Thailand

Michelle’s job here affords us the opportunity to take long vacations, something we were unable to do in the US. So in December we spent 20 days in Thailand. We flew to Auckland, Hong Kong, and then Bangkok, by which time we were pretty well befuddled. The drive from the airport to our hotel took about forty minutes, and we arrived around ten PM. Bangkok impressed us even that first night as a city that truly never sleeps, and it was tempting to stop at one of the many night markets that we passed on the way in.

We stayed at the absolutely lovely Old Capital Bike Inn. The breakfast there was unreal. On our first day in town we took a 40-minute tuk tuk ride to a floating market, where we ate pretty much everything we could get our hands on and rode a longboat through the canals, which were home to some big fish and a few impressive monitor lizards. Later Michelle and I took turns getting Thai massages. On the way to meet Michelle after hers, the kids and I were walking by a flower pot and another monitor lizard erupted from the water and jumped onto the wall.

The next day we visited the Golden Mount, walked to Chinatown for dim sum, and rode another tuk tuk to a mall, where we went bowling and ate more delicious food. The third day was a travel day. A plane to Trang, in the south, then a two-hour drive to the coast and about an hour-and-a-half boat ride on somewhat rough seas to Koh Bulon Le. At this point most of us were suffering from tummy troubles, so this was maybe not the best day of the trip.

We spent a week on Koh Bulon Le. At first Michelle and the kids had to explore without me, as I was rather sick those first few days. I blamed the floating market; Michelle blamed the mall.

Ko Bulon Le is home to a handful of modest resorts, a couple fishing villages, and a few restaurants. Half of it is uninhabited, and many of the resorts were hit hard by the COVID tourism slump. There are no roads, just a few footpaths. So people walk or ride motorcycles, of which there were maybe half-a-dozen on the island. Power is from solar panels and big diesel generators that only ran from evening until early morning.

The food was great, especially the fish. Given the state of my guts, I had to pass on most of it, but did very much enjoy the pizza bread. We also made daily treks across the island in hopes of sampling cinnamon buns of local legend, but woe, they eluded us to the very end.

The best part of our week on island was probably the snorkeling. There was a reef about 5 minutes off the beach in front of our cabana. Giant clams and sea urchins, fish every color of the rainbow, and amazing coral formations. On land, there were some epic monitor lizards, including a hulking beast that lived under the bridge on our route from the cabana to the dining room, making us feel a bit like four billy goats.

We left Ko Bulon Le by speedboat, which was fun for about the first half-hour and then got a bit dreary. After five-ish hours we arrived in Phuket and jumped in a van for a couple more hours, arriving at Our Jungle Camp in Khao Sok for dinner. Khao Sok is squarely on the tourist trail. Lots of organized activities, like a somewhat dubious elephant experience (which the kids loved), rafting and tubing on the rivers (which we all loved), and a trip to the lake, which was kinda meh but we met some really nice people and Maika and Emlen had a blast swimming with some of the other kids. We also took a couple great hikes and got our wild monkey fix.

From Khao Sok we returned to Bangkok, and in our remaining few days we visited temples, markets, and some absolutely fantastic restaurants. We also went bowling again, which, surprisingly, turns out to be a sport for which we all feel a great passion.

In all, a pretty epic trip! In retrospect, probably a little overlong, but that’s a nice problem to have. We’re all thrilled to be back home in Gizzy, where we arrived just in time to see the Rhythm & Vines crowd stumble out of town. The garden needed a good weeding, but it’s providing some treats and promising far more in the not-too-distant future, and the kids are thrilled to be back with their friends.