As I write this, I am staring at the Malacca Strait in the Andaman Sea. The waves are tapping on the rocks…one of my favorite sounds. The sun is warm…the way it was intended to be.
The thing about writing in retrospect is that it requires me to look back at what had gone on in the last few weeks and capture it with words. And now this whole exercise is about to end and “this excellent adventure” is coming to a close. Woow… how did this happen? It will have been close to four months when my plane lands in 10 days in Toronto….oh but once again I am way ahead of myself.
We left Bali completely grateful for the time we spent there. Bali was a blast. Between the massages, the laughter, the shopping, and the sheer beauty of the place we could have stayed longer but that would have meant that someone would have had to come and drag me home so it’s a good thing I left. (grin)
And then came Thailand north. We decided to skip Bangkok after hearing so many mixed reviews and thought we’d do it on our way out of the country. We flew into Chiang Mai, which is a smallish city in northern Thailand. Its fairly close to Burma and Laos and so has some influence from those places along with the different hill tribes people. The old city, which is where we stayed is at least 500 years old and is quite charming…in a hippy-backpacking sort of way. We really did like it, the coffee was as good as anything we consider good…which was a real treat. I have been practically off coffee this whole trip, as I prefer good tea to mediocre coffee. Thai massages also proved themselves to be amazing if one does not mind elbows and knees poking you along with arms and legs stretched every which way. I personally loved it but can see that it would not be everyone’s cup of tea.
But really the north for me was about luscious green as you can see from some of the pictures, it was about spending a day with elephants feeding them and learning to ride them bare back (one of my favorite days on this trip), it was about learning how to make green curry paste with a mortar and pestle, it was about smiles and the wonderful owner of the place where we stayed. (A backpacker haven)
It was about temple after temple although we were quite discerning with our temple visits. And the food, “Oh my Buddha”, as they taught us to say, the food was amazing. As far as my taste buds are concerned, Thai food is right up there with food of the gods.
Yes…(grin) I shopped but I must admit that so far Bali and Rajasthan have been my favorites…could it be? I am shopped out? Not a chance! I’ll just have to try harder in Bangkok.
The pictures bellow are half of my Thailand North…enjoy. I’ll be posting the rest later today and I’ll be posting more from the south in the next couple of days… I don’t want to do that from Toronto. (grin)
The Relationship Creature 