This is looking to be the second last blog post ever so I'm gonna make it super special with witty anecdotes and fantastic puns everywhere. Ok so at the moment its the afternoon after the full moon party, I've had an hours sleep and 7 soft drinks. Looks like we're probably going to be on the beer tonight as well although that might be a bad idea. might.
Last time I wrote something we were dodging bullets in Bangkok so I'm gonna start from there. After the free internet we went for a walk down the Khao San road, we tried to get into a rooftop pool, failed miserably at sweet talking the receptionist into letting us up there for the price of a Pad Thai and were assailed by some Cockney speaking bangkokians, it was a shock when we heard "alrite G'vnor" shouted at us by a little thai man. We went to find a bar to settle in and have a few drinks and ended up in 'Alien Bar' lots of Alien and Predator memorabilia. We ended up spending the whole day in this bar due to the presence of Pro Evo '10 on the computer. Fergus was the undisputed winner of all the matches. After that we walked back to our free storage bar and got our bags ready for the bus outta there. We were told we'd be arriving at the port by 8 and on the island by 11 am. We walked to our bus spying a couple of humongous rats on the way. On the bus we were sat next to two professional fighters complete with puppy chi hua hua and a small bag of cocaine hidden well in a seat cover. We played 20 questions till we fell asleep, rudely awakened at 11.30 pm by someone telling us it was tea time. Tea was at some dirty little hole so I passed the tempting offer of liver and rice. We arrived at the port at 3 am and slept on the floor in a shack until the boat arrived at 7.
We jumped on the boat found our seats and promptly fell asleep. Awoken a few hours later when we stopped at Koh Tao to pick up some more people, which coincidentally happened to include Dom and Tom who you may remember from other such places as New Zealand, Cairns, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. We chatted to them till we jumped off the boat at Koh Phangan. Organized chaos ensued as there was a mad rush for the bags. Everyone jumped off the boat and we jumped into a taxi to take us to the Rin Beach Resort. A thrilling journey of sharp rises and steep drops, all with me hanging off the back of the Tuk Tuk lead to a rollercoaster like experience, Without any of the safety features inherent in the rollercoasters. Met two girls along the way increasing our party size to eight. Get to the resort and get a fan room for three of 200 baht each. Get settled in and head down to the pool, relax for the resto of the day until we leave for the beach to see whats happening. The beach is actually suprisingly nice with lovely fine sand and no rocks. Have a bite to eat and go back to the hotel to eat and drink the night away. The chang beers here are awesome you pay just over a pound for over a pint of chang beer which ranges from 5 to 13% alcohol content so you never know what you're getting. 2 hours and 5 pints of beer later I'm alone at the bar as its about to be shut. I go for a walk to find everyone as they appear to have left me get sidetracked by Dom and Tom and lose a few hours. I return t find everyone in our room drinking rhum mixed with red bull and sprite. I have a shower and curl up in bed spouting incessant nonsense. Get convinced to come to the Coral Bungalow pool party so off we go, we get there and its packed everyones in the pool but I'm still ready to sleep so I leave after 20 minutes, definitely peaked to early. Take 30 minutes to get back using the back roads, but i do get back eventually to curl up in bed content apart from the lack of air con.
I'm gonna sum up the past few daytimes in a short paragraph. We would spend most of the day at the pool venturing out to get food or go for a walk to the beach where we might watch some beach football. Ash one of our friends has got an infected mosquito bite, on the first day he just hobbled around, second day he rented crutches and on the third he had to get the bite cut open cleaned up and placed on an IV drip feeding him considerable amounts of morphine and antibiotics. He got the morphine dose five times overall and was as high as as kite the entire time. He looked hilarious sitting at the bar with his drip with hundreds of girls flocking round him asking what was wrong, he was loving it. We met a fair few of the people we'd seen from our travels, the scottish girls from Nha Trang, guys from my school, guys everywhere. Basically our days consisted of sitting around the pool relaxing. The only time I've been sunburnt was when the clouds were out en force.
The past few night times have been pretty fun and yet I didnt manage to get drunk till the full moon party, my heart just wasnt in it. one of the more notable nights we started out at the pool party where we met some gys from my secondary school, halfway through the night I noticed these guys pulling this other guy out of the pool, it turns out this was the fifth time this had happened and that they had all taken Ritilin, which is ADHD medication, he was the onl;y one with any noticeable effects, these effects seemed to be that he kept on trying to drown himself in the pool. Fantastic, ten minutes later a fight broke out between this guy who kept on bundling people into the pool and this other guy who was completly dry until he got bundled into the pool himself. We were about to leave with the rest of our group for the beach until Henry was sidetracked by this girl who thought he was gay, when he asked her why she thought that, she said it was because he was so well dressed. He was wearing short trunks and pants.... So we didnt get to the beach then, went back to the pool and met the scottish girls from Nha Trang and talked to them for ages, we walked to the beach, on the beach i was distracted by the fire limbo, probably the stupidest sport ever. I then spent half an hour trying to find people again before abandoning hope and leaving for home. On the way I ran into a girl, who completely wasted told me she was trying to find a toilet. Got talkng and it turns out shes going to Bristol for Medicine, we parted ways at the crossroads and I walked back to the hotel. In the room i met fergus who was hungry so i went to buy him food from the 7/11 along the way I looked for the girl, my conscience had informed me it probably wasnt the best thing for her to be left alone. Didnt find her and when i got back fergus was asleep and so ends the night.
There were other nights but they weren't particularly interesting and so I must skip forwards to the full moon night, and so begins the spiritual end of our gap year:
For me it all started at 8.30 I'd been trying to get to sleep for the past half hour and was completely unsuccessful. I'd been doing this as i was already exhausted and thinking that 2 hours of kip would enable me to stay up till sunrise. I gave up on sleep and went to find Dom and Tom, they too had given up on sleeping and had started drinking, i decided to follow suit and so went out the the road bar and bought a bucket of alcohol. Went back to their balcony and proceeded to drink, a few minutes later toms friends turned up with body paint and started painting each other, half a bucket later and Henry, Adam and two girls walked past headed up to our room to drink on our balcony. I joined their party and off we went. Lots of body paint, alcohol and talk later and i was bedecked in markings. Two had prints on my chest and white spots everywhere, fergus had had all the bones on his body highlighted in white paint and Henry had drawn a skull across the side of his chest. Around this time Ash turned up again dosed up on morphine and not entirely together. We drew a picture of the queen on his chest and me and the two girls left to get more alcohol. Came back ten miutes later. We left the balcony around 12 as a party of 10, we picked up Dom Tom and their friends on the way and became an even bigger party. It took us ten minutes to get to the beach, at some point we lost the general party and spent fifteen minutes trying to find them in the crowd of 15000 revellers. Found them again though and we danced, and drank and weed for an hour before moving to a different place. Along the way though we had somehow lost Emilia and so began hours of fruitless searching. Me and Emilias friend spent about three hours trawling the beach and roads of Haad Rin looking for her. We looked everywhere. It was only when we met tom and dom, sat on the side of the road for half an hour talking that we finally found her walking with Henry from the beach. Theyd just found each other and were coming to find us. It was five by then and the sun was rising in about an hour so I decided to use my last reserves of energy in final push for sunrise> we went down to the beach and i spent the next hour talking to a swedish girls about how marvellous the sun rise was. It was amazing, better than any sunset I have ever seen, and i have seen a lot of sunsets. It was sooo good that we all decided that we would hire a boat to take us out to sea so we could watch the sunrise wthout anything getting in the way. We payed 50 baht each and spent the next hour jumping off the boat and appreciating the amazing sunrise. I felt renewed by the rising sun, so much so that when i got to the beach we went to the bar and bought another bucket. However I'm pretty sure this new bucket was full of something akin to white spirit so I ditched it. I complained so much to the person that she gave me a half full bottle of smirnoff which also tasted of white spirit, so i ditched that as well. We spent the next two hours in one of the drum and bass bars dancing the morning away. It was so surreal, dancing in perfect daylight. It was around 7.30 by this time, they started abusing some people sleeping on the beach, at one point they managed to take a guys wristband of witout him waking up. We spent an hour in the water before i got too hungry to continue and went back to the hotel to order a chicken sandwich, along the way I met Fergus and Ash and Adam, we went back to the pool, fergus fell asleep on a sunbed so we picked it up and threw him in. He got angry muttered something unintelligible and fell asleep on another sunbed. I was trying to make it to 11 without sleeping, meaning that I would have done a full 24hr shift but at 10.30 i fell asleep in a dech chair, with my head back mouth open, obviously the temptation was too high and i woke up spluttering as they had poured chilli sauce in my mouth. It was horrible and i couldnt get the taste out my mouth all day. However i that my complete lack of ability to communicate in a normal manner was a good indicator that it was a good time to sleep so off i went.
Woke up at 1, absolutely boiling and went down to the pool. I spent the rest of the day by the pool watching people emerge like zombies from their rooms. Henry and fergus were dead to the world and only rose at 4. At 7.30 we went to watch the football in a bar and i was asleep by ten. Woke at 12.30 byhenry and spent the next half hour trying to get glass out my foot before falling asleep again at 1. Today has been another pool day, interrupted only by saying goodbye to the people who are leaving and playing pro evo in a bar down the road.
The full moon party was the perfect way to end our gap year. It was amazingly awesome and anyone who can should do it at least once in their life. byeeeeeexx

Alrighty then, we are currently in Bangkok awaiting our bus outta here, however for forms sake i must recap the previous few days. It was gonna be pretty boring for you so I will do a quick summary:
We have spent the last few days drifting down a river stopping at bars getting extremely pished, jumping off very high platforms holding on to a metal bar, hoping that when we let go we hit the water in such a fashion as to avoid serious lung damage and to avoid potential hazards, jagged rocks and human beings being the main hazards. High points have included beer pong, water slides and buckets of alcohol. We'd start off the day in the usual way with a few hours of friends, and a tuk tuk ride complimented by a cool beer. Then we go tubing for the next couple of hours until around 7 when we would go back to the hotel get changed and have a spot of tea. Culinary highlights have included drunken thai green curry and watching Henry run in with his tail between his legs after a skinhead started on him. I've usually crashed by 11 and Henry wakes me up at an ungodly hour and refuses to stop talking. I nthink thats a pretty good summary.
Yesterday was a break from tradition as we were leaving for the islands. We jumped on the bus around 1.30. This bus had plastic seats and no air con so we resigned ourselves to a sweat bus journey. We got off five minutes later though and jumped on a new bus, very similar but with a but of air con. A three hour journey, one dead body and a lot of lost sweat later and we arrive in Vientiane. We then get a tuk tuk for a 20 minute journey round the block and back, then an hour journey where he runs out of petrol and we have to get in a different tuk tuk, no room for us though so we were standing on the back> For some reason the tuk tuk took us to the border, where we payed 2500 kip to leave the country. We than jumped in another bus to take us across the border, and then in the back of a pick up truck to take us to the bus station. Then we jumped in our vip bus and off we go. At three o'clock in the morning we were dropped off at a bangkok bus station, we sat and ate for 2 hours with Fergus and Zach, then slept on the floor with some other guys from our bus till 8.30. Jumped on a public bus to take us to the Kho San Road. Saw a few army guys with M16's. Remembered we were in a war zone, took off my red t-shirt (poetic license) and now we're in a free internet cafe after booking our bus to Kho Pangan for the legendary full moon party. Short and sweet that was.x

After hobbling back to the hotel and swimming for 4 hours we got a taxi to the train station in Da Nang, we got to the train station around 9.45 for the 10.44 train, we met the German Girls who had been on the island tour in Nha Trang with us. WE sat with them and waited and waited and waited. 10.44 flew by with no luck regarding the train, eventually by 11.15 the train pulled in. Everyone piled on, we hadn't booked a sleeper and so were in a cramped compartment with 40 vietnameses. our bags set precariously over other peoples heads who were in severe danger of being knocked out by a 20kg bag dropping on their heads. Manslaughter was a possibility. Luckily the train journey went by without incident. 14 hours on a train, being woken up at 6 by the breakfast trolley and with the temperature slowly rising as the sun rises it was an uncomfortable journey, I will never complain about a small 3 hour journey in a car.....(however the 25hr journey we are about to embark on makes this 14 hours seem paltry) We leave the train around 4, stretching our burning muscles and are immediately assailed by a taxi driver. Take us to the Hanoi Backpackers we say to him and he does. We arrive promptly and pay him our dues, walk up the steps to the hostel sign in and 5 minutes later we're throwing our bags down in a lovely fridge dorm, I say its a fridge dorm because it was freezing cold, but in a good way. Unopack our stuff talk to some guy whos already been on the Ha Long bay trip we were about to do. Go downstairs to have a look around, go to the cash machine, at this time me and Henry have about 20 dollars between us, immediate phone calls to the parentals and by 11 that night we're back in business. We book the three day trip for the next morning and go for a walk to find some celebratory food, end up at a pizza place doing 2-4-1 pizzas so we grab a pizza and go back to the hostel. After talking to people for a while, eating the pizzas and packing our bags we're ready to leave on a 3 day trip of drinking, debauchery and more drinking, first we must sleep though.
Wake up early in the morning, get ready to leave, go downstairs have the crappy free breakfast the hostel puts on, get some money out, walking down the alley was an interesting experience due to the massive thunderstorm pounding overhead, thunder cracks down the alleyway causing you to instinctually seek shelter after that we meet the people who are on our tour and the tour guides, a young English guy called nick and a little vietnamese guy called Caspar (not his real name). Our group was a pretty small one with only 15 people, usually there are around 30. Jump on the bus and settle in for the 4 hour drive to the bay, nothing particularly remarkable about this trip apart from the massive lightning bolts streaking across the sky like someone had just drawn on it in white felt tip pen. around 12 we jump off the bus and jump on a little junk to take us to a bigger junk which would be our accommodation for the night. The bigger junk was massive and had lovely little air conditioned rooms with ensuite. After dumping our rucksacks we went back upstairs and had lunch. After luch the junk set off for the interior of the bay, amid all the limestone islands was our destination. After an hour of the slowest movement ever, junks arent built for speed evidently, we make it to our first spot, we then spend the next hour jumping down three stories into the cool water of Ha Long bay, the only hazards being the large jellyfish and trying to avoid belly flopping. After this was the kayak to the fairy cave, this would've been fun is the kayak hadn't zig zagged its way across the whole freaking bay. We got there eventually though, the cave was nice although many knocked heads and stubbed toes coloured the trip with a resentment for caves with no light. We saw the fairy lagoon, a stagnant pond in the middle of the limestone island, it wouldve been pretty if it wasnt for the turqoise colouring of the water giving it a distinctly dirty feel. Caspar our guide gave us a brief talk on the Vietnamese mythology of Ha Long bay and the fairy lake, we went back into the dark cave to find the 'buddha' a stalagmite thats joined a stalagtite that looks a little like a fat person, after the buddha we returned to the boatto continue our freefalling activities. Eventuallt the sun fell from the sky and we were no longer allowed in the water, that signified food time, my favourite time. Had a lovely meal and started drinking, started off with good old fashioned Ring Of Fire, Caspar got very drunk on his two beers and insisted on playing his music, a mix of cheesy 90's music and vietnamese music. Ring of fire moved onto flip cup, after flip cup we movd to the top deck to play some Paranoia, the worst drinking game ever. Paranoia wound down and everyone was talking, Caspar started talking to one of the girls, this ends badly for him, in his drunken state he becomes obsessed with her and harasses her for the rest on the night, following her back to her room, even when she mentioned it to Nick and Nick talked to him he still wouldnt stop. She went to bed early. We stayed up till around 2 talking between ourselves.
Woke up too early the next morning had a horrible breakfast, they like eggs here a lot. waited for the boat to come to take us to the island, half the people left as they were only doing the 1 day trip, we jumped on the boat...whic broke down 5 minutes later, an hour wait later and a new boat was here to take us to the island. We get there an hour later, this little idyllic island with a beach and huts surrounded by rock faces on three sides and the bay on the other. It looks like a perfect little place to spend a few days, unluckily we only have a day on the island so its time to make the most of it. We jump off and dump our bags in the little huts, basically a roof on stilts with matresses and mosquito nets scattered round, we go back to the center to have some lunch, noodles and pork which was lovely, an hour later and we're ready to go wakeboarding, on Ha Long Bay, wakeboarding! how awesome is that. Henry was second into the water and got up first time, after carving round for a while he goes for a jump doesnt quite make it, after that tho hes fine with them only falling a couple of times more. After ten minutes it was my turn, It started off well but the water caught my toes and i fell when i was cutting out to the right. Next try was a lot more successful and I did an ok jumo, by the end of my go the only thing preventing me from jumping the wake was me being unable to get up enough speed. It was all very fun and once everybody had a go we went back to the island to pick up the banana boat. A minute in with eight of us on it the thing submarie\ned then tipped, many bashed heads and lots of pain ensued. Tried again with only four on it, it still submarined throwing more people off it, the whole time we were on it it would start to submarine then tip to one side nothing we could do would stop it. So after 20 minutes and lots of collisions we gave up on banana boating. we just sat around for a while talking a few people had a sleep some people played ping pong, etc. Tea was a barbecua and one of the greatest feeds I've had in South East asia, it was good and there was loads of it. After tea the drinking games began, starting with Yatzee and ending with Ring of Fire, it was all very fun however the main entertainment for the first bit came from drunk Caspar, he was even worse than the night before, he cannot hold his drink, he ranged from always trying to play his own crappy music, to picking fights with the other staff ending with him getting a knee to the balls from the oldest guy on the island and screaming on the floor for the next 20 minutes. He tried to kick bottles off the table ending on his back, punched a lot of inanimate objects and generally embarassed himself. He eventually passed out on the beach leaving us in peace. Around 12 we went for a midnight swim, this didn't seem like a bad idea at the time. In the water were this algae which when moved gave off this green lights, imagine swimming and seeing these green specks all around you, now imagine doing that drunk, it was amazing and one of the best experiences so far. You could lift your arm out the water to see it covered in green specks, we swam out to the pontoon and spent time jumping off it just to see the green specks, eventually though we broke the pontoon and had to swim back in. This was basically the end of the night as everyone went to bed.
Woke up twice in the night once to find myself perpendicular to my bed and secondly due to caspar walking up and down the beach screaming.fun. when we all woke up we had breakfast which was not nice at all and clambered on the boat to take you to the junk then back to the harbour, we were back at the harbour by 12. Ha Long bay was awesome and I'd strongly recommend the Hanoi backpackers trip to anybody. It was a uneventful 4 hour trip back to HAnoi. we returned, got our bagsa, put them in our room, got all our dirty clothes out so we could put them in the laundry. Put them in the laundry bags, on the way out we saw four guys from my school. We talked for a while and agreed to meet them in the bar upstairs later on. Wrote my journal and showered, around 6 we went upstairs to get the burger, meeting them in the process. They invited us on this 15$ snake village trip they were doing, we agreed and went along with them. On arrival we got to hold these thin long snakes, they were so strong and bony it was astounding, after that we were taken to this little restauraunt bit where they fed us bits of the snake ranging from its internal organs (liver isnt good) to its skin and bones. Snake isnt to everyones taste some people liked it some people didnt. At the same time as the food was being eaten they brought out shots of snake bile and snake blood diluted with vodka. You down the blood then chase that quickly with the bile. It was not good I came very close to throwing up, Sean eventually did throw up but that was after a few more shots of snake vodka. After six shots of snake vodka each, lots of snake food and a horrible incident at the end not worth mentioning we set off back for the hostel. Along the way however we were sidetracked by some people who knew of some 4'000 dong a cup beer. However the beer tasted of rusty piss. So that was good. Walked back to the hostel, we didn't really know the way though so it took a fairly long time, when we got back we went our separate ways. Stayed on the internet for a while then went to bed. The next day was very uneventful for me as I was laid low with a bad case of diarrhoea. Took a couple of Immodium and stayed close to the toilets. Henry went for a few walks round the Hanoi. At 2 we picked up our washing and packed all that away. We talked for a while to the people on the desk at to what we would need to get into Laos, turned out we would need 36 dollars each, which we didn't have, and didn't have time to get. Fantastic. Mild panic till the bus arrived but the bus driver in very poor english told us there was a changing point at the border. 25 hour bus journey here we come. First though we have to get on the minibus to take us to the big bus. The minibus was an issue, a long ride with about eighteen people packed in. I was sitting on a bag, another guy was standing. It wasn't fun. Eventually we got there and after a lot of hassle we were on the bus going to Laos.
Around 6 in the morning we all had to get off to get our passports stamped, here we waited a while after everyone else to change some dong to dollars. This was a bad idea as it turns out by the time we get back the bus had left without us, mild panic and a five minute run to find the bus waiting for us at the next checkpoint. Got our visas and jumped back on the bus. We arrived in Vientiane around 3.30 and straightaway jumped in a little minibus with some other people off the bus to take us straight to Vang Vieng. AFter almost being run off the road by a bus on the way we get in around 7, find ourselves a hostel dump our bags and go out to get some food. Stop at one of the places showing friends on the tvs and with sofa table things and spend a few hours there doing nothing but watching friends repeats and drinking beers. Perfect. There are loads of these restaurants showing friends and family guy all the way down the street. At 9.30 we get up and go to Q bar which have free buckets on offer. We get there drink an awful lot of free buckets, then around 11 move on to Bucket Bar which you have to cross a rickety old bridge to reach. Here we see Ellie and Immy from New Zealand, talk to them for a while then we see the girls from Cairns who we dont like, talked to them for a while then by 11.30 we're both exhausted and ready to sleep so we take the long walk home and fall fast asleep.
The next day wake up nice and early and go and watch two hours of friends while drinking 7up, waiting fro Henry to get up, go back to the room, have a shower, theres no power so this has to be done in the dark. Leave with Henry to get breakfast and watch more friends, leave at 1 to get ready for tubing. At 2 we're ready and have met another guy off our Ha Long bay tour, buy some little rubber rings and get a tuk tuk out to the first bar. At the first bar we drink a beer, jump into the river for a little bit and float down to the next bar. The river that you float along is deep in most places but every now and again you see a few jagged rocks sticking out the water to remind you to only jump where youve seen other people jumping. AT the next bar we get two free shots and do a few zip wires, jump off some high platforms, all very safe in our drunken states. Next bar we get a bottle thrown across to us, we let it tug us in and get our free shot, bucket and free chips, do the rope swing for a while and move on to the next bar. Here we spend a lot of time, doing the rope swing and recovering from the massive trauma to the chest when you hit the water wrong. Very painful from 20 feet. After a lot of this we move onto our next bar, which is quite a float down the river. This isnt helped by my popped rubber ring which burst the last time I did the rope swing. We floated down holding onto a friends inner tube until we reached the slide bar, its around 6.30 now so it was shutting down but there was still time to try the slide. Made infamous by the girl who died on it recently. Take another hit to the lungs and wait till we leave. We spend forever drifting down the river till its pitch black and we cant see anything. Around 8 we get intercepted by tuk tuk drivers on the shore who want to take us back to the village so we climb out battered and bruised. The shallow rapids are a bitch when you're floating without a ring. We get the tuk tuk back and go get changed, have tea and spend the rest of the night recuperating in front of friends. Its weird being drunk by 3 and then sobering up again by 10. Interesting. Now I woke up this morning came to write this and ate a pack of oreos. Byeeeee x

After a lovely bruch in Nha Trang we went back to the hotel to suit up and hit the beach. The beach was lovely we spent a dollar each on a sunbed and spent the whole day doing nothing apart from swimming, sleeping and drinking water. The Nha Trang public beach is lovely, whilst on the beach I watched to start of Apocalypse Now, I only mention this because coincidentally he travels from Saigon to Nha Trang where he sets off on his mission. Learn a new thing every day. We also received a flyer to go to the Green Apple bar, where upon buying a main meal, we would receive a free bucket. Of alcohol. for free. After beach we went for tea at the afore mentioned restauraunt, had our free bucket with our meal and left. Went back to the hotel and rested for a while until leaving again at 9. Our first stop was the red apple club, known as the backpacker place to hang out. We spent half the night flippig beer mats and catching them, we worked ut a whole routine and everyting....I know we're very sad. That was until joy of joys (sarcasm) we saw Tanya from Fiji. Henry was in fact more happy to see hre than I was. I really wasn't too bothered. We then spent the night talking to her and her friends. I became very disenchanted with the night and left around 12.30, not before witnessing Henry driving a little cyclo with the vietnamese driver asleep in the front and two girls hangin off the back. I also found out that he'd been escorted into 'the Sailing Club' (very la di daa i know but its basically just a beach party every night) by a prostitute who would not take no for an answer, he ended up basically running away from her.
Next morning woke up nice and early for our island trip, Henry had a large hangover and wasn't so talkative. Had bread for breakfast before being picked up by a minibus and taken to the docks. Found ourselves on a rusty boat with around 30 other people. Our first destination, a little aquarium posing as a concrete pirate ship. We quickly realised that we would have to pay for some of these trips off the boat and should therefore start saving some money. The aquarium was good though limited, with some big fish, small sharks and average sized turtles. The views from the top of the pirate ship were very nice aswell. Next stop was the floating thing with the cute puppies and the little snorkelling. We jumped off the top of the boat for a while so by the time we got to the snorkelling equipment all that was left were these little one piece masks that made you look like frogmen. But in we went, wasn't very good but still was quite fun. Next stop FOOD! Had a little buffet with al the chairs folding down to form a table, was quite a lot like Fiji, a lot of food none of which is particularly nice. After lunch the entertainer guy asked people their nationalities I spoke up with England and that sealed my Karaoke fate. All the people that spoke up had to come up and perform a karaoke from their country chosen by the guy. Mine was wonderwall. A brief panic at the start when I had absolutely no Idea what was playing then it kicked in and I was propelled to stardom in the eyes of the 50 Vietnamese people watching. After lunch was the lovely floating bar, we didnt stop floating away. After leaping off the top deck of the boat a few times, doing a few dives and such like the floating bar was taken in and we were hauled up onto the boat for our last trip. This was to a packed stone beach which you had to pay to get onto, it was appalling, the public beach was so much nicer, we just went to the deckchairs and read till the boat left. When we arrived back at the hostel around 4.30 we had our showers then left to get tea, after tea we played a game of pool and booked our sleeper bus out of Nha Trang, we were leaving the next night at 7. Went back to the hotel watched tv till 10 and left to go to the Red Apple, Henry ghad left his diary there before so when we got there we had to walk back and there again, for the first half the night we entertained ourselves. The second part we met some Scottish girls and the German girls off the boat. Flyer girl organised a group of us to go to the Sailing club, along the way I walked into Why Not bar to talk to some girls about Hoi An, what to do, where to stay etc. but we got bored and left to find everyone else. We got there and strolled in. It was a sunday night so the place was dead, we found everyone standing round on the beach talking, I rejoined the Scottish girls and a new guy, cant remember his name but he was from the midlands. After talking to them for a while we went back to why not bar, they couldnt get in as they hadnt got the stamp, me and the midlands had the stamp, we bid them goodbye and agreed to meet them at the full moon party, after talking to the other girls from why not bar for a while I leave to find Henry, find him down the street talking to a girl with the most peaceful voice ever, not sure if this is normal or due to a lot of alcohol we talk for a while and go back to why not bar. Around 3 we get bored and go back to the hotel to try and get some sleep.
Wake up at 11, go downstairs, go find a cash machine, pack bags, pay for room, leave bags downstairs, go for lunch, play pool, go to beach, go for a swim, meet Tanya and Tanya's friends again, try and swim out to a buoy, is a lot further out than it seemed from the shore, regret decision when we reach the buoy and have to swim back. Make it back very tired, talk to Tanya's friends, ask person how much the Kite Surfing is....30 dollars for an hour lesson, this seems like too much. We are poor and cant afford 30 dollars for a kite surfing lesson. Leave the water and talk to Flyer girl and why not girls for a while. They buy a lobster, we talk for a while, we leave to find some food, have food and leave to go get our stuff from the hotel. Go on the internet for a while, and leave, go to convenience store, buy some convenient stuff and go and wait for the bus outside the tourist office. Get picked up by a minibus and taken to the bus stop. We pile on the bus and Henry recognizes some girls from Fiji, they recognize us, we talk to them. Arond 8.30 the driver turns all the lights off on the bus. Apparently 8.30 is bed time, around 12.30 the driver turns all the lights in the bus on. Apparently midnight is wake up time, we get off the bus to stretch our legs. At 1 we get back on the us and fall asleep. I have a horrible nights sleep, very sweaty, very bumpy and every now and again I'd wake up to a pile of drool on my hand where my chin had been resting, lovely.
We arrive in Hoi An at 6.30 and are immediately assailed by moto drivers and hotel people trying to sell us stuff. This is not fun and makes it very hard to focus on anything apart from saying no thank you. After traipsing up ten flights of stairs and seeing many appalling rooms, we find a cheap double fan room in a hotel with a pool. It is also the cheapest place we'd found so jackpot. We sleep for the next three hours. Around 11.30 we wake up, find we're hungry and go for some foods at the hotel restauraunt, a lovely fried rice dish later and we're ready to go find us some suits. 30 minutes later we're being measured, having chosen the style, the fit, the colour, the lining and the embroidery. Henry only wants a blazer, I get a suit. You'll habe to find out what they look like when we get home, let me tell you though that they are spiffing. I was gonna go for fire red with royal blue stripes but they didnt have that fabric so I had to settle for a more conservative style. After having our fitting session we go for a walk round the town. It really is a nice little town, almost all the shops are dedicated towards customising clothes, from shoes, to bags to jewelley, everything can be done here all you need to do is tell them what you want. We crossed the Chinese Bridge walked along the historic roads dodged our way through the food market, holding our breath for fear of smelling the putrid Durian fruit. Likened to the smell of mature cheese mixed with caramel. and not in a good way. After seeing all of Hoi An we walked back to the hotel stopping by to see our suits being made. We went out for tea but it was generally an uneventful night of resting and watching films, too exhausted to move from the beds.
Woke up the next morning had breakfast, went to see our suits, Henrys was done apart from his shirt which needed a bit of adjustment, mine needed a bit more adjustment but they told me to come back at 5 and it would be done, we spent the day by the pool lying in the perfect sun, slowly getting skin cancer. At 5 we went to the suit shop. There had been a power cut so they hadnt done any embroidering on mine but Henrys was completely done. They said it would all be done by the next day which coincidentally would be the day we were leaving Hoi An. Fast forwards to after tea around 10. Picture Billy and Henry standing on a street corner waiting for a free shuttle bus that would never come, to take us to a beach party that probably no longer exists, and you can picture us. After our weak attempts to get to Cua Dai beach party, we try for King Kong, also recommended in the guide book as a nice place to go for a drink. Nope still nothing there, perfect. King JKong was actually there however there was only one poor vietnamese guy sitting on his own. We decided not to go in. We felt we had put sufficient effort into going out and therefore relaxed in front of Moulin Rouge for the rest of the night.
Woke up this morning, had a shower, horrible pancake for breakfast, Go to suit shop, say it'll be ready by three, go to the pool, swim underwater (mostly) for 2 hours, write a large portion of this, then leave for an overpriced Indian meal. Go back get the clothes we're sending home and go to the suit shop. Try on the suit for the last time, it looks perfect. Package it up and send it and the other clothes home in a very expensive parcel. Lovely, went for a little walk through Hoi An, spent 10 minutes asking a shopkeeper the price of the model ships in there, literally a HMS Endeavour larger than me for 550 dollars. We both decided that we wanted it. Think of the opportunities. 8 foot HMS endeavor is sailing back home as we speak. Fantsatic, after ship shopping we went to a perfect little cafe where we could resisit a scoop of ice cream. And now we are back after running/hobbling back due to intense bowel movements. Oh the joys of Asia.x

Well then after a spot of brunch we checked out the guest house leaving our luggage in the lobby. We then went in a joint search for the central post office and the zoo. After a long walk we reached the post office only for Henry to remember that he doesnt know the adress t send his postcards too. I end up sending most of mine, it's now a race between me and the cards to see who gets home first. After the post office we make for the zoo. Another ten minutes of blistering heat and we find ourselves outside the zoo. this will be our 3rd zoo of the trip. We like zoos. This was a paticulalry impressive zoo as there seemed to be a lot less barriers between you and the exhibits which was good. I almost touched an elephant, and the siberian tiger was particularly majestic. However blike all zoos it is just animlas in exhibits and that gets pretty boring so after a few hours we left to walk back to the backpacker area, we stopped at a little restauraunt on the way cause Henry wanted a crepe. After that we saw one of the guys from last night but he had to leave quickly so we just said hello and goodbye. Back to the guest house we went, detoured on the way to see a free movie, ate some food, and generally just relaxed till we had to get the bus out. We picked our bags up at 7.45 and waited 20 minutes in the travel agency, when the bus arrived I straight away realised that I'd picked basically the worst sleeper seat on the bus. Sandwhiched between tow random people with about a foots width of my own space. For the rest of the ight I was forced to stay perfectly still so I wouldnt disturb anyone. Also I'm sure the bus had the worst suspension of anything ever. Every bump was pain. However at 6.30 this morning the ordeal was ended and we got off the bus in Nha Trang. Walked a small way to the hotel and collapsed on the bed sleeping for the next three hours, till now when I'm writing this. Time for brunch byeeeee.x

Yesterday was a good day. After we checked out of the hostel we went searchinf for a new one and ended up at one across the road, 10$ a night for a double fan room. Aint too bad, although we will greatly miss the luxury of the Air conditioning. Went for a stroll round town, walked to the War Remnants museum in a very roundabout way but we got there in the end. First sight of the building was the chinook sitting outside, then the tanks, then the fighter jets. Outside is a lot more upbeat than the inside. And considering the outside can hardly be called upbeat it doesnt bode well for the inside. Stretching across three levels was a sombre display of the Vietnam war detailing the atrocities committed by the American army. On the first floor were the memories of the massacres committed, as well as grainy pictures of GIs holding up beheaded vietnamese soldiers and pictures of random farmers shot by the soldiers,. Accompanying these images is a brief description of what was happening. it also details Americas involvement in Vietnam from before the war to after when they were still taking a hand in Vietnams future. On the next floor were another series of pictures and explanations, this time about what effect the spraying of chemicals all over Vietnam had on future generations, especially 'Agent Orange' which has caused more than 500'00 children to be born with birth defects as a result of their parents being exposed. Another feature was the jar of three fetuses preserved in formaldehyde which had birth defects resulting from agent orange. Also to be seen are some of the images taken by journalists following round the US army. Outside the museum is a display of some of the torture methods used on the Vietcong, not by the Americans but by other Vietnamese. This was done on an island not far from the coast. Overall the museum was an amazing place to visit. However I left wondering if the American army personnel who instigated the war have ever been held accountable to the countless war crimes they committed. After that sombre affair we walked back into the centre and had a bit of food. We booked a tour round the Co Chi tunnels and a visit to the Cao Dai temple for this morning.....but we overslept and missed it. Good thing it was only 5 dollars then. Around 8 when we were just walking round the park we were approached by a group of teenagers who asked if they could talk to us because they needed to larn some English, we agreed and then spent the next 2 hours talking to them and explaining what things meant and what parts of the body were called. It was pretty cool but around 10.30 we said our goodbyes and left. Back to the room, watched tv for a while and fell asleep.
Woke up, looked across to my phone, saw it was 8.30....we were supposed to be up for the tour and outside at 8 so that was rubbish, my alarm had gone off silently for some reason. Got ready, we'd finally had our laundry done, our hotel does it for 15,000 dong per kilo. Tehyd left out my socks thought so i spent a while searching for them. Next stop was the tour desk to book a bus to Nha Trang for tonight so thats where we weill be by 6.30 tomorrow morning. After tour desk we came here and now we must go for brunch before checking out the room by 12. byeeeeeee xx

After a lovely but very early bus journey across the border we are now in Vietnam. And I love it here. Its such a change from Phnom Penh. Admiteddly there aren't any tuk tuks, too many scooters, and the taxi drivers are a bunch of swindling arses, but i love it here.
We got off the bus yesterday to be greeted by a very very eager taxi driver wanting to take us to our hostel. After a moments deliberation we jumped in and off we went. We stopped at a cash machine on the way to take out some money, basically had to fish from different accounts as i was running very low at this point and Henry hasn't got any yet. We got to the road that the hostel was on and the meter was at just under 500,000 dong. we jumped out and gave him the money, he seemed to be sharing a joke with a nearby policeman, i'm pretty sure it was about us because unwittingly we had just given him 24$ for a 15 minute taxi ride. Swindling arsehole. Anyway after a bit of searching and being guided by a friendly vietnamese lady we found the hostel and in we went. We threw our stuff down in the room but we're only staying for a night as it's a bit pricy. We went for a little wak, for the first time in what felt like forever we were'nt being hassled everywhere we went. It was a good feeling not having to say no thankyou every two seconds. After a while we reach this little park called 23/9 and wander round, a way in a Couple of people from Melbourne waved us over and there started a day long friendship. We initially went for a bit of food in a western restauraunt, I had a fantastic club sandwhich. After a while they had to meet some Vietnamese guys theyd met the day before and had planned to meet again. when we met them we played hackey sack for a while in the park and then went out in search of table tennis tables. They'd already agreed to play so we just tagged along. After a few thrilling road crossings, scooters everywhere. we got to the tabletennis place, it was just a hall full of tables, unluckily for us they were all in use so we went for a walk, ending up playing hackeysack in a park much like the last one but bigger. We played this for a while but everyone got hungry so we went for a long walk to find this traditional vietnamese restauraunt they wanted to go to. they had a meal, but we weren't hungry so we just nibbled and drank ice tea. After a while we were ready to go so we set off back to the road our hostels on. A little walk later and we come across a set of bumper cars. Five minutes of hilarity ensues involving 6 fully grown people and six little person sized bumper cars. eventualyy we were turfed out, our time was up. We bid goodbye to our vietnamese friends and went to find the bar we had originally gone to. Had no money so we went to exchange some Dollar for dong. In the bar we spent the whole night sending song requests to the dj which if he played we had to down the whole of our drinks. He played all of them no matter how obscure. Lots of drink was drunk, happy hour leads to a bottle of Saigon beer being less than a dollar so it was a pretty cheap night. when we got thrown out at 12.30 we went in search of other bars, we found one made to look like a pirate ship and juumped in there. unfortunately it was full of Middle aged guys surrounded by young vietnamese girls. Seedy place if there ever was one. Left there an went to a bar just a short walk from our hostel. I spen the remaining hour starinf transfixed at a tv showing wwf. It was a good night overall but i dont feel too good this morning, but we must go find new accomodation so away i go.xx