29 Apr- 04 May, Koh Phi Phi to Koh Samui
Up early to meet the sawngthaew, an extended bed pick-up (Ute for the Ozzies…) with a roof and bench seats on the bed, that is taking us to the ferry that will be transporting us to Koh Phi Phi (yes- "Pee Pee"). In probably the first recorded case in Thaime history, it arrived at exactly 8:20, the precise time it was supposed to! We were the first two passengers. The “crew” is two young ladies, a driver and another assistant. They check your receipt, pat a color-coded sticker onto your shirt (More on that in a moment), and expertly stack your bags on the back platform. Their English is minimal, however the job doesn’t really require advanced second language skills. We get on just fine with our minimalist Thai and smiles. At the third pick-up, a Chinese tourist and family hopped on. They were just day-tripping to Phi Phi, so were not encumbered by baggage. The father realized he had not gotten his change at the hotel desk and was trying to get the sawngthaew to turn around. He had some English, and that was the language he was trying to meet the attendants in the middle with. We were maybe half a klick away when a professionally dressed lady (business, not pleasure… though I guess they can be the same thing) came zipping along side on a scooter, waving a fistful of Baht. The father was very pleased, and we all had a good chuckle about the Thai sense of duty. I can’t imagine any concierge from a hotel in the Western world dropping everything, jumping in his/her car, and chasing down a guest they already know will be returning later in the day to give them their change.
A hurried and somewhat anxious discussion had begun amongst the attendants and driver. The driver was gesturing at his watch, and the attendants were furiously flipping through the reservation sheets. After more than a few words, the driver turned the truck around and headed back up the street. Lo and behold, he stopped in front of our hotel… Phra Nang Place. The Ozzie couple that had been in our old room got on the truck. The male half had mentioned the previous evening they were going to Phi Phi today as well. JD had just assumed they made transfer arrangements with a different company as there are many, even in a tiny town like Ao Nang. They squeezed in and looked at us and exclaimed, “You let them leave us behind!” Smiling while they said it. We joked about the unique experience of the sawngthaew being there right on schedule. They were also Thailand veterans and had a solid grasp of Thaime.
If I haven’t defined Thaime yet: Imagine a country the size of Texas living on a time scale that makes island-time seem like New York City light. The expression “New York Minute” isn’t even a myth here. On most vacation islands you relax and let the day take you where it may. Clocks exist, mostly to define the boundaries of happy hour. Apply this idea of time as an existential reference point to an entire country. Thais understand the conceptual nature of the idea of “schedule”; they just really don’t have a physical marker or waypoint to actually wrap the working model around. I am fairly positive that it has something to do with Buddhist tenets, as 90% of Thais are Buddhist.
The Ao Nang marina is west of town proper. There are any number of powerboats, longtails and a few different ferries in the mix. Ferries tie up “rafted”. You will sometimes need to walk across three or four ferries to get to yours. That’s why you are given the color-coded sticker. No language barrier with color. Crew simply look at your sticker and point you to the correct boat.
The 9:00 ferry to Phi Phi, which is also the 9:30 ferry to Phi Phi (also known as the 8:30, 10:15 and
on rare occasions the 10:00), is the SAME boat that is the 9:00 Railay ferry to Phi Phi. One boat, two locations: space-time continuum hole? Magic dust? Nope. Thaime! The boat leaves at 9:40, stops at Railay around 9:55, and heads off to Phi Phi for an “11:00” arrival. Along the way Chicken 
Island is off the starboard side. Approaching from the north you can clearly see the “chicken head” pillar for which the island is named. As you come even with the island it becomes distinctly phallic. We can only imagine “Big Wanker Island” wouldn’t have the same family appeal as a tourist draw…though you never really know.
The Phi Phi ferry dock, a solidly built concrete and steel project, survived the tsunami. The boat arrives on “Thaime”. It’s only 11:05. The day was moist. The day was hot. The day was most definitely sticky. The packs are heavier, us being closer to the equator and all. KK parks herself about 250 meters in and instructs JD to return when he has found shelter. On Phi Phi, the low season is more relative than in other locations. It is considered the busiest tourist destination in the country. A staggeringly high percentage of all visitors to Thailand pass through Phi Phi sometime on their trip. “Low season” starts in three days. No one is cutting slack on rates first. JD finds a decent fan room for two nights, and we will search out a different deal without hauling 70 kilos on our backs.
Quick Thai Language Primer (1):
Farang: [fah-rahng], “non-Thai person”, most commonly westerners. Not derogatory or an insult, just what we are.
Krab/Ka: polite positive evocative at the end of a sentence or statement. Krab is used by men, Ka, women. This grammatical propriety is why many Thais end every English sentence with “yes”, the nearest English equivalent.
Sawadee krab/ka: [sah-wah-dee krahb/kah] “hello”, general greeting, can also be used as goodbye, similar to Hawaiian “aloha”
Khun sabai dee mai: [coon sah-bah dee my] “how are you”
Sabai dee krab/ka: “I’m fine”, Mai Sabai Dee: “I’m not fine”
Chai: “yes”
Mai chai: “no”, literally-“not yes”
Pawp gon mai: [pope gone my], “ see you again”
Khawp Khun Krab/Ka: [kawp coon krahb/kah], “thank you”
Nueng, saeng, saam, sii, haa, haw, jeat, phaet, gaow, sip, sip-et, sip-saeng, yii-sip, yii-sip-saeng, saam-sip, nueng-rawy, nueng-pan: [nung, song, sahm, see, ha, hoe, jet, pad, gow, sip, sip-et, sip-song, yee-sip, yee-sip-song, sahm-sip, nung-roy, nung-pahn]. “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 20, 22, 30,100,1000.”
Pet: “spicy”, pet-pet “really spicy”. Thais who see a farang order pet-pet, and actually eat it, are very impressed. Most are impressed to see a farang have any spice at all. JD has adapted quickly to Thai-hot.
Prik: [preek] chili peppers, “Prik nam Plaa”: chilies in fish sauce- a condiment
Nit noi: [knit-noy] “very little”, “very tiny”
“Ph” is always a hard “p”, “Th” is always hard “t”, and “K” is most often a glottal “g” with a hint of “c” as in cat.
All right, enough of that for now. It is better to be a successful mimic here than figuring it out on paper. Thais love to assist, as long as you ask for assistance. It is bad form to presume a person wants help, and you and they both would “lose face” if you were corrected offhand. However, if you ask, they will gleefully attempt to help you with enunciation and vocabulary.
We had spent some time on Phi Phi during the last trip. We left the island about 4 weeks pre-tsunami (PT), and frankly we were a bit nervous about what we would find this trip. How did our favorite eateries fare? How did the people we had met do? Had the tone of the island survived?
Phi Phi shows much more residual visual of the tsunami damage. The palms are widespread and gapped and a few debris piles are still present. At the narrow point you can see from one side to the other. The developed region is on a spit of land that connects two mountainous ends. The spit is maybe two kilometers long, and spreads from about a 100 meters at its narrowest to a shy 400 meters at its widest. The highest point is about 4 meters above the high tide line. The tsunami was almost 7 meters high. The math is pretty straightforward. There are still over 1,000 unaccounted for, some say closer to 2,000. A small memorial meditation garden has been created, and is tucked off the beaten path for privacy.
The island was originally not going to be re-developed. I suspect that idea lasted as long as Britney’s first marriage. It has been re-developed with a vengeance. Many of the (PT) businesses were able to build again thanks to generous assistance from assorted local, national and international groups and the Thai government. Many new enterprises also saw an opportunity to get in while the gettin’ was good. There is now a lot more concrete box construction instead of the original “tropical” wood and thatch. Does it make sense? Absolutely. Is the island still a recreational paradise? Yep. Have the residents added a layer of jaded resolution to their everyday lives? Sadly yes. Can you still find the neat places to stay? If you look hard enough. How about 
actual happy residents? They are also still there: just further off the paving stone paths. What cannot be rebuilt are the ages of character that are absorbed by a place. I’m sure that over time a new character will develop. For us there is a sense of mourning for that which was, while adapting to and exploring that which is now .
The island has no roads. Paving brick and dirt pathways are the thoroughfares. There had been two of three motorized scooters (PT), mostly to move construction material around. Now there are quite a few more. Not city, or even village, amounts, but enough that you are very aware, especially on an island with no roads. Bicycles have had a HUGE population explosion. They seem to have bred like gerbils. NEVER leave two bikes alone and unsupervised. Next thing you know you’ll have thirty or forty. You can spend a lot of time dodging bikes and puddles while wandering about. Many businesses have PT and rebuilding photo montages. The mosque has a large aerial photo taken the day after the event mounted on the outer doors. The Chao Ley had, originally settled Phi Phi, as well as most of the Andaman islands. The Chao Ley are a fisher peoples that are predominantly Muslim. It shows were it itself had been, with its new location also indicated. It is the primary school on the island, and is still in the process of being rebuilt.
Phi Phi has been enjoying the same afternoon thunder-boomers as Ao Nang/Railay. Here they leave large brown lakes in the places that the “street” used to be. Strategic placement of boards and bricks allow one to fjord the largest of these ponds, provided you can be fleet of foot and delicate in your landings. We stay dry most of the time…
Climbing is excellent on Phi Phi. The primary wall is relatively easy to access (For our climbing mates: A 40 meter 5.0 (Yosemite) scramble to the base, after a nice beach walk) with at least a dozen 5.10a (Yosemite) and under bolted/slinged routes, as well as a few dozen high-end climbs, a few multi-pitch, and fantastic views to admire. We head up to the rock about 11:00. It was F*%# - F*%# HOT! Another one of those river of sweat, spontaneous pore eruption scenarios. JD led a 5+
(5.8 Yosemite) and pissed at least a liter of water from his elbows on the way up. Rappelling is the new way down. KK is pleased to not have to lower JD’s bulk, and JD likes to rap anyway. Makes him feel “Commando”, and not in a Kramer way… A rope-gun (guide) is with a couple on a nearby route. An English bloke. He lets us know the sun swings past the face after noon, and the rock cools quickly after that. His client’s head down and he pops into a conveniently placed hammock for a lunchtime siesta. His next group will arrive in about an hour.
We sit in the shade and drink another 3 liters of water, waiting for the sun to move along. The English bloke had a classic Thai story: A year ago he showed up for a three-week holiday. Fell in love with his massage gal, then married her so he could bring her back to England. Her visa is almost set, and they go back for a visit in three weeks. Odds are against them actually staying there, but he does want her to meet his family and mates.
MOMS-SKIP TO NEXT PARAGRAPH- DO NOT READ!:
He also shared another story: Two weeks ago another climbing guide was rope-gunning a 6a+ (about a 10c) with an experienced partner and she was at the chains. A little Thai bloke was on belay, and both the bloke and the belayer watched her daisy into the chains (daisy is a specific type of strap with a locking carabineer. It is strong enough to tow trucks) and she announced the fact as well. The belayer released a large amount of slack, as is procedure, so she could thread the chains, prepare to rappel, etc. Next thing both of them knew the rope was screaming through the belay device and she was in freefall. The little Thai fellow tried to stop the rope, but it was too late. She landed on the rocks in the belay zone. It was not her time. A shattered hip and pelvis, plus significant spinal trauma was the eventual assessment. The English bloke immediately hauled ass to the “hospital” down the trail and about 400 meters up the beach. No doctor on duty. No doctor on the island! They gave him an army surplus canvas stretcher and told him to bring her down… None of the climbers that day had much in first aid training. They did know they needed splints. A popular item here is the beach mat. A bamboo like roll-up made of artificial fibers, two people can lie on one comfortably (We have one), and it is also a great rope protector, place to sit while between climbs, etc. When rolled it is solid. They strapped her to a dozen or so and then got her on the stretcher. A line of thirty or forty people passed her down the quite steep and treacherous access trail to a waiting speedboat. She was whisked off to Phuket, about an hour and a half away across choppy seas. She is fine, in a partial body caste and in good spirits. This story came up because we had been discussing visa runs.
Visa runs are a regular process here in Thailand. When you have a tourist, “O” or “B” visa, you need a stamp every 60 or 90 days. Extended tourist visas need a stamp every 60. If you have a “VOA” (Visa on Arrival) you need a stamp every thirty days, and a fresh airline ticket demonstrating your ass is leaving within the next thirty. The gravity gal was supposed to leave for her visa run the next day… Any number of travel companies offer “visa runs”, bus or train trips across the nearest border for a “day of shopping” and a new stamp on the way back into the country. If you overstay your visa, it’s a 500 Baht a day fine, plus you face the wrath of an overworked and underpaid immigration officer. I mention underpaid mostly because the only way to avoid the Thai penal system after the first twenty-four hours is to make a significant donation to the Immigration Officials Happy Life Fund in addition to the fine. It’s definitely cheaper to leave the country… No one knows if a body cast is an acceptable excuse. Seriously. The guide hadn’t heard yet, as she was just leaving for her run the day before we met him. We need to do a visa run in mid-June. We plan to fly to Indonesia for ours… and no climbing the day before.
We found a neat little place. Chunut House was a collection of 
hillside wood and thatch huts, built on stilts. The room had fans, and a full mosquito net covering the bed. A large lanai with a low sitting table and cushions rounded out the picture. Happy Hour on the Lanai was born. Phi Phi, being the party-friendly hamlet it is, has a number of stores and stalls to purchase beverages and snacks. They also sell drinking kits: A small ,or large, beach bucket, a flask size bottle of liquor (a full size bottle for the big bucket), a small bottle of herbal liqueur, and a can of soda/tonic/mixer. All you need to do is fill the bucket with ice and dump everything else in, put in the provided straw- Instant Party! We tried a mix of SangSom Thai rum, “White Shark” herbal liqueur (that’s what JD 
calls it- The label is completely in Thai with a white shark logo), and a lime soda. It was really quite tasty and refreshing. During Happy Hour the PM thunder boomers rolled in. Cocktails and 500-bid ,our card game of choice, amidst the hiss crackle and boom of a monsoon season storm. A perfect way to unwind after a long day of… well, maybe unwind isn’t the right word, a perfect way to de-stress? Loosen up? OK, it’s just fun to hang on the porch, have a cocktail and play cards. We did go climbing after all, which was sort of like work. Exertion anyway. Who says work can’t be fun too?
The storm continued through to the next day. Not pissing down the whole time, there were periods of drizzle and lighter gray patches. Only to those from Seattle can the difference cloud color be considered a change in weather. We found a great little bookstore/café complete with wireless. As long as you spent 60 Baht (US$1.80) you can surf all day. A mocha was 65 Baht. We had coffees, surfed the n
et, people watched and had a general lazy day of it. People watching in Thailand easily competes with people watching in Vegas. Different cast of characters, but always something interesting walking, riding or ambling by.
All of our fly-fishing friends have told us about the insect hatching rhythms. Having lived on the river, it was a regular event. A large percentage of insects time their
breeding cycle to the full and new moons. It is the day before the full moon. We had only really noticed evening and night hatches until now… Mid afternoon was a cloud of a different color altogether. Tens of thousands of winged things were flitting, flopping and darting everywhere. Mostly they seemed to be a large ant or small termite like beastie. Lots of different varieties though. Significantly more than just an average swarming. Toads, frogs, lizards and geckos were having an absolute feast day. Normally nocturnal and cautious, they didn’t care if you went eye to eye. A couple of the hoppers just sat in one spot 
spinning in circles. No matter which way they faced, there
was more food! JD spotted a huge variegated gecko on the hut wall, easily 10 inches long (25cm). He (the gecko) was a cooperative poser. The second wave was around 10 pm. Even the mozzie net was breached, overwhelmed by shear numbers. The critters were not biters, but even a benign bug is going to wake you up crawling across your neck and face. Sleep was not deep and restful this particular evening.
O
ur 15th wedding anniversary was greeted by AM thundershowers. After brekkie, KK decided she wanted a pedicure for her present, then we both had Thai massage, and dinner at Pum Thai restaurant. Since we haven’t had the chance to spend much time together, it was good to become reacquainted…
The next morning the weather was virtually clear, so we decided a hike to the highest point on the island was in order. Thailand approaches inclines like the Aztecs and Mayans: “We don’ need no stinking switchbacks- Jus’ build steps. 100’s of steps. 1,000’s if necessary” The path to the viewpoints begins with a few hundred steps. Coincidently, it is also the tsunami evacuation route. 
About a 100 steps up a sign points to a level area for the tsunami congregation area. We continue on for another few hundred to the first viewing area… then up the steep path to the top of the mountain. The views are indeed exceptional.
Thai Cultural Note: It is considered incredibly poor form to lose your temper
for any reason. Yelling at a person demonstrates a complete lack of self-control. However… If someone has you that pissed off, it is perfectly acceptable to kick or swat the nearest available dog. Every dog in Thailand has been kicked or swatted at least once. You get to vent your frustration, the dogs really don’t seem to notice, and you have impressed whoever is watching with your deity-like self-control.
The worst storm in 46 years is barreling across the Gulf of Thailand, north of us a hundred kilometers or so. It is flooding everywhere from Surat Thani north to Bangkok. We are just getting the fringes here. Our next destination is in the Gulf, the island of Koh Samui. Yes, it is getting hit as well. We figure it is the big storm of the season and it will be just fine by the time we arrive… in two days.
We attempt to climb in the early afternoon. Humidity has been so high all of our gear is damp and sticky. Nothing will air dry in this particular weather. It is a frustrating attempt, and we hang it up fairly quickly. It’s Happy Hour, and also time to finalize the travel arrangements to Koh Samui- Boat to Krabi, Bus to Surat Thani, Boat to Na Thon (Samui), and van to bungalow at Lamai beach. It will take as long to travel this 200 some odd kilometers as it takes to fly from Hawaii to Sydney… Thaime is an interesting thing. We start at the ferry here at 8:40am.
20-29 April 2007 Bangkok to Ao Nang
Thai Air has spectacular customer service. It is almost impossible to stay happy and content on a 9.5-hour flight, yet they manage it. Ours is an afternoon/evening flight, leaving Brissie at 3:20 and arriving in Bangkok at 9:30 (3 hour time change). There were two Ozzies who were “well into the piss” during the flight, and in general were acting like a couple of pre-pubescent grommets. The flight attendants cut them off about halfway through the flight. A number of people from our section of plane commented strongly during the deplaning that those types of blokes are the ones that ruin it for all Ozzies in SE Asia. We were just happy that we weren’t apologizing for some rude Canadian.
The new BKK international airport, Suvarnabhumi, has many similarities to the Denver airport: Millions of Baht in graft and corruption during planning and construction, an airport 30 minutes from anything- including lodging, built for political expediency rather than any incredible increase in quality and convenience, and its opening last fall (September 2006) was a fiasco of biblical proportions- misdirected flights, lost and destroyed luggage, ticketing computers fried, conflicting signage and airport staff with no clue, immigration control short staffed and uninformed, and a few hundred thousand really pissed off passengers.
All this being said, the internal logistics have been handled extremely well by the time we arrived. We breeze through immigration, customs is a smile and a wave, and the metered taxi area was well marked. The “near airport” hotels are still a 30-minute (minimum) taxi ride away. We try to 
reserve the first nights lodging anywhere in advance, especially if we expect a late arrival. This time it was at the Yamato Hotel (“near the new airport”…). We jump in a taxi about 10:15pm local time. A handy trick is to have a printout of your hotel address in Thai script, and a picture if possible. Unfortunately the web site we booked through was in Roman script. Our very friendly taxi driver had to physically call the hotel to figure out where it was.
Bangkok is constructing an extension to the Skytrain (their elevated train system) that will run into the district of the hotel. It was mid-day full-on peak hour traffic at 10:30 at night. It was almost an hour for our 30-minute trip. The hotel staff was incredibly gracious, even after 11:00. (A very Thai thing by the way- it is “The Land of Smiles”, more on that in a bit) The room is clean and serviceable, the mattress welcoming. Tomorrow we figure out how we are getting south.
A brief constitutional was in order after a typical “American” breakfast Thai-style: A unique poached/fried egg, ham(?) slice, toast, tea, and a truly mystery-meat “sausage”. (Normally we have “Asian breakfast”- spiced rice soup with chicken and veggies, this hotel just assumed farang would want farang food) The sun is already heating the blast furnace that is Bangkok. Stepping outside the hotel caused an immediate and full opening of every single pore and sweat gland in the body. If you watch carefully you can see little tiny geysers erupting all along any exposed surface. Shirts 
and shorts are immediately drenched. It turns out the hotel is in the middle of a local’s neighborhood. We are the whitest (and tallest) bodies for blocks. Traffic is already stopped for kilometers due to the skytrain construction zone. The primary Thai mode of transport is the scooter. Traffic rules are more like suggestions, and pretty much anything goes. It is mostly an English drive country, unless at any given moment it is more expedient to be American drive. It is also the living embodiment of the expression “If you don’t like the way I drive, stay off the sidewalk”. Scooters and smaller cars don’t hesitate to use the sidewalk, either with or against traffic.
Bangkok is the largest population center we have been in for months. Almost 15 million people call it home: Just under 4 times the entire population of New Zealand, and three-quarters the population of Oz. Thailand itself has a population of roughly 65 million. Bangkok is built on a very large lower river delta (read: swamp) and has a permanent blue haze. This haze is a heady blend of exhaust (both two and four stroke), humidity (rarely less than 80%), garbage (food based and other), and the truly organic smell of shallow drain septic. The effect keeps many of the five senses fighting to not be first up- each one trying to push the other senses to the front of consciousness. As with all sensory inputs, you get used to it all eventually. It is not our plan to be here (Bangkok) long enough to find how long eventually really is. That being said, even in the insane press of humanity that is Bangkok, Thailand has a certain feel of “ease” that is pleasant to just relax and experience.
Just so travelers don’t become complacent and think things are too easy, the old airport, Don Muang, is still used by three of four airlines for some domestic flights. For example, Thai Air, our preferred carrier, operates morning and evening domestic flights from Suvarnabhumi, but mid-day flights all use Don Muang. Some international flights into BKK have transfers to domestic flights in Don Muang. The US East coast/West coast best examples I can give are these: Arrive in Kennedy then catch a shuttle to Newark, or arrive in LAX and shuttle to Orange County (John Wayne). It is very important to know exactly which airport you are flying out of. It can take as little as 45 minutes to shuttle between airports, but you really should allow almost two hours…
Krabi is today’s destination. We want an early afternoon flight, so we need to get to Don Muang. It is not close to the hotel… Our driver had no English, but JD’s smattering of Thai (with suitable horrible accent we’re sure) and the help of the hotel staff still got us where we needed to be.
Krabi is the capital of Krabi province, south of the Gulf of Thailand and on the Andaman Sea. It is a market town. That means lots of the provincial merchants trade amongst themselves here. It is an 
access gateway to most of the recreation opportunities it this part of the Andaman Sea: diving, climbing, sightseeing, resort islands, undeveloped islands, etc. Ao Nang [“Oh-Nong” or “Ow-Nong”] is the road accessible town near Railay Beach. During our last visit, pre-tsunami (PT) it was a developing town with a decent infrastructure. It is the cusp of the “low season”, some lodging is on low season rates, and others will be converting next week. We had researched a few reasonable looking places, and had an idea what price range to start negotiations.
The trip from the airport to Ao Nang was the first real issue of tonal inflection subtlety… Thai, like many Asian languages, depends more upon inflection and tone of a word to define its meaning. There are five tonal intonations- rising, falling, low flat, mid flat, and high flat. An example often referred to is the sentence “Mai mai mai mai mai.” The translation is “Wet wood doesn’t burn” each “mai” has a different inflection… there are also no consistent rules concerning the Romanisation of Thai words. Even Thais themselves can have a multitude of “English” spellings of the same word or phrase (“Thank you” for a male is spoken “Kawp Khun Krahb” which you may see written as Gawg Khun Kawp, Kwap Kum Krawp, Khawb Khun Khawp, or any number of additional variations. They are all still pronounced exactly the same way! Westerners, for example, will often indicate a question by a rising intonations. This does not role over to Thai at all… Additionally there are distinct southern, central, and northern dialects. A common issue is a Western businessman learning his Thai from a bargirl (A young lady of negotiable affection…typically originally from the very impoverished northeast) and then trying to impress a local central Thai corporate head with is command of the language. He will think he is saying something like “Mr. Thaksin, your business is most impressive. I feel it would be beneficial for both of our companies to find a way to work together.” When he is actually saying, “Hey Big Man Thaksin, you have pretty store. We make good love each other. Happy meeting”. This example is not as extreme as it sounds…
JD had the name, address and phone number of Phra Nang Place (pronounced [“prahnyahng ply”] written out in English, exactly as it was on the website. We hired a fixed rate car at the airport. JD handed him the address, and confirmed it was “Pranyahng Place”. He and the driver threw the words back and forth a few times, JD trying to be consistent in pronunciation and the driver trying to understand… The driver handed us a tourist map, which luckily had a Phra Nang Place ad. (Of course it was written Phranang Place, but the address did match.) The driver still didn’t get it, as the ad did not have the Thai script name either. He called his dispatch and had an extensive conversation… Dispatch called him back in a few minutes. He turned to JD, and in what JD swore was the exact way he had been saying it, said, “You go Prahnyahng Ply?” to which we smiled and agreed. JD figures initially he was probably saying “fried pepper sand” or some such ridiculous word grouping. Thankfully Thais are infinitely patient if you are making the effort, and most importantly, staying calm while doing it. (To really confuse things, in this region there is also Phra Nang town, a Phra Nang beach on Railay, Pha Ngan Island
The hotel was clean and well appointed. A newer building, less than two years old, and with all the amenities: high speed internet, cable, mini bar, A/C, hot water showers, and great little balconies overlooking the street action. We managed to negotiate to just more than half the posted rate for a weeks stay. It is a half-mile walk or so to the beach and longtails, and there are a number of restaurants and food stalls in the immediate area. The evening thunderstorms began in earnest, 
with a warm tropical deluge and light show for our entertainment. The condenser in the rooms A/C decided it had had enough. There was a dripping sound, and it wasn’t coming from the outside, it began to sound like the shower was running… A small waterfall had issued from the a/c vent and was splashing merrily onto the floor. Our own private water feature. Very Feng Shui. The staff had already shifted to night crew; a younger lady with very little English. She happily moved us to the room next door, while not really understanding why. (We know this because the next morning an Ozzie couple ended up in the same room, with the same issue- they moved as well.)
The weather cleared enough to find an early evening snack. It is food stall territory. For those who 
don’t know our love and attachment to food stalls, a brief catch-up: Thais are consummate grazers. They eat all day. Little snacks, meals, treats, and drinks are spontaneous deeds throughout the day. Enterprising Thais have custom sidecars on their scooters with burners, ice chests, small canopies, and whatever specialty implements are needed for their specific foodstuff. In the evening, when main stores close, they pull up on the sidewalk. During the day, some will always be found just parked somewhere. Some are “semi-permanent” with little tables and a son/nephew/cousin waiter. (In almost all cases, women own, run, and handle all the cash in the stall). Just like diners in the States, look for the busy ones. There will be a Pad Thai specialist (or two…), a fried rice stall, a crispy roasted and fried things stall, Things We Haven’t Figured Out Yet stalls, and the Interestingly Prepared Seafood stall. We are suffering form sticker shock… the last time we were here, you could get a fresh plate of chicken Phad Thai for THB 25 (about $0.60 US). Due to market forces, the same plate of Phad Thai now costs THB 30 (about $0.87 at current exchange rates). We will need to seriously analyze our food budget…
Railay [Rye-lay] Beach is only accessible by boat. It is part of the mainland, however the approach terrain is rugged, and it is not economically viable to tunnel. Not to mention it would totally destroy 
the appeal of the place anyway. It, Ton Sai [Tone-Sigh], and Phra Nang beaches access the premier climbing walls in Thailand. All were hit by the Tsunami, though none had the same level of destruction as Phuket and Phi Phi. Longtail boat taxis provide the transport service for everything from people to pre-cast cement septic pipes. Before (PT) a partially organized “pack” of longtail drivers would tout you as you walked towards the beach. If 
you wanted a boat, they sat you down until there was a minimum of eight people and off you went. At the end of the trip you handed the driver 50 Baht per person. Done. Easy, efficient, effective. The unstoppable march of progress has added a level of bureaucracy to the process. Now, you walk up to the ticket booth, and for 60 Baht (120 with return) buy tickets. THEN you walk to the staging area and sit and wait for at least eight people to load a boat and travel. All the drivers have blue and gold shirts identifying 
them as the Ao Nang Longtail Drivers Club. It works, and I’m sure it wouldn’t stay this way if the drivers weren’t keen on it. We both liked the old way better.
Railay still has just a few scars from the wave. A few piles of rubble mark the locations where buildings were not rebuilt. Otherwise development has been keeping pace with progress… More than a few new “resorts” have implanted themselves into the surrounding hillsides. They look nice, and do seem to work with the surrounding jungle. King Climbers (Railay.com), our primary climbing shop had moved within the YaYa Resort complex and there were now six or seven additional other shops instead of three. We picked up the latest climbing guide and had a bit of a walk-about. After a pair of icy-cold big beers we started the return-to-Ao-Nang process. The blue & gold shirted drivers could be found huddled together over a three-card poker game. Lots of Baht flying around. We said “Ao Nang! -Ao Nang!”, the secret words of travel. Two of the group smiled and indicated a spot of shade and replied, “wait”. Two English blokes were there, and had apparently been waiting a while. We had not prepared… No books, No beach mat, no swimsuits. It is indeed the low season. We wait just under an hour when a group of Japanese tourists are ready to leave. Lesson learned: Pack time-occupying stuff. For the record, our longest wait will end up being just less than three hours. We were well prepared for that one.
It is the actual seasonal cusp as well and has left many climbing walls of our skill level exposed to direct sun throughout the day. This particular direct sun beats straight down upon our 9 degrees 
north latitude with very little concern for our northern European roots. Reaching for the next bolt/sling results in a small torrent of sweat that begins at the finger joint and results in a visibly moving stream by the armpit. Gross? Yes. A hindrance? Yes. A motivator to get to the rock really early? Absolutely. Kimberly observed an actual sweat cataract gushing along JD’s spine by the second move of a moderate climb. “Ewwwwww” is the word of the day. The smell of the day too…
We made it a point to be on one of the first longtails over to Railay the next morning. We arrived at the wall about 8:30. If we could get to the beach at 7:00, we might make the next earlier boat. Not likely to happen, but it’s a thought. The first climb of the day is a moderate 5 (5.8 Yosemite). 12 meters, not technical, but a fun climb nonetheless. JD has more mass than KK. Enough so he can lift her easily with a lead fall, and often times, just coming over a shelf while descending. She will often sit with her feet against the wall to minimize this. The heat, humidity and sand combined to cause an exceptional amount of heat to be generated in her belay device. A new combination of rope friction and equipment heat prevented her from controlling his decent speed… JD got to drop the last ten to twelve feet of his belay (luckily into the sand of the beach.) He was not happy. KK was, if you could imagine, less happy. Beside herself with guilt and worry, she was in quite the state. She, for all intensive purposes, dropped her hubby off a cliff. Adding to the issue, two or three climbing classes were at the rock. At least a dozen brand new climbers and their instructors saw someone dropped on belay. JD had a minor ankle tweak and a small knee glitch. He was functional, but not feeling overly forgiving at the moment. Maintaining a Thai attitude of Jai Ren (Cool Heart), he did not lose his mind. The instructors, in a very Thai fashion, where concerned, but could not offer assistance unless asked. We quietly packed up our gear and moved to a different wall. Two climbs just to demonstrate we could and it was time to relax and assess.
To help assuage her guilt pangs, KK needed an order of mango sticky rice. That, and a few beer 
Changs can always assuage what ails you… KK had the rice, JD had the Changs. We where prepared for the Longtail wait this time. Books, beach mat, cash for the beach snack vendors, sun block. JD watched the card game for a while, trying to figure out how it was played. No luck. He figures another couple of months of Thai language and he might get it.
A day off was in order. Ao Nang has an OK beach, a bit rougher than Railay. Visibility isn’t as good, and there are more issues with Longtail emissions. We found an excellent small restaurant (Big food stall). Perpetual Happy Man, a beverage vendor here during our last visit, still had affordable drinks, and was right next door to a great fruit shake/roti vendor. Some balcony time 
watching the daily commuters on their scooters is always good for a chuckle. The scooter is the family sedan of Asia. Literally an entire family, plus the occassional pet, stacks up on a scooter and of they go. A couple of massages (Helga and Ingrid- the little Thai ladies can really fold you into different origami shapes…) rounded out the day.
Back to the Wall of Shame. KK, while not completely keen on her belay device, manages to belay
her husband with the same solid technique she has displayed these last three years. A few climbs and it becomes HOT damn HOT. Off to the Longtail waiting area. We are totally ready for a long wait, and not disappointed. Almost three hours. It’s all good. Little Muslim boys selling beer out of coolers, pineapple vendors, snack vendors, even people willing to shave your feet for a few Baht. The longtail drivers recognize us by now. “Ao Nang Ao Nang” is the birdcall of the day.
We have found a great DVD vendor. Some “real”, most pirate. You can’t buy a licensed DVD anywhere in Asia, even if you tried. THB 100 ($2.90 US) for ANY movie, in theaters or not… Buy five, get one free! This particular vendor has exceptional English. We use him as our personal Thai language instructor. Money well spent. We learn proper pronunciation of numbers, a few new greetings and departures, and he is in general a funny guy. (We picked up over three days, in no particular order: Blades of Glory, Constantine, The Departed, Over the Hedge, Little Miss Sunshine, Tom Yung Goong (The Protector), Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, For Your Consideration, and Rocky Balboa.) The DVDS player in the laptop is very good.
Weather was iffy the next day. Another hang around Ao Nang day. A cute little tout for massage approached KK. We decided to see her deal. Turns out she was the actual owner of a beachfront massage platform in a beachfront massage platform zone. More or less about twenty different 
massage “huts” on the Eastern edge of the Ao Nang beach. We both had a foot shave and scrub, as well as massage. It will never cease to amaze us what you can do with ten dollars here…Post massage was a new food stall with tables. Absolutely fabulous. Next to it was the “Volks Bar”, a streetside “bar” built from an old Volkswagen van. The top lifted, and the side windows opened. Three little tables, and the fullest cocktail menu ever seen. Good pours as well.
We manage another day of climbing. We think it‘s time to move to Phi Phi (Pee-Pee) island. We’ll 
shift locations the day after tomorrow.
We have our ‘Best Day Ever” here. An early Longtail to Railay and then kayak rentals. We paddle 
around to Phra Nang Beach: A loop around a few nearby karsts (The big limestone monoliths that pop up out of the sea), and cave explorations then onto the beach. This area is accessible by a hike over from Railay, but this is definitely the way to go. Princess cave and Tum Choee wall are a short walk from the end of the beach. We watch a few climbers, including an amputee who is missing the distal half of his right arm. We will never again complain about lacking holds during a climb. We paddle over to TonSai beach, home of the 6b+ to 8c overhang climbs ( 5.10d to 5.14). Some of the most challenging climbing on the planet. Lunch on the beach 
allows observation of a few highly skilled climbers working the routes.
A delicious food stall dinner, a cocktail or two, and we prepare for the morning journey to Phi Phi Island. While Ao Nang has indeed changed, it is still an enjoyable stop on our journey.
04–20 April: Cairns-Port-Brissie
Off the boat and learning to walk on solid ground. KK picked up a nasty sinus thing; we think it was 
a combination of nasty carpet and nasty A/C ventilation on the boat. Our hostel is across the street (and railroad tracks) from the “mall”. A mall like millions of others: Movie theater, food court, Scotch Tape store, etc. There is, however, a chiropractic clinic as well. We are excited to see it is a Gonstead practitioner (Gonstead is a type of chiropractic technique, one that we both use). We know there will be actual chiropractic tables. We wander in to introduce ourselves and borrow a few minutes of table time. The Doc is not in, but the staff rings him up to make sure it’s ok for us to intrude. It’s all good, and we get to adjust each other properly for the first time in weeks!
We are heading north to “The Daintree”. The Daintree North Conservation District is the national park rain forest section of the far north of the York Peninsula. It is where the rain forest runs right into (literally) the Coral Sea.
We are staying at Crocodylus, a safari-tent hostel built into the rain forest. It is amazing; scout camp with much better showers and a pool. There is a self-guided 2.5k trail through the jungle. Every hour or so it rains about ten to twelve minutes. Good jungle rain. Heavy enough you need to pay real close attention to hear someone speak. The 
tents and awnings are in top shape, and no leaks to tinkle in your cheerios. The post rain susurrus (I’ve waited years to use that word in a sentence!) is accompanied by the plink and plop of the jungle canopy releasing the water that didn’t make it through initially.
The jungle is everything that movies and TV make it out to be and more: Chirps, whoops, screeches, clicks, crunches and any other number of sounds in constant flux. Dense greenery abounds. Liana vines can grow upwards of a 
foot a day, and individual vines can reach ¾ of a mile in length. The flora and fauna are not Disneyesque… Almost every plant has another that it will crush, strangle, poison, suck-the-life-out-of, or just otherwise prevent from using the resources it wants for itself. This is not Fantasia with fairy nymphs and dancing buttercups. It’s Little Shop of Horrors, complete with life-size Audreys, and others that make even her seem downright kittenish. Pitcher plants, saprophytes, and all kinds of opportunists co-mingle and compete. When one is trying to walk through the jungle one particularly annoying plant is the Wait-a-While, or Lawyer Plant. Let your imagination work that for a moment… OK- it is a living, or even dead, vine-like tendril. It can be as thin as a spaghetti strand or up to the thickness of a phone cord and be any 
length. (I know there are Gen X/Yer’s reading this that will have no idea what a phone cord even is… Google it.) It is LIBERALLY covered in tiny, incredibly strong sharp barbed thorns. These things will hook anything silly enough to touch them. Think velcro with attitude. Once one has you, you immediately stop, slowly back up, and delicately unhook whatever article of cloth, pack, hat, glasses or anatomy that has been ensnared. The real trick is too not draw too much blood while maneuvering a highly flexible bit of vine that will be just as happy to puncture you as much as your stuff. As mentioned before, even a dead one has the ability to grab on.
Then there is the Strangler Fig family. This particular tree-vine species is a special kind of nasty. It is beautiful to look at, and gives the illusion of symbiosis with its “support” tree. A seed will find a nice treetop and drop a root to find soil. This root will have shoots grow off laterally to wrap the tree. A vine may actually start in the earth and climb, usually in a spiral pattern. If it travels out a branch, or the tree leans, it lowers a tendril. Once this tendril finds earth, it thickens into an additional root-trunk. As the fig matures, it thickens and toughens. The python of the plant world, it slowly squeezes the host tree into nothingness. As the host tree decays, it continues to feed the fig. This might take decades, or even centuries.
Wild pigs and cane toads are noxious introduced species. Both are responsible for the elimination 
of untold indigenous niche species, and are all but impossible to control. Wild pigs were originally farm pigs. A few escape and a century later you have feral pigs that are completely in touch with their inner savage. Wild pigs have recently discovered the delicacy of turtle eggs. The nesting grounds on the Cape York Peninsula have been decimated this year (Luckily turtles run a regular breeding cycle. Unfortunately they already barely keep ahead of attrition. Check back a couple of posts for Mon Repos in Bargara.) Over 10,000 pigs have been culled this year with little obvious change in environmental impact. Our little walk in the woods passes over dozens of pig “routs” along the trail.
Cane toads are another bad idea gone worse… Originally from South America, cane toads had been brought over to Oz in the 1930’s to help control some sugar cane pest. Cane toads are so toxic that snakes die before they can swallow one. Crocs won’t eat them, and any other creature that tries, dies. The bug they were supposed to eat lives 3 to 5 feet above the ground in the tops of the sugar cane. Cane toads are big fat beasties that are as big as a grapefruit and live on the ground… Let logic direct you to the effectiveness of this particular biological pest agent. To make matters worse, cane toads eat anything, and I mean anything, that moves and will fit into their mouths: Frogs, birds, snakes, small mammals, anything but other cane toads. They have spread throughout Queensland, and are working their way into the surrounding states as well. It is not a good thing.
The toad population growth curve was held somewhat in check by an active, voluntary Queensland-wide eradication system. Nighttime drivers would aim for toads in the road. Gardener/golfers would walk their yards with a five-iron and practice their swings. Amateur (and I’m sure some pro) cricketers would practice batting skill sets. While sounding messy, the toads’ ends were swift. An animal rights group pushed for legislation making it illegal, and a finable offense, to intentionally kill a cane toad… and it went through. The only legal way to kill a cane toad now is to capture it, place it in a baggy, put it in your freezer, and then bring the hibernating toadsicle to a disposal center. Needless to say this has resulted in an incredible explosion in the toad population, and a proportionate loss in native species. Who wants a freezer full of toadsicles every night?
DEET is the tropical north cologne of choice. Is it good for the skin/body? Nope. Is it relatively harmless? Nope. Is it effective? Absolutely. We gave the natural repellents more than a fair go. They actually seemed to be attractants. Especially to sheep. Since dengue fever is still a regional concern (Two new cases in Townsville as we were passing through), and being eaten alive by any number of winged nasties takes the fun out of the outdoors, we broke down and used a DEET based repellent. A local one, made here in QLD as a matter of fact. It is highly effective, giving us each a personal cone of protection. Things will orbit, but never land. A little bit goes a long way. What went wrong with DEET environmentally in the 70’s was the “more-is-better” application of gallons repeatedly to flora and wetlands. A few strategic controlled-volume sprayings would have 
been more effective, and without the food-chain concentration disaster that occurred.
We traveled until the sealed road ended at Cape Tribulation. Still 130 kilometers short of Cooktown, the rest of the way is four-wheel territory. Our hire car is nice, but it doesn’t have a FWD or a snorkel, both of which are necessities for that particular trip. Snorkels are extensions of a cars air intake system; commonly capped black tubes the run up the edge of the windshield. This prevents water from getting sucked into the engine when driving through rivers, creeks, streams, 
ponds, puddles, etc. In the wet, any road in QLD can become one of the latter. We stopped off at Daintree Ice Creamery on the way back. They specialize in exotic local fruit ice creams like 
jackfruit, mango, lychee, mangosteen, etc. They also have a wonderfully rare mascot. A Golden Orb Weaver spider has built a nest on their porch. This is the one very big spider. Her abdomen alone was the size of a large plum tomato. In her defense she was pregnant. Five very tiny males were along the periphery of the web, waiting, and no doubt in quivering anticipation, to become snacks.
Kimberly discovered first hand (literally first finger or her kitchen finger as she loves to call it…) that
even the little creatures are not interested in avoiding conflict. Our little tent-cabin was set up with bunk beds. She was bottom bunk. We had come to grips with the walnut sized cockroach we shared the space with, and even got used to the mystery scratching and skittering along the tent walls during the night. Kimberly is an active sleeper, and that was enough to annoy our here fore unknown bunkmate. In the wee hours of the morning JD is awakened by a loud clear pronouncement: “Honey, Something Bit Me”. JD, figuring mozzie or sandfly groggily looks over the edge of the bunk. KK has the headlamp pointing at her bloody finger. It was bleeding well, and KK was incredibly calm, all things considered. We washed the fingertip with JD’s peroxide based contact solution. KK had been 
dreaming her finger kept getting pinched in a sliding door, until the door slammed closed. While sleeping she stuck her hand behind the mattress, into the nest of a melomys. A melomys is a jungle mammal about twice the size of a field mouse. The poor little bugger, scared by the intruder, tried to give a hint or two by giving little nibbles at the giant thing that invaded its home. After that proved ineffective it gave a chomp. That worked spectacularly. KK, fully awake now, moved up to the dining area to read and have a coffee. JD unsuccessfully tried to sleep some more. Every time he was on the edge of REM, he would imagine something crawling along a limb… When KK came down to check on him, he had managed to completely mummy wrap himself in the top sheet, much to her delight.
Even with the bloodthirsty fauna, the jungle was a wonderful experience. We traveled back to civilization to enjoy Easter in Cairns- a nice traditional seafood meal on the waterfront. Oz, like NZ, has the public holiday surcharge. It also has the restaurants willing to suck it up. We chose one of those. Our servers were fun, and the meal delicious. A brief wander through the Night Market led us past the Chinese Massage businesses. You are touted in for the 30-minute full-body seated massage, only $15! Of course the therapists find a few really tight areas that need the special herbal patches, at $5 a pop. JD had four; KK had six, plus a pack to put on tomorrow. The aroma was Eucalyptus/Menthol/Camphor. Quite the bouquet in our little hostel room. Thai massage only two weeks away!
Christine flew in from Melbourne to join us at Mal & Leoni’s in Port Douglas. (Dougie, Port Dougie, or to the real locals: Port) Port is one of the last accessible bastions of civilization in the far north. It is a resort area, still in the growth phase: full time pop about 5,000. The residents have managed to keep building managed and controlled in such a way as to not lose the character of the town. Quite a few movies have been filmed here, most recently “Fools Gold” with Matthew McConaughy. Actor Heath Ledger, one of KK’s favorite voices, was from here as well.
Recreationally there is 4-mile beach, a great stretch of sand and surf, as well as a smattering of golf courses. Mal & Leoni have a great place on the top floor of a commercial building. Leoni welcomes many of the local critters: froggies, geckos, sunbirds and such make their homes on her 
lanai and porches. Cane toads have done such a number on the local tree frog population that a local woman has set up a protected breeding program. She provides fertilized frog egg clusters to willing participants to let hatch and set up residence in gardens and greenery. Leoni had a hatching of white-lipped tree frogs not too long ago. A few still like to visit the lanai regularly.
One froggy in particular seemed to be species confused… In the early morning hours Christine became aware of a rhythmic drumming on her abdomen. Assuming it was a moth or some other flying pest she turned on her light to deal with the intruder. Much to her surprise and dismay it was a large green tree frog using her belly as a personal trampoline! She maintained her cool, removing said froggy back to the lanai. She noticed the hole in the screen door it had used to gain entry and promptly 
barricaded it. Thoroughly. With tissue, paper towels, furniture, anything handy. The next day she took a needle and heavy thread and performed an admirable thatching job. Only the tiniest of frogs would be able to enter her sanctum at this point… The next night, on a whim, JD checked the lanai. Sure enough, a different little froggy was maintaining vigil outside Christine’s door! Much to everyone’s (except Christine and KK) delight, it immediately hopped into the room when the door was opened. It landed on KK who inexplicably went into girly-girl mode, she still isn’t sure why, she grew up in the woods after all… JD promptly rescued the poor little froggy, who happily climbed up his arm, across his ear, and perched atop his head contentedly.
The Wet has been overstaying its welcome up north. The rains continued to be 
frequent, and sometimes persistent, during most of our stay. It has limited beach time, however trips to the Tablelands and a hike through the Mossman Gorge are relatively dry.
One of the hotels in Port hosts a Monday night Hold ‘em poker tournament. JD and Mal decide to sit in. It was very casual… $5 buy in gets you a large pile of chips. Prizes were drink vouchers and food credit. It was a much more casual game than JD was used to. The people were fun, and there were more than a few characters in the bunch. JD lasted about an hour and a half. (Note to his poker buddies: He lost an all-in on an outside straight draw with a pair of sixes to a pair of eights… “Billing” at its finest.)
Chief amongst the local denizens are the salt-water crocs. These saurian survival machines choose to ignore (or maybe just don’t believe) that man is the theoretical top of the food chain. They are fairly common in the region, and you definitely don’t swim or walk along certain sections of stream and beach. In general, you respect them by staying out of their creek and off of their mud-bank, and they won’t eat you. Just like in Florida, a lost ball on the golf course should just stay a lost ball… Take the stroke and drop a freshie. Is your arm worth a $4 Titelist?
Driving the sealed roads through the cane fields also has adventure potential. Mal shared this little tidbit: He was cruising along and startled a large Tai Pan (Usually in position 1 or 2 as the most venomous and cantankerous snake, depending on your resource) lying across the road. Most snakes bothered this way would haul ass into the bush. This particular specimen opted to try and bite the “eye” of this most annoying mechanical beast. The snake, in the lightning fast way that they do, struck the driver’s side window, inches from Mal’s head… The blow was so loud; Mal had difficulty hearing for quite some time afterward.
This is apparently not an unusual story. Mal had another similar event with a different species of snake as well. In both cases the lesson was: “Always have you’re A/C on and your windows up when driving the far north”.
Not everything in the tropics tries to damage you. There are any number of critters that happily go 
about their business without caring about man, one way or another. In the bush (here read: Jungle) Lace Monitors, lizards only 2 meters long, will cozily walk through the lower level of your home and other creatures 
are truly just going about their business and trying to survive. Sometimes they end up in your house or garage. Just show them the door, and most will happily saunter/flap/hop/slither/ or crawl out.
While the weather was not optimum, the visit to Port was excellent. There was a certain calm before the storm. The “season” begins in the next few weeks. Port is part of Oz’s Florida. As the southern climes cool off, people head north to warm up (Remember this Antipodal thing, it’s all upside down) and Port is a prime destination. We have a few days in Brissie (Brisbane) before Thailand.
Gil is our host in Brissie. We met him and Vanessa on the ’04 cruise as well. Sadly he and Vanessa have parted ways since then, though we did get to visit with both of them during our stay. Gil was our master negotiator during off-ship forays during the cruise. He would regularly get taxis and shop keepers to inconceivably low rates.
Gil has a “groodle”, a cross between a golden retriever and a standard poodle. Her name is JD… When they got the dog, the breeder needed a name for the registration and they had just been looking at photos from the sailing cruise… JD is sure some distilled beverages were involved as well.
The plan is to see the Gold Coast to round out this Oz trip. Byron Bay was the top of the list. From all accounts we have heard, Surfers Paradise has lost all character and is just one long Oceanside hotel condo. Gil was gracious enough to lend us his car for the day. JD really enjoyed cruising around in a right hand drive BMW M3. JD figured it would be months before he drives again, and was happy/giddy/exuberant/thrilled to “circulate the fluids” in Gils car. 
Truthfully, driving Gils car virtually circulated JD’s fluids.
Morning coffee while walking the beach at Coolangata allowed an unobstructed view of Surfers Paradise to the north. SP could have been lifted from any part of the east coast of Florida. Coolangata is rapidly being developed, but it hasn’t hit saturation yet. Another 45 minutes down the road brought us to Byron Bay.
Byron Bay is home to the easternmost point on the continent of Oz. A 
lighthouse guards the bluff, and a few kilometer long trail takes you to the beach and rocks that are the currently boundary between land and sea. Geological tidbit: 10,000-20,000 years ago, the coast was another 75 or so kilometers out, during the last ice age… Sea levels were about 100 meters/380 feet lower than today.
It is another beach destination along the Queensland/New South Wales coast. There was a 
wonderful organic restaurant just a block off the beach. After a walk about amongst the shops we head inland to Nimbin.
I know I have mentioned Leavenworth, Washington before. Leavenworth was a logging/mining community in the eastern Cascade Mountains. In the late 60’s the tress were all cut, and the mines played out. The city council and businesses dreamt up a Bavarian theme village. It required EVERY business to participate for 
it to work. They all did, and it did work. Leavenworth thrives year round on outdoor recreation and tourism.
I mention this to set the stage for Nimbin. Pot (marijuana) is the focus of the entire community. There are hemp museums, any number of Amsterdam style cafés, head shops, oldddd hippies hanging out with a good buzz on, and festivals and parades throughout the year. Please remember pot is still very illegal in Oz, though it is my understanding that this particular community gets a good “Schultzing” (“I know nutink! I see nutink!”) from law enforcement.
Thursday is spent preparing for our Thailand departure. Rearranging of packed stuff, culling of unneeded kilos, and the hunt for books for the 9.5 hour flight.
Friday is flight day. Oz began the “100 mL fluids/1 liter baggie” rule this month for international flights. At least in Oz the officials walk amongst the international terminal announcing the rules and supplying a free regulation baggie. The gal at the counter was mildly confused by our Thai tourist visa, and had to check with her supervisor to make sure we did not indeed need an outbound ticket. After breezing through immigration control we had a bite and tried to spend the last of our Ozzie currency.
Next stop: Thailand.
Oz tidbits:
Kilometers Driven: 6,800+ (about 4,400 miles)
Kilometers Flown: 3,300
Kilometers Train: 1,000
Photos Taken: 2,642
Days in-country: 60
Gelato’s eaten: 46 (each)
Average UV index: 12
# of states visited: 5
Average gas price: AU$1.20/liter ($3.69/gallon US)
Percentage of Oz seen: Less than 10%
KK’s favorite (and only…) Ozzie word: Buggah!
Number of times mistaken for Canadian: Uncountable
Number of times recognized as from the states: ZERO
on rare occasions the 10:00), is the SAME boat that is the 9:00 Railay ferry to Phi Phi. One boat, two locations: space-time continuum hole? Magic dust? Nope. Thaime! The boat leaves at 9:40, stops at Railay around 9:55, and heads off to Phi Phi for an “11:00” arrival. Along the way Chicken 
Island is off the starboard side. Approaching from the north you can clearly see the “chicken head” pillar for which the island is named. As you come even with the island it becomes distinctly phallic. We can only imagine “Big Wanker Island” wouldn’t have the same family appeal as a tourist draw…though you never really know.
actual happy residents? They are also still there: just further off the paving stone paths. What cannot be rebuilt are the ages of character that are absorbed by a place. I’m sure that over time a new character will develop. For us there is a sense of mourning for that which was, while adapting to and exploring that which is now .
(5.8 Yosemite) and pissed at least a liter of water from his elbows on the way up. Rappelling is the new way down. KK is pleased to not have to lower JD’s bulk, and JD likes to rap anyway. Makes him feel “Commando”, and not in a Kramer way… A rope-gun (guide) is with a couple on a nearby route. An English bloke. He lets us know the sun swings past the face after noon, and the rock cools quickly after that. His client’s head down and he pops into a conveniently placed hammock for a lunchtime siesta. His next group will arrive in about an hour.
hillside wood and thatch huts, built on stilts. The room had fans, and a full mosquito net covering the bed. A large lanai with a low sitting table and cushions rounded out the picture. Happy Hour on the Lanai was born. Phi Phi, being the party-friendly hamlet it is, has a number of stores and stalls to purchase beverages and snacks. They also sell drinking kits: A small ,or large, beach bucket, a flask size bottle of liquor (a full size bottle for the big bucket), a small bottle of herbal liqueur, and a can of soda/tonic/mixer. All you need to do is fill the bucket with ice and dump everything else in, put in the provided straw- Instant Party! We tried a mix of SangSom Thai rum, “White Shark” herbal liqueur (that’s what JD 
calls it- The label is completely in Thai with a white shark logo), and a lime soda. It was really quite tasty and refreshing. During Happy Hour the PM thunder boomers rolled in. Cocktails and 500-bid ,our card game of choice, amidst the hiss crackle and boom of a monsoon season storm. A perfect way to unwind after a long day of… well, maybe unwind isn’t the right word, a perfect way to de-stress? Loosen up? OK, it’s just fun to hang on the porch, have a cocktail and play cards. We did go climbing after all, which was sort of like work. Exertion anyway. Who says work can’t be fun too?
et, people watched and had a general lazy day of it. People watching in Thailand easily competes with people watching in Vegas. Different cast of characters, but always something interesting walking, riding or ambling by.
breeding cycle to the full and new moons. It is the day before the full moon. We had only really noticed evening and night hatches until now… Mid afternoon was a cloud of a different color altogether. Tens of thousands of winged things were flitting, flopping and darting everywhere. Mostly they seemed to be a large ant or small termite like beastie. Lots of different varieties though. Significantly more than just an average swarming. Toads, frogs, lizards and geckos were having an absolute feast day. Normally nocturnal and cautious, they didn’t care if you went eye to eye. A couple of the hoppers just sat in one spot 
spinning in circles. No matter which way they faced, there
was more food! JD spotted a huge variegated gecko on the hut wall, easily 10 inches long (25cm). He (the gecko) was a cooperative poser. The second wave was around 10 pm. Even the mozzie net was breached, overwhelmed by shear numbers. The critters were not biters, but even a benign bug is going to wake you up crawling across your neck and face. Sleep was not deep and restful this particular evening.
ur 15th wedding anniversary was greeted by AM thundershowers. After brekkie, KK decided she wanted a pedicure for her present, then we both had Thai massage, and dinner at Pum Thai restaurant. Since we haven’t had the chance to spend much time together, it was good to become reacquainted…
About a 100 steps up a sign points to a level area for the tsunami congregation area. We continue on for another few hundred to the first viewing area… then up the steep path to the top of the mountain. The views are indeed exceptional.
for any reason. Yelling at a person demonstrates a complete lack of self-control. However… If someone has you that pissed off, it is perfectly acceptable to kick or swat the nearest available dog. Every dog in Thailand has been kicked or swatted at least once. You get to vent your frustration, the dogs really don’t seem to notice, and you have impressed whoever is watching with your deity-like self-control.
