Oh wow. Since I last wrote we have done so many great things. We said goodbye to our new friends and left Koh Tao on a night ferry (so far this trip: night train, bus and boat. The only thing left is night flight, which I'll do when I leave Bali) which was surprisingly comfortable and rodent-free. We booked a little package deal for our visa run, so we were picked up from the ferry and taken directly to the Thai-Myanmar border. We were stamped out of Thailand, took a boat across the waterway, stamped in and out of Myanmar and sent back into Thailand with a new 15 day visa. We were only in the country for all of about 15 minutes, so I can't say to much about it besides that I was offered every kind of cigarette/alcohol/drug you could possibly want. A few people on our boat returned to Thailand with the cheapest cartons of cigarettes on earth. (Note: like any border town almost anywhere it was a little sketchy, but I have heard really great things about the rest of the country. There were several Burmese people who worked where we stayed in Pha Ngan and they were the some of the kindest, happiest people I've met on my trip).
From the Thai border town we made our way to Khao Sok, a national rain forest on the mainland between the islands we're visiting. We made in there in late afternoon, which meant we went from an island, to another country, and to a rain forest all in less than 24 hours.
We spent two nights in Khao Sok staying in a bungalow for $5/night. We wanted to do some tours around the park but the prices seemed too high even by US standards. So instead we spent a day exploring some of the easier trails by ourselves. We trekked to some "waterfalls" that were so small I don't think they could be considered as such even in the height of the rainy season. But we did see birds, lizards, frogs, snakes, monkeys and scary spiders and bugs. We even saw a giant wasp like thing wrestling with and killing a very big and hairy spider. It was like something off Discovery Channel. And in the late afternoon we got stuck in the forest in a torrential down pour which was actually a lot of fun until leaches started climbing up our legs...
So after that it was time to make out way to our next island destination, the beautiful paradise that is Koh Phi Phi. You may have heard of it for two reasons: it was it hit hard by the 2004 tsunami and the movie "The Beach" was filmed here. It's probably the most beautiful island but also most touristy island we've visited yet and we've done some amazing things here. But all of that is for another posting.......
Apr 26, 2009
Apr 17, 2009
Life's a Beach
For the past week and a half or so we have been hanging out in the Thai Islands and let me tell you: life here is good.
From Bangkok we decided to head right down to the islands rather than sticking around and seeing areas on the mainland. I'm bummed we missed out on some places that I wanted to see but between our visa issues and the Thai new year it just seemed like it would be a better idea to head right down here. We since realized that we could have made it work but that's okay, I have confidence that this won't be my only trip to Thailand.
Our first island destination was Koh Pha Ngan on the east coast. It's a real backpackers kind of place and famous for it's wild full moon parties. We got there the day after full moon and headed to a small beach one over from where the full moon parties take place called Haad Yuan. It's about a quarter mile long beach with 5 or so places to stay and several restaurants and bars. Technically you can get there by road but it's so bad so the main way to reach the beach is just by boat. There is no town there, just the beach front bungalows. It is a very quiet place with just the right amount of tourists so that you can meet people but still have the beach practically to yourself.
We got a great little bungalow built into the rocks with an amazing sunrise view- all for less than $9/night. Tell me where else in the world you can do that? Life at Haad Yuan was great and each day seemed more beautiful than the last. We would wake up late everyday, eat breakfast and chat with new friends, relax on the beach and swim in the crystal clear, warm water. Late afternoons were reserved for a game of volleyball and then dinner and a movie relaxing in our favorite restaurant. We met great people and were loving life. I never wanted to leave! But after about 5 days, we did.
We took a ferry to Koh Tao, an island just north of Koh Pha Ngan, known for it's great diving. We came with a group of new friends who all wanted to do a scuba course here, it's one of the cheapest places in the world to get PADI certified. Jason thought he might want to do the course as well but decided against it.
So we have been on Koh Tao for about four days now, relaxing by the beach and pool and doing some great snorkeling. The water here is equally warm and clear, plus there are coral reefs all around that are filled with sea life. Even relaxing on the beach in less than a foot of water I've had colorful fish swim all around me. We have been going out on our friends' diving boat and snorkeling from there as well.
The fish are so unafraid and swim right up to your mask. Our friends have been loving diving, one of them is even planning when he can come back to do a 6 week course.
Tomorrow we'll leave Koh Tao and cross over to the west coast. We have to cross the border into Burma so we can get another 15 day Thai visa. For anyone wondering, yes, its perfectly safe to spend a day in Burma. From there we'll probably go to the west coast islands around Phuket, but we liked Koh Pha Ngan so much we might head back.
Oh and about the protests in Bangkok and Pataya, we are worlds away from that and in no danger.
From Bangkok we decided to head right down to the islands rather than sticking around and seeing areas on the mainland. I'm bummed we missed out on some places that I wanted to see but between our visa issues and the Thai new year it just seemed like it would be a better idea to head right down here. We since realized that we could have made it work but that's okay, I have confidence that this won't be my only trip to Thailand.
Our first island destination was Koh Pha Ngan on the east coast. It's a real backpackers kind of place and famous for it's wild full moon parties. We got there the day after full moon and headed to a small beach one over from where the full moon parties take place called Haad Yuan. It's about a quarter mile long beach with 5 or so places to stay and several restaurants and bars. Technically you can get there by road but it's so bad so the main way to reach the beach is just by boat. There is no town there, just the beach front bungalows. It is a very quiet place with just the right amount of tourists so that you can meet people but still have the beach practically to yourself.
We got a great little bungalow built into the rocks with an amazing sunrise view- all for less than $9/night. Tell me where else in the world you can do that? Life at Haad Yuan was great and each day seemed more beautiful than the last. We would wake up late everyday, eat breakfast and chat with new friends, relax on the beach and swim in the crystal clear, warm water. Late afternoons were reserved for a game of volleyball and then dinner and a movie relaxing in our favorite restaurant. We met great people and were loving life. I never wanted to leave! But after about 5 days, we did.
We took a ferry to Koh Tao, an island just north of Koh Pha Ngan, known for it's great diving. We came with a group of new friends who all wanted to do a scuba course here, it's one of the cheapest places in the world to get PADI certified. Jason thought he might want to do the course as well but decided against it.
So we have been on Koh Tao for about four days now, relaxing by the beach and pool and doing some great snorkeling. The water here is equally warm and clear, plus there are coral reefs all around that are filled with sea life. Even relaxing on the beach in less than a foot of water I've had colorful fish swim all around me. We have been going out on our friends' diving boat and snorkeling from there as well.
The fish are so unafraid and swim right up to your mask. Our friends have been loving diving, one of them is even planning when he can come back to do a 6 week course.
Tomorrow we'll leave Koh Tao and cross over to the west coast. We have to cross the border into Burma so we can get another 15 day Thai visa. For anyone wondering, yes, its perfectly safe to spend a day in Burma. From there we'll probably go to the west coast islands around Phuket, but we liked Koh Pha Ngan so much we might head back.
Oh and about the protests in Bangkok and Pataya, we are worlds away from that and in no danger.
Apr 13, 2009
Travel Update
Well I really thought I would be better about keeping up with my blog while were traveling, but when I only get on the computer for about 5 minutes once every couple of days it's kind of hard. I can update from my iPod (as I'm doing right now) but that's even hard to find the time to do.
Anyway, things have been going great. Since I last wrote I've been to 5 cities in 3 countries. From Vang Vieng we took the bus down to Viantiane, the tiny capital of Laos (only 200,000 people). We had planned to bus from there all the way down through Laos making some stops in some towns and then crossing the border into Cambodia. But that was going to mean close to 30 hours total bus time so we took the easy way out and flew. We flew into Phnom Pehn (the capital of Cambodia) which we probably wouldn't have made it to otherwise. From there we bused over to Siem Reap, best known for those little temples that are nearby (Angkor Wat). We traveled from Siem Reap to Battambang, a Cambodian town that came highly recommended although I'm not sure why. Finally, just yesterday, we walked across the border into Thailand and arrived in Bangkok late last night. Phew, what a journey over the last couple of weeks!
Here are some highlights:
• Riding bikes all around Viantiane and visiting Pha That Luang, the giant golden stupa that is Laos' pride and joy.
• Visiting the horribly sad Killing Fields and S21, leftovers from Cambodia's dark history of Khmer Rouge. I learned so much and feel a little cheated that it was something that I never heard mentioned in history class.
• Seeing the brighter side of Phnom Pehn at the beautiful Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda.
• Three days exploring Angkor Wat including two sunsets and a sunrise. Absolutely amazing. We saw the "Tomb Raider" temple and I wanted to pretend that I was Angelina Jolie but Jason just laughed at me.
• A wonderful cooking class in Battambang (the only thing we really liked there). We shopped in the local market, made Khmer curry from scratch, ate three delicious meals and learned about our instructor's life growing up in a refugee camp in Thailand.
Coming from Laos and Cambodia, Thailand was quite a culture shock. Immediately after crossing the border there were four lane highways, giant superstores, modern hospitals, McDonalds and 7-11, etc. And that was before we even saw Bangkok. (I'm pretty sure there isn't even a single American fast food restaurant in all of Laos). Bangkok is a big modern city much unlike anything we've been to in SE Asia so far.
I had heard nothing but negative things about Bangkok before coming here. We only planned to stay to see a few sites around the city. But I am pleasantly surprised to find that I actually like it here. The area that were staying in (Khao San Road) is incredibly touristy but kind of nice. There are great restaurants and bars and street food and shopping everywhere you turn. And today we visited the Grand Palace and another temple that were absolutely amazing. It would be worth it to come up Bangkok just for those.
The plan from here is to visit a town called Kanchanburi and then head down to the islands for some quality beach time. Only problem is that we need to get our 15 day visa extended which may turn out to be more expensive of a problem than we anticipated.....
Anyway, things have been going great. Since I last wrote I've been to 5 cities in 3 countries. From Vang Vieng we took the bus down to Viantiane, the tiny capital of Laos (only 200,000 people). We had planned to bus from there all the way down through Laos making some stops in some towns and then crossing the border into Cambodia. But that was going to mean close to 30 hours total bus time so we took the easy way out and flew. We flew into Phnom Pehn (the capital of Cambodia) which we probably wouldn't have made it to otherwise. From there we bused over to Siem Reap, best known for those little temples that are nearby (Angkor Wat). We traveled from Siem Reap to Battambang, a Cambodian town that came highly recommended although I'm not sure why. Finally, just yesterday, we walked across the border into Thailand and arrived in Bangkok late last night. Phew, what a journey over the last couple of weeks!
Here are some highlights:
• Riding bikes all around Viantiane and visiting Pha That Luang, the giant golden stupa that is Laos' pride and joy.
• Visiting the horribly sad Killing Fields and S21, leftovers from Cambodia's dark history of Khmer Rouge. I learned so much and feel a little cheated that it was something that I never heard mentioned in history class.
• Seeing the brighter side of Phnom Pehn at the beautiful Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda.
• Three days exploring Angkor Wat including two sunsets and a sunrise. Absolutely amazing. We saw the "Tomb Raider" temple and I wanted to pretend that I was Angelina Jolie but Jason just laughed at me.
• A wonderful cooking class in Battambang (the only thing we really liked there). We shopped in the local market, made Khmer curry from scratch, ate three delicious meals and learned about our instructor's life growing up in a refugee camp in Thailand.
Coming from Laos and Cambodia, Thailand was quite a culture shock. Immediately after crossing the border there were four lane highways, giant superstores, modern hospitals, McDonalds and 7-11, etc. And that was before we even saw Bangkok. (I'm pretty sure there isn't even a single American fast food restaurant in all of Laos). Bangkok is a big modern city much unlike anything we've been to in SE Asia so far.
I had heard nothing but negative things about Bangkok before coming here. We only planned to stay to see a few sites around the city. But I am pleasantly surprised to find that I actually like it here. The area that were staying in (Khao San Road) is incredibly touristy but kind of nice. There are great restaurants and bars and street food and shopping everywhere you turn. And today we visited the Grand Palace and another temple that were absolutely amazing. It would be worth it to come up Bangkok just for those.
The plan from here is to visit a town called Kanchanburi and then head down to the islands for some quality beach time. Only problem is that we need to get our 15 day visa extended which may turn out to be more expensive of a problem than we anticipated.....
Apr 1, 2009
Party Town, Laos (Vang Vieng)
We took a 6 hour minibus ride through the mountains from Luang Prabang to the small town of Vang Vieng. Vang Vieng is a little town on the river which has become a big backpackers stop and party town in recent years. It's in a beautiful area, jagged limestone mountains and amazingly green forest. But that's not why most people go there. The main draw is the tubing and the bars.
Knowing this and assuming it wasn't really going to be what we were looking for, we only planned for about a day there. When we arrived, we were amazed at the beauty of the place. No one we talked to had mentioned that, only the tubing.
Our first evening there we met up with dome other people in our minibus group: two Brits, an Aussie and a Kiwi. They were all great people and we ended up hanging out with them the whole time we were there. That first night we decided to check out some of the nightlife and headed to one of the many riverside" bars" (which is really just an outdoor area with some tables, a bar and a DJ booth. We hung out drinking and dancing and were still in bed before midnight- arterial this is Laos; early to bed, early to rise.
The next day we were disappointed to wake up to buckets of rain dumping on the village- no tubing today. So our little clan made our way to one of the many restaurants to catch some breakfast and try to wait out the rain. The majority of the restaurants around town have these elevated platforms covered in pillows where you can lounge away your day. They have low tables on the platforms and no walls around the restaurant so it's the perfect place to relax and watch the rain fall. And watch Friends. Fir some reason, every place seems to have obtained a DVD of Friends, Family Guy or The Simpsons and just play them on repeat all day long. It's kind of funny but sure was nice while we had nothing else to do.
The rain eventually let up but it was still too cool out to hang out in the river. So Jason and I decided instead to walk back toward the mountains and see what we would find. We saw some signs pointing the way to caves so we followed them. It ended up being a great little walk, even though I was wearing flip flops through the muddiest roads. We wandered through farmers fields, around herds of cattle and past playing children. We even came across an entire field completely full of four leaf clovers (there's one in my book for safe keeping)! We had to walk over a tiny rickety bridge made of bamboo with a sign reading "only one at a time"- a little scary. Finally we came to where the farmlands end and the jungle begins. You could almost stand with one foot in a field and one in the jungle it was that clear cut. We got into the dense jungle and it immediately got darker and we could hear birds chirping and monkies howling. We felt a world away from the party town we had just came from. We made it to the cave but didn't go in as it was too dark to see a thing. But it was a great adventure getting there.
The next day we did the tubing thing. It was fun fir a day, but I don't know how people stay there fir weeks doing the same thing everyday. But it wasn't really tubing, more just hanging out at bars along the river and occasionally swimming from one to the next. The best part was watching people fly off the giant rope swings and ohhhing and ahhhing at their tricks/belly flops.
We eventually tried to tube the 3 km back to town but the river was too shallow and it was getting too late so we took a yuk yuk the rest of the way.
Knowing this and assuming it wasn't really going to be what we were looking for, we only planned for about a day there. When we arrived, we were amazed at the beauty of the place. No one we talked to had mentioned that, only the tubing.
Our first evening there we met up with dome other people in our minibus group: two Brits, an Aussie and a Kiwi. They were all great people and we ended up hanging out with them the whole time we were there. That first night we decided to check out some of the nightlife and headed to one of the many riverside" bars" (which is really just an outdoor area with some tables, a bar and a DJ booth. We hung out drinking and dancing and were still in bed before midnight- arterial this is Laos; early to bed, early to rise.
The next day we were disappointed to wake up to buckets of rain dumping on the village- no tubing today. So our little clan made our way to one of the many restaurants to catch some breakfast and try to wait out the rain. The majority of the restaurants around town have these elevated platforms covered in pillows where you can lounge away your day. They have low tables on the platforms and no walls around the restaurant so it's the perfect place to relax and watch the rain fall. And watch Friends. Fir some reason, every place seems to have obtained a DVD of Friends, Family Guy or The Simpsons and just play them on repeat all day long. It's kind of funny but sure was nice while we had nothing else to do.
The rain eventually let up but it was still too cool out to hang out in the river. So Jason and I decided instead to walk back toward the mountains and see what we would find. We saw some signs pointing the way to caves so we followed them. It ended up being a great little walk, even though I was wearing flip flops through the muddiest roads. We wandered through farmers fields, around herds of cattle and past playing children. We even came across an entire field completely full of four leaf clovers (there's one in my book for safe keeping)! We had to walk over a tiny rickety bridge made of bamboo with a sign reading "only one at a time"- a little scary. Finally we came to where the farmlands end and the jungle begins. You could almost stand with one foot in a field and one in the jungle it was that clear cut. We got into the dense jungle and it immediately got darker and we could hear birds chirping and monkies howling. We felt a world away from the party town we had just came from. We made it to the cave but didn't go in as it was too dark to see a thing. But it was a great adventure getting there.
The next day we did the tubing thing. It was fun fir a day, but I don't know how people stay there fir weeks doing the same thing everyday. But it wasn't really tubing, more just hanging out at bars along the river and occasionally swimming from one to the next. The best part was watching people fly off the giant rope swings and ohhhing and ahhhing at their tricks/belly flops.
We eventually tried to tube the 3 km back to town but the river was too shallow and it was getting too late so we took a yuk yuk the rest of the way.
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