Cruising down the Mekong

Ferrying to Laos from Thailand

Thursday morning started by checking out of the hotel, and getting into some very old fashioned long boats, to cross the Mekong River from Thailand into Laos.  We spent a little bit of time at the border “stall” to get the whole groups passport stamps and visas. We met our guide for Laos, named Johnny.

Boarding our Mekong River Cruise

We loaded our bags into some Tuk-tuks, and were brought down to our “Cruise Ship.”  This cruise was on a 75 foot flat barge houseboat.  We began our 2 day trip down the Mekong River towards Luang Prabang.  The views were extraordinary.  One either side of the river, we were looking at sheer jungle mountainside, with occasional fishing huts scattering the landscape.  It is surreal to see these people living in these totally isolated villages in such an incredible atmosphere.

For a change of pace, we were finally able to get a small breeze in the HOT and HUMID weather.  The cruise was incredibly relaxing and was a great opportunity to spend time getting to know the group members better.

In the early evening we arrived at Pak Beng.  This is a small village that marks the halfway point between the border and Luang Prabang.  One interesting thing about this town, is that it just got electricity less the one year ago.

We headed with some group members over to the only bar in the town, called Hive Bar.  We were sitting outside, enjoying some cold BeerLao, and the electricity cut off twice.  If the incredibly scenic views don’t remind you that you are in the middle of nowhere, that does.

The whole group ate a traditional Lao meal on the guesthouse patio with a gorgeous view of the sunset against the valley, the Mekong, and the mountain jungles.  The group hung around and drank in the hotel, until the 12 pm Laotian government mandated curfew came by.  We headed to the room, to call it a night, and try to shower off from the hot sticky sweatiness (no a/c in a town that barely has electricity).  As we checked out the bathroom, the shower, was a hand held head, hanging above the toilet.  There was no toilet paper. 

Overall, a good nights sleep, and back on the boat the next morning.

On to Chang Rai

The day started with us sleeping in a little bit compared to recent days.  We woke up at 7 am.  After a quick breakfast, the group rejoined Arin on the bus, and headed off to Chang Rai, which is a city right up by the border with Laos.  Along the way, we stopped for a snack break at a place called Cabbage and Condoms.  It is a center that teaches the Thai people about family planning, STD awareness, and condoms.  The ones they make are smaller then the American ones…

After a four-hour bus ride, we entered the heart of the “Golden Triangle,” known for being the opium capital.  We checked into the Wangcome Hotel, which happened to be quite a nice place. 

Now that we have realized how extremely hot and humid it is all the time here, we went to mail some of the unneeded clothing home.  Then we grabbed some nice Thai food with Hoover for lunch.

 

In the afternoon, we headed over to a relocation zone, wear hill tribe people from Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar are brought in to live and receive education and healthcare services.  First we saw the Akha Tribe do a local song for us, and then we saw the long necked Karen hill tribe with the rings around their neck.  These people literally are living in huts on the side of the mountain, with no modern day amenities like beds, windows, or doors (don’t even think about a/c or running water).

Dinner tonight was in a local style.  We were sitting in a night market, with dozens of stalls all around us serving various different types of food.  Jourdan and I split a chicken and a pork hot pot (bowl of broth on a flame, and we dip and cook food in it).  I also snacked on some grasshoppers and silk worms.  Jourdan decided his quota for bugs has been totally filled.

To help digest, we walked around the outdoor market for a bit, and then caught some of a Lady-Boy show.  We headed back to the hotel, and prepared for our group’s awesome 80’s party.  Definitely a fun night out!

Our Day in Chang Mai

We woke up this morning around 6:30, and were able to see some of the Thai countryside as we headed into the last leg before Chang Mai.  This was a much more stereotypical picture.  We saw sprawling jungles, mountains, ravines, rice paddies, and some small towns as we passed through.  Jourdan used much of this time to read up some statistics about Thailand, and especially their Lady-Boy population.

Around 8:30 we arrived in Chang Mai (the second largest Thai city- it’s up in the north) and headed to the Empress hotel to eat breakfast, wash up, and get ready to begin the day.  We met our new local guide Arin.  He took us to the Wat Phra That Doi Suthep temple (according to Jourdan- I can’t keep track of this stuff). 

To get to the temple, we had to climb 306 steps, not counting all the steps we had to climb to get to the initial landing.  Along the way, we made friends with some little Asian girls, who despite my best efforts, we were unable to bring them home with us.  The temple was very beautiful, had a great view of the city, and contained ancient relics from Buddha.  While here, I got blessed by a Buddhist Monk (Jourdan decided to stay outside).

After the temple, we did an optional tour that Contiki offers, and headed to The Tiger Kingdom.  This is a place where the Thai’s rehabilitate tigers, and have created a sanctuary. Many of these tigers were at one time wild, and none of them have been declawed.  Jourdan and I went all out and bought the total package.  SOOO worth it.  We were able to touch, handle and play with about 25 tigers.  There were 4 different sizes.  The smallest (2 ½ months old), small (6 months-1 year), medium (1 ½ yrs-3 years), and Big.  It was AWESOME.  Between the two of us, and the professional photographer we took well over 300 pictures.  Check out some of the great pics, but we will probably have an album just from this.

After the Tiger Kingdom, we went back to the hotel for a quick shower and change, and then headed straight out to a traditional Thai cooking class.  On the way, we stopped at a local market to learn about the local Thai foods, and how to buy them.  While here, we picked up some more mangosteens, and we also tried some rambutan, and some Thai curry pastries.  We learned to make spicy and sour soup, pad thai, some chicken and cashew dish and some curry pork dish that I can’t pronounce.  Then we learned about how to prepare sticky rice, and a desert with mango.  It was all very delicious, and spicy. 

Big Momma

After the cooking class, we headed back to the city center.  This was amazing.  At night, Chang Mai changes from a quiet city to a bustling night market.  They set up stall along both sides of all of the streets, and throughout all the open squares.  You could literally buy anything there as long as you are ready to barter with the sellers.  We picked up some Buddha statues for ourselves, some knock off polos for about 6 dollars, and some 80’s clothes for the costume party we have tomorrow night. 

We then went to kill a few hours with some of the people from the tour in a local Irish bar.  Being on a trip with so many different people, we really can experience accents from around the world. Between the Irish, British, Ausies, Kiwis, Canadians and the few Americans,  understanding intoxicated friends get quite difficult. Finally, as it started getting a bit late, we jumped in a Tuk-Tuk to head home.  The driver thought he would be funny (I think because we bartered him down so much) and took a quick detour to a local lady-boy bar.  These lady-boys would actually be very good looking women.  It is pretty crazy.  As they tried to start groping us, and we insisted on not being interested, the driver took us back to the hotel with no further delays or issues.

Our Tour Officially Begins

Today we woke up early, and prepared to do some official touring with a guide.  We started the day by meeting our local guide Ron, and heading over to the old Royal Palace.  We used the local river boats to get over to the palace and only managed to lose 2 of the people on the tour on the way.

The palace was exceptionally beautiful.  There were an array of ornately decorated buildings, pagodas, and shrines.  We toured around the outer and central parts of the old palace, and culminated the experience by seeing the Emerald Buddha.  This is one of the holiest Buddhas in all of Thailand.  I was actually a little disappointed in it, because it was a tiny Buddha (about a foot and a half tall) sitting on top of a 50 foot golden   thrown.  I was definitely expecting a grander Buddha, but it was very nice.

After the Palace, we headed back to the pier, but this time for a private tour down the river and canals.  This was very interesting, as the homes along the canal were the shanty town houses on stilts.  It had that dirty poor aspect that we were looking for.  Also on the ride, we passed a bunch of both Thai and Chinese Buddhist Temples, the Royal Barge Museum, and some really nice houses mixed into the shanties randomly.  At the end of the canal, we did some catfish feeding, then turned around and headed back to the hotel for free time.  On the way back, we had our first exposure to some local fruits.  We were eating Mangosteens.  They are incredibly sweet and juicy.  I really liked them, and wonder if I’ll be able to get them back in New York.

During free time, we walked around for a few and grabbed lunch.  It was so hot and humid, probably somewhere in the 90’s with about 80% humidity, that we ended up with half the group hanging out in the pool for a few hours after that.

   At 5 o’clock we headed to the train station and boarded the overnight train to head into Chang Mai.  We ate some dinner on the train, drank a little, hung out with some group members for a bit, and then went to sleep.  Overall it was pretty decent, but uneventful (nothing like Monte and Jourdan’s 26 hour train ride to Florida on Amtrack).



First Night out with the Group

So it is now Wednesday, and the first time I have had a few minutes to sit down and type up some of what we have been up to.  I will start from the end of the last post.

After orientation, and meeting our tour leader “Hoover” we went for some traditional Thai food for dinner.  After that is when the real fun began.  Hoover brought the group out to a local bar, and introduced us to some Thai snack foods.

Hoover picked out some of her favorite selections, including scorpion, locusts, crickets, and grasshoppers.  They actually weren’t half bad.  The scorpion was a little chewy, but mostly tasted like fried chicken skin. I actually kind of liked the crickets.  They sort of had a raisin-like texture.  Jourdan was being a bit of a wimp about it at first, but after enough chiding from me, he finally tasted some.

As the drinking continued into the night, we started getting ambitious, and decided to go with our new friend Ed to a “Ping Pong Show.”  I can only really compare this to a dirtier, sadder version of the strip club.  We ended up with a lot of stories, most of which are not appropriate for public blog posts.  To give you a brief snapshot, we saw magic tricks with scarves, very long strings with bells shot into the audience, beer pong shots that I will never be able to make, balloons popped with blow guns, water turned to soda (EWW), and a picture drawn with no hands (we ended up in possession of this, see attached photo).

When we finally had enough, we took a long Tuk-Tuk ride that involved popping a lot of wheelies.  For a few moments, I thought we might die, but once Jourdan stopped screaming, we realized we were fine.  We stumbled back into the hotel sometime in the early morning, and prepared for the first full day of the tour.

For the purposes of continuity, and to break up the writing, I will try to break the posts down by day. 

Also, as I notice the writing getting a bit long winded, all I can say is, Fuck-it, we don’t care.  This blog is really for us, you are just an extra beneficiary.  Haha.

Day 1 - Arrival in Bangkok

So after nearly 24 hours of travel time, we finally arrived in Bangkok just after 6 am local time.  We quickly headed to the hotel, dropped our bags off, washed up, and headed out to explore.

Quickly, we came to a couple a surprise realizations.  This city is actually quite beautiful, and the people are extremely nice and helpful.  Not at all the way I pictured it (and although Jourdan claims to have known what to expect, I don't buy it).  Also, as people mentioned, everythign is REALLY CHEAP.

We walked over to a local Wat, or temple, and met a very nice man who proceeded to explain all about Bangkok to us.  He mentioned that Sunday (today) is like a sabbath for the Buddhists, and there is a celebration going on now, in honor of the King's 84th birthday. 

We then jumped into an open air pedi-cab, or Tuk-Tuk, to go visit a variety of Wats around the city.  After nearly 4 hours riding around, the total bill was equivalent to just about 66 cents.

While on this tour, we stopped by Bo Wonniwet (where we met the guy), Intharawuhan (large Buddha), Wat Sakat (Golden Mount with city views), Lucky Buddha (normally closed to the public), Wat Benchamabophit (marble temple with monks mowing the lawn), and the Throne hall exhibition.

Also while on the tour, we stopped by to pick up some custom made suits, shirts, and ties.

After a nice pad thai lunch, and a walk around some open air markets, we decided we were in the mood for some massages.

We got a 30 minute Thai massage for a wopping $4 including tip - NO SEX.  Then after another short walk, we decided to get an hour long Swedish massage for $10 including tip - NO SEX AGAIN.

Some problems we are having:  VERIZON SUCKS.  Jourdan's phone isnt working for data, and neither is the air card for the computer.  That might limit posting abilities. 

It is now almost 5:30 pm.  We are going to go down to group orientation, and then head out for the night.

More to come soon.  We will try to put some pics up here, but for time reasons, we will wait till we get home to share the rest.

Getting Ready to Leave

So it is June 17th, and after over a weeks worth of worrying and discussing packing, I am finally almost ready to head out (it is sad that I havent finished packing yet).  Flight leaves at 7:25 tonight, and after 23 hours and 40 minutes of travel time, we will be landing in Bangkok.

Getting really excited!  I dont know how often we will have the chance to update this blog, if at all, but we created it just in case.  Hopefully we will be able to share some of our experiences with everyone here.  If not, we will post about them when we get back.

BBM, email and Skype are the best ways to get in touch with us while we are gone.

BB