We Comin' to America Today

It's true, the Fishers have returned to the US. We'll be spending the next couple of days in southern California with my grandparents. They're throwing us a belated wedding reception, plus we're celebrating my birthday here. But we'll have plenty of time to talk about our plans and endeavors back in our country of origin (though they may not be quite as exciting)--we still have one last Thai adventure to cover.

For our last few days in Thailand, we traveled north to the city of Chiang Mai. We took a sleeper train there, which helped the 13 hour trip go by very quickly.

We spent our first two days there on a treck through the jungle. First, we rode around on an elephant for about an hour, feeding it and enjoying the scenery. Boy do they eat a lot.

Once we finished with the elephants, we began our hike.

It was about a 3 hour hike through the jungle up into the "mountains" as I call them.  The first 20 minutes of the hike were along the road, and this was quite deceiving--the last hour or so was straight up the side of the mountain on what can only be described as slippery mud. However, the view when we got to the top was amazing. 

We stayed in a hill tribe village with the 10 other people in our group. They fed us and we all slept in a room covered in mosquito nets.

The next day, we hiked back down the hill/mountain, including a stop to swim at a waterfall.

We ended the trip by white water and bamboo rafting (during the white water rafting I became reminiscint of the aches of paddling a kayak). Needless to say, we were relieved to get back to a clean bed and a shower. We spent the evening talking with a couple of Buddhist monks. We also found a diner that served the most amazing hamburgers and cheese fries.

The next day, we woke up early to do Flight of the Gibbons. This is supposed to be the most amazing thing to do in Thailand, and it lived up to its reputation.  The best way to describe it is as a ziplining tour through the jungle.

We were outfitted with equipment and went from tree top to tree top ziplining and bungee jumping. Our only complaint was that it wasn't long enough.

So now after spending 36 of 48 hours on either a plane or a train, we are back in the United States and happy to be here. We had a wonderful time in Thailand, but there's nothing like being able to converse with people in English or order a Domino's pizza delivered right to your door at midnight.

Ko Chang!

Our most recent adventure took us to Ko Chang, which in English means Elephant Island. We spent a few days lounging on the beach and exploring the island.

For the first 3 nights, we stayed in a little bungalow literally feet from the beach. It was very basic, but worth it to be so near the ocean.

We rented a motorbike and drove up and down the island. We found this "massage hut", if you will, right on the beach. Hearing the waves lap while being rubbed down by an old Thai lady is what paradise is all about. The best part was probably being forcibly disrobed by the masseuse while other tourists were walking by.

Wednesday we rented a kayak and paddled out to a few of the islands. One of us may have spent half the time leaning back in exhaustion and asking if we were there yet. But no one needs to point fingers. This is one of the islands we rode to (don't be fooled, it's farther than it looks).

Thursday we went snorkeling. The crew on our boat was very energetic and would often find things like a sea cucumber, an octopus and a sea urchin for us to hold.

We also got to just play in the water, which Ben took full advantage of.

That night we moved locations to a nice hotel with an equally beautiful, but slightly more distant view. I was ecstatic that they had a blow dryer in the room--such luxury. We spent one night there recovering from our busy week before heading home.

Tomorrow we leave for Chiang Mai, the last of our adventures before we head back to the US on Thursday. It's been a great trip, and we're sad to leave, but excited to see our family again.

Update

We have been remiss the past while as far as blog writing is concerned. For some reason, Blogger decided to delete all of our pictures, so we put our blog in a time-out. But recently we've been uploading pictures again, but we should give you an update of the many things we've done the past couple of weeks. Just a warning, we have been very busy, so this is quite a long post.

Ben spent a few days in Taipei for his internship. He spent most of the time at the food fair, but he did get the chance to see a bit of the city and even go to the temple.

He rode to the top of the second tallest building in the world.

The weekend he got back, we were invited to the house of a woman he works with, Daun (pronounced Da-gun).

We visited her village where we watched the monks get fed and participated in a party celebrating her cousin becoming a monk.

The family we're staying with left that weekend, so we've spent the past couple of weeks finishing up our jobs and seeing the surrounding area.

The children Megan taught at the kindergarten were so fun and quite enthusiastic.

Ben finished his internship by working at Thaifex, the Thailand food fair. There were many delicious samples and a bit of food carving. Yes, this is all made of food.

For our two-month anniversary, Ben surprised Megan by taking her to a nearby beach, Hua Hin. We had fun playing in the water and exploring the town.

We rented a motorbike so we could get around easier. Ben had fun driving it, but it made Megan quite nervous, to say the least (but NOT because of Ben's driving, that has to be made clear).

Back in Bangkok, we have been able to make quite a few small trips downtown.

We went into town one night to check out Backpacker's Road (locally called Kao Sahn Road). It was interesting, but considering all of the tattoo parlors, dreadlocks, and bars that could be found, we were not quite at home. However, we found a night flower market that we loved. We took advantage of the cheap prices.

We also visited Lumphini Park, which is home to joggers, high school band players, and monitor lizards.

We walked around and rode a paddle boat around the pond. We got to see many monitor lizards up close, including these two that seemed to be having a territory battle. Please note the accuracy of Ben's imitation.

Yet another trip we made was to a nearby floating market. It rained most of the time we were there, but it was still fun to walk around.

We ordered Pad Thai and cocoa yen from boats. Both were tasty. Unfortunately we didn't have time to stay and watch the fireflies.

The most recent trip we made was yesterday. For only 120 baht apiece ($4) we took an all-day tour on a train.

We stopped to see the Bridge on the River Kwai and were able to walk across it.

The train continued over the bridge and took us to the end of the line, where there was a waterfall. We ate our lunch there and then continued back. Plus we saw the Burmese/Thai border (though from a distance). It was a long day.

We were planning on going to the beach today after church, but we were both so tired that we decided to take the day to rest. This was lucky, because we were invited over to another couple's house for lunch, and we've enjoyed getting to know the people here. So tomorrow morning we'll leave for Ko Chang, where we'll be for the rest of the week. We'll be sure to keep everyone updated. Oh, and for more pictures on all of the above-mentioned activities, please see the photos link over on the right.