Hello Oz!

It's funny how quickly the last bits of our Thailand journey slipped away. It was too beautiful in our last Thai stop to even hit an internet cafe (and too much of a rip-off). After Koh Tao, we hopped on a ferry and headed south to Koh Pha-Ngan, the island known for its "Full moon Parties" (and we avoided that area like the plague, strung-out hippies, ew)

Flipping through our book, a beach on the Northeast corner of the island grabbed us-- Thong Nai Pan Noi Beach. A 45-minute ride across dirt roads, through jungle, and up and down hills brought us to a most heavenly spot! A wide, velvety-soft white sand beach with turquoise water was waiting for us, and we stayed in a cute little wooden cabin on a mountain overlooking the bay. It was fabulous. Keeping us company each night were frogs and lizards (Adrian almost stepped on a big toad again!) and giant butterflies...

Needless to say, we loafed around on the beach pretty much every day. Drank banana shakes and swam in the warm, shallow water when it got too hot. On our last day, we got a little more active and paddled a kayak to the next bay, and discovered hoards of skittery crabs on the rocks. Definitely sad to leave our awesome little beach (we'll post pictures soon)... but we had to...

The long ride back to Bangkok began on Saturday (Feb 17) morning. First, the pickup truck across the island (made us a little sentimental for our Cambodia times). Then the 4 hour ferry to the mainland. Then an all-night bus... which was, to Dayle's delight, was infested with cucarachas and tiny spiders weaving webs all over her blanket while Adrian slept. (Well hey, we lucked out for so long!)

And our homecoming, to Bangkok for one last day. We spent it in the massive weekend market, bargaining our way through and observing that (1) they seem to like selling used shoes at full price (2) there are tons of independent, really cool t-shirt designers! (3) shopping is hard work (4) the place smelled like mothballs and (5) uniformed security guards ride Segways... how strange!

---------

And now... after more long, exhausting travel (we're thinking we never want to ride a night bus or train ever again!) we have crossed the equator and rolled into Australia. Wow!

It feels a little like "Bizarro Canada." Signs are in English again, everything's SO much more expensive (no more $7 private bedrooms, *sniff*) and streets are labelled and designed in a grid. How Commonwealth!

We haven't heard too many "g'day's" yet, but we're listening. For now we're running around, exploring, trying to line up jobs soon. We'll be in Melbourne for a little while, we think...

Miss you all! Tell us what's up in Canada.
Love A and D "?"

P.S. Adrian says he's upset he can't eat congee anymore. Dayle's just happy to get cheese again!