DL Quarterlife Travels

To all of my faithful readers, i.e. the 3 of you who read this blog... Maybe 4 now that Brooke has discovered it (even though he was the one who encouraged me to do it! And yes Brooke, I did send you the link about 2 months ago in an email. And you responded and asked why I was awake at 7am on a Sunday). But I digress.

To all of you, I am sorry for the tardiness of this post. I have been extremely busy indulging in all of my favorite things. I have to say I feel slightly guilty that my travel has been so darn easy and spoiling! I envisioned slightly more challenge and hardship but the road in SE Asia is so well traveled that other than the occasional 15 hour bus-ferry-van-bus travel days and scam attempts, it's been smooth sailing.

Lately I have mostly been beach hopping. I spent a week in Railey and Au Nang with Hilary who graciously decided to take a last minute vacation to join. Highlights- the Railey beach itself (see photos), seeing muay Thai fighting, and "soloing" which means rock climbing without ropes above the ocean so you either fall or jump into deep water. I got to about 40 ft a few times and learned that the best way to avoid panic is to jump the second you reach the top.

My next beach destination was Koh Samui where Leigh and I spent a glorious night in a luxury hotel with about 30 couples on their honeymoon- and they were all about 45 too so maybe honeymoons for marriage number 2 or 3. Next was Koh Pangyan for the half moon party- pretty much the exact opposite of a honeymoon, this was a neon paint covered rave in the jungle full of drunk 20 somethings that ran until 6 am. Taking a ferry to Koh Tao and doing my first day of scuba the next morning was an unwise choice, but seeing eels, giant grouper, barracuda an clown fish on the dives that week made it undoubtedly worth the while. Highlights- everything about scuba, lady boy cabaret, beers on the beach for sunset and fire dancers.

All of this have been peppered with amazing weather (and thankfully Ac rooms for respite from the 95 plus days), piggish amounts of Thai food, sampling of excellent new fruits and lots of attempts to call Andrew (I know I know you're in class... But pick up your phone!).

I managed to round out all of this indulgence with a few days in Siem Reap, Cambodia to see Angkor Wat. The temple ruins have been just as extraordinary as everyone said but what I have been most pleasantly surprised about is how much I like the town itself, especially the markets. Plus there are so many Khmer variations of fried noodles for me to sample (much better than my microwave noodle bowls) and they are all so savory and flavorful! Thank you, MSG. Being in Cambodia has also made me how little I know about the Vietnam war and SE Asian history so I've been trying to learn as much as wikipedia on my iPhone allows.

Bedtime for me now- another 12 hour travel day lies ahead. But only two more days until Bali!!