the final hours...

Wow. The end is near. It's hard to believe that we left Canada nine months ago.

We just wanted to let our faithful blog-followers know that in mere hours we are boarding a plane in Bangkok that will take us to Vancouver, via Taiwan. That means that at around 7:00 pm, Pacific Standard time, we will be back in Canada.

Last night, we were cooling off in the fan's generous breeze in our hotel room. The "cool" temperature? 29 degrees. That is a nice cool-down from the nearly 40 degree heat in the sun. Canada's muffled sun will feel nice!

We're going to miss the spicy food, sweaty toilets, and dirty streets, but it will be good to be home. Just in time for the playoffs!!! wooo hooo!!!

-Jason and Corinne

Lions and tigers and ... camels???? Oh, my...

Only four more sleeps! And then... this great adventure returns to Canada. So, with time-a-tickin', what's a boy and girl to do?

Lay on tigers. Duh.

What? Lay on tigers? That makes no sense. Ahhh, my friends. If you knew Asia like we know Asia, you'd know that for the right price, anything is possible. In this case, the right price was about $10 per person. The only question, large, medium, or baby-sized tigers? It's a bit like ordering ice cream, but normally, you eat the ice cream, not vice-versa.

So, with our fine-tuned animal senses at their most alert, we ventured where few have gone before... into a small, confined space with two medium-sized, man-eating beasts! (Why not cute baby sized? They cost more. Why not big-sized? They eat more, and that could include us.)

I think that this is one of those things that you just have to behold with your real eyes, and not the imaginary eyes in your brain that we put fake pictures into.

And with that... real pictures for your real eyes! This is really us and real tigers!

Corinne claims that this isn't as silly as it seems. She also claims that she was only making that face because its tail hit her in the head and it startled her. Jason doesn't believe a word of it.

Here kitty, kitty, kitty. Corinne likes tigers now.

What a beautiful beast. She's 8 months old.

Why isn't Jason in any of these photos? First, he was the photographer. Second, he was quite convinced that man-eating tigers are not to be laid on. Corinne says he was scared, and Jason responds with, "They eat people. Harumph."

Now, what kind of place lets people come in and pet tigers for only $10. What do we think about this? Are there any moral issues to be discussed? We will discuss via the photographic medium. We'll let the photos do the talking.









At least we present the true picture. That's some good, impartial blogging! It was a little sad to see those lovely beasts cooped up in little cages with cement floors, but what did we expect for $10? I think there is a lesson to be learned here.

Instead of ending on a depressing note, we wanted to share one of our stealth photos. We weren't officially allowed to take pictures of the baby lions with their paying customers, but we did. They are soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo cute (says Corinne to Jason's scowling frown).



-Jason and Corinne

PS. Why does the title of this blog have "Camels" in it? At the "Tiger Kingdom", they sold camel food for some mysterious reason. We did not see a camel. Perhaps the tigers ate them.

Beach Bums!

Koa Lanta is the name of the island where we headed upon arrival to Thailand. We chose Ko Lanta for a few reasons. First, it was relatively close to Phuket (no bus ride necessary) so that we could arrive to our beach the very same day we arrived in Thailand. Second, Ko Lanta is the lesser known island in the area due to its close proximity to Koa Phi Phi, which is very well known to travellers and holidayers alike. Third, because it was not as well known, we were hoping that it might be cheaper to visit.

We payed what we precieved to be a hefty fee to travel from Phuket pier to Koa Lanata with the slow boat. We had a stop over in Koa Phi Phi for lunch which broke up the trip nicely. We had a good, cheap lunch on the island, but soon agreed that we were all happy to not be staying on Phi Phi. Too many people selling too much stuff to too many tourists. Actually, little did we know that that mantra was to be fundamental here in Thailand. Described in a word: tourism.

Thankfully, we found a very helpful driver after arriving on Koa Lanta pier. Among many, many pushy people that all seemed to own hotels and resorts, we found the one driver who didn't care where we wanted to sleep. He just wanted to help us get to where we wanted to go, which was away from all of the touts. We knew that we wanted to stay down south, where it is quieter and "hippyish". Our driver found us an extremely reasonablely priced resort, away from much of the noise up north. We ended up staying there for close to two weeks.

So, instead of bragging through words, I shall be bragging through photos. Here is what we were up to in Koa Lanta.

Chillin' on the beautiful beach, taking photos



Partaking in the daily beer-o-clock run to 7-11



Getting the braids and going for Thai massages!



Going swimming in the ocean and showing off the tans



Eating. Lots and lots of eating.



Drinking. Lots and lots of drinking.



Frisbee and volleyball playing



Sunset watching



Lightening storm watching



Shopping at the Lanta Lanta Festival



Showing off their musical talents and partaking in some cultural activities


Fire-show watching



Might as well end this off with some drinking photos...

The infamous rum buckets! They just make you so happy.

Hopefully that gives you sufficient insight as to how our beach time has come and gone (so fast!). We all had a great time on the beach, and looked forward to some more great times up north.

-Jason and Corinne

The Beginning

We met up with D and Tracy on March 2 in Kuala Lumpur at the lavish hostel that Tracy was nice enough to book for us. After nearly seven weeks without a single hot shower and several weeks without running water, Jason and Corinne were bathing (literally) in the luxury that KL had to offer.

D and Tracy were coming into KL by train from Singapore. They had travelled a ridiculous amount of time to get to KL ASAP to see our beautiful faces. After hugs and greetings were exchanged, we all collapsed on our bunk beds to share some travel stories before heading out to enjoy the city.

The number one priority in KL was agreed upon: the Petronas Towers. We found out that they give away free tickets to visit the bridge connecting the two towers every morning. We took a walk to the towers the next day and secured four tickets to go up to the bridge at 6pm that night. Our thought was that there would be better light at that time of day for picture taking. Turns out that no sunset can be seen because of the other big buildings in the vicinity and no good pictures of the city could be taken because of the lack of clean windows to see out of. So with a total of 15 minutes left in the corridor linking the second tallest buildings in the world which are owned by some of the richest people in the world (Petronas being Malaysia's largest oil company), what is a girl and boy to do ?? Corporate espionage!

About two and a half minutes were spent trying to read office computer screens through the camera lens from the bridge. But we soon found other ways to entertain ourselves (see picture below).

All of us were quite excited to be going up the Petronas Towers!

With the first priority completed, it was time for the second... travel planning at Starbucks, a Jason and Corinne tradition! There was a silent but deadly battle of the islands going on (ie. which island to visit for our beach time in Thailand) and a Chai Latte was much appreciated for this discussion. Look at the happy beautiful faces below!

Ok, maybe only three beautiful faces. Not sure what went wrong with D's face.

So plans made (roughly), we made a last walkabout in the city and got ready for our next day's flight to Phuket! But not before getting caught in a torrential downpour rain in Chinatown.

Jason and D playing in the puddles. Actually THE puddle or perhaps river might be a better term. Jason actually just lost his flip flop and is chasing it onto oncoming traffic. Good thing we have a camera for these moments.

And so, off to Thailand we go, in search of sun, sand and rum-buckets!

THAI POOH

Since before our trip around Asia had even materialized in our brains, we had made plans to meet up with our friends, D and Tracy, in Thailand. The reason for this trip was two-fold; to visit with our long lost Korean-bound friends for some good Thailand debauchery after months of not seeing one another and to begin a lifetime adventure known in the inner circles as Thai Pooh.

Thai pooh started out formerly as the "Pooh slipper dinners" in Edmonton, Canada. We (Jason, Corinne, D and Tracy) each chose three restaurants in Edmonton (restaurants in which we had never visited before) and put our designated choices in one of Corinne's used Winnie the Pooh slippers. Each month we would get together at one of the chosen restaurants with the Pooh slipper in toe (a facinating little irony for those paying attention! That's Jason's way of making you realize that Corinne's sentence was especially funny. She didn't even realize her own sharp wit.) Sitting down to a glorious (or sometimes not-so-glorious) meal, we would prominently place the Pooh slipper in the center of the table and after the first toasts were had, the next Pooh destination would be chosen. These dinners were put in place to guarantee that time would be taken to visit with our friends at least once a month and it would also force us to experience different parts of Edmonton that we would not normally visit. After the completion of the Pooh slipper, all four of us thought how fun it would be to experience the Pooh slipper on an international level. And so the idea of the Thai Pooh was born.

Each of us chose one domestic destination (within Canada and USA) and each couple chose one international destination as the six official Thai Pooh nominations. The only rules were that each destination had to have something to do with the local food or drink and all four participants had to be present for each Thai Pooh festivity.

One other stipulation was that a new "Pooh slipper" had to be found to hold all of the nominations. Because it was now known as Thai Pooh, we wanted to buy a container in Thailand. Due to some of the participants lack of love for shopping, the Thai Pooh was found relatively quickly from a hill tribe market near Chiang Mai. All nominations were researched, written and accounted for in the new Thai Pooh. Now for the choosing!!

We all sat down for some street Pad Thai on our last night together in Chiang Mai. Everyone was in giddy anticipation for our next destination to be revealed. Earlier that day Jason was arbitrarily picked to choose the next destination. In true Jason fashion, he verbally rambled on about cherishing the moment, quality time together, meaning of life, blah, blah, blah... until we all started yelling at him to tell us where we were off to next. By reading off the nomination, Jason sealed our fates for the next Thai Pooh destination.

As D and Tracy have not revealed the Thai Pooh location on their blog, we feel that it is not our place to reveal it either. Instead we shall give you some clues...

i. Jason and Corinne nominated this international location
ii. Neither of us have visited this continent before
iii. We will all be enjoying a nice cup of tea together

ANY GUESSES???!!!???!!!

- Jason and Corinne

Quotes of the Day (Bangkok edition: not for the faint hearted)

After nearly two weeks together, all of us finally found our drinking-debauchery moods aligning in beautiful Bangkok! Our night included buckets of alcohol (the local Thai rum - red bull - coke combo), interaction with the local scam artists and a trip to the red light district. Here are some memorable quotes.

"Ok guys, hookers or thieves tonight?"
-corinne asks of her friends before the drinking

"You lady-boy!"
-8 year old Thai flower-selling girl after D rejects her challenge to a thumb wrestling match


"...but I don't often have fire in my pants"
-Jason explains to a local snake wallet selling merchant

"more teet, more teeth"
-corinne eggs on drunk D and Tracy
"wow"
-says a disgusted brother Jason (we have a lovely photo of this quote).

"My bum's wet. How did my bum get wet?"
-D, after 3 buckets of rum

"Are we gonna go see hookers after this?"
-Tracy
"Yeah but I got to go powder my ass first"
-Jason

"I had a good time with those 8 year old girls"
-Jason

What's next?

Well, in the immediate future... bowling!

It's time for a heated, and much-touted match up between Jason "Gutterballs" Ponto and Corinne "Lonely Pins" Schertzer.

Check out our form! Who do you think will win?


But tomorrow we fly to Kuala Lumpur to meet our poor, over-kimchi'd friends, D and Tracy!!!! Then two days later we're all going to Thailand!!!!

Les Journal Photographique! (Sumatra, Indonesia: Pulau Weh)

After all the hectic monkey business, it was time for some relaxation!

We travelled to Pulau Weh, an island on the very northern tip of Sumatra. We found a hut on the water for $5 per night, and made ourselves comfortable. We stayed there a week.

Every day went something like this:

We started our day with a delicious breakfast (banana pancakes for Corinne, veggie omelets for Jason). "Momma", our elderly Indonesian hostess, came out of her hut wearing nothing but a bed sheet and cheerfully whipped us up some breakfast and visited with us. When we left an hour later, she was still wearing just her bed sheet.

At "sunshine o'clock", the hour when the sun hit our balcony at just the right angle, we played cards while we worked on our tans. Finally, we found some sunshine!

For lunch we'd go the local hangout, a little cafe on the beach. Most of the people staying in the area congregated here to eat, drink, and visit. The cafe had three tables. Most of the people staying in the area fit in the cafe. Do the math... there weren't many tourists. Maybe 15 in total. This little cafe had amazing food. For lunch, Corinne usually had a potato salad and Jason had a veggie taco, which was nothing like a taco but it just might be his new favourite food.

The afternoon usually consisted of reading, laying, or snorkeling. The island had amazing snorkeling and we usually snorkeled for a few hours each day.

Then some reading before dinner, which we ate at Momma's. The food was nothing spectacular, but she was just to nice to say no to.

Then an after dinner fruit shake, a game of cards or some reading, and it was time to sleep at about 9:00 (if Corinne could stay up that late).

We did that for 6 days in a row. After looking at these pictures you'll see why it was hard to leave.

Our $5 hut.


Our $5 view.


We did a lot of this...

and this...

not so much of this.

Les Journal Photographique! (Sumatra, Indonesia: Imma gonna catch me an orangutan!)

Indonesia was a side-trip, really. Remember our terrible orangutan photo from Borneo? Well, we wanted to see us some orangutans! So, we flew from Manila to Kuala Lumpur to Medan (on the Northern tip of Sumatra) and then took a bus back into the heart of the jungle! Bonus: it's the dry season here... no leeches!

We went to Bukit Lawang, a quiet little village on the edge of the jungle. We found an orangutan within hours of arrival.

This cute little guy was just sitting on the river bank playing with his stick!

Then, a minute later, his buddy came sommersaulting through the forest and down the rocks to get a drink.

Bukit Lawang is on the edge of a large section of protected rain forest. Sumatra and Borneo are the only two places in the world with wild orangutans. Bukit Lawang also has an orangutan rehabilitation center, where it helps rehabilitate orangutans with too much human contact and prepares them for life in the jungle. Orangutans are special because they live alone (not in groups... with the exception of babies and moms) so they can be rehabilitated as individuals. This program has been quite successful over the last few decades. Rehabilitated orangutans have gone on to live the wild jungle life and raise wild babies of their own.

Twice a day, there are feedings for the rehabilitated orangutans. There are no fences, or seats, or gates, or anything zoo like. A half hour walk into the jungle, they feed them milk and bananas (delicious!). We watched the afternoon feeding and saw a momma and her baby, a few other orangutans, and the big manly male orangutan (he doesn't come to the feeding often... we were lucky).

Then, we spent the night in a jungle lodge, and departed early the next morning on a six hour hike. We saw a few more wild orangutans and some gibbons monkeys. After our hike we rafted down the river on inner-tubes back to where we started.

It was pretty awesome, spectacular, tubular, man!

Here are a few more photos of the orange guys. We took nearly 600 photos. This is just a sample.

Orangutan or Bigfoot? You decide.

Momma and her baby.

Big Poppa.



Oh, yeah. we forgot to mention... Corinne fed an orangutan.



She was excited.



This means that we got really close. And got some really good photos. You'll have to come visit us when we get back to see them.

Les Journal Photographique! (Philippines)

Our time in the Philippines can be described in on word: lazy. This includes our photo taking. Why would you want to take pictures when you can lay in a hammock or on the beach?

As soon as we got to the Philippines we went straight to Donsol to swim with whale sharks. We bought a little underwater film camera, but we have no digital photos. So, our photo journal skips to our next stop.

It was so good, we didn't even know where we were. People ask, and we just don't know. We can point it out on a map next time we see you.

This was our deserted beach. It was pretty awesome when it wasn't raining, which was once in six days. There were other ways to enjoy ourselves. (get your mind out of the gutters!)

Corinne had fun playing in the water. But where was Jason?

Tending his wounds. The salt water hurt, so he stayed out of it. (This photo was taken after the blood was cleaned up, sorry Andrea.)

One of the ways we had fun while it rained was by playing with Brad. There was also a kitten to keep us amused. And we played cards. And we played scrabble. And we ate. (We sound like old people! No offence, old people.)

We also spent lots of time reading. Lots of time. This is Corinne's only sunshine day! (Actually, we think it was only a sunshine hour).

Corinne describes this photo this way: "I think it describes Jason as being very tough, but intellectual at the same time".

After we left our beach, we climbed a volcano. This is the crater lake on the volcano in the lake. Confusing!

We are beautiful people!

Then we went to Puerta Gallera. We seem to have forgotten to take pictures, with the exception of one slightly drunken, mainly blurry, sunset photo.