Hello and Happy Belated Chinese New Year!

Well after travelling through mainland Malaysia and on to Penang our island hopping plans were somewhat scarpered by the oncoming of Chinese New Year. We had hoped to jump from island to island along the west cosat of Malaysia and Thialand however as there is a 4 day weekend this tends to be the time the Chinese (many of which now inhabit Malasia and Thialand) go on holiday. We could not find accomodation anywhere and the prices began to hike! I know many of you will not be feeling a great deal of sympathy right now... but there it is.

So we hightailed it up to Krabi in Thialand figuring there would be more accomodation there. Krabi itself is a small town and the main departure point for Ko Phi Phi, internationally reknowned island resort.We decided to stay in Krabi and do day trips from here out to the islands. The scenery was spectactular and the food amazing. Here are a couple of pictures from our island adventures.

This on is the beach where the movie 'The Beach' with Leonardo DiCaprio was made. Unfortunately there were about 200 other people there the day we were there!

We have recently spent a couple of days in Phuket at Kata Beach and tonight we travel to Bangkok where we will spend a couple of days before we head for Cambodia and Angkor Wat. Hope all is well. We love getting your emails so keep them coming. Kat and Mike

Fun in the Sun in Bali

Prior to Malaysia we spent some time in Bali, Indonesia. We were hoping to head west from here to Lombok and Komodo for the Komodo Dragons however forfeited this plan in favour of Borneo. A good choice it was as well as you can see from the previous blog.

We had a total of 12 days in Bali. Apart from spending most days at the beach, surfing, relaxing, getting massages and pedicures we also explored the island on scooters some days. I thought I would include a few pictures from here as it was a very beautiful place with it's own distinct style.

The Man of the Forest - Borneo

Slipping, sliding, occasionally sinking. We had wanted to get off the beaten track and after 3 hours along a track deep in mud we were. We are in Borneo. Sabah to be exact, the northern region. For those not in the know Borneo is the world's third largest island and is divided between Malaysia, Indonesia and the tiny sultanate of Brunei. We are in Malaysian Borneo and splendid it is too.

We had arrived at an eco-lodge adjacent to a huge river and barely 15 minutes after collecting our stomachs we were aboard a narrow boat looking for the local wildlife. Over the course of 2 days we were extremely fortunate to see many of the forest's jewels including the "man of the forest" itself, a wild orang utan hanging from the branches of a giant tree overhanging the river. Detecting our presence she slowly climbed down behind thick vines to peer out at us from behind the foliage. We were extremely lucky.

When not being poached these awesome apes are suffering from habitat loss. A combination of logging and the planting of palm oil plantations to be used in the cooking and cosmetics industry is depriving them of much needed forest in which they can thrive. We later visted a rehabilitation sanctuary where orphaned orang utans are taken and released into a protected area of forest and helped back to health by regular feeding before eventually (6-10 years) being released back into other forests in an effort to boost wild population numbers. Did you know that the orang utan has 96.4% the same DNA make up as humans!

As well as the apes we saw long tailed macaques and the comical proboscis monkey. Native only to Borneo, this monkey has a nose that must be seen to be believed!!! Another treat was to see a herd of 20 wild asian elephants tearing up vegetation on the river bank - these animals eat around 200kg of food every day! Completing our wildlife showcase, 4ft long monitor lizards, freshwater crocodiles, hornbills, a sea eagle, wild boar and a big hairy spider. And that was in the toilet!

Two days later we visited Turtle Island to see .... yep, turtles! Green Tutles to be exact. We witnessed one huge female (shell over 3ft wide) lay 87 eggs which were then collected by the park ranger to be incubated safely away form predators such as monitor lizards. We then witnessed around 20 hatchlings be hand-released into the ocean under the cover, and safety, of darkness. As it was night time and flash photography was permitted unfortunately we cannot share any photos of this with you!

New Babes in arms and another of Mike's Mishaps!

During our trip home we were lucky to catch up with a few new arrivals, a few 1st Birthday parties and a trip to the beach! Firstly we went to visit Matt who has now moved to Coolum Beach on the Sunshine Coast. We took a trip to the beach with Josh and Hannah (pictured below) his two little ones. We had a great time although I think Mike and I played with the toys as much as the kids. As you can see Matt is well and working hard having just finished his course to become a personal trainer. Work 'em hard Matt!













Once we got home we were invited to Georgia Katherine's 1st Birthday! Michelle and Matt hosted a lovely Birthday breakfast BBQ in the park in Lismore. It was a lovely morning and a great to see Georgia turning into a beautiful little girl with loads of perosonality~!


In between a belated Christmas, Mike's second Birthday, doctors appointments, booster injections, malaria tablets and many trips to the beach; Mike managed to have another little mishap! For those of you that remember the backpack incident in Europe - that was nothing! It goes like this... We had hired a car from Brisbane. Mike had been driving and we were at the beach for a surf... well who went for a surf with the keys in his pocket?! So, we now have a hire car at one of the most remote beaches with no key! What's more is the spare key was in Melbourne (please remember at this point that Australia is a very BIG place!) and it is Friday afternoon after 5pm. The upshot was that the hire car sat at the beach for 4 days while the key got couried down and we were charged the excess for the lost key! What am I to do with this boy!? All ok in the end with us getting the key and car on our day of departure! (nothing like cutting it fine!)

On our way out of Brisbane to Bali we stopped in to see Jade and Sim and their gorgeous little 4 month old Finn. Unfortunately we didn't get to see Sim but Finn was having a ball in his new Jollly Jumper and Jade looked a seriously competent and stunning new Mum.

On the way home we also got to see Greg and Ang in their place in Brisbane who were kind enough to put us up for the night. It was great to see them both well.

Also a big CONGRATULATIONS to Dom and Soumi who had a little boy, Ethan Morley Cheah on the 3rd January.