Michael's Journey

South Africa

2006-01-20T15:39:27Z

Howzit people, so sorry I haven't blogged in ages.
I've been having a good time over here, not quite as eventful as I had hoped but enjoyable no the less. I'm missing all you guys and girls in NZ can't wait to see you again.

My mom and I are currently travelling up the east coast of South Africa, we are currently in Jefferys Bay, international surf spot and beach town, and the surf sucks (for those of you who don't know I learned to surf in Cape Town) the swell is ok today (non-existent yesterday) but the onshore is pumping killing all the waves, they are breaking poorlyu so messy it's hard to surf and near impossible to get out there to catch waves, oh well maybe it'll be better at St Mikes where I'm hoping to stop off aswell.

ok got to go now, take care.
Mike

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SOUTH AFRICA

2005-11-16T14:28:36Z

Hey all this post is way out of date but there is a reason for that, I was wanting to suprise a friend in SA and I knew they would check my blog, so in order to maintain secrecy about my location without lying to all of you guys I stopped posting for a while.

Anyway I've arrived in SA, and had a wonderful week and a bit in Pretoria stay with my family there, gettign up to lots of nonsesnse hahaha, I went to Spur, the legendary South African family restaurant, Steers the legendary South African take-out.

I also spent a weekend at the Vaal with my cousins, Paulet, Desiree, Paulet's husband Gavin and their kids, Kevin and William. It was very nice even though the weather was lousy, had some great braais and my afrikaans got a LOT better than it has been in years.

While I was in Pretoria we celebrated my cousin, Bernedine's birthday wich was pretty cool. It was also really nice just to hang out with family I haven't seen in a while.

Anyway I'm in Cape Town now but I'm being unsocialble so CT update coming soon.

Take Care all, hope exams went well for all those writing. HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Florence - Present

2005-10-15T14:22:50Z

Florence

Ok so I'm back in Greece now, staying with my aunt and uncle agian,
but i'll get to all that later. FOr now I shall tell you about all
the mischief i got into in Florence. After my last post I spent two
more nights in florence.

The next day I took it pretty slowly, I was feeling pretty sick and
not up for much, anyway I went and saw the Medici Chapels, a little
bit of history for those of you who haven't studied art history, the
Medici were the main ruling family in Florence for a long time in the
past and through the Renaicance, anyway Florence had become a republic
and was under pressure from neighbouring states ect. (please feel free
to correct me this is really only what i've picked up in bits and pieces)
Anyway Florence at the end of the middle ages was looking for a case study
if you will on republics, well they found their example from the Roman
Republics and the Greek City states of antiquity, so the Medici (not the
official rulers) started collecting roman sculpture and apparently were pretty
much enthralled with anything roamn or greek, thus the neo-classism
of the renaicance was born (obviously this in not the only cause but
it is one of the important factors as I understand). anyway Lorenzo, the
magnificent, Medici, the godfather of the family (i think) took a very
young Michaelangelo under his wing, I can't remember why he didn't
or couldn't stay with his parents, anyway it's this Lorenzo who gets
Mike learning painting, sculptuor and architecture. Mike falls in love
with Lorenzo over the years and as mike is becoming a bit of a know
artist (I think) Lorenzo dies, anyway Michaelange carves his tomb, it's
never fully completed (he also carves lorenzo's brother's tomb, i think it
is his brother, another inportand Medici anyway) So in this Chapel
are these two tombs, each consisting of three statues (I think the architecture
is by Michaelangelo aswell) and quite a lot of scethes ect. on these two walls
Basically the tombs (esp. Leronzo's) is this act of love and devotion by
Michaelangelo, they are really impressive. Each has a statue of the deceased
and a pair of statues, one has night and day and the other dawn and dusk.
It was definitely worth seeing, really beautiful carving capturing so much
of the character of the men and the attitudes of the personifications.

So I saw that and pretty much went home by a long route, saw a few other
places, mucked around.

ANYWAY the next day I was up at about 6:00 - 6:30 because I was goign to see
the gallery Uffzi, one of the most important galleries in the world on the day
after it had been closed so it was expected that there would be huge lines all
day and I didn't want to waste time as I wanted to get a train out that day.
So I arrived at the gallery with the last tolls of the seven o' clock bell
I must say it took me a long time to get out of bed, came close to giving it
a miss. Anyway there were only two people already waiting so i was third in line
which was pretty neat. Anyway I spent my time doing Su-do-ku and chatting to
an american who was next in line after me and the japanese couple who were
learning their italian.

at 8:15 the doors were supposed to open, they only opened at about 8:30, anyway
I went got tickets and followed th crowds (I wasn't going to rush)(there is also
seperate entrace for people with reserved tickets which you have to buy in advance
cost more but get you in faster and lots of tour groups get these).
Inside the core of the Uffzi (offices) are housed a LOT of pieces of late gothic to
17th/18th C. art and it goes Chronoligically (or by artist if there are main artists
for the same period that they have a lot of pieces by)

Well the whole gallery was really impressive, I found I like the early renaissance
stuf more than I thought I would, I found I liked certain artist more than
others ect. and I got to see a lot of famous paintings
I saw stuff by Fillipo Lippi that I had read about, works by Leonardo Da Vinci
including his 'annunciation' I saw a whole big room full of Bottichelli's
including his 'birth of venus' I saw a whole room of works by Raphaello
including his 'self portrait' and 'portrait of Pope Leo X' I also two out of
the three Rembrant's that the gallery, his self portrait as a young lad
and as an old man, it was really interesting seeing how much his style changed
through those years, unfortunately his "rabbi" was being restored so i couldn't see
that. Anyway I ended up spending four hours in there and really enjoying myself.
I was really pleased that i went and got to see so much magnificent art up close.

understandably I was bushed after that, there was one more gallery in florence
but I really couldn't be bothered walking out of my way to it, standing in line,
jogging through it only to leave later than I wanted and have to arrange baggage
storage for the day.

So i went to catch the train out of florence to venice (I was hoping to get a ferry
from Brindisi to Corfu but in the off season they just don't sail often enough or
at good times for it to be an enjoyable experience. Unfortunately I missed the train
I was going to catch by literally 3 seconds, thus I would miss the 7pm ferry to corfu
and would have to spend a night in venice, not what I wanted at all (didn't get a good
vibe from venice) but I had to anyway, so I found an internet cafe, looked at some
accomodation options and settled down onto the grass outide the train station to wait
for the next train. while I was napping I was woken by drunk italians talking really
loudly, the one was actually supporting the older one and they were walking and
talking and talking with other men about. eventually this happy couple got decidedly
unhappy and started to fight, it was actually really funny seeing these two trying to
fight, not a single good punch between the two of them, shortly they we semi-sucessfully
seperated and started to go their seperate ways, next thing out of the blue the older
drunked guy picks up someone else empty beer bottle, smashes it (holding it by the neck)
and starts at the other guy, this time they were more forcibly settled, now there
was some amatuer counselling and the younger guy got told to get out of there pretty much.
Anyway after everything seems settled and everyones laughing about it, the older guy
flips out, picks up a full beer bottle that someone had on the ground and starts to
try and run after the young guy. the old guy is so drunk he doesn't notice that he is
holding the beer bottle upside down and effectively pouring it all over himself
the young guy is now freaking out big time and sprinting away, the old guy lifts the
bottle to throw it, the young guy stupidly dives onto the path (rough bricks) meanwhile
the old dude throws the bottle at the ground near the young guy, glass goes flying
in a shower almost hitting some sitters by (luckily they were watching what was happening)
next the two guys are fighting again (not very effectively) and then the pigs show up
they do a take down on these two drunks, the young guy gets peeled off and doesn't fight
back, meanwhile the older (drunker) guy is on the ground trying to resist the police
so they start kneeing him ect. until he cries uncle (not uncle exactly but stops fighting
back) anyway it end up with the two dumbasses gettign taken in by no less than 5 police
and one guy losing his beer and everyone getting a free lesson on consumption of alcohol.

Anyway Venice had alright weather but was not pleasant, accomodation was cheap but I
paid 21.50 euros to get there (only 13 euro for a bed) which was waste of time really.
Anyway I went to get a ferry to Corfu, sorted that out, then tried to get into veice
again to get some sleeping pills and phone my aunt and uncle telling them when I was
getting back, that ended up being two and a half painful, long missions. So i really
did not have a pleasant afternoon. Anyway I got the ferry, my tonsilitis went from the
worst it's ever been to worse than that, the sleeping pills did not work, I gave my
aunt the wrong time to pick me up so i wasted their time, and didn't feel well at all.
at least on this ferry the staff were bearable if not exceedingly helpful but a pleasant
change to the pigs that the other ferry line employs.

Anyway I'm back in corfu now,not doing much, gettign some TLC and lots of soup.
take care all, Mike

Sorry about the weird spacign but i was typign offline to save my aunt and uncles moeny and well, i'm too lazy to fix it.

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Firenze

2005-10-10T10:50:29Z

Well Florence has been awesome, i'm staying at a camping site which is ok, i'm sharing a room with and Isreali guy who is pretty cool.
the best part and probably the cause for huge bias is that it's sunny, everywhere else it ahs been raining and just plain ugly weather and now it sunny and clear skies, i'm sooooo happy.
well I arrived two nights ago, so i didn't see that much that day, but yesterday i saw a LOT, well it felt like a lota anyway.
I went to the main church in Florence, (santa maria di fiore) i think, anyway that was closed (on a sunday) so I headed to the baptistery where I was expecting to see Magdalene by Donatello (turns out the wooden statue was washed out in a flood) and was then moved. anyway the mosaics and ceiling were really impressive, next I went to the doumo museum (houses all the art that was in the baptistery and the chapel ) And a lot of other stuff.

Inside were ancient roman carvings and statues, the Pieta by Michaelangelo (the one he started carving for his own tomb but never finished, for reasons unknown) [REALLY amazing (self portrait in Nicodemus) beautiful lines and expressions uncompleted as it is]
Also there was a lot of Gothic pieces, and Magdalene by Donatello, that statue was amazing, beautifula nd scary and mournful and full of fear all at the same time, Donatello sure knew his stuff. I really regret not spending more time looking at those two, but I didn't want to loose the whole day.

Anyway I also went to the Academia Galleria, which house none other than the da da da DAVID, it is INCREDIBLE it is awesome, even when yo know that the hands are huge (compared to the body) it looks perfect. It is absolutely massive it is truley magnificent, overwhelming and beautiful and yeah just awesome.
There was also Michaelangelos prisoners, St. Mark, and a pieta originally accredited to him (not really up to his standard, Christ's chest is on several bottles of steriods and his legs are too short) anayway all of these are uncompleted.

Also there is the annuciation by Fillipo Lippi, which I quite like.
Anywya I have to go, i'm going to try and see the Medici Chapel, and some other stuff, the galleries are closed today so i've gotta e in line early tomorrow for those.

Pasta La pizza

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Roma

2005-10-07T17:17:46Z

Hey all i arrived in rome yesterday didn't take me that long to find a place to stay, only 20euro (40 NZD don't want to know how much that is in Rand) So I got to see some sights yesterday, I took the metro and went to see the Colosseum, which was WAY more impressive than I'd anticipated. It is SOOOO huge and well made, I spent a while walking around trying to imagine the sounds and smells of a working Colosseum (complete with hawkers, animals, slaves, ect.)
THen I headed up past the archiological sites which I would have liked to spent more time looking at, but it was raining quite heavily and I had none of the history of them that I would be really interested in. Next I made my way to the grave of the unknown soldier, an absolutely massive building, with lots of statues. I also found the Trevi fountain which was very impressive.

Today I organised my second night's stay (the original place was fully booked) so I got a place down the road [cheaper and less people to share with]

Next I tried to do some of the angels and demons spots, I manages to hit St. Peters (I spent 30 minutes waiting to go inside and 35 minutes inside) It was actually quite dissapointing, almost nothing was well lit and there were so many dumb tourists and no signage telling you what was what. I went to The Popolo Piazzle but the church from the book was closed until 16:00 so I looked around the area and found a da Vinci expo, which had reconstructions of a lot of his inventions, the only dissapointments were that once agin, not enough explanation, and that the inventions weren't made really nicely, most of the time they only used one type of plank for all of the construction, even the flying machines, but it was quite interesting to see some of his more obscure stuff. I was very tempted to buy a book on his designs but I'll wait till I find one where the price isn't inflated by it's location.

I also saw the Castle and the fountain (water) the fountain was really cool but not how I imagined it at all. Anyway my time is running low. I head to florence tomorrow after I spent the moring seeing the Vatican. Asta La Vista

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Venezia???

2005-10-05T16:53:00Z

Well I went sight seeing today (nice and sunny compared to yesterday where I spent most of the day trying to find accomodation and then sleeping) We only got off to a late start, one of the girls who was sharing my room wanted to see some of the same stuff, so we went together (booking tickets to Roma on the way there) First of all was breakfast, always very important. At about 11 we made our way to the Peggy Guegenhiem house, where she lived and collected art (modern) now it is a gallery open to the public, 5Euro for a student entry, Anyway i got to see Picasso's, Dali's, a room full of Jackson Pollocks and a lot of other Really good artist that I hadn't heard of. That was really cool, I didn't get a lot of the art there but I saw it and liked a LOT of what I saw.
After that she changed her plans so we spilt up, I headed to the Academia Galleria, which is full of renaisance and baroque art, I was feeling pretty ill after only a while in, so i did not spend all the time I could have appreciating the works, there was a fair bit by Titian and some others that I recently read about in my Aunt's 'history of art' this time I got set back 6.5 Euro. By the time I left I was feelign wretched, I think a fun combination of caffine withdrawl (hadn't had tea yet) and Dehyration (couldn't bear to finish the small bottle of sparkling mineral i got with my breakfast) So I tried to find a reasonably priced cafe so I had to walk a while so i was far from any big sites. Eventually i was able to purchase a pot of tea (which I got four cups from, mmmmmmm) now feeling considerably better but still not 100% I left for the Church of Santa Maria something something ( a franciscan church) I bought a ticket and an audio guide this time which set me back 4.10 Euro. Inside the church are two HUGE paintings by Titian a Tryptich? by Bellini and Donatello's St John, Also there is the tomb of Titian, which is very impressive and the tomb of Carlo?? i think which he'd orinally designed for Titian's tomb but was never carried out, so this Carlo's students amde it for him, across from titians and is also very impressive.

I've heard from some kiwis over here that the railways are striking on monday and sunday so I'm not sure i'l either only stay over-night in Rome and get a traint o florence on saturday or stay till tuesday or get a bus, hopefully it's just the vencice rome route but I doubt that. Anyway it'll work out somehow.

I must say I was really impressed by Donatello's St John, It is a painted wood and shows John Really realistically, he looks like he's been eating locusts and honey. anyway I gotta go there are some people waitng to use the free internet provided by my hotel.

Hope you are all well and my sickness goes away, i think i'm either getting a lashing of tonsilitis (would be for the second time on this trip) or the flu.

Live long and prosper.

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Photos and Ferries

2005-10-03T06:27:17Z

Hey all you can acess my photos at http://www.travellerspoint.com/photos/gallery/users/MikeTrev/
I hope you like them, I'm on a ferry to Italy and i'm running out of credit on my internet card so Take care, will email from italy.

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Corfu!!!

2005-09-28T16:39:53Z

Hey all, sorry i haven't posted in ages, I've been really busy and my aunt and uncles computer has been hit with no less than six trojan virusses so emailing has been a challenge, hope you all are well. I'm staying withmy aunt and uncle on corfu and I'm having a wonderful time. I've been to some really beautiful beaches (lost count now) Sadari one of the main tourist towns, the Island across the bay from Corfu town (the main town on the island) I've helped out a bit collecting walnuts and i'm generally having a good time,( devouring books)[so far i've read the da vinci code, some guts and glory flying story, coastliners, and i'm busy picking at 'the history of art' and a greek mythology book, I'm 2/3 of the way through angels and demons, so yeah i'm having a good time. My uncle Yanni left tonight for athens, he is going to do some work on their flat in athens inbetween tenants. ANyway take care all.

asta la vista; Mike

PS i'm gonna try up load some more photos

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Athens to Corfu

2005-09-19T10:25:25Z

Well I left Athens on the 18th with great difficulty, I had, through travellerspoint, found out that one of the best ways to get from Athens to Corfu was to take the metro to a certain train station, then cath the train to the coastal town of Patra and then catch the ferry to Corfu (overnight departing at midnight and arriving at 7am the next morning). So i tried this, I caught the metro only to be told that I had to catch a bus to the train station, what i wasn't expecting that! went outand could see the train staion across the road, went there, asked for a ticket to Patra, the ticket lady said "ask information" so i go to what i thought was information
(from her pointing and the sign) and ask again, no "ask information" what! I thought this was info, no I'm wrong, eventually I ask at the information desk, the guy starts writing in greek on this piece of scrap paper, I have almost no idea of what he is saying but pick up that I have to catch a bus to another train station and some vague direction. Well I manage to get the directions wrong, walk for ages realise I'm not in the right place, ask someone for help, "no go this way" ask someone else "no you must got to the train station". It's raining on me, I'm fed up, the roads are bumpy and wet so I'm carrying my bag on my back, the uncomfortable straps gnawing their way into my collar bones and shoulders. In short i'm pretty pissed off at everything by now, I must look like a madman, mumbling to myself, cursing and changing direction every two minutes. I eventually found a bus, that I thought that was the right one, no it's the right bus but the wrong direction, so now after riding the bus I'm hopelessly far from my destination and my starting point (in the meantime i had been back to the train station, and read the sign saying that the train route was changed on the 8/8/2005 and where I was supposed to go (and what bus I was supposed to take)) so after trying three different bus stops I find on that the bus I'm to catch will stop at, shortly after the bus arrives, I get on, ask if i'm going the right way, I still have no idea as the local english is so bad, I go up the front to ask the driver and lo anf behold it's the same guy as earlier who speaks almost no english but his friend assures me after a bit of unwanted laughing that they will get me to the right place for free, which they did. I do not wish that experience on anyone (maybe bush, but then he'd be likely to bomb greece so maybe not)
I found the station, booked my ticket, waited, ate and caught the train, then had trouble finding my seat and stowing my huge luggage. but it was a nice train ride and lots of lovely views, I mainly listened to my music for the 3.5 hour ride and arrived in Patra with 5 hours to spare, so found the ferry operator that issued tickets to corfu, bought one, and found the gate I was to board at, got some dinner and waited, I ended up boarding at about 10:30 when I saw a tour group board. Anyway, to cut a longer story shorter I had booked a place on the deck (unbeknownst to me), with plastic chairs and no-where to sleep unless you brought your own sleeping roll and sleeping bag, which I didn't assuming we'd have chairs, I complained that I wasn't informed, got moved inside to the 'air-type' seats and ended up sleeping on the floor anyway, I got up at six, listened to music, waited for the sunrise which didn't come or when it did was hidden. and got picked up from the ferry by my aunt and uncle.

So far Corfu has been great, We've been once to the olive groves to water some plants, been to Sadari, a tourist area to visit friends, went swimming through a cave fromed by the sea, went snorkeling at liapades beach, read a small book in less than 24 hours, started readingthe da vinci code, went out to a buffet dinner and greek dancing (no plate smashing yet) And lots of relaxing.

Ok hope you are all well, Mike

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Athens

2005-09-15T15:22:52Z

Wassup, I went sight seeing today, my hotel is quite close to the Acropolis, so I bought a ticket to go and see it and all the building/sites surrounding it. It was great, awesome to see such old and magnificent buildings, just thinking about how they could have built those structures baffles me. I only wish that I could have seen it in it's original state and without the tourists. the weather was lousy and it began to rain (only lightly thankfully) while I at the rear of the parthenon. The statues and carvings in the acropolis museum were great, I forgot to turn the flash off on my camera and got a telling off from security, oh well. The Theatres at the base were very impressive and must have been wonderful to act on and to watch from. I would have really liked to have seen the Odeum from the inside but for some reason it was closed (apparently they have performances there, so it wasn't to protect it :s )
I also went to see the Temple of Olympian Zues and the Arch of Hadrian, the Temple is only really 16 pillars now but they are so huge and there were 104 of them, I tried to think of how they might have constructed it but couldn't come up with a plausible answer. I also went to go and see the national historical museum, with exibits dating from 1453 (fall of Constanstinople) to the 20th century, It was really good (got a bit repetitive though, but then histrory repeats itself doesn't it?) I laughed when I was looking in a cabinet of weapons and other military equipment and saw a pocket knife, a simple precursor to the swiss army knife in my backpack.
So far thens hasn't been bad, still just a city, but I like it way more than bangkok. The flea market I walked through was quite interesting lots of stalls selling army style clothing, bags, sleeping bags, hat everything, it's certainly weird seeing that trend throughout the world, i've seen it at Auckland uni, Thailand and now Greece. I thought to myself what historians in 100s of years might think if there was some natural disaster that preserved it all as is.
Anyway i've taken a whole roll of film today, it's currently being processed. I think when I get to my relatives in Corfu I will spend a LOT of time uploading photos (should their computer and connection allow it) otherwise you'll all have to wait eagerly
I will try and start getting to Corfu tomorrow, I have to catch a metro to the main station, then a train to the port and then a ferry that leaves at midnight to arrive at corfu the next morning. I don't feel like staying in athen much longer.
Ok I might post agin when I get my photos.

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Athens

2005-09-14T14:50:52Z

Hey all i've arrived in Athens and I am currently seeking accomodation, it looks like it's going to be more expensive than I anticipated but oh well, i don't have much choice, hopefully I can find a place that has a bed available. Ok going now to find a place, love you all.
Mike

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The End

2005-09-12T04:57:06Z

Hey all i'm back in bangkok after another 12hour trian ride, i hardly got any sleep because I didn't fully trust my new alarm clock to wake me up before my stop. I'm having an ok birthday, I can't type much now as i'm going to meet Claire for lunch/breakfast now.
Love you all, (I fly for Greece tomorrow yay! SCARY)

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Koh Phangan

2005-09-10T04:10:30Z

Hi all, apologies for the lull and lack of info recently, I went to meet claire and liz at the pier the other day and we decided since none of us wanted to party we'd head for a quieter part of the island, the beautiful north east.
We had an adventurous ride up there through jungle covered hills with lots of steep dirt roads, at one stage our driver stopped to car to get a plant from the national park we were driving through, and he didn't put the brake on properly so we started inching our way forward, but it was all ok in the end, just a little nerve-wracking. The palce we were going to didn't have hot water for the price we'd been given and claire and liz really wanted hot water, so we had a saunter down hte beach and looked at a few places and eventually found this awesome place, 500B a night lovely interior and hot water anyway we had a good couple of days and have pretty much sorted our trip back to bangkok.
Sawasdee, Mike

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Skimboarding

2005-09-07T02:18:43Z

Hey all, i was at the beach and decided it might be ok for skimboarding so eventually after lazing about i went to go and look to either buy or make one, well to cut a loooong story short, i found a boatbuilder named paul who works with plywood and fiberglass and will see about making one today a 2pm. missing you guys,
Mike

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Koh Phangan

2005-09-06T04:40:31Z

Ok so I arrived in Koh Phangan yesterday afternoon and spent about three hours walking around with my backpack ect. trying to find accomadation for myself and 8 girls, the four girls who were on my tour went on to Koh Samui to pick up their 4 friends then they are coming back to Koh Phangan, in the end i gave up and fopund some really ratty place that i'll stay in until they get here, and in the mean time I'll keep my eyes and ears open for good+cheap places to stay.

It's actually kinda nice here a bity of a mix f the other two Islands, not as scummy as Koh Samui and not as quite as Koh Tao.

It's weird with a bit more infastucture and singae this place would be soooo much better.

Ok more photos coming soon (I forgot to bring my CD with me to the internet)

BTW there are still board shorts and towels and stuff at my place that people have left behind, if you don't pick it up sue might go crazy and cut it into little pieces and then feed it to you. (she might not aswell but i'd stay on her good side if i were you)

Take Care all

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Koh Tao

2005-09-03T11:06:03Z

So today the tour leaves Koh Tao for Bangkok, arriving at 7 the next morning. There were lots of Goodbyes, Michael and Miela are off to Koh Phangan, The brittish girls are staying o in Koh tao and everyone else is catching the train, oh almost forgot, I'm won't be catching the train, i'm staying here In Koh Tao, I might then take a ferry to Koh Phangan and see that Island. I didn't want to spend the rest of my thailand leauge in Bangkok seeing as i've done everything i want to do there bar some shopping and it's noisy and ugly, so I was planning to get out of bangkok anyway and this way i've only gotta pay for one train ride not two and it's less than NZ$20 for an overnight train ticket. So i'm in the deep-end at the moment, everything is up to me which is a bit scary after all the baby-sitting we got from yao and intrepid.

Ok i'm about to upload more photos, i'll probably only upload the photos I really like at the moment, to get to them I'm not sure of the best way, but I found if you click on the link under the photo in the main page, then click on The Thailand link and then find one of my photos it can take you to my profile and from there you can see my photos only, i'm sure there is a better way but that works.

Missing you all, and GO the AB's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Koh Tao remains copyright of the author MikeTrev, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Koh Tao

2005-09-01T12:43:43Z

Hiya all, I had the greatest day today, I went on a snorkeling tour with Kate, Meila, Jyri and Michael and a quite a few strangers. We went around the whole island stopping at all the best snorkeling spots, it was so beautiful. The tiny electric blue fish, schooling around the brown mushrooms of coral. Rainbow fish flying through the water like a Da Vinci flying machine but coloured not in sepia but like the third guy in the Gay Parade; pink, blue, turquoise, purple, orange, carany yellow and flouresent everything. Other fish were a a dark brow with yellow bellies and two ultra violet stripes runiing along each cheek up on to their backs, the contrast was amazing. There were Big and little Zebra fish, some with yellow or blue taints near the dorsal fin while others were pure white and black, they would swim right up to me and look straight into my goggles as if to say, what the hell are you and why are you in my water. There were huge schools of what looked like slivers of mirror swimming with one mind collectively seeking food and avoiding danger, prowling around these schools near the surface were fish that looked as if they'd just eaten one of those huge funny pencils, they were atleast 15cm long and only 3cm diameter at the most. The firston I saw seemed to get a big a fright as I, I was marveling at the school offish when into my vision ploughs this bizzare fish welli almost jumped out of my skin and my reaction clearly startled it, the poor thing was so scared it didn't want to break eye contact, so it swam in circles while i rotated for a while, eventually breaking the eye contact and the fish was happy that I wasn't about to eat him. We hada great time I got a bit sun burnt but it was worth it.

I forgot to mention that on our last night in Koh Samui I had one of the best meals of my life (don't worry mom you're still number one ) I order the fried fish in a sweet and sour sauce, it was devine the fish was soft and perfect, the sweet and sour sauce with veg had the perfect balance, and there was a salad bar so I made my self many wonderful salads, Basically by the end of the meal I was completely satisfied, not over full and my tastebuds were singing praises to the cooks, definitely the best meal I've eaten in Thailand and definitely on my top ten meals ever.

ok Take care all,

Mike.
I have uploaded some photos more coming soon.

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Koh Tao

2005-09-01T12:42:31Z

ok Take care all,

Mike.
I have uploaded some photos more coming soon.

Koh Tao remains copyright of the author MikeTrev, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Koh Tao

2005-08-31T10:48:37Z

Hi guys, we caught two ferries to Koh Tao today, the first to Koh Phanang and then another to Koh tao. Koh Tao is supposed to be the second best diving spot in the world so we'll see I might try my hand at scuba depending on price and my comfort level doing it. In SA I tried a dving with air coming from a compressor, through as hose and couldn't do it, maybe this time it'll be different, I think i can try it for free at our hotel.

Koh Tao is the smallest of the main Islands on the east coast of Thailand's peninsula, it is beautiful covered in vibnrant green trees and has stark grinte boulders protuding into the sea, the sand is a stunning white and the water is hot, it's just lovely. our Resort is stunning, right on the beach with a horizon pool and wooden everything only problem is our rooms are up a bit of a hill, we are staying on the second most populous beach on the island (I think) and we are about 2km from the main town, There are Diving tours everywhere, it's quite funny really. anyway I'll stop blabbering and work on getting some photos up.

Mike

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Koh Samui

2005-08-30T11:03:20Z

Hey everybody we arrived on Koh Samui yesterday afternoon, after waiting ages for the bus that was running late. the bus rides were actually quite good, the limestone formations were very beautiful to look at, i would have liked to climb one, they are like big thick pillars sticking out of the earth, covered in forest. haha it pays to be the gentleman, i gave my seat to a lady who'd got on the bus (I couldn't fall asleep because i had an aisle seat) and the conductor got me to go to the back where I got a seat to myself, an open window, less noise and soft bags to lean on hahaha.
Anyway, Koh Samui is lovely, no waves butthe water is clear and warm, our resort is wicked good, pool, good food. the only thing i dislike is the taxi drivers. I even tried wind-surfing today, I was actually doing really well bu the centre board was too narrow an the wind to light for me to get back easily so i got a lift with a speed boat back to the resort. ok I gotta go now, we are leaving for dinner really soon. will post again soon.

Adios bros

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Down South

2005-08-28T11:49:50Z

Hey everybody, we've moved down south with the trip, 12hour train ride from Bangkok to Surat thani, and a 2hour air conditioned bus ride to our resort in Koh Sok ANtional park. The four adjacent parks here form one of the biggest areas of protected wild life in S.E. Asia and it's very beautiful. We arrived yesterday morning, swam in the river and just chilled, almost everyone else went on inner tubes down the river, saw a few snakes and fish and lizards (and a monkey temmple) while i opted to go off on my own for a while and doa trek, it was great, saw some pretty neat stuff, got bitten by one leech and took quite a few photos.
In the evening most of us took a night trek to spot wildlife as a large proportion only comes out a night. we saw bats (which were flying around our resort like dog fighters) frogs, bugs, a flying lizard, an owl, a beautiful white snake (only small) some HUGE spiders with Huge webs, some mouse deer, and a Macaque (type of monkey)
Today we did some more trekking, we stopped and swam at a small set of waterfalls, dived off some rocks, and generally had a good time, after that the british girls who joined us in bangkok were going to go elephant riding so they turned around along with some others, while robin, kate, jyri (yuri), nicole and I went further up stream to find a waterfall, the route wasn't marked very well and at one point we were about to settle with seeing a less impressive waterfall, but I scouted ahead and the sign said we were only a kilometer off, so we soldiered on, with nicole as the exception who needed a sleep. after some more trekking we reached the river again, checked the map and discovered that we needed to crosss this big river, walk up a triutrary and then get to the waterfall, so we put all the cameras and valuables and some food into my bag, and tied that to the pulley system that was setup to take bags across the river, so we swam across, pulled my bag across ad headed up the river. It was getting close to that point where we would have to turn back, so after some deliberation we decided that if we couldn't hear/see the waterfall in 5minutes we'd turn back, so we trudge on trying not to slip taking everyone's cameras in with me. about 200m laterrobin can hear the falls, we catch up and can hear them too, so it's decided now we have to dee the falls and we march on, climbing up the hills where the river is too deep to walk in, jumping from rock to rock and eventually we see it, a magnificent waterfallzig-zagging down the rocks, it was very beautiful. we all took photos, jyri, kate and I swam and robin sun-tanned. I decided I wanted to get behind the waterfall which i felt sure had a open space behind it, got pounded and sent down steam the first try, and the second on the third and what i'd decided would be my last try I mangaed to find some grips on the rocks. The water was pounding white around my head so thick that I couldn't see anything other than the white blur or hear anything but the low roar. Using all four limbs carefully i managed to pull myself, crouching through the falls, I was right there was a space behind it that the water relented and I could stand up. after giving a few victory cries i headed back, this time standing, with my back against the wall bracing myself withmy legs, Kate took a pic of me like this and we headed back. so it was a really great experiece.
On the way back i almost lost the cameras to the water when I was walking with the water up to my chest and the bag above my head all of a sudden the rock i was walking on went into a 45degree angle and i had to tread water to the side and push the bag onto a ledge, alas my shoes were soaked.

Well we've had a great time, Ps i forgot to mention that on the nite trek i kinda fell into a spike covered tree and had a heap of spikes break off in my left hand and arm, luckily Claire is doing her 1st year of med school in cardiff next year and was a medic in the army for a while so she's been taking care of me, still some spikes to come out ho, i'm good, no infection, just a bit sore and stiff.

PPS Photos will come in a couple of days I got three spools developed and uploading a few shouldn't be too hard but it will be easier in Koh Samui.

Take care,
Mike

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The Trek Continued

2005-08-25T09:07:25Z

Well the trekking was great, after the waterfall, we had lunch (i think i'm repeating myself, oh well sorry for you) anyway eventually we actually started walking, uphill, uphill and more uphill. But it was good. Robin was a bit behind me and had a snake chase a frog across the path unfortunately he was a bit too slow to get a pic.
Yao and his friend faung?? were joined by Anan and Pan, two more guides, who knew the new trail we were taking and could help carry more gear. (by the way we were taking a new trail because floods the previous week had taken out one or two important bridges) so eventually after the long uphills and Robin seeing the snake we had a break, during this break pan who was leading the ppl in the front made me a bamboo cup, and some more walking sticks for people. After the break and after a few group photos we started on the downhill (btw i used up my last film on the waterfall so i'll get some pics of the trek from other people) the downhill was good Pan showed us some interesting stuff and yao also pointed some things out, we tried some jungle berries, which are very sour but make your next mouthful of water taste divine, we also tried some jungle chestnuts. we were shown edible mushrooms and bamboo bugs, had some more breaks on at the end of uphills, all very fun. eventually after lots of slipping and sliding on the moist clay soil we reached Karen village, the biggest tribe of the hill tribes (not the biggest village as a tribe is made of many villages) we bathed in the river, i amused some of the kids for a while but they couldn't stay long as it was beginning to get dark, then some of us had a shower after the swim, then came dinner time, can't remember what it was but it was good, then we had some card games and magic tricks, learnt one of the tricks and helped keep the guise up when Geoff a very analytical guy started to see through it. The sleep was ok, one or two things woke me up during the night but hey it was all good in the end. the next day started with breakfast, boiled eggs, toast and pineapple aswell as good tea and coffee, then more trekking. the second day was not nearly as hilly as the first but longer, we stopped for a while in a second karen village to visit a school, they were watching their one hour of tv a day and so rotated to come and get lollies/sweets from some people in the group who had bought for them. the next part of the trek went on for quite a while, mostly flat but not as interesting as the fisrt day but still really beautiful, we were walking along a trade route between the karen village and our next stop over. eventually we reached the big river that the village was on, I was quite hopeful it was near which it was but the shortish distance was quite a challenge, seeing as it was right next ti the river (like on a small cliff) and very very up and down and very slippery with some parts you had to jump across a small gap. When we reahed the village they were busy reconstructing from the damage wrougth by the flood, to our disay we had a huge walk uphill to our particular hut (Sherry apparently refused and was mocked a bit by the locals until she went up) I got changeda nd went for a swim, only to be sorely dissapointed as the riverbed was FULL of rocks and moving really fast, not any fun for swimming, we ended up just lying about for the most part. After my swim i went to go help the villagers with reconstruction but there really was nothing for me to do so i headed up the hill to our hut, but my bag away, got changed and had a Thai massage. We had quite a few of the village women waiting to give massages to weary trekkers and i took up the offer for 200 baht (about 6 dollars) Oh my word that was the best most insanely good massage ever, with some of my ligaments the endorphins rushing through me must have been bumper to bumper. After a while we had a pre-dinner snack, tofu and flour chips with a sweet chilli sauce, those were REALLY good, then dinner was awesome, but i had a bit of sunstroke and dehydration so Kate gave me some re-hydration powder which took care of that, I helped yao confuse everyone with 'black magic' (not actual magic just the trick) theni hit the sack. nicole came and woke me up to get me under the mosquito net properly because i hadn't bothered with it as the others were still up. theni slept quite welluntil dawn whereuponi was woken by two evil roosters rigthunder where we were sleeping, (houses were on stilts) so I go up and chased them away and went back to bed, and didn't sleep that well but slept some more. then it was up and packing after breakfast, getting ready for bamboo rafting.
Bamboo Rafting was GREAT, our rafts were about 5m long and 1m wide, made completely of bamboo from the raft itself to the strips of bamboo used to tie it together. We would steer it by punting with bamboo poles. on our raft we had yao and faung?? doing most of the steering with Robin and I helping out. We had our first rapid after the other boat crashed due to under turning and hit a bigish rock head on, but no injuries nad the raft was fine, so they pulled over and most of the ppl got out and walked around, robin and I stayed on the raft to help get us throught the rapid (yao and Faung could probably have managed but could see we wanted the adrenilane rush and let us 'help' man was that cool or what.
The next rapids were great too everyone was on the raft, all the non-punters were sitting down and because of the turbulance and speed the raft got swamped at one point and some ppl almost got washed off, it was soo cool, we all wanted to do that one again, at one point we were about 15cm from a huge dip in the river which would have nailed us badly.
The next rapid was the BIG insane one, navigating it in a kayak would have been quite easy but in a 5m long raft, not so easy. especiallly when the bamboo pole you are using isn't purchasing on anything, so since we only had on person athe back keeping us from rocks we slammed in the wrong side of one, the front of the raft with all our bags rode up the rock, while the back got dragged underwater and hooked into the ground. no the raft is almost perpendicular to the flow of water and the bamboo poles are humming like a v8 in idle because of the water flowing in between them the other team made it through ok and stopped to help us, we unloaded all the bags (once we swam ashore) and started trying to get the raft free, eventuall just after i climbed over it and others pushed it disloged, luckily some one maaged to get aboard with a pole for punting and pushed it ashore, we loaded up, repaired and carried on. after rafting we had lunch and climbed into our transport, a songathauew or something like that, basically a converted ute/bakkie with a roof over the back and seats along the two sides, quite fun to travel in. anyway after a long, bumpy ride we get back to our hotel and check in, then we had some free time and went out for dinner, the night market and partying which was great, yao certainly knows some good spots. so we got back late, had a day of either thai cooking or a bike tour (i opted for the latter whichw as way cheaper) and got very stressed and angry because we arrived back at the hotel like 3 min before we had to be there. then a 14hour train ride to bangkok. This morning we headed out to the floating market which the part we saw wasn't realy floating and was pretty much the worst goods market we'd seen, so we weren't very satisfied but hey it was only 250bhat each so not a big loss, and we all had a nap in the car there. ok my fingers are starting to and the spelling and punctuation mistakes must be rife, so cheers for now, Mike

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The Trek

2005-08-23T11:59:59Z

On the 21st we started a 3 day trek through the jungle near chang-mai to see some of the hill tribes and do some fun stuff.
We started in the morning and left the hotel for the 'local' market which was about an hour and a half away, so ge got the at about 12 probably, shopped around, bought some gifts for the hill tribes, some of us bought fruit and other supplies, then we headed into the mountains to stop at a waterfall, man it was so beautiful about 20-30m high and soooo powerful, so quite a few of us went swiming and got pounded by hte falls, it was incredible to feel so much power.
Then some more driving to the spot where we would have lunch, fried rice, then a bit more driving and we started trekking. we trekked for two more days and i'll fill the rest in tomorrow, sorry i've got to go to dinner now. So i'm till safe and well.
Mike

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Day 4

2005-08-19T06:10:16Z

So yesterday, after Michael (the german) and I went looking for stuff for his camera we came back to our hotel (not so great, pretty old but liveable) and waited for the others a bit, (we met our group leader, Yao, and he said to come back in an hours time) And so we met some more people from our group, there are 11 people in total plus Yao is 12 .
Yao - Thai Guide, grew up in the jungle in the north, very nice friendly on to it guy
Robby- American Student doing the same thing as me, taking a year off in between college and grad school. Robby played rugby in the states and has worked in Aussie i think and visited NZ
Geoff- British guy working at the bbc, compiling the different clips they need to air all their programmning.
Yuri - Finnish PC systems analyst (or something along those lines)
Hermina?? - Ex NZ living in England doing the same thing as me, she is also going to study English and Classics next year (crazy ay?)
Michael- German is going to study commerce net year
A German chick whose name I haven't caught yet
Sherry and Isaac - American couple finished Grad school
Kate - Australian working for the NSW gov with something to do with Bio/science
Nicole/Nikky - Australian has been travelling most of this yeat i think

So that's the group, i think we are goingto have a lot of fun together, btw only 7 of the 11 are doing the whole 18 days, the rest have only booked a smaller trip that does the same first part.
We might get joined by another smaller group for the second part aswell. We lso might get a different guide for the second half.

So last night after a bit of a briefing, we went out for dinner and into the really crzy touristy part of town( apparently 'the bech' begins there). the restaurant was really nice, i had crab in a yellow curry which was really nice, i also had a freshly pulp watermelon drink which was really yum (only 3NZD )

after that we went to an irish bar of all places and the beer was quite cheap and the cocktails a little bit cheaper than in NZ but not by much, I didn't drink but we all had a really good time dancing. they had two very good live bands, lots of the Chillis and heaps of those songs that everyone loves. so yeah all good.

This morning the plan was to go and see the grand palace, the reclining Bhuddah and take a canal tour, I started getting ready oly to find to my horror that my camera was missing I seached everywhere and got increasignly frustrated, (i' sue sue can still remember my 'angry trying to find something' act, not a happy place, anyway the group had to go and I had to pack (also I forgot about the 12pm checkout so i'd gone and washed clothes and hung them out to dry thinking i could take them down at 4pm an hour before we left, so i stayed to look for my camera and pack. I went everywhere looking for it, the restaurant, the bar, a stall Michael was looking at jeans in, eventually almost given up all hope i checked the internet cafe it went to yesterday and voila it was there waiting for me, so hopefully that means i won't loose it again.

I think i'll try catch a canal tour before getting back to the hotel at four (1ohour before our departure)

ok you all take care, hope your eyes are ok.

Mike

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Day 3

2005-08-17T10:16:31Z

Well I bought some boardshorts today, i wanted to buy these Thai style ones but i wasn't sure if i was tie-ing (aaah help me phillip of spelling) them up right as they are REALLY huge around the waist and you tie them to suit you so they are like one size fits all (americans included). In the end I just bought some standard nonames, well actually i lie, they are "hacker active" boardshorts hahaha, spose i'm a hacker now.

I also spent a LOT of ime looking for a surf shop, without sucsess, lots of "this way" "that way" "this way ten minute" "ahh what is suf" mmmm i think i'll have better luck at the coast?

I forgot to say yesterday that I went to go see some sights, This local told me that I should see "gloden buddah/bhudda?" and "black bhudda" and some other stuff because it was a special holiday, and it was free. so he found me a government tuk-tuk (much cheaper because of government funding for tourism) so i went to see the golden bhudda, which was quite impressive, 32m high 11m wide and covered from toenails to topknot in gold leaf, it is HUUUGE (oh it's also called the standing bhudda (most are sitting or lying down apparently) I also went to see the black bhudda but the temple it is in is under rennovation, but I did get shown a green bhudda, situated in a prayer room which was carver out of sodild emerald and slighty smaller than a real person, sitting cross-legged with a 20c high ruby bhudda in front of that.

By then i had the mean headache so i skipped the rest and went home.

hope you weren't too bored by the read

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