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Published: April 13th 2008
Tuesday the 8th we were woken on the train to Ayathara at 430am by the ticket guy. Our train arrived around 5am and when we got off we brought the next ticket to Pak Chong, actually it was the second train going there,the first was 666 Baht and the 2nd cost 116 baht. This of course meant we were travelling with the locals sitting in 3rd class, but it was only 3 hours and we had seat numbers. We tried to get some sleep on a bench in the train station with our bags under our heads, our train wasn't until 8am. If it wasn't the mosquitos waking us up it was the passing trains, horns, alarms or annoucments, and at one point the Thai National Anthem that came on at 8am. We got on the train and found that no one seems to use seat numbers and we had no where to sit, but a nice ticket guy found us some space in a sink area where we could put down our bags and stand up for the journey. We arrived in pak Chong and tried to find a cab, there wasn't any sort of public transport here, and no
Clouded Monitor
Spotted by our guide jay while driving the jeep in Khao Yai National parkone spoke good english, we asked some guy by typing the hostel name into our phone for him, he then walked us around the streets showing our phone to various people until we ended up meeting a policeman working in a booth at a crossroad. He took us into his booth an gave us chairs and radioed to the police office to find out where our place was. He found the address then a random guy saw us with the policeman and asked if he could help - turned out he had the phone number and the hostel owner came to pick us up! We had a good chat with the policeman about football and then the hostel owner (Don) arrived. He took us to the hostel and also talked about football with us, he has really good english. We arrived at Khao Yai Hostel and it is amazing. It is about the size of a mansion, has a full size snooker table, massive chilling areas, a free gym, internet and is decorated really well. Shame we are the only 2 people staying here! Don gave us a lift down to Tesco (actually a Tesco) and we used ATMs there
Deadly Tiger
This tiger killed 2 people before being shot by park rangers and got some food in a restaurant. We then chilled out at the hostel and played pool and snooker. Adam won Snooker. We wrote up 5 days worth of blog that needed doing then booked our trip for tomorrow around Khao Yai National Park. We went to Little Cowboy to eat which was a steakhouse we saw walking back from tesco. We were the only 2 people in here too - seems its very quiet in the low season, and no one seems bothered by it. The food was a bit expensive for what we got- although we got given some free food to take back to Don, probably for us going there! It was 9pm and we planned to go to sleep and wake up at 1am for Liverpool vs Arsenal, but we never did.
Next day we were up at 7am and got ready for a day in the National Park. The hostel includes self service breakfast int he price so we enjoyed some good toast and butter with hot chocolate. Our guide for the day called Jay arrived at 8am with his little sister (about 12) to help him out. We jumped in our jeep and
Khao Yai National Park
One of the hugh trees we saw, couldn't tell you its name - but jay could! headed for the park, Jay stopped ont he way to buy fruit and drinks for the day for us. First off we drove to a park veiw point, we could see for miles and miles from here adn the park looked hugh, its actually bigger than Singapore! Next we went to the museum for 30 mins, here we learnt about the history of the park and saw some stuffed tigers, one that had killed 2 people before being shot by park rangers! We then put on some leech protectors over our socks. We then went for a 2 hour trek through the national park, trying to spot animals, turns out Jay is a bit of an expert. We soon saw a Clouded Monitor and Barking Deer, but no Gibbons as yet. Jay was starting to get fustrated there was no Gibbons but then said he could hear some, he went off towards the noise then waved us over. He found us one swinging through the trees! The trek was good fun and we didn't seem to be on a very walked trail, the leech protectors were very needed, we were flicking them off us all the time! Next we went
Giant Scopian
crossing the road! to Haew Suwat Waterfall, this is the waterfall from the film The Beach, where the 3 travellers jump from the top. The water fall was amazing and looked perfect for jumping off, although this is not aloud! Still it didn't stop us getting in the water and just checking the water was a shallow as we were told. Turns out it was about 3/4 meters in places but not deep enough to jump the 25m drop! We hung out for a bit here and Adam got in the waterfall! On the way out of here we popped back to the 'jumping point' for one last look over the edge and Nick spotted what we thought was s snake in the water. turns out it was a Water Monitor - another animal to add to our list; Next we went to another veiw point and here we could see over the other half of the park from the cliff we were standing on - we both got chased by wasps here which wasn't much fun on the cliff edge! Then we went south in seach of wild elephants, apparently there are 200 in the park. Along the way we drove along
a 200m stretch of road that must have had about 100 monkeys all over it! We didn't have any luck spotting any elephant but did see a giant scorpion on the way back to the north of the park, it was crossing the road when jay spotted it! We then headed for the park exit and Picked up an airforce guy with a gun to take him out the park too - Jay earlier told us they use this park for training exercises. We got to the hostel then went to tesco (they call it Lotus here for some reason, maybe they can't pronouce tesco?!) We brought some Dvds to back up photos on and got enough food to cook our next 3 meals in the hostel. We wanted to get a cab back to the hostel as it was dark and the road we walk along home had lots of barking wild dogs on it - not something we fancied with the food! Turns out there are no cabs, but there are tesco motorbikes that give you a lift home. Within no time we were on the back of a bike each as they drove us the wrong way
Waterfall from 'The Beach' movie
As tempting as the jump was it wasn't safe enough... down a motorway and left us to cross it ourselves outside the hostel. We cooked chicken, veg and noodles just like our cooking lesson in Laos. It was really tasty and dead cheap. We then used the net and played more snooker waiting for the 1am Man utd game, which we found out at 1am was on a channel the hostel doesn't have. No doing so well with the football watching here. Headed to bed.
After 2 months of not staying in one place for more than 3 days and constantly doing things, we decided today would be a rest day. We had our mansion hostel to chill out in, so after some good toast for breakfast we spent the morning playing snooker and pool and using the internet. Adam put some washing in the coin opperated washing machine which turned out to be broke. But the nice hostel house keeper insisted she would hand wash them for us at no cost. I don't know what she did different but she got the socks white with her hands! We then charged all our ipods, cameras and laptops until Adam heard a noise downstairs that he went to investigate. After
2 days alone in the hostel some guests arrived - 5 girls from England. Adam skidded down the corridoor to tell Nick and after meeting them we all headed off to tesco to get some food. We had a good chat with Carly/Chrisy/Jenny/Lindsey/Lucy on the way. We got burgers/pasta/chips and vodka/beer/wine. We then all met up in the evening for our food and Adam obviously ended up cooking the burgers (ahh those were the days!). Someone wrecked the chips (we did have no oven) and we tried to save them. Which ever girl made the pasta did a great job! Nick ended up washing the dishes to earn his food! We then got started on the drinks and played some games including chase the ace and higher or lower - and obviously 'the frog game'. Don the hostel owner joined in, but after a poor performance in the frog game he got too drunk and headed for bed - leaving behind some Thai wine for us! It tasted a bit like bubblegum! We gave the girls lots of advice as they had only been travelling 2 days and were heading to Chiang Mai next where we had just came from.
Everyone slowy headed off to bed and then we both cleared up helped by 'Dick' (we don't know his real name). Dick sort of works for Don, but all he does is sweep for 4 hours in the morning then watches TV eating nuts from about midday till the early hours - everyday! He cannot speak 1 word of English and we smile and nod at each other all day long. We found our beds about 2am.
Friday 11th Adam was up at 730am and had breakfast with the english girls, they were off to do the park safari we did yesterday. We swapped some contact details as they would be heading to the islands at the same time as us, then said goodbye. Nick slept off the beer and joined Adam and Don for breakfast just before 10. Don gave us a lift to the local bus station at 10 and we got on a local Bangkok bound bus at 11am. These buses are quite decent and they serve up coke and 'refreshing wipes', not bad for the £2 price. Our journey was only 2.5 hours and when we arrived in Bangkok we got a taxi down to
Our Mansion
This is our hostel in Khao Yai that we had to ourselves! 200 baht from 400 and he took us the long drive to Khao San Road area. We were back in backpacker central and were 1 day early when we walked into New Siam 2 where we had booked to stay. This didn't cause a problem and we got our room straight away, thankfully on the 2nd floor this time - last time it was 5th. We sent a text to Megan (our friend from england) who was in Bangkok also. She is travelling for 6 months on a booked tour and was here for 2 days at the same time as us. We headed to the Royal Hotel (how posh!) where she was staying, and had no problems walking in and finding her in the pool with her new friend 'Daisy'. It was nice to see a face from home. She had met Daisy earlier in the day and she was also from England. They hadn't been out and about much so we took them both down Khao San Road and then to the internet cafe. TV camera's and stages were being set up ready for tomorrows Songkran festival (Thai New Year), this festival lasts for 4 days and we
Songkarn Festivities
Everyone on Khao San Road was armed and considered dangerous! had timed our stop here perfectly for it! We then went back to the Royal Hotel as Megan and Daisy had a meeting, after this we watched a film on TV and Daisy went to bed. Adam, Nick and Megan headed out to eat at Fourson's. We had a few drinks here too and at one point someone threw a water bomb from the balconys into the restaurant - much to the anger of some Thai lady. She shouted 'scum bags' ' edjits!' and 'tommorow not today!' for about the next hour. Songkran festival involves splashing each other with water, and she was right it was tomorrow! We had a good time catching up with Megan and all had too many stories to tell. We then headed off to our hotels for bed.
We got up at 11am on the first day of Songkran festival and headed out to Megans hotel slightly unprepared. We got about 20 meters outside the hotel before reliasing we needed the waterproof case for the camera and plastic bags for our wallets. We got them and then armed ourselves with some big water guns from a shop outside. It was a 5 minute walk
Songkran water fights
spilling in and out of the bars and restaurants to the Royal Hotel and we arrived absolutly drenched head to toe. It was still early and every single person in the street had a water gun. Even the Royal Hotel porter on the front door shot at us from behind his pillar! We picked up Megan and headed for Khao San road. This place was mental, it was packed with people, everyone of them armed with a water gun no matter what thier age! We got Megan a gun to protect herself, but it was a bit poor and didn't have a presure pump like ours! It took us about an hour to get up and down the road and it got serious crazy in the middle, there wasn't a dry patch on anyone. We the headed for some food and to try and dry off - something we would later learn was absolutly pointless. People were firing water guns from the balconys and shooting out of restaurants all over the place. We then popped to the hotel room and showed Megan some of our many photos from the trip. We then headed back out for another lap of the streets. We couldn't believe it had got even busier.
Crowded Bangkok streets
All the locals were out - check out the paste on some of them! Another part of Songkran involves putting white paste on each others cheeks and face - this had now got very popular and it wasn't long until locals were rubbing it all over us! We walked past TV crews filming for the news and stayed out until it got dark. As the night went on the streets were full of loud music, people dancing and drinking - and the water fights never stopped. The only downer on the whole thing was Adam catching a guy with his hand almost inside his pocket, a very close call. We decided we'd just take out some money in plastic bags next time and nothing else. We then headed back for some food and drink while watching some premiership. Little kids were shooting water guns inside the restaurant and people were firing in and out of it all the time. We stayed here for the rest of the night before we all headed off to bed. By far one of the craziest experiences of our trip so far - and apparently this continues for the next 3 days! It seemed the locals went for us more with the water and paste - they seemed to
find it funny getting the westerns!
We have also booked our bus/boat tickets to Ko Samui for the 16th, this is the first of the southern islands we will be visiting. Until then we plan to stay in Bangkok and enjoy the rest of Songkarn festival, our swedish friends are arriving in Bangkok today so we will hopefully meet up with them again!
There was soooo many videos and pictures we wanted to put up from Songkran, unfortunatly its not that easy, so hopefully we have picked the best of the bunch!
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Adam Gibson and Nick Burke
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Channell
non-member comment
Well guys...looks like your having an amzing time. close call on the hand in the pocket. Keep the blogs coming...the pictures are great. Some of the girls from my work are addicted too! Take care x