On to Southeast Asia!!

July 13, 2011

We're outta here!!

         Today we left for Malaysia after spending a night in the Gold Coast. We had planned on arriving in the Gold Coast in the morning and then going out for the day and coming back to spend the night in the airport. We walked to the nearby beach with our big backpacks and spent a couple of hours laying around. It was sunny but windy so we ended up getting pretty cold. We got pizza for dinner and then went back to the airport. We noticed that all flights out stopped at 9:30pm and when I asked an employee we found out that the stupid airport closed from 10:30-4am! Lame. There go our free nights sleep plan. We ended up having to walk to a nearby hostel which was probably a good thing because we were super tired after not sleeping much the night before. We took a nap and then had peanut butter sandwiches for dinner. We then went back to sleep which was a bit hard because the hostel was freezing cold and since we're headed to Asia we only packed for warm weather. Seriously not a pleasant accommodation and we left too early in the morning to even get the free breakfast. Perhaps you can detect a bit of resentment at the situation. I've really enjoyed most of my time in Australia but this country is just so damn expensive and we're tired of having to pay so much for everything. So it's a really great feeling knowing that we're headed to a much cheaper land!

         After getting some sleep, which really was a good thing, we got up early this morning and walked back to the airport. After carrying my backpack for the first time yesterday I woke up with sore shoulder, hips, and back. Man, I sound like an old woman. I'm sure my body will get to used to it, but my main thought here is how thankful I am that there will cheap massages in Asia because I think I am going to need them frequently! Ouch.

         We're on a 9 hour flight to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and we're really excited! Unfortunately, this airplane is also freezing cold and because it's a budget airline there are no blankets and we don't have any cash left to buy a blanket. Dern. So hopefully we both make it to Malaysia without getting sick from all our time spent being cold in the last day.

         I won't be writing as often as I did on the road trip because I think we will generally be busier this time. I will post updates occasionally though filling you in on our Asian adventures. The general plan is to spend a week in Malaysia in KL and the Perhentian Islands and then fly up to Bangkok. My besty friend Caitlin is flying into Bangkok the day after us to travel with us for two weeks. It should be great to have her along and it will be so good to see a familiar face from home (in the very unfamiliar country of Thailand! :) After she leaves we are planning to head to Northern Thailand to stay with one of my mom's friends for a couple of days before heading east into Laos. From Laos we'll go into northern Vietnam, travel down south through the country and then west into Cambodia. Fairly loose plans because we don't know when or from where we will be flying home. We think we'll be in SE Asia for about 2 ½ months. So there you have it! Hmm, I can't wait for Asian street food....