Wednesday, December 31, 2008

I hope that everyone is having a great time over the holidays! I enjoyed Christmas with my family in Alaska very much, although our white Christmas was a little bit difficult to enjoy due to the -20 degree weather. Jeremiah and I have decided to continue using our blog to document our travels, so soon I will be posting pictures of frosty Alaska, and, barring any bizarre accidents, in about a month I will be posting pictures of our time in Tahiti, New Zealand, and Australia!

For now though (as per request), here is an excerpt of an e-mail I wrote to my family about my snow/ice/wind delayed trip from Seattle to Fairbanks, Alaska about a week ago- I made it but it was definitely an experience I don't want to go through again anytime soon!

"I made it out! Barely! I did get out of Seattle at 4pm on the 21st. At that point I think we were the second to last plane to leave Seatac airport before they shut everything down, at around 2pm the announced that they only had enough de-icer to clean off 12 more planes, and somehow, my plane ended up being one of them.

It's a long story that spans me getting to the airport at 8pm on the 20th, my flight being delayed until 1am, then canceled at 2am, then standing in the longest line of all time until 4am, making a line buddy (we both had laptops and were standing in line typing with one hand reloading the alaska airlines booking page over and over in case seats opened up), my line buddy getting through to alaska airlines via phone at 4:30am (my buddy was on hold for 2 hours), getting seats on a plane scheduled to leave midnight on the 21st, getting out of line and finding our bags by 5am (well, actually I was the only one to actually find luggage), sleeping on a pile of my clothes under a stairwell (there were people everywhere, I felt bad for the families with small children and the dogs stuck in kennels), waking up at 7am and bluffing my way into the boarding pass only/check luggage line without a boarding pass of any kind and without even knowing my flight number ("it just wouldn't print!"), finally getting a nice lady who checked me in for my flight 18 hours ahead of schedule and gave me a standby pass for a flight leaving at 10am, getting onto the 10am flight when it actually boarded at 11am, getting off of the plane 2 hours later when it became clear that the de-icer people were not going to reach us for another 2 hours, being amused by the Santa riding around in a courtesy cart handing out candy canes and the elf on a unicycle, at 2pm finding out that the Seatac airport only had enough de-icer left to clear off 12 more planes and then the airport would be shut down because all the de-icer was stored in Eastern Washington and they couldn't get it across the pass (!!), finding out that our plane was going to be one of the 12 planes to be de-iced and getting ready to board at 3pm, being told that my ticket was revoked because they decided to pool all of the unaccompanied minors who were in the airport and flying to Alaska on our plane, so they gave away all the standby seats to them, leaving 9 more people stranded, deciding to wait at the gate just in case someone who previously boarded to plane somehow got lost and didn't make it back on, and FINALLY, getting on the plane at 3:30pm (thank god for holiday induced airport confusion). We were de-iced and in the air by 4pm, landed in Anchorage at 6:32, ran to the gate of the Fairbanks flight leaving at 6:43, got on the standby list, made it on the plane, took off at 6:50, and LANDED in Fairbanks and had my luggage by 8pm! Rounding out a full 24 hours in airports, and 2 days without sleep!"

Whew! I hope that everybody else is enjoying their holiday season and has a Happy New Year!!

Thursday, December 25, 2008

Home at last!

My flight home was much less eventful than Kat's but I'm back in Seattle and I'm freezing! I've completely lost my tolerance for cold so I'm pretty much constantly chilled here.

Merry Christmas to everyone!!!

I'll follow up with some more trip details and more photos soon. First I need to eat some pumpkin pie!

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Home Sweet Home!

Well, after several LONG plane flights I am back in Seattle! I am sad that my trip is over but I am getting excited about seeing my family again and moving to Australia! It's a bit of a shock being home again, and the weather here isn't helping!


In Thailand...

In Seattle, 24 hours later...

I SWEAR this happened on accident....



What's better than a mango smoothie? Two mango smoothies!

While we were on Ko Phanang Jer and I really planned on checking out different beaches, going for some dives, going to a different island, and in short, continuing our fast paced travel adventure. Instead, we looked a the ocean, took a deep breath, bought a frisbee and went nowhere. :) It ended up working out in our favor because Jer and I finally got food poisoning, in Thailand of all places. We expected to get sick in India (and we did a little bit) but Thailand is pretty safe for food so we were surprised. We got over it just fine, so don't worry, but I'm glad that we ended up staying in one place after all. I think that sitting on the beach doing nothing really speeded up our recovery.
Here are some long awaited picures from our time on the islands:
Diving in Koh Tao!

A rock formation in Ko Tao, this was one of our dive sites!
Pretty sunset!
The beaches were gorgeous in Ko Tao, perfect for lounging around!
Moving on to Ko Pangang...more beaches and lounging time!
Full Moon Party!
After Ko Phanang we headed back up to Bangkok via all day boat and bus, getting in late and having just enough time to enjoy all of Bangkok's wonderful street food!

Friday, December 19, 2008

Tiny Island, Big Paradise

I'm on a tiny island right now called Ko Mak near Ko Chang (Ko Chang is the more popular larger island). It's only a few kilometers across but it barely has anyone on it. I'm renting a tiny hut near the water. I had to ride my bike across the island to get to the only 'internet cafe' (if you can call it that). The electricity only comes on in the evenings so we can listen to music and then it's back to candles. In short, this place is amazing. The only activities are diving, drinking, and nothing (yes, nothing is an activity if you're actively trying to do nothing). Today I do nothing and tomorrow I go diving.

But this computer is slow so I'm going to be short! I'll update more later.

Sunday, December 14, 2008

The Full Moon

For the last few days Kat and I have been relaxing on Ko Pha Ngan. The beaches here are great and the food is awesome but the real reason we came here was for the full moon party. It's by far the largest party I've ever been to. I would guess maybe ten thousand people were packed onto a beach that was lined with DJ's and bucket vendors. We had a very, very good time! We drank buckets of gin and tonic and had our chests painted (we're in bathing suits around the clock here). Kat had a butterfly painted on her but I decided on a giant American flag. I don't meet very many American's here in SE Asia so I decided to show a presence! But with the flag on my chest I actually did meet another American - from Bellevue no less!

This is a little of subject but I have to post it: throughout our travels it's not uncommon to have a little ant problem in most places we stay. We're not exactly staying at the Hilton so it's not such a surprise as you would think! But Kat hates the ants. Bitterly. So one day in Krong Koh Kong she gets fed up and searches the town for a can of raid. She finds a can large enough to kill a termite mound and has been carrying it ever since. But the best part is how zealous she gets in killing ants. This is an actual quote I overhead her saying to herself when she didn't know I was there, "Die! Die! Die! I'm only happy when I'm killing ants!" Ever since I've been a little worried about her so if I go missing you'll know who to ask :)

We'll stay here on the island another couple of days before we head back to Bangkok so that Kat can fly home for x-mas. The end is too near!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Island Time

Kat and I are on yet another island! But this time it's in Thailand: Ko Tao. We took an open water course here so now we're certified to dive up to 18 meters! I always wanted to dive but I don't think I expected it to be so incredibly fun. Kat and I might actually change our plans a bit so that we can fit in some diving off the Similian Islands next.

Basically we are beach bums right now. The most difficult thing I did this afternoon was cut up a pineapple and a mango and open two bottles of Chang. But in my defense the knife was too small and dull so it was rather difficult :) Fresh pineapple warmed by the sun is about the best food that can be eaten. Well, second only to BBQed fish. But I've been eating plenty of both here so I'm happy.

But this internet is far too expensive here since it's an island so I'm cutting this entry short! Kat and I are both happy, tan, well fed, and salty right now. And it's movie time down the beach so I'm off!

Friday, December 5, 2008

Happy B-Day King Bhumibol!

Kat and I are back in Thailand and today is the King's birthday. The people have a great respect for their King so a lot of places are shut down today and there should be some celebrating tonight! It was actually a little tough to find an open internet place this morning. We're finally waiting for out ferry to Ko Tao, a nice little island in the gulf of Thailand that's well known for being laid-back and having great scuba diving. But we've had a marathon last few days getting here!

I think the last time we were able to update was back in Siem Reap. From there we took an early morning bus to Phnom Penh and then an hour later (after a nice lunch at the Capital Cafe) we set off again to Sihanoukville for the night. This meant a full day in the bus but we had a lot of ground to cover! Sihanoukville is a city the french built in the 1950's so that Cambodia could have it's own shipping port instead of relying on Vietnam. But now it's turned into a full-fledged beach town. We stayed in a nice little bungalow and had BBQ'd seafood right on the beach. I really mean right on the beach: big waves would nearly lick our toes! But we headed out the next day for Krong Koh Kong right on the border of Cambodia and Thailand. Krong Koh Kong is a small town and honestly not that memorable but it's a great jumping off point for either the Cardamom Mountains or a boat trip out to deserted island.

The Cardamoms don't have trails and the only access is by a few roads using dirt bikes so we opted instead for the island of Koh Kong. We hired a boat in town that took us to Beach No 3 (no kidding, it doesn't even have a real name) where there's a beautiful lagoon and a white sandy beach. Just down the beach were some rocks that provided great snorkeling. We spent the entire day lounging on the beach, snorkeling, and finding awesome seashells! It was really the kind of beach that I always dreamed about so for me it was a high point in our trip.

But we wanted to spend the remainder of our trip in the islands in the guld of Thailand. So we proceded on a marathon trip that isn't even over yet. From Krong Koh Kong we took a tuk-tuk to the Thailand border and walked across. On the other side we had to wait until a share-taxi had enought people to fill it to drive us to Trat. From there we took a bus into Bangkok's Eastern Terminal. From there we had to take the public buses to the Southern Bus Terminal. From there we took an overnight bus (it's 11pm by this point) and we arrived in Chumphon - although the bus screwed us by not dropping us off in town so we had to take a moto the remaining 10k into town. From here we're taking a ferry to Ko Tao where we can finally relax on the beach once again!

But Cambodia is done for us. I really really enjoyed Cambodia though. The people were very friendly there and always had a smile. Evening bargaining wasn't stressful because they were always smiling. I'd have to say that the food in Cambodia wasn't my favorite, but the fish amok and the lok lak were both very good. The amok is a curry dish with fish and vegetables that comes wrapped in banana leaves. The lok lak is a plate of cubed beef with a black pepper sauce, a fried egg, and of course rice. But the coffee is always good in Cambodia!

Alright, I have an island to get to!

Monday, December 1, 2008

Angkor! Angkor! Angkor!

It's been awhile since I actually posted something myself, so I thought I would give everyone an update of how Jer and I have been doing. First and foremost, Happy Thanksgiving!

The last time Jer wrote we were in Nha Trang, Vietnam. Since then we have been to Dalat, Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City, depending opn who you talk to), Phenom Phen and Siem Reap. Dalat is a mountain town in Southern Vietnam, and was originally built up by the French during the colonial period to be a relaxation spot. The city's weather is much cooler than the rest of Southern Vietnam and it was a nice break for us. Dalat's weather means that it can grow many different vegtables (ones more similar to what we usually eat) so the food there was a treat. They also produce a pretty okay wine and great coffee- including the famous "weasel coffee." Besides relaxation the main thing to do there is to take a ride with the Easy Riders, a group of older motorcyclists who took part in the Vietnam War. Most of these guys worked for the Southern side, so they had a difficult time finding work after the war was over, and when tourists started coming back to Vietnam they began giving people guided tours of the countryside. Since many of them worked with Americans during the war (my driver was actually sent to Colorado for training) they speak very good English and had some really interesting stories to tell. Jer's driver was in the Air Force during the was but mostly worked at the base and didn't see any fighting. After the war my driver was sent to a "re-education"camp for 3 years, a tough price to pay for his involvement in the fight. They took us everywhere and we were able to get an up close view of the coffee plantations, the rice wine making process, and the silk collection and weaving process. I wish I could put some pictures up but the connection is a little too slow.

From Dalat we went to Saigon, a huge bustling city in South Vietnam. The city was a little overwhelming at first but we got the hang of it and had a great time. We visited the Cu Chi Tunnels, an elaborate system of tunnels that the Viet Cong during the war. The tunnels are TINY, I could barely fit in them. I was dissapointed in the tour however, there was basically no effort to present an accurate view of the war, at the beginning of the tour they showed a video made in the 1960s about the tunnels that described the Americans as "devils who like to kill women and children." At the end of the tour there was a shooting range where you could try out an AK-47, but I thought it was very poor taste to put a shooting range over an area where soldiers of both sides fought and died, so we left as soon as we could. The highlight of Saigon, however, turned out to be the War Remnants Museum, which actually did paint a more unbaised view of the war. It has a special photography display for all of the photgraphers who lost their lives during the war, a section on Agent Orange, weaponry displays, and an area dedicated to peace. One of the more interesting things about Vietnam was that everyone we talked to wanted the past to be in the past, and wanted to move forward peacefully. We expected some level of individual animostity to Americans (and we truthfully told everyone who asked where we were from) but we never ran into anything at all. The government might say something different, but the Vietnam people have gotten past the war and are looking to the future.

After Saigon we took a bus across the Cambodian border and into Phenom Phen. Going into Cambodia was a little bit like going back to India, there was trash everywhere, unpaved streets, people living in very rustic bamboo huts suspended over fetid water, but there was one BIG difference: the Cambodian people are awesome. In India the people we met were often not so nice or at the most indifferent and just wanted money, but in Cambodia the people (while they still want your money) will also joke around with you and seem to enjoy life more. Phenom Phen is a big city and I was a little paranoid about being there after being warned about frequent high speed motorbike bag snatching (and one case where a girl was dragged into traffic and killed) but everything went smoothly. Jer and I stayed at a longtime backpacker guesthouse ($5- back to cheap accomodation, yay!) near the lake, simply because soon the lake will be replaced by a resort hotel. For some reason they are pumping sand into the lake, and plan to build a resort on top of it. How this makes sense I don't know, but they are going about it very energetically. It also means that all the houses nearby are beginning to flood, so Jer and I thought we should check it out before it all disappears. In Phenom Phen we visited S-21, the famous and horrible prison/death camp used by the Khamer Rouge. It's actually a high school building, so it looks stragely innocuous from the outside. Inside there are displays of photographs of victims and, in 14 rooms, the empty beds that held the last 14 prisoners, along with some of the devices used in torture. They were tortured to death right before the Vietnamese took back the city and their bodies left in the prison when the Khamer Rouge fled. It was very sad and really brought home the reality of genocide, the sheer number of people that died at the hands of the Khamer Rouge or subsequently starved to death is almost to vast to contemplate. To round out an already depressing day we visited the killing fields, where the prisoners of S-21 were taken to die. The site is mostly grass, which covers a hilly landscape made up of disinterred mass graves. There were pieces of clothing on the ground, which we didn't take much notice to, until we realized that the clothes blonged to victims. Sorry to sound so morbid but just thinking about it gives me the chills...

Anyway, after Phenom Phen we took a bus up to Siem Reap, where we have spent 3 days visiting the Angkor temples. There are many different temples and they are all very beautiful. We watched 2 sunsets and Jer got up for a sunrise viewing of Ankgor Wat. We will post pictures soon!! Jeremiah and I also spent Turkey Day in Siem Reap. We didn't have turkey or mashed potatoes, but we did have fresh veggie spring rolls, beef curry, and ginger chicken! The food was excellent and we ate in a place called the Butterfly Restaurant, the whole thing was enclosed in a giant net and there were butterflies, frogs, and jungle plants everywhere. We spent the evening with Tony and Kate, two people we met on a boat ride in Nha Trang, Vietnam and we luckily keep bumping into! All in all it was a great evening. :)