How to beat the heat in Maehongson

 

When it's this hot and dry, here are a few ways and favorite places to cool off in Maehongson...

First you need some young friends who beg and beg you to go swimming...

The same young friends in 2019... growing up - but they still want to swim!

Maesagna Reservoir

Waterfall and stream feeding into Maesagna Reservoir

The former Holiday Inn - now in disrepair - used to be a nice cooling off spot - not so much now!

Though scenic, Jongkham lake really isn't where you should be swimming but several vendors make really nice fruit drinks there. 

Sometimes you have to settle for a very small pool.

Even when outdoors, sometimes the pool can be small.

When you need a little more than a puddle, you head for the biggest river around - the Pai river, that soon after this point crosses the border into Myanmar/Burma

Another vantage point - I was told Queen Sirikit came and visited here...

Finally Maehongson

Leaving the big city...

...for a somewhat smaller one!

Jongkham Lake

Wat Doi Kong Mu

View from Wat Doi Kong Mu overlooking the city.

Long time readers of this blog will know that the province of Maehongson nestled on the very northwest edge of Thailand along the Myanmar border is near and dear to my heart. After finishing up the rice harvest at the end of 2019, I tried to get here last year but the Covid restrictions were too many. So finally as February was ending I was able to fly direct from Bangkok to this place where I am home - and just in time to experience a few cool nights before the really hot season arrived. And though I usually stay in the homes of friends, I decided that now as an adult:-), I like to control what and when I eat and not be on someone else's schedule, so I ended up staying the past six weeks at a small but beautiful and beautifully managed guest house called Jongkham View which as its name suggests is nestled right next to Jongkham Lake in the center of  town. 

Considering that I have spent most of the pandemic travelling and based out of four countries - AND that I couldn't even get to Maehongson last year due to the strict covid restrictions in place, it is ironic that I have had multiple covid exposures since arriving here  - largely  from friends who didn't realize it when we shared a meal or travelled in a car together.  Thankfully all of my  subsequent ATK tests have been negative, though covid has remained rampant the entire time I've been here.   Schools were scheduled to end at the end of March and they finally gave up about two weeks before the end of the year as they literally kept sending whole classrooms or grades home for a week only to have them return and another kid would test positive. Wash and repeat. Why the schools weren't testing regularly - for example, testing everyone on a Monday or once a week as students arrived prior to class and then just sending those who test positive home, I don't know. It hasn't been very well thought out IMHO. Covid also made visiting different villages difficult as each village would want you to show a negative test result from the previous three days - and some villages had their own flare ups at various times that I tried to avoid. I only made it to Patyng twice and never was able to get to Napajat.

Though I didn't make it to Napajat, I saw P'Toi frequently in town.

Visiting Patyng, but keeping my distance as Auntie Yui wasn't feeling great that day and Auntie Peng (Uncle Yurn's widow) had also been exposed to covid the day I was visiting.)

Patyng and 'my' rice fields

Dry rice fields, dry hills, dry and hot everything...

Krung Thep Mahanakon

Bangkok, three in one...

Some of you might have seen that the powers that be in the Thai government decided this last month to change the official name of the capital from  Bangkok to Krung Thep Mahanakon (City of Angels) ...but 'Bangkok' will still be officially recognized. This of course caused some confusion much like the ever changing entry requirements into the country. (Vaccinated visitors can now enter again with just one night quarantine and a pcr test upon arrival. But I digress.) And Krung Thep is really the shortened version of the city's much longer full name and still perhaps the longest place name in the world which gives young TCK's bragging rights when they can rattle it off... Krung Thep Maha Nakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit.

After my initial nine days in Phuket, I have spent the last month in Bangkok Krung Thep back at Innspire, the guest house I spent the three months in last year. Bop the manager is still holding on as well as the ten million cats in the neighborhood. A few more tourists can be seen, some tourist venues have reopened and some didn't survive the six months since I was last there. I've resumed running along the khlongs and through the sois often ending up at a trio of parks that anchor the extended neighborhood. 

Listed as one of the 'Large' trees of Bkk, it's hard to capture how big (and old) this Tamarind tree is... at one of my favorite parks!

In things that might interest particular readers of this blog, I have had two 'bird' encounters. The first occurred when I was running along side the river and a pigeon flew directly into my face (clearly not watching where he was going!?) Never have I been more thankful to be wearing a mask! Yes, masks are still required here and even in 97 degree weather there's a lot less fuss about wearing them than other parts of the world! 

The confused look after being hit square in the face by a pigeon!

My second bird experience (and way cooler than the pigeon encounter) was going with Iven and his three boys to the airplane graveyard - a place I had heard of but never seen - even though I had been very close to it several times and just never realized it. It's actually quite easy to find and if you drive by on the right street, you can't miss it the remnants of a couple planes including a 747 just cut up and parked in the middle of the city. Maybe there were plans at one point - maybe not - but for now (and the past ten years or so) an enterprising family has been 'squatting' on the property and will charge you 200 Baht to come in and explore. Given that they were young teenagers, they took the safety of the boys quite seriously telling us not to go in certain areas as it wasn't safe.  Contrary to some online opinion the family was totally friendly and non threatening - but again we treated them with respect and were quite happy to pay for this unusual and very cool experience. 

I know that I still haven't updated the blog from the three months last year and I had barely introduced Iven and Kashmira and their kids but certainly the point of being back in their neighborhood again was to hang out with the HFam. Our shared story is worthy of it's own post one day as it's truly a remarkable story that I am so grateful for. Neither of us realized how our lives would intersect over the course of this past year. So most/much of my time has been spent with them help as I could as they packed up their lives and returned to the US after living in Thailand for 15 years. As part of their leaving process they spent a week at the Juniper Tree at Dolphin Bay south of Huahin. They invited a few friends (including me) to spend some days with them which was an additional unexpected gift. 

Sunrise - Dolphin Bay

One day we went to Sam Roi Yot National Park specifically to see Phraya Nakhon Cave, which often appears in Thai tourist advertising as it is really quite unique and beautiful and serves as the main attraction. Depending on how it's explained, either the roof of the cave collapsed or it's a sink hole - but either way - it's a mighty big cave and having no roof has allowed trees to grow inside. In the cave, there is a four-gable roofed royal pavilion built in 1890 for King Rama V's visits. It's a pretty iconic and photogenic place to hang out. 

Other days this past month were more mundane - but, really this city is never mundane - it's why I enjoy it so much. And being with the HFam is certainly not mundane. They left this week and one of the gifts of my time with them this time was being able to support them and their kids as an adult TCK who has walked a similar road of leaving a place deeply loved...

Two other non mundane things - 1) meeting up with childhood friend Gordan Ellard after close to 30 years - Gordon was my classmate at Chefoo and is now owns a restaurant and a swimming school/business here in Bangkok. 

And...last and definitely least, experiencing a reverse flow/volcanic squat pot toilet on the banks of the Chao Phraya river...the river was quite high and the waves were choppy and every time I would hear the wave outside, the toilet would geyser up inside. I was thankful to not be squatting!

Until next time...

Duncan

Phuket (back to Thailand!)

I arrived back in Thailand two weeks ago. I know I'm so far behind on blog posts...only a couple entries got posted from my three months in Bangkok last year and nothing from my two months in the UK...maybe one day I'll catch up. Maybe not. But I can at least try to share what is going on currently. If I only tweeted maybe it would be easier...here's the short update from the past six months. 

Two amazing months in the UK (captured on fb...maybe one day here also!)...arrived back in Seattle in time for Thanksgiving and Christmas with the fam...but the goal was never to be in my parents basement all winter, so when I found a good price back to Bangkok, I jumped on it. I was all set to leave and had jumped through all the changing hoops to return (visa etc) and was about to complete the last step and apply for my Thailand Pass on December 21 (-with all the same information that is required for the visa!!?) when Thailand cancelled the Test and Go program (that had been in place just over a month which allowed vaccinated visitors to enter with a pre-departure negative covid test and one night in a hotel while waiting for negative arrival covid test results) literally because of one omicron case, reinstating the full quarantine again for all vaccinated arrivals. This I was not going to do again - but there was another option and that was to take advantage of the Phuket 'Sandbox', another scheme allowing visitors to fly directly into Phuket, be tested on arrival and on day 5 while being free to go anywhere on the island for the week of quarantine. A beach quarantine sounded much better than being locked in a hotel room for a week so I was grateful to be able to find and quickly book a decent fare on Qatar Airways leaving on the same day that I had intended to depart Seattle.

Moon over a foggy late afternoon Seattle departure

If this was my last sunset, I'd be ok with that...

I wasn't sure it would happen to be honest and I wrestled with the decision to travel during the days of Omicron given the increased contagiousness. Though I have travelled throughout covid, I have travelled cautiously and followed all the rules and guidelines everywhere I have been. But with Omicron raging, the logistical risks were greater because if someone tests positive in Thailand either on arrival day or five days later you are sent to Thai hospital purgatory for an unknown amount of days - SYMPTOMS OR NOT - which you or your insurance will need to pay for and insurance usually doesn't want to pay for anything if you don't have any symptoms. So you can see why I was a little more anxious - but knowing I was leaving from Seattle and everyone else would have been vaccinated and tested on the plane and being armed with an N-95 mask, I took my chances. And thankfully (very thankfully) I received negative results on both my tests this past week. This report by journalist Jonathan Miller reveals what I might have faced if I had tested positive. This article got the attention of Phuket's leadership!

Appropriate greeting!

And so ironically, the change in plans and accompanying frustration and anxiety allowed me to explore and enjoy Phuket for my first time ever and have some other first time experiences including the following highlights...

Moon upon arrival at 6:40AM in Phuket

The moon upon landing! That's not the sun at the end of the wing but the moon lit up in a fiery sunrise coming into land at Phuket's airport.

Speaking of Phuket's airport, it's been a longtime bucket list wish of mine to visit one of the handful of places around the world where you can stand on the beach and have big planes come screaming in over your head or knock you over with their powerful jet blasts upon takeoff. This box has now been checked! 

Wind and sand blowing courtesy of Finnair

Jet blast can push the water back from the sand!

The beach around the airport is really quite nice with few tourists other than the plane spotters. 

There's a small national park right next to the airport which adds to the charm and quietness of the area (because most tourists don't want to pay the 200 Baht entry fee).  After watching planes in the heat of the day, I took a quick dip and snorkel over some shallow coral right off the shore. There were only small fish (beautiful nonetheless) but surprisingly perhaps to both of us, I ran into a large honeycomb/leopard eel which was really cool to see though I kept my distance! Photo not mine.

Honestly, if I was returning to Phuket for a few days, I might just find a small guest house/hotel around the airport and enjoy the solitude of this beach/national park and plane watch. That would be just fine with me.

As this whole area of Thailand is famous for it's islands, snorkeling and diving, most snorkel/dive trips will take you off of Phuket to other smaller islands but I found plenty of fish to entertain me at the rocky points at the ends of the long beaches that I stayed. And at Freedom beach - another first - seeing a pair of large cuttlefish playing in the sand together! I was happy to be reunited with parrot fish since I now have quite an affinity for them after my months swimming with them in Bermuda. 

View from my room

I stayed at two Hilton properties (because points...see full Tripadvisor reviews here)The Phuket Hilton is a sprawling property on 75 acres with beautiful views everywhere you look, but I  never get tired of views like this looking over the trees to the ocean.