Last posting in this blog

Here I am again writing as unprepared as always. I haven´t written in a while but there are so many things that I want to tell. Since the last time I wrote there are many new places that we have visited. From Bangkok we changed our plans a little bit and instead of heading north we went to Cambodia. This was just due to lack of time, since travelling from one place to another also takes a lot of time.

For me this was the second time in Cambodia and it was just as impressive as the first time. I find it hard to explain what Cambodia is like, it is just a place that you have to experience. Cambodia is an extremely poor country, full of landmines (approx 3 millions) and the recent history is very sad due to a cruel dictator. Still it is amazing how positive the people are and really hardworking.

The places that we visited in Cambodia were the temples of Angkor in Siem Reap then Battambang and finally the capital Phnom Penh. In Siem Reap we hired a driver to take us to the temples of Angkor. He was very nice and also voluntered as english teacher at an orphanage and we bought some booklets for the children. We also bought chocolate cakes that we gave to the children working at Angkor Wat selling stuff and they were very happy about that.

From Siem Reap we took a river boat to Battambang, which took approx 7 hours. I didn´t find the city of Battambang special but the boat tour was beautiful. And on the way there were many floating villages; meaning that people practically live on the river. Small children handled the boats that they used like professionals and were fishing and swimming in the river. It felt like I would have been famous while we travelled there because everybody wanted to say hello. A trip that I will probably remember forever.

From Battambang we went to Phnom Penh for a couple of days. There we visited the Killing Fields of Seung Ek, where they killed the people in the the civil war during the 70´s including women and small children. Crazy. It felt a little bit controversial going to a tourist attraction where they killed the people, but still I thought that it is good that they show what happened in the history instead of keeping it as a secret. I hope that this way people wouldn´t comit the same errors. Wishful thinking maby. In Phnom Penh we also visited the Royal Palace which is almost similar to the one in Bangkok but much more beutiful. Other places to mention were Wat Phnom and the prison called s21, where they tortured the people before sending them to the killing fields.

After Phnom Penh we went back to Bangkok. The bustrip took 14 hours. It is not that the distance would be so long but the roads in Cambodia are the worst ones I have ever seen. When we crossed the border to Cambodia and went to Siem Rieap it took 6hours to drive 160km´s and the road was bumpy. Another thing is that crossing the border from Thailand to Cambodia is not the best way to travel. Unfortunately there is a lot of people who make their living out of tricking tourists. We had to exchange a little bit of money at the border and the exchange rate was lousy.

Anyway from Bangkok we went to back to Australia. First via Singapore for one day to Darwin to pick up some luggage and from there to Sydney. In Singapore I had a very unpleasant surprise as they told me at check-in that I didn´t have a visa to Australia. I had applied and paid for a tourist visa and got a positive reply to it, but in Singapore they insisted that it was not valid. Well they gave me no choice but to pay 50dollars for a visa for which I had already earlier paid 20 dollars in order to be able to border the plane. In Darwin I went to the immigration office to complain about this and they said that it was their mistake. Still I had to contact the customs by mail to claim my money back and I am still waiting for the reply.

In Sydney we also had some other travel issues regarding my ticket to Chile. When we went to the office of LAN Chile to print out the ticket they told me that my ticket was canceled because I hadn´t paid my ticket. Well I had paid my ticket and had the receipt but still I had to pay 100 dollars to so that they could book me a seat, great customer service... Then the next day at the airport I had to explain my future plans because I didn´t have a date to fly out from Chile due to the problems with the ticket. They assumed that I would enter Chile and stay here illegally when the visa expires in three months. Yey, honestly I´m really happy to be out of Australia because it was very expensive to spend there four days all due to communication problems.

Well now we are in Santiago the Chile and have been here for already two weeks. I have met a lot of new people, basically the family and friends of David. I have also created a new blog that I will be using from now on since we have changed continent and it feels like another stage in my life. Up on the right hand side is the link to my new blog. If anyone wants my address here please send me an e-mail and if you want a card please send me your address. Hasta luego.

Thailand

Here we are for the third time this year and travelling fast forward. We have already been to many places and still have a lot to do during theese two weeks that we have left. When we crossed the border we stayed for one night at Hat Yai just to continue to Krabi. We were really unsure about where to go due to the moonsoon season but decided to go west. In Krabi we spent one day and two nights. The beaches were nice there but nothing compared to Malaysia. From Krabi we took the boat to Phi Phi Islands.

At Phi Phi Don (the bigger of the two islands) we had very nice weather when we arrived and spent all day at the closest beach. Phi Phi Ley, which is a national park, is where we ended up going the next day on a boat tour. It had been raining a lot the night before so I was suspicious about the weather. And just when we arrived to Phi Phi Ley it started raining. Still we went to see the beach on Maya bay (from the movie the beach). We had to swim and go trough a cave to get there because the wind was too strong for the boat.. When we came back I heard that our skipper of the small longtail-boat was high and that all the other boats were leaving due to the wheather. Our skipper asked us if we wanted to go back and most of felt like it was not worth risking our lives just to see the islands.

From Phi Phi we continued to Phuket were we just stayed one day. The boattrip to Phuket was also quite an experience due to the wind. The waves were huge and a lot of people sat there with their lifevests on crying and screaming and also vomiting.. Nice. In Phuket we rented a scooter for one day and drove around the island. It was fun driving around although I didn't have a clue about the rules. The police did also stop us but they just checked the drivers licence. Due to the strong wind all the beaches in Phuket had red flags so we didn't go swimming. From Phuket we took the nightbus to Bangkok where we are now. We have already done some sightseing, shopping and checked out the nightlife. Today we wanted to go and see thaiboxing, but I woke up too late from my nap so we just came to Internet. Tomorrow we are on the go again and will take a bus to Chiang Mai to the north. We are also planning to go to Laos and Cambodia. All this in two weeks and after that from Bangkok back to Australia.

Malaysia

Now we have seen Malaysia and it's all good. We had a really wonderful time and Malaysia is my favourite country in Asia at the moment and in the top 3 of all the countries that I have visited. Our visit started by going to Melaka which is located southeast. Melaka is a beautiful city with a lot of history. It was an important port of trade already hundreds of years ago (can't remember dates by heart). After Melaka we went to the capital, Kuala Lumpur, and spent there a couple of days as well. In Kuala Lumpur the most important sights were the colonial district, chinatown, little India and of course Petronas Towers.

From Kuala Lumpur we wanted to go to the worlds oldest rainforest - Taman Negara. Due to ramadan some busses were not running so we could only go as far as Jerantut on the first day. After one night in Jerantut we continued by bus and boat to Taman Negara. We were there for two days and walked around in the jungle a lot. We did also walk on the worlds longest hanging bridge. The animals that we saw were monkeys, pigs, water buffalos, insects and a snake.

After Taman Negara we took the Jungle train to Kota Bahru. The train was the hottest ever, since the air conditioning was not working and we were travelling in the middle of the jungle. From Kota Bahru we were not sure if we should go direct to Thailand or visit the Perhentian Islands first. Luckily we decided to go to the Perhentian Islands, where we enjoyed beautiful beaches with clear blue water. The ride by boat to the islands was exciting as we almost flew over the water and I just tried to glue my bum to the seat. When we came to mainland the boat suddenly stopped and the skipper told us to but our lifevests on. No they were not worried about our safety but the fact that the police was in the harbour...

What I love about Malaysia is that you can see jungle, cities and paradise beaches in one country. The Malays are a mixture of many races, religions and cultures which gives the country its own flavor. The people in Malaysia have also been the friendliest that I have ever met while travelling. The country is also quite well developed so it is easy and safe to travel from one place to another. By the way I have posted all my pictures in facebook. If you are using it please look for me there. You can find my e-mail address on the top of this page. Until next time then. Take care.

Singapore sling

Hello there. Our travel plans changed a bit since we did not want to work more and decided to leave Australia a week earlier than planned. That means that we have now been two days in Singapore and have had a great time. We were very lucky on our last days in Australia since we had some things to sell like car, tv and playstation and we managed to do that without any effort. Well to be honest David did. Still we had a lot of luggage and after packing our stuff we took one bag of clothes to the Red Cross and left one still in a storage in Darwin. My Irish friend Sarah took us to the airport and we came with Tiger Airways to Singapore on Thursday morning.

On Thursday we were quite tired but still we did a tour on our own in Little India where our hostel is. In the afternoon we went to the CBD and spent four hours in the Asian Civilisations Museum. We could have spent there easily more time but they closed.. We had a lot of fun there as we stayed a long time in the childrens department and learned calligraphy and how to play Arabic drums :)

Friday was still my favourite day as we spent all day at the Zoo and evening in the Night Safari. The zoo is definitively the best one that I've ever visited. The place itself is like a jungle and the animals have a lot of space. They have a lot of monkeys and the orang utan was definitively my favourite. It was so cute when a orang utan mother teached her baby to climb around. We also saw a polar bear that was eating watermelon :) The only major disappointment was that the white tiger "cage" was under construction and we didn't see the white tigers.

In the night safari we saw a lot of animals as well. The most fascinating were hyenas, leopards and elephants. We also saw a very good show about the animals. They had teached otters to recycle (sponsored by Nokia). If otters can recycle you could think that people should be able to learn that too. After the Night Safari we took a walk in Chinatown where they start with the mid-autumn lantern festival today. We think that we have seen enough of Singapore today and will be leaving to Malaysia soon, since Singapore is quite expensive compared to other Asian countries. Anyway I must say that I like Singapore and do recommend it to other travellers.

If there is a will there is a way

I think that is the way that the saying goes, correct me if I'm wrong. We have made some new travel plans today and yesterday as well as bought a lot of flight tickets. It feels so good to finally have some new plans and I just can't stop smiling as I am so happy :)

Yesterday I felt that it was my lucky day although it didn't start so happily. I was in the morning in our camp kitchen making some food when the owner of the campsite came and started yelling. The previous night there had been some people playing cards and they had been too noisy, some of them backpackers and some locals. I was asleep at ten o'clock the previous evening so I had nothing to do with it (even though I am usually so noisy and talkative). But the owner still felt like shouting that I'm a f***ing liar and a f***ing backpacker etc.. the list is long. And sadly it is not the first time I have been shouted at in this place.

One evening when I was speaking on the phone a man came from a bush and yelled at me straight in front of my face. According to his opinion I had been too long on the phone and he needed to talk. I didn't even know that he was waiting so I wasn't to happy about his need to open up to me. Well anyway things like this really makes me feel like the time that I have spent in Australia is enough soon.

I can't wait anymore to tell the good news :) After going to some travel agencies and surfing through some netsites we found some good deals. We are now flying to Singapore on the 21.09 and from there we have one month time to make our way to Bangkok. Piritta, I have read through your blog from 2005 today and there are some good ideas of what we could do. Still we have to keep in mind that we have only one month time. After that we fly from Bangkok back to Darwin and continue to Sydney. In Sydney we will only be for three days. Now to my favourite part: on the 23.10 we are flying to Chile. There we don't have any specific plans yet. Probably travel in south or central America and work for a while. From there we are planing to go to New Zealand to work. The only sad thing about this is that it will take a while before we make it to Europe, but good things are worth waiting for. Right?

My writings might not be very clear at the moment as there are so many things that I want to tell about. Anyway congratulations if you made it so far without being very confused. And believe me we have worked very hard to make this all possible and will continue working here for one more month. Hasta la proxima :)

Visit to Darwin

Hello, we have now been working for 19 days in a row and have now two days off because we asked for it. Our crew at the watermelonfarm has grown from six backpackers up to 24. That is why we finally got to take a couple of days off. I haven't been in the city for a month and it almost felt like Christmas to come here. It's is nice to buy fresh fruit and veggies and just to see people other than our colleagues. Anyway sorry if this sounds like complaining I must say that everything is quite good at the moment. We will probably be working with the melons until the end of September.



Three weeks ago when we had our previous day off we went with the entire group to a place called Butterfly Gorge. We had a lot of fun swimming and just relaxing at the hot pools. In the evening our boss invited us all for dinner and the next day we worked only half a day but got paid for a day. Me like it ;) Another thing that made the day out exciting is that in the place that we were swimming they found a crocodile swimming the next day.. We also had a snake visiting us there but according to the locals it was not dangerous.



Our winter is slowly turning to spring which means that the mornings haven't been freezing anymore. During the days we have had like 30c in the shade and very, very hot in the sun. Now we have to go to do our shopping and leave the city to go back to work. I will probably be back here in three weeks. Ciao.

Watermelons all day long

Hey ya, after two weeks of hard work we came to the city for our only day off. Douglas Daly where we have been working is ok although it is a small place. Our team is good and we have fun at work. I'm trying to save my back so I voluntered to drive the tractor, which is easy but very boring. Another good thing is that our employer pays for the accomodation so we should be able to save something here. We are working at least 8hours/day six days/week so we keep ourselves busy there. Usually we start at 7am and while driving to work we have seen about 8 cangaroos every morning crossing the road. Believe me they are not cute anymore when you have to try to avoid crashing with them every morning.

On our days off we have a hot spring that we can go to or our freezing swimming pool. Last week we had karaoke at the local bar and I was surprised of how many good singers there were, one of them being David who got all the old people to light up with his performance of La Bamba ;) This saturday we tasted watermelon with vodka which was a success. We will probably stay here for 12 weeks and cannot say where we'll go next, cause I don't know.