Garden City!

Also an allias to Singapore.

FOOD FOOD FOOOOOD!
Was amaaaaazing!!!!

This is Gurchran digging into some chicken, shrimp and pork ribs! No, not the real thing before you start jumping up and down!!! Its all mock meats...and very delicious!

Yes - its a chocolate dosa!!!! and it was reallly nice!

A masala dosa! mmmmm!

Angad SIngh

We met a lovely gursikh in Singapore - you may know him from his blog.

Angad Singh and Gurcharan at the street food market.

Angad Singh took us to a street food market - here we were introduced to the delights of Singapore's mock meats. In this pic we're munchin on duck, chicken and fish!

Botanical Gardens…
We managed to visit the Botanical Gardens and were pleasantly surprised to find that it was free. It is a massive park – but unlike Hyde or Regents Park, this one has jungle trails and loads of exotic plants! They have a wonderful orchid garden (this you have to pay to go see – only about 2 pounds). Gurch fully well knows – I am a big flower fan, and this simply took my breath away. Gurcharan was thoroughly impressed too. Word of warning – never do this on a warm day which is the mistake we made.

Toy Museum…
Gurcharan took me to the Botanical Gardens – so I took him to the MINT Toy Museum. Both of us were very impressed with that. They had the old favorites from childhood. And some other interesting items!

The island of SENTOSA…
Hmmmnnn….sounds more like the name of an Italian mobster! But this is the themed island of Singapore. It has romantic beaches, pricey restaurants, shows (Songs of the Sea is one of the shows here – read previous post for details on this) as well as a pink dolphin show, 4D cinema is quite a treat. We took a cable car ride to the island from Singapore mainland – which was kinda scary for me at first, and G wasn’t helping when he started rocking the cable car! I eventually got over it and was mesmerized by the view – it was quite romantic actually! :o) It was nice to see large groups of elderly Indian and Chinese aunties and uncles here enjoying themselves. It looked like package tours for the elderly are common here and it’s nice to see that the elderly take the time to go out and enjoy themselves with their friends. I wish I could see more of that in the UK.

I got a littly bit scared in the cable car - especially when Gurcharan was rocking it!

Underwater world...

This place is something else - still within the Sentosa Island. Its got the biggest tunnel i've ever seen. We got to see some fantastic deep water creatures here. An added feature is a "interactive area" where you can actually stroke the manta/sting rays!

Gurch in the tunnel - the sharks had some nasty teeth!

4D max...

The island has a cool 4D cinema...

Dolphin show...

In the evening we went to a pink dolphin show (still on Sentosa Island). A first for me - I've never seen a dolphin before!

Bird Zoo...

This is not on the island - they had a great show and birds that actually did talk! Another first for me - i have never heard a bird say 'hello'!

Our room in SIngapore was teeny weeny eeny! but it was clean and quiet and cosy! :o)

Lion City!

Otherwise known as Singapore!

the White Tigers, there were 3 in the enclosure, amazing!

For a country, it’s a tiny little place – but with quite a punch packed into it! I can honestly say it puts London to shame!

Streets are clean, the facilities immaculate, transport systems efficient, internet speed’s superfast…I could go on!

It is a haven for the ‘stop over tourist’ – meaning it’s somewhere you would visit for 3-4 days before moving onto somewhere else. This is due to the size of the place – they say you will hit the sea within15 minutes of traveling from anywhere in any direction.

However, it’s a nightmare for the budget traveler. The prim and proper country comes with a price. Budget accommodation is rare, almost always fully booked unless you book way in advance and you get much less for your pennies here. Coming from Bali and Thailand, we were not prepared for the shock – we got a bed and four walls here for the same price of a hotel room with with a pool and a view in Bali! Saying that, food is cheap-ish. Transport on the ever-so-efficient MRT (equivalent of the London Underground) is fairly cheap.

Its great for families – its geared for kids and boy does it take the gold medal! I must admit I did miss the family during my stay here – it’s somewhere best visited with the folks and siblings and kids (if we had any!). We have seen some fantastic shows/places/activities:

Our favorite so for is the Songs of the Sea – pyrotechnics, hydraulic powered, laser lights, massive fountains, projectors – all create a fantastic show that vowed even us who have been to some award wining shows in the West End in London.

Above, some pics we took, you can just make out the 3D images projected into water fountains

Another favorite is the Night Safari and Singapore zoo. The zoo had some incredible animals. The night safari is unique to Singapore. Nowhere else in the world will a golf trolley drive you through jungle landscape to view nocturnal animals in their own habitat. No cages here – just carefully sculptured landscape that prevents you from being the leopards/lions dinner! The clever design of the safari allows the visitor to have great views of the animals. I was quite surprised at the number of animals we managed to see, I initially thought the animals would be in hiding and shy from any nosey Homo Eructus.

The lion was scared, he didnt even look at me!

to be cont…

Ubud

Strange gaurdian Demon at one of the temples in Bali

Ubud, this is a town in central Bali, its in the hills making the climate more acceptable, what its really known for is the chilled back atmosphere, the many eateries and the varied artisans. This vibe has attracted many travellers and package tourists and also the infamous Hippy crowd.

Our new buddy, Anna the Anaconda, 40kg worth of snake!

We enjoyed our stay at Ubud which was only meant to be for a few days but turned out to be 5. the combination of the climate, scenery and FOOD! yes this was the place we officially got fat! some of the highlights for restaurants were Indus, a restaurant overlooking Rice fields and the tallest mountain in bali, spectacular! also Bali Buddha was great for vegetarian food and deserts, where we had Mexican and Preet had a Tofu burger. being a healthy hippy joint they had a range of healthy drinks, i thought lets try one, so i ordered a drink thinking it would be a nice refreshing health drink, what i got was something that resembled boiled mud in both taste and looks!! i really couldn't drink, even after stirring in a pot of honey and ginger sugar!

It looks like ####, tastes like #### must be ####!

I'm sure the waiters had a laugh as i was ordering, there is o way anything living could drink that! apart from that the rest of the food was great, and they do a killer chocolate mouse made with rice starch.

Offerings...

The locals in Bali are mainly Hindu, they are quite superstitious, they all put out offerings in front of there doors, the offerings are for good spirits, to keep them happy and bad spirits so they dont enter the house/shop/office.

Egg-plant! in Bali we found vegi food more difficult to get hold of, i was just saying to Preet before i took the below picture, it would be so easy if eggs grew on plants!! and as if by magic, we found an egg-plant, which was really someone being artistic by putting empty egg shells on a plant. after a day or two in bali we found many, many vegi options. so all good!

Rice Paddies...

Ubud is known for its rice paddy walks, and hadn't been for since we got there, so one afternoon we thought we would go, so taking the moped we went to the start of the walk. after an uphill walk we were greeted by some great views and fresh air of the rice fields, oh and the many ducks. rice walks, highly recommended.

Shadow puppet show..

One thing Bali is known for is the shadow puppet shows, this is something which is entwined with the religion of the locals, which happens to be Hindu. the traditional way of doing this is to have a master puppeteer who sits behind a white linen screen which is lit by a large flame. the shows are normally based on Hindu mythology, the show we saw was based on a scene i think in the Mahabharata, two of the characters were Krishan and Arjun. the show was great but it would have been better if i understood the language.

Markets...

Ubud is a base for the arts, a lot of the local people have skills which have been passed down over generations be it wood carving, painting or masonry work. some of the artifacts can be bought in the market at sometimes really good prices and things you would never find in london, except in boutiques for really high prices. Yes, we did shop, but only after confirming that we could ship the goods to london, which cost as much as the products themselves.

Pics to Follow!

Tour of inner Bali

After our white water rafting experience we thought it would be nice to see some more of Bali and its people.

So we booked ourselves on a tour to mount Batur and lake Batur, that took us through the art and crafts villages to see the local work and to get in some kathak Balinese dancing.

Beautiful and elegant Balinese dancers

We started the day with balinese dancing which is performed to a live band which is made up of mainly percussion instruments such as drums, cymbals, flutes and xylophone type things. The production we watched was great, and the music was really good too.

a monkey and Barong- a good spirit!

We then went to see some of the 'authentic' craft work, I say that as i felt the art being created was just for show and the artists were really sales men wanting you to buy there 'art'. It was funny, in one paint shop we pulled up and the 'artists' were lying on their backs, as we pulled up they sprung to their feet and got painting like they been doing it for hours and are really into it, I pointed this out but they didnt seem to understand that little bit of what I was saying.
Out of all the art it was the woodwork that most impressed us, huge pieces carved from single blocks of wood.

Mount Batur

The highlight of the tour was Mount and Lake Batur, which is an active volcano which last erupted in 1975ish. The landscape was sparse and barren, but amazing all the same. Near to the volcano there was a village where the people leave the bodies of the dead un covered under trees, we didnt go there apparently the villagers get quite rough when asking foreigners for money.

We also went to the monkey forest in Ubud, a forest with lots of cheeky monkies and a 15th century Hindu temple which is still used today for religeous ceremonies such as cremations etc. the temples and the forest again made it look like something out of a Hollywood movie set. I think this confimed to us both that Bali is one of the most scenic places we have been too.

A Big tree in Monkey Forest - complete with monkies!

Preet and the stone iguanas

me winding up the locals, but this old fella was chilled!

On the way back we through the stunning scenery we stopped at a coffee plantation where they grew fruit and various spices etc. we tried for the first time 'snake fruit' also known as Salek, snake fruit because the skin looks like the scales of a snake.

Snake fruit
Snake fruit, yummy kind of sweet and sour and a bit dry like cranberry if you know what I mean. We also had some fresh ginger tea, coffee and cocoa.. yummy, but the coffee would knock the death out of you!

White water rafting in Bali..

Sunday 11th nov '07
We decided to try out white water rafting, let me tell you it was an amazing experience, especially for two that have never done it before.
The day started early and we were greeted by tropical rainfall. We made our two hour journey in an ac mini bus to our destination in a central hilly part of Bali - the Telagawda River (sp!).

You expect us to go down that?!

We got to our destination in one piece given the washed roads and steep gradients, thankfully our minibus and driver were up to the job.

For our safety we were given life jackets and helmets by our guide Leo. We waited for the heavens to settle as the rainfall had made the river fast and some areas quite dangerous - not that is any real concern to them! We boarded our raft with another older Japanese couple, the guy thought it would be funny to point out I look like Bin Laden! I didnt pursue the matter to educate him.

The next 14km and 2.5 hours of river were like a magnificent and thrilling interactive ride through what looked like the set to the next Indiana Jones movie. the scenery was a mixture of paddy fields, waterfalls, sheer valleys and of course some serious rapids.

We were totally drenched head to toe, thankfully as the weather got better, in fact it got quite hot.

En route we passed many people whos rafts had overturned and were waiting to regroup, we tried to help...well, kind of, as its hardly the easiest thing to stop a raft crashing around in the rapids!

After the rapids, we had to climb 360 steps to get out of the valley and have our lunch of Balinese noodles and rice....yummy!

We couldnt take pics while on the raft, but this trip showed us an amazing and beautiful side of Bali that we didnt know existed.

Bali - took a few crazy adventures to get here!

So, we're in Bali now!

Not sure how this happened! hehe!
We were loungin around in Ko Lant (Thailand) one day reading the good ol Lonely Planet - and we suddenly realised that Bali's wet season begins in November. So...here we are! :o)

me outside the legendary MBK

Getting here was an absolute mission!
Adventure 1 - it starts off mild
First - took a van to the harbour in Ko Lanta. This took us to Phuket Town.

We spend one night in Phuket Town. Went to this rather posh Indian restaurant - oddly out of place in Phuket Town - and met the owner, Billy Chima. (I think we'll do a separate post for this)Preet posing outside the national museum, Thailand

Adventure 2 - add a bit of spice
Anyway, we took a flight to Bangkok the next day. Stayed one night.
We had enough time here to pay a visit to a good friend - MBK shopping mall! This is a mall like no other - you can find EVERYTHING here! ;o)

Adventure 3 - next come the chilli!
Then another flight to catch to Jakarta, Indonesia. This is where the 'fun' started. As none of our trips are planned, we hadn't booked an onward flight. We thought we'd just leave when we'd had enough of Bali. But when we got to immigration at Jakarta the guy made it out that we couldn't enter because we didn't have an onward ticket! He just needed an excuse cos the next thing he said was 'I'll help you and you help me!' basically he wanted a bribe. It was midnight, we were tired and hungry, so we gave in.

Adventure 4 - somebody order it X-tra Hot?!
Next - the transport to the hotel was a nightmare. We got harrassed and overcharged. Again, too tired to mess around at midnight in a strange country.

Adventure 5 - now the heat's kicked in!
Then - this takes the prize - we got to the hotel and realised I had booked it for the wrong day! The hotel was fully booked so he couldnt even offer another room. So we took a taxi to a nearby hotel which turned out to be a dump. Plus we needed to withdraw money in the local currency. Easy enough right? NO! the taxi driver spoke no English whatsoever! Finally managed to get to an ATM. Got the driver to take us back to the original hotel - where they offered us a 3 bed appartment which was the only thing available - and we gladly took it. It really wasn't our day - everything went wobbly. Must be something to do with the mars and venus alignment or something! hehe! ;o)

Adventure 6 - mission accomplished...I like a good ending!
The flight the next day was to Bali - we finally got to our destination in one piece! The hotel was much much more fantastic than we thought it would be. Which kinda made up for all the crazy mission of the journey.
Its low season in Bali so prices are theoretically more attractive. We have been lucky with the weather - it only really rained yesterday. And boy did it rain! But as all tropical showers go, it only lasted a little while.
It has been a nice stay here in Kuta beach - a bit too touristy for me though. Can't imagine what its like in the high season.

We'll be moving to another beach soon - hopefully something a bit more secluded.

Indiana Jones!

Our guide laughing because we have to walk through that in flip flops!

Ko Lanta, Thailand on 5th Nov 2007
Mai Kaw Cave

Ever been caving before?! Well, its amazing!
We hired a bike and rode to the Mai Kaw Cave in West Lanta - a family run business that takes people trecking through this lush jungle and into a massive cave.
This is jungle trecking in its raw - not some Disneyland set up with perfect steps and grip. oh no sir! We were not exactly prepared for it either - we went in flip flops! and a heavy rucksack! Poor Gurch had to carry the sack on his back for the whole gruelling 3 hours.
i gave up on the flip flops, they were like aqua planing on the mud, not good when you are over a massive trench! i nearly died many times.

It was pure Indiana Jones styley - trecking through thick bush, gorgeous waterfalls, massive trees and some plants had leaves big enough to cover an elephant! Crawling through the cave, climbing massive stallecmites and stallectites. Plus it started pouring which made it even more daring.

We thought we'd seen enough - then we finally came to the cave. Crude is how i'd describe it! It was huge! we kept walking and walking and....the only reason we had to turn back was cos the air kept getting thinner. He lit his cigarette lighter to show exactly how little oxygen we had left. It was very slippery - which made it quite dangerous. Not to mention the HUGE spider we came across. This was seriously MASSIVE! the pic we took doesn't do it justice.

Anyhow - this was an adventure in its true sense. I almost felt like a big round boulder was going to come rolling down from somewhere! ;o)

Ko Lanta

Ko Lanta

01.11.07 – 04.11.07

This was amazing!
Great secluded beach on the island of Ko Lanta Yai.
Stayed at the Blue Andaman Resort and New Beach resort. They have this great lounge by the beach and beach huts facing the beach where you can check out the stunning sunset.

We hired a scooter! Oh yes we did! And Gurch learnt to ride it in about 1 go! As for me – im still trying to get the hang of the thing!

Ok so Gurch has gone a few notches up in my book! He maneuvered the thing in pelting rain – on a muddy slippery road with pot holes the size of swimming pools and areas that could only be describes as mounds of water, mud and slush!

to be cont...

Krabi, Ao Nang

(by the wife)

Outrageous!
It’s been far too long since an update – especially since an hour at the internet café costs 15 Thai Bhats per hour – which is precisely 25p / hr!!!!! hehe! Well – here in Phuket Town it is anyway.

Firstly...I am finally reunited with the hubs!

wooopee!

It was an emotional reunion...there were endless rivers of tears, twittering birds suddenly burst into sweet melodies, the whole world seemed to move in slow motion (not unlike the famous Matrix sequence), I tell you flowers actually blossomed right before my very eyes!

Ok...so im lying.

But you get the idea, right?! Lets just say we were happy to finally be together again.

Anyway, my flight to Krabi was nasty, nasty, Nasty! – rather not talk/type about it!
However, its been absolutely SUPER ever since touch down! Was undeniably the most wonderful feeling to finally see Gurch again after 2 very long weeks! (oh yes, we've covered this in the previous paragraph)

We meet at the airport in Krabi! That smile says it all! :-D

Too much to blog about so I’ll make this simple.
The highlights so far:
Ao Nang Bay Hotel in Ao Nang, Krabi. A beautiful place to stay in a great location. Krabi is a touristy resorty beach in S Thailand. Ao Nang is one of the beaches. We did nothing much here but be total beach bums!
One very funny thing happened during one of our visits to the massage salons. I asked for a facial and Gurch a back message. So we’re lying on the massage beds and as soon as the massage girl walks in and looks at Gurch she bursts out laughing! Somehow I get the giggles and can’t stop laughing either. No idea what exactly was so funny! So we’re all giggling uncontrollably while the girl prepares the oils etc and starts on Gurch’s face – aha! – she thought that Gurch wanted a facial and looked at his beard and that’s why she burst out laughing! Which caused another massive fit of giggles from all the girls in the room. Hmmm – just cant take that boy anywhere!

Ok – so we went to Burger King! And?! :-p (it had just opened – and we wanted to be the first ones there!)

Feasting on food at Burger King of all Places!! The somewhat demented look on my face worries me...

Spent a day in the lovely beach on Railay.

Us at Railey beach, really nice and far better then Ao Nang

That’s it for Ao Nang, Krabi! ;o)

Simon Cabaret (the lady boy show! )

Simon Cabaret...

Where the men are men and the women are men too.....!

For those of you who don’t know this is a cabaret show with a difference, all the people on stage are men, the men are men and the women are men!! Throughout Thailand there is an open culture to men chopping their bits of to become….well womanish!

This show is a blast and a great advertisement for cosmetic surgery in Thailand! From the pictures you can see some of the men-things are quite convincing, but on close up you can see the muscle structure and the porous manly skin, although the more feminine ones have had surgery to reduce this.

Its well know in Thailand that some of the people have problems with the language, so cant pronounce words easily hence in this show all the songs are mouthed over, which is sometimes amusing in itself when the performers are totally off!

Whether you approve of this stuff or not it’s a great laugh and worth the visit!

By the way I went to this on my own!