I'll update this properly when / if I have lots of time!

Tuesday

Looked round massive shopping centre - ate lots of bread / pastries in this rather cool shop!

Took sky train and then boat trip back to hostel area.  Walked around the area a bit and checked out a little local temple.

Wednesday

Got up VERY early to see barefooted monks recieve food in their alms bowls.  I saw a couple, but we were there far too early, and went back to the hostel (Pete n Amy had breakfast n went back, but I went to sleep...

Went to the Grand Palace and saw many local temples in the area.

Had lunch n slept a bit.

Went to see Ladyboys in a cabaret - raaather odd!

Thursday

Took bus to Aruthaya - Got tuk-tuk driver for the day to take us round... Saw the temples there - one was big n white and one was ruined n burned... 

Had more food n chilled out for a bit...

Went to see ping-pong in the evening! Whistles, razors, hankies, flowers, cigarrettes, drunk water, opened bottle, pingpong balls into a glass etc...

Friday

Chilled out n went to get SAM!  Pete was gonna stay with us to meet him, but Sam was late due to arrivals business, and Pete had to run off to get his flight...

Chatted to two randomers in the Shanti Lodge for ages, before going to bed in the dorm room of death! Unbearably hot...  Sam n Amy were in a private double room with aircon. ~_~

Saturday

Met all the Intrepid people, went for a meal with them, went to a bar in a petrol station (very cool place, had phat soundsystems n everything!)

Then went to a club called Gullivers where some thai girls kept giving me their hats, and I danced slightly... also everyone on Intrepid left apart from myself and Natasha!  After spending quite a while there, we headed on to another club!  We were with 2 American guys (one was a scary dancer), Jane from NZ, and three friendly thai girls.

Next place was really cool, with a relatively quiet chill-out area (had apple sheesha) and a dancin bit as well...  Met a Tiny Thai there who was called sommt like Bee or Abby or something... Fun taims were had ;-)

Sunday

Dossed around, did internet, got the sleeper train in the evening (verrrry hot!)

Monday

Arrived and took a truck to Khao Sok National Park.

Did tubing (floating down a river on a rubber ring!)  very fun n chilled out :)  After, we saw some monkeys at a cave-temple, and fed them!  Kl stuff!

Went back to the place we were staying n stayed up late drinking too much!

Tuesday

Felt pretty poor as a result of teh alcohol, but I went on a jungle-trek with everyone else anyway...  After that a bunch of us went to a river and played cards for ages, before heading back to a reggae bar near where we were staying for a BBQ Buffet kinda meal! 

Started raining amazingly hard and we all had to run back to our rooms!

Wednesday

Took a minivan to Ao Nang, near Krabi.

We had some food and tried to go to the beach, at which point the weather went a bit crazy (huge amounts of wind n rain) so we dashed back to the hostel...

After a bit the weather calmed down, so we went back to the beach n had fun for a bit just splashing around!

Met up with all Intrepid people and went for a good cheap meal.  Served by a ladyboy, lol!

Thursday

Took a massive snorkling trip for the day on a speedboat, visiting lots of really nice secluded beaches and diving spots.  Everyone on the Intrepid tour went, which was rather nice!  Got a bit sunburnt, but nothin too drastic!  We saw the beach from the film "THE BEACH" but I've never seen it, so I wasnt too botherd... Look forward to seeing it when I get home, to see if I recognise it!

Sunday

Today we got Ferry passes and visited some of the islands surrounding Hong Kong... First we went to Cheung Chow island. It would have been very nice I think and we saw a little temple. However there were very strong winds and possibly the heaviest rain i've been in!

The rain eased off and we popped over to Lantau Island to see the massive buddha! He was sittin there very nicely when we arrievd, but by the time we'd walked up the massive hill to him, he was covered with mist and we could barely see him when we were right next to him...

Amy was very excited by some cheese she saw, so we got that and at it with some crackers during the bus back to the ferry! Think that was it for Sunday!

Monday

We had some major flight difficulties - amy left her ticket at the hostel and our flight was cancelled... We managed to get her ticket sent to us by a taxi, and caught a slightly later flight and just managing to get our second connecting flight! Thus we won!

After arriving at about 8ish, Pete went to chillax and use the internet, and Amy n I went to a cool bar with a live band playing songs in English (Like Maroon 5 stuff and YMCA, and we had a few tequila shots!

Tuesday

I was Ill during the day :(

Went to a reggae bar and had a nice meal in the evening... Reggae bar was actually playing lots of DnB as well, and had all sorts of flourescent stuff going on. Reminded me of some of the nicer places in Amsterdam.

Wednesday

During the day, we bought a package of activities - An ox cart ride, elephant ride, jungle trek (saw a massive waterfall and a hillside village - tiny TINY place!) and had a bamboo raft ride, during which it rained continuously and very hard, so we got soaked! Still very fun...

In the evening Pete n Amy went off to get a Thai massage, and I sat around watching a very good cover band... Watching the bassist kinda made me jealous though, but he WAS very good, so that was ok... He kept switching through styles of playing randomly here n there and for no apparent reason, though it still sounded fine. Just a very strange way of doing things IMO!

After this we checked out Thai boxing, which was gd fun! Two people kicking each other is always a laugh... The age range for the competitors was very young, and we thought a couple of them must have been about 12 or 14, though most were older. They were all super-muscly though, inc. the kids which was kinda freaky to see...

Thursday

Night train to Bangkok. Pete n Amy did a cooking course but I really wasnt feeling up for that! Met them at the train station and we hopped on our sleeper train! Rather comfy, all things considerd, and I slept a lot better than the previous few nights due to handy air-con!

Friday

Petes flight was at 8ish (we arrived at about 7) and he thought it'd be a great idea for us to all get a taxi to the airport to make it cheaper... Which we did. However OUR flight (me n amy) was at about 3pm, and since it was quite a lot more to get back into town than it was to get to the airport, we waited there for about 6 hours before our flight to Cambodia.  Damn Pete!!

The flight itself was pretty fun since our plane was tiny and had propellers! :-D  In the evening we just chilled in the hostel (which was very nice) and played cards.

Friday

First day in Kyoto, we decided to go check out the big castle here, which was pretty cool! It had floor that squeaked when you walked over it, so that the people inside would know if someone was trying to sneak in!

Also went to a Manga museum close by - we got to paint our own lil models of things like dragons n penguins. Me n Sophie did normal colours, Amy did a weird multi-coloured dragon.

Tried to go out to clubs / bars but we missed the last train, so we got beer n relaxed in the hostel!

Saterday

Today was very temply... Saw a few maintstream ones with really nice gardens to walk through, and after walking up a nearby hill. we then stumbled on a remote and isolated temple area, with nobody else there apart from a bloke doing a very nice ink drawing and someone tending the gardens... Very peaceful and relaxed place, at least until Amy accidentaly broke into it and the alarm went off! We tried to walk back through a forest to the station we got off at, and wound up in a graveyard - dead quiet and kinda spooky. All you could hear was the sound of the birds in the forest..

Following this we went to the old part of town and walked around for a while searching for Geishas and we found a few .  Kinda disturbing how many other people were standing around waiting for them as well as us...

(Partially stolen from Amy cos my comps shite) We also tried to go to a bar, but things are a bit strange in that respect in Japan. A lot of buildings have different things on different floors. So we'd go in to a building with a bar on every other floor and just go up in the lift, open the door to a bar and have a look inside. All the bars we saw were empty tho, or had just one man and a young girl, so it could be embarrassing. We just giggled and ran away.

Sunday

Went to a flea-market during the day in an area by a temple, and though there wasnt much we wanted to buy, it was still interesting to check out all the stuff.  It was basically a car-boot sale but with much older stuff!  After this we checked out the temply business and headed back to the hostel...

The evening was pretty cool since we had two massive meals! First one was a lot of stuff on skewers (cant remember the name for it) and the 2nd meal was a LOT of very cheap sushi! 14 plates only cost about 6 pounds!

Monday

Took a train to Osaka for one day of looking round it!  Went on a massive thing like an elliptical ferris wheel (theres pics of it on Facebook, along with many other things) and wanderd around the central areas and shopping districts... Saw lots of posers with really pointy shoes looking kinda stupid...

Me n Soph arrived in Hong Kong about 4 hours before Amy, and we were meant to meet Pete as soon as we landed... However, he didnt turn up! Amy arrived on time and we spent a while feelin worried and watching Pirates of the Carribean to ease our worry...We also met up with Feon and her Brother and had a crazy meal with pudding which consisted of a loaf of break cut up with condensced milk (Feon is Amys friend from St Helens who is now studying in HK). Went back to the hostel and found Pete sitting there lookin foolish, and it turned out he'd missed his flight and had to wait 9 hours for the next one - the fool!

Started the day meeting Feon again, and ate a meal with her and her bro before exploring the city a bit and generally seeing things.. Sophie had promised to see Pirates again with Pete (who was rather pissed off we'd seen it without him in the first place) so me and amy saw Premonition, which sucked ass! We also walked around Soho and had (comparatively) expensive sushi as a farewell meal for Soph!

I dont remember what happend today, but Sophie left very early in the morning, that much is certain!

Feon had decided to show us round some markets today, so we first checked out the electronics market which ....had a lot of electonics stuff in it! What a shock THAT was! We also checked out an underground one with lots of chickens in cages. Basically what happens is that the chickens are killed and put in a kinda tumble-dryer that takes their feathers off, and then they're sold. Really nasty! Theres alsoa lot of fruit and veg there though, and we were given free fruit by a friend of Feons and also saw some rather nasty sights like frogs being chopped up... Also walked through the Ladies Market (for ladies clothes obv). All in all I ended up buying a 2gb SD card, new shorts and a new tshirt! In the evening we just chillaxed and watched Spirited Away.

Got train to the New Territories (country-side area) and walked around for a while, seeing how the people lived out there... Big difference between the town n country-side. We came back and went up the Peak overlooking Hong Kong, to see the skyline at night. We got to the top to find we were in a big cloud, which kinda sucked! The tram we took up and down was cool though, very good views and it went at a damn steep angle! Buildings were at a 45 degree angle!

Thursday

Capsule inn was FOOKIN WEIRD!  Like a morgue but with sleeping people... Also the floor I was on was baking for a while, and I spent 20 mins melting in my capsule before the air-con started working...  After that it was all good!

Went with Amy to a phat museum which was about as fun as an art-museum can get...  After that we saw this rlly shite street perfomer who was doing tight-rope walking whilst juggling and kept neeearly falling off... and dropping props!  

After popping back to fetch our bags from the hotel, we jumped on a BULLET TRAIN to Kyoto!  VERY fckin fast (obv) and rlly cool sights on the way...  Loads of cool hills n things - so different to our lame countryside...

Found our hostel and chilled out, ate and then got rather drunk! :-D

Tuesday

Not a whole lot went on, but basically we took a bus to Mt Fuji and after a bit of difficulty finding the right station, we arrived at our Traditional Ryokan (Guesthouse)!  We were pretty miffed that we couldnt see ANY of Mt Fuji due to clouds.  Sooo we went for a walk instead!  T'was nice, in a little town with lots of springs n stuff...Rather pretty!  When we got back, we stuck on our Yakartas (like a phat classy dressing-gown) and had a very nice meal made by the owner of the Ryokan.  Beds here were damn comfy, with massive MASSIVE covers, which was good cos it was a bit chilly.

Wednesday

Woke up early and saw Mt Fuji from our bedroom!  Very exciting stuff, it's huge!  After having a funky breakfast which was a lot like most meals here (fish, rice and veg!) had a quick stroll around a lake and whoosed back toTokyo on a train.  Now it's raining a bit which ISNT nice, but we're just about to go and find our Capsule Hotel, which we're staying in tonight for a bit of variety!  Its gonna be very strange. 

Sunday

Sunday is the day of cos-play and dressing up, so we went off to Harajuku to go check out the funkily dressed people!  There were LOADS of them just chilling out on a bridge near the station... You'd have to get every strange-looking person in the whole of Camden to recreate it in the UK...This was also near Yoyogi Park, which had a big temple in it, which was nice...  We also saw 2 weddings going on, and got a few rlly nice pics of the brides n grooms etc lookin rather nice in their fancy get-up! 

After all this excitement, we thought it'd be fun to check out the Imperial Palace.  This turned out to be a lame idea since there was a LOT of gravel and tarmac.  Though we could see the palace in the distance (and it looked quite nice) we couldnt get anywhere near it because it's only open to visitors 2 times a year...

Anyways, cut to the evening!  We had a few beers, played some cards, chilled out a bit and had a bit of a wander around the local area.

Monday

Monday started with a bit of shopping for gifts etc in Asakusa (our local area) and after a nice lunch at a sushi bar(the same one we went to on our first night here) we jumped on a metro line and went to Ginza!  One thing to mention is the rail system here, which is fucking confusing at first, and still manages to confuse the hell outta us here and there... Basically there are 3 "layers".  A subway, metro and a JR system.  It's literally london tube system 3 times over...

ANYWAY in Ginza is the Sony Building.  We just worked our way from bottom to top, lookin rather longingly at everything... The TVs were almost better than real life!  Right at the top of the building was this amazing room which was basically a cinema with the best screen evar!  Just st in there for like 15 minutes watching these amazing short clips of random scenes like india and a very very sparkly temple. 

OH YEAH and there was a video for Final Fantasy 13 being played on one of the massive like 50" screens which looked fookin fantastic!

(Damn Monday was long)
Hopped on a cool computer-contrlled train to the dock area of Tokyo and checked that out.  Didnt do much there, just ate some food and walked around!  There was a ton of shit to do but we didnt rlly have time.  Tonight we've been washing things and getting ready for a trip to an old-skool Ryokan (guest house) where we can check out Mt Fuji. 

Dont think anyones reading this stuff but I dont care, its more for me!

If you are, then kthxbai...x

Thursday

Went to see the temple in the area near our hostel - very pretty and popular with everyone (one of the oldest in Tokyo I think!) Also walked down a fair few shopping streets and random side-streets finding numerous other interesting places to look at.  Finished the day with some rlly nice sushi in a lil sushi bar!

Went to meet up with Amys mum and her friend Val.  Went up the Tokyo Tower (150m high) views were amaaazing!  City is very packed yet clean at the same time... funky shizz...

Friday

Very cultural day - We saw some amazing Sumo Wrestling (Pics and video were taken) and Kabuki (traditional japanese) theatre which were both damn cool tbh!

Saterday

Got up VERY early and went to the fish market in tokyo to see all the fresh fish being sold and auctioned off!  VERY busy and some of the things were fookin MASSIVE!

Wanderd round Akihabara which is the "Electric Town" featuring masses of shops FULL of electrical goods and game arcardes!  Rather funky stuff, lots of neon shizz etc!

Met up with Mrs Iggy and her family (son n daughter plus their spouses...) and we went to this small yet VERY expensive place for Tampura (Basically fried/batterd stuff) which was amazing.  Everything came in little portions but there was a huge amount of it, ranging from sea snails (didnt try that one) to something like batterd mange-tous (or whatever...) as well as scary things like king prawn heads and massive shrimpy things...All surprisingly nice, apart from a whole little batterd fish we had to eat (inc head etc :S) which tasted rather dodgy...