Monday, 8th May 2006. Vientiane to Khon Kaen.

Up reasonably early today as we were crossing back into Thailand.  We took a wrong turn trying to find the right road, but finally found the Friendship bridge immigration post and began the proceedings. Oddly enough, at this border Thai Customs were more than happy to stamp our carnet, unlike when we crossed from Malaysia. After we had paid the toll for the bridge we made our way across on the left hand side of the road this time.  We made great time to Khon Kaen along the superb roads and settled into the Sopon Deema Hotel.  Spent the afternoon walking around the town.

Tuesday, 9th May 2006. Khon Kaen.

Today we sorted out all of the form to be sent back to Paul Gowen regarding the 2nd Carnet for Australia.  We then wandered around the market and drank a cold drink from a plastic bag filled with Ice - a new one for us!!!  

Wednesday, 10th May 2006. Khon Kaen to Sukhothai.

The journey began off well until we started to climb into the small mountains, When we were almost at the top the heavens opened and we saw some fantastic bolts of lightning and heard some bone shaking thunder.  The rain was so intense that I (Amy) had to sit with my face almost on the windscreen to enable me to see the road.  We pulled into a Tesco lotus on the outskirts of Phitsanoluk for a quick KFC and a bit shopping.  We found our hotel but couldn't find anywhere to park as there was a cycle race on, so we decided to carry on to Sukhothi.  This time we found a hotel with car parking.

Lovely sunny morning turns into.................A horrendous storm heading our way.

Thursday, 11th May 2006. Sukhothai.

Today we visited the Sukhothai Historical Park.  It is one of Thailand's most impressive world heritage sites, it includes remains of 21 historical sites and four large ponds within the old wall with an additional 70 sites within a 5km radius.  We wandered around Wat Mahathat taking in the impressive sight of 198 stupas and really large standing buddha's.  As the clouds began to darken we sat down and had a picnic, which was great.  We met a great couple who live in Australia, and they gave us some tips in what to see and do whilst were there.  We checked out some more of the sights but as it felt like 50 degrees we soon called it a day and got back to the hotel just before the storm hit.

Large standing Buddha    Our Picnic spot                         A happy chappy!

Friday 12th May 2006. Sukhothai

Another day spent around the ruins of Sukhothai - this time we drove around to some of the more distant sites which was nice as there were less people around and we had most of the places to ourselves. We were even able to drive down some tracks and right up to the ruins.

Driving around one of the old ruins.

Saturday, 13th May 2006. Sukhothai to Nan

When we were in the Cameron Highlands we met a French chap who told us that we simply had to visit Nan in Northern Thailand, so today we headed there. The scenery in the North is lovely - forested hills and paddy fields. Unfortunately the weather has certainly changed and once again it really chucked it down as we were driving along and we couldn't really see much of the scenery. When we arrived in Nan we were disappointed - it's just another medium sized Thai town - perfectly pleasant in it's way but in our opinion not really worth the drive to get here. Our guesthouse is pretty cool though - it's made of wood and everything in it is wooden as well.

Sunday, 14th May 2006. Nan

Walked around the town today. Of course things like the museum were closed as it was Sunday, so we ended up by the river where we admired the town's Dragon Boat.

The head on Nan's Dragon Boat.

Monday, 15th May 2006. Nan to Chiang Rai

From Nan we drove up to Chiang Rai, which is a really nice place right in the North of Thailand. Great roads to get here, good accommodation in the town and, if we were going to do some trekking into the hills a pretty good place to go from.

Tuesday, 16th May 2006. Chiang Rai

Another day, another town to wander around. Actually, we really liked Chiang Rai and had a nice time here, but we didn't really get up to anything interesting.

Wednesday, 17th May 2006 Chiang Ria to Chiang Mai

Once again it was raining when we left town, but as the roads are so good up here it doesn't really hinder us - in fact, it's actually quite nice to drive along in the coolness for once. We got to Chiang Mai with no bother at all and even managed to find the guesthouse that we'd booked over the internet - which turned out to be a right dump, so we walked out. We then spent another half hour driving around the city looking at other places to stay and eventually settled on the Lai Thai guesthouse as it had a car-park. In the evening we met up with Chris and Elke, who we had last seen in Islamabad. We had a lovely meal and then a few beers in a very funky roof-top bar whilst we swapped stories.

Chris, Elke and Amy in the roof-top bar.

Thursday, 18th May 2006. Chiang Mai

Spent today exploring the town which was good fun. In the evening we walked through the night market and met up with Peter and Linda, the New Zealanders who we last saw in Laos and had a fish and chip supper with them. 

Friday, 19th May 2006. Chiang Mai

Busy old day today! We were up early this morning and drove out to a place called Bo Sang, which is famous for making paper umbrellas. Amy had seen some umbrellas in Laos and wished that she had bought one so we were on a mission to find ones that were just as nice. We pulled into one shop and watched them making the umbrellas from scratch which was interesting. Unfortunately we couldn't find one that was the same as the ones in Laos, but of course we didn't come back empty handed. No sooner had we got back than we were out again - this time to the cinema with Chris and Elke to watch the Da Vinci code - not a terrible film, but not great either. When we got out of the cinema we got a phone call from our friends Nick and Richard who we were meeting this afternoon at the airport, so off we went to pick them up before heading out for some dinner, and drinks.

Drinks with friends, Richard, Chris, Elke, and Nick.

Saturday, 20th May 2006. Chiang Mai

All four of us drove out of town today to the Maesa Elephant camp. With the advent of modern machinery and the Thai government limiting the amount of logging that can take place in the region, there was a problem of redundant elephants and their mahoots - the Elephant camp was set up to give the elephants something else to do and provide a source of income for the mahoot. The place is very well organised and is home to over 70 elephants. We watching the elephants put on a show which included them playing football and painting pictures and then went on an hour long elephant ride through the jungle. Ever since Nepal Amy has had a thing for Elephants and there were tears in her eyes when we visited a 2 month old baby elephant in the nursery - I'm sure that had the keeper turned his back we would have been leaving with the baby in the back of the Landy!

Elephant painting                                      Elephant football.

On the trail                                                     Amy gets a hug from her new friend...

After Elephant Camp we had lunch at a really nice place up in the hills before heading back into Chiang Mai. On the way we stopped off at the Land Rover garage so we could buy a new oil filter as soon it'll be time to change the oil again. To our surprise they said that they didn't have any!! Unfortunately that just about sums up our experience with Land Rover garages - with the exception of Sigma Motors in Pakistan - we have found them to be rubbish. How the company can market the vehicles as go anywhere adventure wagons and then fail to ensure that when you do need a part that you can get it from the dealers is beyond me. You certainly wouldn't get a Toyota dealer telling you that they didn't have an oil filter for your Land Cruiser! Once back in town we headed out for an open air supper before finding ourselves sitting in a street-bar until 2:30am drinking a variety of cocktails.

Sunday, 21st May 2006. Chiang mai

A very, very late start today. Had brunch whilst it rained then went for a stroll around the old part of town, looking at the Wats etc.

Monday, 22nd May 2006. Chiang Mai to Sukhothai.

We got a reasonably early start today to make it to Sukhothai for lunch.  As soon as we had woken up it began to rain and unfortunately it didn't stop all day.  We arrived at the old city which we had visited previously, but as it was still raining we only stayed a short time.  Sukhothai has had a lot of rain since we were here last time as Wat Mahathat was partially submerged blocking off some of the paths!  We checked into the same hotel but chose the standard rooms (mistake - bedbugs!!!) which left a lot to be desired.  A lovely dinner at the dream cafe though.

Slightly cramped in the back.          Enjoying dinner.

Tuesday, 23rd May 2006. Sukhothai to Kanchanaburi.

Not may people looking forward to today's journey as the weather was looking as though it might brighten up causing the Landy to heat up like an oven.  We made great progress but were stopped twice by the police 1st time was to make sure that we new which way to go to get to our destination, and the 2nd time we had to pull right off the road and up to the police station where they told Mark that he had to wear his seatbelt, strange thing was that they didn't even mention the fact that I was sat on the cubby box between the front seats with no seat belt or that the lads in the back had no belts either!  We eventually pulled into Kanchanaburi and checked out a few guesthouses before settling on the Ploy guesthouse.  In the late afternoon we all walked around to the Burma-Thailand railway museum, where you can read all about the history behind the construction of the railway, a very interesting museum.  

Wednesday 24th May 2006. Kanchanaburi.

Today we made our way up to the famous 'Bridge over the river Kwai'.  The lonely planet said that it was a 500m walk but in reality it was 3km!  We browsed the two museums either side of the bridge and then made our way through the Japanese crowds to the bridge, I mean can you believe it Japanese tourists at the Kwai bridge I (amy) personally thought that it was very odd especially when they pushed you out of the way to ensure that they could have their pictures taken on the bridge!  Anyway grumble over, we all had a great day and enjoyed an fantastic dinner.

The Bridge over the River Kwai                  Amy and the Bridge.

Thursday 25th May 2006. Kanchanaburi to Hua Hin.

A reasonably easy day today, and we arrived at Hua Hin with no bother.  We stopped at the traffic lights which stated that we had 102 seconds to wait until they changed, thats when we noticed that the coppers were watching us from across the road, they didn't take long to wander across to us ad demand to see Marks drivers license, this was produced and they told us to pull over and wait.  Mark questioned this and they told him that we didn't have any tax, Mark explained that we didn't need any as it was an English car, the copper didn't understand, so we pulled over and flashed the carnet, this sorted things out and we were on our way again.  We pulled into the Hyatt Regency, and were chauffeured up to the door from the car in a golf buggy how cool are we!

Our friend Nick Nebard checked us all in and we were then shown to our rooms, they were connecting rooms with lockable doors in between.  I was gob smacked when I saw how gorgeous the room was, and when we went down to the swimming pool I again was amazed, the pool was fantastic.  We all put our stuff down onto a sun lounger and plunged into the pool, utter blissfulness.  We spent the remainder of the day from noon until 5pm soaking up the glorious sunshine before heading into town for a slap up meal. Today we also learnt about the severe flooding in Northern Thailand - especially around Sukhothai where we were only a few days ago...another lucky escape!

The swimming pool facing the sea.             Happy sun bathers.

Friday 26th and Saturday 27th May 2006. Hua Hin.

Two days spent relaxing by the pool having such a fantastic time: good food, great sun, fab company what more could you ask for?

Amy riding down the hotel slide              Mark crashing into the pool.

Sunday, 28th May 2006. Hua Hin.

Today we said goodbye to Nick and Richard who are travelling up to Bangkok.  We were supposed to be going but have changed our plans, we will spend another couple of days in Hua Hin getting ready before driving straight to the port in Malaysia.

Monday, 29th May 2006. Hua Hin.

Put in some laundry sat on the beach for a couple of hours and have spent the afternoon updating the website and sorting out our Australian Visas.

Tuesday, 30th May 2006. Hua Hin.

Another day spent in lovely Hua Hin, soaking up the sun.

Wednesday, 31st May 2006. Hua Hin to Chumphon.

An easy driving day today, going back the way that we had come a couple of months ago. Stayed in the same hotel for the same bargain price!

Thursday, 1st June 2006. Chumphon to Surat Thani.

Today we headed for Hat Yai, with the expectation of crossing the Thailand/Malaysian border early tomorrow.  We were not going to have a good day...

We must have been driving for at least an hour and a half,  we were approaching some traffic lights in a small town, I (Amy) was driving and slowly decreased speed in the hope that the lights would change just as I got there, they did, luck was in, the only problem was that the clutch decided to die right there on the highway.  I had no choice but to roll to a stop where I had to stall Hector in 5th gear as I couldn't knock him into neutral.  We took deep breaths and decided that we would try to bleed the hydraulic system like in Laos, however as the engine and the exhaust pipe were burning hot we had to wait for them to cool down. Whilst we were waiting a guy whom we had met briefly at dinner last night appeared in his pick-up, asking what was wrong and could he do anything to help.  Luckily his companion was Thai and they were told by a local that there was a mechanic 5km down the road, so David drove to the mechanic's and returned 10 minutes later saying that somebody was coming to help us.  David had to go as he had to be in Phuket that evening - we were very grateful to him and his companion for their help.  10 minutes later a mechanic arrived and Mark began to explain what had happened. The mechanic couldn't fix it on the side of the road, so called his friend to come and tow us to their garage. A large pick-up arrived and we were towed to the garage not 100m away.  They spent 2 hours trying to fix the problem, which we all thought was a leaky master cylinder. They did the best that they could and after 200baht we were off again.

Not 1 hour later and 50km from a place called Surat Thani the clutch gave up the ghost again. Once again we rolled to a stop in front of the traffic lights and pulled up on the hard shoulder. This time we enlisted the help of the police at the near-by petrol station and they called a mechanic, who bled the system by the side of the road and then charged us 300baht.  This took another 2 hours, making it 4:30pm.  We were on our way again but very aware that the clutch desperately needed to be fixed by people who knew Landy's or who had the correct parts.  We finally arrived into Surat Thani at 17:30 luckily with no further mechanical problems - it's very nerve-wracking driving though the middle of a Thai town in rush hour, knowing that the clutch could go at any second!

After we had settled into our hotel room, we found the nearest internet cafe and checked out how our Australian Visa applications were going. As if today couldn't get any worse, we found out that as we have been out of the UK for so long and have spent over 3 months in places like Iran, Pakistan and India, we have to have chest X-Rays to show that we haven't picked up TB! Yet more delays and admin to wade through! We decided to get ourselves to Penang tomorrow whatever happens - there's a hospital there where we can get our X-Rays done, and a Land Rover garage where we can get both the Master and Slave cylinder replaced.

The first mechanic who tried to fix Hector.           Our filling pot noodle dinner.