Thailand - New Year in Bangkok, blissful beaches and teaching English in Songkhla

We arrived in Thailand just before the end of the year and we spent New Year Eve in Bangkok on Th Khao San street – the main travelers’ centre. It was full of backpackers, locals, food stalls and buckets of vodka & redbull! New Year on Khao San was fun!!!!

We remember Bangkok as a cool place, always on the move, always something happening.

New Year Eve...

Drinking buckets of vodka!

Bangkok temples

Wat Pho (the Temple of the Reclining Buddha)

temples...

floating market, near Bangkok

.After Bangkok we set off to Ko Tao island (never take an overnight slow boat – too scary!!!) to chill on its white sandy beaches, as all of you know, Thailand is famous for its blissful beaches and crystal clean H2O.
Most of Ko Tao was crowded and super touristy but we were lucky to find a resort that was a little bit away from the “inn crowd”. We divided our time between exploring the island and super-chilling on the rocks by the sea.

Ko Tao

as above

Durian

Our next stop was famous Phuket. As Phuket town itself is quite a livable place (we definitely recommend “On On” hotel with its colonial style and its famous 38 – Leonardo Di Caprio room), the rest of the island was invaded by new-money tourism. We have visited Phuket twice – first and the last time.

Phuket town

No 38 Leonardo's room

.On our way to Malaysia accidentally we found ourselves in Songkhla. The town it’s located on the cape so no matter which direction you choose, after 20 minutes you are on the beach. What we really liked about Songkhla was its non-touristy style and the most friendly people that we met in Thailand. If you meet another backpacker there, it means he is either lost or looking for the off-beaten track places.
Believe it or not, I was teaching English at local elementary school, which was quite an experience. The classes were overcrowded, but luckily I had two Thai teachers to help me with the children. The kids were lovely, but I am glad it’s over!

To see some pictures from the school check the link below:

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/SzkolaUli
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In the meantime, Lukas fall in love with Tom Yam! Thank God it’s not a person, but a delicious soup! But he still gets dreamy eyes when I mention the name. ;-)
If you have any chance, try it!
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Songkhla

Songkhla by night

To see more pictures check the links below:

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/TajlandiaZdjeciaUli

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/PakbaraTajlandia

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/OstatniZachodSlonca

Cambodia - temples of Angkor, Cambodian wedding and Christmas on the island...

We divided our time in Cambodia between: Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville.
As all roads in Cambodia lead to the capital and it’s the best point to get cheap transport to most destinations so we had to spend some time there.

Local kids

Local delicatessen...

Eating fried snakes at local place

Sunset

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Siem Reap was really nice, relaxed place famous for its temples of Angkor. It was there where I met Thomas – 63 year old shaman from Uruguay, very interesting and easy going man. We were together exploring the temples and later on we were both invited by our tuk-tuk driver Hak for a wedding party of his best friend! Of course we accepted the invitation and the next day we were among Cambodians celebrating the new solemnized marriage. It was a bit different from the Polish wedding parties, but what was the same was alcohol! They drunk lots of beers but no-one was really drunk. There was also a band playing their typical music and everyone was dancing, me too!!! The only bad thing was that the party was over too quickly – by midnight (in Poland it’s usually till sunrise or even longer;-)!

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Below some pictures from temples of Angkor:

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Our third and last destination in Cambodia was Sihanoukville, at the seaside. It was just before Christmas and we were wondering where to spend it. Lukas got an brilliant idea to go to an nearby uninhabited island. He spoke with local fisherman and he offered to take us to the island and in 3 days take us back. Together with Nuno, Camilla, Monika, Zeb and Thomas - people we had met before in Phnom Penh - we set off for our exotic Christmas on the island. We took with us some food, fruits, plenty of water and beers. On the next day our fisherman, his name was Ti, brought us some fresh fishes, which we had to gut and cook in our focal point. They were the best fishes I have ever eaten!!! Far from civilization we spent the whole 3 days doing nothing, just chilling, swimming and sunbathing. We were all far from our homes and families, what is quite tough especially during Christmas time, but we manage to had great and memorable time.

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Nuno & Camilla

Monika & Zeb

Lukas watching sunset

Thomas and our X-mas bamboo tree

Me, relaxing in a hammock

Best fishes ever!!!!

On the last night Ti and his 2 friends came over to bring us some food and Mekong Whisky... We had really cool evening with our new local friends and Ti even invited us all for a dinner the next day. We met his family and spent another very nice evening.

With Ti and his family - wife At, daughter Lan and little Pia

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Our last night in Sihanoukville we spent with our friend Ti on his fishing boat. During the whole night we manage to catch about 20 squid and 4 fishes, but it was memorable night and the sunset was amazing.

Cambodia is one of our favourite countries with very open and friendly people, what makes this country so special...

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For more pictures check the links below:

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/KambodzaZdjeciaUli02

http://picasaweb.google.pl/Direktone/Kambodza

Laid back Laos

Our guidebook says that when travelers arrive in Laos they utter ‘aaahhh’ and that Laos is the Southeast Asia’s most relaxing country to travel in.

For the first few days we traveled with Roger, German guy with whom we’ve already been traveling from China. He was very nice and very organized and punctual (the last 2 are very uncommon in Asia…).
Our first stop was Luang Nam Tha, beautiful town surrounded by mountains and rice fields. The best way to explore the place was to hire a bicycle or scooter and drive wherever the way leads you. We rented 2 scooters and for the whole day we were visiting the nearby villages and other areas. The one we liked the most was hill tribe village, 10 km ride all the way up, almost on the top of the mountain. Its inhabitants looked very happy and relaxed, even though there was no electricity, no running water, things that we normally take for granted. All the kids came to us smiling and posing happily to our pictures. Nice place, nice people.

Typical Laotian house

Lukas and Roger

Children from the hill tribe village

as above

Woman from the hill tribe

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Our next stop was Luang Prabang, where we wanted to get by boat. We thought it’d be a romantic river trip along Mekong, but it turned out to be very tiring journey on a fully packed boat. There were more than hundred tourists, not really backpackers, but people in posh clothes, wearing perfumes and with 3 pairs of sunglasses… We felt a little bit out of place. Anyway, it was worth the hassle as Luang Prabang was a great place.

Waterfall, Luang Prabang

as above

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One day when we were thinking where to go next, Lukas read about huge, enigmatic jars of unknown origin that are situated around Phonsavan, so we went there.
The town itself has nothing special to offer, but in there we’ve learnt that Laos was one of the most bombed countries on earth!

As the guidebook says: “Between 1964-1973 the USA conducted one of the largest sustained aerial bombardments in history, flying 580,344 missions over Laos and dropping 2 million tons of bombs! Around 30% of the bombs failed to detonate, leaving the country littered with unexploded ordnance (UXO). The clearance started in 1994 but only a small percentage of UXO has been removed and it will take more than 100 years to make the country safe.”

I don’t think I have to add anything to that…

Plain of Jars

as above

Safe path labeled between those stones...

Locals use the war scrap to decorate their shops or restaurants

...or guesthouses

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For a few days we went to Vientiane.

Pha That Luang, Vientiane

Patuxai

Architecture
Buddha Park, near Vientiane

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Our last destination was very green and laid back Four Thousand Islands, where we took our time to chill in hammocks at the riverbank reading books and contemplating sunsets.

Four Thousand Islands

Temple

Sunsets

.To see more pictures check the link below:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Direktone/ZdjeciaUliLaos