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Thailand Journal |
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Thailand Journal |
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I had spent six months training to climb Aconcagua so after summiting my fourth big mountain in late January, I looked around for a place with a warm climate where I could stay in resort hotels and not worry about what I ate. I had been in Bangkok for a few days in 1988 on my way back from Nepal and was interested in seeing more of the country. Cindy, my friend in China had been to Thailand while I was in South America and agreed to go back as my tour director. The only negative was that Bird Flu was raging in Thailand, but we went anyway. After dropping my climbing gear in Connecticut, I flew to San Francisco and spent a week visiting family. On February 16th I took Air China to Shanghai where Cindy met my flight at 7:30 PM the next day and we took a taxi to The Grand Hyatt in Pudong. The hotel occupies the top 35 floors of the 87 stories Jin Mao Tower, third tallest building in the world. I’d been here before for dinner, but had never stayed here. Cindy’s best friend (Cindy Too) works here and she got us a good rate. We spent four nights at the Hyatt taking advantage of their great health club (pool and massage rooms only) and visiting with Cindy’s sister Nicole who just graduated from design school and is trying to get a visa to go to Paris. I had intentionally waited until I got to China before making any reservations in Thailand. Being in the travel business, Cindy was able to get us relatively inexpensive airfare R/T from Shanghai to Bangkok and I wanted to stay at The Oriental in Bangkok. On February 21st, we flew to Bangkok and were met at the airport by an Oriental Hotel representative who helped us to one of their Mercedes’ for the 30-minute drive to downtown Bangkok.
We stayed at The Oriental in Bangkok for three nights. We took a longboat tour of the river and canals, visited the flower market, the weekend market and shopped for Thai silk. There are many temples, which can be visited in Bangkok, but we skipped them. Every night we ate in a different restaurant including the buffet at the Shangri-La Hotel, a traditional Thai dinner show across the river at Sala Rim Naam and a combination dinner/massage at a local restaurant. On February 24th we flew to southern Thailand where we planned to visit the resort areas of Krabi, Phi Phi Island and Phuket on the Andaman Sea. We arrived at the airport in Krabi where I telephoned the Sheraton while Cindy claimed our luggage. The Sheraton Krabi Beach Resort offered what I thought was a good rate so we jumped in a taxi for the 35-minute ride north to the hotel. The topography of Southern Thailand is littered with vertical limestone spires soaring several hundred meters into the air. Abundant on both land and at sea the cliffs are usually covered with vegetation and provide habitat for many unusual species of birds and plants. Occasionally we would see several hundred feet of bamboo poles lashed to the side of the cliffs which are used by local people to reach nesting areas to obtain eggs and nests, used in bird nest soup.
We spent three nights at the Sheraton. One day we went scuba diving with a group of twenty people. Although Cindy had not dove before, she was able to take a quick course and spent both dives in the company of a dive master. There was a photographer on board who made a DVD of the trip, both above and below the surface, which we purchased. The rest of the time, we spent at the beach or pool and ate at a different great restaurant each evening. On February 27th, we checked out of the Sheraton and took the ferry to Phi Phi Island, two hours to the west.
On March 2nd, we took the boat another 2 hours west to the
large island of
Phuket, which connects to the mainland via a bridge at its northern border. We
took a taxi to Laguna on the Andaman
Sea, which is a collection of
five resorts, which share a large cove with a huge white sand beach. Since we
had enjoyed the Sheraton Krabi
On Thursday we took a day trip north for some elephant trekking, sea
kayaking and a visit to the area where the James Bond movie ‘The man with
the Golden Gun’ was filmed in 1975. After a two-hour bus ride north to the
mainland, we boarded a large long-tail boat and rode for another hour to a
cove where we transferred into 3-person inflatable kayaks for a tour of some
caves. The sea undercuts the limestone spires creating caves, which you can
float through. After an hour, we
re-boarded our long-tail boat for the ride to
James Bond
Island, a remote beach with a wonderful view of steep spires soaring up out of
the sea. Unfortunately, it is covered with tourist stalls selling all kinds
of souvenirs, but I suppose that is to be expected. The whole area abounds
with small private beaches at the foot of huge limestone cliffs. As I was
scanning one beach, thinking that the only thing it lacked were some
beautiful girls sunning themselves, I caught a glimpse of an 8-foot monitor
lizard guarding his private domain. We ate lunch at Koh Pannyi Fishing Village, which could now be more accurately described as ‘Koh Pannyi Tourist Lunch Serving Village’. We left at 2:00 PM and went back to the dock where we boarded our bus for a short ride to the elephant park where we boarded one of the elephants for a half-hour trek through the jungle. After the ride, we were treated to a show by two young elephants. On Friday, March 5th we moved a half-mile down the beach to The Laguna Beach Resort, which we had discovered during a bike ride a few days before. The rates were better than the Sheraton and they had a great waterslide at their pool. We spent three days playing tennis, wind surfing, jet skiing and playing with the resort’s elephants – Puggy and Anna. Cindy took a Batik painting course and painted a beautiful handkerchief, which she gave to me. On our final night we went to the famous Banyan Tree Resort at Laguna and had a wonderful dinner at Saffron, their Thai restaurant. We had purchased round trip air tickets from Bangkok to Krabi and thought it would be easy to change the return flight to the airport in Phuket, but it turned out to be impossible, so on March 8th we took a taxi back to Krabi where we spent one night at The Maritime Park and Spa before flying back to Bangkok on the 9th where we arrived at noon. I planned to go north to Chiang Mai and Cindy was scheduled to fly to Shanghai and then on to Beijing on the 10th. Her sister Nicole had received her French visa and was preparing to leave Shanghai for two years in France. Cindy wanted to see her before she left so we tried to change her ticket so she could continue on to Shanghai the afternoon of the 9th, but there were no flights. We decided to stay in Bangkok one night and then fly out on Wednesday. We took a taxi to The Peninsula, which is across the river from The Oriental, and checked-in for one night. Cindy insisted on eating at the hotels Chinese restaurant so she could get her metabolism back to normal. The next day, after a wonderful buffet breakfast overlooking the river, we checked-out ant took a taxi back to the airport. Cindy’s flight was at 10:00 AM and my flight to Chiang Mai was not until noon. I only bought a one-way ticket to Chang Mai, as I was still unsure of my plans for the next week. I had a return ticket from Bangkok to Shanghai on the 18th with a one-hour layover and then a flight to San Francisco. When I got to Chiang Mai, I wanted to look into visiting Myanmar, Laos or Ankor Wat in Cambodia and I thought I might fly to one of those places and then return directly to Bangkok. I checked into the Sheraton Chiang Mai and started organizing my plans for the next week. A visa to visit Myanmar (Burma) takes several days and I decided it was not worth going there on short notice. Cambodia is assessable by Visa on Arrival, but all flights are through Bangkok so it did not make sense to go there either. I did find I could make a day trip to Laos and The Golden Triangle (the junction of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos – famous as the former opium capital of the world) so I made those arrangements. I also planned a day trip south to one of Thailand’s national parks. The morning of the 11th, I was picked up at my hotel for the two-hour drive south to Doi Inthanon National Park. We visited a couple of waterfalls and a Chedi & Temple built by the Thai Air Force to comerate the sixtieth birthdays of the King & Queen. The park is site of the highest mountain in Thailand, part of the Himalayan Range.
On Saturday, I took a tour north to Chiang Rai and the Golden Triangle. We left early at 7:00 AM driving north almost 300 kilometers past Chiang Rai to the border of Laos and Myanmar. We took a long boat ride on the Maekok River, which included a half hour visit to an island in Laos where we were tempted to buy cobra whiskey. After lunch we drove up into the hills and visited three unique villages of hill tribe people. In one village the women all had pitch black teeth, a result of chewing a local leaf product their whole lives. The women in the second village had large earlobes, which were fitted with bracelet size rings. The third and most amazing were the Karen Long Neck Women who, starting at age five, fit heavy brass rings around their necks. Originally mandated by a headman to protect the women by being killed by tigers, it has now become more of a tradition. We did not see any men in the villages and all the women we saw had their own shops of handicrafts for sale. I spent the next several days wandering around Chiang Mai. There are many important temples, Wats and Chedis in this area, but most of them look similar. The wall is only evident in places and the moat now looks like a long pond. There are tourist stalls everywhere – but they offer local handicrafts, some of which are interesting. I had hoped to see the luxurious Four Seasons Chiang Mai, a five star resort built amongst active rice patties on the north side of the valley, but didn’t get the chance. I’ve been in Thailand for
almost a month now and it has only rained once. The weather is getting hotter
and will be almost unbearable (for tourists) in another couple weeks. As I am
leaving, my hotel is setting up to host the
Maxxis Asia Open (motorcycle endurance race) and more interestingly, the
Miss Thailand Beauty Contest next week.
On March 18th I left Chiang
Mai and took the first of three flights, first to Bangkok, on to Shanghai and
then continuing to San Francisco. I plan to stay in California for a few weeks
and then head to Las Vegas for Easter. | Back |
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