Bear catching in Khao Yai

Our tour of the national park turned out to be more than we bargained for..as we were nearly at the end we saw something in the road..when we slowed down we saw it was a baby black bear! such a tiny cute thing. we pulled over and it ran into the overgrowth, the guide shouted that we needed to catch it because the mother had obviously gone and it was lost. we thought it was crazy to begin with but then Jonas (one of the german guys on our tour) went into the bushes to try! it was absolutley insane, we were all so scared the mother would suddenly appear, knowing we would be attacked if she did but not wanting the bear to be left unattended because he would surely die. We all got out and tried to stop him running off and Jonas appeared with him scrabbling around in his arms..we put him into the back of the truck and had to get in with him!!!!! he just cowered in the corner and thomas stroked him to calm him down.

we got to where the ranger was and everyone wanted a photo, the poor bear was so scared and we were very protective of him! eventually the ranger came and they expected the guys to just pick him up and put him in, as though they were supposed to be the qualified ones!! it was pretty heart breaking putting him into a cage but they reassured us they would try to find the mother and if not then find a surrogate for him. The whole experience was amazing, a one in a million chance of finding a baby bear! The guide had only seen one in his whole 21 years of working there!
Me at the waterfall from "the beach" right before we jumped in and a huge storm started...we were so soaked but it was fun.
Our guide at the park "bonsai" such a funny guy!!
Us in Khao Yai national park
Bugs at the night market...one of the oh so inviting dishes here!
Not very clear in this small photo but this is at the bats cave..around 6pm every night about a million bats fly out to feed. they are all in one big line and it last for over half an hour, you can hear all their wings fluttering..very cool!
Us bathing in a natural spring
The people that were so so friendly on the train..one of their brothers even gave his seat up for me! it was so hot and i was so grateful. Thai people have been lovely so far, felt bad that i couldnt speak any of their language and we had a conversation in broken english, pictures and acting out!! they all waved to us as we got off the train, so sweet.
Me at some ruins in Auythaya
Mary and Janey's picture at some ruins and Buddha statues in Auythaya
river side in Ayuthaya, beautiful place :)

New pics

Just a few quick photos for you...my other memory card is still out of use and im not sure if i can retreive them..here are some new ones tho! :) me and liz drinking from our cocktail buckets! buy one get one free!
Eugene and Liz on the ferry boat, that cost us a whole 13bart! (They tried to charge us 500 for the tourist one!)
Bangkok in the sweltering heat

Outside national gallery, bangkok

Liz at a cafe bar on Kao San Road

Mary and Janey's card they drew for me on a bus in India..with our ticket

A very rickety bus in India..but very cheap

The Red Fort

The guard asked for "just one snap!!" i had no idea what he wanted....but just a harmless photo with us

Liz at the Red Fort in India

goodbye india!

ok...so finally we have left india...and what an experience it was!!
in the last few days i have been ridiculously accident prone and was headbutted by a cow on the ghats in varanasi (liz had warned me he looked menacing but i didnt believe her!!). I also have a few other bruises and bumps from being hit by a passing cricket ball and then walking into a road sign!! yes i know that was a silly thing to do, liz had walked under it and i hadnt noticed it..so now i have a nice bruise on my nose and head :-( nevermind eh, im sure it will go down soon!

we were both glad that we stayed in india for another week, varanasi was much nicer than we expected and we stayed in a lovely family run hostel for the whole time where they cooked us food on demand and were just generally lovely! we became a bit more experimental with our food as we decided that even being very careful didnt go down well...some of the street food was amazing and so so cheap! We also met a guy from the Fiji Islands (Shymal) in the last couple of days who we hung out with for a bit, we all got up for sunrise (well lizzy forgot to set the alarm so we had to rush out at 6am instead of 5.30..whoops), we got in a boat and watched the sun rise from the Ganges..it really was worth the painfully early morning for :) Lizzy is insistant that her name has been changed from "hello madam" to "hello boat"...and if she doesnt respond to this it usually follows with "hello smoke?" haha.

we found a lovely little western cafe which had a rooftop restaurant and got chatting to the american owner, she was really friendly. we had a lovely massage that was well needed by this point...feeling absolutely disgusting after 3 weeks of hard wear and tear, altho that was a few days ago and i could do with another one already! hehe.

the train journey back to delhi was pretty good, we sat with a group of people from korea that already knew each other so we didnt need to be sociable and could just get into bed and rest!! got an okay nights sleep but it was much colder this time. we bought some crisps that looked like they were going to be cheese and something but as soon as i opened them it was some random indian flavour...to my disgust!! i couldnt eat them!! lizzy managed to so they didnt go to waste, although she wasnt a fan either. the constant chaiwallahs and coffeewallahs make us laugh, they must get bored of shouting the same thing over and over again...the coffee and chais are really good tho..very sweet, just how i like them!! :)

my memory card appears to have aquired a virus which i am yet to fix so for now there will be a wait on the photos until i take some more. hopefully i can retrieve the old ones!

we are now in singapore, but for a very short time, back on the plane tomorrow to bangkok. it is such a contrast here, so so clean and tidy...almost too preened!! everthing looks perfect...but there is a perfect price tag on everything to go with it.

ok, well better go, hope you are all well and hopefully speak to you soon xxx

varanasi

ok, so just a quick message to say hello and short update!
we made it to varanasi fine, train was actually not as bad as expected as we were put with the other tourists and managed to avoid most of the staring. we arrived about 8am ish and managed to get an "auto" to our chosen hotel, cheap but nice. people are very friendly and welcoming but the room is very basic. it is owned by a doctor and we had a long chat where he basically talked at us about the benefits of meditation..very interesting but he kept repeating himself and we were tired. we havent taken a dip in the ganges, it is very tempting but we'd rather not take the chance with the septic water..even tho im sure it was fine susan! tonight we are eating at the guest house with their family and tomorrow we will move to a more central ghat. we have walked around the ghats a lot, so so hot here and quite a lot of hassling for boats etc but lovely place. i think we will take a boat in a couple of days when we are staying closer, we have found somewhere that is only 60 rs each for an hour.

ok must go, hope u are all well, thanks for the comments, will update again soon. xxxx

extended stay in india

i have no idea why when i type on here it tries to turn it into a link beneath photos..any advice anyone? i dont have the time to sit and figure it out!! we're in delhi again now, we tried to change our flights but there was some confusion and they tried to overcharge us so we have decided to stay for the original 3 weeks. To use up our last 8 days or so we have decided to change our plans and go to varanasi after all, although we read that the water is ridiculously septic so we shall be staying away from the bathing areas!

we went to the train station to sort our tickets out today and once we had managed to get past the very convincing touts we were okay and managed to struggle through the process of booking. we have decided to go for the lowest class of train, the non air conditioned sleeper..this may well be an experience as it was only about 4 pound 50 one way! for a 800km journey!
we shall let you know how we get on!

julia left delhi today, she has flown to the south to meet up with some other friends, meantime me and lizzy have relocated to a cheaper hostel as the tour wiped us out a bit. its pretty cool here though as its a proper backpacker place and there is lots going on. tomorrow we will be getting up early to try and find the official tourist office (you dont understand how difficult this will be!!) to get some info on varanasi before we take the train at 6.30 pm. we will arrive there at 7.30am in the morning and will have to find accommodation with no guide book etc so this is quite vital. we are finally attempting to try indian (well, westernised indian) food again after losing our appetites for it because of being ill. fingers crossed we will be fine from now on.

ok, well im off to bed early as we have a long day ahead, hope u are all well. speak to you all soon, lots of love....i shall leave you with some more random photos! xxx

our lovely driver Harry and his car that he kept very clean and shiny

if you thought u couldnt carry much on a motorbike, bike, truck etc then come to india for some inspiration..if u think it wont fit dont worry it will...and then some more!!!

jonny the camel! so cool...if a little bumpy...and not great when lizzy asked the guy if he could make him run :-o

more waving from school girls maybe?randomly asked for a photo while waiting for our henna..very sweet little girl!

another pic of me at the taj mahal

just couldnt resist taking a photo of this!!

more india photos!

our hotel room in ranthambhore

me at the ghats in Pushka..after being given my "pushkar passport"

the indian birthday party we were invited to

at ranthambhore fort with some of the many people asking for our photograph!

all at the ranthambhore fort, the monkeys were everywhere!

looks impossible!

my lovely guide on the ranthambhore safari :)

me with the best seat on tour!

one of the many birds coming to check us out...the australians got told off for feeding them biscuits

the view from our current hotel in pushkar....surrounded by garlic fields

our beautiful henna

outside another beautiful temple

india gate

near india gate again i think

dirty delhi!

first hotel in delh..hotel relax