Water festival and Krabi

QOTD: "The trouble is, you think you have time." Buddha

 So this is our Last vacation, the idea is crazy. I feel like I just got here to Thailand, but at the same time, like I've lived here my whole life. I'm horrified at the thought of leaving the kids I've come to love so much, but excited to start a new adventure of working in Yellowstone National Park with my best friend. Anyway, I tried to savor every second of this vacation.

We drove to Bangkok and found ourselves in the airport since the best beaches are far south. It felt to weird to be in an airport again but it was great because we found some missed treats like Krispy Kreme! I had almost forgot completely about the water festival that brought in the Thai new year and ment a country wide HUGE, Intense water fight. I remembered this important fact when the worker in Starbucks pulled his water gun on me after I order. Still unarmed, he got me haha. I love Thai people.

 When we drove into Krabi town we saw loads of trucks like this. They were full of people who had barrels of water and threw buckets of it at anyone they passed! We all got more and more excited with every truck we saw.

When we got to our bungalow's, they were a lot further civilization than we realized, but luckily, they had a tuk tuk service to take us there for free. Turns out the guy who drove us knew ALOT of people in town and brought us right through the action at his friends houses. It seriously felt like a dream. He would be driving on the rode and then slow down as we approached a huge group of people. these people would kind of cheer at the sight of us and run at us with buckets and bucket of water, and water guns and water hoses. haha we were drenched! and then they would run up with these buckets of white gooey stuff and slather it on our faces and necks saying Happy New year! One of the guys told us it was for good luck so we welcomed this stuff in any color it came. Yellow, Red, Orange, Lime Green (this one actually kind of burned) but it never lasted long because you would be pelted with water in five seconds anyway. We were so surprised with was this big that we just laughed and laughed every time we got a new water poured on us. 

When we got to town the same thing happened but we were on foot and there was a lot more freezing cold water, Idk where they got it haha. We bought the first water guns we could find and played all day. 

On the way home Michaela and Lindsay manned the back of our Tuk Tuk like A military jeep and pelted all the people in the back of trucks passing by. 

 The water festival was SO much fun but considering it was cloudy all day, and you were never Not wet, we were pretty exhausted and cold by the end of the day and spent the night relaxing in our hammocks and whatnot.

The next day was just as cloudy and it was so weird because I'm honestly kind of used to the 110 degree weather with loads of humidity so I was cold and I bought a cup of hot chocolate. I never thought I'd find myself wanting any form of hot drink here.

Our beach was pretty empty so we decided to take one of the long tail boats to another beach. I'd always seen pictures and wanted to take a ride so I was surprised, for some reason, to see how big they were. 

I was falling out of the boat, nbd. 

We found the limestone cliffs and floating mountains even more beautiful that the last beach and spent most our time in and out of the water. (surprisingly still cold most of the time, but definitely a nice change to the burning heat we usually experience in Phichit)

This was our longest vacation (five days) so we decided to splurge on nicer rooms for our last couple nights, and it. was. awesome. I forgot what it felt light to have all those extra silly frills of a nicer room (like AC and room service)

The beach here was awesome too. It was on a really secluded beach where I hardly saw anyone else and it was nice because then I would play in the sand and look for seashells like a little kid singing the little mermaid. Just kidding....maybe. 

All these little sand ball things were from the crabs coming out and I have no idea how the sand forms like that but it was incredible because there were thousands of these tiny crabs! thousands, running to the water like a swarm of walking sand ants!

And there where loads of starfish too! I'd never seen a starfish so it was pretty exciting for a long time. 

We got to go sea kayaking too. It was really relaxing but hard at the same time. Kayaking in the ocean is way different to what I'm used to but I loved it.

The tide went WAY back at sunset. So far that I we walked to one of the floating mountains and explored all around it, finding cool seashells and sand-dollars. 

A few of us really wanted to try out rock climbing since people come from all over the world the climb the limestone floating mountains here. We decided on whats called "Deep Water Solo". They take you out on a boat to one of the floating mountains, obviously in deep ocean water, you climb up it with no ropes, no chalk, just your climbing shoes, and then when you slip or or to tired, you jump into the ocean from the wall! After a long ride in a sailing boat, he stopped here and we realized, Oh Crap, what did we get ourselves into. 

We met some really cool people who came too, like these guys from Vegas. But when we saw them, we just got more anxious at how embarrassing this was going to be haha.

It ended up being WAY more fun (and much less pressure) than we'd imagined. after the "guide" hung up a couple rope ladders off the rocks, he pretty much just told us to jump into the water and go at it  :)

It was so much fun to go climb over and over again and fall into the water. I honestly have a HUGE fear of really deep water and haven't ever stayed in water this deep....well....ever. So I thought I would have a huge issue when I got in there. But facing my fears wasn't hard when it was so much fun. 

Oh and I got to go snorkeling for the first time! On the way back to the beach, we were all sitting on the front end of the boat when we got caught in the rain! He had to pull up the sails and it all seemed so mystical,   sailing through the storm towards the foggy floating mountains. It was really cold, but I loved every second of it. 

After rock climbing, we were trying to find our way back to the right beach when we say this rope going straight up through these steep red rocks. It wasn't hard to decide we wanted to try it out, so Mekenzie and I left our flip flops at the bottom and started climbing! It was this steep for most of the hike, which was longer than I anticipated but it was probably my favorite hike I've done cuz I felt like tarzan :)

After the steep rocks, There was thick jungle and it was the best feeling to walk through bare foot. After a while we found a breathtaking view point that we could never capture. 

On our last day we sent a message in a bottle. A bucket list for all of us and I'm sure it's washed up on the same shore by now but it's the thought that counts ;)

Right before we left, I got to play with this adorable little boy (son of one of the cooks at the Bungalow's) He  loved my sunglasses :)

I loved all of our adventures in Krabi and the relaxing days spent in a hammock on the beach. Sigh. Sometimes I crave the beach bum life. 

Love from Thailand,

Nesha <3

Bungee Jumping and a day with the Elephants!

Quote of the day- "The most dangerous risk of all- the risk of spending your life not doing what you want on the bet you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later."
" On the other side of fear, lies freedom."

Let me start by saying that the past few months, I have felt more free and alive than I have in my entire life. I've gained the realization that there is a way to do anything your heart desires, Anything; and although the best things require a lot of work to get there, they end up being so much sweeter when you've had to struggle  to get there. I feel like Thailand has changed my perspective in so many ways, and I wont be afraid to aim high anymore, because anything is possible. So anyway, lets get down to business:

This past three-day weekend, I was able to experience two things that I've wanted to do my entire life and they exceeded my exceptions by far. We started on a 8 hour train to Chiang Mai for our second time. We arrived at 5 am and ended up not being able to get into our hostel. We waited around for three hours until it opened but it wasn't bad because all the monks come out in the morning so we just did some people watching. haha

When we got into the hostel it turns out that our reservations didn't go through and we ended up basically stumbling upon the nicest rooms we've stayed in for pretty cheap. After our housing was settled, four of us started to get ourselves pumped for bungee jumping! which I've been wanting to do forever!

I hadn't really gotten nervous at all prior to the trip, I even looked up the risks of the jump and everything that could go wrong but it didn't really hit me until about 30 minutes before we were going to leave. I felt a little nauseous but I still wanted to do it and by the time we were in the car I was pumped again!

When we got there, Sarah went first and watching her jump made me so excited, I decided to go second. 

So they weigh you and then just tie you up in this chair! They were cracking so many jokes that I actually felt pretty calm. I decided to hit the water on my jump for the full effect, I thought, what the heck, if your going to jump off a platform and speedily approaching your death at the bottom, you might as well hit the water to make it scarier!

I was laughing the whole time i had to hop over to the platform. I just kept blabbering away to the photographer guy and before I knew it, BAM there is this view and the guy id helping me to the edge. 

My toes dangling over the edge of this platform was such a crazy feeling because it was just my own wits and the count to three that kept me from falling of the edge for an awesome adventure.

I was surprised at how easily I fell forward, It only took one count-down 3...2...1... and then i'm parallel to the Earth and I swear I've never had such a huge rush of adrenaline. My terror and pure joy created the loudest scream my body has ever created and before I knew it, the world was gusting past me and the water was coming fast!

I was dunked in the water up to mid-torso and then I was shooting up into the air again.

I was pulled into the sky and then thrown back down over and over again and I couldn't help but laugh and laugh because I was so happy. I was wiping off my wet face and just looking at the beautiful jungle around me and I was so zoned that I didn't hear anyone, but then I had to come back to reality and grab the pole so they could pull me down.

 In the end they even gave me a certificate of courage and I came soooo close to going again and jumping backwards but I decided to save my money and go again sometime in the near future. haha

So bungee jumping exceeded my expectations beyond imagination and I didn't even cry or pee my pants as we all accepted as a possibility. The adrenaline lasted through the day and I felt on top of the world

Later we rented mopeds and became true Thais, zooming through traffic on their "anything goes" policy. Although they drive crazy, they are all very mindful of where everyone is on the road so we felt relatively safe :)

We ended a perfect day at the Saturday Night Walking Street market and enjoyed some less stressful shopping (since we've got most of our gifts bought).

The next day, we had yet another perfect day, but this time, it was spent with my favorite animal on the planet, elephants! 

We go to wear these shnassy full jean outfits while working with the elephants. Not only were they very practical, but they help the elephants (who are colorblind and don't have very good eyesight) recognize who is there to feed them and play with them :)

When we got to Baan Chang Elephant park, this is the first thing we saw and i got SOO excited! 26 elephants have been rescued and brought here to Baan Chang. I loves this elephant park because they gave us so much information about elephants and how these elephants have been protected and constantly cared for. An it's not just for show, you can tell that these are happy elephants :)

So this is my first time on an elephant alone and it was a little scary! we learn commands on how to get them to lay down,walk, turn and stop and it was sooo awesome when I would actually get my voice loud enough for them to respond!

This Mahoot was my favorite. He kept tickling my barefeet when I was on the elephants and would make fun of the way we said the commands. We learned a lot about the Mahoots and I think that they are incredible. The ones at this park are all from Burma and stay with the elephants more than 12 hours a day. Elephants in the wild have a leader to their pack, but since these people have been working with the elephants for over 1000 years and now each elephant selects a Mahoot who takes the place of his leader. The elephant gets distressed and frightened when the mahoot isn't near and so these men give their whole lives to the elephants, caring for every single need that it has. Anyway, I think they are awesome. Oh and they don't hit the elephants with that hook, its in case the elephant freaks out and tries to attack someone, the hook couldn't kill the elephant, but they are really afraid of sharp things so it would just scare it. 

We got to feed all of the elephants loads of bananas and sugar cane. It's crazy cuz elephants can eat literally all day long if its the right kind of food for them and its not bad for them as long as they get exercise. These ones would just take like 6 bananas at a time and want more 5 seconds later! it was so fun :)

Then this adorable baby elephant gave us kisses! He would put his trunk right on you and suck in making this  kissing sound haha, The mahoot (trainer) thought it was SOO funny to make him kiss us on the mouth lol

I was just being a creeper and looking at the elephants eyes and the Mahoot would come up and grab my ankles and scare the crap out of me! haha I was a little cautious considering there were 26 huge elephants just chilling all around me. 

When we're not feeding elephants, we chill in super comfy bamboo hammocks. (I Want One)

We rode the elephants through the jungle and it was incredible and super fun. about half of it was either super steep incline or decline so it was exciting when all you have to hang onto is the elephants head haha. 

 Probably my favorite part of this day was bathing the elephants in the lake. They were like puppies and would roll around in the water and splash us with it. The Mahoot would also throw buckets of water at us and we just ended up having a massive water fight and between the buckets of water, the mahoot, and the splashing elephants, we were DRENCHED!

This elephant got me good....about 5 times haha

After an amazing day we showered off, said goodbye to our elephant friends, got in the car and ended it with massages and shopping.

The next day we headed to Burma, or Myanmar to extend our visas. 

When we crossed the border we mostly saw a lot of poverty and chaos. It's crazy how much of a difference there can be between two countries, between a few feet of land in fact. The Thailand side had loads of gold statues and soldiers and the Myanmar side had busy streets and people begging for help. 

We didn't spend very long there. We went to a market and looked around but all in reality, it's not very safe. I did enjoy the experience though and thought the stark difference was incredible. Soon enough we were in Thailand again and on our way home. 

 We stopped in Chiang Rai at the incredible Heaven and Hell temple but unfortunately were only 30 minutes to late to go inside. It was a beautiful sight at sunset though.

Well, this three day weekend brought so much adventure I can't even believe it. And to think, I only have three days of teaching with my Thai babies this week, and then we're off to Krabi for the country wide water fight! My days are numbered here and every time I think about it I want to cry. So just don't think about it right!? that's my plan.

Love from Thailand
Nesha <3