New Years took us back to Thailand to meet up with our friends Kim & Jeanette. The plan was to meet up with those two crazy Norwegians in Phuket (Surin Beach) for three days, after which Mike and I would continue on to Thailand’s famous Railey Beach in Krabi for a few days of R&R.
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| Jeanette & Kim |
Mike first met Kim back while doing his undergrad at SFU (they were roommates) and, as things often go when meeting up with old friends that you haven’t seen in a while, it didn’t take long for the gin and tonics to start flowing and the stories of ‘back in the day’ to start. Mike and Kim jumped the gun on the New Year’s Eve celebrations and the 30th turned into a pretty big night at a beach bar full of Russian tourists and the four of us. Why is it that when Norwegians decide they’ve had a bit too much to drink they decide that ordering a bottle of white wine is a good idea?
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| Surin Beach |
After the excesses of the 30th, New Years eve was a little quieter, we spent it on the beach at a fantastic little Rastafarian bar, drinking Singhas and watching each hotel along the beach (there were literally dozens) put on its own independent fireworks display. The result: a somewhat unplanned, but completely over-the-top fireworks spectacle that seemed to be occurring all around us. All and all, a pretty near perfect way to end 2010.
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| New Year's Eve |
Feeling far from our best, the next day Mike and I said goodbye to Kim and Jeanette and took a ferry and headed over to Railey Beach in Krabi Province. Apart from a few near “bonding moments” between me and the open waters of Thailand (thank god for the cup of noodle soup they were selling on the boat) the two-hour trip was for the most part pretty smooth sailing. Upon arriving at Railey we were shuttled off the ferry onto a long-tail boat and delivered to the beach.
Upon arrival we walked up to the nearby hut (aka information desk) and asked if they could point us in the direction of our hotel. To which the guy simply with a big smiled replied “oh why you stay there? So very far”
A Side Note: Railey is a beautiful little laid-back beach town only accessible by boat. There are no cars (or none that we saw anyways) and everyone gets around on foot, meaning everything, for the most part, is pretty accessible……. for the most part.
Having now spent some time in Thailand and SE Asia, I figured when the guy told us “very far” he was just looking to make a buck and wanted us to hire one of his guys to carry our bags – although looking back I realized that he never actually offered this service.
If you haven’t figured it out already, we had a few issues getting to our hotel.
The walk to our hotel went a little like this:
“Discussion #1”
After 15 minutes of lugging our roller suitcases through a town with no roads and mostly sand trails, Mike and I found ourselves on the outskirts of town on a hiking path “discussing” if we were heading in the right direction.
“Discussion #2”
While wearing flip-flops and with our suitcases still in tow, Mike and I found ourselves enjoying some quality time scaling boulders, climbing over trees and acting as a mid-day snack for the local mosquitoes. At this point our “discussion” had a few colorful words added to it.
Mike's Cliff Notes in Purple (he felt I glossed over a few of the finer details of this particular “Discussion”)
Seeing my obvious frustration with the situation Mike offered to carry my suitcase the rest of the way. I was a little mean when I snatched the suitcase back and snarled: “Don’t touch my fucking suitcase”. In hindsight I might have over reacted. Strangely, I have never apologized to Mike about that, and he still supports me as a loving husband. I guess sometimes I take him for granted. He is my rock. But I digress…
Finally, after about 20 minutes, Mike and I managed to stumble across our hotel only to be greeted by the staff giggling at us and asking, “why no take boat? –it free you know”
Turns out we missed the part of the hotel website where it said the hotel was "boat access only"
Our hotel was made up of 20 bungalows all carved into the side of a mountain – and extremely peaceful. It was stunning. However, at the time of check-in Mike and I had reverted to a form of one word communication between the two of us and we were not necessarily feeling at one with nature.
One can only imagine how happy we were when the receptionist ever so nicely pointed out that our bungalow was the first bungalow at the top of the mountain - 234 steps straight up.
As we hiked up to our bungalow, our one word form of communication soon became an awkward silence, which Mike took to indicate an opportunistic time to point out "You know Risha, this suit case you were carrying its a lot heavier than mine - we should do something about that".
If you haven’t figured it out already, we had a few issues getting to our hotel.
The walk to our hotel went a little like this:
“Discussion #1”
After 15 minutes of lugging our roller suitcases through a town with no roads and mostly sand trails, Mike and I found ourselves on the outskirts of town on a hiking path “discussing” if we were heading in the right direction.
“Discussion #2”
While wearing flip-flops and with our suitcases still in tow, Mike and I found ourselves enjoying some quality time scaling boulders, climbing over trees and acting as a mid-day snack for the local mosquitoes. At this point our “discussion” had a few colorful words added to it.
Mike's Cliff Notes in Purple (he felt I glossed over a few of the finer details of this particular “Discussion”)
Seeing my obvious frustration with the situation Mike offered to carry my suitcase the rest of the way. I was a little mean when I snatched the suitcase back and snarled: “Don’t touch my fucking suitcase”. In hindsight I might have over reacted. Strangely, I have never apologized to Mike about that, and he still supports me as a loving husband. I guess sometimes I take him for granted. He is my rock. But I digress…
Finally, after about 20 minutes, Mike and I managed to stumble across our hotel only to be greeted by the staff giggling at us and asking, “why no take boat? –it free you know”
Turns out we missed the part of the hotel website where it said the hotel was "boat access only"
Our hotel was made up of 20 bungalows all carved into the side of a mountain – and extremely peaceful. It was stunning. However, at the time of check-in Mike and I had reverted to a form of one word communication between the two of us and we were not necessarily feeling at one with nature.
One can only imagine how happy we were when the receptionist ever so nicely pointed out that our bungalow was the first bungalow at the top of the mountain - 234 steps straight up.
As we hiked up to our bungalow, our one word form of communication soon became an awkward silence, which Mike took to indicate an opportunistic time to point out "You know Risha, this suit case you were carrying its a lot heavier than mine - we should do something about that".
- END OF DISCUSSIONS -
Looking back I can laugh, at the time not so much….
All jokes aside, we are still married and once I got over my bout of crankiness our little mountain hut and everything to do with Railey was great. It is indeed a stunning place and I fully understand how these beaches are rated amongst the top in the world.
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| View from our Bungalow |
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| Mike & his "boat meat" |
Our Railey trip was followed up shortly afterwards with a visit from our friends Andrew & Erica who stopped off in Singapore on their way for a month-long vacation in Vietnam. These cool cats stocked us up with some of the latest and greatest music from the mother country (a highly appreciated gift).
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| Erika & Andrew on their way to Vietnam! |
Although we were very excited to show both Andrew and Erika the highlights of Singapore, it was actually Andrew, a man well versed in philosophy and the arts who ended up playing tour guide.
As he was quick to point out that Singapore’s famous Merlion is actually a giant phallic symbol.
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| Mike's reaction to Andrew's observation |
Much appreciated Blackwell.
This new discovery for Mike now ranks up there with Mike’s need to point out "Popkum" & "Anis" road every time we drive out of Vancouver.
Ahhhh! Railei! Had a wonderful week there while I was on exchange. Did you do any rock climbing other than en route to the hotel? More importantly, did you get in on the red bull buckets with thai whiskey?
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