The popular backpackers' route from Luang Phabang to the Thai border is a two-day slow-boat journey up the river. This was the way I'd originally intended to cross from Laos to Thailand, but by the time I returned to Luang Phabang from Phonsavan (and the Plain of Jars) I had already taken so many boat rides, and so many long bus journeys that I just couldn't face the prospect of another two days sitting around on deck. So I decided to splash out a bit, and treated myself to a flight to Chiang Mai. I had finished the Indochina Loop, the classic "Gringo Trail" through Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos that I had started in Hanoi last December, and now I had a few weeks to play about with until my flight to China in early April.

In Chiang Mai I signed up for a Thai cooking course, where I learned the secrets of making curry pastes, and how to work out just how many of those tiny chillies you need to put in to make your mouth burn. With all of the cooking oil and cholesterol-laden coconut milk, I don't even want to think about how many calories I consumed during those four days, and I was feeling completely bloated when the course finished and I boarded the bus south to Phitsanulok. From there I headed into the northeast, the region known as Isaan, which was formerly part of Laos, and still retains a strong Lao influence. Isaan is more popular with Thai tourists than farang, and as you travel farther into the region fewer people speak English, the food gets spicier, and you get more stares from locals who are surprised that a westerner has bothered to go there. The towns do not feel the need to adapt to accommodate westerners, so the pizza parlours disappear, and evening entertainment is often limited to the dreaded karaoke parlours. I was the one who had to adapt, and found the few words of Thai that I'd picked up were very useful when checking into hotels. During the cooking course I'd memorised the Thai names of a few popular dishes, which came in handy when ordering food - but when that failed it was always possible to indicate what you wanted by pointing to the ingredients on the food stall ("I want those noodles with some of those veggies, and some of that grey stuff, even though I'm not sure what it is...").

My route from Phitsanulok took me east to Khon Kaen, southeast to Ubon Ratchathani, then back west to Si Saket. From here, I made a day trip to the Angkorian-period temple ruins of Khao Phra Wihaan. It felt just like being back at Angkor Wat, except that while at Angkor there are hundreds of temples scattered over the flat landscape, Khao Phra Wihaan sits alone at the edge of the Khorat Plateau, looking down over an escarpment to the Cambodian plains below. Ownership of the temple was long disputed between Thailand and Cambodia, until an international commission in the 1960's decided in Cambodia's favour. However, it's almost impossible to reach it from the Cambodian side (unless you feel like days of driving over appalingly bad dirt roads, and a final climb up the escarpment through a minefield). Vistors from the Thai side can cross over into Cambodia for the day without a visa, and there were many Thai tour groups - this is one of the most important temple sites for Thais. Just to remind the Thai vistors who owns the place, there is a big sign near the entrance saying "I am proud to be born Khmer." And to remind everyone that it was the site of major battles between the Cambodian army and the Khmer Rouge, a field gun still sits by the remains of a temple gateway.

Back to Bangkok for a couple of days, then a long journey south to the beach: night train to Pedang Besar on the Malaysian border, quick taxi ride (and visa run) into Malaysia to the port of Kuala Perlis, longtail boat back into Thailand to Tha Thammalang, bigger boat out past the Tarutao islands to a point a couple of hundred metres off the coast of Ko Lipe, then one last longtail boat onto the beach. I jumped off the boat into the knee-deep water and waded onto the beach almost exactly 24 hours after leaving Bangkok. Ko Lipe turned out to be a bit more developed that I was expecting, with a number of bungalow operations on the beach, and a couple of very chilled-out bars. My budget didn't quite stretch to scuba diving, but I took a snorkelling trip to some of the surrounding islands where there were beautiful soft coral formations, clams, anenomes, starfish, sea cucumbers, and lots of fantastically coloured reef fish. I found a large shoal of cuttlefish, and managed to swim along with them for a while - until I remembered that I had to surface for air and they didn't.

Unfortunately, it wasn't just the sea that harboured abundant wildlife; my mattress turned out to be infested with voracious bedbugs, and when I woke up on the day I was due to leave for Ko Lanta, I counted fifty-two bite marks. The problem with bedbugs is that they're not satisfied with just biting you once or twice, like mosquitoes - they bite again and again and again, leaving red marks in long lines along a leg or arm. With the itchiness of the bites, and the sunburn on my back from the snorkelling trip, I felt a total mess.

Ko Lanta is larger and much more developed that Ko Lipe. I stayed on "long beach" which is a very nice stretch of clean white sand, but I found the general atmosphere quite bland and anonymous. I think there were just too many identikit beach bungalow resorts, too many restaurants serving the same selections of western food... After a couple of days I took a boat north to Ko Jam, which was much better - only a few bungalow operations, well spread out along the beach and electricity for only a couple of hours at night. There was a good bunch of people here, some just passing through and spending a few days, others who had been there for months. With no electricity to power a TV set we made our own entertainment; I jammed out Thai pop songs on a beaten-up guitar with Bank the barman, and we all usually ended up drinking far too much in the evenings.

Night trains back from Bangkok from the south get booked up days in advance, and the only ticket I could get was in a non-air-conditioned sleeper compartment. Turned out to be not quite as bad as I expected, but I sweated like a pig, and turned up at Paul's flat off the Sukhumvit road looking and smelling like a total scumbag. Felt so much better after a shower, a haircut and a shave. Bangkok is definitely entering the hot season, and the weather is getting oppressively humid.

There are now just a few days left before I fly to China, and about one month before I return home to London. A few months ago, I found that I would get depressed whenever I thought about returning to England, but now that has completely changed and I feel much more positive about it. I can't describe exactly what has changed - but I have a feeling that I'm looking at it not as a permanent return, but just as a short interlude before setting off on the next trip! Next stop is Kunming, then Tibet...