Tasty Thailand

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Ah, it's great to be back in Thailand. Such happy people with pearly white smiles. (And me with my busted up trailer teeth!) It's nice to return to a place we've been before. I forgot that sometimes they serve beer with ice which I find funny. The food here is so tasty with zesty lemon grass, Thai basil and hot pepper flavors and scents. I took a short cooking class so I can make a few things when I get home.

We first went to the island of Phuket where we rode around the island on a motor bike. We visited a gibbon rehab center. Thailand made it illegal to buy or own gibbons in the 90s. This rehab center takes in those that people turn in. Quite sad stories with their parents being shot so the babies can be sold as pets. But they aren't good as pets when they get older and were usually kept in cages for years or worse. Will spare you the details. They are blond like the one pictured or black with blond around the face. Quite cute and they make the funniest whooping sounds. It's like half a siren only going from low to high. They get each other going until it's like a bunch of tea kettles going off at the same time.

We also went diving in the Similan Islands in the Andaman Sea. We saw some cool stuff we haven't seen before, especially a big purple jelly fish that moved through the water like a dancer.

We met some great people on the dive boat. Really we have been so lucky to meet great people everywhere we go from all over the world. We occasionally are up until the wee hours chatting with peeps from Spain, Germany, England, Holland, etc. And it usually seems to happen when we have to catch an early bus or ferry the next morning. We end up kicking ourselves for our lack of sleep but it's always worth it. 😊

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Photos

Something you don
Well honey, I've got to go walk the elephant before it gets too dark.

Can you believe...
that I'm the only one in this picture who was born without a winkie? Yep, they're lady boys.

View point over three bays
Nice view despite the fact that we had mostly overcast weather when we were on the island of Phuket.

"Giant Buddah of Phuket"
It's 42 meters high. Pretty giant.

$7 bathroom
One of the cheapest rooms we've paid for yet. Thought you might like to see how the other half lives. ;-) The room next to ours was used in the filming of "The Beach" with Leo DiCaprio. I'll have to see it again to recognize this place.

$12 waterfall
Can you believe that we paid $7 for a hotel room and then $12 to see this ho-hum waterfall?!

Gibbon in rehab
Maybe she'll make friends with Amy Winehouse while she's there. ;-)

Phuket mansion
Ah, what stories this old mansion could probably tell.

Thalang Guest House
Phuket Town is full of old buildings like this one where we stayed for just $9 which included a private bath with hot water and soap. No towels or TP though. Amenities are always a surprise at budget digs.

Leila the love pup
We went to this great blues bar in Phuket town. The owner is from Singapore and this is his golden retriever, Leila, obvously a Clapton fan. She's super sweet and lets you hug and pet her all you want.

Similan Islands
Strange rounded rock formations around these islands.

Lion fish with blue dots
I know, we've posted enough of the various lion fish to make you puke. Toby thought this one with the blue dots was worth posting anyway.

Leopard shark
Don't know if you can see it in the picture but it has these ridges that run across it's back. From a pure top down view it looks like a plane on a runway with long wings.

Napoleon wrasse
These are usually green. This guy is about 2' long.

Bat fish
The Robin fish is hanging out in the bat cave. ;-) Yeah, pretty lame. Couldn't help it.

Eel at the dentist
Must be nice to have a dentist who doesn't use a drill. My day in the chair is coming. :(

Purple jelly fish
This jelly fish was mesmerizing to watch. It softly squeezed it's mantle up and down to propel itself forward. It almost ran into Toby while he was taking this picture. There were little fish swimming around its tentacles, apparently immune to its sting.

White & black nudie with yellow spots
Hm, probably tastes like vanilla ice cream in chocolate sauce with yellow juju bees on top.

Black & white nudie with orange spots
Chocolate ice cream with marshmallow sauce and orange juju bees on top.

octopussy
This octopus was at least 3 feet long to the ends of its legs. We watched it swim and it sat and looked at us tentatively from the top of this rock.

Darth Vader of the coral reefs
Crown of Thorns star fish like this one are beautiful but they eat the coral. Their natural predator comes in a huge and beautiful shell which is poached for the tourist trade. Sad for the coral reefs of the ocean. :(

Sea turtle
Okay, I know I've posted enough turtles. But this one seemed to just want to hang out with us around the boat. We jumped in with all our scuba gear and he came over to investigate. Our dive master accidentally kicked him in the head but he just kept swimming around us. What a buddy.

Comments

[Todd]

Guest house
The architecture of that house must be somewhat ubiquitous to southeast Asia. We saw a lot of the same architecture in Vietnam. Narrow, like a shoebox, but tall. One of our guides said that the tall buildings with small footprints are due to the high cost of property. We love reading your entries and looking at your pics. Keep 'em comin'!

[George]

Boys will be boys?
I was going to say "boys will be boys" but......always wondered what the true level of surprise is if one doesn't know, but never wanted to know badly enough to find out. Girls should n ot have winkies. That is my final position on the matter.

[Liz]

Hey Guys!!
Hey Lisa and Toby!! It's amazing you can do all these blogs while traveling! Brendt and I will write soon when we are out of Thailand. We are back in Phuket as our flight from Bangkok was suspended last week. Have a blast!!!!