The one where we are all pooped..

Yesterday afternoon we finished a 2 day trek in the hills outside Chiang Mai. Today we are very sore and sorry for ourselves! It's midday and all we've done thus far today is eat and sleep. Well, I've eaten but not slept. But I'm getting used to that now, I don't think I've slept properly in almost a month! Too much excitement and rock hard beds for me. I'm hanging out for my lovely pillow top mattress at home (spoilt).

So a recap of the trek:

It started out with half hour ride in the back of a tuk tuk/ truck. They are called Songthaews and are basically a ute converted to have bench seats in the back, with a roof over the top. After 30 mins we stopped at a market for a brief wander around, while the guide purchased lunch materials for the trek. Market was stinky and very uninteresting after being to many markets over the last few weeks. Avalon complained the smell was stinky in her nose, so we waited outside! Back in the truck for another 30mins to an Orchid and Butterfly farm where we dropped everyone else off and continued on to the long-neck Karen tribe 'village', which we paid extra to see. It was a total tourist trap and not really a village at all, just a collection of souvenir huts that Karen tribe women come to stay at during the day so that tourists can gawk and buy their handi crafts. It was really a rip off, but I'm glad we went because it was very interesting to talk to some of the older women about the traditions and apparently it is a dying tradition because more and more of the younger generation are choosing not to wear the bands because they don't want to (and aren't forced to) and also because they are expensive for families.

 

 

 

Back in the truck to the orchid farm (there were very few butterflies) for a quick look around. Nothing too exciting here, some pretty orchids and cute ducklings wandering around!

 

 

 

Back in the truck once more for another 30 mins drive to the base camp for the trek. Fried rice lunch was waiting for us, plus a cool looking bowl of soup that the lovely Thai ladies made especially for Avalon, complete with a piece of sausage? shaped like a bear face?



 and no, she didn't eat it, but did keep telling the Thai ladies that the bear was very cutie! She did eat a whole plate of fried rice though!

 

After lunch, the trek began and around 20 of us set off the Black Lahu hill tribe we were to spend the night with. After about 20 mins, I got a rather unfortunate case of Bali Belly/ Thai Tummy?? and got to reach an all-time travelling low: diarrhoea in the jungle while the rest of the trekking party had to wait. Needless to say, I did NOT make eye contact with any of my trekking mates when I rejoined the party. It actually topped that time in Ethiopia when Sol and I made the 2 day bus trip to Lalibela and we stopped once after 6 hours for a toilet break.. along a dry dusty road with no toilets in sight, just half a dozen tiny bare shrubs that offered no leafy protection from the rest of the bus travellers. That was the time I learned never to wear trousers on such a trip because squatting to pee with a skirt on like the locals is much more discreet than mooning the bus with your bare white bum because you have to pull your trousers down. Lesson learned. Anyway, it provided the locals with a good laugh!

 

Toilet issues aside, it was a hard trek. Once I got sick, I passed Avalon over to Sol and he carried her the rest of the way up the mountain. I carried our backpack most of the way, which was almost as heavy! Our kind guide took pity in the steepest parts and carried my bag though, which I was soo grateful for because the hills were VERY steep! By the time we reached the top, you could tell which ones were the smokers, as they started to drop like flies, the higher we got and were pooped once we reached the top! We were all pretty relieved to finally reach the Black Lahu tribe village at the top. We didn't see too many villagers, as we had our own long-house style dormitory with mattresses under mosquito nets. We had dinner at the long house, followed by music and games, which degenerated into drinking and loud chatting. Avalon and I went to bed early and Avalon has become such a flexible sleeper that she fell asleep fairly quickly despite all the noise.

 

piggies in the village

on the deck of the long house

precarious pussy cat!

hanging out, listening to one of the guides playing guitar and drinking local whiskey

 



Avalon's Lahu friend.

 

 

Next morning we woke to the sound of chickens underneath the long-house. After a quick breakfast, Avalon got to partake in her fave new pastime: chasing chickens and roaring at them! Shortly after that, we started the long descend.

 

 

After about 2 hours of pretty steep descent (fortunately down a different route to the one we took to reach the village, because I don't think I could have climbed back down that way, it was so steep in parts!), we reached a nice waterfall for a rest and swim. After that it was cross country for another hour. We passed a couple of small swellings along the way, one of which had a tiny baby monkey as a pet, which I got to cuddle. It was so cute! It's mother was shot by villagers, and the owner rescued it's baby.

 

Avalon was pretty thrilled to pat the monkey baby! Actually, if it wasn't for Avalon's amazing eyesight, we wouldn't have stopped to see the monkey. As we walked past, she started yelling out that there was a monkey and we all thought she was being silly because all we could see was what looked like 2 dogs playing underneath a table. But it turned out she was right! It was a small dog playing with the monkey baby.

 

Not long after, we reached the road where our truck was waiting for us and from there, drove to the elephant camp where we had lunch waiting for us: Pad Thai and fresh fruit. After lunch we went on an hour long elephant trek. Avalon actually almost fell asleep on the elephant! It started raining though and woke her up. It was the only time it rained during the 2 days, so we were incredibly lucky, considering it is the rainy season! It would have been super tough to climb up and down the mountain in the rain. It was wet and muddy enough in parts! After the elephant ride, we put our swimmers, life jackets and helmets on and went white water rafting. I had checked beforehand and knew that the water levels were pretty low, so the rapids were tame enough that it would be safe for Avalon. As an added precaution, we had 2 guides in our boat, plus Sol paddling and Avalon and I sitting safely in the middle of the boat. We did tell them in advance that Sol can't swim, but I think it got lost in translation, because when we mentioned again halfway down the rapids that he couldn't swim, the guide said "What?! Oh my Buddha!" haha. Never mind, Sol absolutely loved the rafting! He did so well, considering he has never paddled a canoe or boat in his life and had to respond quickly to English commands. He got mixed up a few times and jumped to the other side of the boat when he was meant to be paddling forward etc which made for quite a few laughs! We were the last of our group of boats to leave, but arrived first at the landing, overtaking all the other boats who got stuck on the rocks. We had an awesome team! Avalonny loved the rafting. She especially loved (as did I), when we passed a mahout elephant training camp where there were 2 mother and baby elephants being washed in the river and we had to go around them. The baby elephants were sooo cute!! It was a shame we couldn't take our camera with us.

After the white water rafting, we switched to Thai style bamboo rafting for the rest of the journey down the river to the landing where our truck met us, ready for the 1.5 hour journey back to Chiang Mai. It was a very busy 2 days and we are well and truly pooped, but we are so glad we decided to do the trek! It was a pretty well trodden tourist route, which I'm not a big fan of, but it was still good fun despite that. It was fun to meet the other people on our trek (Avalon made friends with an older British lady who took her under her wing and drew pictures with her, gave her lots of cuddles etc) and it was nice to get that sense of achievement after climbing up and down what felt like Everest. It was also nice to feel a sense of achievement from managing to do all of the above with a 2 year old! It's no mean feat to carry an active toddler on your back up a mountain for 3 hours.. she was very patient but sick of being carried at times. Plus preventing her from walking off steep cliffs, falling off elephant etc. I would def. do it again though.. she got a lot out of it, as did we!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So we arrived at Palm Tree Resort on Sunday morning. I had stayed at the sister resort Bow Thong in 2007 and really enjoyed it's position at the northern end of Sairee Beach, as it's a little quieter, away from the loud bars on the main beach section and streets. The resort was pretty much as I remembered, though the Palm Tree section was nicer and newer than the Bow Thong part we stayed in previously. There was a mix up with our room, the one I had booked online had been double booked for the first night, so the lovely receptionist upgraded us for the first night to the premium beach front bungalow. It was really cool staying there that first night.. being right literally on the beach was very cool.. we could sit on the porch and relax while Avalon played in the sand right in front of us.

Avalon 'appreciating the view' from behind closed eyelids upon our arrival

 

First order of business: breakfast! We were starving!

 

 

Sol was pretty impressed with 'paradise'

 

The view from our balcony!

 

 

 I am glad we didn't stay there the whole time though, as it felt a bit like staying in a fish bowl as you had to shut all the curtains or everyone in the restaurant next door, or people lounging on the beach in front of the bungalow could see straight in. The next day we moved a few metres away to a brand new villa room which was actually MUCH nicer, only a few metres from the beach and had a bath which Avalon was most excited about! She spent about an hour in there that night, splashing and swimming like a little fish.

We didn't do a whole lot during our stay in Koh Tao, we spent each of the 5 days going to the beachside restaurant for breakfast, then we would go for a walk and swim. Most days we went for a walk to the shops in Sairee Beach as we always seemed to need something, either water or nappies or wipes! Sol and Avalon made a friend on day while I was checking out the Havianas shop.. a lovely lady who runs a small fruit stall in the main street. She was obsessed with Avalon's curly hair and hair colour and every time we saw her, she gave Avalon a piece of fruit to make her smile. She has been there 15 years and it was really interesting talking to her about how much Koh Tao has changed since I was there last in 2007. Back then, there were plenty of backpacker, but they were mostly there to do the scuba diving certification, or just to chill out on one of Thailands quieter islands. These days the island is completely overrun with backpackers (there were only a few families travelling there, the overwhelming majority was 20 year old backpackers looking for a tan and a good time). They all hire motorbikes, so walking down the street with a toddler in a stroller was a bit nerve wracking as most of the young girls especially doubling their friends didn't look overly competent at riding them and the sheer number of bikes was hugely annoying.

The beach itself was still beautiful, the water still just as blue and the good thing about Sairee is that the bay is really shallow, so it was perfect for Avalon and Solomon. The downside to the tourism boom though is the amount of rubbish that washed up on the beach every day was really disappointing. Each morning Thai workers sweep the beach, picking up all the beer bottles and rubbish that floats in on the tide and only an hour later when we would go for a swim, much of it would be back! While swimming, you would see plastic bags and bottles etc floating around you.

                                                Muuuum! Can't a girl eat her weetbix in peace?!



On the 4th day, I made the silly decision to get lunch at one of the Mexican restaurants on the island. Badddd move!!! The whole experience was shoddy, actually. I ordered a chicken quesadilla for Avalon and really tried impress upon the waiter that we wanted NO jalapenos as it was for the toddler. I even mimed it to him, so there would be no mistake. Of course, when it arrived, it had chopped up jalapenos all through the cheese, Avalon took 1 bite, screamed and spat it out in her hand, then proceeded to wipe her eyes with her hand. More screaming ensued.. I tried to talk to the waiter about it but he just shrugged and walked away, leaving us to pick out the tiny bits from the cheese. By that afternoon I was sick as a dog with food poisoning.

Next morning we had to check out and wait around for an hour or 2 before we could catch the ferry back to Chumphorn, ready to catch the train back to Bangkok at 9pm. It wasn't a great experience for me, seeing as I had been up all night throwing up and all I wanted to do was lie down and die a little bit. All the rocking that day on the boat, bus and train didn't help! We also had quite a wait at the station for the train. I was VERY glad to get on the train to find the beds already made up and slept really well. The next morning we arrived at Bangkok at 7am and went straight to our hotel expecting to have to wait around all day for the 2pm check in time, but the amazing staff pulled out a floor map, let us choose which room we wanted, took our bags, sent us next door to the restaurant for breakfast and by the time we got back had our chosen room ready! All before 8am! and it's not that they were quiet either, the hotel was booked out! Tara Place is my fave hotel of anywhere I have stayed, ever. It might not have resort style facilities, but it is spotless and the service of every single member of staff is incredible from reception, to the door men, to the cleaning staff and the restaurant staff! Can't say enough good things about it and boy did I appreciate that room at 8am when I was sick and exhausted.

The one where we went to Chatuchak Weekend Market and a sleeper train..

We decided today to check out the Chatuchak weekend market, since we had already had a tantalising taste of small roadside markets in Bangkok and it had whetted our appetite for the real deal. Chatuchak market is HUGE. Like, we spent hours there walking around and didn't make it through even a quarter of it, huge. It was also mega hot and quite unpleasant, to be honest. We have taken the pram everywhere with us so far with no problems, so we took it again as it has been amazing for Avalon to nap in. Since it's so hot here and we've been so busy, she has been napping quite a bit, so for that reason alone, it's indispensable. However, it wasn't great for navigating through the tiny little maze like alleyways of Chatuchak. It was fine in the main outdoor alleys, but in the tiny, shady, CROWDED alleys, it was pretty awkward. There were also wayyy too many people there. We lasted a few hours but after that were too hot and sunburned and thirsty to stay any longer. We made a couple of small purchases (hat for me and shorts for Sol) and then headed back to the hotel.

A quick Skype with the family turned into a longer Skype than expected and we left ourselves with 10mins to pack our belongings and get a taxi to the train station. It was a bit frantic, but we made it to Hualumphong station with time to get some dinner before boarding our overnight train to Chumphong.

 

 Avalon was very excited about the train trip.. it was the first time she had been on a train since 9 months old. She was less than impressed when the man came around to make our seats up into beds though, as she wanted to keep playing!

 

 

We arrived at Chumphong station at 5am, an hour later than expected and had to run to catch our bus to the pier where we caught the Lomprayah high speed catamaran to Koh Tao. Avalon was quite excited about the whole thing.. the bus ride, the ferry.. it was all new and exciting. When she got bored of the sitting part, my phone with the movie 'Cinderella' kept her amused! Sol was amazed at how fast the catamaran went, as well as the huge expanse of water (coming from a land-locked country) and asked how big and deep the lake we were on, was.. which made me laugh!

We arrived a couple of hours later at Koh Tao, a driver from our hotel picked us up and eventually we reached our destination: Palm Leaf Resort, Sairee Beach. To be continued..

The one where we went to Dusit Zoo and Kao San Road...

So today we went to Dusit Zoo so that Avalon could see elephants and tigers, and maybe possums! At Phranakorn Norn len, there was a small garden area at the entrance and every time we walked through it, Avalon would say we were walking through the jungle and needed to look out for the above mentioned animals. SO we thought we should take her to the zoo so she could see some real animals. There are 2 zoos in Bangkok. Safari World which is tourist oriented like Ocean World, priced to match and is outside the city. Dusit zoo on the other hand, is a 'local' zoo, aimed at Thai locals, very cheap and only 10 mins from our hotel. So that decision was a no brainer. I knew in advance that this was a typical SE Asian zoo and that animal rights etc are not a huge concern here. The zoo lived up to my expectations in that department. Some of the enclosures were alarmingly small and had me hoping that they were just in 'day pens' and would be taken somewhere nice and roomy at night.

The Zoo itself was a good day out, animal rights aside. Entry was cheap, roughly $10 for the 3 of us. You can hire bikes, prams, toddler bikes with handles with which to navigate the park, which is a decent size. There is also a motorized train that you can catch around the perimeter of the park. In the centre is a very picturesque lake where you can hire some dilapidated paddle boats.

Avalon enjoyed seeing the animals, especially the rabbits, goats and fake sheep in one garden (which she insisted on feeding grass?!). We didn't see the elephants, somehow we missed that exhibit.. and we also didn't see possums, but we did see a few squirrels which she was very excited about!!

It was a very hot day walking around the park and we were pretty relieved to find a tiny air conditioned KFC in the park. It was the only western food vendor in the park that we saw and the entire menu was in Thai (this place has mostly Thai signage unlike other foreigner- oriented places).

Once we could no longer stand the heat, we exited the park and got a tuk tuk back to the hotel. After a brief nap, we caught the hotel tuk tuk to Kao San Road. Avalon got some fresh pineapple on a stick, ate a few pieces and then fell fast asleep in the pram, leaving Sol and I free to shop in peace!! We got a few shirts each, got Avalon a couple of pairs of cute (and practical) hippy pants and then we went to a nice restaurant where we enjoyed dinner (again, in peace!). Sol was very taken with Kao San Road, it has such a cool vibe about it and there is some great people watching to be done there.

                                                          ROARING at the dinosaur..
                                  

 

                                                     Avalon feeding the sheepies grass

 

 

 

                                                                       Kao San Road

 

 

 

The one where we had a BIG day out..

 

As the title may suggest, today we had a BIG day out and about in Bangkok! We started by catching the hotel's tuk tuk to the Grand Palace complex where we checked out the Palace as well as the temple of the Emerald Buddha. It was really cool to see some important historical sites in Bangkok and Solomon really enjoyed checking out the temple. He was quite astounded at how beautifully they are decorated and with so much gold! It was HOT though.. like other falang (foreigner) passing out on the sidewalk, hot. It was also really really crowded. I don't mind a crowd and I don't mind heat, but when those were combined.. it made for an unpleasant experience. I'm glad we saw the complex.. there were a lot of cool temples I would have loved to have had a good look at, but it was just too darn hot! I also would have loved to have been able to photograph inside the temple itself, but it is strictly forbidden. I may be a tad juvenile, but the highlight of my time at the complex was probably when the guard rolled up the thick wad of papers in his hand and whacked some poor Japanese woman in the head without warning, as she was trying to take a nice family portrait inside the temple!

Avalon patting the 'puppy'! haha

After we left the complex we decided that it was too hot to do anything other than swim or be inside aircon buildings. We decided it was a good time to check out The Mall, Bang Kae. I had read about this place on Bangkok.com and it sounded really great. It is a 'locals' mall, unlike Siam Paragon or MBK shopping centre which are full of American chain stores, foreigners and prices to match. We had already visited 2 shopping centres like that and weren't too fussed as they were soo crowded and pricey! The Mall, Bang Kae was probably just as big, but we didn't see a single foreigner the entire time, it wasn't crowded at all and had some cool shops with decent prices.

Inside The Mall, Bang kae

 The shopping was good, but we didn't do much of it because we were really there for the 4th floor entertainment. Avalon was in piggy heaven on the 4th floor! There is a small amusement park section with a beautiful roof painted with a fake blue, cloudy sky, lots of little kids pay as you go type rides, plaster painting (we didn't have enough time, but Ava would have loved it), playground areas for soft play, even a Pirate Ship gondola ride, suspended from the ceiling!

 

 

 

Avalon had a go on some coin operated rides (30c! so cheap!), Sol and I bought some noodles from a vendor, Avalon got some popcorn and then we headed outside to the main reason for our visit to the mall: Fantasia Lagoon. It's a small water park aimed at families rather than thrill seekers. There is a lazy river you can rent tubes for, shallow pools for little kids, long slides that have awesome views and plenty of other pool areas with different themes like pirate ships, Aztecs etc. All the pools are quite shallow (I think the deepest I saw was a metre deep), but then most of the Thai people there didn't seem to be able to swim well, so makes sense. It was very reassuring for me, seeing as I was there with 2 people who can't swim! You have to hire (or you can buy your own) swimming cap but you just pay a deposit for them.. the money is refunded after you hand them back. Not that it matters, the whole place is so darn cheap! Entry for the 3 of us, plus locker hire and cap hire set us back less than $10! We could have spent all day there.. well Avalon could have, she had to be dragged out of there at 6pm!

Then to top off a perfect day for a 2 year old, we took Avalon in to the Toys R Us opposite Fantasia Lagoon and let her choose a small toy. She picked a pretty princess wand (her beloved wand my cousin Carlie made her had to stay at home) and once she got the cashier to cut the package open for her, she did a little dance and sang a happy song in the middle of the mall. bless!