The journey from Siem Reap to Bangkok took some 12 hours. The journey itself was straightforward enough and pretty bumpy for the 5 hours to the Thai border. The road really was little more than a series of potholes arranged in a straight line - it would have been smoother to have gone off road over the fields! The border crossing was smooth as anything and we glided through without having to bribe anyone, which is contrary to the usual stories we hear from near enough everyone else that makes a border crossing in Cambodia. The walk over to Thailand was a joy and seemed so amazingly clean. After waiting an hour or so we boarded a pristine VIP bus and crawled slowly to Bangkok (a 2 hour journey took our driver 5 hours!!!).

On arrival in Bangkok we immediately felt the crackle of energy in the air and drifted along the guesthouses along Soi Rambuttri trying to find a room as it was incredibly busy. Eventually we got one by pure fluke and dumped our stuff to go get some food from the street stalls we like.

Ahhhhh it's very difficult to explain and yet obvious to all who have read our previous reports back from Thailand: we love this place for so many reasons! The food, the money, the language, the friendliness of the people... it was just such a lovely lovely feeling to be back!

We were due to meet with Mick and Tom and Vic on the 1st February so had a few days to kill, shopping for some new clothes and enjoying being in Bangkok. We took the opportunity to visit Adam, who was in the Binfield Bard Amateur Dramatics group with Cheryl in the UK (www.binfieldbards.co.uk) and has just moved to a new life in Pattaya - a few hours by bus from Bangkok.

It was such a lovely visit and Adam was a great host, along with his beautiful girlfriend Guhn. He showed us the town that night, which is - ahem - 'eyeopening'. The bright lights of Pattaya offers more than your average night out. We were drinking till 4am - this is definately a party town.

Adam had to go to work the next day, which was a shame - but i don't know how he managed it after the late night. Well, lets face it, any thought of going to work at all is quite beyond us now. Our lunch with Adam and Guhn before leaving back for Bangkok the next day was marvellous, sat out on a quiet beach under the shade of the palm trees chatting away. Quite the opposite of work lunches I used to take, sat in front of the computer screen back at Ascot! We wish Adam all the luck in the world in cracking the real estate market there (and beyond!) and keep living a great lifestyle.

On our return to Bangkok, along the Kaho Sahn road we bumped into Kiwi Craig who we had met in Siem Reap and next day we caught up with Mick and met another Craig and some lovely girls from Essex (one of whom was recovering from been attacked in Phnom Penh and had been stabbed in the bum. They were flying the 12 hours home to Blighty the next day - ouch!) and went dancing at this mad nightclub.

Next day we met up with Tom and Vic and the madness started from there.... Mick, Tom, Vic, Chezza, and I all bought these amazing happy drinking hats from some selling in Kao San Road. The women are all dressed up in northern traditional dress and sell bracelets, musical frogs and HATS>>>

Later on that Night we got Craig (UK) to buy one, met upwith CRAig (NZ) and got him to buy one too all of a sudden 4 was now 6 and the group just got bigger and bigger.... WE meant to fantastic Australian Guys called Beefa and Chris and encourged them to buy hats too and spend the rest of the night with us, despite their protests about having to get up early for a flight to cambodia... We then met Doogie from Scotland who happily joined the clan.... (HAS anyone got Doogies email address??? Can they pass on our details to him?? I'm sure he would love to see the photos of that night!!) Luckily at the last minuete we managed to find a hat small enough for sipon to where and with that we were off on a scoot across town for bowling at a mega futuristic alley!! We got a bus to MBK (the coolest place in the world) and with 11 Ferrang on the local bus somehow we manageed to turn a few heads..... Was it that we were forigners or that we were wearing hats with bells on???? Then the madness began and the most fantastic night ensued!!!!! We would both like to thank everyone for a wicked night and urge you to have a look at the photos as words just cant do it justice!!!

We happily ended up staying in Bangkok for much longer than anticipated and sadly waved Mick goodbye (but we'll be visiting him in Brisbane really soon!) and then Vic and Tom and Craig and Craig and Zoe. All of us with slightly different travel plans. That said, we made some broad plans to meet up again with Tom and Vic and Zoe further south on the islands...

For our part, we were headed to Krabi on the overnight train and then try and get a ferry to drop us off on an almost deserted island somewhere for some solitude and sun!