Day 17 - Dec 31 - 40 meter drop

Today we flew through the trees.
Today we crossed bridges and climbed ladders.
Today we wore bonnet things to go under our helmets.

The car was supposed to pick us up at 9:00, but we didn't start till 9:30. We had a pretty drive in the hills and around corners. Over the few weeks we have noticed that the cars honk while going around sharp corners to let other cars know they are coming. It's comforting to know that even though you come very close to cars head on, the drivers here are careful.

We have had several zip line experiences so this one had many things to live up to. It started out well with cute little bonnet things to go under the helmets, and easy harnesses, but there was a lot of waiting around. However, it wasn't that bad waiting. It was fun watching, and taking pictures, of our family zipping through the air!

We also got a pleasant surprise in that it was a little different experience because mixed in with the zip lines were little obstacle courses and sheer drops. We got to walk on bridges and platforms, beams, and logs, and we got to fall straight down off the platforms. Honestly the best part of the adventure was hearing people scream. Myra got first place in the screaming contest followed by Ani. Mia got last because the most of a scream she ever had was a little squeak. There were four drop-off stations we went down, and the last one was 40 meters tall, which is around 130 ft! It was very tall. Over all we had a good time, and it ended with a nature walk back, lunch, and a free t-shirt.

On the drive back to our hotel we stopped at the fresh market where our driver showed us around and we saw a bunch of strange things.

This resort is the best place to celebrate the last day of the year. We can see the flying lanterns go across the sky, there are two trees with glowing lanterns, and the river reflected normal lights into beautiful streaks across the water. For a grand finale our neighbors set off streamers, sparklers, and a Big Bang. It was a wonderful New Year's Eve that frankly reminded me of Independence Day.

Goodbye 2012!

Day 16 - Dec 30 - Compliments to the Chef

Today we were picked up at 9 for an all day cooking class. We were first taken to a market where a guide showed us some of the ingredients that are common in Thai cooking, such as 'Thai chocolate' -- shrimp paste (used in curry paste), eggplant (green curry), turmeric, kale, and others. Then we were driven to the cooking school, where we met Nancy, our teacher for the day.

The full day class had us making 6 dishes and curry paste (to make our own curry). We started with soup, of which we had 4 different choices, though everybody save one chose Coconut Soup. The process for making each dish was fairly similar: Nancy passed around a plate of one ingredient, we would take however many she told us, then she would tell us what to do with that ingredient; chop, slice, or in the case of garlic and chili peppers, smashing and dicing :) We got to adapt the recipes as we chose, I passed over mushrooms for one dish, we could add or subtract sugar and other flavors, and for each dish we chose the number of chilies that went in.

After the soup we made noodles (Pad Thai), then an appetizer (spring rolls, mango salad), a stir-fry (chicken with cashew nut), dessert (so it could cool as we cooked -- we made sticky mango rice and bananas in coconut milk), then curry paste, and finally curry.

After each dish we took a break from cooking to eat, so by the end we were so full. We did take away our leftovers, but everyone wanted to try each dish fresh, so we ate too much anyway :) Everyone had a great time and we also really enjoyed the company of our classmates: two lady friends (one from Australia, one from London) were enjoying a day away from families, and an international couple (the man from Australia and the lady from the Czech Republic, who were both living together in London). Both groups were interesting to talk with and there was never a dull or quiet moment.

Everyone loved the class and it was definitely one of my favorite parts of the trip. I have taken cooking class at home, but they were pretty pathetic. This was a really great experience and I hope to put it to good use when I get home!

We had expected that the end of the class would be the end of our day, but we learned that on Sunday there was a walking market in the Old City (we also learned that today was Sunday, which no one had been keeping track of).

So at 5 we hopped on the boat shuttle and cruised down the river into town. We found the market and got to work spending money. After about an hour and a half, some members of the party were quite ready to leave, so we tried to find our way out. Unfortunately, we chose the wrong direction. As the streets became more and more crowded, we got more and more stuck. It took us 2 hours to find our way out (though we continued to shop throughout) and when we finally caught a taxi back, everyone was tired and grumpy. But we made it back alive and the burden on our purses much lightened, so it was worth it in the end.

By the time we left, the market was insanely crowded. It was a struggle to force our way through the crowds to the exit. In addition to being the Sunday market, it appears it was combined with some sort of countdown festival for New Years. Large paper 'balloons' as they called them, were lit with a flame and launched into the sky to float off into the darkness. They were very pretty.

Day 15 - Dec 29 - Flappy Ears Mean Happy Elephant

Today was the long-awaited highly-anticipated day spent with elephants!

We were picked up at 7:30 in the morning and driven to the Patara Elephant Farm, about 40 minutes away from the city. Patara has about 31 elephants, and 7 of those are babies.
The owner met with us for about 10 minutes to explain a bit about their philosophy, then we were handed off to Wut(?) who introduced us to the elephants and explained the basic training. All 6 of us were matched with our own elephant, and we took a basket of food (at this season it was bananas and sugar cane) as a peace offering. You can't make friends with the elephants without food, as they said!

Mom was the first paired, and her elephant was Tirasu (named for the sound of falling water since he was born near a waterfall), an 8-year-old. Dad had to remember the name of Mae-Bun-San (bun-san means lucky, or good karma), a 31-year-old female; Mia was on the largest elephant, 38-year-old female, Mae-Ko-Pok (Mae means 'mother', ko-pok is sunflower); Ari got 27-year-old Mae-Tom-Kum (gold) and her baby Fern followed along; Ani was on the tiniest elephant, the other male, about 27 years old, Top-Tun (also meaning gold?); Myra was on Mae-Meung (going up? positive?). And since they are Thai elephants, we learned the commands in Thai!

Say 'buhn' to get the elephant to lift its trunk, which opens its mouth, then deposit food in mouth. Feel soft slimy tongue :). Give positive reinforcement by saying dii-di-di. Repeat!

Then we learned how to check the health of our elephants.
1. Are her ears flapping and her tail wagging? Yes? She is happy.
2. Elephants sleep on the ground -- unless they are sick. Then they know they couldn't get back up if they go down, so they sleep standing up. Elephants sleep about 6 hours a night, but only 45 minutes in each position. So when they wake up, they should have dirt on both sides. If they do, they slept on the ground, and are doing well.
3. Elephants sweat in one place only: between their toes. If they are sweating, good.
4. Elephants have no tear ducts, so they are always 'crying'. If their tear paths are the same length from both eyes, good. Otherwise it might indicate an eye infection.
5. You can tell a lot about an animal from its dung. From an elephant's droppings, we were taught to observe (and check for ourselves!):
5a: There are at least 3 piles of poop. Elephants digest in about 2 hours, and should eat enough for that.
5b: The poop has moisture. This means the elephants is not dehydrated.
5c: There is no strong smell. It should smell like grass (except baby poop). If it smells it means the food took longer to get through the digestion and there may be a problem.
5d: The fibers in the poop are small. Big fibers mean the elephant didn't chew properly, and may have a problem with her teeth.

After checking them over, we gave them the command to sit, 'na-long', and whacked some dirt off with grass brushes -- which we then fed to the elephant -- then hosed them off and let them eat some more. Elephants go through about 250 kg of the basa(?) grass every day.
(Interesting fact -- the dung is used for fertilizer, but nothing grown for elephant food can be grown with elephant-dung fertilizer. The elephants won't eat it.)

Then our elephants were ready to ride. We learned 3 ways to mount the elephants.
1. Make them sit down. Mount.
2. Have the elephant bend its leg, use that as a stepladder.
3. In front, have it lower its head, grab the ears, step on the trunk and the elephant lifts you up. Turn around.
4 - special way for Mae-Meung, so the way I mounted: Have her lower her head. Grab the rope around the middle. Jump! Turn around.

Once we were mounted, we set off on our near-2-hour elephant ride through the forest. Lots of ups and downs and interesting footing for the elephants! And they always want to eat. My elephant at one point saw a ripe bamboo branch (maybe 20 feet long) just sitting in the path, so she decided to take it with her. My trainer hacked off half of it, but she carried the other half for a few minutes, dropping it now and then to snack on the leaves, then picking it up. She just wasn't going to let it go, until Ari's elephant took hold of the other side and they lost it to a separating tree.

We rode the elephants bareback. We had pants they provided so it was soft on our legs, we rode without shoes and could rest our feet sometimes on the elephant, our knees on their ears. I found them soft on my feet, but it was work to make sure we didn't fall off!

Kicking the ears and saying 'bye-bye' makes her go forward, or one ear turns her. Tapping my heels back and saying 'toy' I could make her reverse, while setting the heels back and saying 'hao' halts her.

Thus we rode with 1 break (for water and bananas), until we arrived at our destination: a small waterfall, where we were to give our elephants 'skin care'!

This meant getting in the water (in our swimsuits), with a scrub-brush and water basket, and scrubbing the elephants (who would rather roll around in the cool water). This was pretty fun, though we took care not to get squished or stepped on. The baby elephant almost went down under two adults at one point.

Washed and scrubbed, the elephants were finished, and so were we. We enjoyed an elaborate feast of Chiang-Mai fried chicken, pork and sticky rice, black sticky rice, mangosteen, tangerines, bananas, sweet sticky rice, palm tree cakes, banana and coconut cakes, and banana fritters. Lots of rice, but pretty tasty, and we couldn't finish it all. Almost everything was wrapped in palm leaves, so we took a few things back with us. The rest was divided between being saved and being rolled up for us to feed our elephants.

However, it wasn't the end!

We were driven over to see the baby elephants, and learn a little bit about them and their mothers. Baby elephants stay with their moms until 1-2 years old, and the elephants continue growing until 20-25 years. They live about as long as humans, and between the ages of 11 and 55 female elephants will have up to 5 babies.

Then - that really was the end. We were driven back to our hotel, talking about our experiences.

It was an awesome fun day and the highlight of our trip to Thailand!

Day 14 - Dec 28 - Lions and Tigers and Bears, oh my!

First off, if you ever ride a sleeper train, take your own pillow.
We arrived a few minutes ahead of schedule, then our ride was late, not expecting an early arrival. But we held strong against the hoards of taxi drivers trying to convince us that our driver would never come, and finally he arrived. We made it to our hotel, though it was too early to check in. We got some breakfast, then left our luggage in their care and took one of their free shuttles to the zoo (they offer two free shuttles a day into the city).

The Chiang Mai zoo is really big. The size is deceptive though, as it isn't designed for pedestrians. They offer little bus things and a monorail, but we chose to walk, a decision some regretted since the zoo is big.

We saw the animal show, where an otter fetched cans from a pond, parrots rode bicycles and played basketball, a big beaked bird flew around and ate berries, and some furry animals hung by their tails and ate stuff. The narration was in Thai, which made it a little boring at times.

After that we wandered around in a big circle, trying to see everything. We visited the Panda House, where we got to see three pandas. The dad panda was eating bamboo for a bit then he rolled over to take a nap (the other 2 were already napping).

I likened the zoo to a cheap cruise ship, where it's nice, but worn, and they try to sell you things around every corner. (The Panda exhibit was one of those extra things.)

We found the koala exhibit, which was home to no less than 5 koalas of 3 different types. We saw a seal show, the small aviary, Gibbon Island, a White Bengal, and a bunch of other things. My favorite animals were the otters. They were really active and cute. They chirped at us as they ran around and dived into the water and swam around. We visited their exhibit three times :)

After leaving the zoo, we waked and walked and walked, till we came to an English pub where we ate and ate and ate till we could eat no more. Incapable of movement, we called the hotel (using a cellphone they provided to us) and had them send a taxi for us. Then we finally were able to see our rooms and relax a little. Myra has declared this her favorite resort so far. I really like it, but I wish that the Thai shower standards were a little higher.

We expect to sleep well this night in preparation for adventures tomorrow!!

Day 13 - Dec 27 - Trains Trains, Trains, Trains

We were scheduled to be picked up by the airport shuttle at 7:30, which was 30 minutes before breakfast was supposed to begin. But the kitchen staff arrived at 7, so they kindly got us a light breakfast and then we were on our way to the lovely Koh Samui airpot, which was probably the most interesting airport I have ever been to (about 24 airports at Ari's count). It was an open air airport. This made it both pretty and interesting, but the most important part was the snack corner at the gate. There were no less than 5 finger foods (freshly made, not store bought), a coffee machine, juice, and chocolate milk -- no extra charge. It was everyone's favorite part of the airport, despite having just eaten breakfast.

To get to the airplane, we had to take a shuttle. Then they fed us again on the plane. It was a 50 minute flight. I still haven't figured out what they were fattening us up for.

Upon arriving in Bangkok, we sat around at the airport for an hour reading, then took a train into the city. Then we took the Sky Train to Siam station, where we got off and went for massages. Foot massages were something I had wanted to do since we arrived in Thailand, but we never seemed to get around to it. Finally, Myra and Ari insisted upon it. It was a nice way to burn up another hour. We got a foot/shoulder massage at 300 baht a person, which is about $10. We hope to do it again in Chiang Mai.

Afterwards we went to a Japanese restaurant for lunch. It was tasty and fun and I would like to go back, though some are of the opinion that we should stick to Thai food while in Thailand. But Thai food at home is cheaper than Japanese food at home.

After lunch, we took the Sky Train to the Metro station, where we went through the rigorous metro security: we each had to open our bags and have them shine a flashlight and look for about 2 seconds. Once we had satisfied the security guards, we got on the train and took it to the train station, where we waited to board our final train of the day, a sleeper train.

We departed Bangkok at 6:10 PM and expect to arrive alive in Chiang Mai at 8:15 AM tomorrow. Our berths are small and a wee bit dingy, but it is an adventure and we shall enjoy it.