RTW solo backpacking trip

Again woke up and my insides are still falling out - haven’t eaten anything proper now for 3 days and it’s like I’ve been eating 12 roast dinners an hour

Fuck sake

I am going to risk my coach journey later, I’m just going to eat bread and rice and then maybe down 2 Red bulls 2 hours before I’m due to leave to maybe clear me out...

The bus station is only 11 miles away from where I’m staying but traffic here is fucking awful. It doesn’t move. So I called my taxi 2 hours ahead of time to get there on time

My coach leaves at 8 - it’s now 7:22 I have to be at the check in counter at 7:30 and I’m still 6 miles away - good chance I’m going to miss this coach, if I do I’m just gonna book a flight out of this miserable shitty place (just moaning cause I’m sick)

Update: turns out I can’t travel on from Mandalay anytime soon due to a festival and something to do with government restrictions on travel, so I can no longer go to the Shan State - decided to just pay for a flight out of Mandalay (at quite a cost) back to Bangkok -it is a shame really but the country still isn’t that stable. I’m most gutted about not seeing Naypitadaw but I’m sure it’ll still be similar in a few years time

So - back to Bangkok on the 17th - I’m going to do some of the bits I missed out on such as bridge over river Kwai, Ayutthaya and the floating markets.

I’ll probably head into Cambodia after that to see Angkor Wat - which will be another thing off my bucket list done.

I’ll be in early May at that point so I’ll see where the league is at before making any decisions. I might try snd squeeze in either Koh Lanta or Laos in before coming back by the 12th May.

If the league isn’t likely I’ll definitely do a tour of Loas and the Southern Thái Islands. At that point I’ll be low on money so I may just fly back with a few quid or just go somewhere like Singapore and live like a king for a few days.

I’d still take a Liverpool league win over anything though

I MADE THE COACH... JUST!!

I had to bail on the taxi and just run, I had no idea where I was going at all, I was just following the crowd and it’s not a bus station. It’s a farce, I’ve genuinely never seen anything like it, it’s a jungle. Extremely exciting but a jungle non the less.

I had no idea of where the JJ express station was so I was just running around. Luckily a super nice woman could see I had no idea where I was or anything. She told me where JJ express was and I ran around to it and as I ran around to it the bus was out of the station. Again luckily another young girl could tell that was my coach due to the dismayed look on my face. She banged on the coach and stood infront of it to stop it.

I ran onto the coach and I feel really bad I had no time to turn around and thank her. But she saved me a lot of grief, as if I had of missed it I’d of probably just got a hotel for the night and probably been in a mood and booked a flight out of here in the morning hahahha.

Tbh I’m not even 100% sure this is my coach - it’s a JJ express coach and it said Bagan on the front. I’ll be unlucky if it isn’t mine hahahaha

Update: it’s my coach so that’s a relief - what isn’t a relief is that my stomach is making noises and giving me pains. Burmese toilets are woeful, most are holes in the ground with bucket flush. I think I’d rather get piles by keeping it in than go one - i did finally get around to watching venom though. Boss film!

So it’s 22:07 now so I’ve got 8 hours till Bagan... gonna try and get some sleep but as I couldn’t put my bags under the coach as i got on late it’s taking up the room where my legs would go so I’m extremely uncomfortable. I’m sure I’ll sleep easy though. Slight rocking, dull drone of the engine - always gets me awayLue lisää