Aimlessly Ambling Across Asia: March 2012

Boiling the silkworm cocoons

Thailand February 15-16

We confess to a major planning blunder. Just before leaving for Myanmar we realized that trying to fit in Vietnam and parts of Thailand with Ian wasn't feasible, so we decided that the 4 of us do Vietnam before Ian arrived and then not be so hurried while he was with us. The plane tickets to Vietnam were bought for the 16th of Feb and it wasn't until we got back to Bangkok that we realized our Vietnam visas are not valid until Feb 26. It was impossible to get ahold of the Embassy, with an English speaker and it was too late to change or refund the plane tickets. In the interest of sanity we have eliminated Vietnam and Laos from our itinerary. So that left us with the quandary of where to go until Ian arrived on the 25th. There were some places in Thailand that we particularly wanted to do with him so in the meantime we...

Feeding hungry elephants

February 17-20 Kanchanaburi Thailand

Kanchanaburi is a 2 hour bus ride west of Bangkok. The major point of interest in the town is it's history about the Bridge over the River Kwai during WWII. After the Japanese invaded these countries during the war, knowing their naval supply lines were suseptible to capture and destruction; they purposed to build a rail line through inhospitable jungle and terrain and link Bangkok and Rangoon. They wanted to have a secondary supply line through which to continue their push to India and beyond. They used allied POW's and conscripted Malaysians and other Asians as their labor force. The working conditions were horrific and the Japanese Army officers often cruel and very demanding. The line was built at the cost of thousands of lives. The bridge itself was eventually bombed and put out of commision later in the war. It was repaired and is now quite a tourism item. We went to a museum that gave the history. It was very well done with photographs, maps, dioramas and items. Captioning was done in both Thai and English (a greater percentage of the POW's were Dutch, English and Australians than American) Across from the museum is a huge, well-tended cemetery with the POW's who died during the construction were reburied.,

Getting a wet willie from a friendly elephant

There were 114 work camps built during the construction of the railroad and the dead were buried near those. After the war, using records kept by both the POW's in secret and the Japanese captors, those sites were traced down and the remains exhumed and reburied in this one cemetery, before the sites were lost in the encroaching jungle and forgotten. The American dead were repatriated. The following day we walked to the bridge itself. As I said it is a tourism item. There were several huge tour busses in town every day. And we could tell as we watch folks in the cemetery, some were making a pilgrimage of sorts looking for a relatives stone. We found a great guest house with a pool and made ourselves at home in for great periods of time. After 3 days it was time to move on.

"Who says we elephants don't know how to have fun!"

February 21-25 Koh Samet Island

We wanted to check out a beach before Ian arrived so he could get a chance to get over jet lag before we started moving faster. We chose Koh Samet Island and it took us a 5 hour bus ride, a 15 minute taxi ride and a 30 minute ferry ride, but we ended up on Koh Samet Island and got a place for the night. We ended up spending 5 nights and 4 days doing a check of the area. This involved 2 full days of lounging in beach chairs and periodic dips in a tropical ocean to cool off, as well as building sand castles. We also checked out several more guest houses and stopped at many restaurants to find ones in our price range. The bungalows and rooms on the beaches were way out of our budget, but we found a nice little place called Miss Hong’s House in the village which was a 10 minute walk from the white sand beach.

February 25-26 Bangkok

"We are artists too"

We bussed back to Bangkok and got checked into a hotel. That night at 11:40pm we greeted Ian at the airport. It was so good to see him after 3 months separation. Sharing this part of the trip with him has been special. We spent 1 day in Bangkok to allow him to get acclimated a bit. We went to the Grand Palace Compound which includes the former royal residence of the King’s (it is only used for ceremonial purposes now) and the royal temple. The palace is not open to the public, but the temple area is and includes several buildings and shrines. We also walked around the palace and some of the other buildings. From there we took the river ferry back to our hotel and spent time cooling off in the pool.

"And we pay soccer."

February 27-29 Koh Samet Island

Ahhh, 3 more days of beach time. The weather is hot , slightly humid and mostly clear. Days we spend at the beach on beach chairs under umbrellas or in the water. Evenings we wander into town for supper and an ice cream at the 7-11. One night we walked the beach. It is lined with resorts and restaurants and brightly lit up. Several of the restaurants have fire shows Far off shore are the bright lights of the fishing boats. Our last night we ate at one of the restaurants. It was very pleasant with the sound of the ocean waves a few feet away as they had set the tables right up on the beach.

The owner of our guest house was a very friendly lady as were several of the people we got to know in our wanderings through the village. One morning the landlady shared with us one of the local seasonal delicacies; fried cicadas. We each tried one and Sam said they reminded him of french fries.

Off to the jungle with our favorite bull cart driver.

Southern Thailand is quite hot and humid. The people are friendly, but we're finding it very well touristed wherever we go. The cities are modern, clean and a great public transport system. Most highway signs are in both Thai and English script. Busses and bus stations often have the signage in both languages. Not everyone on the street speaks English but in a pinch we can often find someone with enough words to get the information we need. We have run into more tourists from other countries than we have Americans. Koh Samet was particularly popular with the Russians and French. We have also run into Danes, Germans, Israelis, Australians, Brits, Japanese and Chinese.

"Yeah, we also offer the best jungle taxi service!"

March 1-5 Cambodia

It took nearly a day and a half by bus and taxi to get to Siem Reap in Cambodia. Fortunately we had AC all the way. Siem Reap is a couple of hours from the Thai border and the location of Angkor Wat. Ankor Wat is probably the symbol for Cambodia. Angkor Wat is one spectacular temple compound in an area loaded with other temples, shrines and compunds that were built over a period of several hundred years, by several different kings, and some were Hindu and some Buddhist. The temples are scattered over a wide area. The Cambodians have done a great job in presenting them. The roads connecting the various temples and areas are paved or smooth dirt. The signage is pretty good. It is a hugely popular tourist area. There were thousands of tourists from lots of different places. Many were like us, arranging our own tuk-tuks (motorcycles with passenger wagons attached on back) to ferry us to where we wanted to go, some were bicycling the sites and others were package tours with large tour busses carrying around 30 or 4 people from place to place.

Northern Thailand

There are lots of hotels, guest houses and places to stay in Siem Reap. It is low season so the Okay 1 Villa guest house we were in wasn't full. We had a $35.00 room with 6 single beds and it's own bathroom on the 5th floor; one floor below the rooftop terrace and pool. We spent quite a bit of time in the pool. One day we went to a silk farm and did a tour that showed how silk is produced from the worm to the finished cloth. This particular farm is all hand done. They have the sheds with the worms, mulberry shrubs in the fields, the threads are pulled off the cocoon by hand, spun, dyed and woven on hand looms. It was all pretty interesting.

We spent so little time in the country it is hard to say from first hand experince what the country is really like under the tourist veneer that is Siem Reap. This is the country that in the 1970’s was devastated under the Pol Pot regime and over a million people died in the genocide. What daily life is like for the majority of the people is hard to say.

Orchids

March 5

Getting back to Bangkok via 2 busses and doing immigration formalities was a day long affair. We arrived at our hotel at 7:00pm and hurriedly left a couple of things in our stored luggage, got money from an ATM and then caught a taxi to the long distance bus station. By 9:00pm we were on an overnight bus on our way to northern Thailand.

Riding the Akha village kid's bicycles

March 6-8 Chaing Mai Thailand

Chaing Mai is in the northern half of Thailand In an area known for its hills, indigenous people known collectively as the hill tribes and trekking. Chaing Mai itself is a large city, Steve’s oldest son Adam was born in Chaing Mai almost 38 years ago. The city and the area has changed a lot since then. At that time the only way to see a hill tribe village was to go with a missionary. Now trekking to the villages is a big tourist business. One day we did a “Safari Tour”. Elephants had long been used in Thailand for logging and riding. Recent years have seen a drop off of logging due to deforestation. Elephant camps for tourism is now a big business to make use of these now out of work elephants. We watched elephants bathing in the river, they did a show where some elephants “danced”, one kicked soccer balls through a goal, and two painted a picture.

Sam making drip castles with his French and Chinese friends at Samet Island

March 6-8 Chaing Mai Thailand

A gate at Angkor, Cambodia

Using Akha bird hunting slingshots

A Thai Spirit house

We then did a half hour elephant ride in the countryside. It was great fun as the seat rocks back and forth due to their rolling gait. While at the elephant camp we also went on a bullock cart ride and went for a ways down the river on a bamboo raft. It was a great day. On the way back to town we stopped at an orchid nursery which was also interesting. The rest of our time was spent wandering Chaing Mai looking for the perfect khao sawy; a coconut and noodle soup, hanging out and seeing a couple of temples.

The Kwai River bridge, Western Thailand

March 8-11 Chaing Rai

On the March 8 we caught a bus further north in Thailand to Chaing Rai. It’s much smaller than Chaing Mai and closer to the Mynmar and Laos borders. It too is close to the hills and the home of the hill tribes people. We checked out a guest house that we saw on a brochure stapled to our bus tickets. It was situated on the river in Chaing Rai and owned and run by the Akha people.

Our guest house, Samet Island

Fishing boat, Samet Island

Street stalls, lunchtime

The next day we went to their guest house 23km from town. It is located right in the middle of an Akha village and overlooks the mountains, tea plantations, lychee orchards and jungle. It was an incredible place. We stayed in a cement bungalow with hot shower, tv, and the great views. It is a small village of about 130 people and we could wander around through the village, on the trails in the hills, and just hang out. Nearby is a waterfall where we went swimming. We spent a couple of days there, hanging out, relaxing, and soaking up the atmosphere. One of the fellows is putting together an Akha Museum.

A Thai temple, Bangkok, Thailand

The Buddhist ruins of Angkor Wat, Cambodia

. Things have changed radically in the last 20 years and he fears many things of his culture and history will be lost. We spent a couple of hours with him and he shared about the animal traps, toys, tools and so on that he has put together.

Yesterday evening at 6:00 we caught a night bus to Bangkok and arrived at 6:00 this morning. Today has been spent arranging train tickets to southern Thailand and Malaysia, repacking our backpacks, hanging out in the pool and savoring our last day with Ian. Tomorrow he flies out at 8:00am and we catch a train at 3:00pm. We have so enjoyed travelling with Ian. It has been like old times and our other trips, and will miss him on the rest of the trip.

Posted by Martha