chiang mai: songkran.

The trip back to Thailand was pretty exhausting.  On April 11th  we got a tuk-tuk from our hotel to the bus station, but the bus didn’t leave till 4 so we just had to sit around for what seemed like an eternity!  We had to just sit in the heat for ages and twiddle our thumbs while waiting for the bus to load and leave.  We got on a suuuuuper hot bus and were placed all the way in the back for the trek to the laos/thai border.  Once we crossed the border we had to wait til 8pm for the bus to Chiang Mai.  13 hours later we were finally had arrived!  We grabbed a songtell to our guest house, the little bird, which is located right in the middle of the old city by the eastern gate.  We dropped off our stuff and immediately left to go get food.  We went to this place called Mike’s and shoved our faces with hamburgers and French fries….did I mention it was only 10am?  After filling our stomachs we went out to buy some water guns so we could begin the madness of songkran!

Now the main reason we decided to come to chiang mai at this time was for this amazing festival called SONGKRAN.  April 12 – 15^th every year is Thai New Year, Songkran, and its celebrated with a nation wide water fight. Streets are lined with thousands of people armed with buckets and water guns as well as pickup trucks filled with trash bins filled with ice water and Thais dousing anyone they can reach!  It’s the craziest festival I’ve ever been to and it was amazing!  The Thais often take work off to celebrate and love having foreigners getting involved and I loved feeling like party of the Thai community.  One of the best parts of this festival is seeing the whole family getting involved…you see the dad’s driving the big trucks with all the kids piled in back with huge bins filled with water, while the mom is sitting in the front seat, window rolled down just a crack so she can get people too and so she can pass food back to the kids in the bed of the truck.  And people will use anything and everything to soak you….i mean hoses, buckets, water guns, water bottles—and they’ll hit anyone and everyone!  I got drenched by a little old thai lady, no mercy!  I’ve never seen anything like this and its hard to believe something like this exists!  The streets literally flooded with all the water that was being thrown into them!  I was lucky enough to make friends with this thai guy that let me take water from his huge trash bin—he even had a MASSIVE block of ice in it too so I was able to throw freezing cold water at everyone that passed me!

 The girls and I planned out our week by breaking up the songkran festivities with some other activities that we wanted to do while in chiang mai.  We spent one day ziplining up in the mountain jungles and it was AMAZING.  We opted for the all day tour and it was a great choice and it included 34 platforms and 22 ziplines.  We went with a company called Jungle Flight and our guides Yuti and JoJo.  They were hilarious and we had a blast with our group, which included about 6-8 other people.  There was this hilarious older guy from china in our group and he needed to be the poster guy for this program…he had the biggest grin on his face the entire day, he videotaped every zipline he went on and he was just screaming and cracking up the entire day!  Half the fun of the day was just watching him!  It was a great day and I’m so glad we found the time to fit this adventure into our trip!

Another day the girls and I decided to adopt elephants for the day!  We got picked up in the morning by the owner/elephant trainer, Wood.  He drove us out to his elephant reserve, which was about an hour outside of chiang mai in the hills.  There were 14 of us in the group.  When we got there Wood had us all change into these really cute outfits….long sleeved navy shirts and long navy pants—we were supposed to wear these to help keep us clean and to protect us from the sun during our day with the elephants, but really they just made us hot!  We were sweating so much the entire day.  Wood had us sit around this big table and he taught us how they train the elephants at his place.  Next he gave us pens and paper and gave us the commands we would be using with the elephants later that morning.

            Yok kah—leg up

            Suung—higher

            Bai—forward

            Toi—backward

            Yuut—stop

            Bao—slow down

            Kwaa—right

            Sai—left

            Bon son—open mouth

He gave us 10 minutes to memorize the words and we all scrambled to remember them—it felt like we were studying for an exam!  Finally he took us out to meet the elephants!  He introduced us to each of them and gave us a chance to feed them bananas and other fruit.  He then taught us how to climb upon to the elephants by stepping on their legs and holding on to their ear….its a LOT harder than you think!  We spent the rest of the morning practicing going in each direction with the elephants and using the commands the guide them, it was a little nerve wracking being on top of this huge creature and trying to control it with just your words and how you use your legs on the backs of their ears.  After practicing all the commands we headed back inside to eat a delicious lunch.  After lunch we climbed on our elephants and began our trek around the hillside.  WE had to sit 2 to an elephant so Alysha and I teamed up and we got to have Faa as our elephant for the afternoon.  I got to sit on the head of the elephant first and guide it using the commands we had practiced that day.  It was stressful and hard, but so much fun.  A few times Faa would sneeze and get her snot ALL OVER US. So gross, but kinda cute….i guess…We rode up to this little overlook place and took a break from the heat and rested for a few minutes before switching positions and Alysha got to lead Faa for the next part of the trek.  We walked to this little river where we got off and let the elephants cool off and play in the water while we got a chance to wash and clean the elephants.  It was fun to watch the elephants play in the water, the semmed like big dogs just playing and splashing around!  After bath time, we walked the elephants back their homes, gave them a kiss and drove back into town.  It was an amazing day and I now have a deep love for elephants :)

When we weren’t water fighting, ziplining, or playing with elephants, the girls and I spent our time eating delicious Mexican food at a placed called Miguels, shopping at AMAZING markets (Saturday walking street, Sunday walking street), getting massages from prisoners at a women’s jail, drinking delicious smoothies from our fruit lady, eating tons of khao soy, checking out the bars, and meeting tons of great people.  It was an amazing week we spent in chiang mai and I was sad to leave, but knew that I would be back soon with my parents in just a few short weeks!  We left Sunday night, April 17^th, and caught a night bus back to Bangkok, and from there we were headed for….CAMBODIA!

laos: in the tubing.

i love laos.

So on March 31^st we finally arrived in Vientiane LAOS!  We decided to stay here for a few nights…we were tired of buses and wanted to stay in once place before hitting the road again.  We wandered the streets around the river trying to find a decent, cheap place to stay for a few nights.  We found a nice little place next to this amazingly delicious restaurant/fruit shake place.  We ate a LOT of our meals here.  We were pretty exhausted after our long day of buses and border crossings so we just passed out for a while before heading out to grab some dinner.  We went to bed pretty early and woke up refreshed and ready to explore!  I have to say, Vientiane is probably one of the most livable capital cities I have been to.  It was easy to get around, enough stuff was in English to understand things, the people were SO NICE, and there were tons of bread/pastry shops everywhere!  Each morning we went this little Scandinavian bakery and shoved our faces with delicious chocolate croissants, fruit salads, and sandwiches.  After filling our stomachs we decided to take a tour of the city and check out its main highlights.  We went to one of the oldest wats in the city, saw the Victory Gate of Vientiane which is modeled after the Arc de Triomphe in France, and went down to the Mekong River to enjoy some Beer Laos while the sun set as we looked over the river into Thailand.  We booked tickets that night for the next day to head up to Luang Prabang, a town that sits up in the mountainous region of northern Laos. 

 

We had to be up and packed super early to be ready for our 7am bus ride.  It took around 10 hours to get to Luang Prabang, and it was the most miserable bus ride I’ve ever been on.  I would take the 24 hour bus from Vietnam to Laos over this bus ride any day!  It was just all winding roads, up these huge mountains, and although the views from the bus were beautiful with little bamboo houses perched up on the sides of cliffs, it was just suuuper uncomfortable.  I was so so happy when we finally got off the bus and caught a tuk-tuk to take us into the main part of town.  We walked around for a bit to find a place to stay and finally decided on a little hotel off the main road.  We dropped off our stuff and headed out for the night market.  Every night Luang Prabang shuts down the main street and turns it inot a night market filled with amazing food and crafts.  We went to a food stall that let you fill your plate up with an assortment of noodle and vegetable dishes for 10,000 KIP, so cheap!  After filling our stomachs we explored the market.  There were so many things I wanted to buy, but we decided to just look and scope things out before going back and actually buying them.  We ended the night getting delicious fruit shakes (watermelon and pineapple) and headed to bed.  Woke up the next morning and went to the same scandiniavian restaurant that we went to in Vientiane and then headed out to rent bicycles for the day.  We grabbed some sandwiches from a street vendor and set off on our bikes.  We were hoping to bike to a set of waterfalls we had heard about, but soon realized that it was further away than we thought.  The further away from the main road we got, the more rural the streets became.  We rode down some bumpy dirt rounds, waving at everyone who passed by us and taking in the beautiful countryside.  The roads got to be too much for our bikes so we turned around and rode through town to the river where we posted up and ate our sandwiches.  We spent the rest of the afternoon lounging around, hanging out by the river catching up on the internet and loving our A/C room and eating lots of sandwiches and shakes.  The next morning we woke up early and caught a songteau to the waterfalls!  We made the right decision not trying to bike there, it was quite the trek on a windy dirt road.  It took about 30 minutes to get there in the truck.  There were several tiers of waterfalls and they were gorgeous.  We swam at some of the pools and at one there was a rope swing so the girls and I took turns flying off of it into the water.  It was a great afternoon and we had a great time exploring the falls.  Right outside the waterfalls was a small sun bear sanctuary that had 8-10 sun bears!  They are adorable and we spent way too much time watching them play around.  It was our last night in Luang Prabang, which meant our last shopping opportunity so we hit the night market for our big shopping spree.  After a lot of deliberation I bought this amazing handmade blanket from a little old lao lady.  It’s purple and beautiful and I can’t wait to be home so I can use it!  

The next morning we woke up early and left for Vang Vieng.  There were tons of seats on the bus so we all spread out and passed out for most of the 6 hour bus ride.  We didn’t want to suffer through the bus ride like we did last time so we bought some OTC sleeping pills so we could just pass out and they worked amazingly!  Vang Vieng is a backpacker town and its main street is full of guest houses, bars, restaurants, internet cafes, tour agencies, western tourists, and various stands selling “In the Tubing” tanks and Ray Band sunglasses.  Vang Vieng is also known for its bars and restaurants that play episodes of “Friends” and “Family Guy” ALL DAY.  It’s so random, but we loved being able to watch “Friends” at every meal! Inner tubing down the Nam Song River is a popular attraction amongst backpackers.  The river is lined with bars selling Beer Lao and equipped with rope swings, zip lines, and large riverside decks.  We were able to meet up with Chelsea here and the 4 of us spent 3 days tubing down the river and having a great time!  The first day only Kianna and I went out to the river and we were able to scope things out and made some friends that we hung out with the next 2 days when we went tubing which was a lot of fun.  The river was pretty clear that day, but thanks to a big rainstorm that night, the river became super muddy and dirty for our next 2 days of tubing.  Unfortunately, the dirty water somehow made its way into my waterproof camera and it broke, so I wasn’t able to get many pictures while on the river, but I have memories that will last a lifetime!  Laos was probably my favorite country we visited during our travels.  So many good times there, the people were so friendly, the food was great….just an amazing experience!

  After our 5 nights in Vang Vieng we were ready to head back to Vientiane and spend a night there before we hopped on a bus on April 11th to Chiang Mai, Thailand for our next adventure….SONGKRAN!