Princess Adventures A little something-something to run around the world with....

Another post from Andrew....

Before I stuck into the nitty gritty of our last few incredible days, I wanna get these two things off my chest; It's been bugging me, okay? It's just a short two points and I'll get them released quick and painlessly for both of us.

1. Rubbish Bins: Where they at?
It's getting ridiculous to find somewhere, anywhere to put my junk. No, I'm not talking about my gentlemen... I'm talking about my plastic bottles, my wrappers from various crazy Thai 7/11 foods. It's impossible to find a decent rubbish receptacle anywhere in this place! Honestly, I think I've seen a grand total of 6 in my travels and that's being generous. In short; It's literally rubbish the way Thai people treat their rubbish. I've seen thousands of bottles piled up on walkways and the few bins I have seen overflowing. It's really sad and puts a downer on a great location (such as Ko Samui or Chiang Mai) when you see people ditching rubbish into rivers or the ocean (or out the side of cars). My solution? All the beggars should be hired by the local governments to collect rubbish instead and paid a basic wage. Killing two birds with one stone.


2. Walkways: UnF#@&nwalkable
Ever wanted to walk from your bathroom into your bedroom and not stub your toe, trip or collapse entirely on the floor? Well good luck with that in Thailand, the land of the unholy walking areas. Walk to the beach without tackling a dozen or more uneven walkways? Forgetaboutit. Wander aimlessly around market stalls without falling down an cracked gap in the path the exact size of your foot? Not a chance, sister. The number of times I've bashed my already trashed toes on a series of steps that would baffle even the most ardent athlete could be counted in the thousands now. My number one accessory for newbie travelers to this wonderful country would be a purchase of a solid pair of steel cap boots. Not for the uneven sidewalks or hotel thoroughfares, but to brutally kick the ass of the civic authorities who allow this stuff to remain in a constant state of irreparable damage.


Italian pizzas and floating islands...


We're back in Bangkok after returning on our uneventful train ride back, of which, we slept. Yup, not many more exciting things than to blog about my comfortable sleep in my air conditioned train carriage. New Years day was designated as our "rest" day between our Southern trip and joining up with our new group leaders and hopping a train to Khao Sok National Park. Fortunately, we've got Master Jedi Dong for the whole gig, so we're very happy and our new group is somewhat larger than our last, with 5 People joining us and we're picking up an extra two later on in Ko Samui.
Kristy and I set off on our 'rest' day for a trip to MBK, the biggest, insanely cheap mall in Bangkok. It's situated in 'new' Bangkok, which is the portion of the city which has been, er, "developed" into a more modern, cliched metropolitan city. Sorta. Compared with old Bangkok, where we are staying, it's a bit of a clash of Thai-meets-west but charming in its own right. This is the place to get every knock-off imaginable, from Jewelery to T-Shirts and some are so convincing I have a hard time believing they're actually knock-offs and not just "missing" from the factory.

Legit or not, both Kristy and I came away with a mass of presents, bargains and, yes... More T-Shirts for me. Showing interest in the Thai culture is always greeted with smiles and excitment from the locals, so I asked and recieved 2 CD's of current Thai "pop/rock" music for my aural pleasure and a movie described to me by the record store worked as "epic thai movie, very good" so lock that in, Eddy. About $10 later and I had me some legit Thai entertainment. We also checked out a couple of Toy Shops at MBK stocking Transformers, only discover the things cost MORE in Thailand than Australia. So my dream of a crazy-thai Transformer were temporarily dashed. After booking a ticket for the new Guy Ritchie 'Sherlock Holmes' film at 2pm, for a grand total of $3.60, we settled in for an afternoon of chilling at the cinema and subtitled Thai Robert Downey Jnr fun!

Movie completed, Sky Train and boat back to the hotel out of the way, we repacked our bags and headed for our Southern trip to the National Park. Being New Years Eve we were caught between wanting to celebrate properly and sleep, knowing we'd have a few busy days ahead of us. Opting to chat and sleep turned out to be the unanimous option and we arrived in Khao Sok after our epic train ride refreshed and ready for adventure.
We slept in above-ground tree-house type things inside the actual park and although they were very basic, the views and resort was anything but. Situated right on the river with a cliff-face covered with the most beautiful tree's and forest growth, it occasionally presented the odd Monkey to watch as you enjoyed a snack, drink or dinner. We learned here that monkeys are basically nocturnal, sleeping for most of the day and only heading out to entertain us tourist folk between 5pm - 7pm as the sun is setting, where they retreat back into the bush to look for food and do Monkey business (see what I did there?)

Khao Sok also has an extensive man-made lake, which was flooded for the dam in 1982. It supplies the majority of Thailands power needs, the exact amount I can't remember, but it's fairly significant and a great initiative of some badly needed clean-energy for the country. More importantly for us, the flooding has created some of the most fantastic scenery photos can take!...
Our trip around the lake via longtail boat stopped for lunch on a floating resort between two 'islands' on the lake. Our delicious locally-caught fish lunch was downed quickly and Kristy and I took our Kayaks across the lake area, swam for around 2 hours in the fresh water and more importantly, achieving greatness by doing massive bombs off the rickity wooden floating bridges into the deep water.
No rest for the weary though, it was back to the National Park resort for a quick group meeting, fixing up our food and bar-tab (no cash is allowed at the resort and it's locked away for safety) and our first main group dinner at Dongs favorite ITALIAN restaurant! Which was somewhat bizzare, as he had his 'mountain man' rice rather than the pizzas we all ordered for a quick western food reprieve in the jungle! As an aside; Dong is getting pretty predictable with his food requirements. It's rice in the morning, rice with a fried egg on top for lunch, regardless of whether or not it's on the menu, and rice with chilli and chicken for dinner. He'll take us to these amazing places to eat and I'm getting good at picking a new Thai dish each time, but Dong will get the same thing everytime. He calls it 'Mountain Man' energy.

Doesn't help his swimming skills one bit though. I'm enjoying getting one back on him for our laborious mountain treks by 'forcing' him into the water. Water he is literally, a fish out of.

...Speaking of water (nice segue-way), there is plenty of that coming up in our next and final entry as we travel to Ko Samui, a beach resort haven, situated on an island off the east coast of Thailand. The water theme continues as we travel on to Ko Tao or 'Turtle Island' a much smaller island further north of Ko Samui. You'll learn more about our wonderful new group members, what Andrew looks like as a belly dancer and finally, our last entry concludes with some underwater snorkeling and one final night only, in Bangkok.

Until then, remember; Don't pat the stray dogs. Where there is one in this city, there are another four who all want your hugs, food and more importantly, need to share their fleas.