Which bit of "Monsoon" was I unsure about...?
Hey guys,
Just a quick note, as I'm having all kinds of fun looking up Visa requirements and the like.
I've now swapped coasts of Thailand, and gone from that facing the Gulf of Thailand to that looking out on the Andaman Sea. Specifically, I'm now in the port of Krabi, ready to go and explore the beautiful islands which lie offshore here. The only slight fly in the ointment is the weather - we're still in the tail-end of the SW Monsoon, and there's apparently a pesky typhoon hanging off the Philippines or something, so it swings from "hazy and quite pleasant" to "vertical torrential downpour" in a matter of minutes, on a semi-regular basis. Which makes planning things a little interesting, but I've decided just to bite the bullet, and head out to some of the smaller, close-in islands tomorrow on a daytrip. I'll probably head on to Ko Phi Phi the day after that (I toyed with the idea of going to Lanta, but there doesn't seem to be a huge heap to do there other than lie on the beach, which my normal inclinations and the climatic conditions render not ideal without a fall-back option).
In the meantime, I continue to struggle along, stumbling through a few (very basic) phrases of Thai and reverting to pidgin English at need. And smiling a lot. Smiling definitely earns brownie points over here. Any kind of signs of grumpiness doesn't. So I'm trying to work to my "If you can't affect it, then don't stress over it" ideal, and not get annoyed by any of the demonstrations of what I now instinctively think of as "Fiji-time". You never know, the UK might just get back a slightly more serene version of me in December. Or I might be a raving maniac by then...
Take care and have fun,
Pat
Just a quick note, as I'm having all kinds of fun looking up Visa requirements and the like.
I've now swapped coasts of Thailand, and gone from that facing the Gulf of Thailand to that looking out on the Andaman Sea. Specifically, I'm now in the port of Krabi, ready to go and explore the beautiful islands which lie offshore here. The only slight fly in the ointment is the weather - we're still in the tail-end of the SW Monsoon, and there's apparently a pesky typhoon hanging off the Philippines or something, so it swings from "hazy and quite pleasant" to "vertical torrential downpour" in a matter of minutes, on a semi-regular basis. Which makes planning things a little interesting, but I've decided just to bite the bullet, and head out to some of the smaller, close-in islands tomorrow on a daytrip. I'll probably head on to Ko Phi Phi the day after that (I toyed with the idea of going to Lanta, but there doesn't seem to be a huge heap to do there other than lie on the beach, which my normal inclinations and the climatic conditions render not ideal without a fall-back option).
In the meantime, I continue to struggle along, stumbling through a few (very basic) phrases of Thai and reverting to pidgin English at need. And smiling a lot. Smiling definitely earns brownie points over here. Any kind of signs of grumpiness doesn't. So I'm trying to work to my "If you can't affect it, then don't stress over it" ideal, and not get annoyed by any of the demonstrations of what I now instinctively think of as "Fiji-time". You never know, the UK might just get back a slightly more serene version of me in December. Or I might be a raving maniac by then...
Take care and have fun,
Pat
posted by Pat at 11:27 am
<< Home