Catching Up

From Khao Yai

I always do this. I wait to post stuff cause I am tired, and then there is just too much stuff to write about. We last left off with a return to Thailand from the USA about a month ago. Well, we (Becky) decided that a great way to recover from our trip would be to drive to the mountains of Khao Yai national park about three hours Northeast of Bangkok. I admit, I also thought this would be a nice relaxing trip...and it was, compared to a weekend in Hell.

I kid, I kid.

Mostly.

If you did a google search of Khao Yai national park, you would see pictures of monkeys and elephants and waterfalls and hornbills! Sounds exciting. I was indeed, very excited. We headed out right after school on Friday in some brand new rentals (there were 12 of us total). Three hours later we were in some awesome fresh air. (Bangkok is not known for its cleanliness). It didn't take long to encounter our first wildlife.

Khao Yai is the region of Thailand where they (feebly) grow wine grapes, so there are all these vineyards. Its actually quite nice, even if the wine is subpar. So we go to this first restaurant, and its really cool and during dinner, one of the girls says, "Oh look, a humming bird," pointing to a "hummingbird". As the "hummingbird" draws nearer to our table, the squeals of excitement slowly crescendoed into screeches of terror as we all begin to realize that the "hummingbird" is in fact a giant beetle. Check out the picture of this mug when it landed on the table.

The rest of the dining experience was OK. They had a vineyard out back, which I thought was cool.

The next morning Becky and I decided to join seven other people for a trek through the rain forest of Khoa Yai. You might be thinking, that sounds really cool! I was thinking the same. You might also be wondering, how much does a guide for something like that cost. The answer my friends is ZERO! "How could that possibly be?" you are now most definitely asking. Simple, why would be want to spend five dollars on a guide when we could rely on our friends who have been here many times and could lead us.

From Khao Yai

Any idea how this one turned out? Correct. We got lost. Turns out, a hike through a rain forest on a trail you mark with "that one big bush" and "do you see that funny looking tree" during rainy season is a bad idea. So yes, we got lost but we were still having fun. Look how happy we look at this big 'ol tree.

Pretty much immediately after this picture, the skies opened up and unleashed its fury upon us. I think now is time to tell you about the other wildlife that we encountered on our trip. Let me flash back to getting ready for the trek. See the picture below.

Do you see those silly looking things. Those are leech socks. See how happy I am to be wearing them. That happiness did not last long. At the begging of our hike, these little suckers (punny) were not too bad. They were getting on us but only a few at a time. Well, as soon as it started raining, these things were everywhere. The girls on the trek were losing it. I think I may still have a few marks where these things leached on. And no, I did not have a Stand By Me moment. I think Becky would have been jealous of the leach...hi five! Actually, Becky did get a leach near her fun zone, but nothing too sketchy.

From Khao Yai

From Khao Yai

I could go on and on about the rediculousness of being lost in the forest with a group of people. I think there was genuine fear among some of us (not me...Eagle Scout). I think I heard one person say that we should eat them if they were the first to die. Slight overreactions. It got to the point where I was like, OK, I am going to lead us out the way we came in.

About this time, someone was on the phone with the park service and they were trying to tell them where we were... "There is a tree, and, uh, some mud, and uh, hmmm, a river."

Well, eventually (5 hours later) we followed the sound of motorbikes and found our way out. We all had like 30-75 leach bites and were exhausted.

All was not lost, as we finally saw some wild life on the road on our way out.

From Khao Yai

Overally, it was an interesting experience and we learned that we should just go to the beach during rainy season and check out the mountains when its dry.

CHANGING GEARS....

We celebrated Becky's bday with a weekend of fun. We stayed in a nice hotel downtown. Ate a nice steak dinner. We went to a bar, The Londoner, afterward as they were celebrating October Fest and we got litres of beer. Whoa. That is apparently a lot of beer. Then on Sunday we watched the Ags and the Wolverines both lose...sad, and hung out at the pool. Pretty nice little weekend.

What's that? It's your birthday? Oh, well then have a corn sunday!!!

We finished out first quarter today and get our first days off since school began. We are heading to Laos for a week of fun in the sun. Hopefully there will be fewer leaches.

Gig 'em Aggies and BTHO K-State and Texas Tech. Go Blue (for my lovely wife).

Isaac and Becky

PS - Some leech aftermath...lots of these punks made it way past the leech socks.