Yesterday we had to broach the subject of getting our bags to the main pier without wanting to carry them for half an hour so I said, tentatively,'We have a boat at 9am...' and the receptionist finished for me: 'Bring your bags here at 8.30 and we will take them.' which was a relief! So we had breakfast and followed on alongside the man with the trolley, carrying our bags, until he began to run, and then we just caught up with him at the boat. It was still relatively early, so a lot of the stalls weren't open, and because we were with the bag guy no-one offeredus taxi rides or boat trips or tried to sell us anything. It was a hassle-free walk! We passed all the restaurants, most with sleeping cats (and a handful of kittens that just fit into the palm of my hand until I put them back down and they fell asleep again) with bent and broken tails and one white cat with a whole story written in pink writing on his side, but it was in Thai so I couldn't read it. There were offerings to the spirits outside most places: plates of toast and butter, tea and coffee and normally some rice; that would be changed at lunchtime. All the shop signs were written in Hebrew too, often as the first language, to accommodate all the Israelis, and one shop offering 'Clean Food' had put the transfers on the windows the wrong way round so they were constantly declaring 'CleaF nood' which I thought was funny.

Then we reached the boat and we had to shuffle round to the front, along the railing to drop our bags into the bag place and then shuffle round the other side to find a seat downstairs. It was only when we were sitting in the cramped, dark cabin that I realised I wasn't feeling too good. I felt sick and dizzy and I couldn't breathe properly, and it was so hot. Only about 90 degrees with the air-conditioning on, but I felt hotter and shakey. I don't reallyremember the trip (I don't think there was much to remember though) and then we did the mad dash to the front of the boat to get our bags (but they cheated and changed the rules so we still had to stand for ages and wait) and then we bought a taxi ticket, waited for a long time for the taxi bus to be ready and headed for Phuket (poo-ket, in case you were wondering) town. The hostel we chose was the most recommended in the Lonely Planet, so we'd normally stay away from it, but I was desparate. We had to wait for half an hour while they cleaned the room and then we could take our bags up seventeen (two) flights of stairs and across five miles (?) of landings and corridors to our little hut on the roof.

It was one of the biggest rooms we'd had, very bright, with six windows, and we had our own bathroom too, which was good. Unfortunately there was no air-conditioning and the place had an asbestos roof which made the room like an oven, but I didn't care - I just dropped my bags and slept for a few hours.

I was still stifling when I woke up and not feeling too much better, but Mikey was downstairs (where it was cooler) so I read for a while. I'd finished all my books and the only thing I could find (on the bedside table) was one of those girl-books, the sort of thing people buy in airports about sensible Irish girls doing crazy things and living in America. It was a kind of 'poor people on hills' for the younger generations and really, really not my sort of thing. But I was desparate. Then I had a cold shower (I had no choice) and I felt a bit better.

When Mikey came to find me we decided to have a little stroll round town and take a whole load of things to the post office to make our bags lighter (it's a well-known phenomenon!). We'd hardly stepped onto the pavement when a taxi-driver stopped us (one of those open-backed trucks with two benches facing inwards - the drivers could get 18 people in one of those) and asked wherewe were going. We waved at our map and told him confidently that we were going to the post office and it wasn't far, and he said something strange. It was Sunday! Who'd've thought it, eh? One of the first times a day of the week had mattered and we didn't even know about it. So we took all our things back and went to find some food and a flight to Bangkok instead.

Phuket town seemed deserted. All the shops were shut, there was hardly any traffic and no-one on the streets. All the stray dogs seemed to be keeping to themselves too. We found a 7-eleven and bought a snack and then found an internet cafe for the air-con. We bought tickets to Bangkok on Tuesday and we returned to the hostel and carried on reading. In the evening we went into town for supper.

We found a small restaurant and had a bit to eat, and then, because it was dark, I thought I might find a pancake. I've recently discovered Thai pancakes: at a restaurant in Ko Phi Phi I was able to see over the road and watch people go by. Right next to us was a lady with a pancake stand, and she was doing a steady trade. It was fascinating to watch as she took a ball of yellow, marzipan-like dough from a tub, flatten it a bit and then flap it down on the work surface over and over again until there was an almost see-through disk about 18 inches across. Then she put in the filling, often banana but sometimes cashew nuts or something I couldn't see, folded the sides over to make a square, and fried it on a built-in flat hotplate, in butter. Then she flipped it over, did the other side, and then transferred it to the work top to put the sauce on (peanut butter, condensed milk or chocolate) and finally used a giant cleaver to chop it neatly into squares. She slid a plate underneath the whole thing and presented it to the customer with a wooden stick in the middle of it. I watched her do about thirty of these and then decided that I had to have one. It seems that pancakes are only made at night, so I had a banana one on the island and now that it was dark I could have one here. I had sugar,not banana here. We'd had a little look round a shopping centre (only clothes) and we went to a bookshop and Mikey tried to save me from the girl-book buy buying something else. We found a guide to Thai customs and etiquette. Phuket had started to come alive now, and there was a lot more traffic and almost all the shops on the main street had lights on. We finally went back to the hostel, I finished the book and slept for ages.