MERRY CHRISTMAS & HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone we hope you all had a fab Christmas Eve and we bet a few of you are a little worse for wear! Well you won't beleive it Santa Claus didn't forget me this year. Mike secretly snook off on the scooter while I was cathing some rays and I had a few presents, he is a sweetie hey!

The present were some Cd's and the number one present, a bat and ball, come on!! Well we had a great day on the beach and a really lovely Thai meal, no turkey here but lots of spice!!! For New Years Eve we are going to splash out and go a lovely tapas restaurant 'The Red Snapper' that has a real cheeseboard yum! yum! and olives and much much more. Then we are heading down to the beach for a big PARTY with fireworks and plenty of alchol with our fellow travellers - should be fab! It will be over here by the time you just get started (7 in the morning) at 5pm your time we will be singing and welcoming the arrival of 2008. May all of you have an amazing night and hope you all have a wonderful 2008

Christmas in Ko Lanta

After spending a few days in Phuket, we have arrived in Paradise!! The island is relatively untouched with a few beach bars and a very laid back vibe and we have decided to spend Christmas here. We have met some friends and we are enjoying the glorious sunshine, cooling down in the blue sea and getting into island life. Mike is also quite pleased to have a beer & football buddy!!

Here is our view everyday - not bad hey?!

Most days are spent chilling out on the stunning beach, near to a wicked bar, drinking mango shakes, eating great food and listening to the mellow tunes. Mike and Ben have also started a headers competition, check out the hats!

Don’t be fooled by thinking every day we are just laying on the beach, ohh no. We have hired a wicked pink scooter and have had a few road trips!! Again Mike has taken on the driver’s role. Needless to say we have ended up on a beach but hey we are out exploring this magical island!!

You would be wrong to think the upcoming festivities have escaped the island. Here you can see the beautiful Christmas tree on the beach and also we have managed to buy a couple of hats to get into the spirit of things. Not sure what we will be doing on the 25th but as you have probably guessed it will more than likely involve lying on the beach!! However we would love to pop home and just smell those turkeys’s cooking and watch those festive films. What’s on this year any token James Bond or a classic like Oliver?!

Have a great Christmas Eve everybody and we hope Santa Claus brings you everything you hoped for. Make sure you have a few drinks for us, miss you all xxx Ho Ho Ho

Festive greetings from Thailand

I bet you are all on count down to December 25th and looking forward to what Santa brings, we on the other hand still can't quite grasp that Christmas is only 11 days away. We have seen the trees in the malls and all the decorations and lights but it just doesn't seem right that we haven't put our tree up or turned on the heating!! We have made our first stop in Thailand , Bangkok.

As you can see we visited the Grand Palace, and some other temples they were all really cool we even had to wear some crazy clothes, Mike had some nice long pants and I had a fab skirt very sexy -not.

We managed to get away from all the noise and stinking pollution one evening when we visited the Bayok Tower. We took the lift to the 84th floor where we had an amazing views of the city and a few drinks, it was really cool one of the highlights of our stay. Lin I would love you to bring out some digestives when you visit Oz I may have a small list for you(He He) can't wait to see you, Ian & Arron. Also CONGRATULATIONS to Nat & James, Ry you are so under pressure now Ha! Ha! Next stop Phuket for some beach time !!!

Mike's 28th Birthday

Thankyou for all my birthday messages and for the e cards I recieved. Cowhead you fool the reason I didn't get your card or money is we are still in Malaysia you muppet!! but I appreciate the thought. As you can see at breakfast I was greeted with an embarrising rendition of 'Happy Birthday' from everybody which included a lovely chocolate cake also check out my flower in my hair.Danielle made me wear the flower until lunchtime and insisted it was part of the birthday celebrations!!

Along with chilling on the beach I also took a jet ski for a spin, then Danielle surprized me with a romantic candlelit dinner on the beach. All in all I couldn't of asked for a better 28th. We are now in Penang and you will all be happy to know we have had a couple of days of rain!! We are heading to Bangkok on 10th December to check out the city and try and find somewhere to celebrate the festivities on the 25th. Danielle is really missing digestive biscuits by the way - she is so strange!!! as you probably guessed from the comments on the blog.

Beach Time

After our hectic adventures we have finally hit the beach, plenty of sun, sun & more sun. First stop, we on the island of Langkawi , beautiful powder white sand, blue sea and of course lots of palm trees, paradise( by the way today over 30C).


We did hire a car for a day to check out the island (very small). We took a cable car ride to the top of the jungle where you can see Thailand but then headed straight back down to the beach. We are officially beach bums and we are loving every minute of it. However when we feel that this lifestyle is getting too much for us and we feel a wee bit tired we have a little siesta but then head straight back to the beach. As you can probably imagine life is quite stressful - not!!

Can you spot Dan?

Our hotel is called Sunset Beach and you can see why,every evening we have been watching the sun go down before making the most important decision of the day-where to have dinner!! Thanks for everybodys comments on the blog and emails so far. They really do make our days and we do miss you all. Its Mike's birthday tomorrow and we plan to do the same but also hire some jet skis and maybe go island hopping. I hope this warms you all up and helps you to get over the winter blues

Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur what a city we have had fun - not. On day one we decided to go into the city centre to the Petrona Towers but for some reason Taxis we not allowed there. We just assumed there was some kind of event. We got a tram and then had to divert to a bus. We where the only white people, the bus was full of Indian's. It then stopped as the Police would not let the bus in because of the Indians.(Umm Mike reassured me it was fine)

Mike said we could walk. As we started to walk there were hundreds I mean hundreds of hundreds of Indians looking menacing and unhappy. I told Mike that something was not right , he insisted it was a festival!!! 'OK' I said as we walked further along it got worse and worse like a rally. It was only when one kind Indian told us to stop as there was Police with TEAR GAS and WATER CANNONS!!! Ohh yes we where in the middle of a massive protest about Indian rights and blaming the English- funny was it, NO. As you can imagine a few choice word were exchanged by myself. Luckily we took refuge in a very nice hotel and watched the antics for a few hours until the crowds dispersed. A F***ing festival!!! seriously!!!

But don't worry everyone we are fine and even manged to meet some lovely people who lived in Holland. We even had a lovely birds eye view of the fiasco from VIP lounge, as they were on their honeymoon. After a few hours once it had all died down we spent the afternoon with our new friends and had a lovely evening eating drinking and having a laugh. Here are a few pictures of the Petronas. We are now heading for Langkawi and hoping we can just chill on the beach.

Singapore

Wow what a place, this is the most cleanest & safest place we have ever visited. Its so up to date in every way and has gadgets and machines for everything- which Mike is loving, typical man! It is so hot & humid we have been walking round looking like sweaty heaps - nice. We thought it couldn't get any worse untill the sun came out ohh my god it is boiling!!!

We have visted the famous and exclusive Raffles hotel - if only our budget stretched that far!!

Its been really weird being in this climate and going into the shopping malls (more on that in a minute) and seeing all the Chritsmas decks and hearing Mariah's 'All I want for Christmas'. At nightime the city is amazing it takes on a whole different feeling the skyline is so impressive. Orchard Road is lined with Christmas lights and wonderful window displays, amazing we had a bus tour at night just to see them all!! As for shopping ohhh my god seriously if anybody wants a blow out come here and shop. The city has more malls than we can count and they are all massive with a minimum 8 floors - Mike recommends any men to not bring there lady's here unless they want to be broke!!

We also took a visit to Singapore Zoo (more like a huge jungle) and followed this up with a night safari where all the nocturnal animals come out to play. It was brillant and I got up close and personal with some adorable orang-utans!!!!

Table Mountain

The sun is now shining and before we leave South Africa we have taken the opportunity to revisit Table Mountain and it was well worth it. The views from the 1086 meter high mountain are stunning.

It took just over 2 minutes to reach the summit!!

This is the view of Cape Town and in the distance Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was inprisoned which we visited during our stay.

This a view of Camps Bay where the rich and famous hang out!!

This is our last post from South Africa we have had a fantastic time and we would definitely love to come back ( maybe for the 2010 World Cup) Ange and Leeroy you will love it. We will catch up with you all from Asia.

Addo Elephant Park

We have been on safari in the 'Chico' and we travelled to Addo Elephant National Park and had an brilliant day. We saw lots of different animals including lions and hundreds of elephants. It was so cool we just parked up our 'Chico' and the elephants just wondered past almost in touching distance. At one point though we nearly crapped ourselves as i forgot to turn off my engine. A heard of elephants were walking past and the massive male didn't seemed to impressed with me and the lemon. He started walking straight for the car stopping just before the bonnet and staring us out until I swiftly turned the engine off whist breaking out in a nervous sweat and nearly having an accident!!! Anybody who has the chance to go on safari should go for it as it was one of the best days we have had, here are a few photos for you to look at.

Garden Route

After exploring all that Cape Town has to offer it was time to drive the Garden Route. Our first stop was Hermanus which is famous for whale watching and diving with great white sharks. Unfortunately when we arrived the weather was bad and all the boat trips including the great white shark experience was cancelled (gutted). However we still had a fab afternoon watching whales from the shore, it was really surreal.

Our next stop was Wilderness which was a four and a half hour drive through some breathtaking scenery. We stayed at the Fairy Knowles Backpackers it was amazing set in the forest in the national park, with a camp fire and outside bar. It reminded us of camping but with extremely nice rooms - to our fellow camping buddies you would you would have loved it. The next day we went kloofing ( travelling down gorges and waterfalls) down the Kaaimans River and abseiling down 45 meter cliff edges through waterfalls, a fantastic day out the scenery was unbelievable. The top picture is Mike and the second my goodself!! I was really brave.

Jefferys Bay a fantastic place a mecca for surfers - Chris you would love it. The waves are massive and surfers fantastic its a really chilled out lifestyle. There is loads of discount shops selling really cool stuff , however Mike has curbed my spending so only managed to by some flip - flops!! We have spent a few day here before heading back to Cape Town

Chico Time!

We are now offically on the road. We have hired a ' Chico'( dont laugh) and don't worry Mike is driving- Ha! Ha! Its really easy to get around just one hazard the Baboons!! We took a trip to the amazing Boulders Beach to see the cute penguins, its was brilliant, I wanted to give one a hug and take it home! They were just like Pingu. Next stop was Cape point, where the Atlantic meets the Pacific.(see the lighthouse) The scenery was beautiful like something out of a film.

We have also taken a trip up the famous Table Mountain but unfortunately the views were short lived as the ' Table Cloth' swallowed us up, so no photos. Basically we ended up freezing cold in the clouds, very weird. Fingers crossed we may be able to take another trip before we leave.