Starting point in SouthEast Asia

paddylonglegs

Hi all,
looking for your opinion here. We are flying into SEA from Australia.I'm wondering whether to fly into Singapore and make our way up to Thailand this way or whether to fly into Bangkok and head south for a while, then go back on ourselves to tour cambodia and Laos,north thailand.From what I'v researched I like the look of North Thailand and what it has to offer in terms of trekking and activities. Not hugely into staying in the pub and being at the beach is nice, but only for a while i.e Phuket doesn't sound like my bag at all. I wonder is it worth the time to travel all the way up from Singapore or will I get to see enough of southern Thailand by going down from Bangkok.We are travelling as a couple by the way. Is this enough info?

Mewzel

when myself and my boyfriend were there a few months ago. we went:
thailand-laos-vietnam-cambodia-thailand-malaysia-singapore then were flying to oz from there. it was a really easy trail to take, so you could try similar but the opposite way around?
but that said the second time we were entering thailand over land they had changed the visa length so you could only get 15 days (which isn't nearly enough time), but if you were flying in you still got 30 days. it might have changed back to 30 days overland now, but its worth remembering! might mean you'd be better off just flying straight to thailand.

Mewzel

ps. the hill tribe treks in chiang mai are cool, but the best treks we went on in SE asia were in a place called khao sok (south of bankok, near surrathani). its a rainforest and flooded jungle. we saw so much wildlife and stayed in tree top huts. amazing.

paddylonglegs

thanks mewzel,I think we're gonna fly into bkk and make our way up north and on the way back down we'll head south for a while.for our time frame it seems to make sense.cheers