Thailand!

Yesterday night we had some interesting conversation with Bob. Bob was brought up in Liverpool and now runs a small 16 room hotel in Wales with his Scottish wife. He told me I would be a leader of men. If I go to Wales while he's still running Alpine Lodge, I'll stay there for sure.

So today we had a crazy adventure:

I woke up at 9am and at 945am Zack, my hostel owner, came to tell me that the 1130am ferry off Langkawi was cancelled: today is a holiday here, Hari Raja I believe it's called, so they reschedule to 1030am and 130pm.

I got myself ready in 5 minutes and he drove me to the guesthouse where Josephine, Ian, and Ron were staying. They soon agreed that they should hurry up as fast as possible and Zack would drive us to the port. Ian was still in the shower and unaware of our new plans. 10 minutes later we were loaded into Zack's 5 seater and on our way.

Zack drove us at crazy speeds with the car really loaded down with us and four backpacks, and we arrived at 1030am, departure time. They let us get tickets and we made it onto the boat, thanks to Zack. He had called the ferry to confirm the times, and thanks to him we made it. He also used probably half a tank of gas on a 25 minute drive that usually takes about 40 minutes and with all of our stuff in his car.

Zack had also helped us arrange our train ticket for Thailand. We arrived in Satun, Thailand, and caught a tuk-tuk (pick up truck with two benches sideways in the back, and a canopy for shade) to the travel agent where our tickets were waiting.

We paid for our tickets and after some time and effort communicating with the kind lady who spoke very limited English, had plane tickets booked for us. We then loaded up on food and drink from 7/11 and caught a 3 hour bus to Hat Yai. We spent a few hours in a restaurant here eating food that was not the best, but satisfying.

In 50 minutes, our train departs Hat Yai and 14 hours later we arrive in Bangkok. A few hours after that, we'll board a plane for an hour long flight to Chang Mai in northern Thailand. Many adventures await us there.

I could have uploaded photos at this net cafe, but my laptop is too deep in my backpack and we have too short a time to get it unpacked, uploaded to my hosting, and repacked, as we still have to get to the train station. Maybe tomorrow?


One last reminder to UBC students: PLEASE vote for me for Senate :-)