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| Me, Becca, Kim, Haley & Sarahann |
We worked SO hard to plan the perfect
spring break. After weeks of constantly checking plane flights, booking treks,
and researching villas, we finally left for Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai, in Northern
Thailand, was by far my favorite part of the trip. The city is relaxed and extremely
welcoming to backpackers and our hostel, The Living Place, was the best hostel
I’ve ever stayed at. The owners, a Thai couple (and their dog WeeWee) were SO
accommodating and extremely helpful in assisting us with booking activities,
renting mopeds, and giving us suggestions on different places to go. When we told
them that we were considering going to the cabaret show, the owner organized a
group of other backpackers to all go together. On our last day, they encouraged
us to try the Thai food they were having for lunch and then walked with us to
get a cab to make sure we got a fair price. I would recommend it to anyone.
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| The Living Place, hostel |
Our first day in Chiang Mai, we went to
Baan Chang Elephant Park, where we got to work with elephants who were rescued
from abusive owners and inhumane tourist traps. We started the day by feeding
them sugar cane and bananas, in the nifty denim outfits they gave us. We took
turns getting on the elephants bareback and learning how to make them stand up,
turn, walk, stop, and lay down. Elephants are really smart animals and each one
has its own trainer, or mahout. Our
elephant’s mahout would do things like stand on its trunk and have the
elephant, Chambu, lift him onto his back. Then, Chambu would pick up the
mahout’s flip-flops and hand (trunk?) them to him. After a delicious lunch, we
took two long walks through the woods using the commands we had learned. We also
went to a pond where the elephants played and bathed. We went in to wash them,
but really just laid on their backs and got into water fights. We had a lot of
fun with the elephants and it was an awesome experience to kick off our spring
break.
The next day, Becca and I signed up for a
random excursion to go white water rafting, zip lining, and hiking. It turned out
that we were the only ones who signed up for our specific tour, but we were
with a group of people doing similar things in the same program. They first
took us to an orchid and butterfly garden, aka a place to try and get us to
spend money. Our guide kept telling us to “trust Johnny,” because we were
nervous we were on the wrong trip, but we honestly did not trust him. So
instead, Becca and I just took unnecessarily dramatic photos with the flowers.
When
we finally went to the activities, it turned out to be an all-in-one tourist
place, so while everyone else was riding elephants, we went zip lining through
the jungle. We then went on bamboo rafts down the river that we didn’t sign up
for, but everyone else did so Johnny just had us do it too, which we didn’t
mind. Finally, we went white water rafting. Before we got in the raft, this
older man was smoking something out of a water bottle and as luck would have it, he was our guide on the raft! We were also in
a raft with a Chinese woman who knew we spoke Chinese, and because the guide
was actually from China, our whole rafting experience was in Chinese. There
were some pretty big rapids at some points, but for the most part it was
relaxing and fun, splashing the other boats and getting out to swim down the
river. They ended the trip with a small waterfall we could swim in, but we all
just took pictures and left. Not going to lie, this whole program was pretty
sketchy, and while it ended up being fun and safe, I still would not do it again
(or trust Johnny). 
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That night, we went back to the Chiang Mai
night market and watched the cabaret, which is a famous drag show. It was an
hour of awesome music and costumes, and it was cool to get to know the other
travelers from our hostel. In the morning, we had a few hours before
our flight to Cambodia, so Becca and I rented mopeds and scooted around the
city. We went to a huge food market and had our first taste of mango with
coconut sticky rice, which got us hooked for the rest of the trip. We explored
side streets, various wats (temples), and the old city walls, got Thai
massages, and had lunch, all before getting in the characteristic Chiang Mai
red taxi to the airport.
When we arrived in Siem Reap, we picked a
random restaurant near the hostel. It ended up being a fancy, candlelit dinner
where we got bread and salads with our main course, and a waiter poured the
bottle of water for us… all for a grand total of $10.
The next morning, we woke up at 4:30 AM
(egads!) to meet our 5 AM tuktuk driver, Tah, and go to Angkor Wat for sunrise.
Seeing as it was still dark out, the lights at the ticket station attracted
thousands bugs that swarmed everywhere around us as we bought our day passes.
We finally arrived at Angkor Wat and stood amongst hundreds of tourists trying
to get the perfect photo. After we took the classic sunrise picture, we went to
grab some breakfast. All of the venders were following us and harassing us to
get us to eat at their place. In addition to that, the children selling souvenirs
were equally persistent. The worst was probably one boy who stood next to Becca
for probably TEN minutes as we waited for our meals just repeating, “Postcards.
1 dollar. 1 dollar. 1 dollar.” The sunrise at Angkor Wat was stunning, but the
relentless venders, adult and child alike, left a bitter taste in our mouths.
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| Sunrise at Angkor Wat |
After eating, Tah brought us to the other
temples, starting with the Bayon, my favorite. The whole complex has
beautifully intricate carvings and designs, but the Bayon is famous for the
giant faces covering the exterior. We climbed up and down and explored every
inch of it before moving onto the other temples. It was crazy hot out, and we
were wearing long pants and long sleeves in order to show respect in the
temples, but it was still nice to take our time and stroll around the ruins. We
didn’t want to miss a thing so we had our tuk tuk driver stop at every ruin in
the vicinity, and then we climbed around each one.
Another famous ruin is Angkor Thom, where
nature has grown alongside the ruins and trees have become a part of the
architecture. Angkor Thom has an Indiana-Jones-esque vibe to it, with vines
tangled around columns and trees devouring old walls. We sat here for a while
to rest and enjoy the shade, and I thought about how my taekwondo master always
talks about the power of nature, like when a flower grows in the crack of a
sidewalk. Angkor Thom demonstrates this persistence on a whole new level. Since we started our tour at 5 am, we were done with the ruins relatively early in the afternoon. It would have been nice to have another day to travel to the farther parts of the complex, but it was so hot and Angkor Wat was incredible enough, that we did not mind missing the more remote ruins. By this point, we only had $5 to last through lunch, dinner, and breakfast, but we didn’t want to take out more money and pay service fees (plus Cambodia is really cheap), so we napped, had a standard $2 dinner, bought a $1 souvenir at the Siem Reap night bazaar, and shared a bag of rolls for breakfast.
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| Crossing the border! |
To get to Thailand, we took a bus to the
Cambodian border-town, Poipet, where we crossed across into Thailand, took a
tuktuk to a small restaurant, (bought some pad thai), and got in a van to Bangkok.
The travel took all day but it honestly wasn’t too bad, and we met some nice
people along the way. Obviously, the convenience and luxury of planes and
hotels are always nice, but there is something to be said about the backpacker-hostel
lifestyle. We were constantly meeting new interesting people and getting more
authentic experiences, as the hostels were all in central locations. Plus, we
saved a few hundred dollars. That night, we went to Khao San Road, the main
tourist strip in Bangkok, had a delicious curry dinner, and strolled around
until going back to the hostel.
The next day, I toured Bangkok’s main
tourist sights. I first went to the Grand Palace. It was huge and defined the
word “luxurious.” Within the complex is the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. The
Buddha is surprisingly small and sits atop a tower of gold, although apparently
it is actually made of jade, not emerald. I also went to the Queen Sirikit
textile museum, which showed how Queen Sirikit redefined traditional Thai
fashion and was one of the best-dressed women of her time. 
I then took a boat across the river to Wat
Arun, the Temple of Dawn. It started raining as I climbed up the narrow steps
to the top. It was not crowded and once the rain started, most people climbed
down, so it was very relaxing and was a nice break from the heat. The top was a
beautiful vantage point and I took my time before climbing back down, crossing
the river, and returning to the hostel.
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| View from the top of Wat Arun |
The next morning, we embarked on the last
leg of our trip and hopped on a plane to Surat Thani, where we took a
three-hour ferry to the beautiful island of Koh Samui. Our taxi brought us along these winding back
roads until we arrived at our beautiful villa, where we immediately put on our
bathing suits and jumped in the private pool. We then took a walk down to the
main road and got dinner before getting some groceries at a local market. Later
that night, Kim, Haley, and Sarahann arrived and we all sat around the pool and
caught up on the past few days’ adventures. |
| Sail Rock |
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| Haley, Me, Kim & Sarahann |
After the dive, I met up with the girls on
the beach where we relaxed until sunset. We were on a relatively remote part of
the beach so it was quiet and perfect. That night, we made ourselves dinner. I
loved being able to cook my own meal for the first time in months. The next
day, we went to the beach again, but this time right in front of a resort. We
eventually made our way to their infinity pool and they let us stay as long as
we got a drink from the pool bar… tough compromise. We spent the whole day in
the water and laying out, a perfect ending to our incredible spring break.
