Thailand Travels Day 2

Chitraroff Blog Thai Entry

Bangkok, Thailand, Day 2

Saturday, 11/19

“pom ben kroo”  I am a teacher.

“no tai mai jai”    I don’t speak Thai.

“korp kun krub”  Thank you.    (Leslie says, “korp kun ka” because she is female).

After our sleep to shake off jet lag, our first order of business was to find breakfast.  Bodhi wanted to have a traditional american breakfast offered by our hotel, but the rest of us had other plans.  So, we spent our morning wandering around the market closest to our hotel.  After wading through massive amounts of clothing vendors (hundreds of stalls selling the exact same thing), we finally rounded a corner and found the food vendors.  We came across five empty chairs in front of a very friendly couple and ordered 5 bowls of noodles.  You could either get them “dry” with no broth or “wet” with broth.  The “dry” portion was akin to chow mien and the “wet” portion was like Vietnamese Pho.  So, we ordered 2 dry, 3 wet.  The broth was so savory and Leslie and I kicked it up a notch with some Thai spices.  It all was delicious and we fed our family of 5 for about 250 bat ($7.14).

The food vendors realized that we were having difficulty expressing numbers beyond 10, so Kahlo got a quick lesson on how to organize higher numbers.  They found a scrap of paper and quickly sketched out how to pronounce numbers beyond 10.  They were very willing to teach us despite our inability to pronunciate properly.  We are learning very, very slowly.

After breakfast we boarded a tuk-tuk (motorcycle with seating for 2).  We crammed all 5 of us into a space designed for 2-3 people.  Yes, there are benefits to being small.  A tuk-tuk ride is an experience like no other.  With minimal traffic laws, it is pretty much a free-for-all on the roads.  Cars, taxis, scooters, motorcycles, tuk-tuks, cyclists and pedestrians are all simultaneously navigating this matrix of chaos.  And remarkably, we haven’t seen an accident yet.  Plus, there is a considerable amount of politeness with very little horn honking amongst the drivers.  The tuk-tuk driver took us to Wat Pho (a Buddhist temple that houses the largest reclining Buddha which was 46m long and 15m high).  That’s about 120 feet long!  

Wat Pho was built in the 1600’s, so it is mind blowing to walk amongst structures that have been in existence for over 400 years.  I know for Europe travelers this is common place, but I’ve never been to Europe so I am impressed, nonetheless (hey that rhymes!).  There must be over 1000’s Buddha statues of all sizes within these grounds with each one being unique in its shape, facial expression, size and gilding (outer coating). In each temple, we are required to remove our shoes and hats and women have to cover their legs down to their knees and both genders must cover their shoulders.  There were female tourists walking around in these bright, green robes who did not have proper covering.  Leslie did her homework and was prepared...that’s my girl!

We walked across the street to the Ministry of Defense which houses the Royal Temple and the Royal Park.  The Thai king who reigned for 70 years just passed away. So, to honor him they were giving away free food and drink outside the Royal Temple. So, we graciously accepted and ended up getting a free lunch of rice and pork, water and green tea.  There is a free lunch, after all!   We were “all templed out” at this point so we wandered around a bit, then found some really fun exercise equipment to play on in the Royal Park and entertained ourselves for about an hour while challenging each other to complete different tasks.  Leslie did 10 spins on this rotating disk, no hands!

We were all pretty tired at this point, so we hopped on another tuk-tuk with a very friendly driver who wanted to know all about us.  He had 4 children with his daughter of 21 years being the oldest.  He was trying to set up Kahlo with his daughter with just the right amount of humor with the proposal.  But, she already had a baby.  After some trouble deciphering his English after awhile, we finally figured out that he was saying “Trump” and “Clinton”.  Apparently, we figured out he was a Trump supporter after showing us the thumbs up sign and a big smile while saying “Tramp” repeatedly.  We were amazed that he even followed the US elections. 

Back at the hotel, we went for a swim, had some cool beverages, and then got ready to head to Chinatown for the night market.  After another harrowing Tuk Tuk ride, we came across the very happening scene of the night market.  We pretty much sampled most of the fare along this 4 block stretch.  There were lines of people waiting to eat at the street vendor carts.  We ate fried dough balls, sectioned pomegranate, thai basil sausage, egg rolls, roasted animal hearts and bbq’d kidney.  There was a vendor selling fried insects and larva of all varieties, but we politely declined.  We will ease into that one a bit...maybe later :).  One of the most entertaining parts of our night was watching the street chefs prepare their food with such speed, agility, and flair.  There were massive flames shooting up the sides of woks everywhere! We will be taking a Thai cooking class together when we head north to Chiang Mai.

The tuk tuk ride home was super fun.  The driver had mounted a blue tooth speaker, so Kahlo hooked him up with his best jams and we cruised back to our hotel with LED lights flashing and some reggae music blaring into the Bangkok night.  

Tomorrow, we will embark on a 20 mile bicycle tour from the farmlands outside of Bangkok and into the city with many stop along the way including one at the floating markets.  Until then, blessings to all of our friends and loved ones.

~The Chitraroff Family

“Lah Gorn Krub”  Goodbye.

Thailand Travels Day 1

Chitraroff Blog Thai Entry

Bangkok, Thailand, Day 1

Friday, 11/18

Hello (sa-wat-dee krub),

Well, we survived the 17 hour plane flight from LAX to Beijing to Bangkok.  The strangest thing is that we started our journey at 8:30 Wednesday morning and we arrived at our hotel in Bangkok at 3:00 am Friday morning. We lost an entire day due to the time zones alone.  Luckily, we get that day back upon our return to America.

Our China air plane flight from LAX to Beijing was a 12 hour leg.  Luckily, each seat had private  video screens with movies, TV shows, games and my favorite, an onboard navigation system that gave us all of the details of our flight.  This kept the boys entertained nicely.  

Leslie and I were amazed that our journey took us right past our meeting place of Arcata, CA along the west coast, across the Pacific Northwest and towards Alaska, Russia and beyond.  For some reason, we thought that we would be heading towards Hawaii. My science mind was excited to see all of the specs of our flight like elevation, cruising temperature and flight speed. 

Luckily, the seat layout was such that I could do some laps around the plane every couple of hours to relieve the dead leg syndrome from sitting on my butt so long.  I also had the opportunity to finish a borrowed book from a friend titled, “Survival of the Sickest”.  It was an enlightening book.  

Our in-flight experience had one special highlight for me.  The beverage cart had free beer which I took advantage of every time that cart rolled down my aisle.  Can you believe it...FREE BEER on a flight!  It seems like we were fed every couple of hours, so nobody really got hungry, except for Bodhi who complained that the meat and rice dish was rivaled wet cat food.  Of course, I am an “opportunivore” so I ate every time there was food in front of me. 

Our connecting flight in Beijing China was the most stressful event in our journey.  We had to pass through customs and through security again in addition to changing to a terminal that was 1/2 mile away.  Customs was slow and security was even slower.  They went through our backpacks throroughly and demanded that we give them our back up power supply units for phone charging because they exceeded the 100mv requirement. We made it through security with only 10 minutes to spare to catch our connecting flight which was 1/2 mile away, so we ran!   We felt like we were in the Amazing race, with all of our backpacks jostling about sprinting towards the terminal unaware if our connecting flight had already left or not.  Fortunately, we arrived huffing and puffing with the knowledge that our flight was 15 minutes late...GASP! The air quality was so horrendous (thick of burning smoke) that Leslie had a major coughing spasm after our sprinting event.   We still had to take a bus out to the tarmac to load up the stairs into our plane. 

The flight from Beijing to Bangkok was only 5 hours, so our total flight time was 17 hours.   Most of us slept on the last leg, so it passed quickly.  We arrived in Bangkok and it was about 1:00 a.m.  We caught a taxi to our hotel in Bangkok which only took about 45 minutes.  I cannot express to you how wonderful it felt to get horizontal on a comfy bed after that journey.  We crashed out!

Tomorrow would be an open day to explore the bustling city of Bangkok.  Hopefully, we will encounter some unique Bangkok sights, smells and adventures. 

Goodbye (Lah gorn krub) and thank you (Korp kun krub).

Much Love,

~The Chitraroff Family

Preparations for Thailand

Well, the time has finally come to embark on our first adventure to Southeast Asia. I have to give kudos to my beautiful wife who arranged pretty much every single detail of this trip. I am stoked to say that she put together a dream trip with plenty of adventure. She also found some incredible places for us to say that would cost a small fortune in America.

As far as I can tell, the part of our trip that appears most enchanting will be our time spent in Northern Thailand at Chai Lai Orchids, an elephant sanctuary and eco tourism type of place that is in the jungles near Chiang Mai.  We are hoping to encounter some spontaneous and unexpected travel bliss along the way.

The aspect of travel that gives us the most anxiety is two-fold...the language barrier and the length of the plane flight. We have a Thai phrase book to help out with the language. The 17 hour plane flight poses the biggest challenge for our sanity, however. We have some good reading and music. We're hoping to have the luxury of wandering around the plane every couple of hours to get some blood flow to the glutes.

With prayer, proper planning, a spontaneous and a gracious spirit, we are hoping that the doors of travel open up lots of oportunity for adventure and joy.

...stay tuned for future blogging.

~Blessings,
The Chitraroff Family.

Many Rivers to Cross to Playa Santa Teresa, Costa Rica

Tuesday, July 24th, Playa Santa Teresa:

Today, we arrived in Santa Teresa from Guiones.  It was quite a journey to get here, with 6 major river crossings.  For each crossing, Kahlo would get out and walk the river to find the most shallow passage. Then, I would say a prayer, put in 4wd high and go for it.  At some points, the river was well up to the driver's door.  Surprisingly, we didn't have any stalls or water in the car.  My biggest concern was water in the exhaust, but i kept on the gas the entire time to avoid it.   On one of the river entrances, however, we bottomed out and the plastic shrouding on the front of the car came loose.  I secured it with zip ties in 9 spots, however, part of the shrouding broke off.  Looks like our car rental fee will be a little higher in Costa Rica.

One of many river crossings

Bicyclist showing how it's done.

Another, deeper crossing

River Crossing Video.

The road to Santa Teresa was all dirt and rock and extremely rough.  Now, I know why car rental rates are so high here...the cars get worked on the roads.

Once we pulled up to the beach in Santa Teresa we saw perfect waves and were stoked to surf the next morning.  At the first place we stopped to check into possible accommodations, we ended up getting a great discount.  The hotel was actually 4 individual houses with full kitchens, air conditioning, swimming pool, incredible architecture and only a minute walk to the surf lineup.  Normally, $200 per night, we got it for $125.  I know, not a bargain, but pretty much the going rate for Costa Rica beach-front lodging for a family of 5.

Bo surfing the fish.

Kahlo coming off the top.

Mama on a sweet right.

Micah and Bo paddled into waves
on their own.

Papa surfing a right on the longboard.

The woman managing the property was named Maria and she and her sister were extremely friendly and extremely accommodating.  They actually started to cry when we left 2 days later.

Kahlo and I surfed 3x a day here.  The waves were overhead with steep drops, but the offshore winds kept the faces up and exposed so there were infinite opportunities for cut backs and turns.  We had some of our best waves of the trip here.

The first morning we awoke, we noticed that the pool had 11 dead crabs in it.  We found out that at certain times, the crabs drop into the pool and lay there eggs.  However, the chlorine kills the crabs.  The pool guy says that sometimes he will scoop out 5 buckets of crabs at one time.  The eggs left the water very murky but the pool guy took care of that.

Our deck at Cabinas Sta Teresa 

Mi amor getting ready to charge the surf.

Surprise!  Micah had a visitor in his luggage.

The air-conditioned Master Bedroom.

Leslie at the outdoor/indoor shower.

Clean, refreshed with a glass of vino tinto.

Kahlo cutting back.

In the newly cleaned pool with the boys.

Amores!

Our casita in Playa Sta. Teresa.

On Tuesday afternoon, there was an incredible rain, thunder and lightning storm.  It rained harder than any other time on our trip. Lighting was flashing, rain was pouring, thunder was shaking and the howler monkeys nearby in the tree were going crazy making noise and frantically moving across the branches.

Massive downpour. 

Raindrops and a beer.  Good times!

Thunderstorm Video.

Surfers know that rain will sometimes calm down surf and make it glassy.  So, as the storm slowed down, Kahlo and I grabbed our boards and had such an incredible surf session. Initially, I was cold from the rain, but when I stepped into the ocean, it was surreal.  The ocean was like bathwater, and it instantly warmed me up.  That was such a great feeling to have the ocean water warmer than the air.  Towards sunset @ 6:30, the sun peeked out from behind the clouds and produced one of the most magnificent sunsets I've ever seen in my life.  Unfortunately, we surfed until dark and never got a picture of the sky.

So far, Playa Negra, Playa Santa Teresa and Playa Tamarindo (in that order) have been our favorite Costa Rican surf spots.  Tomorrow, we leave the coast and head towards San Jose.  Our trip is coming to an end, but the memories will last a lifetime.