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Published: September 7th 2006
Hi all, sorry it's been so long. I'd like to say that we've just been too busy to take the time to write, but I don't think your all going to buy that. Blame it on the twin brothers laziness and procrastination. As it turned out the stolen bike never did turn up ( surprise, surprise ), even after we sneakily checked out the lot I rented it from to see if they had put it back into service. Almost everyone we talked to about it was quick to say that there are rental stores that will steal their own bikes from tourists, collect the fee, and put them back out altered or chop them for parts. With them having your address and a key to the bike and bike lock that came with the rental, you can see how easy it would be. I was still in class though so I had to get another bike, but this time it was getting double locked every time! The following week was Vicki's last week of courses at ITM so everyone who was graduating planned for a big night out at Riverside for some live music and drinks on Friday. As it
turned out our visitor visa was scheduled to run out that weekend so Vick, Corinna, Devina, and I booked a daytrip to Mae Sai, a Burma border crossing, for 6:00 AM Saturday. Things ended up going so well at Riverside on Friday that we decided that we would go out dancing instead of heading home to bed. I can't remember the name of the club but the experience was one I won't forget. We hadn't been in the club more than 15 min before it was time to visit the loo and off I went unsuspecting. I found the bathroom, sidled up to the latrine and was waiting for nature to take its course when all of a sudden a man's hands landed on my shoulders. Startled I turn around to find a Thai man giving me his biggest smile while he starts to massage my shoulders. After a moment another dude joined in massaging my calves! Welcome to the bathroom masseuse, strictly above board but decidedly strange. I tried to stand in there and accomplish what I set out to do but alas it just wasn't going to happen so I zipped up and beat a hasty retreat. Needless
to say this problem wasn't going to resolve itself so after taking 5 to gather myself back in I went. These guys don't take a polite " no thank you", so I just decided to relax and enjoy it. Funny thing the guys had massage in their bathroom and the chicks didn't even get toilet paper. We finally called it a night and made it home for 3 hrs sleep before we were up and off on our visa run. Considering the previous night the trip wasn't that bad but it certainly wasn't that exciting either. It basically amounted to alot of driving, broken up by stops for shopping, and by this point I had enough of the markets. We did get to go on a boat trip on the Mekong river in the Golden Triangle area and stopped in Laos for a short break ( more markets ). Next stop was the border crossing for a quick trip into Burma and back again just to get a fresh stamp on the passport. The crossing attracts beggars from the Burmese side and it is a cold experience to walk by all the children with their hand out. The best part
of the trip was just the fact that it got us out into the countryside for what was one of our first good looks at the land. Over the next couple of weeks Vick got to split her time between hanging out at ITM and ironically enough hanging with her friend Itoshi. She lived with her while living in Whistler last winter and low and behold just happen to end up in Thailand and Chiang Mai of all places at the same time. So she kept busy while I was finishing my stint at Muay Thai. I can honestly say that the training was one of the hardest things I've done in the last ten years. It also showed me that alot of the talk in training literature about the dangers of overtraining are overemphasized. I must admit though that my feet were very happy when it was all over. Lastly the guys were all great and where else can you train with a class of Spaniards, Irishmen, Englishmen, Germans, Kiwis and Thais? After my classes were finished we hung out for a few days to see some more of the local temples and to check out the zoo. Then
it was time to say goodbye to Walai House/Chiang Mai and get on the road again. We took the bus to Sukothai where there are ruins of the old capital of the Khmer empire (very cool) and spent a day wandering and taking photos before we hopped the bus to Bangkok. We got off in Bangkok and shortly after realized we had forgotten an oil painting on the bus. A half-hour and 150 baht later we tracked down the painting and made our transfer to the Southern Bus Terminal where we caught the overnight bus to Ranong. The only reason Ranong made it on the itinerary was it was time to renew our visas again and this was as convienient as it got. We got into Ranong at 6am and got absolutely hosed by the motorbike taxi's to take us to the pier. We spent the last of the cash we had on us to purchase the tickets that would take us By boat to resort in Burma that had their own immigration service. Nice boat ride over and a easy trip through immigration and then nothing but a wait before the next boat left. The sad part was that
we found out that they didn't take credit so instead of a much needed meal after all that bus time, we had to settle for a coffee that the concierge was kind enough to provide gratis. How many times we've been caught out without cash is embarrasing to admit. Finally we were back on our way to Ranong where we would catch another bus to Surat Thani, which was our last stopover on our way to the east coast islands.
This was a moment we had both been looking forward to for a long time. All that tropical heat with no beach or ocean had been getting under our skin, but now we had a month to just kick back and soak it all up. After failing to get a decently priced taxi again, we ended up at Hat Lamai. We ended up at a nice cheap place on the beachfront without much effort only to find the beach at this end was too shallow and rocky for swimming. The swimming was about 500 m down the beach, but I couldn't complain, I'd never been on a beach that you couldn't through a baseball across. We spent two days
completely bumming around the beach and the crazy little town. The islands are so tourist dense that the town centers near the beaches are nothing but concentrated capitalism and vice. Believe me after awhile in those areas you start to feel a little uncomfortable in your own skin, seeing what our tourist dollars are building. I'd be a complete hypocrite though if I didn't say that it was entertaining. We toured up to Hat Chaweng the next day to check out the scene there and encountered some of the more entertaining beach buskers of the trip. So far we met lots of people selling a variety of wares, which is mostly annoying when you are trying to relax, but some clever bugger figured he'd get some kids to work the crowds. A lot of the beachfront restaurants have benches with mats set up on the beach for eating and relaxing, the only thing missing was gambling. Problem solved, get some smart-ass/charming little kids, train them to be superb Connect Four players and unleash them on a soft, tipsy, group of tourists. It was amazing to watch these guys work a crowd. They challenge people to a game of Connect Four
for a determined price, winner take all, and we never seen them loose! Beats delivering newspapers. We left Koh Samui, on the slowest boat they had, for Koh Tao, the smallest island and the most popular diving destination. A Thai woman we met at the hostel in Surat Thani told us to go to Ao Leuk if we were looking for a quite beautiful beach on Koh Tao. Due to our lack of forward planning we had to spend the first night in a shoddy shack full of insects on the hill above the bay but luckily we got a bungalow on the bay the next day and settled into probably the nicest beach of the trip. It is a relatively small calm bay, with plenty of coral for snorkling on the sides and a sandy center with a drop off perfect for swimming. One family owns the land so it's not very developed and the amount of people is just right for a chill atmosphere. We spent most of our first day snorkling in the coral. The visibility was excellent and my first tropical snorkling experience was amazing. The only thing we were missing at Ao Leuk was some
family or friends to share it with. After five days at the perfect little bay it was time to move on. Vick had a seven day silent retreat booked at a temple back on Koh Samui and I had booked in at Crystal Dive at Mae Haad on Koh Tao for their Open Water Diver course.
MY TURN NOW! ha ha ha! You don't keep me quiet for long!Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. What can I say about a silent meditation retreat. Something I have never experienced before. It was a bit like summer camp in a way. There was a bell every morning to wake us all up,BUT, the bell was a repetative soft sounding dong rather than clang. I was waking from my plywood bed covered with a nice layer of nothing but bamboo straw(not even as thick as a yoga mat!) and surrounded by a mosquito net, and the bell is at 4:30 a.m!!!!! Believe it or not it was my favorite part of the day. The temp. was perfect. Not too hot or cold. It was still dark and completly quiet other than your typical jungle creatures singing away. When the sun did rise it is the most beautiful million
dollar view ever. Our meditation hall is up on the side of the mountain so you have jungle as a view on the one side of the open air hall and a ocean view on the other side. The grounds were donated by a lady that lives in the Lamai Bay of Ko samui. Her father had a coconut plantation that she must have inherited and gave up as a place to create a retreat center and have Monk Ajarn Poh reside here at the age of about 80 to guide the center. With so much of the south islands being eat'n up by tourism as they call it the "S's" of ko samui (sun, sand and sex ), it was so refreashing to see the property and have the honour of spending some time there away from all of the craziness.
We had 2 meals between 8:30 and 11:30 a.m and then as following a monk life style we did not eat the rest of the day until 8:30 the next a.m. For some this was the biggest discipline, for others it was the no speaking thing. But for me I found it the hardest (believe it or
not it wasn't the no talking rule) it was having to attempt to sit in one position for a half an hour or longer with out moving and concentrating on clearing the mind to think about nothing!!!! I tell you, when your foot falls asleep and starts to crawl up the leg and continue on to the arss, is when the mind is not so clear and you start to try and trace back to your physiology lessons, thinking "what is the worst that can happen if you ignore the cutting off of blood supply to a limb for long enough.!"
The retreat started on a friday and followed through to the following thursday. I would do it again in a heart beat, no saying when I would be practiced enough to do more than 7 days though. All in All a real eye opening experience. And it was so great to see Brett when I was finished. After, I felt like I was floating for the next 2 days. There is something to be said about taking a true break from life.
When Vick told me she was thinking about the retreat I thought it was a
pretty cool chance to try something like that but we decided it would be too distracting to do it together so (sigh) I had to settle for scuba diving. I got settled into a bungalow at Crystal Dive just in time to see Vick off on her boat back to Samui and silence (for us both, haw,haw). I met the rest of my group the next day and we started the classroom portion. My group consisted of two girls from Ontario, two young fellas from the British army, a British girl and our instructor Steve. The classroom and confined water portions of the program were finished in two days, and then we were onto our first open water dive! To celebrate our impending introduction to the Big Blue it was out on the town for the night, which is about the last thing one should do before a dive. Needless to say everyone was pretty subdued on the boat ride to the dive site the next day, and once the dive was underway the one english lad learned how to vomit through a regulator at 15 m. The diving over the next two days was fantastic, with so much marine
life to see the dives seemed to be over in minutes. The only downside was the great deal of trouble I had equalizing my ears on the way down. My eustachian tubes were stuffed up apparently, causing for a very slow and painfull descent. Everyone else just zipped down without a care. Each time we ascended a great gob of blood and snot would be forced out into my mouth, eventually helping to clear out the passages, Yippie. I don't know how many opportunities I will have to make use of the training but I really look forward to the chance to do a less structured fun dive with more freedom and time to explore. A post certification party later I was back on a boat to Koh Samui to hook up with Vick and see how the seven days of silence went. I knew were she was going to be dropped off so I went there to surprise her. I saw her get out of the truck and walk towards the internet cafe I was in and even though it sounds silly I had to look at her twice to make sure it was actually her. She really looked
different. I don't know if our restless minds play out that much on our faces but that really made me think so. You could see the peace of mind. I could use some of that. After a quick reunion we were off again to catch the boat to Koh Phangnan. We spent a few nights in Hat Rin Nok, the home of the infamous full moon parties, where we ran into most of my scuba crew and although we missed the full moon, any phase of the moon is an excuse to party and so we did. Soon we were looking for more peacefull shores and we spent the next 8 days chillin' at the more out of the way Big Bottle beach and Ao Nai Pan Yai. Mindfull of the life of vice we (me) had taken up Vick thought the best thing for us was to head back to Koh Samui for a detox program and so we attempted to get into The Spa Resort on Lamai beach because they offer a large variety of cleansing programs and a full vegetarian menu. As it turns out you have to book well in advance so we found a nice
beach front hut nearby and planned to do their liver cleanse for the next three days. This consisted of eating vegetables and fruit only accompanied by three nasty liver flush shakes per day. Besides the drinks the meals weren't that bad except you never knew if they were going to put basil in them or not. It appeared to be a random thing and rather unpleasent for me, I can't stand the heavy licorice taste their variety of basil has. Three days and some grumbling later we both felt better and even wished we had the time for their seven day fast program. Most everyone at the resort was at some stage of a fast and it was mildly amusing to watch them all walking around with their five gallon pails full of enema solution. Their lives revolved around their bowel movements. I won't get into it any more than to say some of the vivid video documentaries they have really make you wonder what kind of baggage your carrying around in your lower intestine. The time to leave Thailand had been approaching and our desire to move on was growing along. Thailand and it's people had been great but
we both needed a change back to a quiter, cooler, english speaking environment. We arranged to fly to Bangkok from Koh Samui and spent our last night on the islands in luxury. We flew out the next morning at 6 am got into Bangkok at 7:30 and then had to taxi to the embassy to pick up Vicki's long awaited new passport. After a touch of last minute shopping it was back to the airport to wait for our 5:00 pm flight back to Auckland. We arrived in the morning after listening to the brat infront of us wail his way through the flight. I hate to sound regressive but that kid should have got a whuppin', he wasn't crying out of fear or discomfort, he was just making noise for attention. Other than that though Thai airways was a pleasure to fly with once again. Getting off the plane almost felt like coming home again. The familiarity was refreshing. We spent four nights in Auckland before we rescued our bikes from storage and grabbed the bus to Taupo. The first week back in Taupo the weather was perfect and we spent our time revisiting some sites and scanning the
paper for an apartment and getting our work papers in order. Eventually we got a room in a house that serves as a long term stay for backpackers which has been ideal. Fully furnished, TV, DVD, lots of room, a laid back environment and some cool roommates to boot. We both also just got jobs cleaning ( I get my own smock!) at the Top 10 motor camp, so everythings in place. With summer coming our hours should fill up nicely between work and preparing for another sprint triathlon. To those of you that made it this far thanks for your patience and we both hope you all enjoyed your summers. Take care!
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Uncle Dave
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Enjoy Blog
Starting Fall here, is great to see the two of you viewing the other side of the world. I was able to drive combine in harvest. Am trimming the trees in my yard now, and hope to put new shingles on the house. Keep your feet on the ground and your eyes on the Lord. Love Uncle Dave.