Wat Tham Seua

A couple weeks ago Dusty and I finally made it to the top of Wat Tham Seua, the famous Buddhist monastery and temple in Krabi. Most of the monastery is at the bottom of the mountain or karst as they are called here including the caves, temples, housing and administrative buildings. But at the top of the karst is a group of statues and shrines that are just magnificent, and to get there you have to climb 1,237 steep steps. Definitely not for the faint of heart or anyone out of shape. It took us about an hour and a half with plenty of stops for water and rest ... remember its still in the mid-80's to 90 every day and very humid. As you can see from these photos, the view from up there is pretty spectacular. In the first photo you are looking out toward Krabi Town and the ocean. You can see some of the resort islands including the famous Phi Phi Island in the distance. In the second photo, our house is about two miles away and if it wasn't for the karst on the right side in the second picture you would be able to see it, but it's hidden from view unfortunately. We are in that little valley you see behind the three Buddha statues.

A Fish Pedicure?

A couple days ago we went to a festival down in Krabi Town, and one of the businesses that had a booth was doing "fish pedicures". The way it works is you put your feet in this tank of fish for anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour, and the fish clean the dead skin and other junk off your feet. The fish are around an inch long and are a type of carp I think. They don't have teeth so there is no biting to worry about. They are suckers and they produce just a tingling sort of feeling. It was very relaxing and after 15 minutes my feet never felt so clean, even the calluses from my running were gone! I highly recommend it if you ever get a chance to get one. I saw on the internet where some specialty shops in the US have been doing it for a couple years and the going price was $35 for 15 minutes. We paid $1.85!

Sunday we started out for Wat Tham Seua (Tiger Cave Temple) but decided to stop first at Phanom Bencha Mountain Resort. It's a private resort just outside Khao Phanom Bencha National Park and not far from us. The resort was so interesting and beautiful we ended up spending a lot of time walking around the grounds, and never got to Wat Tham Seua. But there is always tomorrow when you live here and are retired. We are going to try and get to the wat later this week. The picture you see is one of several ponds, all connected by a mountain stream, and the restaurant is on the left. In the center is a small island and while we were there, a rather large python could be seen in one of the trees. While we were watching it, a water monitor lizard dropped from the tree and into the water then swam right over to us. I think it was very relieved to escape the python. There are more pictures of the resort on our Facebook site.

Our resident tree frog ("bpaat" in Thai) Francoise, has been pretty active lately. He has moved off the outside window frame and now seems to like being just inside the window. That's fine with us but we had to put a stopper in the window so it doesn't get slammed shut by the wind when it kicks up like it can when a monsoon storm blows through. We've seen many a geko get squashed in the windows that way and we'd hate to see that happen to Francoise.

We're Legal!

We've all been driving around Krabi without Thai licenses and on Wednesday we finally went and took the tests. Fortunately, we all pasted but it wasn't easy. In Thailand you need a doctor's medical certificate saying you are basically healthy just to take the tests, and we had gotten them about a month ago. Well, they are only good for 30 days so we had to get on with it. There are some ways to just exchange a foreign license for a Thai license but we weren't able to swing that so it was take the test or continue to drive illegally. We were all nervous about the test because it's not easy and it had been a long, long time since any of us and taken a driving test. The written part was in the morning and consisted of 30 questions of which you had to get 23 or more correct. We did get an English version, but the translations were not the best and the questions were tricky. Dusty and I flunked the first time through, but unknown to us going in, they give you a second chance and we both passed. Athan was luckier and pasted on the first try but just barely with 23. Next came the driving part which was in the afternoon. The test had three parts. First, you pulled up to a curb. Sounds simple but the front tires had to be on this 6" wide line that was perpendicular to the curb and the left side tires (they drive on the left here like in Great Britain) had to be on a yellow line that's 25 cm (about 10 inches) from the curb. Next, you drive up this lane marked with poles on each side for about 5 car lengths, stop and back back out. Dusty messed this one up and hit the last pole, but they gave her a re-do and she did fine. Then finally, you have to parallel park. Again, not so hard since we've been doing it all our life except everything is reversed. Your car steering wheel is on the right and you are parting on the left. But we had all practiced and did fine. It was an entire day at the DMV and a bit stressful, even for Sakorn who had to watch all of us hoping we didn't screw up too bad, but in the end we were all kind of proud of ourselves.

Francoise and Tabkaak

This is the latest addition to our family here in Thap Prik. It's a little tree frog of some sort that we named "Francoise". Being a frog, we figured a French name was in order. He moved in almost a week ago and spends the day where you see him, which is on our front porch on the window frame. He just sits there all day, then a night he leaves but is back in the morning. I guess he goes looking for bugs for food, something there is no shortage of here. The other day he didn't come home for two days and we thought we'd lost him but he finally came back. I guess he know he has a good thing here.

Today, we took a ride up to one of the less developed beaches and had a nice walk looking for shells and such. It is call Tabkaak Beach and the view was pretty spectacular. The beach is on Phang Nga Bay, which is the big bay between Krabi on the mainland and the island of Phuket to the west. The bay is just loaded with the karsts you see in the photo, which are the same sort of rock formations as the ones next to our house, except these of course are in the water. The beach is one of many in Krabi Providence, and was about a half hour drive from home.

Mangosteens are here!

In case you thought all we had in Thailand was snakes, I thought I'd post something about one of our unusual fruits. This is the Mangosteen, or Mangkut in Thai. Southern Thailand is the home of the Mangosteen, and its so delicious its considered the "Queen of Tropical Fruits". We have several of the trees on our property and they are producing faster than we can eat them right now. As you can see, they have a dark-red or purple skin and white fruit segments which has a sweet, slightly tart flavor. The trees start producing in May and continue through most of the rainy season, so we will be having them for a while. They are suppose to be very good for you health-wise in that they contain a very potent antioxidant. But until a few years ago you could not get them in the U.S. due to import restrictions. Now, the ban was lifted recently and I read where they have sold in gourmet shops in New York for $45 a pound. Maybe we should load up our suitcases when we come back next month!

Meet our latest visitor!

A couple days ago a Monocled Cobra showed up on the carport. Fortunately, we saw it in time and it was a small one. Cobras, as most people know, are very poisonous and dangerous. But like most snakes they are also very shy and non aggressive, so we had little problem convincing him to leave the area. Now we are just hoping, since he was a young one, that he doesn't have any siblings hanging around!

On a less exciting note, we finally got a car last week. Its a little red 2004 Honda Jazz that we picked up from the owner of a small resort of Koh Jum. We've been driving around a

bit getting use to driving on the left and having the steering wheel on the right. We haven't been too far since we didn't have insurance until yesterday, and we still don't have driver's licenses. We had heard we would get a pass on getting the Thai driver's license and not have to take a test, but that's not the case. We have to take a written test, in English at least, and a driving test with parallel parking! The parallel parking will be the tricky part since its on the left of course. We've been practicing and will give it a try next week.