Great trip! It was time to head home, so I plodded along to the bus station thinking how great this trip was. I sat there, bus ticket in hand, wondering when I would be coming back to Mae Hong Son, as it was incredibly tranquil there.

The bus rocked up at five to one, and I stood politely at the back waiting for my turn to get on the minibus. As I got there I wanted to clarify that this was in fact the right minibus. So I asked in Thai if it was the Mae Hong Son-Chiang Mai bus.

"This ticket is for tomorrow..." The bus driver said, angrily handing the ticket back to me.

"You better be kidding me!" I said to nobody in particular, quickly turning on my heels and walking swiftly to where I'd bought my ticket 30 minutes beforehand.

I looked around and the girl that sold me my ticket was gone. There was some random girl sitting three booths down, so I quickly told her that the other girl had made a mistake and put tomorrow's date on my ticket.

She slowly sat up and began to book another ticket on her computer. I was getting frantic, as the bus was due to leave any second.

"When would you like to leave?" She asked on autopilot.

"NOW! The bus is leaving now!!!" I said urgently.

She booked it and then had the audacity to try and charge me for changing my ticket. I told her that it was their mistake and I wasn't going to pay (I would, but I didn't want to). Fortunately a Thai lady translated for me and I got the ticket just in time to jump on the minibus.

...And that's it...?

Of course it fucking wasn't...

As I was getting on the bus I clocked this Thai guy in his mid forties sitting near the door. I had no idea why I noticed him, but I was about to find out a few hours into our six hour trip...

Two hours after driving through some windy roads we heard the unmistakable sound of loud heaving. I zoned in on it, hoping it would end there, but a minute later he was being sick. He came prepared, as he had a plastic bag that he was being sick in. Sadly for the rest of us though this meant the bus was about to stink of sick.

I know what you are thinking, people are sick on buses all the time. Why is this such a big deal?

Well, it wasn't just a bus; it was a minibus. One of those Asian minibus rides where the passenger windows will not budge, and the only form of air getting into the bus was one, maybe two, of those shitty air conditioners you can turn on when you are in a vehicle. It took two minutes for the whole minibus to reek.

The bus driver wouldn't stop either. He had his head out of the drivers window as if to say, "I don't know what you lot are moaning about, I'm fine!" I put my hand over my nose and breathed through it so all I could smell was my sweaty hand, and did that for an hour until the driver had a ten minute break.

We stopped, and I chatted to a German couple. I was concerned about the girl as she had her fingers firmly pressed on her temples during the ride. Turns out that was her way of coping with Nasty McSmellybus. We got back on hoping that the Thai bloke would stop puking since we'd had a rest, and he did! Well for 25 minutes away, then it was business as usual.

It wasn't all bad though; I was deep in thought (Mainly trying not to be sick myself) and out of boredom I looked to my right. I saw the German couple rocking out to music they had in their earphones that they were listening to together with huge smiles on their faces. It was hilarious to watch the rest of the bus struggling to cope with the guy constantly being sick, listening to his heaves every minute, while this couple were nodding their head in unison as if they were at a rap concert.

So I survived, but it was a little dampener on what was otherwise an excellent trip. Luck of the draw I guess. If you get a bus, you never know who you are going to travel with. Back to work now. I might start writing another book next year, but to be honest I'm in no rush to start. So unless I sell a million books by some absolute fluke, then it's best I get back to normal work and earn some pounds...

My six books, available on Amazon