Man I Love Bangkok!

See if you can guess the first place we went after securing a room for the night...

Yep! May Kaidee's for lunch. Alloi mak maa!

May (which is pronounced 'Mai') also offers cooking classes at her restaurant. Her and her staff are the bubbliest bunch of people, she also seems to have a bit of an empire going which is great for everyone involved.

I've been nagging Bighead for sometime now to do a Thai cooking class somewhere and seen as though we have a few days spare, we've booked in for tomorrow afternoon.

The Most Beautiful Thing

We ended up with a bit of a raw deal regarding the boat journey to Koh Phi Phi. When I booked the tickets, I’d asked the dude how long the trip would take. He paused, just for a millisecond, before telling me it would take one hour. So I wasn’t particularly surprised when the trip ended up taking two, as his ever-so-tiny pause had sewn a seed of doubt in my mind as to whether he was being completely honest with me. However, that wouldn’t have been so bad if the boat had been in the least bit comfortable. No air-conditioning or cushioned seats to be seen! Aren’t we flashpackers now? How could this happen? Check out the life jackets… Anyway, I couldn’t whinge because we were on our way to one of the most beautiful islands ever.

It’s difficult to explain how gorgeous the island is. I can’t even really show you with pictures (although I’ll try) as they just don't do it justice. It certainly is one of those places that needs to be visited in person in order to fully appreciate its natural beauty.

Seeing the sheer size of the surrounding mountains and the way they shoot straight up into the sky from the ocean is a sight that will remain with me forever. When you combine an awe inspiring view like that with beaches lined by jungle, stunning crystal clear bays, great diving and very few vehicles, I reckon it could just about be called paradise (if you shut out the extremely pushy touts, one million speed boats, and over-the-top resorts).
After the ferry trip from hell (I’m exaggerating, but it was pretty bad), being harassed by touts the moment we set foot on the creaky old jetty, and nearly causing an all out brawl between them and our hotel porters (it’s complicated), we finally made it safely to our room. Later that night at Papaya Restaurant (good value tasty food), I couldn't help but photograph this clever little guy. He knows where it's at!On Saturday, we took a two dive trip with Hippo Divers. We had an awesome day and two really enjoyable dives. The scenery all around us was stunning. Hippo Divers provided a great service with yummy food and friendly, professional staff. The visibility on the first dive was better than the second, but we were still lucky enough to see loads of sort after species, including a reasonable sized shark, several turtles, two octopus lovers (they were holding tentacles), sea snakes, scorpion fish and loads of others that I won’t bore you with. It was very cool and some of the best diving we’ve had on the trip so far.

Dive Site #1 - Bida Nok

Dive Site #2 - Palong West

Phi Phi Leh

While all the delightful action packed travel was taking place, other decisions were being made. We're now in Krabi Town, on our way to Bangkok. We’d always planned to include Cambodia in our travels and have decided that now is as good a time as any. Might as well do it before ‘settling down’ in Phuket. Do they have mango sticky rice in Cambo?

So it was a bit of a whirl wind tour to Phi Phi this time round but we've promised to go back soon. I’m still shocked that I was able to leave such a beautiful place.

On the move

Last week we'd been staying in Phuket Town so that we were right in the middle of the action during the festival. Now that it's finished we've moved over the hill to check out Patong.

Before leaving town, we decided to have lunch at this little jungle cafe on the top of Rang Hill called Tung Ka Cafe. The view over Phuket Town and south down the coast to Rawai was stunning. The food was really tasty too, chicken satay and a lovely fresh stir fry with cashew nuts (back into the meat now!). They even had soft seats. It sounds weird but comfy furniture is one of those things you don't realise you miss until you have it again. I had to giggle when I noticed they were playing Christmas songs in the background though.The coffee afterwards was served in the traditional Thai way, with a refreshing cup of tea alongside.
Patong is one of the most popular beaches on Phuket, it's on the west coast just north of Karon. It has a long white sand beach, several large malls with a cinema and supermarket, beautiful green hills all around, and a pumping night life (apparently!).It also seems to have a bit of a reputation for being one of Thailand's major destinations for sex tourism, however, unless you're out at 3am, this aspect of Patong goes largely unseen.

If you put aside its reputation, Patong is actually pretty cool. There are loads of different places to eat, ranging from cheap road side stalls to high end internationally acclaimed restaurants. In Kata/Karon area we found it a bit tricky finding cheap eats as it's a bit more resorty.

Bighead and I do like to be close to the action and the food, so perhaps Patong is the one for us??

Today however, we're off to Phi Phi for a couple of days to do some diving. We've never been before so I'm looking forward to seeing what the fuss is all about.

For all you veges out there

This sure is one very good reason for you to book a flight to Bangkok right now.

Pack your bag, slip on your flip flops and relocate. May Kaidee's Vegetarian Restaurant is waiting for you.

We've had to eat here quite a lot over the past few days, we simply couldn't go anywhere else. Every dish we've tried has been excellent. So fresh and rich. They also make a mean banana and coconut shake. Trust me, you will find it very difficult to leave. Besides, how could anyone resist May's wee drop dead gorgeous pup? He is far too cute for his own good and gets up to all sorts of mischief racing around chewing on patrons flip flops and sleeping on feet!

This is hands down the best vegetarian restaurant I have ever been to. If you're in Bangkok, you must check it out. They have two restaurant's in Banglumpoo and also a branch in Chang Mai.

For all you veggie's out there, these pics are for you.

The real deal babi guling

We decided we'd better try some babi guling elsewhere, as we've seen signs all over the show advertising warung that sell it. I was keen to find out if the babi guling served at Ibu Oka's had been altered for westerners in any way. We stopped at Warung Renon in Denpasar to find out, and this is what we were served.
De fuckin'licious!

Very similar to Ibu Oka's and just as tasty, if not more! There were a few more odd things on the plate and a lot less meat. In fact, you can't see any meat in the photograph at all, but there are a couple of fatty pieces hiding underneath all the other goodness.

I'm not entirely sure what everything on the plate was, but I'm fairly sure we ate some organs (Dad, you'd love it!). The dish was served with a delicious little meatball broth and was quite possibly the best one we've had in Bali. Don't worry Mum, usually after a lunch like this we have a plate of fruit for dinner!

Just while I'm on the topic of food (again), this has got to be the best fish satay I've had in Bali. It was in Permuteran in northern Bali and I've been meaning to include it somewhere on my blog. Even Bighead had some!

You see that crispy fried piece of fish at the top, I ate that whole thing, fins and all! It was sublime. Crispy goodness like you wouldn't believe! The satay had this green chilli sambar smothered all over the fish, out of this world.

Man I love good food.

Good eats

We've been milling about in Sanur for a bit now. It's great to be staying still for a while. As every traveller knows, moving about all the time can be hard work.

Sanur is cool, there's enough here to keep us happy. The beach isn't the best but we have a nice place with a pool. Bighead and I have started doing laps in everyday. Gotta try and work off all that deep fried goodness somehow. We're not getting any younger!

We spend quite a lot of our time buzzing about on the scoot, looking for places to eat. Our favourite so far in Sanur is Warung Pregina. It has tidy, hand crafted furnishings with lots of dark wood and soft cushions. The red leather menus are beautifully presented, the staff are friendly and attentive, and the food is prepared and presented with love.

Nasi Campur (hold the nasi) - 22,000Rp/NZ$3.50
A delicious collection of meats, vegetables, sambar's and tasty treats like the grated and spiced coconut you can see at the bottom of the plate.

Balinese Grilled Chicken - 25,000Rp/NZ$4.00
Perfectly grilled chicken leg. It was smokey, creamy and perfectly spiced.

Masakan Padang

Another tasty type of food here is masakan padang. The warung serving up this delectable style of food, are easy to spot. Check out the unique way the food is displayed in the front window.

You can select any number of these tasty tid bits. There’s usually lots of different types of meat, veg, tempeh and tofu dishes on offer.

This particular warung seemed to be more expensive than others we've been to. My meal cost about NZ$4.

On my plate you can see a whole fried egg, a corn fritter, dried beef,

beef rendang, and a potato ball. Yes, it is mostly fried, so not the sort of meal you'd eat too much of, but oh so tasty!

My personal favourites are the potato balls (why don’t they make em like this at home?) and the beef rendang.

The Balinese Feast

Food is a major part of ceremonies and festivals throughout Indonesia (I’m not sure we’ll make it to Thailand after all!). The size of the feast depends on the importance of the ceremony. In Bali, at smaller ceremonies, the Balinese will smoke a duck or chicken to accompany a range of delicious spicy salads. Whereas at larger celebrations, no expense is spared and families will also enjoy a spit roast pig (babi guling, my favourite! and a local delicacy – more on this later!).
Several restaurants in Ubud offer these feasts to tourists on a regular basis. Bighead and I have already par-taken in several (surprise!).

Ketut’s Place on Jl Suweta provides these feasts on Sun, Wed and Fri. It costs 135,000Rp per person (about NZ$20) and you can eat as much as you can squeeze in! Drinks are extra and there may be a service charge (Ketut took ours off after asking where we stayed! Go figure).

Before the meal Ketut welcomes all guests into his family compound and shares some interesting info about Balinese culture. Each guest is poured a glass of Balinese rice wine (not unlike dessert wine from home, although unfortunately only 1% alcohol) and a cup of ginger tea. The feast is laid out in buffet style and contains about 15 or so different dishes. Various spicy salads, tofu satay, coconut satay, chicken curry, smoked duck, peanut crisps, fried tempeh, prawn crackers, the list goes on. Samesame’s eyes are bulging as she tries to play it cool. Waiting patiently as the guests before her seem to take an eternity to fill their banana leave baskets… oh so tasty!

However, a better bargain waits at Rumah Roda’s Guesthouse and Restaurant on Jl Kajeng, where a very similar feast can be had for just 30,000Rp (about $4!). The environment isn’t quite so up market but is lovely just the same, which is more our speed anyway. Roda's serves up a delectable array of dishes, where the main item that’s missing is the ubiquitous smoked duck.

The other thing I love about Roda’s, is that he refills water bottles for 20c a pop. Anything to help decrease the ever increasing plastic problem in Bali, is all good as far as I'm concerned!