Chiang Mai - cookery course

We spent a great day with the "Pad Thai Cookery School" in Chiang Mai today. We started with a short market tour where we got to taste various curry pastes - red curry, green curry, fish sauce (yes it really is made from raw fish and water fermented for 6 months), and introduced to the basic herbs used in Thai cooking - basil (3 types), lemongrass, kafir leaves, etc.

We were then ferried to the cooking school, a short drive from Chiang Mai, in a very green and leafy suburb. There were 9 in the class and our big and bouncy teacher, Nokky, whose personality was even bigger than her bum (which was impressive).

Nokky

We started with Pad Thai (stir fried noodles with egg and tofu) which was the best we've had in the whole of Thailand. Then veg spring rolls which are much harder to roll than you'd expect. Nokky did say it was like rolling a joint and strangely all of my spring rolls were bigger at one end...! Next up was tom yam soup - a spicy but watery soup. At this point you must understand we had eaten a whole portion of each dish (4 spring rolls) in about 2 hours so were feeling nice and full.


Tom yum soup and spring rolls

After a short lull, we went on to make green curry, stir fried chicken (or prawns) with cashew nuts - which included a rather spectacular moment where the whole wok catches on fire (on purpose) and finishing off with banana in coconut cream (El) and black sticky rice pudding (Kieran).


This is supposed to happen when you make Chicken with cashew nuts (note Kieran's special spiderman apron, bought especially for the occasion)

Oh and I forgot to mention that half way through we got to try some Thai fruits - Mangosteens, Rambutan, Lychee and Langlan fruit. By this time (5 hours later) if we had eaten another wafer-thin mint we would have exploded in a most unappealing way.

It was a great day, wonderful fun with Nokky probably the funniest Thai I have met, eating and making delicious food with a fun bunch of people (including Sue and Denee from the trek).

Burp!!!

Chang Mai Trek

So we set off on a 3-day, 2-night trek to the "non-tourist" (read treks that are organized so that you don't see any other groups or your money back) area of Chang Pai two hours from Chang Mai.

The first day was a bit of a let down; lunch at a hill village equipped with satellite TV and a walk around the village that made me feel like a peeping tom with the added bonus of a local "naughty boy" shooting his pee shooter at us, nice start!!!



We then hiked, passing the local witch doctor's hut (he wasn't in, which was a shame), for all of an hour to the next hill tribe. They, at least, seemed to not have discovered the delights of satellite tv or at least were still waiting for it to be installed. We showered in the local stream next to a cool device that used the river water to crush rice.

That night we got stuck into the Sangsom rum and coke and watched the "traditional dance" which may be because of the rum, but I really enjoyed it. The guide called "D" made us clap along which some how made it more fun. We then had to sing them a song and do a dance. Eleanor suggested the hokey pokey for the group, and the last thing that we "put in" was our bum cheeks, juvenile but fun and they seemed to enjoy us make fools of ourselves. D then took out his guitar and we all sang traditional Thai song like "Stairway to Heaven" and "Yesterday" by The Beetles and some of the guys in the village who joined the party with some extremely strong home-brewed Thai rice whiskey (known locally as "moonshine") showed us some magic tricks, well at least he tried to. I think the whiskey was going to his head as he had to keep on repeating the trick, "Are you sure it was the Ace of hearts? Really? Damn let me try again."

Day 2 was fantastic: we had a lovely walk through the hills, D told us a story of a trek he was leading where a boa constrictor fell on one of his customers and tried to bite his head off. The girls went very quite for a while and I could not help hissing now and again to keep the tension up!!!

To liven up the walk I suggested I spy, which went down a treat, even if Team Canada (Denee, Sue and Carl) won hands down. At lunch we made it to a small village made out of one family that had ten times as many animals as humans, including a begging piglet that all the girls went slushy over, "oh look at his nose, isn't it cute".

The village's main highlight was its waterfall which after a 2-hour hike was very refreshing, team Sweden even had soap for us all.



After that we walked to the elephant camp and got an hour's ride on elephants: we all took turns to ride on their necks which was a fantastic experience. I rode with Team Sweden (Johnny King of the jungle and Therese) and Johnny's wannabe lover Georgina (the Elephant)and had a great laugh when the first time she called for her young baby we thought that she was farting. The young baby also kept on trying to climb the side of the path and ended up falling up on her arse and headbutting a tree trunk.



The day ended in a hut outside the Karen village that was a lovely spot and we all bought some ethnic tat from a woman who just happened to be selling bracelets and bags and settled in for some more rum and card games.

I was lucky to get a leech while walking which was ironic because I joked with everyone that if any one got one they would have to buy a round, luckily they let me off.

Day 3 was another nice walk though some different types of forest and ended up with a raft race in which Team Sweden won through bad sportsman ship by tripping up our Captain, Denee, and throwing her into the river.

All in all a really good few days and we thank everyone on the trek for making it such a laugh, Thanks Denee, Sue, Carl, Johnny, Therese, Nicole and Natasha, and of course our guide, Dyo.

Bangkok 2nd Time Around

So we came back to Bangkok from Koh Tao this time by boat and overnight train. The train of course was an hour late, but the carriage was quite clean and the sleeper mattress was mega soft and clean which was a bonus for the train seemed to have no suspension that or the track had sleeping policeman to slow the train down. I have never been on a train that bumped so much, they also seemed to think that turning the lights off to go to sleep was for wimps, but with the wonders of ear plugs and eye masks, the train was no match for the travelzangs.



We hooked up in Bangkok with a friend, Carolin, our German Dutch-looking dive buddy who is vonderful. We have had a completely different experience in Bangkok this time as we decided to stay in the centre of town on "shopping street" in a lovely hostel called Suk 11 with bags of character and close to the sky train. We had a lovely few days shopping and getting the sand out of our hair so to speak.

Anyway, Spiderman 3 was cool and 28 Weeks Later was awesome (we LOVE zombie movies) and so you can see that we are fully immersing ourselves in Thai culture. Someone pointed out the great Palace from the bus last night up to Chang Mai where we are now but Eleanor couldn't be bothered to look as we had stolen/borrowed a copy of Empire magazine from a bar and that was more interesting. We will do one or two more temples but India kinda templed us out!!!



Off to do some "trekking" for lame-o's where you walk about 3 hours then get on an elephant and see "hill tribes" (the ones with rings round their necks) although by all accounts they have a group of tourists every day so not sure how genuine the whole experience will be but at least it's not diving or temples!!!

After that we may do some massage / jewellery /wax batik courses / downhill mountain biking / painting before setting out for Loas.

Missing home but now we're back on the run and have a renewed sense of adventure. We'll be in Laos from 1 Jun for 2 weeks and internet is prob not available there (there is apparently one ATM in the whole country!) so you may not hear from us in that time.

Koh Tao - Dive Master Snorkel Test

For those not in the know, the final piece of training for dive masters is a very serious test called The Snorkel Test. It was clearly invented by a Brit as no other nationality (except perhaps the Aussies) could come up with something like this.

Essentially you go to Lotus Bar* (*location optional) and after warming up with a few G&Ts, and have had a bit of food (we had a lovely fish BBQ with friends on the beach), you get sat down on The Snorkel Test Seat and are presented with a custom-designed mask and snorkel combo with a special funnel attached to the snorkel which you then don. A small bucket (about 1 litre) of cocktail is then poured down the aforementioned snorkel funnel and you have to drink the whole thing in one go without a) breathing, b) puking, or c) passing out completely.


Well as Kieran and El are such true Brits we managed to pass the test with flying colours and to be honest the rest of the night was a horrible sticky mess that neither of us can really remember!!!

Suffice it to say it was a really fun night with our dive buddies and the next day we didn't manage to get out of bed until 7.30pm. Obviously we are never drinking ever again (until the next time) and have realised that once you're past 30 you just can't do things like that anymore! Still it was a good way to say goodbye to Koh Tao and we made a fairly quiet exit 2 days later, exactly 2 months after we got there.

Some kind of sunset

some kind of sunset
Originally uploaded by Mr Zang.

Burma - for a whole 50 minutes

We had been in Thailand for 60 days and it was time to do a visa run. The nearest and cheapest option is to go to Burma, and it means we get another stamp in our passport!!

We headed off on the morning catamaran to nearby Chumphon. It felt lovely to have the wind on our faces and in our hair and getting away from Koh Tao for a while. We picked up a bus at the pier and had a 3 hour trip to Ranong, a Thai city just on the border of Burma. In fact it is across the other side of Thailand, on the western coat (Koh Tao is in the gulf of Thailand). The border to Burma is along the coast where many islands can be found. We hopped off the boat at a port and jumped on another boat for a 30-minute ride to an island within the Burmese boundaries.

There is nothing at all on this island except an immigration office, and a very large, very swanky casino-cum-hotel with absolutely nobody in it except a large number of very bored and hence helpful staff and a handful of cheapskate backpackers on a budget visa run. Really quite bizarre!

After a whole 50 minutes in the hotel we were shepherded back to the pier/Burmese immigration (!) and back on the boat to Thailand to collect our passports and new 30-day visa. After a rather boring mini bus trip back to Chumphon we stopped and found a nice hotel to stay in for the night. There was a wedding in the hotel which we didn't quite manage to gatecrash but was amusing to watch all the guests swanning about.

After a comfy night's sleep we had just enough time to do a bit of shopping (boring stuff like aspirin, razors, etc) before getting the bus back to the pier and the catamaran back to Koh Tao. This may seem like a boring story but actually it was great to be moving again and realising that there is life outside of Koh Tao. We need to leave and have started formulating our escape plan for 20th May and have found a renewed sense of zeal to finish our DMTs and start on the next leg of our trip.

We're 6 months in and have got a lot of ground still to cover but we're planning to head to north Thailand first...Chang Mai, the city of trekking, cookery courses and massage.

Koh Tao - Shark Bay

Here there be sharks

As a diversion from our usual diving activities we spent a lovely afternoon at a beach on the south of Koh Tao, Shark Bay, thus named as there are lots of reef sharks living there and you are pretty much guaranteed to see some when you snorkel there. Despite the fact that the beach is about 2km from our apartment we have so far failed to go there so it felt really good to be stretching our wings a bit!!!

Unfortunately the tide was very very low so we had to swim - well, almost drag ourselves over the reef to get to deeper water. About 300m out we were in water about 5 feet deep and we saw our first shark - a black tip reef shark about 4-5 feet long. It was swimming over there and minding it's business and was very cool. Then it swam back the other way...still cool. We drifted around for a bit and then Kieran pointed behind me...The bloody shark was heading straight for me!!! I wriggled around and he lost interest before getting close and I heaved a huge sigh of relief. Then we saw 2 baby sharks - maybe 2 feet long each. Very sweet, but when we sae another big one swim about we started getting a bit scared - I mean they were within 10 metres even if they weren't interested in us - so we headed back to shore.

We felt much happier when we were in about 1 foot of water, barely able to swim but too much coral to walk. And then it happened!! About 2 metres in front of me a great huge, well OK it wasn't that huge, 5ft shark swam right across my path. I'm not really a girlie girl but I must confess I screamed through my snorkel and swam pretty damn fast close to shore. I was pretty adrenalined up. I knew it wasn't going to hurt me but Jaws has had a big affect on me, evidently.

Finally as I approached the shore I felt a pull on my fins - BLOODY HELL THE SHARK IS BITING MY FINS I thought and I swam like the clappers (can clappers swim?) to the beach. I was crapping myself and called out to Kieran and looked behind me and it was Jason all along. He had come down to the beach to join us and had heard me scream I think and made his way behind me and grabbed my fins. I think I aged a year that afternoon.

Still. Snorkelling with sharks is very cool.

El's 31st birthday

We got up early and went to Pook's Kitchen for breakfast - they do the best coffee on Koh Tao at a very cheap price! I was assisting on Corrie's Stress and Rescue course in the afternoon so spent a few hours being an 'unconscious diver' and having all sorts of 'problems' underwater, like losing my fins, accidentally putting my mask on upside down and other such antics.

After a few G&Ts at Lotus, and checking my birthday emails and cards (thanks everyone who sent a message), we headed to Portobello, Koh Tao's classy pizza place for a dinner with the gang. Kieran had bought some balloons and Nat (Instructor at Scuba J) spent the afternoon blowing them up to hang up at the restaurant. We had yummy pizza and 2 bottles of delicious Argentinian wine - mmmMMMMmmm red wine!!!! We capped off the meal with a huge, sickly and disgustingly sweet cake which was a lovely surprise and was quite the most synthetic cake I've ever had! We capped off the meal with a cigar that we've been lugging round with us for 6 months and tried not to do too many Jimmy Saville impressions!

We then went onto the Bee bar which is one of Koh Tao's few pole dancing bars. They have happy hour until 11pm and free pool, and poles to dance on, not to mention really sweet girls there. I announced it was my birthday and they announced it was happy hour for me all night!!!! Then after a bit of drunken pole dancing, they gave me some more balloons and brought out a 'birthday cake' made from prawn crackers and candles. Hilarious but a really sweet thought. Of course, we all had to try and shove as many in our gobs as possible...I think you perhaps had to be there!!!

El, Nat and Corrie enjoy prawn cracker cake

We then went onto another bar but by this point we were pretty knackered and drunkard so decided to call it a night and were back in home in bed by 3am.

Happy Birthday El

21 again!!!

Koh Tao - End of the Suck and Blow Squad

We have now been here over a month - and in someways it feels longer and in others shorter.

We have both read a lot more books and met a lot more people than we have in all our travels up to now.



We have had quite a busy week of birthdays and leaving dos, and we are on a bit of a low at the moment, mainly because all our new friends have left or are leaving and also the weather has taken on an English personality i.e. wet and miserable.

We now plan to leave on the 20th of May and do a sweeping tour of South East Asia, and at least try to see some of the culture of this region of the planet instead of acting like the travellers out of "the beach" and sitting down to watch the latest film releases, with people getting up to get the popcorn within the film! and very very bad English subtitles, "so bit down on the house" she said and so on!!!

Still it's not all bad, a few people are starting the course that seem really nice and we are adopting them as wise old DMT's that have been there and done that, "Dorothy" (not her real name) is one and something that she said, again opened our eyes to truth of life on Koh Tao and how you can get sucked into it, by calling the main road along the beach the yellow brick road. Suddenly everything made sense and we began to see all the instructors at Scuba J in character, K the manager became the Wizard of Oz and so on.

Follow the yellow brick road, follow the yellow brick road, for we are off to see the wizard the wonderful wizard of Koh Tao (Oz)