Sabang Beach #1 Palawan
An early morning 4 hour flight brings us into the Manila Clark airport at 11:15 am. We have a 4:30pm departure out of the domestic terminal to Puerto Princessa Palawan. The problem is the domestic airport is a totally different airport and is 1 ½ hours away by bus… at least we had enough time in-between flights to make it and not be stressed about it. On the bus ride we met a guy name Dan who not only has been to the Philippines before but has been working in the Philippines for the past 13 years originally with the Canadian Embassy. Dan was great as he was more than helpful providing us with tips and a brief overview of the country’s history. Based on the info Dan provided to us it helped us decide our itinerary and visit both of Philippines Sabang beaches on different coasts and islands. We spent the first night in Puerto Princessa at the overpriced Hotel Fleuris. They promised us Wi-Fi and since they were unable to deliver Lindsay managed to get us a discount as she informed them about how we were “writers” for a Calgary travel blog/magazine and this would be documented in our article. The next morning we head north to our first Sabang beach. We have two options for getting there:
1) Rent an air conditioned van for PHP 3500…approx $75 CAD
2) A jeepney which is a cross between a jeep and a bus, lowered, spray painted, and named by owner which is PHP 200/person or approx $4.60 CAD
We opt for the jeepney. We get to the jeepney terminal at about noon and we are scheduled to leave at 2pm. Jeepney’s do not actually have a set schedule as they do not leave any terminal until they are full. When I say full I mean jammed packed with people; 4 to a seat which is the size of a park bench making at least 20 people inside some on the roof and others hanging off the sides of the Jeep. If they aren’t hanging off the side to begin with, wait a few minutes, eventually it will pick someone up from the side of the road and give them an outdoor lift. Our Jeepney leaves at about 2:30 and our journey begins. What we were told was going to be a 2 hour trip turned out to be almost 4 hours but felt like 10 due to the Jeepney stopping at every little road side store to drop off product. Since we planned on a 2 hour trip tops, we were starving, grumpy and ready to loose it when we finally arrived into Sabang. We went right to a restaurant and ordered 3 dishes to get rid of our growling stomachs. Filipino food is not that great; in most small restaurants their chicken dishes consist mostly of bone and fat in a sauce with a side of rice and a few veggies. Upon arrival Elmer introduces himself to us, Elmer is one of many locals who assist you in finding hotels, tours and return travel. They do this because they get paid a percentage from the hotel or person gaining your business. This is nice because you can ask for proper help without being taken for a ride which is something we experienced in other parts of the Philippines. Our first few nights are spent at Taraw Vista Lodge, a bamboo cabin on the ocean. We would have stayed our full four nights here except this small village of Sabang has rotating power outages making for a hot, sweaty and uncomfortable sleep. Fortunately after night 1 we meet 2 American girls on the beach who are currently teaching in Korea, this works to our advantage since there is one hotel in the village that has 24 hour power, a pool, A/C… and is really beautiful. The four of us decide to rent the deluxe suite at the Daluyon Resort and spend our last 2 nights relaxing by the pool, enjoying the A/C room and being pampered by the staff. The only other thing we will mention about Sabang Palawan is the underground river tour which we experienced since it is being considered as one of the top 7 wonders of the natural world. It was a great experience and one we highly recommend; however, you will have to see this for yourself as our pictures will never do it justice because it is an underground river/tunnel in a cliff and very dark. A guide will paddle your boat on a 45 minute tour through this bat filled cave…that’s right we saw the Bat Cave….a word of wisdom don’t open your mouth while looking up ;)
Sabang #2 – Puerto Galera
This is the second most popular tourist destination in the country and after being on a secluded beach we were looking forward to meeting other travelers. There are two major reasons people go to Sabang beach #2, one is for the diving and the other is for the girly bars…we wish we knew this before we decided to go there.
The diving is great, self explanatory so let us tell you a bit of the interesting facts we learned about the girly bars:
- The bars are all called disco’s so when we walked in looking for a night of dancing we were surprised to see girls up on stage with little clothing on, dancing next to polls….not on the poles, just beside them.
- They do not actually remove clothing unless it has been a slow month (or so we were told) luckily we did not see this when we unexpectedly stumbled into the disco.
- They live with approx 8 girls per room with half the number of mattresses, meaning they could often be sharing beds.
- The girls dance 3 at a time to the same 3 songs every night at the same time and this is one of the ways they get noticed by the male tourists...
- The girls are between 16 to 24, but who knows as we saw some that looked no older than 14.
- $1000 Pesos approx $23 CAD allows the girl to leave the disco with you, $200 Pesos go to the mama (pimp) and the girls get the other $800
- Approx $1000 Pesos is expected to be given as a tip the next morning or so we were informed.
- The girls send most of the money home to their parents who are looking after their kid or kids. This money is used to support the whole family (parents, siblings, their kids and other family if needed)
- The girls work from 7pm to what ever time they get home.
- A beer in the disco costs $50 Pesos but if you want to buy a drink for one of the working girls that beer will jump up to $250 Pesos in which $50 of it will go to the girl and the disco keeps the rest
- The average Filipino makes $6000 Pesos a month, approx $120 USD which is why a lot of girls resort to working at discos as they can make that amount in as little as three nights
- We were told that in a lot of Asian countries, some of these girls are pushed by their parents into this occupation to support the family.
Remember h0w we told you in a previous blog that the whole older men with young Thai girls gets under Kathy’s skin, well this sex trade situation is what makes Lindsay’s blood boil.
Throughout this small town built onto the beach of Sabang Puerto Galera we met quite a few interesting characters.
There is Robin, a slightly creepy older American man who works as a videographer for Discovery Channel. There was Canadian Mark and his American travel partner who although we spent much time speaking with, his name escapes us. They currently work in Afghanistan. There was Bruce and his daughter Charlie coming from London. Then there was our dive guide Josh who we only mention because he is 38 years old and just started smoking 9 months ago…WTF??
On our way back through Manila we spent some time with Dan (our Manila tour guide) who informed us that in the Philippines there is actually a bank that will give you coconut oil if they run out of money, who knew coconut oil, had such high trade/sale value. From there we went to Kuala Lumpur before heading to Koh Phagnan Thailand. In Kulala Lumpur we spent 2 of the funnest (yes we know this isn’t a word) nights of our life. We met a crazy amount of fun people including a cute professional kite surfer from France on his way to a magazine shoot in Indonesia and some US Air Force pilots currently stationed in Japan….we highly recommend Reggae Bar if you are ever in KL.
Highlights, funny situations and interesting facts
- One day while on Sabang beach #1 Lindsay is reviewing pain killers in a local store behind the counter since they are stored in drawers and sold as individual pills. One store clerk starts pointing out commonly purchased medication such as Immodium AD, Naproxen and Dulcolax… another store clerk hears this and proceeds to scream out “THAT IS A LAXATIVE” in front of a store full of people which consisted of at least one good looking guy. Lindsay has to stay behind the counter for a few minutes till the store clears out and she is able to regain her composure. We have always laughed about this story but it was pretty damn mortifying for Lindsay at the time. Who screams stuff out like that??
- In Puerto Princesa we decided to pamper ourselves and go to our hotel “spa” for a massage. They send us to the shower before the massage and tell us to just wear our panties and the robes provided into the massage room. It was the weirdest set up as no shower had a hook or shelf to keep your towel and robe on; it is for this reason that Kathy forgets she still has panties on and proceeds to shower with them making for a damp situation. Under normal circumstances this would just be a humorous incident; however, a shuttle is taking us to the airport right after our massage and front desk currently has control of our luggage. I wonder what the massage ladies thought of the wet spot on Kathy’s massage bed especially after she told Kathy before the massage started that she had a nice body maam.
- Our massages were held in the same room which was weird as it felt a bit like a couples massage and at one stage they roll you onto your back for a frontal massage and your naked chest is exposed to everyone in the room. They start at the collar bone, head south and come underneath your chest and up under your armpits…well at least that is what Kathy experienced. Lindsay’s on the other hand can only be described as an exotic rubdown; she would like to know “who goes to second base without asking permission or at least a first kiss?”
- We found the Philippine airports interesting as only those traveling are actually able to enter the airport and a security station is set up at the entrance to enforce this.
- In restaurants all employees care for a table, so anyone in the restaurant will take your order, fill your glass or bring you your bill which you always have to ask for. Eating out is a social affair and in Filipino culture is not to be rushed but rather relaxed and enjoyed.
- No one walks or takes stairs unless absolutely necessary….yes Dan that is a stab at you
- As a tourist in Philippines it really is not an easy task to get around the country or cities. Even if you ask around or do your own research, there is not really a definitive answer and the prices are always different for foreigners.
- To get around the big islands there is a great freeway called EDSA (4 -5 lanes going each direction). We were pretty amazed that a third world country which does not have a lot of car owners has better transportation roads than that of Calgary. We were in awe to see police officers’ standing in the middle of the freeway to make sure their presence was noticed and ensure that no one was violating the traffic laws. Even if traffic laws were broken I am not sure how the police would have done something about it as traffic was traveling over 50 kms and the police were on foot with no vehicle in sight.
- In Manila we spotted bright pink C shaped urinals for men only. When we asked about it we were informed that these are put up around the city mostly for the taxi drivers as they would just stop and pee on the side of the road in the middle of the city if they had to go. Even though we did see these urinals around the city we unfortunately still saw full grown men facing bushes and relieving themselves.
- It feels as though most Filipino’s will try to take the common white folk for a ride or “rip them off”. On one of our last taxi journey’s Lindsay had just about enough of this and after passing our hotel and trying to take us on one final spin around the block Lindsay firmly says “STOP THE CAR, STOP THE CAR RIGHT NOW.” Have you ever seen the IKEA commercial when the lady yells “start the car” well this is Lindsay to a tee except we were not getting a great deal.
- As a foreigner in the Philippines there is a few things to watch out for:
o Taxies do not want to give you change and will take you the round about way to get everywhere
o Looking for a simple question answered will result in a “small tip maam”
o Highballs served with anything other than Pepsi/Coke are subject to be charged as a cocktail, which is often double the price.
o Lemons are the small green ones and Limes are the bigger yellow ones (this did only happen to us once but was quite funny as she clearly did not know what she was talking about but tried to convince us this is how it is in the Philippines).
We enjoyed our Philippines experience but are excited to get back to the hustle and bustle of Thailand and to enjoy their excellent cuisine, better prices, less stress travels, and a better understanding of how things operate.
Keep following our final adventures as our trip comes to its final leg (insert tears and crying sound here) on the Eastern islands of Thailand
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Friday, July 31, 2009
Perhentian Paradise
We found a way to beat the heat we took a VIP air conditioned bus from Hat Yai to Kuala Lumper (KL). As nice as it was to get away from the plus 35 degree temperature we were neither dressed nor prepared for the -35 temperature that the bus dropped to that night during our travels. Let’s just say a lot of glass could have been cut that night. We finally arrived into KL at 3am and were on a hunt to find a hotel. Off we went with our pulley suitcases down the street; the first stop was a 7-11 to hit up a bank machine. The 7-11 clerk suggested the Citin Hotel just down the street. It was a nice hotel and very clean but had the worst beds ever we both slept with springs digging into our backs. Apparently we were really tired as we over slept our free breakfast witch ended at 10:30am. We decided we would check out and switch rooms to ensure a more comfortable sleep would be had the next night. We packed up our bags and put them into the hotels storage until a room was cleaned and we could move into it. We started our day looking for KL’s China Town in search of dim sum. We are in Asia so easy task you would think, right??? Not…they have one dim sum restaurant and it was closed so we ended up at a street food court which was quite good and very cheap Afterwards we hit up Central Market which is a hip trendy little mall made up of herbs, shopping, and galleries. It was here where we found the fish spa. Basically you stick your feet into a swimming pool full of fish and the little guys eat the dead skin off your feet…it was ticklish for the first 5 min but it was wonderful and worked wonders. There is one in the States but it’s extremely expensive so really this is the one you should patronize.
One thing we noticed while walking through China Town and Little India was the cleanliness of KL and lack of bad smells compared with its neighbor Thailand. We have also yet to see (knock on wood) Old men with young girls so that’s a plus and have noticed that there is not much inflation in Malaysia and so not much room to negotiate price of items. Some things are the same, street vendors selling their knock off wares and playing loud knock off music. The bonus is that the knockoffs seem much better quality than that of Thailand’s; however, we did not price shop in Thailand so we can not compare prices. Regardless the shopping is well worth it. A trip back to the hotel, goods in hand, proved futile as the room we were switched to had worse beds than the original so we grabbed our luggage and once again were looking for a hotel room. We found a place in Chinatown called Chinatown Boutique Hotel; good location, brand new, comfy beds, and great staff who helped us out quite a bit…stay here if you are ever in KL. Morning arrived much to early as our cab picked us up for 7 am to go to the airport. This was a bit of overkill because we arrived 4 hours early for our flight so early that we could not even check in for the flight but hey we avoided the morning rush hour traffic so not all was lost.
A quick flight took us to Kota Bharu and we were off in a cab to Kota Besut to catch the afternoon speed boat to the Perhentian Islands.
After the quick 45 min boat ride we arrived at the breathtaking views of teal blue water and white sand beaches. We were both so excited and wonderful feelings about what our next 10 days of pure bliss would be like. Well it did not start off on such a great note as we did not have a hotel booked and due to past experiences thought this would not be a big deal, but we were proved wrong. If you are coming to these islands do book a hotel in advance even if only for the first few nights. For the next 4 hours we were on the hotel hunt yet again. Two water taxies later and 2 locals calling every resort on both islands ended up providing us with two options, one was a hole in the wall so dirty it can only be described as disgusting and since we had to keep up with our princess image we settled for our second option Bubu Long beach the most expensive hotel on the islands… don’t judge us it was clean, new, had free buffet breakfast and free wifi. We arrived at our hotel and finished checking in just after 5pm again Kathy managed to get some sort of discount it was rather minimal overall but a discount none the less. We put our bags down and went off to find a restaurant for dinner. After eating we were sauntering back to our hotel room to make our usual 10pm bed time and discovered this was quite a hip beach and had quite the night life so we decided to make an exception on our curfew to go people watch for a while and relax from the hectic day. When we returned to our hotel there were 4 people sitting around with all of their luggage we being the social butterflies that we are got our nose into their business only to find out that the couple was waiting to catch a taxi boat to the next island to get to their hotel but the two swiss girls were homeless and no accommodation could be found. They were planning on playing cards all night under our covered beach bar and continuing to look for accommodation the next morning. Us being the concerned female travelers that we are sublet one of our queen beds to them for the night…this was a win-win situation as it cut our costs down and gave them a really nice place to stay and sleep for the night.
The loves and loathes of Long Beach….
The Perhentian Island are truly amazing with breathtaking scenery and perfect weather but we do not want to rub in the fact that we spent 10 days of pure bliss of rest an relaxation on some of the world’s most beautiful beaches so instead we will quickly note our loves and loathes:
LOVES
- One night while walking down the beach we ran into a turtle, its shell was as big as a two person kitchen table. It was coming up on land lay eggs we were told. Wow how many of you can say you have ever ran across a massive turtle before…we can.
- Lindsay went up to by a rum and coke and for $9 CAD came back with a mickey of “Monkey Juice”. Monkey juice is made from tree sap and can only be described as smooth rum. It is 24.5% alcohol and made locally.
- Diving and snorkeling were amazing here. You could snorkel right off the beach from your hotel and easily see 30+ different species.
- The water was teal blue and crystal clear, you could see to the bottom without any problems.
- We met some really interesting people during our stay here but we would like to mention one person in particular; Greg from Kentucky and we mention him not only because he asked for and is following this blog but also because he blogs his adventures himself and landed a writing gig to go to Mexico out of a previous blog. He has also spent time in a remote island in Indonesia with a dirt poor family surviving on plain rice, some veggies, and broth made of pig’s fat for a month. His stories are awesome and we are truly happy to have been engaged by them over dinner one night. Even though we always forget to say goodbye when we leave for the night Greg, we never forget you we just can’t find you
- .All the restaurant’s, pubs and clubs floors were all made of sand. Everyone was dancing shoeless feeling the soft sand under their feet and between their toes; we thought this was cool and a neat experience.
- The last love that we want to mention is we both love the rich coconut color skin we are leaving here with.
LOATHES
- Getting our hotel room broken into and Lindsay’s phone/iPod and Kathy’s dad’s phone (which he lent to us) stolen. Yeah that is right the most expensive hotel on the island is the one hotel we have a theft problem with. Not just any theft problem but a theft problem that consists of hotel staff as the door to our room was actually not broken into but unlocked with a key.
- The food…Meh it was ok but nothing to write home about.
For example Lindsay kept ordering tuna fish sandwiches and time after time she would get 2 tbl of tuna thinly spread between 3 slices of bread. Lindsay thinks she only gets 1 tbl of tuna and Kathy thinks two so we compromised on 1 tbl of tuna and 1 tbl of filler such as mayonnaise.
We finish this blog with a few interesting tidbits:
- Water taxies double their price after 7pm, we did not use this service we just found it interesting
- We have yet to stay at a hotel in Malaysia that has a top bed sheet (you get a bottom sheet and a comforter on top).
- Air fare, is very inexpensive. Since time is money and our time is so valuable we have made the executive decision to fly everywhere we can. Paying somewhere in between $50 and $100.00 CAD round trip to each of our international destinations destinations.
Stay tuned to hear about our upcoming adventures in the Philippines.
One thing we noticed while walking through China Town and Little India was the cleanliness of KL and lack of bad smells compared with its neighbor Thailand. We have also yet to see (knock on wood) Old men with young girls so that’s a plus and have noticed that there is not much inflation in Malaysia and so not much room to negotiate price of items. Some things are the same, street vendors selling their knock off wares and playing loud knock off music. The bonus is that the knockoffs seem much better quality than that of Thailand’s; however, we did not price shop in Thailand so we can not compare prices. Regardless the shopping is well worth it. A trip back to the hotel, goods in hand, proved futile as the room we were switched to had worse beds than the original so we grabbed our luggage and once again were looking for a hotel room. We found a place in Chinatown called Chinatown Boutique Hotel; good location, brand new, comfy beds, and great staff who helped us out quite a bit…stay here if you are ever in KL. Morning arrived much to early as our cab picked us up for 7 am to go to the airport. This was a bit of overkill because we arrived 4 hours early for our flight so early that we could not even check in for the flight but hey we avoided the morning rush hour traffic so not all was lost.
A quick flight took us to Kota Bharu and we were off in a cab to Kota Besut to catch the afternoon speed boat to the Perhentian Islands.
After the quick 45 min boat ride we arrived at the breathtaking views of teal blue water and white sand beaches. We were both so excited and wonderful feelings about what our next 10 days of pure bliss would be like. Well it did not start off on such a great note as we did not have a hotel booked and due to past experiences thought this would not be a big deal, but we were proved wrong. If you are coming to these islands do book a hotel in advance even if only for the first few nights. For the next 4 hours we were on the hotel hunt yet again. Two water taxies later and 2 locals calling every resort on both islands ended up providing us with two options, one was a hole in the wall so dirty it can only be described as disgusting and since we had to keep up with our princess image we settled for our second option Bubu Long beach the most expensive hotel on the islands… don’t judge us it was clean, new, had free buffet breakfast and free wifi. We arrived at our hotel and finished checking in just after 5pm again Kathy managed to get some sort of discount it was rather minimal overall but a discount none the less. We put our bags down and went off to find a restaurant for dinner. After eating we were sauntering back to our hotel room to make our usual 10pm bed time and discovered this was quite a hip beach and had quite the night life so we decided to make an exception on our curfew to go people watch for a while and relax from the hectic day. When we returned to our hotel there were 4 people sitting around with all of their luggage we being the social butterflies that we are got our nose into their business only to find out that the couple was waiting to catch a taxi boat to the next island to get to their hotel but the two swiss girls were homeless and no accommodation could be found. They were planning on playing cards all night under our covered beach bar and continuing to look for accommodation the next morning. Us being the concerned female travelers that we are sublet one of our queen beds to them for the night…this was a win-win situation as it cut our costs down and gave them a really nice place to stay and sleep for the night.
The loves and loathes of Long Beach….
The Perhentian Island are truly amazing with breathtaking scenery and perfect weather but we do not want to rub in the fact that we spent 10 days of pure bliss of rest an relaxation on some of the world’s most beautiful beaches so instead we will quickly note our loves and loathes:
LOVES
- One night while walking down the beach we ran into a turtle, its shell was as big as a two person kitchen table. It was coming up on land lay eggs we were told. Wow how many of you can say you have ever ran across a massive turtle before…we can.
- Lindsay went up to by a rum and coke and for $9 CAD came back with a mickey of “Monkey Juice”. Monkey juice is made from tree sap and can only be described as smooth rum. It is 24.5% alcohol and made locally.
- Diving and snorkeling were amazing here. You could snorkel right off the beach from your hotel and easily see 30+ different species.
- The water was teal blue and crystal clear, you could see to the bottom without any problems.
- We met some really interesting people during our stay here but we would like to mention one person in particular; Greg from Kentucky and we mention him not only because he asked for and is following this blog but also because he blogs his adventures himself and landed a writing gig to go to Mexico out of a previous blog. He has also spent time in a remote island in Indonesia with a dirt poor family surviving on plain rice, some veggies, and broth made of pig’s fat for a month. His stories are awesome and we are truly happy to have been engaged by them over dinner one night. Even though we always forget to say goodbye when we leave for the night Greg, we never forget you we just can’t find you
- .All the restaurant’s, pubs and clubs floors were all made of sand. Everyone was dancing shoeless feeling the soft sand under their feet and between their toes; we thought this was cool and a neat experience.
- The last love that we want to mention is we both love the rich coconut color skin we are leaving here with.
LOATHES
- Getting our hotel room broken into and Lindsay’s phone/iPod and Kathy’s dad’s phone (which he lent to us) stolen. Yeah that is right the most expensive hotel on the island is the one hotel we have a theft problem with. Not just any theft problem but a theft problem that consists of hotel staff as the door to our room was actually not broken into but unlocked with a key.
- The food…Meh it was ok but nothing to write home about.
For example Lindsay kept ordering tuna fish sandwiches and time after time she would get 2 tbl of tuna thinly spread between 3 slices of bread. Lindsay thinks she only gets 1 tbl of tuna and Kathy thinks two so we compromised on 1 tbl of tuna and 1 tbl of filler such as mayonnaise.
We finish this blog with a few interesting tidbits:
- Water taxies double their price after 7pm, we did not use this service we just found it interesting
- We have yet to stay at a hotel in Malaysia that has a top bed sheet (you get a bottom sheet and a comforter on top).
- Air fare, is very inexpensive. Since time is money and our time is so valuable we have made the executive decision to fly everywhere we can. Paying somewhere in between $50 and $100.00 CAD round trip to each of our international destinations destinations.
Stay tuned to hear about our upcoming adventures in the Philippines.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Thailand 2: Sun N Fun adventure begins
Koh Phi Phi makes a mess of you and me…
The train ride into Bangkok was pretty uneventful except for the man across from us who kept letting gas pass throughout his sleep; no joke, the guy was a methane factory…fortunately he wasn’t a smelly methane factory but gassy none the less.
We met up with Kathy’s dad in Bangkok and we all went to the airport together; Kathy’s dad (Fred) headed to Calgary and us to the island of Koh Phi Phi. We flew into Krabi and spent the night there before catching the morning ferry to the island. The ferry ride is an hour and a half and that’s about as descriptive as we can come up with because I was smooth sailing…literally. Once on the island we checked out a few places before settling on a nice bungalow at Anita House. We promptly spent the remainder of the day on the beach tanning, swimming, and relaxing and the beach was just a short jaunt from our place. ….what luck. We decided to hit up Reggae Bar later that night as Lindsay remembered from a previous trip that they do muay thai boxing shows. The show started at 10 pm and we were there ready to cheer the fighters on buckets in hand at nine. Let us describe the bucket; this is a small plastic pail that children use to make sand castles on the beach with. Fill this with ice, a few shots of liquor (your choice on kind), a shot of pop, and three straws… and now you have yourself the infamous bucket. This was the beginning of the end; please draw your own conclusions…I will however say that the beach by our place is also the party beach and you will be happy to know Kathy and I arrived home safely with only minor cuts and bruises.
Morning arrives with a thunderous boom, oh wait that’s our heads…damn buckets. A quick scope of the room has it that Lindsay has no flip flops which she swears were stolen, not misplaced and our room key is now gone. We used the room key to enter the room earlier that morning and it has somehow gone missing in the last few hours while we slept. The issue is that the room key controls the air con as well as all the power in the room and also runs a replacement charge of 1000 baht or $37.50 CAD. We searched our room for several days but had to pay the fee as the key was gone and nowhere to be found. We checked out after three nights because the parties go until 6 am every morning and even though they play our favorite songs you can only take Rihanna’s Disturbia and thoom thoom thoom echoing through your bedroom for so long.
We changed our return boat ticket to go to Phuket’s Patong beach so we could explore another part of Thailand neither of us had previously been to. This ferry ride was quite eventful as we were rocking side to side because of turbulent ocean conditions and the stewards on the ride actually handed out barf bags to each passenger. Needless to say we arrived and made it Patong beach where we checked into the Merrison Inn for 4 nights. It is during the hotel search where we met Team America, consisting of Matt, Brian, and Steve.
Kathy worked out a deal with the very nice and new hotel for a rate of $600 Baht per night equivalent to $20CAD. During our stay in Patong beach Lindsay purchased new flip flops to replace those that were “stolen” and Kathy got herself a shiny new skin color of red or in her eyes…pink. Regardless she had to put my aloe vera in our fridge to help the pinkness.
We enjoyed several activities during our stay such as wave jumping and tanning as well as Bangla Road. Bangla road is the main party road and you can get anything from all inclusive drinks, ping pong shows (which if you don’t know what this is, we aren’t describing it, please google it yourself in private), as many lady boys as one heart desires, or just a genuine girl for sale good time. We did make it down to Bangla Road with team America one night where we were informed that they were happy to have us with them as we were like bodyguards for them and this insured they were not accosted by every female they passed. We went to a small karaoke bar that had a pole in it for dancing. Lindsay had once taken stripper school at a bachorlette party in Calgary so Matt challenged her to a pole off…planning to do a couple good spins Lindsay accepted. Matt went first and his show can only be described as the best male pole dance either one of us has ever seen (this was actually a first for both of us…but still it was a great dance). He was called superman and spongebob by the karaoke host and one guy commented to Kathy ”That guy sure knows how to work a pole”…let’s say Matt won as Lindsay isn’t much for full out shows on the pole. According to Matt, those from California are more free and are able let themselves go…Lindsay is A Ok with not being free and self go letting. Honestly this was the funniest thing we saw this trip so far. You probably would think the action stops there but no it continues…Matt, Steve, Lindsay and Kathy hit Tiger Bar. His is a great place, really expensive (for Thailand – drinks were $5.50 CAD) good music, lots of people, in general a good time. When we arrive we are walking to a new part of the bar with Kathy and Matt leading up ahead and Lindsay tailing behind Steve by a few people and watching the lady boys in action. Lindsay turns ahead to watch where she is going only to see Steve pleading for her help as he is getting accosted by the Thai ladies who has swarmed him like bees do to their prey…this is where she realizes that in addition to being annoyed by DVD sales people, tuk tuk drivers etc…men have to worry about being groped and constantly hounded by women (wow sucks to be them). If she had not have seen it first hand she never would have realized what lengths these girls go to, to get the attention of the white man. Lindsay looked up and saw 2 sets of what were believed to be women literally ripping Steve in half trying to get him to hang out with and come sit with them. Lindsay put her hands on Steve’s hips and the girls parted like the Red Sea. Thank God that doesn’t happen to women because these boys say they experience this numerous times a day as girls try and get them into massage parlors as well as bars.
Later we are dancing and the song “I’m not a girl comes on” we both thought this was such a great song to play in Thailand since this is reality for so many of the ladyboys in this country. The playing of this song becomes the second funniest thing that night, as Matt spots 2 flamboyantly gay gentlemen sit at the table next to us singing their hearts out. This is when Kathy bets Matt and Steve a beer to go and dance with the two flamboyant boys. Kathy being dead sober is excited to watch them make fools of themselves. They dance over to the boys and end up getting a few love nips on their arms, kisses on their necks, and a proposition for later. We all leave immediately and Kathy chalks up her only beverage purchases to well worth it.
We want to mention that every now and then a strange power outage occurs on Bangla Road, one second we are on this busy street that’s well lit up with lots of lights, music pounding and hundreds of people talking and the next second nothing but blackness and silence which recovers quickly, like 3 seconds later. We mentioned earlier that you are harassed by tuk tuk drivers, store clerks, and massage parlors which are all trying to get your business but one store clerk takes the cake….normally they ask what size you want when you look at something and when you ask a price they say something extortionate and then immediately follow up with, “what you give me?” It’s annoying that’s why this guy cracked us up…were walking along and some guy tries grabbing for Lindsay’s arm to take her back to his shop to show her some items, she says no were not shopping tonight to which he yells out but I’ve got Michael Jackson underwear....as tempted as we were to check them out, we kept walking, laughing all the way. It is up in the air as to whether the undies were for men or women; I guess we should have looked.
Our final day brought us back to the beach as it was yet again another sunny day and we were looking for the perfect cool down. We were minding our own business and tanning when we started hearing a lot of commotion from the guys who rent out chairs and jet skis. 4 men were pushing a jet ski into the water and a woman was waving from down the beach. It turns out that a young boy had gone out too far where the waves are quite rough and had to be rescued. He must have been sucked out because another wave jumper had grabbed him and was holding him up but couldn’t get him into shore; the waves are tough so you had to be careful going out to far in them. The jet skiers got to him in record time and raced him back to shore. It was a feel good end to a feel good trip but this ends our first entrance and installment into Thailand as we move forth to the Perehntian Islands of Malaysia.
Our departure from Thailand is anything but graceful. We booked a mini bus to Hat Yai so we could catch the overnight sleeper train to Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur. We are picked up at 7:15 am by mini bus #1…we take the Patong Beach tour at no additional cost before making a roadside switch to mini bus #2 aka leaky air conditioning bus with lunatic driver who brings tailgating to an entirely new level. We get to Krabi province and are moved to mini bus #3 for 4 hours and are in the back seats where the roof slopes down and Lindsay cannot sit up without her head being in the roof, in fact if we hit a road bump her head slams into the roof, how exciting. Once in Hat Yai we get to the train station only to learn that there is one a day and we weren’t on it and tomorrows gets in too late the following day to make our flight to the island. This brings us to where we are now, on an overnight VIP bus to Malaysia - a luxury compared to the mini buses.
We will see you next time with Malaysia’s Perehntian paradise blog.
The train ride into Bangkok was pretty uneventful except for the man across from us who kept letting gas pass throughout his sleep; no joke, the guy was a methane factory…fortunately he wasn’t a smelly methane factory but gassy none the less.
We met up with Kathy’s dad in Bangkok and we all went to the airport together; Kathy’s dad (Fred) headed to Calgary and us to the island of Koh Phi Phi. We flew into Krabi and spent the night there before catching the morning ferry to the island. The ferry ride is an hour and a half and that’s about as descriptive as we can come up with because I was smooth sailing…literally. Once on the island we checked out a few places before settling on a nice bungalow at Anita House. We promptly spent the remainder of the day on the beach tanning, swimming, and relaxing and the beach was just a short jaunt from our place. ….what luck. We decided to hit up Reggae Bar later that night as Lindsay remembered from a previous trip that they do muay thai boxing shows. The show started at 10 pm and we were there ready to cheer the fighters on buckets in hand at nine. Let us describe the bucket; this is a small plastic pail that children use to make sand castles on the beach with. Fill this with ice, a few shots of liquor (your choice on kind), a shot of pop, and three straws… and now you have yourself the infamous bucket. This was the beginning of the end; please draw your own conclusions…I will however say that the beach by our place is also the party beach and you will be happy to know Kathy and I arrived home safely with only minor cuts and bruises.
Morning arrives with a thunderous boom, oh wait that’s our heads…damn buckets. A quick scope of the room has it that Lindsay has no flip flops which she swears were stolen, not misplaced and our room key is now gone. We used the room key to enter the room earlier that morning and it has somehow gone missing in the last few hours while we slept. The issue is that the room key controls the air con as well as all the power in the room and also runs a replacement charge of 1000 baht or $37.50 CAD. We searched our room for several days but had to pay the fee as the key was gone and nowhere to be found. We checked out after three nights because the parties go until 6 am every morning and even though they play our favorite songs you can only take Rihanna’s Disturbia and thoom thoom thoom echoing through your bedroom for so long.
We changed our return boat ticket to go to Phuket’s Patong beach so we could explore another part of Thailand neither of us had previously been to. This ferry ride was quite eventful as we were rocking side to side because of turbulent ocean conditions and the stewards on the ride actually handed out barf bags to each passenger. Needless to say we arrived and made it Patong beach where we checked into the Merrison Inn for 4 nights. It is during the hotel search where we met Team America, consisting of Matt, Brian, and Steve.
Kathy worked out a deal with the very nice and new hotel for a rate of $600 Baht per night equivalent to $20CAD. During our stay in Patong beach Lindsay purchased new flip flops to replace those that were “stolen” and Kathy got herself a shiny new skin color of red or in her eyes…pink. Regardless she had to put my aloe vera in our fridge to help the pinkness.
We enjoyed several activities during our stay such as wave jumping and tanning as well as Bangla Road. Bangla road is the main party road and you can get anything from all inclusive drinks, ping pong shows (which if you don’t know what this is, we aren’t describing it, please google it yourself in private), as many lady boys as one heart desires, or just a genuine girl for sale good time. We did make it down to Bangla Road with team America one night where we were informed that they were happy to have us with them as we were like bodyguards for them and this insured they were not accosted by every female they passed. We went to a small karaoke bar that had a pole in it for dancing. Lindsay had once taken stripper school at a bachorlette party in Calgary so Matt challenged her to a pole off…planning to do a couple good spins Lindsay accepted. Matt went first and his show can only be described as the best male pole dance either one of us has ever seen (this was actually a first for both of us…but still it was a great dance). He was called superman and spongebob by the karaoke host and one guy commented to Kathy ”That guy sure knows how to work a pole”…let’s say Matt won as Lindsay isn’t much for full out shows on the pole. According to Matt, those from California are more free and are able let themselves go…Lindsay is A Ok with not being free and self go letting. Honestly this was the funniest thing we saw this trip so far. You probably would think the action stops there but no it continues…Matt, Steve, Lindsay and Kathy hit Tiger Bar. His is a great place, really expensive (for Thailand – drinks were $5.50 CAD) good music, lots of people, in general a good time. When we arrive we are walking to a new part of the bar with Kathy and Matt leading up ahead and Lindsay tailing behind Steve by a few people and watching the lady boys in action. Lindsay turns ahead to watch where she is going only to see Steve pleading for her help as he is getting accosted by the Thai ladies who has swarmed him like bees do to their prey…this is where she realizes that in addition to being annoyed by DVD sales people, tuk tuk drivers etc…men have to worry about being groped and constantly hounded by women (wow sucks to be them). If she had not have seen it first hand she never would have realized what lengths these girls go to, to get the attention of the white man. Lindsay looked up and saw 2 sets of what were believed to be women literally ripping Steve in half trying to get him to hang out with and come sit with them. Lindsay put her hands on Steve’s hips and the girls parted like the Red Sea. Thank God that doesn’t happen to women because these boys say they experience this numerous times a day as girls try and get them into massage parlors as well as bars.
Later we are dancing and the song “I’m not a girl comes on” we both thought this was such a great song to play in Thailand since this is reality for so many of the ladyboys in this country. The playing of this song becomes the second funniest thing that night, as Matt spots 2 flamboyantly gay gentlemen sit at the table next to us singing their hearts out. This is when Kathy bets Matt and Steve a beer to go and dance with the two flamboyant boys. Kathy being dead sober is excited to watch them make fools of themselves. They dance over to the boys and end up getting a few love nips on their arms, kisses on their necks, and a proposition for later. We all leave immediately and Kathy chalks up her only beverage purchases to well worth it.
We want to mention that every now and then a strange power outage occurs on Bangla Road, one second we are on this busy street that’s well lit up with lots of lights, music pounding and hundreds of people talking and the next second nothing but blackness and silence which recovers quickly, like 3 seconds later. We mentioned earlier that you are harassed by tuk tuk drivers, store clerks, and massage parlors which are all trying to get your business but one store clerk takes the cake….normally they ask what size you want when you look at something and when you ask a price they say something extortionate and then immediately follow up with, “what you give me?” It’s annoying that’s why this guy cracked us up…were walking along and some guy tries grabbing for Lindsay’s arm to take her back to his shop to show her some items, she says no were not shopping tonight to which he yells out but I’ve got Michael Jackson underwear....as tempted as we were to check them out, we kept walking, laughing all the way. It is up in the air as to whether the undies were for men or women; I guess we should have looked.
Our final day brought us back to the beach as it was yet again another sunny day and we were looking for the perfect cool down. We were minding our own business and tanning when we started hearing a lot of commotion from the guys who rent out chairs and jet skis. 4 men were pushing a jet ski into the water and a woman was waving from down the beach. It turns out that a young boy had gone out too far where the waves are quite rough and had to be rescued. He must have been sucked out because another wave jumper had grabbed him and was holding him up but couldn’t get him into shore; the waves are tough so you had to be careful going out to far in them. The jet skiers got to him in record time and raced him back to shore. It was a feel good end to a feel good trip but this ends our first entrance and installment into Thailand as we move forth to the Perehntian Islands of Malaysia.
Our departure from Thailand is anything but graceful. We booked a mini bus to Hat Yai so we could catch the overnight sleeper train to Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur. We are picked up at 7:15 am by mini bus #1…we take the Patong Beach tour at no additional cost before making a roadside switch to mini bus #2 aka leaky air conditioning bus with lunatic driver who brings tailgating to an entirely new level. We get to Krabi province and are moved to mini bus #3 for 4 hours and are in the back seats where the roof slopes down and Lindsay cannot sit up without her head being in the roof, in fact if we hit a road bump her head slams into the roof, how exciting. Once in Hat Yai we get to the train station only to learn that there is one a day and we weren’t on it and tomorrows gets in too late the following day to make our flight to the island. This brings us to where we are now, on an overnight VIP bus to Malaysia - a luxury compared to the mini buses.
We will see you next time with Malaysia’s Perehntian paradise blog.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Thailand 1: Piece of Pai
Our flight between Tokyo and Bangkok we finally get seated next to each other…the problem was that we were in the middle of a row of four meaning we have to jump over the aisle seats to go to the bathroom and on a 6.5 hour flight this means 4 or 5 times.
Once boarded we were told that the flight was going to arrive in Bangkok 35 minutes early but then we sat on the tarmac for an hour squished in between our neighbors. Regardless, we did make it to Bangkok for the original time of 11:30pm. We cleared customs without incident and went to the baggage carousel to claim our bags. At that time an announcement came over the intercom saying there was a problem with our flights baggage and it would be an hour before the bags started coming out; however, one hour turned into two and we didn’t find ourselves in a cab headed to our hotel, the Grand Watergate until 1:30am.
Because we slept on the plane and in the baggage claim area we went for a walk upon arrival to our hotel. The first thing we noticed about being back in Bangkok was the smells and after being in Japan the dirtiness.
The next day we decided to treat ourselves to a glorious 2 hour massage which ran us 300 baht which amounts to $10 CAD approx. It was heaven.
The second thing we noticed was the price differences
- Massages
- Manicure pedicures ran us $10CAD
- Food and drinks; an average meal costs us $2-3 CAD and is delicious
- I (Lindsay) bought a super nice bikini for $7.50
- Cost of transportation and getting around the city and country
We chose to eat at a lot of street vendors and try Bangkok’s finest; this can be construed as scary but it really quite good and quite inexpensive. One sad thing we should mention is the amount of wild/stray animals roaming about; many are loved pets but many are fighting for food and hanging about….makes us miss our beloved pets back home
Before we begin our beach adventure, we decided to head North for a taste of Northern Thailand and a trip to Laos for the river rafting in the town of Viang Vienne. We purchased a $20CAD ticket for the sleeper train headed to Chiang Mai, an easy access route to the Laos border.
We were given seats and beds number 13 and 14; this is cool because my favorite number is 13 and used to be my Dad’s basketball number and Kathy’s favorite number is 14 and is her soccer number. On the train Kathy learned how to play Gin Rummy for the first time and a Canadian girl Melanie came to join us so she could eat at our table. Why you ask, because at 7:00pm Melanie went to the bathroom and returned to her seat to find it had been made into a bed and she had not yet had dinner. We asked the train hostess ( aka Train Nazi) for a bedtime extension and we were given until 8:30 pm before our table and chairs would be converted over. We tried to tell Train Nazi that only children under 10 go to bed before 9:00 pm; however, she did not care. I guess our lucky numbers didn’t help a delayed bed time. The Food and Beverage (F&B) workers on the train told us that Nazi is always in a bad mood…no kidding. One of the F & B sales girls befriended us and told us something shocking about their working conditions. They work 3 months on with 10 days off in between. They get 9 hours in between shifts for sleep and personal time and this is spent away from home and their sleeping quarters represent that of a park bench. They are only paid in commission of 10% of the food and beverage sold on the train and these prices are 50% higher than that sold outside. We had brought our own food and drink as had many others on the train. We bought two Spy wine coolers to do our part.
When we arrived in Chiang Mi it was pouring rain. We sat in a breakfast spot and went in search of the cheapest, fastest and best way to get going to Laos leaving that day. The breakfast spot had WIFI or at least an unsecured network we could log into. At that time we discovered that Laos was pouring also and would be for 7 days; this would not work as the town we were headed towards is all dirt roads and the highlight for going was the river raft tour. After further research we found a cheaper and easier route into Laos from Bangkok so we decided to stay in Chiang Mai and to visit Pai and we would possibly hit up Laos at a later date.
We found a nice hotel (Lanna House) in Chiang Mai for approx $22 CAD with a stay 3 nights get the fourth for free deal incl breakfast so we are paying $7.50 CAD per person a night. Despite the rain (which only lasted a day) we decided to tour the town on foot and find a few fun activities to do. Here is what we found and decided to do:
- a Thai cooking class
- Flight of the Gibbons as featured on Amazing Race…this is a New Zealand run event which is many ziplines and abseils through the Northern Jungle. It was here we met Ang and Holly, two Aussies on holiday and Kim the Canadian who may meet up with us later…oh yeah and 6 Israelis. The two guys were nice but the 4 chicks were kinda moody. One of the girls was wearing 4 inch wedge heels and a bar like outfit to do a jungle ziplining activity. I know you don’t believe us when we tell you this so we have the video to prove it
- On our walk we met 2 guys; one from Texas and one from Amsterdam who had just got back from 4 days in a monastery doing meditation with monks. This has now become an interest and will be pursued before we depart Thailand. It is not supposed to be fun but it helps with concentration and centering, two important factors for benefitting us in the upcoming school semester.
As those of you who are dim sum fans know, you get uncontrollable cravings for this Cantonese specialty so we found a place. Dim sum here is a buffet but by buffet, you order whatever you want off the menu and they make it fresh and bring it over, you can order more if the first round doesn’t fill you up or in our case 3 rounds and we only left due to time constrictions with our zip line excursion. The cost is approx $12 CAD /person.
At 7-11 we noticed that the liquor section of the fridge was covered and therefore no liquor would be sold for 2 days due to a Buddhist holiday. We only mention this because you would think this is why we go to bed at 10 pm every night but it’s not, we are tired regardless and therefore spend no time partying even though we plan on it every night, we have yet to do so. We claim to not be jet lagged but only blame the fact that we wake up at the crack of dawn every morning for our early bed times. Another craving kicked in for pizza and in the monsoon that came in for 4 minutes we went to the “best” pizza place down the street from our hotel. And it was the best; it was by far the best cardboard I have ever eaten. If you know anything about Lindsay you know my love for pizza and you know how bad it must have been for me to throw it out because it just wasn’t worth it. That’s right I threw out expensive pizza because it just wasn’t worth it, it didn’t matter because there was honestly no flavor. Kathy and I covered it with salt, Italian herbs, and hot sauce oil….nothing. We won’t stray from Thai food again
The sex trade is prominent even up North; it seems more so up here because the size is much smaller. For instance in the evening the local bars have young cute Thai girls working to draw in men. They are dressed for sale, literally. You will also notice a gross amount of old white men (60 +) with young Thai girls (not older than 20). If you want to get under Kathy’s skin this is the situation to do it with; she has been known to yell her displeasure to me on the street about it. Once The Aussies had mentioned they met a girl who was sold into the trade at 14 and was now 17 and they witnessed her turn down 3 East Indian men because they are often rough and wanted to go three at a time. This makes us very sad and damn proud to be Canadian. Say what you want about Westerners but we have it quite good. It should be mentioned there are individuals who are offering assistance to young girls to get out of this industry. Many young women take the help and are taken to remote places to stay hidden and to get an education; however, those that don’t take the help do not because they wish to remain close to siblings or friends trapped in the trade. There are many massage parlors catering to men on men, women, and lady boys. Although the names are funny (i.e; One 2 Come, New Climax) the context really isn’t but the rooms offer private showers. We did not patronize any such parlors for the record, settling only for a clean massage by women costing $4 CAD for an hour.
Our trip to Pai..
We took a mini bus to a very small town further north called Pai.. To get there from Chiang Mai is 130 km (4 hours); 40km is regular highway and 90 km is the world’s windiest road with 1000 “s” like turns. It is not for the weak stomach or the hungry. Pai is a quaint lovely town with only two traffic lights and you can walk anywhere although locals will insist you need a motor bike or taxi because no one walks anywhere in Thailand it seems. We decided to rent a motor bike to go outside of town to the waterfalls. Rachel suggested renting the motorbike because she said that there is little traffic so therefore safe. Rachel lied….Kathy drove without problem to the waterfall even though a small amount of rain came down.We sand Jo Dee Messina’s Heads Carolina, Tails California all the way up; we did this because 15 years ago we used to drive around in lindsay’s BMW listening to this song and claiming we would one day fulfill the words and flip a coin todecide which route to take and here we are, doing it. The way back it was Lindsay’s turn to drive ….big mistake. We had to go down a mud hill to get to the road and we were but 7 feet from the parking lot when a Mercedes was coming up the hill. I moved over to the shoulder to let the car pass when the bike tire augh on wet mud causing our bike to go over and us to go with it; thank God we were coasting and not on the gas. Needless to say Kathy got out without a scratch and Lindsay got a scrape on her ankle and elbow and a giant patch of scrapage taken out of her thigh, not to mention a large tumor bump on her shin. It is fair to say a piece of me will always remain with Pai. Advice from a local pharmacist has helped heal the injuries quite well within 2 days.
We have a train ticket from Chiang Mai to Bangkok for the 12th so we can meet Kathy’s dad there before going south to the ocean. We returned our $5 CAD motor bike (that includes insurance which was invaluable) ….best $1.50 we spent yet and headed to the local bus station. The bus pulls in and can only be described as a chicken bus. The seats looked like those old school bus seats from being a small child and were full so they wanted us to stand for four hours…yeah right, we got off and went to find the higher price option also more comfortable with guaranteed seating. On our way out of the bus station which actually looks like a residential bus stop in Calgary we me One (not sure about spelling) One informed us he had to go to Chiang Mai as well and would drive us there right away for the same price. So, we jumped into his ’72 chevy and coasted outta there. The car looked like an old muscle car, was dark green and spray painted with I love Pai in yellow (picture to come) This turned out to be a great thing to do as One really ggave us great insight into Thai culture and was informative about things you woyuld see along the way but never guess what it really was. For example, what looked like workers on the side of the road was really locals hunting for crickets. This iis apparently a delicacy they fry up with garlic, onions, chilies etc for food and is quite popular. This is our favorite fact to share. This ride was extra good for Lindsay and her wounds because she could take over the whole back seat and was much more comfortable than our ride out there with very poor cushioning.
We write this blog on another sleeper train to Bangkok and we fly south to Krabi and te island on Koh Phi Phi tomorrow.
Look forward to Thailand 2: Sun N Fun coming next week…ish.
Once boarded we were told that the flight was going to arrive in Bangkok 35 minutes early but then we sat on the tarmac for an hour squished in between our neighbors. Regardless, we did make it to Bangkok for the original time of 11:30pm. We cleared customs without incident and went to the baggage carousel to claim our bags. At that time an announcement came over the intercom saying there was a problem with our flights baggage and it would be an hour before the bags started coming out; however, one hour turned into two and we didn’t find ourselves in a cab headed to our hotel, the Grand Watergate until 1:30am.
Because we slept on the plane and in the baggage claim area we went for a walk upon arrival to our hotel. The first thing we noticed about being back in Bangkok was the smells and after being in Japan the dirtiness.
The next day we decided to treat ourselves to a glorious 2 hour massage which ran us 300 baht which amounts to $10 CAD approx. It was heaven.
The second thing we noticed was the price differences
- Massages
- Manicure pedicures ran us $10CAD
- Food and drinks; an average meal costs us $2-3 CAD and is delicious
- I (Lindsay) bought a super nice bikini for $7.50
- Cost of transportation and getting around the city and country
We chose to eat at a lot of street vendors and try Bangkok’s finest; this can be construed as scary but it really quite good and quite inexpensive. One sad thing we should mention is the amount of wild/stray animals roaming about; many are loved pets but many are fighting for food and hanging about….makes us miss our beloved pets back home
Before we begin our beach adventure, we decided to head North for a taste of Northern Thailand and a trip to Laos for the river rafting in the town of Viang Vienne. We purchased a $20CAD ticket for the sleeper train headed to Chiang Mai, an easy access route to the Laos border.
We were given seats and beds number 13 and 14; this is cool because my favorite number is 13 and used to be my Dad’s basketball number and Kathy’s favorite number is 14 and is her soccer number. On the train Kathy learned how to play Gin Rummy for the first time and a Canadian girl Melanie came to join us so she could eat at our table. Why you ask, because at 7:00pm Melanie went to the bathroom and returned to her seat to find it had been made into a bed and she had not yet had dinner. We asked the train hostess ( aka Train Nazi) for a bedtime extension and we were given until 8:30 pm before our table and chairs would be converted over. We tried to tell Train Nazi that only children under 10 go to bed before 9:00 pm; however, she did not care. I guess our lucky numbers didn’t help a delayed bed time. The Food and Beverage (F&B) workers on the train told us that Nazi is always in a bad mood…no kidding. One of the F & B sales girls befriended us and told us something shocking about their working conditions. They work 3 months on with 10 days off in between. They get 9 hours in between shifts for sleep and personal time and this is spent away from home and their sleeping quarters represent that of a park bench. They are only paid in commission of 10% of the food and beverage sold on the train and these prices are 50% higher than that sold outside. We had brought our own food and drink as had many others on the train. We bought two Spy wine coolers to do our part.
When we arrived in Chiang Mi it was pouring rain. We sat in a breakfast spot and went in search of the cheapest, fastest and best way to get going to Laos leaving that day. The breakfast spot had WIFI or at least an unsecured network we could log into. At that time we discovered that Laos was pouring also and would be for 7 days; this would not work as the town we were headed towards is all dirt roads and the highlight for going was the river raft tour. After further research we found a cheaper and easier route into Laos from Bangkok so we decided to stay in Chiang Mai and to visit Pai and we would possibly hit up Laos at a later date.
We found a nice hotel (Lanna House) in Chiang Mai for approx $22 CAD with a stay 3 nights get the fourth for free deal incl breakfast so we are paying $7.50 CAD per person a night. Despite the rain (which only lasted a day) we decided to tour the town on foot and find a few fun activities to do. Here is what we found and decided to do:
- a Thai cooking class
- Flight of the Gibbons as featured on Amazing Race…this is a New Zealand run event which is many ziplines and abseils through the Northern Jungle. It was here we met Ang and Holly, two Aussies on holiday and Kim the Canadian who may meet up with us later…oh yeah and 6 Israelis. The two guys were nice but the 4 chicks were kinda moody. One of the girls was wearing 4 inch wedge heels and a bar like outfit to do a jungle ziplining activity. I know you don’t believe us when we tell you this so we have the video to prove it
- On our walk we met 2 guys; one from Texas and one from Amsterdam who had just got back from 4 days in a monastery doing meditation with monks. This has now become an interest and will be pursued before we depart Thailand. It is not supposed to be fun but it helps with concentration and centering, two important factors for benefitting us in the upcoming school semester.
As those of you who are dim sum fans know, you get uncontrollable cravings for this Cantonese specialty so we found a place. Dim sum here is a buffet but by buffet, you order whatever you want off the menu and they make it fresh and bring it over, you can order more if the first round doesn’t fill you up or in our case 3 rounds and we only left due to time constrictions with our zip line excursion. The cost is approx $12 CAD /person.
At 7-11 we noticed that the liquor section of the fridge was covered and therefore no liquor would be sold for 2 days due to a Buddhist holiday. We only mention this because you would think this is why we go to bed at 10 pm every night but it’s not, we are tired regardless and therefore spend no time partying even though we plan on it every night, we have yet to do so. We claim to not be jet lagged but only blame the fact that we wake up at the crack of dawn every morning for our early bed times. Another craving kicked in for pizza and in the monsoon that came in for 4 minutes we went to the “best” pizza place down the street from our hotel. And it was the best; it was by far the best cardboard I have ever eaten. If you know anything about Lindsay you know my love for pizza and you know how bad it must have been for me to throw it out because it just wasn’t worth it. That’s right I threw out expensive pizza because it just wasn’t worth it, it didn’t matter because there was honestly no flavor. Kathy and I covered it with salt, Italian herbs, and hot sauce oil….nothing. We won’t stray from Thai food again
The sex trade is prominent even up North; it seems more so up here because the size is much smaller. For instance in the evening the local bars have young cute Thai girls working to draw in men. They are dressed for sale, literally. You will also notice a gross amount of old white men (60 +) with young Thai girls (not older than 20). If you want to get under Kathy’s skin this is the situation to do it with; she has been known to yell her displeasure to me on the street about it. Once The Aussies had mentioned they met a girl who was sold into the trade at 14 and was now 17 and they witnessed her turn down 3 East Indian men because they are often rough and wanted to go three at a time. This makes us very sad and damn proud to be Canadian. Say what you want about Westerners but we have it quite good. It should be mentioned there are individuals who are offering assistance to young girls to get out of this industry. Many young women take the help and are taken to remote places to stay hidden and to get an education; however, those that don’t take the help do not because they wish to remain close to siblings or friends trapped in the trade. There are many massage parlors catering to men on men, women, and lady boys. Although the names are funny (i.e; One 2 Come, New Climax) the context really isn’t but the rooms offer private showers. We did not patronize any such parlors for the record, settling only for a clean massage by women costing $4 CAD for an hour.
Our trip to Pai..
We took a mini bus to a very small town further north called Pai.. To get there from Chiang Mai is 130 km (4 hours); 40km is regular highway and 90 km is the world’s windiest road with 1000 “s” like turns. It is not for the weak stomach or the hungry. Pai is a quaint lovely town with only two traffic lights and you can walk anywhere although locals will insist you need a motor bike or taxi because no one walks anywhere in Thailand it seems. We decided to rent a motor bike to go outside of town to the waterfalls. Rachel suggested renting the motorbike because she said that there is little traffic so therefore safe. Rachel lied….Kathy drove without problem to the waterfall even though a small amount of rain came down.We sand Jo Dee Messina’s Heads Carolina, Tails California all the way up; we did this because 15 years ago we used to drive around in lindsay’s BMW listening to this song and claiming we would one day fulfill the words and flip a coin todecide which route to take and here we are, doing it. The way back it was Lindsay’s turn to drive ….big mistake. We had to go down a mud hill to get to the road and we were but 7 feet from the parking lot when a Mercedes was coming up the hill. I moved over to the shoulder to let the car pass when the bike tire augh on wet mud causing our bike to go over and us to go with it; thank God we were coasting and not on the gas. Needless to say Kathy got out without a scratch and Lindsay got a scrape on her ankle and elbow and a giant patch of scrapage taken out of her thigh, not to mention a large tumor bump on her shin. It is fair to say a piece of me will always remain with Pai. Advice from a local pharmacist has helped heal the injuries quite well within 2 days.
We have a train ticket from Chiang Mai to Bangkok for the 12th so we can meet Kathy’s dad there before going south to the ocean. We returned our $5 CAD motor bike (that includes insurance which was invaluable) ….best $1.50 we spent yet and headed to the local bus station. The bus pulls in and can only be described as a chicken bus. The seats looked like those old school bus seats from being a small child and were full so they wanted us to stand for four hours…yeah right, we got off and went to find the higher price option also more comfortable with guaranteed seating. On our way out of the bus station which actually looks like a residential bus stop in Calgary we me One (not sure about spelling) One informed us he had to go to Chiang Mai as well and would drive us there right away for the same price. So, we jumped into his ’72 chevy and coasted outta there. The car looked like an old muscle car, was dark green and spray painted with I love Pai in yellow (picture to come) This turned out to be a great thing to do as One really ggave us great insight into Thai culture and was informative about things you woyuld see along the way but never guess what it really was. For example, what looked like workers on the side of the road was really locals hunting for crickets. This iis apparently a delicacy they fry up with garlic, onions, chilies etc for food and is quite popular. This is our favorite fact to share. This ride was extra good for Lindsay and her wounds because she could take over the whole back seat and was much more comfortable than our ride out there with very poor cushioning.
We write this blog on another sleeper train to Bangkok and we fly south to Krabi and te island on Koh Phi Phi tomorrow.
Look forward to Thailand 2: Sun N Fun coming next week…ish.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Tokyo or Bust
Our trip started with a night in Seattle… the room our travel agent put us up in was wonderful; it had a full English TV guide, two double beds and smelled like urine. Yes you read correctly, smelled like urine; we are really hoping this has no reflection on the next 2 plus months.
The next day we hopped on a flight to Portland only to fly back over Seattle to Tokyo. The flight was ok; it would have been a lot better if we were sitting beside each other for the 10 hour and 45 min flight. At first Kathy’s sound was broken on her entertainment system and she was told by the stewardess on our Delta flight that they could not do anything with the individual sound systems. This led Kathy, our quiet and generally congenial friend to say “Are you telling me that I’m on a 10 hour flight with no sound?” Miraculously, the stewardess brought cheapy headphones which worked and Kathy used her Bose noise cancellers to cover those so she remained calm and happy for the remainder of the flight….my sound system broke later and no headphones would work and there was nothing they could do…C’est a vie
We arrived into Tokyo around 4 45pm and we priced out our options to get into downtown Tokyo which is 60 km from the airport. Our options were: Taxi = $450 CAD dollars, Train which we could not get a price or route in English so we decided to take a cab… just kidding, we took the bus for $45 CAD dollars per person which took us 60 min and then we had to catch a train to our hotel station. The bus was interesting as no cell phones were allowed as it “annoys” your neighbor and since Lindsay and I were once again across the aisle from each other that was good to know. While on the bus we drove past the biggest Costco ever, The packing garage alone was 5 tiers but Lindsay thinks it was closer to10 tiers so we compromised on 7 ½ tiers. We got off the bus at Shinjuku station and hopped onto the train for 2 stops to get closer to our hotel. Locating our hotel (Hotel City NUTS) was no problem which was a blessing as we were so tired and hungry. Our room turned out to be really nice but really small with little room to move around. The onsite bathroom was multiple shades of pastel colors and was about half the size of our room. We did get a 42’ flat screen TV which took up one whole wall and did have 3 English channels at most depending on the time.
Tired and starving we set out in search for sushi. You would think it would be easy to find however we walked around for 30 + min and was still unable to locate a full sushi restaurant. Even though Lindsay is “fluent” in Japanese she had difficulty reading the menus and translating for me. We would recommend only going to restaurants with food pictures or displays and prices located directly on the menu. Otherwise you will have to learn Lindsay’s impression signals for things like mackerel fish.
Some of the interesting observations and customs we came across are:
- Tokyo is one of the cleanest and most efficient cities we have ever seen
- They drink their beer with ice in it – yummm
- No one crosses the road unless the walk light is on and no one seems to jaywalk even when no cars are coming
- Wedding rings seem to be simple silver bands for everyone
- The fashions are crazy and out there but lack color…the standard seems to be grey, black, blue, and white with a few pastels randomly scattered in
- You pull the lever up to flush
- There is usually no soap or towels in the washrooms
- No one tips in restaurants or otherwise
- Smoking is permitted in restaurants but not on streets yet amazingly if surrounded by smokers in restaurants you will leave not smelling of smoke
- There is an unspoken organization for how to take escalators and/or get around train stations. Such as everyone stands on the left on an escalator leaving room for those to walk up the right.
- People will only take the stairs if the escalator or elevator is broken and then they will ignore the signs and walk on the opposite side.
- While walking, it is very important to do so on the correct side or you run the risk of being taken out by men who will drill you hard without glancing back….ooooh if I knew swear words in Japanese. I’m not kidding we have watched women bounce off men as they pass each other and we personally received a few ignorant elbows which I’m still hurting from
- Starbucks coffee comes in one size and runs about $6.50CAD
- The trains are always packed with 50% of people sleeping, 35% on cell phones, with the remaining 15% reading or staring blankly about. In a city of over 12 million this is quite a sight.
- In our mad dash to get to the world’s largest market early we also noticed that if you try jumping on trains while the door is closing, the door will not reopen as Kathy experienced first hand. Although funny to watch Kathy trying to pry the door open for me, this could have been quite dangerous. Needless to say those 4000 people on that train cart were not amused to be held up for an extra 3 seconds. Tokyo is probably the only place in Asia where everything runs on time and you run with it.
- You are also not able to take out items purchased from a store on the train to show friends as it also disturbs your neighbors.
- The Japanese people are very quiet and everything is based on respecting the people around you. In fact we only witnessed one conversation between passengers on trains.
- They speak very little English and the English that is spoken is poorly translated i.e. soy=rice.
- It was also very interesting to see how tall Japanese people really are. We expected Lindsay to tower over everyone; however, 50% were her height (5’11) or taller.
The fish market is really something else; you will find everything from octopus to 6 plus feet tuna. The tuna is so large it has to be cut with a band saw, 7 foot knife, or an ax (seriously like chopping wood). They use what can only be described as a forklift to lift these massive fish up to the saw. When cut, tuna can actually be mistaken for a side of beef. After the fish market we again set out in search of sushi. Our sushi when found was great but for 7 individual pieces, a tuna roll and 2 miso soups we paid $60 CAD and left a little hungry. In fact during our whole stay in Tokyo we only felt full once and that is when we went to a buffet and stuffed our faces. A few hours after most meals we were once again feeling a bit hungry. The portion sizes are quite small which is why we think only 1 in approx 20 Japanese people are overweight but would be considered average in Canadian standards.
Overall we really enjoyed Japan; however, the general expense is why we left so quickly. We wanted to travel to Kyoto but after researching options to get there we discovered that the 2 day trip would cost us at least $750. For example, if you were to have a car and drive the 3 hours to get there the road tolls would amount to $150 CAD. The train ride back to the airport cost us $25 CAD as we are now Japanese train experts.
Thailand here we come…
The next day we hopped on a flight to Portland only to fly back over Seattle to Tokyo. The flight was ok; it would have been a lot better if we were sitting beside each other for the 10 hour and 45 min flight. At first Kathy’s sound was broken on her entertainment system and she was told by the stewardess on our Delta flight that they could not do anything with the individual sound systems. This led Kathy, our quiet and generally congenial friend to say “Are you telling me that I’m on a 10 hour flight with no sound?” Miraculously, the stewardess brought cheapy headphones which worked and Kathy used her Bose noise cancellers to cover those so she remained calm and happy for the remainder of the flight….my sound system broke later and no headphones would work and there was nothing they could do…C’est a vie
We arrived into Tokyo around 4 45pm and we priced out our options to get into downtown Tokyo which is 60 km from the airport. Our options were: Taxi = $450 CAD dollars, Train which we could not get a price or route in English so we decided to take a cab… just kidding, we took the bus for $45 CAD dollars per person which took us 60 min and then we had to catch a train to our hotel station. The bus was interesting as no cell phones were allowed as it “annoys” your neighbor and since Lindsay and I were once again across the aisle from each other that was good to know. While on the bus we drove past the biggest Costco ever, The packing garage alone was 5 tiers but Lindsay thinks it was closer to10 tiers so we compromised on 7 ½ tiers. We got off the bus at Shinjuku station and hopped onto the train for 2 stops to get closer to our hotel. Locating our hotel (Hotel City NUTS) was no problem which was a blessing as we were so tired and hungry. Our room turned out to be really nice but really small with little room to move around. The onsite bathroom was multiple shades of pastel colors and was about half the size of our room. We did get a 42’ flat screen TV which took up one whole wall and did have 3 English channels at most depending on the time.
Tired and starving we set out in search for sushi. You would think it would be easy to find however we walked around for 30 + min and was still unable to locate a full sushi restaurant. Even though Lindsay is “fluent” in Japanese she had difficulty reading the menus and translating for me. We would recommend only going to restaurants with food pictures or displays and prices located directly on the menu. Otherwise you will have to learn Lindsay’s impression signals for things like mackerel fish.
Some of the interesting observations and customs we came across are:
- Tokyo is one of the cleanest and most efficient cities we have ever seen
- They drink their beer with ice in it – yummm
- No one crosses the road unless the walk light is on and no one seems to jaywalk even when no cars are coming
- Wedding rings seem to be simple silver bands for everyone
- The fashions are crazy and out there but lack color…the standard seems to be grey, black, blue, and white with a few pastels randomly scattered in
- You pull the lever up to flush
- There is usually no soap or towels in the washrooms
- No one tips in restaurants or otherwise
- Smoking is permitted in restaurants but not on streets yet amazingly if surrounded by smokers in restaurants you will leave not smelling of smoke
- There is an unspoken organization for how to take escalators and/or get around train stations. Such as everyone stands on the left on an escalator leaving room for those to walk up the right.
- People will only take the stairs if the escalator or elevator is broken and then they will ignore the signs and walk on the opposite side.
- While walking, it is very important to do so on the correct side or you run the risk of being taken out by men who will drill you hard without glancing back….ooooh if I knew swear words in Japanese. I’m not kidding we have watched women bounce off men as they pass each other and we personally received a few ignorant elbows which I’m still hurting from
- Starbucks coffee comes in one size and runs about $6.50CAD
- The trains are always packed with 50% of people sleeping, 35% on cell phones, with the remaining 15% reading or staring blankly about. In a city of over 12 million this is quite a sight.
- In our mad dash to get to the world’s largest market early we also noticed that if you try jumping on trains while the door is closing, the door will not reopen as Kathy experienced first hand. Although funny to watch Kathy trying to pry the door open for me, this could have been quite dangerous. Needless to say those 4000 people on that train cart were not amused to be held up for an extra 3 seconds. Tokyo is probably the only place in Asia where everything runs on time and you run with it.
- You are also not able to take out items purchased from a store on the train to show friends as it also disturbs your neighbors.
- The Japanese people are very quiet and everything is based on respecting the people around you. In fact we only witnessed one conversation between passengers on trains.
- They speak very little English and the English that is spoken is poorly translated i.e. soy=rice.
- It was also very interesting to see how tall Japanese people really are. We expected Lindsay to tower over everyone; however, 50% were her height (5’11) or taller.
The fish market is really something else; you will find everything from octopus to 6 plus feet tuna. The tuna is so large it has to be cut with a band saw, 7 foot knife, or an ax (seriously like chopping wood). They use what can only be described as a forklift to lift these massive fish up to the saw. When cut, tuna can actually be mistaken for a side of beef. After the fish market we again set out in search of sushi. Our sushi when found was great but for 7 individual pieces, a tuna roll and 2 miso soups we paid $60 CAD and left a little hungry. In fact during our whole stay in Tokyo we only felt full once and that is when we went to a buffet and stuffed our faces. A few hours after most meals we were once again feeling a bit hungry. The portion sizes are quite small which is why we think only 1 in approx 20 Japanese people are overweight but would be considered average in Canadian standards.
Overall we really enjoyed Japan; however, the general expense is why we left so quickly. We wanted to travel to Kyoto but after researching options to get there we discovered that the 2 day trip would cost us at least $750. For example, if you were to have a car and drive the 3 hours to get there the road tolls would amount to $150 CAD. The train ride back to the airport cost us $25 CAD as we are now Japanese train experts.
Thailand here we come…
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