Thailand

It is cold at 5 in the morning in London. I had a jacket on, which I would later lose at immigration, but was trying to dress light due to my imminent arrival in country promising 35 degree heat. The loss of my jacket before even entering Thailand might be the quickest I have lost a thing whilst being away; it was the first of a few things that have already left my side and will in no way be the last. I am keeping a close eye on my passport, bank card, and phone and all other possessions are just transient, unnecessary items holding me back from moving from place to place without a sore back. Although I do quite like my highland cow shirt; I hope I don’t lose my highland cow shirt.

I have foreshadowed the loss of my jacket like any good writer would. Building suspense before the final pay off when I get to the other side of immigration and think aloud, ‘I don’t have my jacket’. But before this fateful moment I had to be on a plane for a long time. Qatar Airlines are a really nice airline, withholding their heavy editing of horror films and misuse of the word ‘sandwich’ where the phrase ‘reheated meat slab’ would be more appropriate,I had a very pleasant flight: the food quality was generally very good and the 20-30 minutes of sleep I had during the 23 hour journey really paid dividends to my general health and well-being.

Finally arriving in Bangkok I walked confidently towards immigration, jacket in hand. I asked the lady at the information desk for a pen and she handed it over. Full of the courage and vigour of a man who currently still owned a jacket I filled in the immigration form and headed towards the immigration line. Another literary trick I will now employ is where you let your audience know a secret the protagonist is not currently aware of, allowing them to feel a sense of superiority over their hero: I was no longer in possession of my jacket. I passed through immigration without incident, now in possession of a little sticker in my passport that allowed me into Thailand for 30 days, I reclaimed my bag and reached for my jacket...

Having already been to Bangkok nine years previously I didn’t have many plans whilst in the city. I spent the majority of my time lying in the hostel either talking with people or browsing my phone, whilst getting annoyed with myself that I wasn’t reading my book. On the first night I accidently got too drunk and smashed my phone causing me to spend 4000 Baht (100 Pounds) getting the screen replaced, but I think the less I say about that whole debacle the better. Although the actual experience of getting the screen replaced was a good one. I got a Tuk Tuk to the MBK Centre, a huge shopping centre in the centre of Bangkok. On the third floor are the electronics dealers. Seven acres (this is a complete guess and probably totally wrong) of small stalls essentially offering the same thing: new phones and phone repairs. As you walk around you get beckoned over by the enthusiastic stall holders hoping that their combination of phones, accessories, and repairs makes them stand out from the endless competition. It seems to be a general rule in Thailand that all the shops selling a particular item or offering a particular service need to all be found in the same place. I stumbled across a guitar shop whilst walking around Bangkok and then managed to stumble across 10 more almost identical shops. After getting very similar quotes from a handful of dealers I handed over my phone over to a stall. An hour and one cheese toastie later I had a fixed phone in my hand and smile back in my heart.

When I was here with Alex nine years ago I didn’t even take a phone but this time I would be pretty lost without it. The amount of internet cafes has severely dropped since 2008 and my willingness to look through guide books has fallen to almost zero. All my plans are made on my phone through Google, accomodation booked ahead, and maps saved offline so I always have access to GPS to guide me about. I need my phone and my phone needs me, if for nothing more than to pay for it to be fixed when I drop it on its stupid face.

After three days of doing next to nothing I decided to head north. I went to the train station and, after standing behind a very confused couple for about ten minutes, handed over my 15 Baht for a train ticket to Ayutthaya, the old capital. On the train I got talking to a girl called Svenya from Germany who, along with a handful of other folk, I would travel with for about a week. After about an hour of the train not moving just outside Bangkok we pulled into a station and was instructed by an enthusiastic food seller that we needed to change trains to continue our journey to Ayutthaya. Begrudgingly we gave up our seats on the train in exchange for a pungent corridor area near a toilet on the new train. I would later discuss this train journey with two young Australians who opted to stay on the initial train and got into Ayutthaya an hour before we did. During the journey many monks had to walk through our pungent corridor to get to their dedicated section, with one pointing at Svenya and saying ‘You! Go away!’ Being in that close proximity to a woman is not viewed favourably by monks. Only men are allowed to sit next to them on public transport, and apparently the sharing of pungent corridors is also frowned upon.

Ayutthaya was pretty nice. It had temples, ruins and other things of cultural significance to look at and to be near. I took this opportunity to look at and to be near these culturally significant things. After the exhaustion of looking and being near the aforementioned culturally significant things I ate the best pad thai, and arguably the nicest meal, I have eaten since arriving in Thailand. It was very nice. My eating habits have been split into two categories. The first being street food: pad thai, fried rice and meats, assorted meat on sticks, spring rolls etc. The second category is things I can purchase from 7/11. From this category special mention has to go to their cheese toasties of which I have had somewhere in the region of 15, an average of about one a day. This average was severely affected by my first full day in Bangkok where I was merrily hungover and ate four. I am hoping that in both Laos and Vietnam I can keep this culinary tradition going.

From Ayutthaya I moved onto to Lopburi where I met the remainder of my temporary travelling companions. Listed by their country of origin alphabetically: Beth and Rob from Southend, Jim from The Netherland, and Lucas and William from Sweden. Lopburi was a little town which had a large population of resident monkeys. They mainly hung out around the temple in the centre of town where you could pay to feed them and have them clamber all over you. The young ones were generally quite cute and polite whereas the adults were a bit more forward in their quest for corn; they would jump up to grab it from your hand or just try and take whole bag. Beth managed to get between an infant and its mother and was on the receiving end of a lot of hissing and teeth baring from the mother. Even though the monkeys were clearly accepted by the community as a whole, they were still a pest having to be chased out of restaurants and causing all sorts of monkey havok. Once a year they have a big feast for the monkeys, leaving out large amounts of fruit and other monkey delicacies for them to enjoy. I didn’t manage to ask a monkey what they thought of this tradition but rumour is that they are into it.

From Lopburi we continued to Sukhothai. The train only went as far as Phitsanulok and from there we had the plan to get a coach to our final destination. However, we were informed there were no more coaches and was pointed in the direction of a lady who was in possession of a vehicle that looked like it would be more suited in the transportation of prisoners or livestock. It was a truck with two benches on its back facing inwards with a large metal cage covering this entire seating area. With all eight of us squished in the back and the cage securely locked we headed off to Sukhothai. I really enjoyed this journey; apparently transit by cage really speaks to me in a way I’d never had imagined.

My main interest in going to Sukhothai was to a climb a mountain in Ramkhamhaeng National Park. Jim agreed to come with little encouragement, Svenya after quite a bit more; Rob also agreed to go but was a bit sleepy in the morning when we were heading off. The three of us ate a hearty breakfast in Poo Restaurant. I am unsure whether there has been some translation issues here or they have cleverly given their business a dumb name to suck in tourists. Either way, it was very nice and over the course of our three nights in Sukhothai we had many meals in Poo, including their internationally renowned Poo Set Breakfast One and Four. After breakfast and utilising the Poo waitress’ English skills to explain to a Tuk Tuk driver where we wanted to go we were on our way to the National Park.

At the bottom of the mountain we paid our entrance fee (ten times more than the Thais pay), booked a tent for an overnight stay at the top, and started walking. The walk was hot, and steep, and hot again. We climbed 4km in just over 2 hours, with multiple stops for putting water both on and in our faces. At the top we were directed towards our tent and given sleeping bags. After a short bit of lying still to recover from the climb we headed to the mountain summit to soak in some pretty spectacular views. From a smaller summit, in order to avoid the crowds, we watched the sunset which was also pleasant. I tried to take a timelapse but my battery ran out after 15 minutes and the remaining footage only confirms my inability to sit still. With darkness upon us we returned to the campsite taking in the fireflies on the way.

At the campsite there was approximately 100 people. Aside from us and another couple everyone was Thai. I only found out it was an option to stay there from stumbling across someone’s blog; I hadn’t seen it mentioned in any guides or hostels noticeboards. We were quickly beckoned over to join a large family of holidaying Thais, being offered meats off their barbeque and liquor from their mysterious liquor bags. Without being able to speak each other's language we managed to spend a whole evening communicating. Before you took a shot of bag alcohol you would shout ‘oop’ and then punctuate the shot with a satisfied ‘ahh’. With shots being taken in turns out of a upside down bottle cut about an inch below the cap, and the amount of bag alcohol and mysterious meat seemingly limitless it was a really fun evening.

The next day, feeling a little worse for wear, we headed back down the mountain. We had sort of brokered a deal with our tuk tuk driver to return and pick us up at 1pm but at 1:30 there didn’t seem to be any sign of him. We even turned down a lift back to town from our friends from the previous night as we felt to bad if the driver did turn up. With the realisation he was not coming we started the 25km walk to town in the midday-ish sun. Luckily within a kilometre a truck pulled up and gestured for us to get in the back. We were dropped a lot closer to town and got a tuk tuk the remainder of the way.

From Sukhothai we got a coach to Chiang Mai. Halfway through this heavily air-conditioned journey we pulled up at the side of the road and were told this was our toilet stop. Stepping out the coach we were greeting by the sight of a very overweight man lying on his bed, like a Thai toilet Jabba he was had a women sitting by his side and a collection of dirty possessions scattered around him. He gestured to a sign that said ‘Toilet 3 Baht’ next to an alley with a toilet at the end. I was at the end of our little toilet crew’s line and with one person left to go Jabba smiled and beckoned for me to walk deeper into his lair to use a toilet around the back. I walked past his collection of buckets and into this secret shadow toilet. I was very aware that the bus driver probably was not prepared for someone to be offered this level of security clearance and might leave as soon the last person left the level one alley toilet. I was right to be cautious because as I walked out of Jabba’s dwelling I saw the bus slowly pulling off and the door closing. With a level of speed and skill that wouldn’t have seemed out of place in a Mission Impossible film I managed to jump on the bus to be greeted with the sight of all my traveling buddies jumping out of their seats to alert the driver of my fate. It was nice to know they wouldn’t have just accepted me as a sacrifice the toilet kingdom.

After the last three smaller towns Chiang Mai was a bit of a culture shock. Suddenly we were back in a tourist centre surrounded by enthusiastic market stallholders, travelers with questionable haircuts, and western food outlets like McDonald's and Hard Rock Cafe. Incidentally, I’ve never actually been in a Hard Rock Cafe. Interesting, huh? We spent three nights in Chiang Mai and with my reluctance to do expensive organised tours I spent most of the time by the pool browsing my phone or reading my book. One day I managed to rip myself away from the pool and cycle up the mountain that towers over the city. After hiring a bike of reasonable quality it took my about 3 hours to get up to 4,500 feet; the ride included a lot of sweating and a lot of stopping and wondering what I was doing. I didn’t manage to make it the whole way to the top of the mountain but stopped just shy at a palace. Before heading back down the mountain I stumbled around the palace gardens feeling incredibly light headed from cycling in the 30 degrees plus heat. Because I was wearing shorts I was given some massive fabric trousers to wear around the palace which I enjoyed immensely; I don’t need much to keep me entertained. I had a coke and sat at a viewpoint to re-align my mind with reality before the upcoming descent. The descent was amazing fun. Due to the steep decline and tight turns all the cars, minivans, and mopeds were travelling at a relatively slow pace meaning I was overtaking them all as I went down; it was fun. At one point I spent what felt like ages behind a coach, but then saw an opening on a decent straight and sped past it pedalling as fast as I could, I overtook it just before a turn and cut in front to see a clear road in front of me. Again, fun.

The day after the cycle I went for a Thai Massage at The Woman’s Vocational Correctional Institute (I have not double checked the name). It is a place where women about to be released from prison work during the day allowing them to be go back into society with experience and skills relevant to the working world. The centre has a massage parlour, spa, and restaurant. The massage was good. At one point she climbed onto my back grabbed my arms and told me to pull against her. Enthusiastically, and not remotely at the correct time, I started pulling and pulled her down on top of me. She laughed and managed to communicate that she would count down so I wouldn’t get confused. Counting down from three she pulled me backwards off the massage table causing my back to make a satisfying crack.

From Chiang Mai we travelled to Pai. A haven for people who want to call you ‘bro’ a lot, talk about energy, and participate in drum circles. The ratio of people without dreadlocks against people with dreadlocks suddenly started to level out, and the amount of tie dye spiked dramatically. Hippie atmosphere aside, Pai was a very relaxing travellers haven. Nearly everything in the town was geared towards tourism in some way with very little evidence left of the town it was before. This being said I had a very nice three nights in there: cycling out to waterfalls and canyons, relaxing in hammocks with the hostels puppies, and going for shoeless walks through the forest. The last item was borne more out of necessity than any need to feel more closely connected to the earth. We were trying to walk to a waterfall a bit outside Pai, but the track took us through a stream so often it seemed a better idea to just take our shoes off as we were having to do it so often anyway. I didn’t leave the walk with any sort of spiritual realisation apart from the fact that shoes are good and walking without them on hurts.

Leaving Pai I bid a fond farewell to the little travelling crew I had amassed and moved onto Chiang Rai which is where I am currently writing this, readying myself for a 5:30am start tomorrow to try and get to Laos. Whilst here I have seen one tourist attraction, the amusingly bonkers White Temple. An artist is currently going through the process of creating a massive white temple just outside the city. There is currently one part of it completed and its scheduled finish date is 2070, presumably years after the artist himself has died. As you enter a cardboard cut out of the Temple’s double denim, Croc wearing creator points you towards the ticket booth. You enter and walk towards the incredibly ornate white temple, whose mirrored surfaces shine uncomfortably bright, blinding you as you walk past white hands coming out of the ground and white devils riding on the back of dragons brandish their spears in your direction. Entering the temple the walls are covered with murals depicting the evil of the modern world: the twin towers stand one aflame with a plane heading towards the second, Pikachu smiles happily as demons from hell wait just below for her, above Pikachu a Minion hangs out with the kid from Ben 10, whilst an Angry Bird flies overhead. Facing this mural is a monk sitting cross legged, incredibly still observing people come and go. I overheard a tour guide say that the mural represents all the violence in the world and the things we need to let go of in order to achieve peace. I’m not sure what Pikachu’s done to be held partly responsible for 9/11 but who am I to argue.

Laos tomorrow.

End of Days

We leave tomorrow. In the early hours with probably only a handful, if any, hours of sleep under our belts we fly from Budapest back to Stanstead on the 6:20 flight. I wonder if the Ryanair cabin crew will still be so cheery at that time in the morning. My guess is that they probably will be, fuelled by Irish spirit and the joy of selling cigarettes by the carton. It's been a good time and I hope I don't wait another six years before going travelling again.

Our final night in Belgrade was again punctuated with the consumption of Balkan liquor and dancing on boats. I managed to lose track of Poya at about 2am and didn't see him again until 6am when, with a flourish, he enthusiastically woke me up to inform me we had to leave for our 6:45 train to Budapest. He had managed to stay up all night, get someone else drunkenly into a taxi for their flight, eat a burger, feel sick on a boat for about an hour after drinking 'some blue shots', and eventually wake me up for the train. Well done him. I would've failed in reaching the train without his help as I had already happily slept through one of my alarms. Tip: when you need to get a 6:45 train do not go to bed at 04:30. Although, our flight tomorrow is really early and I think we plan on not sleeping. Perhaps we will inadvertently win ourselves some extra holiday. Insurance covers new flights due to sleep, right?

Early morning Poya making sure I'm ready for the train.

Budapest is good. It's really nice to walk around in and there's a huge amount of interesting, unique bars including ones built inside old abandoned buildings. However, I don't think so-called 'party towns' are generally for me. We went on a pub crawl and my idea of fun is not being led around by a gruff sounding man who is prone to shouting things such as 'Come on you pussies' and 'Let's get wasted!' My reaction to that is generally 'Do we have to?', 'Can't we just sit down?', or 'Does anyone have chess?' Obviously I enjoy drinking and meeting people but the regimented, macho nature of it all seemed a bit forced. We went to a Spa Party (ingenuously named Sparty) two nights ago. That was really fun; I'm not sure I've been drunk/swimming before. Although I found it odd that as soon as people are surrounded by a translucent liquid their drive for public fornication seems to sky rocket; the edge of the pool was just a public gallery of people's sex faces.

Back in the land of phone signal

The day after rafting we decided to climb to the highest peak in Montenegro. Well, I assume it is the highest. Montenegrins seem to speak in hyperbole when referring to their own country’s natural achievements. I have heard claimed multiple times that the Tara canyon is the second largest in the world, second only to the Grand Canyon, but a quick bit of Googling finds no evidence to back up this claim. Either way, the mountain was really high. I was fine throughout the majority of the climb until we reached the final 200m of the 2600m mountain. Suddenly a large sheer drop opened up in front of us and we had to scramble up rocks in order to reach the summit. Normally this type of ascending would be really easy for me but with a massive drop below me it became a bit more worrying. I sat at the top of the mountain clinging onto nearby rocks even though there was quite a large gap between me and the edge. Whilst Poya and the Dutch guys we climbed with took photos, smoked cigarettes, and ate Panda Cream I descended back down the mountain walking on all fours in a crab-like position. I survived without plummeting to my death and am glad I did it.

The day after we went canyoning through a small, narrow section of the Tara Canyon. I was slightly worried I might feel claustrophobic but there was only one tight section that worried me a bit. I’m seem to coming across as a man of many fears but I promise you I am very strong and very handsome. Canyoning was really fun: jumping off rocks into pools of water, traversing across streams, and butt sliding down naturally forming chutes. About halfway through a Belgian guy got the onset of hypothermia and we all had to give him a bear hug to stop him shaking. Our guide decided it was his wet-suit that wasn’t doing its job properly and stripped down to his orange, spotted underwear in order to change suits. We deposited him in the sun and rubbed him a bit more and that seemed to do the trick. Afterwards there was more whole fish for me to consume in their entirety.

Zabljak was great. We stayed an extra night and managed to sell out bikes to the hostel owners. I got slightly less than I might’ve liked but 130 Euros isn’t bad and the owner of the hostel was really nice so I didn’t mind giving him a good deal. We wanted to bungee jump off the Tara bridge whilst there but unfortunately it has been made illegal. There used to be a British company who ran the bungee jumping: they did it well, and had an 100% safety record. However, some of the locals decided that was their money to earn and blackmailed the guys, eventually driving them out of the country. These men then took over the bungee jumping and three people died in the first week. No-one got prosecuted as all the deaths were attributed to mistakes made by the customers, bungee jumping was subsequently made illegal, and that was that.

                              Poya standing confidently while I hang out low

We took the bus to Belgrade yesterday and went out to a club on a boat in the evening. Usually on this trip I have been going to bed pretty early as I get sleepy and lose the ability to conduct meaningful conversation. Apparently to some travelers this is sacrilege and the whole point of traveling is getting really drunk most nights (or so I am reliably informed). Either way, I put my sleepy nature to the back of my mind and went to a loud place. It has been a long time since I have been to a loud place and I was pleased to discover that the way I approach these places has changed quite dramatically. I remember when I was younger feeling pretty out of place and thinking I should be dancing or interacting with people in ways I didn’t feel comfortable doing. However, this time I just really enjoyed doing stupid dancing, often I would have to stop for a bit as I was making myself laugh (I probably looked insane), and just taking pleasure in observing people puffing up their neck feathers and cooing at the opposite sex. Really fun.

What I wrote on the other website

An overdue update

As I mentioned on Facebook I dropped my phone in the toilet. I thought that the toilet light wasn't working (apparently it was) and I was trying to use my phone as an urination illuminator. I must've jabbed at it rather vigorously and propelled it into the toilet. The stupidest thing was that in my inebriated state I continued to make toilet for a good few seconds before the wires in my head connected and realised that this was a not a good idea. I picked up my now rather sodden, disgusting phone and looked at the screen. It was putting on a rather colourful flashing display as if it wanted to die in a spectacular fashion. After this show it faded to nothing and would not turn back on. Paya wisely suggested not trying to turn it back on and putting it in a bag of rice. Unfortunately I am not a wise man and did neither of these things. I have since bought another phone (of the Windows variety obviously) but have never had both phone signal and WiFi at the same time so cannot gain access my Google blog. Ah well, here is a write up of some things that have happened:

I think the last thing I wrote about was the rather wet cycle that we did up to the monastery, so I will start from after that. The nest day we cycled from the capital Podgorica to Budva. We said goodbye to Nino, who worked in the hostel, with plans to meet with him again when we returned in a few days time. The cycle to Budva was really fun, the small mountain road snaked alongside a massive lake, and the lack of cars made for a relaxing ride. We had fish soup for lunch with cheese ‘that my mama makes’. The final climb before Budva was long, sweaty, and Paya had to push his bike some of the way up. Generally I cycle ahead of Poya and Paya on the uphill climbs. I think this is due to my thinner tires and the fact I don’t have a penchant for consuming an unholy amount of cigarettes. Although I should probably chalk it up to my supreme fitness and unrivaled manliness. In their defense cigarettes are very cheap here. The downhill into the city was great fun as always, with only a slight sketchy moment when I had to fit through quite a small gap between a cow and a passing lorry. Budva was a much more touristy city compared to Podgorica: it housed inflated prices, loud beach clubs, and scantily clad women trying to lure you into restaurants with the promise ‘I’ll be your waitress’ (who knows what that might lead to? Perhaps a salad?). It wasn’t for us and we only stayed one night. Although I did have a great time zooming around on a hired jet ski and it took all my courage not to go and sit alongside the children in the 7D cinema. From the pictures I ascertained that the extra dimensions were jerky chair movements, bad special effects, and disappointment. There was an 8D cinema as well but I didn’t want my mind blown.



The cycle to Kotor was short. On a nearby beach SeaDance festival was happening and we happily cycled passed a traffic jam that must’ve lasted at least 7 miles. The journey ended with a mile long tunnel that was awful to go through: it was loud, the path was really thin, and I hit my foot on a protruding plastic thing that I can only assume was imperative to the tunnel’s functionality. The Old Town in Kotor is a car free, cobbled city full of beautiful old buildings and a plethora of stray cats. We loved it there and stayed three nights. As soon as we arrived in the hostel shots of Rakia were forced into our hands and we proceeded to get very drunk. Later I dropped my phone in a toilet (did I mention that?). During our time in Kotor we cycled to a monastery 5,000 ft above sea level from which you can see 80% of the country. It was tiring and on the descent Poya fell off his bike, fortunately he managed to do a very impressive forward roll over his handlebars and did not fall off the mountain (I would’ve probably led with that news if he had fallen off the mountain). On a good day you can see Italy; we could not see Italy. The day after we went on a rather more sedate ride around the bay with a Canadian man we found in a corner. He hired an electric bike from the hostel which decided it did not like functioning or having a chain about two thirds of the way round. We therefore spent the last 9 miles pushing him along in shifts. It was fun. That evening we walked up to yet another Monastery about 1000ft above Kotor; it was quiet and pretty eerie and Poya and I filmed a mini-horror film which I will try and upload somewhere. I will maybe post the link below this on Facebook.



I’ve got bored of just writing what I’ve done so I’m going to do that quickly and then write some other stuff (not sure what yet). Cycled back to Podgorica. Really fun windy downhill. Had a Top Gun Ice Cream (3 stars). Met Nino. Drank beer; ate meet. Stayed at Hostel Nice Place (booked purely due to the name). Got given 4 litres of homemade wine by Nino (nice man). Failed to cycle to Zabljak (was far and Poya’s ankle hurt). Sat by a nice river. Went on a bus to Zabljak (took some convincing and bike disassembling to be allowed on). Arrived in Zabljak: mountain town. Had to buy a jumper as it was cold. Amazingly the jumper says W4 on (THAT’S MY LONDON POSTCODE). Hostel owners made us a barbeque. Talked to people and drank too much homemade wine. Next day went on a rafting tour on a river through a canyon. Was promised 100 Israelites; they didn’t materialise. Zip lined across the canyon. Had a nap. Found an internet café. Wrote a blog.





Ok so. Writing exactly what I do is kinda dull. It’s a lot of ‘I cycled here’, ‘I had fun’, ‘I dropped my phone in a toilet (did I mention that?)’. Either way here are a few disconnected things, observations I have made without much context.

Apparently you’re not meant to eat the whole fish. I was given a whole fish to eat and though ‘Apart from the head Imma gonna eat all dat’. I then tucked in, so engrossed it my culinary experience I did not notice how everyone else was approaching their dead river friend. Apparently you don’t normally eat the tail, skin, spine etc. Apart from being a bit crunchy I enjoyed it all. I almost ate the head. But I poked it with my knife and the eye popped out and that freaked me out a little bit.

Everything comes with bread here. I’m pretty sure if you were to try and buy drugs it would come with a separate bag of bread crumbs. Even just getting a salad or an omelet comes with a big bowl of fresh bread. That’s nice; I like bread. Paya refused to throw away any bread and would cycle around with stale day old bread which he would munch by the roadside.

Car horns are mostly used to warn you of cars presence rather than for cross reasons. This is much better as hearing a horn whilst cycling lets us know we are about to be passed by a car. In London I instantly think that I have done something naughty, or an irate motorist is angry at me for a reason that does not make sense.

I can’t remember the name of a delicious ice cream I had. But it would’ve gotten 5 stars. It had a lcvely chocolate syrup that ran through the centre of the cone and I couldn’t fault its presentation. (I am currently in an internet café; I hope someone isn’t reading the stupid things I am writing. If they were that sentence probably freaked them out and caused them to stop. Yeah, I’m talking to you!).

Dead animals I have seen: dog, cat, hedgehog, snake, lizard, frog, some sort of thin brown thing, insects (I have eaten a few of those as well (accidentally)). I was keeping count of how many of each one I had seen but gave up pretty quickly; my mental tally only goes up to ten. There are probably more. I will have a think.

I have thought of more things to say but can’t remember them, I should write stuff down so I remember. I won’t do that. These things will do for now. I will post this on actual blog if I get my place back. If not I’ll keep doing it here. Will update on Facebook where stuff to read is. Not complicated at all right?

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Wet Men

Yesterday our plan was to cycle a 60 mile round trip allowing us to visit the Ostrog Monestry, which is a monastery built into the side of a mountain. So we set full of optimism, and with a song in our hearts. To measure our optimism Paya had a happiness meter on his handlebars, the needle of which needle was teetering dangerously around 'Euphoric' at the start  of the cycle. Unfortunately about 10 miles into the ride we cycled directly into a thunderstorm.

Dry men

With our spirits undamped and Paya's happiness meter reading 'happy, wet and determined' (it's a very precise metre) we plowed up the mountain in the pouring rain with lightening striking the valley not more than a mile away from us. It was a very wet time for all involved. We decided to cancel the monastery visit due to the weather and after a coffee and a conversation in broken English with some pleasant restaurant proprietors we circled around and headed back down the mountain. Descending in the pouring rain was a cold, and slightly scary experience as sheer drops without any safety barriers were pretty common. However, we survived and the happiness meter read 'still wet, still optimistic, and looking forward to a flat cycle home and the forthcoming prospect of watching the World Cup final and having a beer' (we all had to squint at the meter to read that particular one, accurate as it was. I also may or may not have caused a car crash (jury's out).

Wet men

Wet men

 

Evening was easier: ate a stupid about of meat for €5, and watched the football with people from the hostel.

I think I am going to restrict my ice cream reviews to cone shaped ice creams, otherwise it might have the tendency to get silly...

Lion Ice Cream: On first glance this ice cream does not impress. The colour of the caramel flavoured ice cream is something akin to vomit and the chocolate on top is poorly presented; it is also very brittle causing you to displace quite a lot of ice cream as you bite into it. The caramel ice cream itself tasted slightly odd to me, but the inclusion of a chocolaty conclusion meant I left the experience in a good mood. 2 stars.

The weather that made the Wet Men wet when they were previously dry.

 

Albania - Montenegro

After getting stitches I decided that it would not be the brightest idea to cycle 85 miles so went and loaded my bike into the back of  a furgon (essentially a minivan) which would take me across the country to Tirana. There were points on the journey where I was sad I had decided not to cycle, such as during the elongated downhill sections. However there were moments where our little van was teetering along small mountains roads in the pouring rain with unguarded death drops on either side of us that I thought that maybe I had made the correct decision.

Tirana was really good. A few years ago the mayor had realised that the communist era buildings that make up most of the city were not very appealing. Unable to build new buildings he decided to paint them in bright colours, often adding stripes or interesting  patterns. It gives the city a unique look that I enjoyed. Due to how cheap everything is out here I decided to buy myself a vaguely expensive meal. I had a massive swordfish steak for just under 20 pounds, which came cut fresh was a massive swordfish they had on ice. I was in a hostel and was looking forward to talking to people for the first time in a while. Unfortunately, the first people I talked to gave me a little bit of weed that made me very sleepy and unsociable for the rest of the night. Ah well, my book is pretty good.

Racing stripes in Tirana

 

"How can we improve this murky brown area?"

"Put some colourful triangles on the pipe"

 

Today during my cycle to Montenegro I got two punctures. That was poo. A nice friendly Albanian man helped me with one of them and pulled a spiky object out my tire that was causing the issue. Everyone is Albania has been really friendly. However, at one point a car pulled up and someone handed this man a large roll of Euros that gave me the impression he was also involved in some untoward business outside his roll of roadside bike helper, which I had previously assumed had to be his job. I crossed the border and cycled to meet Poya and Paya, who had gone out and bought very cheap mountain bikes not suitable in any way for the cycling we plan to do. Any fear I had that they might get super professional bikes and always zoom ahead of me dissipated quickly. I went and got thinner tyres put on my bike from a man who spoke very enthusiastically about pitball terriers and all was happy.

Poya and Paya

Kit Kat Ice Cream – Similar to a Cornetto but with chocolate ice cream the Kit Kat Ice Cream initially impresses with its neat presentation and single Kit Kat stick going down the centre of the cone, peaking out of the top of the product. The lack of chocolate at the end obviously disappoints but due to the chocolate ice cream it isn't as glaring an omission as on other similar products. 4 stars.

Dog bites, stiches, ice cream etc.

A dog bit me today (see above)! I had just started my cycle and a pack of about 10 dogs appeared from behind a gate and started chasing me down the road. Usually when a dog from a property begins to give chase they loose interest once you have cycled on for a bit. However, these ones were particularly tenacious and a little while up the road one sunk its teeth into my leg. This caused me to veer off course and ride into the side of the road resulting in me coming to a stop. With me now stationary the dogs seem to loose interest and trotted back to their dwelling, leaving me with two reasonable sized holes in the back of my calf. I rode down the hill and asked the next person I saw if he knew where I could locate a bandage of some sort. This bearded fruit seller seemed to sympathise and pointed me in the direction of a place two towns over that had ‘a clinic’. The clinic turned out to be a pharmacy and the friendly man behind the counter put some anti-septic brown juice on the wound and bandaged it up for me. For the rest of the trip through Greece I was exceedingly wary of dogs, even stopping when I thought I saw a pack of them ahead on the road (they turned out to be sheep). However one more dog did give me a little chase but gave up pretty quickly.

The Albanian Border

I crossed the Albanian border easily and headed off towards Pogredec. I stopped at a bank and exchanged 150 Euros for Albanian Lek. This was a move of excess. I just ate a meal of three kebab skewers, salad, chips, bread, and two beers that set me back the equivalent of about 6 Euros. Having this much money for two days is too much; I will probably go for a really nice meal tomorrow in Tirana. Who knows, it might cost me over 10 pounds. The rest of the cycle was nice. I went through a lot of Albanian farmland and saw people going about their day to day business. I would’ve liked some more photos of people but I felt intrusive cruising in on a bike and taking people’s photograph as they worked. One thing I did really enjoy was a donkey I saw, fully loaded with hay, walking happily along the motorway. I took its picture and wondered where it was going. A little further down the road I saw a man running in the donkey’s direction shaking his stick. He smiled at me as if to say “I have lost my donkey. But don’t worry, I am faster’. My mountain bike also came in handy here as the Albanian idea of a road seems to sometimes be a field you can drive through. There were lots of stony paths and muddy ditches for me to navigate. It was really fun.

When I arrived at the hostel I told my host about my dog ordeal and was quickly whisked away to hospital. The man at the Greek pharmacy had said to seek medical attention if I started feeling weird but the hostel owner thought it was better if we went even though I was feeling fine. The doctor spoke no English but kept saying ‘No problem’ and giving me a thumbs up as he stitched up my bite marks and injected me with what I assume was a rabies vaccination. They didn't charge me for the affair and apart from being pretty painful it was quite a painless affair.

Final thing before I sign off. After my disappointing Cornetto experience I tried another ice cream cone today; it was simply called ‘Nestle Ice Cream’. At first it was a bit underwhelming as the top didn't have any chocolate or nuts on it, just plain ice cream. However, once I got past this the cone was far crunchier than the Cornetto and was very satisfying. When I reached the conclusion I was delighted to find solid chocolate waiting for me at the bottom of the cone. Result. This was a far better experience than the Cornetto and one I would happily repeat. 4 Stars. For more ice cream reviews and hopefully less hospital trips please check back regularly.

Also, I just tried to buy a few cherries for a snack. I offered the equivalent of about 80p and now have over 100 cherries to contend with. Oops.

This is not the best way to hold an ice cream