I want my Bali!!!

48 hours of real travelin’.  40 minutes on the back of a truck.  We get the boat, see the fans and cushy mattresses and think it looks sweet.  We then find out we are sentenced down below, to sleeping on grass mats, sans fan, 4 foot overhead clearance.  Trying to sleep was a waste of time so I sat up on the bow half the night watching the stars, small rocky islands and bright lights of the squid fishing fleet.  We arrived at the docks of Surat Thani in the morning, and were gently-form fittingly packed into tuk-tuks which drove us thru town to a tourist office.  From there we were picked up by a minivan and driven a few hours to the Malaysian boarder.  We crossed the boarder, loaded onto a bus, and road the next day through Malaysia to Singapore (the bus was actually very nice, air conditioned, and we watched I Am Legend dubbed in Malaysian(It was better).  We arrived in Singapore as the bars closed, and fought for an expensive taxi to the airport.  Our 150 dollar flight somehow turned to 300 each, and another 12 hours of sleeping in the airport. We thought we were in sheitesville, BUT THEN WE DISCOVERED SINGAPORE AIRPORT!

• free computers and internet at every turn.
• two free 24 hour movie theaters
• free swimming pool (also 24 hour)
• TV lounges with tons of channels
• free coffee
• free arcades and on-line game rooms
• free, free, free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Airport empolyees actually greeted us and asked how they could improve the airport. The only thing I could think of was free beer and Mexican food.  The 12 hours melted away, and we caught our flight to Indonesia. 

We got into Bali late, haggled the taxi drivers for a bit less then an hour, and finally got a decent price for the 16 km trip to Sanur.  Getting in late is a gamble, it means either a buyers or renters market.  That night went to the renters, and we paid dearly for our mold crusted walls.  We found much happier confines the next day at Julia 2, and began the final lap of our travels.  Indonesia proved the perfect choice…

Again, we were tavilin’

D and B

Koh Tao

after an all night bus ride and an hour and a half on a boat, we finally made it to koh tao.  koh tao is an island about 70km off the eastern coast of thailand in the gulf.  we were turned on to koh tao over all the other islands after my good pal jason visited it last november and came back raving.  like i said in my previous post, we owe jason a huge ‘thank you’ for scouting out this location prior to going.  southern thailand is full of so many different islands on both the east and west coast so it’s easy to get bad information.  trust me when i say that koh tao could never be a let down (unless of course you’re looking to get drunk at the full moon party, fall down, and hurt yourself.  then you should stay far away and leave koh tao alone).  on our boat ride to the island drew and i saw a bunch of flying fish.  this was my first time seeing them and definitely wasn’t the last. 

like every other place we’ve visited, we spent no time getting right down to it, figuring out what’s good and where to go.  we knew we wanted to stay on the side of the island that jason suggested so we headed there and immediately found a dive resort that we thought suited us.  This was the first time too, that the cold shower only guesthouses were more of a benefit then not…  It was HOT… 

Up until this point i didn’t think there was a chance in hell that i’d go scuba diving with drew because i’m so scared of the ocean, however on the ride to koh tao something changed in me and i grew some guts. 

we spent the next four days, 8 to 9 hours a day getting our open water scuba diving certification from the Buddha View Dive Resort in Chalok Baan Kao Bay.  there were two other people in our class, brian and esmee.  brian is from england and esmee from ireland and they had been friends since birth so naturally they acted more like brother and sister than anything.  our dive master was a guy named Jesper (pronounced Yespa) from Denmark.  he had bright red hair, blue eyes, and a very dry, clever sense of humor.  we loved him!  our first day centered around the classroom and the swimming pool, while our 2nd, 3rd, and 4th days were in the ocean.  oh! i forgot to mention, drew was certified years ago in Belize but apparently his training was pretty crappy and he didn’t feel he knew what he should, so he did it again.  he also had a different certification, while the one we got in koh tao is a PADI certification which is now the most widely recognized and some say best!  scuba diving is so much more complicated than i ever would’ve imagined.  it’s not hard, there’s just a lot to it.  with a little bit of practice though and some repitition you get it pretty quick. 

esmee and brian have a good friend named mick (a true old salty brit) that’s living in koh tao becoming a dive master.  he buddied up on our course to get some more dives under his belt and watch jesper as an instructor.  mick is renting out this crazy mountain bungalow for the duration of his stay.  when i say ‘renting out a bungalow’ i mean, he is renting the whole place and managing it with his ladyfriend.  the view is absolutely spectactular from there! the place looks like a giant treefort that lover looks mountains and ocean.  doesn’t get much better than that! 

after we were officially open water divers we spent the rest of our time cruising the island on our motorbike.  every evening we set up shop at this bar that sits right on the beach.  it’s got a deck with bean bags and low tables, a bar, and a killer buffet so we’d go and relax there.  the bar is actually associated with buddha view so we managed to see a lot of familiar faces there, which is always comforting as well.  just thinking about that buffet, i really miss the potatoes smothered in cheese and sour creme they had. oh man…

one of our last days there we managed to rent some snorkel gear and go to shark bay.  a few days before we went to this bar that overlooks shark bay and from the bar you can sit there and actually see the sharks swimming around.  they don’t come in close to shore but the whole bay is so shallow they’re still in only knee deep water.  this freaked me out.  again though, i wanted to be brave and try snorkeling there.  we got into the water, swam out a bit, and i immediately freaked out.  i stood up and told drew i couldn’t do it and started walking back to shore practically in tears.  had i not gone to that bar to actually see the sharks, i think i would’ve gone in but once i knew they were there and in really shallow waters, i spazzed.  drew did the snorkel by himself (sorry!) and i laid on shore waiting for him.  he came back and said that he was scared too but held it in because he knew i was far worse than him.  he was swimming around and hadn’t seen anything when a shark came bolting past (4 or 5 feet) him from behind!!  i know had i been in the water my heart would’ve stopped at that very moment.  he kept going though and eventually had five reef sharks swimming around with him!  the sharks are black fin reef sharks that wouldn’t harm anyone but those beedy eyes and sleek bodies are enough to keep me out of those waters.

after 10 luxurious days on koh tao we decided it was time to move on and head south to bali.  it was a bit of a struggle getting us to figure out how we were going to get there because at this point we’d started to give up a little and slow down.  we were fighting ourselves to get all the logistics squared away because our brains were so tired of doing the math.  i gotta say though, we had faith that bali would be far worth the energy…

Get out of Bangkok as fast as you can…

This is what we heard from almost every traveller we’d met (except for two german girls we met in vietnam who said they loved bangkok!).  we fully expected to arrive there, stay one night, and move on.  our bus from vientiane, laos arrived in bangkok at 5 a.m., which easily could’ve been mistaken for 11 p.m. because of how full the streets and cafes were with people still awake from the previous night.  i gotta say, i haven’t ever seen that much activity in NYC at that time of day.  i’d give bangkok the title ‘the city that never sleeps’ in a heart beat. 

we decided to stay in a neighborhood just east of famous koh san road.  it seems as if everyone thought it was a good idea to stay there because one guesthouse after the other was sold out.  sold out. ugh.  at 5 a.m. the last thing you want to hear is ’sold out’.  we finally found a guesthouse for way too much money but with a/c and took it.  the great thing about it though was that we checked in around 5:30 a.m. on saturday morning and didn’t have to check out until noon on sunday making it seem as if we got two nights instead of just one.  we slept until noon on saturday and woke up to the hottest place we’d been yet.  we spent the day feeling alittle off kilter from the crazy night bus ride, eating traditional thai food, and getting a feel for the city and our neighborhood.  since it was pretty unanimous that bangkok sucked we didn’t do any previous investigating as far as what to see and do there so we felt as if we were starting from scratch.  the one thing we did know about bangkok though was that if you see a hot woman, the chances are she’s a man.  we were intrigued by this and knew we wanted to explore the part of town that’s full of cheap street vendors and the infamous ’naughty shows’. 

the street vendors had nothing but junk and the ’shows’ were less than savory.  just walking around you could peek into the venues where girls were dressed in bikinis standing on a stage where they looked like zombies.  none of the girls we saw employed to perform did anything but stand there and their tricks were anything but that.  if anything it was really sad because we didn’t see a single girl that didn’t have stretch marks draped across her belly from having babies.  we wouldn’t suggest anyone even bothers with this part of bangkok.

we must say though, the rest of bangkok was absolutely stunning.  all of the rumors we’d heard about tuk tuk drivers being pushy, the streets being dirty, and the city being a quick stop over were so wrong.  drew made friends with a tuk tuk driver named Jai, who quickly became our tour guide for the town.  one night he took us on a night ride through the city and even got us snuck into one of the temples through the back door after paying off the security guards. it was incredible! we had the whole place to ourselves and they let us roam and take as many photos as we wanted!  the temples in bangkok were second only to angkor wat.  the bright yellows and golds and the immense size of the temples amidst the vast city was so impressive!  our secret night time tour was one of the best things we could’ve hoped for!  on our way back Jai bought drew a beer and gave me some thai balm for bug bites; a very sweet gesture!  the following day we went on another half day tour with him where he showed us even more of the city.  he could’ve kept going but at this point in our trip we weren’t as enthusiastic about temples as we might’ve been two months ago.  however, it was a lovely day and we owe it all to our great guide!

we tried to see some muay thai boxing and were all pumped to hang with the locals and watch it all go down.  we got to the box office only to find ticket prices a lot more expensive than we ever would’ve thought.  it was $30 for the very back and $60 for ring side.  now, i don’t know if it’s always this pricey because we heard it was a big fight that night.  if i were to go back to bangkok on a smaller trip i’d surely try to hit up some muay thai boxing again.  the thing is, we knew from bangkok we were going south to the islands to scuba dive which is another expensive venture and unfortunately had to pick and choose.  that’s the deal though on a three month excursion!

 

we owe jason a big ‘thanks’ for leading us south to koh tao!

Symphony of Puke!

we thought our bus ride from vang vieng to luang prabang would be a cinch. it was a short 4 to 5 hour ride up through the mountains that we hadn’t heard any bad things about, besides if we could do a 24 hour bus ride through Vietnam we could get through anything. this bus ride turned out to be the most treacherous thing i’ve had to endure on this long journey. the first hour or so was fine but after that i started feeling nauseous. i thought i was a huge baby for feeling so sick but the turns in the road were sharp and so close together my stomach just wasn’t taking it. all of a sudden, as i’m feeling like i’m going to vomit, i hear a girl (poor lil 14 year old french girl) a few rows ahead of us throw up. awesome. it was then i realized the whole bus was feeling the same way i was. so, for the next few hours all we heard was the crinkling of barf bags and the sound of puke. thankfully i had a stuffy nose so i couldn’t smell it but drew certainly could. by the time we reached luang prabang the bus was empty of barf bags and everyone was hunched over and green. i don’t know how but drew with his iron stomach managed to escape the sickness and even though i felt sick i never actually did vomit. i would never suggest that ride to anyone. ever. ever.

we got to luang prabang though and found it to be a nice little town with one main street packed with shops, cafes, and restaurants. it was more upscale than vang vieng which made it a bit pricier but nice nonetheless. we spent no time finding out about tours and things to do in town. everyone had told us we must go see the waterfall right outside of town so we booked that trip for the very next day.

years ago drew had taken me to my very first waterfall, snoqualmie falls, outside seattle, and i loved it! this time around was even better because we got to climb to the top and then go swimming on one of the three tiers. the water was so clean, clear, and warm! no one had been swimming when we got to the second tier and we were a little unsure of if we could or not but we couldn’t resist. there was a group of Japanese tourists right behind us and they loved it so we all jumped in together! there were many hi-fives going around that day!

on our trip we met a guy named ben from London and a girl named stacy from canada. ben was a really cool guy who actually worked in British television and stacy had been living in phnom penh for the last year working on the Truth and Reconciliation trials (the trials for the victims of the Khmer rouge. it’s the first time they’ve EVER been given a voice and are able to tell their stories. pretty damn impressive). we wound up going out to dinner with them later that night! in between the waterfall and dinner though drew and i climbed to the top of the hill in the center of luang prabang. at the top was a Buddhist temple with neat ‘days of the week’ buddha’s and a great lookout. we hit it right at sunset, which was perfect. in the morning you can go up there for sunrise and right before see the monk procession down the street. we tried to wake up for that but opted for sunset instead.

anyway, dinner was rad! we got the laos bbq which was a mixture between chinese hot pot and korean bbq. in the center of our table was a grill and on top of the grill they put this huge pot that has a bump in the middle. what happens is, on this bump you place your meat and tofu and all of the juices from that drips down into the mote surrounding the edge of the pot. this is where you put water and veggies. the heat brings the water to a boil, the juices from the meat drip down, and the veggies cook down in the boiling water to create this magnificent soup! i think out of all the bbqs and hot pots we tried, this was by far the tastiest!

since the beginning of the trip all i wanted to do was ride an elephant. our plan was to head into northern Thailand from luang prabang via the Mekong river, see some temples, and it would be there that i would get to ride some elephants. thankfully after talking to stacy she persuaded me into riding elephants in laos instead of thailand. apparently it’s much more touristy in thailand and she said she saw a few places there that didn’t treat the animals very nice. so, we opted to stay in luang prabang an extra day and book an elephant trek. it had to be the perfect one though where we could bathe the elephants as well though. after a lot of looking around we finally found one! it was the best!!!!! there was one too many people on our trek so they asked drew to ride actually on the elephant while the rest of us sat in wooden benches. i wanted so badly to ride on the neck of the elephant but got too scared when the time came so drew did it instead. the trek lasted about an hour through the jungle and we ended at the edge of a river. it was this river where we got to climb on the backs of the elephant, get in the water with them, and scrub ‘em down! i LOVED it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! the elephants were so fun splashing around with us! my guy even took a dump in the water and we watched it float past us. y’all know how big elephant poop is!!! it was the best!

the night market in luang prabang was pretty epic as well. they mostly had hand sewn pillow cases and duvet covers. they were beautiful though and in all different colors and designs. they also had some really neat artwork. it was definitely the best night market we went to on this trip!

since we did my elephant trek in laos we didn’t really find too many reasons to head into northern thailand. we were also really anxious to get to bangkok and even further down to the beach. by this point we were a little tired of mountains and temples and were ready to hit the sand. so, we opted to take the bus back down south. one might think i was crazy for wanting to take the puke bus back but thankfully my doctor gave me some sleeping pills for those long, hard journeys. it was a 9 hour ride back down to Vientiane where we would catch the bus to bangkok but we decided to break it up with one more night in vang vieng on the way down. it was nice having one more day there in that town. we really became attached to it over the few days we’d spent there.

welcome to the most bombed country on earth…

what we had heard about Laos up until this point was that it was an absolute paradise. we were told the people were much nicer, everyone was friendly, the sun was always shining, and we were less inclined to get ripped off. so when we got to vientiane, laos we had really, really high hopes! we flew to vientiane from siem reap, cambodia and immediately headed into town to look for a tourist agency so we could catch a bus to vang vieng, laos. apparently vientiane isn’t the most fun spot to hang and with less than three months and a budget you can’t really screw around. we found a travel agency, which claims to be the only one around which we later found out was a huge lie, and they said they had a mini van going to vang vieng in 2 hours so we say ‘great!’ pay them and wait. 2 hours pass and a taxi then awaits for us at the tourist agency to take us to the bus station. we head to the bus station only to find the crappiest bus jam packed with boxes and bags of rice and all kinds of other junk and no air conditioning which was promised. we were ripped off. our options then were to go back to the tourist agency and demand our money back, miss the bus, and pay lots of money to spend the night in vientaine (not only is it no fun, it’s also expensive) OR take the bus since everyone said it was the ‘last’ bus of the day. after drew calms me down we get on the bus and set out for vang vieng. oh! there was a guy on our bus with an automatic weapon which we later found out was for our protection. 5+ years ago there used to be rebels in the hills between vientiane, vang vieng, and even more north luang prabang and they would attack buses and rob them. the laos police started putting an armed guy on all buses and set up shop in the woods surrounding the streets. there hasn’t been any problems in the last five years but they keep the guys on the buses for safety.

we arrived late at night so we did what lonely planet said and walked to the river to find a guesthouse. the only good thing about arriving in a town late at night is you can argue the price down quite abit because the chances of them selling the room at all is very slim. we wound up getting a great corner room with multiple fans and tons of windows for pretty darn cheap. when we woke up in morning we opened our door to beautiful karst mountains, lush green trees, and a fantastic river that we couldnt’ see in the dark. this place is certainly somethin’ else!

drew and i like to pick our ’spots’. by this i mean we cruise around, try out a bunch of local bars, and then pick which one suits us best to return to night after night. we stumbled upon a bar called ‘alake bar’ as soon as we got to vang vieng, where we met two boys who became our buds. we forgot the one boy’s name almost immediately (oops) he is 15 years old, and the other, who we spoke with more, was a 19 year old named Psone (pronounced pawn but he didn’t mind being called phone and actually kinda liked it!). anyway, it was at this bar that drew and i sat every evening to watch the sunset over the mountains while laying in hammocks drinking special, yummy cocktails. psone taught me how to speak in his language while i taught him mine. while we were there the whole country of laos was celebrating ‘women’s day’ which is a big to-do there. the whole day consists of the men doing what the women normally do (cook, clean, etc.) that night the 15 year old boy approached me and asked if drew and i would come to dinner. the two owners of the bar, who we never formally met and spoke no english, had made a traditional laos dinner and they wanted us to join them. now, most people know i’m a vegetarian but there were a few dishes i couldn’t pass up because 1) when in rome… and 2) i felt like i would be rude if i didn’t and i wasn’t sure they would understand so i ate some river snails that they had plucked right outta the river and some incredibly spicy fish, you guessed it, right from the river as well. drew seemed to enjoy it a little more than i did but i can’t say it was all that bad…

the main attraction in vang vieng is tubing down the river. kids line up down the street all day waiting to get their tube, dry bag, and hop in the tuk tuk to take them 4km north so they can tube back. drew and i were totally clueless as to what was in store for us. we get dropped off and start tubing only to find it all looks like one big mtv beach party. every few meters there were bars blaring jay-z, serving all kinds of drinks and selling chips, and 9 times outta 10 the bar had a crazy huge zip line you could climb up to, swing down, and jump into the river… it was pretty awesome! we kinda appreciated the fact that most of these things were ‘do at your own risk’. if you’re an idiot, you pay a consequence, if not you have a wonderful time tubing and enjoying yourself like drew and i did. by the time we reached the last bar it was something like 2 hours later and we were bored of tubing so we climbed outta the river and walked down the road until a tuk tuk doing rounds found us and brought us back. i gotta say, i was too scared to climb up to the zip line but fearless drew did it and had a great time!

on our third day in vang vieng we rented mountains bikes and road 7km to a cave and crystal clear lagoon where we went swimming. the bike ride was rough on me because i thought my bike kinda sucked and i had never done mountain biking before so i wasn’t really used to all the rocks and such but the lagoon was sooooo relaxing and nice. that was my first time seeing such clear blue water in nature. there were fun, much smaller, rope swings that we played on and we saw fish all around us. after the 7 km ride in the heat, to jump into the water was so incredibly refreshing.

vang vieng is the first time we really felt relaxed on this trip. all of the places we visited up until laos were full of temples and museums that we wanted to see but now we were able to swim, play cards, lay on hammocks, and take it all in. fortunately for us, most of the people our age who come to vang vieng spend their time on the main drag watching back to back to back episodes of ‘Friends’. i say ‘fortunately for us’ because it meant the bar on the river was empty and anyone who came down to join us was someone we knew we’d wanna talk to. what an amazing place!

Check out our pics of Laos!!