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Published: February 7th 2008
Hello all! I know, it has been a while since my last post, but in my defense it is because there was no internet on the islands we stayed on for over the past week. But now you get to hear all about the islands! Horray! Your patience paid off.
Alrighty, so if I have this correct, the last time I posted was on the 23rd of January after the stimulating full moon party. After posting my blog I'm pretty sure I lay on the beach the remainder of the day, reading the book The Beach by Alex Garland, and taking a ridiculous amount of sunset shots as usual.
The next day was pretty similar: eat food, read, swim in ocean, talk to the owner of our bungalow about symbolism. That last bit was pretty interesting to me. I had been wanting to talk to more Thai’s to get a better feel of their culture, but due to the language barrier it has been difficult. Luckily the owner of the bungalow spoke English pretty well and was able to relay some philosophy.
He explained that what influenced him to have children was a tree. One day his neighbor
wanted to cut a tree down, and the easiest way to do this was by cutting a groove into the base of the tree all the way around and letting the tree die slowly so that it would be easier to pull out of the ground. (I have never tried this technique, so don’t quote me on this.) What the man noticed was that the tree bare more fruit in its final month than it had ever bare before. Even in the trees dying moments it gave much life. The man realized that he was getting older and that he did not have any offspring of his own. Seeing that the natural order of things was to give life, he decided to have children, and now has two young daughters that are very cute and full of life.
I love that he can find symbolism like that in his life. I think finding symbolism and meaning in the world is a somewhat Buddhist oriented view on life which over 90% of the Thai population adhere to.
The following day we took a boat from Ko Pha Ngan to the mainland town of Surat Thani, where we then took
a share taxi 5 hours south to Hat Yai. All I can recall from that day was watching an absolutely horrible movie on the boat ride called War, spending a good hour in Surat Thani driving around the city picking up passengers, and being thankful that I was finally able to wash off the sunscreen, deet and seawater build up from the last five days. I have never appreciated a warm shower more in my life than right then 😊
The next day we realized that we had left our Lonely Planet with Katie on Ko Phan Ngan, so we weren’t exactly sure how to get to the southern islands from Hat Yai, but we were excited to figure it out on our own.
Kam had read online that there was a place to get a share taxi across from a post office in town, so we took a tuk-tuk to a post office, but not the right one. Then we took another tuk-tuk to the right post office, but found that the taxi was too much for our budget. So we took another tuk-tuk to a bus station, where we were informed that the bus station we
were at was the wrong one. We took another tuk-tuk, this time to the right bus station, where we got a share van for significantly cheaper than we would have paid for the taxi. Even though it took more time to get to our destination the journey was fun 😊
The share van took us 1 ½ hours south to Bak Bara where we made the boat just in time to Ko Tarutao, which was another 1 ½ hours of travel.
The island of Ko Tarutao is apart of Tarutao Marine National Park which consists of over 50 islands. We arrived on a small dock and eventually made our way to the park ranger’s office where Paul and I rented a tent for the 3 nights we would be staying on the island. Kam had smartly bought a hammock in Bak Bara and was able to string it up between a couple trees right on the beach.
I spent the remainder of the day walking along the beautiful, almost deserted beach we had pitched our tent on. The pure white sand made sounds like tires screeching on pavement when I dragged my foot through it. Hundreds of
crabs scurried to their holes as I approached them on the beach. The sun setting cast a beautiful orange glow over the whole setting. Once the sun set the night sky was the blackest I had ever seen except for the momentary illumination to the south from lightning flashes. It was a peaceful time 😊
The following day I awoke to the sound of the ocean, (I wish that happened every day), and we headed out for a day hike. We walked along a jungle fringed dirt road, where we spotted brown macaque monkeys and water monitor lizards periodically along the way. I felt like I was in Jurassic Park 😊
We eventually made it to a small encampment where we were hoping to get some lunch, but instead found the place uninhabited. We snacked on some chocolate wafers and sweet sticks called pocky to hold us over as we trekked to a waterfall. We cooled off in the refreshing pool of water at the base of the small falls and Paul jumped in from a ledge above. We then walked back to our campsite along the coast, stopping for food, and chasing the thousands of tiny crabs
into their holes.
The next day we got in the back of a large truck that took us 12 km south to an area where political prisoners of Thailand were held, from the years 1936-1947ish. The prison was a series of huts with each one holding hundreds of prisoners. Unfortunately, due to time and weather the original structures do not exist anymore, but newer buildings had been erected in their place. Knowing that the buildings weren’t the originals took away from the authenticity of the experience, but learning the history was still interesting.
The population of the prison peaked at 3000 during the early 1940’s, but during the beginnings of WWII supplies to the island dwindled and malaria ravaged the populace. Around 1945 due to the lack of supplies, the prisoners and guards resorted to plundering ships that passed near the island, essentially turning them into pirates. Argh! (At least they found common ground to come together on). Sometime in 1947 Britain sent 300 soldiers who quelled the pirate threat, and returned the island to its natural uninhabited state. In the mid 1970’s the island was officially declared a national park and there was much rejoicing.
After
walking through the prison grounds we took a stroll out to a large granite rock jutting out of the ocean like it owned the place. And before leaving on the truck we had a staring contest with a monkey, which eventually got bored and yawned at us. I have the picture to prove it 😊
We came back to our camp site and I read on the beach for a while when I was distracted by some sounds coming from the trees just behind me. I went to investigate and found a family of 10 langur monkeys hanging out in the trees, eating bugs off the branches and each other, and eyeing me with suspicion. A mother had a baby wrapped around it, holding on for dear life and curiously looking at me at the same time. I almost had a super awesome picture of the baby, but the mother wouldn’t have any of it and jumped away from me.
After the monkeys we hiked a small limestone cliff, where we got a nice view of the ocean and some of the island as the sun set. Then we came back to camp and illegally started a small
fire with some pine needles and bark. We are such rebels.
The next day we packed up our tent as giant spiders scurried out from under it and took our leave of the island. We caught a boat which took us 1 ½ hours further south and west of Ko Tarutao to the island Ko Adang (he, he). (I am aware that I laugh at elementary humor 😊
We arrived on Adang to find it similarly populated to Tarutao. I would say there were roughly 150 people on the island, including tourists and locals. Again Paul and I rented a tent and Kam slept in his hammock throughout our stay on the island. I finished reading The Beach which has a Heart of Darkness theme to it and an interesting query into nature’s influence on man.
Once night came Kam explained the inner workings of astrology to me, almost blowing my mind in the process. What did finally blow my mind was the bioluminescence we found in the water and in the sand. We got a look at one after some intensive searching and found that it appeared to be a very small shrimp looking creature, essentially
plankton. Whenever they are disturbed, such as from surf, or humans digging through the sand, they produce a greenish glow. According to wikipedia, the reason they light up is to attract larger predators to eat their predators in their vicinity. It doesn’t seem like such a bright idea to me (I like puns 😊, but then again I am not a plankton.
The following day we trekked through the jungle for a couple hours to a waterfall that was not really flowing. I had the most fun trying to find my way up past the waterfall where there was no trail, having to dodge spiders, fire ants, and thorn ridden branches. I enjoyed meandering through nature where there is no human influence whatsoever. It is a rare experience.
After the hike I walked to a small secluded beach where I studied some hermit crabs. They are like dogs I found out. When one sees another near it, it will quicken its pace to reach the other, where they will then stop in front of one another for a moment, looking each other over with their feelers, and then move on. The whole ritual reminded me of dogs sniffing
each other 😊
The next day I got up early to see the sun rise. It was very pretty, but all of my pictures of it look like my sunset shots 😊 Then we took an all day boat tour of the area near Ko Adang and an adjacent island Ko Rowe. We stopped at a few snorkel sights in the area where we saw some incredibly colorful fish, ranging from: butterfly fish, angel fish, long thin trumpet fish, trigger fish, giant clams, many different types of coral, puffer fish, clown fish swimming through sea anemones, an infinite number of sea urchins, and schools of yellow and black striped fish. The reef was like a busy city.
After snorkeling with a bunch of Thai university students who couldn’t swim and so floated around in life vests, our boat stopped at a tiny island with a black rock beach. The rocks were scalding, but Kam managed to build himself a mini tower out of some. After making a stop at a busy beach on Ko Rowe we snorkeled at another spot right next to Ko Adang where we had to make some tactical maneuvers to get around the thousands
of tiny stinging jellyfish on the surface of the water.
The following day was super relaxed. I ate, read, ate, read, ate, read, lay on the beach, ate, and read. I was reading about the fundamentals of Buddhism from a couple essays that were written by a Thai university teacher that Kam had gotten from Katie, and I came to the conclusion after reading them, that I am a Buddhist! I have always thought about Buddhism as being one of the few religions that I might adhere to, and after reading about it I realized that I exhibit many of the qualities of a Buddhist. Which means, at the core of it, to understand impermanence, impersonality, and suffering. I only scratched the surface of the religion with the 60 some odd pages that I read, but it is a very empathetic, accepting belief system of all cultures and religions. I will study up on it more when I get back to the states and possibly start a religious movement with these ideas at the core of it 😊
The following day was somewhat similar to the last. Lots of reading, eating and beach relaxing. Later in the day
I climbed a small hill to get a view of the surrounding islands. The color of the water just off the coast was such a beautiful turquoise, which led to the deeper blue green as my eye was drawn out to sea.
Once I returned to the camp site a couple guys that we had snorkeled with on the boat trip a few days before, told us that they had swam with some reef sharks just off the beach we were staying on the day before. They were going out again and we decided to tempt fate. In actuality swimming with reef sharks is not dangerous, especially the ones we were going to swim with because they were max maybe 3 ft in length according to the guys. But my adrenaline was flowing as we slowly swam the quarter mile out to the spot where our fellow shark hunters had seen the creatures the day before. Mainly it was because the water started to get murkier and I kept thinking I saw shadows of sharks in the distance and the inevitable Jaws theme played through my head. At one point I was sure we would see sharks when a
large school of the yellow and black striped fish swam quickly in our direction. But no, no sharks.
We swam back to shore separately, and once Kam caught up with me he said he had seen two reef sharks. What a lucky monkey.
That night after dinner we saw a lot of lightning just off the coast, so we excitedly got our cameras set up for long shutter speeds. I didn’t get such a great shot of the lightning illuminating Ko Lipe, I would direct your attention to Kam’s blog for a picture of that, but I did get a pretty sweet one of lightning radiating out from a point in the clouds as you can see.
The following day I took a long tail boat ride to Ko Lipe, which is the most touristy island in the national park, where I made some phone calls and spent more on a plate of food than I had on 2 plates of food on Ko Adang. That night it rained pretty heavily for a couple hours, which Kam somehow managed to sleep through in his hammock. He’s a animal 😊
The following day Kam and I got
up before sunrise and climbed the cliff that overlooked the islands, where we got some sunrise pictures that you will not be able to discern from sunset pictures. Then we packed up the tent, took a long tail boat to a ferry which took us back to Bak Bara, where we then took a share van to Treng and hopped on an overnight train to Bangkok. 22 hours of traveling in a 25 hour period, take that Christopher Columbus!
We arrived in Bangkok yesterday morning and took a share taxi to Lily’s house where we were warmly greeted by the maids, who cooked us lunch and washed our clothes. The rest of the day I spent finishing Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance which was a gift to me from my uncle, and wow, it really blew my mind. I read all 530 pages within a period of 4 days which I don’t think was intended by the author because of how densely philosophical the writing is, but I devoured it. I recommend it to anyone and everyone, but it should be read at a much slower pace to really soak up all the text.
Finally I
am caught up to today! Horray! We didn’t do too much today. I went out to an internet café to make some phone calls using skype while Kam wrote his extensive blog, and Paul watched American Gangster. And for the remainder of the day I have been writing this, which has taken much longer than I thought it would. I will not let a blog go unpublished this long again because I’m sure I left a lot of stuff out. But I would direct you to Kam and Paul’s blogs where they may have recalled something that I forgot.
Alright now it’s time to spend the next hour loading pictures. Enjoy!
Daniel
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Mom
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A fulfilling blog
Thank you for all of your writing, wherever, however, whenever you do it. This blog, as your others, is a beaut. You're so good in saying so much and being succinct and poetic. I began to tear up when I read your lines about setting up for lightning shots. Your dad has done that but I particularly remember a time in Texas at the ranch when he was so taken by the lightning and when he set up the camera on the back porch of the ranch house we stayed in. Anyhow, you brought back those memories and I appreciate your interest in photography. I love that all of you boys have an interest in recording your feelings about what you do and see, your insights developing and then your sharing with the rest of us. Thanks, kiddo. I like your reference to Zeus in that dramatic photo. The coral is magnificent. That photo of Kam on the tree is so amazing. The two branches that stretch down could easily be interpreted as his legs (at least in my world). Don't you see it? That cat! Curious style. The story of the tree and the man who had children at an age that is older than usual, is beautiful. I loved reading it even though you'd already told me the story by phone. City of fish, and growing anxiety over sharks. I love your descriptive narrative. Keep it comin' kiddo and keep on truckin'. I'm glad you feel connected with a seemingly peaceful and open philosophy such as Buddhism. I hope to now finish the copy of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance that Uncle Steve gave to me when I was in college. I made some notes when I first read it. Perhaps you would be interested in reading them. I love you. Goodnight.