29th of Feb and after a good breakfast we decided to go and check out the real Jungle at Khao Sok National Parc. Khao Sok itself is just a one street 'town' with several GH and Hotels along the streets. One can tell that within a few years this place will also be spoiled by loud and noisy tourists ruining the place partying and giving a damn about Nature.... We paid 500 baht entry fee and went out for a 2,5 km walk in the heat of the day. Jens was extremely suffering from the heat, hardly being able to breathe. The humidity in this region is really high and just moving slowly brings you to sweat like you just ran a marathon. We got to a small waterhole where Kjell and I went out for a swim while Jens caught his first leech! Luckily, it has not started to suck blood therefore he could remove it easily.... The mood went down to Zero...;-( The result of that trip was an exhausted husband, blisters from my sneakers, one leech bite and an unsatisfied kid that wanted to climb on rocks and jump off waterfalls.... Dinner afterwards cheered us up while we were still eating Kjell went down to the small river to build a dam with the local kids. He was happy afterall... For the night we had booked a Night Safari. We had our own Guide and it turned out to be pretty cool: We saw three snakes (green vipers and a mangrove snake, both poisonous), huge spiders (golden orb spider), a slow loris just eating a huge grasshopper, a crab living in a bamboo trunk, chamaeleons, a scorpion and many other cool animals.... Towards the end of the two hour trip, Kjell decided that he was way too tired to move any further and started crying like a wild monkey. The rest of the tour was a drag and we were all happy to be back at our tree house with bat and monitor lizard.... As I undressed, one leech full with blood fell out of my pants and on the other foot another leech still kept on sucking my blood! We sprayed Mosquito spray on it and it could easily be removed... I was dripping blood for two hours. No pain, no itching.
1st of March and we just did not do anything... relaxing at our place and looking at the monkeys in our Garden.
2nd of March we were picked up early to go on a whole day lake tour! The start was quite horrible for Jens as during the one hour drive to the Lake he felt really sick.. Fortunately my travel sickness pills helped and he was better after a while. The trip was cool, we drove by longtail boat for 1,5 hours on the cristal blue lake (that in fact is a dam) and stopped for a fantastic Thai lunch break and an even better swim in the pee-warm lake. We then took a bamboo raft to a small cave. To be honest, no caves can impress us any more and Kjell keeps on dreaming of the "Blue Lagoon" cave in Vang Vieng. That definitely cannot be topped... Nevertheless, we had a great day, though Jens definitely takes more time getting used to the climate than I was hoping. Packing our packs and looking forward to move on the beach parts of our trip.. ;-)
3rd of March and in the morning we left with a public bus for 490 baht (all 3 of us) for Phuket. After 4 hours we arrived in the Old Centre of Phuket and after a 10 minute walk arrived at our Hotel Rattana Mansion. Nothing special but clean and with A/C and an extra bed for Kjell. Jens felt sick again and so Kjell and I went out for Dinner to grab some Thai style burgers. As I had forgotten my Converse chucks in Khao Sok I bought some fake Converse sneakers for 5 Euro. ;-) Phuket is stuffed with Russians and I am glad that this is just a quick stopover....
4th of March we were picked up to get the ferry to Koh Lanta via Koh PhiPhi.
4 hours later we arrived on Swedish domained Koh Lanta. The pick up from the Hotel was excellent and we ended up in the most perfect and beautiful place... Long Beach Chalet! It is not the cheapest but definitely worth the money... A wonderful wooden bungalow, just newly built in 2011, extremly clean and huge, A/C, an open bathroom but no bugs, bats or lizards in it. We are directly in front of a nice pool that Kjell jumped in 5 minutes after arrival. The Restaurant "The Three Mums" serves great food and we feel like in heaven! The beautiful beach is only a three minutes walk away.
Unfortunately, it is only shallow at some small part and then goes down pretty quick. I will have to get used to that... though people told us that this might change according to the weather. Kjell prefers the pool. We will see tomorrow.... at night we had some major rain and thunderstorm which was sooo cool as underneath our bungalow we have a sitting area with a hammock and cosy pillows. We played cards until Kjell fell asleep and we finally had some parents' time to enjoy and drink some Chang beer and cocktails. We love this place !!!
5th of March and we just had a perfect good nights sleep until late in the morning. We enjoyed breakfast that for once is included in the price. ;-) The rest of the day we spent in the pool. Kjell will turn into a fish, I am sure about that!
In the afternoon we had spring rolls and a chocolate pancake at one of the cool beach bars, took a swim in the sea (after the rain yesterday the beach actually changed and we had sandbanks to swim to and feel safe as well as the less "rough" sea with less waves. We enjoyed our watermelon and mango juices and felt sooooo relaxed!! The beach bar was special, its furniture made of waste (lamps of old lighters and music tapes, chairs made of stranded goods, the bar guy was a typical lady boy and the bar dog only had three legs....). Tomorrow, we will start to explore the Island and right now I am looking forward to the 3 courses menu at the "Three Mums" tonite....;-)))) Life is wonderful and we are all enjoying each other so much.....
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