It's been awhile. I have had to officially interrupt my slow, late recounting of my Eastern European adventures to begin my South East Asian accounts. I will eventually finish off the other trip though. After 3 days of wedding parties we were finally ready to set off on the big one year honeymoon. One catch. 4 fucking aeroplanes to kickstart the trip. I hate flying. Not to worry. Fucking ccomputer just shut itself down. Typical lol. Anyway. What could go wrong? Easy, you say? We rocked up to the airport and determined to make it, rounded the corner and we had a propeller plane. Propellers? In 2012. Couldn't they find a real plane. Propeller planes never fill me with confidence. We boarded and headed for Dusseldorf. The plane took off. Good start. Then an old, fat German man cranked his seat back and crushed my knees. Arsehole. After a scream of pain he put his seat up, only to keep putting it down every 10 minutes. At least he allowed me meal time to recover my knees before crushing them again. He also tried to go to the toilet when we were landing and was send huffily back to his seat. We hadn't slept for ages and we switched planes for leg 2 to Abu Dhabi. The German was with us all the way to Bangkok. I am sure with his winning personality he has had to resort to hunting down young Thai prostitutes with the rest of his creepy old gringo buddies over here (Persoanlly he may even be a kiddy fiddler. He was that creepy). I watched Thor (average), Blades of Glory (average) and Captain America (good). I think I watched something else as well, but it was probably average. Cannelle got some good films in with Lost in Translation and The Talented Mister Ripley. Abu Dhabi was its usual pleasant 210 C in the evening and it was on to Bangkok. Managed to sleep a little on that one, but was still really knackered when I finished. We arrived in Bangkok, hanging on by a thread. There we met a girl from Manchester, who was off to the islands. She had to wait for ages as well, so we hung with her, eventually got our flight to Phuket. When we arrived we resolved on a taxi for 1400 Baht. Our first quoted price was around 3000. A guy offered to take us to the road for 200 and then upsold us to go to our hotel (nearly 2 hours away) for 1500. Too tired to care, we accepted. Then he complained all the way that the price should have been more. My heart bled for the taxi driver. Such a hard life. It takes a lof of effort to be a total prick all the time. We got to the hotel and ate before sleeping for 20 hours.....Very........very.......very......tired.
We woke up for breakfast and went back to sleep again. Then we watched Date Night and Die Hard in the hotel, ate an extortionate meal, went to the swimming pool and slept a lot again. productive day.
The next day we decided to do something, so we headed out to Kao Lak National Park with another super expensive taxi. At least after the first 5 days we would not be staying somewhere miles away from everything else. It was a decent national park and we went for a short hike. I had already inherited the shits for the first time in Asia. Too quick really. I had to keep visiting the toilet or making my own toilet in the middle of the jungle. A local guide made a leaf into a heart shape for us. I got myself a McDonalds as my bowels were knackered and Cannelle got a crappy meal from the 7/11. There was not a lot to do around there, but we were just enjoying some R and R time, as well as spending time together.
We had wanted to go to the Similan Islands to do some snorkelling, but they were shut during the Monsoon season. One less thing we could do. We decided to take the free bicycles and head off to some waterfalls. Not cycling for a while leaves you with a real pain in the arse. We headed off and saw all the other gringos (or falangs. I prefer gringo) taking the scooters around. Cannelle saw the turning, but didn't tell me as she thought I knew where I was going. I did, but I was wrong. We even asked a family and they sent us another 3km in the wrong direction. Hey, at least we were getting our exercise. We arrived eventually at the waterfall and it was ok. probably not worth the pain of getting there, but we needed to work on our fatty Paris figures. After we headed very slowly down to Boat 813. We had been looking for it the day before and as it turns out, we had been right next to it. What a waste of time. It was a police boat that had been carried in land for 1km during the tsunami. They are in the process of turning it into a memorial park. We had some good fish and took a taxi back with the bikes. We went in the swimming pool again and then cycled round to White Sand Beach. Its quite nice there, but I've never been much of a beach man. As soon as we arrived the guy asjked us if we were ready to order. That would be an impressive feat given that we were yet to see the menu. Cycling back at dusk was cool as you see the colours descending over the sea.
The final day in the hotel and we were finally up to do something. We had both realised that we were not people who can just sit around even on a honeymoon. Cannelle realised she was much more of an action junkie than she had suspected. We took a tour to do some rafting. It was low grade but should be fun. We got a hotel pick up and were off to do our elephant trekking. Cannelle was super excited to be up close to her favourite animals, but at the same time she was a littl concerned the trek would be super tacky. It was and almost everyone we've met hasn't enjoyed it much. You get on the elephant (Much more comfortable than a camel) and it walks up and down som rough terrain. The down feels a little uncomfortable. We declined to sit on its head and the guide had to get down as the three of us were too heavy. I am just a fat bastard after my camel in Morocco refused to carry me, screaming nooooo in the middle of the desert. The advantage of that was all the photos he took so that we didn't have to buy the official ones. After the trek they offered us bananas. Stupdily we thought they were for us and not the elephant. Luckily we got to watch a Korean girl feeding the elephants. Watching the elephants moving andc eating close up was much better than riding them. I think we will head to Surin though to see one of the camps if we have time. After we met a French guy and his Thai girlfriend. He had a dive school down in Phuket. We were off rafting. I fell and badly bruised the base of my left foot. I was having Dom levels of luck. The rafting was only grade I - III, but the guides were mental. Lots of throwing water at each other from the paddles, plenty of hitting the walls and lots of riding up the arse of the other rafts, so we almost flipped when we impacted the underside of another raft. I think they were trying to liven it up and it worked even if I felt we were on a theme park ride. After we went on our hike to a waterfall. I consider a 5 minute walk not to be a hike, but its obviously a long way for some people. The water was too cold to swim, we got lunch and then headed home earlier than advertised. Oh well. We ordered in some pizza, which turned out to be a rip off (spot the theme in the touristy parts of Thailand) and watched the film After Sex. It was total crap.
In the morning we got a free ride to the main road and flagged down a bus to Kao Sok National Park. We arrived and were immediately whisked off for free to a 300 baht treehouse. I don't think we are ever going to walk in this country. We met some Spanish people and did a little translating. We signed up for the two day, one night tour of the lake and looked like we would be going with some 15 year old French Swiss girls. Cannelle had a traumatising experience when she went to use the bathroom and found two mini tarantulas in there. We went out to a nice little restaurant down the road, where everyone seemed to be going from our hotel. We couldn't open the door when we got back, but eventually jammed it open.
Our tour group was 2 German girls and the 6 Swiss girls. Me and my bitches lol. It gave me a lot of time to practice my French. We took a truck ride to the lake and then a one hour boat ride across the lake. It was very beautiful with all the limestone rock formations coming out of the water. We arrived at the huts and dived into the lake. The Swiss girls went for a swim and kayaking. We dropped in the water and I swam across the lake at the point we were. Got chatting with one of the Swiss girls (Veronique) who said I was a big fish. She was a pottery maker at school (they were all finishing school). Swam back over for lunch when there was a panic as there was a snake in the lake on the other side. After lunch it was time for the hike. The guide told us all about the leeches. We were prepared and had read that you need to tuck your trousers into your socks. Some of the girls only had sandals though. Oh well. Maybe there would not be that many. We headed off on the trail. I saw a monkey from the boat, which was ok but I think the others wanted to see them and I may be the only one on the boat who had seen them in the wild before. The trail was pretty and toughish for an organised tour. I was quite surprised. We waded a river and we kept our shoes on as I thought the leeches came from the water. We all got to the other side and noone had any. It looked good then. We were walking along when all of a sudden there was a scream from behind. I thought it must be a snake No. It was the leeches. Apparently they can't swim and are on the land not the water. The Swiss girls had a few on their feet. Then another scream up ahead. One of them had 5 on her feet. It was like a horror movie. They had crawled between the toes, under the feet and in the straps of the sandals. They were attacking us as well and we had some in our boots, on our socks and one had even climbed up half my leg. The guide assured us they could not get through materials, but we were not 100% confident in our system. It was untested. Thank God I didn't have my socks with holes in anymore. Every so often I felt something uncomfortable and I thought that they had maybe got inside the clothes. Yet removing the clothes would leave the skin exposed. Meanwhile we moved slowly, with occasional screams and a few of the girls were traumatised. The leeches were presistent and hard to remove. You had to yank them off with force, but then they stuck to your fingers. So we ended up having to use leaves to remove them. Persistent buggers and they walk up you end over end. Wewere moving so slowly and one girl had a leech on her neck. That finished her off. I suggested leaving one guide with some of them and going on without them. In the end we left three of them in the river on their own and pushed on without them. We got to the cave eventually. People had dorwned in there from a flash flood so you could not go so deep anymore. 3 of the Swiss girls and I decided to go in. Moment of truth. I removed my shoes, socks and trousers. No leeches. The system worked :-) We did not have to worry so much anymore. We waded into the cave and went about 100m. It was quite pretty, though not as cool as Belize. After we headed back and picked up the ones we had left behind. I spoke Spanish with Veronique all the way back to practice. It was good, but I still use too many French words. It had been good for me to practice both languages. We got back, had dinner and then went on a night tour of the lake. With the boat engine we were never going to see any wildlife. It just seemed like a star watching exercise. We did catch a civet cat up in the tree. Well its eyes anyway. There were some dickhead Austrians there as well. Great. One of the German girls was told she couldn't use shampoo in the lake as it killed fish and then went and did it anyway. The blonde one was walking up and down the promenade and when Cannelle asked her what she was doing she said she was recording her footsteps to use in future stuff. They were a mixed back the Swiss, but had some interesting traits.
In the morning it pissed down with rain so we couldn't go kayaking. After the leech experience, only two iof us were going hiking (me and Veronique). She was quite hardcore and was off to Africa for some work experience. At the last minute Morgane decided to join us and we set off hiking. All the way they were quizzing me on our lifestyle and how it was possible. We discussed the differences between European countries and English speaking ones. Apparently we managed to put some ideas into their minds for the future which their parents wouldn't necessarily like. We saw a crab and a millipede on the trail and chatted about infidelity, masculine societies and with the guide about whether Thai people like foreigners in general. It was a fun walk and no leeches. Meanwhile Cannelle was chatting with the blonde girl mainly and they were the 3 with the strongest personalities. The guide grabbed us some lychees on the way back and we told the Germans we would meet them to take the night boat to Ko Phang Nan. Then after they left we changed our mind and decided to stay another night. Cannelle felt bad for leaving them, but I didn't think they wanted to travel with us after we spoke so much French. We met an American girl and an English girl. The American had been diving with Big Blue and reaffirmed Ben's recommendation to dive with them. Meanwhile we warned them about the leeches and they both went out to buy some socks. We went for dinner and Veronique told us to close our eyes so we could try a fruit. It was tamarind and quite acidy. Her and Morgane came to talk to us during the meal and the others told them to leave us alone as we were having a romantic meal. The perils of being a couple. People are less likely to travel with you. We went back to the hotel and hung out with the American again until late. We went to sleep.
In the morning we said goodbye to the others and we were off to the islands. It was pissing down with rain, but Veronique had gone off hiking on her own in the morning. Bit mental. We wished the American good luck in the jungle and left.
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