Week 17 Thailand
(Chang Mai 2, Khao Sok, Koh Lanta)
17th
to 23rd of November
On a sunny
morning the 6 Theron birds had to leave their Bamboo Nest in Northern Thailand
for the hustle and bustle of the big city of Chang Mai again. We had to change
accommodation form Julie’s Guesthouse to Rose (on the corner of a busy street)
Guesthouse. The return journey by pick up truck to Chang Rai, revealed that we
had not even scratched the surface of the beautiful north. We had to wait a few
hours on the busy bus station, but that gave Arno chance to do a bit of sandal
shopping with Alana. Her travel sandals were not up to the trek anymore. A 3-hour
ride in a Sunday afternoon bus and then some tough negotiating with eager red
taxi drivers, brought us eventually at Rose’s, by 6pm. We were hungry and
tired, the cheap guesthouse was……cheap, but served us in a marvelous way and
the food was good. We did a short hike up the street for the promised
ice-creams and continued onto the famous Sunday market in the old town. Rose Guesthouse
is inside the city walls, so for the sake of the market, some of the streets
were traffic free. That provided a bit of a challenge for us with our luggage
on arrival, but the kids were great and praise God, the walk was not THAT
long!!
The main reason
for our return to Chang Mai, was to have an elephant encounter and to pic up
our train journey south (this time pre-booked sleeping bunks…yay!!!!!) Our
preferred elephant camp was the highly acclaimed Nature Elephant Park. Only 25
visitor’s per day are allowed in here. We left it too late and missed a
visiting spot there, but not to worry…in Chang Mai you will never be short on
elephant encounters. We managed to secure a booking with Happy Elephant Home
(which ended up begin just across the river from our first choice…still more
than and hour’s drive outside Chang Mai) We could leave our luggage at Rose’s,
while we were out for our morning excursion. A early morning pick up turned
into a nail biting affair….other pick ups, traffic and a long distance away
resulted in us just getting to the Happy Elephant Camp by 10:30am. Well, you
might wonder why we were so anxious? We booked half a day Ellie encounter, with
the view that we had a sleeper train to catch from the station in Chang Mai at
4pm…a train that we were NOT intending on missing!!!! The encounter was not
cheap and we were planning on having some good time with the elephants. Well, a
little bit of brain adjustment had to be made, not to distract our attention
off the main event of playing with these AMAZINGLY large animals. (Who knows,
maybe never to be repeated….)? We were with the elephants, even though it was
now way later than we anticipated…and we were going to enjoy it!!!
So after
introductions made by our chief mahout, Omo, we got changed into our mahout
outfits (these are to keep the elephants familiar with the look of their
ever-changing carers.) We were introduced also to Bambam, Café, Muklock and Tawhee
and they loved us because we had hands filled with bananas to feed them.
Fact stop: Only
male Asian Elephants have tusks, and most of the time also just one…. The
females do not have tusks.
The little mahouts
impressed Arno and I so much. They were feeding the giants, walking beside
them, leading them by a rope halter, talking to them and feeding them some more
bananas. All but the littlest mahout. She just wanted to ‘lead’ her mama, talk
to her mama and keep a very safe distance between herself and the gentle
giants.
So after the
initial banana indulgence of our big pets for the morning, we led them down to
the river with the help of the ‘real’ mahouts. It was a gentle walk with some
steep sections, but the elephants were like ballerinas and we were the specie
slipping and sliding on the loose gravel. We brought them to a lovely riverbed.
They did not need any encouragement…straight in. We gave them a little
ellie-play-time, before we stripped down to our swimmies and joined them in the
water. We could wash them, splash them and then it was their turn to spray us
with gallons of water!! We had the best time. Nina opt for playing with the
stones on the riverside, and Philippa, although in the river with us, preferred
one of us holding her high out of the water!! The mahouts had a bit of a hard
time to get the ellies out of the river, but nothing that a banana cannot fix!!
Our little
Philippa, impressed us by requesting to lead Bam-bam home. It was the sweetest
memory of the day: seeing her walking fearlessly beside this huge animal (and
it was a baby elephant!!)
After lunch, a
swim in the resident pool and a few farewell bananas, we were on our way back
to Chang Mai. With an hour to spare, we were dropped off at ‘Rose’. We grabbed
our bags and Arno was running down the street to look for a ride. We saw at
least 4 red-‘wagons’ parked along the street, further down, but all driver-less.
Praise God another one came crusing towards us. Arno flagged her down. Then
ANOTHER stand off. She wanted to charge us double the amount we paid to get
from the train station to our hotel in the first place. We were fed up and not
having any of her nonsense!! We just told her to go away, we will find somebody
else, then she changed her mind and winked us back over! Amen!!! We reached the
train station 20 minutes before departure!! Yay!!! After dropping the bags in
our carriage, Alana and I rushed to a nearby 7Eleven for supplies. At 4pm our
sleeper train departed for Bangkok and we were on it and had food to tie us
over till the morning!! Pfeew!!! All in one day!!!
This train was
exceeding all expectation with a lovely clean bathroom (even including a
shower!!), an carriage attendant coming round to make everybody’s beds up for
the night and a lady coming to take our dinner orders. A bit of a different
scenario form the 3rd class travel we are used too!!! After a good
night’s sleep (Arno and I even watched a movie after we’ve put the children to
bed) we arrived in Bangkok station. We were now seasoned travelers, knew the
best coffee shops, where the find the 7Eleven for another stock up on goodies
and how much to pay at the toilets!!! We might not have explored the city of
Bangkok, but we certainly know our way around the train station!! By 8am we
were on our next train, heading to the south!
A full day was
spend reading, sleeping, watching movies and admiring the changing landscape
from our comfy seats. Bliss. Slowly rice fields were changing into pineapple,
palm and rubber plantations. The hilly north also give way to the flats of the
south with the occasional karst mountain. I was totally mesmerized with these
awesome little limestone mini-mountains randomly scattered over the green ocean
of tropical vegetation. Just lovely.
Mr Driver was
waiting for us on the platform on arrival and before we knew it, we were on our
way to the Green Mountain on the outskirts of the Khao Sok National Park. 28
hours after setting off in Chang Rai we arrived at Mr Tawee’s resort. Well, it was
more a bush bungalow camp, amongst interesting bugs, beasties and rubber
trees!! A very laidback travelers rest, where reggae is played until the wee
morning hours and Mr Tawee and his friends are enjoying their wiskey!! The
friendly lady at the helm of the kitchen was such a sweet woman. I never saw
her without a smile. It’s a bit of a family business with Mr Tawee being the
director!!
After a lazy
first morning here, we were sorted out fast with a cousin-guide to take us down
the lazy river on tubes. The kids absolutely loved the experience. Nina was on
my tube and Philippa with Arno. Loadsa splashing was going on, balancing acts,
swinging on ropes and negotiating small rapids. With a light afternoon drizzle,
some of us were just starting to loose feeling in our fingers when we were
navigated to the riverbank, with our pick-up truck waiting. Nice. Last but not
least, we had to do a proper hair and body wash under a nice refreshing cold
shower. Such brave children!! A hot Milo (kind of hot chocolate drink) put
everybody in a better, warmer place!!
At first glance
the accommodation was a little rustic and the service not always up to
standard, but we met some great fellow travelers here. Stefan, a German
cyclist, was living his dream riding his bike around the globe. His wife was
happy to remain at home, while he was giving himself a 50th birthday
present. Every now and so often, she would fly out to meet him somewhere!! Very
inspirational man!! And then there were the Dutch honeymooners, Katinka and Rob.
They shared a taxi with us eventually and the kids so loved telling them
stories and hanging out with them.
We planned to do
a bit of a jungle trek with guides, but Arno had a little accident, cutting his
foot on a plastic container in the children’s bedroom, so we decided to forfeit
the moaning of little children that wants to be carried…. to just spend our
second morning in a hammock (hee hee!!)
Another big
highlight was to follow in the afternoon!!! Proper elephant riding!!!! After
arriving at the elephant sanctuary, we were rushed over to an elevated platform
(we had to climb up with steps to the top of this). The platform was built just
at the right elephant-back-height. Alana, Nina and I got on first and our
lovely Indian lady elephant was instructed by her mahout to move out, so the
next beast can move into her place at the platform to pick up Arno, Thomas and
Philippa. What followed was an unforgettable hour of gentle mahout
encouragement and corresponding elephant grace, strength and compliance. Our
lady, Thomas’ newest lady friend(!!) and the rest of the other 6 or so ellies
who were following us, went up the steepest jungle treks (most of them
extremely slippy and sloppy after the rain of the previous night), over tree
stumps and roots, big boulders and through sloshy mud mazes. They knew the
route and did not need to be lead or pushed at any time. It was more a case of:
What, do you need me to walk through this mud puddle…again?? Really??
I was having pity
on these gentle giant ballerinas, but also admire them even more now. With
those amazingly big body shapes, these elephants can maneuver through the
tiny-est little gaps. Respect! If I ever have admired elephants in the past, I
now absolutely adore them!!!
Elephant fact:
African elephants are much larger and more moody than the Asian elephants…and
they have two tusks…both male and female (unless they have managed to survive a
poachers attempt to steel their tusks…)
Our last evening
in the Khoa Sok National park was spent watching a movie with the kids in our
mosquito-net covered double bed and then having dinner with all our new friends
in Mr Tawee’s tree-trunked tabled restaurant. Chatting and exchanging travel
experiences have become our latest point of connection with man and mouse….no
surprise there!!!!
While settling
the kids in their bamboo and grass woven hut, I made a trip or two to our room,
to fetch and drop off clothes and so on. After every quick visit to our room
(did not switch the main lights on, since I knew what I was looking for…) I had
an ant or two on my leg or shoe….(You might guess what I am going to tell you
now…..!!) At first I did not think to much about this, until during my third
trip to our room the ants were really starting to bite me once I stepped into
our room. I switched the lights on and what I saw …well to put it lightly…sort
of freaked me out… A LOT!!!!!!
Many ants were up
my legs already and biting me like mad…reason…the floor of our room looked like
a major ant Christmas-come-early party!! I did not even took time to take it
all in, but just ran out of our room as quick as my flip-flops could go, to get
re-enforcements in the form of Arno, a HUGE can of ant-spray and a broom. Just
for your information, ants are very good at climbing…even up mosquito nets.
For the next hour
or so Arno and I was turning ‘mission impossible’ into a bug-free zone. Well,
he was doing most of the stripping of our bed and shaking of the mosquito net,
while I was handling the bug-spray and mainly trying to stay clear from the crawling
menaces. Actually, I started using the
bug-spray on the pavement almost 3 meters away from the bottom step leading up
to our hut…because that’s where the troops were already starting to line up for
their big carry out….. I even went to the kid’s hut and sprayed their
doorstop…just to make sure the beasties did not change their route. Needless to
say, we took back an empty bottle of bug-spray…..
A HUGE lesson to
be learned…never ever ever EVERRRRRR allowed the children to eat cookies in
your bed, while watching a movie…especially not when you are staying in a
wooden/leave-woven hut and ESPECIALLY after the owner have warned you (du-hu)
to be careful with keeping your food sealed, because of the ants…..
Many times during
our cleaning up extravaganza did I promise that there will be NO chance that I
will sleep in that bed again, but bless my wonderful man!! He did the most
amazing job in de-ant-ing our bed and room. I did end up sleeping in the bed
and no ants bothered us.
It was one of
those really fun, turned very challenging, evenings…which by the grace of God,
will never ever be repeated!! In times like this I am so grateful for my kind
and hardworking husband…and also for investing time in the past to practice
effective communication!!! Such a very un-expectant and bizarre situation can
so often place a lot of strain on a relationship and without the tools in our
‘marriage kitbag’ this situation might have had a complete different outcome.
Face it, we’ve been with one another now for over 4 months…24/7!! I do not say
we know it all, but what I am trying to bring across is, that it is worth it to
invest quality time into your marriage by:
·
spending
a date night together at least once every two weeks (Nikki and Silly Lee,
authors of the Marriage Course and
the Marriage Book suggest once every
week!!),
·
learn
together about listening and communicating well (this will empower you to
handle challenging situations better)
·
and
finding out what your partner’s love language(s) is (Garry Chapman writes about
it in The Five Love Languages).
There are other
foundational principles worth investing into too, but ‘nough said!! (Let me
know if you’ve got any questions about anything I’ve mentioned in the last
paragraph. Will be happy to help, advice or recommend!!)
The Green
Mountain Resort was an interesting experience, with big highs and a very big
low. Lets say, for the moment I wont be rushing back there…..but who ever knows
what the future may hold!!!
 |
| Somebody else might disagree with me.... |
A three hour
mini-bus (this time we opt for a private transfer and our new friends, Katinka
and Rob joined us) brought us into Krabi Town just before 11am. We boarded the
water taxi to our Thai island of choice: Koh Lanta. On arrival we had to
negotiate the steps of the jetty, carrying our heavy packs and dodging a good
number of other tourists in a torrential thunder shower!!
But we were on
Koh Lanta. Our home for the following 7 nights. We were soooooooooooooooooo
looking forward to this island stop and man, did it come at the right time!!
In meeting all
these fellow travelers over the last few weeks and making some great new
friends, the saying of Herman Hesse stays with me:
“Where paths that have affinity for each other
intersect, the whole world looks like home, for a time.”
Our home is here
and now….and we love the company!!!! Each new relationship very significant!!!
Then we went to the City Palace and the king who stayed there was a absulute giant, who was seven feet tall and extremly wide. 
