Beaches and Bungalows
Ok, I'll start with the top left. This is Mary as we walked back to our room one evening on Ko Samet, an island in the north of the Gulf of Thailand. It was paradise and a great way to spend our first week. The guidebook said the sand was "squeeky clean" and we didn't realize they meant it literally. It squeeked as we walked on it, we got a kick out of that! The first few days we had Thai massages on the beach and then I took a scuba diving class. Utopia.
And on the top right is me with our new friends Tom and Toby (from England). We had met them over drinks the night before and mentioned that we found men in sarongs to be sexy. Who should walk down the beach wearing sarongs the next day?? Of course it was picture worthy! That night we all went swimming to see the phosphorescent lights in the sea. I'm not exactly sure how it works but if you stir up the water, it lights up, like there are pieces of glitter in it. I guess it's little fish and a chemical reaction but it was so much fun to see!
Most people have asked us what kind of places we stayed in. A majority of the time we stayed in bungalows, one room with a double bed - sometimes with a bathroom attached, otherwise it was just down the way. We usually paid $3-$5 a night so it wasn't a bad deal! On the bottom right is our little place on the island of Ko Pha-Nga, the cheapest room we rented. And we got what we paid for with that one. There was a missing floorboard and a missing lightbulb out front - a bad combination if you're in a hurry at night. Yep, I fell thru and hung off the balcony until Mary and a few others could rescue me. Thankfully I came away with only a small cut and a very large bruise. Then, the next night I fainted on a gravel street. Not sure why that happened but it might have been the overwhelming stink of my bug spray! I came away with lots of bad scrapes and with a fear that bad things came in threes... luckily that was the end of my painful streak!
On the bottom right is our bungalow in the rainforest at Khao Sok Nat'l Park. The park was beautiful, very lush and green. It's here that we went elephant trekking and then hiked thru the park on our own. People had warned us about leeches and we found that out soon enough. Ew. Not only that but we battled off all sorts of stinging insects, tried to get the cockroaches to leave our bungalow without having to touch them, learned to not put on clothes without shaking the biting ants out of them and spent some quality time with the rat that lived in our bathroom. Despite all of this, we loved the place! No really, we did!!
Food and Drink
We tried so many different kinds of food, both in Japan and Thailand. My favorite was the Thai dish Pad Thai, which is fried noodles, usually with egg and vegetables. However, we didn't get a picture of that! Instead, on the top left, here I am with khao laam, a specialty in the town of Nakhom Pathom (near Bangkok). What you see in the background are bamboo shoots and inside they wrap sticky rice with sweet red beans in banana leaf and then cook it. There isn't actually that much inside of the shoot, just as well because it's pretty filling.
And top right is me with some fruit. Rambutan is small and red with soft green spikes. Someone offered us a few at a bus station, otherwise we may not have tried them! You have to peel off the outside and there's a large pit in the middle. Delicious.
On to the drinks! At Naga, the guesthouse on Ko Samet, they had happy hour from 10-12 every night. They flip a coin and if you call it, you get the drink for free. Why don't they do that everywhere?? We got to know the bartenders and met quite a few people. The picture in the bottom left is taken further down the beach where we were having dinner. There is nothing better than having dinner and drinks with your feet buried in warm sand, I'm sure of it!
And on the right is Mary, Jen and I enjoying more coctails on Ko Samui. Since drinks were about $1 each we tried several new ones and that was fun! There was also a place on the beach that we went to a few times. They had straw mats layed out on the sand with small tables, triangle pillows and lanterns. That was also really cool since even in the evening the weather was warm!
Bangkok
Afriad that I don't have many pictures of Bangkok. It's quite a city, one that lives up to it's reputation. Most people told us to stay away as much as we could but we enjoyed our time there. We stayed on Khao San Road, well known as being a backpackers haven. It was full of guesthouses and had lots of shopping and cheap food stalls.
On the left is a close up of one of the roofs at Wat Pho (a wat is a temple). The detail at all the wats was amazing and usually done in gold with bright colors. It's a style that I enjoyed seeing for the first time in Thailand.
And on the right is myself, Mary and Jen at the Grand Palace. We never did get to go in and that was a shame. You have to be properly dressed (long skirts/pants, covered shoulders and shoes with backs) and when we finally went correctly dressed, it was closing early that day! But this is us with three roofs of the wat behind us. Looks like it would've been fantastic but I'll go next time I'm there!
I'm still waiting for a few more pictures to be developed but I've added some extra to another page. If you've enjoyed this so far, continue on! And here is where you can head to my Popularity site for just a few pictures of random people!
More of Thailand
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