Final Days in Thailand: Hua Hin

Sorry it's taken me so long to put these up (if anyone is still reading this). These are the last Thailand photos. They are from our second destination: Hua Hin, a coastal community south of Bangkok. We took a train to go there, which was an adventure in itself.

A view of the train station. This is where we waited for our train to arrive.

Downtown Hua Hin

We arrived to our beachside resort and, wow, was it beautiful! We enjoyed lazy days basking in the sun, getting massages, and eating like kings. It was a wonderful three days.

The pool Main Building (the place had a real British Indies-type feel and look) Everything was beautiful!
A view of the gardens
Walking down one of the walkways to a poolside/oceanside eating area.

We liked to take early evening walks on the beach. We often discovered all kinds of interesting things. Noa was amused by this huge jellyfish that washed ashore.

I had to meet the "locals."

One day, we went to see and ride elephants. Elephants live in protected areas of Thailand and are used in the tourism industry. It was obvious that elephants are their livelihood in the area that we visited. The elephants lived with the people! I was a little concerned that the elephants would be overworked, but they seemed to have plenty of food, water, and care. It probably helps that the tourists feed them hundreds of bananas a day! We enjoyed our visit and had fun interacting with these huge beings.

We even got to ride an elephant. The hour long ride took us through "elephant country" and up a small mountain. It was so interesting to see this huge elephant walk a small trail up a mountain side, but she (the elephant) had no difficulty. Here's a view from the top of Hua Hin.
Elephants were in everyone's backyard!

Here we are!
Feeding bananas.
Noa feeds a hungry baby elephant.

Here we are back at the resort on our porch. We had such a great time.


Now, I couldn't end this post without mention of the king. Here's a picture of the longest living monarch in Thailand's history. The king, who I think is around 79 years old(looks great for his age, huh?!), is greatly loved by the people of Thailand. Although he is not the governing power of the country, he holds respect and is admired by the people. His picture is posted everywhere - on streets, outside buildings, at intersections - pretty much all over. We were so intrigued by the loyalty of the Thai people to this man and his family; I just had to mention it. Long live the king!

Bangkok: Day 2

Sorry it's taken me so long to get these up! Here's day two in Bangkok. We spent our second day visiting the grand palace and had a boat ride along the river. The grand palace was so crowded! The grand palace is similar to the other shrines we visited in style: extremely elaborate and ornate. However, it was much bigger than any other shrine we had visited. The grand palace houses the Emerald Buddha (which is actually made out of jade, not emeralds), but I wasn't allowed to take any photos of it. So, here are some photos of the grounds.

Grand Palace

Hand painted murals depict Thai mythology. There are over 200 scenes painted for the story on these walls.

Immaculate attention to detail.



A row of Tok-Toks ready to take tourists to wherever they want to go.

Boat Ride
The front of our boat

This is the kind of boat we rode on, called a long boat.

Houses along the river's edge.
Noa feeding the fish. They looked kind of like the carp at the Botanical Gardens.
A local shrine along the river's edge.
Happy New Year! Notice the yellow shirts? These shirts are popular in Thailand for two reasons: one, it's the king's color and two, each day of the week has a lucky color. This day happened to be yellow. Noa and I picked up some of these yellow shirts before leaving Thailand.

Bangkok: First Day

Eating at a Thai restaurant. Beautiful!

Okay, so it's not a good picture, but I wanted to show you that we were right on the water (it's a new camera...I'm trying to get the hang of it).

Here are some of the scenes from the city as we walked to the see the Golden Buddha.

Tok-Toks and pink taxis everywhere!

Thailand is known as the "Land of Smiles". Everyone was very friendly.

Produce market

An altar in a tree I passed.

At the temple for the Golden Buddha, New Year's preparations were underway. Women were putting together flower arrangements, people were burning incense, and and crowds were everywhere. These strings were set up outside the temple for a New Year's gathering of Buddhist monks. My understanding is that the people that attend the ceremony each get to hold one of these strings. Each string is interconnected with other strings, thus symbolizing the interconnectedness of people.

Outside the temple.

The Golden Buddha - made of solid gold, this buddha was once covered in concrete and supposedly came up out of a river. When it was being moved to a new location, a piece of concrete fell off it's hand and the gold underneath was discovered.

To me, Bangkok smells like incense. When I got home, all my things smelled like incense.

This is a female Chinese Buddha statue found in Bangkok's Chinatown, which is supposedly the biggest Chinatown in the world.

Noa and I ride in a Tok-Tok (pictured earlier in this post).

The enormous Reclining Buddha: I took this photo from one end of the Buddha. The entire temple (inside and out) is so elaborate and orante. The wall of the building are about 200 years old and hand painted. Even the bottom of the buddha's feet are inlaid with mother-of-pearl.

The head.

Here's a picture of proportion - Noa stands by the armpit.

Giant toes!

Outside of the temple, Noa had me climb up to the fertility altar. By making a wish and touching this, um, object, one is supposed to be blessed with children.

Noa and our tour guide, Michael, bring "care packages" to be presented to a local monk. The items are used by the monks during the rainy season.

Here's the monk and a funny story to go along with this photo. During the little presentation ceremony, Michael, our tour guide, kept telling me to "hold his hand" as I brought up the care package items. I was so confused because I was told that monks are never allowed to touch or be touched by women. So, as I brought up the items, I reached out to the monk's hand - the monk kinda looked at me with uncertainty and I quickly pulled away, as Michael and Noa gasped at my sudden movement toward the monk. So I crept back, never actually touching him. Thank goodness too. Michael meant that I was supposed to hold Noa's hand while presenting the items to show that they were from both of us. Oops.

Buddha, buddha, buddha....

Lastly, this Buddha is located in one of the most decorated temples, which is designated for the royal family. More about the royals in later blogs....

Lap of Luxury

Well, Noa and I just returned to Bangkok from Hua Hin and we're feeling good. We've been living the good life for the past few days: stayed at a sweet resort, lounged around, and got a bunch of massages at the spa. Yep, it's been fun to get spoiled. Surprisingly, though, both of us are starting to get sick of "vacation mode". We're ready to get back to work, eat PB&Js for dinner, and just hang out in a familiar place. Not to say that we haven't enjoyed our trip - on the contrary, it's been wonderful - we're just ready for things to wind down and return to the familiar.

We fly back to Oki tomorrow and you can be sure to get a large sampling of photos from the trip. It's funny how we now consider going back to Oki as going back to our "home". How quickly one's perspective shifts!

Goodbye Bangkok, Hello Hua Hin

After several days exploring the city of Bangkok, Noa and I are packed and ready to head to the coastal city of Hua Hin. We're taking the train this morning - which I'm sure will be an interesting experience - and then plan on spending the rest of the day on the beach.

Bangkok has been a learning experience and I have enjoyed my time here. Both Noa and I are fine - we were not affected by the recent bombings that occurred here on New Year's Eve. In fact, we would not have known about them had it not been for the morning news on tv. Originally, we were going to celebrate that night at the World Trade Center, but decided instead to forgo the crowds and stay at the hotel. Good decision - that's where one of the bombings took place.

Our time in Bangkok has mostly involved sightseeing, as we spent our day visiting temples and castles. The people here have been extremely friendly and good-natured. It's a busy time in the city and it's flooded with tourists now, so we've met people from all over the world. Even when we are in our hotel, we encounter so many interesting people. You never know what language the other people riding in the elevator will speak. So, we go with English and wish them a happy new year - it usually works.

I hope to blog one more time from Hua Hin, but I'm not sure what kind of internet options will be available there. I've taking a ton of photos already with my new camera so there will be lots to share upon our return.

Oh, and happy New Year to you!