In Transit. . .

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Our travel marathon began on Sunday morning at 9:30 and ended on Tuesday evening. There were two boats, several tuk tuk's (kind of like trucks with seats in the back), and a number of busses.

We began on the island of Koh Yao Noi, and took the 9:30 ferry to Krabi. We enjoyed our last bit of time in the bay of Phang Nga, the limestone kursts, and the playful kids on the ferry. From Krabi province, we took a tuk tuk to Krabi town, found an airconditioned cafe and killed a bit of time before our bus left at 3:30. Our bus turned out to be a van which travelled around Krabi picking up travellers to catch the bus to Bangkok which departed several hours from Krabi.

Around 7:30 that evening, we hopped on our bus. The hard thing about night busses are you never know when or where they are going to stop. Should you hydrate now because there will be a stop in a couple of hours? Or should you allow yourself to be thirsty because the bus may never stop? Always hard to say.

So, apparently the busses in Thailand are not always direct, even if we were told that they would be. After finally getting to sleep in our cramped corners, we are woken with yelling at 1 am to get off the bus! As the drivers unload all of our bags from the bottom of the bus and essentially throw them on the road, we bustle to make sure we have all of our belongings, and find a quick bathroom (as the old lady store owner is yelling at us to hurry up because the bus is going to leave--in Thai of course, but I think that was the geral gist).

So, again we settle in, this time to be awoken at 4 am. We go through the same routine, but this time there is not enough seats on the bus for everyone, and some people are stuck standing or sitting in the aisles. Finally, around 6 am we are dropped in the middle of Bangkok, exact location undisclosed. We managed to take a city bus to Khao San road (the backpackers mecca of Bangkok).

We had a day to kill in the city before catching what we hoped woud be a train to the border of Laos. Unfortuantely, it was booked and our destiny was yet another bus to Ubon Ratchathani, a small town in northern Thailand, short of the Laos border. We killed time in Bangkok by eating, shopping, and getting foot massages, before taking a city bus to the northern bus terminal.

The northern bus terminal was insane, and we were running late. There were 90 platforms, and we had to ask a number of people before figuring out which one was ours. The hundreds of people who were also waiting for their various busses didn't love getting out of the way for us--I held onto Phil's backup and together we plowed through the chaos. The icing on the cake involved getting 'bumped' by a bus as it was making it's tight turn into it's parking spot next to where we were loading our gear into our bus. Not only did it literally hit me, but came about one foot from running over my day pack which held my ipad. Ugh.

Our bus was pleasant enough--direct, not too cold and didn't blare loud music all night (a welcome change). We arrived to our destination at 7 am, booked the next 3 hour bus to Pakse Laos, and endured the border crossing. This was our first walk across border crossing. Leaving Thailand was tame enough, but arriving in Laos was full of different visa price quotes, lots of standing in various lines, and finally getting our stamp of approval.

As we arrived to Pakse, we met an old school Australia/Austrian couple who were also heading to our destination of Don Det. Rather than taking one last bus, we opted to pay a little extra, rent a tuk tuk amongst the four of us, grab some beer and snacks, and drive across the countryside in the back of this truck. We arrived to the port just in time to take a ferry across to the lovely Don Det Island! 2 days of travelling commenced--we slept very well that night. . .

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Photos

Ferry Ride
Note the orange head covering and outfit of this little girl.

Comments

[Ben]

Yes
I frickin love that post. Reminds me of every traveling experience we've had in the developing world. Sometimes a sane bus ride from point a to point b is the hardest thing to find in the world. Glad you made it eventually.

[Lucy Kendzior]

Your journaling is incredible. I almost feel like I am with you. I may not be as tired as you at the end of your jaunts but truly enjoy them. I marvel at your ability to eat what you can and be well with it. As you endure and enjoy together the experience is endearing to you both. Love and miss you!

[peg Kauffman]

Hope the Mekong River area more than makes up for that miserable trip! XXXXXX