TraveLLs

Last week the Thai teachers at Anuban Khon Kaen had a big retirement party for our top director.  They took all the Thai teachers up to Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai to do some shopping for the celebration.  This celebration lasted from Wednesday to Saturday, which meant we had three days off of school.  While I opted out of the invite to join them, I decided to use this luxurious five-day weekend to head up to Chiang Mai on my own. This trip marks the first, of what I hope to be many, adventure traveling on my own.  After talking with a few girls who had recently been up to visit Chiang Mai I decided to stay in the hostel called A Little Bird .  At only 100 baht a night it was a great place to meet other single travelers and book some great last minute tours. I took the night bus from Khon Kaen to Chiang Mai.  It left Khon Kaen at 8:00 pm and I arrived at A Little Bird at 8:00 am.  It was quite a bumpy, windy, and hot ride but after a long day a...

Last Friday was the Queen’s birthday.  In Thailand, the Queen’s birthday is Mother’s Day and the King’s Birthday is Father’s Day. After a long and awkward celebration on Thursday morning-where a random third grade class crawled in front of us on their hands and knees and sang a Mother’s Day song while bowing down to us at random intervals-we had a nice, long, three-day weekend.   The third grade class bowing to those who were very obviously not mothers. Instead of venturing off to the big city of Bangkok for some tourist destinations, my friend Ashley and I decided to go the opposite direction to Nakon Panom.  We found a nice home-stay in the country near the border of Laos.  We left Friday morning.  After a 4-hour standing bus ride we met up with John, the owner of the farm.  John was a nice man from the Lake District, England.  He met his wife, Wi, online 9 years ago after Wi had a major motorcycle accident in which she lost her 1...

This past weekend I decided to meet up with some girls in Khao Yai National Park.  We stayed one night in a place called Bobby’s Apartments.  With our stay we bought a half-day tour that included visiting the natural hot springs and the bat caves for 300 baht, which is only 10 dollars!     After a very successful 3-hour bus ride (these are becoming more common after the initial disaster of a bus ride) I arrived in Pak Chong just outside the national park where Bobby's Apartments is located.  We ate some lunch and relaxed until it was time to pile in the back of a pick up truck to venture off on our tour.   Bobby's Apartments' dining area Riding in the back of a pick up truck is becoming a regular occurrence First stop on our tour were the natural hot springs.  I have been to plenty of natural hot springs in my life and I can tell you this one was quite peculiar: it was not hot.  In fact, it was rather cold consid...