SE Asia

Thailand: Khao Sok & Similan Islands
Tuesday, December 9th, 2008

Michael and I traveled to Thailand as part of our 2007 career break. The following is an excerpt from our travel blog.

[singlepic=607,200,,,right]Of course our stop wasn’t just about the tsunami – we also managed to squeeze in some trips.  On one of these trips we visited Khao Sok National Park.  Known for its great jungle treks, we decided to let the elephants do all the work on this particular trek.  Lumbering along from atop our ride, we were taken along a beautiful hike to a waterfall, where we would stop for a “rest” and the elephants would get a bath.

After meandering back, we got to reward our ride with a “tip” – bananas.  We followed suit and had lunch at one of the parks lodges, which consisted of tree top bungalows.  Then a canoe trip down the jungle river, passing large limestone karsts that are believed to have been part of a reef system spanning from China to Borneo – five times the size of the Great Barrier Reef.

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Thailand: Homestay with Andaman Discoveries
Tuesday, December 9th, 2008

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Michael and I traveled to Thailand as part of our 2007 career break. The following is an excerpt from our travel blog.

Of all the places we would visit on this trip, the last place I thought Michael would be able to relate to the most was a small Muslim Village in Thailand.  But surprisingly, he eased right into sleeping on a mattress on a floor under mosquito netting with roosters crowing at 2am, speaking a completely different language from anyone else around us, and feeding baby goats twice a day.  But he easily compared it to consulting – traveling endlessly from one hotel to the next, needing to learn a new dialect or corporate speak, and understanding a new corporate environment and supporting it.  Makes perfect sense.

Our stay in Tung Nang Dam was thanks to Andaman Discoveries – an offshoot of the North Andaman Tsunami Relief (NATR) organization.  As their website states “we started by doing relief projects FOR community members, then we progressed to development projects WITH community members, now we are assisting with projects led BY community members.”

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