Welcome to Thailand. Rather, welcome back!
Another month has passed and we have no idea where it went. After completing the circuit, Moo and her two trekking buddies headed to Pokhara to relax for a week or so before moving on to a place called Chitwan. It is a part of Nepal very close to the border with India, and, consequentially is very very very very very very very hot. We embarked upon another workaway where we were to stay at an 'Eco Park' - a communal campsite with responsibilities that included (and were pretty much limited to) 'erecting corn'. This meant spending two hours just after sunrise standing up corn crops that the buffalo had trampled on. Fields and fields of corn awaited us and although it was early the sun was inevitably scorching and the work was hard. The task of erecting corn itself wasn't so difficult, it was more the scale of things that proved a challenge. Nevertheless, we managed to still make it enjoyable with a good bunch of fellow volunteers and a cracking 'corn erecting' playlist.
We were given a day off at the weekend and our host suggested that we take the local bus to the middle of nowhere and look for the river so we could have a swim.
The river that we found was the border between us and the national park, and we were lucky enough to spot elephants in the distance when we arrived. Beaming with excitement for the promise of a cool dip in the water, we quickly stripped off and jumped in with our beers in hand. We'd been relaxing for all of 5 minutes when a local guy came running over and told us, 'no swim. crocodiles!'
Now for some reason which escapes me now, we didn't take this guy seriously. Perhaps he didn't deliver it with the sense of urgency that you'd expect in that situation. Whatever it was, the message didn't relay. So we carried on swimming.
A further 5 minutes had passed when another guy approached and pretty much shouted us out of the water. His manner was much more concerned. It did the trick. No sooner had we left the water that we noticed in the distance a scaly friend stalking its way up stream.
H-o-l-y S-h-i-t
Woops!
Despite our near death experience, the day turned out to be pretty chilled and ended with a huge camp fire (I know, a fire... in the desert... didn't seem entirely necessary. But it made a great aaaaawmbience.)
The cheeky children of Chitwan
Croc river
Walking back with an entourage
Corn is the future
Eco Park
Flunky Ball
Me and my new bestie
Saying goodbye to Eco Park was once again difficult as we'd formed a great bond with our fellow corn erecters. Alas, I am sure we will all meet again somewhere in the world!
It was time now to embark upon the adventure that we had heard so much about in our time in Nepal.
We boarded yet another rickety bus and made our way from Kathmandu to a town called Thulo Pakar where we would spend the next 3 weeks building schools that had been ruined by the 2015 earthquake.
This was where the real hard work began. Mixing masala and concrete 7 hours a day, 6 days a week in 40 degree heat, carrying bricks up and down site and gathering bamboo from near by valleys. Absolute killer. But booooyyyy did it feel good to see that school going up! And the wind down at base and temple bar was always just what you needed after a hard day's work. This was where we met our friend Verity who was to join us in Thailand for our first 2 weeks.
Following in dad's footsteps
Chamuna
Brick cutting
The 'nice' toilets at camp
Base
Walking to catch the bus home from work
Chamuna
Preparing for a lock in (due to local elections and political tensions)
Yita!
Lunch
Moo's message to the volunteers
After a crazy final few days in Kathmandu, coupled with some chill out time in mountainous Nagarkot, we boarded a plane and journeyed on to Bangkok.
Verity and Moo had vowed not to take the well trodden tourist path, and instead made their own somewhat improvised route a few hours west of the city. We started in Kanchanburi, staying on a rafthouse overlooking the Bridge on the River Kwai, where we embraced the history of the place, educating ourselves by watching The Railway Man (with a scene that featured our actual rafthouse in the distance!!) and taking a trip to the Hellfire Pass museum.
We then moved on to the surrounding rainforest, edging closer and closer to the border with Myanmar until we were basically just walking distance away. We crossed the Mon bridge, the second longest wooden bridge in the world, with some snap happy monks from the Three Pagodas Pass who asked US for selfies with their top of the range iPhones (always a confusing image to me).
We spent the night in a treehouse, met lots of lovely local people, stayed on the river in Amphawa by the floating market and finally relaxed on the beach in Cha Am - our first bit of sea and sand in 3 months of travel! From here we went our separate ways, but will surely see each other again in the UK.
Final All Hands farewell in Kathmandu
Our gorgeous cottage in Nagarkot
The Bridge on the River Kwai
Rafthouse views
Rafthouse
Erawan falls
Hellfire Pass
Hornbill
Lonely waterfall in Thong Pha Phum national park
Our treehouse
Myanmar Monks on the Mon Bridge
Amphawa floating market
Last beer on the beach!
Me and Mini Georgie riding the Death Railway
Hitching in the rain!
Now we are in Bangkok, patiently awaiting the arrival of our DAD!! We have a flight to Phuket in a few hours where we will spend one night in a hostel before checking into a hotel and preparing everything for his lordship!
Words cannot describe how excited we are. You'll just have to hold on and see what we get up to!
From One Nutty Moo to Another
x
