Playing Big

Gunnar has a thing for big dogs. For example, his best friend, Sarge, is a rottweiler. Here is Okinawa, he has become pals with the largest Italian Greyhound I have ever met. Fiona weighs in at a little over 25 pounds (what? She's big boned....) and Gunnar loves a good wrestle with her. Here are some photos I took during a weekend playdate at Fiona and Gamine's house.

Check out the size difference!

This picture really cracks me up. I was trying to take one of Sadie, but look what I captured in the background. Gunnar is biting Fiona's nose!

At least he tries to make nice with a kiss....

...or try to start something all over again!
He didn't leave Gamine out of the frenzy.

And here's Sadie looking so cute with her tongue sticking out. I think she was trying to tell me how she felt about leaving the playdate.

Dogs of Thailand

My heart went out to them all.

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.