Tuesday, February 09, 2010

Krabi Adventure: Day 2

Isaac always tells me that I speak with a weird American-Britsh accent, which I disagree with.

I woke up at 7am (GMT+7hours) to get ready for the local tour I booked the day before. Nervous as hell, as this will be the first time I'm going on a local tour booking with a bunch of strangers that are prolly going in pairs.

Trip of the day: Jungle trekking
Guide Name: Gan --- good spoken English, good understanding of complicated questions asked by our group of 14, bad and lame jokes.
Group Members: 2 from French, 2 from England, 1 Canadian, a Russian family of 4 (Mom, Dad, Son & Daughter), 4 others which I forgot where they're from, and me.
Destination: Hot spring waterfall, Emerald Pool, Blue Pool, Tiger Cave Temple

When we were told that our trip to the hot spring waterfall will take approximately 50 minutes to reach, I, of course, doze off. If there were any additional lame jokes being told along the way, I'm glad I missed it.

Don't get me wrong. Gan is an extremely nice girl, which makes it even harder for us to tell her straight to her face her jokes sucks, and we're all forced to fake a laugh with her. It's just plain sad.

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Destination 1: Hot Spring Waterfall
We're told by Gan that the water atop of the hills is close to boiling point that you can boil an egg in it, but since it's a 2km hike uphill through the jungle and we cannot bathe in it (unless we wanted to cook ourselves), we'll be heading straight to the waterfall, which water is about 30°C - 40°C.

As we went headed to the waterfall, I can feel steam radiating from the water in the stream, which makes me even more curious about how hot can the water on top of the hills be. My mind kept drifting there. I really wanted to go on top of the hills badly to throw an egg in there and test if Gan's theory of boiling an egg is true. Well, that, and also partly because I was hungry.

When we reach the so said "waterfall" it turns out to be a very small slope, where the which water falls from the hill created a couple of natural 'tub' where people can actually lie in it and enjoy a therapeutic dip. While the rest who immediately stripped off and jumped into the hot spring to take their dip, I told Gan that I wanted to follow the jungle trek further down to where the water flow ends.

When I reached the end of the trek, I came to a huge river-like steam and I thought to myself: "I wonder what the water temperature is like here?" So out of curiosity I dip my right foot in...

A chill went straight up my spine! Holy fucking shit! The water is cold!! How can the water be so cold when water of a natural hot spring of 40°C flows into it 24 hours a day, non-stop!

When I got back to the meeting point, I asked Gan about it and was informed that apparently the water that flows there came from the Emerald Pool. As the water from the Emerald Pool is cold water, water from the hot spring gets nuetralized into nothingness. I have a feeling I wouldn't like the Emerald Pool so much.

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Destination 2: Emerald Pool + Blue Pool
Journey from the hot spring to the Emerald Pool takes about 15 minutes on the mini van. The pool is up another hill beside the one where the hot spring is situated. To get to the pool, Gan took us on an 800 meters hike down a ready-made pathway.

While on the path to the pool, Gan introduced me the Canadian who also happens to be travelling alone. Jud, 70 years old this year, sold his house November last year and has been travelling around Asia since. His last stop will be in Phenon Phen where will will fly back to Vancouver at the end of February, and is still not certain what will happen when he gets back, since he is now homeless. And for someone who's already 70 years old, he's got the best stamina of us all, we'll get to that later...

When we got to the Emerald Pool, I wasn't exactly amazed. It's just an almost-round pool with clear spring water in it, which flows down from the hills and happens to create a huge pool in the middle of the jungle. But according to Gan, the water in the pool contains minerals and water in the pool should not be drank. And a note of warning from her to all of us: It's slippery everywhere! Almost everyone jumped in the minute they heard mineral and good for the skin. While they are taking a dip, I told Gan I wanted to go see the Blue Pool which is another 500 meters hike into the jungle path uphill.

The hike was really no joke. Even with wooden planks laid out as a path to follow, it was a scary experience to hike up to the Blue Pool. If it weren't for two other guys and a girl whom I met during my hike up, I would've gave up and turn back. And I'm really glad I didn't turn back!

The pool, oh my fucking gawd, is really blue! I really don't get it! You can actually see that the water is clear blue in color! As the description of the pool is written in Thai and I don't understand Thai, I really have no idea what and why the pool is blue and a "NO SWIMMING" sign hangs in the vicinity. I just know that there were bubbles coming up from below. (Click to enlarge the picture below...you will see it...)

I really can't wait to head back to Gan and ask her what's with the Blue Pool that when I reached the vicinity of the Emerald Pool, me being me, I of course, slipped and fell and nipped myself on the elbow. >.<

According to Gan, what made the pool blue is because of the minerals contained in the water. However, no one is allowed to swim there because the bottom of the pool is actually quick sand! o.O

After spending about an hour at the Emerald pool, we had lunch a simple lunch at the restaurant just outside of the national park before making our way to the Tiger Cave Temple.

The minute we got on the mini van, Gan told us we need to conserve our energy and take a nap if we could because we would need all the strength we can muster for the Tiger Cave Temple visit. At first I didn't quite understand her, then after seeing the question marks floating above our head, she continues: "There are two ways to go about at the Tiger Cave. One is up the hill to the top of the mountains, where you will get a panoramic view of Krabi and see a giant Buddha statue above the hills, while the other way is a up a jungle path where you will see the original tiger cave, where the monks used to meditate and live and where their meeting place."

And just when I was about to ask, someone did it for me: "Can we go both ways?" The answer was, expectly, no. Gan explains, "If you choose the first way, which is to go up the hill, you will need to climb 1237 steps up. But if you choose to go the second way, you will only have to climb 250 steps." At that point, I thought to myself. We have Batu Caves in Malaysia, if I can do Batu Caves, I'm sure I can do Tiger Cave, right? So I slept for the next 50 minutes of the journey.

When we got there, I couldn't wait to clim up the steps and reach the top to see what there. Most of the women gave up the minute they reach there and decided to go for the 250 steps jungle hike, so me, the French couple, the Russian guy and his son, the British guy and Jud (the 70-year-old Canadian uncle) sets out on our journey up the steps.

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Destination 3: Tiger Cave Temple
Only one word came to mind when I reach steps #247...

..."FUCK!" 

The steps first started out ok, then from steps, it became a steep ladder climb!

While I was on the verge of fainting and shortness of breath at Step #458, I lost sight of the the 70-year-old Canadian, who sprinted up the stairs as if they were steps from his house!

At Step #925, deep inside my heart, I was cursing whichever fucker who painted the numbers at the pole of every landing. If you don't know which flight you are on, at least you can look up and tell yourself you're about to reach, but when you keep seeing those numbers, your mind will keep counting and tell you how far you are from the top and how close you are from dying from an asthma attack.

The Russian kiddo bypasses me at Step #1105, and at that point, I couldn't care about how long it was going to take me to reach the top. I'm just gonna sit and rest for every 10 flights of steps I climb, and pray hard that I wouldn't faint and fall backwards down the flights I just climbed up from. Oh, did I forget to mention that landings don't count as a "step"? = =

...Finally!

I was the third to made it up to the top, then came the Britsh guy, who told me that we lost the Russian guy at about steps #600 or so, and the French couple are still making their way up the steps when he last saw them. After about 15 minutes or so, the couple made it and the four of us cheered for them for finally making it, before breaking to them the unfortunate news of us only having less than 20 minutes to get our arses back down before Gan and the rest of the team leaves us there. But we decided we couldn't care less anymore. We're up there and they're down there. There's nothing she can do, unless she can sprint up those steps in less than 15 minutes to haul our arses back down.

The kiddo started to make his way down while the rest of us, try to catch our breath (mostly me and the British guy), take pictures (mostly the French couple), and enjoy the view (only that 70-year-old uncle). The phrase "breath-taking view" will never be the same again for all of us after this trip.



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While making our way down from the mountain top, we had ourselves a little bonding time. The French couple told us they are newlyweds which are currently on their honeymoon. The wife also told us that the husband actually had a knee problem which the doctor advise him not stress his legs during the trip, and while we are on the way down, he was clearly limping because of the pain. The wife held him each steps of the way down, while the rest of us waited for them at every landing we came across.

The 70-year-old uncle told us that he lives in the mountain area of Canada which is why he is so accustomed to climbing up high steps. PLUS, he is also a part of a relay team in his city, where he would train himself for at least an hour a day to make a 250km lap with his team every week! Talk about staying in shape!

The British guy shared with us that he and his wife are in Krabi to get away from the cold weather in England, where when they left is covered with snow everywhere they go. And when they asked me where I'm from, everybody seemed to be in shocked. "You don't speak like a Malaysian." "I thought you're from Hong Kong!"

Isaac always tells me that I speak with a weird American-British accent, which I disagree with. My European colleague, Alessandra, once asked if I graduated overseas because of my accent. Well, at least we can now conclude that regardless of how my English sound like, it ain't Malaysian English. = =

Monday, February 01, 2010

Krabi Adventure: Day 1

So, my day started with a fight with the girl at Air Asia's check-in counter...

All of us (me and the rest of the passengers, that is) were queuing up at the long check-in counter queue. After close to 20 minutes of queuing, when I was third in line, the girl told the two mat-salleh in front of me that the counter's closed. The two mat salleh, of course, made a fuss about how long they were waiting in line, how she should've stopped people from queuing if she wanted to close the counter and demand to be checked in.

The counter girl next to her, then asked her to close the queue, and divert the rest to another line, which is empty and just opened. The girl, got out from her counter, close the line with about 10 of us in it, and divert the rest to the new counter. So this meant that the 10 of us who are still in the queuing zone will be checked in, right? Wrong.

After she checked the two mat salleh in, when I got up to the counter, she tells me that the counter is closed. Why can the two in front of me check in and I can't?! Now I'm really pissed. I started screaming at her telling her that all of us who are still in the line have been queuing up for the past 20 minutes and if she can serve the two mat salleh, she can serve the rest of us before closing. At that point she got embarrassed, stood up and looked at the people she had in line and mumbled that she will finish the queue before she closes the counter.

Air Asia has been providing us with somewhat cheap tickets, this much I must agree, but they have got to improve on their customer service. It is not our fault that she didn't cut the queue earlier to avoid having to serve us when it's time for her break. I've taken Air Asia flights long enough to hear all sorts of rude comments from people behind the check in counters. Once the check in counter close half way through and told the rest of the people in queue that they can't check in anymore because the plane is about to take off, and gave them a lecture about how they should've came earlier when they complaint! Talk about bad customer service.

Just when I thought the bad is over. It ain't.

On the plane, a pair of mother daughter is seated next to me. The mother, glared at the air stewardess angrily when she kindly asks if she could use the table in front of her to do the emergency exit demonstration. The stewardess looked confused for about two seconds before turning to the person on the other side of the aisle to ask for permission instead. To prove that she doesn't has any civic conscious, she then took the air sick paper bag out from the front pocket of her seat and her daughter's, and passes it to her daughter so that her daughter can doodle over it. When her daughter of done doodling on the paper bags and ran out of space, the daughter started to bug her for more paper. To my horror, she actually told her daughter to look in to the front pocket of my seat to see if there's any, without asking for my permission! Thank goodness the paper bag was nicely tugged away behind the emergency exit card and her daughter couldn't see it, or else I would have to force myself to throw up my breakfast to teach them a lesson.

To make things worse, this spoiled daughter of hers started whining again half way through the flight and she gave the daughter her story book to read. This brat, proceed to ask the mother to read out loud, which she didn't even think twice and did it. I normally wouldn't mind and find it cute, but this girl is big enough to know how to read, and s obviously spoilt rotten by this mother of hers. The mother and daughter then proceeded to read the stories word by word, line by line, OUT LOUD! This is a plane for heavens sake! Not their house! I can see people from the opposite aisle started to glare over and I even heard someone sushing them. But the mother didn't give two fucks and kept on reading with her daughter. Where is an air stewardess when you needed one?! Thank god for Sony Ericsson's flight mode!

I really didn't know what to expect when we reached Krabi International. As I booked and paid my hotel and airport transfer online, I didn't know where the heck my hotel was (other than it was walking distance to the beach), and I have no idea who the person who was going to pick me up look like (other than he will be holding a sign with my name on it). When I got through the long and winding queue at the immigration, there he was. An old and polite-looking uncle dressed in white uniform and black slack holding a sign with my name. He asked me to show him my booking confirmation, told me that the journey to my hotel would take about 45 minutes and asked me to follow him.

When I got to the car park, I was shocked. They sent a bloody limo to pick me up! To make things more awkward, as we made our way to to my hotel, we were heading more to the rural side of town. You can see people riding motorbikes, driving old cars, riding in tut-tut, and then there's me in a big ass white-colored airport limo! >.<"

When we reached Baan Purr, the mini hotel where I will be staying for the next three nights, all I wanted to do is to rush out from the hotel limo, and hide myself in my room as soon as I could before anybody sees me.

I booked myself two full day trips later that evening, before going for an evening walk along Ao Nang beach.