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PHIL: Hey everyone! Well, I haven't written for ages - probably a good thing for you all as you could finally rest after my essays!
So much to tell....I don't want to cover old ground but it's hard not to when you want to share with everyone how good places are and all your funny stories. As you know from the others, South Africa was amazing - we are finding it really hard not to compare everywhere to there as it was beyond our dreams, such a fantastic country and still so much for us to go back and see in the future. When I wrote last we were in Coffee Bay; Since then we went to Port St Johns which was a very last minute add-on - a great hostel called Jungle Monkey with lovely pool, great setting - a very good last minute decision if you ask me. We did a trip to the mud caves there (which you may have seen from the pics) where we got decorated by one of the locals and we couldn't resist doing funny (and rude) drawings on each other in mud! We were then driven through the town where we were the laughing stock (!) and then taken to a great beach to wash it all off and have a bbq in the sun. They had live bands here every night which got the hostel going. The first night there was a massive lightning storm so we all sat up on the deck watching that as we drank and listened to the music, this was one of those nights when you have one of those 'moments' and realise how lucky you are to be there, enjoying all this......The second night all the locals came up and everyone danced and drank copiously and that's the night I had my phone stolen from under my pillow as I slept. - Yes I may have had alot to drink but I am a very deep sleeper anyway so I can't blame the drink on why I didn't wake up - I'll sleep through anything. But I do blame mark and nathan for not waking up though, they have no excuses!!
Next was 'Mantis and Moon' hostel at Umzumbe - again, a place we'd not heard much about so was last minute, but we were again so pleased we added this in to the schedule.The hostel was ace - a big bar, poker tables and roulette (mark was in his element as he broke back into croupier mode!), a lagoon pool, a hottub, nice room, really cool staff....we stayed there 4 nights and Santi joined us from Mantis and Moon on the 2nd night so that was cool - the family back together!
Then it was on to Durban! It was really hard to believe we were at that stage in our journey where we'd reached Durbs - it always seemed like ages away...but time goes so fast, especially when you're having this much fun. We stayed in Durbs just over a week, half in Tekweni hostel and half in Happy Hippo. Tekweni was a bit disapointing as we'd been told it was totally part central here but it was pretty dead and the staff were....really nice but a bit 'not there' half the time! So we made our own party and as Santi was there that's not hard!! It was on Florida Road which is made up of loads bars. clubs and restaurants so that was perfect location. And very near to all shops you need etc. Happy Hippo on the other hand was in a rubbish location - where it wasn't safe to walk around after dark at all, but the hostel was well cool! It's massive and like a proper hotel! It was well clean which we loved - the kitchen was big and clean and the bathrooms were sparate boys and girls and very clean and the beds were like a travelodge room, dead comfy beds and well clean again.....so I was happy! The bar was on the roof and it played the football so the boys were automatically very happy too. We did alot in Durbs - went to Ushaka Marine Workld where we wnet ot Wet 'n' Wild - absolutley hilarious! I love water parks! Everyone's just automatically in a greta mood, all giggly like kids again, we were racing each other on all the rides we could and were sneaking past the staff and jumping on slides to go down in a chain before they had chance to shout at us that we weren't allowed, we braved the Kamikaze one(s) which gave us all bruises and sore bums and we even made the family one the best ride ever - we rocked the big ring thing and screamed like girls so loud that everyone joined the queue to do the ride as they thought it must be the best one there!! However at the end of this one where you shoot out, I somersaulted backwards out of the ring and into the pool and as it was so shallow I cracked my head on the bottom of the pool...you know when someone falls over and hits their head with such a crack it makes you feel sick? Well that's what it was like, except as it was my head I had the pain to go with it. AND, to top it off, i got stuck under the flipping ring!! Paul rushed to help me out, nathan wanted me to stop all rides for the day in case I got concussion, and mark just laughed!! Funny though - even if I did have nathan constantly asking me if I felt ok all day, not wanting me to fall asleep in case I had a serious head injury.....awww!! We paid a visit to Sun City casino, to the cinema, to 'The Road to Gateway' (MASSIVE shopping mall - and where we spotted Billy Zane and the mysterious brunette!!), to the Quiksilver Surf Final 2008, to the Botanic Gardens (sorry but not my thing at all - I'm not really into all that stuff unless I've got a massive picnic I can sit on the grass and eat, I'm not really interested...same with the boys, but atleast we went), the massive night fleamarket (I loved this - loads of stalls selling everything; clothes, books, music, jewellery, shoes, bags, souvenirs, ornaments....and so much food - chinese, thai, malaysian, italian, american, indian...and a massive stall with loads of desserts!! You could one for 6 Rand each or something or 6 for R30.....so.....I got 6 all for myself!! Mmmm mmmm, allthough I was SOOOOOO annoyed when someone stole one from the fridge the next day, god my blood was boiling that they'd DARED touch MY food!! We did finally get to try the Durban speciality though - there is a huge indian population in Durban so there's some great food on offer and the speciality is Bunny Chow - a quarter/half/full loaf of bread with the inside bread scooped out, filled with curry and then some bread put back on the top which you're then supposed to use to dip into the curry. It's delicious! We had chicken, boneless - you have to make sure you say that as they eat it with bones alot out there - and it was beaut! Nath didn't come to the market as was a bit poorly so O reported back about the bunny chow, but can you believe it, I shared my desserts with him?!! - it must be love! And I bought him the Beckham book, as I knew it would keep him going for the whole trip! He loves it though and is getting through it pretty fast...I'm going to have to find something else for when he finishes...! Also, the people of Durban are, the majority, very well-off - we constantly saw ferraris and lamborghinis driving around, such beautiful cars, full of stuck-up people with their slicked hair and women that were so stuck up they couldn't smile in case their make-up cracked - it was funny when we went on a night out in Florida Road as we were all dancing like true english nutters and they were all sipping from their champagne glasses and looking down their noses....yes they had much better cars than us, but we had a better night!!
Then it was Central Drakensburg and then Northern Drakensburg - beautiful. A complete contrast to Durban, They were quiet, stunning, tranquil mountainous areas...at Central we stayed at Inkosana Lodge which was fantastic - like a home from home, a place mum and dad would have just loved. Enormous grounds, so much green, a MASSIVE, as in really massive swimming pool - so much so it was really a lake!, a large lounge area, beautiful room - we had a family room and it was so clean and so comfy, with carpets and duvets and everything. We did a hike here which was cool. I've realised I'm not a big hiker - I can appreciate the scenery and I feel really good afterwards for the exercise, but I can get bored easily - I think I'm a bit impatient, once we set off I want to reach my destination, and I usually like it to include a well deserved picnic at the end. But I can say that the scenery on this one was....pretty breathtaking. Joby I think you and Jase would just be in your element in places like that, it's so beautiful. We again took pictures but it doesn't show you what it really looked like..the massive rolling hills and mountains and the waterfalls we stopped at along the way. Northern Drakensburg was much the same - great setting, loads of land to play with and.....A TRAMPOLINE!!! How cool! This one had a sauna aswell as a hottub too, but we didn't do any of the hikes here, just chilled during the day - I did a few workouts, went for runs round the fields and sunned myself.
Last, and probably least, Johannesburg. The big bad city. We didn't experience any trouble, but we didn't let us as we didn't really go anywhere. At all. We ended up going to Jo'burg earlier than planned as the hostel sounded so cool with tennis courts, a gym, full size snooker table, free internet etc etc...but it was a right dive! The place was filthy, my bed was minging, it had a mouse (so obviously I didn't stay in that room after I saw that), the tennis courts had no net and weren't actually in the hostel grounds so you had to leave and enter the 'ghetto' and risk a drive-by, and the gym was just a couple of weights. The staff luckily ran free shuttles to most things like food shops, and we went to the Apartheid Museum one day which is the only thing we'd really wanted to do in Jo'burg anyway - it was well interesting, proper shocking, but I expected that, but maybe too much reading - I preferred the visual footage so you could really take it in and understand it. However, when 50 CENT walked in me and nath lost all concentration! That was pretty amazing! - Nath walked up to him and held his hand out and said "Nice to meet you" and 'Fiddy' said, "It's a pleasure" - which made nathan's day! I got photos of him, which he was more than happy to pose for. I just didn't get a pic of me with him as nathan was too busy running round like a schoolgirl chasing him so he wouldn't stand still long enough to take a picture - I've used this against him many times since ha!
So that was South Africa, in a nutshell...maybe a fairly large nutshell. We didn't want to leave at all...we knew we should be excited about our next leg of the journey but we could only think about the face we were leaving the country we'd all fallen in love with. We're already planning on going back, doing the Baz Bus again but going to all the other places we didn't do - do the other route through Swaziland, and again stopping at all the places we love the most. It really opened our eyes - it's so diverse, you couldn't not love it there. I can't believe people were doing it in 3 and 4 weeks, when we didn't have enough time with 3 months. I already can't wait to visit again, and there's not one person we've met who's been there and not said the same.
So, on Sunday 4th May we flew from Johannesburg to Singapore. A great flight! We were given so much food!!!! As soon as they'd delivered all drinks down the aisle, they turned round and started back up offering again! It was just heaven! I, as usual, made the most of these services. We arrived in Sing at 5.30 am (6 hours ahead of england now) and had until 8 before the hostel opened that we were booked into. I started to feel a bit poorly for some reason so when we eventually got the taxi to the hostel I somehow lasted the journey but pulled up outside the hostel, jumped out and was sick in the doorstep! Nice. Don't have a clue what happened there as it certainly wasn't the food, but what a waste eh?! Anyway, it was flipping boiling in Singapore...so humid, really uncomfortable heat so when our rooms were ready at 12 we went for a nap. I still felt a bit dodgy so I didn't get up until 11pm and then decided to explore with Nathan.....It was ace!! Straight away I loved the place! There was so much going on in the streets, people still selling from their stalls, cafes still open, Little India was bustling next door...and you felt so safe. It was so strange being able to walk round the streets at this time and not actually have to worry if someone was walking that little bit too close to you.
We did alot in Singapore - we did alot of shopping, mainly window shopping as it's expensive in Sing, but we experienced all the big malls they have; we got a pass for the open-top sightseeing bus and went on all the tours on this for a day - we did the City tour first which showed us all the more modern things i.e the shopping malls, the Singapore Flyer, the Formula 1 track for the 1st night race in September, the different kinds of housing, the theatres, Raffles Hotel....and the Heritage Tour took us round more of the history of singapore - Little India, Chinatown, the history behind the buildings and how they've changed, the cultural stuff and religious mosques, temples etc. It was ace! We proper loved it - we jumped off at places, going on the Singapore Flyer which was great, going shopping, walking down what will be the F1 track, going to a typical foodhall and having the proper food for $3! It is expensive in Singapore but you can eat cheap and it's a great place - me and nath were so impressed, apart from the humidity, we could live there. - and I'd have to have Mum shipped out to make me food other than noodles!Both hostels we stayed at were nice -I preferred the location of the 1st and the rooms were and everything were alot cleaner and the staff helpful - in fact the dude on reception was from Halifax - Shibden!! They both gave free breakfast too, but the 2nd was in the red light district - funny! But I didn't really like their dorm room, the bathroom was gross. But their 'chill-out' area was cooler. All in all, we loved Singapore, it was a very pleasant surprise after South Africa!
Next stop, Kuala Lumpur - a one hour flight with AIR ASIA to K.L. that we just added in at the last minute. By the way, for anybody who needs to know, Air Asia are very cheap but your backpack can't be over 15kg and if it is (like ours) you have to pay for excess baggage and this was really expensive, so the flight didn't work out as cheap as expected! Anyway, K.L. isn't somewhere I'd rush back to in a hurry, but I'm glad we experienced it. The hostel (Pudu Hostel) was pretty terrible, maybe the worst we've stayed at - the staff were s**t! Rude and useless. And it was a dirty place - K.L. is in general...there's sme very 'interesting' smells in that place. It's great for shopping as there's plenty of malls and it's cheap. We spent our first full day visiting these (which included an indoor theme park and cinemas etc) and went to the KL Tower and the Petronas Twin Towers. We all went up the KL Tower, which was pretty flipping high - I was well proud of nath for doing it. We didn't make it up the Twin Towers though as they only let a certain amount up everyday and they had passed that amount by time we arrived. So we just went in the gift shop and the giant shopping all at the bottom - where I tried sushi for first time!
There's not alot to say about K.L. really...oh apart from the fact that when we arrived back at the hostel the day we did the sightseeing tour (nowhere near as good as the Singapore one, but a good way of finding out what you'd like to see in a country/city), we walked into the lounge and sat there was an english couple we'd met back in Cape Town in our 2nd week!! It was well weird as none of us had even planned on going to Kuala Lumpur and they were supposed to still be in New Zealand but had left early...so was a shock!Such a small world. So we've spent all the time since with them really. We're all now on Langkawi Island which is at the top of Malaysia, almost in Thailand. We came here on the overnight sleeper train on the 'Jungle Line', which was well cool, on Friday 9th May. I won't go on about this place, as all I need to say is...it's absolute paradise! And you'll see this from the pictures I eventually get on. I'll go now as the game of Blackjack/pontoon being played is getting very exciting so I need to go join in. I love this hostel though you should all know - we're all in awe of this place, it's like we're actually on holiday here - AMAZING golden sandy beach across the road and a 5 star hotel that we all sneak into from the hostel and use their fantastic pool!!
I'll leave it there anyway as someone's wanting to use the internet....take care all and speak soon xxxxxxx
PS Nathan found a barber's in Kuala Lumpur and had his hair 'groomed'!!! I laughed my head off when an old school Fresh Prince Will Smith walked out!!! ha ha!!
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