A little Thai history anyone?

While taking a break outside of a ruin in Ayutthaya, a young Thai woman who had been educated in the US stopped and chatted with me for a bit. She indicated that Ayutthaya was the 2nd capital of Thailand (Siam). Sukhothai was the first, Thonburi the 3rd and Bangkok 4th. She said there was some talk of moving it yet again since Bangkok is so congested - hard to imagine but I guess time will tell. From what little I've read, the real history of the area is much more complex and dynamic than her brief synopsis. But there is no doubt that Ayutthaya and Sukhothai are unique and interesting places.

Arriving in Ayutthaya by bus was pretty exciting. The history of the area is readily apparent - there are ruins everywhere. Old mixed with new and streets simply built around ( often unidentified) ruins. The city is actually an inland island. There are rivers on all 4 sides.

A random ruin in the middle of the road

Ruin complexes were all over - mostly Wats

According to a sign at the site of the Grand Palace, the traditional Thai belief was that where ever the King stayed was the center of the universe - "the center of supreme power and divinity". As such, a Wat (temple complex) was built in each of the 4 directions of the palace grounds. Interestingly, the Wats comprised the vast majority of the visible ruins. They were made primarily of brick and stone where the palace buildings apparently were mostly timber. When the Burmese finally succeeded in sacking the town (after 20 some unsuccessful attempts), they looted and burned the palace grounds destroying untold amounts of art and history. There was a large model speculating what the palace grounds looked like based on historic accounts, piles of rubble and traditional architecture but the grounds themselves were mostly a beautiful park with some low brick walls and foundations.

Speculative model of the Palace grounds

By contrast, the ruins of Sukhothai are separated from the modern day town (new Sukhothai) by about a 25 minute bus ride. I rented an amazing old bicycle that practically rode itself and tooled around the ruins and beautiful grounds.

There is a statue of Ram Khamhaeng the 3rd ruler of Sukhothai and acknowledged "father" of the Thai alphabet. An inscribed obelisk next to the statue tells of the area during his reign in a great deal of detail. There's an interesting write up about it on wikipedia (just search on Ram Khamhaeng). Even though the story was a bit utopian, I was disappointed to read that it's authenticity is in question. Dunno if this can be zoomed in on and read or not but here's the bulk of the translation that was in the on site museum:

I've spent the last 3 days in Sukhothai mostly resting and am feeling better. Chiang Mai tomorrow! The buses I've taken here are literally never on time so I thought it might be easier to plan a night in a hostel for my first night so probably won't see Sean and family for a day or two but I'm really looking forward to it.

Travel like a Thai

I found Bangkok to be an infinitely interesting city and could've spent several weeks there. Unfortunately for me, interesting usually equates to exhaustion and the accompanying illness which I yet again am fighting off.

The Grand Palace in Bangkok was indeed grand. The amount of detail put into the beautiful buildings was amazing and the entire place left one with a lofty opinion of a successful state.

Many beautiful buildings

Up close you realize they are adorned with tiny mirror tiles

The most boring job in the world...

There are many inexpensive options for transportation in Bangkok including my favorite of course - walking. For any kind of distance, the local river boats seemed to be the best option. For 14 baht (less than .50c) you can go to any one of 35 or so piers including ones on the other side of the river, thus bypassing all the congestion on the roads. There are also some trains that crisscross the city but they were a fair ways from backpacker central where I stayed - infamous in some circles I suppose - Chao San Road. At night, Chao San Road is literally the noisiest place I've ever been. Bars right across the narrow street from each other compete to drown out the music of the other - it's crazy. Thankfully I was in a nice quiet hostel a few blocks away.

The King's birthday was on the 5th and in the evening I went to a massive park area with some hostel mates to see the fireworks. We sat central/back from where I thought the festivities would be only to find that we were right in front of the fireworks launch pad - the first couple scared the hell out of me. I've never been so close to fireworks and was grateful nothing went wrong cuz the whole thing was a recipe for disaster. But oh so cool!

3 nights ago I took a local train to Kanchanaburi. When I got to the train station it was full of police security types and the press. I have no idea why - one of the frustrations of not speaking any of the language. At one point, right before the train before mine left, a guy was rushed in amid a flurry of activity from the press and loaded onto the train. He spoke from the platform in a manner that could only make me think of Caesar Chavez. I saw it on the news later in a shop in Kanchanaburi. I'd like to know what it was all about but probably never will.

I met a lovely man on that train - he translates new age (I told him, my church calls it new thought and he seemed to know what I was referring to) religious books from English into Thai.  I have to say, the number of deep spiritual connections I've made with random people has been extraordinary. It cheers me.

The main draw for Kanchanaburi was the history that took place here during WWII. The Bridge on the river Kwai is located here. During WWII, the Japanese brought prisoners of war to the area to build an overland railroad. Many local people were hired as well with promises of high wages, they came from all around. Conditions were horrendous and many, many died. I took a local bus the 80 km to the memorial museum next to Hellfire pass. It was a somber place and very moving.

Hellfire Pass

Am currently waiting for an air conditioned van to Ayuttaya. It should be arriving soon so I will have to postpone pictures - will try to update this posting soon. The plan is to be in Chiang Mai by the 21st. I'll be staying with Sean for a couple of days and looking for a small apartment - I'm feeling a need for an extended break and CM seems like the perfect place. I'm looking forward to seeing Sean and family and am hoping he has something going that I could be of use to him for a few weeks.

They must have heard I was coming, cuz they threw me a party!

My first night in Thailand just happened to coincide with their annual Loi Krathong festival. The tradition is to make or in my case, to purchase a boat made from banana leaves, flowers, incense, candles - add a lock of hair or some finger nail clippings (no idea why...) and then float it down the river. If it goes down stream it's supposed to bring good luck and renewed fortunes for the coming year, upstream is obviously bad luck! Along with the festival was a massive street fair with stalls selling anything from furniture to fried bugs.

I suppose I should back up a little bit... I took a bus from Melaka back to Penang in one long boring day. The intent was to spend an extra day in Penang and visit the Bat cave temple and a couple of other things I didn't have time to see the first time around. However, it was the start of school holidays and the hostel I'd booked was only available for one night - rather than breaking up the day and moving across the city, I just decided to head to Langkawi - an island north of Penang. The highlight of Langkawi  was a day tooling around the island on a scooter. There are a couple of geo parks, one has a gondola to the top of a mountain with beautiful views.  Unfortunately, the view for me was uni-directional, the other half was socked in. predictably, I got a bit wet on the way back to the hostel on the scooter.

After just 3 nights on Langkawi I was feeling a bit anxious to get to Thailand. It was clear that the trip to Krabi had a number of connections so I opted to buy a package for 110 ringgit (about 27usd).  The hostel manager took me in his vehicle to the ferry terminal, bought me a ferry ticket and handed me a brown stapled envelope with the name of a guy I was to ask for when the boat landed in Satun. I asked him if there was cash in the envelope and he said he didn't know what was in it - haha. When I got off the boat, there were the usual hucksters "where you go?" A sleazy looking guy (straight from a mexican boarder town I swear - gold tooth and all) came up and, after looking at my envelope, claimed he was "the guy" and I was to wait.  After negotiating with and gathering up several of my fellow travelers, we were all loaded into the back of an old pickup truck and the driver was given my envelope (re-stapled) and extensive instructions. A 10 minute ride to a bit of a bus station followed. The pickup truck driver talked to the guys at the bus place and they wrote me a ticket to Trang. I got a bit upset arguing that I'd paid to go to Krabi (Trang is about half way of a 4 hour journey). After a bit of back and forth in broken English they managed to impart that the driver of the van to Trang would buy my ticket to Krabi. Not really knowing what else to do, I trusted it. About 15 mins into the 2 hour ride to Trang, the van driver pulled up next to a bus at a stop light, they rolled down windows and chatted then pulled over to the side of the road and I was summarily moved from the nice new air conditioned van to perhaps the oldest running bus I've ever seen and was told he would take me to Krabi. Which he did. Once at the Krabi bus station, another pickup truck ride (which I've since learned are called Songthaew) got me within 2 blocks of my hostel. Someone had told me awhile back that stuff like this happens in SE Asia but this was the first time I'd seen it in action. Multiple connections involving boats, taxi's, vans, buses and who knows what and somehow it all just works.

It's late and I'm tired so adventures in Krabi will have to wait. I'll try to add to this tomorrow.

Nov 30, 2015

Railay is an area on the mainland that is only accessible by boat and thus feels like an island. Stark limestone cliffs make it a climbers paradise. Getting there involved walking down to the river, forking over 150 baht and waiting for 9 other people to have the same inclination. Then it's maybe a 20-30 minute ride on a banana boat to a uniquely beautiful place. I spent a few hours exploring the beaches and trudging through the jungle until the storm clouds started rolling in. By the time I'd made arrangements to return, all hell broke loose and in the time it took to get from the beach down the pier to the boat I was completely drenched and a bit worried about being on the water in a little boat in such a vicious storm. On the way back I just thought if I died out there, it would be at the end of a perfect day, my life was complete.

The following day I figured out how to get a songthaew to the Tiger Paw temple. I had seen the giant Buddha on the trip into town and wondered if there was a way to get up to it. There was, by way of 1260 steps. With the heat and humidity, I didn't see anyone who didn't struggle with the climb. But man what a view from the top! The land formations that made Railey so beautiful were just as stunning from a distance. So unique.

A 12 hour bus ride has landed me in Bangkok. I really wanted to take the train from Surat Thani (a 3 hour bus ride from Krabi) but not knowing if I could get anything other than an over night 3rd class seat and not really wanting to stay overnight in Surat Thani, I wimped out and just took the bus. Overnighters seem like a waste of a good opportunity to see the country. 

Going backwards

At this pace I'll be in New Zealand by Christmas! Just kidding of course... 

After so much effort to send off the power of attorney, I was hesitant to leave Kuala Lumpur until Erik actually receives it. Also didn't want to stay in KL. So, I backtracked a bit and am spending a few days in Malacca, or Melaka in Malaysian. It is an old trading port with a long history. It has been fought over by the Portuguese, Dutch and of course the English dating back to the early 1500s.

A Famosa was a fort built by the Portuguese in 1512. Most of it was destroyed by the British in the 1800's but the gate remains:

There's the skeleton of an old church on the hill behind this gate with several massive headstones of the people who are buried beneath it. I'm sure for Europeans stuff dating back to the 1500s is no big deal, but I think it's ever so cool.

The Church - you can see the tombstones inside to the left

Since Melaka is only 2 hours from KL, it seems to be a popular holiday spot for many Malaysians. There are what they call Trishaws all over the place - they are bicycle driven rickshaws decked out with extraordinary amounts of fluff in themes like Hello Kitty or Frozen. Some of them even have sound systems pounding out sappy love songs.

 More fort remains overlooking the river:

Like a bad penny (I keep turning up)

Amazingly I am back in my least favorite place - Kuala Lumpur round 3. The good news is, the land I had in South Park has sold! The title company wasn't happy with the power of attorney I'd executed for Erik before leaving the States so I had to find a US Embassy to notarize a new one. I wouldn't recommend it btw, at $50 usd per signature it's the most expensive notary ever. So I will find an overnight shipper today and leave this pit tomorrow, not sure just yet to where... maybe back to Penang?

Penang was lovely as expected. Carol (from Gili Air fame) met me for a couple of days there - we hired a scooter and had a great day touring the island and hiking in the national park. We parked the scooter and went for food, leaving the helmets with the bike as everyone else seems to do. When we returned, one helmet was missing. Luckily, a local took pity on us and got us a new one for "local" prices - 30 ringit or $7.50 usd. Could've been worse.
  

Cameron Highlands

Spent 4 nights in Tanah Rata - the main city in the Cameron Highlands area of Malaysia. CH is somewhere around 6 or 8k feet above sea level and is much cooler - it was a welcome relief from the heat and a beautiful area. There are some muddy trekking trails in the area so I spent a couple of days back in my element :)   Apparently the climate is good for growing tea, the area tea plantations were quite lovely and kind of surreal - they look like a funky carpet or something laying on the hillsides.

Beautiful Cameron Highlands

I'm currently in Penang (arrived late yesterday) and am finding it quite interesting and full of character. Much of today was chewed up by a long walk to the Thai embassy in round 2 of an attempt to obtain a 60 day visa, I have to go back tomorrow to pick it up - hopefully all is well.

Penang is known for it's food and I have found some delicious food here - but then it's been pretty amazing all along since leaving Australia. I'm staying in the Georgetown area which is a world heritage site and clearly has a lot of history (something I'm looking forward to learning about). There is a National Park here (Penang is an island) and lots of other interesting looking things to explore in the area so I think I'll be spending several days here before moving on to perhaps Langkawi? or another island in the area.

This meal looks like it would eat you back!

Indonesia = Rest Up!

Well quite far behind on the ole blog once again. The truth is, I've really not done much in Indonesia. It has mostly been a battle with illness and the accompanying exhaustion but I will attempt to summarize the highlights.

As mentioned in the last post, I hired a scooter in Ubud and had a great day just exploring around. The hostel that rented it to me required a 50,000 idr deposit for a towel but thought nothing of handing over the keys to a scooter to anyone willing to cough up 50,000 idr for the day. By the end of the day, I was kind of wishing I had just tried to rent a scooter in Kuta for 10 or 12 days and circumnavigated the island.

Bali is defined by their temples. They have a unique mix of Hindu and older island religion. As well as participating in the local temple, everyone has a temple in their house. They pray and make offerings multiple times a day. I found a one of the temples I'd set out for that day - nicknamed the water temple for it's beautiful water features.

There was a second temple I'd been told about that I never found due to getting sucked into a tourist vortex. I had turned down a narrow dirt road, following google maps to where the temple should be, when a guy came up on a scooter, stopped me and said I didn't want to go down there, that it was better to get to the temple I was looking for by the "main" road (I never figured out what that was). He then told me he was on his way to pick his kids up from school and he would show me to a coffee plantation that offered tours for free. So I agreed to follow him. He was on me like white on rice after that. After a 15 min scooter ride, we went in to a lame staged area where an old lady was roasting a few coffee beans over an open fire. I was then seated and presented with 8 or 10 cups of different coffee's and tea's. I asked my new found friend about picking up his kids and he gave me some vague mumble about his brother would do it., So I asked him what he got out of bringing me to the plantation and he told me he got a cut of whatever I spent there. It was clear to me then that I wasn't getting out of there without making a donation of some sort. Long story short, I gave them 50,000 idr for a cup of rat poo coffee (kopi luwak on wikipedia if you're curious about this specialty coffee - and no, I didn't care for it...) and bolted. Later that same night, I went to the fire dance (or Kecak - named for the percussion sounds the roughly 100 extras made throughout the hour long event) at the temple up the road from the hostel. A small village of about 700 put on a production involving over 100 people - I thoroughly enjoyed it.

After Ubud, I took a shuttle north to Lovina. I was sick much of the 5 days in Lovina and spent a lot of time lazing around. I did hire a scooter there and took it into the mountains to a waterfall one day. I screwed up and left the keys in the scooter while I hiked up to the waterfall. There was a 10,000 entrance fee to go to the waterfall that I'm sure only applied to those with a tourist face. When I got back, a creepy guy had my keys and tried to extort an additional 10,000 from me to get them back. I held my ground and he eventually relented. It could've been much worse and I was hyper vigilant with the keys after that.     

After Lovina came the Gili Islands a series of 3 small islands off the coast of Lombok (the large island east of Bali). Gili Trawangan (or Gili T) is the most built up and has a reputation as a party place, Gili Meno is quiet and sparsely populated and Gili Air (meaning water in Indonesian) is somewhere in between the two. An all day trek landed me on Gili Air where I spent 4 fun days with instant hostel friends Carol, Steven and a few others. The highlight of the time there was an all day snorkeling trip around the islands which was fantastic - loads of sea turtles and colorful reef fish. Steven had found a hostel on Gili Meno that sometimes offered free accommodation for volunteer work and I decided to go along and spend my last few days on the sleepy little island. The hostel already had it's limit of 4 volunteers and Steven and I paid 80,000 idr to sleep on the sunrise platform - by the water, under the stars (there were hammocks we could move to underneath if it rained). The night was damp and cold but a great experience. The next day I decided to find proper accommodation and moved to a nice private hut that had air conditioning! The wifi was a lie, but for about $12 usd a night with a lovely tomato and cheese omelet breakfast included, the air conditioned room was a much welcomed luxury and I didn't have it in me to complain.  5 nights there and I felt more rested than I have in several weeks. As it turned out, it was lucky the first hostel had no volunteer spots available, Indonesian Immigration showed up later on the day I left and hauled away the 4 volunteers that were there. A tourist visa plainly states that no work is to be done here - volunteer or paid. It couldn't have been a pleasant way to leave the country. Though I had my doubts I would've opted for the work, over paying 6 bucks to do nothing ;) Steven would've been caught up in it had there been a spot available.

The day long journey back to Bali happened yesterday. One more night in Kuta and an early morning flight back to Kuala Lumpur tomorrow.  

Whew! Ubud!

Arrived in Ubud today, it is the first place since leaving Singapore that I feel glad to be.

Spent 4 nights in Kuta (where the airport is in Bali) which was 4 nights too many. I've never said no so many times in a short time in my life. As soon as you get past customs at the airport people start haranguing you with "taxi" or "transport". I wanted to simply get some money from an atm and wait for sunrise to take the 3km walk to the hostel. I must have been accosted 30 times before I could find a quiet place in the airport away from the "helpful" locals. Then the walk from the airport was a nightmare of help - it left me feeling beat up and very negative. One guy (a rent a cop from a hotel) demanded to see my passport - then while I was fumbling to find it, he ran and got his buddy to come try to sell me transport! The very worst though was the next morning when one of the hostel staff came into my dorm at 8:00 to see if I wanted to rent the scooter I'd inquired about the evening before! It was like a nightmare come to life - you are in hell, there is no sanctuary. Every day in Kuta was pretty much a constant barrage of  people wanting a piece of me. I finally learned to just tune them out, it was just too exhausting otherwise.

I went to the shuttle bus stall on Friday to book transport to Ubud and ended up taking a sunset tour kind of spur of the moment to the Tanah Lot temple. It was by far the most touristy thing I've done yet (with the possible exception of diving the GBR). I would've liked to learn some history about it but it was pretty much just a commercialized operation. We weren't even allowed up to the temple proper. But it was a lovely place and for about $12 usd, was an evening well spent.

The hostel I'm in is a bit outside of Ubud proper, surrounded by rice fields and coconut trees. It's not exactly quiet and tranquil but it's a welcome relief from the busy cities I've been in for the past couple of weeks. They rent out scooters for about $4/day so I will get one tomorrow and start exploring the area.

View from my bed

They paved paradise and put up a casino

Last post about Kuala Lumpur (since I'm in Bali now...).  Took a day trip to Genting Highlands, it is Malaysia's version of Las Vegas and apparently the only place in Malaysia where gambling is legal. The highlight of the day was the gondola ride over one of the last remaining bits of jungle left in the country. It was really quite lovely. The preservation of this jungle area made the whole resort complex worth it, without it, perhaps the whole area would've been divided up and developed.

It was quite hazy, as it was pretty much every day in Singapore and Malaysia. Someone said it was from fires in Indonesia - they harvest crops then burn the field and let it lay dormant for 2 years before planting again. I met a lovely young woman on the bus back to KL, she was studying to be a Dr and had taken the day trip with one of her teachers. They offered to show me around KL the following day but unfortunately the scratchy throat that I'd attributed to the smoke in the air turned out to be a cold. I'd been pretty exhausted since leaving Singapore so I suppose it's not surprising the crud finally caught up to me. Still dealing with it nearly a week later :(

There was a woman about my age who had just finished the Camino de Santiago earlier this year. After hearing her tales, I'm seriously looking forward to that journey come spring! Lots more travel between now and then however.

Chicken feet!

Kuala Lumpur

The train ride from Johor Baru was uneventful and less scenic than I had hoped. It was nice to be able to get up and move about - especially because the air conditioning was freezing cold! I had been toying with the idea of taking the train to the north east to Khota Baru and then back again just for the scenery (they call it the jungle line) but apparently it's been shut down indefinitely due to flood damage. 

I must admit I've yet to fall in love with Malaysia. I'm sure it's not fair and I'm trying to reserve judgement until I can get out of these big dirty, stinky, barely functioning cities. I've been hesitating to make this blog entry because I don't have a whole lot of positive of late. But I guess ya gotta take the good with the bad, and looking back I'd like to remember these days with a degree of realism (it should be no surprise I'm not enjoying the big cities...). So, to those of you who are living vicariously through me... stop now if you only want vicarious beautiful beaches and rainbows. You've been warned!

I've had a policy all along of not booking more than 3 nights initially in any hostel in case it sucks. That backfired in Singapore and I was faced with having to move rooms every day, or switch hostels. Switching actually worked out for the best (the Happy Snail was such a great hostel :) but it left me thinking maybe it was a silly way to go about it since the vast majority of the places have been just fine. So, I went ahead and booked a full week in KL... sigh... I'm in a private room with a fan, no window, roughly the size of a prison cell. There was supposed to be central air but they really don't turn it on much so it's brutal hot most of the time. Leaving the hostel feels like I'm entering a war zone. To the right the sidewalks are all torn up like they replaced some piping or something underneath them several months ago and never finished the job - you have to pick your way through the rubble and jump over the open sewers. To the left and across the street, the sidewalk has been closed off completely by a boarded up empty lot so there's no option but to put your life on the line and walk in the street. The upside is there's a terrific Indian food place 3 blocks away where a large tasty meal can be had for about 2 bucks. That is until I got to chatting with a woman from South Africa (another middle aged woman traveling alone.. a rare find!). She told me to be sure to sit towards the front because the cock roaches kind of have the run of the place towards the back and can get aggressive about climbing on you! LOL!

I've booked a flight to Bali leaving Sept 29, returning to KL October 27th. The one thing I wanted to get done in KL was to get my visa for Thailand. I found it hard to get clear information, but had read online that they would issue a 60 day visa (extendable to 90 days for a few bucks once there) that would be good for 6 months with the 60 days starting when you cross the boarder. It took 4 hours in a hot little room with a couple of hundred other visa hopefuls to find out that it would only be good for 90 days. So, I'll have to wait until returning from Bali to get that taken care of. She did tell me I could do it in Penang, let's hope she's right. Thailand has the most obscure, nonsensical, crazy visa system I've ever heard of. It's like they really don't want tourists - or at least not backpackers arriving by land wanting to stay for a bit (a boarder visa if arriving by land is for only 14 days - by air they give you 30).

I've been out wandering the city most every day - only one day so far worth reporting. The Batu Caves are large caves on the outskirts of KL that have been turned into a Hindu shrine. It was a little bit commercialized but not too much - it's a functioning, active temple. There are a ton of steps to get to the top (272 according to wikipedia) and monkeys all along the way. People take new born babies to the top to be blessed. I saw one, it was wrapped in a bright yellow cloth, tied to sugar cane stalks and suspended between two panting,  sweaty guys.

And a baby for Beth! Sorry I didn't get it's cute little face  :(

What a difference a boarder makes

Crossed over into Johor Bahru, Malaysia and off the beaten tourist path. I was honestly surprised to be the only backpacker and probably the only english speaker, on the bus. The process was pretty simple and efficient. The confusion started on arrival in JB. I came out of Singapore with very little money and was thinking since I was arriving at a transportation hub, there would be an ATM close by. My experience with money changers hasn't been all that favorable so far, it's much better to just get cash from an ATM. After wandering around in a massive shopping mall for an hour or so, I finally found a bank with a row of ATMs. After waiting in line, the ATM rejected my card and I was starting to worry. Luckily the bank across the street had one that accepted my transaction. Then it was a matter of negotiating the mall maze back to JB Sentral so I could purchase a train ticket to Kuala Lumpur. The train is super cheap (about $8 US for an 8 hour journey) - I hope it's a reasonably fun experience.

With my first two goals achieved, it was time to make my way to the hostel. They had sent me directions that involved taking a completely different way out of Singapore and would have made the trek to the hostel pretty straightforward, but I wanted to get my train ticket bought and as near as I could tell, the only way was to show up at the ticket counter at JB Sentral. So after stumbling around for awhile, I found my way downstairs to a noisy, busy area where buses were coming and going. After studying the system map for some time I realized it was hopeless and was toying with the idea of getting a taxi. I'd read some nightmare tales about taxi ripoffs in JB and was reluctant to go there just yet. So I started walking and saying "Nusa Bestari?" - a shopping mall next to the hostel - if I could get close, google maps would take me there (best thing since the invention of the internet!). After boarding 2 wrong buses, I got on one that claimed that was where he was going and started praying and following along on google maps. Some 30 mins later I jumped off pretty close to the hostel and was hit by overwhelming joy as I walked through the door.  I'm booked in for 3 nights and wishing it was just 2. There isn't much to see or do here as far as I can tell and no one speaks enough english to be able to ask and understand the answer. It will give me some time to make plans and get rested up after many exhausting days in Singapore so is probably a good thing.

I asked both at the departure desk from Singapore and the entry desk into Malaysia if I would be able to re-enter the respective country and they both indicated it wouldn't be a problem. I had thought this to be the case but couldn't find it definitively on line and wanted to confirm. This clears the way for a round trip sojourn to Bali from Kuala Lumpur!  

Singapore!

I really didn't know what to expect from Singapore beyond it being a very large city (which it is...). I've found it to be quite extraordinary and endlessly interesting. I went to the Asian Civilization museum yesterday and took a short tour that included a quick overview of the history of the area. Singapore has long been a trade hub and a melting pot for the whole region. Monsoonal winds coming south from China to the east and India to the west cross and thus terminate at Singapore. Trade ships would follow the wind down, leave their cargo and then wait for 6 months until they could get back home. Their crews established second homes here often with second families as well. It split from Malaysia in 1965 after a period under English rule from the mid 1800s. I was just a few days too late for their 50th anniversary celebration.  They have been a busy 50 years. Singapore is a well designed, modern city on par with what I imagine Dubai to be like. They have the best public transportation system I've ever seen.

I spent one of my first days here at the Gardens by the Bay area. It's perhaps the most iconic area in Singapore. The architecture is incredible. I came away thinking that some really brilliant and brave people planned and executed the development there.

There are several of these large "trees" covered with plants and lights. They have 2 free light shows every night where the tree lights are timed with a musical program. There's also a laser light show a short walk away at the harbor where images are projected onto a fountain of water accompanied by music. The hotel in the background is unbelievably impressive. You can kind of make out the palm trees on the roof and get some idea of how massive the building is.  

Evidence of the wealth of the city is everywhere. At the base of this hotel is a huge shopping mall full of large stores with just a few hand bags or a couple of racks of clothing in them. With this being a small island country, real estate is very expensive as you can imagine. The contrast is that it's a just a short train ride to Chinatown where an entire walmart's worth of goods is packed into a space the size of an American bathroom. Great food in Chinatown as well for 3-5 Singaporean dollars ($2-3 USD).

Other stuff I've done here:

A day at the botanic gardens - it's big enough that my feet gave out before the places to see did. They have a beautiful orchid garden area with many rare species.

Haw Par Villa - an elaborate sculpture garden built by the founders of Tiger Balm. There are many intricate scenes depicting Chinese legend and tales as well as other larger sculptures - all quite colorful and interesting.

Little India - a much touted shopping/eating area that I found less compelling than Chinatown

Buddha Tooth Relic temple - a relatively new temple in Chinatown - very elaborate and ornate. They have a pretty nice museum of Buddhist artifacts upstairs and a floor detailing the life of the Buddha.

Pulau Ubin - an island off the coast to the north east that has been set aside as a nature reserve. Much of the stone that was used in the early days of the city came from quarries on this island - the quarries are now lakes. A few people live on the island and support the tourist trade with food, drinks and bicycle rentals.

I think it was a mistake not passing through Bali on my way here - I might try get a round trip plane ticket and head there for a couple of weeks but will need to do a bit of research into re-entry visas and figure out the best way to go about it. I had a bit of trouble at the airport in Darwin - the airlines required proof of onward travel before they would let me on the plane. An explanation of my travel as a lifestyle and a desire to travel over land by train (tickets only obtainable at the train station) through Malaysia did nothing to dissuade her. She informed me I had an hour before check in for my flight closed to figure it out. So, cursing and grumbling, I moved off and found a website that books bus tickets out of Singapore. I took a stab at how long I might want to stay here and just booked the cheapest bus I could find ($15 US) to Kuala Lumpur. That ticket is good tomorrow but I've had some time to research the bus company and have decided it's not worth $15 to subject myself to the types of horror tales that are being told online. Long story short, I'm paid up at this hostel through Sunday night and will likely move onto Malaysia on Monday but I will take some time tomorrow or Sunday to do a little research into Bali options before locking in the plan. 

Litchfield National Park

I've been on the go and have fallen a bit behind in my posts so will attempt to get caught up. I've added some pictures and video to the last post (Kakadu) as well.

The highlights for Edith Falls (northern Nitmiluk) and Litchfield Natl park were the swimming holes at the base of a series of waterfalls. The days were so oppressively hot, hiking was out of the question after about 9 in the morning and a nice swim was a welcome relief. I hadn't realized that sitting under a waterfall was on my bucket list but now it's been crossed off!

Edith Falls

  The termite mounds at Litchfield were interesting. I had thought the mounds were just a rubbish heap reflecting how deep into the earth they had built their homes. I couldn't get over how inefficient it seemed to keep going higher instead of spreading the dirt out! lol show's what I know... turns out the mounds themselves are their homes. They build up so that they don't get flooded out in the rainy season. There are termites in Litchfield that build their mounds in long thin blades along a north/south axis. It's the only place in the world where they are known to exist. They've experimented with artificially changing north using magnets and determined the termites detect magnetic north. The thinking is that it helps them regulate temperature better.

I pulled into the campground at Wangi Falls mid afternoon, changed into swim gear, made a sandwich and headed for the falls. I took 3 steps from the van and this bird:

 swooped down and took a half slice of bread off the ham sandwich I was carrying! I never saw him coming it was incredible.

Beth had requested a picture of a kangaroo with a baby in pouch. I really doubted that I could make it happen. But there were a bunch of wallabies eating outside of a visitor center I went into and a couple of them had babies. So Beth - this one's for you!

Kakadu and beyond

Picked up my camper van rental last Friday and headed to Kakadu Natl Park.  I don't know what I expected exactly but it was no where close to reality.  By the end of Friday I was sorely disappointed.  The drive was much like the drive out to Watch Hill station - mile after mile after mile of short somewhat sparse trees and scrubby brush. Took a walk to a swampy place (they call them billabongs an aboriginal word perhaps?) that had a lot of birds and was somewhat interesting but honestly I was thinking what the hell.  

Mile after mile after mile of this...

Then it got better. A LOT better. Saturday was a whole new day that started much like Friday with a drive to Ubirr.  On the way, I took a walk through a micro climate rainforest along the east alligator river. Got sight of 3 different crocodiles in the river and had the eerie feeling that there were many many more. I have a video of one swimming down the river that I'll post it at some point if it turns out. This was the walk that had a woman's only area men weren't allowed by aboriginal culture. Apparently there are men only areas as well.

Ubirr itself was the place that made the entire trip worth doing. It's a 1 km walk past several extensive aboriginal rock art sites ending with a climb to spectacular views of the surrounding areas.

Flood Plain - during the rainy season this whole area fills with 2-3 meters of water

Rock Art Site

Stone country - there are an estimated 10000 rock art sites in this forbidding country - about 5000 have been documented

Third and final walk took me through an interesting rock and canyon area that sort of reminded me of Utah.

Kakadu has more to offer but many places require a 4 wheel drive and more time than I had. So on to Katherine and Nitmiluk Natl Park.

I stopped at the information Center in Katherine yesterday to inquire about hikes in the area.  The woman there convinced me to check out the free public hot pools down the street. The heat here has been oppressive - I spend every day bathed in sweat.  So I thought I'd just go for a quick dip before heading up to the canyon for a hike. 2 and a half hours later, I was finally able to talk myself into leaving. The spring source was maybe 200 yards upstream so the water crystal clear and beautiful. There were a series of pools,  the last of which had a short waterfall into it. It made an infinity pool space where you can swim among the bubbles endlessly without ever going anywhere, or wedge between the ladder and the waterfall and let the water massage sore neck and shoulders. Or go up and slide down the moss on the waterfall into the pool. Too much fun.

I did manage to hike a bit late yesterday and get a glimpse of the gorge that defines Nitmiluk.  Heading back north today. There is another way into Nitmiluk to a place called Edith falls. Apparently they have put up a metal fence to keep the crocs out so swimming is allowed there.  One night there then on to Lichfield for my last 2 nights.

Croc video:

 

Farewell to Cairns (homeless again)

Flying to Darwin in a few hours. I've already booked my ticket out to Singapore in 2 weeks time. I'll have a week to kill in Darwin and then have booked a campervan for a week in order to see Kakadu and Litchfield national parks and some of the surrounding area.

We've been celebrating my departure for the past week. I made fish tacos on Tuesday and Andrew showed off his extraordinary chef skills for the past 2 nights making some delicious curry on Weds and then amazing Asian fish cakes last night. I can only dream of cooking so well...

My family for the past month - left to right - Lisa, Andrew and Nina:

I love you guys and will miss you ever so much. Many thanks - I couldn't have asked for a better group of roomies. Best wishes for the best that life has to offer!

Watch Hill Station

It seems like some of the best experiences just come out of the blue, totally unexpected. My visit to see Cloudy and Bram at Bram's cattle ranch certainly falls into that category. I was excited to see Cloudy and the outback but I didn't think it would turn out to be SO MUCH FUN! First a bit about the road to get there.

I spent Sunday walking and hiking around Kuranda, followed by a short night in my tent at a roadside camping area. Andrew had suggested that I camp at a place called Davies Creek, but the road was rough to get to it and it was a violation of my rental agreement to take the car on unpaved roads - something I wanted to save for getting to Watch Hill... still, it would've been nice to see Davies creek it sounded really beautiful.

Barron Gorge National Park is just outside of Kuranda. A really nice elevated boardwalk through the rainforest leads to a view of Barron Falls - although it looked pretty big to me, it is apparently just a trickle compared to the rainy season:

Mount Hypipamee National Park was a short stop and hike to nice waterfalls and a deep volcanic crater - the picture on this sign is better than any I was able to take and hopefully you can read a bit about the area:

I also sidetracked to Undara Volcanic National Park. Apparently there are lava tubes there that run for many miles. It is a closed area and can only be accessed via an organized tour. Much to my disappointment, I got there a bit late to see them - I wanted to be sure I got to Watch Hill before dark. I did take a hike to the top of a volcanic cone (Kalkani) with wide views of the surrounding lava plain - very forbidding country.
A couple of small kangaroos were on the path - I got a picture before they took off but it's a bit rough:

The drive to Watch Hill was mile after mile after mile of pretty much nothing but road. There were these lumps all over the place - at first I thought they were rocks but they didn't really look like rocks:

Turns out they are termite and/or ant hills. Some of these were as large as the little car I was in, the ones at Watch Hill are shorter (maybe a foot or 2 in height) and pointy and all over the place. They turned out to be a part of the obstacle course that made Tuesday so much fun.

I got to Watch Hill late afternoon on Monday (August 10) and found the place completely deserted. I had no idea what to expect, but this wasn't it. After waiting around for maybe an hour, I finally heard some noise and saw dust rising in the distance on the other side of the house. I made my way down to a maze of steel pens to find Cloudy and Bram running cattle through a series of spaces that narrow down to a chute that forced them to dive into a pit of tick dip. Watch Hill is in tick country and the cattle have to be dipped before transport to market. It was dusk and they were just wrapping up but Cloudy wasn't near to being done for the day - she still had animals to feed and dinner to make - we all dropped into bed probably around 10. I slept like a rock. Among the animals she feeds are the orphaned calves (they call them poddies) - she bottle feeds them a powdered milk mixture morning and night. She had me feed one - I think I ended up with more on me than it got in it's tummy - they are very enthusiastic about feeding time and kept yanking the nipple off the bottle.

Tuesday was chopper muster day - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muster_(livestock). It was a chopper muster because Bram hired a small helicopter to help him chase the cattle out of the bush. With 38,000 acres and over 4000 head of cattle, you would think it would require a small army to run the place but it was down to just Bram and Cloudy. Bram's father was in the hospital (a bit of a heart procedure - he's going to be just fine) and they have an open position that Bram is trying to find someone to fill. This was quite lucky for me as I was drafted to ride the 3rd quad bike. Bram did a great job of explaining what needed to be done and we had a very successful day of bringing the cattle home. It was just too much fun :)!

I posted some pics on facebook (for those of you who haven't found me there yet - my profile name is Rasta Pasta and pic is of my siberian husky Rasta)