Apr 2008

This has nothing to do with monkeys of any kind. It's a day trip to a forest with very tall trees. We wear a climbing harness and fly from tree to tree on what's called a zip line. This is a thin heavy duty steel cable. We attach a cable, that has a pulley at the end of it, from our harness to the main cable and slide, at speed, through the air as though sitting in a chair while dangling from the cable. It is all extremely safe thanks to the professional guides helping us. However, when you are a hundred foot in the air with nothing under your feet it can be a little scarey. For a fearless person, you would gently hold onto your cable and let the pulley do the work. For someone who is afraid of heights it's probably a non starter. But if you dare, there's a tendency to want to want pull yourself up towards the cable while your sliding along.

At the end of the first run I felt as though I had just been arm wrestlling an adult gorilla never mind a gibbon! There are about ten slides to do and you get to abseil down twice. An eight year old girl in our group puts the rest of us seven adults to shame. While we're gathering ourselves for the next slide, she's wanting to get to the front of the queue so she can go first.

Later we have lunch and are then we're taken to a waterfall. This one is one waterfall, but is in about seven stages. There are small drops of about thirty feet or so to little pools. A staircase has been cut into the side of the hill to allow you to climb near the top. It's quite steep so it's a bit of an effort getting to the top.

This is one more thing to which I can say: seen it, done it, got the t-shirt.

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I'm woken up early in the morning by the mad crowing (or whatever the hell you call it ) of a cockrell. What's more there's two of them in the village. First one calls out and the other one echoes it a few seconds later. I take a look at my watch - it's 3:26 in the morning. If I had a shotgun to hand there would have been two gun blasts at 3:30am and barbecued chicken for breakfast.

At about 7:00 am I get up and take a bath, which is a trip out into the river with my soap and shampoo. I'm feeling quite good after that. Breakfast at 8:00am is tea, toast with jam and fried eggs. That's better than what I normally have at home.

Next we're going on an elephant ride. This is a hairy experience particularly for two of us who have to ride on an elephants neck. The others sit on wooden seats on the back of the elephants. We went up and down steep banks and accoss streams for about an hour and a half. A few times, when the elephant turned it's head, I could feel myself slipping off. That would have been an interesting accident insurance form to fill in. We finally get to our next destination after following a memorable journey.

Now we have to get on bamboo rafts and travel down river. From the photos I had seen previouslyI didn't think this would be particularly testing. It turned out to be quite eventful. We had poles that were used to manoever the raft down stream, missing rocks and guide us over small rapids. I had a few blisters on my hands afterwards. There were three rafts and at some stage of the journey we had all fallen out. After two hours we got to our final destination, a restaurant.

Again we have a nice meal. There's a great sense of comaradery now. I was on the raft with the three German girls and we're all friends now. Everyone agrees it was been a really enjoyable experience over these last two days. It's definitely one of the best things I've done. The only sad part is it's over and we all have to split up as we have different itinerarys.

We're driven back and dropped off at our different hotels.

I hope I caught somebody out with yesterday's blog. It didn't happen. It was just a quiet day taking in the sights.

Today it's off to the jungle for a trek. I'm not expecting too much from it. We're not expected to encounter Puma and Leopards or the like.

We travel in a large 4x4, carrying twelve of us, for an hour to a national park. We stop off at a local market on the way to stock up on essentials like water.

Our first point of call is to see a waterfall. I would say it's just over a hundred foot high and the water falls into a pool which is about the size of a swimming pool. It's quite impressive and peaceful to look at. There are eight girls and four guys in our group, plus two local guides who are guys. There are three German girls, who are university students, on their midyear holiday. There's a German couple, a French couple, an English couple and two Irish girls. We stare at the waterfall for a while before the three German girls and a chief guide strip off and jump into the water. It's not often you get a chance to stand under a waterfall and swim under it, so I do the same. I was a little apprehensive at first, but I'm really glad I did it ! It's better than watching others do it from the bank. The water wasn't particularly cold and it's quite invigorating.

The jungle trek begins at a gentle pace. After about half an hour it becomes apparent that this is not a stroll in the park. At times walking up and down steep hillsides, winding tracks and rickety bridges makes it testing. Another three hours of trek was to follow. We finally get to a small village inhabited by only thirty families. There's a collective sigh of reilef. However, another group has beaten us to the accommodation so we have to go on. It's forty-five minutes later; another small village; it's getting dark and we're all a little tired. A river flows past the village and we all strip off to bathe in it.

We're given a Thai cooked meal. They're well geared up for groups like us at the village. The food tastes extra nice; we had built up an appetite. After the meal we play a few party games and get to know each other. At about midnight we're all in our beds. It's just a big wooden hut accomodating all of us, with thin matresses on a wooden floor. We have mosquito nets to keep the bugs out. Earlier I had been asked by the three German girls to help save them from a jungle creature (it was a big beatle of somekind) which had some how managed to sneak into one of their beds before the mosquito nets had been pulled down. I wasn't scared at all, your honour. Well, not as much as the girls anyway.

I'm looking forward to sleep as much as Homer Simpson looks forward to food.

I wake up with a big headache, a handful of ping pong balls around the room, a tattoo of a ladybird on my shoulder and underneath the tattoo it looks like it reads 'Ladyboy.'

I remember catching a tuk-tuk back to the hotel and it's a blur after that.

I've got to get this lasered off or something !

One day of cooking won't turn me into a Chef, but let's give it a go. I take a Thai cookery course. There's only two students on it, me and a guy named Jeff from the U.S. First we're taken around a market and we buy various ingredients. The market itself was an eye opener. It's another one of those where you need to see it for yourself to appreciate it. There are fruits and vegetables, many I don't recognise; fresh fish; squid; a whole host of stuff.

We cook six courses and eat our food after having cooked it. We don't eat all of it as that would be very glutinous. Under the supervision of the Chef, the food turns out okay. I manage to offend Jeff during lunch by ridiculing George Bush. It takes a little while before we're on friendly terms again. Luckily, in the meantime, he hasn't bipassed the United Nations, labelled England a rogue state and sent the troops to flush out Alqaeda. It's been a successful course - we got to cook and eat food without messing it up. And I get to talk to someone who has travelling experience in other south east Asian countries.

In the evening I go to watch Muay Thai (Thai boxing). There are six fights fights to watch, beginning with youngsters of about ten, up to an adult ladies fight and the main event: a fight between a local Thai and a Belgian, who has flown in especially for the fight. Every week it's Thailand against another nation.

All of the fights end by stoppage. Either one person has taken too many knees to the belly and is doubled up in pain or there's a knockout. It's no pillow fight; you wouldn't catch me in there. Apparently, there's some place where they let tourists go into the ring to fight a Thai girl Muay Thai fighter. It usually results in some burly tough guy being beaten up by the girl. This I wouldn't mind seeing, maybe another time.

I sneak up to the corner of the ring. I hear the Belgian's corner man give him final instructions, "Slowly, John, start slowly !" He nods in acknowledgement. The Belgian looks good for about 45 seconds landing a few heavy punches flush on the chin of the Thai. Could this be an upset ? He's still looking good until the Thai fighter quickly spins around and catches the Belgian on the temple with the back of his fist. The Belgian does a brief impression of Bambi on ice before crashing to the canvass and being counted out. He's come along way for a one minute fight and ignominious defeat in front of his girlfriend and a few hundred fans. And his mate caught it all on his expensive video camera. That's one travel video the family and friends will not want to miss.

I have my picture taken with the champion. He's not that big and bad with his nancy boy haircut, I could take him on if I wanted.