Far East 2012

Like I predicted, the morning went past while we slept our hangover away. Later during the day we walked around the nearby area, mostly hiding in a large shopping mall as it has been raining almost all day in here. And I mean really raining, heavy monsoon rain pouring down..

We also briefly visited Bangkok Art & Cultural Center to check out some photo exhibitions in there. Now in the hostel with not much to do, as going outside and getting totally soaked isn't sounding like a good option.

Just adding a blogentry to attach some pictures to. Haven't done much, just hit the Khao San Road for some beers and pictures during the evening. Now sleep, tomorrow hangover. :)

Moved to an another hostel as they now had free beds. Way more quiet location, but maybe even a bit too quiet.. Well, we can always take a taxi or some other method of transportation to more crowded areas during the evenings. At least this place has comfortable beds and AC in the room.

We reached Bangkok finally after the seven hours bus drive, checked into our temporary accomodation (the hostel which we will be using for the rest of our stay in here was full today) and had a beer. Our hostel is right on middle of Khao San Road, the bar street of Bangkok so.. It's not exactly a silent place. :p

Still on the way, already fed up with sitting in a bus... Although it's pretty comfortable. Now having a 30 minute food break at a local food court. Damn the local food.. Usually its not hot at all, but suddenly some restaurants surprise you. Mouth burning now...

Chumporn reached, by a speedboat from Koh Tao. Not much to say, a comfortable and fast ride, took about 1.5 hours. Next is the worst part, a seven hour bus ride..

Today we took our last dives around Koh Tao, or actually Timo did. As I'm on antibiotics and was not recommended to dive by the doctor I just snorkeled around and took a couple of pictures. According to the doctor that was ok to do.

Next some food, and then we will leave the island by a speedboat and a bus towards Bangkok. I'm pretty sure this is not the last time on Koh Tao, maybe we will return here just to dive for a week or so. It's relatively easy to reach the island via Bangkok anyway.

Blah, back on antibiotics again. As the flu symptoms continued and got a bit worse I visited a local doctor just to check if he thinks I need more medication or would it be nothing..

Well, the doctor put me back on antibiotics as there were still signs of inflammation in lungs, throat and inner ears.. Let's see if these will give more permanent effect this time.

More diving today, or well, trying to.. Around midday we boarded Drag Queen again and she took us to two different dive sites. I had some symptoms of minor flu in the morning, a bit sore throat and ears.. They were only minor, but while diving it was impossible for me to equalize the pressure of my left ear, so my diving was "slightly" limited, not being able to go deeper than a couple of meters.

Well, so much for diving today then.. Maybe better luck on Thursday morning. We also got hit by a huge monsoon rain while diving, it's now actually damn cold in here.. And on the boat it was warmer to jump to the sea with a snorkel than stay on the deck with wet clothes and massive amounts of rainwater pouring horizontally to the deck.

As we came back from the diving trip early enough, we rented a pair of scooters again and explored the island a bit, climbing to top of the mountains for nice views of the island.

There roads in here are mostly dirt roads in bad condition and extremely steep, so the driving was fun and challenging.. :)