Got a couple hours of sleep on my favorite bench in the Saigon airport before it was time to check in. Luckily b/c of my job at sapidyne where I got to fly all the time for work, I am a 1k star gold member on united and the star alliance, which means you get to hang out and enjoy the 1st class business lounges while you wait for flights. These always include good free food and unlimited free beer, cocktails, and spirits. So I made sure to indulge at the star alliance lounge in saigon.
From Saigon I had a short 2.5 hour flight to Hong Kong where I had a decent layover. I first checked out the united red carpet club there and stocked up on some american food and beer before heading out to the Thai airways (smooth as silk) royal orchid lounge. Thai is a member of star alliance and I know that the thais have a tendancy to spoil people. And I was right. The other lounges are all fancy and luxurious, but this was beyond that. Had some good thai food (and some cereal!) the got a massage from the massage chair, did a bit of a work out on the elliptical machine, and then took a nice hot shower before relaxing in a comfy chair and doing some internetting with a thai cocktail.
My next flight was from Hong Kong to San Fran and took 11 hours. I sat next to a middle aged business man from san diego who was just blown away by the fact I had been in se asia for a year. He said he wished he had done that and just kept exclaiming how amazing it was. He suggested I do at least one more before going to the real world (my sentiments exactly) though also told me an all to true joke: What do you call a person with a bachelor's degree in biology? Unemployed. Though apparently I'm easy to pick out as a biologist. For those of you who have been abroad, you undoubtedly remember the customs form that you have to fill out. With all the questions that you usually answer no to: are carrying any disease agents, any fruits or vegetables, currency greater than US 10,000, any drugs, etc. Well there are the two questions that ask if you have been on a farm or in close contact with livestock. B/c there is no way of knowing, I think most people just answer no to those so they can speed through customs, not really understanding that all those questions are set up to protect us in the US and not just to cause hassle in the airport. Well knowing the biological consequences of bringing diseases into our country (wiping out crops or animals) or ecological damages (those in boulder county are all too aware of the havoc that new zealand mud snails are doing on the creeks in the area), I checked yes on those. So it did mean I had to go to some special line where they disinfected my shoes (gave them a nice shine) and anything else I had that may have touched dirt or mud. They were all very nice and appreciated me being honest and checking those. They asked if was a biologic science major b/c they said it is usually only those that voluntarily check yes on those forms.
In San Fran I settled into the red carpet club before my 3ish hour long flight to Denver. I slept pretty hard so I don't really know how long it was, but I was woken up with a jolt when the pilot came on the intercom as we were preparing to land and said that the current temperature at DIA was a balmy -7F.
I was easy to pick out by my mom b/c I was the only one in the area code wearing shorts and also had an asian cone hat on. Had a happy greeting with my mom and then rolled outside to the parking lot full of blowing snow, subarus, and below zero temps. I guess the low that day at been to -16F. The low in Saigon had been 85F. The high in Denver -2F, the High in Saigon 97F with 99% humidity.
On the way through Estes Park, mom treated me to Taco Bell. Mmmm! It was good to be back home, if not cold! Gave the papa bear a big hug and then went downstairs after some more food to watch jay leno and some sportscenter.
Recouperated and tried to stay warm for a couple days. Got more into the swing of things today and went out with mom to cut ourselves a Christmas tree. Drove out into a snowy road into the national forest and then traped through the snow before we finally found a nice one we liked. Tonight after some pizza (very difficult to eat with chopstix let me tell ya) we sat down to watch the snow village and listen to a concert a la Reg. Tomorrow heading down to Denver for a big Christmas concert at the buell theatre and then a fancy dinner in LoDo.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Vietnamese Sahara
12/7 Took a late flight from Hanoi to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City)where I arrived around 12:30. Slept at the airport and then took a bus in the morning to Mui Ne for a day trip. I met a really nice security guard at the bus station who went around showing me all his favorite things to eat for breakfast and helping me find my bus. When he found out I was American he was all excited saying how great a country the USA is. He asked me, "did you know we were once enemies? Not anymore now. I talk to many americans!" This was actually the first vietnamese that had brought up the American war (as it's known everywhere outside of n. america) without me asking something about it And as I had come to find, still no one with hard feelings. The interesting thing about vietnam is that although we may have lost the war, it appears as though we won overall. Everywhere you look are American products, chains, movies, tv, freedoms, and ideas. Vietnam appears to be full steam capitalist with only communism as a name. Everyone is out trying to make a buck, or a dong...or as many millions of dongs as they can (1 USD= 20,000 dong). Hung, my motorbike guide was saving up to start his own business, something I'm pretty sure you wouldn't find in a communist society.
The book had said that the trip from Saigon to Mui Ne was supposed to take 2.5 hours, but it took 5! But I still had plenty of time b/c check in wasn't until 4am the next morning. So I rented a motorbike (a sweet fully manual old bmw), and took off to explore the area which is known for its fish sauce plant and sand dunes. My first stop was a fishing village where I scratched my head at the completely circular boats that they had. Seemed like not the best boat design to decrease water drag. But I guess it's been working for thousands of years.
Rode on to the red sand dunes, which you got it, are some dunes made of red sand. Climbed up to the top and then went back to the bike to ride the 30k's to the white sand dunes. The drive along the coast was very scenic, though blustery with sand blowing around. The desolate, hot, and dusty landscape made me think of how I imagined the dust bowl to be, especially after having passed a huge cemetary just placed in the middle of nowhere amongst plants that looked like sage. But then I saw the towering white sand dunes in the distance, glowing out of the stark landscape with a shimmering lake below them. These dunes were much larger and more spectacular. It was a bit of a rough and 4wd road to get to them. I spent a couple hours hiking around them and up to the tallest one. Once back at my bike, 3 of the boys who work there renting sleds to slide down the dunes with asked if I could give them a ride back to their village. Why not? I put one up against the handlebars up front and two behind me (plus I still had my pack on). It was just like the typical asian soccer mom van that you see all around: a mom driving (always talking on the phone, with a baby on the front and 2 kids on the back, and perhaps a live chicken strapped on for dinner. I put on my asian face mask (to keep out the sand and dust) and took off. A little ways down the road some tourists had crashed on the wild road. People were there helping them, so I continued past them. All the bystanders gave me quite the quizzical look. A white guy, with four vietnamese children crammed on, wearing a face mask, and driving an old school bike (most of the tourists rent the typical scooter or semi automatic motorbike). It was like I was asian, and after 364 days, I sure as heck should have looked and acted like one.
On the way back I stopped at the red sand dunes to watch the sunset where I met Safrie a nice indonesian who had gone to the savannah college of art and design, a big CofI swimming rival.
Back at Mui Ne at 6pm, I found out that the last bus to Saigon had left at 5pm. Well there was one that left at 2am, but it arrived at 6am to saigon, and I needed to be at the airport by 4am for check in. Everyone said that there were no more busses. But this is Asia, and I certainly didn't believe this. I told them that there must be busses running along the major highway that starts in hanoi, goes through Da Nang and Nha Trang. They said probably so. So I took a motorbike out to the highway and also took with me a sing with Saigon written on it in case I had to hitch hike b/c I am sure there would be plenty of traffic on the highway. After a few minutes, the first public bus came by. It was 8pm, which meant I had 7 hours plus 1 hour allowed for a taxi to the airport to get to saigon. Considering the direct bus had taken 7 hours but had lots of traffic, I would make it. But I got on the bus and it was terribly slow. Every asian bus I have been in has a driver that drives like crazy. But not this one. featherfoot. Add that to stopping for bathroom breaks, a meal, and picking up and dropping off people, and I was getting quite worried that I would make it. Believe me, I was timing how fast we were doing 25km segments (it was exactly 200km (124miles) from mue ni to saigon. It was starting to look like it would be very close. I didn't want to risk it, so at one of the food breaks, I stood by the highway and flagged down a fast moving minivan. It had room for me and was glad to take some dong to take me, actually neary the airport. Ended up getting dropped off around midnight at some random point in saigon and with plenty of time. So I sat down for my last meal in South East Asia!! Had two bowls of Pho and 2 bottles of saigon brew.
The book had said that the trip from Saigon to Mui Ne was supposed to take 2.5 hours, but it took 5! But I still had plenty of time b/c check in wasn't until 4am the next morning. So I rented a motorbike (a sweet fully manual old bmw), and took off to explore the area which is known for its fish sauce plant and sand dunes. My first stop was a fishing village where I scratched my head at the completely circular boats that they had. Seemed like not the best boat design to decrease water drag. But I guess it's been working for thousands of years.
Rode on to the red sand dunes, which you got it, are some dunes made of red sand. Climbed up to the top and then went back to the bike to ride the 30k's to the white sand dunes. The drive along the coast was very scenic, though blustery with sand blowing around. The desolate, hot, and dusty landscape made me think of how I imagined the dust bowl to be, especially after having passed a huge cemetary just placed in the middle of nowhere amongst plants that looked like sage. But then I saw the towering white sand dunes in the distance, glowing out of the stark landscape with a shimmering lake below them. These dunes were much larger and more spectacular. It was a bit of a rough and 4wd road to get to them. I spent a couple hours hiking around them and up to the tallest one. Once back at my bike, 3 of the boys who work there renting sleds to slide down the dunes with asked if I could give them a ride back to their village. Why not? I put one up against the handlebars up front and two behind me (plus I still had my pack on). It was just like the typical asian soccer mom van that you see all around: a mom driving (always talking on the phone, with a baby on the front and 2 kids on the back, and perhaps a live chicken strapped on for dinner. I put on my asian face mask (to keep out the sand and dust) and took off. A little ways down the road some tourists had crashed on the wild road. People were there helping them, so I continued past them. All the bystanders gave me quite the quizzical look. A white guy, with four vietnamese children crammed on, wearing a face mask, and driving an old school bike (most of the tourists rent the typical scooter or semi automatic motorbike). It was like I was asian, and after 364 days, I sure as heck should have looked and acted like one.
On the way back I stopped at the red sand dunes to watch the sunset where I met Safrie a nice indonesian who had gone to the savannah college of art and design, a big CofI swimming rival.
Back at Mui Ne at 6pm, I found out that the last bus to Saigon had left at 5pm. Well there was one that left at 2am, but it arrived at 6am to saigon, and I needed to be at the airport by 4am for check in. Everyone said that there were no more busses. But this is Asia, and I certainly didn't believe this. I told them that there must be busses running along the major highway that starts in hanoi, goes through Da Nang and Nha Trang. They said probably so. So I took a motorbike out to the highway and also took with me a sing with Saigon written on it in case I had to hitch hike b/c I am sure there would be plenty of traffic on the highway. After a few minutes, the first public bus came by. It was 8pm, which meant I had 7 hours plus 1 hour allowed for a taxi to the airport to get to saigon. Considering the direct bus had taken 7 hours but had lots of traffic, I would make it. But I got on the bus and it was terribly slow. Every asian bus I have been in has a driver that drives like crazy. But not this one. featherfoot. Add that to stopping for bathroom breaks, a meal, and picking up and dropping off people, and I was getting quite worried that I would make it. Believe me, I was timing how fast we were doing 25km segments (it was exactly 200km (124miles) from mue ni to saigon. It was starting to look like it would be very close. I didn't want to risk it, so at one of the food breaks, I stood by the highway and flagged down a fast moving minivan. It had room for me and was glad to take some dong to take me, actually neary the airport. Ended up getting dropped off around midnight at some random point in saigon and with plenty of time. So I sat down for my last meal in South East Asia!! Had two bowls of Pho and 2 bottles of saigon brew.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Motorbike touring through northern Nam to China
12/2 After my walk around hanoi in the morning, I met my motorbike guide, Hung, and the owner of mototours asia. We sat down for some green tea before taking off. This was to be a for real motorbike tour. Not one of those wimpy ones on a scooter or a semi-automatic bike. No, this one was on an old soviet minske bike. Fully manual, no gauges like odometer, fuel, etc. We got decked out in motorbike pants and a motorbike jacket, loaded up saddle bags and headed off. It took us an hour to get out of hanoi, and it was one of the most exciting and nervewracking thing I have done. You remember in a previous blog me describing how crazy the traffic was. Well I went into it headon. Good thing Lucas had taught, way back in the Philippines when he burned his leg, me how to drive a manual or I could have been in trouble. Of course the good news is that the other drivers are so skilled it didn't matter if I didn't know the rules (or the unrules) of the road. But before long I was weaving in and out with no problem.
The first day was mainly just driving on flat roads through the red river valley. We passed lots of countryside and agriculture and women working in the field sporting the infamous conical vietnamese hat. Just like the vietnam that you always think of. For lunch we had dog bbq. Yep, that's right, DOG bbq! I asked the name of the dog, and it was little Fluffy. Just kidding! They actually have farms for dogs, just like we have for chickens or cows or pigs. Crazy as it was, it was one of the best meat dishes I had eaten in Asia. Truth is, in all liklihood,I had eaten dog before in asia b/c it's a common food and lots of times when ordering things from pots set out by street vendors, you just point and then eat it. You try and figure out what it is, but usually they don't know english, and our english sounds for farm animals (moo, quack, oink, baa-a, ruff) aren't the same in their language. So you just eat it. Probably have eaten horse, snake, lizards, and other such things as well.
This motorbike trip was actually one of the best tours I had done in Asia. And one of the great things was the food. For lunch Hung always took me out to a local joint and ordered a plethora of things. Instead of the attempt at "western" asian food (what I mean by this is asian food that guides always assume is the only thing we can eat like fried rice or noodles and beef or the like), he ordered very vietnamese food, and not just the food they had out for display, but ones only a vietnamese would know how to order. Also had some other unusual things like chicken feet, fish poppers, duck embryos. Also at every lunch we had other people in the restaurant come up and offer to buy me beers and rice wine. We'd usually accept a couple, but then as we had to drive, we'd decline the rest. The locals were always so interested in me and they'd come up to talk (translating through hung with his excellent english)...and just so friendly. I of course had worried a bit about hard feelings towards me as an american visiting a country they we fought, bombed the heck out of, and is still suffering the effects of agent orange. But this was pointless worry. They loved americans and were so happy to meet me, shake my hands, share some rice wine with. SOme of the homestay people had maps and wanted me to show them all the nice places of america. (my version of the nice places of american probably differs just somewhat from most: Estes Park, Stanley Idaho, Jackson hole and the geysers, the grand canyon, the big trees of california, moab, aspen, etc). You could just see in their friendly eyes their true interest and enjoyment with talking to me. And always offering me rice wine, beer, and green tea (which is their social after meal drink that is drunk at a different table than where the meal is. It's also a welcome drink at homes and a drink to share when you meet new people). And Hung was really great b/c he would do a great job of translating and when we'd meet teachers or other educated people, he wouldn't let them speak in vietnamese for basic english conversation. On this trip I really felt like I got to know a lot of the people. But even on my little bit of independent travel I did get to do while in vietnam, I found the locals so nice. Always willing to help me out or just go out of their way to try and offer me the better spot (for my long legs) on the bus, or get me to the right bus, etc.
Each night we stayed at the home of a hill tribe minority group. The ethnicity of vietnamese makes up 90% of the population of vietnam. The rest of the 10% is made up of westerners and the minority tribes in the north such as the tay, white tay, black tay, and hmong. They each have very distinct dress, languages, and houses. The homestays were great. They would cook an amazing meal and we'd have an unlimited amount of rice wine. As is tradition, you first get out the rice wine, where you take little shots and saying jesuquay before taking it. In the Tay minority they'd also shake hands after each shot and say howmaydo (thankyou in Tay). You'd take several shots of the rice wine before it was time to start eating and then continue while eating and then after eating until it was time for the green tea. With the first family they brought out a 1.5L old coke bottle of rice wine. I was really feeling it when we finally finished it, and I was quite relieved, but then, the father went back and brought out a whole other bottle! At first I thought the rice wine stuff was only being done for me as the tourist, but he said they always do it, and it's true that I would notice everyone in the restaurants with their bottle of rice wine. One of the really great things about this trip and the homestays was that the family would eat dinner with us and then attempt to talk to us via hung the interpreter. And I was actually staying right in their house, so with them all the time. I have done quite a lot of homestays on this trip and with most of them you stay in some specially built shack for tourists or on their deck. Rarely inside the actual home. And also usually the family doesn't eat with you, and neither does the guide b/c they instead eat their everyday local food and give the tourists that western asian food I was talking about. So I really felt like I got attached to the family and got to know them.
The first night we stayed in a little village called Ton Tra with a white tay minority family who were farmers. They lived in stilted houses that could be open to the air in the summer or closed up in the winter (which it was now) for warmth. That night the vietnam soccer team was playing thailand in their first pool game of the SEA games. The South East Asian equivalent of the olypmics. They're the two best teams in SEA, so it was a tough match with plenty of rice wine that ended in a 1-1 draw. We woudl also along the trip watch the next 3 games as the vietnamese were really into their soccer. Amazingly Conrad and Whitney who were flying out of Vientiane, Laos where the SEA games were being held attended the Vietnam/Thai game and I'm assuming were rooting for vietnam as well since in their pictuers they were wearing red shirts with big yellow stars.
On day 2 we headed out on a small dirt single track to check out a lake. We then continued further north through more rural areas and some hills. This was the start, but definitely not the end of endless children running out to wave and shout hello. They loved to come bounding out to shout hello. But even all the women endlessly walking or pushing bicycles on the road carrying loads of agricultural stuff would smile and wave. And all the highschoolers on bicycles going back and forth from class (it always seemed like they were going back and forth from class) would come say a bold hello and then run back away shy and giggling to their friends. And of course the men sitting drinking beer or just hanging about would wave and smile. You'd hear shouts from high up on the hills or high up on buildings as you'd go by. And anyone passing you on a motorbike would slow down to wave and smile. I just loved all that. I don't think they get many westerners in the area b/c it's far of the tourist track. In the whole 6 days on the trip I didn't see a single westerner. Mix all the friendly locals with the great scenery and the unique little agricultural fields and villages and it was just great riding. That night we stayed in a Hmong minority house on the shores of Ba Be lake. Of course had a great meal and plenty of rice wine.
On day 3 we did a couple hour boat ride on Ba Be lake in Ba Be national park checking out the mountain and jungle scenery and watching monkeys along the lake shore. Today was a day of riding over big mountain passes with amazing scenery in order to get to the town of Cao Bang. From Cao Bang it was a short ride over another pass and into a magical land of towering limestone karsts and rice paddies and little villages. Of course this unique landscape came with so many smiling and waving people. It was like travelling back in time to days gone by. There was absolutely not machines save for a few passing motorbikes on the road. Water buffalo were used to plow the field, all the harvested crops (along with anything else imaginable) was carted off on bicycles or on shoulder yokes carried by the women. All the fields were being handwatered by people carrying large buckets on shoulder yokes. Definitely no irrigation here. And no tractors to help harvest the various things. Just huge groups of people. The students coming in on their bicycle would soon join the group working out in the fields. Old women were in the little huts cooking on fires. It really looked like something out of the middle ages or 16th century china or something. I just really loved riding through here b/c it was so unique and the karst scenery so absolutely amazing. If you've heard of the famous guilin tourist destination in china, this is what that is like. Something else unique about this area was that being winter and farther north and up in elevation a bit, it was cold. So everyone was out in coats and wool hats and gloves. I hadn't seen that in Asia yet of course. I figure the cold (not that cold maybe 50's to 60's as the lows) helped me to begin my acclimitization towards the cold colorado winter I would be returning to. That night we stayed in Quang Uyen with a Nung An minority family that had the funniest and happiest grandma I had seen and a cute little daughter, who was 3 or 4, who was always so happy to share her fruit and water with me.
Day 4 was an amazing amazing day of scenery. Add the scenery to the sunny mild day, the cool little farming villages, all the happy, waving people, and the great food and homestay, and the day definitely made it into my top 10 days overall best days in asia. I can't even imagine how incredible it would have been had we been there during the wet season when the rice paddies shimmered green instead of being harvested and brown now.
We drove for several hours through the amazing karst scenery up little passes between farming valleys. The woman at the gas station accidentally didn't mix the oil with the gas, which is what needs to be done for minske bikes, so we had some engine issues, which was the only slight damper on the day. But after a while Hung with the help of other guys on the road was able to get them going again. We took back roads arriving all the way at the chinese border in the north. The border is a river, with a beautiful and very wide waterfall at one point. The falls are called Ban Gioc. Once there, we took a bamboo raft along the river to get right up to the spray of the falls. I had crossed borders on this trip about every way imaginable: boat, plane, train, automobile, walking, but I hadn't swum across yet. So I wanted to do this. But Hung told me that one of the signs written in vietnames said no crossing over to the border. Had Hung not been with me, I probably would have done it, b/c a. I couldn't read the sign, b. there weren't any police or anything around, just women selling wares and men poling bamboo rafts, and c. I could have dove deep and held my breath the whole way across so they wouldn't have seen me anyways. But I decided to not get hung in trouble so I didn't do it. But it was kind of funny b/c on our side were the vietnamese tourists (no westerners) and on the other side were chinese tourists. We could wave at each other, but not go across to the other side. In fact a chinese tourist through me a chinese apple from his boat to my boat. Delicious! I was able to get the boatman close enough to the chinese side that I was able to quickly jump onto a rock on that side and jump back, and can now say I've been in china. I would of course end up in Hong Kong later via airplane, so it didn't really matter. I don't know if you've ever noticed at chinese or vietnamese restaurants (or maybe it's only the ones i've been to) but the paintings and drawings of the steep mountains (limestone karsts) and waterfalls flowing onto rice paddies. Well, that's basically what this was. Wow! So beautiful. On the way back to Quang Uyen we took a different way and just as scenic. At one point we took a steep dirt road up to the top of a mountain (where they were currently erecting a monument to the unknown soldiers who had died in the american war) that had great views down to the river and across all the mountains.
Day 5 we started off early, but about an hour into it my bike broke down most likely due to residual problems with the unmixed fuel. I had to get a tow back to the town which meant that Hung drove his motorbike with one leg extended while he pushed me. After several hours, it had appeared they had fixed the bike, so we continued on. Up over a really scenic, sweet and rough dirt pass. At the very top my motorbike died. Luckily I was able to coast the next 12km to the town at the bottom (no different than mountain biking really.). Another couple hours later the bike was fixed (and this time for good). We had obviously made poor time that day, so we wouldn't be making it to the destination and homestay we were supposed to and would instead have to take a shortcut, or at least faster and easier way. Hung still wanted to get a bit closer to Hanoi, so we drove on into the night. Now with all the fixing of my bike going on, the headlight had lost power. So Hung bought me a flashlight and I just followed behind him, which was fine. An hour later we arrived in That Khe where we stayed at a guesthouse
Day 6 We continued on to Hanoi through Lang Son and more nice scenery before arriving in the crazed traffic of hanoi. Since we still had day light left, Hung showed me some sights in Hanoi like where John McCain's jet had crashed and he'd been captured, the wreckage of a B52 bomber shot down, and the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum. We later sat down for some sugar cane juice and to wait for his wife so that I could meet her. She was all excited to practice her english with me.
But wow! what a great tour and an amazing way to see the beauty and friendly people of north vietnam.
The first day was mainly just driving on flat roads through the red river valley. We passed lots of countryside and agriculture and women working in the field sporting the infamous conical vietnamese hat. Just like the vietnam that you always think of. For lunch we had dog bbq. Yep, that's right, DOG bbq! I asked the name of the dog, and it was little Fluffy. Just kidding! They actually have farms for dogs, just like we have for chickens or cows or pigs. Crazy as it was, it was one of the best meat dishes I had eaten in Asia. Truth is, in all liklihood,I had eaten dog before in asia b/c it's a common food and lots of times when ordering things from pots set out by street vendors, you just point and then eat it. You try and figure out what it is, but usually they don't know english, and our english sounds for farm animals (moo, quack, oink, baa-a, ruff) aren't the same in their language. So you just eat it. Probably have eaten horse, snake, lizards, and other such things as well.
This motorbike trip was actually one of the best tours I had done in Asia. And one of the great things was the food. For lunch Hung always took me out to a local joint and ordered a plethora of things. Instead of the attempt at "western" asian food (what I mean by this is asian food that guides always assume is the only thing we can eat like fried rice or noodles and beef or the like), he ordered very vietnamese food, and not just the food they had out for display, but ones only a vietnamese would know how to order. Also had some other unusual things like chicken feet, fish poppers, duck embryos. Also at every lunch we had other people in the restaurant come up and offer to buy me beers and rice wine. We'd usually accept a couple, but then as we had to drive, we'd decline the rest. The locals were always so interested in me and they'd come up to talk (translating through hung with his excellent english)...and just so friendly. I of course had worried a bit about hard feelings towards me as an american visiting a country they we fought, bombed the heck out of, and is still suffering the effects of agent orange. But this was pointless worry. They loved americans and were so happy to meet me, shake my hands, share some rice wine with. SOme of the homestay people had maps and wanted me to show them all the nice places of america. (my version of the nice places of american probably differs just somewhat from most: Estes Park, Stanley Idaho, Jackson hole and the geysers, the grand canyon, the big trees of california, moab, aspen, etc). You could just see in their friendly eyes their true interest and enjoyment with talking to me. And always offering me rice wine, beer, and green tea (which is their social after meal drink that is drunk at a different table than where the meal is. It's also a welcome drink at homes and a drink to share when you meet new people). And Hung was really great b/c he would do a great job of translating and when we'd meet teachers or other educated people, he wouldn't let them speak in vietnamese for basic english conversation. On this trip I really felt like I got to know a lot of the people. But even on my little bit of independent travel I did get to do while in vietnam, I found the locals so nice. Always willing to help me out or just go out of their way to try and offer me the better spot (for my long legs) on the bus, or get me to the right bus, etc.
Each night we stayed at the home of a hill tribe minority group. The ethnicity of vietnamese makes up 90% of the population of vietnam. The rest of the 10% is made up of westerners and the minority tribes in the north such as the tay, white tay, black tay, and hmong. They each have very distinct dress, languages, and houses. The homestays were great. They would cook an amazing meal and we'd have an unlimited amount of rice wine. As is tradition, you first get out the rice wine, where you take little shots and saying jesuquay before taking it. In the Tay minority they'd also shake hands after each shot and say howmaydo (thankyou in Tay). You'd take several shots of the rice wine before it was time to start eating and then continue while eating and then after eating until it was time for the green tea. With the first family they brought out a 1.5L old coke bottle of rice wine. I was really feeling it when we finally finished it, and I was quite relieved, but then, the father went back and brought out a whole other bottle! At first I thought the rice wine stuff was only being done for me as the tourist, but he said they always do it, and it's true that I would notice everyone in the restaurants with their bottle of rice wine. One of the really great things about this trip and the homestays was that the family would eat dinner with us and then attempt to talk to us via hung the interpreter. And I was actually staying right in their house, so with them all the time. I have done quite a lot of homestays on this trip and with most of them you stay in some specially built shack for tourists or on their deck. Rarely inside the actual home. And also usually the family doesn't eat with you, and neither does the guide b/c they instead eat their everyday local food and give the tourists that western asian food I was talking about. So I really felt like I got attached to the family and got to know them.
The first night we stayed in a little village called Ton Tra with a white tay minority family who were farmers. They lived in stilted houses that could be open to the air in the summer or closed up in the winter (which it was now) for warmth. That night the vietnam soccer team was playing thailand in their first pool game of the SEA games. The South East Asian equivalent of the olypmics. They're the two best teams in SEA, so it was a tough match with plenty of rice wine that ended in a 1-1 draw. We woudl also along the trip watch the next 3 games as the vietnamese were really into their soccer. Amazingly Conrad and Whitney who were flying out of Vientiane, Laos where the SEA games were being held attended the Vietnam/Thai game and I'm assuming were rooting for vietnam as well since in their pictuers they were wearing red shirts with big yellow stars.
On day 2 we headed out on a small dirt single track to check out a lake. We then continued further north through more rural areas and some hills. This was the start, but definitely not the end of endless children running out to wave and shout hello. They loved to come bounding out to shout hello. But even all the women endlessly walking or pushing bicycles on the road carrying loads of agricultural stuff would smile and wave. And all the highschoolers on bicycles going back and forth from class (it always seemed like they were going back and forth from class) would come say a bold hello and then run back away shy and giggling to their friends. And of course the men sitting drinking beer or just hanging about would wave and smile. You'd hear shouts from high up on the hills or high up on buildings as you'd go by. And anyone passing you on a motorbike would slow down to wave and smile. I just loved all that. I don't think they get many westerners in the area b/c it's far of the tourist track. In the whole 6 days on the trip I didn't see a single westerner. Mix all the friendly locals with the great scenery and the unique little agricultural fields and villages and it was just great riding. That night we stayed in a Hmong minority house on the shores of Ba Be lake. Of course had a great meal and plenty of rice wine.
On day 3 we did a couple hour boat ride on Ba Be lake in Ba Be national park checking out the mountain and jungle scenery and watching monkeys along the lake shore. Today was a day of riding over big mountain passes with amazing scenery in order to get to the town of Cao Bang. From Cao Bang it was a short ride over another pass and into a magical land of towering limestone karsts and rice paddies and little villages. Of course this unique landscape came with so many smiling and waving people. It was like travelling back in time to days gone by. There was absolutely not machines save for a few passing motorbikes on the road. Water buffalo were used to plow the field, all the harvested crops (along with anything else imaginable) was carted off on bicycles or on shoulder yokes carried by the women. All the fields were being handwatered by people carrying large buckets on shoulder yokes. Definitely no irrigation here. And no tractors to help harvest the various things. Just huge groups of people. The students coming in on their bicycle would soon join the group working out in the fields. Old women were in the little huts cooking on fires. It really looked like something out of the middle ages or 16th century china or something. I just really loved riding through here b/c it was so unique and the karst scenery so absolutely amazing. If you've heard of the famous guilin tourist destination in china, this is what that is like. Something else unique about this area was that being winter and farther north and up in elevation a bit, it was cold. So everyone was out in coats and wool hats and gloves. I hadn't seen that in Asia yet of course. I figure the cold (not that cold maybe 50's to 60's as the lows) helped me to begin my acclimitization towards the cold colorado winter I would be returning to. That night we stayed in Quang Uyen with a Nung An minority family that had the funniest and happiest grandma I had seen and a cute little daughter, who was 3 or 4, who was always so happy to share her fruit and water with me.
Day 4 was an amazing amazing day of scenery. Add the scenery to the sunny mild day, the cool little farming villages, all the happy, waving people, and the great food and homestay, and the day definitely made it into my top 10 days overall best days in asia. I can't even imagine how incredible it would have been had we been there during the wet season when the rice paddies shimmered green instead of being harvested and brown now.
We drove for several hours through the amazing karst scenery up little passes between farming valleys. The woman at the gas station accidentally didn't mix the oil with the gas, which is what needs to be done for minske bikes, so we had some engine issues, which was the only slight damper on the day. But after a while Hung with the help of other guys on the road was able to get them going again. We took back roads arriving all the way at the chinese border in the north. The border is a river, with a beautiful and very wide waterfall at one point. The falls are called Ban Gioc. Once there, we took a bamboo raft along the river to get right up to the spray of the falls. I had crossed borders on this trip about every way imaginable: boat, plane, train, automobile, walking, but I hadn't swum across yet. So I wanted to do this. But Hung told me that one of the signs written in vietnames said no crossing over to the border. Had Hung not been with me, I probably would have done it, b/c a. I couldn't read the sign, b. there weren't any police or anything around, just women selling wares and men poling bamboo rafts, and c. I could have dove deep and held my breath the whole way across so they wouldn't have seen me anyways. But I decided to not get hung in trouble so I didn't do it. But it was kind of funny b/c on our side were the vietnamese tourists (no westerners) and on the other side were chinese tourists. We could wave at each other, but not go across to the other side. In fact a chinese tourist through me a chinese apple from his boat to my boat. Delicious! I was able to get the boatman close enough to the chinese side that I was able to quickly jump onto a rock on that side and jump back, and can now say I've been in china. I would of course end up in Hong Kong later via airplane, so it didn't really matter. I don't know if you've ever noticed at chinese or vietnamese restaurants (or maybe it's only the ones i've been to) but the paintings and drawings of the steep mountains (limestone karsts) and waterfalls flowing onto rice paddies. Well, that's basically what this was. Wow! So beautiful. On the way back to Quang Uyen we took a different way and just as scenic. At one point we took a steep dirt road up to the top of a mountain (where they were currently erecting a monument to the unknown soldiers who had died in the american war) that had great views down to the river and across all the mountains.
Day 5 we started off early, but about an hour into it my bike broke down most likely due to residual problems with the unmixed fuel. I had to get a tow back to the town which meant that Hung drove his motorbike with one leg extended while he pushed me. After several hours, it had appeared they had fixed the bike, so we continued on. Up over a really scenic, sweet and rough dirt pass. At the very top my motorbike died. Luckily I was able to coast the next 12km to the town at the bottom (no different than mountain biking really.). Another couple hours later the bike was fixed (and this time for good). We had obviously made poor time that day, so we wouldn't be making it to the destination and homestay we were supposed to and would instead have to take a shortcut, or at least faster and easier way. Hung still wanted to get a bit closer to Hanoi, so we drove on into the night. Now with all the fixing of my bike going on, the headlight had lost power. So Hung bought me a flashlight and I just followed behind him, which was fine. An hour later we arrived in That Khe where we stayed at a guesthouse
Day 6 We continued on to Hanoi through Lang Son and more nice scenery before arriving in the crazed traffic of hanoi. Since we still had day light left, Hung showed me some sights in Hanoi like where John McCain's jet had crashed and he'd been captured, the wreckage of a B52 bomber shot down, and the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum. We later sat down for some sugar cane juice and to wait for his wife so that I could meet her. She was all excited to practice her english with me.
But wow! what a great tour and an amazing way to see the beauty and friendly people of north vietnam.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Sailing through the descending dragon on an old junk
11/29 Joined a three day tour to the famous world heritage halong bay, which means dragon descending into the ocean. We first drove to halong city where we boarded an old (chinese?) junk. It was quite fancy and luxurious really. We spent the first day sailing around halong bay. Spectacular! Halong bay is a bay in the gulf of Tonkin where giant limestone karsts jut out of water producing huge sheer cliffs that rise straight from the water up to the top of the mtn. In the afternoon we explored a very intricate cave on one of the islands and then kayaked around some of the islands and watched the sunset. At night we had a nice dinner and then sat up on the deck of the junk and watched the stars.
The next day we did more touring of the gorgeous bay before stopping on one of the bigger islands to do some biking through nice scenery to a small village. After the biking we continued on the junk through halong bay where we stopped for lunch at a beach and did some more kayaking. After that we reboarded the junk to sail onto cat ba town on cat ba island. On the way we passed lots of cool floating fishing villages. When we checked into the hotel, most of the people went to take naps, but I hiked up a hill just outside of town to get a nice view of the bay and the sunset over the bay. On top of the hill there were some old ruins, that definitely looked like some old fort b/c the windows had the narrow slit design used to protect from arrows or bullets or whatever. Not sure how old they were.
The next day we made our way back to halong city, of course going through amazing scenery. We arrived back to hanoi in the late afternoon, so I got to explore hanoi a bit for the first time in daylight. I continued to really like this alive city. Walked to some lake with some temples in the middle and to an old cathedral and just enjoyed walking around looking at all the goings on of the city. At night I sat down for some pho and bia hoi and watched my last full moon in asia =(
12/2 I had a motorbike tour booked to leave today, so I got up really early to continue my walking around hanoi in daylight hours. Of course the city was quite active even at 6am. My favorite was walking around the same lake with the temples. Lots and lots of people were running around it, but the best were huge groups all around doing yoga, tai chi, and dancing to music. People of all ages out there doing exercises and dancing. Pretty funny and entertaining. And on one side there were even whole free weight sets where guys were working out. I hadn't experienced anywhere else in asia yet where there was such an exercise conscious society.
The next day we did more touring of the gorgeous bay before stopping on one of the bigger islands to do some biking through nice scenery to a small village. After the biking we continued on the junk through halong bay where we stopped for lunch at a beach and did some more kayaking. After that we reboarded the junk to sail onto cat ba town on cat ba island. On the way we passed lots of cool floating fishing villages. When we checked into the hotel, most of the people went to take naps, but I hiked up a hill just outside of town to get a nice view of the bay and the sunset over the bay. On top of the hill there were some old ruins, that definitely looked like some old fort b/c the windows had the narrow slit design used to protect from arrows or bullets or whatever. Not sure how old they were.
The next day we made our way back to halong city, of course going through amazing scenery. We arrived back to hanoi in the late afternoon, so I got to explore hanoi a bit for the first time in daylight. I continued to really like this alive city. Walked to some lake with some temples in the middle and to an old cathedral and just enjoyed walking around looking at all the goings on of the city. At night I sat down for some pho and bia hoi and watched my last full moon in asia =(
12/2 I had a motorbike tour booked to leave today, so I got up really early to continue my walking around hanoi in daylight hours. Of course the city was quite active even at 6am. My favorite was walking around the same lake with the temples. Lots and lots of people were running around it, but the best were huge groups all around doing yoga, tai chi, and dancing to music. People of all ages out there doing exercises and dancing. Pretty funny and entertaining. And on one side there were even whole free weight sets where guys were working out. I hadn't experienced anywhere else in asia yet where there was such an exercise conscious society.
Good morning Vietnam (and wild hanoi)
11/27 Flew from Luang Prabang, Laos to Hanoi Vietnam, a city that turns 1000 in 2010. Checked into a really sweet hostel in the Old Quarter and then walked around Hanoi. Hanoi is a crazy and awesome city. Perhaps my favorite in Asia thus far. It's very alive and happening and has felt the most "asian" of the places I've been. Maybe b/c hollywood is always doing vietnam or chinese (n. vietnam has a large chinese influence) movies so that's what we think of. But all the ladies in the street are walking around wearing the conical hats and carrying their wares over their shoulder on bamboo poles with straw baskets. There are locals out on all the steet courners eating noodles (pho) and bia hoi (pints of on tap beer hanoi for the huge sum of 15 cents). The streets were filled with people walking, cyclos (the 3 wheeled push bikes used to cart people around), old chinese bicycles, and of course hordes of motorbikes. One of the things I really liked about the city was that there was not a so-called tourist ghetto like khao san in bangkok. Here the tourist stuff was intermingled with the everyday lives of the local vietnamese. Whereas in bangkok you had to walk a bit to get to a place that wasn't entirely there b/c of tourists, in Hanoi it was right outside your hostel. And the city was so alive and happening and abuzz, which was a huge contrast from Cambodia and Laos. And it wasn't some giant nasty city either, it was sort of cute with nice boulevards, lots of lakes and parks, and tree-lined narrow streets.
The traffic in the city was purely insane. They say saigon is worse, though I didn't have much time to experience it there. But anyways, there are about 7 million people in Hanoi and somewhere around 5 million motorbikes. As someone said, hanoians eat, sleep, and dream on motorbikes. There's not really any road rules and the roads are so packed with motorbikes, people, and bicycles that it's a wonder that the traffic moves, but it does of course. Traffic supposedly drives on the right side of the road in vietnam, but in the city, it doesn't matter what side you drive on. Motorbikes are on the right side, in the middle, on the left side, using the sidewalk, anywhere. At 4-way intersections, there's really no stopping or traffic lights. Instead all 4 sides just go into it. They dodge, swerve, and ultimately find their way through to the other side. You've seen those movies that show the mess of pedestrians on sidewalks in downtown NYC where they are bumping into each other, swerving out of the way, etc. Well this was how the roads in hanoi were except with motorbikes, bicycles, and pedestrians (lots of sidewalks are so crammed with motorbike parking that you just have to walk in the road). The amazing thing though is that the motorbike drivers are so skilled and adept at swerving around and through traffic that I never once witnessed an accident. Some near misses, well everything appeared to be a near miss, but no accidents. The other thing that's interesting is that they seem to have unlimited patience with each other. They never get upset if they have to do a hard swerve or sudden break, or at anyone going the wrong direction. The only time that they get angry is that if they are at a rare stoplight that is obeyed and someone isn't already moving into the intersection before the light turns green. In hanoi they have the stoplights with the countdowns that tell you how long until the next green or red light. So when it's a red light and the countdown is down to 4, you better be going, which means of course, the other side still has about 3 seconds left of green. But again no accidents.
Another fun, and at first scary experience is crossing the roads in hanoi. There are crosswalks, but they are just a waste of paint. You can't wait until there is a break in traffic b/c that definitely won't happen until perhaps at 3 in the morning. So what you do is just start walking into the street, sort of blindly. Taylor the canadian I had travelled with in burma told me that you just have to go and if you hesitate, then that is when you'll be hit b/c they are trying to predict your moves. Now I had a leg up on most tourists here b/c I had been dealing with asian traffic and street crossing for a year now. It is usually does involved walking into the road with the traffic going, just going one lane at time. When one lane clears, you cross it, then stand on the divider line as traffic whizzes by until the next lane clears up, and then you go across. But hanoi was even more intense b/c instead of 4 lanes with 4 lines of traffic to cross, you had 4 lanes with 20 motorbikes across, swerving, going the wrong direction, etc. But it's true, you just walk out there slowly and keep moving, and they swerve around you. It's crazy to see the little kids (like 5 years old) doing this, or the women with the long bamboo poles taking up a much greater width doing it, or the old grannies that can hardly walk in the first place. I loved watching the traffic there. It was so crazy. When I was eating noodles at an intersection ones, I watched a western couple attempt to cross the street. It took them 20 minutes to attempt to cross the street before they ended up hiring a motorbike to take them across. But you just got to go and they'll miss you.
11/28 With my shortened time left before my trip ended and in an attempt to see as much as possible I would be doing a couple of tours out of hanoi. I usually try to avoid these, b/c they are never as good as doing it by yourself on your own time, but I was short on time, so I needed the quick day type tours instead of arranging going to the place myself, sleeping there and then touring it. So instead of going to Ninh Bin to visit Tom Coc I would just do the day trip, and instead of going to Cat Ba island to tour halong bay from there, I would be doing a 3 day trip out of hanoi that made a stop there.
So today I took a day trip to Tom Coc, known as Halong Bay on rice paddies. On the way we stopped at a few temples back from the time when China controlled vietnam. Once we arrived in the Tom Coc area we took a couple hour bike through a cool canyon. Then we boarded a little boat that fits two people rowed by a vietnamese woman and were rowed for several hours through a cool limestone canyon on a little river that included going through 4 cave tunnels. Very gorgeous and serene ride.
The traffic in the city was purely insane. They say saigon is worse, though I didn't have much time to experience it there. But anyways, there are about 7 million people in Hanoi and somewhere around 5 million motorbikes. As someone said, hanoians eat, sleep, and dream on motorbikes. There's not really any road rules and the roads are so packed with motorbikes, people, and bicycles that it's a wonder that the traffic moves, but it does of course. Traffic supposedly drives on the right side of the road in vietnam, but in the city, it doesn't matter what side you drive on. Motorbikes are on the right side, in the middle, on the left side, using the sidewalk, anywhere. At 4-way intersections, there's really no stopping or traffic lights. Instead all 4 sides just go into it. They dodge, swerve, and ultimately find their way through to the other side. You've seen those movies that show the mess of pedestrians on sidewalks in downtown NYC where they are bumping into each other, swerving out of the way, etc. Well this was how the roads in hanoi were except with motorbikes, bicycles, and pedestrians (lots of sidewalks are so crammed with motorbike parking that you just have to walk in the road). The amazing thing though is that the motorbike drivers are so skilled and adept at swerving around and through traffic that I never once witnessed an accident. Some near misses, well everything appeared to be a near miss, but no accidents. The other thing that's interesting is that they seem to have unlimited patience with each other. They never get upset if they have to do a hard swerve or sudden break, or at anyone going the wrong direction. The only time that they get angry is that if they are at a rare stoplight that is obeyed and someone isn't already moving into the intersection before the light turns green. In hanoi they have the stoplights with the countdowns that tell you how long until the next green or red light. So when it's a red light and the countdown is down to 4, you better be going, which means of course, the other side still has about 3 seconds left of green. But again no accidents.
Another fun, and at first scary experience is crossing the roads in hanoi. There are crosswalks, but they are just a waste of paint. You can't wait until there is a break in traffic b/c that definitely won't happen until perhaps at 3 in the morning. So what you do is just start walking into the street, sort of blindly. Taylor the canadian I had travelled with in burma told me that you just have to go and if you hesitate, then that is when you'll be hit b/c they are trying to predict your moves. Now I had a leg up on most tourists here b/c I had been dealing with asian traffic and street crossing for a year now. It is usually does involved walking into the road with the traffic going, just going one lane at time. When one lane clears, you cross it, then stand on the divider line as traffic whizzes by until the next lane clears up, and then you go across. But hanoi was even more intense b/c instead of 4 lanes with 4 lines of traffic to cross, you had 4 lanes with 20 motorbikes across, swerving, going the wrong direction, etc. But it's true, you just walk out there slowly and keep moving, and they swerve around you. It's crazy to see the little kids (like 5 years old) doing this, or the women with the long bamboo poles taking up a much greater width doing it, or the old grannies that can hardly walk in the first place. I loved watching the traffic there. It was so crazy. When I was eating noodles at an intersection ones, I watched a western couple attempt to cross the street. It took them 20 minutes to attempt to cross the street before they ended up hiring a motorbike to take them across. But you just got to go and they'll miss you.
11/28 With my shortened time left before my trip ended and in an attempt to see as much as possible I would be doing a couple of tours out of hanoi. I usually try to avoid these, b/c they are never as good as doing it by yourself on your own time, but I was short on time, so I needed the quick day type tours instead of arranging going to the place myself, sleeping there and then touring it. So instead of going to Ninh Bin to visit Tom Coc I would just do the day trip, and instead of going to Cat Ba island to tour halong bay from there, I would be doing a 3 day trip out of hanoi that made a stop there.
So today I took a day trip to Tom Coc, known as Halong Bay on rice paddies. On the way we stopped at a few temples back from the time when China controlled vietnam. Once we arrived in the Tom Coc area we took a couple hour bike through a cool canyon. Then we boarded a little boat that fits two people rowed by a vietnamese woman and were rowed for several hours through a cool limestone canyon on a little river that included going through 4 cave tunnels. Very gorgeous and serene ride.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Thanksgiving in Laos and a sad goodbye to the Franks
11/25-26 Took the crazy nightbus to luang prabang. The bus driver and conductors both had ak-47 machine guns with them b/c apparently the night bus in this region can often get raided.
11/26 Thanksgiving! We arrived bright and early into Luang Prabang in time to see the huge procession of brightly orange clad monks collecting their food alms in the morning. Luang Prabang is a world heritage city for its well preserved french era architecture and plethora of temples. It's at the confluence of the mekong and some other river. It's a really nice city with the rivers, perfect weather and temps, clean and quiet streets, and laid back feel. A bit boring, but in a good way. A place my parents would really like with its chic cafes, great bakeries, good french and european food, art galleries, tourist markets, and just sort of classy vibe. Most of the tourists seemed to be affluent and of middle age or older. We just walked around and saw a bit of the city in the morning and got our baguettes and fruit shakes. In the afternoon we took a tuk tuk up to Tat Kuangsi Waterfall, which was a multi tiered fall of incredibly beauty similar to erawan falls in thailand. A couple huge falls and then lots of small cascades and sweet pools made even better by the cool blue milky color of the water. We hiked up to the top of the falls and then came back down to swim in the pools and do some waterfall jumping. I'll never get over how sweet the little pools and falls in limestone karsts areas are. Just like a disneyland fairies' wonderland.
Back in town that evening we had the task of trying to put together a thanksgiving feast. Conrad and I had walked around the town in the morning looking for an american expat throwing a party while whitney recovered from the bus ride. We did find one american expat who owned the lao lao garden bar, but this was the first year of his 5 years he wasn't throwing a party b/c of the lack of americans travelling this year. So we just went to the night food market and pieced together our thanksgiving dinner. The holiday is really about family, friends, and being thankful, which we had, so it didn't really matter what we had. We avoided the snails, toads, chicken toes, cow intestine, and other uknown things and settled for a vegetable and noodle buffet. 80 cents to fill a plate as high as you could with noodles, vegetables (including potatoes and pumpkin!). We were quite successful with our stacking and managed to stuff ourselves in good thanksgiving fashion. But don't worry America, we didn't let you down and have only vegetables, we stuffed ourselves even further by getting a whole fish and some chicken (hey it's poultry) legs and of course beer laos. We had also found a very good, but extremely overpriced bakery that had pumpkin pie. We bit the bullet in honor of thanksgiving and got a slice of pumpkin, apple, and in honor of SE asia, mango pie. We finished the night with some tiger beers by a fire at the american lao lao garden bar. Not a bad thanksgiving at all! We got kicked out of the bar at 11pm as laos has an 11pm curfew (unless of your you're chinese and own a chinese bar or bowling alley, b/c then, well, your country gives so much money to laos, you can do whatever you please), so grabbed some beer laos roadies and went back to our place to finish the pies.
The next morning we walked the town a bit, had some last baguettes together and then had fruitshakes in the shade by the mekong river. We all got our last beer laos together as I waited for the tuk tuk to take me to the airport. It was a sad sad goodbye as I had so much fun with conrad and whitney. They are so fun, good and adventurous, and great travellers. I always love being with them, and now I know travelling with them is great as well. Thanks Conrad and Whitney!!! It was great. Love ya and miss ya both!
I had hoped to bus to hanoi, vietnam, but apparently there are some decent mountains and crappy roads in between so the route would take 2+ days, which would have been fine if I had the time, but time is running low so I opted for the 40 minutes flight into hanoi and the 2 hour drive in crazy traffic from the airport to the old quarter.
11/26 Thanksgiving! We arrived bright and early into Luang Prabang in time to see the huge procession of brightly orange clad monks collecting their food alms in the morning. Luang Prabang is a world heritage city for its well preserved french era architecture and plethora of temples. It's at the confluence of the mekong and some other river. It's a really nice city with the rivers, perfect weather and temps, clean and quiet streets, and laid back feel. A bit boring, but in a good way. A place my parents would really like with its chic cafes, great bakeries, good french and european food, art galleries, tourist markets, and just sort of classy vibe. Most of the tourists seemed to be affluent and of middle age or older. We just walked around and saw a bit of the city in the morning and got our baguettes and fruit shakes. In the afternoon we took a tuk tuk up to Tat Kuangsi Waterfall, which was a multi tiered fall of incredibly beauty similar to erawan falls in thailand. A couple huge falls and then lots of small cascades and sweet pools made even better by the cool blue milky color of the water. We hiked up to the top of the falls and then came back down to swim in the pools and do some waterfall jumping. I'll never get over how sweet the little pools and falls in limestone karsts areas are. Just like a disneyland fairies' wonderland.
Back in town that evening we had the task of trying to put together a thanksgiving feast. Conrad and I had walked around the town in the morning looking for an american expat throwing a party while whitney recovered from the bus ride. We did find one american expat who owned the lao lao garden bar, but this was the first year of his 5 years he wasn't throwing a party b/c of the lack of americans travelling this year. So we just went to the night food market and pieced together our thanksgiving dinner. The holiday is really about family, friends, and being thankful, which we had, so it didn't really matter what we had. We avoided the snails, toads, chicken toes, cow intestine, and other uknown things and settled for a vegetable and noodle buffet. 80 cents to fill a plate as high as you could with noodles, vegetables (including potatoes and pumpkin!). We were quite successful with our stacking and managed to stuff ourselves in good thanksgiving fashion. But don't worry America, we didn't let you down and have only vegetables, we stuffed ourselves even further by getting a whole fish and some chicken (hey it's poultry) legs and of course beer laos. We had also found a very good, but extremely overpriced bakery that had pumpkin pie. We bit the bullet in honor of thanksgiving and got a slice of pumpkin, apple, and in honor of SE asia, mango pie. We finished the night with some tiger beers by a fire at the american lao lao garden bar. Not a bad thanksgiving at all! We got kicked out of the bar at 11pm as laos has an 11pm curfew (unless of your you're chinese and own a chinese bar or bowling alley, b/c then, well, your country gives so much money to laos, you can do whatever you please), so grabbed some beer laos roadies and went back to our place to finish the pies.
The next morning we walked the town a bit, had some last baguettes together and then had fruitshakes in the shade by the mekong river. We all got our last beer laos together as I waited for the tuk tuk to take me to the airport. It was a sad sad goodbye as I had so much fun with conrad and whitney. They are so fun, good and adventurous, and great travellers. I always love being with them, and now I know travelling with them is great as well. Thanks Conrad and Whitney!!! It was great. Love ya and miss ya both!
I had hoped to bus to hanoi, vietnam, but apparently there are some decent mountains and crappy roads in between so the route would take 2+ days, which would have been fine if I had the time, but time is running low so I opted for the 40 minutes flight into hanoi and the 2 hour drive in crazy traffic from the airport to the old quarter.
Vang Vieng: The partyer's disneyland
11/23 We arrived in the late morning into Vang Vieng, a small and cute town situated along a scenic river with karst mountains everywhere. Amongst backpackers, vang vieng is known for its tubing. Now this isn't like tubing in the boise river or boulder creek. This is tubing on lao lao whiskey and beerlao! You rent a tube and a tuk tuk takes you up to the start. The tubing part of the river is 4km. But all the bars are located in the first 800m. We started about 1:30 and figured we'd have plenty of time to make it all the way back to vang vieng before dark. Boy were we wrong. Anyways, there are maybe 8 bars in the stretch. You start at the first bar with a beer and a free shot of lao lao whiskey. It has an incredibly sweet rope swing at least 25 or 30 feet high above the river. Quite scary the first time, but then great everytime after that. Especially with a few tall boy beer laos in us. Eventually it was time to move onto the next bar. As you're floating downriver. Laos guys throw ropes out to you to pull you in. When you get pulled in they quickly poor laos laos into your mouth and welcome you aboard. The bars, without the toys of the swings, ropes, and zip lines are sweet in themselves. Just a bunch of people from everywhere having fun, dancing, and good music. Throw in the water stuff, the Franks, and it's amazing!! Of course there were other things going on (read lots of drugs) and supposedly even mushroom shakes, though we steered clear even though a couple american girls were really wanting me to roll some joints for them since they had bought some maryjane and were completely sure that everyperson in colorado could roll a good joint with their eyes closed. By the time it got dark we hadn't even made it to the last bar, let alone the 3km's past that. So instead of tubing that part in our drunket state, we took a tuk tuk back to town where we feasted on baguettes. On a side note, the baguettes in laos are amazing. Thank God for the French influence there. It's so nice to have some good bread finally. We definitely got more than our fair share of the big 3 (beer laos, mango shakes ,and baguettes) in laos since they were all so incredibly cheap. We crashed early that night...around 9pm, but that's what happens when you start at 1.
The touristy part of vang vieng is interesting b/c it a bunch of people recuperating and watching reruns of friends and family guy and also lots of people in arm slings and foot bandages most likely from drunken river accidents (thought he one gal I did ask had broken her hand punching her boyfriend for cheating on her)
The rest of our days in vang vieng weren't so crazy, though of course they did involve plenty of beer laos
Our 2nd day we took a tour that first involved a boring buddha cave but then a sweet tubing trip inside a cave. You jump on this tube and then paddle into this cave that i only really accessible via floating inner tube. So that was a cool experience. After that we kayaked 12 km's of the river along the gorgeous mountains including the last 4 km's that we had missed on the tubing. We of course did stop at a bar when we got to the tubing area. It was the slide bar that we had missed before and featured a giant slide that shot you straight out and slightly up over the river. Very scary and very fast, even after having done it a couple time, but so much fun. That night we went out for beer laos and a fancy steak dinner for whitney's american birthday. (3.50 for steak, salad, french fries, fruit shake, and garlic bread on a baguette)
Our last day we rented bikes and toured the vang vieng rural countryside a bit, which was great. We stopped at a big cave and then did some swimming and rope swinging at a great little swimming hole called the blue lagoon. That night we rolled up to a bar with hammocks overlooking the river and watched the sunset over the karst mountains and river while sipping on beer laos and reflecting on how sweet laos is. One of the things we love about laos is how the family just lives in the store or hotel or business that they work at. This may happen in the other countries, but it's so noticeable here. You roll up to a conveniance store and the baby is just walking around chasing marbles on the floor. grandpa is leaning up against a case of beers, grandma is knitting on the floor and you can see the mattresses stored away to be brought out at night (and most of the day as well). Pretty nice really. Means you can live and work at the same place with no commuting and lots of sleeping. That night we got a massage and the usual chicken baguettes and fruitshakes before catching the incredibly windy and bumpy night bus to the world heritage city of luang prabang.
The touristy part of vang vieng is interesting b/c it a bunch of people recuperating and watching reruns of friends and family guy and also lots of people in arm slings and foot bandages most likely from drunken river accidents (thought he one gal I did ask had broken her hand punching her boyfriend for cheating on her)
The rest of our days in vang vieng weren't so crazy, though of course they did involve plenty of beer laos
Our 2nd day we took a tour that first involved a boring buddha cave but then a sweet tubing trip inside a cave. You jump on this tube and then paddle into this cave that i only really accessible via floating inner tube. So that was a cool experience. After that we kayaked 12 km's of the river along the gorgeous mountains including the last 4 km's that we had missed on the tubing. We of course did stop at a bar when we got to the tubing area. It was the slide bar that we had missed before and featured a giant slide that shot you straight out and slightly up over the river. Very scary and very fast, even after having done it a couple time, but so much fun. That night we went out for beer laos and a fancy steak dinner for whitney's american birthday. (3.50 for steak, salad, french fries, fruit shake, and garlic bread on a baguette)
Our last day we rented bikes and toured the vang vieng rural countryside a bit, which was great. We stopped at a big cave and then did some swimming and rope swinging at a great little swimming hole called the blue lagoon. That night we rolled up to a bar with hammocks overlooking the river and watched the sunset over the karst mountains and river while sipping on beer laos and reflecting on how sweet laos is. One of the things we love about laos is how the family just lives in the store or hotel or business that they work at. This may happen in the other countries, but it's so noticeable here. You roll up to a conveniance store and the baby is just walking around chasing marbles on the floor. grandpa is leaning up against a case of beers, grandma is knitting on the floor and you can see the mattresses stored away to be brought out at night (and most of the day as well). Pretty nice really. Means you can live and work at the same place with no commuting and lots of sleeping. That night we got a massage and the usual chicken baguettes and fruitshakes before catching the incredibly windy and bumpy night bus to the world heritage city of luang prabang.
Floating Away in Laos
11-19-09 We met up with our guide Seng and took a sawngthaew to Ban Khoun Kham from where we hiked up to a nice waterfall called tat namsanam for a very, very cold swim in phu hin bun national park. Saw some elephant poo, but no elephants.
The next morning we drove to the river to set off on our kayak trip. The river was initially a bit too low, but as we sat there getting the stuff ready, the river started rising pretty quickly. This is b/c the chinese own a dam up above and begin releasing more water in the morning. The chinese are heavily invested in laos. laos doesn't have enough money to construch huge projects like dams, but china will build it for them, bring the electricity to china and then sell it for 3 times as much. Pretty crazy. But hydropower dams are being built all over laos. We kayaked all day, going through small villages, past lots of water buffaloes, and people just hanging out by the river bank. Towards the end of the day we reached phu hin bun (we were kayaking on the nam hin bun river) which was more jungle clad and had lots of big karst mountains around making the scenery quite stunning. When we reached the national park we just put the kayaks together and floated. Less than 1km from our final destination we came upon a large fallen tree in the water that we didn't see until the last minute. Conrad and Whitney's kayak was on the outside so they narrowly escaped, but Seng and I had to wait for them to get out of the way. We were able to duck the first branch but were flipped by a small branch sticking up. I was able to grab almost everything from the kayak except for our fish and meat for the night which quickly sunk. Shortly after we arrived at the village. It was a cool little village only accessible by foot or river float. Obviously no electricity or anything like that. The thing that we thought was the funniest and most interesting was how many farm animals were just running through the villages, and especially babies. It was bookoo babies: pigs, chickens, cows, waterbuffalo, dogs, cats, ducks, and humans! Babies everywhere. It was really windy and quite cold, so we huddled by a fire before curling up on blankets to sleep on the deck of the village leaders house. And by deck I mean open aired living/cooking/etc space.
Our 3rd day we kayaked most of the day to another similar village. From here though we dropped off our stuff, crossed the big river and then hiked a bit to a cave, or more like tunnel cave. It had a little stream running through it. We walked through the cave, partway in water, for 2 km's to reach the other side. The other side was a completely isolated valley surrounded on all sides by huge, towering, sharp, and completely vertical karsts. So the only way into the valley was by the tunnel. And guess what? There were some ancient angkor wat era ruins being strangled out by the jungle. AND a villege of about 6 to 8 houses. Complete with...yes, babies of all types. The cows and waterbuffalo and pigs and logs for the houses, and everything had to be carried through the cave and then the couple more kilometers through the dense jungle to the village. Pretty crazy. At that point we were feeling quite remote. Here we were in Laos, a country already quite remote with our kayaks parked at a village only accessible by two day boat ride or a very long walk, and on top of that in some hidden valley only accessible by a dark, watery 2km long cave. Of course the locals used torches to see in the cave. The village, which is in the national park had a porcupine caged up (which would shoot quills at you if you got too close apparently). This was sad to see considering it was a national park. That night was even colder and windier (conrad later referred to it as a gusthouse as opposed to the traditional guesthouse)than before, so we went to bed early and had to spoon to stay warm.
On the 4th day (Whitney's Laos Birthday!) we were to take a longtail boat 4 hours down the river to a small town that busses went through. It ended up taking quite a bit longer b/c of a cultural experience we were given...a very expensive one. Halfway down on our trip, we stopped along the river bank to pee. The dry bag with our cameras (and memory cards) was left on a little fence. We remembered we had left it about 5 mintues later. The boat had quite a small motor and had to go upstream, so 15 minutes after that we arrived at the bag had been left at. It was gone! Considering the remoteness of the village, it was quite obvious it couldn't be far. There had been one man with a little baby in a boat right there when we peed and figured he had picked it up. There were also some boys loading rice on that side of the river that may have possibly gotten it. We asked them (through Seng's interpretation) and they didn't have it, nor had they seen anyone other than the man. So we went to the other side of the river where the village was to ask if someone had picked it up. Now you have to realize we're really freaking out b/c not only are our cameras quite expensive, but also all our priceless pictures were there too. But I just knew it had to be there or in the area. But, in typical laos fashion (the full name of Laos is Lao PDR for people democratic republic or in other words lao people don't rush) seng was so frustratingly slow at asking people if they had it or had seen it. It seemed like he was just sitting and shooting the breeze and hardly trying. The man with the baby was nowhere to be found, and some people said he had gone out to tend his buffalo. This seemed a bit suspicious considering lao people don't rush and it was hard to beleive that in 15 minutes, during lunchtime no less, he would have crossed the river, put the baby away and gone rushing out to his buffalo. The village wasn't very large and we had soon asked everybody with no luck. Buffalo man's wife came home from the fields and she looked in their house and couldn't find it. We were really freaking out now, thinking the longer we waited, the less chance of getting it back we had. We sent conrad down stream with the boat driver just in case it had accidently fallen into the river and was going downstream. Whitney and I feared the buffalo man had taken it, run off towards a town to try and sell it. The nearest town with a road was 8 km away. I was ready to go try and track down buffalo man, but strangely, no one in the village knew where his heard was or where he might have gone. It was decided that whitney would stay at the village in case it showed up there and I would take a tractor towards town to try and hedge him off before he could sell the cameras if that was the case. Deep down inside I didn't think that would happen b/c first I had faith in just little village people that they would just be kind and also knew that used cameras don't fetch a whole lot in the laos markets. But before I left, we decided to put out a reward to anyone that could find the dry bag. We did this b/c the entire village was just sitting there watching us, doing nothing, but just watching the poor white people fret, and we hoped that by offering a reward, they would jump up (especially the kids) and try and find it. We asked Seng, and he said to offer 50 bucks (the equivalent of 10,000 dollars to us if you consider their average wage). Still no one really moved. A few minutes later, on the monks' loudspeaker, we heard them announce something in laos. I asked seng what they said and he said they had just talked about the reward. As soon as seng finished answering the question who do you think walked right into the village? Buffalo man with a huge smile on his face. As soon as I realized he had it, I gave him and whitney a big hug. He took us to his little grain barn and burried in the grain was the dry bag. Hmmm... Mighty suspicious if you ask me. It's hard to know if it was coincidence or not, but buffalo man seemed to appear out of the bushes at quite the right opportunity to receive the reward. So now we were in a bit of a sticky situation b/c we had offered 50 bucks to whoever found the bag, and he hadn't exactly found the bag as it had been with him the whole time. We were giving out the reward more to someone already there to go out and find it. Of course we had promised the reward, so we would honor it, but we really hated paying this guy so much money in front of all those people, especially the kids b/c what lesson did it teach them? Grab a white man's stuff and get lots and lots of money in reward! But we had no option really. We had hoped the guy would say no to the reward (as I feel any one of our neighbors would do if we offered up a reward for a lost cat or something), but he definitely wasn't going to do that, which made his whole thing even more suspicious. In the end we couldn't really be sure as to if he had just picked it up and would have given it to us or if he was waiting for a reward or how deep the whole thing went. Maybe all the villagers were involved. Even seng could have been involved. Who's to know, especially when all the conversation was in Laos. What I would have given to know laos then! But in the end we were thankful as we had retrieved everything. B/c of that fiasco and Seng being picky about what bus we took We didn't arrive into vientiane (the capital of laos) until around 1am. We were originally supposed to be in around 6 to catch the 8pm night bus to vang vieng. But while waiting for the bus to vientiane we had some beers to celebrate whitney's laos birthday.
So we spent a short night in vientiane before catching the early bus to vang vieng
The next morning we drove to the river to set off on our kayak trip. The river was initially a bit too low, but as we sat there getting the stuff ready, the river started rising pretty quickly. This is b/c the chinese own a dam up above and begin releasing more water in the morning. The chinese are heavily invested in laos. laos doesn't have enough money to construch huge projects like dams, but china will build it for them, bring the electricity to china and then sell it for 3 times as much. Pretty crazy. But hydropower dams are being built all over laos. We kayaked all day, going through small villages, past lots of water buffaloes, and people just hanging out by the river bank. Towards the end of the day we reached phu hin bun (we were kayaking on the nam hin bun river) which was more jungle clad and had lots of big karst mountains around making the scenery quite stunning. When we reached the national park we just put the kayaks together and floated. Less than 1km from our final destination we came upon a large fallen tree in the water that we didn't see until the last minute. Conrad and Whitney's kayak was on the outside so they narrowly escaped, but Seng and I had to wait for them to get out of the way. We were able to duck the first branch but were flipped by a small branch sticking up. I was able to grab almost everything from the kayak except for our fish and meat for the night which quickly sunk. Shortly after we arrived at the village. It was a cool little village only accessible by foot or river float. Obviously no electricity or anything like that. The thing that we thought was the funniest and most interesting was how many farm animals were just running through the villages, and especially babies. It was bookoo babies: pigs, chickens, cows, waterbuffalo, dogs, cats, ducks, and humans! Babies everywhere. It was really windy and quite cold, so we huddled by a fire before curling up on blankets to sleep on the deck of the village leaders house. And by deck I mean open aired living/cooking/etc space.
Our 3rd day we kayaked most of the day to another similar village. From here though we dropped off our stuff, crossed the big river and then hiked a bit to a cave, or more like tunnel cave. It had a little stream running through it. We walked through the cave, partway in water, for 2 km's to reach the other side. The other side was a completely isolated valley surrounded on all sides by huge, towering, sharp, and completely vertical karsts. So the only way into the valley was by the tunnel. And guess what? There were some ancient angkor wat era ruins being strangled out by the jungle. AND a villege of about 6 to 8 houses. Complete with...yes, babies of all types. The cows and waterbuffalo and pigs and logs for the houses, and everything had to be carried through the cave and then the couple more kilometers through the dense jungle to the village. Pretty crazy. At that point we were feeling quite remote. Here we were in Laos, a country already quite remote with our kayaks parked at a village only accessible by two day boat ride or a very long walk, and on top of that in some hidden valley only accessible by a dark, watery 2km long cave. Of course the locals used torches to see in the cave. The village, which is in the national park had a porcupine caged up (which would shoot quills at you if you got too close apparently). This was sad to see considering it was a national park. That night was even colder and windier (conrad later referred to it as a gusthouse as opposed to the traditional guesthouse)than before, so we went to bed early and had to spoon to stay warm.
On the 4th day (Whitney's Laos Birthday!) we were to take a longtail boat 4 hours down the river to a small town that busses went through. It ended up taking quite a bit longer b/c of a cultural experience we were given...a very expensive one. Halfway down on our trip, we stopped along the river bank to pee. The dry bag with our cameras (and memory cards) was left on a little fence. We remembered we had left it about 5 mintues later. The boat had quite a small motor and had to go upstream, so 15 minutes after that we arrived at the bag had been left at. It was gone! Considering the remoteness of the village, it was quite obvious it couldn't be far. There had been one man with a little baby in a boat right there when we peed and figured he had picked it up. There were also some boys loading rice on that side of the river that may have possibly gotten it. We asked them (through Seng's interpretation) and they didn't have it, nor had they seen anyone other than the man. So we went to the other side of the river where the village was to ask if someone had picked it up. Now you have to realize we're really freaking out b/c not only are our cameras quite expensive, but also all our priceless pictures were there too. But I just knew it had to be there or in the area. But, in typical laos fashion (the full name of Laos is Lao PDR for people democratic republic or in other words lao people don't rush) seng was so frustratingly slow at asking people if they had it or had seen it. It seemed like he was just sitting and shooting the breeze and hardly trying. The man with the baby was nowhere to be found, and some people said he had gone out to tend his buffalo. This seemed a bit suspicious considering lao people don't rush and it was hard to beleive that in 15 minutes, during lunchtime no less, he would have crossed the river, put the baby away and gone rushing out to his buffalo. The village wasn't very large and we had soon asked everybody with no luck. Buffalo man's wife came home from the fields and she looked in their house and couldn't find it. We were really freaking out now, thinking the longer we waited, the less chance of getting it back we had. We sent conrad down stream with the boat driver just in case it had accidently fallen into the river and was going downstream. Whitney and I feared the buffalo man had taken it, run off towards a town to try and sell it. The nearest town with a road was 8 km away. I was ready to go try and track down buffalo man, but strangely, no one in the village knew where his heard was or where he might have gone. It was decided that whitney would stay at the village in case it showed up there and I would take a tractor towards town to try and hedge him off before he could sell the cameras if that was the case. Deep down inside I didn't think that would happen b/c first I had faith in just little village people that they would just be kind and also knew that used cameras don't fetch a whole lot in the laos markets. But before I left, we decided to put out a reward to anyone that could find the dry bag. We did this b/c the entire village was just sitting there watching us, doing nothing, but just watching the poor white people fret, and we hoped that by offering a reward, they would jump up (especially the kids) and try and find it. We asked Seng, and he said to offer 50 bucks (the equivalent of 10,000 dollars to us if you consider their average wage). Still no one really moved. A few minutes later, on the monks' loudspeaker, we heard them announce something in laos. I asked seng what they said and he said they had just talked about the reward. As soon as seng finished answering the question who do you think walked right into the village? Buffalo man with a huge smile on his face. As soon as I realized he had it, I gave him and whitney a big hug. He took us to his little grain barn and burried in the grain was the dry bag. Hmmm... Mighty suspicious if you ask me. It's hard to know if it was coincidence or not, but buffalo man seemed to appear out of the bushes at quite the right opportunity to receive the reward. So now we were in a bit of a sticky situation b/c we had offered 50 bucks to whoever found the bag, and he hadn't exactly found the bag as it had been with him the whole time. We were giving out the reward more to someone already there to go out and find it. Of course we had promised the reward, so we would honor it, but we really hated paying this guy so much money in front of all those people, especially the kids b/c what lesson did it teach them? Grab a white man's stuff and get lots and lots of money in reward! But we had no option really. We had hoped the guy would say no to the reward (as I feel any one of our neighbors would do if we offered up a reward for a lost cat or something), but he definitely wasn't going to do that, which made his whole thing even more suspicious. In the end we couldn't really be sure as to if he had just picked it up and would have given it to us or if he was waiting for a reward or how deep the whole thing went. Maybe all the villagers were involved. Even seng could have been involved. Who's to know, especially when all the conversation was in Laos. What I would have given to know laos then! But in the end we were thankful as we had retrieved everything. B/c of that fiasco and Seng being picky about what bus we took We didn't arrive into vientiane (the capital of laos) until around 1am. We were originally supposed to be in around 6 to catch the 8pm night bus to vang vieng. But while waiting for the bus to vientiane we had some beers to celebrate whitney's laos birthday.
So we spent a short night in vientiane before catching the early bus to vang vieng
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Chillaxin in Southern Laos
11/12
Took a bus from Kratie to the Cambodia/Laos border. The border was pretty hilarious. It was just two random delapidated stilted wooden buildings. One to leave cambodia where there was a 1 dollar "fee", then a 100 meter walk to the one to enter Laos where the guy there decided to charge a 2 dollar "fee". Which I guess makes sense b/c we had to wake the poor guy up. There was no video security or anything like that, but one guy was there with a digital camera taking photos of all the white people crossing the border. Maybe for his own fun, but maybe for something official. The healthcare checkpoint was only guarded by a rooster, so we breezed through that, wary of catching bird flu from the inspector.
We then hopped on some big old passenger truck and took a short ride on an extremely pot-holed rode to the riverside of the mekong. It was now completely dark, but we hopped into a little longtail boat and headed off to Don Dhet, one of the islands in Si Phan Don (the 4000 islands). We checked into a place and then had fruitshakes and our first drink of the infamous beer lao. There is no electricity there from 10pm to 4pm, so it was definitely a sweaty night in our bungalows without a fan.
The next morning we got up early to take advantage of the slightly "cooler" morning air to ride bicycles to Don Khon Island. To get between the islands you cross a bridge that housed the only rail line ever built by the french in laos. From there we continued to bike until we came to the otherside and there is a powerful waterful as part of the mekong tumbles through some cataracts. The waterfall wasn't very tall or anything, but still very impressive with the huge amount of water of the mekong tumbling down and creating all that force. The ride there and back was scenic, through some rice fields and quiet villages. The 4000 islands are known as being the most relaxed place in Laos, a country that is known as one of the most relaxed places in the world. And we found that to be true. Almost everyone was just sitting in their hammocks or sleeping under a tree or in their store. And just very quiet and peaceful. So slow moving.
After our bike ride, we broke laos tradition and instead of spending the rest of the day in hammocks along the river sleeping and reading, we took the Happy Boat Tour which was a party barge type thing. We were on it with 2 germans (burndt and Anya), an Irishwoman (danielle, who was a covert bbc reporter paid to just chill in asia until some sort of story came up, but most recently she had been doing undercover reporting in Burma where the bbc is prohibited), and 2 aussie gals. The tour involved motoring to some island, swimming in the mekong all day to stay cool with beer lao bottles and buckets of lao whiskey and coke. At some point we had a fish bbq and then moved back to the river for more buckets and swimming. Then a mud fight of course! Eventually we got out tubes, tied them to the boat and took off back towards don dhet, all drunk and having a good time.
11/14 Took the boat then bus to Pakse and then another bus to Paksong, high up on the Bolaven Plateau where the air was magically and refreshingly cool. We celebrated the cool air with a thai bbq. The Bolaven plateau is noted for its cool air, waterfalls, and coffee plantations.
11/15 Rented motor bikes and drove 55km to Namtok Katamatok, the supposed largest waterfall in SE Asia. It's 120m tall (400ft) and truly impressive. You can't get down to the base of it, but even from a distance it's incredible as it tumbles off of the jungly plateau. The sound alone is crazy loud and then just watching the water crash onto the rocks and make all that mist. A most awesome waterfall indeed. The 55k there was an adventure as well. The first 10 km was on the "good" road according to the guy we rented from, but it was a paved road pockmarked with giant motorcycle swallowing potholes. So we had to get our swerve on and basically play mario kart with our real life scooters dodging potholes, oncoming traffic, chickens, water buffalo, cows, dogs, pigs, little kids, etc. After the paved pothole madness it was just a bumpy dirt road. On the way back we stopped at two other impressive waterfalls and swam at the top of one. It also poured and poured rain on the back. Brought me back a little to my sumatra motor biked days being on a cold and high plateau in pouring rain. I luckily had my rain coat with me, so I didn't get too wet and cold. But conrad and whitney just had their shorts and t-shirts, so they were icicles (whitney a shaking icicle) when we got back to our guesthouse. We were very thankful (for the first time) to have piping hot noodle soup to eat.
That night we went out to some carnival thing. There was this came with coffee beans where you put money on how many beans you thought were under the cup. It was fairly easy to see how many beans were under the cup, yet the two laotians playing were guessing wrong half the time. All of our eyes lit up with the thought of how much kip (laos money) we could make off this came, b/c it just seemed so simple. But after a short time we had all lost about 2 bucks and were done betting (2 bucks = two large beer lao's). But we were determined to figure out how we were losing, b/c it was so easy to see how many beans were under the cup. So we stayed some more and watched and realized that the guy with the beans had two co horts that were also betting and winning and losing money (which of course didn't matter b/c they were all together). These guys were used to draw you into betting b/c they would lay down stupid bets and lose. Say you saw that there were 2 beans under the cup, they'd bet 3 or 1 and lose, and we'd think how easy it was since it was obviously 2. But as soon as we bet, when it was obviously 2, it would become 3. So we figured out that the bean man would add or subtract beans magician style at the last moment after you had bet, so that you couldn't win and the to players in with him were just used to build up your confidence. There was also some weird cheat thing that would go on to draw you in as well. But we became quite intrigued with the game and went around to lots of different dealers where we could immediately spot the two helpers, and we were entertained watching them suck other people in. We of course could get really into it and talk english to each other, b/c no one else could understand. We were frustrated at our stupidness for being scammed and losing 2 bucks on the game, but of course it was 2 bucks for a whole night of good entertainment.
11/16 We walked to three other waterfalls on the plateau. First we went to Tad Champee which was an incredibly scenic and secluded falls that we enjoyed a nice dip in the very refreshing water. Next we went to Tad Fan, which is a twin falls dropping 100 meters off of the plateau. It was breathtaking, but only a bit more breathtaking than the ledge you had to stand out on to get a view of the falls. The last falls was, of course, another beautiful one called Tad Yuang. After we got done hiking to the falls, we hitch hiked a ride back to Pakse, where we got some good indian food (and some roti canais!) and then caught a night bus headed for vientiene, the capital city. The bus was super sweet as it was a sleeper bus, which meant we each had beds. We were only going as far as Tha Kaek though, so we got off at 1 am there. We hitched a ride towards town. We got picked up by an employee of one of the guest houses, so we were dropped there. The available rooms there smelled terrible, so we turned it down and walked the 1km to the next recommended guesthouse. It, and the ones nearby were all full, so we walked the next km to downtown where we finally found a guesthouse and went to bed a bit after 3am. A crazy night for sure.
11/17 Today our main job was to do laundry, buy toothpaste, and book a tour to the national park we wanted to go to. Only the toothpaste proved easy. The tour company we wanted to go through has no office here yet, even though that's what we had thought originally. But the branch in pakse said it would be easy to find other companies here. Well, there were definitely no other companies here and the tourist info office was closed for some reason (perhaps public holiday). We finally were able to get a hold of a guy to let us into the tourist office and get some info, but there wasn't anything good. So we called the company we wanted to go with originally and who is based in vientienne. They said they had nothing and couldn't, so we were kind of bumming and not knowing what to do. But as is my asian moto of nothing is impossible, don't believe anything from anyone, and be persistant, we tried another number from the same company and were able to book a tour, and only 1 day later then we hoped. With the Laundry conrad and whitney gave someone our clothes who asked for 2 dollars and they assumed would wash it. This is yet to be determined. But we are psyched for our tour in Phin Hun Bun national park.
Tonight we have a date to sip beer lao along the cool breezes of the mekong as the sun sets across the river over thailand.
Tomorrow we plan to just hang out in Tha Kaek, do some reading, perhaps a massage, and anything else there is to do here before our trip that takes off on the 19th and goes until the 22nd.
11/18 Didn't do much except head to the tha kaek market where Conrad made sure to buy the highly endangered pengalin to bbq up that night. j/k. But yes, it was one of the more crazy markets I have been to in asia yet with plenty of frogs, snails, snakes, rats, squirrels, and giant flying squirrels to be had. As well as some even more sketchy animals like the pangolins and beavers
Took a bus from Kratie to the Cambodia/Laos border. The border was pretty hilarious. It was just two random delapidated stilted wooden buildings. One to leave cambodia where there was a 1 dollar "fee", then a 100 meter walk to the one to enter Laos where the guy there decided to charge a 2 dollar "fee". Which I guess makes sense b/c we had to wake the poor guy up. There was no video security or anything like that, but one guy was there with a digital camera taking photos of all the white people crossing the border. Maybe for his own fun, but maybe for something official. The healthcare checkpoint was only guarded by a rooster, so we breezed through that, wary of catching bird flu from the inspector.
We then hopped on some big old passenger truck and took a short ride on an extremely pot-holed rode to the riverside of the mekong. It was now completely dark, but we hopped into a little longtail boat and headed off to Don Dhet, one of the islands in Si Phan Don (the 4000 islands). We checked into a place and then had fruitshakes and our first drink of the infamous beer lao. There is no electricity there from 10pm to 4pm, so it was definitely a sweaty night in our bungalows without a fan.
The next morning we got up early to take advantage of the slightly "cooler" morning air to ride bicycles to Don Khon Island. To get between the islands you cross a bridge that housed the only rail line ever built by the french in laos. From there we continued to bike until we came to the otherside and there is a powerful waterful as part of the mekong tumbles through some cataracts. The waterfall wasn't very tall or anything, but still very impressive with the huge amount of water of the mekong tumbling down and creating all that force. The ride there and back was scenic, through some rice fields and quiet villages. The 4000 islands are known as being the most relaxed place in Laos, a country that is known as one of the most relaxed places in the world. And we found that to be true. Almost everyone was just sitting in their hammocks or sleeping under a tree or in their store. And just very quiet and peaceful. So slow moving.
After our bike ride, we broke laos tradition and instead of spending the rest of the day in hammocks along the river sleeping and reading, we took the Happy Boat Tour which was a party barge type thing. We were on it with 2 germans (burndt and Anya), an Irishwoman (danielle, who was a covert bbc reporter paid to just chill in asia until some sort of story came up, but most recently she had been doing undercover reporting in Burma where the bbc is prohibited), and 2 aussie gals. The tour involved motoring to some island, swimming in the mekong all day to stay cool with beer lao bottles and buckets of lao whiskey and coke. At some point we had a fish bbq and then moved back to the river for more buckets and swimming. Then a mud fight of course! Eventually we got out tubes, tied them to the boat and took off back towards don dhet, all drunk and having a good time.
11/14 Took the boat then bus to Pakse and then another bus to Paksong, high up on the Bolaven Plateau where the air was magically and refreshingly cool. We celebrated the cool air with a thai bbq. The Bolaven plateau is noted for its cool air, waterfalls, and coffee plantations.
11/15 Rented motor bikes and drove 55km to Namtok Katamatok, the supposed largest waterfall in SE Asia. It's 120m tall (400ft) and truly impressive. You can't get down to the base of it, but even from a distance it's incredible as it tumbles off of the jungly plateau. The sound alone is crazy loud and then just watching the water crash onto the rocks and make all that mist. A most awesome waterfall indeed. The 55k there was an adventure as well. The first 10 km was on the "good" road according to the guy we rented from, but it was a paved road pockmarked with giant motorcycle swallowing potholes. So we had to get our swerve on and basically play mario kart with our real life scooters dodging potholes, oncoming traffic, chickens, water buffalo, cows, dogs, pigs, little kids, etc. After the paved pothole madness it was just a bumpy dirt road. On the way back we stopped at two other impressive waterfalls and swam at the top of one. It also poured and poured rain on the back. Brought me back a little to my sumatra motor biked days being on a cold and high plateau in pouring rain. I luckily had my rain coat with me, so I didn't get too wet and cold. But conrad and whitney just had their shorts and t-shirts, so they were icicles (whitney a shaking icicle) when we got back to our guesthouse. We were very thankful (for the first time) to have piping hot noodle soup to eat.
That night we went out to some carnival thing. There was this came with coffee beans where you put money on how many beans you thought were under the cup. It was fairly easy to see how many beans were under the cup, yet the two laotians playing were guessing wrong half the time. All of our eyes lit up with the thought of how much kip (laos money) we could make off this came, b/c it just seemed so simple. But after a short time we had all lost about 2 bucks and were done betting (2 bucks = two large beer lao's). But we were determined to figure out how we were losing, b/c it was so easy to see how many beans were under the cup. So we stayed some more and watched and realized that the guy with the beans had two co horts that were also betting and winning and losing money (which of course didn't matter b/c they were all together). These guys were used to draw you into betting b/c they would lay down stupid bets and lose. Say you saw that there were 2 beans under the cup, they'd bet 3 or 1 and lose, and we'd think how easy it was since it was obviously 2. But as soon as we bet, when it was obviously 2, it would become 3. So we figured out that the bean man would add or subtract beans magician style at the last moment after you had bet, so that you couldn't win and the to players in with him were just used to build up your confidence. There was also some weird cheat thing that would go on to draw you in as well. But we became quite intrigued with the game and went around to lots of different dealers where we could immediately spot the two helpers, and we were entertained watching them suck other people in. We of course could get really into it and talk english to each other, b/c no one else could understand. We were frustrated at our stupidness for being scammed and losing 2 bucks on the game, but of course it was 2 bucks for a whole night of good entertainment.
11/16 We walked to three other waterfalls on the plateau. First we went to Tad Champee which was an incredibly scenic and secluded falls that we enjoyed a nice dip in the very refreshing water. Next we went to Tad Fan, which is a twin falls dropping 100 meters off of the plateau. It was breathtaking, but only a bit more breathtaking than the ledge you had to stand out on to get a view of the falls. The last falls was, of course, another beautiful one called Tad Yuang. After we got done hiking to the falls, we hitch hiked a ride back to Pakse, where we got some good indian food (and some roti canais!) and then caught a night bus headed for vientiene, the capital city. The bus was super sweet as it was a sleeper bus, which meant we each had beds. We were only going as far as Tha Kaek though, so we got off at 1 am there. We hitched a ride towards town. We got picked up by an employee of one of the guest houses, so we were dropped there. The available rooms there smelled terrible, so we turned it down and walked the 1km to the next recommended guesthouse. It, and the ones nearby were all full, so we walked the next km to downtown where we finally found a guesthouse and went to bed a bit after 3am. A crazy night for sure.
11/17 Today our main job was to do laundry, buy toothpaste, and book a tour to the national park we wanted to go to. Only the toothpaste proved easy. The tour company we wanted to go through has no office here yet, even though that's what we had thought originally. But the branch in pakse said it would be easy to find other companies here. Well, there were definitely no other companies here and the tourist info office was closed for some reason (perhaps public holiday). We finally were able to get a hold of a guy to let us into the tourist office and get some info, but there wasn't anything good. So we called the company we wanted to go with originally and who is based in vientienne. They said they had nothing and couldn't, so we were kind of bumming and not knowing what to do. But as is my asian moto of nothing is impossible, don't believe anything from anyone, and be persistant, we tried another number from the same company and were able to book a tour, and only 1 day later then we hoped. With the Laundry conrad and whitney gave someone our clothes who asked for 2 dollars and they assumed would wash it. This is yet to be determined. But we are psyched for our tour in Phin Hun Bun national park.
Tonight we have a date to sip beer lao along the cool breezes of the mekong as the sun sets across the river over thailand.
Tomorrow we plan to just hang out in Tha Kaek, do some reading, perhaps a massage, and anything else there is to do here before our trip that takes off on the 19th and goes until the 22nd.
11/18 Didn't do much except head to the tha kaek market where Conrad made sure to buy the highly endangered pengalin to bbq up that night. j/k. But yes, it was one of the more crazy markets I have been to in asia yet with plenty of frogs, snails, snakes, rats, squirrels, and giant flying squirrels to be had. As well as some even more sketchy animals like the pangolins and beavers
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
The Rare Irrawaddy Dolphins
11/11/09
We started the day a bit slow in Kratie, partly due to being tired, but mostly due to how incredibly hot it was. Kratie is a nice little town that sits along the mighty mekong river. We hit up the market for some fruit and fresh baguettes. Thank you French!! Laos and cambodia (and hopefully vietnam) have good bread, the only place in asia, due to the heavy french influence. We then rented some motor bikes and headed into the countryside along the mekong. Cambodia life here is very 3rd world, and as elsewhere in cambodia, dominated by the hammock, the wheelbarrow, the tuk tuk seat, or whatever other device can be used for sleeping away the hot days. We have figured the cambodians have a life similar to the cat, sleeping most of the day and night.
Our first stop was along the river where we roused a boatmen from a nap to take us to look for the extremely endangered Mekong Irrawaddy Dolphin. There is apparently only 50 or so of these noseless freshwater dolphins in the mekong, but they stick to certain areas and are thus still easy to find in this protected zone. So we ended up getting to see quite a few. At least 10 from the boat and 3 from shore. We watched them swim around hunting for fish for about an hour before heading back to shore to take a nap under the shade. We continued on up the river for several more miles, stopping for some 5 cent icecream cones and some ice fruit desert (sorta similar to the ABC in malaysia) to try and stay somewhat cool. We also tried to get some food, which we eventually did, but was extremely difficult b/c we still haven't learned how to ask for food or prices in Khmer language and the people just in general weren't too excited to sell us some food (very untypical asian) as I think it would mean getting up from the hammock.
On the way back to Kratie, we took a dirt road to some village and along the way, some people sweating the in rice fields invited us with a hand motion to come help them. So we worked a bit with their special tool, harvesting their rice with them.
We're just hanging out the morning today waiting for the bus from phnom penh that will take us to the laos border and that is supposed to be also delivering us our passports with our laos visas. So if all goes well, we'll be in Laos tonight.
This part of cambodia, aside from the heat, is much nicer though b/c people are back to being more friendly (though a cautious friendly) and less of trying to sell you things (for 1 dolla). Tourism isn't so big here like it is in the other 3 cambodian places we've been. And I like the much more relaxed feel. This definitely isn't so much scambodia as cambodia. Though of course hard bargaining is still a necessity.
We started the day a bit slow in Kratie, partly due to being tired, but mostly due to how incredibly hot it was. Kratie is a nice little town that sits along the mighty mekong river. We hit up the market for some fruit and fresh baguettes. Thank you French!! Laos and cambodia (and hopefully vietnam) have good bread, the only place in asia, due to the heavy french influence. We then rented some motor bikes and headed into the countryside along the mekong. Cambodia life here is very 3rd world, and as elsewhere in cambodia, dominated by the hammock, the wheelbarrow, the tuk tuk seat, or whatever other device can be used for sleeping away the hot days. We have figured the cambodians have a life similar to the cat, sleeping most of the day and night.
Our first stop was along the river where we roused a boatmen from a nap to take us to look for the extremely endangered Mekong Irrawaddy Dolphin. There is apparently only 50 or so of these noseless freshwater dolphins in the mekong, but they stick to certain areas and are thus still easy to find in this protected zone. So we ended up getting to see quite a few. At least 10 from the boat and 3 from shore. We watched them swim around hunting for fish for about an hour before heading back to shore to take a nap under the shade. We continued on up the river for several more miles, stopping for some 5 cent icecream cones and some ice fruit desert (sorta similar to the ABC in malaysia) to try and stay somewhat cool. We also tried to get some food, which we eventually did, but was extremely difficult b/c we still haven't learned how to ask for food or prices in Khmer language and the people just in general weren't too excited to sell us some food (very untypical asian) as I think it would mean getting up from the hammock.
On the way back to Kratie, we took a dirt road to some village and along the way, some people sweating the in rice fields invited us with a hand motion to come help them. So we worked a bit with their special tool, harvesting their rice with them.
We're just hanging out the morning today waiting for the bus from phnom penh that will take us to the laos border and that is supposed to be also delivering us our passports with our laos visas. So if all goes well, we'll be in Laos tonight.
This part of cambodia, aside from the heat, is much nicer though b/c people are back to being more friendly (though a cautious friendly) and less of trying to sell you things (for 1 dolla). Tourism isn't so big here like it is in the other 3 cambodian places we've been. And I like the much more relaxed feel. This definitely isn't so much scambodia as cambodia. Though of course hard bargaining is still a necessity.
Sihounikville, Sun, Sauce, and the Sales
So took the bus from PP to Sihounikville. We arrived at night, got our rooms and then headed for some street noodles. At the noodle stand we also got a pitcher of angkor beer to go. Of course a pitcher to go, means beer in a bag...just like tea or pop in a bag everywhere else in asia. After we finished that, we headed to a bar with 50 cent draft angkors and 2 dolla (I forgot to mention before that both the USD and the Riel are used anywhere anytime) mekong whiskey buckets. We had a good time there and eventually made our way back to kyle and lindsey's nice hotel where we went swimming in our unds in their pool. At first we tried to be quiet, but then all the guards (especially the ones sleeping on the lawnchairs poolside) knew we were there, but they could care less. It is scambodia after all.
The next day we headed out to the beach where we were able to rent beach chairs and umbrellas for the whole day for just buying one mango shake or draft beer (again 50 cents). Of course we bought a few more than that and just chilled and swam in the ocean all day. Also got some beachside massages. We splurged on a seaside dinner with fresh red snapper, a salad, and amazing baked potatoes for 3 bucks. They also had mekong buckets for 1.5 dolla here and tasty cocktails for 1.5.
Something funny: a mangy dog ran under Conrad's beach chair. Conrad was trying to shoe him away, but wasn't having any luck. So he asked the guy in charge of the bar/restaurant that we were at to help him get rid of the dog as the guy had been fairly successful at getting away the annoying beach vendors. But the man didn't have the best english and thought that Conrad wanted the dog cooked for dinner! In siem reap lots of the western restaurants had signs saying, "we serve no worms, insects, dogs, snakes, or lizards"
After a quick shower in the bathroom of the sale's hotel, we all caught the night bus to phnom penh which was continuing on to Siem Reap for the Sales. Conrad, Whitney, and I got off. Our goal was to try and higher a taxi to Kratie in northern cambodia b/c the next bus there wasn't until the morning and would didn't want to stay in phnom penh another night, plus the bus would take an incredibly long time. But Phnom penh was absolutely dead at 12:30 at night. We finally found a minivan loaded with cargo that was going in the morning, and were able to convince it to take us there that night for a bit of dough. Turned out to be an ok ride, b/c we could lay the seat down onto our bags so that it was sort of a "sleeper" van. The ride was long, on incredibly rough and often potholed dirt roads. But we made it safe and sound into Kratie about 6am the next day, which was also good b/c we hadn't wasted a day travelling.
The next day we headed out to the beach where we were able to rent beach chairs and umbrellas for the whole day for just buying one mango shake or draft beer (again 50 cents). Of course we bought a few more than that and just chilled and swam in the ocean all day. Also got some beachside massages. We splurged on a seaside dinner with fresh red snapper, a salad, and amazing baked potatoes for 3 bucks. They also had mekong buckets for 1.5 dolla here and tasty cocktails for 1.5.
Something funny: a mangy dog ran under Conrad's beach chair. Conrad was trying to shoe him away, but wasn't having any luck. So he asked the guy in charge of the bar/restaurant that we were at to help him get rid of the dog as the guy had been fairly successful at getting away the annoying beach vendors. But the man didn't have the best english and thought that Conrad wanted the dog cooked for dinner! In siem reap lots of the western restaurants had signs saying, "we serve no worms, insects, dogs, snakes, or lizards"
After a quick shower in the bathroom of the sale's hotel, we all caught the night bus to phnom penh which was continuing on to Siem Reap for the Sales. Conrad, Whitney, and I got off. Our goal was to try and higher a taxi to Kratie in northern cambodia b/c the next bus there wasn't until the morning and would didn't want to stay in phnom penh another night, plus the bus would take an incredibly long time. But Phnom penh was absolutely dead at 12:30 at night. We finally found a minivan loaded with cargo that was going in the morning, and were able to convince it to take us there that night for a bit of dough. Turned out to be an ok ride, b/c we could lay the seat down onto our bags so that it was sort of a "sleeper" van. The ride was long, on incredibly rough and often potholed dirt roads. But we made it safe and sound into Kratie about 6am the next day, which was also good b/c we hadn't wasted a day travelling.
Khmer Rouge
We spent our morning in Phnom Penh trying to arrange what we would do, which is more difficult with 5 people, 2 of which are staying in another part of town and then also getting our laos visas in order. After we had that set, we tuk tuked over to the S-21 (Tual Sleng)prison camp. It was a school turned prison camp during the Khmer Rouge era (the late 70's) that was used as a prison, torture area, and just killing area. It's been turned into a museum now. A very sobering one in that. It's a terrible story in which the khmer rouge an aggerian communist group took over, kicked everyone out of phnom penh, and killed all educated people. At least 2 million of the 8 million population (1/4 of it) were killed during the khmer rouge. And it was only 30 years ago, so it still has its affects here psychologically. I think the people are less trusting, less friendly than other places. I mean, anyone over 30 living here, lived through the khmer rouge (and lots through the american bombing of the vietnam war), so they witnessed all the killing. And lots of times no khmer rouge cambodians turned to killing their fellow countrymen just so they could survive themselves. So even 30 years afterwards, it's a real mess, and you can still kind of feel it. And even to this day, there are about 700 reported deaths a year due to unexploded ordinance and land mines from the khmer rouge. In cambodia, you definitely don't go off the trodden trail for fear of landmines. So when it's time to pee, whitney goes one way on the road to pee and conrad and I to the other. After visiting S-21 we decided we didn't need to visit the killing fields which are basically fields filled with 1000's of skulls all piled up that have been dug up from the times of the khmer rouge. In Phnom Penh you can also shoot ak-47 machine guns and rocket launchers (probably one of the only places in the world to do this an not be in the millitary), which you sickeningly shoot at cows, goats, or another animal of your choice. But we of course found this quite in poor taste after the museum we visited and had no intentions of doing that. So we instead decided to catch a bus to Sihounikville, a beach resort. It was in the opposite direction of the way that the franks and I were going, but we wanted to spend the last few days with the sales before they headed to angkor wat and phnom penh was not a good place to do this.
Friday, November 6, 2009
Scambodia
Got up as early as we could on the 5th and took the water taxi, then the tram to the bus station to catch a bus to aranyaprathet at the cambodia/thai border. Ignored all the calls that you needed to pay extra money for a special visa, and just walked over into poipet cambodia where the visa was simple enough. The busses to siem reap (the city where angkor wat is) were all finished, so we had to take a taxi. The taxi took us to some random place in cambodia where a man, luc, gave us a "free" ride to, not the hostel we wanted to go to, but another one he said that was good, which of course he was connected with, just as the taxi had been connected with him. It was ok though b/c we got a sweet deal at the place we stayed (8 bucks for the 3 of us with free internet and cable tv and hot shower). Of course luc wanted us to take his tuk tuk tour of angkor. We weren't so sure if we wanted his tour, so we walked around town and checked some other places as well as ate at an amazing place with great noodles and fruit shakes. In the end we decided to go with luc on his tour.
The next morning we were up at 5am so we could catch the sunrise on Angkor Wat, which was pretty stunning. Then we walked around the giant temple complex built by one of the jayavarman kings (known to us as javaman). We ate some nice breakfast in front of the temple and then went back to our driver, who it turns out wasn't luc, but someone who worked for him. This new driver showed us the route he was going to take us on, which wasn't where we had wanted to go, which maybe we'd have known if luc had shown up for our 10 oçlock meeting, which he didn't. The proposed route was one we wanted to do on our bikes. And then we had been promised the driver would be a guide, but he just drove you to the temples and then slept in a hammock while he waited for you. So with this is mind, and after a bit of arguing with luc on the phone, we paid the driver for the ride to angkor and then decided to find a different driver. We also bought a nice guide book for 5 bucks (cover price of 30). There are no copyright laws in scambodia, so it makes book prices really cheap. I got a laos lonely planet for 3 bucks (I had bought the indonesia one for 37 in KL) here as well. So with our new driver we told him we wanted to go out and seem some further out temples while we had a tuk tuk so we could bike the next day to the closer temples. So that day after Angkor Wat temple we went to banteay Srei temple with it's incredibly intricate designs. It also had no shade and we nearly died of heat, so we lovingly refer to it as the temple of fire as well. From here we went a ways out to the hills and jungle. We happened to arrive just in time for a tour of a wildlife rehab center, which was pretty cool. Then we hiked up to this area (Kbal Spean) where there were some carvings in the bed of the river. Pretty amazing considering there is a river constantly washing over it, and how one carves in a river is crazy too. But it wasn't as amazing as the freezing waterfall that we showered under up there. A much needed refresher. After coming back from Kbal Spean we went to Banteay Samre temple and then on to Pre Rup for a nice sunset. On pre rup you could climb up to the top and watch it there. We were greeted with cold beers on the top for 1 dolla (everything there was 1 dolla) and we couldn't resist. There was a large japanese tour group on top already (but no problem for us b/c even whitney was much taller) and when the sun sunk they all clapped excitedly, like perhaps it was an event that doesn't always happen.
The next day we rented bikes to do the main circle. We visited the temples of Banteay Kdei, Ta Prohm, Ta Keo, Preah Khan, the victory gates of Angkor Thom, and then the Terrace of the Elephants, Terrace of the Lepers, Baphuon, and Bayon temple all inside of ankor thom. Ta Prohm may have been my favorite temple. It had been left to nature as opposed to restored like the others, so it had more of an indiana jones temple feel (they actually filmed laura croft tomb raider with angelina jolie there apparently). It was sweet b/c it was all crumbly with moss growing everywhere and giant trees and strangler figs just growing out of the temple with their huge roots going down into the cracks in the blocks. I also liked Preah Khan a lot b/c it had the same feeling, but with no tourists there, so we had it to ourselves. And Bayon was also sweet with it's huge faces everywhere. For sunset we walked up Phnom Bakheng to the Bakheng temple to watch the sun fall over tonle sap lake. Of course that night we ended with some tasty noodles and mango shakes and a khmer style massage.
11/8 In the morning we took a tuk tuk to the Ruluos group farther afield from siem reap and visite preah ko, bakong (the oldest of the major temples), and Lolei. We then bussed to phnom penh where we met up with Kyle and Lindsey Sales. We didn't like phnom penh at all as it was dirty, hot, stinky, and just not very nice, so we made plans to get out.
But the temples of angkor were definitely sweet. Amazing that something so big could be built way back then and in such heat. Adding to the experience of the temples was the horde of women and children that were always trying to sell you things at the temple entrances. You were always hearing cold water sir, one dolla, hey lady you want fruit, one dolla. You remember me sir, you come back and buy from me sir. One dolla. Of course cambodia is a place full of bargaining, so we could always get great deals. The walk away method is amazing and I think we always got what we wanted doing that. And whitney is an intense bargainer. As Kyle Sales would say, when he needed a good deal he'd call Catan over (catan is whitney's nickname here due to her skills at a board game back home).
The next morning we were up at 5am so we could catch the sunrise on Angkor Wat, which was pretty stunning. Then we walked around the giant temple complex built by one of the jayavarman kings (known to us as javaman). We ate some nice breakfast in front of the temple and then went back to our driver, who it turns out wasn't luc, but someone who worked for him. This new driver showed us the route he was going to take us on, which wasn't where we had wanted to go, which maybe we'd have known if luc had shown up for our 10 oçlock meeting, which he didn't. The proposed route was one we wanted to do on our bikes. And then we had been promised the driver would be a guide, but he just drove you to the temples and then slept in a hammock while he waited for you. So with this is mind, and after a bit of arguing with luc on the phone, we paid the driver for the ride to angkor and then decided to find a different driver. We also bought a nice guide book for 5 bucks (cover price of 30). There are no copyright laws in scambodia, so it makes book prices really cheap. I got a laos lonely planet for 3 bucks (I had bought the indonesia one for 37 in KL) here as well. So with our new driver we told him we wanted to go out and seem some further out temples while we had a tuk tuk so we could bike the next day to the closer temples. So that day after Angkor Wat temple we went to banteay Srei temple with it's incredibly intricate designs. It also had no shade and we nearly died of heat, so we lovingly refer to it as the temple of fire as well. From here we went a ways out to the hills and jungle. We happened to arrive just in time for a tour of a wildlife rehab center, which was pretty cool. Then we hiked up to this area (Kbal Spean) where there were some carvings in the bed of the river. Pretty amazing considering there is a river constantly washing over it, and how one carves in a river is crazy too. But it wasn't as amazing as the freezing waterfall that we showered under up there. A much needed refresher. After coming back from Kbal Spean we went to Banteay Samre temple and then on to Pre Rup for a nice sunset. On pre rup you could climb up to the top and watch it there. We were greeted with cold beers on the top for 1 dolla (everything there was 1 dolla) and we couldn't resist. There was a large japanese tour group on top already (but no problem for us b/c even whitney was much taller) and when the sun sunk they all clapped excitedly, like perhaps it was an event that doesn't always happen.
The next day we rented bikes to do the main circle. We visited the temples of Banteay Kdei, Ta Prohm, Ta Keo, Preah Khan, the victory gates of Angkor Thom, and then the Terrace of the Elephants, Terrace of the Lepers, Baphuon, and Bayon temple all inside of ankor thom. Ta Prohm may have been my favorite temple. It had been left to nature as opposed to restored like the others, so it had more of an indiana jones temple feel (they actually filmed laura croft tomb raider with angelina jolie there apparently). It was sweet b/c it was all crumbly with moss growing everywhere and giant trees and strangler figs just growing out of the temple with their huge roots going down into the cracks in the blocks. I also liked Preah Khan a lot b/c it had the same feeling, but with no tourists there, so we had it to ourselves. And Bayon was also sweet with it's huge faces everywhere. For sunset we walked up Phnom Bakheng to the Bakheng temple to watch the sun fall over tonle sap lake. Of course that night we ended with some tasty noodles and mango shakes and a khmer style massage.
11/8 In the morning we took a tuk tuk to the Ruluos group farther afield from siem reap and visite preah ko, bakong (the oldest of the major temples), and Lolei. We then bussed to phnom penh where we met up with Kyle and Lindsey Sales. We didn't like phnom penh at all as it was dirty, hot, stinky, and just not very nice, so we made plans to get out.
But the temples of angkor were definitely sweet. Amazing that something so big could be built way back then and in such heat. Adding to the experience of the temples was the horde of women and children that were always trying to sell you things at the temple entrances. You were always hearing cold water sir, one dolla, hey lady you want fruit, one dolla. You remember me sir, you come back and buy from me sir. One dolla. Of course cambodia is a place full of bargaining, so we could always get great deals. The walk away method is amazing and I think we always got what we wanted doing that. And whitney is an intense bargainer. As Kyle Sales would say, when he needed a good deal he'd call Catan over (catan is whitney's nickname here due to her skills at a board game back home).
Conrad, Whitney, Changs, and Mango Shakes in Bangkok
Arrived early into Bangkok, where it was suprisingly chilly. Felt like an early morning in june in estes to me.
Made it back to my favorite guesthouse where I ordered a mango shake and waited for the franks. When they arrived I was waiting for them with 3 big changs. We did a few random things around bangkok, got a massage, and went to the golden mount temple for sunset. The night was good fun with several buckets (and refilled buckets from 7-11 sneakily added by the gibster) and more changs.
We all woke up in the morning and realized that we had bought something while under the influence. Not a big LOVE MOM tattoo, but 3 bracelets from the northern hill tribes.
A most excellent reunion with amazing friends in a great city to have one.
Made it back to my favorite guesthouse where I ordered a mango shake and waited for the franks. When they arrived I was waiting for them with 3 big changs. We did a few random things around bangkok, got a massage, and went to the golden mount temple for sunset. The night was good fun with several buckets (and refilled buckets from 7-11 sneakily added by the gibster) and more changs.
We all woke up in the morning and realized that we had bought something while under the influence. Not a big LOVE MOM tattoo, but 3 bracelets from the northern hill tribes.
A most excellent reunion with amazing friends in a great city to have one.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Thailand: 1970's
Stayed the night at a lovely guesthouse in Trang with a very friendly family. The next morning, took a van to Hat Yao and then a boat on to Ko Libong (incase you forgot ko = island in Thai). It's a nice little tropical island with lots of flowers and a couple fishing villages and no cars. The fishing villages are all muslim, which meant I had a nice roti canai for breakfast upon arrival before taking a motorbike the 10km on a dirt road to the other side of the island. There are only three small places to stay on the island, all on the same beach. As it's the low season (which dramatically ends on nov. 1st), I got a great deal on my beachside bungalow run by a really friendly family as well. Had a great day of weather, so spent the afternoon wondering around the beach and wading to a nearby island and then just doing some reading in the hammock and playing beach pong with the owner's 3 kids. And of course swimming in the andaman sea. I had forgotten just how warm the water in Thailand is. Malaysia and indo have warm water, but thailand is even warmer. It's like bathwater, except it doesn't cool down so you can stay forever. I was also the only tourist on the whole island. The trang islands are still a bit more off the beaten path being farther and harder to reach than phuket and phi phi. So this added to the fact that it was low season, meant I was the only one on the whole island. I had dinner that night in a nearby fishing village. I think it's rare for tourists to wonder into the villages for eating so it drew quite the crowd and commotion to come see the farang eat at the local place.
The next morning, got up bright and early to great weather to take a longtail boat and go dugong spotting. Dugongs, also known as sea cows, are a very endangered sea living relative of the infamous florida manatee. Saw 4 on the trip, or the same 1 4 times, who knows. They just come up for a couple fairly quick breaths, like a whale, before diving back down to munch on the sea grass.
After I was done with the dugong tour, I took a boat back to hat yao on the mainland. As I was barterig over the cost of the motorbike ride to the next port I was going to, 3 japanese expats who live in bangkok stopped by and told me they'd take me there in their car. They live in bangkok and work for a magazine that is published in bangkoks for all the japanese expats living there. These guys' jobs were to write the travel section each weak, so they get to go to these different islands to write about them and the places to stay. Not a bad job. It was 1pm when I arrived at the port and turns out I had missed the last boat which goes at noon to ko mook, so I would have to do an expensive charter. But, I have been in asia long enough to know there is always another way. So I asked around the port and found a boat heading to ko mook just carrying supplies and I could hitch a ride with it. It was amazing how smooth of a travel day it had been. I had never had to wait, from the time I got finished with the dugong tour until my arrival in ko mook, more than 5 minutes for any kind of transport. I couldn't hardly believe it, especially after being in indonesia. It was a good thing too b/c a few minutes after landing on ko mook, it started pouring. There was a woman on the cargo boat with me and she led me to the place she worked at called cocos. They had nice bungalows, but out of my price range. The two owners were incredibly nice though and gave me a tent to pitch on their beach. The owners were both totally chilled thai guys who had lived at one point in LA and I enjoyed just sitting and talking with them. After the rain ended I walked around the fishing village there and then to the otherside of the island to Farang beach where most of the accomadation was. The beach there was gorgeous with huge karst rock cliffs on either side and islands in the distance and empty as well. Although ko mook was a bit more developed for tourism than ko libong, it was still quite empty. I had the whole beach and the sunset to myself. On the way home I stopped at ate at this really nice woman's restaurant, and she was so happy to have me there to talk to. I wanted to do a tour the next day, but to charter a whole tour yourself was quite expensive, but I couldn't fin any other tourists, so I told her my dilemma. She said to come back the next morning.
The next morning (Halloween!!), walking by her place, she came running out telling me she had found 3 other people to share with. So that was most excellent.
The first stop was a place called emerald cave. It was this cave into the limestone cliff that you had to swim about 100 yards, 80 of it in pitch black (the guide who was far ahead did have torch) to this small emerald lagoon and white beach inside the mountain with the only opening to the outside world, straight up. It was quite spectacular and very amazing. Apparently pirates back in the day used to hide their treasure in there. A lost and hidden beach and lagoon. Something straight out of pirates of the caribbean. The swim to it and back to the ocean was pretty intense b/c of the total darkness and the waves, which were small but had a crashing noise amplified by the cave and tunnel. I'm a good swimmer, but at one point, even I was a bit nervous I'd get lost, but apparently there were no side passages.
The next place we went was ko kradan for some snorkelling and then onto the gorgeous white beach there with good views of the turquoise sea and surrounding karst islands. We did the short hike to the otherside of the island for views to that side.
When the tour was over, we all just sat around on the ko mook beach and read and then swam, b/c again, the water is so insanely warm here. Back at my bungalow area, the guys had prepared me a big halloween feast (that they would end up not charging me for as a gift) of some spicy peanut curry and then a huge, huge fresh fish. We also had some fresh grilled pumpkin for halloween and a desert of papaya picked from one of their trees. After the dinner, I walked back to the other side of the island to a place owned by an australian guy (brian) and his thai wife who were having a halloween party. Every tourist on the island was at the party... all 7 of us. The three other people from my tour (max--french canadian, manny--brit, izzy--aussie), some old irish guy, and then an american couple (virginia--from texas and robbie from florida). Costumes were in short supply, but fun was not.
The next day, the guys I was staying with had hooked me up for a homestay at a muslim fishing village on an island in ao phang nga marine park where I was going next. So I took the boat to the mainland, bus to trang and then bus to phang nga town. When I got off the bus a woman came up to me and asked if I needed any tourist info. I was interested in the tours they had and how to get to this island where I would be staying, so I went with her. Turned out she did the tours and booking with the same people I was going to stay with, so she was able to arrange all the transport and everything for me. Again, such smooth travel.
Took a boat ride to ko panyi, which is a little island in the bay. The fishing village is quite interesting b/c it's completely on stilts. None of it is on land. There is a huge giant karst rock as the island, but nothing can be built on it, so instead the people have built a village on stilts. At low tide there is land muddy land exposed, but at medium and high tides it's all water underneath. It's so crazy where they build! I would imagine there are some older people on the island who have never touched foot on actual land. They have a soccer field, but it's a cement "field" on stilts. Needless to say the island was gorgeous and and stunning views, especially at sunset of the bay filled with giant limestone islands. These limestone islands are so spectacular b/c they just just straight up out of the water 100's of feet high. Impressive impressive impressive. I again had the island to myself. During the day, lots of tours come to this island from phuket on their day trips, but I had it all to myself in the afternoon and evenings. They made me a huge tasty seafood meal and I just enjoyed the view under the full moon. The full moon is the one thing that has been keeping me in check in terms of time on this trip, b/c it's such a blatant reminder...and well, there is only 1 more full moon left on my trip!
The next morning I went on the full day trip of the phang nga bay and marine park. Only one other guy, a dutch geologist, was on my tour. And what a great tour it was. First of all, I was glad to be on a traditional and smaller longtail boat compared to the huge budget boats with 40 some people coming from phuket or the fancy schmancy modern speedboats coming from phuket b/c it allowed us to go into smaller caves and areas such as that, as well as I got much better views with only two of us on the boat. We first explored the mangroves and some back passageways there, and then we visited some of the main sites such as hidden lagoons, huge caves and tunnels that we could go from one side of the island to the other buy going under the mountain in the boat. We also visited one where we got out and walked through a cave to a hidden lagoon on the inside of the island. We had lunch on a secluded beach. And we also visited the famed james bond island which is one of the main tourist draws b/c the island just sits awkwardly balanced over the water, like it will fall anytime. And also I guess b/c it was featured in james bond's man with the golden gun. And lastly we saw some places where people 3000 years ago lived in cliff dwellings and had some hieroglyphics. But the best part of the tour was definitely just cruising by and checking out all the crazy gorgeous limestone karsts jutting out of the water.
Stayed another quiet night on the fishing village, and left the next morning back to phang nga town. I was lucky to have gone on the tour the day before b/c this day was ugly and cloudy, though just a sprinkle of rain. Back at phang nga town, I took a motor bike to Phra Sang Manora national park and spent the day walking around there. It had some cool caves and rainforest, but the best was the streams in the area that were blocked by some unique limestone formations into lots of clear blue pools for swimming. So I hiked up the nature trail one way and came back by walking and swimming through the creek. The pools were how you might imagine a fairyland, with tall trees and big roots everywhere and then these pools with cascading waterfalls coming out of each one. Reminded me of the pools in the animated movie Fern Gully that takes place in the australian rainforest (and is a great movie by the way), and which of course has some rainforest fairies.
Back in phang nga, I explored around a bit. It's a nice town with limestone karsts cliffs everywhere as well. Went up to a buddhist temple with a nice view of the town and then made it back in time to catch my night bus (fancy double decker) to bangkok to meet up with the infamous conrad and whitney.
I was very lucky to experience this last bit of thailand that I did. The fact that I was in some of the less touristy areas combined with the turn of the offseason to the start of the higher season is what made it so great. I feel like I got to experience thailand like it was back in the 1970's. You always hear from old backpackers (that I meet in other countries) who travelled in the 70's when the hippy trail was first starting about how completely amazing thailand was with its friendly people, empty beaches, etc but how now they think it's ruined and won't go back. Well, I think I was lucky to see this b/c I can tell you it was definitely much different from when I was there in march-april at places like ko tao, samui, and phi phi.
The next morning, got up bright and early to great weather to take a longtail boat and go dugong spotting. Dugongs, also known as sea cows, are a very endangered sea living relative of the infamous florida manatee. Saw 4 on the trip, or the same 1 4 times, who knows. They just come up for a couple fairly quick breaths, like a whale, before diving back down to munch on the sea grass.
After I was done with the dugong tour, I took a boat back to hat yao on the mainland. As I was barterig over the cost of the motorbike ride to the next port I was going to, 3 japanese expats who live in bangkok stopped by and told me they'd take me there in their car. They live in bangkok and work for a magazine that is published in bangkoks for all the japanese expats living there. These guys' jobs were to write the travel section each weak, so they get to go to these different islands to write about them and the places to stay. Not a bad job. It was 1pm when I arrived at the port and turns out I had missed the last boat which goes at noon to ko mook, so I would have to do an expensive charter. But, I have been in asia long enough to know there is always another way. So I asked around the port and found a boat heading to ko mook just carrying supplies and I could hitch a ride with it. It was amazing how smooth of a travel day it had been. I had never had to wait, from the time I got finished with the dugong tour until my arrival in ko mook, more than 5 minutes for any kind of transport. I couldn't hardly believe it, especially after being in indonesia. It was a good thing too b/c a few minutes after landing on ko mook, it started pouring. There was a woman on the cargo boat with me and she led me to the place she worked at called cocos. They had nice bungalows, but out of my price range. The two owners were incredibly nice though and gave me a tent to pitch on their beach. The owners were both totally chilled thai guys who had lived at one point in LA and I enjoyed just sitting and talking with them. After the rain ended I walked around the fishing village there and then to the otherside of the island to Farang beach where most of the accomadation was. The beach there was gorgeous with huge karst rock cliffs on either side and islands in the distance and empty as well. Although ko mook was a bit more developed for tourism than ko libong, it was still quite empty. I had the whole beach and the sunset to myself. On the way home I stopped at ate at this really nice woman's restaurant, and she was so happy to have me there to talk to. I wanted to do a tour the next day, but to charter a whole tour yourself was quite expensive, but I couldn't fin any other tourists, so I told her my dilemma. She said to come back the next morning.
The next morning (Halloween!!), walking by her place, she came running out telling me she had found 3 other people to share with. So that was most excellent.
The first stop was a place called emerald cave. It was this cave into the limestone cliff that you had to swim about 100 yards, 80 of it in pitch black (the guide who was far ahead did have torch) to this small emerald lagoon and white beach inside the mountain with the only opening to the outside world, straight up. It was quite spectacular and very amazing. Apparently pirates back in the day used to hide their treasure in there. A lost and hidden beach and lagoon. Something straight out of pirates of the caribbean. The swim to it and back to the ocean was pretty intense b/c of the total darkness and the waves, which were small but had a crashing noise amplified by the cave and tunnel. I'm a good swimmer, but at one point, even I was a bit nervous I'd get lost, but apparently there were no side passages.
The next place we went was ko kradan for some snorkelling and then onto the gorgeous white beach there with good views of the turquoise sea and surrounding karst islands. We did the short hike to the otherside of the island for views to that side.
When the tour was over, we all just sat around on the ko mook beach and read and then swam, b/c again, the water is so insanely warm here. Back at my bungalow area, the guys had prepared me a big halloween feast (that they would end up not charging me for as a gift) of some spicy peanut curry and then a huge, huge fresh fish. We also had some fresh grilled pumpkin for halloween and a desert of papaya picked from one of their trees. After the dinner, I walked back to the other side of the island to a place owned by an australian guy (brian) and his thai wife who were having a halloween party. Every tourist on the island was at the party... all 7 of us. The three other people from my tour (max--french canadian, manny--brit, izzy--aussie), some old irish guy, and then an american couple (virginia--from texas and robbie from florida). Costumes were in short supply, but fun was not.
The next day, the guys I was staying with had hooked me up for a homestay at a muslim fishing village on an island in ao phang nga marine park where I was going next. So I took the boat to the mainland, bus to trang and then bus to phang nga town. When I got off the bus a woman came up to me and asked if I needed any tourist info. I was interested in the tours they had and how to get to this island where I would be staying, so I went with her. Turned out she did the tours and booking with the same people I was going to stay with, so she was able to arrange all the transport and everything for me. Again, such smooth travel.
Took a boat ride to ko panyi, which is a little island in the bay. The fishing village is quite interesting b/c it's completely on stilts. None of it is on land. There is a huge giant karst rock as the island, but nothing can be built on it, so instead the people have built a village on stilts. At low tide there is land muddy land exposed, but at medium and high tides it's all water underneath. It's so crazy where they build! I would imagine there are some older people on the island who have never touched foot on actual land. They have a soccer field, but it's a cement "field" on stilts. Needless to say the island was gorgeous and and stunning views, especially at sunset of the bay filled with giant limestone islands. These limestone islands are so spectacular b/c they just just straight up out of the water 100's of feet high. Impressive impressive impressive. I again had the island to myself. During the day, lots of tours come to this island from phuket on their day trips, but I had it all to myself in the afternoon and evenings. They made me a huge tasty seafood meal and I just enjoyed the view under the full moon. The full moon is the one thing that has been keeping me in check in terms of time on this trip, b/c it's such a blatant reminder...and well, there is only 1 more full moon left on my trip!
The next morning I went on the full day trip of the phang nga bay and marine park. Only one other guy, a dutch geologist, was on my tour. And what a great tour it was. First of all, I was glad to be on a traditional and smaller longtail boat compared to the huge budget boats with 40 some people coming from phuket or the fancy schmancy modern speedboats coming from phuket b/c it allowed us to go into smaller caves and areas such as that, as well as I got much better views with only two of us on the boat. We first explored the mangroves and some back passageways there, and then we visited some of the main sites such as hidden lagoons, huge caves and tunnels that we could go from one side of the island to the other buy going under the mountain in the boat. We also visited one where we got out and walked through a cave to a hidden lagoon on the inside of the island. We had lunch on a secluded beach. And we also visited the famed james bond island which is one of the main tourist draws b/c the island just sits awkwardly balanced over the water, like it will fall anytime. And also I guess b/c it was featured in james bond's man with the golden gun. And lastly we saw some places where people 3000 years ago lived in cliff dwellings and had some hieroglyphics. But the best part of the tour was definitely just cruising by and checking out all the crazy gorgeous limestone karsts jutting out of the water.
Stayed another quiet night on the fishing village, and left the next morning back to phang nga town. I was lucky to have gone on the tour the day before b/c this day was ugly and cloudy, though just a sprinkle of rain. Back at phang nga town, I took a motor bike to Phra Sang Manora national park and spent the day walking around there. It had some cool caves and rainforest, but the best was the streams in the area that were blocked by some unique limestone formations into lots of clear blue pools for swimming. So I hiked up the nature trail one way and came back by walking and swimming through the creek. The pools were how you might imagine a fairyland, with tall trees and big roots everywhere and then these pools with cascading waterfalls coming out of each one. Reminded me of the pools in the animated movie Fern Gully that takes place in the australian rainforest (and is a great movie by the way), and which of course has some rainforest fairies.
Back in phang nga, I explored around a bit. It's a nice town with limestone karsts cliffs everywhere as well. Went up to a buddhist temple with a nice view of the town and then made it back in time to catch my night bus (fancy double decker) to bangkok to meet up with the infamous conrad and whitney.
I was very lucky to experience this last bit of thailand that I did. The fact that I was in some of the less touristy areas combined with the turn of the offseason to the start of the higher season is what made it so great. I feel like I got to experience thailand like it was back in the 1970's. You always hear from old backpackers (that I meet in other countries) who travelled in the 70's when the hippy trail was first starting about how completely amazing thailand was with its friendly people, empty beaches, etc but how now they think it's ruined and won't go back. Well, I think I was lucky to see this b/c I can tell you it was definitely much different from when I was there in march-april at places like ko tao, samui, and phi phi.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Aye Calypso I sing to your spirit
so i never had time to get this part of my trip journaled, but since I'm just waiting for the franks here in bangkok, finally had the chance
10/5
Arrived in Maumere from Moni to see amongst the scattering of hardly water worthy vessels in the indonesian port, one beautiful wooden ship sitting there. The Cheng Ho! The boat I was to be on the next 12 days.
So a little background: This is one of those lucky things that can happen to you when you're on a long trip. In the philippines I had met Hergen and Kerri at a diving place. They had actually been working in Indonesia in the Bali and Komodo area for quite some time on liveaboards and such and told me that when I got to bali I should email them for suggestions of where to do a bit of diving. Well, when I got to bali and emailed them, they suggested I contact the company, Kararu, that they used to work for (they had just moved to Manado in Sulawesi for the diving up there) and see if they had any last minute deals, especially with the economy in a worse state than the coral reefs these days. I heard back and found out there had just been a big group, who had chartered a boat, cancel for some reason. Well, this boat still had to make it from maumere to Ambon for its next group of people to pick up that would be going from Ambon to sorong and the raja ampats in papua, so this meant it was going no matter what. So they offered me an incredible deal to go on this ship last minute since with the cancellations they were now empty at the moment and obviously had little hope of getting many people b/c most people thinking about doing a trip like this were 2 week holidayers from europe or the states. The ship is a luxury sail ship with first rate diving. They offered me 65% off of the normal fair for the lowest class single bunk, waved the port fees (worth over 500 US), free use of all dive equipment, and a free upgrade to their nicest room, the state room. Even at 65% off, the trip still wouldn't be considered cheap, but after to talking with hergen and Kerri as well as Bill and Lisa Bubb from Australia who had done some similar trips, I decided it would be stupid not to do this trip since I was in the area and wouldn't even require a flight to get there, as who knows how long the reefs will last and as this is supposedly the 2nd most diverse reef area in the world (behind the raja ampats just next door) as the ocean apparently started way back when where the raja amapts are now, so the species are the most diverse. For example, the caribbean has like 30 species of butterfly fish and this area has over 350 species. And I'd also get to see some cool parts of indonesia that are usually either very expensive to get to or take a really really long time.
So I arrived at the hot, sweaty, and dirty port of maumere in flores to be ushered into the Cheng Ho, served and icy welcome drink, introduced to my luxury cabin, and no matter how hard I tried to decline the offer, had my luggage carried for me to my cabin. I met Peter and Kristine the dive cruise directors from Chicago and California. The other guests would be arriving in about an hour from the airport. I expected several people, but to my surprise there were only 2. Keep in mind the ship usually takes 18, but can hold 21! Dirk from Amsterdam and Paul a physician from Tampa who is originally from Puerto Rico. We were also introduced to the other two dive guides Bawa and Nyoman from Bali. So here we were, on this luxury ship, just the three of us, with 4 dive guides. We were all tingling with excitement and knew the trip would be amazing. We got a tour of the ship that had a huge and beautiful dining area, top decks for relaxing, and even an entertainment room with a huge flatscreen and an amazing video and novel library. They also gave me a laptop to use for the trip. The internet was actually broken, but not that it would have mattered b/c it did cost 2 bucks per email sent. But I used it to catch up a bit on my blog by just writing in word and then pasting when I got back to the internet and for looking at photos we took. And it was basically anything we wanted we could get. We had full access to sodas, fruit juices, milk, candies, cookies, and fresh fruits. I must have gone through so many oreos and milk the first day. That had been another thing I was craving: oreos dipped in milk. We would be served 5 meals a day. A first breakfast before the first dive with all the food of a real breakfast: fresh fruit, cereal, breads, etc. Then a real breakfast with eggs or french toast or whatever. Also there were afteroon snacks. And then a alway tasty buffet lunch and dinner that rotated between asian food (indian, indonesian, chinese, japanese (sushi!), and thai) and western (american, mexican, italian and just standard western fare like big pieces of meat). The interior of the ship was all decorated in balinese and papuan designs and pictures. And the whole ship itself, a 160 ft. long wooden phinisi schooner (traditional indonesian styled ship), was just beautiful, and kind of had the air of pirate ship.
We did a check out dive, a night muck dive, just off the boat in the port and immediately the diving was off to an amazing start and we knew the trip would be great. We saw an adult epillette shark and a juvenile one as well as lots of cuttle fish and two leaf fish. I didn't know quite how amazing it was to see an epillette shark, yet alone two of them, but Paul excitingly explained how rare a sight they were. It was great having Paul on board b/c he was so enthusiastic and was always making sure we knew just how amazing the diving was or what we were seeing. He's a physician as I said, but also is the photographer expert for a dive shop in tampa and has literally done hundreds of liveaboards and thousands of dives all over the world, so he knew what he was talking about. During and after the trip, he loved to say how my diving career had only begun not long ago, but now was over b/c there was no way I could ever live up to a trip like this (except at the raja ampats). Everything else would seem 2nd rate. (of course everyone is entitled to their opinions and other people have told me the solomon's, pulau, or komodo are just as good or better, so don't worry I still have places I can go in the future =)) And, yes, I would agree with him that these were the most diverse reefs I had ever seen and I saw everything I had hoped to see and more. Just so much. However, I would not say they are the healthiest reefs I have seen. This is b/c we were diving just in a lot of random islands, none of which are protected as national parks. A lot are fairly protected just due to remoteness and distance, but they are still fished. Because as Peter said, in indonesia fish is food. And even more than that shark fins and other big fish like napoleon wrasse are like gold for them when selling them to the chinese and japanese in the some legal and mostly illegal fish trade. So b/c of this we didn't see as many sharks or other big pelagic fish (napolean wrasse, bumpheads, barracudas, tuna) as you would expect to see (though we did see some) in a truly healthy coral reef ecosystem, but that didn't matter to me b/c I had gotten to see lots and lots of the big stuff at Sipadan in malaysia and tubattaha in the philippines. And the diversity of the reefs and fish there was just so staggering and amazing. After the dive we set sail for eastern flores on our pirate ship under a full moon. I sat up on the crow's nest for a while and just enjoyed the breeze, the full moon, and the feeling of being on this ship.
10/6 Did 4 more amazing dives around eastern flores and serbete island going to a new spot each time. Of course saw amazing corals and fish and on top of that saw a very bold octopus, and some huge bumphead parrotfish and napolean wrasses. The scenery above water was just as nice. With gorgeous tropical islands and nice turquoise water. Today while sailing between dive spots I sat up on the crow's nest and enjoyed the wonderful scenery from 80 or so feet up. The captain also showed me how to read the navigation charts and let me captain the ship for a bit.
10/7 4 stunning wall dives in the alor archipelago, specifically kawula island. Just unbelievable diving really. Saw some eagle rays, black and white tipped sharks, bumpheads, napoleans, more nudibranchs than you could imagine and 3 cute little pgymy sea horses. These little guys were only first described by science in like the early 90's and sit on large sea fans. They're tiny (smaller than a standard paper clip) and take on the color and texture of the sea fan they live in, so are difficult to spot. It's at this place that Paul says this is the best diving in the whole world. Wouldn't disagree with what I've seen so far in my diving and snorkelling career. Of course the underwater world was only just part of it. Woke up in the morning on my plush bed, looked out my huge window onto nice water and a smoking volcano rising out of the sea. I mean even just sitting up on the deck, reading on this crazy pirate ship, watching the surreal water and the volcano was spectacular enough, let alone what was below the boat. On the night dive, we saw some really cool flashlight fish amongst other things and then set off under the full moon again. Of course that night I couldn't help myself but watch pirates of the caribbean after the tasty italian meal.
10/8 Still in the alor archipelago, but on to Pura island with 4 more dives. The first dive site was called clownfish (like nemo) alley and was just a carpet of anenomes which meant millions of clownfish Also two sweet frogfish. There was a fisher village on the island and some of the local kids came out in their little dugout canoes to see us. They had these home-made goggles made from broken glass bottles and wood that they use for diving. So we swam around and did some free diving with them as well. And crazy as this is, the front cover of the Indonesian lonely planet, which is a gorgeous photo with nice water, a sweet ship and some local kids with home-made goggles in it. Quite the surprise to find myself there and it turns out the ship was kararu's old ship. Saw two more pygmy sea horses here and lots and lots of the beautiful mandarin fish. On the night dive we saw two coral cat sharks and an ornate ghost pipefish. As we weren't sailing that night, we had dinner on the deck of the boat.
10/9 again in the alor archipelago at pura and alor island for 4 more dives. Just brilliant brilliant fishes. 3 octopi on one dive and 2 larger seahorses on another. And one of the big finds of the trip, I found a wonderpus, which is this amazing octopus (search it on the internet if you want to see what it looks like). That night was bbq dinner on the deck with steak and potatoes...probably from idaho haha
10/10 Alor Archipelago at alor island and ternate island. 4 dives. Of course great fish and corals. Some more frogfish, some cool flounders. lots of stonefish and scorpionfish. Sailed all night with pretty big waves as we were crossing into some big open ocean
10/11 3 dives today as we arrived late due to unfavorable currents and winds at Wetar Islands in the Molukas and also had to get moving early to make the next destination in time. Some more incredible wall dives here. As we had to leave early we had a movie afternoon up in the gallery with popcorn and vatican chase scenes in angels and demons. Some more sweet big waves crashing over the bow that night.
10/12 3 dives at gunung api island (fire mountain island). This little volcanic island sitting in the middle of nowhere in the ocean and home to thousands of sea snakes. If you've seen the planet earth series, this is where the sea snake stuff was filmed. 2 types of snakes here: banded and olive sea snakes. Sea snakes are the most poisonous snakes in the world, but their mouths are too small to bite humans and they are also non-aggressive. In fact, I really loved them. They're so curious. They would just come swim up from far away right up to you and then swim around you and try and check you out. I laughed watching the other divers with sea snakes following them. These snakes are basically the only sea creatures I've seen that don't swim away from you. Everything else you see a lot of their backside, but not these sea snakes. They'd come right up to you. There were hundreds of them and you could hold them and play around with them and they wouldn't care or even act bothered. Some some other cool things here like an octopus and blue-spotted stingray. When we had arrived at the island we could smell all the sulfur in the area and while under water on our 3rd dive, we felt (and heard in the water) a small eruption. Sailed again all night.
10/13
Woke up to 3 beautiful tropical paradise islands all interconnected by sand bars. We had the choice here to dive 2 dives at the beautiful walls here and 4 and the ambon, the next spot or do 1 hear and 5 at the next. We chose to do 1 here b/c we had seen lots of amazing walls and b/c ambon is very unique and diving and one of the best muck diving spots in the world. Turns out fate would also make this choice for me of one dive anyways. After a great dive with several sharks and turtles, I got up onto the tender boat. We sat there for about 5 minutes waiting for the rest of the people to get on. Once we got to the ship, I started getting a sharp pain in my abdomen on the left side. I asked the Peter and Kristine if they thought it was decompression sickness, but they said no b/c that's not one of the symptoms and I had dove conservatively (as you should) and it was the first dive of the day. Well in just a few more minutes, the pain got really sharp and I had to sit down. Then all of a sudden my left leg went numb. By then I had called over peter and paul (and where's mary?) to help me. Both my arms went tingly and then numb and my vision started to go wavy then I could hardly see at all, and I was getting pretty scared. I never full passed out and they quickly gave me oxygen. After a bit of oxygen and lots of water and an electrolyte drink the numbness went away everywhere except my left leg, but then a few minutes later, even that was gone. Both Peter and Paul (a physician) diagnosed it as dehydration and electrolyte imbalance. So I just rested the rest of the day, watching lots of movies as the ship sailed on towards ambon island and the capital of the molukas.
10/14 Ambon island molukas 5 muck dives, and absolutely amazing and out of this world. several octopi, a rare mimic octopus (similar to the wonderpus, but mimics other poisonous animals), lots of seahorses, flamboyant cuttle fish, flying gurnards, dragonets, 2 rhinopius, 2 leaf scorpionfish, stonefish, robust ghost pipefish, other pipefish, lots of cuttlefish, tons of lionfish and scorpion fish, several frogfish, lots of mandarin fish. Just amazing diving, like nothing I'd ever done.
10/15. I did one more muck dive on this day, seeing some of the same things. Paul and Dirk couldn't dive b/c they had a very early flight the next day and you need to allow 24 hours after a dive before flying...one of the bonuses of not pre-booking my flights with the company is I could get another dive. That afternoon I went to the airport to book my flight to jayapura as our ship was docked like 5 minutes from the airport. The travel agent that kararu uses had been looking for flights for me and the best deal he had found was 560 bucks flying to makassar and then having to spend the night and then flying to jayapura. Hmmm...this is indonesia and I knew better than to believe a travel agent or that a flight could be that expensive, so I went to check myself. And I found two different airlines going for 165 bucks and without having to spend the night in makassar! The rest of the day, I just relaxed and read and watched movies on the glorious cheng ho.
10/16 Sad goodbye to the chengho, it's crew, and dirk, paul, kristine, and peter. Flight to Jayaprua via Sorong.
Well, no doubt, the diving was truly amazing. And one of the best parts was that it was so diverse. Great wall dives, great coral. Muck dives. unique dives like clownfish alley and the snake island. And I loved how kararu set up it's diving where it wasn't a thing where you had to follow exactly behind the divemaster and all time and come up at exactly 50 mins or something. You could dive where you wanted and stay down as long as you wanted...or your air supply or dive computer let you. To me, this was really great!
10/5
Arrived in Maumere from Moni to see amongst the scattering of hardly water worthy vessels in the indonesian port, one beautiful wooden ship sitting there. The Cheng Ho! The boat I was to be on the next 12 days.
So a little background: This is one of those lucky things that can happen to you when you're on a long trip. In the philippines I had met Hergen and Kerri at a diving place. They had actually been working in Indonesia in the Bali and Komodo area for quite some time on liveaboards and such and told me that when I got to bali I should email them for suggestions of where to do a bit of diving. Well, when I got to bali and emailed them, they suggested I contact the company, Kararu, that they used to work for (they had just moved to Manado in Sulawesi for the diving up there) and see if they had any last minute deals, especially with the economy in a worse state than the coral reefs these days. I heard back and found out there had just been a big group, who had chartered a boat, cancel for some reason. Well, this boat still had to make it from maumere to Ambon for its next group of people to pick up that would be going from Ambon to sorong and the raja ampats in papua, so this meant it was going no matter what. So they offered me an incredible deal to go on this ship last minute since with the cancellations they were now empty at the moment and obviously had little hope of getting many people b/c most people thinking about doing a trip like this were 2 week holidayers from europe or the states. The ship is a luxury sail ship with first rate diving. They offered me 65% off of the normal fair for the lowest class single bunk, waved the port fees (worth over 500 US), free use of all dive equipment, and a free upgrade to their nicest room, the state room. Even at 65% off, the trip still wouldn't be considered cheap, but after to talking with hergen and Kerri as well as Bill and Lisa Bubb from Australia who had done some similar trips, I decided it would be stupid not to do this trip since I was in the area and wouldn't even require a flight to get there, as who knows how long the reefs will last and as this is supposedly the 2nd most diverse reef area in the world (behind the raja ampats just next door) as the ocean apparently started way back when where the raja amapts are now, so the species are the most diverse. For example, the caribbean has like 30 species of butterfly fish and this area has over 350 species. And I'd also get to see some cool parts of indonesia that are usually either very expensive to get to or take a really really long time.
So I arrived at the hot, sweaty, and dirty port of maumere in flores to be ushered into the Cheng Ho, served and icy welcome drink, introduced to my luxury cabin, and no matter how hard I tried to decline the offer, had my luggage carried for me to my cabin. I met Peter and Kristine the dive cruise directors from Chicago and California. The other guests would be arriving in about an hour from the airport. I expected several people, but to my surprise there were only 2. Keep in mind the ship usually takes 18, but can hold 21! Dirk from Amsterdam and Paul a physician from Tampa who is originally from Puerto Rico. We were also introduced to the other two dive guides Bawa and Nyoman from Bali. So here we were, on this luxury ship, just the three of us, with 4 dive guides. We were all tingling with excitement and knew the trip would be amazing. We got a tour of the ship that had a huge and beautiful dining area, top decks for relaxing, and even an entertainment room with a huge flatscreen and an amazing video and novel library. They also gave me a laptop to use for the trip. The internet was actually broken, but not that it would have mattered b/c it did cost 2 bucks per email sent. But I used it to catch up a bit on my blog by just writing in word and then pasting when I got back to the internet and for looking at photos we took. And it was basically anything we wanted we could get. We had full access to sodas, fruit juices, milk, candies, cookies, and fresh fruits. I must have gone through so many oreos and milk the first day. That had been another thing I was craving: oreos dipped in milk. We would be served 5 meals a day. A first breakfast before the first dive with all the food of a real breakfast: fresh fruit, cereal, breads, etc. Then a real breakfast with eggs or french toast or whatever. Also there were afteroon snacks. And then a alway tasty buffet lunch and dinner that rotated between asian food (indian, indonesian, chinese, japanese (sushi!), and thai) and western (american, mexican, italian and just standard western fare like big pieces of meat). The interior of the ship was all decorated in balinese and papuan designs and pictures. And the whole ship itself, a 160 ft. long wooden phinisi schooner (traditional indonesian styled ship), was just beautiful, and kind of had the air of pirate ship.
We did a check out dive, a night muck dive, just off the boat in the port and immediately the diving was off to an amazing start and we knew the trip would be great. We saw an adult epillette shark and a juvenile one as well as lots of cuttle fish and two leaf fish. I didn't know quite how amazing it was to see an epillette shark, yet alone two of them, but Paul excitingly explained how rare a sight they were. It was great having Paul on board b/c he was so enthusiastic and was always making sure we knew just how amazing the diving was or what we were seeing. He's a physician as I said, but also is the photographer expert for a dive shop in tampa and has literally done hundreds of liveaboards and thousands of dives all over the world, so he knew what he was talking about. During and after the trip, he loved to say how my diving career had only begun not long ago, but now was over b/c there was no way I could ever live up to a trip like this (except at the raja ampats). Everything else would seem 2nd rate. (of course everyone is entitled to their opinions and other people have told me the solomon's, pulau, or komodo are just as good or better, so don't worry I still have places I can go in the future =)) And, yes, I would agree with him that these were the most diverse reefs I had ever seen and I saw everything I had hoped to see and more. Just so much. However, I would not say they are the healthiest reefs I have seen. This is b/c we were diving just in a lot of random islands, none of which are protected as national parks. A lot are fairly protected just due to remoteness and distance, but they are still fished. Because as Peter said, in indonesia fish is food. And even more than that shark fins and other big fish like napoleon wrasse are like gold for them when selling them to the chinese and japanese in the some legal and mostly illegal fish trade. So b/c of this we didn't see as many sharks or other big pelagic fish (napolean wrasse, bumpheads, barracudas, tuna) as you would expect to see (though we did see some) in a truly healthy coral reef ecosystem, but that didn't matter to me b/c I had gotten to see lots and lots of the big stuff at Sipadan in malaysia and tubattaha in the philippines. And the diversity of the reefs and fish there was just so staggering and amazing. After the dive we set sail for eastern flores on our pirate ship under a full moon. I sat up on the crow's nest for a while and just enjoyed the breeze, the full moon, and the feeling of being on this ship.
10/6 Did 4 more amazing dives around eastern flores and serbete island going to a new spot each time. Of course saw amazing corals and fish and on top of that saw a very bold octopus, and some huge bumphead parrotfish and napolean wrasses. The scenery above water was just as nice. With gorgeous tropical islands and nice turquoise water. Today while sailing between dive spots I sat up on the crow's nest and enjoyed the wonderful scenery from 80 or so feet up. The captain also showed me how to read the navigation charts and let me captain the ship for a bit.
10/7 4 stunning wall dives in the alor archipelago, specifically kawula island. Just unbelievable diving really. Saw some eagle rays, black and white tipped sharks, bumpheads, napoleans, more nudibranchs than you could imagine and 3 cute little pgymy sea horses. These little guys were only first described by science in like the early 90's and sit on large sea fans. They're tiny (smaller than a standard paper clip) and take on the color and texture of the sea fan they live in, so are difficult to spot. It's at this place that Paul says this is the best diving in the whole world. Wouldn't disagree with what I've seen so far in my diving and snorkelling career. Of course the underwater world was only just part of it. Woke up in the morning on my plush bed, looked out my huge window onto nice water and a smoking volcano rising out of the sea. I mean even just sitting up on the deck, reading on this crazy pirate ship, watching the surreal water and the volcano was spectacular enough, let alone what was below the boat. On the night dive, we saw some really cool flashlight fish amongst other things and then set off under the full moon again. Of course that night I couldn't help myself but watch pirates of the caribbean after the tasty italian meal.
10/8 Still in the alor archipelago, but on to Pura island with 4 more dives. The first dive site was called clownfish (like nemo) alley and was just a carpet of anenomes which meant millions of clownfish Also two sweet frogfish. There was a fisher village on the island and some of the local kids came out in their little dugout canoes to see us. They had these home-made goggles made from broken glass bottles and wood that they use for diving. So we swam around and did some free diving with them as well. And crazy as this is, the front cover of the Indonesian lonely planet, which is a gorgeous photo with nice water, a sweet ship and some local kids with home-made goggles in it. Quite the surprise to find myself there and it turns out the ship was kararu's old ship. Saw two more pygmy sea horses here and lots and lots of the beautiful mandarin fish. On the night dive we saw two coral cat sharks and an ornate ghost pipefish. As we weren't sailing that night, we had dinner on the deck of the boat.
10/9 again in the alor archipelago at pura and alor island for 4 more dives. Just brilliant brilliant fishes. 3 octopi on one dive and 2 larger seahorses on another. And one of the big finds of the trip, I found a wonderpus, which is this amazing octopus (search it on the internet if you want to see what it looks like). That night was bbq dinner on the deck with steak and potatoes...probably from idaho haha
10/10 Alor Archipelago at alor island and ternate island. 4 dives. Of course great fish and corals. Some more frogfish, some cool flounders. lots of stonefish and scorpionfish. Sailed all night with pretty big waves as we were crossing into some big open ocean
10/11 3 dives today as we arrived late due to unfavorable currents and winds at Wetar Islands in the Molukas and also had to get moving early to make the next destination in time. Some more incredible wall dives here. As we had to leave early we had a movie afternoon up in the gallery with popcorn and vatican chase scenes in angels and demons. Some more sweet big waves crashing over the bow that night.
10/12 3 dives at gunung api island (fire mountain island). This little volcanic island sitting in the middle of nowhere in the ocean and home to thousands of sea snakes. If you've seen the planet earth series, this is where the sea snake stuff was filmed. 2 types of snakes here: banded and olive sea snakes. Sea snakes are the most poisonous snakes in the world, but their mouths are too small to bite humans and they are also non-aggressive. In fact, I really loved them. They're so curious. They would just come swim up from far away right up to you and then swim around you and try and check you out. I laughed watching the other divers with sea snakes following them. These snakes are basically the only sea creatures I've seen that don't swim away from you. Everything else you see a lot of their backside, but not these sea snakes. They'd come right up to you. There were hundreds of them and you could hold them and play around with them and they wouldn't care or even act bothered. Some some other cool things here like an octopus and blue-spotted stingray. When we had arrived at the island we could smell all the sulfur in the area and while under water on our 3rd dive, we felt (and heard in the water) a small eruption. Sailed again all night.
10/13
Woke up to 3 beautiful tropical paradise islands all interconnected by sand bars. We had the choice here to dive 2 dives at the beautiful walls here and 4 and the ambon, the next spot or do 1 hear and 5 at the next. We chose to do 1 here b/c we had seen lots of amazing walls and b/c ambon is very unique and diving and one of the best muck diving spots in the world. Turns out fate would also make this choice for me of one dive anyways. After a great dive with several sharks and turtles, I got up onto the tender boat. We sat there for about 5 minutes waiting for the rest of the people to get on. Once we got to the ship, I started getting a sharp pain in my abdomen on the left side. I asked the Peter and Kristine if they thought it was decompression sickness, but they said no b/c that's not one of the symptoms and I had dove conservatively (as you should) and it was the first dive of the day. Well in just a few more minutes, the pain got really sharp and I had to sit down. Then all of a sudden my left leg went numb. By then I had called over peter and paul (and where's mary?) to help me. Both my arms went tingly and then numb and my vision started to go wavy then I could hardly see at all, and I was getting pretty scared. I never full passed out and they quickly gave me oxygen. After a bit of oxygen and lots of water and an electrolyte drink the numbness went away everywhere except my left leg, but then a few minutes later, even that was gone. Both Peter and Paul (a physician) diagnosed it as dehydration and electrolyte imbalance. So I just rested the rest of the day, watching lots of movies as the ship sailed on towards ambon island and the capital of the molukas.
10/14 Ambon island molukas 5 muck dives, and absolutely amazing and out of this world. several octopi, a rare mimic octopus (similar to the wonderpus, but mimics other poisonous animals), lots of seahorses, flamboyant cuttle fish, flying gurnards, dragonets, 2 rhinopius, 2 leaf scorpionfish, stonefish, robust ghost pipefish, other pipefish, lots of cuttlefish, tons of lionfish and scorpion fish, several frogfish, lots of mandarin fish. Just amazing diving, like nothing I'd ever done.
10/15. I did one more muck dive on this day, seeing some of the same things. Paul and Dirk couldn't dive b/c they had a very early flight the next day and you need to allow 24 hours after a dive before flying...one of the bonuses of not pre-booking my flights with the company is I could get another dive. That afternoon I went to the airport to book my flight to jayapura as our ship was docked like 5 minutes from the airport. The travel agent that kararu uses had been looking for flights for me and the best deal he had found was 560 bucks flying to makassar and then having to spend the night and then flying to jayapura. Hmmm...this is indonesia and I knew better than to believe a travel agent or that a flight could be that expensive, so I went to check myself. And I found two different airlines going for 165 bucks and without having to spend the night in makassar! The rest of the day, I just relaxed and read and watched movies on the glorious cheng ho.
10/16 Sad goodbye to the chengho, it's crew, and dirk, paul, kristine, and peter. Flight to Jayaprua via Sorong.
Well, no doubt, the diving was truly amazing. And one of the best parts was that it was so diverse. Great wall dives, great coral. Muck dives. unique dives like clownfish alley and the snake island. And I loved how kararu set up it's diving where it wasn't a thing where you had to follow exactly behind the divemaster and all time and come up at exactly 50 mins or something. You could dive where you wanted and stay down as long as you wanted...or your air supply or dive computer let you. To me, this was really great!
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