TravelStream™ news feed for member gazlu on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/gazlu en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Mon, 29 Sep 2008 06:16:31 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1222681260/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1222681260/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1222681260/tpod.html Mon, 29 Sep 2008 06:16:31 -0400 Gaz and Lu's adventure's in wonderland

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Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia

Our Indo days are comming to and end, but what a time it has been!

Lu left you last in nusa Lombongan (best right handers of my life at shipwrecks! Tom, thinking of you ;0) since then we have done loooooads, we headed back to Kuta Bali as we had Patch, Hels and Mikey coming over for 10 days of fun in the sun. And fun it was.

It happened also to be Lupis birthday so once again we abandoned the travelers budget (seems we've done that a lot) and pimped it up with the guys for a week or so. we moved our packs into a plush hotel resort and traded the nasi gorang and bintang for steaks and cocktails, epic!

Needles to say with the guys here we had a blast, lots of surfing shannanagns, massages and way to much booze in some of the trendyist bars in bali. we also tried to squeeze a little culture in and hired a big old people carrier and headed off. we stopped in Ubud and both me and mikey got bitten by a monkey, the foaming at the mouth hasn't hit yet so think were safe. also, went down to ulawatu but the swell wasn't playing so chilled on the beach.

when the guys left me n lups went on the wander again. headed over to the gili islands off of the coast of Lomboc. Heaven! tiny islands you can walk round in an hour, no cars or motor vehicles so you get around by horse cart. best sunsets yet and the diving was fantastic. Needless to say we ended up staying on the islands for a while.

we then made the short trip over to lomboc and stayed at singigi whilst we prepared for our mountain adventure.

Mt rinjani at 3700 meters seemed doable, we found an agent that arranged a guide and porters and booked 3 days on the mountain! THE HARDEST THING EVER! but one of the best things we have done since leaving home. we climbed for 7 hours the first day through mountain forest and steep rooty hills, never sweated so much in my life, however our poor porter was doing the same with a stick across his back balancing on each end everything we would need for 3 days, food, water, tents cooking pans, allsorts, weighing in at around 40kg! and he climbed in flip-flops, insane.

the second day we left basecamp 3 at 4:30 am and began the 12 hour climb in the dark inorder to catch sunrise on the crater rim, it was well worth it. we then climbed down into the crater toward the lake and volcano at the bottom. this had an average gradient of around 50-70 degrees and was hard going.

At the bottom we swam in a Lake at over 2000ft which was verry cold followed by a bath in the hot, waterfall springs which was hotter than any bath i would usually take (not that ive had on in 6 months). the climb back to the rim was pretty hard core and after a good feed of noodles fresh veg, rice, chicken and pineapple we slept, alot.

The final day was the descent, the whole experience was unreal and some of the best views I have ever seen. My legs feel like a dead mans now though.

Since then we have been back in Bali, thankfully the surf has been pumping so we have been all go.

Our indo adventure comes to an end in 2 days. Then the Oz adventure begins................

Irene and Hugh, we cant wait to see ya next week get a bottle of wine on ice ;)

To everyone else, as always miss and love ya loads.

speak soon
Gaz n Lu

xxx
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Nusa Dua, Bali, Indonesia

Good morning Vietnam! I'm sure everyone that has been there has said that the first morning they wake up there, so I didn't want to break the trend...!

Ah, it has been quite a while since a messenger pigeon has winged it's way to you.... so here is what has happened since we left Koh Tao last month!

Went to the July full moon party on koh phang ngan which is a tick the box thing you have to do if you're in the area - it was properly crazy - neon painted dogs running around and too many 'special' milkshakes sitting on the mountain side - but we did see a full circle rainbow round the moon at some point, and had this verified by someone responsible, so all in all prety good night!

Then hotfooted it to koh phi phi for some R and R and diving - it was pretty stormy and rainy as it was monsoon there, but was nice to see the chilled out side of thai beaches, and met with some people we half knew from Uni so hung out with them as well. On the last night there we met a crazy swede called Troll who collected people's names, and Gary in his less than sober state was convinced he collected souls, so we left the next day....

And so to Cambodia for the somberest part of the trip so far. Started it in Angkor Wat, and saw the awesome temples, especially the ones with massive tree roots all over them... hooked up with some English guys who were doing the same cambo/vietnam route so we had friends for 2 weeks and I didn't have to pretend to read cambodian newspapers when i got bored of gaz's ramblings!...(only joking Tina!)
From here went to phnom penh to the genocide museum which was really shocking and sad - no glossy billboards like you'd get in the U.K - just big rooms with torture beds in them and a photo on the wall of the last inhabitant - all gruesome stuff. We topped off this with a visit to the killing fields - they have built a shrine to the dead there, and it is a see through monolith filled with skulls form 8000 vicitms of the khmer regime - just a tiny portion of those still in the field surrounding the area. On the lighter side of cambodia, the people were super friendly, and they have amazing croissants for breakfast!

And so onto 'Nam! Went straight to Saigon, which is a crazy busy city - we took a motorbike ride of death and even our 'experienced' drivers were screaming which was pretty worrying! decided to rely on the good old legs after that - not ours but the grandad aged dudes peddling us around on their cyclo taxis of course...
Topped up our horrific history levels with a visit to the war remnants museum form the vietnam war - it used to be called the 'American atrocities museum' and you can see why as it is chock full of pictures and stories of the fall out of chemical warfare, and when we got to the real life pickled siamese babies in a jar we decided we'd soaked enough of that up...
So onto the 'fun' war part - crawling throught the tunnels the real life vietcong used - they are about 0.8m wide and just over a metre tall - as this is 'Nam there are now safety breifings, lights or even oxygen down there. I managed a whopping 15m before i felt like i was being buried alive, and Gaz when the whole 100m and came out looking like those guys that get stuck down mine shafts for weeks - very glad to see daylight, and kinda skinny...

We decided we were missing the beach after 2 straight weeks away and so went to Mui Ne, which is a small fishing village on the coast, really pretty, full of kite surfers and the like - nice for a few days, but we had to keep on movin'!...

Onto Singapore for a pit stop before indo - we just had 48hrs here so went straight to mecca - Raffle's for a singapore sling! the guy behind the bar was really unimpressed with how excited I was, and just poured it straight out of a pre mixed jug - could only stop for on as they cost about $30 each! filled out pockets with free peanuts and left to wander the clean sparkly city...
next day went to singapore zoo which is really cool - the monkeys are pretty much free to just swing around everywhere, and we were reading a sign when suddenly it started to rain - rain which smelled suspiciously like orangutan wee - the little bugger was sitting on a branch above us pi**ing himself in more ways than one...

And so to Bali!! We are super excited about this bit, and have been here about 10 days now! got straight into the surf when we got to Kuta, and the little waves are clean and perfect for me, and sunny all day! Kuta itself is like newquay with less 17 year old scallies, so we left after a couple of days and hired a little jeep and drove around bali - went to epic surf break Medewi first, looked alright but was too Reefy for me, gaz had a good wave though. Drove through some amazing scenery and 75% hills which we went backwards down a few times, but made it to Ubud where it was Galangal which is the balinese hindu version of christmas so it was a tropical party atmosphere - lots of street dancing, offerings to the gods and gambling, which is apparently what they do in the afternoon - very traditional!
Then down to the bukit peninsula where some of he best waves are to be had - missed the rip curl search posse by a day or 2, but no great shakes as there are some absolutely ripping locals surfing on tea trays and hub caps who love nothing better than to laugh manically, snake in front of you and then perform repeated 360's, awesome to watch! Gaz got some epic waves at uluwatu and dreamlands (for those of you in the know) and I got some great pics.

So that brings us finally (thank god as it's hotter in here that is legal), to Nusa lembongan, off the coast of Bali. It is a little bit of heaven, with 'epic, speedy heavy rights' (according to Gaz) and to top it all off today we went diving and saw 3 Mola mola (sun fish) within 20minutes of each other, all so close you could touch them - it was like diving on the moon they are the weirdest looking things ever!

we have squeezed shed loads into the last month, and it looks to get better and better with mates form London (Mike, Hels and Patch) coming over for a week of debauchedness, surfing and my birthday!

Thanks for all the emails and stuff guys, will try to do better on the news updates honestly :)

laters for now, keep happy and soak up that last little bit of sun before it leaves your shores for another 11 months - hee hee!

Luce and Gaz x
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Bangkok, Thailand

Well, I guess you though we were in prison!

I know it has been a while, but me and loops have been having far to much fun to sit in a stinking chicken shack internet cafe and wait 45 min for a page to load. but we love you so here we are.

we last chatted to you after the maldives thinking life could get no better ...... que Thailand. It has been a pretty crazy month or so so far.

We started in Bangkok and headed for the Khaosan road, the party capital of the capital.. it lived up to its name, we arrived around midnight and were drinking buckets os sansong with randoms within the hour! pretty hectic place but we found some cool local live music bars a few streets over, we were the only westerners in there and was very cool.

after a couple of days we decided it was time we warped our fragile minds by experiencing the ping pong bar. again a random but very cool night.
We met a couple of young US guys and started the night in style, we went to a bar called vertigo on the 59th floor of the banyon tree hotel. (very swanky and exclusive) the best panaramic view in bangkok and we forgot we were travelling for a while and ordered wine that cost more than a weeks accomodation.

But then within 20 min of leaving we were holding a pingpong bat and defending ourselves from some very fast flying and sticky pingpong balls! (Say nomore!)
The night should have ended there however Lu and the american chap got chatting to the mummasan who took a liking to them and took us clubbing, skipping all queues and getting us drinks, cool.

On leaving Bankok we went to Authia to see our mate Chris 'the rock' who works as a teacher up there. We spent a few days drinking far too much Thai brandy with his expat mates. Lovely to see him tho.

from there we jumped on a sleeper train and headed south to visit the Islands. Epic weather and beautifull beaches, we spent a while on Koh Samui people watching the sex tourists and watching a bit of Thai boxing, and basically chilling.

Since then we have spent the last 19 days on Koh Tao (Heaven), its like the Lost island as we kept meaning to leave but staying even longer meeting more and more people.

Since being here we have been very busy compleating Advanced diver, Emergency first response, Rescue diver and around 10 fun dives. The diving is amazing, 30 foot vis, and 30 degree waters.
We have seen al sorts the coolest being graytip reef and bull sharks, large shoals of barricuda and tons more.

Just checked out and waiting for our boat to Koh Pangan for the full moon party tomorrow night!

massive love to all and see you in about 10 years!

P.S it takes at least 2 weeks to upload any photos here so check my face book for a couple of snaps, i'll show you the billion others when were back. Lee we'll have revenge for your 3 hour slide show ;0)



]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1210941840/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1210941840/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/gazlu/1/1210941840/tpod.html Mon, 16 Jun 2008 09:10:57 -0400 Gaz and Lu's adventure's in wonderland

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Maldives, Maldives

Been a stressful time since our last entry I must say.

The Maldives is hell, everyone kept making us surf perfect right handers in 30 degree water as well as get waited on hand and foot............. its hard, I know!

So, we have been through a fair few places since we last spoke, when we leftt you in Rajistan. After that we hopped over to Sri Lanka and after a few nights in Colombo (dodging more bombs!) we took a train south..... 3 hour journey cost 40p..we were like battery chickens on the train though.
the seasons werent quite right and the fact that Sri Lanka is like Bosnia at the moment we decided to get over to the maldives early.........Good choice.

Mr Rory Moore came through like a legend and hooked us up on a locals island for 20 dollars a night, and another guy provided a little boat everyday to take us to different surf breaks.

Just when we thought it couldnt get any better Mikey Crisp arrived and we headed to our resort. Again Rugger hooked us up, it was the first week they were open and we were the guinni pigs. All food and drink was half price for us four and they put us in the pimp appartment overlookng an epic right hand surf break...... we could see the break from our balcony and as it broke on to 2 foot of water we werer the only ones stupid enough to be out there, so we had it to ourselves all week....

Needless to say we had an awsome time with a lot af partying with the guys..... the diving was also unreal. both Lu and I saw white tip sharks, turtles, eagle rays, dolphins and so on!

Lu is now as tanned as a coco pop, and I'm just getting grubbier.

after another brief stay in sri lanka we are now in thailand and it is NUTS! been here 5 days and seen things that would make your toes curl.......

Met som,e cool people and now stying with our mate Chris 'The rock'
we'lll fill you in on the Thai adventure soon


Until then
massive love
Gaz n Lu

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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Rajasthan, Rajasthan, India

Hello peeps,

We are still alive, I know its been about a month since we updated this last but we have been off the radar in most places......

So, we are about 6 weeks in and about to finish our India shenanigans.... We left you last in Goa after chilling on the beach. Now we are full on culture vultures with the overload of temples and forts dribbling out of our noses.....

after our last update we stayed in Goa for a while and stayed at beaches across the whole of the state... the further north we got the shittier it turned with packed beaches and overcrowded sea. Needless to say we stayed mostly in the ridiculously chilled south, more sunsets and dolphins...... its a hard life., at some beaches we had the beach to ourselves for as far as the eye can see, very cool.

We met a good bunch of peeps in one of the smaller beaches so stayed for a few days, odd having a game of cards with 7 different nationalities at the table, but a great laugh.
We had to force ourselves to leave otherwise we would have stayed for months.

after the beaches we headed inland 7 hours on a sleeper train to Hampi, which was loads of fun. Packed carriages with touts selling everything you could think of, the chai was especially good.
Hampi is an ancient ruined city with some temples dating back a thousand years, we chanced upon a legend of a rickshaw driver named Ramesh who ended up being our guide for 3 days.
Turned out he was studying history so new about everything and took us to some places tourists just don't go. We went to a tiny temple on top of a mountain where a guy had been there for 6 years! the thing is the temple is about 10 foot round and formed beneath a rock that leaves around 4 foot of space, so now he is a hunchback... not sure all that praying payed off???

Anyway, after that we flew up to Delhi (Really smoggy and stank! but still worth a day wandering). some travelers we bumped into in hampi told us about a hotel which we ended staying at and using to book a driver and tour for the whole of rajasthan.

So for the last 13 days we have been hopping from city to temple to wildlife park to fort to city and so on. seen sooooooo much and seems like we have been on the road for months! driving though the desert and small towns makes it all worth it though, its really beautiful here. All the people we have bumped into have been ridiculously friendly and most want to take photos with you, and the kids, no matter how poor have got massive smiles on their faces. Heartbreaking and amazing to see at the same time

Some highlights........ Getting to the Taj mahal at 5:30 am for sunrise, first through the gate so got 'the Diana' pic before hundreds of people flooded in.........on safari, following a female tiger for an hour whilst she stalked deer, we were only people in hotel that even saw one. some people Had been out for 6 days, we went on a 3 hour safari, hee hee........Lu getting swamped by loads of teenage Indian boys as they had never seen a white chick before..............the forts at Jodpur, the biggest and best of the lot!.......Lu getting washed by an elephant........just driving through it all.

So we now have our culture fix for a while and desperate to get back to the beach and find some waves... Tomorrow we fly to Bombay and onto srilanka where the surf is pumping.. woo hooooooooooooo

speak soon

mahooosive love and girly kisses
Gaz and Lu
'The hedge Monkeys'
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Goa, India

Namaste!

Our first week in India has been amazing (and completely chilled!).
The huts we are staying in are the kind you would build if you landed on a desert island and had all the time and coconuts in the world to build - totally lush!
We have finally ventured out of Palolem today on our trusty steed, and have been south to galjabag beach, which just has hammocks sturng between the trees, and north to Agonda Beach which is about 3miles long, and has hardly anything on it, so a stop there is on the cards.

Palolem itself is pretty chilled out, with loads of coco huts and little bars peeking out from berhind the palms, and amazing sunsets. We kayaked round the point of the beach yesterday to view in al it's glory, and just as the sun was dropping a dolphin surfaced a few feet in front of the kayak - like something out of a film! We then got nailed by the surf trying to look all cool landing the boat, so the karmic balance was restored!

We were also in town for Hindu new year yesterday, which involved lots of drumming and chanting, and then a mass gassing of the crowd as all the men in the village ran around us holding what looked like fireworks, random!

Plans wise - Rajasthan is in the grip of a death heat wave, around 45 to 50 degrees, and us little pasty whites would shrivel in that, so we may be heading to the hill stations and tea plantations instead... who knows!

Anyway, nothing else to report as we have not really started any intrepid trekking yet, I feel like I'm just writing about a holiday at the moment - so take care everyone and we'll be back when we head out of Goa in a couple of weeks.

massive love Lu and Gaz x x x

To the Mum's - We are still in one piece, are drinking only bottled water and wear helmets on the scooter, promise! x
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