Autumn in Melbourne

View of the famous Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) from our seats in row Z! Our first game was the Geelong Cats v Collingwood Magpies, despite our allegience to the Magpies (of course!) the Cats won 65 to 62.


Martin enjoying a snag (sausage butty) and a VB beer before the walk along the Yarra to the MCG.


Melbourne is famous for it's 'street art' and here is a photo of my favourite piece. It's on the wall of Scotchmer Street in Fitzroy North and the cards are real! Melbourne street cleaners famously scrubbed off a Banksy piece so hopefully they'll be more careful from now on and this will survive a bit longer.


The view of the city take from Princes Bridge near Fed. Square and Flinders Street station. The Yarra river looks pretty dirty after torrential rain the week before!



Me standing in front of the footy pitch in Edinburgh Gardens after a gorgeous Sunday afternoon walk amongst the falling leaves!

The Great Ocean Road

This is one of the beautiful beaches on the stretch of road between Bells Beach and Lorne.


A view of the famous 12 Apostles that rise up out of the sea just after Apollo Bay. A gorgeous sigh but very windy. Warning: Ear muffs a must!


Me and Martin posing by the new sign that marks the start of the Great Ocean Road. This was originally erected to honour the hard work of men who built the road after returning from fighting in WWII only to find themselves unemployed and socially isolated.


A kookaburra enjoying the morning outside the window of our hotel


Don't try this on the M6!

Our Neighbourhood

The view of the city from Edinburgh Gardens
Our nearest park, about 5 minutes walk is the stunning Edinburgh Gardens where you'll find Melbourne's coolest residents hanging out on a Sunday afternoon. This photo is taken from Martin's favourite bench - mainly because of the amazing views of the city!

Our new home in Melbourne

Celebrating moving into our new home!
We moved into our own flat in Fitzroy North a week after arriving in Melbourne. We were celebrating the start of our 'new life' with a glass of red and spaghetti bolognaise! Fitzroy is a great place to be based, we're about 3 miles north of the city and amongst lots of bars, cafes and vintage shops.

Brisbane

Drinking in the Elephant and Wheelbarrow in Fortitude Valley with Tash and Moon.
Meeting up with John and Tash, our friends from Wigan made us feel homesick but hearing all about their lives in Oz made us excited for what was to come!

Saturday 19th March 2011, Gili Air, Lombok, Indonesia

Before leaving Trawangen we did two dives. We went to Manta Point and Shark Point where we saw our first shark, a baby white tipped reef shark - amazing. The diving was excellent despite some very strong currents and we both feel we are improving technically at diving. We have also dived from Gili Air, heading to Simon’s reef in the early morning. It is probably one of our favourite sites as the visibility is amazing - at least 50 metres and the diversity of the aquatic life was stunning.

After Trawangan we spent three nights on the smallest and quietest of the islands, Gili Meno. We spent our days exploring the island, snorkelling, swimming and sunbathing, after deciding that we needed to take it even easier before we go to Australia to find jobs!

Today is our third day on Gili Air, which is somewhere between the party island Trawangen and semi-deserted Meno. Again we continued our renewed attempts at taking it easy, snorkelling (which is phenomenal on all three islands) and generally sunning ourselves and honing our frisby skills on the white sand beaches.

Tomorrow we head to our final destination, Sengiggi which is on the west coast of Lombok. On 22rd March we begin our journey to Australia, flying to Brisbane via Darwin. When we arrive we’ve arranged to couch surf staying with an Australian guy who lives in the suburbs outside the city. We’ve met lots of travellers who’ve raved about couch surfing which is basically consists of a website where you can contact people around the world who are offering a couch to sleep on and arrange to stay with them. It’ll be a nice way to meet some locals on our arrival and do some cooking rather than eating out every meal, which sounds great but we’re really missing non-fried vegetables which are something very rare in S.E.Asia!

Thursday 10th March, Gili Trawangan, Lombok, Indonesia.

We travelled from Ubud to the Gili Islands in one long and very eventful day. The first hint that the day was not going to run as smooth as we’d hoped was when our mini bus ran over a puppy on the way to the harbour (fingers crossed for its survival). A few minutes after we arrived at Padang Bai harbour a speed boat exploded right before our eyes. The local people were in a frenzy, not really knowing what to do and worried for the one injured man who luckily dove into the sea from the boat as it exploded. He didn’t escape without some serious burns though and everyone was distressed as he came out the water screaming before being placed in a van and driven to the hospital. Once we got to Lombok, our bus broke down and we nearly missed the boat but we eventually arrived on the largest of the three Gili Islands; Gili Trawangan.

Our first impression was that it was much bigger and busier than we expected, although it is described in the travel bible as “the party island“! However we have been taking things easy generally relaxing on the beach by day and eating gorgeous food followed by a movie on the beach by night. The ocean is pristine and full or sea life and corals although the beach is a little stony and can lack the ’wow’ factor in places (the odd medicine bottle and flip flop doesn’t help but hey nowhere is perfect!).

We have had some adventures though, we rented bikes and cycled around the island on one day stopping off at various points to snorkel off the beach, where we saw two turtles feeding just before sunset amazing. Now we cant wait to go diving and hopefully swim with some sharks! Today we rented a surf board and practiced our surfing skills, although only a few dubious stand-ups, it was good fun. We have both been talking about what it will be like when we get to Australia now that it is getting really close. We’re nervous but excited about this next chapter, we can’t quite believe we’re going to have to get jobs though - how boring! :o)

Saturday 5th March 2011, Ubud, Bali, Indonesia

We travelled to Ubud after spending 2 nights in Kuta, Bali. Numerous people advised us not to go to Kuta but this only made us more curious to check out the frenetic party place. It was busy, loud and brash but the biggest disappointment was the beach which was quite dirty and because of heavy rainfall recently, the water was brown - not a very appealing concept! So we booked a bus and left and so far the cultural town of Ubud with its dense forests, gorgeous crumbling temples and focus on art and crafts is much more our scene! Today is the Balinese celebration of ‘Nyepi’ which is their new year. Contrary to how we celebrate, in Bali the new year is seen in with a day of silence… allowing time to relax and reflect (and have stomach rumblings as all the restaurants are closed!). We are suffering from cabin fever a little but our little hut in a traditional losmen (a courtyard) provides a lovely backdrop to the silence…

Prior to Bali we spent 3 days in Singapore which was fantastic and one of our favourite places although we didn’t expect it to be. There is just so much to do, from amazing shopping to theme parks and water sports (you can water-ski and wake board in the local park!). We hired a tandem and cycled through the park on sunday morning enjoying the immaculately clean surroundings of this gorgeous and tiny country. Already we are thinking about what we’ll do on our next visit!

After Singapore we flew to Jakarta where we spent the day (only!) which was good. Again, we had many warnings to avoid it but it was charming and the people were really friendly. We went to an entertainment complex but with no performances on we settled for the cinema and ate popcorn - a not very Indonesian experience but a very welcome one!

Friday 25th February: Coral Bay, Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Malaysia

This morning we begin our journey from the north of Malaysia using boat, taxi, bus, plane and train to reach our goal; Singapore. We have spent 3 lazy days on the small Perentian island, sunbathing, eating and diving. We did two dives; the Temple of the Sea which is a huge pinnacle with amazing underwater life - including a HUGE 3 legged turtle who winked at us (?!) and Pauh Reef which lies in between the two islands but had poor visibility and a mostly sand bed. The islands are described as paradise and they didn’t disappoint, although there was a lot of construction happening while we were there as the local businesses geared up for the peak season soon to start.

We arrived a day late to the islands after the train from Taman Negara (on the ‘Jungle Railway line’) was later than we thought it was but got to spend the night in Kota Bharu and enjoyed having a stroll around the busy evening streets.

Our stay in Taman Negara was good. We chose to take the road less travelled (pause… Emily??) which meant we were at one with nature… or at least with one lizard, a couple of birds and a handful of monkeys. We were quite under whelmed by the lack of wildlife but the walks were interesting and we spent the night in a hide. It was surprisingly modern although we had to wade across a river to reach it and the ‘jungle noises’ we expected to hear through the night boiled down to a few crickets and the snores of a German couple sharing the hide with us! We used the opportunity to practice some photography (see pictures!) and walk along the longest canopy walkway in the world at 500m in length and 50m high. With deep breaths and nerves of steel we went for it and the views were well worth it.

Friday 18th February 2011: Cameron Highlands, Malaysia

We spent our last few days in Thailand relaxing on the gorgeous beaches of Ko Pha-Ngan, Thong Nai Pan , a beautiful bay on the north-east of the island was our favourite by far and we were pleased we hired a moped (and didn’t kill ourselves) to get there. The drive there from where we were staying passed through the hilly, jungle-y heart of the island and the scenery was amazing.

Our journey to Kuala Lumpur was straightforward but we were met with the most stifling humidity on our arrival and had to endure it for 3 days in order to do everything we wanted to. We visited the Petrona’s Towers but didn’t get up early enough to get a ticket to cross the sky bridge. There are only so many tickets to go up Asia’s tallest towers and we missed out by only a few minutes we think. So, to numb the pain we went shopping! One word: Topshop!

Whilst in Kuala Lumpur we also visited Chinatown and Little India where we ate the best masala dosas and reminisced about our time in India! We soon realised however we weren’t in India and so to make the most of our time in Malaysia we booked tickets to the Cameron Highlands, a mountainous region in the centre of peninsula Malaysia. Here we met up with two American guys, Ben and Tristan, who we trekked with in Chiang Mai and… did some more trekking! We followed one trail halfway up the second highest hill before descending for a cold beer and (another) masala dosa. The following day we began an epic 25km walk from Tanah Rata up to Brinchang, visiting a strawberry farm, various markets and the Boh Tea Plantation. The plantation was a great sight; rolling, fertile hills and friendly faces punctuated our walk there, an experience only seconded by the delicious tea and pasties we ate in the café on the highest hill!

Tomorrow we travel to Taman Negara, the peninsular jungle by bus then boat, where we can sleep in a ‘hide’ for the night and listen out for (and hopefully see) a range of different animals - hopefully we’ll see a wild elephant!

Wednesday 8th February 2011: Ko Tao, Thailand

We have spent 8 days on the beautiful, small island of Ko Tao and are now certified Advanced scuba divers! We finally arrived after a 40 hour journey from the north of Thailand to the south and began the Open Water diving course a few days later.
Our instructor, Andy, was great, very passionate and approachable and our small group with two other girls were lovely. On our second day of the course we went into the pool to practice using the scuba equipment and afterwards felt really excited about our first open water dive the next day. And we weren’t wrong - it was a m a z i n g! We went to the Mango Bay and Twins dive sites and saw moral eels, stingrays, trigger fish, hermit crabs…the list is endless! The 45 minute dives flew by and before we knew it we were excitedly comparing what we’d seen on deck.
We loved it so much that we signed up for the Advanced course (although it was another £150 and a thick manual to carry!) and started the next day. We could choose 5 specialist dives to do so we opted to focus on navigation, buoyancy, multilevel diving, photography and a night dive! Of the 200+ photos we took, there are a few great ones - as you can see - our favourite is the one of the trigger fish up close - they can attack if you approach them but Helen risked it and it’s great! The night dive was awesome but really scary at first as you can barely see 1 metre in front of you when the torches are off. We also picked up a few injuries by bumping into rocks in the dark! We have 4 days left in Thailand before we fly to Malaysia so we’re heading to Ko Pha Ngan, there’s no full moon party at the moment so we’ll manage to avoid the day-glo paint and Thai whiskey buckets, and just chill out instead!

Monday 31st January 2011: Bangkok, Thailand

We spent an amazing weekend on our jungle trek with a group of 10 people plus our guide Johnnie Walker. Firstly we visited a market where we purchased supplies of Thai whiskey and sampled some deep fried maggots, which was much nicer than the blended/fried frog we had in Pattaya. We didn’t have the courage to eat the cockroaches though, I mean you have to draw a line…

On our first day we visited an elephant farm where we got to feed the elephants then rode on them, which was a bit like a ride at Alton Towers with platforms to get on and of the elephants! After lunch we started our trek walking up into the mountains for around 3 hours at a frantic pace being led by the two German iron men in our group. We spent the night in one of the hill-tribe villages in a bamboo hut overlooking a deep valley with forested mountains as the backdrop. The bamboo huts came with a mini bar and a village woman selling various wares, including Burmese cigars - which Martin sampled of course. We watched the local children perform a traditional song and dance for us and were then encouraged to perform back. Helen duly led our international group through renditions of ‘If You’re Happy And You Know It’ and ‘Old Macdonald’ complete with actions and dancing - brilliant!

Day two involved more walking and we both abandoned our Converse trainers due to blisters and risked trekking in flip-flops. We visited two waterfalls during the day - taking lunch at the first. We spent the second night in another bamboo hut in the forest by a river, playing group drinking games into the night and finishing all the beer supplies in the camp!

With slightly fuzzy heads on day three we completed the trek with a short walk, before we took to the river and white water rafted down the river, before changing to bamboo rafts for the final gentle part of the river. When we returned to Chiang Mai we spent the few ours before our night bus exploring the Sunday Night Bazaar, which closed down most of Chiang Mai’s traffic and the streets become full of traders. Our next stop is the southern island Ko Tao and learning to dive!

Thursday 27th January 2011: Chiang Mai, Thailand.

We arrived in Vagator in Goa a few days before New Year and the parties were excellent! Lots of fireworks, new friends and Old Monk rum ensured a great night although Martin did need to be carried home by a 65 year old German man! On the 2nd of January, after eventually rising from our hangovers, we travelled down to Baga and went to the airport to collect the Bull family fresh from the UK winter. We spent a week in Baga and went to Anjuna market and the spice plantation where mother Bull and Martyn had an elephant shower. After Baga we travelled to Palolem where we stayed for another week or so relaxing on the beach. We did arrange a boat trip to do some dolphin spotting and visit Butterfly Island however (which had, ironically, no butterflies!). We then took the train to Mumbai and spent our last days of the Bull holiday exploring the sights, before saying our farewells to both the Bull’s and India.

On the 17th January we flew directly to Bangkok and stayed on Khao San Road, sampling the Thai whiskey buckets on arrival, then spending the next day in bed again with hangovers. Once we recovered we explored the city taking a river ferry, walking through China town and visiting some Buddist temples. We also had a day of shopping in Siam Square and went on the Sky Train. Once we left Bangkok we took the bus to Pattaya where we stayed with Vic and Anan, who are currently living and teaching there. Unfortunately en route we lost our camera and most of our photos from Mumbai and all from Bangkok :o( However, it was good to spend time with Vic and Anan and feel at home whilst in Pattaya and we had an enjoyable night out as VVIP’s at the opening of a new club, which again involved Thai whiskey and a dance off against some crazy Russians (which, sadly, Martin lost).

After a good weekend we took the overnight bus from Pattaya to Chiang Mai in the north of Thailand. We have spent our last 2 days chilling and exploring the ancient city, which is much more chilled than Bangkok and Pattaya. Tomorrow we begin a 3 day trek into the jungle!