Khao Ra

So the Plan was to get up early meet at the temple at the base of the mountain and then hike to the top before Noon and hike back down before dinner……mice and men, haha. And although the travel books recommend a guide we figured a few experienced trekkers could surely follow a path up a 627 meter “hill”. Anyway of course everyone got a late start and we were exhausted from all the swimming the day before. We got ourselves, some drinking water, some fruit to snack on and out the door. Sophie and I accidentally drove right passed the temple turn off and almost all the way to the other side of the island! But we still beat everyone else to the meeting spot :P we followed the signs up to a gravel lot to park the motor bikes then up a gravel road to where we found the trail head. But as we passed over a beautiful flowing creek/waterfalls we unknowingly lost the trail….we continued up the waterway and after much debate about shoe traction and slippery rocks decided to follow a footpath and not stay on the waterway. We found a trail or path that looked like it was going up…and headed up. The trail gets smaller and the brush gets thicker. I am sure you all know where this is going finally the trail disappears and we are in the middle of the jungle facing a giant boulder there is no going around…..uh-huh. So back down till we find the water, some take a dip, some want to leave, some want to look for the real trail…..we all ended up leaving it for another day but it was good exercise and a great laugh. At least we found our way back right :)

Snorkeling

Oh what a Fabulous day, just swimming along on the surface of beautiful turquoise sea :) haha, um yea, I was humming that as I wrote it…..I went snorkeling today! It was SO much fun, though I did have to get up rather early, 6:30AM. Much too early while on vacation :) We were served breakfast (peanut butter banana pancakes!) at the pier and then traveled 3 hours by boat to Koh Tao, (actually a very small island a little ways away) it was so pretty, just big enough for one little resort and bar and shaped like a triangle with three bays one on each side sharing a 3 sided beach in the middle. There were fish everywhere and the coral was so full of life. It was great exercise too because the coral is protected so no flippers are allowed, we swam for a couple hours and even saw a trigger fish! We went back to boat for Lunch and ended up swimming out to the boat anchored offshore for the divers instead of waiting for other snorkelers on a boat taxi and that was a superb challenge, Miriam beat me in the race but what did I expect from a girl who bicycled from Holland to Thailand, talk about some leg power ;P Then we went over to another little island and snorkeled for a few more hours. We could use flippers this time and it was more of a relaxing activity, just floating along surrounded by all the fish, we took an underwater camera but don’t have the pics back yet……it was such a great day & we were also on the boat with Sophie so that was great fun too! The ride back we were exhausted and my backside is extra tan…....see if you can guess the name of the rock formation we passed on the way back ;P, haha.....

Moon Set Party

At first it was a little confusing, how everything was set to a lunar calendar but it is becoming a great rhythm. You never have to know what day of the week it is and it never matters, haha. Everyones work and social calendars are calculated around the Moon parties; Full Moon, Half Moon, Black Moon, Shiva Moon, Blue Moon etc….and it makes absolutely no difference if the party is on a Sunday or a Thursday :P I discovered a new one last night too, the Moon Rise/Moon Set which is 2 days before and after the Full moon. At Pirates Bar the nice secluded north…..great music, small intimate crowd and if the tide is low you could walk there from Mirjams bungalows. ….

Full Moon Party

So yes I just had to see for myself although I have heard a myriad of reasons why its not all that anymore, we went with great company and no expectations :) The core crew was Mirjiam, Sophie and I but many others met up beforehand. We cooked Spaghetti and garlic bread, I made two different sauces, one veggie and one meat. We had about a dozen people for dinner it was hilarious because we had plenty of food but had to improvise the bowls and plates, haha. Then we had a few drinks got all painted up and caught a taxi to Haad Rin. By the time we got there around midnight it was full on chaos, the beach was packed with dancing drunks and the streets were full of vendors selling everything from glowtoys to flipflops to buckets of ice with a bottle of liquor/mixer and 6 straws, HA! We started out at a sushi place called Joy, the owner is a great guy I met when I first arrived and the food there is fabulous…We took a 2-3 hour intermission in the middle of the dancing and hung out in his upstairs lounge/balcony and people watched, it was GREAT! We wandered down the beach and stopped whenever the music suited us. There were bars playing anything and everything, Drum & Bass, Reggae, Psytrance, House, Top 40s, Hip-Hop etc. Dancing galore! Everyplace opened right onto the beach so you got an extra workout dancing in the sand :P We spent a lot of time dancing at Tommys where I ran into a ton of people I knew and after the sun rose over the ocean we followed the crowd down to Zoom Bar. I danced till 8 am and could have gone on all for another whole day but alas my crew was ready to retire and so we headed home to relax a bit skip the after party but maybe hit up the after after party which is closer to where we stay :) Overall I had a FANTASTIC time, it was a bit sad to see all the people pissing in the sea, and even funnier to see the really drunk ones falling down trying or passed out drunk all over the beach but its their hangover not mine….

R & R and Yoga

So Mirjiam has a little beachside bungalow on the north side of the Island (we went up and took a swim the other day and met some of her neighbors). It is right down the way from a Yoga school/retreat and a much less populated part of the island. The little community of maybe a dozen or so bungalows run by a Thai couple affectionately known as Mama and Papa, they have a little open air restaurant and also an Herbal Sauna down by the water. It is a wonderful spot, most of the folks are attending the Yoga retreats and the energy is so wonderful, next door at the yoga halls they have a big shared kitchen and a library and TV for movie night (we went to watch Gahndi). It is a bit of a drive from where I am currently staying in Baan Tai but I may just have to scoop up Marjiams bungalow when she leaves….tho I hear Hady (one of the neighbors further back from the water has his eye on her bungalow too….. :)

Jumanjy

Ah, what a great night! It was a birthday party at this great place just around the corner in Thong Sala, it has a fab set –up with free pool, lots of lounge platforms a great upstairs deck, DJ booth and JACUZZI! There was a wonderful food spread with Papaya salad, pork meatballs, seasoned potatoes, YUMMY and good music too. Sophie is in Koh Phangan now too so she joined us out tonight, it was great fun! We brought our bathing suits so we were well prepared and after a bit of dancing we jumped in and relaxed for a while. These ladies are great, I can tell we are going to have a blast this week. We sort of closed the place down, we weren’t the last ones gone but close enough and it was almost 4am…..

Pancakes

YUMMY, I awoke today to the wonderful smell of pancakes cooking in the kitchen! Mirjiam went out early in the AM and got supplies including “proper coffee” for herself (instead of the instant kind :P the pancakes were perfect, delicious and a great unexpected treat! It was a great start to the day :) I will be having pancakes again soon now that we have everything we need to make them …..

Cookies

Today I spent the day making cookies with Dex, I know you may say it doesn’t take all day to make some cookies but it was quite the undertaking. We had to go to 3 different places to get the ingredients, and western foods are expensive and a bit of a pain to come by here. So we found Chocolate chips and cocoa powder at Limpipong market (nice selection of baking supplies here, yay!), vanilla and butter at Big A’s (they carry lots of western items but its way overpriced), and eggs, salt and sugar at Tesco Lotus (which is as close to an actual supermarket as it gets). It is so silly to picture, me walking up and down the aisles looking for stuff that is totally not where you would expect it to be and it is all written in Thai anyway….for instance pepper and salt are nowhere near each other on the shelves, salt is a baking ingredient and pepper is a condiment. It was so much fun to be sharing an activity that reminded me a bit of home tho, and I haven’t had western style sweets/snacks since I got here. Dex had all the tools and appliances needed; mixer, bowls and even a convection oven! The chocolate chocolate chip heaven we created was soooo worth all the work :)