Jungle trek first day - 13th September 2007

13th was the day we set out for our 3 day jungle trek.  10 of us crammed in the back of one of those ‘local busses’ that was really just a ute with a canopy on the back and a bench seat down either side.  When JB and I got in there were two others already there. First up was the Canadian (NOT American!) Josh who was here because his travelling partners (3 girls - lucky bastard) decided to do cooking courses and he wanted something with a bit more spice.  Then there was el presidente Jacob, I call him the President because the pommy bastard had an uncanny knack of winning at Arsehole (card game) and getting to wear the “President’s hat”.

The civilised lads among us were then outnumbered when two more poms got on, these two were Danny & Mark (the arsehole). So named because (obviously) he ended up wearing the ‘Arsehole’s hat’ almost as much as Jake got to be el presidente.  In fact these two hats we speak of were each their own hats, the two of them just won (or lost) so much that their hat’s just kind of morphed into titles and got passed around to the winner (or loser) as required.

A bit of a drive and in piled a couple Hebrew speaking lads by the names of Miki & Ivan.  Miki was a quiet sort of dude that didn’t have too much to say (in English at least), Ivan however was the Jay to his silent Bob - well ok, not to quite that extent but there was a bit of a yin yang thing happening there.

Lastly were the German duo Daniel & Petra (supergirl).  Daniel I think got a bit ripped off here as Petra gained the title supergirl after deciding to wear their one big backpack containing gear for both of them for a while.  Of course Daniel had it on the rest of the time but never really got any kudos for it.  Matter of fact I seem to recall us giving him some shit for letting Petra carry it up the steep parts while he took care of it on the easier sections.  This wasn’t warranted at all of course, but hey, you gotta give a bit of shit at times…

One more stop had us a little worried as we already numbered 10.  The space was tight and we didn’t really want any more people crammed in there with us.  It was all ok though as it was simply a stop to let an old gent with “tourist police” written on his shirt have a bit of a yarn to us.  Seems he wanted to let us know that everything was on record and he knew who we were, where we were going, what our itinerary was and when we were expected back.  He also went on to re-assure us that our guide (the rather unique Tong (or Tung, never was quite certain of the pronunciation) was certified as he’d done a cooking course.  Now personally I would have been a lot more re-assured to hear about other skills such as navigation, bush survival, first aide….but no, seems cooking was the important bit.  This was great material though for a series of jokes the entire three days all centering around how a cooking course seemed to be the only qualification needed to lead a trekking expedition.

An hour or two of bumping along in the back of the ute and a quick stop to a local market for some last minute essentials and we were at the start of the trek.  This was the elephant ride stage and we were herded up large bamboo structures with little platforms on to get on to the elephants.  This was pretty cool and JB & I seemed to luck out with one of the faster beasts of the pack.  We were about last in the line of elephants heading out but our guy seemed intent on getting up the front of the pack - he must have been a tuk tuk driver in a previous life.

 

 

Then, after maybe 45min to an hour on the back of the beast we hopped off for a quick stumble through the jungle to the river crossing area.  This was a pretty cool cage/flying fox setup that we loaded into two at a time and just simply whizzed across the top of the river on:

Then the pain began.

My problem was that I’d assumed that these jungle treks were geared to the average overweight lazy western tourist type.  So me being fairly comfortable that my level of fitness is higher than average decided to load up on camera gear, lots of camera gear, heavy camera gear.

That night around the fire I asked Tong if he ever had people that simply couldn’t make it up the mountain.  He replied with:

*giggle* “Yes yes yes, sometimes they big and fat” *puffs out cheeks and curves hands out to show girth* “And we start warm up trek and they stop and say “cannot do - want money back” but I no give” *more giggling* “They say “but travel agent said I can do” and I say “Well you should know, jungle trek not like the shopping!!” “

Bloody oath it’s not like the shopping…

Anyways after a VERY painful couple of hrs we got to where we were going to stay for the night - one of the hill tribe villages.  The night was passed by our rather intoxicated host giggling about fat tourists, playing match stick games and lamenting that out of the 10 of us not a one could play the guitar. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chiang Mai - 12th September 2007

The 12th saw us in Chang Mai in preperation for our 3 day jungle trek.  This however was a rest day and so I sought out some internet while JB tried to arrange a day at an Elephant orphanage.  Not much to say about Chang Mai really, it’s a bit of a sleepy town (at least in low season) - not much going on.  Though we did go out and spend the evening watching some Muai Thai.  This was kinda dissapointing actually - I’ve seen better kickboxing matches back homme in my own (martial arts) school. Before the main fight they also put on a ‘cabaret’ show I could have easily lived my life without seeing.  They were all lady boys and unfortunately they looked just like what they were - average looking guys wearing too much makeup and silicon implants.  Not at all the gorgeous “you’d never know they weren’t girls” tranvestites Thailand is suppossed to be famous for, these ‘gals’ make Dame Edna Everage look genuine…

Highlight of the night by far was after the main event - they threw about 4 or 5 guys into the ring all decked out in Muai Thai clobber with one thing extra - a blindfold each.  Hilarious mayhem ensued.  The refs then jumped in and started shoving guys into each other.  There were wild swings that connected, wild swings that missed, wild swings at refs and wild swings at absolutley nothing….I laughed so hard I almost fell off my chair.  It went on until all but one guy couldn’t stand anymore.

On the way home we must have been in a rush to get away from the lady boys because we managed to take a wrong turn and somehow get on the INSIDE of the inner city moat rather than the outside. This meant my “keep the moat on my right until I see our street” navigation plan was perfectly wrong as we were facing 180 deg away from where I thought.  After a while we worked out that things weren’t right so we pulled out the map to have a puzzle over.  It was at this moment that we met one of the more interesting people I think I’ve met so far.  Karioke Bob.  Basically this old Chinese gent saw we were in a spot of bother and offered us a lift.  Upon piling into his large SUV he started hitting some buttons and down folded an LCD television screen, the inside of vechicle lit up with neon glows and a decent sound system started pumping.  Not satisfied with the quality of the music however the old feller (who’d introduced himself as Bob) then switched tracks and pulled out a big microphone.  Yeah - we got driven home AND kariokeed too.  Oh we also had to say hello to some mate Bob rang up on his mobile and yelled at for a bit - seems the guy didn’t believe Bob had a couple farang (thai for foreigners) in his car.  All in all the drive back was probably more entertaining (blind bout aside) than the rest of the night at the boxing ring.

No pics for the moment, sorry… 

A day in Bagkok - 10th September 2007

The morning of the 10th saw us turn up (thank buddah) in Bangkok.  We arrived admist screams of “taxi, taxi” with the drivers vying hard to urge us into their respective vechicles.  Knowing (from my trusty lonely planet) that there was budget accommodation somewhat close by we waved them away (no easy feat) and started to set off down the street.  Up ran a brittish girl who asked where we were going as the taxi driver had just told her the nearest accomidation was 5km away.  I told her there’d be some closer and so she called over her boyfriend and they decided to walk with us.  Sure enough about 3mins walking and an impromptu turn down a side street and we were at Khao San Rd - backpacker central.  Walking down the road we spied taxis pull up dropping off folks from our bus.  I chuckled to myself over the couple of mins of circles they probably just got driven on.

This was the day I was swapping Celine for Johnny Boy so after finding a decent guest house and checking in, it was a matter of hunting down some coffee and then waiting for Jb to rock up.  Coffee was sorted by a vendor who set up directly outside of the guest house and JB arrived a little later than expected but safe and sound.  The first few hrs were spent breaking our fasts and wandering along Khao San rd trying to avoid the damn annoying tuk tuk drivers who wanted to take us on ‘cheap tours’.  Which were really just a drive around to a temple or two followed by trips to places where they were hoping we’d be talked into buying shit so that they could get their kickbacks.  Which I must admit we did end up doing - simply because JB has limited time in Thailand and we wanted to get the trip to and from Chang Mai, jungle trecking, white water rafting, elephant rides etc organised.  

We ended up walking away from the travel agent with a overnight air con sleeper cabin train trip up to Chang Mai (no more busses for me if I can help it), a couple nights accommodation in a guest house with private bathroom (including pick up from train station), 3 day jungle trek, extra day golden triangle tour, elephant ride, white water rafting, bamboo rafting and all meals on trek for all inclusive about $200 Australian.  Which is more than we could have paid if we organised everything ourselves but really - it’s not a bad price.  And there is something to be said for having everything arranged for you.

In the afternoon it was time to bid farewell to Celine and do a touch of exploring - which didn’t turn out all that well after some ridiculous traffic and unexpected rain.  Though I’ll always have a chuckle when I think back on JB and I sprinting through the teeming rain to get to a large awning for some shelter only finding that after getting under it we are still getting wet.  A glance up revealing it was only the framework of an awning - the roof was missing.  It doesn’t seem that funny in retellilng it but Jb and I were laughing our asses off as we ran down the street searching out some more reliable shelter…

A couple Bangkok temples:

 

 

 

 

Walking the dog Bangkok style:

 

Overnight bus to Bangkok - 9th September

This was a fucking nightmare.

First part was kinda far out as we were loaded into the back of a ute and SPED toward the bus depot.  I capitalised the word sped becasue I have a feeling our driver is paid by the trip, not by the hour.  Tyres were screeching around each and every corner and the brakes were locked up more than once.  Couldn’t see much of what was going on as there was a canopy thing set up over us in the tray, this was probably a good thing.

It all went downhill from there.  

Our bus looked nice from the outside, a brightly painted double decker number that called itself the VIP bus.  I’m sure with a bit of thought I can come up with a suitable alternative meaning for that acronym but to be honest I can’t be bothered.  Anyways the seats folded back so far that almost all leg room behind them was cut off.  Now maybe a small Thai type could squeeze their legs in the space that was left but I didn’t have a prayer.  I spent the whole trip alternating between being rolled up in a ball on the seat and sitting uncomfortably diagonally on the chair so that my legs could go out into the aisle.  Then there was the air conditioner that must have been lovingly taken care of for a long time - like since air conditioners first came out.  I say this becuase all it had was on and off - no middle ground.  So it kept on clunking on for about 20-30 seconds every couple of mins.  And it was LOUD, so loud my headphones couldn’t overpower it.  Even with Linkin Park cranking I still heard it clunking in and out.

Oh but I saved the best for last.  The tour opperators kindly supplied us with an onboard toilet - which was nothing more (apparently, I didn’t go in it) than a container you shat in, which slowly filled up though the trip, and it was RIGHT UNDERNEATH US.  The end result was a bloody uncomfortable, erratically noisey, shit smelling 14hrs to Bangkok.

Never in my life have I been so happy to get into a city and no, I didn’t even consider taking any pictures…

Islands around Krabi - 8th September 2007

Next day after the mini tour we decided to take Mr Tuar up on his offer of a day long 4 island tour plus some snorkeling.  The snorkeling part was quite amazing with the sheer volume of fish that swim all around you, within touching distance.  Made me wish I’d bought that underwater housing for my camera, oh well.  The water was that crystal clear blue/green you assoiate with postcards of the Caribbean and the whole day was pretty bloddy amazing.  If you’re the computer game type then I can put it best by saying that wandering around these islands makes you feel just like you’ve been sucked into Farcry.  I havn’t got too much else to say really that can’t be said better in pictures, so: