Just to tie up the panda place - we bought by far the greatest piece of tourist tat so far at this esteemed spot (it was absolutely wonderful by the way) - a walking panda that not only has flashing eyes but also plays the lambada as it moves - uitterly compelling. We've called it (wait for it) Panbada - original huh!

Quite alot has happened in the last few days so take a seat and buckle up - this could take some time. We went on our second organised tour yesterday - to the biggest Buddha in the world, the Great Buddha at Leshan. It is over 70m tall and stands on the riverbank. To get the best view you can take the speedboat and take pictures from the river. After walking about a mile and a half around the complex this was a pretty enjoyable way to make our way back, even if the driver thought he was a James Bond baddie and kept making tight turns and laughing maniacally.It was an enjoyable day, spent in the company of the same people we went to the panda institute with - yet more Aussies and a couple of Brits. We felt it was time for a night out so at around 8pm we all gathered at 'The House of Union' which is basically a few sofas, and a fridge on the riverfront. It's very 'backpackery' but a really good place to chill and swap stories, and of course, sample a little of the local ale. It was a motley crew (no bad poodle perms on show here though) of people; obviously Jen and myself, Luke (the most bearded man on earth, and at 5 ft 11 and a half he's a real gentle giant) and Flic (another dentist - God can you imagine the conversations her and Jen had about root canals etc...), Carolyn (Aussie who joined our 'group' yesterday), and Paul (Barnsley fan with great music taste) and Dave (PhD in Physics - the brains of the operations - much dodgier taste in music, which included some Chinese alternative stuff...). We spent a good few hours just having a great time and then walked the half mile or so back to the hotel. The now obligatory exchange of emails and a promise to meet up in Aus then occured. We have also met a couple of great Kiwis who are on the final leg of their year out. Having previously been living and working in Hong Kong, Sally and Richard are returning to NZ after Richard was made redundant last year. Again, we're keen to meet up with them when we hit Wellington some time in August.

The flight situation has resolved itself but only after we've forked out 350 quid for flights to Bangkok. We were basically in a no win situation, BA would/could/whatever only re-route us out of Beijing to Sydney as a result of us being unable to travel to Hong Kong. They also wanted us to pay (!) for this riveledge despite having already paid for 2 re-routes that we now couldn't use. We still haven't had a reply to the email we sent 10 days ago...very very disappointing. We're flying from Chengdu to Bangkok with Thai Airways and, unsurprisingly, when I contacted them to change the date of our flight to Krabi they did so within 3 minutes and said we could pick up our tickets at the airport - FREE OF CHARGE. If anyone at BA ever reads this you could go some way to sorting your appalling customer service out by looking at how Thai do things, quickly, efficiently, and always with a smile. RANT OVER (again).

So, onto Bangkok for, I think, the 7th time now in total - although once we didn't leave the airport. Hopefully staying at our fave place but they haven't come back to us yet so we're a bit nervous about having to stay with the hippies on Koh Sarn Rd. We should be in Bangkok for the Songkran festival where everyone has a massive water fight apparently - something to do with cleansing the spirits from the previous year. Wish I had the double-barrelled pump action water pistol I bought whilst still a student.

After this back to the beaches - we're hoping to get some diving in before the monsoon season hits the West coast.