So now we've been home 6 and a bit weeks and enjoying being here and meeting up with all family and friends. Travelling around the globe is becoming a bit of a distant memory and plans for the future and "real life" are being made. The envitable Scottish cold, runny nose and sneezing hit us the second we arrived after avoiding all trace of sickness whilst travelling and I think we having finally settled back into some sort of routine again, be it one that is 30 degrees colder than what I'd like.

So thought it was about time to catch up on the end of our travels.

After leaving the lovely people and friends we have met and made in the Philippines, we boarded a plane with a handful other people and headed back to Singapore. At the best of times airports are a bit of a pain in the bum, but this time we were to spend an entire night sleeping on the airport floor.

Singapore airport is pretty glamourous and with an array of terminals to choose from we found a spot to settle down for the night. A long, long night at that. Oh geez!

The next morning we were flying to Phuket, a smallish island on the west coast of Thailand. We planned to totally chill out before heading back to Scotland in a couple of weeks. We stayed at the Deevana Resort and Spa in Patong. Devastated a few years back by the Tsunami, the resort itself shows no trace of the disaster that took so many lives. Typical holiday stuff went down, ate too much, overdosed on sunshine and read and read many books and magazines.

I thought Phuket was beautiful but I wouldn't recommend it as a relaxing holiday, unless you plan to stay within your hotel complex. But we like to get out and explore which was more stressful that it was worth. A day spent at the beach, beautiful white sand, lovely warm water and chilled diet coke would be a pretty perfect day for me except our tranquility was completely ambushed every 1 minute (I counted) by venders and hawkers and sales people trying to make us buy their every bit of tat. Ranging from a fan to a bag to a sarong to a drum. Oh my gosh just leave us alone. Callum could not concentrate at all on his book  and the interruptions got far to much for us, that that was the only day we spent at the beautiful beach which has been spoiled by these annoying people.

We decided to give any boat trips a pass due to Callum's past record so unfortunately we didn't make it to The Beach. We did however get taken for a ride on an elephant called Mickey. We paid 400 Baht for pictures with the elephant to be taken waaay into the jungle on Mickey. Which was cool at first but then bumpy and hot after a few minutes.

Our Thai driver direct the elephant into the Thai jungle and away we went. Later on he turned round and asked if he could take some pictures of us on my camera. Pleased I passed my camera over to him and with an axe he climb down from Mickey and notified us that if we would like our camera back then we'd have to pay him some money, whilst swinging his axe, "maybe 100, 200, maybe 300 baht". Quickly we agreed to this deal?!?

Feeling like we were on our wedding day again (being made to smile constantly, not sitting on a giant elephant) we eventually got fed up with this deal and encouraged Mickey to travel on, Callum grasping hard to the ears so he wouldn't topple over on the 45%decline. After swapping 300 baht for our camera and after our guide was finished looking at my pictures of Britney. We were allowed to get off the elephant and bused back to our hotel.

The next day we went on a Thai cooking course which was great. We learned how to cook Thai green curry, sweet and sour chicken and Tom Khat soup, which hopefully isn't cat soup and enjoyed eating what we had accomplised. Now I can add a few more dishes to my Mac n cheese! The staff were lovely and took our photos with our certificates "Callum Smith" and "Sara Smith".

 Most nights we would venture out and try the local cuisine which was incredibly cheap and very tasty. We found this fantastic little restaraunt on the main strip called NO.6 with wonderful food we could eat for under a fiver. On our extremely lazy days room service was just as cheap and cheerful.

"Thai massage?, Thai massage?" A day wouldn't go past without this ringing out in your ears. Eventually we gave up avoiding them and went for a two hour massage. Relaxing, hmmm maybe not the word. Not sure what is the word but after Callum and I had changed into hareem pants and a size 24 shirt we lay down to be elbowed, kneed and cracked into place. The worst part for me was when she pulled on each individual finger and cracked everyone and then repeated the exercise on my little toes! OUCH! I could hear Callum's massuse(?) puffing pulling his back up to crack. I don't think there was a bone un cracked in my body by the time she was finished and for the next hour felt just that little bit more limber than before, but the next day brought the pain! 

At times I had to hang on tightly to my husband so the ladyboys didn't make a grab for him. Yes they look like women, but no they are not!  If you can handle this and the incesant pestering for you to eat at their restaraunt, sit on their seats, pee in their toilets and buy their crap, then this is the place for you. I'm sure though if you throw in the 13 hour flight from London you are just as well to head to Ibiza where you can be pestered equally as much. Bangkok and then that is our 8 months of travelling complete... until next time!