We had kept in touch with the occasional email while we have both been away, with a lose agreement to try and meet each other in Penang in February. Gav and I had recently decided that we would not be going to Sumatra so another trip to Penang was not on the cards (especially after the exhaustion of the last visa run). So we extended an invitation for Rach to visit with us here in Hua Hin.

Rach arrived on the 11th of Feb and stayed until today. We had an amazing visit with her and we are all really glad that she made the trip North through Thailand to visit with us. The week was spent with a few visits to local swimming pools, a visit to Wat Khao Takiab and shopping, the rest of the time was spent relaxing at the house and doing an awful lot of talking. Rach is one of the only people I know that can equal me in the chat stakes……

Tehya has such a wonderful time that she ended taking a few days off school so that she did not miss out on any fun – they painted together, played with play dough and dolly’s solidly for the whole week. Rach is officially Tehya’s new best friend and after the week we spent together she is also officially aa even dearer friend of mine and Gavin’s as well.

For the first time since we saw our sisters we felt able to go out and have some time on our own and leave Tehya. We also got a few morning lay in’s – and I can’t honestly remember the last time we got one of those.

We said our goodbyes at the railway station – while Rach set off on a mammoth two day journey south to Singapore to get her flight to Africa. We parted with sincere promises to keep in touch and to see each other on our return.

I can’t wait……….!!!!

Dear Rachel, thank you for coming to stay with us. We loved your visit – it was a pleasure to spend so much time with you, we look forward to cups of tea on all of our return!!!

6 Fall Birch Road, Lostock. Bolton. Lancashire – 2004

Julia Higginson’s Funeral is being held at St Mary’s Church, Horwich at 12 noon on Wednesday the 4th of March.

Dearest AJ

Our thoughts and love are with Aunty Julia today. We have written about the things we loved best and will remember the most about Aunty Julia. Affectionately we always refer to her as AJ.

The love and passion she held for Uncle Bernard and the wonderful stories she often told us all of their life together.

AJ’s love for us – which she was never afraid of showing.

Her kindness and thoughtfulness.

Our Sunday evening phone calls.

Her joy and appreciation at receiving our flowers.

The beautiful cards and heartfelt messages she always sent to us. She never forgot a single occasion.

The love AJ had for her garden: the pleasure she got from watching it change with the seasons and her gratefulness of Bernard’s consideration when he chose it for her. She adored her spring garden in particular and the birds that visited it. Her garden will blossom soon in her memory.

Her love of all animals. She called them her ‘special friends’.

The wonderful stories of her younger years and the funny and often cheeky stories she told about working at The Swan and The Pack Horse Hotels.

The pleasure she took in hearing stories about and receiving photos of all of us and more recently her great great niece Tehya of whom she was so proud.

Her delight in the decisions we made about our lives which she always supported even when it meant we travelled far away from her – which we know made her feel sad.

Her glamour. AJ radiated glamour. She was always the height of fashion throughout her life. Her dark hair and stunning beauty.

AJ made the most delicious trifle in the North of England.

Finally over the last three years of her life – AJ’s beautiful Blue Eyes that always spoke of love even when she could not.

AJ has always been a wonderful Aunty and an exceptional lady – she meant a great deal to every one of us. We all miss her greatly for many different reasons – all of them special.

We know that AJ’s greatest wish was to be reunited with the love of her life. Her beloved husband Bernard. Now she will get her greatest wish. And we today share her happiness.

Aunty Julia and Uncle Bernard share peace and happiness together now.

with love now and forever xxxxxxxxx

Wednesday 04-03-2009

Pictures of Me, Hanna and Tehya saying our farewells on the beach in Thailand.

The rest of the family also showed their respects in Cornwall and Australia. We all managed to say our goodbyes in our own  personal and respectful ways the least a loved one deserves.

AJ Our Remembrance Day - For Her Funeral



AJ's memorial with the golden Buddha in the back ground Hua Hin Beach Thailand.




Dearest Aunty Julia. We lit candles and in scents sticks in Julia's memory.




Candles in scents sticks and flowers -  our small tribute to celebrate the life and passing of Julia.






Hanna and Tehya (Julia's great great niece). Tehya sang songs and we spoke of our fondest memories.

We are not the kind of couple who put a lot of effort into these kind of anniversary dates!! We don’t celebrate valentines day and our original anniversary – our first date we celebrate on the 1st April (conveniently April fools day – which is something that makes us smile) usually gets celebrated with a kiss and a beer!!!

It was also a Wednesday and with no child care and a school day the next day – we kept it simple. We went to the gym in the morning, went for lunch at a sandwich shop with Tehya and in the evening we went out for a meal at an India restaurant. Which turned out to be pretty terrible – why we thought Indian would be a good idea in Hua Hin who knows (although India in Penang Malaysia is amazing)!!! But the restaurant staff were pushy and rude and the food at best was average.

We had a beer :@> a kiss and a smile and made our way home with Tehya.

Maybe next year we will have child care and can go out and get drunk!!!! (hahaha)

We all lay in bed chatting and relaxing – then Gavin and Tehya went off to put the kettle on and watch TV leaving me in bed to drink my coffee, relax and read the girlie magazines they had bought for me.

After a breakfast of boiled eggs and lots more relaxing – we all jumped on the bike and headed off into Hua Hin to get some lunch and then on to the Palm Hills golf and country club where we spent the afternoon reading more magazines, swimming, playing, sunbathing and of course – more relaxing.

That evening Gavin got the BBQ fired up and Tehya and I made the veggie/chicken kebabs together, we had fish and prawns – with corn on the cob and garlic bread while Gavin had beef burgers and ostrich steaks. We sat and ate until we were bursting at the seams – drinking the lovely red wine that big Nana and big Granddad had very kindly bought for me. We danced and took very silly photos – and Gav and Teh sang me happy birthday with sparling candles.

The rest of the evening was taken up with drinking lots of red wine!! phone calls, reading text messages and emails from friends and family. So thanks for all those very lovely birthday messages and calls I really appreciated them all.
Big love to everyone x x x x x x

PS Becca – I did have a hangover but I wasn’t sick!!!! Yipee!!!!

Lots and lots of love

Gavin and Tehya xxxxxxx

It was so great to get back to our little house in Royal Home Village. We had one full day to de stress, relax and recover from the journey back from Malaysia then Tehya started school on the 23rd December. They celebrate Christmas in Hua Hin but not in the same way we do in the UK and the school was due to be open on the 25th December. We had decided to let Tehya go to school for two mornings on the 23rd and 24th as that would give Gav and I time to do the Christmas food/drink shopping and finishing the last bit of present shopping too.

It was wonderful – Tehya loved school immediately and we had time after school each day to let her decorate the tree and the house. On Christmas eve we surprised her with tiny miniature tree for her bedroom and over all the excitement in the house was much the same as it would have been if we were in England.

We were invited out on Christmas eve by a friend of Jon’s – he was having a Swedish Christmas meal at a restaurant in town. So Tehya and I joined in and ate some tasty Salmon and potatoes – while Jon and Gavin got to dine on meat balls and salted fish…….yummy!! We sat in the restaurant garden and drank wine relaxing in the warm Thai evening……we certainly would not have been doing that in Cornwall.

We got home at about 10.00pm to deposit an exhausted and very over excited Tehya into bed (after leaving carrots and sausage rolls out for Father Christmas and Rudolf). We sat up late into the night with Jon – drinking Port and beer and generally getting pretty drunk……..

Christmas day dawned with clear blue skies and very warm…. Tehya woke at about 7.00am a very respectable time!! We arose with hangovers to start the day with egg and toast for breakfast and present opening. Tehya was delighted with all her gifts and to make the day extra special she received two small parcels from her two aunties in Australia Becca and Oonagh. The rest of the morning was spent riding up and down the street with Jon on the new bike her Big Nana and Big Grandad bought for her – it was definitely her favourite present…. it plays a tune and has a squeaky rabbit on the front to the dismay of all our neighbours!! The rest of the day was spent relaxing and drinking the odd glass of wine……. Jon popping in and out at various points of the day, preparing food for the evenings BBQ, playing with Tehya and her new toys, a cat nap or two and chatting with family and friends on the computer.

The evenings BBQ was a great success we had  huge fresh prawns, trout, sirloin stakes, home made garlic bread and crackers with blue cheeses and olives and salad. We drank red wine, beer and port with the cheese….. all in all it felt pretty traditional or at least as traditional as you can make it with no oven and a BBQ as your only way of cooking……. We fell into bed that evening exhausted and happy.

Jon gave us a lift to the train station to catch the 18.24 south bound train – Bangkok to Butterworth. We all felt a little down as we had moved into our new house just four days before and Tehya was incredibly excited about her new bedroom, she had managed every night in her bed (without slipping into our bed for a cuddle until about 7.00am). It was perfect and in just four days we had all settled into a nice routine of lounging round the house and playing in the garden.

We got on the train with a takeaway from one of the local food stalls outside Hua Hin station, plenty of water/juice, fruit for breakfast and healthy snacks to last us until about midday when we expected to arrive at Butterworth station.

If life could be that simple….. man – we moan about transportation and the lack of sleep way to often!!! It has proven to be our down fall and the one part of travel in Asia that really bothers us in a negative way. The train was really old and rattled and banged its way through the night – we were stuck by the doors and had to listen to them hush open and then slam closed all night. We got little if any sleep all night and woke feeling grumpy and tired – things did not improve as the train ended up being delayed and we did not arrive at Butterworth until after 2.00pm. We headed off on the now familiar route over the the bridge and across the ferry – we arrived at Star Lodge to be greeted with the joyful smiles of the Chinese staff that work there. They managed to be even more helpful than ever and gave us the run down on the local visa service – which we decided to use.  If the forms were completed/handed in that night then we could have the completed passports back the next day.

We went up to Number 75 and handed over all our paper work and money – they insisted that we did not need a visa for Tehya and we reluctantly took back her paperwork. That night we talked about it at length and decided we would get Tehya a visa anyway as we did not want to take any risks. We spoke to one of the managers at the guest house and got him to call the boss runner for the visa service and the boss agreed we did indeed need a visa for Tehya. As we already had the completed forms it was an easy process – we just took everything up the road and dropped it off when we collected ours.

Gavin rushed off to the train station to book our return train tickets. We were feeling very excited as even with the delay of  Tehya’s passport we looked as thought we could finish the process a few days earlier and be home quicker. We had left Thailand on the 16th arriving on the 17th – we had not expected to start the visa application until the following day – this was bought forward by using the visa service. Unfortunately when Gavin got to the station there were no tickets available on any day before Sunday…. we had hoped to be home by Sunday morning but we were not going to be leaving Malaysia until Sunday afternoon!!! Gav bought the Sunday tickets and returned to tell us the news – we all sat feeling very glum at the prospect of more time away from our little house.

We decided that we would make the best of our time in Penang – we love the food and went to all of our favorite restaurants to eat amazing Indian food. We re visited Tehya’s favorite Bindi and Bangle shop and got her lots of little bits (including some stuff for her Christmas stocking). We found a cafe we have not eaten in before called The Rainforest Cafe and had fab fresh homemade bread and great sandwiches, beans on toast and cookies. It was a real treat to have such good homemade bread in a very friendly atmosphere.

We did some Christmas shopping for Tehya and had real giggles tricking her with funny stories about the contents of some of our bags – we also got two bottles of Port!! You can’t have cheese without port at Christmas!!

We also went to the Pulah Pinang Pesta which is a big fiesta that takes place every December – it was a fairground and we took Tehya along to it as a late night pre Christmas treat…. it was great fun!! We left the guest house at about 4.30pm, got the bus to the Pesta at about 4.45pm and arrived there at about 6.00pm. It was very exciting for Tehya – we could see the flashing lights, the Ferris wheel and hear the music from across the bus station. We stayed for about three hours and Tehya got to go on five rides and a bouncy castle (to those of you that know Tehya! bouncy castle = heaven). We got fizzy pop, candy floss, a princess balloon and left exhausted and cheerful ready to try and find a bus back to Georgetown.

Georgetown always has a seedier side and this time other than the usual old man homeless that you get used to seeing. This time there was also a very young women sleeping rough on Chulia Street -  she would wander around vacantly holding/sniffing a bag of glue!! She was obviously pregnant and it was disturbing and distressing to see. We had to get passed her on a few occasions and she would stare at Tehya as we walked by – trying to speak to her. It was uncomfortable and I kept her very close to my side………!!

On the Sunday morning we got up late (tricked Tehya by hanging towels at the window so she thought it was still night) it was a luxury to lay in and we made the most of it. Packing took no more than five minutes as we arrived with only a small blag bag with a few changes of clothes. We went for breakfast at a local cafe on Chulia Street and then got a cab to the ferry terminal – we got to Butterworth early and had lots of time to sit and wait. I shot off to the market food stalls by the bus terminal and bought various Indian snacks – we also had a bag full of nuts, fruit, fresh bread, buns and cookies to last us the journey!!

The trip back was less awful thank heavens – the train was delayed again by about three hours. It stayed in several train stations not moving anywhere and the lack of motion meant that we slept pretty well. We got up at sunrise expecting to be close to Hua Hin – we weren’t!! I had made friends with the very cheeky and effeminate train usher the night before and he bought us several cups of coffee, we left Tehya sleeping next to us and lay on the bunk – drinking our coffee and watching the sun come up over the Gulf of Thailand – the sea was flat calm and they sky had barely a cloud it was very beautiful.

We got off the train at Hua Hin station and arranged a taxi back to our house – it was a warm sunny morning and we all felt chilled out and relaxed even though we were tired. I walked to the local shop to get milk, bread and eggs – and then made us all boiled egg on toast with Lady Grey tea. We sat watching TV for a while – then the three of us piled into bed to sleep until well after midday. We got up feeling refreshed and ready to start getting excited about Christmas.

Hope you have a special day HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Lots of love Tehya, Gavin and Hanna xxxxxx

The Visa Run Options

We have looked at most of the options for visa runs (leaving the country you are staying in i.e Thailand and visiting another to renew your visa) from HuaHin and here are just a few of visa borders runs we considered :

1. Laos: Vientiane

You pay about 1500Baht each just to enter Laos so £90 for three + Thai visa fees and travel = us not going to Laos

2. Cambodia: Ban Laem

Not really an option as you have to travel to the capital, Phnom Penh if you want the 60 day +30 day extension visa.

3. Burma (Mynamar): Andaman Club or Kawthong (Victoria Point) (click for our visa bounce to kawthong)

Not an option as there are no Embassies or Consulates + you only get 15day extensions at the moment (15-12-08)

4. Malaysia: Penang, Kota Bharu

We considered Kota Bharu but having been there twice before (see here) and knowing its roughly monsoon season from October to March we decided to do the visa run to Penang.

Visa run to Penang

You can obviously take the plane, train or bus all have there advantages and disadvantages.

• Bus: (Slow) Cheap but slow and very painful with Tehya as she can’t get up and walk about.
• Plane: (Fast) Read the rest of the blog about Hanna and planes, also Tehya has to pay full price.
• Train: (Slow) Not so cheap either but you can sleep and you certainly get more leg room than on the buses and planes.

We have chosen the slow tedious train route that leaves Hua Hin on Tuesday the 16th December at 18:11 and arrives in Butterworth on Wednesday the 17th around 13:45 (18 hours). The problem with this option is that you have to submit your visa documents before 12:00 in the afternoon so we can’t submit our forms until Thursday the 18th. Then hopefully pick them up on Friday the 19th of December and return Sunday the 21st of December. We have to stay until Sunday as we need our 90 day visa to last until our return to the UK on the 20th March 2009.

Oh I wish we would have purchased a one year multiple entry visa for Thailand before we left the UK, this would have allowed us to get an automatic 90 day visa upon entering Thailand from any of the bordering countries.

At the time of writing the Thai government had recently changed the rules on the visa border bounce, i.e you only get a 15 day visa if you do a border bounce over land instead of the normal 30 days. Designed to get rid of the riff raff. It will be a big problem for many Farangs in Hua Hin as its a long way to bordering countries. Certainly wont do much for Thailands carbon footprint as most people will now fly into the country.

{w:650;w250} Thai consulate, Jalan Tunku Abdul Rahman, Penang, Malaysia

(map of Thai embassy/consulate Penang, Malaysia)

Thai Consulate Penang, Malaysia contact details:

You can print the Thai visa application form to save time click here for the pdf form

Documents that you need :

- Passport or travel document with validity not less than 6 months
- Visa application form completely filled out
- Two recent (4 x 6 cm) photograph of the applicant
- Air ticket or eTicket paid in full
- Financial means (20,000 Baht per person and 40,000 Baht per family)
- Consular officers reserve the rights to request additional documents as deemed necessary

You basically get a 60 day visa in Penang for 120RM (1200Baht or £22) and then pay an extra 1,900 Baht (per person) to extend for another 30 days, so this allows a total of 90 days in Thailand before requiring another visa.

(The Visa actually cost 110RM (1100Baht or £21))

The total cost for the visa run without hotels, food, taxis :

(1) Train to Penang (return) 2nd class sleeper (we only pay for x2 tickets as Tehya sleeps with Hanna) = 2,200Baht Oneway

(1a) x1 person return = 2,200Baht so Total train bothways x2 people = 4,400Baht

(2) 60 day visa from Penang consulate per person 1200Baht (120RM) = 3,600Baht

(3) 30 day visa extension 1900Baht per person = 5,700Baht (We will purchase this in Thailand a few days before our 60 day visa runs out)

Total price for Tourist Visa = 13,700Baht (£257 roughly)

(all of the above details may change at the drop of a hat, so please check with the Thai consulate or embassy)

Thai Visa Service – Penang

You can also easily get your visa done on the day of arrival, we checked at guest house NO75 (near star lodge) and the charge was 130RM. You can drop off your visa application in the afternoon and it is returned the same day around 5pm. So you only need to spend one day in Penang. You also don’t need to supply any other information to the consulate other than filling in the visa application and adding x2 photos. You can sit back and have a relaxing afternoon as somebody else deals with the visa application – Hassle free!!!!

We got back to Hua Hin with a feeling of cheery familiarity – we were not able to go straight to Jon’s house as we had planned, he still had another guest staying. Jon came and picked us up from the bus station and took us to a local guest house, dropped us off to shower/clean up before he came back a little later to take us to a near by restaurant for an evening meal. Tehya was delighted to see him and a little disappointed that we had to stay somewhere else for a night – she was desperate to see her favourite dog ‘Lucky’ again.

The next day we went to Jon’s house and settled into life in Hua Hin. We spent several days relaxing with visits to a local hotel swimming pool, hanging out at the house, taking the dogs for walks (Tehya’s favourite pass time) and going to the park.

We got our first reminders that it is December and Christmas will be here soon. We had been to the Tesco Lotus store and seen shelves of toys, decorations, coloured lights, cards and pretty paper!! A child’s delight -  very quickly Tehya was letting us know what her desires were with regards to Christmas. We had arranged to return to Koh Phayam on the 10th Dec, the accommodation was booked and our original plans were to leave Hua Hin with everything we needed to set up home on the islands. A basic and budget celebration – without much in the way of elaborate decorations and small gifts (as we would have to carry everything with us).

After a week of seeing the build up to Dec the 25th it became increasingly difficult to imagine a Christmas with no traditional tree and little in the way of pretty decorations!! I am sure we would have managed to make a very pretty home and I am also sure that we would have had a very lovely time but after tilting on the edge of making a decision – we finally made up our minds…… !!! We would find somewhere to rent and stay in Hua Hin – it is very difficult not to buy into ‘Christmas Hype’ and the media pressure to spend money! So we chatted with Jon about the best ways to find accommodation and the search began.

The hunt for accommodation began tentatively around the 3rd or 4th of Dec and seriously by the 6th or 7th – as we had finally decided we would not be going south by then!! We went and saw a couple of one bedroom flats in a condominium block recommended by a friend of Jon’s, we kept an open mind and did not write them off immediately but they seemed poor quality and highly priced. The search became increasingly frustrating and upsetting – I spent a week terrified that we had made a bad choice and worrying we should have kept to our original plans. The whole experience became incredibly stressful as we went to visit property after property, either be told ridiculous rental prices as soon as the owner realised we were ‘Ferang’ tourists or suddenly the house was not for rent for some obscure reason. We kept being told that we would not be able to rent at a good price as it was Christmas and prices go up in December – ‘what even for locals’? I kept asking. We want to rent a normal everyday house not a holiday flat or holiday house. We finally met a few local people who gave us advice that made some sense – we kept looking, driving around writing down the telephone numbers on signs/adverts at the side of the road. We also got Nok (Jon’s girlfriend) to call the owners for us as she could get all the information and a rental price in Thai – then we would turn up with her to help us negotiate. It worked well a few times and we got offered one really lovely house – they dropped the price by a huge amount (twice) to try and rent to us. It was over the budget we had set so we hung back for 48 hours and just as we had almost crumbled – taken it anyway!! I called a number I had seen on a gate on the road adjacent to Jon’s. The women who answered was called Rudee – she was straight down the line and told us a sensible rental price. The rent was less than our budget. The house had everything we wanted and more!! Two big bedrooms, fully furnished with nice furniture, clean, well looked after and well maintained and a lovely landlady. What more could we ask for…….. Rudee asked if we could wait two days before we moved in as she needed to get her cleaners in to spring clean the house and tidy the garden – she also needed to get Tehya a bed. For the next two days we sat at Jon’s house (over the wall) listening to the tantalizing sounds of cleaning, scrubbing and fixing! On the afternoon of the 13th we were able to take our bags and belongings round the corner and settle in to what we hoped was to be a very happy home for the next few months. We had three nights to relax and settle before we had to set off for the visa run to Malaysia.

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{w:600;h:350} Kaw Thaung, Burma – Visa Bounce

(map of Kaw Thaung, Burma – visa bounce from Ranong, Thailand)

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{w:600;h:350} Koh Phayam Island, Thailand (near Burma)

(map of Koh Phayam, Thailand)

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{w:600;h:350} Ranong, Thailand

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{w:600;h:250} Patong Town on Phuket Island, Thailand

(map of Patong town on Phuket Island, Thailand)

I love you and miss you, lots and lots of love Tehya.

The two nights at the Green Hotel were pleasant enough, the hotel rooms were very basic (a little prison cell like) but clean – the restaurant downstairs did pretty good food (mix of Thai, Israeli and western). They made a fantastic tomato soup which Tehya ate once a day if she could. One of Tehya’s favourite snacks at home always used to be tomato soup – it can be hard to find really tasty tomato soup in Asia. We left only because the rooms at Villa Cha Cha are just a little more expensive but are 100% newer and much more comfortable with cable TV.

We did not do very much in Bangkok this trip – on our first day we collected the Laptop. It was so good to see it again after what felt like forever. You don’t realise just how much you come to rely on a piece of machinery. It has become a vital part of our travel kit – for communication and keeping the blog up to date. It was all shiny and new – the hard-drive, disk-drive and all the other issues/problems we had with it had been replaced or fixed. So the catch up began in earnest……..

We spent a few afternoons out and about and Gavin went off one day and walked to all the main tourists spots along the river. We took it easy though as there were real problems with the government, the main Bangkok airport had been closed and was held hostage as a form of political protest. There was a lot of unrest at other points around the city and it was looking increasingly likely that there would be a coup. We had seen various streets blocked off with barricades and lots of police everywhere. The final straw was seeing the ‘reds’ taking to the streets to protest….. we came across a huge party of them the day before we decided to leave.

In the end things were beginning to sound too risky so we packed Tehya and our stuff and caught the Monorail to Victory Monument and found an air-con mini bus to Hua Hin. Jon had been in touch and had agreed that we should call passed his house and stay for a few a week on our way south.

The boat off the island is a flat rate of 150 Baht per person and you buy the ticket from the pier on the day you wish to leave. There is a fast boat for 350 Baht – if you are in a hurry! The bus from Ranong to ChumPorn was 290 Baht per person, including a taxi pick up at the pier to the bus. We later found out you can get a local taxi for 20 Baht and the bus to ChumPorn is 120 Baht – so we did pay well over the odds going through an agent. The train tickets from ChumPorn to Bangkok were 800 Baht and if we had bought them direct from the station they would have been about 500 Baht – so again we paid well over the odds.

We bought the tickets from the agent with the idea that it would make life more simple and straight forward. The agent had reasurred us of all the connections – as of course they are the experts. We got the afternoon boat at 2.30pm and arrived promptly in Ranong at 4.15pm, where we were picked up by Pon – who was waiting on the quay and delivered us to the bus station at 4.30pm. Our bus was due to leave at 5.00 for the one hour 45 minute journey – which should have meant that we arrived in ChumPorn at 6.45pm in plenty of time for our 7.30pm train. The reality was the bus left at 5.00pm and it was a two and a half hour journey – we still had to collect our train tickets from an associated travel agent. The bus stopped briefly for me to jump out and get the tickets, thankfully we had met some other travellers on the bus who were really friendly and as we pulled up to the station they ran in to hold up the train so we could get Tehya and our luggage onto the platform. It was a total nightmare of stress – I was so angry! If we missed the train we would have lost out on over priced train tickets and had to buy more – as it is the only night train we would have had to pay for a hotel too. The bus driver could not have driven the journey between Ranong and ChumPorn any faster with out killing us all – so to say it is a 1 hour 45 minute journey is a joke. The guards held up the train and were not very happy about it – we said a rushed thanks to the travellers and train guards and got on at the very end of the train. We had to walk the length of the train which was 9 carriages before we reached the place where we would be sleeping for the night.

We spent the evening in the restaurant carriage eating train food, drinking beer and learning some Thai from the waiters (buying them beer). It was a pretty funny evening……. there were quite a lot of train police on board as well as there are often reports of troubles in the south. They were all very busy drinking a large bottle of whiskey or two.

The train got into Bangkok at 4.30am 1 1/2 hours early. We found a taxi and made our way to the Khao San rd area and booked into a hotel. The Villa Cha Cha was booked up so we went across the road to the Green Hotel and collapsed into bed and slept until well after mid day.

We left Ranong on the slow boat, it was 150 Baht a ticket for Gavin and I and free for Tehya – it took just under two hours to get there. It was a really pleasant journey. The boat was old and definitely not comfortable with hard wooden seats – Tehya did her usual trick and fell asleep within about 10 minutes. She was laid out across my body – from my chest to just passed my knees so I made a kind of human mattress….. it was not very comfortable but nice at the same time.

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The scenery was dramatic – the coast of mainland Thailand was like a huge green mountain range of lushness….. reaching up into grey misty/rainy skies. Along the coast were many small islands and further out to sea there were larger ones. It is impossible to tell which are Thai and which are Burmese. We passed the island which holds the Andaman Club and you could see the golf course… eventually passing Koh Chang and then reaching Koh Phayam. After Tehya woke up I sat up on the side of the boat to watch the ocean slide by and I saw hundreds and hundreds of huge jelly fish – they were bigger than dustbins with massive bulging tentacle bulbs floating under them. I had images of us all getting stung in Malaysia and sat hoping we were not about to experience the same (we didn’t).

When we got to the island we were dropped off at the only pier….. we walked along it and straight into a very small village, a huddle of little shops selling odds and ends – cafe’s and a few small bars. There were several motor bike taxi’s but we had no idea where we wanted to stay. We got approached by a young boy who told us he worked for Vijit Bungalow and said he could get us a free ride there. We took him up on his offer…….. we wove along a very narrow road that was well concreted and then onto a smaller road that was definitely not well concreted – we carried our bags between us, Gavin had the large one, I had a small one and Tehya – a tourist staying at Vijit helped out with the third bag.

Vijit has a really beautiful spot on Buffalo bay beach – he is in the centre of the beach and the bungalows are surrounded by trees. When you look out to sea you can appreciate the shape of the bay – to the left the mangroves and to the right the bay sweeps around to rocky beaches and forested hills. The set up is very attractive – the bungalows look pretty and the restaurant is right on the beach. We got offered a room for 400 Baht – it was more than we really wanted to pay but decided it would do until we could orientate ourselves with the island. The room we rented was just back from the beach but still had nice views and a big balcony which Tehya was pleased about. That night we decided it was not so great – the bed was the most uncomfortable thing I have ever slept on and the room was really smelly with the windows closed. The room was so dark during the day – they only provided electricity at night and with no windows in the bathroom, it was pitch black – it made going to the toilet a bit of a nightmare with Tehya. You had to just sit in total darkness to shower or go to the bathroom. The next day we got up and ate – I wondered around the place checking out other rooms. Lots were empty and had not been used for quite some time. Then the people in the room next door checked out. Their room was a little bigger – lighter and had a slightly more hospitable bed!!

We moved rooms and settled in ready to make the most of the island! Sadly…… that night we did not get to go to sleep before the fighting started. There was an English couple that have been staying at Vijit for a long time (in the room next to ours) they started screaming and shouting at each other. We could hear them spitting, pushing and screaming horrific language then it escalated to smashing furniture, smacking and punching each other. It was obvious that they were drunk – It got so bad that I was feeling quiet upset – there was no way either of us were going to intervene and risk injury to ourselves so we had to just lie there for hours listening to it.

The next day the man was sitting with his friends as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. I went to speak to him about the previous evenings entertainment in front of the owner (who was also sitting with him). I explained (very politely) that I am not paying to stay somewhere, where my daughter (who is only four) has to be a witness to such terrible language and domestic violence. The man involved made a weak effort at an apology and the owner did not even raise an eyebrow at my comments or obvious distress and unhappiness.

Unsure what to do next – we stayed for another night and took the opportunity to go out on a bike to check out the rest of the island, to see what it had to offer. The island is amazing – it is so beautiful, a treasure trove of nature. The locals make their money from harvesting cashew nuts, rubber from trees, fishing and a little tourism. The island is up to now -  under developed, there are various places to stay around the island they range from the budget traveller up to around 1000 Baht a night.

I was told about a Thai women who had a house for rent, Gavin spoke to the owner of Vijit about it and he agreed it was a good place for a family and told us the ladies name – we introduced ourselves and spent a day negotiating a price and what we would need in the house. Then suddenly it was not going to be ready on time (she was leaving that day to go back to England)! I had already packed our stuff and was ready to move in. I was so upset I broke down and cried. I had not realised until the opportunity was offered – how tired I was feeling, how much I would appreciate not moving constantly and just being in one spot. I had promised Tehya we would do some cooking together – so she was gutted too!! On the positive side the women (landlady) felt so bad because of my tears she introduced us to the owner of Phayam Cabana the place we ended up staying at for our remaining days on the island. She also told me that part of the problem with renting me the house was the owner of Vijit – who she said got funny about us moving across. I don’t know if that was true or if she was trying to find a way to dig herself out of an uncomfortable hole. All the same I appreciated her introduction because Phayam Cabana is lovely – it lacks some of the obvious prettiness of Vijit in its layout. If you scratch the surface at Vijit there was not much below it…..the staff were not very friendly and the owner did not seem to care to much! Phayam Cabana was so friendly you felt there was little they would not do to make your visit great. The rooms were up on stilts, they were large, bright, airy, clean and very very comfortable and cheaper!!! The room at Phayam Cabana was only 300 Baht!!! We stayed for another four nights – it was a good visit all in all. We met two really friendly families one from Germany Lars, Judith, Finn and little Aneka – and the Estonian’s Ivo, Liis, Karl and Mai. We shared beach time, kid time and travel stories – it was really good to meet other people travelling with small children and Finn was a huge hit with Tehya, they took to each other instantly – another great example of friendships built with no (little) shared language.

I loved the island – it was so rural. It would have been possible to spend weeks of adventuring and walking and enjoyed the friendly local charm. We went to a summer fare that was really good fun with amazing food stalls (we tried loads of different local foods), canoe racing, a Thai version of the slippery pole and the bizarrest evenings entertainment we have ever seen – kids dancing to very cheesy dance music with plastic bags on their heads, with crazy faces on them!!

The problem for us was the rain…. it rained all day everyday (accept for one afternoon). By the end of the week we were so wet, with not one piece of clothing that was clean or dry and because of the rain no way to dry anything. Tehya’s cough was not getting better and we felt sure the damp was not helping things – then she started to get really bad pains in her ear. Enough was enough……if we wanted that much rain we would have stayed at home in Cornwall for the summer. We woke up early on our sixth morning and went to check weather reports on the net – it predicted rain for another week at least. Gavin managed to get in touch with the Mac service centre in Bangkok who said the laptop was ready for collection – so with the call of our computer ringing in our ears we bought tickets off the island for the next day.

We said our goodbyes to the new friends we had made and went on our way…….. with plans to return in ten days! If the sun came out………………!