Karin Hotel Udon Thani

... be novel but not very safe, our suspicions were confirmed when one of the pair mentioned that someone had borrowed the tuk tuk from them and ended up in hospital with some horrible injuries. Still, you've got to hand it to them, a novel way to travel. We also met the lovely Felix from Germany, travelling on his bicycle. He had arrived on the early morning bus and was waiting for his room to be cleaned and we were having breakfast and getting ready to leave, but not before ...

... en France on relativise quand même ). Il faut bien que je fasse la différence entre la technique de massage Laossienne et celle thailandaise non ? oui Mik Mik ! Super excuse ! Je suis ensuite rentrée dans ma chambre qui pue et j'ai demandé à en changer car ça sent vraiment le renfermé et je n'ai pas de fenêtre, il fait une chaleur épouvantable et cela fait deux nuits que je sue et dors mal ! Et bien juste en face il y a une super chambre avec fenêtre, air ...

... ever seen with a huge owl perched on top eye balling everyone and next to us was a 3ft alligator in a 2ft fish tank!! We felt like we hsd just walked into a film set for a horror flick! Suprisingly a really nice coach turned up and drove us through the night to get to Chiang Mai at 8am the next day. We were even given a snack which looked like a Happy Meal burger but had cream custard inside - tasted good though!

... a Colonel from the Lao Airforce. I had ducked out to grab a quick bite, and bring something back for Matt. I headed into the Chinese restaurant, sat down and tried to look inconspicuous with my book. When I was invited over to join a group. I couldn't refuse, as they just kept saying "you can't possibly eat alone", "you must join us", "we can practice our English". They were an interesting bunch, the colonel spoke 5 languages and had been an attache in the ...

... but at least the air-con was working on this one! On the down side, it was even slower than the last one, so I didn't get to my guesthouse until 7pm! Ok, rant over now. Everything after that was good! The guesthouse (www.mutmee.com) is lovely and the English man who runs it is so friendly and knowledgeable, he's been here 16 years, and I can see why. All the other guests seem really friendly too, and theres a massive ...

... a different dialect and have a unique culture. One of the culinary distinctions of the Issan is their fondness for bugs. Urai took us to a local market where we could get our fill of the creepy crawl critters. Of course they weren't creeping and crawling when we ate them, they were crispy critters. Paul is a retired professor from a Japanese University with an MA in English language and an MA in English Literature. Now he writes college textbooks for Japanese students. So ...

... logical step of ordering a pad thai in thailand (to compare with the 1100 consumed in Sydney). Notably, we didn't order just pad thai of course... but also a pork belly stirfry and soup and... and... We'll be rejoining the West a little heavier as long as most meals cost a dollar yet could comfortably command $20-30 if served in Sydney. And after a late evening bike ride we are sure to leave room for sticky rice and mango. Our bike riding skills have lost a bit of ...

... Its owners, Julian, a British guy and his thai wife Pao, have thought of just about everything you could want as a tired western backpacker in search of a little slice of home, and are really cool. As a tribute to and validation of how chill this place is, a mini-villa has sprung up around it, which includes a 7 day intensive yoga course center, a bookshop with internet, a floating restuarant and bar and an astrology/ tarot card reader, have ...

... we would be in Nong Khai around 1:30 and everything was looking good, we pulled into a bus station for what we thought was a loo stop. We asked the driver how long and he wrote 15 on a bit of paper, naturally we thought we had 15 minutes... On the way back from the loo we bumped into Josef, who we had met in Chiang Khan, who was catching the same bus, only to find out that 15 had ment 15:00. The bus ...

... Thai. So in Thailand, everyone starts talking Thai to Farida. Funny! She looks at them befuddled, and I wait for one of them to react. So, she's learning Thai. Which makes it better for me. Because when she tells the wait staff that "the meal was delicious, thank you", they respond in Thai (complimenting her accent, but not doing either party any good), Farida is back to saying that she's not Thai, she doesn't understand. But really ...