Our first Christmas in Asia

  HT arrived from Australia on the 22nd and as we were going to be in Phuket for Christmas we had a "mini" Christmas day meal and presents here before we went away. It was quite a challenge trying to find all the usual things we have for Christmas but I felt very pleased to find a turkey breast, sprouts, redcurrant jelly, crackers and parsnips although I was horrified to pay $12 (£6) for only 2 parsnips! 

  In typical Christmas tradition we finished off the evening with a tub of Quality Street and a film, Lone Ranger starring Jonny Depp, although he was pretty hard to recognise as Tonto.

 The next morning we flew to Phuket and joined the Neely family, it was fabulous to see them again and catch up on home news. The hotel was very nice, with 2 pools and a gym and was only moments walk from the beach, bars, restaurants and shops. Patong beach is really busy and the infamous Bangla Road (ping-pong shows, ladyboys and prostitutes) just down the road, it did feel a little bit like we had landed in an 18/30's holiday resort but this was going to be such a different Christmas to normal we threw ourselves in to the spirit of the place.

On Christmas day the hotel had very sweetly left a little stocking full of sweets for each of us, and Father Christmas had even found 2 Chocolate Oranges, not Terry's but still very edible. 

  After breakfast we bartered, badly, with a boatman and having agreed a price took his longtail boat to nearby Freedom Beach which was much quieter and had great snorkelling. 

Many different types of beautiful fish loved the bananas we held out for them and came flocking, or should that be shoalling? We had a lovely day there apart from when whilst messing around I got kicked in the eye, which was v.painful  and now I have the most impressive black-eye. It's rather embarrassing and N is a bit worried that people will think he did it.

 

 

                                                                Christmas beach party

That evening we dressed up and went to an amazing restaurant that a local friend had recommended, the Baan Rim Pa, It was perched on the hill side overlooking the bay and we had a fabulous Royal Thai banquet, consisting of at least a dozen different dishes, a very memorable Christmas dinner. 

The next day Kicki, Marcus, Louisa and myself went for a yoga class which was quite challenging but hilarious at times as our teacher tried to get us to stretch more than our bodies really wanted. Later on we all went to the Let's Relax Spa, the 4 boys had a 2 hour Thai massage and came out groaning as they had been pummelled and pulled into all directions. Us 4 girls had chosen hot stone massages with aromatic oils which was blissful-we chose well. 

        Yoga divas!                  

Waiting for our massage

That evening we plucked up courage and walked down Bangla Street. It was packed with people, was very noisy with blasting music but was strangely fascinating. We declined the frequent offers of watching a ping-pong show but did stop for a drink where the young lady ( I think she was a lady but you can never be sure in Patong) looked bored as she bumped and ground against her pole on the bar. Outside most of the bars were huge sections of wood, the game was to hammer a nail into it with as few hits as possible, the challenge was that you had to use the pointy end of the hammer- HT was very good at this and at one point did it in only 2 hits to everyone's amazement. It seemed rather bizarre to see many of the 'ladies of the night' playing Connect 4 with men, I guess making friends!

 The next day we went to Karon beach via a party tuk-tuk that blasted loud music all the way, Neil and Danny looked rather embarrassed as people turned to look as they heard us coming.          

The beach was lovely but had very large and strong waves and it was fiercely hot with no shade, of course in spite of using suncream some of us got a bit sunburnt, yet more colour for me!

On top of the hill you can just see the 45 meter high Big Buddha

On our last evening we watched the best sunset of our stay whilst enjoying a final cocktail and then went to see another famous Phuket sight-the Simon Cabaret. It was a bit disappointing and Neil fell asleep although the costumes and sets were spectacular and of course the ladyboys looked very beautiful.

The next morning we waved goodbye to the Neelys who were heading off to Chiang Mai, jungle trekking and elephants, lucky things.It was so lovely to be with them for our first Asian Christmas and a real bonus to have HT with us. I went for one last walk along the beach first to the village where the long tail boatmen live

and visited the floral tributes that had been left after the memorial service to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the tsunami. 

   

So here we are back in Singapore, feeling very lucky particularly in view of the recent plane disappearance, can't help but think that could so easily have been us, there for the grace of God...

Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve

This weekend N and I visited the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve, it's way up in the north of Singapore, go past the Kranji Racecourse, the industrial units and timber merchants and stop just before you meet the Straits of Johor.
   The area has been a nature reserve since 2002 and comprises over 200ha of mangroves, mudflats, ponds and secondary forest. It's home to many plants and animals and the wintering ground for many migratory birds.

 Almost as soon as we stepped out of the very informative visitor centre we met wildlife, a skink, a damsel fly and my favourite a huge water monitor lizard

 

We followed signs to the newly opened coastal trail, with Malaysia coming into view as we walked along the boardwalk

 We saw a family staring at something just below the boardwalk,  they pointed out a snake-the dog-faced snake. This water snake is apparently the commonest snake found at the reserve.

Looking down through the mangroves we saw loads of tree climbing crabs, who climb up the trees as the water rises then when the level drops return to the muddy shore to feed

Nypa Fruticans, the plant has many uses-the leaves and stalks are used for roof thatching, hats, umbrellas and fuel, while sugar, wine and vinegar can be made by processing the sweet sap from flowering stalks. Atap-chee, a sweetmeat is made from young seeds and served in the local dessert-Ice Kaching

As well as the crabs were mud skippers, some were about 6-8 inches long

Mangroves (Rhizophora) on the watery side.... bamboos on the dry side of the walkway

   

                                                                    Nipah Palm

3 warning signs- watch out for crocodiles, a warning not to catch the fish and the third to seek shelter during lightening and thunder storms. I'm definitely most worried about the risk of lightening after hearing how many people are hit by lightening in Singapore- the country that has more lightening than any other in the world!

Further on was the "mud experience' a rope bridge over the mud flats but due to the high tide it was largely submerged and it wasn't possible to follow it. We turned back and walked to the Buloh Tidal ponds and on the way met another large monitor who looked like he might have just eaten seeing his swollen belly 

Crossing the bridge to the wetland area another warning about crocodiles, I sort of hoped we would see one at a distance of course

Reaching the mud flats we started to see lots of birds; herons, plovers and other wading birds from the tall hide

                                                         

then a flock of egrets, we think they were either the Little Egret or the Chinese Egret but couldn't really tell even with the help of the identification chart on the hide wall.
We saw several flashes of blue-Kingfishers but they were just too fast to capture on film, lovely to see though

    these looked like giant clam shells

and two storks-possibly Milky Storks

Leaving the hide I glanced down and saw movement out of the corner of my eye, it was another dog snake with something in its mouth

       
                                                                                           as it slithered back into the water another snake appeared and seemed to try and snatch the prey from the first snake-so exciting to watch    

 Looking out over one of the ponds we spotted a huge monitor lizard hunting and sure enough he soon caught a fish and brought it ashore to eat

                                                           happy, fat and full.

                                   In the water there were lots of fish

       

Needle Fish

The Archer fish which can spit out a bubble of water to shoot down its prey but sadly none of them obliged whilst we watched

hearing a rustle above our heads we were surprised to see yet another monitor lizard just lounging around in the tree-looks like he had a very comfy perch

We headed home, I stopped to visit the ladies and when I came back N told me that he had seen an Oriental Pied Hornbill but of course it had now flown off -shame I would love to have seen it.  This was my second trip to the wetlands, last time I had been lucky enough to see, and hear the squeaking of, a family of 4 or 5 otters swimming through the mangroves, this time they were no where to be seen and sadly nor were the crocodiles, next time I hope to see them.

We had had a great time and had seen lots of wildlife, the weather had been pleasantly warm not too hot which was a bonus but we were famished so stopped at the first place we could find- Kopitiam at Kranji MRT station where we had this Indian snack, a sort of crepe with Nutella, grated fresh coconut, nuts and bright orange sherbet!