Posts from — January 2010

It was an early 8.30 start for our trip to Chiew Laan Lake. We were introduced to our Thai guide and our travel companions, a young German couple named Sven & Susi.  We had a 1 hour trip by ute to the pier, followed by another hour in the long tail boat to the lake houses.

It seems the vehicle of choice for most Thais (if not a motorbike or scooter) is a ute – preferably a Toyota Hilux dual cab.  Actually, we were surprised by the quality of the vehicles on the road – there are hardly any bombs, most seem pretty new and you can always find someone washing their pride and joy on the side of the road! [Read more →]

The lovely owner of the Pan Beach Bungalows organised a minibus for us to go to Khao Sok.  This time the minibus was nothing short of luxurious – very spacious, brand new with frosty air conditioning.  We arrived in not time in very good shape.

We had read about Our Jungle House, Khao Sok National Park and Chiew Laan Lake from other family travel blogs and had been on our list for a while.  We would have liked to stay in a tree house, which are built up in the tree canopy but unfortunately they did not accommodate 6 and so we had to “settle” for the riverside bungalows.  All the tree houses and bungalows are off down winding tracks in the undergrowth from the reception/restaurant area and just walking to the house, we saw mini-frogs, a squirrel and heard a number of different birds. [Read more →]

We had taken the precaution of pre-booking our first few weeks of accommodation in Southern Thailand because of the school holidays.  This turned out to be inspired as there were holiday makers everywhere. 

We were waiting with trepidation to see our accommodation in Krabi at Pan Beach Bungalows – it all looked good on the internet being right on the beach but we did also know that there was no electricity during the day until they turned their own generator on at 6pm and also no hot water. [Read more →]

The trains into Thailand were also booked weeks in advance, so once again it was time for the long distance bus.  From KL to the border town of Hat Yai was quoted as taking about 7 hours.  9 1/2  hours later, including several duty free shops and border control on each side, we stumbled into Hay Yai, tired and dirty. 

Passport control at the Thai border turned into another one of those heart pumpers.  If you cross in Thailand by land without a visa, you can only have 15 days in the country, so we had been sure to get our visas in Perth from the Consulate which would get us 60 days.  We stood in the line thinking we were  all fine but the border guard who was dressed in what looked like a military uniform, spoke virtually no English and when we said we wanted 60 days, she looked at us like we were martians.  When I pointed to the visa stamped in the passport, she yelled something that sounded like “Receipt!  Where receipt!”  After I again explained, we got the visas before we left Australia -  “look here in the passport” and again pointed, she again looked at me like I was the most stupid person on earth and yelled again. 

I thought, wow this is not going to work out and we’re going to be lucky to be let in the country let alone get the standard 15 days!  She suddenly jumped up and walked out to talk to someone else; came back in and started stamping.  We got our 60 days but we have absolutely no idea what she was going on about!

We had booked 2 rooms in a good 4 star Novotel hotel online in KL to stay at in Hat Yai (very cheap last minute price!). We got in about 6.00pm, & lucky for us, the coach stopped right out in front of the hotel. We had an easy night of room service & all early to bed.

The next day was New Year’s Eve and we were to take a mini-bus to Krabi (4 1/2 hours).  It turned out to be one of those days – to add to the day before!

First thing was the check out at the Novotel – we had booked and paid online last minute, but they were insistent we had to pay again.  We had to catch the minibus at 9am and we were still discussing the online payment at 8.50!  In the end we just had to say that we were going, we couldn’t miss our bus – so we’re hoping we don’t get charged somewhere down the track.

Typically, the bus was not on time but eventually turned up 25 mins later.  The driver jumped out and indicated to us that there was no room in the boot (mainly because all the seats took up the bootspace) so our packs had to go on the roof rack. 

We through the kids’ packs in the van and put our big, heavy packs on the roof and the driver jumped in ready to go!  We asked him about tying them down and he said “No time!” and indicated to us to get in and hurry up.

I was completely freaking out, thinking there is no way our packs could survive 4 hours without being tied to the vehicle!  Luckily the driver was just taking us to the bus depot to catch yet another minivan – but I can tell you that the 5km it was to the depot was pretty nerve wracking with every bump we went over!

Thankfully at the end of our minibus journey – we found Pan Beach Bungalows in Krabi where we recovered from 2 crazy days of bus travel.

We originally planned to catch the train from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, however as expected with school holidays, the trains were all booked weeks in advance so we had to go to plan B – the long distance bus.  I admit I was a little bit worried about the standards of the bus we might end up on – but we were there on time to board this beautifully appointed coach, complete with footrests and massagers built into the seat back!  Great this wasn’t at all what we expected!  That was until a lady came up to us and said could she check our tickets as she believed we were sitting in her seats.  We showed ours; she showed hers – funny they were both identical!  Welcome to Asia!  She went back to the ticket office and complained loudly in Chinese until the ticket operator came on board – checked ours, checked hers, walked up and down – lots of heated Chinese and so it went on.  Eventually, he came back on board and said to us that we had been put on the wrong bus and we should get off immediately, walk further up the road and board another coach.  Luckily the new coach was just as good and after we had calmed our nerves after being kicked off our bus – we waited for departure. 

We have quickly learned that buses never leave on time.  So we left Singapore an hour late.

It’s amazing to drive from Singapore where it’s beautiful and green and very clean – go over the bridge into Malaysia and suddenly it’s very obvious that you’re in a different country.  The first thing I noticed were the huge palm plantations – I had read in Lonely Planet that the Government had encouraged vast amounts of clearing of the natural rain forests in favour of planting palms for palm oil.  There are certainly a lot of them and they go on for miles.

KL was a real eye opener for the kids.  Lots of people on bikes, traffic jams and rubbish on the streets.  Unlike Singapore where we were forced into 2 taxis, the drivers here had no problem at all putting us all in a little 4 cylinder Proton.  The taxis all seem to be converted to LPG so have a big gas cylinder in the boot which doesn’t leave a lot of room for luggage.  Needless to say, we drove through peak hour with 5 of us in the back seat complete with all the kids backpacks.  Squashed was an understatement!

Lonely Planet has a lot to say about taxi drivers in KL – that is that they will continuously try to rip you off and you must negotiate your fare before getting in.  We found they were incredibly helpful (and chatty!) – we never had a problem with fares and they always quoted the same fare consistently.

We had hoped to go up the Petronas Towers to the Skybridge but you have to queue well before 7am to try to get the free tickets before they run out and we weren’t up for the early start so stood outside and looked up.

We managed the subway in KL as it’s very cheap (together with the better exchange rate) compared to Singapore.  An interesting thing abt the MRT in both Singapore & KL is that the platforms are enclosed ie they have sliding doors that open in line with the sliding doors on the train, so there is no way to access the tracks.

The train pulled in and it was absolutely choccas.   We grabbed the kids and pushed on (we had read about another family who had a plan for if they got separated on a train when the doors closed on them – half in half out!) so now I get on first and Paul gets on last with the kids in the middle.  We were all packed in – one bonus for us – we were taller than the locals so we weren’t the ones jammed in someone else’s armpit like you are in London!

The kids took it all in good spirits and actually really enjoyed it.

After a day and a half in KL we were all well and truly culture shocked and city fatigued.  Honestly, we were all wondering what on earth we had gotten ourselves into and there were a couple of comments like – “Couldn’t we just skip the rest of Asia and go straight to Europe?”.  So to calm our nerves, we indulged -as we discovered McDonald’s delivers in Asia!  Woo hoo!  Big Macs all round and you may not like their cheese but they taste like home!  Yum..

So after months of planning, we finally departed Australian shores en route to Asia – first stop Singapore. 

Everything we’d ever heard about Singapore was true – it’s incredibly clean and green.  There’s a minimum $1000 fine for littering here and it obviously works – there’s very little rubbish and definately no graffiti.  Although, I’m not sure what you could graffiti on because everything has plants growing all over it.  They certainly take their streetscaping seriously – every road verge is like a park, even the overpasses have vines covering them!

Orchard Road is the main shopping precinct  and it was decked out in Christmas lights.  It is absolutely amazing – there are so many shops and not just shops but shopping malls.  Multi-storey malls with millions of shops and they seem to be on every street corner – it’s completely insane.  (Marrissa you are never allowed to come here!) 

We didn’t do much while in Singapore – we deliberately chose a better hotel with a pool and the kids made good use of it.  We walked up Orchard Road and checked out some of the countless multi-storey shopping centres.  Obviously we can’t shop so none of that was of any interest to us.  The kids were very disappointed when they discovered that Maccas was twice the price it is in Australia!

We also discovered that with 6 of us, it was far cheaper to jump in a taxi then take the MRT.  Of course, being sticklers for rules the drivers wouldn’t allow us all to ride in the one taxi so we attempted our first separate journey in our teams.  Paul, Caitlin & Michael were in the taxi in front and I was feeling like I was in an episode of The Amazing Race – telling the driver to “Follow that taxi!  Keep it in sight – don’t lose it!  Faster!”

We caught the Sentosa Express monorail from yet another shopping centre  to Sentosa Island which has numerous family oriented activities including a contstruction site for the next Disneyland.  Our goal was the skyrail and luge.  The skyrail was quite good, if a little bit scary – but the luge which I had been quite looking forward to was really disappointing.  The tickets were quite expensive and you don’t get to go very fast or for very long before it’s all over.  A bit of a let down all round and so not worth the exorbitant fee.

 I’ve decided that Singapore could be a good starting point or not depending on how you look at it.  You could say that it is a good place to ease yourself into what is sure to come in Asia or on the other hand (as I think it was with the kids) it can give you a false sense of security that if this is Asia then this is going to be a piece of cake!

That illusion was shattered when we went to catch our bus to KL and the bus station is like little Bangkok – everything is Thai.  Naturally we had to do a toilet run and the girls were faced wit their first squat toilets.  It was quite funny – Ashlea was quite puzzled as to what you actually do, Georgie just got on with it while Caitlin preferred to wait until the 1 western toilet became vacant.

Next stop the real Asia.