Jamie and Laura have left Australia and have been experiencing the best of Thailand beaches. They arrived in Koh Lipe and have been working on the tans for a couple of weeks now.

“Koh Lipe is really small, you can walk to most places in about ten minutes. There are three main beaches, Sunrise, Sunset and Pattaya. We stayed on Pattaya beach which was the busiest, but the best beach was definitely Sunrise.”

The post besides giving great information on the beaches they’ve frequented also names the restaurant Spidermonkeys and the Thai Pancake Shop as great places to get a feed. Also they make a note that the book swapping shops aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, and therefore suggest taking plenty of reading material with you to save on the baht.

Moving on to Koh Phi Phi saw lots of snorkeling (see above) and they also visited Maya Bay, which is where the Leo DiCaprio film The Beach was filmed. Unfortunately a low tide meant rather than clear crystal waters there was just exposed grey coral, not what they’d expected, but this didn’t but too much of a downer on the day.

Since leaving the beach scene they’ve passed through Phuket to Bangkok. There they had a full day to celebrate Jamie’s birthday, which they did with golf (on the 18th floor of the Baiyoke Hotel), ice-cream sundaes and a massage… very nice.

Our STA Explorer Jimmy, who also goes by the name of Asia By Foot doesn’t update all that much on his blog, but he keeps us in the loop by other methods. We recently received an email informing us that he’d been honoured by a tribe in the form of receiving a tattoo – they used sticks and it took nine hours. You could say he’s an adventurous type; see the final paragraph of this article.

He did post yesterday though, offering two links to pictures. One of which is this excellent Thailand photo gallery. I’ve included a few images below. Click on them to see them full size and with comments explaining a little about what Jimmy was up to.

The other link was also to a photo. Now bearing in mind that Jimmy likes to integrate himself fully, click on this link with caution. I imagine it was less painful than the nine hour tattoo, but I can’t be sure. However, he looks happy enough. Comments welcome…

Our Tuesday night meet-up was the place to be if you’re interested in travelling to Thailand. The evening kicked off just about as scheduled and attendees didn’t hesitate in getting to know one another over the Thai beverages and snacks.

Once we had experimented with Tiger Balm and Cherry’s (@CherryEC) eye - Sophie’s (@somiraculous) doing - and made our way through most of the refreshments we decided it was time for some Thailand talk. Sarah from STA Travel’s St. Paul’s branch was kind enough to come and do a presentation, being an expert on the destination and having been there seven times she really knew her stuff.

Sarah finished with a question and answers that saw jovial discussion ensue, as Malph (@mankinimalph), Alex (@alexpstatravel), Sophie and Paddy (@paddy_doyle) all shared their experiences of Thailand – some of which were more palatable than others - there was communal ‘eww-ing’.

Since there were quite a few guys present who were applying for STA Travel’s World Traveller Internship we decided to watch a few of the submission videos, all of which were well received. We’ve already featured Nick (@The_Nickmeister), Alex and Paddy. So below I give you Sophie’s disco moves – this is only a place holder, but the real deal is on the way, though no word as yet as to whether or not it features ‘the crab’.

You can see photos of the event on our Flickr profile and we have videos being edited together which will be uploaded to our YouTube channel in the next few days. Thanks to everyone who came and made the evening what it was. And if you’re travelling to Thailand then get in touch through email or Twitter and we can involve you with the STA travelbuzz community.

Continuing our Travel Tuesday feature of highlighting travel blogs we are today featuring Nomadic Matt.

Nomadic Matt is, as his blog states, about life untethered. He refers to himself as twenty-something vagabond, who has been on the road regularly since 2005,

“My original trip was supposed to last a year. I didn’t come home until 18 months later. Once back, I knew I couldn’t go back to my old life or a typical job - I wanted to travel more. Three months later, I was traveling again. I haven’t stopped since.”

His about page passes on more info on how he came to where he is now an also features interesting facts. Did you no Nomadic Matt once got lost in a jungle?

Nomadic Matt’s Travel Site contains tips, his blog, photos, videos and more all on where he’s been and what he’s done. You can find him on YouTube, Twitter @nomadicmatt, Facebook and FriendFeed. If you want to know insider knowledge about a specific destination, from hostels in NZ to learning to scuba-dive its likely Matt will be able to help you out.

Matt, on this fine Travel Tuesday, you’re our man.

Just a quick post to remind one and all that tonight we’re having our monthly STA travelbuzz meet-up, where we get like minded travel souls together for a chat. Tonight will be themed around Thailand, though we’re going to squeeze in a little bit on video editing also for those applying for STA Travel’s World Traveller Internship.

It’ll be in our Soho office tonight, beginning at 7:30pm. All the details of the Thailand meet-up are here, including Fran’s promise of Bangkok Coolers… So get on your scooter and come along. Just email Camilla and we’ll send you through the details.

What follows is an update on three of our STA Explorers who’ve all been up to some rather excellent travel related shenanigans.

The always entertaining Lucy has begun her adventure, and ‘I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t covered in sand!’ is her first post since landing! I’ll warn you now; it’s lengthy, but worth your time as it covers the arrival in Thailand and the 10 subsequent days. There has been noodle eating, socialising with fellow travellers and chilling on the beach, among other activities,

“Got to the [Full Moon] party and got body painted up in preparation and then got well and truly stuck in on the beach with M and P and 30,000 others! The beach was AMAZING […]”

Good work Lucy! Body paint is one way of preparing for mixing with others while globe trotting, another method might be to learn the language, I give you Michael,

How cool is that? He even amends an error in pronunciation – that’s attention to detail. I love audioBoo and I’m becoming quite a fan of Michael too!

Finally Marianne of £10 Pom fame who has been writing about Canberra, Australia Day, and hooking up with travelling friends,

“After Tom, the Brits kept coming. Chris, Kerri and Kat (who spent just a bit more than £10 to fly Down Under) arrived in their camper van after exploring Melbourne and the Great Ocean Road. I count Chris among my STA connections thanks to Cam and the lovely people at STA travelbuzz.”

In case you’ve not heard about Chris he’s another Explorer, his camper van trails can be found at The Wanderings of a Devonshire Boy.

As you can see our tribe of Explorers continues to grow, new and old - but all superb and full of travelling experiences on a variety of destinations. Love ‘em!

We’re in the throes of planning our next meet-up and with Fran at the helm of organisational duties, ably assisted by Cam of course, it promises to be grand. If you’re travelling to Thailand this ones for you, so if you’ve been or fancy a Bangkok bound excursion come along and get involved.

It’s at our office in Soho, beginning at 7:30pm on the 23rd of February.

Sarah from the STA Travel St. Pauls store has been secured, after all sorts of negotiation (Fran has promised we’ll write a song about her, sadly I’m unsure this will be ready for the event, but you never know…). Her attendance is a good thing as her Thailand knowledge is vast and she’ll be giving a talk along with answering any questions that arise.

Our very on video whizz Aaron will be on hand too. He’s going to be giving tips on editing your holiday movies, something that will come in very handy should you be putting together an entry for STA Travel’s World Traveller Internship. Speaking of which, we have Paddy coming a long too, who we can’t wait to meet!

That’s about it, if you’d like to come along just email Fran or send Cam a tweet and we’ll give you the address. There is likely to be a BK Cooler in it for you, made by Fran, he likes to think he’s Brian Flanagan… and why is the BK cooler appropriate?

“Bangkok is Thailand’s hottest city, both in temperature and night life. This cocktail helps the overheated traveller to cool down…”