Scare Canada ?

Okay I lied, — well not really a lie but sort of an unintentional little fib. I sort of inferred that the last entry would be the last entry, and here I am again. Had to tell you about the final bits of our journey. Up at 0600 in Bangkok so that we could make our flight to Hong Kong and then our connecting flight to Vancouver and Victoria. All went swimmingly well on our Cathay Pacific portion to Vancouver. They gave us hot food, new warm sockies for our tired feet, our choice of many movies and the did not lose our luggage. In fact, we flew with a number of airlines in Thailand, to a number of different airports, both large and small, and nobody lost our luggage and the flights were on time. Well guess what — remember my whining about our national carrier, Air Canada? You guessed it, but let me not get ahead of myself.

We arrived unscathed, at Vancouver International, at 11:30. Now this is about 1:30 in the morning of the next day to us, but we are back. The one minor glitch that we have is the next leg of our trip, the 20 minute flight to Victoria is scheduled for 21:30, or 9:30 at night. A rather long wait, after a long flight, but as Air Canada Jazz fly to Victoria nearly every hour so we hoped to bump our flight up a bit. Well we cleared luggage through customs, (all our luggage) without mishap, and hand delivered them to Air Canada. At this time, the agent kindly changed our departure time to the scheduled 2:00 flight. We removed the baggage tags which were installed in Bangkok and replaced them with genuine Air Canada tags, for the remaining 20 minute flight. On we went to our departure lounge to await our 2:00 flight. About 13:30, Air Canada made an announcement to the effect that there were some maintenance issues with our intended aircraft, and so the flight was canceled. The silly passengers would be shoe-horned onto the following flights, and this would be accomplished alphabetically. Our name should have been Aardvark rather than Roberts because when Bonnie checked for our new time, we were back to 9:30 at night. Other than feeling particularly sorry for ourselves, or trying to recover our luggage and make our way to the ferry, we were at a bit of a loss, so decided to await the results of the 3:00PM flight. Wellll, we didn’t make the 3:00 but Air Canada announced that things were going so well that they would probably have the backup cleared by the 4:00 or 4:30 flight. Now the 4:00 was delayed and the new departure time would be 4:10, then 4:20, then 4:30. In the meantime, they had apparently found another plane, and were going to toss it into the mix and really clear up the backlog. Now we have the delayed 4:00, the 4:30 and the extra plane all slated to depart at 4:00. Fortunately, Air Canada seem to dash about in constant confusion, as our 4:30 flight didn’t leave until 5:15. We did make it to Victoria unscathed, and just when I was beginning to feel less sorry for myself, I tried to find our luggage. Wrong, — it ain’t gonna happen. It has magically disappeared in a 20 minute flight. The lost luggage ladies, who were actually quite pleasant, assured me that our luggage would indeed show up on one of the subsequent flights. The 9:30 PM flight being the final one. After trying to check on our luggage via phone, and finding out that we were talking to a lady in India, who did not yet have it listed into the system, we drove back to the airport. We were there but our luggage still wasn’t, and the next flight was the last flight, the 9:30, which was now arriving at 11:30. Well the end result was we did get our luggage at 11:30. All is well that ends well. It seems that when we got our new departure time in Vancouver our luggage was re tagged with a 21:30 flight, so it patiently sat in Vancouver, waiting for its flight, which was late anyway. All this now clocked up to about 31 hour on the go. Need some Rip Van Winkle time.

Oh well, the vacation still was great.

Time in a bottle

Well this is it. The sand in our hour glass is all at the bottom. It is time to go home. Today we fly from Koh Samui to Bangkok, tomorrow Cathay Pacific takes us back to Vancouver via Hong Kong. Maybe it is just an age thing, but time has really dashed by. Would we do this again?? — Oh ya! Will we do this again ? You bet!

We saw a lot of really interesting places and met some very nice people. Add to this, our constant search for some bad Thai food, which we were unable to find. I know that it must be out there, but we couldn’t find any. We also tried to find a mediocre massage. Not. They don’t have them here, and regardless of how hard they poke, pound and twist, you always feel great at the end. But all good things must come to an end, and this is it. Time to get back to the real world, as we know it.

A wise friend once explained to me that the reason a boating season is only five months long, is because it takes seven months of work to get ready for the next boating season. That is where we are at. We now have a couple of months to get that seven months preparation accomplished. Then it will be time for our next adventure.

Till then, enjoy each day, and take care of yourselves…….
T

No mind and Idle time

The question is how do you know if you are relaxing if you haven’t done anything to begin with? I may put that question to Johnnie B, when next we get together. It isn’t as easy as it might appear you know, arise in the early part of the day and eat, relax in the sun then eat, relax some more and probably eat, then recuperate from this strenuous ordeal with a good sleep — repeat as required.

The relaxing in the sun time has given me the opportunity to observe my surroundings in great detail, and one of the conclusions that I have drawn is that somewhere in the wilds of Thailand is a great concrete forest. In our travels to some of the more remote regions, I have tried to spot this anomaly, but to no avail. Now the smaller, immature trees are cut and used as fence post, while the more mature growth are used as power poles. I use the term “power poles” quite loosely as it seems that everything gets strung on them. Telephone, 220 AC power, internet, cable tv and, I suspect, laundry on Tuesdays, all share the same poles. This results in a hodge-podge of tangled wires hanging haphazardly at will, much like a poorly engineered bird’s nest. It is no doubt done to code, it is just that the code is virtually nonexistent. At any rate, every pole in Thailand appears to be of concrete, which no doubt lasts very well, but also saves the teak for touristy items and furniture. Now if I could magically collapse some of the furniture into a small package, I would be quite willing to fill my suitcase and kiss my clothes good-bye. This would, of course, be only for the trip home.

Another construction oddity which I have noticed is the scaffolding. With all the construction going on, it seems that every other building is covered in scaffolding. The odd thing is that most of this scaffolding is made up of bamboo poles lashed together with rope. Scurrying about this structure are many many workers doing whatever. This is all done without benefit of guard rails, hard hats, hard toed boots or safety harness. Wouldn’t WCB (workers compensation board) have a heyday. They couldn’t write out fines fast enough. With the scaffolding, I have heard that the workers prefer the bamboo as you can hear it give away prior to it actually collapsing. I did actually see bamboo scaffolding going right to the top of a 15 story building in Hong Kong. I am a little uncertain that I could scramble my way to safety if it started to crack and snap. Then again, if I was on it, it would be entitled to crack and snap.

Bonnie has now reduced her time for general shopping, (such restraint and intestinal fortitude) and started to hang out around the numerous knock-off art galleries. Not Rembrandt, mind you, but some good contemporaries and some abstracts. In some cases, we should have stuck with the elephant paintings in Chiang Mai. At least you could tell what it was that the elephants were painting. The really amazing thing is that they were painting with their noses. Mind you, if you noticed how cumbersome the limbs of an elephant are, and that fingers are pretty much non-existent, it is probably easier to hold that itty-bitty brush with your nose. Did manage to get some artwork that we enjoyed, and that will also remind us of our time here.

Nuff for now — yet still more to follow
T

Krabi, a place, not a disposition

Up before breakfast and off to Phuket town. Going to catch the local ferry to Phi Phi island, then another ferry to Koh Lanta. Now Koh Lanta is pretty laid back for the most part. Sort of a back-packers paradise if you are of this generation, or a hippie hide-a-way if you were never able to let go of the sixties. Both groups are there. This would rather narrow the potential accommodation somewhat, — unless you have Chad’s Angela as your booking agent. She managed to get us rooms at the Lantham Resort, and what rooms they were. Whole resort is built on the side of a mountain so the views are spectacular, but one has to get up and down from these rooms. The getting down part is quite easy as gravity tends to assist, but the up part is a little more trying. Now for those folks not in the peak physical condition of our hardy little group, the resort would move you in both directions in their own little tuk-tuks, but for those of us in top form, a vertical stroll was in the offing. When the sound of me gasping for air got too noisy, I would casually grab hold of something and gaze over the landscape as if enjoying the view. This bluff may have worked, other than I did the same performance at night when you couldn’t see a thing. I’m certain that it was the sheer magnitude of the undertaking and not my physical condition that required this procedure. Laid back and relaxed for a few days, well except for Bonnie, who would awaken to some church group, who would sing at all weird hours of the day. Actually was a mosque, and they were calling the faithful to prayer. I guess Bonnie missed out, and she never did get a burkah. Off by car to Krabi.

Another ferry crossing and a highway jaunt would take us to a Sheraton Resort outside of Krabi. Another Angela arrangement. Good work Angie!! Two thumbs up on the fancy digs. I may start traveling with you, and leave Granny to baby sit. On our road trip portion of our travel, we stopped so that I could admire a rather impressive snake skin. I had serious thoughts of packing it into my suitcase, or better yet, Bonnie’s, and bringing it home, but the snake was still using it and seemed cranky enough as it was. Could be how they named the area Krabi. At any rate, he seemed particularly put out that traffic would not let him cross the road. That or the fact that he had no legs and had to spend his entire life dragging his belly in the dirt. I’ve only been doing that for a few years and it ticks me off at times. It turns out that it was a King Cobra, about 15 feet long. The best I could do was take his picture, but even then I couldn’t get him to smile.

Great rooms, swimming pools, pool bars and restaurants — what a regimented life we lead. Interrupted our busy schedule to take a “long-tail” to Railay beach. Really laid back there but quite scenic. Some of the wildest rock formations we have encountered. Great, vertical snaggle-toothed limestone rock formations forming sort of mountains on the land, and islands in the surrounding water. It is like everything in between was made of soft material and over time, washed away. A very popular spot for rock climbers, and I lived vicariously through their efforts. I do much the same thing with bungy jumping.

Can’t believe that these past 10 days have disappeared so quickly, but here it is time for Troy and Chad to head back. We had truly a wonderful, memorable time, and it seems like they just arrived. Can’t say enough good things about their wives and families as well, to have encouraged them join us here. It is all something that we soon won’t forget.Troy and Chad will catch a plane to Bangkok, and we will catch one to Koh Samui. That will be another story. Take care to all.

T

Vacation Recipe

Recipe for a perfect vacation. Take almost constant sunshine, miles of white sand beaches, clear water and friendly people — now add to that mix some family to share with and it just doesn’t get much better than this. It seems as though the boys just arrived and now it is nearly time for them to leave. We did have a lot of fun.

The boys arrived at Karon beach about 12:45 in the dark of night. Now the beauty of having company is that it gives Bonnie a reason to plan things to death, followed immediately by a reason to worry yourself sick that the planning was less than perfect and everyone wouldn’t be totally thrilled. Such was the case with the rooms we had arranged for in Karon, and we ended up changing in mid stream. That, in itself, would not be much of a problem other than this middle of the night arrival. As the boys had already left Seattle by the time we made this change, we had no way of letting them know, and having them bashing on the door of a place where we were not guests seemed in poor form. We elected to stand on the street and wait. Now this was the night of a downpour and although it was prior to our sojourn, had little effect on us, it did curtail the street activity earlier than usual. All is well that ends well and indeed we did meet the lads and were able to lead them to their new digs.

It really is a small world. Took a scoot up to Bang Tao beach area to see a longtime family friend. Kevin Haglof was just wrapping up a business tour, and we got to spend an afternoon with him. He and Troy have been close since school days in good old Dawson Creek. In fact, both families have been pretty tight so it was really great to have this time. Kevin and his family now live in California and we got to hear about his growing family as well. Got to reminisce over a few “wobbly pops”, and time just flew. Imagine, you have to travel half way around the world for that moment in time when paths will cross with the past. Too weird.

Took the night tour into Patong under the guise of a change in dinner menu. Does seem to have the market on night activity in the beach area. They close off some of the streets to traffic and it becomes a sort of a giant mall. You can buy copies of almost any brand name item you might fancy, and some of it might even hold together long enough to get it home, but the beauty is you can haggle to your hearts content. Serious haggling must be very thirsty work, as along with all these stores nearly every second place is a watering hole of some sort. Now one would think that this sort of night activity would mostly involve the younger set, but no, there were numerous old gaffers with their young lady guides. In fact, there were spare guides lined up in the streets (mostly in front of the aforementioned watering holes). It seemed that there were so many of these good Samaritan ladies, prepared to look after the old and infirm, that there weren’t sufficient young ladies left to participate in some type of dance review. However, the show must go on and they managed to fill the spots with young fellows dressed like girlies. Uncertain as to how much of this wild night life we wished to expose our children to, we taxied back to the quiet of Karon.

Off to Phuket town for some much needed shopping. Bonnie suffers too severely from withdrawal pains if she is deprived for too many days. She managed to find a silk bed cover she had been looking for all over Thailand. Now when we were in Chiang Mai, we went through a facility that told us all about the manufacture of silk. How the silkworms are raised until the cocoons are formed. The cocoons are then boiled and unwound and the approximately 5 kilometers of ultra fine silk is separated. This is then spun into usable thread, dyed, and woven into cloth. Truly amazing, but the part that really puzzles me is, how did this all start? Picture this — “Hey dude, look at all these cocoons man. I bet if we could cook these little critters, they’d make a great snack.” “Well gnarly, just toss some in this boiling water, dude. I was just about to make some organic tea” “Hey man, just look, if I grab this itty bitty string, I can unwind this sleeping bag like a spool of thread.” “Outta sight dude — hey take a hit of this man, look at all that colour. You know, if we dyed this string these rainbow colours we could make some brilliant pantaloons for the fat man at the temple.” Maybe not exactly like that, but I ask you — who has enough time on their hands to find the starting end of a cocoon?

The ferry ride is next, but that is another day.
TTFN (ta-ta for now)
T

More Travel

I know, I know, I have been very remiss in updating my blog and I apologize to those of you who have been sitting on the edge of your seat, with bated breath, awaiting the next thrilling episode of “old people traveling in Thailand”. I know that those nasty butt welts, caused by the edge of a chair, can be very aggravating. I would like to place all the blame on sketchy internet, but in truth, lethargy might enter into the picture.

At any rate, we left Khao Lak by car and traveled to Phuket airport. About an hours drive and 600 bht.(about $20.) Traveled through some major rubber plantations. Now when artificial rubber was developed about the time of WW ll, a high percentage of raw rubber was used in the manufacture of surgical gloves. One would have to wonder where all those proctologists might be working — but then, just think of all the politicians we have, just awaiting their service.

Traveled from Phuket to Bangkok in a 737, about an hour, for $100. US. Does not remind me of my travels to Dawson Creek in I think maybe a DC-3, via, I believe, Great Vulture Airlines, for about $800.US. Oh well.

Actually had quite a good time in Bangkok, did a lot of the touristy things and one of us managed to have our hair properly pouffed. The other of us doesn’t have enough hair to worry about. Took a tour to the Grand Palace and Wat Phra Kaew temple. Established in the 1780’s the palace is mostly ceremonial, but the temple is still active. Now it would seem that the monks have an aversion to hairy white legs, and as I fell into this category I was loaned a pair of brilliant colored pantaloons. It would seem that they take no offense to a good sense of humor, as I looked just like Bozo the clown. There was, of course, no one who enjoyed this more than Bonnie, and she was quick to point out that the rest of our tour group were also enjoying this situation. In their defense, they, at least, didn’t point their fingers and laugh out loud. At this point I would like to confirm that there is indeed a God, for on the following day we took a tour of another palace and yet another temple. On this occasion they not only took offense of the hairy white legs, but also did not care for exposed, fleshy shoulders and yes, they made Bonnie wear a table cloth and a brilliant yellow shirt. At this point she could have had a choice of continuing with the tour, or becoming a street vendor. She chose the tour, which may or may not have been the best choice. After looking in the royal digs and noticing the elevated temperature with the layered clothing, Bonnie took it upon herself to expose not only her legs, but her shoulders, for a walk about the grounds. She was soon set upon by the clothes nazi, who spotted her from a distance and soon overtook her on his bicycle. He stayed right there while Bonnie covered up the offending flesh. The bright red face which I displayed, was no indication of a pending cardiac situation, but was, in fact, the result of my trying desperately to stifle raucous laughter. Remember that not poking the bear bit? Of the 40,000 temples in Thailand, I suspect that we have seen most of them, so that when we head south I suspect that we will go to a mosque. Wait until they try to dress Bonnie in a burkha.

Also took a river trip in Bangkok on the Mae Nam Chao Praya river. You can say it in Thai. It sounds a great deal like clearing your throat several times. This is the largest river in Thailand, and is inter-connected with numerous canals or klongs. This accounted for Bangkok being known as the Venice of the east. Now this boat trip was aboard a long-tail boat. This is a rather long, but narrow vessel, capable or carrying probably twenty people. At the blunt end of the boat is a rather rickety frame to which is attached a used engine from a 1976 datsun pickup. On the transmission is a bloody long shaft with a two bladed propeller. On the fan end of the engine is another long shaft which a skinny little Thai helmsman swings on. It is his function to pivot this entire contraption from side to side in an effort to control the direction of said vessel. Either that or he is desperately hanging on to prevent being dumped into the klong, which can become somewhat odoriferous in spots. Did I mention that we also got to go to the day market, the night market, the weekend market and several large malls. It just doesn’t get much better than that.

Back to Phuket Island on the 737. Cost only $50. US on the return trip. Downhill I guess. Time to prepare for the much anticipated arrival of Troy and Chad, but that is another story, and another day.
T