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Published: March 4th 2008
Ang Thong View
Dave and I climbed a little further than the others, as boys are expected to :PTwo years on and I once again find myself starting off a year abroad in Thailand! This time I had the pleasure and privilege to travel with Clara (AKA Claz) who was my "buddy" while I was studying in Vienna. The only complaint that I came up with after 5 weeks of travelling together was that she was too nice! I'm sure if you asked her the same question she would rattle off a plethora of very reasonable and truthful complaints about me, so thank you for putting up with me Claz! :P
After crashing Michael's Valentines Day in Singapore and having a quick look around the city and the National University of Singapore Campus (where I'll hopefully be studying Engineering on exchange for one semester starting in August) I caught another flight on to Bangkok. Claz arrived a few hours later and we caught a bus to Khao san Rd, checking into a guesthouse at 2am (very usual on Khaosan Rd). We stayed in Bangkok a few days doing the usual sightseeing and shopping and naturally getting massages pretty much every day. 😊 However as anyone who has been to Bangkok will know, a few days is more than
Feeding Elephants bananas on Koh Pha-ngan
It was quite amazing how gently the elephants took the bananas from you! ample, so it was with great enthusiasm that we hopped on an overnight train bound for Chiang Mai.
Arriving the next day more than a little bleary eyed, due to the "Party Wagon" we found ourselves in for 5 hours or so, we booked tickets on a bus to Pai. The famous 763 curves in the road to Pai didn't do much to help my condition, and I was quite relieved when we finally arrived 3 hours later!
Pai Pai is nestled in a river valley near the border with Laos surrounded on all sides by jungle covered hills. We arrived in that twilight period just as the sun was setting and as we wandered down the quiet streets I knew I was going to love this town. There was a Jazz band playing at a bar near the river and we could still hear them once we had crossed the river on a rickety bamboo bridge and found a cheap bungalow to stay at for the night. Then we chose a small Indian Restaurant out of numerous equally delicious looking alternatives and after dinner sipped Chai as we watched people wandering past on the street. The kind
of tourists that we saw in Pai probably best fit into the two categories of well traveled vagabonder and pot smoking hippie. Everyone was very chilled out and looked as though they were enjoying their stay in Pai almost as much as us! 😊
The next day we hired a motorbike and explored the surrounding countryside visiting a waterfall, a canyon, some thermal springs and an Elephant Camp. We signed up for an hour long ride with the elephants and that turned out to be one of the highlights of our Thailand Trip! I had ridden an elephant the last time I was in Thailand but this time we walked in a river and when we reached a deep spot our elephant (with a little encouragement from our guide) promptly fell over, throwing us into the river! The guide then got me to stand on the elephant's back and at his command it started thrashing around in the water until I fell off. Lastly he said to rest my weight on its head and after doing so it tossed its head back throwing me over its back and into the river! I ended up spending a good 15 minutes
Rafflesia arnoldii
The World's Largest Flower and pretty impressive! mucking around with the elephants in the water, oblivious to the cool temperature because I was having so much fun!
Koh Pha-ngan From the idyllic quiet town of Pai we headed South to Koh Pha-ngan, an island off the East coast of Thailand famous for the best and biggest beach raves. We arrived the day before a Full Moon Party was scheduled only to find out that it had, that morning, been postponed for 2 days. The first day was for a Buddhist Festival and the second was due to elections. However there are far worse places to be stranded for a few days and I had a great time exploring the island on a motorbike as well as taking a one day tour to the Ang Thong National Marine Park.
Eventually the Full Moon Party did come around though and it certainly lived up to expectations! We headed down to the beach (Had Rin) with a big group of people we had got to know over the last few days at around 12 and ended up getting home just as the sun was rising. For a change I was at a party that played awesome Trance music
Bangkok by night
Enjoying Singapore Slings 83 floors above Bangkok! (Full credit to Claz for this photo, along with many others in this blog!) and to top it all off the dance floor was an amazing beach illuminated by an almost full moon! Highlight number 2!
Phang Nga National Parks Unfortunately after the Full Moon Party Clara had to head home to Vienna as her University was starting up soon. Cheers for all the great times Claz! Looking forward to catching up again in Croatia in July!
I had a few days before I was meant to meet Joy (a Kiwi I met while studying in Vienna) so I decided to check out some National Parks north of Phuket. I first went on a boat tour in the Phang Nga NP staying overnight at a Muslim fishing village called Ko Panyi. The village is built entirely on stilts above the water and was really cool to explore, especially at night and early in the morning. Just after we arrived the call to prayer went up so I thought I'd quickly go to the Mosque to watch the people arriving to pray. On the way there I saw a group of Thai people sitting quietly in a house all facing the same way so I walked past as quietly as I could, discretely
looking in the doorway as I passed. To my surprise I saw that they were all watching a bad Thai movie, completely oblivious to the Adhan happening outside. :P
During the boat tour we went to some cool places too, including a number of caves (some with rock paintings), a secluded beach on an uninhabited island where we had lunch and of course the famous
James Bond Island (which features in "The Man with the Golden Gun"). I met a really cool Danish family on the tour who I had some good chats with and who gave me some good travel advice. Funnily enough I quite randomly bumped into them at Kata Beach on Phuket a few days later.
Khao Sok National Park After Phang Nga NP I took a bus further north to Khao Sok NP to do some hiking. The next morning I hiked 14km along a narrow jungle trail beside a river to reach a waterfall, sometimes having to climb as the trail was pretty rugged. I stopped a few times for a quick swim, and to pull off the leeches that managed to keep attaching themselves to my feet! The waterfall was well worth
Khao san Rd, Bangkok
Enjoying a quiet Singha while we people watched. the hike and leeches though and I hung out there for a while having it completely to myself. In the afternoon I did another hike, this time with a guide, to see the "biggest flowers in the world". These flowers are the symbol for Khao Sok NP and were really cool to see. I crashed at around 7 that night, totally exhausted, and didn't get up till 7 the next morning when I had to get a bus to Phuket!
Phuket I would love to say that I enjoyed Phuket but the truth is that it came to symbolise everything that I dislike about travelling in Thailand. Heavily overweight men wearing tight budgie smugglers, old wrinkled women burnt to a crisp after way too much sun, tourists who never leave the confines of their resorts, Westerners treating Thai people as if they are in some way inferior, prostitutes lining the streets at night, 7-11's on every street corner, and the ubiquitous tailor ready to measure you up for a suit at even the slightest indication of interest.
Having said that it was great to catch up with Joy and meet some of her friends! Cheers for the good
times guys!
Flying to Burma tomorrow for a few weeks so hopefully I'll have the next blog up around the end of March.
Oh yeah I uploaded more than 27 photos so if you want to see them all you'll have to click on the second page.
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Penny
non-member comment
It's tough being you!
Hey Joel, so happy to be reading your blog again even though it makes me so jealous! Great photos as ever. Happy travelling.