Thailand in 3.5 Minutes

While I'm struggling to get my blog updated (being back to work seems to make this difficult!) here's a video of our whole trip in 3.5 min, courtesy of Ren. The music used was recorded in Chiang Mai at the Sunday Market, played by a couple of buskers in the middle of the street.

Enjoy!

Trekking and Hilltribes in Northern Thailand - Day 1

The tour bus dropped us off on the side of the road to begin our hike. We set out straight across the road and immediately up a hill that felt to be 90 degrees but likely was only about 30. However with the 20lbs of stuff (camera, clothes etc) it was far from easy especially with my leg muscles burning from clinging to the back of an elephant for the last 2 hours.

Eventually the path evened out but not for too long. Up and up we climbed, my lungs burning part from exertion and part just from my shoulder bag crushing my chest. 

The scenery, however was totally worth the effort. Rolling green hills went on for miles,turning a hazy blue in the distance, the humidity clouding the horizon. 

Up and down through the hill we went,  ducking under branches and dodging the odd spider blocking the path.When we started our journey we'd acquired a follower - a little hilltribe dog that trotted along in front of us the whole way. He'd run ahead, and then come back to find us.

We trekked for about an hour and a bit before coming out into a clearing with a few little bamboo huts set up for people to sleep in. Straight ahead was a huge waterfall. Exhausted we all sat down to enjoy the sound of the water crashing over the rocks and the nice cold refreshingness of a can of Chang. (Beer Chang as it's always referred to in Thailand).

soooo sweaty!

Because the sun disappears early in Thailand we didn't stop for too long. About 20 min of rest and we were back on our feet on the way to the hilltribe village. We only had to walk about half an hour before reaching the village, which I think we were all ecstatic about. The last trek up the hill leading into the village seemed to be never ending.

As we walked up the hill we were greeted by some people from the village, a trio sitting on the front "porch" of a hut drinking mystery liquid from a communal glass. Tony Montana, our wonderful guide, introduced us and taught us the hilltribe word for "hello". We all said hello and were offered a drink from the glass. I took a sip.. it tasted like vodka, or whisky... kind of smooth with a definite burning after taste. I passed it onto the boys doing my best to not shudder from the taste.

Saying goodbye to the villagers on the porch, we walked to what would be our home for the night. We were instructed to put our stuff in the cabin and that dinner would be served shortly. We walked up into our cabin and were greeted with about 5 mats on the ground and mosquito netting hanging from the ceiling. We each picked a mat and dropped our stuff on the ground. I immediately draped my sweat drenched clothes over the lines hanging in the room to attempt to dry them out before our trek the next day... and realized I didn't have any other dry clothes. So, on went my bathing suit top and I wrapped myself in my pashmina scarf. Sometimes you just gotta make do.

We went down to the table in the "yard" to eat dinner. The family had been hard at work putting together a meal of rice, massamon curry and stir fried veggies. We were shown the cooler with the drinks in it and told to mark off what we bought and we could pay the next day. Apparently starving, we each had multiple servings of the wonderful food while discussing the day's events up until that point. We marveled at all the things we'd done and how many more things we still had yet to do.

After eating we were invited into the family's main  living area. We decided to play cards. First a game of Asshole/Shithead and then a hilltribe game called "Black Magic". A simple enough game to play, Tony Montana explained the rules to us: Each person is dealt a card. Ace is low, Kings are high and unbeatable. You look at your card and decide if you want to keep it. If it's low enough you can trade it with the person beside you, unless they have a King, in which case you can't. Once everyone has traded you turn your card over. The winner is the holder of the highest card. And he gets the honour of performing "Black Magic" on the loser.

Photo Courtesy of Ren Bostelaar

In this case "Black Magic" means rubbing their finger on a sooty pot bottom and drawing on the losers face in whatever way they see fit.

I did great for the first couple rounds. And then I lost. Repeatedly.

By the end of the game I was covered in soot and looked like the guy from V for Vendetta. Lovely.
But it was a lot of fun, it really was. Even more fun was being able to wash my face off with face cleaner without truly running water.

We all went to bed soon after that, our elephant and hiking muscles completely exhausted from the amount of work they got. I'm not usually one for super hard beds but the fact that I had a place to rest my weary body meant that I fell asleep fairly quickly.

Bangkok to Chiang Mai

Not sure if it was the excitement of the next leg of our journey or just that I wasn't tired but I woke up at around 6:30am. I did a bit of internet-ing and then started to get ready.

The boys both woke up fairly early as well ms with our extra time before the shuttle we decided to go for a walk to find food. We walked down the street and bought some drinks on the way. Instead of turning right at the end like the night before we opted for left. As we walked we passed a coffee place but it wasn't open yet.

We came across a street vendor selling what looked like donuts, so both Ren and Eric bought some. Not extremely sweet, they were still tasty. We walked a bit further down the street until it became obvious that there really wasn't much to find so we turned back. The coffee place we ha passed earlier was open so we all got coffee for about $1.

I stopped and bought a little bundle of sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves.  It tasted a bit like banana bread.

When we got back the shuttle was ready to go so we piled in and headed for the airport, which was only about 10 min away. Upon arrival we checked in and decided to find some food.

There was a food court of sorts that had the normal chains like McD's and burger king, as well as a few little
Cafe places. The boys each got
Egg mcMuffins and I opted for mango sticky rice and a coffee. We walked to our gate, boarded our flight and set off for Chiang mai.

The airport in Chiang mai was small but completely functional. We were off the plane and had gathered our luggage in about 25 min. Outside was a bunch of taxi drivers waiting so we grabbed a cab and asked him to take us to Yourhouse hostel, one of the ones I'd made note of prior to leaving Bangkok.

The taxi drive was only about 10 min, and the driver took us right to the place. We unloaded ourselves and went to the desk to check in. We opted for a 3 person room with a fan and private washroom. The total was 350baht, or about $10. Total. Absolutely crazy that it can be that cheap.

We dropped our belongings off and decided we should get out and explore. Ren wanted to find a place called the Lost Hut, run by the brother of a colleague at henrys. We decided to start there and see where the day took us.

As we crossed the road somehow caught the attention of a local who was very helpful in regards to how we should go about booking the next couple days of adventure. He said we should talk to the tourist info places, not the hostel or travel agencies because they have better prices.

 We found the lost hut but it was closed (assuming it opened later) so we opted to search out lunch instead. As we stood staring into our
Guidebook for recommendations another local asked if we needed help. We said we wanted a place to eat. He suggested a place around the corner, so we took his advice. Happy we did too, since we had a fantastic meal of pad thai, Chiang Mai noodles and green curry for about $3 each.

After lunch we wandered around some more and then decided to go for traditional Thai massages- an hour for about $5. They were an amazing experience. The little Thai woman spent 15 min on each leg, another 20 on my shoulders and arms and the last 10 walking up and down my body on her elbows and knees. It was unlike anything I have ever had before.

We decided we should make a plan for the next couple days and decided on elephant riding, trekking through the jungle to a hilltribe village and spending the night and then more trekking to a place where we would ride a bamboo raft down the Mekong river. We booked the whole adventure with one of the tourist info places and got what we thought was a great deal: 4000 baht for the whole thing (about $130).

All booked and prepared for the next day we headed back to the Lost Hut, which was now open, and had some drinks while talking to the girls that worked there and Blake the owner. Around midnight we called it the end and made our way back to the hostel (via McD's) and promptly passed out.

Next stop, elephants and hill tribes.

Thailand Planning

In about 5 weeks I'm taking off on my next adventure. As I mentioned before I'm off to Thailand with two of my good friends. We've only got about 10 days to see as much of the country as possible. We are all photographers, so we want to be able to hit all the photogenic sites (and a beach or two for me, hopefully...)

Here's the itinerary (for the most part) if you're interested. We're trying to not plan too much of the trip and just let it happen, but with only 10 days we're forced to set a few parameters:


Depart from Toronto at 10am. Convince myself to sleep on the plane so that I can function when we arrive in Hong Kong. Spend 24 hours in Hong Kong just because we can. Hopefully do a whirlwind tour of the city and see what we can in a short period of time. I'd love to hit a night market if possible.

Hong Kong at Night  (Google Image)

We fly out of Hong Kong in the afternoon and arrive into Bangkok in the late afternoon. We've got an airport hotel booked, so we'll drop off our stuff and probably take a bus into the city (or maybe just sleep, it's hard to say).







Next morning we have a relatively early morning flight to Chiang Mai. We have about 3 days in Chiang Mai to check out the temples, elephants, markets and hilltribes.

I've been given a heads up that we know a family that operates a bar/restaurant that we should check out, The Lost Hut, so we will definitely do that. I've also heard that if you're going to do a cooking class in Thailand, the northern part is the place to do it.

Long Neck Tribe (Google Image)

 


After that we head to Phuket to take in some beach action. The guys aren't as stoked about the beach as I am but I refuse to go to Thailand and not see at least SOME sun. They're more than welcome to go do their own thing while I frolic in the water. I have full intentions of attempting to surf ... and probably doing some snorkelling. Will probably look here for more ideas on what to do in Phuket

Koh Phi Phi (Google Image)

From here we're going to hit up Krabi province and it's islands (Ko Phi Phi for example), the backdrop for the movie The Beach.

After some beach time, which I'm sure will also include lots of party time, we're heading back up to Bangkok for the last few days before returning home. I've already made some Twitter friends that we are going to meet up with to get a photo tour. Since it's our last stop before heading back, I'm really looking forward to some night markets and maybe the Ampawa Floating Market, if we have time.

There are so many things I'm looking forward to doing on this trip - eating being a huge part of it. I love Thai food. Well, lets be frank, I love food. I'll try just about anything once... and if this includes some of the stranger things like roasted tarantulas or crickets, I'll give it a go. Rice and rice noodles, I live for those things. I think I'm going to be the only person who comes back from Thailand having put on weight.

 

 

 

image courtesy of wikipedia

Overall, I can't wait. It will be a fantastic trip and I'm sure I'll have a million awesome photos to share when I get back so that I'm not forced to steal images off the internet to fill my blog with :)