By this Author: tommy-gunn

Hi All,

Its been quite a while since i last updated my blog! So i thought it was about time i got up to scratch with my travels and filled you in on what I've been doing!

After Koh Tao my next stop was Chiang Mai which unfortunatley was at the very north of Thailand, unlike Ko Tao were it is deep south of Thailand. After 36 Hours of travelling catching a boat, saganthew and 2 trains myself and Adam had arrived in Chiang Mai at around 8 o'clock local time. Tired and extremley hungry our first action was to find a place to sleep for the night, trailing the streets of the city we stumbled upon our first choice of hostel, which was full but luckily had beds available the next day so we booked up with that hostel and headed over to another for the night, but at least we were sorted for the 4 days we were there for and paying a whooping $2 a night we'd had a right result!

On the first day in Chiang Mai after showering for the first time in 36 hours we decided to head out and do some cultural traveling stuff, this involved us walking around looking at the 200 and something temples that Chiang Mai had to offer! Deciding that we weren't gonna see all 200 of them we decided to pick the biggest ones we could find to have a look around. The temples themselves are absolutely incredible buildings covered head to toe in gold and with dragons and Buddhas sloted all over the place. Though saying that whilst every tourist was in awe of these great big sacred temples, i found myself outside the building calculating how many solar panels i could fit on the roof!! (what a geek!, but old habits die hard i guess, Cheers Solar advanced) Anyway after looking around 3 of the temples and just about to call it a day we bumped into this really friendly local who gave us some advice on the areas of Chiang mai that was really useful and he suggested that we go to see this temple a bit out of town but was made of complete silver (not normal apparently) and was supposed to be very sacred and important to the buddhist religion, and true to the locals word the temple was the best one by far, it wasn't very big but it was head to toe silver and we even got a glimpse of the monks building some of the silver artwork for the temple which was pretty cool! after that we headed back to our hostel for some food and to suss out the night life, which at first seem not exsistent as there were quite a lot of old people around but then we found this little square called the yellow square and that's were all the cool, hip travellers hanged out, so naturally i fitted in no troubles!

The next day we booked up for our elephant riding trip and outdoor bonaza so our second was spent mooching around in hammocks and playing pool ready for our early start for the next day. At 7am we got picked up by our Mini Bus to take us up to the jungle/forest whatever it was to start our day. The first thing we did was the elephant riding, which was amazing! we got about a 40 minute ride on the elephant scaling through the jungle and we even got a chance to stop and sit on the elephants neck and feed it which was just absolutely fantastic and something i will keep and remember for the rest of my life! anyway the fun didn't stop there next we got to zip line our way down the hill over 16 stations 1'800k long and that was pretty awesome too! then we got to go white water rafting which was OK but very mediaoce as the rapids were about 10m long and about 5 minutes in between so it could have been better. Finally on our way back to the city we stopped off at the blue lagoon close by which was just picture perfect and the water was so refreshing, that was a great way to round off what had been an pretty epic day!

The next day we met up with the Dutch people that we had met down in the Islands and spent the day chilling with and going out for dinner and then to the yellow square for a night on the Buckets which was great fun! and on a spur of the moment we decided to go visit Tiger Kingdom the next day and go man handle some Tigers!

Waking up the next day with a sore head and not much recollection after the 1st bucket of the night and a wrist band on me saying ' I am Lady Boy' i realised that i had agreed to go get in a cage with a tiger! my first thought was of excitement at the fact i was gonna get up close and personal with a tiger. That all changed as soon as i got to the center, deciding on what options i wanted to do I.E. have pictures with Big, Medium, Small and the cubs, i thought i go see what the tigers looked like and the first pen i saw was the one with all the Big Tigers then i thought "Shit! that tiger is really big!" After flicking between doing it and not doing it, i thought back to an old uni saying "Tommy Gun man the f**k UP!" so i did that pick my package and went in for it, luckily Adam had picked the same package as me so it weren't so bad and if it weren't for Adam keeping his calm i would of bottled it, i was freaking out! and my heart was racing like hell. But once i was in the cage with the Tiger i was surprisingly calm and it was just incredible to be up and close with such a beast! after the big tiger came the small tigers who were 5 months old and that was brilliant as they were so playful.

After that it was time to decide were to go next i had heard some really cool things about a place called Pai which was suppose to be a real hippy and relaxed town, but also i needed to be out of Thailand within 5 days so i decided to skip Pai and go back to it when i next visit Thailand and head to Luang Prabang, Laos by slow boat! which i booked up and set off the next day and at the same time parting ways with Adam who was going to Singapore. So once again i was on my own heading into another country!!

Tommy Gun
xx

Hi All,

Well It's been a few days since i write about Koh Phang Nan and that seems ages ago now!

From Koh Phang Nan, I moved onto Ko Tao with two guys i met in KPN they were Adam again from England and another guy called Kurtis from Cananda. We had all pre booked our scuba course in KPN at the same place which was Crystal dive resort. We left for the Island on Thursday morning by ferry which was probably the worst journey of the trip so far, still feeling the effects of the night before, the boat was hitting every single god gamn wave in the sea and felt like i was gonna bring up my whole entire internal organs in one go. But never the less i had survived the boat trip and arrived in Ko Tao before i knew it. After collecting our bags and getting off the boat we met our guy with the crystal sign who was gong to take us to the resort, expecting another 30 min - 1 hr car ride i could feel the victor meldru inside me building up! But to my complete surprise we walked a 100m down the beach and we had reached the reception of the dive resort. Once we arrived we got all our details and medical forms done for the diving and checked into our rooms before we started our course that very Afternoon.

That afternoon we got put into our groups and introduced to our instructors who would be teaching us for the next 4 days. My group consisted of 7 guys which was crap as i was hoping for some pretty girls to be with us, anyway we got introduced to our instructors who were a English girl called Sam and an American Bloke called Scott from Texas who was built like a tank! Shortly after meeting the instructors we got stated on our course, first we had to do the theory side which as you can imagine was dull and not how i planned my afternoon, but that was OK as we got it all done and that allowed to get in the water for all of the next day.

The next day came and it was an early start for us at 8am. 8.30am and we were starting to learn how to prepare all our scuba equipment before we entered the water, after repeating the process 5 times we were done and ready to jump in the pool to learn the scuba skills that would allow us to go deep in the sea, the skills went by really quickly and was all really easy and surprised how basic it was how to learn to scuba dive. After the skill learning it was back into the classroom the final test, if we passed it we were allowed to go on the boat to dive sites. I passed with 90% so it meant i was all good to dive the next day!

Next day came and it wasnt such as early start but i was up at 9am ready to pack all my stuff and get on the boat for my first dive in the sea. It took about 30 minutes to get to the dive site and 5 minutes before we arrived we got suited up and ready so we could be first ones off the boat. we jumped in off the boat and headed to the front of the boat for our first descent underwater! before i knew it i was sinking to the bottom with the rest of my group and it was awsome! once we got to the bottom we had a few skills test to do to show we were capable of scuba diving in the sea at a depth and then after that we got to swim around the reefs which was absolutley beautiful! the colours of the reef and the fish were so vivid and the feeling you expereince whilst swimming around all these tropical fish is absolutley amazing! the best expereince ever. Anyway we had another 3 dives over two days before we finished and they all sort of followed the same pattern and it was a brilliant two days. So good infact that i decided to stay on for another 3 days and do my advanced scuba diving course!

The advanced course was without doubt the best decision i have made since deciding to go travelling. The course was allowed a lot more freedom and taught you better skills like navigation etc. so you could be more independent. We kept the same instructors for the course which was good as i'd got to know the two guys really well over the 4 days, and it made the course a lot more relaxed, also we were joined by two norwegian girls which was defintley an added bonus i must say! The course exsisited of 5 dives over 2 days. 2 dives were compulsory which was the deep dive and the navigational skills dive, but then we got to pick 3 other dives from a list, we all picked to do the night dive, the buoyancy skills dive and a naturalist dive. The three dives worth talking about were the deep dive, night and naturalist dives, but the deep dive site conditons were poor and visibilty was only 2 metres so you couldnt see anything at all which was a shame but we got to dive to 30m which was prety cool. The naturalsit dive was cool as we got to identify all the fish and coral life we saw on the dive, on that dive in particualr we saw barracudas, bat fish, nemo fish, a huge grouper and the best by far was seeing a turtle! and it doesnt stop their the turtle came out from it nest and swam right in front of my face asd was literally inches away from em as we swam together, was soo cool! The best dive i did though was the night dive, it was the most awsome expreince i have ever done and the marine life at night is just show much bigger, i saw stuff like stingrays and big schools of barracuda, my words cannot describe how amazing it is so im not gonna bother doing that!

Anyway i finished my course on the tuesday and by wednesday i was back on a train to Chiang mai which is where i am currently now, safe and sound, and still having the time of my life! so till the next blog goodbye.

'Keep it real, Ian Beale'
Tommy Gun
xxx

Hi All,

Soory for the delay in updating my blog, but the last week i have been very busying becoming and advanced scuba diver and partying hard in the evening so as you can understand i ahvnt had much free time lol. Anyway this blog will be about my time in Koh Phang Nan and the infamous Full moon Party.

I arrived on the island of Koh Phang Nan around the 5th feb local time 13:00, and soon got to my hostel and checked in stress free (thank god). Anyway the hostel was owned by a french guy called David and he pretty much owned every shop and Hostel on the stretch off the road we were living on. The hostel itself was called Dancing Elephant and was not to bad but had plenty of Beds so was a good sign to meet people. Anyway later that day i bumped into a guy called Adam who i met in Bangkok and had also travelled down for the FMP, so it was good to see a familiar face.

Later that day i ventured to the beach to see what the crack was for partying at first i was like nice sea, ok whitesands and then just rubbish everywhere near the bars so i didnt know quite what to make of it! anyway night time came and i quickly got on it with Adam from BKK and was chilling with some changs when we met this Dutch couple called niels and Gada, who were lovely and ended up drinking with us in the bar 'same same' later on about 12;00 we ventured the beach, were there it was.... clubbing heaven hit me smack in the face! on the beach it was alive crazy bars everywhere people dancing and a shed loads of fire jugglers and fire skipping ropes! it was also the first time i had my first bucket, for those of you who dont know what a bucket it is bascially a childs plastic bucket filled up with a bottle of spirit (whisky) a mixer of your choice (coke) and then concentrated red bull, which may as well be speed as it sends you to the moon and back. Anyway i had my first bucket and that was my memory of the first night soon gone after a bucket.

Anyway most days sort of followed the same pattern, wake up with a bad hangover, head to the beach chill out then back to hostel for a quick nap and then uv paint up and get on it!

Koh Phang Nan is basically the party island of Thailand were it is 24/7 partying. The FMP itself was just ridicoulous for that one day everyone just goes for it hell for leather and at night the beach is double in partygoers and is absolutley mental! Worth noting there are loads of Americans at the party and this only increases my hate for the country and the arrognat wankers they are, though some of the girls are hot! but if you ignore them there are loads of scandinavian women who are absoltuley unreal and are by far my favourtie race of women!

I almost forgot as well but there is aplace on the beach of Koh Phang Nan called the mushroom mountain, which for those who have gone know what im on about an those who dont seriouslt need to visit as it is one of the most amzing nights ive ever had there.

Anyway thats Koh Phang Nan really, i'll update on Koh Tao tomorrow which is defintley worth reading as it was my fav place by far out of the two islands

Take Care

Tommy Gunn
xxx

Well after 13 hours of travelling by plane and succesfully negotiating the streets of bangkok i was able to check in to my hostel in bangkok. The hostel itself was actually really nice for $4 a night and was perfect for the time i was there, anyway shortly after arriving and having a nap to try and get rid of some of the jet lag i was out on my first night in bangkok!

I managed to have a chang beer and pad thai noodles for all of $2!! in a restaurant which was crazy and bloody nice. after that i took a walk down the night market onto the khoa san rd which i can only describe as something like the malia club strip, packed to the brim with street food vendors, bar and night clubs. i quickly discovered that the irish bar was the place to be and got stuck in, i was quite nervous at first but i met two guys from eastbourne of all places and got chatting, had a few beers with them until we called it a night at 2 o'clock.

On my 2nd day in bangkok waking up with a sore head, i braved the heat and tried to do a bit of sightseeing/walking but got bored quite quickly as there aint much to do in bangkok to be honest, except get drunk!! so in the evening with some of the people from my hostel we went to the muay thai (thai boxing) championship fight night, which was brilliant!! The atmosphere was brill and the thai people were going nuts for the underdog every time! After a few drinks and some brutal fighting we headed back to the khoa san Rd and to the irish bar were lots of chang beers towers and cocktails were consumed resulting in a night out clubbing! which was awsome and very messy!

on my 3rd and final day in bangkok waking up with a very bad hangover and a recollection of pretty much nothing! I chilled out around the hostel with everyone and prepared myself for my trip down to the islands of Koh Phang Nan on an overnight sleeper train. The sleeper train was an experience to say the least but was ok as i slept pretty much the whole way.

So now im in Koh Phang Nan writing this blog with a stinking hangover in 36c, sweating my tits off! but last night was the full moon party which was epic! but ill tell you all about that next time, were ill be writing from the island of koh tao.

Tommy Gunn x

HI All,

Well this is my first entry on the blog and in roughly 15 hours time i will be getting up and shooting off to heathrow to catch my first flight to Bangkok, GET IN!

But currently i am packing and its such a harder task when mum is not around. Currently the packing is keeping me occupied from the excitement of the trip and also the realisation that i will be travelling by myself for 5 months which still hasn't properly set in yet.

Anyway i've got to get packing, watch this space as there will be plenty more to come!

Bon Voyage people

T-gun
x