Koh Tao (Turtle Island), Thailand

Koh Tao is a relaxing, youth filled island that is mainly obsessed with open water diving. The beaches are all a beautiful powdery pure white with about the consistency of the flour used for baking.

On Sairee Beach where we stayed, this powdery sand stretched into the ocean at such shallow of angles that the aqua water radiated heavenly crystal clear blue-green, especially in the mornings when the tide was just right.

We ended up staying in Coral Grand Resort that offered up free accommodation in this top end resort with purchase of a PADI open water diving certification course. The course cost about $300.00 USD for the four days of training. The resort had nice little bungalows secluded by the jungle-like atmosphere of the surrounding gardens. Unfortunately, we free loaders were only offered basic hotel-room-like accommodation at the back of the property but we both agreed we were getting a hell of a deal.

The diving was good with Moray Eels, Large Groupers, schools of Barracuda, and even territorial Trigger Fish frequently spotted by our group out in the water. We even saw a Sea Turtle in the distance, the amphibians for which this island was named. Okay, actually Matthew was the only one in the group that didn't see it.

If you don't want to dive, don't get turned off this cool island. We both agree that the beach would be perfect for a young family because the beach is so shallow allowing for great visibility. We saw a few families with there toddlers enjoying the rockless beach along with some friendly beach dogs. There is also an awesome yoga studio, borrowing elements of Thai traditional houses, it is a shimmering beacon of peace on this beach during the day. Perhaps the nicest part of being a non-diver on Koh Tao is that you get large swaths of the beach to yourself throughout the day. This is especially true during the mid-morning and afternoons when most divers are out in the water. Alissa enjoyed her time here cat-posing the beautiful days away on this beach.

At night the vibe is ratcheted up a notch as hypnotic beach tunes spill out along with BBQs, firedancers, and laid back crowds (but not so many backpacker losers) lounging about with the moon reflecting off the waters.

Our Bangkok City Bus Goes Up In Smoke

We were told that the city buses in Bangkok were great for getting around. After our experience, we wouldn't really recommend it...

On our hour long city bus journey to a Bangkok water park, we could smell something not right, something burning. At first we disregarded it, and figured that the buses in Bangkok must be very old and a bit undermaintained. Aways, the locals seemed to be able to ignore it, so we also tried. About 40 minutes into our trip things started to get worse. The bus ticket taker gave us the heads up and told us to go near the rear exit where the fumes weren't as strong. God bless her.

So we got up and stood by the exit, by this time the other passengers started to share uneasy glances and some used their scarfs or jackets to cover their mouths. When we got to the exit a well-to-do, nicely dressed business man told us very bluntly, “This bus is NOT SAFE. Get off now!”

Just as the last word left that man's lips, the whole front of the bus was engulfed in an unhealthy looking black smoke. We got the hell out of there in a hurry. Looking back we can't help but laugh.

Scenes From Bangkok

Bangin' In Bangkok: Back In the Big City Again

After jumping off the overnight train from the Laos boarder we headed straight to the center of Thailand's concrete jungle and posh commercial center of Thailand, Siam Square. In the hub of the city we were overwhelmed by the hustle and bussel of this developed city. We marched by delux movie theaters, skinny new skyscrapers, and fancy boutiques with our heavy backpacks. We were dazzled by the way sky train tracks twisted and crisscrossed with overpasses in the mix of thousands on foot. As busy it was, it still didn't seem chaotic.

We ducked into one building and when we came out the busy streets of Siam Square came to a griding halt. All subways, sky trains, roadways, and pedestrians came to a spooky standstill to allow for a presidential convoy to pass. This happened twice in as many days the Asian Summit was to be held days later, security was at its highest. As the crowds began to move we were off to search for a hotel.

We tried to splurge for once but the nice hotels were outwardly reluctant to offer rooms to two scrubby backpackers who haven't showered in a few days.

After showering at a cheaper quest house and looking semi-presentable, we decided to treat ourselves to gourmet ice lattes at a ritzy cafe that overlooked the Mae Nam Chao Phraya river. We filled our hot sweaty bodies with cool beverages while rich Europeans ordered fancy appetizers around us. After such strong gustatory delights comes washroom visits. While Matt was doing his business, he removed our money belt from his waist. He placed it on the lamp stand in the swanky washroom.

Thirty minutes later while enjoying the view from the balcony, in a moment of panicked realization, it occurred to him that he had left the money belt in the washroom. We lost $300.00 in Thai baht that day. Lucky for us none of our American currency, bank cards, credit cards, or passports were taken. We were a bit cheesed that some richy was walkin' around with our money. Had it been a poor man or something we would have at least thought “they probably need it more than we do”. Anyways it turned into a big deal with many police with machine guns blocking off and questioning all those within the area.

We learned a lesson that day. We must do a better job of splitting up the money, and never, ever remove the money belt, even if you think it might fall into the toilet or that you might poop on it.

Feeling a little low on cash, we decided to go to the gourmet imported food supermarket a Siam Square. It was the most upscale food store that we have ever seen. The samples were prepared like tapas. After making a few rounds with a cart as to not draw suspicion, we left with our tummies full and grins back on our faces.

The Bolaven Plateau: Home to Laos' World Famous Coffee and Enchanting Waterfalls

We managed to spend as little time as possible in Pakse, the unexciting gateway city to Southern Laos. Instead we hit up the high altitude of the Bolaven Plateau.

After evading the most obvious of scams at the bus depot, we traveled slowly up onto the flat plateau. We could feel the air become more crisp as we begin to see coffee, tea, and rubber plants growing in the fields surrounding the narrow and surprisingly smooth highway.

The sight of large mats at the side of the road drying fresh picked coffee beans peeked our interest, silently encouraging us to examine the production on a tour the following day.
Our hotel manager seemed friendly enough, that we bluntly asked if he could tour us around for the day and drop us off at the bus station to take our bus into Thailand. He accepted the offer with the fee of $60.00 USD.

First he took us around beautiful coffee plantations. Here we saw different machines that sort the beans. We also took a short stroll between the rows of planted bushes. We learned the following interesting facts about coffee production on the Bolaven Plateau:

-Coffee was first planted here by French colonialists.
-When coffee produced here was first brought to France it was declared “The Champagne of Coffee” and acknowledged as some of the best in the world
-There are three types of coffee produced on the Bolaven Plateau: Arabica, Arabica Typica (mixa), and Robusta
-Each of the three types have a distinct a looking tree with characterizing features
-Coffee plants take 3-5 years to produce beans
-The best coffee is produced from the bean of 8 year old trees
-Coffee plants stop producing beans after 30-50 years
-The Bolaven Plateau produces 20, 000 tons of coffee per year.

After absorbing so many coffee facts we took a short trip down a bumpy stretch of highway into a tea plantation where we actually got to taste some of the tea produced there. It was pretty good!

Lastly, he took us to one of many breathtaking falls in the region. We hiked around the surrounding park that was surrounded by beautiful wildlife, flowers in the backdrop of an enormous waterfall. We sat and soaked up the beauty before heading back to catch a train to Bangkok.

Weird Houselike Graves of the Katu & Alak Minority People in Southern Laos

As we were told the Katu & Alak minority peoples on the Bolaven Plateau in the Southern Laos Province of Champasak make these eerie wooden house graves. We toured them on the side of the road. They were really crazy looking with such strange features as umbrellas that hang from the eves, mirrors on the sides of the walls, fences that surround the graves, and strange shelves that support plants that hang under the outside of little windows. If you look through the little windows some of the house graves have wooden caskets covered in other trinkets while others have no caskets because these minority peoples build these graves years before they even die.

Cool stuff!

Southern Laos: The Four Thousand Islands of the Mekong (A main bullet point presentation)

We’ll keep it brief because all we really did on some of the 4000 Islands was relax our brains away.

- Took a ferry to Don Khong, (Khong Island a.k.a Large Island) the biggest of the 4000, where there was nothing to do in this mindlessly lazy place but relax to the sight of the brown Mekong and the sound of the temple drums.
- Watched a pack of water buffalo waddle through town munching on colourful flowering trees in front of the temple.
- Meditated and had a nice, unforced conversation with a chatty novice monk.
- The next day we headed to Don Det (Det Island), an island filled with unimaginative hippies and typical backpackers.
- Found a $5.00 USD Mekong view wood, thatched-roofed bungalow and hammocked our days away.
- Drank a ‘special’ milkshake and lost a day of our lives (see above pictures of Alissa to confirm potency of shake).
- Rented bicycles and crossed a bridge to the connected island of Don Khon (Khon Island) in search of the extremely rare Irrawaddy Dolphin.
- Saw some large splashes in the water from the corner of our eyes. We could neither confirm nor deny the existence of the endangered Irrawaddy Dolphins. We did see Cambodia though.
- Met a troubled dive instructor that almost started crying when he recalled a time when he lost the lives of 2 Russian tourists in the deep Mediterranean Sea. He recommended that we take an open water deep sea diving course on Koh Tao Island in Thailand. Looking back we don’t know how he convinced us of it!

Getting Out Of Phongsali: A Story of a Man of Many Jobs, Foggy Flight Conditions, and Machine Guns Pointed At Our Heads

We had an amazing time in Phongsali and stayed there for more than a few days. It was really untouched by tourism. With no attractions to see, we spent most of our time strolling the city and eating, drinking, and conversing with local Lao people as well as trekking the surrounding hillsides.

After not too long we yearned to get back to civilization and decided to save ourselves 3 days of back tracking and a traitorous bus ride through Oudomsai and Luang Prabang by purchasing a plane ticket out of this remote city. It sounded simple enough but, it tuned out to be not even the slight bit simple.

We asked the local townsfolk where we could purchase plane tickets and they directed us to the Phongsali Hotel. We went into this eroding building and saw a small empty booth just big enough for one person with a homemade 'Lao Air' sign scotch-taped to the top.

We hollered for service and after some time a man with strong alcohol on his breath emerged from a back room with loud thumping music. He asked us if we wanted a room. We told him we're looking for tickets back to the capital Vientiane. He immediately turned from hotel receptionist to tour agent and walked from the front desk to the homemade 'Lao Air' booth. In his best effort to hide his slurring speech he explained that there are only two flights a week out of this province- one on Wednesday and the other Saturday. We booked two tickets out of here for Wednesday and he took our passports, money, and personal information. He told us that the bus driver would pick us up from our guesthouse early that day.

On Wednesday morning we woke up to some of the thickest fog we've ever seen. There is no way our plane could navigate through mountain peeks onto some small unpaved runway, we thought.

Out of the fog emerged the bus driver, the same man who packed our bags into the minivan 'bus'. Slowly the 'bus' took off into blanketing fog on our way to the airport in the nearby town of Boun Neua. The road was absolutely horrible, so we had to pop some pills to calm our motion sickness. Finally we arrived at the airport, which by all means did not resemble an airport at all. It was a small empty building about the size of a convenient store with two signs outside barely separate from each other that read 'Arivals' and 'Departures'.

We grabbed our bags and waited for our flight. The same man that sold us our tickets and drove the 'bus' was also the person responsible for weighing and labelling our baggage. He checked us in and directed us to a small waiting room.

We met two Philippinos that would be flying to Vientiane with us. We all anticipated leaving this small town and getting some fresh coffee from the capital but wondered how the airplane would ever take off.

We were all so happy to get out of this place. Our happy faces were all shot down in a second as the man with so many jobs, the man we were so convinced was going to be our pilot, walked into the room and looked out the window and mumbled "the flight is cancelled" before walking away.

We all looked at each other and said, "What did he say?"

Matt replied, "The flight is cancelled?"

The Philippinos commented, "No, it can't be!"

Alissa cried, "I'm not staying here! I'm going to kill someone, this place is making me crazy!"

The Philippinos went to the front desk to confirm the message, then they were quickly organizing a way out. We also over heard a Taiwanese business man make some plans over the phone. We got our tickets refunded by the multi job man and he told us that there are no busses out of the province until tomorrow morning. This was not going to work for us. We managed to arrange two outs. One was Taiwan and the other was the Philippinos.

Because the take-charge Taiwanese businessman wanted to take 3 days to reach the capital and the Philippinos wanted to get there as fast as they could, we sided with the impatient Philippinos. The Philippinos filled us in on why they are in Laos. Remember how we mentioned how Laos is a charity case, well, they both are International Accountants who run their own business auditing aid projects for international charities and governments. Interesting work. Interesting people. We shared many of the same opinions about Lao and had many laugh-out-loud moments with those two down-to-earth accountants.

We spent a few hours in the town of Boun Neua watching in awe of Taiwan who went to the back kitchen of an apparently empty restaurant and made himself "special recipe fried rice" from the ingredients found in the abandon kitchen. We were also blown away by the pageantry of different hill tribe women and their elaborate and wildly elegant traditional costumes. You might notice the lack of people photos on this blog. This is partly because we find picturing people quite intrusive and a bit rude. We know this from firsthand experience in Korea. Actually the sight urged us to ask for permission but ALL tribe women responded with a terrifying "NO!"

In these areas they hold the belief that if you take their picture you are taking their soul. Some will allow you to take their pictures but ONLY if you send them the picture, you know, so they can get their soul back.

Actually, a few times in Phongsali province we ran into tribes women that ran in completeand utter terror away from us. This is really untouched land! Oh.... sorry back to the story...

The accountants got a hold of a shinny new 2009 Laos government Toyota Pathfinder (I think) along with a government driver. And we cruised in style back to Luang Prabang. This ride made those painful roads as smooth as Laos silk. This was the swankiest we've traveled thus far and we didn't take that A/C and extra leg room for granted, that's for sure. It didn't take long before we dozed off. Actually, we slept most of the trip after the darkness of night drowned out the beautiful virgin landscape.

In the middle of the night, on some rural back road in the middle of nowhere we awoke to AK47s pointed at our heads and ready to fire!!!

Two vigilantes had barricaded the road. Our cool-as-can-be government driver said something in Laos to these militant looking men and we passed through no problem. We looked like ghosts but we were safe.

The government driver said they just wanted money and that these roads are a bit dangerous at night if you're traveling alone. Cue Alissa: "No Shit Sherlock!"

Trekking In the Mountains to Hill Tribe Villages In Phongsali

Click on these links on Matt's tea blog to read a lengthy and tea focused tale of our adventurous hike to visit the hill tribe people of the Phounoy Tribe. Or at least look at the pictures.

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Chinese New Years In Phongsali: Getting Drunk With Grandma

After arriving in Phongsali we still had much to do. Firstly, we had to find a place to sleep. Secondly, we had to find something to eat.

With so few visitors to Phongsali, finding accommodation was no problem. The atmosphere of the city was immediately festive with EVERY shop and house decorated with that iconic symbol of the Chinese New Year, that red thin papered lantern. Every second house had music blaring from loud speakers with dancing that spilled into the streets.

We were absolutely starving having only has a Chinese breakfast at the Oudomsai bus depot 13 hours ago. So we settled into a dirty, overpriced, windowless, Chinese operated hotel without much looking around. With stomachs growling louder than party beats we wandered the small center of the city in search of food.

We must say that it was quite difficult evading the locals invitations to come in and party but we knew full well that drinking on an empty stomach would lead to a quick end to the night. I think we both shit our pants a few times when sugared-up, wide-eyed children lit clusters of fireworks off right in front of us. Actually, if we had an audio clip of the walk through town it would sound more like a battlefield than a celebration.

We must have walked down every street before accepting (actually re-accepting) an invitation to drink it up Chinese New Years style.

All restaurants were closed down for the holidays. The ironic thing was that because it was Chinese New Years every house had a full extravagant table setting of food. We were even desperate enough to poke our heads into some houses and haplessly point to the setting. But everyone declined our offer for food all the while offering us shots of homemade rice wine. This food wasn't to be eaten, it was the food offered only to deceased ancestors. We settled down in cheap plastic lawn chairs located in a large tent that flooded into the street. At least we had a drink!

We managed to bump into two Frechies that had made a Lao friend. We asked their new friend if we could get some food, any food. He immediately pulled out his cell phone and was on top of it.

The food did come- Chinese stir fried ginger pork with Lao sticky rice. We didn't hesitate to devour it local style, with our hands. The food was good. The rice wine was strong. This intoxicating elixir above 50% alcohol screwed us up good!

Under the large tent the locals explained to us that today was the second day of celebrating Chinese New Years. On the first day, they summon the spirits of the relatives that have passed away. For the sake of simple communication and for sheer humour value we all called the spirits 'Grandma'. On the second day they eat and share food and get smashed off stronger-than-strong moonshine for the sake of 'Grandma'. When we asked where 'Grandma' was now, the old men who we were drinking with pointed to a large rectangular wooden box covered in incense and wrapped in bright, flashy fabrics. This box was in the center of the tent and often people would walk up to it and light incense and pray to 'Grandma'.

And so all night long we got trashed with the old men and 'Grandma' as loud music pumped out of drive by motorcycles and nearby houses as people prayed, danced, and celebrated in the street.

The locals gave us the big invite the next day when they were going to take 'Grandma' to the old stadium and do some sort of 'good bye for now' ceremony with her. When we asked when this will take place they just said, "when we decide, that is when". Every body in town was drunk. The party was intense.

We managed to get back to the characterless hotel and fall asleep. The next morning we woke up to middle school students chugging beer and dancing in the lobby to the same loud music we fell asleep to.

When we went outside all the same people were still drinking with 'Grandma' in the tent and the dancing, music, and praying seemed like it never ended the night before. This was crazy!

As we bummed around town catching packs of woman's exotically dressed in costumes from years ago, we saw a large truck being driven by monks. In the back of the truck was 'Grandma' and staggering behind the slow moving truck was all of the dedicated people in the tent. They stumbled along, throwing dry rice at 'Grandma' as the truck made it's way into the distance.

Beautiful Laos Wildflowers

The Most Horrible Bus Ride In Our Lives To The Remote Laos Province of Phongsali

Our bus was scheduled to leave from Oudomsai to Phongsali at 8:00AM. It didn't leave until around 12:30 PM. We spent the time waiting at the run down terminal discussing the geopolitical ramifications of an ever increasing Chinese presence in Northern Laos with an author of a book on the people of Laos (see Link). We chatted for awhile while sipping on fresh Laos coffee the traditional way. Fresh grounds are placed in a sock-like filter and boiling hot water is poured into the sock. When the liquid is fully drained from the filter it is poured into a cup with sweet condensed milk at the bottom. Mix it. Drink it. It's quite sweet but good indeed.

When the bus finally arrived at the station for boarding all chaos broke loose as locals carrying live pigs in nylon sacks and roosters in bamboo woven baskets pushed their way into prime seats saving their spots with their bags and jackets.

In the confusion Matthew helped shove our bags onto the roof of the old, dusty bus where a man stacked them with bags of corn, rice, and other goods until the single decker bus resembled a dilapidated double. Alissa made her way onto the bus and threw someone's bag onto another seat securing us seats together. After witnessing some tense moments as arguments broke out over prime seats, we were finally off.

We made many, many stops, in fact, we stopped in every little town along the way. It was slow, but beautiful to experience the small unchanged village life of the different hill tribes.

The houses were made of bamboo or wood, simple, traditional, and functional, not much has changed in these villages for hundreds of years. The women still adorn exotic, traditional costumes. It was like flipping through real life pages of National Geographic.

Every time the bus stopped, locals would haul their chickens off the bus which sometimes required a bus attendant to climb on to the roof of the bus to retrieve the cargo. Everybody on the bus really had a laugh when the bus driver accidently pulled away before the attendant made his way down from the roof. After riding the twisty road for a few hundred meters, the attendant, who must have been clinging to the roof rails, threw a rope used to tie down the cargo in front of the driver's window to signal distress. The bus stopped to let the man back down into the bus. The look on his face when entering the bus was priceless.

A few hours later we had another laugh at something that was sure to happen. When it did, we still laughed. Kind of like watching the same comedy twice.

Yes, while driving on the twisty dirt roads that spinned up the mountains, a bag fell off the roof. We laughed harder when we confirmed that the bag wasn't ours.

As we traveled along, the bus climbed to higher altitudes and the road got worse with each kilometre, kicking up big plumes of red dirt. The odd patches of road that were paved had large sections washed out from this autumn's flash floods. We still don't know how the shitty bus managed to navigate these giant gaps that swallowed up all but the very minimum of road way required to pass without falling into the mountain valley below.

Alissa claimed she smelt gasoline and was covering her mouth in disgust. We both could smell something a bit off but the smell slowly depleted throughout out long journey North.

It was a hot bus ride at times especially in the heat of midday. The heat was compounded by the fact that all windows had to be sealed closed to prevent the thick clouds of red dust from entering. After a few hours of habituating to the noxious smell of chemicals, finally the source of the odour was discovered. The inconspicuous culprit had two jerry cans of gas wrapped in old clothing. He was ratted out by some of the passengers in front of him. The attendant scolded the man and immediately took the cans of gas and threw them from the moving bus.

A lucky passerby even decided to take his new found treasure home with him. His face looked like he just struck gold as he lugged the heavy cans off the side of the road.

Of course we found the whole ordeal completely amusing. We couldn't seem to stop laughing. It was pretty funny but, then again, we were pretty bombed from wallowing in the fumes for hours!

Soon things started to cool down as the sun dipped behind the mountains. It took a few more hours before we finally reached Phongsali, 12 hours after our initial departure time. We breathed a sigh of relief when our bags were finally lowered from the roof of the bus. Little did we know what was in store for us in Phongsali.