During the waiting we had met a great Aussie woman and when this independent traveller heard that it wasn’t coming she took the bull by the horns and led me upstairs leaving Cliff to look after the baggage. I then found myself stood alone in front of what I think was the desk where we bought our ticket with large Malaysian women surrounding me shouting furiously in a language I couldn’t understand, without a clue what was going on I stood there dumbstruck realising that this was surely part of backpacking but not really knowing what to do, then through the crowd I heard the voice of our new found Aussie friend and before I knew it I had my money back and the next second parted with it again for a ticket on another coach due in 10 minutes.

Making our way to our new coach she casually said ” this is reminds me of the time I got stranded on top of a mountain in Vietnam without any money” I didn’t think it was quite like that but it had certainly been an experience. So the coach was packed like sardines in a tin, but in some kind of exotic spicy sauce and the journey was long but we left KL looking forward to the next step of our journey.

Hot and humid doesn’t even start to describe what the weather was like in Kuala Lumpar for our time there, to say when you left the air conditioned comfort of the hostel and stepped outside that the air hit you like a sauna is an understatement. And being British and not use to that climate to start with we didn’t fair too well and to say we got use to it wouldn’t really be true. The intensity of the heat and dryness of the air leads me nicely onto section two. . . Times Square.

Picture a huge glass shining skyscraper beautifully modern and clean, rising up into the clear blue sky above, surrounding this serenity is a world of complete contrast. The heat, chaos and choking smoke engulf the city and lining the litter covered streets that screech with the sound of swerving scooters are rows of dilapadated terrace houses littered with ferrel cats and dogs. With dark rotting interiors and children’s faces emptily peering out through the glassless windows you feel with a sudden pang the inequality that KL endures.

The aforementioned structure of modernism is Times Square, the biggest shopping mall in Malaysia. With uncountable floors, 2 food courts, a cinema, bowling alley and indoor theme park it certainly is a shopping mall that has it all! Yes. . . I did say indoor theme park . . on about the 10th floor of this monster of consumerism you’ll find a full sized roller coaster thundering its way amongst the shoe shops and restaurants, whilst browsing the aisles of the pharmacy for yet another mosquitoe bite cream it is somewhat of a surreal experience to hear the screams of thrilled riders on the roller coaster situated just above and left a bit of the hair care aisle.

We found ourselves spending a fair bit of time at Times Square partly as a cool retreat from the heat but also as a safe bet when it came to food. . .by this stage we still hadn’t taken the daunting leap into buying from hawker stalls mainly because they sold food that looked like it didn’t really belong in this universe. Malaysian food, we discovered very quickly, contains a large amount of chilli, due to mine and Clifford’s intolerance to spicy food this became a daily challenge to find somewhere that didnt put chilli in everything including their mango salad.

Aside from the world wide cuisines served in Times Square it also allowed me to indulge in my favourite pastime, no difficulty in guessing what it is, shopping! From clothes emporiums to electronic superstores and endless quirky little shops selling Malaysian bizzares, and the cool temperature meaning Clifford didn’t mind the wandering around, I was in my element.

After our adrenalin packed day at Dreamworld in Oz we decided not to visit the themepark in the shopping centre however did indulge in a couple of games of bowling. . . . don’t tell him I told you, but I did whip his ass! So I think that kind of sums up Times Square. . . now for KL outside of the shopping mall that turned out to be more than just a shopping mall.

So on one fateful day we took the leap and ventured outside of Times Square and what a day it turned out to be! We needed to go to the bus station to book our onward journey to Penang and the only way to get there was to walk, so we dressed in as little clothing as possible and set out. Kuala Lumpar is a pedestrians nightmare, the city is built for traffic and traffic alone, amongst the smut and smog we walked down a long main road in the baking early morning sun past strange smells and even stranger sights including a strangely large amount of bottles of wee thrown from the windows of parked coaches and buses, this was our sign that we had reached the bus station. The building was dark and hot and absolutely packed with people, a din of foreign shouts filled the air as you got shunted from every direction, so eventually we found a vendor and bought what we hoped was a coach ticket for the next morning, having fought our way out of the station but into the burning sun we decided to push on and head across the river to KL bird park and orchid garden.

This plan stumble at the first hurdle, from the map the route looked easy, left out of the station straight across the main bridge, take a right and follow the road around to the garden and park complex. So the first bridge turned out to be for vehicles only with no pavement, we needed to cross and walk further down the river to find another bridge however crossing turned out to be impossible with the traffic moving at a great speed with no kind of logical order to who went when and in which direction and as people fell off their scooters in the middle of the road narrowly avoiding death and then leaped back on as if this was a daily occurance we decided that maybe we shouldnt cross just there. What followed was a lot of wandering, a lot of sweating and long detours, we did pass some beautiful buildings but their wonder paled in comparison to the heat and frustration! We walked via Chinatown and as they were setting up th stalls for a days business I managed to get a great deal on a fake Rolex for my brother. Eventually having passed a family of monkeys playing on the pavement which ordinarily would have warranted a few photos but on this occasion somehow didn’t we found ourselves at the bird park. The largest covered avairy in the world housed a vast array of exotic birds including the rather stern looking Hornbill, tropical parrots and stunning fuscia and black flamingos, we strolled around and consumed about 4 bottles of water eventually the heat got too much and we took a sticky taxi ride back to the safety of Times Square.

Times Square

Outside Times Square

Equator hostel, is a large brightly painted converted house set over three floors, our room was at the top of the long concrete staircase and down an outdoor corridor/balcony. Simply decorated with a large double bed, lockers and air con, further down the corridor were the showers and toilets, toilets where you can’t put the loo roll down the loo but instead you put it in a bin. . . apparently that is quite common in malaysia but certainly took a bit of getting use to as did being watched by a couple of geckos whilst you take a shower.

Ok, I may have exagerated the luxury slightly, although I am sure when the coach came off the production line it was perfect, however a few years down the line the arm rest was broken, the speakers were fuzzy, the screens werent exactly clear and it all smelt a little odd, but for 7 pound each we couldn’t complain!

This is a shrine at the main bus station, perched by the side of the main road with traffic thundering past. The floral wreaths you can see are placed there by worshippers throughout the day. Its a small gem of beauty in a industrial landscape.

Inside our Hostel at One Florence Close was like a peaceful oasis, although just the other side of the front door was a sticky bustle of stalls and shops and a buzz of unfamiliar words, sounds and smells. Our room was minimal and chic with a double matress on the floor, a small table with a TV and the undeniably important aircon machine, the rest of the hostel comprised an IKEA furnished open plan kitchen and living space with free internet access and travel guides and leaflets and an amazing set of showers. You couldnt have asked for more after a hot and humid day out in the city to come back and stand under a downpour of cool clean water.

My favourite feature of Florence coast were their two pet Persian cats, Pepper and Romeo. They made themselves at home wherever they fancied whether it was on your bed whilst you were trying to get in it or on the sofa you were just about to slump onto, both loving a great deal of attention and in catlike tradition whenever you realised you couldnt spend the whole of your time here with the cats and stopped fussing them they would look you at you with those big beautiful eyes as if to say “just another 5 minutes” and you’d forget all about that big wide world out there! They certainly made it feel like a home from home!

Away from the cats and into the heat, due to the delay of the flight we only had one full day to see SIngapore (we tried to extend our stay but they were fully booked) and feeling a little daring we headed straight for Little India and dived head first into the cultural hub of the city. They say to expect a culture shock when you arrive somewhere like this, somehow it was so exactly how you imagine it, it was all a little surreal. . . small brightly coloured terrace houses deserted and derelict, shops selling bizzare foods in colours that surely cant be natural, stalls displaying glistening golden trinkets and floral wreaths for religious offerings. Bright yellow taxis honking away seeming to have no sense of road safety or even what side of the road they should be on or infact the difference between the road and the pavement, scooters weaving their way through leaving in their wake even more vehicle confusion. Little old ladies making their way to temples weighed down with offerings for their gods. People shouting from shops, enticing you in with offers you didnt understand. An overwhelming fusion of different smells from spice shops, restaurants and open drains. The most stunning architectural temples rising serenly out of all the mayhem, covered almost completely with sculptures of gods in dazzling colours with swarms of people coming and going all with the same purpose. And somehow in all of this nobody but us seemed to realise how bloody hot it was!

We decided to swallow our nerves and enter one of the temples, visitors are accepted aslong as shoes are removed and respect is shown, we added our flip flops to the mounting pile outside and as we walked up the steps I already felt this wasnt qute right as I seemed to get in the way of the first religious ritual of kissing the top step and ringing a bell, once inside you cannot deny how incredible it is surrounded by small highly decorated booths with monks praying in and followers lining up to have their gifts taken to the main shrine in a complicated ceremony which involved a robed man adorning the offering onto a large scultpure, chanting and lighting candles then splashing water and then returning to repeat the process again. Taken aback with everything that was going on we stood and watched for a few mintues, we knew it was fine for us to be there but somehow it just didnt feel right, these people were faithfully fulfilling their religious beliefs and carrying out their ago old ceremonies this wasn’t a tourist attraction to be gawped at by westerners. We left, honoured we had seen it but agreeing that we wouldn’t intrude again.

As we boarded our flight we discovered that it flys to Darwin first and picks up some more people before heading off into the unknown, I wont go into too much detail here but basically as we were coming into land in Darwin and I was starring out the window amazed at the scenery of yet another part of Australia I suddenly felt a peircing pain through my head, then the pressure in my head built till I could hardly stand it any more. Having stumbled off the plane, I sat shaking for what felt like an eternity whilst Cliff tried to find some help, the next hour seems a little like a blurr it involved a wheelchair, some paperwork, immigration stamps, more paperwork and then an ambulance. I was given some stick thing to breath in, it was suppose to taste like tutti frutti but believe me it really didn’t, all the normal tests were done and the next thing I knew I was sat in a cubical at Darwin Hospital with Cliff by my side.

What followed were alot of different pain killers, about three different doctors and talk of a bleed on my brain. . . . . “we may need to put a needle in the base of you spine and draw off some liquid to test”  a needle. . . . . . . in my spine! After about 6 hours and having been moved out into the corridor I had a CAT scan, it was kind of like a UFO circling round your head whilst the aliens searched for proof of life. . . .well luckily for me there was life and no blood.

This is where the saga should have ended, but with the pain still not subsiding and whilst I waited for the CAT scan results they gave me one last painkiller which made me violently sick, for about 5 hours. They gave me something to calm my stomach. . . I was sick. They gave me something to stop me being sick. . . .I was sick. In the end they gave me an injection and all I wanted to do was leave that hospital corridor and go to bed, after turning down a drip we left and found our way to a Hotel where I was sick and then collapsed onto the bed and slept until morning. Nobody knows what Cliff did in this Hotel room whilst I was asleep I have a feeling it involved a bubble bath and a mini bar though!

Oh yeh I forgot to mention what was actually wrong with me, it’s a bit of a let down after all that but thankfully it was just my sinuses, I had air trapped above my eye and it was trying to expand in a cavity of bone causing the pain. ( I shall just write here that the doctors and nurses in Darwin hospital were amazing, Cliff reckoned it was because they didn’t want a dead British traveller on their hands. . .very reassuring)

The next day feeling weak and like there was a large furry creature living in my throat we made our way back to the airport, after having run into someone I knew from uni and contacting the hospital to get clearance for me to fly (didn’t they understand it was just my sinuses) we boarded our flight to Singapore with even more nerves and a whole heap of aprehension. . . thankfully this flight was uneventful.

Visiting the Great Barrier Reef was always a must do day trip in Australia, and we had both been getting increasingly excited about it as we made our way up the coast, along with that excitement came a considerable amount of apprehension, neither of us had snorkelled before and certainly not in the middle of the sea. Also there was the very small issue that when I left the UK I couldn’t really swim, just kind of thrash around like a fish out of water, since we had been on our big adventure Clifford had been patiently teaching me to calmly front crawl it wasn’t the easiest task but through his patience and encouragement I was ready to enter the olympics 2012 (well I thought so anyway)

Deciding which part of The Great Barrier Reef to visit was quite difficult there are about 7 key spots on the coast where you can take day trips from and everyone we spoke to advised a different one but in the end after a lot of research and deliberation we had decided to go from Airlie Beach, and what a great decision!

The day started very early, we were picked up from our holiday park and taken to the harbour and our hi speed vessel that would take us out to our pontoon. The speedy journey took about 2 hours travelling through the Whitsunday Islands that had all the beauty and familiarity of Fiji islands, travelling at this speed did mean that on the open deck the wind was strong and rather cold however having been told we may spot Whales on their migration Clifford insisted that we endured the icy blasts for the entire journey. . . . we didn’t see any Whales.