Holiday...

I guess a trip to Thailand without going to the beach would feel like a visit to the Empire State Building and taking the elevator...to the basement. Possibly nice, but with a feeling you might have missed out on something. I wasn't the only one with that feeling, so after little over a month in Nong Khai I joined Jodie, Rani and Marcella on a 12 day trip including some beach-time, crazy Bangkok nightlife, and a bit of cultural/historical sightseeing in Cambodia.

First out was Bangkok, and some temple sightseeing. They've got a whole bunch of them there, but we concentrated on the big ones within walking distance. My personal favorite is Wat Pho, the Temple of the Reclining Buddha. Big things are always cool and you can't really go wrong with a 46 meter long and 15 meter high golden Buddha image. I had been there before but it's always amazing to walk in to the temple and see that huge statue.
No visit to Bangkok and its temples would be complete without a visit to Wat Phra Kaeo, the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. Not the biggest one, but the most important buddhist temple in Thailand and the Emerald Buddha being the most important icon for thai people. No pictures were allowed and like all other buddhist temples it had a calm, almost soothing atmosphere with the Emerald Buddha centered around various different buddha images and sculptures.
Located withing the grounds of the Grand Palace is not only the temple, but a large number of amazing buildings, temples, stupas, museums and even a small scale model of Angkor Vat. It's easy to spend a whole day walking around inside those giant walls admiring the beauty in which the thai's reverence to the buddha manifest itself.
Also the one place where it's required to cover your knees and shoulders at all time, with stuff to borrow for those whose clothing didn't live up to the dresscode, like me. I was fortunate enough to get my hands on a pair of very stylish purple silk pants, slightly oversized, resulting in a tourist/clown look I felt very proud to display for the thousands of others who planned ahead that day and wore long pants. No pictures were allowed (by me) of them either.
After a few days, having seen some cultural sights, the huge weekend market and the rest of the time spent inside giant shopping malls due to the extreme heat and humidity, we decided to take on Bangkok's nightlife starting with the circus that is Khao San Road. Lots of cheap cocktails, a visit to Bangkok's not so nice areas, and some tuk-tuk adventures later we were pretty much done with the city for that time and couldn't wait to get out of smelly, hot, crowded Bangkok and enjoy the beaches of Koh Chang.





Thailands second biggest island after Phuket, Koh Chang, has surprisingly not been overrun by tourists yet and still has a nice relaxing atmosphere with cheap bungalows on the beach and the feeling of a backpacker paradise discovered not so long ago. There's not one big beach stretching for several miles, but instead there are many small beaches on the island, contributing to the feeling that it's your own little paradise that only you and a handful of fortunate others have discovered. I'm sure it will all change in a few years, and there are places that are even more desolate and untouched, but for us it was perfect. First night was spent on Paradise Beach on the northeastern side of the island, but after having discovered that the tide basically made almost the entire beach disappear until in the afternoon, we took our stuff and headed down south for a better place. The island is pretty big and can offer other activities than just spending time at the beach. There's a national park that offers elephant rides, trekking and swimming in waterfalls. We thought about doing something like that, but once we saw the beaches we pretty much knew were we were going to spend most of our time. And since going back and forth between places can be both expensive and take some time, we wanted a place we could spend the whole week at. The roads in Koh Chang are apparently some of the most dangerous in Thailand, so we gave up the idea of renting scooters and exploring the island. Scooter adventures had its time as well...




We found the perfect spot a bit further down and got a really nice and cheap bungalow. So, what do you do in a place like this? Apart from the obvious things such as relaxing, eating good food, enjoying a few drinks on the beach, a snorkeling trip to four small islands surrounding Koh Chang was however one thing we took time out of our otherwise so very busy schedule to enjoy. Great fun, apart from a pretty nasty sunburn but otherwise perfect. There's not much to say really, I've could have gone crazy with the pictures and posted about a hundred postcard pictures of this paradise but I won't. Everyone who's ever been to a place like this know pretty much what it's like and what you do there. Enjoy beautiful sunsets, avoid getting killed by falling coconuts and wonder why the hell you were born so close to the arctic circle.....The only thing we didn't get to experience was the fullmoon party that had taken place the weekend before we got there. Good reason to go back though...



At first our main goal of the trip was just the beach, but since Cambodia didn't look too far away on the map, we figured we might as well cross the border and check out Angkor Vat. The way things looked on the map and the way things were in reality were however completely different. The province of Trat, where you take the ferry to Koh Chang is pretty much right on the border to Cambodia, kind of like Nong Khai and Laos, but if you're not Thai or Cambodian, you're referred to one of three border crossings available to foreigners. This meant we had to take a minibus up north to a place called Aranya Prathet, get our visas, and then cross into Cambodia.
I'd heard some other backpackers describing the Cambodian side of the border and the city of Poipet as hell, so I figured we had something unpleasant waiting for us on the other side. Personally I didn't think it was that bad though, but I guess if your used to how things operate pretty smoothly in Thailand and the friendliness and respect for foreigners, you're in for a bit of a culture chock. The whole time it was just and endless wait for either buses, people, getting your passport stamped or...the mysterious six people we kept hearing about but that never showed up. Most likely just a lame excuse from the Cambodians to handle the growing frustrations of the people waiting to get out of Poipet.
Once on the bus, we had the pleasure of enjoying an eight hour ride on the bumpiest dirt road known to mankind, in a bus that had seen better days. There were plenty of things to keep one occupied however, dodging flying suitcases and giant backpacks, trying to find a position to sit in that didn't hurt too much, or trying not to pass out from heat-exhaustion were some of the options available as entertainment along the road. We arrived in Siam Reap, the city were the temples of Angkor are located, around 1AM, having traveled since 8AM that day. Sleeping had never felt better...


Next day it was time for the small tour, and with our personal chauffeurs (tuk-tuk drivers) we headed out to the temples. The area itself where they are located is huge, so you need transportation to get around. We saw some brave tourists on bicycles but that must have been pretty hard considering the heat in Cambodia were just as bad as in Bangkok, it just didn't smell as bad.
Walking around the temples was pretty amazing I must say, and the only thing missing was a little more background information about each place. Instead the place was jammed packed with tourists and Cambodian children selling postcards, t-shirts or anything else visitors might be interested in. It was sad seeing all those poor children, some of them not older than 5-6 years old, running back and forth constantly trying to make you by something with their parents always a few steps behind ready to collect whatever money their children (mostly girls) where able to earn.


Last stop on the first day was Angkor Vat itself, the biggest and most well preserved of the temples. It's always an amazing feeling seeing something you've read about and seen tons of pictures of for yourself, and Angkor Vat was no exception. Gigantic, rugged and the largest religious monument in the world built in stone, it was a cool experience climbing its steep steps to the top and looking out over its great surrounding walls.
Next day we started where we left of, getting up early to catch the sunrise over Angkor Vat before heading out on the grand tour including Angkor Thom and the Bayon temple as highlights of that day. All the temples had its special atmosphere and vibe, but I've got to admit that after two days of nothing but tons of sculptures and temples it all started to get somewhat tiring, and on the third night we were more than satisfied and couldn't wait to get on the bumpy roads that would take us back to Thailand.