The mosquitos feasted on us overnight and by morning we both resembled measles victims. We had breakfast at the hotel and could feel the temperature rising as we boarded our TukTuk, dodging through the army of cows who blocked the road en-route to the dive centre. 'Dive centre' was possibly a slightly generous name for the ramshackle building in the grounds of a budget guesthouse but the staff were fantastic. We met our dive master Asa and got kitted out before m...

We woke to the smell of rain and the sound of unfamiliar birdsong. I watched a chipmunk running along the roof of the house opposite and finally came to terms with the fact that we were going to have to catch another 4 hour government bus in the very near future. Our TukTuk driver piloted us through rush hour to the bus depot and showed Bob where to wait whilst I headed out to find breakfast. I returned empty handed to find Bob guarding a pair of seats at the ba...

Courtesy of the time difference our body clocks were well awake by 630 and we re-packed our kit so as to take Gerry up on his kind offer of leaving some baggage with him. After an awesome garden breakfast of fresh fruit salad, scrambled egg on toast, followed by waffles and icecream, we loaded up our TukTuk and headed for the bus stop. Our driver waited with us on the side of the road, apparently the 'bus stop', and having seen half a dozen battlebuses crammed w...

Packing was easy, as we had barely unpacked during our time in Tokyo, so having caught the JR for the last time and posted the postcards we were soon arriving at the airport where, apart from getting the wrong terminal, things went smoothly. The highlight of departures was seeing a policeman on a Segway and the metre long dried and pressed squid which I could have bought in duty free... The flight was a glorious 9 hours of ad lib films, excellent food and lots o...