Back two weeks

Well, we've been back for two weeks now, so thought we should upload the final few pictures and post the last update.

We had a great time, anyway, and are quite sad to be back.

So, the final update - We stayed in an a pretty average hotel near to Lamai in Koh Samui, called the Lamai Buri Resort. It's was okay, but not great. We wanted to stay somewhere really nice as we were going home in a few days, so we cut short our stay there (staying only 5 days rather than 8), and moved onto a much nicer hotel called the Peace Resort near to the north of Koh Samui, in a resort called Bo Phut.

After that, we went to Koh Samui airport, travelled to Bangkok, then onto Dubai in the same day. We stayed for a night in Dubai, then travelled to Birmingham, where it was cold and rainy.

The End.

Oh dear...

Oh dear... It's time to go home.

Beach...

We've just spent 6 days on the beach and by the pool at Khao Lak. We're off to Ko Samui tomorrow which is an island - Khao Lak is a beach resort on the mainland.

We've added a few more pictures but they're not very interesting....

Adam

Lots of places since last update...

So, where have we been since the last update? Lots of places...

We went from Sydney to the Blue Mountains for a couple of nights and saw a few nice things and did a leg ruining walk that included going down 800 ridiculously steep steps.

Then it was back to Sydney for a night, where we stayed at the super nice 5* Radisson Plaza Hotel. It was absolute luxury... Calm, quiet, fantastic bed. Just lovely and relaxing, but in the middle of the city. No public transport rides into the city - Just everything on our doorstep (most of the time, we've been staying a little way out of town in order to keep costs down).

Then an 8 hour flight onto Bangkok - When we got upgraded by Emirates to first class!!!! Wow!!!! Lie flat beds, 21 inch personal TV, food on demand. Very very very nice.

So, here we are in Bangkok. To be honest, it's a bit of a culture shock after the Western nature of New Zealand and Australia. People everywhere, car fumes, tuk-tuks zipping around. So far we've just wandered around near to the city centre, founds lots of very air-conditioned shopping centres, Louise had her hair cut, got a boat up the river, figured out how to use the superbly air-conditioned Skytrain public transport system, went to the Khao San road and seen the Reclining Budda (a very big 45 metre long gold Budda statue).

Still lots more we want to see... But only got tomorrow before we fly off to Khao Lak on Wednesday. That's when we stop sightseeing and lie on the beach for 6 days...

Tasmania and Sydney

We've added some new photos of a wildlife park in Tasmania, and some pictures of Sydney. It feels really hot here at the moment, thank goodness for air conditioning.

We're off to the Blue Mountins tomorrow. They are the mountains west of Sydney, take about 2 hours to get to, then off to Thailand on Saturday. Done lots of sightseeing around Sydney, all the usual tourist stuff...

Having a lovely time.

Louise and Adam.

Arrvied in Australia...

We're in Australia.

New photo's added of Melbourne and Tasmania... Off to Sydney soon.

Adam.

End of New Zealand.

Since the last post we've moved from Fox Glacier to Wanaka, then onto Queenstown.

Wanaka was really nice, a small touristy town on the edge of a really nice lake. We were supposed to go on a plane trip to Milford Sound from here, but it kept getting cancelled due to bad weather over the mountains. As a result we went to Wanaka Puzzling World instead (?) and saw the leaning tower of Wanaka, a big maze and a room of faces that appear to follow you as you move. Adam also went on a river jet up the Clutha river, which he really liked...

Next we moved onto Queenstown. Still couldn't fly to Milford Sound, so we went to a bird sanctuary and saw a few Kiwis and Keas (worlds only alpine parrot - Famed for liking to chew rubber, especially windscreen wipers off cars) and Adam did a bungy jump :-) whilst Louise went to a Yoga class.

...and that was New Zealand. Flying to Melbourne tomorrow.

Christchurch to Wanaka...

Hello,

More photos - Hopefully they should appear in some sort of order, so that the latest New Zealand ones appear at the end of the slideshow.

These cover Christchurch, travelling over Arthur's Pass to Hokitika (where we stayed in a nice log cabin my the sea), down to the pretty tourist trap called Fox Glacier (where we encountered a bad tempered motel owner and did a glacier walk), then the journey on to Wanaka (via the Blue Pools and a wobbly bridge).

There aren't any photos of them, but we have experienced a couple of combined single lane road and rail bridges. These are nasty. You just have to hope the train isn't coming and drive.

Some more...

Sorry for the delay in updating things....

We lost the camera after Taupo and had to buy a new one - So I'm afraid we haven't got any photos of things there. However, We have uploaded another 15 or so into the New Zealand album (on the right).

Since the last update, we've travelled from Rotorua to Taupo. Taupo was nice, a lakeside touristy place (imagine Windermere with nicer weather), waterfalls... ... Then onto Art Deco Napier for a couple of nights where we saw lots of 1930's buildings.

Finally, we went to Kaikoura on the train and did some dolphin swimming and Albatross watching.

We're currently in Christchurch (no photos of here yet though), just meandering around at the moment.

Auckland and Roturua

Some new photos of Auckland and Rotorua (thermal/volcanic area). Click on the New Zealand photo gallery on the right.

Arrived at Auckland on Sunday, feeling very tired. Followed a bizarre BA Jet Lag calculator, which told us to sit in bright light between 3pm and 5:30pm that day, then dark for a another couple of hours, then to get up and sit in bright light between midnight and 2:30am... ... Anyway, this seems to have actually worked for Adam (but not for Louise).

Wandered all round Auckland on Monday and Tuesday morning - Visited the SkyTower (see photos), parks, museum etc.

Rotorua yesterday afternoon and today. Geysers and mudpools.

First night in a hostel tomorrow... Not too sure what we're going to make of it.

Having a lovely time but walking too far, about 10 miles a day....

Adam and Louise

Dubai..

Wasn't planning to update this soon, but as we've had to use the internet for other reasons, we thought we'd post a few pictures of Dubai.

Adam.

Just for the record...

We've decided that we aren't going to update this diary particularly often - So, it's not really going to tell you that much, I'm afraid (sorry!).

The reason is that we don't want to spend our entire holiday sitting in front of a computer - Which I'm sure you'll understand.

Sure, we'll upload some pictures, and will put a quick message on here to let you know that we've done this, but we aren't going to write pages and pages (we'd prefer to tell you in person when we get back!).

Hope that's okay.

Adam and Louise.

First post...

Here it is, the first post we're making to this web page.

Hope it works okay...

Here's a picture of some bantams: