Chrisandra's Thailand Trip in 2013

Aloha all,

this update has more pictures than my updates usually have. But Thailand is a very colorful country and this is really just a small selection of the way too many pictures we took. And just think of the alternative: If I were to write a thousand words in lieu of every picture in this update, even the most avid readers amongst you would loose interest. 

Obviously, three weeks was not enough even just to see all the sights, let alone really experience Thailand. On Koh Phi Phi, a common question is "Are you traveling or are you just on holiday?". Traveling means you quit your job and you are traveling for at least a few months. Thailand is so cheap that most Westeners can afford to do that on a pretty small budget. We were "just on holiday", but even though everything is cheap, we still managed to spend as much as we did on our US road trips. Then again, on our road trips, we did not get a massage every day and we do not go scuba diving or elephant riding…

Here are some of our favorite things we did in Thailand:

• The scuba diving on Koh Phi Phi was just spectacular. We saw several scorpion fish on every one of our seven dives. On our night dive we saw 4 gorgeous lion fish. With the mix of hard & soft coral, the huge gorgonian fans and schools of fish everywhere, it felt like diving in an aquarium. The perfect water temperature and the top notch dive operation obviously helped, since it is hard to enjoy the beauty when you are cold or worried underwater.The island of Koh Phi Phi is a weird place. There are no roads on Phi Phi, no cars, no mopeds and no Tuk Tuks. Sound like a pretty idyllic place, doesn't it? I had no idea how busy and crowded an island without traffic could be. The one and only town is crammed on the narrow stretch between the two mountains. It is party central. So if you like to party or if you like to scuba dive, it's a wonderful place, otherwise I would not know what to do there.
• On the way in and out we had a few days in Bangkok. It would be honest to describe this city as: modern AND 3rd world, awesome AND awful, easy AND confusing. We like big cities, but this is definitely one I do not want to live in. But checking out the temples, riding the river taxis, sunset drinks in various roof top bars was all very fun for a few days.
• We spent almost half of our stay in Chiang  Mai, a quieter city inland in the north of Thailand. Lots of things to do there. Our favorite was a one-day trekking trip that included an elephant ride, a hike to a waterfall, whitewater rafting and floating on a bamboo raft. We also did a fun zipline tour and a beginner's ATV tour that turn into quite the adventure when one of the ATVs and one of the other participants gave up and we ran out of gas, in the dark with the lights not working…

Here are some things I noticed about Thailand (and believe me, it was not always easy to hold back the German in me who wanted to tell them how they could run their country more efficiently. They seem to be doing just fine without my help.)

• Overall, Thailand is a very safe place. Even in Bangkok, at night, walking through some random neighborhood seemed as safe or safer than most European or American cities. I explain that with the fact that Thailand is the most buddhist country in the world and in general buddhists are not fond of violence. If that is indeed the reason, it would put Islam and Christianity to shame. However, the buddhist culture does not stop them from letting women be exploited or trying to scam tourist. 
• Regardless which form of transportation you choose, it is always a bit chaotic. But we learned to go with the flow. You might not get to where you wanted when you wanted. But you always get somewhere sometime. Taxis are so cheap that the only problem is finding a taxi that is willing to take you at the metered rate. River taxis are fast and cheap and easy to take, but we did not always end up where we thought we'd be going. The same is true for busses. Tuk Tuks are cheap and fun, but can be a little scary if you are used to traffic that follows some kind of rules. 
• To be honest, we were a little disappointed by the food. We love Thai food, so obviously we thought we'd love it even more in Thailand. Maybe we are spoiled by Thai Chef, our favorite restaurant here on Maui. Maybe our expectations were so high that we had to be disappointed. We tried everything from street food, to hole in the wall places and fancier restaurants. The food was always good, but never spectacular. And we found out that you actually have to specifically order even curry dishes spicy otherwise they assume that Westeners can not handle any spice at all.
• Reviews on TripAdvisor, Yelp or any other such web site are always personal opinion and as such will vary from one person to the next. We found this to be even more extreme in Thailand. It's just normal that one description of a restaurant says: I have lived in Thailand for a year now, this is the most authentic food, it's spectacular, fresh & cheap and the service is top notch." while the next one, supposedly about the same restaurant, warns "Tourist trap, no local would ever eat here, overpriced canned food and terrible service." The funny thing is that we never felt we got bad food or great food, it was always in the middle...
• Massages in Thailand are actually only $6-$9 for an hour like everybody told us. But of course I didn't really believe such silliness. The only day I did not get a massage I made up for on the next day with two. I never thought there could be a point where I would mind being asked whether I wanted to get an hour of massage for $6, but it happened. We were also told that the only problem with massages was to only get a massage and not more. Of course I would have refused, but should I be insulted that I was never even offered a 'happy ending'?
• Everybody in Thailand seems to speak English. They never expect any foreigner to speak any Thai. You don't even have to ask for an English tour, it is understood. Even signs in museums are always bilingual. But what surprised me that even though everybody speaks English, hardly anybody speaks it well. Signs are often comically bad translations and even though we had very nice tour guides, most of the tours stayed with the very basic information. I was longing for some in-depth information like you usually get from an American National Park ranger. The kind where you have more questions after the talk than before because he brought up so many interesting points. And he can answer slightly more complex questions in a language I understand. Of course you could say I should learn Thai if I want to learn more about Thailand. But judging by how long it took us to learn just the two words for hello and thank you, I don't think I could ever learn enough Thai for a meaningful conversation.
• From Bangkok we did a combined boat & bus tour to Ayutthaya which was surprisingly fun & informative. Ayutthaya is the former capital of Thailand. In fact, in 1700 it already had 1 million inhabitants, making it the largest city in the world at that time! The ruins still stand, but one of the towers gives the tower in Pisa some serious competition.
• One of the most surprising things about Thailand for me was the fact that there are basically no old cars there. By some standard, Thailand is still a 'third world' country. Yet, in three weeks all over Thailand I have seen fewer old cars than I usually do on my 7 minute commute through a fancy resort area of Maui…. I guess if a Thai family can not afford a new car, they don't buy an old car, they just buy a moped. Mopeds are routinely used to transport three or even four people, including babies or more cargo than we could fit in our car.
• On a one day trip from Chiang Mai to the Golden Triangle, we got to go to the border to Myanmar and spend a few minutes in Laos. This area is or was known as the foremost places for the opium trade. As far as we can tell, they have completely transitioned to the hand bag trade now.
• The number of temples, the elaborate structures, decorations and artwork sometimes made me wonder whether this is the best way to spend money in a country that clearly is still struggling with some basic infrastructure to improve the standard of living for it's people, such as potable water. I found that to be most extreme in the Anantasamakhom Throne Hall in Dusit Park in Bangkok. Here the king displays some of his finest artwork, including wood carved altars of huge dimensions that have such delicate artwork that it took dozens of artists several years to complete. Surprisingly, these were not historic artifacts like you would expect in Europe. Most of them were created in the past 7 years! Yet, despite this kind of lavish spending, the king seems to be loved by everybody. Thailand is deeply decided politically, in fact we drove by a demonstration against the controversial amnesty bill, but they all agree how wonderful the king is. He must be doing something right. He is has been king since 1946, which makes him the longest reigning living monarch in the world.

And that's the news from Lake Thailand, where all the dives were spectacular, where all the massages were cheap and everything is a little more colorful than average.

Aloha & Sawadee krab!

Chris & Sandra

We have seen the light - The story of Kayaks & Fireballs on Kauai

Aloha all,

We have been back for a few days from our kayak trip on Kauai's NaPali Coast, but we are still on an emotional high. I usually only feel that way after Ultimate Frisbee tournaments or after a few months on a road trip. If I had to sum up our trip in one word, I'd say: EPIC! But since I can use as many words as I want (and you can read as few words as you want), let me elaborate:

We had seen the spectacular NaPali Coast of Kauai a few times before: on several hikes, boat trips and helicopter rides, but kayaking the entire 17 miles from Haena to Poihale Beach was by far the best experience. The perspective looking at these cliffs towering up to 4,000 feet above from a kayak just few inches above sea level is amazing and intimidating by itself. The fact that we had never done anything like this before just added to the sense of adventure. I think the longest I had ever kayaked before this trip was around a cruise ship anchored outside of Lahaina.

We are grateful that our friend Ute invited us along for this expedition. I bet this would be an awesome experience even as a commercial, guided tour. But going by ourselves (we were nine all together) with a few old and a few new friends was even better. And thanks to our unofficial leader Keith, we knew where we were going and what to do when we got there. Thanks to Keith, we also spent the last night before the actual trip in style, at the Westin Villas in Princeville, including a half priced 4 star dinner, that probably tasted even better because we knew we'd be eating spam and freeze dried food for the next four days.

Early Friday morning we launched our kayaks at Haena Beach. Sandra and I almost flipped over going through the shore break. We had good intentions to practice before going on such a long trip, but my tendonitis and life got in the way and our only practice paddle was less than an hour inside the reef in Lahaina. The first few strokes felt so wobbly that at first I doubted we would make it very far. But we never actually flipped over. Also Ute & Dyan quickly proved that flipping over does not affect the enjoyment of the trip in the very least.

The first day was the hardest. 7 Miles of open ocean is about all I ever want to paddle in one day. Some companies offer the whole 17 miles as a day trip. I assume they check that you are an olympic athlete before they take you on such a trip. The luxury of doing the trip in several days also allowed us to check out a few really cool sea caves along the way.

Those of you who have read my update from my sailing trip from Panama to the Galapagos might wonder how this seasick sailor did in a little kayak bouncing around the NaPali coast …surprisingly well. Sandra felt a little seasick, but for me, the old rule seemed to work: If you are driving the car yourself, you don't get carsick. I have no other explanation that I felt fine. But the paddling was hard on our untrained arms. But the longer it took, the happier were we to finally make it to Kalalau Beach, our home for the next two nights. This is a huge beach with a picture perfect waterfall behind it, which doubles as a shower and fresh water source. There was plenty of shade under the trees to set up our tents. Considering how remote this beach is, it was actually surprisingly busy. There are even some permanent residents here. As idyllic as it is, I like civilization enough that I don't want to live here year round. But there was plenty to do for two days.

We hiked along the beach, went into several caves and swam around the rocks to Honopu Beach. Swimming is the one and only way to get to that beach. Not even kayaks are allowed to land on this sacred beach. The only exception is if you are filming a Hollywood movie. If you have seen the 1976 version of King Kong or the 1998 movie "Six Days Seven Nights" or "Raiders of the Lost Ark" with Harrison Ford and remember a huge natural arch, then you have seen Honopu Beach. This is such a special place, I'd go there all the time, if it did not involve a drive to the airport a flight via Honolulu to Kauai, 7 miles of paddling or 11 miles of hiking, another long walk and a gnarly swim to get there…I guess that's part of what makes it so special.

In the afternoon, we hiked up the Kalalau Valley, when I realized, I had seen this valley before. The popular lookout point with the view that's on every postcard stand in Kauai at the end of the drive along Waimea Canyon just happens to be at the rim of Kalalau Valley, but what a different experience this time! The reward for talking the hard way here instead of the drive-by sightseeing tour: We got to refresh ourselves at a nice waterfall and swimming hole.

After two nights, we had to pack up our stuff and move on to the next camp site, 5 miles of paddling further along the sea cliffs. This is the most scenic part of the NaPali Coast, including the 'open ceiling cave'. I have not heard any description or seen any photos that do this cave any justice. We spent almost an hour exploring, jumping off cliffs, climbing on the little island in the middle and just marveling at the beauty of this place.

The last night we spent at Milolii Beach. This campground is a lot less busy since you can not hike here. Besides us there were only two other groups of kayakers. After a much needed nap, we went snorkeling and then Sandra, Stacey & I went exploring the nearby stream. A little rock hopping later we found another fresh water swimming hole, with a beautiful twin waterfall. Life does not get much better than this…or so I thought.

After dinner, we all laid down on the beach for some star gazing. Thanks to the remote location, a late moon rise and clear skies, the conditions were just as good as on Haleakala, without the cold! We even got to see a couple of shooting stars. What happened next still gives me goose bumps when I think about it. This super bright colorful streak of light rushed half way across the sky. It was so bright and lasted so long that, for a second, I was truly concerned for our planet. It just did not seem right. All of us sat up, howled and wondered what just happened. 

To call it a shooting star would be correct, but an understatement. I guess the better term is a "fireball meteor". According to the The International Astronomical Union a fireball is "a meteor brighter than any of the planets. Well, what we saw was easily 10 times brighter than venus. It actually is reported as an official event on the website of the American Meteor Society: http://www.amsmeteors.org/fireball_event/2013/1815
It's nice that we all got to see it, and it's nice to see it officially verified. It kind of proves what we felt even before: That this was a very special, magical weekend.

Four days in our normal, everyday life can pass by without much notice. It seemed like we experienced a few months worth of adventures in just a few days. Not that 'normal life' on Maui is not special, but this was the most awesome out-of this -world trip that I can imagine taking in such a short time. And compared to a road trip, which we never would want to end, this has an added bonus: As much fun as it was, it is also nice when it's over, since we do like cold beer and soft beds as well.

Aloha from Lake NaPali, where all the paddlers are strong, all the sea caves are good looking and every moment was above average.

Chris

Mini Roadtrip from Sacramento to Lake Tahoe in 2013

Aloha all,
you have been spared by these lengthy updates because it had been way too long since Sandra and I went on a road trip. Another long trip like 2008 and 2010 is always on our mind, but it will be a little while before it becomes a reality. So we decided to do a little 'mini road trip' to shorten the wait. We've been back for a few days, but in case you are not on Facebook, you might not have heard much about it.



We picked Sacramento & Lake Tahoe mostly because we had never been there. But still, the first evening in Sacramento was very predictable: Within hours from landing, we walked to the State Capitol (because we like state capitols and there is none on Maui), we found a great Indian restaurant (because we like Indian food and there is none on Maui) and found a bar (because we like margaritas and surprisingly we had to go to Sacramento to find out that they taste really good with coconut in them).

The next day we got our first history fix taking a tour through the California State Capitol. The building looks impressive by today's standards. To think that they built it in 1860 when the population of California was only 1% of what it is today is mind boggling. One can argue whether it was visionary foresight of how important California was to become or whether it was just another government wasting taxpayer's money. Either way, we enjoyed it and learnt a lot on the free tour.





We also visited the Leland Stanford Mansion. He was the Governor of California in the 1860's and founded the prestigious Stanford University. He was one of the business men who struck it rich during the gold rush, not by looking for gold, but by selling things the gold prospectors needed. Even more interesting was the Governor's Mansion, where several Governors lived up until Ronal Reagan moved out, apparently it was not the best neighborhood then. It's a fine area now, we stayed right across the street from here and even Jerry Brown, the current Governor moved into a condo just around the corner from here. I am glad he did not want to move back into the historic Governor's Mansion, that leaves it available for Joe, our tour guide, who turned it into his own comedy club. His humor was lost on the school kids on the tour, but we were so amused, I actually considered taking the tour a second time.

Because we like boat tours and underground tours, we took a boat tour on the Sacramento River and an underground tour of Old Sacramento. With a bucket of crab for lunch in between and another Indian dinner afterwards. Old Sacramento is a very authentic looking western pioneer town. Since it was built right next to the then unregulated river, it got flooded so often that they had to raise the whole town by one floor. What used to be street level is now the basement. Surprisingly, that was easier than moving the town to a drier area. I don't know what it is about underground tours, but just as in Seattle, it does seem to attract the comedian type tour guides. We loved it.

We also visited the historic "Fort Sutter". That used to be THE place to go if you were a pioneer who just arrived in California. John Sutter was instrumental in opening up California to the masses that followed. He was Swiss, but just happens to be from Kandern, Germany, only a few dozen miles from the towns where Sandra and I are from. The courage and determination of these early pioneers is pretty amazing anyway, but the fact that he grew up in the same area as I did, makes it even more impressive. It was at his mill where the first gold was found in California in 1848. But even though he was at the seemingly right place at the right time, the gold rush actually ended up bankrupting him rather then making him rich. That fate he shared with many of the "49ers" who came here in America's biggest mass migration in the year following the gold discovery, with very few of them actually finding a lot of gold. Can you believe it, I did not know or even think about why the San Francisco 49ers are called the 49ers? We still have a lot to learn!

On our way from Sacramento to Lake Tahoe we stopped at the Sudwerk Riverside Brewhouse. By lunchtime it was about 100 degrees. The cold beer alone did not cool me down enough. Luckily, this Riverside Brewhouse is right by the side of a river. Very refreshing. That night we went to an 80's party at the Amphitheater at Thunder Valley, hosted by Pat Benatar and Cheap Trick. They both have been playing music for over 30 years and still seem to enjoy it just as much as we enjoyed listening to them.

Lake Tahoe presented itself in three distinct shades of blue so colorful that it truly impressed us, even though we are spoiled by the view of the Pacific Ocean from our lanai. The "beaches" were actually packed and there were more stand up paddle boarders than here in Maui. But the very idyllic 'Tallack Historical Site' was not busy at all, so that's where we went. I think if you had told me in high school that I would rather visit a historical site than go to the beach, I would have called you crazy. Considering how much we enjoy historical sites now, it's surprising how little Sandra and I enjoyed history lessons in school.

Facebook can be a silly waste of time, but sometimes it comes in really handy. We did not even know that our friends Ron & MaryAnne had a place on Lake Tahoe. But after seeing our post, they spontaneously invited us over for a barbecue at the cottage that Ron built himself in 1959. We also took another fun little underground tour at the Cal Neva Resort. During the heydays of this resort, which obviously have passed, they built tunnels to smuggle alcohol,  mafia bosses, Frank Sinatra & Marilyn Monroe between California and Nevada. Our tour guide had some interesting conspiracy theories, including some that seem to suggest that he thinks that even the weirdest conspiracy theorists don't have a clue about what is REALLY going on;-)



Lake Tahoe on a sunny Sunday can get pretty busy even in early June. Our plan A was to leave the crowds behind on a hot air balloon ride. But apparently the balloon company was worried that due to the prevailing winds, we might get too long of a balloon ride for our money, so it got canceled. But we did enjoy our plan B: getting away from the crowds by doing a hike a little bit away from the lake. I had not realized that the drive to the trailhead was already so remote that we were actually glad we were driving what others have described as a "Jellybean" rather than an RV. We did two awesome hikes to Grass Lake and Eagle Falls, interrupted by an awesome lakeside lunch at the West Shore Cafe.

On Monday we did two more hikes, around Spooner Lake and along the rugged shoreline of Lake Tahoe by Chimney Beach. We found out why it's called Chimney Beach: There is a big chimney right on the beach, but why? Maybe it's to warm you up after skinny dipping since there is a nude beach close by. I would have considered going swimming if the chimney had been in use. The culinary highlights that day were both made possible by Yelp. Lunch at the "Wild Alaskan" was voted as the best value by Sandra and me since we got to use the 50% off deal from Yelp on the happy hour prices. And dinner at the "Himmel Haus" was voted the most fun meal of the trip. Usually, I am suspect of Germans looking for German food on vacation. But since our options for Spätzle and Bratwurst are very limited on Maui, I felt justified to look for a German restaurant. Little did we know that the "Himmel Haus" is THE local hangout in Tahoe. At least it was that night, possibly because it was 'open mic night' and the local softball team won their game that day and had their party here. We sat down at a large table, quickly were joined by others and discussed German food, beer and Hawaii and played yenga. I had just told the guy next to me that I thought the food was pretty authentic, when I found out he was the owner of the joint and that his cook is not German at all, but an Italian Jew from Chicago. The beer tasted so good that Sandra bought an actual Himmel Haus beer stein. She claims that the beer tastes better out of it even here in Hawaii .

On our way back to Sacramento we went to the actual site where the very first nugget of gold in was found in California, causing the Gold Rush: Sutter's Mill at the Marshal Gold Discovery Sate Park. We got an almost private tour from a park ranger. Of course we also tried our luck at gold panning. Judging from our success, Sandra would have been a lot better prospector than me. She found more than twice as many flakes of gold. Even the tourist version of panning for gold was hard on the back. I don't think I am sorry we missed the actual gold rush by 160 years.

On our last night we had another bucket of crabs at "Joe's Crab Shack", which is kind of a Bubba Gump on steroids: Lots of dancing, singing, silliness and crabs... our kind of place! Overall, we enjoy all kinds of surprises on a road trip. But what we do not enjoy and did not even know that they still had in California is smoking rooms. Can you believe it: Two hotels insisted on giving us smoking rooms. I hate to be a complainer at the Front Desk since I am usually at the receiving end of that, but smoking rooms in 2013, really? Well, Priceline and Hotwire came to the rescue when called. Overall, I have to say I was pretty surprised that all our hotel rooms cost only about as much as what we charge at the Royal Lahaina just to upgrade your room from a garden view to an ocean view. But I will continue to offer those upgrades so that we can take another road trip soon. Maui might be our favorite place in the world, except being on the road…



And that's the news from Lake Tahoe, where all the hikes were awesome, all the food was delicious and where life was even more good than average.
Chris & Sandra