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Be back (not-so) soon |
We’ve been home for a little while and have managed to connect with a lot of you, and there’s more of that to come.
Two quick announcements from us…
We’re moving to Rotorua to work in Natalie’s parents in the family business, Cosy Cottage International Holiday Park. As first official order of business, I’d appreciate a like on the Facebook page ;-)
Secondly, we’d like you all to meet Buster Bay.
Whoops- managed to overstay our visas in Thailand! We were so busy enjoying the beaches, the snorkelling, the sun and the good thai food that we completely forgot about it. A costly mistake! Heres a few pics of our last few weeks in paradise.
Koh Samui with Robyn.....lots of fun times and cocktails at Happy hour!
Self explanatory...
Fish , fish and more fish.
Koh Lipe- magjcal!
Crystal clear waters made for amazing snorkelling around the coral.
We have been incredibly slack on maintaining our blog and therefore have ended up with an incredible amount of blogs to put up. So to keep things breif here are just a few snippets from our time in Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai.
- 3 day trek in the jungle, visiting hill tribes and sleeping in primitive places. Sounds far more idylic than what it actually was. We battled with leeches, mosquitos, blisters and some pretty terrible food!
- We happened to be in Chiang Mai for Loy Krathong festival which was unreal! A festival of lights, lanterns, parades, fireworks and food. A definite highlight of our trip!
- We attended another cooking class so that we are ready to whip up some more thai delights when we get home. This time we have mastered Tom Yum Gong.
Starting out on the jungle trek all gung ho!
Accommodation for the night-
Loy Krathong- lighting our lantern
Thai food- YUM!
Money well spent in Kerela ….a 2 dollar eye test to discover we are both blind as bats (one significantly more than the other!) and 2 pairs of glasses made that afternoon for under 100 dollars! Gotta love India.
Two relaxing days sitting on a river house boat with our Swiss friends Sarah and Lynn. I powered my way through the appropriate book, Shantaram. Despite the self-indulgent writing it lived up to the hype.
We had delicous local southern Indian food prepared fresh each day and enjoyed the stops at the local villages and precarious ‘bridges’. The sunsets were among the best we’ve seen on the trip.
Looking back it was worth the 7000 Rupees a night.
Chilled. In one word. The pace is so enjoyable after the hustle of the north.
The Chinese fishing nets were more fascinating than effective. An Indian laundry mat also proved to be an eye opening place where some back breaking, wet work took place. Nat had a go at using the coal iron…they iron everything!
The spice garden was exactly that, spicy. After proving I liked spice with a ‘modest’ clove chilli the owner gave me a cream green coloured chilli that literally had me sweating and doubled over in agony an hour later. The cultural show with beautiful costumes and makeup made for a fun night out. Sadly the river safari in Periyar wildlife sanctuary was uneventful, but we fared better than those who opted for the safari trek and came back covered in leeches.
The tea plantations were another highlight. Whilst I sat in the back of our taxi with A/C on recovering from my ‘spicy’ attack, the driver and Nat hopped over a few fences to join the local tea picking ladies. An amazing experience where they warmly welcomed her, dressing her up and getting Nat to cut a few leaves. This surreal experience was ruined half an hour later by them asking for money! Typical!
Varanasi – Population 1.2 million
I find it impossible to describe Varanasi, the holy city of India in just a few short sentences. You truely must see it, smell it, taste it and live it to fully understand the chaos that Varanasi is.
It is a holy city where millions of Hindu undertake a pilgrimage to worship, mourn or to die there. The Ganges river is where it all happens! There are crematoriums lining the river with daily undertakings, people bathing in the water to wash away their sins, children playing in the water, women washing thier clothes in it, hundreds of people chanting and other rituals along the river banks and Hindu holy men (or Sadhus) praying peacefully along the edge.
Interestingly enough the Ganges is one of the most polluted rivers in the world and Danny – curtesy of wikapedia, explained that there was 60,000 faecal particles per 100 millilitres. This kept me well inside of the boat during our morning and sunset outings!
Moving around Varansi was also an experience and we are lucky to have come away with all our limbs intact and only a small dose of Dehli Belly (due to a recent bout of dysentry in the city).
Would I visit Varanasi again – YES!….but not in a hurry.
Preparing for a day out in Varanasi!
Action on the Ganges
Sights around the city...
This is a PG Rated blog so you’re getting the the very tame version of our latest outting.
After 4 hours on bumpy roads covering only 80kms we arrived at the (in)famous ‘Kama Sutra Temple’ of Khajuraho. The medieval erotic carvings depict the details outlined the Kama Sutra text. Everything was reasonably well preserved with exception of some defacing done my Muslim invaders. Interesting stuff.
We stayed in another restored palace in a small town with charming locals…
Orchha was a nice but nothing sort of place, made memorable by the activities we did rather than the views or monuments.
- Witnessed a motorcycle pile up due to King Cobra attack.
- Learnt how to make some seriously Indian food ( eggplant curry, chai tea, okra curry and tomato chutney)
- Watch Piri kick goals like a machine against Argentina ( 4 nations anyone?)
- Mingled with Sadhus on the Betwa River bank.
- Swam with frogs in our swimming pool.
The Taj Mahal lived up to our expectations. A 4:50AM start ensured we got there early and avoided the enormous queues. We also got the better pictures with the smaller crowds and the dawn’s early light.
TTYL.
