02.03.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 9:53 pm by admin
Outside one of the 300 temples in Chiang Mai. (There are 121 within the municipality limits).
Chiang Mia is located in northern Thailand. It is considered the northern capitol. It really is so beautiful and is known as the ancient city with mystical legends. It is surrounded by mountains, a moat and very old wall. In reality, Chiang Mai has a rich history as well as an up and coming modern side. We found the city to be small and quiet, but could see that boutique hotels, shopping, and restos are making their way in.
We stayed at the Montri Hotel, right across from one of the old wall gates and right inside the walled city. There are parts of Chiang Mai outside of the wall, but the sides really just seem to blend together, aside from the moat separating it. The wall is still visible, but obviously worn and destroyed with time.
Part of the moat that surrounds the city. There are many breaks in the moat where cars and people are able to cross.
A portion of the old wall. So beautiful. Remains are still surrounding the city.
On a walk through the city.
Here we are at the Sunday Market. This is not just any market. It was HUGE and people come from ALL over to witness this! They literally cover the city with arts, crafts, clothing, music, food, pet items, flowers, shoes, jewelry, bags, etc... I could go on and on. The beginning of it started right outside our hotel. We walked and walked for hours and still did not see all of it. It begins at 4pm and stays out until 10 or 11pm. We could watch the excitement from our room! While we were out walking we could not resist the CORN and STRAWBERRIES! Our absolute favorites!
Ryan was watching this man intently as he was preparing our corn, butter, and salt! : )
The view of the Sunday Market at night from our hotel room.
We went out one night with friends (Liz from Brent, her brother, sister and their friend Jerry). They met us up in Chiang Mai and we hung out a bit. We stopped by this outdoor pub area and this cute little Thai boy was selling roses. Of course I had Ryan buy me a couple. Then I forced the kid to take pics with me! : )
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02.02.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 4:33 pm by admin
Happy New Year from Bangkok! In this picture we are standing on a walking overpass decorated with tons of lights that say "Happy New Year." We were on our way to the Central World Plaza near the Pratunam District. They closed off the streets for the evening and tons of vendors were out selling great food and drinks. We could hardly move, there were so many people out!
Our Bangkok New Years was pretty fun. We arrived in Bangkok on the 30th, so we had a day to recover from our lazy beach days. We toured the city, took some tuk tuk rides (just like trikes in the Phils), ate a lot, and walked through the crazy shopping alleys. We didn’t go inside any of the Wats because we had done that earlier last year and didn’t need to do it again (and we didn’t want to pack our day… we just wanted to walk around and hang out). At night we had a taxi driver drop us off at a popular street that we hadn’t been to yet. VERY INTERESTING. Thailand’s nightlife is very sex driven. It is a little odd that it is so ‘normal’ in Thailand to pass out explicit flyers and for adults and even kids to walk up to you asking/telling you about their clubs, their ladies, and their shows. The clubs are all mixed amongst the outdoor shopping areas and food vendors. We walked through the maze of shopping stalls (with everything you can think of from True Religion jeans, to Coach purses, to local crafts, to designer belts) and decided we weren’t going to buy anything (because we can get the same things in the Philippines) and there was no place in that maze that we would feel comfortable eating at. We made the choice to try and find the river! We figured it couldn’t be too hard. We knew the general direction, so we just started walking (it was dark out) down the street and figured we would find it. Well, the walk was quite scary. There were no street lights, we passed by old buildings with random people hanging on the corners, and old shop keepers closing their stores. We had no idea where we were and we were hungry - not a good combination if you know either of us when we’re hungry! We bought a street map - which didn’t help because it was in Thai and it was the entire country - not just Bangkok. Haha. We managed to find an alley that led us to a super nice hotel on the river, but there was no access to any restaraunts or a good walk way. All that was there was a REALLY nice restaraunt (not our style) at the hotel and a small pier serving beer that waited for the river taxi. Needless to say, we turned around and got a taxi (because he was willing to put his meter on, most taxi drivers in Bangkok will tell you it is broken, don’t fall for that, they are just scamming!). We went back to the road we were on previously, Siam, and ate at a GREAT Irish Pub called O’Reilly’s. We had salmon, salad, and chicken. YUM. While we were eating a Thai Beatles cover band started playing! They were great but I totally expected them to have bad accents. But the music was great. We were definitely the youngest people in there, jamming to the Beatles with a bunch of older Euros and this Thai band!
On New Years Eve, we had a lazy morning where we walked around the city - exploring different streets and trying to figure out the city. We had massages in the morning!
Before the massage they wash our feet. Ryan loved it!
They took us upstairs to a room filled with mattresses. Each mattress was for 1 person and could be separated from the others with a curtain. The lights were really low and we changed into these really baggy but very comfy outfits. We could see each other during the massage and it was hard not to make funny faces at each other. I tried hard not to laugh as I was watching a tiny Thai lady completely manipulating Ryan’s unflexible body into really crazy positions. Massages in Asia are no joke - they REALLY stretch you out!
At night we met up with Liz, her brother, her sister and their friend Jerry. It was a lot of fun and we spent most of the night waiting outside with thousands of people for the countdown. There was music, people, food, drinks, and fireworks - the whole works.
Our group of new friends we met while waiting for the countdown standing outside a Starbucks right across from the central COUNTDOWN
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Posted in Uncategorized at 4:31 pm by admin
Bye Bye Beach!
We really had such a great time on Samui. Bophut and Chaweng beaches were amazing and perfect locations to experience different parts of the island! We lucked out with the resorts, rooms, and included breakfasts. We would go back to Samui in a heartbeat! And we recommend the island to anyone doing a beach vacation to Thailand! We just wish it didn’t cost us 100USD to leave our Philippines airport each time. Grr. The only thing holding us back from more long weekends in other countries is that we have to pay each time we leave the country (weird, I know). It adds up to 100USD so it is not really worth it to add 100 to a short trip anyway. When we leave the country, from now on, we decided that it will be during our Christmas breaks or Spring Break so that we can sort of country-hop and get the most out of that 100USD charge to leave! : )
Good-bye Samui … we’re off to Bangkok to celebrate New Years with Liz (from Brent) and her brother, sister, and family friend.
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01.25.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 2:15 am by admin
We had a lot of beach days, but we also spent some time riding around the island and checking out the other beaches. The island is basically one big beach, around every turn there is another beach of some kind. One day we rode for a couple hours - we were in search of the Mummified Monk and also some waterfalls.
It was really weird. They have this monk in a glass shrine inside a temple. You can even see the hairs on his head. He died like this over 20 years ago (in a meditation position).
I will just post some more pictures of the drive… when we were searching for the Mummified Monk we accidentally traveled about an hour farther than we had intended! Oops! We found ourselves at a random beach and WAY past where we were supposed to be! We weren’t laughing at the time because our rear ends were so sore from the bike!!
At this point, we had stopped at what we THOUGHT was the Mummified Monk. We stopped outside a Wat, no one was there, so we turned around. Once we got back to the main road we saw a tourist map and we finally figured out that we were WAY off! Time to retrace our steps!
A small portion of a tourist map on the side of the road. We were supposed to be on one of those white lines on the right side. We were past that, all the way on the left side of the map at a small, small undiscovered beach. Too bad we didn't bring our suits along!
The small beach we found.
Outside a wat that we THOUGHT was the Mummified Monk. We were too scared to go inside since it was deserted! Later we found out it was not our tourist destination. Haha. So much for our good directional skills.
We found a really cool rocky look-out area. So we climbed as far as we could to the edge and propped our camera up for a self timer picture! I was a little nervous about being close to the edge. But we ended up just fine! The view was gorgeous and we could see off to the left all the way to our beach, Chaweng!
At the end of our 'ride' - a long day full of exploring the southwest part of Koh Samui. We never got to the waterfalls because we refused to pay a guy to be our 'guide' - we knew he wasn't a real guide and was just trying to take our money, so we drove off. We can see waterfalls elsewhere. Koh Samui is so great - from the beach or from the inland drives. We love it here!
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01.14.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 12:47 am by admin
We are NOT tech people… as you’ve probably observed with our lack of a ‘cool’ blog. It is basic and that’s just about all we know how to do. But now I’ve got “Big Buddha” floating in weird places when I look at the blog entries. I am not sure how to fix it… so I apologize. It may never correct itself because goodness knows, I have no idea how to do it! : )
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01.13.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:54 pm by admin
We knew we’d be on Koh Samui for a week and we thought we’d get bored staying on one beach. So we planned for a split stay on the island with a couple days (including Christmas) at a quiet beach (Bophut), and then a couple days at a more lively beach (Chaweng). It worked out great!
Samui is small and the whole island is like one big beach (well, around the outer rim anyway!). The island has a bunch of mountains in the center and the whole outer rim is a bunch of beaches. We had so many beaches to choose from, it was amazing! We would drive and drive (on our motorbike for the week) and check out so many cool places!
Chaweng is the most popular beach because of the size and all of the shops and restaurants. We stayed at the First Bungalow Resort. It is one of the first on Chaweng Beach. It is situated right at the corner of where 2 beaches meet (Chaweng and Chaweng Noi). It was pretty cool!
Our hotel was at the edge of two beaches. This was the view to the left (This is the very beginning of Chaweng Beach).This is Chaweng Noi (where we laid in the sun and played in the waves most of the time). On the left of those rocks, past the little make-shift bar, is Chaweng Beach. To the right of this picture is the rest of Chaweng Noi.
An almost-sunset shot of the rest of Chaweng Noi. We sat outside until the sun went down behind the mountains.
Pretending that I like the darn bike.
The road lined with shops selling overrun items and trinkets.
- Ryan bought the yellow floaty for me from the store near our hotel on Bophut. This was my first time using it! So fun! Now I could go out deep and Ryan wouldn’t have to hold me on his back!
His first 'shave' of the trip.
Lots of fun being beach bums for a couple weeks!
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Posted in Uncategorized at 1:09 am by admin
Hellllllooooooooo Buddha!
One of the touristy things to do on Koh Samui is visit the Big Buddha. There is a little inlet that leads out to a small area that hosts a large, large golden Buddha. You can see it for kilometers away and it stands nearly 12 meters tall!
When you walk up to the top of the structure, you can see forever!
At the bottom of the temple are various shops and vendors serving yummy Thai food. : )
It was a fun little outing. Ryan just needed a little adventure. He was just happy I let him drive the motorbike around. : )
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01.12.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 6:34 pm by admin
‘Cat People’? Have we really become ‘Cat People’???
Since the beginning, Ryan and my allegiance has been to dogs. We fantasize about the day we can buy a lot of property and let our dogs run wild. We’ve talked about dogs since before we were married and to this day we negotiate how many dogs we’ll have and if we’ll love our dogs more than our kids. (Joking).
But truth be told, we are just plain out animal people. We love animals and there are a plethora of stray kittens here. The odds were against us from the start.
After bringing home 4 kittens last year, (the 2 -Bruin and Gus- I snuck home while Ryan was at baseball and the other 2 -Rooney and Harley- I rescued from someone’s ceiling/roof while Ryan was at school), I am really surprised we haven’t ended up with more kittens this year… they just aren’t popping up like they did last year! We are down to 1 kitty (Gus) after the adoption of Rooney and Harley and Bruin’s disappearance.
We laugh at ourselves constantly because we’ve always joked about people whose lives begin and end with their pets. We weren’t even sure we’d ever really ‘like’ Gus because she was such a brat when she was younger and we never thought she would be a real pet. But now that we are a world away from friends and family - Gus is all we have and we have found ourselves beginning and ending our days with her!
The day she learned to get out of the bathroom window.
While we were gone over the summer Gus and Bing (our maid) did a lot of bonding. When we arrived back in the Philippines, Gus definitely let us know she was not happy we were gone but she also immediately became more cuddly and started sleeping with us more often. Now that we left her over break, we noticed she has developed a strong sense of ownership over us. Haha. She never leaves our sides and she can’t stand it when one of us is upstairs and the other is downstairs - she just can’t decide who to go lay with. At night, she sleeps in an amongst the pillows between mine and Ryan’s heads.
Lately, she has been sleeping through the entire night and will wake up with us in the morning. (If she wakes in the middle of the night, Ryan puts her in the hallway because he does not like his sleep messed with). If she is in the bedroom while one of us is showering, she insists on sitting on the edge of the bathtub and licking us as we get out. I promise, really, we do give her fresh water in a proper kitty bowl!
She is constantly 'needing' to be on our laps whenever we are on the computer. The little ham.
We are really learning to love this little Gus of ours.
But we’re NOT ‘cat people’
: )
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01.09.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 8:24 am by admin
“Everything we know about Christmas, we learned from Jesus”
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Our Christmas Eve tradition is to go out and buy random gifts for each other. Last year we were in Sydney so we split ways and came back to the hotel later that night with a couple small gifts for each other. It was a little harder in Samui because there isn’t exactly a big city or shopping malls! But we did our best. We hopped in a taxi (after trying to do the walk ourselves and finding it WAY too hot to be walking along a dirt road) to a shopping center. We did one walk through together, then split ways for one hour. I had an idea of what to get Ryan prior to getting to the store. I was worried about Ryan because I am SUPER hard to buy for and I knew he would be lacking in options (considering the shopping center we were at).
We came home with our packages wrapped for each other and Ryan made me a Christmas Tree with lights and everything!!! Our little tradition is perfect for us, because we really don’t believe in tons of gifts at Christmas and we love the idea of leaving behind a world of materialism and just ‘being together’ at Christmas. It is very powerful and meaningful for us.
Our Christmas Tree made out of a floor lamp. And those 2 white balls of fluff are actually toilet paper wrapped gifts! (Sunglasses that I bought for both me and Ryan but didn't have anything to wrap them with!)
Our Christmas photo by our tree and our gifts. The only thing missing is our little Gus (kitty). I begged Ryan to open his gift before we went to the Christmas Eve party (I hate waiting for him to open gifts). He was reluctant, but finally gave in!
Shaking it to see if he can hear anything. Ha. You can't tell, but my wrapping is horrendous. There was a long line so I asked if I could just pay for the wrapping paper but do it myself. The girls were very confused but let me step in and do my thang! Haha. Wish I had a picture of the scene I made! : )
His first pair of grown up flip flops! Hahaha. I found them at the supermarket for less than 5 dollars. The hardest part was finding his size, which I am amazed that I was able to do. First of all, they are in numbers like 39, 40, 41, etc. I know he is a solid 11 in the states. Yikes. I also know that Asian men have smaller feet than Ryan (it's a height thing). So I picked the biggest pair I could find. Then I proceeded to try them on, measure with my hands, compare it to the feet of men walking past me... Haha. I was a screwball. But even if they didn't fit - the worst thing that could happen is that we donate them to someone and go buy a new pair somewhere else. I was just really set on them because I knew what he would be wearing to the party and he needed a pair of flips to wear! After we did the shopping we met at KFC (for a classic lunch of crispy chicken and mashed potatoes!). I told Ryan to close his eyes for 2 minutes without opening. He trusted me, and I got down on all fours and tried to measure his feet with my wallet (the flips I bought were 2 wallet sizes) and I tried to see if I was close. According to my 'wallet' measurements of his feet and the flips I bought, I was confident that I had bought the right size. GO ME!
World Resort held a really fun Christmas Eve party with a big buffet and lots of entertainment and games. We had a ton of fun and met some really neat people during the party. It was awesome. We stepped out of our comfort zone and really made the most of the party - Ryan participated in a game onstage and we talked to several people who were living overseas. It was fun to go to a party not knowing anyone but each other and to just have an honest to goodness good time!
Our 1st picture with a Thai Santa! : ) We love diversity : )
Christmas Eve was wonderful. After the party we went up to the balcony and laid under the stars before falling asleep. It was pretty magical.
On Christmas Day we woke up late, ate breakfast (free buffet) and then hit the beach. Now THATS how you spend Christmas! : ) We had so much fun just hanging out. We opened presents before breakfast… Ryan got me a yellow floaty for the ocean and I got him those flip flops and a new pair of cheap sunglasses. We break and lose them constantly.
It was a perfect Christmas with the perfect life partner. We hope everyone had an amazing Christmas as well as quality TIME with family.
Love to all
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Posted in Uncategorized at 7:17 am by admin
Thailand… sweet, sweet Thailand. How we love Thailand.
We had a difficult time narrowing down our 3 week break… we had so many places on our list that we wanted to see. The problem, is that we could have made it to more places than we did, but it just wouldn’t have given those amazing places justice. We decided on the island of Koh Samui simply because we thought it would be ‘different.’ We have heard about Phuket and it is one of those ‘big name’ places like Bali (and we learned that names mean nothing). Koh Samui is on the east side of Thailand and Phuket is on the west. We figured Samui would be less touristy and one of those places that it would be awesome to visit because not many other people have or will ever go there. Well.. we were wrong! The whole island was full of white people! Haha. It is VERY well known to people who do a lot of travel over here (Aussies and Euros). We hardly ever hear a North American accent anywhere and it wasn’t any different on Samui.
We had to fly from Bali to Bangkok and then Bangkok to Koh Samui. The trick about getting to these islands is having to take a bunch of little flights.
The Samui airport is AMAZING! The nicest airport we have ever been to… Nicest for an open air, small island airport. Each of the lounges was like a traditional hut with cute wooden furniture. The bathrooms had big fish tanks and huge stalls! I couldn’t even believe it.
A lounge where you wait to board the plane!
We were super duper impressed by the airport when we arrived. We took a cheap airport shuttle to our 1st beach, Bophut. We decided to split our week in Samui into 2 parts. We wanted to be on a quiet beach for Christmas, then experience the more popular beach for the rest of the trip. We stayed at the World Resort on Bophut from the 23rd-26th. World Resort was really really cute and we would have been lucky to stay in any of the rooms they offer. Most of the rooms are cute little cottages in the garden. We opted for the beachfront room with a private balcony. (Sounds deluxe, but really - we found amazingly good room rates, we never pay very much for rooms. And compared to what they would cost in the states - the prices are CHEAP).
Our fun room. We loved this idea of having the big comfy couch a step down from the bed (what you can't see is the big flat screen that Ryan fell in love with!)
This is what we woke up to every morning! We had an amazing private balcony overlooking the beach and ocean. We had 2 nice lounges, a lily pad pond and a wooden shower tub! We had a private staircase leading down to a restaurant table for us and the beach!
This is the table below our balcony.
Washing off after a nice swim in the ocean! It was so neat!
We had a drying room, so we hung Ryan’s shirts to get all the wrinkles out! We travel with backpacks and EVERYTHING gets wrinkled.
Self timer picture from the balcony!
I was taking pictures of Ryan swimming. I was standing up on the balcony.
Bophut Beach: sunny, beautiful, relaxed, and well priced! : ) A perfect place for us!
As soon as we walked into our resort on Bophut, we knew we were in our little paradise. Actually… on second thought, we knew we would love Samui when we were driving up to the resort. We were on a regular Thai road, with great vendors on the side of the road, cute shopping and local dives. It looked perfect before we even got to our place! Haha. : ) Needless to say, we loved, loved, loved our week in Samui.
Our first couple days on Bophut were great and very relaxing. We had free breakfast at the hotel. AWESOME. And then we would lay out, read, and swim for the rest of the day. Perfect.
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