Koh Samui: Beaucoup des francais...

We arrived in Koh Samui late on Thursday night and checked into our place. It is a really neat resort nestled into the side of a cliff literally. Our "room" is actually a little hut with an amazing view of the Chaweng beach and the gulf of Thailand. We are just south of Chaweng and just north of Lamai beach. Today we got up and spent some time at the pool and then headed into town. We rented a scooter/motorcycle thing and were off. Immediately Jay started driving on the American side of the street at which point Vanessa started screaming. Then with a quick jerk and a gut wrenching twist, he pulled the bike right and we were ok from then on. We tried to go to some beach we saw on the map but couldn't find much other than rocky beach. Somehow we happened upon a neat little lunch spot and had traditional Thai soups from coconuts. Unfortunately we read the tour book at lunch and it mentioned all the tourist accidents on motorbikes caused from stray dogs and falling coconuts and got freaked out. We rode very cautiously home and spent the late afternoon reading at the pool (cool disappearning edge/Jay pool!). Tomorrow we are going to see these neat rock formations, hit the beach and get one last massage on the beach. Then we are heading back to Bangkok for the night before our early Sunday morning flight (Sat. night U.S. time). We realized tonight at dinner that between the two of us we have not picked up even one word of Thai. Pathetic. Luckily all of the french are here for their month off so we've been able to brush up on that. A bientot!

Phuket: Thank you SPG...

We are now resting in the lap of luxury in a resort in Panang Beach on the island of Phuket. It is a really nice resort (thank you Starwood points) and there seem to be people that stay here for weeks on end. It has everything (rock climbing wall, private beach, etc.). We're at a little internet cafe in town now because they were going to take our first born in exchange for internet access at the hotel. We just got our first Thai massages - very good but kind of strange. You are lying on the floor in this room with all these other people getting massages. But its cheap and good so we like it. We were going to do more tailoring here but decided against it. Tomorrow we are off to the eastern side to Koh Samui...we'll write more from there and add some pictures!

Angkor Wat: You buy, you buy from me...

So we arrived in Cambodia Monday night. Had to get Visas to enter for $20 USD pp. Nice business for the Cam govt. Lots of people in line. Got to the hotel and it was awesome. Lots of French colonialism influence. Nice staff. VERY attentive. We hired a driver for Tuesday at Angkor Wat and scheduled a wake up call for 4:30 am so we could get up there for the sunrise. Our tickets to Angkor Wat were stamped at 5:12 am. We made it. Another $20 pp. So far, Cambodia is the most expensive place we have ever been to in South East Asia. The sunrise was under heavy cloud cover but it didn't take away from the awe of watching the light come up on one of the most amazing man-made structures one could ever imagine. It was also really neat to be there with all of the other psychos that got up at 4:30 am. There was a calm silence that we knew would be completely gone in another few hours once the tour buses rolled in. We were offered coffee from a small boy who from the outside appeared shy and meak. He was not however. When we didn't want his coffee, he showed us what it meant to be small but tough: "You buy, you buy from me". This turned out to be the theme of the day.

After sunrise, we went back to the hotel for breakfast and then headed back up to the other temples of Angkor Thom and surrounding area. It was a great day - we learned alot about the history of Cambodia during the times that these temples/cities were built as well as how the economy is currently supported by the tourism this great piece of history brings to the country. We were fascinated with the persistence of the children selling their wares inside of the temples. They would ask you where you were from, we would say "US" and they would say "US? Capital: Washington DC". THen we would say Illinois" and they would say "Capitol: Springfield". It was the same with each kid. Then we stumped them with "Maryland" and crumbled their code. Turns out they only knew 21 states and the capitals and Maryland just didn't make the cut. WE taught them about Annapolis. They sold us $4 cokes. Towards the end of the day, the only way we could get them to leave us along was by offering to re-sell them the things that other children had already sold us. This they were not interested in. However, at one point we did have some interest in a pen Jay found deep in his pocket. "Jay, don't forget me! You buy, you buy from me. You don't, you break my heart! Don't break my heart Jay!" Another kid, about 3, offered us the opportunity to take a picture of him for the bargain price of $1. Anyway, they were great kids - very enterprising and with a good sense of humor.

We made it till about 3:30 pm at which point the early morning wake up call had taken its toll. We headed back the hotel for a swim and shower and some beers. Jay made a friend with one particular bartender and learned lots about the current economy and how significant a role tourism plays (although he told us that 80% of Cambodians are farmers). All of Siem Reap is bascially like Lundy's Lane if you have ever been to Niagara - just nicer hotels but a much more impovrished surrounding area (ie: huts for locals).

We went into the downtown Siem Reap area for an amazing dinner of Khmer Curry. We had the price fixe menu for $4.50 USD pp. And $0.50 drafts. Great deal - really the only one in Cambodia. The next day we had to take a tuk tuk to the airport which was kind of a riot and were then promptly charged $25.00 USD pp to leave the country. So yes, Cambodia is the most expensive SE Asian country we have ever been to. But we loved it!

Chiang Mai - yes please.

We arrived in Chiang Mai about mid-day on Saturday and immediately felt that we were going to like it more than Bangkok. We checked in and immediately headed down to the city center in a tuk tuk (little motorized scooter that carries passengers). We had lunch at a local Thai place - two appetizers, two main courses and two accidently enormous beers for 250 baht (about $7.50). Jay said "I love Chiang Mai" on at least three separate occassions during lunch. We next walked around to find Jay a tailor and found one we liked. He was measured for two dress shirts and a tweed sport coat. We then walked around for a while and explored some of the wats in Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai and its surrounding areas is only a fraction of the size of Bangkok but has the same # of wats. Saturday night we went to the night market where we did some bargaining and got lots of fun presents :) Jay wanted to find someone who would sell him something for 1 baht. "1 baht? 1 baht? No? Ok - 2 baht?" Didn't happen. Mind you that is the equivalent of Jay taking off with their merchandise for free...

Day two in Chiang Mai we ventured north of the walled city. First thing in the morning we went on an elephant ride (see photo!) and got to feed our elephant little bananas and pieces of bamboo. There were about 10 female elephants that were used for riding at the camp we were at with three baby elephants in tow. One of the babies stepped on my foot while we were taking a picture and I couldn't believe how much it weighed...

Next we headed out to a Karen village to meet some people and then went trekking through some rice paddies and then to a waterfall in the woods. It was beautiful. We had lunch at a "restaurant" literally on the side of the road and it was delicious - curry, sweet and sour, rice, fresh pinapple for dessert.

The afternoon was a bamboo raft ride down the river. The "raft" was 8 pieces of bamboo held together with a sort of rubber band fashioned out of old tires. There was a 12 year old boy who steered us with a long stick that he used to push along the bottom of the river.

We headed back to Chiang Mai (about an hour's drive) and went into the Sunday night market late last night. We got our first Thai massages which were ridiculous. It was 60 baht ($1.80) for 30 minute foot massage. Amazing! I want to move to Chiang Mai....

This afternoon we leave for Cambodia. Should be amazing....more to come soon!

Love us xo

PS - Today is our 2nd anniversary!

On the menu....

As a recovering vegetarian, I viewed this trip as an opportunity to truly spread my wings. Yeah. That is not going to happen. On the menu: Chicken Knuckles, Ostrich Sausage, Fried Pig Neck, Dried Cuttlefish, etc. I had Red Curry w/Tofu :)

Bangkok

After a long trip, we made it to the hotel last night around 1am Bangkok time. Went to bed, got up and headed out to the Grand Palace to see the sights. Within 15 minutes, the locals had already tried out all the scams on us...Our taxi driver was particularly annoying and tried to "help us out" by avoiding traffic and dropping us off for 200 baht at a boat that would take us to the palace and then tried to "help us out" by turning off the meter and just charging us a flat rate of 250 baht. We declined and had to listen to him whine about the traffic all the way to the Grand Palace where we charged the meter rate of only 90 baht... Anyway, the Grand Palace was amazing and we took way too many pictures. We saw the Emerald Buddha (made of jade) and went to the Wat with the Reclining Buddha which was breathtaking in its enormousness. We went to the outdoor markets and were overwhelmed with the multitudes of smelly dried fish for sale. We didn't buy any - nasty! Then we took a long boat tour of the canals and the floating market. All in all, the historical aspects of Bangkok are amazing but the rest of it is pretty polluted and overcrowded. We're excited to check out Chang Mai for the next few days which is supposed to be a beautiful walled city with far fewer people than Bangkok.