Thai Beaches

Choosing the right islands to hit up in Southern Thailand can be a difficult decision when time is limited. Ko Tao specializes in SCUBA. Ko Phangan in wild faux-hippy beach scene and full moon parties. Ko Samui, stunning but prone to November mini-monsoons. Phuket, touristy and expensive. So Ko Phi Phi (gleefully pronounced "pee pee"), seemingly a combination of the above, became my choice.

To get there though, you go through Krabi. I arrived early, chilled for far too long at a funny coffee shop, and then at the hotel with the strangest staff in Asia and awaited my friends Vicki and Justine, Canadians I met in Chiang Mai. We had a memorable night on the town for Vicki's birthday. The evening ended motorbike taxiing to the club we were told to go to. Frankly, It looked dumb. But Kansas Saloon was right next door! With a few in my system I let most of the bar (95% locals on this night) know I was from Kansas and so requested Blowin in the Wind. The band huddled up and the one guy who knew the tune sang it with his marvelous Thai accent. Too bad I meant Dust in the Wind. They also sang Vicki Happy Birthday!

The next day we longtail boated to Railay Beach and got a hilarious little 500 baht ($15) bungalow. I peed in my third ocean on this trip, swam some, and emerged to snap a gorgeous sunset.

Told them to exaggerate their walks for the pic. Quick learners.

We then ferried to Ko Phi Phi and hiked a path through town to our bungalow in the hills. That first night we trudged to the island viewpoint. It was a bit sobering to picture the 2004 Tsunami enveloping the entirety of what lay below. We then had what we hoped would be a memorable seafood dinner. But the food missed the mark and it proved hard to concentrate with Chinese Big Ern directly in my view the whole meal.

It had been a few weeks since I'd had a strange tour, so we were due. From a plethora of options we forsook the cheap wooden boat tours and the expensive Captain Bob booze cruise and chose a middle of the pack one. It took us to Bamboo Island, Monkey Beach, past the Viking Cave, and to Maya Beach (the beach from The Beach, unfortunately rainy at the time). Along the way our group could snorkel, jump/dive off the ship's plank, or use the kayaks. We indeed had to use the kayaks, as the ship was too big to park it on the beach. This led to hilarious scenes of foreign kayak novices going every which way. And like the Titanic, there were not quite enough for everyone and no Molly Brown to speak up for me. I volunteered anyway to swim (and sometimes be towed) to shore usually.

I should also mention our ship's crew consisted of five young, gnarly Thai dudes with limited English. I believe the ship's cabin and Cheech and Chong's living room shared more similarities than differences. Made for a fun, random day, ending in a postcard-perfect sunset!

The options for a drunk person in Ko Phi Phi are truly endless. You could go from a hypnotizing beach fire show to Muay Thai boxing to clubbing your ass off to a poorly thought out bamboo tattoo to late night street food. Maybe end it by puking, making out, or puking and making out on the "gross beach" (luckily there's a "nice beach" too). And somewhere along the line you hopefully got your picture with the gibbon in children's overalls (I sadly did not). All of this is largely fueled by buckets of liquor.

We were almost disappointingly tame. Had some Changs and shared some Mojito buckets for sure. My favorite was the Reggae Bar Muay Thai. Semi-pros who MURDER each other for our entertainment alternate with true amateur bouts, i.e. tourists fighting tourists from the crowd for free buckets. I told Justine under no circumstances let me volunteer (because it looked fun as fuck). A broken rib or two ruins a trip pretty quick though. Thankfully, on an island awash in young European scumbags and d-bags, several of them drunkenly wailed on each other to our cheers and boos, even lady bouts! Tourist volunteer Muay Thai, best idea ever.

With a sick Vicki at home, Justine and I kayaked back to Monkey Beach for some swimming and, well, monkey feeding. These maniacs can go from serene accepter of corn (most of the time) to bloodthirsty demon devil in the blink of an eye. Was seconds from punting one, but he charged me and just grabbed at my shins, as opposed to biting and making me patient zero in Outbreak 2.

Justine and I put our stuff on the rocks far down the beach and went out for a swim. Coming ashore even further down, I glimpsed what I feared, monkeys in our packs. By the time we got to them, one had unscrewed and drank my Gatorade and another was rummaging in Justine's pack. Tried to get it, but the large male bared his teeth, stole portions of our souls with his murderous eyes, and charged, sending a usually tough Justine screaming into the sea.

That's when our guardian angel materialized. A 6'5 man in a magenta tank top. He spoke English perfectly, yet when he faced off with the minions of Hades, he seriously uttered some kind of Babylonian/primate gibberish (yet there seemed to be distinct words in there). Even he flinched a bit as the large male counter answered his charge, but Magenta won out and returned our stuff to us. His last and pretty much only words to us before disappearing: "You've got to BE the animal." Considered rowing back and getting a tattoo of that sage advice then and there.

The next day I had to see Vicki and Justine off. Sadness. They were amazing travel mates, fun, funny, and chill. I miss them already :)

I had hopefully the saddest (in food terms) Thanksgiving dinner of my life and then woke up early to Skype my family at the Thanksgiving table. Campaigning hard for "Thanksgiving 2" upon my return. I spent my final full day in Thailand lounging on the nice beach before a vigorous 24 hours of ferry, bus, and plane travel ending in Singapore. Had a love/hate relationship with Thai beaches, but as should be in life, let's focus on the love. Shah-la-la-la. Til next time.

Cambodia

From the moment I departed the plane in Siem Reap my spidey senses started tingling. Maybe this was due to several prior warnings regarding Scambodia. Maybe it's because my hotel proprieter looked like The Texas Chainsaw Murderer sans mask. Or because his hotel (nice as it was) was down the darkest, most third world side street I'd been in since Guatemala. Or because I saw a bald, Marlon Brando looking guy give the Nazi salute to his pal before he noticed me in the back corner of the German place I had my first meal. Or maybe simply because Pol Pot's dark shadow looms over the country decades later. Whatever it was, my guard would be up in Cambodia.

Turns out, all I needed was Jimmy. How can you not trust a guy named Jimmy? He was my personal tuk-tuk driver. Met no one cool at my hotel, so I'd be visiting the vast Angkor Wat and accompanying temples complex alone. Jimmy would get me there.

Felt a bit like Ceasar in this chariot. My first day, we journeyed far east to Beng Mealea, a place you could "get your Indiana Jones on." An almost two hour ride through the countryside yielded dozens of smiling and waving children. So cute ("...or is it ominous, waving me goodbye?" thought my dark mind).

Cambodian gas station.

That's a pig. Lot of strange stuff on the back of motorbikes in Cambodia.

Regardless, I made it and spent a swampy afternoon scampering around impressive ruins. An old man guide even appeared out of no where and showed me around.

First result once I discovered my camera had face recognition self-shot.

The next day was temple-less as I stayed in town. Siem Reap is a trip. Neon-lined Pub Street certainly defines lively. The night markets have some decent finds and everything is in USD, which is nice. Only problem, here more than anywhere else so far, I was constantly besieged. "Sir you want massaggggge? Tuk-tuk sir? Buy something from meee." After I refuse some of those, I sometimes get, "okay, but you want weeeeed?" The one successful sale they made was a "Dr. Fish" massage....because they threw in a free beer. "You got me!" Swarms of fish nibbling on your feet counts for one of the stranger sensations I've felt in my life.

I saved my last day for Angkor Wat. Tragically, Jimmy was engaged elsewhere. So a new guy and I journeyed out. First, we went far into the country to see Banteay Srey and then Kbal Spean, which included a kilometer trek through the humming jungle to some river carvings. Then I scoured Angkor Thom, the complex where Angelina's Oscar-nominated Tomb Raider was filmed.

Controversial "Stegosaurus" carving.

Finally, made it to the main attractions, Bayon, teeming with serene face carvings, and Angkor Wat. The temples were just as inspiring as any Incan or Mayan ones I've seen. A great bonus was watching the monkeys! I included Cambodia on my itinerary solely to sate my archaeology nerdom with some world class temples. They more than delivered.

Monkey staggered shot!

Straddling poop....as in life.

Early the next morning I hopped on the back of a motorbike which took me to a random sedan which took me to the border. Flew through Cambodian side, then spent almost 4 hours in line at the Thai side!!!! I'm a patient man, but I was just short of instigating open rebellion against the king as we inched forward in sweltering humidity in a broken system conducive to cutting (escalated from my smiling revival of "no cuts, no butts, no coconuts" to outright melting people with death stares). Five more employees and some damn rope could fix the problem, but I guess the royal family needs an extra golden horse or something.

From there, a cramped shuttle van delivered me back to Khaosan road in Bangkok, the touristy area I had somehow missed the first time. I was so tired I chose the first place I came across, the Lucky Inn. Picture the Thai version of Josh's (Tom Hanks) first hotel room in the city in Big. But unlike him, I did not curl up and cry as this trip is slowly limiting my ability to be phased. And more important, I knew gorgeous Thai beaches awaited me. To be continued.....