani and from there, another bus to Krabi.  Unfortunately, when we arrived at the train station in the morning, having said our goodbyes to Jess who was meeting with a girl we'd met in Laos to continue her Thailand adventure with her, we were told that the 8am train was already full, and that there were only seats available on the overnight train.  Having not really slept on the bus from Chiang Mai, we couldn't face another sleepless night and so opted to spend the night in Bangkok and catch the train the following morning.  

We met up with Jess, Rheann and Rheann's friend Siobhan for dinner that night before myself and Kay hoped in a taxi to The Dome skybar.  This is the skybar which was used for filming scenes in The Hangover part 2.  We'd read that there was a bit of a strict dress code but with nothing but flip flops or hiking boots to wear on my feet, I put on my nicest dress and my hiking boots, jokes, flip flops, and hoped for the best.  I'd love to say it was "No shoes, no shirt, but I still got service", but I was politely told that there was no way I was getting in with flip flops.  Thankfully, some ingenious woman has started selling shoes from her shop across the road, this happens a lot I guess, and so I bought the ugliest pair of pumps you'll ever see, and off we trotted back to the bar.  Apparently, the hideous shoes are much more acceptable attire, and we were granted access to the lift which would take us up to the 64th floor.  The views from up there were absolutely breathtaking. They weren't demanding you buy a drink, which was nice, but we decided to treat ourselves none the less to a drink each, at a grand total of £28. We had just spent four days in Pai doing nothing, and eating even less, so I think we deserved a wee treat.  Only enough time ( and money ) for one though as we needed to be up before the roosters to get the train to Surat Thani.

We met a lovely Canadian on the train to Surat Thani who invited us to stay with him, his wife and three year old kid when we go to LA.  Seriously contemplating it, he seemed very genuine and said he would show us the sights around LA.  We took a bus from Surat Thani to Krabi and stayed there the night before getting a boat to Railay Beach the next day.

We got off the long boat and were advised, by some idiot, to head to the other beach about ten minutes walk away where, he said, we would find plenty of cheap accommodation.  This was complete nonsense, but we walked the ten minutes, with our heavy bags on our backs, and had to find this out for ourselves, the hard way.  I went for a walk and eventually found some nice cheap accommodation back on the beach we had previously been on.  We spent the afternoon walking around Railay, having lovely fruit shakes and booking things to do while there.  There was a big crowd of scots staying at our accommodation, it was lovely hearing the accent and not have to explain my name to them.

The next day we went on a snorkel trip.  This consisted of visiting a few different islands, some snorkelling and then a BBQ on a quiet beach.  After sunset we got back on the boat and went out to sea again so that we could do more snorkelling, this time at night, with phosphorescent plankton.  This was one of the nicest island trips we've done.  Railay beach and surrounding are just breathtaking! Swimming with the plankton was unreal, so so cool seeing it light up in the water. 

The next morning we got up bright and early to do some rock climbing. We were taken to an area at the end of our beach where we got to do five climbs each.  It was quite hard going at times but the view from 30 meters up was well worth it.  We had lunch with a lovely canadian girl who was climbing with us and then the three of us spent the afternoon catching some rays on the beach.   

We spent our last day at Railay exploring some of the beaches in the area.  We walked some ridiculous jungle path to get to Ton-sai beach.  We sunbathed for a while but as it was pushing 40 degrees we did the sensible thing and went for a long lunch. After lunch, we met a nice New Yorker on the beach and she spent the afternoon with us sunbathing.  There is a path over the rocks at the end of the beach that will take you back to Railay.  We decided this was a much better option as the jungle path was a bit of a killer and Sarah (NYer) had already been to Railay this way that morning and assured us it was much quicker and easier.  It probably would have been, if we hadn't got a bit lost, walked far too high up the hill, and ended up coming out at some random point on the beach, startling the couple sleeping in the shade.  We spent some more time sunbathing and swimming in the crazy hot water, which wasn't particularly refreshing.  Myself and Kay left late in the afternoon to walk to the view point which was up in the hills that we had been rock climbing at.  Sarah decided against it and made her way back to Ton-Sai, hopefully using the right path this time! 

We had expected a bit of a rocky path up to the view point as some Scottish people we had met at our accommodation, who had already been up, advised we wear "proper shoes".  What we were not expecting, was to have to scramble up the hill for about twenty minutes.  Our clothes and bags were completely covered in the red dust from the hill by the time we made it to the top.  It was worth it for the stunning view of all four beaches and the beautiful sun set.  

Our last time in Thailand this trip.  Feeling a bit sad to see the back of it, we've been here so much now that it's starting to have the familiarity of home.  But onwards to Malaysia we go for more fun and frolics.