Laurie's World

When you open a new blog post on this blog app, it says “share your story….” You start typing and it disappears as your characters appear. My story today is a sad one as I have to share why I’ve not been blogging. We flew to Chiang Mai on Sunday with so much excitement! This is the part of the trip I look forward to the very most! I had the very best intentions of catching up on my blog during the flight. And i did, then I left my iPad on the plane….I’ve never had a sick feeling like this in my entire life. I did not discover my error until 11 pm the day we arrived, so of course could not start the search until Tuesday morning. After a completely alertness night, I rushed to chiang Mai airport at the crack of dawn, only to completely lose my faith in humanity when I hear that my iPad has not been turned in.

It’s not the iPad, it’s the information contained on it that concerns me. All my passwords and access to every online account. Two years on brainstorming ideas for my classroom, photos, the U posted blog entries, everything in a stranger’s hands. It’s heartbreaking and stressful.
So I will try to recreate the experiences of the last few days and the missing entries from Au Nang, but it may be sparse, and there won’t be photos…..

Now-about today, woke up to another beautiful, hot day! We’ve had exceptionally great weather since arriving -really the whole trip. We think we are meeting Riam to go to Mae Hong song to see her father. When she isn’t arriving, we call and realize her father in law had difficult night so we can’t go out until tomorrow.

This is a photo of an iced coffee that I was able to purchase this morning for 20 baht (60 cents) from a thai speaking only street cart while we were waiting for Riam. I’m quite proud of myself being able to procure such a beverage in my limited Thai. Plus it was only 20 baht, how could this not make sense when I routinely pay between 60 and 80 baht for such a drink from a restaurant. Which is still such a good deal when I pay four dollars for this drink in a Thai restaurant at home. It’s all a matter of perspective, isn’t it?

We decide to go to tailor to have some clothes made! We’ve never had clothes made here and have known others to, so are giving it z try. Ian has a fellow he recommended, Landon used him last year, so we head off around 11am. Mr. Suvit over on Tapae Road. Our old stomping ground from the first couple years here when we stayed at Raming Lodge. We have NO idea what we are doing, it’s hard to imagine a shirt or pants made out of fabric that all you can see is a roll of. Poor troy, I had some fun wrapping him up in fabric trying to imagine it. We managed to negotiate what we assume are decent prices. Once again no idea what we’re doing. But we’re not paying more than we would pay in America. And presumably we will have clothes that fit us perfectly. What a novel idea.

With that “chore” taking care of, we head off to Wararot market. This is the local market that we go to at least one time each visit to get our list of must-have items secured for the trip home. Curty paste, dried mango, laurie’s coffee supplies etc.

Then on the way back of course we have a mandatory stop at the McDonald’s for a 20 baht soft serve cone. And a stop st the used bookstore to try to find a book for Landon, which I found out later was the wrong bookstore. No worries I have tomorrow!

Let’s be honest folks this is a lot of walking around, so after minimal discussion, the best course of action that we can come up with is of course, a massage! With T’s recommendation, we try a new spots. It ended up being an exceptionally good foot shoulder and back massage combo that I tried today. What a brilliant idea, and of course it left me wanting more of everything so I guess I’ll be going back there.

The massage place was just down the street from Ginny’s café, so we came back to have some supper. I have a yearly commitment to eat my way through the menu here, so tonight’s selection was chicken with cashew nut. Troy however enjoyed himself one Tes’s fabulous cheeseburgers and fries.. No judgment.😉

Try and Ian have gone off to watch a movie tonight at the big mall. It’s either Star Trek or Star Wars, I have no idea, and no interest. So I have decided to make the most of my free evening and try to catch up on the blog.

TTFN

I had such an awesome day. We got super lucky with another great weather day. Woke up around 7:15am and got myself set up with a coffee, then hit the breakfast room around 8. This is starting to be my pattern. Although not tomorrow as tomorrow is a moving day and I’m not sure how or why I thought this was a good idea, but I’ve booked us on a 9am flight 😳this means I will be setting my alarm I suppose. Perhaps it had something to do with wanting to be I Chiang Mai in time for the Sunday market, I’m not sure. I suppose I’ll be glad when it is said and done, but really 1pm is a most civilized time to fly I think.
Regardless, my day is shaping up nicely here. After breakfast we came up to Kim’s balcony and I spent some time catching up on my blogs. As you can see if you are reading this live, I didn’t get very far. I will go back and catch up and fix up when I get better internet. The Internet is slow here, so uploading pictures is PAINFUL. But I will try to get he chatter down and upload pictures when my connectivity improves. (Big techy word eh?)
Around 11 or maybe 11:30 Kim and I decide to hit the streets of Au Nang! Since she has been down with tummy troubles, she hasn’t been out much. She is feeling SO much better! So we suit up, sunscreen and bug spray up, grab our beach bags and head out, leaving troy to whatever his heart desires (time alone with his kindle😉)

We stopped and marveled at the trinkets along the way, then decided to stop and eat, as it was lunch time and all. We chose a place that has pizza as that seems like it meets the new tummy trouble dietary requirements of my friend Kim (as per the pharmacist that gave me the meds for her). We split a delicious thin crust Quattro fromigano pizza (4 cheese). Hey put blue cheese on 4 cheese pizza here….it really yummy. Might try it at home….
Then we hit the beach. We walked the length of the beach first, then on the way back found a spot that met both our sun and shade requirements. I’ll let you decide who needed which….I went out into the ocean and had to go a loooooonnnnngggggg ways before I was chest high in the water, it’s very shallow beach here. Perfect for play!! Regardless, it was peaceful and beautiful and I spent a long time out there just soaking up the view, trying to remember everything. Around 2:45pm, we decided to look for a massage. Quick text to troy determined he was up for such adventures himself, so he met us on the min street and we ended up walking all the way back to the other end of the beach for a massage in one of the beach huts in the beach. Nothing quite says massage at the beach than an outdoor foot massage with the sun, surf and sand. Best 200 baht spent of the entire day. We hung about a bit longer, troy and Kim had a beer and I had a coffee milkshake. YES, you read that right, it was a milkshake made of vanilla ice cream, a shot of coffee, chocolate chips and a big scoop of mocha ice cream plopped on top. That was the best 100 baht I spent today 😊😊
Then we decided it was time for supper….based upon the recommendations of Kim and I, Troy was up for going back to La Casa for another round of pizza. So we did that. Three thin crust pizzas and some water later, we were stuffed!
Then an absolutely stunning sunset walk on the beach back to our hotel, capped off an amazing day. 
Oh yeah, I think I’m driving Kim a little crazy with my penny pinching ways. We could have booked a car to airport in the morning for 500 baht if we booked it out on the street, but we forgot so asked the front desk, they are charging 600B, so I was annoyed and going to go back out to the end of the street to get it for 500B. Kim said absolutely not. For $3, she just wanted to get these guys to book it. I guess it’s true, but it still annoys me to overpay. It’s the principal 😉 maybe she will rub off on me, maybe I’ll rub off on her. Who knows, we have 2 more weeks to work on it! Maybe we will meet in the middle!

On our last full day in Thailand, we decided to take the public bus (we call it the chicken bus) to Phuket town. If for nothing else but the adventure. So it cost us 60B for the two of us to ride the chicken bus (vs 500b for a taxi). And we were off. It took probably about 45 minutes to get there as the driver went about 10 miles per hour until he was through Kata and Karon beaches. It was nice though as it is all open and there was a nice breeze being generated.

So we get there and there is only one other couple on the bus also tourists. We turn around and there are 2, what turn out to be very persistent taxi drivers. Seriously, there is no escaping this guy…he is determined to take us around. He says only 20 baht. So we know right away…he wants to take us to factories etc where he gets gas stamps…sigh. I make him promise only one stop and then we go where WE want. Yes…he promised!

Uh huh! After that one stop he starts asking for more stops…please….he begs us. He gets 2 liters for each stop…sigh. I just feel bad for the guy. And we are in a very nice SUV after all. So I agree to 2 more stops. And bonus…he said today was free for us. I did not have to pay him the 20B. OK…so that is about 70 cents. I am not really in this for the savings now am I?

I did ask him how much to take us to airport from Kata Beach? He said 600 baht. Now that is 200 baht less than what we could find from the taxi mafia in Kata. So at least that will make it all worth it.

Anyways…blah blah blah…we did a bunch of shopping and I got the last few things ticked off my list. He drops us back where we have been assured a bus will come and get us to go back to Kata Beach. There is another family (also tourists from South Africa) and they are waiting for the same bus we are. We all waited and chatted for well over half an hour, and no bus stopped to pick us up. We just gave up hope and flagged down a tuk tuk. The other guy negotiated us 400 baht for all of us to go back to Kata. We get in and lo and behold does the bus come. Oh well….we had a nice view of it as it followed us all the way back to Kata.

All part of the adventure….

Hi all. I know I said I would update on our big adventure on Monday! But I did not. Bad bad…

We did go on a tour of a bunch of different islands on Monday. We went to a place called James Bond Island. One of the James Bond movies was filmed there…kinda famous around these parts. We also went snorkeling/swimming at another island. We went kayaking in a very cool lagoon. We did not actually do the paddling. We pulled up to the lagoon in our speedboat and there were all these guys just bobbing around in the ocean waiting for us in their bright pink inflatable kayaks. They said only one time a day does a boat come with tourists this time of year. So it really felt like they were waiting JUST for us.

We had lunch at the unbelievable place that is totally built on floating piers. There were thousands of people ther and all we were brought there to do was eat. It actually poured rain while we were at lunch…so that was weird. But then by the time it was time for us to go, it had stopped. Anyway, it was a fun day. We both got sunburns (I so thought we were past that) but there is no protection out there on a boat in the middle of the ocean.

I must admit…I have been a bit remiss in updating. BUT what you must know is that I have done absolutely nothing to report….now while this must seem like an outrage to some of you…the rest of you will understand what total treat that is for me. To just do nothing. It was hard at first…I must admit! But I am slowly becoming accustomed to this feeling and will therefore find the real world back home a bit of a shock I know!

We get up around 9am…only because we need to haul our sorry behinds to breakfast by 10 am. Then we come back to room and hope to find that a small person wants to talk to us…so maybe we do that for a while. Then we may or may not go to the pool….or walk down the street to shop. Then if we have left the premises…we surely come by by 1 or 2pm and for sure then find ourselves in the pool with out books in hand. We stay there until we can prune up no more, then we clean up and find a place to eat supper. After supper…come back…maybe find an early riser from back home to talk to on the chat…and then maybe read some more and doze off….rinse lather repeat. See what I mean? I am in for a BIG shock aren’t I?

We are however going on a real tour tomorrow. So I will have something to say tomorrow night or the day after….stay tuned!

Due to my laptop dying a horrible death…i am trying an experiment. Blogging on the iPad. We will see how it goes. It might take me a sight longer and i can not put photos in…but i guess it is better than nothing. At least I can let folks know I am alive. : )

We made our way back to Kata yesterday…there sure is something to be said for an air conditioned car ride! We are staying at the Kata Palm Resort, which is where we stayed when we were inKata last year with the kids. So I was a little veclempted due to all the memories that came back. I sure do miss my kiddos!! You know who you are!! We did some wandering around and such…had some pool time. But other than…pretty low key. Same today actually. Hmmm…seeing a pattern!

We did walk up to the Red Chair tonight…fantastic inexpensive place. A bit of a hike…but totally worth it. On the way back we stopped at a fruit stand and bought a pomelo. The yummy citrus fruit thing that Riam introduced us to. So we have that for a snack tomorrow.

We are planning to walk to Karon tomorrow (if Bonnie and Terry can do it, so can we!) and deliver the card for Tony from Granny and Grandpa. We are loyal snail mail carriers : )

We went to the Riverside (Thanks for the tip Terry!)  for supper tonight, first night open in a month of being closed! Our good fortune!!

But alas found ourselves back at Nok and Jo’s for a banana split  : )

And me with my precious Alberta flag. So sad–no British Columbia flag for Troy–but we will have to fix that!

Got my game back today–we went out walking. Went down to Surin beach and while it was a very hot and sweaty walk–It was sure nice!! You just can not beat the beaches here…

For the last couple nights  we have gone to Nok and Jo’s. It s a restaurant/bar across from the hotel that is owned and ran by a Thai/Canadian married couple. Nok is the lady and she is Thai. Jo is Canadian and he is from BC/Alberta. So the place is full of Canadian flags and car plates and all kinds of stuff. It is built out of logs, like something from Jasper…makes me think of home  : )

So here we are–I look a little flush–that was a fever day i suppose…

As promised to Jackie–here are the pictures of Riam and her son we took Saturday morning before leaving Chiang Mai…His English name is Art.

Then also–here we are on our last morning at Na Thapae in Chiang Mai

More to follow…we are moving to Kata tomorrow…

For a couple of reasons, the blog has been unattended for a few days. One–the internet here is a little lacking. Second I have been a little under the weather. Discovered I had a fever on Saturday when we got here to BangTao beach. Fell into bed upon checking into hotel and have not gotten up much since. Fever is down but extreme exhaustion and headache persist. No worries–I am travelling with a wonderful caretaker  : )

I do not have any fun travel news to report. I do have some pictures from Saturday morning before we left Chiang Mai, but I think I will have to wait until tomorrow to post

TTFN

We packed up this morning and are catching a flight to Phuket at noon. Somehow i am having trouble getting all our stuff into the bags I brought. I thinking this must somehow be Troy’s fault! haha–I doubt it–but sounds better than saying it is something I have done…

We are staying 3 nights at The Kris in Bangtao Beach

http://www.thekrisresort.com

Just in case anyone needs to find us  : )

Here are a couple pix i took yesterday for you BK–same same BUT different!  hahaha