We expected to get dropped off at the pier around 6am and the first boats leaves at 7am to the smallest of the three gulf islands, Koh Tao, our destination. Surprise! surprise!.. at 2:30am we get dropped of at the pier!! 3 and a half hours ahead of schedule! There was nothing at the pier except a cement pad with a few park benches, a few lights and a closed ticket office. We laughed and sat a around fora bit, not really sure what to do. There wasn't anywhere to go. We grabbed a bench and set up camp as we put our long shirts and pants on to help protect us from the swarms of blood thirsty mosquitoes. We tried to get as much sleep as we could but it was so hot, humid and sticky and there were sooo many mosquitoes. I was fortunate to falls asleep for a few hours (thanks to my Bayda genes), Jeremy on the other hand sat up all night and didn't sleep a bit.
The first boat to Koh Tao did leave right on time at 7am. It was three hours on the boat to Koh Tao and when we arrived, we were soo happy to see our resort guy waiting for us at the end of the pier. It felt like the long journey there but the island was stunning and we were soo excited to spend the next three days there.
-Kendal
Thursday 22 March 2012
BANGKoK
We took a night bus to Bangkok, scheduled to arrive at 6:30am.. For the FIRST time ever this trip, the bus arrived early and we were dumped in Bangkok at 4:30 am. We couldn't believe it! We managed to find a room where we stayed for just one night.
That day we strolled Khosan road, the popular tourist Vegas-style strip. We met a lovely local man who informed us that it was the sacred day when they celebrated the death of Buddha. He arranged a tuk-tuk to take us to the temple that was only open on this special day of the year, where there was the lucky Buddha housed inside. When we arrived, a sweet old man showed us how to pray to the Buddha for good luck and told us how lucky we were to make it to this temple on this one special day. He was also shocked that we had even arrived there in the first place, since no tourist ever know about this lucky Buddha! We love finding the non-tourist things to do and were excited that we were able to do this. Later on that night, we ventured out to another very local area and found a massive second hand market. At first we thought it was a night market full of junk but when we actually realized that this was all old, used, one of a kind stuff, we began to really look through it and found hidden treasures! Amazing old watches and jewelry, old time shoes from 20 or 30 years back. It was a blast from the past as we came across our favorite old action figures, original gaming consoles and tamoguchis! We spent all night there looking at so many hilarious things.. We had so much fun! By midnight we decided to head back to our place, but first stopped to have a beer and a foot massage back on the famous Khosan Road. After our amazing foot massage was done we decided to pay a little more for a back rub too! After that, we were out like lights!
The next day we went to the temple where the ginormous gold reclining buddha was. The temple there were beautiful as they were decorated with beautiful tile and glass work. Afterwards we finally indulged in some long-awaited Burger King! Jeremy thought he had died and gone to heaven for a bit!
Bangkok was everything that we expected it to be and we were very happy we only planned one night there. The air was disgustingly thick and heavy from the pollution of the city. The streets were crazy and there were tourists and Thai people everywhere! We enjoyed the craziness while we were there but that evening we caught a bus to the pier, to catch a boat out to the islands in the gulf!! Islands are more our style ;)
-Ken
That day we strolled Khosan road, the popular tourist Vegas-style strip. We met a lovely local man who informed us that it was the sacred day when they celebrated the death of Buddha. He arranged a tuk-tuk to take us to the temple that was only open on this special day of the year, where there was the lucky Buddha housed inside. When we arrived, a sweet old man showed us how to pray to the Buddha for good luck and told us how lucky we were to make it to this temple on this one special day. He was also shocked that we had even arrived there in the first place, since no tourist ever know about this lucky Buddha! We love finding the non-tourist things to do and were excited that we were able to do this. Later on that night, we ventured out to another very local area and found a massive second hand market. At first we thought it was a night market full of junk but when we actually realized that this was all old, used, one of a kind stuff, we began to really look through it and found hidden treasures! Amazing old watches and jewelry, old time shoes from 20 or 30 years back. It was a blast from the past as we came across our favorite old action figures, original gaming consoles and tamoguchis! We spent all night there looking at so many hilarious things.. We had so much fun! By midnight we decided to head back to our place, but first stopped to have a beer and a foot massage back on the famous Khosan Road. After our amazing foot massage was done we decided to pay a little more for a back rub too! After that, we were out like lights!
The next day we went to the temple where the ginormous gold reclining buddha was. The temple there were beautiful as they were decorated with beautiful tile and glass work. Afterwards we finally indulged in some long-awaited Burger King! Jeremy thought he had died and gone to heaven for a bit!
Bangkok was everything that we expected it to be and we were very happy we only planned one night there. The air was disgustingly thick and heavy from the pollution of the city. The streets were crazy and there were tourists and Thai people everywhere! We enjoyed the craziness while we were there but that evening we caught a bus to the pier, to catch a boat out to the islands in the gulf!! Islands are more our style ;)
-Ken
Thursday 15 March 2012
Chiang Mai: Part 2
After the first few days flew by in Chiang Mai, our next activity was a Thai cooking class. We thought taking this course would be a great idea because we could take a little bit of Thailand back home with the food we will learn to cook! We each chose opposite dishes from each other, and learned to cook 8 different Thai style dishes all together. After our class we darted over to the night bazaar to see the LadyBoy Cabaret show that everyone was ranting about. Upon finding the venue, Kendal was extremely excited but I was extremely hesitant towards this whole idea and experience... she didn't have to worry about the lady boys checking her out! Haha But after the show began they were actually very impressive dancers lip sinking to brittney spears and everything! After the show, I gave it two thumbs up!
The next day we arranged for a tuk tuk to take us up to the longneck and big ear tribes of Thailand, as refugees from Burma, they ended up in Northern Thailand. Seeing this tribe was unbelievable! The rings around their necks and knees were extremely heavy. The girls of the tribe begin to get rings put on when they turn 5 years old. Some of the older ladies had 25 and 26 rings around their neck which weighed up to 20 lbs! After we visited this village we were told to go see a monkey show also, which was also very impressive! The trainers would mix up cards counting 1 through 9 and the monkey could grab whatever card number the crowd shouted for. The monkeys also knew how to play basketball very well, with one guest from the audience shooting 2 out 3 free throws in the monkey sank all 3.
The next day we rented a motorbike and ripped around the city with it. With no idea how traffic works here we braved the worst and set out on our adventure only to find out that this city has too many one way streets! And with no warnings about them at all, keeping in mind that in Thailand they drive on the opposite side of the road! After driving around we found a Chinese doctors office which caught Kendal's eye very quickly, so stopping in quickly to take a peak, Kendal had an appointment within two seconds. Afterwards we decided to drive around the city square and look for cool little shops, getting tired quick and the sun going down all of a sudden millions of moths came out of no where and we found ourselves trying to drive on this motorcycle and hold our breath while getting nailed in the face moth after moth! Returning back safely we packed our bags as for tomorrow Bangkok would be our next stop!
-Jeremy
The next day we arranged for a tuk tuk to take us up to the longneck and big ear tribes of Thailand, as refugees from Burma, they ended up in Northern Thailand. Seeing this tribe was unbelievable! The rings around their necks and knees were extremely heavy. The girls of the tribe begin to get rings put on when they turn 5 years old. Some of the older ladies had 25 and 26 rings around their neck which weighed up to 20 lbs! After we visited this village we were told to go see a monkey show also, which was also very impressive! The trainers would mix up cards counting 1 through 9 and the monkey could grab whatever card number the crowd shouted for. The monkeys also knew how to play basketball very well, with one guest from the audience shooting 2 out 3 free throws in the monkey sank all 3.
The next day we rented a motorbike and ripped around the city with it. With no idea how traffic works here we braved the worst and set out on our adventure only to find out that this city has too many one way streets! And with no warnings about them at all, keeping in mind that in Thailand they drive on the opposite side of the road! After driving around we found a Chinese doctors office which caught Kendal's eye very quickly, so stopping in quickly to take a peak, Kendal had an appointment within two seconds. Afterwards we decided to drive around the city square and look for cool little shops, getting tired quick and the sun going down all of a sudden millions of moths came out of no where and we found ourselves trying to drive on this motorcycle and hold our breath while getting nailed in the face moth after moth! Returning back safely we packed our bags as for tomorrow Bangkok would be our next stop!
-Jeremy
Tuesday 13 March 2012
Chiang Mai: Part 1
After our long adventure through Laos we finally arrived into Chiang Mai, Thailand safe and sound. We found a cozy little place called Tawan Guesthouse where we ended up settling there a little longer than we expected. After checking in we took a walk down the main strip of the city where we found a Burger King, McDonalds and Starbucks. Seeing these joints made us a feel just a little bit more at home and a small sense of relief knowing that Thailand was going to be much more developed than the other countries we travelled from. We surprising passed on the McDonalds and Burger King and instead found a little sushi place where enjoyed fresh made sushi with some amazing spring rolls. Before coming to Chiang Mai there was a zip lining adventure, called "flight of the gibbon" that people and reviews ranted and raved about. The next day we embarked on an adventure of swinging through the tree top canopies of the jungle, attached to zip lines and harnesses. Never doing this before Kendal and I were extremely excited! we woke up at 5am to be the early group so we could avoid the afternoon heat and big crowds of other tourists. Our tour guide "cash" he was extremely enthusiastic and fun to be with for the day! Zipping from one tree to the next, across 33 platforms and 19 ziplines, our day finished to a wonderful lunch waiting for us back at the resturant. Returning to the guesthouse we were really tired and with all intentions of sleeping we ended up skyping home to our families. That night we bought $12 ringside tickets for the Muay Thai boxing fights. We expected to walk into a huge stadium like the one you would see on tv, but we actually ended up being an old, run down boxing arean with worn ropes, no dressing rooms and a terrible announcer who was talking through blown speakers. The fighters were being prepped right behind us in the corner! The ring was surrounded with tons of locals but also bars..the most memorable one to us was the lady boy bar.. Actually called "Lady Boy Bar" where local cross dressing males live the dream and dress like females and prance around the bar... thank god we did not sit there! None the less though there were 8 fights and none seized to disappoint! Flying feet and fists everywhere as fast as lighting. Deciding to order a drink while watching, Kendal thought she read a spot in the menu where it said girls drink 40 baht. ($1.30) Innocently asking about some clarification this ended up being the price that you can pay to order a girl to sit with you and drink for 40 baht! As the fight went on we were entertained with a halftime show, which happened to be blind boxing. Two men boxing with blind folds on and oh yea a midget boxer without a blind fold was thrown into the mix! So instead of 2 blind folded guys boxing we were witnessing 2 and a half men boxing blindfolded, but the midget had the advantage of sight because he had no blindfold!! Only in Thailand! As the fights went on they had to have saved the best for last. Two very good fighters with amazing speed and reaction going at it! With the fight so close little did we know we were about to see Muay Thai fighting at its finest moment this being a quick kick right to the face this would result in a knock out! We looked at each other dumbfounded on what just happened because it was so quick! It was an incredible finish!
Waking up the next morning Kendal was talking the owners of the place about Chinese medicine and naturopathic medicine which she plans to study in the near future. With intentions on getting some information on where to go meet a local doctor, they offered to bring us with them to their doctor. Pulling into a small creepy looking alley loomed a little screen door where a small 76 year old Chinese man was waiting for us. We were introduced right away and before we knew each of us were lying on his working table. Reading palms for only two seconds at most, it was like he had known us for years! He read everything.. personality, characteristics and medical issues, some we knew but others we didn't know about! It was amazing how he knew all this just by looking at our palms, and we didn't say a word. It was incredible and it was very fascinating to meet this man.
-Jeremy
Waking up the next morning Kendal was talking the owners of the place about Chinese medicine and naturopathic medicine which she plans to study in the near future. With intentions on getting some information on where to go meet a local doctor, they offered to bring us with them to their doctor. Pulling into a small creepy looking alley loomed a little screen door where a small 76 year old Chinese man was waiting for us. We were introduced right away and before we knew each of us were lying on his working table. Reading palms for only two seconds at most, it was like he had known us for years! He read everything.. personality, characteristics and medical issues, some we knew but others we didn't know about! It was amazing how he knew all this just by looking at our palms, and we didn't say a word. It was incredible and it was very fascinating to meet this man.
-Jeremy
Sunday 11 March 2012
Surprise phone calls home!
When we got to the boarder town, we found the ATM, paid for our boat ride and had an incredible weight lifted off our shoulders! We just missed the last boat across to Thailand at the boarder, so we had to spend one final night in Laos. There wasn't much to do since it was a small town on the boarder, so we sat down to enjoy a no-budget dinner. The excitement was comparable to Christmas, being able to pick whatever we wanted from the menu and we even indulged in ordering a appetizer! That night we found a small run-down Internet cafe and were able to use Skype to make phone calls home. We had skyped home to our families before but it had been 2 and a half months since talking to our parents over the phone and we thought it might be a fun surprise for them to answer the phone to us! I knew my mom would have just been getting up for the day, so I called the house phone and sure enough my mama answered. It was so exciting for me to hear how ecstatic she was to hear my voice when I could hear her tear up in the background. It was really fun to talk to her and wish them a great day! Jeremy tried calling his mom but couldn't get a hold of her and then called his dad while he was at work. His dad too was so thrilled to talk to him. We loved being able to quickly chat with our families. Since our time away and especially after being at the orphanage, family means something more to us.
-Kendal
-Kendal
Pakbeng, with no cheng!
We were very excited to take a boat as our means of transportation rather than another bus. It was awesome as we could enjoy the sun and wind instead of broken air conditioning and a smelly bus.The boat was an old long boat with van vehicle seats as seating! So innovative! (made us think of Joe Bayda) Haha . The 9 hours up the Mekong river was beautiful with amazing landscape and many villagers fishing, washing clothes, sifting rice, and carrying on their daily lives on the riverside.
We arrived in Pakbeng, a tiny one-strip town, just after sunset, and were only there to catch the next boat in the morning to the Laos-Thailand boarder. Pakbeng was unlisted in our Lonely Planet Book and had virtually nothing about it on Trip Advisor so we knew we going somewhere small and literally off the map, but we wanted to try something different from the bus so we thought it would be a good adventure.
After we arrived we got a hotel room at the one of two hotels in town. We were low on money and needed to pull money out from the ATM before we could find some dinner. Asking locals to direct us to an ATM, we got all the same answers, "No ATM, no bank." Wait..What do you mean no ATM or bank? We laughed at first.. we have no money..
We wanted to believe the locals just didn't understand what we were asking but they did, and there was no ATM or bank. The closest one was over two hours away. Initially shocked, then a little panicked and stressed, we scrounged up whatever we could find in our bags and pockets and together came up with $6.
We had $6 to feed the two of us and it wasn't even close enough to buy us our boats tickets out of Pakbeng to the Loas-Thai boarder in the morning. Upon that realization, we were a bit stressed. What the heck were we going to do!? I considered trying to sell my iPod or something haha. A really sweet local man saw us trying to figure out what to do and suggested that we could trade our passports with the boats men and then pay them on the other end when there was an ATM. We crossed our fingers that that it was going to work and then made a plan to budget our $6 for three meals and drinking water between the two of us.
We budgeted dinner down to $1 each for some sandwiches and bought a small bunch of bananas for 30 cents. For the rest of the night we didn't know what to do. It was a really scary feeling of having almost no money. We thought it would be a good idea to make it an early night in because we wanted to conserve our energy since we didn't eat much and knew we wouldn't be for probably the next 24 hours.
It was feeling unlike any other that night. If we were broke at home we could at least hang out around the house or at a friends house. If you're hungry there will be something in the fridge or you can go to someone's house for dinner... But we were in the middle of no where with no money. In the moment we both felt a little homesick, but more incredibly grateful for our friends, family and full fridges at home. We were so lucky that we just had enough to get a room to sleep in, but if we would of had any less, we would have been sleeping outside, homeless for a night. It was incredibly eye opening to imagine how a mother or father must feel when they honestly just do not have money to feed their children. In North America, I don't know if we really have an actual grasp on this concept. Having no money. None. No loans to get by, no friends to borrow from.. Just no money anywhere. My heart broke as I really thought about that. Jeremy and I at least already ate two full meals earlier that day. And we knew we'd see food and money again the next day when we got to the ATM... But to really have absolutely no money, struggling to day to day.. It's so hard to understand that that is reality for people. Heart breaking.
In the morning we shared a really small breakfast and bought some cheap fruit and sandwiches for our lunch on the boat. Our last very 30 cents went towards a bottle of water. We were surprised with ourselves when at breakfast the table next to us left some food behind on their plates and the both of us truthfully considered eating it! We also questioned whether or not to ask the bakery how much it would be to buy some of their day old buns from them! It was very humbling, especially when we had to ask the boats men if we could pay on the other side since we had no money. They agreed upon us giving up our passports. It was such a relief to know we were on the boat and heading to the boarder, and an ATM.
-Kendal
We arrived in Pakbeng, a tiny one-strip town, just after sunset, and were only there to catch the next boat in the morning to the Laos-Thailand boarder. Pakbeng was unlisted in our Lonely Planet Book and had virtually nothing about it on Trip Advisor so we knew we going somewhere small and literally off the map, but we wanted to try something different from the bus so we thought it would be a good adventure.
After we arrived we got a hotel room at the one of two hotels in town. We were low on money and needed to pull money out from the ATM before we could find some dinner. Asking locals to direct us to an ATM, we got all the same answers, "No ATM, no bank." Wait..What do you mean no ATM or bank? We laughed at first.. we have no money..
We wanted to believe the locals just didn't understand what we were asking but they did, and there was no ATM or bank. The closest one was over two hours away. Initially shocked, then a little panicked and stressed, we scrounged up whatever we could find in our bags and pockets and together came up with $6.
We had $6 to feed the two of us and it wasn't even close enough to buy us our boats tickets out of Pakbeng to the Loas-Thai boarder in the morning. Upon that realization, we were a bit stressed. What the heck were we going to do!? I considered trying to sell my iPod or something haha. A really sweet local man saw us trying to figure out what to do and suggested that we could trade our passports with the boats men and then pay them on the other end when there was an ATM. We crossed our fingers that that it was going to work and then made a plan to budget our $6 for three meals and drinking water between the two of us.
We budgeted dinner down to $1 each for some sandwiches and bought a small bunch of bananas for 30 cents. For the rest of the night we didn't know what to do. It was a really scary feeling of having almost no money. We thought it would be a good idea to make it an early night in because we wanted to conserve our energy since we didn't eat much and knew we wouldn't be for probably the next 24 hours.
It was feeling unlike any other that night. If we were broke at home we could at least hang out around the house or at a friends house. If you're hungry there will be something in the fridge or you can go to someone's house for dinner... But we were in the middle of no where with no money. In the moment we both felt a little homesick, but more incredibly grateful for our friends, family and full fridges at home. We were so lucky that we just had enough to get a room to sleep in, but if we would of had any less, we would have been sleeping outside, homeless for a night. It was incredibly eye opening to imagine how a mother or father must feel when they honestly just do not have money to feed their children. In North America, I don't know if we really have an actual grasp on this concept. Having no money. None. No loans to get by, no friends to borrow from.. Just no money anywhere. My heart broke as I really thought about that. Jeremy and I at least already ate two full meals earlier that day. And we knew we'd see food and money again the next day when we got to the ATM... But to really have absolutely no money, struggling to day to day.. It's so hard to understand that that is reality for people. Heart breaking.
In the morning we shared a really small breakfast and bought some cheap fruit and sandwiches for our lunch on the boat. Our last very 30 cents went towards a bottle of water. We were surprised with ourselves when at breakfast the table next to us left some food behind on their plates and the both of us truthfully considered eating it! We also questioned whether or not to ask the bakery how much it would be to buy some of their day old buns from them! It was very humbling, especially when we had to ask the boats men if we could pay on the other side since we had no money. They agreed upon us giving up our passports. It was such a relief to know we were on the boat and heading to the boarder, and an ATM.
-Kendal
3 days in Luang Prabang, Laos
We were excited to go to the next city Luang Prabang after hearing how much other travelers loved it. We took an overnight mini van rather than a bus, thinking it would be easier on our stomachs since Laos roads are so bad and twisty. It ended up only being Jeremy, myself and the non-english-speaking van driver who blasted his Laos tunes the entire way. We made it to Luang Prabang by 6am, found a guesthouse and crashed for some quality sleep. Our first day we just chilled and then found a local who took us in his boat down the river for sunset. We stopped at at a sand bar to sit and enjoy the sunset and our local friend just stripped down and started swimming in the river and making sand castles. We were laughing because how often can you say that your tour guide was talking to you about his country and culture while freely hanging out in his ginch with you!
That night we went out to dinner at an amazing bar called Utopia which was a garden that overlooked the river, all lit by candles, lanterns and low tables with pillows. It was beautiful and so unbelievably relaxed. It was perfect right before bed.
The next day we went out to Kuang Si waterfall where we hiked to the top and it was so beautiful. Starting with the big waterfall which ran off into roughly 4 tiers of waiting pools which ran to the bottom of the mountain. At each one tourists were able to either, use the rope swing or jump off small cliffs into the pools, swim or relax on the side by viewing from the benches.
On our final day in Luang Prabang we woke up at 5:30am to witness the everyday morning ritual of alms giving where hundreds of monks walk the streets to collect food such as fruit and rice, given to them by the locals. It was really neat to watch so many monks of all ages walking in single file, collecting food one by one. On one corner we saw an old beggar women with a box begging the monks for food, and as each of them walked passed they shared their food with her as they dropped some of their own into her box. It was really incredible to see the circle of everyone in the community taking care of each other. The locals gave to the monks and the monks gave to the poor.
Afterwards we attending a beautiful yoga class for sunrise at Utopia. We practiced our asanas on a platform that overlooked the river and with the heat of rising sun, it was so refreshing and exactly what I felt I had been needing. It was a very slow basic class and totally inspired me to get my butt in gear and start teaching.
In the afternoon we climbed to the temple on top of Mount Pho Si for a panoramic view of the city. That night we went for a traditional style Lao BBQ which jeremy and I were extremely excited to do and this being it last night made it to be perfect timing. We enjoyed grilling thinly sliced water buffalo which tasted like beef jerky, chicken and pork. While grilling all of this a soup broth was boiling around the grill. The broth consisting of veggies and Lao spices they had also given to us with the dinner set. This Lao style of BBQ is amazing and all of it tasted sooo good! Afterwards we attended night market and headed back to our hotel room where the next morning we would board a boat to pakbeng.
-jeremy and Kendal
That night we went out to dinner at an amazing bar called Utopia which was a garden that overlooked the river, all lit by candles, lanterns and low tables with pillows. It was beautiful and so unbelievably relaxed. It was perfect right before bed.
The next day we went out to Kuang Si waterfall where we hiked to the top and it was so beautiful. Starting with the big waterfall which ran off into roughly 4 tiers of waiting pools which ran to the bottom of the mountain. At each one tourists were able to either, use the rope swing or jump off small cliffs into the pools, swim or relax on the side by viewing from the benches.
On our final day in Luang Prabang we woke up at 5:30am to witness the everyday morning ritual of alms giving where hundreds of monks walk the streets to collect food such as fruit and rice, given to them by the locals. It was really neat to watch so many monks of all ages walking in single file, collecting food one by one. On one corner we saw an old beggar women with a box begging the monks for food, and as each of them walked passed they shared their food with her as they dropped some of their own into her box. It was really incredible to see the circle of everyone in the community taking care of each other. The locals gave to the monks and the monks gave to the poor.
Afterwards we attending a beautiful yoga class for sunrise at Utopia. We practiced our asanas on a platform that overlooked the river and with the heat of rising sun, it was so refreshing and exactly what I felt I had been needing. It was a very slow basic class and totally inspired me to get my butt in gear and start teaching.
In the afternoon we climbed to the temple on top of Mount Pho Si for a panoramic view of the city. That night we went for a traditional style Lao BBQ which jeremy and I were extremely excited to do and this being it last night made it to be perfect timing. We enjoyed grilling thinly sliced water buffalo which tasted like beef jerky, chicken and pork. While grilling all of this a soup broth was boiling around the grill. The broth consisting of veggies and Lao spices they had also given to us with the dinner set. This Lao style of BBQ is amazing and all of it tasted sooo good! Afterwards we attended night market and headed back to our hotel room where the next morning we would board a boat to pakbeng.
-jeremy and Kendal
Friday 2 March 2012
Vang Vieng.
While our time in Vientiane was very short lived due to the limited amount of activities and things to see, we decided to make our way up about 3 hours to a small city called Vang Vieng. After hearing all the cool and exciting stuff to do there we wanted to experience this all first had right away! On our first day we got in off the bus somewhat late so we decided to just survey and see what the hot spots were in this little city. Hearing about the famous tubing here prior to coming, we somewhat had an idea of what to expect. We thought drink beers, and float down the river in your tubes. Around six or seven o'clock when we noticed mass amounts of people stumbling around the streets, with missing shoes, painted bodies and waiting at street vendors for food. We knew we were in for a treat.
Being our first night, we wanted to prepare ourselves for tubing so we decided that the next day we would have a bit more of a relaxing day, so we heeded out to the blue lagoon which was another must do here. It was about 9 km outside of town, so we decided to rent bikes to soak in the beautiful landscape and grab some exercise of course. $2 each and we found ourselves on these funny, crappy, little city street bikes while we were on horrid backcountry roads with rocks the size of watermelons. It was so hard in the blazing afternoon sun, up and down hills, we couldn't wait to jump into the cold water at the lagoon. We finally arrived at the blue lagoon where we soon discovered along with another group of people there is two blue lagoons, and this was not even close to the pictures we have seen. This one should have been called " the brown lagoon" and needless to say it was a knock off that the local directed us too and made us pay for! Having no idea where to head from there in search of the real blue lagoon, we biked back out to the main road only to find a big yellow sign saying "tourist blue lagoon" with an arrow pointing the opposite direction from the little tiny wooden sign which we followed two seconds prior. Biking for another 2 km we finally arrived to the real one.
The water was so blue, and made Kendal having cravings to eat those 25cent blue whale candies. It was a real neat place because along with the extremely clear blue water, came an enormous tree equipped with two ledges to jump from one being about 10 feet the other 20 feet high and rope swings as well. After watching people jump off this tree, Kendal and I had to do it! After jumping off the tree, swinging around and swimming with the fishes in this beautiful lagoon, we called it a day and began our bike ride to our little bungalow we rented for $6 a night.
While at dinner that night we met another Canadian couple who were our age traveling from Winnipeg. Once getting to know them a little better, we decided to meet up with them the next day for tubing. While renting our tubes, we met a guy named Shane from Australia and together we set out to the river by tuk tuk. By noon we were pulling up to our stop on a random dirt road only to hear music blaring and find just as much beer flowing as the river itself. From side to side, bars after bar, alcohol served in sand buckets, guys throwing out lines to fish you in to their bar, we were greeted at every bar with free shots of the local homemade whiskey called Lao Lao. There was beer pong, life size drinking jenga, enormous swinging zip lines into the river and a water slide that shot you off into the river, which looked awfully close to the ski jumps in Canada Olympic park....yep, we did them all. And now looking at it if sober we wouldn't have even gone near them, they are so dodgy and dangerous! We got back to the city around 7 o'clock and found ourselves to fit right in with the rest of the tubing crowd, walking around bare feet since we lost our shoes, covered in red body paint and getting food from the street vendors.
We tried to keep the night alive as went to the bucket bar for free buckets hour, but that didn't last to long as we both were just in dire need to sleep, advil, more food and water.
The next day we would be leaving to a city more up north called luang prabang where it is a lot more culture than party so maybe if there was a church there we could ask god for forgiveness on the copious amounts of alcohol consumed previously in Vang Viang.
P.s. Mac, Casey, Landon and whoever is interested in going back to this new found heaven, count me in!
-Jeremy
Being our first night, we wanted to prepare ourselves for tubing so we decided that the next day we would have a bit more of a relaxing day, so we heeded out to the blue lagoon which was another must do here. It was about 9 km outside of town, so we decided to rent bikes to soak in the beautiful landscape and grab some exercise of course. $2 each and we found ourselves on these funny, crappy, little city street bikes while we were on horrid backcountry roads with rocks the size of watermelons. It was so hard in the blazing afternoon sun, up and down hills, we couldn't wait to jump into the cold water at the lagoon. We finally arrived at the blue lagoon where we soon discovered along with another group of people there is two blue lagoons, and this was not even close to the pictures we have seen. This one should have been called " the brown lagoon" and needless to say it was a knock off that the local directed us too and made us pay for! Having no idea where to head from there in search of the real blue lagoon, we biked back out to the main road only to find a big yellow sign saying "tourist blue lagoon" with an arrow pointing the opposite direction from the little tiny wooden sign which we followed two seconds prior. Biking for another 2 km we finally arrived to the real one.
The water was so blue, and made Kendal having cravings to eat those 25cent blue whale candies. It was a real neat place because along with the extremely clear blue water, came an enormous tree equipped with two ledges to jump from one being about 10 feet the other 20 feet high and rope swings as well. After watching people jump off this tree, Kendal and I had to do it! After jumping off the tree, swinging around and swimming with the fishes in this beautiful lagoon, we called it a day and began our bike ride to our little bungalow we rented for $6 a night.
While at dinner that night we met another Canadian couple who were our age traveling from Winnipeg. Once getting to know them a little better, we decided to meet up with them the next day for tubing. While renting our tubes, we met a guy named Shane from Australia and together we set out to the river by tuk tuk. By noon we were pulling up to our stop on a random dirt road only to hear music blaring and find just as much beer flowing as the river itself. From side to side, bars after bar, alcohol served in sand buckets, guys throwing out lines to fish you in to their bar, we were greeted at every bar with free shots of the local homemade whiskey called Lao Lao. There was beer pong, life size drinking jenga, enormous swinging zip lines into the river and a water slide that shot you off into the river, which looked awfully close to the ski jumps in Canada Olympic park....yep, we did them all. And now looking at it if sober we wouldn't have even gone near them, they are so dodgy and dangerous! We got back to the city around 7 o'clock and found ourselves to fit right in with the rest of the tubing crowd, walking around bare feet since we lost our shoes, covered in red body paint and getting food from the street vendors.
We tried to keep the night alive as went to the bucket bar for free buckets hour, but that didn't last to long as we both were just in dire need to sleep, advil, more food and water.
The next day we would be leaving to a city more up north called luang prabang where it is a lot more culture than party so maybe if there was a church there we could ask god for forgiveness on the copious amounts of alcohol consumed previously in Vang Viang.
P.s. Mac, Casey, Landon and whoever is interested in going back to this new found heaven, count me in!
-Jeremy
22 hours to Laos.
Cut right to the chase, 22 hours on bus in Asia... Never again! Unless I am either knocked unconscious or I have a Mickey of vodka and valium.
Every other bus ride we've ever taken has stopped so many times for food and bathroom breaks, so we assumed that on a 22 hour long ride, it would be no different. This was the only time we didn't stock up on snacks for the ride because we planned to just pick some up at the stops along the way. We also had been making a good attempt to stay hydrated in this heat as we were putting back great big bottles of water often. Well, we were really kicking ourselves for drinking so much water and NOT packing food because the bus stopped only twice in the entire 22 hours! No food or bathroom breaks for us!
One of the two stops was the Vietnamese and Laos border at 6 am which was the most dysfunctional border I have ever been through. They had two officers for a lineup of about 200 people, while the other customs officers sat outside and seemed to be enjoying a nice coffee and morning smoke, while we stood in line freezing!! After we finally got our departure stamps,we went get back on our bus, and it was gone. We had read that there are lots of bus scams in Vietnam that just leave you once you get to the Laos boarder, and we really thought we were now part of one. We looked and looked but there was no bus in sight. We were a little choked but were also laughing because everything of ours was on the bus. All we had was our passports and $70 in pocket. We decided that we may as well try to start walking in the direction of the Laos boarder even though we had no idea how far it was. We walked aimlessly in the fog for roughly 5km up a hill, trying to find our bus or the Laos boarder, which ever came first.
We luckily made it to the Laos boarder to happily find our bus waiting for us on the other side, but again be faced with 3 people dealing with visas and entry for another 200 person line up. After trying to wait patiently, we finally got to the front to see that Canadians had to almost pay double the price as everyone and what do ya know bam! Kendal and myself only have enough money to pay for 1 and 3 quarters of a visa. We had finally reached the boarder but just barley didn't have enough money to get into the country! Falling only about 10 dollars short, the couple beside us whom also had been from Canada, graciously gave us the remainder of what we owed, which was a huge relief. After all was said and done we had gotten into Laos without being illegal aliens to the country woohoo!
We boarded back onto the bus to finish this bus ride from hell, but we had figure out a way how pay this couple back, with absolutely no cash on us and not ATM is sight. With good ideas coming far and in between, we had one hidden treasure that was going to save us... the 50 dollars American my old man papa Tim had given to me before leaving and said to only use this when you really need it!
It was one of those experiences that at the time this was all super stressful and extremely frustrating but now we can laugh about it! Needless to say we arrived safe and sound with enough money to pay back the saviors from Canada, lunch and our tuk tuk ride to the hotel.
P.s. this blog was written with a smile on my face!
-Jeremy
Every other bus ride we've ever taken has stopped so many times for food and bathroom breaks, so we assumed that on a 22 hour long ride, it would be no different. This was the only time we didn't stock up on snacks for the ride because we planned to just pick some up at the stops along the way. We also had been making a good attempt to stay hydrated in this heat as we were putting back great big bottles of water often. Well, we were really kicking ourselves for drinking so much water and NOT packing food because the bus stopped only twice in the entire 22 hours! No food or bathroom breaks for us!
One of the two stops was the Vietnamese and Laos border at 6 am which was the most dysfunctional border I have ever been through. They had two officers for a lineup of about 200 people, while the other customs officers sat outside and seemed to be enjoying a nice coffee and morning smoke, while we stood in line freezing!! After we finally got our departure stamps,we went get back on our bus, and it was gone. We had read that there are lots of bus scams in Vietnam that just leave you once you get to the Laos boarder, and we really thought we were now part of one. We looked and looked but there was no bus in sight. We were a little choked but were also laughing because everything of ours was on the bus. All we had was our passports and $70 in pocket. We decided that we may as well try to start walking in the direction of the Laos boarder even though we had no idea how far it was. We walked aimlessly in the fog for roughly 5km up a hill, trying to find our bus or the Laos boarder, which ever came first.
We luckily made it to the Laos boarder to happily find our bus waiting for us on the other side, but again be faced with 3 people dealing with visas and entry for another 200 person line up. After trying to wait patiently, we finally got to the front to see that Canadians had to almost pay double the price as everyone and what do ya know bam! Kendal and myself only have enough money to pay for 1 and 3 quarters of a visa. We had finally reached the boarder but just barley didn't have enough money to get into the country! Falling only about 10 dollars short, the couple beside us whom also had been from Canada, graciously gave us the remainder of what we owed, which was a huge relief. After all was said and done we had gotten into Laos without being illegal aliens to the country woohoo!
We boarded back onto the bus to finish this bus ride from hell, but we had figure out a way how pay this couple back, with absolutely no cash on us and not ATM is sight. With good ideas coming far and in between, we had one hidden treasure that was going to save us... the 50 dollars American my old man papa Tim had given to me before leaving and said to only use this when you really need it!
It was one of those experiences that at the time this was all super stressful and extremely frustrating but now we can laugh about it! Needless to say we arrived safe and sound with enough money to pay back the saviors from Canada, lunch and our tuk tuk ride to the hotel.
P.s. this blog was written with a smile on my face!
-Jeremy
We found Jurassic Park in Vietnam.
We were warned that it was cold in northern Vietnam but we questioned, really, how bad can it be? We decided to brave it out so we could see the famous natural formations of Halong Bay and took a 19 hour sleeping bus to Hanoi. This was our longest bus ride and the it also happened to be on the roughest, most run-down bus we've seen. We laughed, felt like crying, and prayed that we would just arrive safely. We stuffed the broken air conditioning with our pillowcases and kept each other company and were entertained by our new friend beside us shooting a mickey of vodka with his Valium pills! Crazy.
When we arrived in Hanoi our questions about the weather were quickly answered as we were greeted with blowing winds, pouring rain and freezing cold. We were so excited of our hot showers in our hotel room but when we got there, it was 108 stairs (..ya, I counted) to our room which had no hot water or heat and we could see our own breath in the room. At this moment that I regretted our decision to come to Hanoi. We weren't planning on seeing cold weather on our trip so neither of us packed any decent clothing for the cold. We layered ourselves with basically all of our clothes in our backpacks to try stay warm and didn't change out of them for the 3days we were there. Thank God for dry shampoo!
Hanoi was a crazy city with insane traffic and people everywhere to turned. When the intensity got to be a bit much, we booked one night cruise on Halong Bay. We heard that it was beautiful but we were surprised at how stunning it really was. We were really lucky to board our cruise with 3 other Canadian couples, a sweet old Swiss couple, two hilarious Norwegian girls and a few Australians an a lone American. It was a really great crew of people to enjoy the great meals and other activities with. We went kayaking and explored the amazing limestone caves. After dinner, we sat off the back of the boat, drank beer, ate the vietnamese version of wagon wheels and fished for squid. Jeremy's determination paid off when he caught the biggest squid, nearly a foot in size, three hours later.
Halong Bay was completely mystical and like Jeremy explained it, it was like we were in Jurassic park. It made braving it through the cold completely worth it. It was beautiful, breathe taking and so serene and surreal.
With our time in Vietnam coming to a quick end, we had one more bowl of delicious pho before we got on another bus to Laos. Except this one, longest of them yet, 22hrs.
-Kendal
When we arrived in Hanoi our questions about the weather were quickly answered as we were greeted with blowing winds, pouring rain and freezing cold. We were so excited of our hot showers in our hotel room but when we got there, it was 108 stairs (..ya, I counted) to our room which had no hot water or heat and we could see our own breath in the room. At this moment that I regretted our decision to come to Hanoi. We weren't planning on seeing cold weather on our trip so neither of us packed any decent clothing for the cold. We layered ourselves with basically all of our clothes in our backpacks to try stay warm and didn't change out of them for the 3days we were there. Thank God for dry shampoo!
Hanoi was a crazy city with insane traffic and people everywhere to turned. When the intensity got to be a bit much, we booked one night cruise on Halong Bay. We heard that it was beautiful but we were surprised at how stunning it really was. We were really lucky to board our cruise with 3 other Canadian couples, a sweet old Swiss couple, two hilarious Norwegian girls and a few Australians an a lone American. It was a really great crew of people to enjoy the great meals and other activities with. We went kayaking and explored the amazing limestone caves. After dinner, we sat off the back of the boat, drank beer, ate the vietnamese version of wagon wheels and fished for squid. Jeremy's determination paid off when he caught the biggest squid, nearly a foot in size, three hours later.
Halong Bay was completely mystical and like Jeremy explained it, it was like we were in Jurassic park. It made braving it through the cold completely worth it. It was beautiful, breathe taking and so serene and surreal.
With our time in Vietnam coming to a quick end, we had one more bowl of delicious pho before we got on another bus to Laos. Except this one, longest of them yet, 22hrs.
-Kendal
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