Olivier and Sven goofing around in Asia

I've been back for about 2 weeks now... and I must say that - although I had read a book about and talked a lot to experienced travellers about the psychological aspects of this kind of trip - I could never have predicted what I feel now. I first thought of it being a personal feeling, but yesterday I got an e-mail from Olivier describing the exact same feelings... so I thought it'd be worth to mention and try to describe. Let me be honest with you: there's no way I can put thi...

I had never gone back home after a "holiday" with such mixed feelings. On the one hand one year had been a long time and I was really looking forward to see my friends and family again and recharge the batteries, but on the other hand I realised my trip had come to an end and I would miss Efrata.

Anyway, on September 14 I woke up, thanked Nabil for his hospitality and took the Skybus to the airport. There my plane left at 4pm for London and the flight would take 13 hours.

It was great to arrive in Kuala Lumpur again; as I had been there quite a few times it really felt like coming home again

At the airport Olivier was awaiting me. It was great seeing him again and catching up, and we spent several hours sharing stories about our adventures and future plans. Then, we took the Skybus to KL Sentral and the LRT to Nabil's place. Nabil was currently in Cambodia, but Olivier had been so kind to pick up the key to his appartment at his office (...

 Bondowoso and Kawah Ijen (East-Java)

During my trip around Indonesia I didn't want to miss out on visiting Kawah Ijen and Gunung Bromo, two of Java's highlights. Efrata hadn't visited either of those either.

When we arrived in Surabaya, we took the bus to Probolinggo, then from there two more buses (which was quite a hassle) to finally reach Bondowoso, near to Kawah Ijen...

Efrata's International Week had ended and all the co-organisers and participants had gone home. She had taken the rest of August off from work and we would travel around Bali, Flores and Sumba. We had really been looking forward to this trip for a while

Before moving on to Ubud, we checked out the memorial in Kuta for the victims of the 2002 bombings. On October 2002 two bombs exploded on Kuta's bustling Jl Legian, injuring more than 300 people from at least 23 co...

So my plans had changed and I wanted to stay in Indonesia for another month (Efrata and I wanted to travel around Bali, Flores and Sumba), but my 30-day VISA on arrival was running out... And it can't be extended so I had to do a "border run" - go to another country, come back and apply for a new VISA on arrival.

So I booked a flight to Kuala Lumpur, the cheapest flight available, and familiar territory, Kuala Lumpur really started to feel like home.

Initially I didn't plan to go to Indonesia. I thought about making my way up to the Southern Part of China, from there up towards Mongolia. But as rainy season kicked in and South-China not being the perfect destination at that time and we decided not to go to Mongolia, I decided to change plans. This time of year the climate is best in Malaysia and Indonesia... and people kept on telling me how beautiful Indonesia is... so I decided to give it a try!

I had met up a couple of times again with my friend Mia (who was "partner in crime" for checking out the nightlife in Phnom Penh :)). She was in Kuala Lumpur too, recovering from a knee injury. She could barely walk and it would be like that for 4-6 weeks, which was driving her crazy as that would limit her in her travels.

Seeing that it would be hard for her to travel on her own, that I had no plans for the next few weeks and I hadn't been able to explore Mayalsia's i...

It actually felt great to be back in Kuala Lumpur - I had been there quite a couple of times, I knew the city quite well, my friend Nabil was so kind to let us stay over at his apartment, it was great to see my friends there again, it actually felt like coming home

• Nathalie hadn't been to Kuala Lumpur yet, so the first day we went for a walk along Chinatown and Little India, then on to KLCC and the Golden Triangle. Quite a long walk and her foot -  which was ...

I last wrote about one of my Airasia flights being cancelled. well, everything worked out well. I e-mailed the person responsible to ask them what to do and it turned out that actually both of the flights I would be taking were cancelled, so they just booked me on the next flights. The only downside was that I would arrived 1,5 hrs later in Singapore but that wasn't a...