Day 128 – Chiang Rai.

We had a few hours left with our bike (Barbara) so after breakfast we decided to take it out again. We popped back to Central Plaza to pick up a few things we didn’t get yesterday and then went for a short drive around the town. We feel quite sad to hand her back as we became quite attached to it. Felt like a local because we just hopped on it and rode around wherever we wanted to go!

The next few hours were spent just chilling in the hostel as Chrissy wanted to get some drawing done for work, which gave me a chance to write some of this as I haven’t in a few days.

We then walked down the road and went out for dinner, which was really disappointing! As you know I like to look on Trip Advisor for places to go and I found some recently opened burger place by an Australian guy. I thought this must be good, I was totally wrong. The food was bland and terrible but the service was amazing. I should probably just copy and paste this as a TA review right now. After here we walked around the Night Bazaar (market), which was also disappointing. Everything was overpriced and no one wanted to bargain with me. I think because it’s here every night they don’t really care. This made me even more gutted about missing out on last night’s market.

The final thing I wanted to see in Chiang Rai was the Clock Tower show. There is a roundabout with a clock tower on it and on the hours of 7, 8 and 9pm it has a light and sound show. Imagine the Disneyland castle but smaller, basically the same thing. It was a cute little thing and went on for about 5 minutes. Once that was over we went back to the hostel to pack up all ready for our flight to Bangkok early tomorrow morning!

Day 36 – Taupo

The market was a bit of a disappointment as there were only a small amount of stands. It was cool to see what the local produce is and it was quite different to what you would expect to see in a UK market. 

After here I walked alongside the lake and watched a Circus act. I saw there was a stand when we arrived but it just looked more like an advertisement than an actual circus show. It lasted just over an hour and was called Campground Chaos. The whole thing was being done on donation and by the looks of it they got quite a bit of money. Some of the strength the guys had was pretty impressive! Their finale act involved a picnic bench being hoisted up and them jumping off it, doing some acrobatics and chucking flames.

I then walked a bit further down the road to McDonalds. This is apparently the coolest one in the world because you can eat in a real life plane! This plane was put there in 1990. As the weather had picked up a bit I decided on just buying a caramel sundae to enjoy the plane experience. 

I then walked to the park and just chilled out and finished the final Hunger Games books, for me the movies so far have been a bit disappointing and I’ve loved the books but part of me is quite excited to see what they do in the film! After catching some rays I just cooked some dinner and packed my bag ready for the early start tomorrow!

Day 21 – Queen Victoria Market.

7:30am - This has to be the earliest I’ve woken up since leaving Perth but it was all for a good reason and that reason was breakfast (and to see Valerie)! Valerie’s flight back to Sydney was at midday so we arranged to meet at 8:30. Eventually I found the right Crown hotel entrance (why make a hotel so big?!) and we were on our way.  We only walked around the corner to one of the restaurants on the southbank, it was a pretty chilly start to the day but it soon brightened up. After a lovely catch up it was time to say goodbye but I shall be staying with Valerie when I’m in Sydney in March so it’s only bye for now.

I walked back to Flinders Street where I jumped on the free tram to Queens Street to make my way to the Queen Victoria Market. This market runs 4 days a week and sells pretty much everything; fruit, vegetables, clothes, souvenirs etc. Shruthi had said about going to this market so she came and met me. When the market started to close, this is when it really came alive! People snatching up every last bargain they could and fruit being sold by the boxes for just a dollar or two. Absolute mayhem!

We still had quite a bit of the day left and we weren’t quite sure how to spend it. We had mentioned about going to the cinema before so we looked at what was on around us. The Wolf of Wall Street is the film of the moment so we decided to go and check that out at the Holgs cinema in Melbourne central. Although it was quite a long film (3 hours to be exact!) I’m not quite sure what to make of it, the whole thing was pretty crazy really.

Day 8 - Fremantle.

Another crazy hot day but that wasn’t going to stop us! As it was a weekend the markets were on in Fremantle, a place just south of Perth which is about 40mins by train from where Michael lives, so that is where we spent our Sunday. The public transport in Perth is on top form, if only it was like this everywhere else in the UK!

We decided to take the ‘Fremantle Tram Tour’ around the city as it wasn’t too expensive, a good excuse to get some shade and we had a very informative driver! The bus took us from the train station to the town hall, the markets, the prison, the harbour and a few other places. We went on one round trip then got off at the harbour to have some fish and chips from the No.1 shop in Western Australia – Cicerello’s! It was pretty tasty and definitely filled me up for most of the day. From here we walked around the markets where yet again I didn’t buy anything! (I’m getting good at this.)

Our next and final stop was the Fremantle Prison. This prison operated until 1991 with the last hanging in 1948… or was it 68? I can’t quite remember but it was pretty recently. What I do know is that 41 people were hanged and only 1 was a woman. When they knew they were going to close the prison the inmates were given paint and were allowed to paint on the walls which is partly still there 13 years later. It was weird to walk around and think that this place was in action not so long ago as most things you end up seeing are ’80 years ago…’ or some time length which is way before I was born. 

We got to go on 2 tours with our ticket, both very informative and thoroughly enjoyable. We were taught all about what happens day to day and how people tried to escape and whether they succeeded or failed. Both tour guides said they get quite a few exinmates come back just to have a look at places they may have never seen and where they spent quite a few years of their lives.

Before getting the train home we popped into Little Creatures brewery for a drink and then stopped in Leederville where we bought some frozen yogurt for dinner from Tutti Fruittis! I can live on water and frozen yogurt/ice cream can’t I?