Kathrine Breivik

It all started very nicely with a mini bus trip from Khao Sok to Krabi where we had a change over.  However, after hours of waiting we ended up getting transported to another minibus from the back of a pick up van (an open back), was pretty hilarious as 5 of us squeezed on, holding on to our bags and dear life. The next minibus was extremely hot. This should really be the end of our transport adventure. However, there were no taxis or even ‘tuk tuks’ around the bus stations, and we were told they only do transported by scooters. So after waiting around for a while hoping to spot a taxi we decided we just had to go on the back of the scooters with all our bags! It was very entertaining indeed. When we finally managed to get to our hostel in Trang it was evening. But we were very positively surprised by Trang. I thought it was really nice.

We went to a night market, which turned out to be great!

It is Chinese New Year at the moment (if you did not know), so there are decorations everywhere, they just love fairy lights over here.

We have both been really excited about going to Khao Sok National Park as it is a large rainforest, even older and more diverse than the Amazon Rainforest. We stayed in a tree house just by the national park entrance, it was basic but still really nice. The couple who owned the tree huts were so nice and the wife cooked us all the meals making them extra spicy for us, she was a great cook. We also had our own guard dog ‘Mac’ (who lived there), he looked after us and ran after anything that made too much noise, I wanted to take him home with me.  The first evening it rained A LOT (apparently it rains a lot in rainforests, hehe) so we just relaxed and did some reading and more travel plans.

The next morning we went on a day trip to to the ‘lake’, which is the Rechabrapha dam. The lake was just incredible, as you see some 200 meter high limestone cliffs around it.

After 1 hour on a longtail boat we arrived at some floating bamboo raft houses.

The setting for the floating houses was amazing, and we went for a swim in the lake which was so relaxing and nice.

After lunch we went on a 1 hour walk to the Namtaloo Cave. We walked through the rainforest, climbed up waterfalls and crossed the river at least 10 times. We saw a poisonous snake in the river as we were walking by. I came to realise that this was obviously the same river that i walked into waist high, a little scary.

When we arrived at the cave we all got our torches out and got ready for some darkness. We spent about half an hour walking into the cave, but because it rained a lot the night before it was very deep at some places, even deeper than me and we had to swim. One again in the darkness and cold water this was a little scary but also very fun. And the walls inside the caves were just wonderful to look at.

Overall this was an amazing visit to another rainforest. We hoped to see the Bua Phut flower, which is the largest type of flower in the world, but sadly we missed the chance to see one as after only 1 week it dies and we were 2 days too late. Anyways, Rainforests have definitely won a big part of my heart, I just love being that close to nature.

We spent a whole day on Ko Phi Phi, which is only a 2 hour boat trip away from Phuket. Ko Phi Phi is surrounded by beautiful limestone cliffs and fine white sand.

When we arrived we decided to rent our own long-tail boat for a few hours, where a local long-tail boat driver took us around a few places for some snorkeling, swimming and sightseeing.

We went by the Viking Cove and went for a swim nearby, the water was crystal clear and amazing to take a dip in. Then we headed for Loh Samah Bay where we did a little snorkeling. I saw lots of types of fish that I have never seen before.

We stopped briefly at Maya Bay (where the film The Beach was filmed), however, decided to move on shortly after as it was packed with tourists (being high season it was very busy).

Our last stop was at Monkey Bay, where we saw some monkeys. The Monkeys obviously knew that tourists came and fed them there as they just stood there waiting for us. We decided not to feed them, however other people did and I have to say that these monkeys were quite aggressive and would fight for the food and even chase people to get some. The funniest part was when the son of our long-tail boat driver who came with us annoyed the monkeys a little and they all chased him by the beach (he was laughing, I think he came on the trip just for this).

THAILAND! We arrived in Bangkok late at night. However, we only stayed one night by the airport in Bangkok and jumped on a plane the next morning and headed for Phuket. We are staying in Patong in Phuket, next to the beach and the ‘main street’ called Bangla Road which is one of the loudest and craziest street I have ever seen. There are bars everywhere, women dancing on tables by the street, loud music, people trying to sell you everything, just crazy. But, it is also very entertaining in moderation.

But we are very lucky and are staying in an amazing hotel, with our own spa in our room, amazing.

Back in Sydney again, to see and do a few of the things we did not get time to do last time. As well as being in the city center we also took a day trip to Bondi Beach, which was really beautiful. However, the beach was very busy with people which ruined the scenery a little, but overall a very good day out.

We stayed at some of my friends flat from Derby, which was really fun as I have missed them all a lot! And we went out for dinner and a few drinks after, was a very fun night!

Cairns! We did not know what to expect when we got here as we had heard a lot of different things from other travellers on our way up here. There is no beach here, but there is a big nice lagoon. However, this does not really matter as Cairns is not far from The Great Barrier Reef. So we booked on a boat to go out on a day-trip to explore the Reef, and the only way to explain it is AMAZING! The pictures really do not do the reef and the fish any justice, the colours were incredible. Please also excuse me looking like a large blue smurf, but it is stinger season so I had to wear a full body singer suit, lovely.

The fish below is a barracuda (left) and  was about 1.5 meters in length and had huge teeth. The other one (right) is a Maori Wrasse, which was bigger than me! I think it was just under 2 meters long and very fat. He came right up to us and let us stroke him on the back. The people working on the boat called him Wolly, he was cool.

John has been practising his filming under water, and I showed him a Nemo (Clownfish) family.

Mission Beach is where we did our SKYDIVE! It was the best location as we got to see some spectacular views and land on the beach! I was extremely nervous, but I am so glad that I managed to do it. It was a perfect way to celebrate John’s birthday.

The rest of the time we chilled on the beach. We were also lucky to see a cassowary and some wallabies.

We went on a little day trip to Magnetic Island from Townsville. Magnetic Island hosts a lot of beautiful beaches, including Alma Bay (picture above) and Horseshoe Bay where we spent most of our time.

Townsville had a stunning waterfront esplanade. The Strand is also situated by the waterfront; stretching 2,2 km long and has parks, pools and cafes by it. We walked all the way up The Strand to the Rock Pool (an artificial swimming pool surrounded by sandy beach). We got told to look out to the ocean just by the Rock Pool to see some turtles, and we were lucky enough to see some, coming up to catch a breather.

We also went up to Castle Hill, which is an 286 meter high red hill, which gives a great view of Townsville. We walked up via the ‘goat track’ 2 km uphill. It was a pretty demanding track as it is very hot in Townsville, however, it was worth it when we got up and enjoyed the views.

We welcomed the New Year in Airlie Beach. We spent the day of New Years Eve by the pool having a few drinks, then went to a few nice bars, finishing the night by the lagoon looking at fireworks. We can not swim in the water here due to it being singer season, so we relaxed by the pool and by the nice lagoon by the sea.

As Airlie Beach is a nice gateway to The Whitsundays, we grabbed the chance to go out on a purple catamaran called Camira for some sailing and some snorkeling. We also stopped off at Whitehaven Beach, where we went swimming in our lovely wet suits to keep the singers away and guess what? As we were swimming some Stingrays were swimming right next to us!

After our lovely day trip out on The Whitsundays we went for a Thai meal as Blaine is now sadly leaving us to go back home.

We did some surfing in a small place called Town of 1770, by Agnes Water. This was the last place where we could surf up the East Coast. This time we tried some hard boards, which were smaller than the boards we previously used, so it was a bit more challenging. However, it was still a lot of fun.