Blogs from Northern Thailand, Thailand, Asia - page 42

Advertisement

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand October 13th 2005

An hour from town, a battered old sign in indecipherable Thai just past the bridge is all I have to go on. I turn off the tarmac road, pausing briefly to comprehend the steep rutted mud track disappearing into the forest. Time for my 100cc Honda dream-machine to go off-road. Slip sliding through the forest steering with my feet, the back wheel sprays orange mud about the place and demonstrates a worrying penchant for the valley floor. The further I go the boggier and swampy the conditions become, it hasn’t rained for over 24 hours so it is now well overdue. Menacing black storm clouds loom on the distant tropical hills, drawing their plans against me as I reach the point of no return. If it rains on this surface I’ll be lucky to walk out, ... read more
Karen Villagers
Buddha
Burmese Muslim girl

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand » Chiang Khong August 17th 2005

The second day of our Intrepid tour's about waiting. Waiting for our bus, waiting for Ping to arrive. He's always late. It's Thai time, one of the Kiwis said. And that's when we started talking about Asia, and that things in these region are never on time (Singapore and Japan are the exemption, not the rule). My group mates were bored and I really can't blame them. We're all dying to get to Laos. But for me, I think, who just crashed and burned and trying to have my life back (after years of rushing from one news coverage to another, and later, after years of being confined in the desk) , waiting is about taking things slowly, learning to let go. Chill Prime!, I told myself. In Singapore, everything's has to be scheduled. In ... read more

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand » Chiang Khong July 29th 2005

Well two days and 1000 kms of bus and train later, and I'm sitting here in Chiang Khong on the Mekong River right up in the Golden Triangle. Laos is literally 100m away from our guesthouse (or however wide the river is) and we'll be heading there at 8:30 tomorrow morning. I found out about a place in Vang Vieng (about 100 or so k's north of Vientiane) that does WWOOFing, and I might look into doing that for a week or so! I've decided that the ONLY way to travel is to stay somewhere for more than just a few days (more than a week too, but you can only get 15 days in Laos, so I wanna see a bit more of it). The actual TRAVELLING part of travelling sucks! I've taken to lying ... read more
View over the Mekong River
Apocalypse Laos
Finally! A Zappa Tee!!!

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand » Chiang Saen September 9th 2003

The Golden Triangle is the location in the north of Thailand at the border of Myanmar and Laos. The name comes from the fact that the opium that was cultivated there, was paid with gold, hence the name... We visited a village of the Akba-tribe. Besides that, we briefly visited Laos. In fact, at the Golden Triangle you can cross the Mekong river to enter Laos. Once you're there you have to pay an arrival tax (this was to be expected ;-). So technically spoken, I can say that I've been to Laos... But in reality there was not much to see. Besides a little shop there was a post office "from where you can send a postcard to your home". We were tempted, but until now we are still waiting for the postcard to arrive. ... read more
Short trip to Laos
Snake Whiskey
Mekong River

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand November 1st 2002

After my beach vacation in the south, I met up with an organic farmer named jo. I had planned to work on his farm, but instead volunteered with him, working on various adobe building projects. The first was in Chaiyaphum province in the northeast. We were building an entire village for a group of farmers who had been displaced from their land by a government dam. Nov 4 2002 Hello all, Here is yet another mass e-mail from this crazy fool. So I made it to Malaysia after my month of roaming the south and watching my bowels change their consistency and frequency in a chaotic patternless manner. Yes I saw about two minutes of Malaysia, leaving Thailand, entering Malaysia and coming right back. It was a ridiculous process of routine paperwork, but indeed, I got ... read more
Main Building Site
Mortar
Kids and Pillar

Asia » Thailand » Northern Thailand June 2nd 2001

Fantastic to see the natural beauty of Thailand: the pale and elegant greenery of the bamboo forest, views of the mountains that border Burma, the rice fields, banana plants and fully-forested hills! Best activity: riding the neck of an elephant, big ears flapping over my legs and holding onto the soft brown head. Next best: river rafting on bamboo platforms then touring a damp and eerie cave. It turned out to be home to a large snake, a massive spider and insects you could put a saddle on and ride. Also numerous smelly bats. Fantastic! The food was terrible but our guides, Nai and Pairo, were fun and enthusiastic. Staying in the Lahu and Lisu villages was about as contrived as I feared but the chance to teach two little girls "Stop In The Name Of ... read more
Jungle trek, North Thailand
Breakfast in a little village, somewhere in N. Thailand
 Jungle trek, North Thailand




Tot: 0.131s; Tpl: 0.005s; cc: 7; qc: 52; dbt: 0.0681s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.2mb