Now in Bali

First post in a while. During our week in Phuket, I couldn't access blogspot.com from the internet cafes - I suspect it is blocked by ISPs at the request of the government because I found some news reports from a couple of years ago that it was blocked during earlier political unrest. Then during our 6 days in Kuala Lumpur, I couldn't find a single internet cafe around the area we stayed - lots of nice cafes with free wifi but we didn't bring a laptop.

Now we are on Bali and except for truly horrendous traffic (narrow roads, constant stream of motorbikes trucks and cars), it's a beautiful place.

We didn't get too much done in our 6 days in Malaysia because Gyorgyi caught Dengue Fever towards the end of our time in Phuket and spent most of the time in KL in bed recovering or at the hospital for blood tests. (The doc in Phuket diagnosed food poisioning and it wasn't until she had a blood test in Kuala Lumpur that it was properly diagnosed. It is spread by mosquitoes.) Still, could be worse as I see Mexican swine fever is coming to a town near you soon.

That aside, we enjoyed Phuket and Kuala Lumpur. In both places we stayed in upmarket hotels which had kids clubs and so on, elaborate breakfast and dinner buffets, etc. Now we are back to basics, relatively speaking! - in Bali. Kuala Lumpur is truly a shopping paradise and we threw out some old clothes and bought replacements. I got a bunch of counterfeit stuff in the Chinatown.

While in Phuket we did an organized boat trip to Ko Phi Phi where we visited beautiful places but it was like being on a tourist production line - each place we stopped had 20 to 40 speedboats full of tourists pulled up to the beach to see the same thing. The girls liked it because they could swim with some fishes in shallow water and feed some monkeys on a beach but I thought it fairly horrible and will avoid package trips from here on.

Today in Bali I had my first surf lesson... in some quite heavy waves. It was fun although a number of bruises to show. Tomorrow we will tour around the west of Bali a little and then maybe I'll take another lesson the day after.

Gyorgyi still needs a lot of sleep but slowly getting her energy back.

For more news, here's an email I sent to a few people while on Phuket.

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We arrived in Phuket from Koh Samui last Sunday. Again I have to say that the airport in KS is the best I've ever seen. Apart from having a completely open air feeling that is impossible to describe in words so I have to upload some pictures, there was FREE SNACKS AND FRUIT JUICE. Yehayy.

We are staying in a Marriot here in Phuket, having run out of enthusiasm to find somewhere else before leaving Hungary. The room rate of about 80 Euro is not bad considering the relative luxury of the place (3 pools, large exercise room, kids play house, etc), but eating and drinking there is very expensive compared with normal Thai restaurant prices.

The area we are in - Surin Beach - is nice enough but fairly dangerous for swimming - big waves and strong undertow - which led to Gyorgyi putting her back out on Monday and I was lucky the same didn't happen to me. But apparently it's like this everywhere along the east coast at the moment - a bit stormy on some days, with occasionally Thunderstorms (not today luckily when we had a boat trip).

Gyorgyi's had a bad run of luck this week - first a crown fell out, then she hurt her back, and this morning she woke up with upset stomach and possibly fever which led to her missing our trip to "James Bond Island" today. On Tuesday we visited a private hospital's dental clinic and in the end it was decided not to do anything with the tooth because she has no pain, possibly it will have to be removed so better to do that at home in case of any complications. She also got her back checked - only pulled muscle - and got some physio for it and again on Thursday.

While she was at the hospital in Phuket town the girls and I went into the town center to look around. Not an especially interesting place but it gave us a reason to see it. We also visited a butterfly farm on the outskirts of the town after the hospital which was enjoyable.

The highlight of the time here was the Thai New Year's day on Monday - called Songkran. The day is an excuse for massive waterfights, with westerners a prized target. You have to imagine groups on people every few meters on the streets, with water guns and buckets and large barrels full of water, then lots of people in the backs of pickup trucks similarly armed driving around, with everyone throwing water over everyone else. Even motorcyclists get drenched which is pretty dangerous. The fire brigade goes around keeping the barrels filled-up. We armed ourselves with two waterguns the night before and set out in light clothing on Monday morning, actually with the intention of taking a tuktuk to the large Patong town. Well, we gave up on that idea after 50 metres when we were already soaked to the skin. So we just joined one of the groups of Thai people on the street
and spent a happy hour firing water at everyone in sight. This goes on all day but an hour was enough for us.

Our visit to Thailand is almost at an end now. On Sunday we fly to Kuala Lumpur. We've visited Bangkok, Chiang Mai in the north, the eastern islands Koh Samui and Ko Phan Gan and the western island Phuket. It's impossible to make any direct "which we preferred best" comparisons, as the north and the islands are completely different. The islands are heavily tourist-ised leading especially to much higher prices for food, transport etc, and a less natural experience of the real Thailand. On the other hand they are breathtakingly picturesque, and great for snorkelling and diving and boat trips. I'm sure if we came again it would be worthwhile to explore much more of the north, but I'd really want to see more islands too. We had been regretting not visiting Koh Tao which is the next island north of Ko Phan Gan - reason being that many scuba diving sites are around there - however we heard two people tell us that they didn't like it so much - good for diving but otherwise not a great destination. (We got a nice surprise on our last day in Ko Phan Gan when some people from Munich we had met earlier came back from Koh Tao for one last night on Phangan instead - they had changed hotel room 3 times during their stay on Ko Tao it was so noisy at their resort!)

Today we visited the James Bond Island (so nicknamed because it was in two JB films) by longboat. And a couple of other locations in the area. Nice day trip and beautiful scenery but gazillions of tourists. Tomorrow we have a trip planned to Ko Phi Phi and a beach where the fishes swim around you on the beach - good one for the kids we hope.

Must go back now to hotel and check the girls out of the "kids club" before it closes. Gy trying to sleep off her illness in peace and quiet.

Animals we've met

Some of the animals we've met, from Frogs to Elephants http://picasaweb.google.com/patstephens99/Animals#

From Animals

From Animals

From Animals

Silk

Pictures from Gyorgyi's trip to silk production in Chiang Mai now viewable at http://picasaweb.google.com/patstephens99/ChiangMaiSilkProduction.

And a couple of days ago in Ko Phan Gan she got to taste the raw material!

Reading list

We've gone though The Wizard of Oz, and James and the Giant Peach, and are half a book into the Narnia ("The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe") series.

Gy and I've been picking up books on the shelves at the guesthouses and resorts. At the moment I'm reading The Confederacy of Dunces, a wonderfully funny book that's been on my wish-list for a while. To give a reference point, the main character in the book very closely resembles a 30-year-old version of "Spoilt Bastard" from Viz.

Ko Phan Gan @ Tuesday

Since we arrived on Ko Phangan until yesterday the weather has been a bit stormy. Today's the first day without rain.
The island is much more basic than Ko Samui which is well developed and pricy. This island is a collection of small resorts and two towns. Some of the resorts are backpacker level, others like Haad Salad where we stay contain more 'family hotels'. We've only briefly been to the two main towns so far - Haad Rin when we arrived and last night in Thong Sala when we had to bring Fiona to a doctor, but more about that later!

It's a really relaxing laid back place, and not expensive like Samui. Nice atmosphere in bars and restaurants in the evening, even if it's not been too busy there are people there to talk to. The "full moon party" is on Friday so now we start to see more people arrive for that as it's a big event, all-night party in Haad Rin on the opposite end of the island but accomodation fills up everywhere.

Briana loves the pool here because it has a water slide and she can also jump in from high up, so we have lots of fun there. The sea is alright but not perfect for kids because there is a lot of shells small rocks and broken coral in it to hurt the toes. We were at the next beach Mae Haad on Sunday and it seemed a bit better for swimming.

We met a nice couple Markus and Kristina from Munich who have a 4 year old daughter Anna. Fiona liked to play with her so we often ate with them. Kristina's father is Hungarian and she speaks the language, although she was born in Germany. They went off to another island today, but we expect to keep in touch as they will visit Budapest this summer.

I mentioned that we had to bring Fiona to a doctor last night. She had been coughing for a couple of days and yesterday her temperature reached 39.2 at one point in the early evening. Gyorgyi got talking to a Thai man living in Europe who said we should be careful of Dengue Fever (which rightly or wrongly he called Donkey Fever!), so we headed off the the nearest clinic at Thong Sala, a 20 minute taxi ride. They didn't gave us any major reason to be concerned, prescribing some anti-fever medicine and antibiotics for the cough (probably unnecessary), and said to bring her back today if fever persisted. She was much better this morning luckily. Now I will get to see if the medical insurance pays out! Not too expensive though.

Yesterday I finally managed to get out Scuba Diving, at a site called Sail Rock. Because of the poor weather there hadn't been too many dives operating, and the visibility wasn't great but the dive site was very good with lots of fish, some colourful and a few biggish (butterfly fish, angel fish, barracuda, a grouper maybe 80-90cm long, lots of coral).
A german guy and I shared one divemaster and we had one 55 minute dive and one 47 min dive so got decent value out of the day. Not sure I will do another dive here because it's not too cheap and visibility poor so I can wait for Bali.

Gyorgyi has been getting some training in Thai Massage from one of the operators on the beach. She even got to help them work on a real live paying customer today! Gy and I have also had a few massages there and at the same place the girls got their hair braided, nails painted, etc. Although the weather has been good even if a bit stormy, the good thing about this place is that there is a lot to do. Gy and I also went to a pilates class together on Sunday and the girls played with the 8-year old son of the teacher (who sleeps in a tree house connected with the main house by a rope bridge - talk about ever boy's dream!)

Our flight to Phuket is on Sunday and we will probably stay here until then, as there is a boat which if it goes on time will get us to the airport in Samui for the flight.

I've given up trying to run here, as the island roads are up and down like a rollercoaster and I also had my heels nipped by a couple of dogs the other day. One got his teeth onto my calf and hand but luckily it was not serious about biting me - playful, but a bit too on the aggressive side for comfort. So the fitness level is gone to hell.

Probably we planned to stay here in this location too long, although it is very nice. Getting taxis around is quite pricy compared with the north of Thailand so it would have been better to have planned to stay 2 or 3 places in the same time rather than base ourselves in one location. Live and learn. We will look at our Bali schedule and if it's worth planning it any differently based on experiences here.

Thunderstorms

Stormy weather here. Nice sunshine for a while, then thunderstorms and heavy rain. The girls got their hair braided, nails painted. I went snorkelling.

Our children and other animals

One of the things here that's a little bit hard to get used to at first are the animals allowed to roam freely in bars and restaurants. Dogs especially, and cats too, not to mention the small lizards that appear on the walls everywhere!

The kids are a bit nervous around dogs, but so long as they see they dogs aren't going to leap on them, it's alright and they get quite friendly especially with the smaller ones. To my surprise they haven't freaked out at the lizards and other assorted wildlife like dragonflies. Last night Briana calmly said that something wet jumped across her foot. Mosquitoes are our Public Enemy Number 1 and we are heavy consumers of lotions and potions to keep them away.

The other day, I was on a sunlounger when a lizard jumped down almost on top of me from the bar roof, followed right after by the cat which was chasing it. The lizard sat still for a while on the neighbouring sun lounger, while the cat lurked underneath. Then the lizard took off, and was easy prey for the cat, who took it off into the neighbouring English pub for a tasty meal.

Haad Salad, Ko Phangan

Yesterday we moved to the next island to the north - Ko Phangan - which is a little smaller but a lot less developed than Ko Samui. We are staying at a nice resort called Cookies in Salad Bay on the north-west of the island. There's a great view down over a small beach which has a couple of nice resorts and a bunch of more basic bungalows and bars. No real town to talk of, just a small concentration of a few shops and motorbike hire places. Very very relaxed place.

Right next to us there is a relatively swanky resort which has just opened, it has lots of staff and not a single guest as far as we can see! They had two guys sweeping the beach this morning!

The boat ride here was fairly rocky. The weather has changed to unsettled night before last, and a few moments before we boarded the boat a storm came; the rain was lashing the boat by the time we departed and the sea got fairly rough. The ride was only about 35 minutes but most of us started to feel a bit green... and a few threw up. The next surprise was the road from the Haad Rin pier to our resort - for the first few km, a rollercoaster ride up and down hills and around sharp corners.

By the time we arrived it was nice and sunny again so we chilled out at the resort, eating, swimming, strolling around. I snorkelled out 100m to a small coral reef where there was a nice selection of fish.

There is a place nearby where a British lady lives giving courses in Yoga etc. I went to a Pilates class there this morning - been meaning to try this for a while. Enjoyed it. She holds it every day if enough people so I'll go again. Gy might do a yoga class and they have a special Herbal Steam room operating a few days a week, and there is a kids class on Sunday we could bring the girls to.

The plan is to do a few days diving here. Weather is not ideal for diving, rather stormy periods again today between the sunshine, but hopefully it will be good enough. Gy still has some ear pain and would like to dive but not sure yet when it will be possible.

Gy was kept awake last night by the people in the neighbouring room watching tv until late. Turned out to be Irish, fortunately leaving today so we don't have to complain :-) Also another Irish lady here originally from Sligo.

We are really chilled out now, just enjoying doing very little, hanging around the pool and beach, eating well (too much of course - smoothies especially are delicious here). Briana is swimming really well, Fiona still a little cautious but gaining confidence.

On the 9th, before we leave this island, there is a world-famous Full Moon Party - the beach at Haad Rin is taken over for the full night with trance, techno, etc djs. Probably we will go for the show (the music is fine for me, not sure for the others!).