After a rather long stopover in Hong Kong, the four of us finally made it into Bangkok around midnight on Tuesday. Coming out of the air condition airport i knew it would be hot, but coming from chilly Hakuba it was like walking straight into a wall of heat. Bangkok at the moment is around 30c so it was a bit of a shock considering only a few days earlier i was riding powder in -10c.

My travel buddies Ray and G had already been to Bangkok before, so they sorted out everything and got us to Kaosan and in a nearby hostel. After being in Hakuba for so long it was strange to walk around somewhere new that was so different in every way to Japan.

The main street is full of stalls selling all kinds of stuff at crazily cheap prices. I myself got a new backpack and after a bit of haggling got it at a third of the price back compared to back home in the UK. It may be a knock off and not last very long but hopefully it will at least get me to Australia.

The streets are also lined with people selling all types of food and drink, Pad Thai being my favourite and fried scorpions probably my least favourite of the lot. It was nice to eat hot food again as Japan use literally no spice in their food at all, not even in their curries.

It’s also been a while since i was hassled in the street when shopping. If you’re not being hassled into buying a suit then you’re probably being hassled for a Tuk Tuk ride. Walking through Kaosan you basically couldn’t go for more than 10 yards without being offered something, sometimes a lot worse than a suit.

Our plan was always to find our island and head over there as soon as possible, so me and G spent the next couple of days scouring the web trying to find the perfect place to stay. We knew all about the main islands in Thailand, but we wanted to go somewhere a bit more unknown so we could all just chill out for a while away from the crowds.

After many hours of intense Google searching we found our island and organised our travel. Unfortunately this meant a 12 hour bus ride but we were all looking forward to getting out of the madness of Bangkok and down to our beach hut to chill for a while.