9 Weeks Back packing in SE Asia: Part 5c - Koh Samet, Thailand

Transparency: This post is being written in 2020 as we did not have a blog in 2016.  I am using stay at home time to flatten the curve of the global pandemic Covid-19 to organize photos from this trip into a post.  Memories may not be exact.

Koh Samet is a three-hour drive from Bangkok and a 45-minute ferry ride from the Ban Phe pier on the mainland to the main pier on the island called Ao Klang.  The other five piers on the island are used for diving boats and tour boats.

This small (5.1 square mile), t-shaped island is named after the samet (or cajeput) tree that grows everywhere here - and in many places throughout the world.  Its the largest, most westerly and driest of a clutch of islands off the coast.

Much of the island is taken up by the Khao Laem Ya-Mu Ko Samet National park.

On the mainland, we have to clamber over the roof-tops of several boats to get to the ferry that will take us to the island.  This is why backpacks were made.  People with suitcases needed help.

To welcome us on the island is Phra Aphai Mani, looming large at the end of the pier.  Phra Aphai is recognized as a National poem, an incredible fantasy of 48,700 lines filled with mythical creatures that Sunthorn Phu (the "Bard of Rattanakosin") started writing in 1822 and finished 22 years later.  The theme throughout the poem is of peace and non-violence.  The alternate name for it being the "Jewel of Forgiveness".

The first night we stayed in a cabin on the beach but decided that is was both too expensive and too far from everything.  Besides, the ATM swallowed my bank card!    Near the end of the journey backpack gremlins have had time to do their work of adding weight and its a long 2 km slog back to town.

Eventually, we find a cabin at Tok's that's in a well-landscaped area to provide shade.  A walk through the property, across the road to the resort's restaurant and beyond that the beautiful, warm, clear and clean Gulf of Thailand where we spend much of the rest of our time.

Our cabin.  We really relaxed here.  This was only a room and a big bathroom.  No shopping.  No cooking.  Usually not our style.

The walk to the beach from the cabin

We don't know if it was this guy or not, but some little lizard lived under our cabin and when he got vocal he sounded exactly like a kid in trouble.  His call was very distinct: Uh-Oh.

The beach:

So we're on the beach one day being comfortable on loungers like this ...

... when I see a young woman obviously finish reading a book.  I approach her to ask if she's interested in exchanging reading material and she is.  Turns out she is from Kelowna (a two-and-a-half-hour drive from our home), teaching ESL in Thailand and she is the niece of a friend in Grand Forks where we live!  The school has a break right now.  So we have fun talking this day and other days on the beach.

How we usually are at the beach.  We would budget for the expensive beach loungers and only do them every so often.

The best thing was lunch or dinner at the beach.  This person carried on a yoke, chicken that was cooking on a hot charcoal BBQ,  barbecued eggs and fixings for a papaya salad.  We skipped the eggs but the chicken and salad are so good.  The salad was made fresh right in front of you. If I was younger, I could make a good living doing this on the Tulum beaches.  What a great idea ... and inexpensive.

Actually in all our travels since - even in other parts of SE Asia, we have never seen anyone else do this.  Here at least a couple of vendors provided this service.

Around the corner from our beach - out of sight, mind and hearing was a very busy beach.  There were resorts where a lot of Chinese tours came to.  There were lots of noisy boats for water sports, lots of shops and a big karaoke stage.  We would walk there every day just to see the action which had a large component of young women in big sunhats and diaphanous dresses doing selfies on the beach for hours on end.  We were grateful to not have landed there.

Near sunset, we might head to a patio bar to hear some music and chat with others.  It was on the beach but up one or two stories to catch the breeze and the views.  This was the painting on the wall.

One day a work truck is by our accommodation.  No safety standards here.  Look carefully at the photo on the top right.  Barrels of gas beside the driver instead of a gas tank in the truck.

The proud owner poses for us

One day we go for a long walk and end up at a high-end resort.  The bay here is like glass.  You'd think it was a lake and not the sea.  We pick up a drink and snack to eat on the beach and have a swim before walking back.  Another day we do a bit of a hike in the National Park.

This was such a relaxing time.  The sea was so warm it was hard to drag myself out of it.  Perfectly lovely.  There are so many more islands to explore in Thailand.  We have never made it to the south and the islands there.  Later in 2019, we get to Koh Chang, recommended by someone we met on this trip ... but that ended badly with a huge flood three days in that wiped out ferries, roads and bridges.

Now it's time to head home.  We are grateful to friends Anne, Nancy and Pete and John who were travellers long before us.  They shared stories, recommendations, pulled out maps and got us excited about doing more research and just going.  At retirement age for the first time, we head away from North America into new cultures and worlds and we love it.  I think that having no children has given us some carbon credits for flights.  We take local and land transport as much as we can.

In 2017 we take on a six month backpacking trip and in 2019 we hit the road for a year ... ending that journey only because of the Covid-19 global pandemic and the world going on lockdown.

We can hardly wait to see what's next.

Some fantasy statues around the island:

9 Weeks Back packing SE Asia: Part 5b - Ayutthaya, Thailand

Transparency: This post is being written in 2020 as we did not have a blog in 2016.  I am using stay at home time to flatten the curve of the global pandemic Covid-19 to organize photos from this trip into a post.  Memories may not be exact.

Ayutthaya, UNESCO World Heritage site is an island at the confluence of three rivers.  This geographical position helped it become the trading capital of Asia and quite possibly of the world.  Built in the 14th. century it had a population of one million inhabitants by the 1700s.  As of 2017, the population was 53,300.

Ayutthaya was destroyed in the 18th. century by the Burmese and much has since been reconstructed.

There are nine or ten temples on the island and another six or so off the island.  Entrance to the historical park on the island is free although some of the temples charge a very small fee ranging from 20 to 50 THB to go in.

The island itself is beautiful

A couple of bridges on the island:

Storks of the island:

Some of the Temples on the Island

We are out for a stroll one day and spy this sign on the gate of a private home.  With Paul's family history of wooden boat building on the west coast of Canada, this stop is a must!

A tiny, quite elderly Thai woman comes to the gate when we ring the bell.  She says that we can roam their property at will and apologizes that her husband is not well enough to come out.  We learn that her husband was a builder of traditional wood Thai boats for years, then became a professor teaching others to build boats.  This is his life's work and they have turned it into their own private museum.  There is no entry fee.

There are boats and boat models everywhere sometimes stacked one on the other.  We learn that a boat was often constructed particularly for how it was to be used.  For example, the rice seller had different needs than the vegetable or the fish seller.

These little 'to scale' models illustrate the purposes that boats were put to.
You can click on any photo to enlarge it.

Below are full-size boats.  Looking closely you will see that no two are the same.

This amazing boat in his back yard is known as a Scorpion-Tailed boat.  This boat was used to transport the King's cargo.  A professor in Chiang Mai built one in modern times and used it to give tourists a ride on the Ping River.  At the age of 70 years (in 2017) he retired and no one took over.  There is however a museum of Scorpion-Tailed boats in Chiang Mai so that their history will not be forgotten.

With a side view, the camera could not capture the entire boat

Here is a specialized boat indeed:

Just another boat in the yard.

After we look at everything we are invited into the home to meet the boat-builder/professor.  He is delighted that we are here and interested in his museum.  His greatest fear is what will happen to the collection when he dies.  Neither of his sons is interested.  I hope they were able to develop a plan to save it.

This man has been granted several awards by the King over the years:

His house is crammed with so many model boats and ships that its really impossible to take a photo of them.  Below are just two:

Random Photos from the Boat Museum:

Out bicycling one day we come across the Wat Chi Chian Sai temple which houses the Phra Mongkhon Bophit Buddha, otherwise known as "Buddha of the Holy & Supremely Auspicious Reverence".  This statue was sculpted in the year 1538.

Wat Chi Chiang Sai

Phra Mongkhon Bophit

The landscaping outside the temple is gorgeous and includes a stupa that is stunningly white in the brilliant sunshine:

Next, we decide to do a sunset cruise to visit three temples that are off the island:

Temples on the riverbank

A few of the many boats we pass on the river.  The barge/dredger bottom left photo is so large, this is only about a third of it:

On the grounds of some temples that we stop at:

Temples often have animals, real or mythical such as dragons, monkeys, pigs, horses, tigers, snakes, rooster, and more associated with them either in statuary or in some cases real animals.  These are three evident this evening.

After all, this sight-seeing it's off to the island of Koh Sammet for some R & R beach time.

Random Photos