Our first venture, after Bangkok, was to show Vic and Dave what Thailand is really famous for; its beautiful beaches. We took an overnight train to Surat Thani, arriving at 4am and then took a short bus ride to Krabi where we arrived by early morning to make sure we would get the optimum time on the beaches! We decided to stay just outside Krabi Town, in a beach area called Ao Nang. The long beach is lined by lapping blue waves and out in the bay are plenty of sm...

After four years of wanting to do it, we finally got ourselves to the floating market outside of Bangkok. We had pictures in our heads of people selling food from their little boats on the canal, but unfortunately this has changed somewhat since the invasion of tourists! The traditional vendors selling fruit, veg and spices vanish by about 7am to make room for the souvenir guys! The boats are now full of tourists loaded with cameras and sun parasols (of course, w...

Ko Samet is a small island four hours from Bangkok, two and a half hours by bus, one hour sat on the ferry in port, while they loaded everything (including the kitchen sink) on the roof, and then thirty minutes once it gets going. We arrived into the small, but busy port. We first attempted to walk across the island, but gave this up as a bad job when Becky’s flip flops repeatedly got stuck in the mud pit that doubled as a road. So, we hopped in the back of one...

We arrived into Vang Vieng on a proper VIP bus this time! Although, as usual we were dropped off at a bus station miles from the centre of town and had to get a tuk tuk the rest of the way. After traipsing around the town in the midday heat, we found a nice enough guesthouse that would be our base for the next few days. Vang Vieng is a well known backpacker haven and packed full of bars and restaurants, which all run episodes of “Friends” back to back. The t...

We had been thinking of spending the day with the elephants since Chiang Mai, but there are so many different outfits to choose from we could never decide what to do. So when we saw this camp, on the outskirts of Luang Prabang, we felt it was the right choice for us. The camp is a sort of sanctuary for elephants that have become redundant or sacked from the logging industry. Three of the seven resident elephants are blind from accidents caused during their workin...