Leaving Southeast Asia

We left Hanoi on Thursday the 15th and arrived in Bangkok at around 11:00, we proceeded to our hotel, which was a huge new hotel adjacent to the airport. We checked in and then took a 35-minute cab ride to the tailor where we had the suits made for the final fitting. Since this was right over on the street Rena had lived on we sort of felt like we were going “home”. Everything fit great (they were still trying to sell us more suits!!) so we proceeded back up the street to the Sky Train and took it to the Siam Paragon Mall, a 5 story complex that probably tops anything we have in the US as far as shopping goes. A few of the name brands I recognize having grown up with Rena around such as Pucchi, and Dolce and Garbanna, but the rest is lost on me being the shopper I am not. We had the rest of the day to fill so we just looked around, not really buying anything. It is amazing to go from Oz to Bangkok and notice the pricing of things. We bought a 1gb memory stick in Yamba for $70. (Yes you read that correctly) in Bangkok we bought them for $12, in the US I think they are about $25-30. My camera died one of the last days we were in Bangkok and I bought a new Canon and paid about the same I would have in the States, so not everything is cheaper over here.

Due to Greg’s great sense of direction we were even able to find our way back to Curries and More a good restaurant Rena had taken us to for dinner. We were due to fly out for Brisbane the next day around 4 so we spent Friday relaxing around the beautiful pool the hotel had, it was lovely to be outside and in the air. The overnight flight to Brisbane was a grinder with a capital “G”. For some reason they would not let us sleep, but kept bringing us awful airline food. The flight was something like 9 hours, but we had a 3 hour time change, so arrived in Brisbane around 6am. After getting our car rental which there was a mistake on we (Greg) drove out of the airport and headed south for Yamba. I promptly fell asleep but Greg was able to drive over half way before he pulled over to the side of the road for a nap. After some “rest”, it really couldn’t be called sleep; I got behind the wheel and drove the rest of the way. We checked into the Yamba Sun and went right back to sleep for a couple of hours. By this time it was early after noon and we went out to Chris and Freddie’s house to get our boards and things we had left behind. We stayed for dinner and had a chance to meet and get to know Casey, their 19 year old daughter who was home on break from Uni. She is a very nice girl who is studying music, she plays the piano and after dinner she played a few pieces for us and is pretty good. We were both falling asleep at the table so they sent us home and we went to bed and slept for 11 hours. We went looking for surf in the morning, but did not get in the water until the afternoon here at Main Beach, where it was big and basically had no shape. Greg had some good stand-ups and I body surfed. It was good to be back in the water!!

Our old “home” was already rented so we had to settle for the Craigmore at the end of Beach Street which has a killer view of Main Beach and Convent, but the apartment it’s self is kind of funny. Oh well we will only be here a couple days.

I went out at Back Beach this morning, but Greg sat on the beach, he wasn’t feeling very well (I think he got Quyet’s cold). It was well overhead and good shape but I was scared the whole time I was out there. I got a couple good waves, one huge drop, and did ok. We went back in the afternoon after Greg had taken a 2-hour nap, but it had dropped off considerably. I am counting the number of times we have left to be in this amazing water, I will surely miss it, surfing in SB will never be the same!

The weather here in Yamba has changed considerably in the two weeks we have been gone. Winter has really arrived it is long pants weather now all the time, it was beautiful and sunny today, but the air has a chill to it now. The sun is so low on the horizon it is so weird to be experiencing this, when it should be full on summer! The water is still as warm as it was when we left; it almost feels warmer due to the colder air.

I must say I am glad to be away form the land of air conditioners; I do not like the things, although in Southeast Asia at this time of year they sure were a lifesaver! I felt like we could never get any fresh air while we were gone (there’s not to much of that commodity in the parts we were in even if you did open the window!!)