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I will try and keep up with the blogging a bit better. The last time I wrote we had no clue what we were going to do for 3 weeks before I started school. With Susy having an afternoon nap in our lovely air conditioned room in Hua Hin, I took the time to read the lonely planet for an hour to figure out where we would like to explore! Many neat places in central Thailand and more beaches/islands around the gulf! Also a visa run to Cambodia by September 2nd so we don't end up in Thai jail like on broke down palace. When Susy woke up I was ready to give her a full on presentation about our options...her response was "give me a brief summary" and we'll go from there. WHAT?! I just made 3 pages of detailed notes about must sees, events,
National parks, transportation and mini adventures! Ok, let's go to Kanchanaburi. And we'll take the train to get there. Train delays land us in Ban Thong, not where we originally planned to connect, but we figured we'd already missed the connecting train so we might as well get the bus from here instead.
Well, this wasn't really a tourist place. No one spoke English, so when I walked up to the ticket counter at the train station and spoke gibberish for
all this poor man could know, he handed me a hand written note that said..."kanchanaburi bus, straight 500m to clock tower, turn right 50 m to bus kanchanaburi"
Awesome! Someone else has obviously done this and made our life easy! There was standing room only for the first half of this bus trip. Next time we may opt for the tourist bus as its a 2 hour trip instead of the 8 it took us on the local transport. Moving off the tourist path a bit, Kanchanaburi was a lot quieter than we were used to, and it was just what we were looking for. A lot of history in this area, some may recognize it because of the book and/or movie "Bridge Over the River Kwai". The first day we put our feet to work and walked to all the city sites including The JEATH War Museum, death railway bridge and, of course, the markets. Day 2 we rented bikes to head up the highway. We never found our first destination, but did manage to make it to HellFire Pass to stroll along the Thai-Burma railway that was built during WWII and Erawan national park for a dip in a waterfall.
One morning when I was out for a run, a Thai gentleman pulled up beside me on a bicycle and handed me a pamphlet for a mini marathon in 4 days! I was stoked. I hustled home to see if we could work it into our plans!
Looks like it'll work, 2 nights in Sangkhlaburi and then to Thong PhaPhum National park to stay in Tree top huts, then back for the run. To make this remote traveling a lot easier we asked to leave our bags at the guest house and stay there again when we come back for the run.
With a much lighter load we were off for a walk to the bus station. We got there with 10 minutes to spare before the next bus goes out, perfect timing to grab some chicken and rice and head out. Oh ya, this is the local bus again. No worries they say it will only take 3.5 hrs, a half hour longer than the tourist mini bus!
We both slept for the first bit of the trip. I was awake for a lil while, when all of a sudden we were stopped and they were yelling at us in Thai to get on another bus. Ok...ummm yikes! We got on the other bus and it was full of school kids! Whew, we weren't going to be stolen or robbed. The next 1.5 hrs was a beautiful drive thru mountains and the jungle. Up and down these hills I didn't think the bus was going to make it a few times. The road was half washed away in areas, and you could tell when things were getting sketchy because the driver would start smoking. Well we made it, and we're very happy that we ditched most of our belongings and only brought a small bag with us. We walked around town for an hour or so looking for what turned out to be very scarce accommodation. We ended up finding a sweet place right on vajiralongkorn lake and were glad we were patient. The next day we wanted to rent bicycles and ride around...but nowhere had any to rent:( instead we'd walk! We went for breakfast in town but no one here is overly friendly, or could speak English...so to order we just pointed to what the people were eating at the next table and said "song" meaning 2 in Thai. It ended up being delicious, "ahroy". We were fed and ready for our trek for the day. First we had to cross the bridge to the mon village Wangka. The mon people are Burmese refugees. The old town of Sangkhlaburi was flooded in 1984 and two villages were wiped out. These people were rescued by Luang Pho Utama, a monk. He provided health care, housing etc for the Burmese as they have no rights in Thailand. He died in 2006 and he is still being mourned which was pretty obvious from the statues and hundreds of photos if him at the temple. We learned "dangoon" for thank you in mon.
Feuds between the mon and Thai teens happen on the bridge so it's not recommended to be around there at night. We toured both temples and shopped at the temple market (remembering to use 'dangoon') before returning across the bridge to Sangkhlaburi. When crossing the bridge 3 tour busses of Thai tourists were crossing as well. We had seen these busses thru the day. Being thankful that we were always ahead of them when entering the establishments. When we crossed the bridge though there was one who was extra nice and could speak English fairly well. As we were chatting to him it was becoming obvious that a lot of cameras were being directed in our direction. Finally we hinted enough that it was ok and they got up the courage and we began to pose for photos with them. We became celebrities for a short 10 minutes as all of as sudden 20 Thai men wanted their pictures taken with us. One by one we stood and smiled with them.
This was ok, as we haven't encountered a single other tourist all day, and they were showering us with compliments! (beautiful is the only English word I think the majority of Thai men know). After lunch and wasting some time at the markets in town, we caught the green bus to Three Pagodas Pass, as close to Burma as you can get. The border opens occasionally, but can close at any given moment and is said to be unsafe to cross! So we were just going to check out another Thai town...the end of the road really! Again, not a single tourist in this area! We got off the bus, and walked through the markets. These people do it right, they let u sample things to see if you like it before u buy it! Let me tell you...we came back with a lot of new random food. Most we don't know what it was, but it sure tasted good. The people were very friendly as well. Then there was the question...how do we get back? The lonely planet doesn't tell us anything beyond getting there...hmmm. In 20 minutes we had toured the town and market and it was 5:15 so we needed to find a way back. Well just around the corner we saw the nice green bus! We were set, he's leaving in 5 minutes! ( remember any communication is done us speaking English and our Thai vocab of about 10 ish words, and them 100%thai!)
We made it back to Sangkhlaburi. Driving back I felt like I was in heaven, surrounded by mountains, in the jungle! This is my favorite place so far. Not sure if its because it's more or less off the tourist map, or it's because of the beauty of the landscape.
Our 2 nights in Sangkhlaburi were up so
we hopped on the tourist bus to Thong Pha Phum town in hopes of making the last bus to the national park. We didn't make it in time (it's a little hard when the last bus is in the am!) so our dreams of sleeping in the treetop huts in the jungle were crushed:( it was also pouring rain, and there are about 3 places to stay in this town and one turned us away before we could ask for a room. Again thankful we only have one small pack each, we walked thru the pouring rain with a real s***ty city map... We ended up at the library and they called a taxi for us and took us to some accommodation. Thank goodness because we were so turned around, even map girl couldn't figure it out. (no English...remember)
The day was a write off, but as the sun began to shine the next day, so did we! By 10am we were fed and had viewed the sights in town and we (mostly me) were on a mission to go zip lining. The good ole LP tells us there is a resort that offers zip lining but gives no other details.
Our poor Thai pronunciation and pointing at "the book" landed us on a taxi bus...we rode for an hour and a half to get to the resort, hoping it wasn't going to be a round trip driving tour. We swung like Tarzan, crossed rope bridges and zig zagged thru the jungle! It was AWESOME! I wish we had more time to stay out there and do some kayaking down the river and maybe a little quading. Butttttt we had a race to get to! So...We were finished, and again hadn't given it too much thought as to how we were going to get back to town. We waited on the road, the last bus will be coming by real soon, just flag them down, we were told. Ok, we waited and waited, and knowing the last bus from town to Kanchanaburi leaves in 1.5 hrs, racing dreams were beginning to fade as well:( that's when the owner of the resort pulls out and offers us a ride to town as they were going to buy something anyways! YESSSSS! The drive to town took 25 minutes, don't ask me where the bus took us on the way out to make the trip 1.5 hours, but we made it in plenty of time to find the Jungle bar and have THE BEST CURRY EVER! (by far the best meal we've had) We also took advantage of driving with an American educated Thai. Aye helped us learn our numbers on the drive into town. We were having trouble when shopping because we ask "how much?" in thai, so they would respond in Thai...and then we'd be ashamed and repeat in English and they would laugh and repeat in English.
The hour bus trip to Kanchanaburi was enough for Sus and I to master 1-100, 1000 and 10, 000(which I hope we never have to use).
An early rise for these holiday athletes;) 6 am start time for the race! We were well prepared though, we rented a scooter the night before to get us to/from the start line, because no taxi was up at that time. If we felt like celebrities in Sangkhlaburi...then fame has found us again! About 90% of the runners were male, and we were the only international females registered! Everyone was excited that we were participating, they were also full on gawking and secretly snapping photos of us! It wasn't until we jumped into a group photo that they would outright pose with us. We are in no half marathon shape, but we were both happy with our finish times. I came in first, Sus, a few minutes behind. We were handed medals and told to wait around for the awards ceremony! What did we win?!....................... Refrigerators!!!! That's right, a full sized fridge with a freezer. They ask us to pull our car around to load them. Well, hmmm...this poses a slight problem, we doubled on our scooter! Luckily there was a lady there willing to buy them off us! Yep it cost 220 baht ($7) to enter the race, I sold my refrigerator for 8000 baht, Susy for 3500 (Hers was slightly smaller for second place). I guess this makes up for the money that was stolen out of my bag in Khoa Sok and the fine Susy paid for her bike crash on Koh Phangan.
To finish our Central Thailand tour we have made the journey to Auytthaya. (on the tourist van). We're currently sitting on our fresco private balcony. Complete with fake lawn, gazebo, wrought iron dining set, all for the price of 500 baht per night.($17)
Pictures to come tomorrow!!!!
- comments
Laura Great adventures Beth! I love living variously through you. Next time, draw a big mustache on your face or jiffy mark our some of your teeth for me. xo
Mom Wow! What a lot of experiences. Some make me a bit nervous as your mom lol. Enjoy. Get ready to study hard for a few weeks.
Andrea C Hey pretty lady, this was a very good entry, you two seem to be getting really busy over there lol Congrats on the marathon you celebs! Miss you, xo