I know we only just posted an update, but this will be quick(ish) and we won’t bother you again for a month or so - promise.
We spent the second half of a long day travelling from the Cambodian border back to Bangkok to complete our loop-the-loop. 4 nights and 3 days were squeezed in before our Malaysian detour, so we went to revisit the favourite sight from our first trip, the Grand Palace (as beautifully gleaming, majestic and busy as we remembered), had a daytime trek around Nana with her glut of gorgeous go-goers, young pervs, middle-aged pervs and very old pervs and had a couple more late ones resulting in the unavoidable Changovers (and Leovers).
This time we stayed near the legendary Khao San Road, not far from where we were in 2000, and even though there are now many more hotels and guesthouses, the place was still full to the seams and there was a great buzz and atmosphere to the whole area. Can’t wait to come back again one day, but it was time for Malaysial and, as it was one of the highlights of Miss Gawler’s trip so far, I will leave you in her firm hands as she guides you through a piece of Malaysian Borneo – to be wild…
…Kuching Kuching kool! A lovely city with a pretty waterfront, surrounded by mountainous national parks and not far from the South China Sea. We spent an amazing 5 days here but could have happily stayed longer and explored further afield and seen more of Kuching’s delights.
We began our adventures trekking through the jungle at Kubah national park taking in wonderful views, being scared by teeny-weeny leeches and dipping in the icy waterfalls, oh and sweating lots – lovely!
Then we went to visit the famous orang-utans and were lucky enough to have close encounters with several semi-wild, hairy, orange ‘men of the forest’. It was simply wonderful to watch these large creatures nimbly swing from tree to tree, especially whilst one carried a baby under her arm!
Some more jungle trekking, this time at Bako national park, was unforgettable; beautiful scenery, wonderful deserted beaches and best of all the strange-looking proboscis monkeys. These rare creatures, native to Borneo, are very shy and most of our sightings were from far away, but, as we quietly watched two youngsters at play, a large male came really close to us, and we sat and watched him for ages going about his monkey-business.
As well as the wild jungle and the wildlife, we had some wild nights in Kuching too. We met up with some locals and shared some drinks and then they invited us to go dancing in the rainforest. We jumped at the chance, I mean how cool would that be? But we were a little disappointed as we got driven two streets away to a nightclub called The Rain Forest!
As for food, I think the rule in Kuching is, if it moves you can eat it! But the tankful of frogs with their great bulbous eyes staring at me was too much! We ate great seafood in a very strange location - on top of a multi-storey car park! It was a very scenic car park though!
Well, as some of you know, I could talk about “When I was in Malaysia…” for a very long time, but I’ll leave it there and pass you back to Derek for Kuala Lumpur…..
….where we were royally entertained and hosted by mad Uncle Raymondo and his lovely girls; lady wife Joanna and their baby daughters bonnie Bonnie and smiley Roxanne.
We were in luxury; 27 storeys high giving my vertigo a serious workout and with stunning views of downtown KL by day and even better by night. It felt like being in Manhattan, probably. We shopped out at the insanely busy malls and then checked out the local birds (wiv fevvas), getting to see the colourfully crazy hornbills, toucans and even parrots doing maths!
For the last couple of days, another younger not-quite-so-baby cousin Angela and her husband Gavin arrived from Scotland to start their hollies and we all had a great time boozing it up on Tiger, getting knackered at the swimming pool (congratulations Gavin), crying over the Edinburgh derby (actually that was just me as I was surrounded by Jambo filth on all sides except for Helen’s shoulder), injuring ourselves at the mental Cosmo’s World fun park at Times Square and signing off with a cracking night out involving shirt-swapping (no names), roti hats (Uncle Ray), embarrassing hooker moments (no names) and sensational shapemaking (everybody).
All over too soon, it was time for farewell and off we flew to Ho Chi Minh City on August 9th which is nearly up to date!! Thanks to the Dougalls (and Robbs) – what about a hot water bottle, Waddle?
Finally, congratulations to a Mrs C.Gawler of Fishponds, Bristol who wins our yet-to-be-confirmed prize for being the first person to sign our burntfish guestbook.
Until next time, let me ask you a question: what time is love?
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