Koh Phangan

We apologize for the lack of updating and the posts will be a bit thinner from here on out. This is due to the recent break down of Nola's computer. It appears that from here on out we will have to use Hunters phone to blog, which severely limits our capabilities. 

Day 1

Snagging a tuk tuk on the dock, we cruised to our home on the island: pinks bungalow. We were set up not 30 feet from the water and had a spectacular view of Koh Phangan's sister island Koh Samui. Even better than that we had our own private room with a hammock swing on the front porch.

Not letting a moment go to waste, we trekked up to the main road and rented some scooters. The first stop on our adventure list was to cruise up to the northwest part of the island near a beach called Haad Salad. Being more on the quieter side of the island, we will lazed on a not very crowded beach that straddles two coves.

A beach next door to Haad Salad. The water is 86 F and pretty clear and shallow for hundreds of feet out. 

The big peak during a brief moment while it is not in the storm clouds. 

Hunter and Paul took to the water and began snorkeling. Nola layer on the beach and soaked up some sun, which we had all been looking foreword to for a while. Although the visibility wasn't spectacular for Hunter and Paul, they saw that about a dozen different species of fish were hidden among the numerous types of coral and plant life. Some highlights of these were a large and multi colored parrot fish, humongous sea clams, and an unknown type of fish which had a peculiar spotted pattern which camouflaged it seemingly well with the sand colored coral. A video of this is somewhere on the post but we can not see or move it with a phone. 

As the sun started to go down around 6 o'clock, we drove back along the shoreline into the main part of town. For dinner we caved and got burgers at the "best burger spot on the island". 

Finally back at the bungalow after a great first day in paradise, we realized the first draw back to our accommodations: it was unbearably hot and we only had one fan. With no screens and a deck as a floor we were hit by a few mosquitos that night as well. 

View from our bungalow. 

Day 2

Off to a great start we woke up early, kinda, and went out in search of breakfast. The first place we came across was closed and so we continue just five more places up the street before we found a hidden gem: Thai smile. More on that later but trust us it was good.

Realizing we need a little more umph in our transportation, Hunter and Paul stepped it up and traded in the scooters for some dirt bikes. It was Paul's first time riding a manual motorbike but the island has little traffic and some good roads to learn on.

As we ventured out further into the forest, it became apparent that the dirt bikes were a great idea considering that the barely paved roads turned into barely unimproved dirt roads. We were faced with 20% grade roads with huge 1 foot deep ruts lining the surfaceof it.

Hunter and Paul pause along a nice section of the trail. 

Doesn't ever seem it from pictures but this road was STEEP!

Not being phased however, we pushed on in search of our mission for that day: waterfalls. After not finding the first one we continued on up the highway towords the more northeast part of the island where the map said to be three waterfalls in close proximity.

We arrived at the first waterfall in no time and set out on foot about 200 feet down a dirt trail from the road. Although it hadn't rained that morning, we were still expecting more than a slow trickle across a few rocks. Needless to say our waterfall expectations were of something a little bit more granduer. The journey is always more fun than the destination though.

Hunter laughing at the "waterfall".

Ironically enough as we left from the waterfall Hunter experience motorbike issues. He got a flat tire in his front wheel in the middle of the jungle with no repair shop in sight. Paul zoomed ahead to the next town to go look for one while he followed at a snails pace along the highway. Not a short 40 minutes later, Paul saw Hunter creep around the bend where he waited at the repair shop. We think it took the man a fraction of the time to fix the wheel then it took us to actually get there. So much for experience.

Hunter, super pumped about his trek to the repair shop behind him. 

Although we went to the town for the wrong reasons, we stayed for the right ones. We cruised down to the beach, which turned out to be gorgeous, and also happen to have some teenage boys playing beach soccer. Opportunity struck us hard so we jumped in and ask them to play. We got our shorts handed to us in 3v2 but then played every man for himself and did alright.

Another great day down, we opted for pizza tonight and found a local italian place just down the street from the bungalow.  The heat wasn't as bad this night so we slept a little better and prepared for our next day on the island. 

The gang in hammocks. 

Burgers and the pizzas were our first non-rice meals in weeks. 

Two other things to note about the first two days are that Nola and Hunter had fallen into a routine of stomach problems that made the paradise island a bit less... optimal. Also, it rained 10-20 minutes very intensely about every hour. We started to think less about classic beach activities and more about what to do in the rain.  

Day 3

The third day Nola stayed home sick for the majority of the day while Hunter braved out with Paul to see what the party beach looked like during the day. The morning looked like more rain and we before we left for the day we got a great shot of the storm coming in. 

This may look like an evening thunderstorm but it's really that the cloud was so dark and dense that it blocked out most of the sun. When this storm hit, visibility dropped to less than 50 feet! 

After waiting out the worst of the rain we continued on to the party beach area, Haad Rin. The road is super windy and curvy and we really fun to ride on. 

Right around this turn there is a section of road that basically goes vertical. It was difficult to walk up. 

Once we got to the beach and explored around we found out that there was a beach soccer tournament getting set up and if we wanted to play we had to sign up right then. Hunter and Paul signed up and were placed on a team with a bunch of Italians, three of which were named Stephano. The first game was against FC Myanmar who had proper kits and had obviously done this tournament a few times before. We lost 3-2 but we played extremely well for not knowing what we were doing. The next few games of group play were fun because we crushed the rest of the teams we played. We went home that night content with our success and found a small friend waiting for us on our porch. The sunset that night was, alright. 

The beach soccer pitch, 5 a side including the goalie and three 5 minute periods of play. Still completely exhausting and tons of fun. 

Big lizard, the size of a forearm. 

Day 4

The next day it was very rainy as usual so Hunter and Nola, feeling a little better, went out and got Thai massages while Paul read his book.

Hard to tell but all the shrines here used Fanta in their offerings. We couldn't quite figure out what it meant. 

After the painful and thurough massage for Hunter and relaxing massage for Nola (same massage) we all headed out to checkout a slip n slide complex that launched you into a big pool. 

There is a video in here as well of Hunter charging in and trying it out. He survived well so Nola and Paul ended up giving it a go as well.

After the slip n fly adventure it was time to get back down to Haad Rin for the final stages of our beach soccer tournament. When we arrived we immediately got ready for our semi final game which we ended up playing a man down. We still won pretty handily and awaited the final. The other team that made the final was undefeated and the announcer was building them up as our rival as dozens and dozens of people surrounded the field. Little to our surprise FC Myanmar showed up as the other team. It was the perfect rematch story and when we were up 2-0 with just a few minutes left all was looking good but somehow they came back and won 3-2 again with two fluke goals. Hunter was upset about the loss, too upset if you ask me, and cooled off in the ocean during the medal ceremonies. The only picture, because of that, is of the medal later that night. Again there was a great sunset. 

Pre game bow for the semifinals.

Second place whoop whoop!!

Day 5

The fifth day was finally a little bit sunny so we layed out on a beach and took in as much sun as we could. Just a few hours later the clouds blotted out most of the sunlight and on our way home it rained hard, as usual. While at home and mentally preparing for the big Half Moon Party, Hunter's hammock from Cambodia broke and he thought he cracked his tail bone he landed so hard.

 

Catching the small amount of sun on Haad Chaloklum. 

Repaired hammock. 

After dinner and returning our vehicles, we got ready for the full moon party. When we arrived we were blown away by the amount of neon paint and the amount of people packed into the beach. There were water slides and flaming limbo and jump ropes, perfect for drunk people. Hunter tried the flaming jump rope and only lasted two jumps before the swingers sped up the rope and got Hunter right in the leg. The drink of choice at the party is a bucket of liquer and soda so decided that we had to try them out, a couple of times. 

Hunter and Paul trying out some buckets. Nola isn't 21 so she definitely didn't take advantage of the seemingly nonexistent drinking age here...

A group of wild yet responsible party goers. 

A sea of people, guesstimates at 5000+.

Some guy could do every level of the burning limbo. 

A side view of the party from up on the hillside bar. 

Hunter and Nola went home late in the night and grabbed some toasties from 7-11 before catching a few hours of sleep before we left in the morning. Paul stayed out all night with our friend Ash from Chiang Mai and met up with us in the morning for breakfast. 

The owner of Thai Smile put on the classic reggae soundtrack and opened an hour early for us. He was one of the nicest and happiest people we met on our trip so far and if anyone reading this ever goes to Koh Phangan they have to go there for breakfast and wifi.

Mr. Smile himself and his trusty cook and wife in the background. 

After a quick breakfast we jumped in our taxi and said good by to the paradise island as head headed towards Phuket. 

 

 

Wrapping Up Chiang Mai

After returning from the ENP we cleaned ourselves and ate meat to make up for our vegetarian lifestyle of the previous two days. After this we hung out for a little while in our hostel and it turns out there were a few other people doing the exact same thing we were doing. One of them was an interesting man from England who had been away in Australia as a semi professional basketball coach. So, on our last day in Chiang Mai we invited him, Ash, to join us on our day adventure.

We took our scooters that we had rented the night before and stopped off for a quick breakfast at a small cafe on one of the back alleys. After gulping down a great breakfast of eggs, ham, and bread, we revved up and skirted through traffic until we reached the outer limits of the city.

Similar to Boulder, Chiang Mai has hills and mountains that jet up almost immediately as the city ends. Our intentions were to go into the National Park and see whatever wonders the rainforest held, specifically waterfalls. The road up into the forest was quite the adventure as it was incredibly curvy and steep. The scooters were up to the task however and we raced up into the mountains.

Almost 30 minutes later of driving through small mountain villages, we reached an overlook on the back side of the mountains which afforded us an incredible view of what we had ridden up. The dark clouds looked somewhat like rain, however, so we didn't pause long before continuing on in search of a waterfall we thought would be at the top of the road.

Looking out into the Doi Suthep-Pui National Park.

After reaching the end of the road we were disappointed to only find a vacant campsite with a couple of Thai men and restoring the buildings there. We did find an excellent view back out over Chiang Mai however and stopped to take some photographs.

Looking down on Chiang Mai

After this we went on a short hike through the rainforest in attempts to reach the local peak of these mountains. Although we didn't reach the top we saw cool forest scenes and had a bizarre experience listening to the rain forest. The cicadas, or other similar bug, was almost deafening as we walked through the overhanging moss and vines. The crazy thing was that everyone of these bugs, which never actually saw, made their sound in perfect unison. Every thirty seconds a blaring noise would erupt from the trees and last for about 10 seconds. This happened almost the whole way up.

The crazy bugs.

Afternoon was fast approaching and we needed to return the motorbikes so we turned around from the hike and began to drive back down the steep winding roads. We knew for certain of a waterfall at the base of the mountains and decided to stop off for a quick peek. We walked up the path for about 200 feet before being graced with the sound of falling water. Almost sliding off the rocks (Paul), we approached the waterfall and sat down for a couple of group pictures before continuing on back into town.

Finally made it to a waterfall! Ash took a pose with us as an elder Thai man tried to operate a smart phone.

Around 5pm in Chiang Mai, the rush hour hits very hard so we fought traffic and attempted to return the scooters before our rental place closed. Thank goodness scooters can easily weave in between the deadlocked traffic. After about an hour of wiggling through cars and speeding off at green lights we finally made it back to our part of town.

Our dinner spot that night in the night Bazaar - they had just a few options.

Later that night it was time to return to Bangkok so we boarded a night bus and scrounged out what little sleep we could while being jostled around and awoken intermittently by the bus stopping to let passengers off. At one point in the middle of the night we stopped and several military personnel with guns boarded the bus and removed what seemed like a local without question. Soon afterwords we were on our way wondering what just happened. We made an agreement that we are definitely not doing another night bus in our lives if at all possible. 

After we arrived completely groggy and almost sleepless to Bangkok we rented a room for a day and showered and rested. We aren't huge fans of this city and Hunter was suffering in full swing from some sort of stomach bug so we stayed inside sleeping and writing all day and barely even went out for food. Feeling a little tired, and some of us still pretty sick, we got ready to take our night boat down to the beautiful island of Ko Phangan. The idea of finally being at the beach gave us the energy to stay positive regardless of our energy levels.

Nola can't wait to be bear the beach, Hunter can't wait to be near a bathroom.

In order to get down to the massive catamaran speed ferry that would take us to Koh Phangan we had to take a bus from the center of Bangkok to the shore. After the bus arrived over 1.5 hours late we climbed aboard. After some time passed, thoughts of the previous night bus started to creep in. unfortunately these thoughts were made into reality and we had broken our night bus pact only 12 hours after creating it. The bus took us down to the coast for 6 or 7 hours where we met the boat around 5 am. Then we waited for another hour and a half before getting on the boat as per typical Thai efficiency. After the 3 hour boat ride to our island we had finally made it and could relax.

Elephant Nature Park

**Keep posted for some cool videos coming soon. Will post when sufficient wifi is acquired.

Quick apology for what may seem like repetitive pictures, it's hard to capture and show how amazing these guys were up close and personal. We were picked up at 7 a.m. from our hostel in a commuter van where we met what would be our group for the two day trip. After a quick yet moving informative video of the Asian elephants and their history of how they were treated, we finally arrived at the Elephant Nature Park. I had been waiting my entire life for this moment, finally just to touch an elephant. We were guided to the platform where we left our bags and found buckets of bananas, watermelon, pumpkins, and cucumbers. Groups of elephants slowly grazed in, ready for their daily morning treat. We were told to hold our hands out from behind the red line about three feet away from the elephants, and they would stick their trunks through, wrap around the treat, and toss it into their mouths. The ends of their trunks feel solid, yet squishy as they wrap around your hand holding the food. 

Nola's look of pure joy after feeding her first elephant

After a good feeding session, we set off to see the different elephant groups. The entire park has 64 elephants, mostly females, with four babies. Along with the elephants, there were around 400 dogs and 200 cats roaming the property. Elephants mostly stay in packs of females, the nannies and mother, revolving around the baby of the group. 

This gal had a full head of hair

Going in for the kill

As seen below, these were our first actual encounters with the elephants. Sure of how powerful these big guys were, yet unsure of how close we could get, you can see we were hesitant at first to get too close.

Loving nanny and baby moment

Nola's foot inside an elephant's footprint

After getting more comfortable with the elephants, we were able to come up to them and stroke, pat, and hug their trunks and sides. Real live elephants don't feel quite the same as my collection of stuffed elephants at home, their skin is a little more rough, with coarse hair and dry wrinkles. Placing your hand on their side, you could feel their muscles flexing as they shift their weight, which was incredible to feel their strength. The trunk, though flexible and slightly squishy at the bottom, was super solid and strong up top.

We went on to walk around meeting different groups of elephants and learning more and more about elephants and the park. We watched the elephants as they gave themselves baths, and right afterwords completely covering themselves in mud and dirt again.

Elephant teeth. Elephants only have four teeth

Ele goin for the butt grab

After lunch, we continued to walk, meet the elephants, and learn new facts until we got down to the river to wash our young elephant. Lured with a basket of fruit, we scooped buckets of water and wet every inch of the elephant. Washing the younger elephant happened to be much easier than the elephant next to us, who was much too tall to reach the top of. This marked the end of day one's elephant activities, and we were left on our own to relax, see our bungalow, and meet some new doggy friends. 

This poor guy was paralyzed waist down, yet
still managed scratch himself and keep smiling.

Dinner was served at six, buffet style, with many different vegetarian Thai stir fries and curries. As an animal sanctuary, the meat was fake, yet still delicious. For dessert there was an array of different brightly colored jello looking substances. To our surprise, they ended up being more like a chewy and very sweet taffy. We conversed with our group members from New Zealand, along with our dog friend who relaxed on the table throughout dinner, without begging for food once. He stayed there the whole night, and probably through the morning as well. After dinner, the overnight guests were shown a video about the mistreatment of elephants and the owner of the Elephant Nature Park. Her efforts have been tremendous in helping save the elephants and getting them back to where they belong. Despite how horrific the film was, it was inspiring to learn about the proper treatment of the elephants.

After a long and exciting day, we were ready to dream about elephants. The next day we had breakfast at 7, followed by a jam packed day of elephants with our new guide, Sunshine. I would say the best two words to describe sunshine are passionate and cheeky. 

The elephant themed bungalow

The sunset over the river from our bungalow

Sunshine really knew his stuff growing up with elephants in his small village. We trekked to each of the elephant groups, and helped make sure their ears were flapping and tails swinging, a sign of happiness and health. We watched a group in the water with two year old "Doc Mai", a baby boy who had quite the playful side. This little guy was pretty troublesome as he refused to get out of the water.  In fact, Sunshine told us that he behaves a lot like a monkey and he needs a lot of nannies to keep him from getting into trouble. He approached us quickly once, thinking that we would play tag or have a pushing war with him.

This group of elephants had a big ball to play soccer with

We waded across the river with the group of dogs that had been following us the whole day, and arrived at an isolated area where three older elephants were taking in the sun. What was special about this group was one of the girls, who had a severely broken hip. As seen below, she could hardly stand right, and with every step her hip would sink and her leg looked like it was crumbling. This was a result of forced breeding and logging, which included horrible methods of training. A comment about putting down the pained elephants struck up a heated debate between Sunshine and another member of our group. It was amazing to hear how passionate he was about saving these animals and keeping them safe.

Interesting fact: these elephants are separated from the rest because
the leader of the group is highly protective of the injured one. They
worked in the logging industry together for a long time and then were
separated for over a decade. When the leader elephant met her friend
again at ENP and saw that she was injured she got very angry and protective.

We moved on after lunch to find two elephants higher up on a different property. After crossing a not so sturdy bridge, we climbed up to a spot where two elephants were alone looking for food. These elephants were taking their first steps into being able to survive on their own, which is a huge step for the Elephant Nature Park. 

Nola's second favorite bridge, only because we
didn't shake this one.

The day was complete after seeing different and special groups of elephants, and hearing about their stories of what they were rescued from. We watched as the water buffalo crossed the river and had a final goodbye with our group and guide. 

Sko Buffs

Nola- This experience was everything I could have ever hoped for. I learned so much more about elephants and that was really exciting and personal for me. It was a dream come true to just touch an elephant, let alone feed, bathe, and hug one. These guys are just so smart and delicate, despite their size, and deserve to be treated with respect. It's amazing to see the passion and dedication put into these animals here and I felt so lucky to be a part of that. I cannot wait to come back and hopefully volunteer for more time. Before you take a vacation to Asia, make sure you think twice about elephant trekking or shows. Check out savetheelephants.org to learn a little more about why these animals are so special and what is happening to them.

Hunter and Paul- Nola is obviously very passionate about her favorite animal but I can honestly say that I felt nothing for elephants more than the awe of their size at the zoo before visiting ENP. Elephants have been an important part of Thai culture and society for a long time. They have especially been used as labour animals because they are so strong. Putting in a hard days work and pulling heavy weight in the sun all day with a few small breaks is hardly the problem because humans do this sort of thing all the time and we make cattle do it all the time. The problem is how they train elephants to do these sorts of things. We watched a horrifying video that goes into the process in detail. They steal the elephants at a young age from their mothers and then poke them with sticks while they are stuck, immobile and unable to defend themselves. They poke them in the sensitive areas to inflict as much pain as possible to break the elephants spirit and attachment to its mother. Oh ya, the sticks have two inch nails stuck into the end of them. The whole idea is to make the baby elephant so terrorized and in so much pain that it gives up on life. This isn't a problem for most farm animals but elephants are different because they can feel. The fact that the two reunited elephants had an emotional connection once reuniting, elephants can grieve over a lost loved one for decades, and the horrible screams of the young elephant as they captured it and tortured it are testaments to that they can feel. Obviously this should be stopped right? Well there are no laws to treat elephants with any sort of civility currently because the government is faced with changing a thousand year old tradition of it's people. A similar thing is going on with bull fighting in Spain. The facts are such, current fear tactics and spirit breaking tactics are very cruel and have been used for thousands of years and are crucial to many minority groups survival. Positive mutual friendship tactics are just arising and are wildly successful, for some things much more so than the alternative. For me the choice is clear and I hope the Thai government agrees sooner rather than later. Lastly, as Nola said, the "training" for logging and farm work is the same training for elephant riding so please please please do not partake and keep the demand for breaking elephants as low as possible.