Ooooh, We Live A Hard Life

We just spent the past 4 days in paradise! It was so beautiful, the water was crystal clear and so many shades of blue! From our island we could see many different islands just jutting out of the water. We traveled with our new German friends Anna and Diar! We had such a great time soaking in the sun!

We went on snorkeling trips 2 days that we were there! Each time, we took a long-tail boat like this one. It was just Eric, Anna, Diar and I the entire time! We got our own private tours somehow...lucky us!
Sunset Beach was just a 10 minute walk through the jungle to the other side of the island! We caught 3 amazing sunsets! The best part about Sunset Beach was coming home, on the way back. The jungle is lacking in lights and we had to use our little flashlights. We were screaming the whole way...very brave! More than once, we thought we were going to be attacked by giant crabs or jumping tree frogs!
This was the beach we walked out to every day from our wee bungalow! There was never more than 10 people in the water and the beach was so peaceful. That's right, be jealous!!Our beautiful shower!! At first, I was kind of scared of a shower that had no roof, but it was actually really cool! If you took a shower at night, you got to see globs of stars in the sky. The whole island used ground water, so all the water was a little brown...it was very nice to get back to the mainland and take a real shower!One of the amazing limestone islands that just pops out of the ocean! On one of our snorkeling trips, our guide brought us to an island (a little bigger than this one) and we followed him through a cave. We were swimming through pitch-black darkness...I was thrilled, it was so fun! We finally came out into this crazy lagoon. We were surrounded on all sides by massive limestone walls covered in jungle straight out of Jurassic Park. It felt like we were at the bottom of the mouth of a volcano, and the only way in was to swim through this cave! It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen!
The water was crystal clear and the snorkeling was amazing! We saw so many colors and different fish! Eric had a blast with the sea cucumbers! I never knew Thailand had such beautiful islands!...Katie

Thai National Anthem

We get to witness the craziest thing in Thailand! Everyday at 8am and at 6pm loud speakers all over Thailand play the national anthem. First, there is a tick-tock that happens and then the anthem is played. People can be grocery shopping, running or trying to catch a bus, but when they hear the national anthem...they stop in their tracks until it is finished. Eric and I had no idea what was going on the first time, but since then we've kind of caught the hang of it. This is a video of a huge park where people go to exercise after work and we happened to be there at 6 o'clock. We caught this phenomenon on film. It's pretty amazing!...Katie

fluidity is the name of the game

This is what is considered a motorcycle here in Thailand.
It is far from this....

BOLTS ACTION

but it is a 250cc scooter that has no problem doing 100 kph down the shoulder of a highway. Now this is only about 60 mph. It was very able to go faster but its little tiny bicycle like wheels felt a bit squirrely for me. I averaged about 80 kph most of the time out in the country. Yesterday, was my first day riding a "motorcycle" here in Thailand. I was pretty nervous considering the way motorbikes and cars handle themselves in traffic. (If you dont know check back to my Crazy Motorbike post from a couple weeks back.) After driving in it for about 45 minutes on the way to the beach I pretty much had it figured out. The chaos of driving here actually works for them. The way it works is like water. Water doesn't like open spaces in it. If you poke a hole in water it quickly fills it back in. Traffic here is no different. You the bike have to act like that. (along with everyone else on the road). If there is an open space in traffic you quickly and carefully fill it. People here dont get pissed at everyone for cutting in front of them and all that stuff. Everyone here is just getting to where they are going.
It is crazy, but it works for them. It is one of those things that you don't understand until you are actually neck deep in. Now I am by no means good at driving in this crazyness but I understand it a little bit better. This little bit of fun also made me really miss driving my bike back home.

Here are some of the spots we were able to find on our rides. This is such a beautiful place and i am so thankful to be here. enjoy....Eric