133 - June 12th
Woke up after one of the single best nights of sleep on the entire trip! Something about the 72 hours of traveling combined with the cool room and very squishy bed (not just by Asia standards!). Upon fully waking up we realized we were in the middle of a very intense rain storm. After watching it for a few hours the Seattle-ite in us kicked in and we put on our rain coats, shorts and flip flops to head into town. As we were leaving the resort we were offered two golf umbrellas to add to the ensemble and a ride into town, yes please! Town is sort of relative here as the entire village of Bang Bao is houses on stilts built down the length of a pier. After wandering the whole town (ok, so we walked up and back on the pier), we settled in for a delicious seafood feast (heck, you can see the crab pots off the edge of the restaurant).
View of our resort from the pier
Woke up after one of the single best nights of sleep on the entire trip! Something about the 72 hours of traveling combined with the cool room and very squishy bed (not just by Asia standards!). Upon fully waking up we realized we were in the middle of a very intense rain storm. After watching it for a few hours the Seattle-ite in us kicked in and we put on our rain coats, shorts and flip flops to head into town. As we were leaving the resort we were offered two golf umbrellas to add to the ensemble and a ride into town, yes please! Town is sort of relative here as the entire village of Bang Bao is houses on stilts built down the length of a pier. After wandering the whole town (ok, so we walked up and back on the pier), we settled in for a delicious seafood feast (heck, you can see the crab pots off the edge of the restaurant).
View of our resort from the pier 134 - June 13th
The only thing about visiting an island in the start of the rainy season, is you must must must have books with you to occupy your travel companion. So, the goal today was "Find John Something to Read". Headed out to Lonely Beach where rumor had it we would find a good used book store. Turns out there is a bit of a different concept with used books in Thailand, each book was being sold at the Baht equivalent of the price on the back in dollars (regardless of where the book was from and therefore if the original price was quoted in pounds or euros the price as still converted as in US dollars). After John located a book he was interested in, I went back and found the same book exactly but published in Britain so that it would be 1/2 the price. Worked out fine after all! And to continue what is starting to look like a trend, we hopped in a sawngthaew and the sky opened up.
Beach in Ko Chang
135 - June 14th
As an analyst I know that it takes three points to make a trend, that being said we are officially in a massive huge black clouds and pouring rain trend, it is awesome! We also discovered the joy of swimming in the pouring rain, where the water is coming back up at you due to the force of the drops hitting the pool. In the midst of our swim a girl came running up to the pool with two towels and an umbrella for when we were done. Very thoughtful, though we were fine with being drenched.
Back side of the resort
136 - June 15th
Rain storm day 4, definitely a trend! Will attempt to upload a really cool time lapse photo set that John took of massive waves crashing, but we'll see how that comes out.
Single frame from his cool time lapse
137 - June 16th
Woke up this morning to blue skies. That's right, not rain. It even looked like our trend might be broken. Luckily, mid way through a morning swim, we noticed a huge black blanket coming in from the north. Spent the next 20 minutes watching the storm approach and then took shelter as it opened up overhead. Pretty neat to watch!
138 - June 17th
Today is our last day living the posh life and of all the luck, we got real honest sunshine! Decided to make the most of it and cram in another swim, a walk around "town" and a mosey around the resort grounds. It was a really lovely place to be and a great way to recharge for the final month on the road!
139 - June 18th
Another transportation day: sawngthaew to ferry, ferry to Laem Ngop, sawngthaew to Trat bus station, bus to Bangkok, taxi (no monorail or subway this time) to OTHER bus station, bus to Kanchanaburi (dinner on the bus), and finally a pair of cyclos to our guest house.
We then wandered around town for a short while and then crashed. It was hard to leave our island paradise, but we decided to keep moving.
140 - June 19th
One of the highlights of Kanchanaburi is Erawan National Park. As most of you probably already know, Erawna is the Thai name for the elephant who carries Lord God Indra (of Hindu fame). So we boarded a local bus out to the park. As with most local buses, this one would have long ago been retired in the US. But we bounced along anyway. The main attraction of the park is a seven tiered waterfall. This one beats the pants off the two so called waterfalls in the Cameron Highlands.
It takes about two hours to hike up the paths next to the river. Each fall is carefully marked, so there is no confusion about what level you are on. I tried to swim in one of the pools, but there were a ton of fish who wanted to nibble on my feet and legs. Since this is quite an odd sensation, I opted for a brief swim.
The nibbler fish
Also, on the hike out we found a vendor selling sticky rice and beef jerky (among other things) and this turned out to be a very tasty combo.
141 - June 20th
We were going to try to see a temple where monks have taken to living with tigers, but as logistic would have it this didn't happen. So instead we wandered around town. I went to see the Bridge over the River Kwai. From a distance that is. It was really hot and I lost my motivation. Then we boarded a bus back to Bangkok (at this point we have been to Bangkok four times without staying the night. A tourist record I think). Right now in Thailand there are protests going on. Some people apparently have a different idea on how the government should be run. There was a huge march on a government building today. I don't think anybody has been seriously hurt, but we heard of a couple of arrests. We have stayed away to avoid any trouble. But the protest did make our cab ride to the train station about a hour longer then it should have been, and we had to walk the last three blocks. Not too much trouble at all. And we finally arrived at the train station. There we caught an overnight train to Chang Mai.
142 - June 21st
The beauty of the rail system in Thailand is that they have really figured out the timing. You get on a train at 8pm and it arrives somewhere at 9am, leaving you with a solid night's rest, accommodation in the form of transportation and a beautiful view of the countryside! Once we arrived in Chiang Mai we were greeted by the now familiar swarm of tuk-tuks, sawngthaew and other taxis offering us a ride anywhere. After settling in at our guest house we decided to venture to the other side of town and see is the Chiang Mai Night Market lives up to all its hype. It does. It very much does. It is a combination of small shops, street stalls, and a few block sized multi story building for more small stalls. We did a single lap through it all and it took us nearly 3 hours with almost no purchasing since we were simply overwhelmed. Pretty sure we will be back, but next time with a purpose (bring home souvenirs for friends and family). Other highlights of the Night Market include dinner that again exceeded John's dish size expectations and the "awesome" band covering Elton John songs without a complete command of English, meaning a number of sentences were more like close approximations of the sounds contained therein.
143 - June 22nd
Wat a day. Sorry, I couldn't help myself. Hey, I resisted for along time. Anyway today, as you many have guessed, we toured a couple local wats. This is another situation where poor spelling can not be held against me.
We saw Phra Sing (one of the largest and most popular wats in Chiang Mai), Chaing Man (the oldest wat in CM), and Chedi Luang (home to a massive Lanna-style stupa (basically a really tall (six stories) pile of bricks with Buddhas at the top)) to name a few.
After touring the wats we took a break at a Tex-Mex restaurant. Hmmmm, nachos. Tasty. Then, fully recharged we headed out to the Sunday Market. Basically everyone and their kitchen sink descends on downtown Chiang Mai and sets up a stall. If you want to but silver stamped into the shape of an elephant, thousands of little knit key-chains (which I later realized where actually cell phone charms), or a t-shirt that reads "Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most" you have come to the right place.
The only thing about visiting an island in the start of the rainy season, is you must must must have books with you to occupy your travel companion. So, the goal today was "Find John Something to Read". Headed out to Lonely Beach where rumor had it we would find a good used book store. Turns out there is a bit of a different concept with used books in Thailand, each book was being sold at the Baht equivalent of the price on the back in dollars (regardless of where the book was from and therefore if the original price was quoted in pounds or euros the price as still converted as in US dollars). After John located a book he was interested in, I went back and found the same book exactly but published in Britain so that it would be 1/2 the price. Worked out fine after all! And to continue what is starting to look like a trend, we hopped in a sawngthaew and the sky opened up.
Beach in Ko Chang135 - June 14th
As an analyst I know that it takes three points to make a trend, that being said we are officially in a massive huge black clouds and pouring rain trend, it is awesome! We also discovered the joy of swimming in the pouring rain, where the water is coming back up at you due to the force of the drops hitting the pool. In the midst of our swim a girl came running up to the pool with two towels and an umbrella for when we were done. Very thoughtful, though we were fine with being drenched.
Back side of the resort136 - June 15th
Rain storm day 4, definitely a trend! Will attempt to upload a really cool time lapse photo set that John took of massive waves crashing, but we'll see how that comes out.
Single frame from his cool time lapse137 - June 16th
Woke up this morning to blue skies. That's right, not rain. It even looked like our trend might be broken. Luckily, mid way through a morning swim, we noticed a huge black blanket coming in from the north. Spent the next 20 minutes watching the storm approach and then took shelter as it opened up overhead. Pretty neat to watch!
138 - June 17th
Today is our last day living the posh life and of all the luck, we got real honest sunshine! Decided to make the most of it and cram in another swim, a walk around "town" and a mosey around the resort grounds. It was a really lovely place to be and a great way to recharge for the final month on the road!
139 - June 18th
Another transportation day: sawngthaew to ferry, ferry to Laem Ngop, sawngthaew to Trat bus station, bus to Bangkok, taxi (no monorail or subway this time) to OTHER bus station, bus to Kanchanaburi (dinner on the bus), and finally a pair of cyclos to our guest house.
We then wandered around town for a short while and then crashed. It was hard to leave our island paradise, but we decided to keep moving.
140 - June 19th
One of the highlights of Kanchanaburi is Erawan National Park. As most of you probably already know, Erawna is the Thai name for the elephant who carries Lord God Indra (of Hindu fame). So we boarded a local bus out to the park. As with most local buses, this one would have long ago been retired in the US. But we bounced along anyway. The main attraction of the park is a seven tiered waterfall. This one beats the pants off the two so called waterfalls in the Cameron Highlands.
It takes about two hours to hike up the paths next to the river. Each fall is carefully marked, so there is no confusion about what level you are on. I tried to swim in one of the pools, but there were a ton of fish who wanted to nibble on my feet and legs. Since this is quite an odd sensation, I opted for a brief swim.
The nibbler fishAlso, on the hike out we found a vendor selling sticky rice and beef jerky (among other things) and this turned out to be a very tasty combo.
141 - June 20th
We were going to try to see a temple where monks have taken to living with tigers, but as logistic would have it this didn't happen. So instead we wandered around town. I went to see the Bridge over the River Kwai. From a distance that is. It was really hot and I lost my motivation. Then we boarded a bus back to Bangkok (at this point we have been to Bangkok four times without staying the night. A tourist record I think). Right now in Thailand there are protests going on. Some people apparently have a different idea on how the government should be run. There was a huge march on a government building today. I don't think anybody has been seriously hurt, but we heard of a couple of arrests. We have stayed away to avoid any trouble. But the protest did make our cab ride to the train station about a hour longer then it should have been, and we had to walk the last three blocks. Not too much trouble at all. And we finally arrived at the train station. There we caught an overnight train to Chang Mai.
142 - June 21st
The beauty of the rail system in Thailand is that they have really figured out the timing. You get on a train at 8pm and it arrives somewhere at 9am, leaving you with a solid night's rest, accommodation in the form of transportation and a beautiful view of the countryside! Once we arrived in Chiang Mai we were greeted by the now familiar swarm of tuk-tuks, sawngthaew and other taxis offering us a ride anywhere. After settling in at our guest house we decided to venture to the other side of town and see is the Chiang Mai Night Market lives up to all its hype. It does. It very much does. It is a combination of small shops, street stalls, and a few block sized multi story building for more small stalls. We did a single lap through it all and it took us nearly 3 hours with almost no purchasing since we were simply overwhelmed. Pretty sure we will be back, but next time with a purpose (bring home souvenirs for friends and family). Other highlights of the Night Market include dinner that again exceeded John's dish size expectations and the "awesome" band covering Elton John songs without a complete command of English, meaning a number of sentences were more like close approximations of the sounds contained therein.
143 - June 22nd
Wat a day. Sorry, I couldn't help myself. Hey, I resisted for along time. Anyway today, as you many have guessed, we toured a couple local wats. This is another situation where poor spelling can not be held against me.
We saw Phra Sing (one of the largest and most popular wats in Chiang Mai), Chaing Man (the oldest wat in CM), and Chedi Luang (home to a massive Lanna-style stupa (basically a really tall (six stories) pile of bricks with Buddhas at the top)) to name a few.
After touring the wats we took a break at a Tex-Mex restaurant. Hmmmm, nachos. Tasty. Then, fully recharged we headed out to the Sunday Market. Basically everyone and their kitchen sink descends on downtown Chiang Mai and sets up a stall. If you want to but silver stamped into the shape of an elephant, thousands of little knit key-chains (which I later realized where actually cell phone charms), or a t-shirt that reads "Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most" you have come to the right place.
Having long ago worked out a market shopping system, Eliza and I browsed though rather uneventfully. A couple of small purchases were made, but nothing that would make the evening news. Which was rather surprising to me. I expected to act as a sherpa as I think it's Eliza's goal to have one gift for every person she knows. Do you have any idea how many people she knows? Plus, I think she made up several of the Sarahs so she can buy more things for herself. At the end of the night I asked if she was feeling alright, I mean she was far under performing in the purchasing department. Her response: "No, I feel fine. Tonight was just for looking. We'll be back tomorrow or the next night to actually buy things."
144 - June 23rd
Some how, while resting in our little slice of paradise both of us got a little bug. Nothing major (as traveling goes), just a small flu or something. We tried to fight through it in Kanchanaburi, but all the travel and bustle caught up with us today. So we scrapped our plan to see the elephants. Instead we walked out of our guest house and headed left. Different because previously we always headed right, and a big and bold move because each step took us father west then we have traveled before. We ate Thai soup for brunch, and headed back to the guest house. Some three to five hours later we headed out in search of falafel. Well, Eliza went searching for falafel (I still am not sure what exactly a falafel is). But, the falafel place was closed, so we settled for a cheese burger. Spicy curry or Pad Thai not being the ideal comfort food. We followed the afternoon meal with about three hours of sitting in Starbucks. Yes, there's one in Chiang Mai, don't act that surprised. This was followed by (as Eliza puts it) a slow mosey to dinner. Dinner consisted of some sort of leaf vegetable boiled in garlic sauce for Eliza and fried rice with chicken for me. At the bewitching hour of 7pm we headed back to the guest house for more R&R.
145 - June 24th
Elephants! Today we boarded a bus headed for Bangkok with the assurances from the bus company that it would stop and let us out at the Thai Elephant Conservation Center. Sure enough, after about 45 minutes of driving the bus pulled over, the bus attendant waved to us, and pointed to a giant "Thai Elephant Conservation Center" sign. So off we headed. First we signed up for an elephant ride. Which was awesome.
It is kinda like riding a slow horse canter (Eliza says), only the "horse" is 9000 lbs and ten feet tall. A really nice way to travel through the jungle. The elephant was apparently hungry because at various times throughout the ride he would stop and start pulling bamboo and other vegetation out of the ground with its trunk. The manhout (elephant handler) would first try to talk the elephant out of stopping for a snack. Then he would step up the commands. And finally he had a stick used to encourage the elephant along. Now I have heard elephants are thought to be one of the brighter animals in the world. Well, this one definitely knew who was bigger and therefore who should be in charge. I don't' speak Thai or Elephant, but I think the conversation went I little like this:
It is kinda like riding a slow horse canter (Eliza says), only the "horse" is 9000 lbs and ten feet tall. A really nice way to travel through the jungle. The elephant was apparently hungry because at various times throughout the ride he would stop and start pulling bamboo and other vegetation out of the ground with its trunk. The manhout (elephant handler) would first try to talk the elephant out of stopping for a snack. Then he would step up the commands. And finally he had a stick used to encourage the elephant along. Now I have heard elephants are thought to be one of the brighter animals in the world. Well, this one definitely knew who was bigger and therefore who should be in charge. I don't' speak Thai or Elephant, but I think the conversation went I little like this:
Elephant: Hmmm food.
(Elephant stips one branch of bamboo clean)
Manhout: No, no stopping now.
(Elephant strips another branch of bamboo clean)
E: Hmmm, bamboo, my favorite.
M: No. no food now. You'll get food when we get back to the stables.
(Elephant strips yet another branch of bamboo clean)
E: But I want food now.
(Elephant now moves on to grass)
M: Okay, one more bite.
(Elephant rips off more grass at the base)
E: Yeah, whatever.
M: No. I mean it. Let's go now.
(Elephant starts in on some vines)
E: Oh yeah? Make me!
M: I mean it. If you don't stop eating right now and get back to carrying these tourists around you will get no bananas at snack time.
(Elephants continues to rip the vines off of the trees)
E: Just three more bites.
M: No now!
(Manhout taps elephant on the head with the stick)
E: Hey, that was uncalled for. Okay, I'll start walking. Sheesh I was just taking a little nibble.
(Elephant rips up more grass and stuffs it in his mouth to eat as he walks)
Another cool part about riding an elephant is that you don't appear to be moving that fast, but with each step the elephant covers about ten feet. After the elephant ride, we headed over to see some elephants get bathed. Basically this means the elephants walk into a small lake and start splashing themselves. While, the handler on their back tries (unsuccessfully) to stay dry. One of the tricks the elephants have learned is to suck a bunch of water in their trucks, hold their trucks up for the manhout to grab and aim at someone, and then blow the water out. Largest squirt-gun ever.
(one took a detour before her bath into the tourist tent)
After bathing, the elephants (and spectators) walk to the performance area. There the elephants display some of their tricks: bowing, kneeling, waving (their trucks), picking up the manhouts dropped shoe, laying down, and putting a hat back on their handler. The elephants also show off their artistic side by playing the xylophone, drums, chimes, and painting pictures.
As part of the demonstration the traditional forestry skills of the elephant are displayed. The elephants pushed, pulled, kicked, and carried logs as they would have done many years ago.
John handing out bananas
Total elephant joy!
We followed this up with the purchase of some souvenirs. One of you lucky readers might get elephant dung as a gift, so you better be nice to us when we get back. After all was said and done with the elephants we headed back to the main highway to flag down a bus headed for Chaing Mai. This took thirty minutes, but might have only taken five had a semi-truck not been between us and the first bus to drive by.
(one took a detour before her bath into the tourist tent)After bathing, the elephants (and spectators) walk to the performance area. There the elephants display some of their tricks: bowing, kneeling, waving (their trucks), picking up the manhouts dropped shoe, laying down, and putting a hat back on their handler. The elephants also show off their artistic side by playing the xylophone, drums, chimes, and painting pictures.
As part of the demonstration the traditional forestry skills of the elephant are displayed. The elephants pushed, pulled, kicked, and carried logs as they would have done many years ago.
John handing out bananas Total elephant joy!We followed this up with the purchase of some souvenirs. One of you lucky readers might get elephant dung as a gift, so you better be nice to us when we get back. After all was said and done with the elephants we headed back to the main highway to flag down a bus headed for Chaing Mai. This took thirty minutes, but might have only taken five had a semi-truck not been between us and the first bus to drive by.
Once in town, we headed back to the street market to buy some more souvenirs. Eliza, in prime form as usually, left no stall un-inspected and no vendor questioning who was the better negotiator.
146 - June 25th
146 - June 25th
Somewhere along this trip I learned about cooking school. It is quite the popular thing to do in Thailand, learn to make a few of the more common dishes and take a recipe book home. I could barely contain my excitement, John was doing a much better job. The day started with a ride around town picking up all the participants and a trip to the local market to see where some of our ingredients were purchased.
ALL the rice options at the market
After getting that all squared away we were off to the farm to make our own curry paste and become Thai chefs. All in all we definitely made some dishes, with varying degrees of success.
(We didn't plan the "team green" part)
John's yellow curry was delicious, my chicken and basil dish was a success and the rest of the menu gave us a solid jumping off point for future attempts.
147 - June 26th
With three things remaining on our "Chiang Mai List" we headed up to an alleged bike rental shop. I say alleged because it was not where it should have been on the map and no one in the area had ever heard of it. Making me wonder if it really ever existed. So we settled on an unofficial taxi (a guy in a taxi t-shirt driving a regular car) and headed out to Wat U Mong. Built in the late 13th century it is a Wat out in the forest, with the main temple built back into a hill so that it is a series of short tunnels that take you from place to place. It was built as a place for Monks already trained in the cities to come learn more about the breathing and meditation arts. Quite a cool site and very relaxing. After this we headed over to Wat Suan Dok, a Monk University where students from Wats all over Thailand come for advanced education. Two very different styles, both highly cool. Ended our Chiang Mai tour with a stop into the National Museum. We we walked in, two individuals working there hurried over to turn on all the lights. We were officially the only people visiting at the time and I very much enjoyed it due to the proliferation of very good dioramas depicting Chiang Mai in various times through history.
At this point we are entirely caught up on our blog.
I know sevral of you doubted this would ever happen, and we know who you are (elephant dung headed your way). I am sitting an a internet cafe typing right now, watching a parade go by. There are elephants, Thai shadow boxers, and tigers. I will say the tigers don't look that well cared for. They look a little hunge...
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