TREKKING ON

Back to the blogging after a well earned rest, too much typing and I just might get one of those "sydromes."

The first few days in Thailand were spent in Bangkok, doing laundry, uploading photos, sorting out flights, and all the other less glamourous aspects of this adventure. Also met up with my new travelling companion, Niall, fresh out of Korea. Took off for the island Ko Samet for 4 days while Niall was off in Hong Kong helping the Seoul Gaels successfully defend the All Asian Gaelic Championship. A small island chosen solely for its easy and cheap access from Bangkok, it met the goal of chilling out and doing nothing. Not many other options were available. The weather was a bit moody, tossing in daily storms resulting in the loss of electricity the first two nights and rain the whole of the third day. Regardless, I sat around, read some, watched some movies that don't deserve mention, and hung out in the beachside bar for a few drinks.

Back to Bangkok and met up with Niall. Messed about there for another 2 days awaiting the return of his Vietnam visa. Nothing much to report here, just the usual Bangkok shuffle, dealing with mad tuk tuk drivers, buzzing through the night markets, getting harrassed by every pusher of something on the streets, and trying to sort out watching football matches after closing time. Yes, for all its craziness, most establishments in Bangkok close at 2am. And if you ask a tuk tuk driver to take you to a joint that has the football on the tele, he'll take you to the same one the tuk tuk driver the night before took you when you asked for a place that had cold beer but without working women.

Flew up north to Chaing Mai on, uh, Thursday I think. Yeah. Found a place to stay on the outside of the moat, yes, the city has a full fledged 4km square moat around it. Went out for some pool and darts, talked to some joker Americans and Brits who have been in Thailand way too long, and stayed away from the lady boys. Friday we got in touch with a local trek guide, who came highly recommended from Chris, who had gone trekking with him back in June. Too easy, conducted negotiations at a street side foodcart vendor over a few beers. Set out the next morning.

First stop on the way out to the hills was the local market, where Anan stocked up on food for the next 4 days and we cringed at the sight of bugs, innards, and other such marvels that exist in the local diet. We were dropped off at the designated location, ate lunch, and then set off up the hills into the forest. The first 2 hours were spent hiking up rather steep hills, with Anan cutting half a path with a machete, and us sorting out for ourselves the other half. Luckily, Anan claimed to have spent the last three weeks doing nothing but drinking and smoking, so many rest stops taken. At some points along the way, our fearless leader appeared a bit confused, uncertain, but didnt yield his confidence, so we trekked on. To make a 4 hour story a bit shorter, we ended up in the same place we started at, none the better save for all the energy spent. Anyway, he fell back on a Thai proverb, and came up with an alternative plan, and we took a truck to the elephant and rafting camp on the river, which was to have been our third nights stay. Anan the chef cooked up some eats, and we spent the evening playing cards and chatting in our bamboo hut facing the river.

First up on day 2 was an elephant ride, which was different enough, but would have been better if it was more of a trek than a 30 minutes down the road and 30 minutes back sort of affair. But I have an elephant ride under my belt, another block checked off. The days trekking took us through some amazing forest/jungle vegetation, sticking to a path the first half of the way, and following a river hopping on the rocks for most of the second. It wasnt til I was well confident hopping the rocks with the pack on that I had a false step and went for a splash. Sometime in the afternoon we arrived at our destination, a Shan hilltribe village. The Shan tribe came south into Thailand from China about 45 years ago to escape persecution. The Thai government leaves them alone for the most part, but the don't have any rights as Thai citizens, don't own their land, and don't have any government assitance. How they expect them to prosper under such an arrangement is beyond me. Maybe they just want to protect the trekking market, so they have to keep the villages in order. Anyway. The place was unspectacular other than the location, bamboo huts for living, dirt roads/paths, chickens, roosters, pigs, dogs, cats, kids moving about all over the place. We went for a stroll and ended up getting a tour from two kids, about 6 and 3 in age or so. They showed us how to make whistles out of grass, fed us some leaves, and never stopped impressing us with their English. They talked constantly, limited to their knowledge of the word "hello". Dinner was cooked up by the family we were staying with, and afterwards the village leader joined us, sort of, as we played cards and sat around. He showed us some village tricks and a bit about their way of life.

Day three started magnificiently as I stepped out the hut to find I was now on a mountain island, an oasis above the clouds floating below us. A few other peaks here and there, but for the most part floating on a bed of clouds. After a deliberately slow start, we set off for the next day along a real road until we reached a Budhist Lahu village. Arrived just in time to get into our lunching hut before the rains came, the chef whipped up some fried rice and fruits in our hosts hut. After coffee and more card playing, either rummy or loser, we set off again. We added one man to the trek, "The Doctor", so named for the thoroughness of his kit bag. We could see the destination, a Christian Lahu village, across the valley, but the hike went around instead of down and up. Two hours later and just outside the village we came upon the best shower in the forest, a nice waterfall with a half bamboo shoot to get the whole shower effect. After a good scrub we hiked up in flip flops, a bit of a mistake, but made it nonetheless. Moved into our hut, and half the village seemed to join us. Our man Anan is quite the legend there, for whatever reason, so we had a whole crew waiting on us and cooking green curry for dinner. The hut sat above the village, and offered a stuning view into the valley and the ridgeline in front of the setting sun. After dinner we received an in hut entertainment show, with the young girls from the school/church in full garb doing a singing and dancing performance. Quite an experience, really. After that we chilled out, played cards, attempted conversation via hand signals and gestures with The Doctor, and so it went. The ambience was heightened by the chorus and rythmes of the forest at night, which vividly reminded me of a non-verbal performance, where the performers make sounds out of random objects.

Day four we set off for the road where we came in at, or roughly that area. The trekking again involved making your own path, but was mostly downhill, thankfully. The final leg of the journey was a raft ride down the river, starting at the camp from Day 1. It consisted of about 1 minute of white water rapids, and 59 minutes of gently floating down the stream. No complaints about that. Cruised back into Chaing Mai in a jeep, and that was that. Great times, 4 days with no electricity, eating by candlelight, chilling but not talking with the villagers, beautiful forests and vegatation, and none of the madness from the cities.

Another 4 days here in Chaing Mai, awaiting Laso visas, then up north for a few more in Thailand before jumping to Laos.

BACK TO BANGKOK

Three months and 23 days after departing Bangkok en route to Lisbon, I am back in Bangkok after a 44hr journey that involved a 6hr bus from Prague to Berlin, a 2.5 hr walk thru Berlin to the airport in the dead of the night, 4 hr wait at the Berlin airport, flight to Amsterdam, 4 hr layover, 11 hr flight to Bangkok, and 1.5hr bus ride to Khao San Rd. So here I am, chilling for a day before heading down to Ko Samet, 3hrs to the south. There I will as much of nothing as possible for 4 days before heading back to Bangkok to meet up with Niall and fly north to Chaing Mai on 14 Oct or so.

Prague is a great city, probably the most photogenic city I've been too. The old areas the wrap the Vlatva River are in excellent condition, and the history of it all is overwhelming. Obviously though, it is immensely overtouristed, the majority of the people on the streets in the city are tourists, but what would you expect.

So the European travels are now complete. Without doubt, Turkey was the best place for traveling. It combined a wide range of sights and diverse natural beauty with the experience of feeling of being in a different place, with a different culture that Europe cannot match. My travel plan was to go to Eastern Europe, as in different than Europe, but for the most part, it is better catergorized as Central Europe, or the eastern side of Europe, as it not much different than the western bit, just a few years back in the developmental process. Even Romania, much further behind the rest, is just a poorer version of Europe. Not until Turkey did things change in a drastic way, and there, most the change was in the Eastern half. Traveling through a culturally distinct land is much more interesting than plodding through Europe to see all the sights. Just walking through a Turkish city can be interesting enough. So thanks to Chris for injecting the Turkish into the travels. Of course, I wish I could have hit Croatia and the Balkans, more of Czech and Hungary, and Poland, but there is never enough time and money for everything.

The general plan for the next 10 weeks is to head to Chaing Mai and northern Thailand for two weeks, then east in Laos for about two weeks, traveling south and east into Vietnam, journey through the southern half of Vietnam, then cut into Cambodia up through the killing fields and Ankar Wat before returning to Thailand.