Goodbye Thailand, Hello Europe!

Beach on Koh Tao
Originally uploaded by camandkristin.

So, we fell off the blog wagon for a while- things have been busy with Adam and Reanna here, but we are now back in Bangkok (for the 6th time) and passing time until our flight out tomorrow night. This one might be a long one, so for those of you who aren't our parents, we won't be insulted if you just want to skip to the photo journal- a picture is worth a thousand words after all!

Going back... As soon as we posted the last blog, we returned to our hostel to deal with a "laundry issue" (white shirts go in white, and come out brown). After a lot of useless back and forth, we packed up our stuff and left the hostel at 7pm and walked next door to another of the billion guesthouses available. The switch proved to be quite useful, as our new place also happened to be a tour agency which ran buses directly to Koh Chang in Thailand, which was exactly where we wanted to be and eliminated a wasted day of travel back to Bangkok. So we signed up and the next day chugged along the crappy Cambodian roads to the Thailand border. At the border they exchanged our tickets for a piece of electricians tape wrapped around our thumbs- that's how things get done around here. We were directed across the border where we wandered around for a while with our thumbs out until we finally found somebody who actually recognized the tape, and was willing to convert it back into the rest of our transportation to Koh Chang. This sort of thing never ceases to amaze us- it works more often than it doesn't. We made it to Koh Chang that evening and checked into a grass hut that sort of resembled a place to sleep, and bunked in for the evening. The next day we switched to Treehouse Resort on Long Beach where the bungalows were a little more sturdy, but no more secure from bugs. There were no fans, so we slept each night with the door and windows wide open, our bags locked to a flimsy stick of wood that made up a shelf, and nothing but the mosquito net protecting us from anything.

After 4 nights of sweltering heat we packed up and headed back to Bangkok, and then on to Kanchanaburi to see The Bridge Over the River Kwai. The bridge itself is pretty unspectacular, and actually isn't the original bridge (as it was bombed by the Allies shortly after it was built) but the history of the Thai Burma Railway is pretty interesting, albeit very sad. Kanchanaburi has several large cemetaries for the Allied soldiers- mostly POWs who died building the railway.

We then returned to Bangkok to wait for the arrival of Adam and Reanna and that's when things got busy. As soon as they got here, we headed north back up to Chiang Mai on the overnight train. We spent the first day poking around, and then booked a cooking course at an Organic Farm. At the course we had Nice and Wawa (our transvestite chef-in-training) help us make our own green curry paste, stir fried chicken and basil, Tom Yum soup with prawns, spring rolls, and bananas in coconut milk. It was pretty fun, and it turns out we are all quite good cooks (even if we don't all like to eat our creations...). I suspect that when Adam and Reanna get home there will be a trip to Chinatown, followed swiftly by an overdose of green curry. But that's just a guess...

From Chiang Mai we headed further north to the Laos border at Chiang Khong. We spent the night there and then crossed the Mekong River the next morning which put us in Laos. Laos is actually pronounce Lao- the French tacked on the "s", but the country, the people, the language, and the food are all just called "Lao". We asked. We boarded the "slow boat" for what would be 2 days of floating down the Mekong River enroute to Luang Prabang. You have two options to get down the river- the slow boat (which takes about 15 hours, but which you should survive), or the speed boat (which requires a helmet, takes 6 hours, and which has accidents "often including a fatality" almost weekly). Not a tough choice- although our butts were probably willing to take the risk after the first few hours on the wooden slat benches that barely pass as seats. We made it though, and Luang Prabang was a destination worth the journey. It is a really beautiful city and has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It has a great nightly market where we all shopped up a storm, lots of good restaraunts, and many beautiful buildings. And lots and lots of monks. We got up one morning at 5:30am to see the monk's processional and offered them alms of rice and fish wrapped in a banana leaf. Actually, Re did the offering- we weren't brave enough... Those little orange guys are intimidating!

From Luang Prabang we took a bus to Vang Vieng along a windy cliff lined highway. We weren't nervous until we saw a large truck (similar to a bus...) flipped on it's side, with it's cargo of Beer Lao spilled all over the road. The driver didn't seem concerned that his truck was only a few feet from plumetting down a cliff- he was sitting in the shade on an overturned crate drinking a beer! We made it to Vang Vieng safely and checked into the cheapest place we've been- $3 a night for a room with a bathroom. And ants! They were included in the price ;) Vang Vieng seems to be a town built for the sole purpose of holding tourists while they tube down the river and drink Happy Shakes. Those are the principle activities there, and while we passed on anything prefaced with "Happy" we did enjoy the tubing. There are also tonnes of cool caves in the limestone cliffs- we spent over a hour walking 3km back into one until it ended at a secret lagoon. Very cool.

We moved on to Laos' capital- Vientiane which, although it is a beautiful city, doesn't have too much exciting to offer. We hit the highlights, and Kristin hit the bathroom (her luck finally ran out after 6 months...). We then caught a bus across the Friendship Bridge to cross the border back into Thailand, and caught a night train back to Bangkok on our way south. We arrived in Bangkok at 7:35am after 12 hours on a hot, dirty, terrible sleeper train, and then hopped directly onto another train at 7:45 for a further 7 hours. Trains suck. We made it to Chumphon (our destination, and the jumping off point to the island of Koh Tao) that afternoon with nothing to do but wait for our ferry the next morning. We finally made it to Koh Tao, and after a couple of failed attempts, found bungalows nice enough to stay in, and bunked down for the next 5 days. Koh Tao is really a mecca for divers, but it also offers great snorkelling off its coral beaches. The coral means it's not exactly the white sand paradise you see in pictures, but it means the snorkelling is some of the best you'll find in Thailand (and even rivals Galapagos, as far as we're concerned) and it was a beautiful place to relax for a few days before our time with Adam and Reanna came to an end.

Our time on Koh Toa finally ran out, and we caught the ferry and train back to Bangkok, where we walked into the middle of the melee that is Songkran- Thailand's New Year and Water Festival. The original tradition was to sprinkle water on the hands of monks, but it has elevated to a "throw as much water on as many people as you can, as often as you can, for four days" kind of thing. You literally cannot go outside without coming back soaked from head to toe. They also mix talcum powder with water to rub on your faces, and the street outside is a slippery quagmire of talc and water. Today is supposed to be the last day, so hopefully tomorrow when we head out to the airport we can do so dryly...

Our flight to Egypt is tomorrow at midnight, via London (seriously... London is NOT on the way...). We have two weeks in Egypt and then we head to Greece. At this point, we don't care where we are, as long as it is not as hot as it is here. The one benefit of the water festival- it's easy to cool off, which we will go do now...

Until next time-
Kristin and Cam.