ABC
Laksa and Beef Curry
Dim Sum
The best fish dinner we had
Our Thanksgiving dinner
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Whirlwind through Malaysia
So only a week has past, but we're another country and four stops later which might make for a lengthy blog post, but we'll do our best to keep it short. Our first stop was the island of Langkawi. This is the duty-free beach haven of Malaysia, a long cry from our last island stop...about as far as it could possibly be actually. The Lonely Planted touted beaches so bright that you would need shades and they weren't kidding. Accompanying that was every ounce of tourist economy you could manage so we didn't stick around long. The guesthouse we stayed at was adorable though, and run by a Japanese women who had lived all over the world. When she found out we had just gotten married, she made every person who passed by wish us well in their native language. She handed out beer at the same time so quickly we amassed a table of people from all over the world and spent the night in great conversations, only interrupted by her playing the wedding march to keep everyone in the spirit.
The next stop was Pulau Penang, another one of those legendary places that you hear about, but would never imagine going to. It was much much more of a city than we imagined, however that turned out to be for the best, since it made for more places to eat. The cuisine in Penang is where the legend comes from and the food we got to eat certainly lived up to it. Yeah, we did some other stuff too, including hiking through a national park to monkey beach and dropping in to an icy theater to watch "Bolt" and the new James Bond movie... both of which we put on the recommended list for anyone who hasn't seen them yet.
After that we cruised up to the Cameron Highlands in the interior of Malaysia and spent a couple of days shivering. It's amazing how much the temperature can change over a five hour bus ride (the pitch of the road should have given it away). We didn't stick around too long as the weather was pretty wet, but we did take the time to tour a local tea plantation and have a pot of strawberry tea on the veranda.
The last stop in this post is another Malaysian island: Pangkor. It is much different - again - from any of the islands we've seen thus far. The biggest thing here is that there are very very few caucasian tourists. Apparently Pangkor is the Malaysian tourist getaway, and as we decided to come here during a school holiday, we got to meet that fact head on. It's been wonderful though, with some island side snorkeling and a decent collection of Malay food stalls to keep us fed. Ooh... a good story about that actually. In Malaysia they have two deserts that we have never come across before and will certainly be doing our best to bring home with us (in some way, shape or form): Cendol (pronounced chin-dool) and ABC (hopefully you can figure that one out). Both of them are basically like a big snow cone covered in anything syrupy you can imagine - in all combinations. We've had them both covered in molasses, sweetened condensed milk, cherry flavoring, gummy bears, peanuts, pinto beans, black beans and the piece-de-resistance green jelly-wormy-noodles. If it sounds intense, it is, but it's also perfect on a super hot day. We'll eat another one tonight and post a picture.
Much love, don't freeze!
TeamWander
P.S. We heard a rumor that NC State is in a bowl game!!! Party time at Mama Wander's house....
The next stop was Pulau Penang, another one of those legendary places that you hear about, but would never imagine going to. It was much much more of a city than we imagined, however that turned out to be for the best, since it made for more places to eat. The cuisine in Penang is where the legend comes from and the food we got to eat certainly lived up to it. Yeah, we did some other stuff too, including hiking through a national park to monkey beach and dropping in to an icy theater to watch "Bolt" and the new James Bond movie... both of which we put on the recommended list for anyone who hasn't seen them yet.
After that we cruised up to the Cameron Highlands in the interior of Malaysia and spent a couple of days shivering. It's amazing how much the temperature can change over a five hour bus ride (the pitch of the road should have given it away). We didn't stick around too long as the weather was pretty wet, but we did take the time to tour a local tea plantation and have a pot of strawberry tea on the veranda.
The last stop in this post is another Malaysian island: Pangkor. It is much different - again - from any of the islands we've seen thus far. The biggest thing here is that there are very very few caucasian tourists. Apparently Pangkor is the Malaysian tourist getaway, and as we decided to come here during a school holiday, we got to meet that fact head on. It's been wonderful though, with some island side snorkeling and a decent collection of Malay food stalls to keep us fed. Ooh... a good story about that actually. In Malaysia they have two deserts that we have never come across before and will certainly be doing our best to bring home with us (in some way, shape or form): Cendol (pronounced chin-dool) and ABC (hopefully you can figure that one out). Both of them are basically like a big snow cone covered in anything syrupy you can imagine - in all combinations. We've had them both covered in molasses, sweetened condensed milk, cherry flavoring, gummy bears, peanuts, pinto beans, black beans and the piece-de-resistance green jelly-wormy-noodles. If it sounds intense, it is, but it's also perfect on a super hot day. We'll eat another one tonight and post a picture.
Much love, don't freeze!
TeamWander
P.S. We heard a rumor that NC State is in a bowl game!!! Party time at Mama Wander's house....
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Last Hurrah in Thailand
So we finally made it away from the hordes of people who travel to the beaches and islands in the south of Thailand by heading to Koh Tarutao national park - it is the lonely, blue/green watered island that you would imagine when you think of the perfect place!! To get there, we first had to stop in the port town of Pak Bara for the night before catching a ferry to the islands. The town was not much to speak of, but we had one of the best dinners of the trip in a little bungalow on the beach at sunset. Almost too perfect, but the mosquitos came out in a fury to remind us of reality. They also found a way to infiltrate where we were staying the night, so needless to say between them and the mouse (yup a mouse) also sharing the room, we didn't get much sleep.
Once on the island though, we couldn't have asked for more. We had a cute, clean bungalow, a set of half a dozen new friends that we had met en-route, and stretches of unpopulated, beautiful, white-sandy beaches. We spent a day riding around the island on a long-tail boat (basically a canoe with an 8-cylinder diesel engine strapped to the back) and our new friends, stopping off to explore vacant coves and try to do a bit of snorkeling. Other than that, we took our sweet time doing nothing - we finished books, laid on the beach, and had a blast for our last hurrah in thailand.
Next stop - Langkawi island in Malaysia, possibly the direct opposite of Tarutao... we'll report back soon.
Heard the wolfpack might make a bowl, yessssssssssssssssssssss!!
Go Pack,
TeamWander
Once on the island though, we couldn't have asked for more. We had a cute, clean bungalow, a set of half a dozen new friends that we had met en-route, and stretches of unpopulated, beautiful, white-sandy beaches. We spent a day riding around the island on a long-tail boat (basically a canoe with an 8-cylinder diesel engine strapped to the back) and our new friends, stopping off to explore vacant coves and try to do a bit of snorkeling. Other than that, we took our sweet time doing nothing - we finished books, laid on the beach, and had a blast for our last hurrah in thailand.
Next stop - Langkawi island in Malaysia, possibly the direct opposite of Tarutao... we'll report back soon.
Heard the wolfpack might make a bowl, yessssssssssssssssssssss!!
Go Pack,
TeamWander
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Krabi - an unexpected adventure
Our next stop was a small town in the southern-most part of thailand called Krabi (gra-bee). It sits just outside the common tourist path and is well in to the part of thailand where Islam is more common than Buddhism. You can definitely notice the difference, most namely in the availability of alcohol (or lack thereof), but also in the fact that Mosques now outnumber the Wats.
Krabi was a wonderful surprise to us, we spent the very first night at a beach just outside of Krabi and to waste no time beating around the bush, it sucked. it was 100% a tourist economy and not the yummy interesting kind, the yucky kind instead. So, needless to say, we hopped a shared taxi back to Krabi the next morning and found different accomodations to spend the next couple of days. Krabi had so much to offer, both expected and unexpected. We ate most of our meals at a bustling night-market (the very best way to eat in Thailand) where you can walk from stall to stall and give everything a shot. One night we ended up drinking a couple of towers (not to be confused with a couple teen) at an expat bar that was running a few english movies and spent most of the night talking with the bar owner and a few of his friends.
The next day, we recovered from our minor hangovers and went to a buddhist temple here that is about 8 km out of town. the temple exists half at the base of a mountain and half up a flight of 1,283 steps. The view and serenity that we earned at the top was worth every bead of sweat on the way up. Plus we made some amazing new friends. One of our most unexpectedly amazing nights here in thailand, we joined up with a pair of Scottish expats, took a taxi to the wrong town, feasted on tons of indian food and countless carafes of wine and drank the rest of the night away at an irish pub. Ian and Stella we hope to cross paths with you again someday - look us up in Costa Rica.
We've since headed even further south, we're now a stone's throw away from the malaysian border. There's a national park down here that consists of about 91 islands and we're going to go camp on one of them for a few nights. should be beautiful, we'll let you all know.
Hugs to everyone,
TeamWander
PS. We sent half of our stuff home (quite literally) with Mama Wander and are now living out of one (the smaller of our two suitcases). It's proving to be an amazing lesson in how little stuff you actually need, and hopefully we can carry it over to packing for Costa Rica.
Krabi was a wonderful surprise to us, we spent the very first night at a beach just outside of Krabi and to waste no time beating around the bush, it sucked. it was 100% a tourist economy and not the yummy interesting kind, the yucky kind instead. So, needless to say, we hopped a shared taxi back to Krabi the next morning and found different accomodations to spend the next couple of days. Krabi had so much to offer, both expected and unexpected. We ate most of our meals at a bustling night-market (the very best way to eat in Thailand) where you can walk from stall to stall and give everything a shot. One night we ended up drinking a couple of towers (not to be confused with a couple teen) at an expat bar that was running a few english movies and spent most of the night talking with the bar owner and a few of his friends.
The next day, we recovered from our minor hangovers and went to a buddhist temple here that is about 8 km out of town. the temple exists half at the base of a mountain and half up a flight of 1,283 steps. The view and serenity that we earned at the top was worth every bead of sweat on the way up. Plus we made some amazing new friends. One of our most unexpectedly amazing nights here in thailand, we joined up with a pair of Scottish expats, took a taxi to the wrong town, feasted on tons of indian food and countless carafes of wine and drank the rest of the night away at an irish pub. Ian and Stella we hope to cross paths with you again someday - look us up in Costa Rica.
We've since headed even further south, we're now a stone's throw away from the malaysian border. There's a national park down here that consists of about 91 islands and we're going to go camp on one of them for a few nights. should be beautiful, we'll let you all know.
Hugs to everyone,
TeamWander
PS. We sent half of our stuff home (quite literally) with Mama Wander and are now living out of one (the smaller of our two suitcases). It's proving to be an amazing lesson in how little stuff you actually need, and hopefully we can carry it over to packing for Costa Rica.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Sorry we're slow...
All our company in the past week and a half has distracted us from blog writing, so you can blame them. ;) Just kidding, it was fantastic to see some familiar faces and we had a great time. Miah's mom arrived first, followed a couple days later by Michelle and Jaime. We decided to celebrate Thanksgiving once they all arrived since we'd be back on our own for the official celebration. (Actually, that's today, so HAPPY THANKSGIVING everyone!) We made a pretty impressive spread if we do say so ourselves, so each of you should tell us yours so we can compare. We managed to make chicken and sweet potato coconut curry, glass noodle salad, spring rolls, pork with holy basil, pad thai, coconut rice, and a "birthday cake" to celebrate the ones we'd missed. Our cooking class apparently paid off.
Once leaving the resort, we all headed down to Phuket Town and took a boat trip out to Phi Phi Island which was destroyed by the tsunami a few years ago. Thanks (kindof) to big tourist dollars, the island bounced back almost immediately. At least this time around there's a little more thought about sustainability. There was a coral reef along the island which was great for snorkeling, and otherwise we just enjoyed the sunshine and blue seas. Our last night in Phuket, we had one of our best meals of the trip, at this out of the way seafood place right on the water. Everyone was a bit taken aback when the food arrived (lots of animal eyes staring back up at us), but it was delicious! Even better, Michelle was almost scared to death by a lobster the size of your torso (she'll have to post the picture).
After Phuket, we headed north to Phang Nga, to a sleepy town surrounded by cliffs and mountains. What seemed like a relaxing night turned quite interesting when we returned to the guesthouse to find muddy footprints on Jaime's bed and up the wall. The guesthouse owners (who didn't speak English) came to the same conclusion we did that someone had broken in to the room, but they did not seem concerned at all. It seemed as if the guy next door had crawled into the ceiling, over the wall, and down through their drop ceiling to get into the room, but was scared off before he could take anything. Finally (after much hand waving and arguing), we were able to convince them we did not want to stay there and moved to another hotel down the street.
Strange things continued the next morning when we decided to visit a nearby cave. When the tuk-tuk dropped us off though, it looked like we had stepped into the Thai version of South of the Border. The place was deserted but there were odd animal statues all over. We wandered farther back and were greeted by dozens and dozens of monkeys climbing over these animal statues and up the rock cliff behind them. We were dumbfounded watching them all and then a monk showed up with food and they quickly surrounded him and were trying to tear the bag from his hands. The larger ones would run in screaming trying to scare the others off and it was complete mayhem. If this monkey colony wasn't strange enough, we then entered this giant dragon's mouth and started following a dark, creepy passage through his body to reach the cave we were trying to find. Reaching the other side, there is a garden of statues that are portraying hell, tortured in any variety of ways. The cave itself was beautiful though - huge with a wandering stream down the middle. The monks had constructed bridges back and forth across the stream until you reached a shrine in the back. The whole experience was just bizarre, no description can do it justice. We'll try to get some photos up next time we get to an internet cafe with our camera.
No sooner did we finish this, that we started on another - though slightly less awesome at the outset - adventure. We took a boat tour of the bays around Phang Nga. This included going around the mangrove forests as well as out in to the bay and to see the illustrious James Bond island (from "The Man With The Golden Gun" for those of you watching along at home). Turns out the "boat" was barely big enough for the six of us and putzed around at just under snail pace and James Bond island paled in comparison to the limestone monsters that filled the rest of the bay, but all things considered, once the rain stopped we had a blast. The last part of the trip was really the most notable. We spent the night in a Muslim fishing village at the mouth of the bay. Established (officially) about 15 years ago the village is basically a random collection of huts that all sit up on stilts at the base of a big limestone rock that pops up out of the sea. The centerpoint of our time in this village was dinner. It was amazing. Plate after plate of yummy thai seafood dishes came out from the kitchen and the 12 people at the table (all of us were part of the same tour) ate every scrap of the food on the table.
We've just come across a small mosquito emergency here in the computer lab, so we're going to disappear for now. Hope everything is wonderful and don't forget, we want to hear your thanksgiving stories!
Eat up!
TeamWander
Once leaving the resort, we all headed down to Phuket Town and took a boat trip out to Phi Phi Island which was destroyed by the tsunami a few years ago. Thanks (kindof) to big tourist dollars, the island bounced back almost immediately. At least this time around there's a little more thought about sustainability. There was a coral reef along the island which was great for snorkeling, and otherwise we just enjoyed the sunshine and blue seas. Our last night in Phuket, we had one of our best meals of the trip, at this out of the way seafood place right on the water. Everyone was a bit taken aback when the food arrived (lots of animal eyes staring back up at us), but it was delicious! Even better, Michelle was almost scared to death by a lobster the size of your torso (she'll have to post the picture).
After Phuket, we headed north to Phang Nga, to a sleepy town surrounded by cliffs and mountains. What seemed like a relaxing night turned quite interesting when we returned to the guesthouse to find muddy footprints on Jaime's bed and up the wall. The guesthouse owners (who didn't speak English) came to the same conclusion we did that someone had broken in to the room, but they did not seem concerned at all. It seemed as if the guy next door had crawled into the ceiling, over the wall, and down through their drop ceiling to get into the room, but was scared off before he could take anything. Finally (after much hand waving and arguing), we were able to convince them we did not want to stay there and moved to another hotel down the street.
Strange things continued the next morning when we decided to visit a nearby cave. When the tuk-tuk dropped us off though, it looked like we had stepped into the Thai version of South of the Border. The place was deserted but there were odd animal statues all over. We wandered farther back and were greeted by dozens and dozens of monkeys climbing over these animal statues and up the rock cliff behind them. We were dumbfounded watching them all and then a monk showed up with food and they quickly surrounded him and were trying to tear the bag from his hands. The larger ones would run in screaming trying to scare the others off and it was complete mayhem. If this monkey colony wasn't strange enough, we then entered this giant dragon's mouth and started following a dark, creepy passage through his body to reach the cave we were trying to find. Reaching the other side, there is a garden of statues that are portraying hell, tortured in any variety of ways. The cave itself was beautiful though - huge with a wandering stream down the middle. The monks had constructed bridges back and forth across the stream until you reached a shrine in the back. The whole experience was just bizarre, no description can do it justice. We'll try to get some photos up next time we get to an internet cafe with our camera.
No sooner did we finish this, that we started on another - though slightly less awesome at the outset - adventure. We took a boat tour of the bays around Phang Nga. This included going around the mangrove forests as well as out in to the bay and to see the illustrious James Bond island (from "The Man With The Golden Gun" for those of you watching along at home). Turns out the "boat" was barely big enough for the six of us and putzed around at just under snail pace and James Bond island paled in comparison to the limestone monsters that filled the rest of the bay, but all things considered, once the rain stopped we had a blast. The last part of the trip was really the most notable. We spent the night in a Muslim fishing village at the mouth of the bay. Established (officially) about 15 years ago the village is basically a random collection of huts that all sit up on stilts at the base of a big limestone rock that pops up out of the sea. The centerpoint of our time in this village was dinner. It was amazing. Plate after plate of yummy thai seafood dishes came out from the kitchen and the 12 people at the table (all of us were part of the same tour) ate every scrap of the food on the table.
We've just come across a small mosquito emergency here in the computer lab, so we're going to disappear for now. Hope everything is wonderful and don't forget, we want to hear your thanksgiving stories!
Eat up!
TeamWander
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Chiang Mai (An Addendum)
I can't believe we forgot this in the other post. It must have been long enough already, but this is news that's simply worth posting, so it deserves it's own special note. While we were in Chiang Mai, we also decided that we would make a voyage to the nearest town to the north (about 15km) in the back of a pickup truck to go pet baby tigers... yes, that's what I said: pet baby tigers. What an incredible experience. There's a rehab/breeding center/tourist attraction in this town that affords visitors the ability to be a part of the recreation of young tigers. We spent 15 or so minutes in a big cage with 5 4-6 month old tigers. We'll have some more pictures up on flickr soon if you want to see them. What an experience!!
Hugs and go Wolfpack,
TeamWander
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Heading South
From Chiang Mai we took a night train to Bangkok and then flew down to Phuket. We'll leave out our day spent in Bangkok since it was probably our least favorite place we've been to so far. Once in Phuket we had another week at a resort that was given to us as well. We had no idea how amazing it would be though. We pulled into a driveway lined with huge torches of fire and were greeted with leis and mojitos to check-in. They took us to our villa which had 2 bedrooms, 2 baths, kitchen, living room, deck...everything set in the jungle. The pools are huge with turtles and elephants shooting water, slides, etc. and it is all set on these gorgeous white sandy beaches with crystal blue water. We never stayed anywhere so nice in our lives, but could definitely get used to the high life here. :) Our backpacker nature came out quickly though, and we had to rent a motorcycle to get to town 40km away so we could buy and cook our own food. Let's just say that two people and 40 pounds of food is no easy task to drive back on a bike. We wake up in the morning to yoga and pilates classes and then enjoy a day in the sun. Sorry for all of you in winter weather at the moment! Company comes later this week as Miah's mom, Michelle, and Jaime come to join us here.
Love and sunshine to all,
TeamWander
Love and sunshine to all,
TeamWander
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