Although this trip did start out with a shock. I got a notice on my phone that I’d received a WhatsApp message from Exotic Asia Hotline. My first thought was, “How did my WhatsApp number get compromised?” My second was, “Do they deliver?”

It turns out it was my infelicitously named tour company confirming my reservation. Maybe it’s a side business. More likely the tours are the side business. Sweet. I’m not just a tourist. I’m a coconspirator in a Malaysian money laundering scheme. Made it, Ma!

Land: Bukit Malawati

First stop, Malawati Hill, in Kuala Selangor. About 40 miles west of Kuala Lumpur, Malawati is a strategic location at the mouth of the Selangor River, draining into the Straits of Malacca. Malays built a fort there in the early 16th century, but the Dutch, in a fierce combination of boredom and rage, took it in 1784.

My favorite part of this history is that the leader of the Dutch troops was an officer named Dirk van Hogendorp. Yep, Fightin’ Dirk van Hogendorp. I am totally not making fun of his perfectly reasonable Dutch name. I’m sure there are respectable van Hogendorps all over Dutchland. But seriously. I’m sure he was positively savage in person, but the name doesn’t exactly inspire fear. Dirk van Hogendorp. Say it with me.

Curiously, the British didn’t come along and fuck the Dutch for the fort (until much later). The Malays actually captured it back the very next year, before it fell for good in the 19th century during a civil war fought with the colonialists as amused bystanders.

But there was plenty of back and forth before then. To no one’s surprise, the Dutch took the fort back and used the opportunity to build a lighthouse on the hill in 1794. Then the whole thing became British, as things did back then, and they refurbished the lighthouse in 1910, which still stands today. The ruins of the fort are also still around.

But I promised wildlife. And a land war. What gives?

OK, absolutely no one goes to Malawati Hill for the lighthouse or the ruins of the fort. They go, as I did, for the monkeys. And where there are troops of monkeys, there will be war.

Did you know that the alternate collective noun for monkeys, besides the more standard troop, is cartload? I can assure you, Malawati Hill boasted cartloads of monkeys. Specifically, there’s one cartload of Long-Tailed Macaques and another of Silvery Langurs, also called Silver-Leaf Monkeys.

I’m on record about the macaques. They are not mischievous. They are aggressive little thieves and thugs who’d mug you for a banana. To use a random example. But I was very excited to meet a cartload of the langurs, who are, by repute, gentle, pleasant creatures. From whom the macaques could learn a thing.

They’re easy to tell apart, by the way. The Silvery Langurs, as the name implies, have black fur tipped in silver, approachable faces, and bright orange babies. The macaques are brown, with frightening muzzles tapering to sharp, pointy teeth and dead eyes that would love nothing more than to watch you suffer.

We’re dropped off at the bottom of Malawati Hill and make our way up, through the trees abutting the coastal mangrove forests that are home to both macaques and langurs. The various cartloads of monkey hang out in those trees because they are adjacent to a generous source of food: us.

On the way up the hill.

The langurs, especially, have no problem being close to humans. Very close.

There are a lot of babies, and lots of committed parenting.

Very alert and protective.

Both the langurs and the macaques carry their chiddlers clinging to their bellies.

I am forced to admit that this particular cartload of macaques seems less criminal than most. Perhaps it’s the exposure to the langurs, or perhaps they’ve simply learned that they get more food if they display some rudimentary manners. Either way, I feel noticeably less at risk in their presence.

It feels like the walk up the hill introduces you to the whole concept of monkeys, so you’re at least somewhat prepared for the scene that greets you at the crest. What is that scene like? Chaos. Madness. War.

At the top of the hill, vendors hawk little burlap sacks generously stuffed with sliced fruit, beans, shoots, and bananas. For a mere 10rm, about $2.50 USD, you can be part of the great circle of life. Feeding monkeys. So many monkeys.

That looks like fun, doesn’t it? Since the theme of this whole adventure seems to be Stupid Things Dorothy Isn’t Here To Prevent, I signed up. You’ll never guess what happened.

How did that episode end? With one of the fucking macaques tearing the bag from my hand, running off, and hissing at me with bared teeth when I tried to retrieve it. Macaques, amiright?

The langurs were pretty awesome. Even if they had trouble maintaining boundaries. But you’ll notice in these shots that none of the macaques actually clamber up people. They’ll get close enough to steal, but don’t seem to favor scaling their marks. I am, as always, grateful for the small things.

Monkey selfies!

Air: Kampung Kuantan Firefly Park

From Malawati we drove to the banks of the Selangor River, one of Malaysia’s most critical water sources. We stopped for a ridiculous dinner, and then hopped a boat to take the river upstream to the Firefly Park.

Which is exactly what it sounds like: one of the largest firefly colonies in the world. Although the official collective noun for fireflies isn’t colony. A group of fireflies is a sparkle. Aww. In related news, I just learned that the collective noun for kittens is coven.

There’s not a whole lot to see here. It’s dark, and camera flashes both ruin the view and confuse the fireflies. But floating past is an experience so magical it seems almost fake. Like if Disney wanted to do the whole firefly thing, it would look exactly like this.

This doesn’t do the experience justice, but it’s all I’ve got.

Sea: Blue Tears

After the fireflies, we turn around and head back down river, past the mouth and into the Straits of Malacca. What are we after? Dinoflagellates. No, not prehistoric kinskters, bioluminescent plankton. Pervert.

This will be my third time with glowy sea monkeys: once before as a child in Guadalajara and once in Vietnam with Dorothy. There aren’t that many places in the world where they occur. Filling in my bingo card.

But it is a subtle effect and hard to capture. Like the fireflies, camera flash washes it out completely. We were each given a PVC pole with a fish net at the end. Scooping the net through the water agitated the poor things and made them glow. Did we care? We did not. We all scooped and scooped, bathing in the mystical glow. All you get out if it is a murky video.

As promised, Malaysia’s wildlife in land, air, and sea. It may not be much for y’all to look at, monkeys aside, but it was a pretty fine show in person.

If you’d never seen a Hindu temple, it would be hard to imagine that Buddhist temples were attempting to take it down a notch. Give credit where it’s due, though, as It takes a fair amount of effort to make a Buddhist temple look restrained. Unapologetically lurid, Hindu temples are a brightly colored rebuke to the very notion of moderation. Give the people what they want: tall tales and flamboyant displays.

The Batu Caves site is actually two attractions piled atop one another. There’s Batu itself, which is a Hindu temple built inside a limestone cave and dedicated to Lord Murugan, the Hindu god of war, in 1891. The 140 foot tall statue of Lord Murugan was erected in 2006, and still has that new deity smell.

The other attraction is the Ramayana Cave, home to several Suyambu Lingam, or naturally occurring Shiva Lingams. What I might call stalagmites. But I have no connection to the divine, because I’m a peasant. The other feature of Ramayana Cave, which gives it its name, is a series of dioramas depicting scenes from the Ramayana. I’m not 100% sure when they were installed, although they’re clearly modern, or if there were more primitive installations before these, but they certainly take advantage of the natural cave system.

The Grounds

The grounds feature a handful of bonus temples, beyond those built in the Batu Caves, and a metric buttload of fucking monkeys. So many monkeys. I submit to you that there are monkeys that are cute, both visually and behaviorally. Macaques are not those monkeys. They are rats with prehensile tails. The collective noun for macaques is infestation. Look it up.

Are these adorable? They are not. They are evil.

Cute? No. Clearly retreating to their lair so they can plot against us.

Practicing boarding techniques for ship-to-ship warfare. And you thought your yacht was safe.

You know what’s even worse than macaques? People.

Vendors were selling bananas for the express purpose of feeding the monkeys. No one needs a hand of bananas at a temple. These jamokes were teaching the monkeys that if a human was holding a banana it was theirs by divine right. Droit du fucking seigneur. [This is called foreshadowing, by the way.]

This is the big not-in-a-cave temple.

So I go into that last temple, which is a no-shoe temple, as they do. But I walked past this on the way up, and there is no fucking way I’m leaving my shoes for the thieving macaques. So I take them off and carry them in, all respectful like. But everyone starts gesturing and yelling at me, in a very chill Hindu way, until it finally dawns on me that even carrying my shoes is verboten. They force me back out to set them down on top of the steps, but that was the fastest temple visit I’ve ever done, and I was looking over my shoulder the whole time. There was no way I was letting the little terrorists run off with my shoes.

The Ramayana Cave

My first stop was the Ramayana Cave, an installation that strongly suggested that LSD is part of the Hindu sacrament. God loves all his children, but especially when they’re tripping. And then we love Him right back.

The approach certainly set the stage.

The immediate response on entering is to look for the disco ball. Color changing LEDs appear to have revolutionized the Hindu religion.

The true and real attraction, disco lighting notwithstanding, was the Ramayana dioramas. Spectacular.

Come for the Suyambu Lingam, stay for the trippy lighting.

Batu Caves

Everything about the approach to the Batu Caves is epically proportioned. A massive, 140 foot tall golden statue of Lord Murugan stands in front of the 1,000 foot tall limestone bluff and to one side of the 272 colorfully painted steps that lead to the first of the caves and temples. A temple sits to the left of the stairs and is dwarfed by its surroundings. It is truly breathtaking.

You’ll be surprised to learn that there are macaques all over the damn place. I refuse to call them monkeys, because I think it’s insulting to other monkeys.

Once the 272 steps have been surmounted, the vista opens up. That’s some cave.

On my way into this temple I was offered a piece of waxed paper with some kind of rice goo on it. I asked if I was supposed to use it as an offering and was told that it was their special blessed rice goo and was a free snack. OK. Then I stood in line briefly so this next guy could magically transform a 10rm note into a smear of ash on my forehead. It’s a miracle! He also gave me a banana.

I had to ask at the rice station what I was supposed to do with the banana, and they looked at me like I’d taken a blow to the head and explained that it was a snack. And that the common practice with snacks was to eat them.

So, with ash on forehead and banana in hand, I take the next set of 100 stairs to the penthouse temple.

If you know your classic literature, you know that a banana in the first act always goes off in the third (I even called out the foreshadowing for you, because I like you, but you’re a little slow).

Next thing I know, I’m being trailed by one of the fucking macaques. Not this one specifically, as I was too busy fending off a macaque attack to take a picture for you. Get over it.

This little bandit has locked eyes on my banana. I switch it to my left hand, further away from him, and he’s tracking it like DefCon One has been declared. Back to my right hand, left hand, right hand, and he’s tracking every millimeter of movement while inching closer. I’d seen what one of his mates had done to that poor woman in the square, and she was trying to feed them.

I finally tossed the banana over his head, away from me, so I could draw him off and finish my 100-stair climb, safety trumping snackage. Fucker leapt for it and gave a distinct what-are-you-doing-with-my-banana vibe. And I thought white people were entitled.

To everyone’s surprise, there was another temple in the attic. More ashes, please.

But I watched the guy after me, and the priest dude ducked back into the alcove and came back with a little golden statue. Merch! Maybe he donated more than 10rm, maybe there’s a secret handshake, but all I got was ashes. I wasn’t even offered a banana, but I knew better by that point anyway.

Past that temple, the space opens up into a limestone chamber soaring over 300 feet and open to the sky, like a Yucatán cenote. It’s a spectacular space, and the perfect cake topper for a truly beautiful site.

Sometimes tourist places are meh, and sometimes you totally get why people bother. Batu Caves paid off.

But not until the descent. No one bothered to explain that there were also 272 steps down. That seems like a thing you’d want to know.

But Wait, It’s A Hindupalooza

Everywhere else we’ve been in SEA, Hinduism is a palimpsest, overwritten by whatever local flavor of Buddhism has taken root. You can see its traces, most obviously in the Ramayana, but even that’s picked up Buddhist flavoring along the way.

Not so Malaysia, where Hinduism stands on its own. It has to be the Indian population. Malaysia has the most Indians of any of the SEA countries, both in terms of raw numbers (almost 3M) and percentage of the total population (about 7%).

So it’s no surprise that a substantial Hindu temple, Sri Maha Mariamman, can be found in Kuala Lumpur’s Chinatown. It’s not a massive structure, but it’s still the oldest Hindu temple in Malaysia, having been established in 1873. Its current structures were built in 1968. It looks like nothing so much as the temples we saw in Mumbai (before this adventure, so no blog posts about that trip).

This is a working temple, an active place of worship for KL’s Hindu population. And while it might lack the overwhelming scale of Batu Caves, it makes up for it with the quality of the execution. This was a Grade A Prime Hindu temple.

The temple’s interior.

The grounds were full of really well done sculptures and dioramas.

He who loves Ganesh is my friend.

There were galleries on both sides of the temple, flanking the exterior, with truly excellent tile paintings.

What a lovely addition to the Batu Caves tour. It will be interesting to see if the Hindu temple is part and parcel of the Malaysian experience, or if these were sports. If this is all there is, I’m satisfied. This is quality, quality templeage.

Or maybe a trip to Thailand’s highest spot, The Roof of Thailand, just sounds fun. Rumor has it there are waterfalls involved. Reason enough right there.

Doi Inthanon (doi is mountain) is named for King Inthawichayanon, whose given name at birth was Inthanon. He died in 1897, the last king of Chiang Mai, and his ashes are housed in a stupa at the highest point in Thailand. Improbably, Doi Inthanon is part of the same range that includes Everest, which, at 29,000 feet towers over Doi Inthanon’s 8,415 feet.

But before we reached the Roof of Thailand, there would be trekking and waterfalls.

Wachirathan Waterfall

Our first stop, inside Doi Inthanon National Park, was Wachirathan Waterfall. At ~250 feet, Wachirathan isn’t Thailand’s tallest waterfall, but it may be the most powerful. The volume of water is truly impressive.

There’s some rainbow action in the video, too.

Trekking

Back in the van, which held a dozen of us plus guide and driver, to our next stop, the Pha Doc Siao Nature Trail, a three kilometer trek that started at over 4,000 feet. I kept asking the others whether they felt the altitude when they tried to, you know, take a full breath while hiking, but all I got was pity. Bastards.

I wasn’t sure whether the end of this hike was Thailand’s roof or only its mezzanine, so nothing to do but carry on and avoid, if at all possible, fainting.

Here’s our guide, Lucy, introducing us to the two members of the Karen village who would be our docents for the hike, as we weren’t permitted to wander loose on the trail. If one of was slow, not naming names, one of the Karen would hold back and make sure we got back to the group.

I suspect this was more safety than anything. The path was super uneven and completely unmarked. If one were, say, panting to take a breath, one might get disoriented or trip over a tree root in the path. No one wants to be the weakest gazelle at the watering hole, so the extra help was appreciated.

The trek involved following a series of three waterfalls through the jungle, the third of which permitted swimming. We’d exit through a Karen village, and then some other things would happen. Not clear what the post-3km trek offered.

You will be, I believe, unsurprised to learn that the nature trek was just unfairly beautiful. Other jungles were jealous. On the negative side, though, we didn’t see any of the gibbons we were promised lived in the area. Lucy did share with us that Thai people, who will apparently eat anything (she listed monkeys and snakes specifically) won’t eat gibbons because they pair bond for life, like humans. Aspirationally. I just felt better knowing that as an actual lifelong pair bonder, Thai people would be unlikely to eat me.

We quickly came to the first of the trek’s waterfalls. We were cautioned not to swim, but that seemed unnecessary. It was no Wachirathan, but there was still an impressive water flow. There was no part of this fall that called out to me to risk my life by entering.

The water kept us company as we trekked to the next waterfall.

This was another no-swimming, no-problem waterfall. Not even the shadow of an inclination.

Our trek to the final waterfall took us through a valley that was used by the Karen for rice cultivation. The water had been diverted around the valley, and routed to the next waterfall, to prevent random flooding that damaged crops. The park was established in 1972, but the Karen and Hmong villages had been established right around 1900, so their agricultural footprint predates the park by a fair amount.

When I was at DC Comics I visited one of my artists, Steve Parkhouse, who took me for an excursion around his home in England’s Lake District. We were touring one of the national parks when we crested a hill and I saw a village in the valley below. “Who let them build a village in a national park?” Steve laughed. “The national park is just over 50 years old. The village is over 1,000.” Like that. Only newer.

Which brought us, blissfully, to the third and final waterfall, the one where swimming was permitted.

Here we have delightful proof that children are stupid in exactly the same way across vast cultural gulfs. Let the children teach us: we are more alike than different.

The end of our 3km trek took us to the Karen village of our guides, a hamlet of about 350 people. This turned out to be the highlight for me, which was a surprise, as I’d already visited a Karen village. But these two villages could not have been more different.

The first village I’d been to had been a Long Neck village, while this tribe was White Karen, who don’t use the neck-lengthening brass coils. But the differences went way deeper than that. As I mentioned, the White Karen village had been established around 1900, while the Long Neck villagers had fled persecution in Burma/Myanmar in the 80s. As a result, the White Karens owned their land and were Thai citizens, while the Long Neck village was effectively a refugee camp, the villagers having no actual rights within Thailand.

How this played out in the two villages was fascinating, manifesting in both art and architecture. But we had a couple of stops before we hit the village proper. The first was their coffee operation, which is an important part of their economy. Prior to its establishment as a National Park, this part of Thailand was thick with opium poppy cultivation. The government officially banned opium production in the fifties, but the effort picked up speed with a Royal Project in 1969 that focused on crop substitution. That’s why the Karen grow coffee and strawberries now.

This fellow was by the path roasting coffee by hand. If only he’d had some for sale. JK. Of course I bought his hand-roasted coffee. I’d most certainly also have bought his opium, but if any was available it wasn’t on offer to farangs.

The next stop was the Karen weaving shop. I’m sure most of the weaving is done in the home, but this is a central spot on the nature trail that gathers all of the village’s wares in one place. That’s the longest backstrap loom I’ve ever seen, by the way. For making the long straps on the woven tote bags? Maybe?

I will always share video of weaving. Don’t click Play if it bores you.

The two Karen villages’ vastly different profiles, one settled citizens, one stateless refugees, couldn’t have been more apparent than in their weaving. The Long Neck Karen had small backstrap looms they clearly carried with them when they fled Myanmar, while the White Karen had frame looms large enough to be cosplaying as backstrap looms. That difference leads to a notable distinction in the depth and richness of the patterns being woven.

Finally, the Long Neck Karen have made a virtue out of the vice of scarcity, weaving pieces that are more open float than weft. While the White Karen weaving does feature some open floats, it’s a design accent rather than the primary effect.

Here’s what I picked up from the White Karen village. Those are rich and subtle.

And here’s what I picked up from the Long Neck Karen village.

I’m not suggesting for a moment that there’s a qualitative artistic difference between the two villages’ work. Both are beautiful. I’m suggesting that the obvious differences in execution are attributable to their different circumstances, that the decisions aren’t purely aesthetic, but are tied to their social and economic profiles. I wasn’t expecting a master class in microeconomics on a hike and a swim, but you have to hold yourself open to the universe.

The final lesson came when we reached the village proper, where our van was waiting to pick us up for the next leg. The village was so much more built than the Long Neck village. It might look like corrugated tin lean-to construction, but it was solid.

This is what tipped me over, though. Fucking dormer windows!

Compare that with the Long Neck village, whose building designs are constrained by the materials available. No architectural details for them, just pure utilitarianism.

Many years ago, on a DC junket, I found myself at Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands, one of the world’s oldest neolithic cities. You could see the foundations of the housing and the street grid. What was most fascinating to me was that there was evidence of indoor plumbing, the oldest, I believe, ever found. Which spoke of a society with enough labor bandwidth that not all of it needed to be focussed on subsistence.

You don’t get indoor plumbing without the equivalent of a city planning function, and you don’t get city planners unless you value their efforts enough to feed them, since they’re busy city planning instead of hunting. There’s an entire value system embedded in something as simple as sewage lines.

That’s what I thought of when I saw those hilarious dormer windows. There’s a value system embedded in those windows, that says we value beauty over efficiency, joy over utilitarianism. And we have the necessary labor bandwidth to manifest those values in silly, silly windows. The Long Neck Karen, on the other hand, are just trying to survive, and their buildings, as they will, reflect those values.

Made It, Ma! Roof Of The World…

At this point it was clear that our 3km trek was not terminating at the Roof of Thailand. Would there be another trek to the highest point in Thailand? I dearly hoped not. I hadn’t actually tweaked anything, but more than one of my joints was throbbing. That 3km was over very uneven paths, and knees and ankles took a beating.

So I was delighted to get back in the van, and surprised when, just a few minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot for the Roof of Thailand. Which was only a modest walk of 250 meters from the parking lot. That’s service! I’d just assumed that reaching the summit was its own trek.

It wasn’t a trek, but it was a ball of confusion. For starters, the sign that says “The Highest Spot in Thailand” isn’t. It’s just the sign at the beginning of the trail. You can even see the trail behind it winding higher on the mountain. I mean, you can’t even trust the signage.

Next up the path was the stupa holding King Inthanon’s ashes.

If you continue around the path, you go behind the stupa.

You can see the little square plinth just in front of the stupa’s base. For awhile, that was the tallest thing on the mountain, but so many people were traipsing up to it that it put the integrity of the stupa at risk. So on the other side of the path they built a new plinth, a couple of inches taller than the old plinth, so that could now be the highest point in Thailand, and people would leave the poor king’s stupa alone.

One nice thing about Thailand’s roof. At over 8,000 feet up, the air was deliciously cool. They’ve still never had snow up there, which is fine, but it was a refreshing break from the turgid lowlands.

Dueling Pagodas

Our final stop on our long day was the twin pagodas, one for the king, one for the queen. The setting was peaceful and the pagodas were quietly beautiful, as opposed to the not infrequent Clown Car approach to Thai temples. Looking at you, Wat Rong Khun. Let’s take a restful break before we head back to Chiang Mai.

Our Real Final Stop

Before hitting the road for real, two hours back to Chiang Mai, we stopped at what Lucy called a local market. I mean, technically true, but only in the sense that every market is local, if you think about it. But not at all true if you think the common English meaning of local market is a place where locals shop.

This place was inexplicable for so many reasons. First, there were dozens of those stalls, stretching in both directions. So that’s a lot to parse, right off the bat. What made it doubly hard to parse is that every stall carried the same snacks. In the same packaging. With the same labels. At the same price. There could honestly have been one stall.

This was all clearly a front for Big Snack. At first I thought, well, they may be buying big bags of this stuff wholesale, but at least they’re bagging it up for retail. But then I saw that the labels were identical. I honest-to-god think they’re all just buying the pre-bagged snacks from the same supplier and stacking them on their tables. As a demonstration of native Thai stacking culture it was awesome. As a local market it was… weird.

Ephemera

A couple of things that didn’t fit elsewhere.

More Me!

My daughter, Ruby, is pathological about having pictures of us on our travels. I’ve consistently demurred, as I think in any given setting we are always the least interesting thing. But I couldn’t escape my guide for my tour of Wat Doi Suthep, who insisted on taking my picture, which I shared on the post. Well, that made Ruby clap her little hands together in delight, like Veruca Salt stealing a squirrel, so here we are again. Please. Blame Ruby.

But Wait, There’s More…

These kinds of tours can make or break based on the folks. Some people are wrapped up in their own thing, which is often us, to be fair, but mostly people are there for the experience, and sharing it with the rest of your tour group is part of that experience. Which is to say, this was a pretty good group.

With one standout, who warrants specifically name checking: a charming Frenchwoman named Doris Buttignol. I know, I dunk on the French all the time. But only because it’s easy and fun. But when faced with an actual French person, I’m unexpectedly open-minded.

Doris was interesting to talk to, which we did off and on over the course of the day very pleasurably. But at lunch she confessed that she’s a documentarian, which immediately made her more interesting to me. Not that I operate at her level, but writing the blog requires looking at the world through a lens and trying to understand it, rather than letting the experience just wash over you. I’m an ardent amateur, so It was great to spend time talking to someone who does that professionally.

Doris shared with me a link to her most recently completed piece, about Icelandic politics. Which sounds dry but was anything but, encompassing as it did both women’s political empowerment and dealing with climate change. It was trenchant in its observations, but more than that it was visually stunning. Her eye for framing and composition is superb, and I was regularly brought up short by the raw beauty of an image.

Doris has generously let me share the link to her documentary. So everyone, please say Thank You to Doris.

My thanks go to Doris, as well, for giving me an experience, both in her company and her work, that went well beyond what Thailand had to offer. This is why we travel.

Thailand is blessed, in the south, with beautiful beaches and islands. Chiang Mai, in the landlocked North, not so much. Thus, we have the Grand Canyon Water Park, an abandoned limestone quarry about 30 km southwest of Chiang Mai. There were several pickup windows, but I opted for the 9:30 shuttle, which picked up at my condo, in order to beat the worst of the afternoon heat.

There were two British gals in the van, and when we arrived we discovered that we were the only attendees. The place was empty, which was weird. Then they held back, to see if it picked up, I assume, leaving me to navigate the place all by myself. Which was weird.

I’d looked at pictures before going, so I realized that most of it was like a floating bouncy castle crossed with American Gladiator. Not my jam, but I figured I could bat at that a little bit and then relax in whatever they had set aside for lolling. Except there wasn’t anything set aside for lolling. It was all obstacle course.

What’s a 69 year-old man to do except press on as if he couldn’t imagine how he’d feel the day after? I mean, what were my options? Well, the water was actually quite a bit warmer than it looked, and life jackets were a requirement, so one of my options could easily have been just relaxing and bobbing in the water. Of which I did some. But mostly I climbed and clambered and crawled and fell into the water and pulled myself back up. With, as it happens, no regard at all for how I’d feel the day after. Spoiler: really, really sore. And for more than just the day after.

But it was curiously fun, and made much more sense as the morning wore on and more people showed up. It’s a place that operates best when full. Which also gave me ample opportunity to take pictures of activities I had no interest in participating in myself. Which was quite a few of them.

Several items were verboten in the water: glasses, hats, phones. You were going to tumble into the water, so that made sense. But I had a dry pouch for my phone and found a few vantage points that seemed stable enough to keep me from falling in while holding my unsheathed phone.

One challenge was the giant sprinkler heads which shot water all over the park. While they obviously used quarry water, aerosolizing it and spraying it made it noticeably colder than the lake water. I tried to find a dry spot where the streams from multiple sprinklers didn’t intersect, but no such luck. Which meant that while I was braced to keep from falling off a floating, inflated platform while I took pictures and video, I often forgot that I was never more than a few moments away from being completely doused in cold water, phone and all.

Which is my way of apologizing in advance for the shakier-than-usual camera work. I was standing on something that was moving underneath me, and which could jump violently if some mook came running down the same section I was on.

While there was plenty of solo climbing and scrambling, there were tons of group activities, many of which fostered displays of performative masculinity that, interestingly, weren’t confined to men. There were squads of womenfolk willing to push the boundaries of common sense if it meant they could show off. It was a very egalitarian demonstration of stupidity. The dream is alive.

There was a floating soccer pitch.

Here it is with pratfalls. Always an improvement.

There was also a floating badminton/volleyball court.

There were slides, one of which released close enough to the water that even I was willing to try it.

The others? Nope. Check that close one, which has a wicked scoop at the end, to help get that last little bit of stomach churning loft.

Here it is in nausea-inducing action.

A closer look? Sure.

There was quite a bit of equipment available.

There was also whatever this is:

I love everyone’s confidence in this clip that they are the one who’ll maintain their balance.

But the absolute acme, the pinnacle, was the Pillow Bounce. It was like a trust fall for profoundly untrustworthy people. I have multiple clips, because I was transfixed. Here’s the lifeguard showing how its done.

Here’s civilians, not entirely in sync.

You don’t have to watch all of these. Although this one’s pretty good.

I saved the best for last. I apologize for losing the end of that spectacular finish, but someone came running down the inflatable lane and I was lucky to not go completely ass over teacups. Still, plenty awesome.

There was even a performance, right before I left. It answered this question: Why is there someone down there wearing a lamé dragon costume?

I should have known. A dragon in the first act…

Those little white skimmers the performers were riding were available for patrons to try before the show. No one got farther than about two leg pumps before slow motion sinking. Is it schadenfreude if it’s funny?

I love that the superhero didn’t make it to the end of the zip line and had to be rescued. By a blue-suited monkey? My admission came with a zip line ticket, which I gifted to the British gals so one of them could go twice. I could close my eyes and visualize the firehose of vomit that I’d rain down like one of the sprinkler heads if I were foolish enough to zip line.

And finally, no water park would, apparently, be complete without cheesy, inexplicable décor.

And thus I drag my weary body back up to meet the van that will return me to my condo. Where, once I’ve relaxed, I’ll realize that I’m not weary so much as very, very sore. Every time I fell into the water I had to haul myself back up hand over hand on the grips. I am still sore, several days later, in places I didn’t know could hurt.

Hopefully, this thing that’s keeping me young won’t kill me.

The problem with waterfalls is that their romance is undercut by their terrible cost: crisp mountain waters that deliver a cold shower more life-threatening than bracing. As much as I long to stand in the pool directly under the falls and let my soul be cleansed by the healing waters, ouch. I don’t think my soul has ever been properly cleansed while shivering. Thus, my dirty, dirty soul.

Would I be able to live the dream, letting the warm waterfall flow over me in a rhapsody of jungle bliss? Yeah, mostly.

But first, never let it be said that I am unwilling to humiliate myself for your entertainment. Because this tour was my second attempt at the hot springs waterfall, not my first.

One of the big questions many of you had as I embarked on solo travel was, “Is he smart enough to keep himself alive without his Jiminy Cricket?” We now have the answer to that question. Barely. Just barely.

The day before my scheduled tour I went swimming and had lunch at my usual beachside café. I’d been eating pretty native, but decided to treat myself to a comfort burger. I’d barely swallowed the first bite when I felt my stomach churn. “Well, that’s an odd coincidence,” I thought. “It can’t be the burger. That’s way too fast a response for food poisoning. Weird.”

So I finished the burger. Which ended precisely where you’d expect.

The next morning I’m waiting for the van in front of my hotel thinking, “Ooh, I don’t know.” Retching in the bushes was, thankfully, dispositive, and I called it off.

I rescheduled for a couple days later, figuring that should give me enough time to recover, and also because it was the last practical opportunity for me to take a day trip before I left Krabi for Chiang Mai. Once again, I’m waiting for the van downstairs, thinking, “Maybe I shouldn’t.” Which is confusing, because “Maybe I shouldn’t” occurs to me so rarely.

Maybe I shouldn’t, but I did. And it was fine. A little fraught, but fine. Still, you don’t miss your water ’til your well runs dry. I’m certain I’m safer with Jiminy along.

Namtok Ron

Namtok Ron starts with a lovely jungle walk before you reach the hot springs.

There are three distinct areas: the hot spring falls themselves and then two spa pools. The spa pools are filled from the same source, they’re just constructed pools instead of the natural falls.

Each of the three areas is also a completely different temperature. I’m not entirely sure how that works, but the waterfall pool is just a degree below body temperature, and the two spa pools are 104° and 113° (!) respectively. Or simmer, parboil, and rolling boil.

I started with the mildest, the waterfall pool, and discovered that it wasn’t quite what the word “waterfall” evoked. It was more spillway than falls, but it was delightful to cozy up in a stone nook and let the warm waters rush over and around me. Even though it wasn’t what I’d imagined, my inner curmudgeon was wet, warm, and pacified.

My intention had been to do them in ascending intensity, but I got the two spa pools mixed up and went in the 113° first. I was terrified of the last one, thinking that it was going to be even hotter, so I was relieved to find out that it was actually the middle pool.

This was not our first hot springs/hot air adventure, having dipped in Cleopatra’s Pool in Pammukale in Turkey. In that case the air temperature was a near-death 107°, as opposed to Krabi’s ~ 90°. Still, all three pools performed the neat trick of making the air seem cool on exit.

Emerald Pool

Like Namtok Ron, the Emerald Pool is part of the Khao Nor Chu Chi national park, so it was a short drive to our next stop. It started with a buffet lunch of flavorless hot-table food, for which I was profoundly grateful. The last thing I wanted was activity down there.

There were two additional pools besides Emerald: Crystal Pool and Blue Pool. Emerald was the only one of the three that was swimmable, and it was already a full kilometer walk from the entrance. I decided that the additional photo ops weren’t worth the risk. I bobbed in the Emerald Pool, held pretty still, and stayed close to a toilet.

The bobbing was excellent. Emerald Pool was only cool compared to our previous stop. The water temperature was like the beach at Ao Nang, where you could just walk in without that moment when you’re waist deep and you hold your breath and dunk yourself to get it over with quickly. I stayed in for pretty much the full hour we had there, without regrets. Warm water an impossible green. What’s to regret?

Wat Tham Suea

Our last stop was Wat Tham Suea, a temple complex that includes the temple and grounds, a Buddha on the Hill, and Tiger Cave. This didn’t sound as bad as the concentration camp that was added to the Bangkok waterfall tour as enrichment, but it also seemed a little off the mark. Like that Bangkok tour, the bulk of our day was spent swimming and hiking, so sure, toss in a temple. Knock yourself out.

Imagine my surprise (I’ll wait a moment while you do) when it turned out that Wat Tham Suea is one of my favorite temples that we’ve visited. I am going to have to retire the phrase, “The Liberace of churches,” but there’s a reason I keep using it. I’ve used it to describe the Guzman in Oaxaca and the San Cayetano in Guanajuato, and in both cases I was describing a kind of overwrought turducken of architectural ornamentation.

That’s less the case at Wat Tham Suea, which seems almost subtle in comparison, but is still utterly ridiculous in a way that warrants the Liberace callout. I’m prone to clown clothes, so it should be no surprise that architecture of the If-Some-Is-Good-More-Is-Better school would sing to me.

The first and most obvious attraction is the ground level temple. There’s also one up at the top of the mountain that everyone is happy to remind you is 1,260 steps and you’re probably not up to it. That temple is fairly new at about fifty years old, but the one at ground level is so new it’s still being worked on. Unlike Bangkok’s 300 year-old temples, which are just maintained so they look freshly built, Wat Tham Suea legit just opened to the public.

The interior lived up to the exterior’s promise.

I don’t know whether there had been a complex at ground level that had been razed or whether this was all sui generis new construction, but practically the entire site seemed like hard hats should be required. But they weren’t. No tort lawyers!

Where not under construction, the grounds offered ample eye candy.

Stairway to Heaven

I obviously wasn’t going to assay the 1,260 steps to the summit. Had I been tempted, the signs to that route were labeled Mountaineer, so yeah, no.

This warning was at the very foot of the steps.

While I didn’t see any monkeys (I think they’re mostly on the path to the summit) I kept a weather eye out for the little bandits. No one wants their stuff snalched. Least of all by thrieving monkeys.

And before you’re all, “It’s insensitive to mock people for making typos in a foreign language,” I will submit to you that if I made a sign in Thai and it contained errors, Thai speakers would be fully within their rights to mock me. I would even say that they were obliged to do so. And I would join them heartily.

Our guide, by the way, offered a long list of things we weren’t supposed to do with the monkeys. “Do not feed them, fight them, eat them, or Thai box them.” Among others. Those are the admonitions that stuck with me, at least, probably because they seemed the most important to remember.

Tiger Cave

Tiger Cave is several distinct features. The first is this antechamber, before you reach Tiger Cave itself. I’m not sure about the vintage of these pieces. I suspect they’re closer to the fifty years of the summit Buddha than the just-unwrapped temple, as the site itself doesn’t have any significant history prior to Big Buddha.

Then there’s Tiger Cave itself. There are conflicting stories about why it’s called Tiger Cave. One has the monk who founded the temple in 1975 entering the caves to meditate only to find tigers roaming about. Which I would find an impediment to meditation, but that’s why I’m not a monk. That and the vows of chastity and poverty. Please comment below: Top ten reasons Mark isn’t a monk.

Another explanation is that there are tiger paw prints on the cave walls. Another is that tigers roamed those caves long before a monk found them in the 70s. However it got it’s name, Tiger Cave presents as the world’s weirdest gift shop.

The cave system is all throughout the mountain that holds the Buddha, but only parts of it are accessible. Getting to the backside of the caves requires walking around the base of the mountain and taking some steps. Quite a few less than 1,260. 137 steps up, 89 down, 25 up, and 12 down. I counted, because I hadn’t spilled any matches, so there was nothing else to do.

It’s not clear exactly what’s on the other side. This did not clarify matters.

I think it was referring to this?

I sat on a bench and waited for this photo. I think this is the best picture I’ve ever taken. It’s certainly my favorite.

There truly wasn’t much else behind Tiger Cave. Caves and Buddhas. Go figure.

137 steps down wasn’t so bad.

And that was the end of an epic day. I hiked, I swam, I sight saw, I took several long bus rides, and I did not shit myself! You define victory however you like. I’m taking the W.

Verdict: 100% improvement over Four Islands. No crowds and the focus was squarely on snorkeling, a full hour at each of the islands, followed by lunch in a secluded cove with a delightful beach. Was it the most spectacular snorkeling we’ve ever done? Not even close. That would be Ambergris Cay in Belize back in the day, and Jemeluk Bay in Bali, where you could walk into the water from the beach and swim five minutes to a colorful coral reef full of amazing fish. Just for accessibility, Jemeluk takes the prize.

There was both coral and fish in abundance, but not the kind of eye-popping colors you get at the prime swimming-in-an-aquarium spots. There was something I hadn’t seen before, though: huge schools of small and medium fish you could swim with and through. Add in enough warm water, and you have the ingredients for an outstanding day.

I’m sure you’ll be grateful to know that there aren’t very many things to say about snorkeling, so I’ll flip my typical words:pictures ratio, and give you mostly pictures.

You’re welcome.

Taking Off

I booked a teak long tail boat, like I did for the Four Islands tour, rather than a speedboat. It’s entertaining to watch them maneuver with the super powerful engines and the propeller at the end of a two meter long tail.

The Andaman Sea’s topography seems a little similar to Vietnam’s Lan Ha and Hạ Long Bays in the Gulf of Tonkin, rocky outcroppings of limestone karst. It’s a pretty, atavistic landscape. You would be unsurprised to see pterodactyls circling their peaks. OK, you have more sense than I do. I would be unsurprised.

Our guide mentioned that we were coming up on Chicken Island, which concerned me, as that had been the sole snorkeling spot on the Four Islands tour, and it had been bleak. Thankfully, it was a drive-by photo op.

Yawasam Island

Here we are pulling into Yawasam. Hard to believe it has a formal name. Yawasam is probably Thai for Rock In Water.

The setting was stunning.

Truthfully, all the action underwater was the schools. Individually, meh, fish. The kind you’d see in a tin, and even then, the “Oooh” is for the sauce. But collectively, wow!

Talu Island

And here’s the second pile of rocks masquerading as an island.

Schools of fish. It was the whole story.

Talu was where I figured out I could swim with them, and not just hold still and watch.

Buya Beach

Buya Beach is a cove on Koh Poda. It featured white sand, warm, turquoise waters, and only two other boats when we pulled in. Plenty of space, even in this small cove, for lunch and swimming, without feeling like you’re in a scrum. There was an extra lunch, so our guide threw in balls of rice, and the little yellow-with-black-stripes guys churned the water like piranha.

And back to the dock to be picked up and delivered to my hotel. It’s good to be king.

I know that everyone’s calling themselves an “ethical” elephant sanctuary these days, but I also know that the devil is in the details. If they let you interact directly with the elephants in any way, that’s entertainment. No feeding, no bathing, certainly no riding. A truly ethical sanctuary respects the elephants’ agency and autonomy, and doesn’t force them into interactions.

I did my homework, first on what constitutes ethical treatment in the first place, and second on how well the options near me hewed to those standards. One stood out in particular: Following Giants, whose tag line is “Letting elephants lead the way.” I signed up for their half-day tour, which included pickup and delivery at my hotel. I was looking forward to an awesome day of close, but not too close, contact with these magnificent beasts, who had all been rescued from their lives of toil to a well-deserved retirement on 85 acres optimized for their material and emotional needs.

I was not expecting to have my heart broken.

It turns out that there’s a lot more behind “rescued from their lives of toil” than I’d accounted for. Every one of these poor animals had a tragic, Dickensian backstory, although they all seemed to be variations on a particularly gruesome theme. It starts with some sort of backbreaking physical labor, mostly logging or hauling, both of which cause unnatural stress on their legs and backs.

When they can no longer work due to injury they have two paths: chained up without food and left to die, as it no longer makes economic sense to feed them; or, if they are healthy enough, converted to entertainment, offered the opportunity to enjoy direct interactions with humans.

That might sound like an improvement over the elephant chain gang, and I suppose it is. But I’m not sure it makes much difference to the elephants. They don’t like interacting with humans. How much don’t they like it? Following Giants had a helpful placard describing the training regimen required to get an elephant to accept human interaction. It’s called The Crush.

They separate young calves from their mothers, keep them in isolation, deprive them of food and water, and beat them until they are broken and can be controlled by fear. That fear is the only reason they tolerate close contact interactions. One assumes that the older elephants who convert to entertainment have gone through a similar process. It’s not like they lined up to volunteer to drag logs through the jungle.

Also, elephant vertebrae point upward. Instead of round, smooth disks, elephants have sharp, bony protrusions extending upwards from their spine. It’s obviously worse with a howdah, but even with a blanket, imagine what riding an elephant does to their spines. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

Deformities and a lifetime of pain. That’s what elephants get in exchange for letting humans ride them. No wonder they don’t like us.

If you ever have an opportunity to visit an elephant camp, here are things to keep in mind. If you are riding an elephant, you are causing it physical and emotional harm. If you are interacting with it directly in any way, feeding it, bathing it, petting it, you are engaged in a painful, non-consensual interaction. Elephants who interact with humans do so because they’re forced. They will never choose to have anything to do with you.

As we walked the grounds it was emphasized over and over how smart and emotionally perceptive the elephants are. We were cautioned to not say negative things, as they can pick up on tone, to mind our body language, as they would pick up aggressive cues from us. They said they were careful never to use the names they’d had before coming to the sanctuary, as hearing their slave names triggered them. You’re basically looking at 10,000 pounds of PTSD that has had enough of your shit.

They have physical problems and emotional problems. Some of them are afraid of everything, some act out aggressively, some seek solitude, some need companionship. At least one of them is bisexual and another is a committed lesbian. They’re like fucking people. So it’s hard to hear about their histories, to realize the horrific abuse they’ve endured. I had trouble simply appreciating them for the majestic creatures they are.

One fell down a hill carrying furniture and broke a hip. One, carrying a rider after injuries from logging, had had enough. She grabbed the rider with her trunk and threw him off her back, killing him. One is afraid of loud noises after working as a parade elephant, and runs in fear when she hears loud cars. Several are blind, among their other injuries, from having been whipped in the eye by their mahouts.

When people talk about how travel is broadening, sometimes I think that’s true only in the sense that I am constantly learning new reasons to hate people, discovering new depths of depravity that humanity can plumb. The whole experience was kind of like touring historic plantations in the South. If they’d been turned into retirement communities for freed slaves.

Following Giants is an old business, the current owner being the sixth generation of his family to run the elephant camp. In the beginning it was like any other, using the animals for labor. In more recent times, the camp was in the entertainment business. The current owner, Ray, started to offer educational programs on mahout culture and elephant behavior, but he couldn’t transition fully to that model, as rides were the only thing people would reliably pay for to keep the camp open.

He met with World Animal Protection in 2017, and they’ve partnered together to move Following Giants to a fully elephant-friendly business model. The current camp in Krabi houses fourteen elephants, with another eleven at their camp on the island of Koh Lanta.

But I hear you. Elephants are cool. Can’t we just enjoy the elephants without the sermonizing? Are you even capable of unalloyed pleasure?

Yes, we can. And no, apparantly, I’m not.

Line up everyone who knows me and poll them for the Top Ten Things About Mark. Feels Deeply would be on exactly no one’s list, my own included. This isn’t fun for me, either. If I’d wanted feelings I’d have been having them all along.

So, elephants all around, barkeep.

It started with orientation and booting up. We were told to bring socks, but the only socks I have are no shows. So now I have blisters on my ankles from a half day trekking in rubber boots.

The first elephants we met were Pumpkin and her eight-month old daughter, Carrot, who is still nursing. They’re in a wooden-fenced pen until Carrot is ready to deal with the rest of the herd.

Elephants at many camps, by the way, are kept in enclosures with electric fences, but those have a habit of frying other critters. Following Giants uses wooden fences, which the elephants could easily knock down. All of the elephants are penned at night, to keep them from wandering off. Providing enough food and water in the enclosures keeps them from being motivated to bust loose.

Here’s some adorable baby elephant trunk action, courtesy of Carrot.

We were introduced, from a safe distance, to the elephant who had killed her rider. We were encouraged to look into her eyes (no thank you) and keep a safe distance (a completely unnecessary admonition).

Here’s some typical elephant hijinks. In this clip, the banging of the leaves shakes off insects and dirt, making the treat ready to eat. Plus, a pair of cute younger elephants. One is the adult’s daughter, and the other is an orphan she’s taken in.

This elephant is spraying itself with red dirt, which acts as a natural sunscreen and keeps them from getting burnt. The second half of this clip is just about how very close we were able to get to the elephants. They were fine with being near us, so long as we didn’t try to force some interaction.

A few more examples of how very close we were able to get to them. It felt like a walking safari. The absence of predatory carnivores was a nice touch.

Here’s the lesbian and the bisexual (I apologize for not representing them properly, but I don’t know which is which) enjoying a spa day together.

At the end we wound up at a little open air lodge for lunch. It had an excellent overlook of the grounds.

While we were waiting for the buffet to be delivered, we were brought this.

Lunch was even better than anticipated, since it wasn’t a mud loaf. Nothing like grading on a curve. “How was lunch?” “Great. Not mud!”

While we were dining, one of the young’uns did her best to get around her mahout and into whatever we were doing. Which apparently looked fascinating. Here’s the little scamp.

Her mahout did his best to distract her with water games, and she did her best to get around him. If we’d wondered whether elephants were as smart as claimed, here was our answer.

And then the short hike back to the beginning to deposit boots and inspect blisters.

It was good. I’m glad I did it. Elephants are objectively amazing. Sometimes I wish I could just have an enjoyable experience without the shadow of one form of colonialism or another tainting it. But I’m not actually convinced that it’s some failure on my part.

I suppose what I’d really like is for there to be spaces that haven’t been tainted by one form of colonialism or another. I thought maybe Thailand, as one of a handful of nations that have never been actually colonized, might offer that experience, but I’d forgotten how low we’re willing to sink to impose our will on others, however many legs they might have.

Four Islands

I should have been suspicious… I should probably just stop there. I just should have been suspicious. Anyway, I should have been suspicious when I asked if they had fins available and they said no, just masks and snorkels. I’ve never been on a snorkeling trip that didn’t offer the full kit, so that was odd.

And mask and snorkel weren’t required, as at this point I travel with my own set. Poor fit and comfort can ruin an otherwise great snorkeling trip. I even have my own flotation vest. That probably sounds like overkill, but it isn’t. I’m not a strong enough swimmer at this point to go without flotation, and life vests suck as swim aids.

It’s right in the name: they’re meant to preserve your life. They are designed, with flotation front and back, to keep you upright in the water. Until you can be rescued. So if you’re wearing one to swim horizontally, with your face down in a mask, they will constantly be attempting to pull you up. You’re working against them.

Instead, I have a small lightweight vest that inflates with air, but only in the front. Put your face in the water and the vest will keep you in that position, so you’re never fighting against it. I also travel with my own pillow. It’s interesting what qualifies as essential when you do this long term.

I looked around Ao Nang to see if I can rent or buy a set of flippers, but since there’s no snorkeling in town, there aren’t any dive shops with gear. That’s fine. I’ll make do.

The van picks me up and delivers me to a churning sea of island hoppers. The seven people in my van are instantly absorbed into the chaos. Both speedboats and long tail boats leave from this zone. I’m on a long tail boat which seated 17 for my group. I can’t headcount a group this large and spread out, but it adds up to a lot of boats.

A trainee picked us up from the van and gestured vaguely towards a series of tables with people lined up to check in. I somehow found the correct line, checked in, and was given a colored rubber bracelet, which identified my group. This is how they wrest order from the chaos.

I was reminded of nothing so much as the tiffin wallah system in Mumbai, where over 5,000 people deliver over 200,000 bespoke lunches every day using a completely manual color-coding system. If you ever want to see a technology consultant cry, and who doesn’t, just bring up the tiffin wallah system.

This whole arrangement was a huge red flag: too many boats, too many people, too few islands. Maybe we were all going different places. But no. Another red flag I missed was that the Four Island Tour was offered by multiple tour operators, all going to the same places. This machine was on rails, and I was just a cog. Might as well relax.

Railay Beach

Railay Beach was confusing. For so many reasons. First, we landed at one end of a little crescent bay. There was no beach there, as it was just where the boats pulled up and dropped anchor. I naturally assumed the beach was at the other end of the harbor, so I walked there and found nothing but more boats anchored.

I asked one of the workers where the beach was, and he pointed me back the way I came and told me to turn right when I got to the end. In order to get to the beach, you have to take a path that leads… away from the water. How did I miss that? So obvious.

And that was obviously the beach experience, as well.

I swam. Because that’s what I came to do, until there was snorkeling. But that is legit the most crowded beach I have ever been on. There were also enrichment activities, which I thought was sweet.

I noticed a white sand beach a ways off that looked like it had fewer people. It was back in the direction of the dock, so I figured I’d head down there and then return.

What I didn’t reckon on was my complete absence of anything like a sense of direction.

The path from the dock basically cut across the narrow part of the island to get to the beach on the other side. But the other beach wasn’t in that direction at all. By the time I got there and realized I’d have to retrace my steps to get back to the dock, there was no time left to swim. I had to hustle to get to my boat on time.

Fine. The grapes were sour there anyway. Almost as many people as at the main beach.

Railay feels like one of those places people go to because people go there, until there’s so little reason to go that everyone has forgotten what the original appeal was. Like places named for the natural feature that was destroyed to build it.

Like the lovely development of Twin Oaks. Go ahead, look for the oaks. I’ll wait.

Right?

Chicken Island

We bid farethewell, less than fondly, to Railay…

And head to our first snorkeling stop, Chicken Island. Or, as I later learned, our only snorkeling stop. I was gutted to learn that it wasn’t an island full of chickens. If someone took you to Monkey Island and there were no monkeys, you’d be pissed, right?

Chicken Island boasted more than just an absence of chickens. It also enjoyed a near complete absence of sea life. Allow me to quote the tour listing: “Snorkel with a colorful coral reefs and fish at Chicken Island.”

I submit to you now, the evidence.

OK, I’m swimming in the Andaman Sea on tropical islands off the Thai coast and I’m all, “It was crowded. There were no fish!” So, asshole. We can all agree. But I also think we can all agree that Chicken Island was a grim snorkeling experience for a tour that touted colorful reefs and fish.

It was also just as crowded as Railay Beach. All the boats dropped anchor in the same spot next to one another, so the flailing snorkelers were all shoulder to shoulder. I ran into other swimmers constantly, like slow-moving cars bouncing off each other in an ice storm. We were offered a generous fifteen minutes of snorkeling, because, really, who would want more than that?

I asked our guide about it, and he confessed that if I wanted snorkeling I was on the wrong tour. Then take it out of the fucking name of the tour.

At least I now understood the absence of flippers. What would have been the point?

Koh Mar & Koh Tub Islands

I suppose after all the carping I should acknowledge a bonus island, as island #3 was two islands, connected by a narrow white sandbar at low tide. Which would have been lovely and magical if every one of the people who’d been at the previous stops wasn’t also there. It felt like a Disneyland ride all thousand of us were on together. That’s one crowded roller coaster.

I know that complimenting people, especially women people, on their appearance is gross. “Nice rack” may be objectively true, but even I know it’s not ok. “Nice ink” seems like a different matter, though. Ink isn’t an inalienable attribute that says nothing about who you are as a person. Ink is a choice, a reflection of taste and values. So while I don’t do it often, I will occasionally be moved to call out an especially fine example (looking at you, Urnaburga).

I saw this particular piece on a woman who was being photographed by her boyfriend for the Gram (I saw them taking pictures at the next island and she was wearing a different bathing suit).

I was taken not only because it’s objectively amazing, but because it appeared to be Sak Yant, like the one I got in Cambodia. So I wasn’t just moved to compliment her, I also wanted to ask her if it was Sak Yant, because I didn’t know they could be executed with color. The monk doing mine didn’t offer, it was just black ink for you, farang. I was prepared to feel gypped.

What I wasn’t prepared for was being asked if I wanted a picture with her. Sure? I stood there awkwardly and he told me “Ok to touch her.” That didn’t seem like his call, so I checked.

I don’t think that made it less awkward.

It was Sak Yant, by the way. So, yeah. Gypped.

Koh Poda

Island #4, Koh Poda, was both the longest stop, about two hours, and the longest beach. We were able to spread out a bit, so it didn’t feel quite so rush hour. We were fed an entirely plausible lunch before returning.

So let’s put this in perspective. It’s not so much that the day sucked as that it was unnecessary. I’m a fifteen minute walk to Khlong Muang beach, which offers the same warm, wet water without the crowds. I took the tour to do something I couldn’t do at Khlong Muang, which was snorkel. Which only occurred in the technical sense.

I mean, I did my due diligence. They said snorkeling at a colorful reef with colorful fish. Again, technically correct, but wildly misleading. I think my takeaway from this is to look at the itineraries more closely. If multiple tour operators are offering precisely the same itinerary, you’re being offered a canned tourist experience. Which is why, for the most part, we don’t do tours, which is maybe the larger learning.

For example, there are elephant sanctuaries here, many purporting to be “ethical.” There were lots of tour operators offering identical tours, but I found one of the sanctuaries that would pick you up and take you back if you booked their half-day experience, which I did. I am 100% certain that I had a better experience than if I’d booked with a tour operator.

On the other hand, 4 Islands Day Trip With Snorkeling cost all of $24.01 for a day on and in the water. So I should probably just shut the fuck up.

I know I complained that my Bangkok apartment only had hot water coming out of the shower head. As it happens, that’s one more hot water source than my current lodgings offer. I am retroactively grateful.

To be fair, I’m not truly in an apartment. I’m in a hotel room with a refrigerator, so I don’t need hot water to cook or clean. I only have breakfast and snacks en suite, which is easy to clean up. And the climate doesn’t exactly argue for hot showers.

Still, some hot water, anywhere, kind of feels like table stakes for housing. Like you shouldn’t have to check with your outcall beforehand that she boasts a full complement of limbs. You just assume some things. At your own peril, apparently. It makes for an awkward greet.

Krabi is both the province and the nearby town. I’m staying in Ao Nang, which is a little beach town, not unlike our location in Bali. The beach in question is Khlong Muang, which is a convenient fifteen minute walk from the hotel. I’m even closer to the Main Street for shopping and eating, although there are good eats right nearby. The hotel is called Amanah Mansion, so I can only assume that Amanah translates as Gilding the Lily. It is a mostly serviceable hotel room, which may be the definition of mansion here.

Per my host, the disco light machine was the room’s highlight, and it’s hard to disagree with that assessment.

The Neighborhood

Like Bangkok, there are a wealth of weed shops here. I don’t know if Thais are smoking all the weed or if the clientele is primarily farangs. There seem to be too many to be supported by farangs alone.

My host pointed out where I could rent a scooter nearby, and I actually considered it, as the traffic here isn’t like Bangkok. There were tons of farangs on scooters, so that made it look plausible. Although that’s the clever observation that got me stranded on top of a pyramid. Twice.

Then I took a ride on, or clung to, a Grab scooter, which picked me up and delivered me to the supermercado in Krabi Town. And I have to say that nothing about that experience made me think, “You know, this would be way better if I was in charge.”

Then there was this sign, which was all over. The authorities seemed to feel that this message was important, which gave me pause. Although I can’t for the life of me figure out why it’s only in English.

Hilariously, this sign was always on the left side of the road. So if you were driving on the wrong side, you’d never see it.

Another reason not to rent a scooter, as if I needed one, is that the whole gas situation here is opaque. I’ve seen one actual gas station, but mostly it’s this:

These are just scattered about. It seems straightforward, but that’s what I thought about the Bangkok train system’s ticket machines. First you had to find your destination on a touchscreen interface that assumed you knew how the different lines were structured. When I finally worked my way through that, I stumbled through to payment to learn that it wouldn’t take a credit card or bills. Coins or a local payment app only. Leaving me reasonably confident that I’d never figure out how to make the gas pumps work.

This guy was just a few doors from my lodgings. I’m not out all hours soaking up the nightlife here, as if there were any, but I have yet to walk past this business when they weren’t actively processing coconuts. All day and all night. The mound never seems to get any smaller. I think they add to their stores at about the same rate as they process them.

Or they’re witches.

Shopping

The only stores right in Ao Nang are convenience stores. There are, unaccountably, multiple 7-11s. There are supermercados in Krabi Town, a short but harrowing scooter ride away. The other shopping venue is the Ao Nang Landmark Night Market, which is open every day of the week from 5:00 – 11:00, and completely lives up to its name. No groceries, but everything else your little heart could desire.

If you’re a farang, that is. I’d say 90% of the clientele was farang. That’s OK, it’s our job to contribute to the local economy.

There are sit-down restaurants, but also a dense warren of takeout stalls offering a mind boggling selection. There are clothing shops and kiosks, handicraft stalls, and every form of entertainment known to man.

When it was my turn to tip this delightful creature I handed my 100฿ note to the little girl in the clip, so she could deposit it for me. And I wasn’t arrested!

There was even a poorly regulated Muay Thai bout, with mats for the ring and no referee. This lent the affair even more of a street fighting ambiance than the arena bouts I saw in Bangkok.

The Beach

Of course, my entire point in being in Ao Nang is the beach, and it did not disappoint. It’s not one of those tropical beaches that travel writers lose their shit over, but it has everything you’d want. Clean white sand, warm, calm, turquoise water, colorful teak longtail boats, cheap delicious food from stalls lining the beach, and no crowds. It’s perfect. I’ve been swimming (bobbing, to be more precise, since swimming is actual work) twice a day.

So I’m waiting for a smoothie at one of the stalls, in a line that’s not moving very quickly, to be fair. Just ahead of me is an Aussie who can barely contain himself. Finally, he walks up to the front to inform the proprietress that she should hire another juicer, as it’s taking so long that people are leaving and she’s losing business.

That is wrong on so many levels. First, you’re waiting for a smoothie on a beach in Thailand. Dude, it’s ok if the operation isn’t running at peak Western efficiency. That’s almost the point. It’s a feature, not a bug.

Second, White Savior much? Do you honestly think that without your prompting it would never have occurred to the owner to explore the pros and cons of scaling up? Thank goodness you were there to calculate her run rate, factor in the cost of a new hire, and assure that the marginal revenue increase produced a positive ROI. All that, just from standing in line. Thank goodness the poor dear had you there to rescue her.

I was praying he’d turn to me for farang solidarity, but, sadly, I had to keep my opinions to myself. Like you’re supposed to.

The only thing missing from my perfect beach is snorkeling. That requires boat trips, and boat trips there will be. In the meantime, there are other interesting things to do here besides swimming, and I intend to do them. And write about them. I have two weeks to fill, and don’t think I won’t.

I would definitely not have done this with Dorothy. I clocked over seven miles of hiking, which is well past her limit. While the path was okay, the ascents and descents were steps made of stones of variable height and pitch, which Dorothy would have hated. Plus, she doesn’t trust her joints enough to negotiate entry into the pools over wet, uneven rocks. All by myself I was free to frolic like drunken mountain goat, although I suspect I presented more as coked-up bear.

But before I got to enjoy that experience, I was subjected to a stop that made it clear that my lawn, all unbeknownst, extends all the way to Thailand. And those kids were stomping all over my rose bushes.

I’m sure that my invocations of Dyspepsia, Goddess of Bile, are amusing, but I don’t actually take pleasure in experiences that engender that response. The whole curmudgeon thing feels like a form of weakness, that I somehow lack the capacity to find joy in whatever situation I find myself in. But hear me out. I’m not sure joy was on the menu for this experience.

JEATH War Museum

So we have a tour group whose primary interest is hiking in the jungle and swimming in the pools under waterfalls. This activity alone, with transit time, is about nine hours. That’s a commitment. And you ask yourself, as a tour operator, “What can I add to that tour that will appeal to my ardent hiker/swimmer nature lovers?”

And you answer yourself, “Why, it’s obvious. A POW concentration camp museum! Genius!!!”

Weirdly, this is the standard tour. It doesn’t matter which tour operator you use, unless you hire a private car and driver to take you to the falls, your day in nature comes with a free side of concentration camp. Specifically, the camp the Japanese set up in Thailand to house British and Australian POWs forced to build, wait for it… The Bridge On The River Kwai. Or as it’s properly called in Thailand, Khwae Yai.

The museum is set up to simulate the housing for the POWs, and it includes exhibits and a video. There were photos, which I side-eyed because I couldn’t greet them face on, which looked like the liberation of Auschwitz, nothing but living ghosts.

When I was in high school, a history class showed Judgement at Nuremberg, which includes documentary footage from the liberation of the concentration camps. To which my response was, “You, yeah y’all totally need to watch this. It will be a character building experience for you. But I’m good.”

I know there’s a difference between bearing witness and misery porn, but I’m not sure I can actually tell them apart. I feel like I’m capable of understanding how fucked up humans can be without having my head held down and my nose rubbed in it. There’s a level of fact that just seems gratuitous.

I’m a big baby and a raw, throbbing nerve. I couldn’t watch the video. I spent the fifteen minutes of the video following this Majestic Beast:

I truly don’t understand the impulse. Is this their way of turning something horrific about their past into something positive? “That was bad, but at least we can charge tourists to see it.” Do they think we want to see? I had a driver in Kolkata who insisted on taking me to a colonial-era church because he wanted to show off the architecture. I stayed the minimum time necessary to avoid providing insult, but the space felt haunted by the brutality of the Raj. It made me nauseous, and it wasn’t even my own history. I don’t know how it was just architecture to my driver.

We had a driver in Cambodia who offered to take us to the Killing Fields. You can take tours in Vietnam of the guerrilla tunnels. I’ve also never been to Gettysburg. No. Just no. 

Here’s the deal. Every one of the yellow triangles on this map is a POW camp run by the Japanese with the Thai government’s forced acquiescence. “Nice country you got here…” It’s not really an offer you can refuse. And while there are protocols for housing prisoners of war, the Japanese couldn’t be bothered. Not when there was a train to be built and forced labor to build it.

This was the message given to the workers:

As befits my shallowness, my favorite display was this very Pugsley Addams recreation of the Allied bombing of the bridge.

Next stop: down the river to the infamous bridge itself. We could get there on the bus, or for a mere additional 150฿ we could take a boat down the lovely river.

My seat mate in the six-seat boat was a German tourist. When we landed at the dock by the bridge he informed me that there’s no way the bus could have beaten us there, as we were doing a brisk 40 km/h on the water. That is the most German thing ever. Lord knows how he snuck his sextant past me.

I figured once we were out of the faux POW camp I’d be fine, but the bridge had its own issues.

Its other side is where it’s problematic. First, there’s this:

But mostly, there’s this:

A POW-themed village, with food stalls and merch kiosks. And the same approach to verisimiltude as Hogan’s Heroes. Misery cosplay with a happy clown face donked on.

Thankfully, that concluded our Journey to the Past. Next stop: blessed immersion in the waters of life.

Erawan Falls

There isn’t actually a whole lot of incisive commentary available for this part of the journey. Jungle is swell, waterfalls are magic, and the water was… brisk. So, a little bit of travelogue for you. Enjoy the pictures.

These are the pre-falls. They don’t even merit an entire integer. Fall 0.5.

Fall #1.

And here it is, in action.

These guys were in all of the pools, and came in all different sizes. At first I thought they were just indifferent to my presence and comfortable swimming right into my legs. Then I realized these are the same fish they had in tanks all over Vietnam. Stick your feet in and they’ll eat the dead skin cells right off your legs, the world’s creepiest exfoliant. I was never tempted to try that, but those fish were at least tiny. These were fucking carp sized. I shudder to recall it.

Fall #2.

Fall #3.

More action.

Fall #3 was where I found a woman who apparently enjoyed the free spa treatment. She just stood there the entire time I was at 3, doing this:

The path up to fall #4 featured:

Fall #4 is called The Sea Ogress’s Breasts, because it features two large round rocks that the water falls over. And because everyone everywhere is twelve. It also features idiots. There’s one now, negotiating one of the ogress’s breasts. Oh, the stories he will tell his grandkids.

More beautiful half falls on the way to #5.

The walk from 4 to 5 was one of the longest, about 600 km, so I made 5 my personal peak. It definitely felt like I got the payoff.

And here it is, in all its glory.

Here, I think, was the real reason to stop. Would I be able to top the peak experience of seeing an influencer in her native habitat? Don’t be silly. Also, don’t make eye contact, and don’t extend your hand if you’re holding food.

On my way back down, this guy presented himself. Perfect ending. To a weird but, on balance, rewarding day.