Tunis

Well I'm now in the land of camels,though I haven't seen any yet.

The weather is a little wintry, sunny with lots of rain.

Looks like there are lots of interesting places to visit including Soussse on the East coast of Tunisia and Tatatouinne in the south of Tunisia.

09 09 09

Yesterday was an important day in Thailand,the ninth day of the ninth month of 2009.
With the belief that the number nine is very lucky and especially yesterday with the combination of all those nines the day could be deemed to be really lucky for any new babies born on that day or anyone wishing to start a new venture or business;Tata Young the Thai pop star launched her new album at the Don Muang Airport;which had been shut down especially for Tata.

There also was a celebration of the release of the remastered Beatles albums;and the number nine plays its part on the Beatles album 'Abbey Road'where the last ends with the number nine continually being repeated.

Krabi/Phi Phi Island

Last week with Alicia went to Krabi and also did a speedboat trip to Phi Phi Islands and Bamboo Island doing lots of swimming and snorkelling.It was nice to visit Maya Bay again but the place was over run with boats and tourists one of the beach was completely full of tourists.
Did the climb to the Viewpoint;it was woth the climb for the death defying view looking down on the island!However,the climb down to the Lagoon was more difficult because of the slippery muddy conditions and the jagged rocks that had be navigated so I only reached the second to last stage of getting to the Lagoo.About half the people who attempted the climb were brave enough to go all the way down to the Lagoon.Oh well! the next time;I was too tired from all the swimming and snorkelling to go right down to the end.

Malaysia Borneo

Nearly at the end of my time in in Sabah;it would have been nice to have spent more time here as there's a plenty of interesting things to see and do.
Anyway in Sandakan no beach here just really a different place to stay and then back to Kota Kinabalu the next day.Met an interesting guy who has been travelling aound for the past four years in search of his 'home',who has been documenting his travels
on his web site:http://www.thelongestwayhome.com/index.html

Spend a few days in Kuala Lumpur.
Visited the Putrajaya/Cyberjaya city and went on a pleasant boat cruise on the lake.

I also visited the Bird Park as I went late in the afternoon about an hour before closing time it was empty of visitors just an American woman and me.There were loads of storks in nearly every part of the park and as it was virtually empty the storks felt relaxed about walking and flying about without being annoyed by camera snapping tourists.

Malaysia Borneo

Delays with both my Air Asia flights to Kuala Lumpur and Kota Kinabalu over an hour delay for each flight so it was rather boring spending so much time at the airport.

At the moment I'm in the East coast town of Sandakan got here by the shuttle bus from the Probosis Monkey santuary,the day before I had been to the Orangutuan Sanctuary at Sepilok.
I stayed at a dormitory style place,just 5 minutes away from the Orang Utan Santuary,in English money,I guess about 8-10 pounds but in general the accomodation in Sabah is cheap;it just depends on what you want.
Actually there was a nice big swimming pool,great to cool off at the end of the day!
Today I saw loads of the 'big nose' monkeys,why do they have such big noses ?;apparently it's a sign of their male proweness and the abilty to attract the females.As well as the monkeys also saw an egret,some hornbills,a stork,squirells,crocodiles with loads of mosquitoes molesting them so quite an animal packed day. Unfortunately on Tuesday my the LCD screen of my digital camera went weird as if I'd dropped it so all I could see was a big black hole against a grey murky background so it meant I had to take photos 'blind' and hope the photos would turn out

OK.

Pat's Environment Diary(Part 6)

Australia town bans bottled water !

A rural town in Australia has voted overwhelmingly to ban the sale of bottled water over concerns about its environmental impact.
Campaigners say Bundanoon, in New South Wales, may be the first community in the world to have such a ban.
They say huge amounts of resources are used to extract, package and transport bottled water.
The discarded plastic bottles then end up as litter or go into landfill sites, the "Bundy on Tap" campaign says.

click http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8141569.stm for the complete news story.

The French are here!

Yes it's La Fete again,for the 6th year in Bangkok,and so far one of the best events I've seen so far was the show Lands End.