Hello Everyone!

Being on the sailboat for 5 days was interesting, we learned a lot about how self-sufficient a person would have to be to live as cheap as they do. I’d like to try some day (be able to live comfortably on virtually nothing), but not right now. Unfortunately it ended up being a bit cramped on the boat (7 people) and we didn’t really liking the guy who was the captain. He was arrogant and didn’t listen to a word we said. So after a few days in a harbor we jumped ship and stayed at this little beach called Ko Ma on the island of Koh Pha Ngan.

Ko Ma is an “islet” – a small island connected by a sand bar to the bigger island of Koh Pha Ngan, so it was a very cool environment to be visiting.

Ko Ma, with the sand bar disappearing

We lived in another cheap hut, motor scooted around the island and just hung out in general. Driving was tough on the island because – for some damn reason – they built their roads going straight up hills rather than around them at shallower grades. Some of the roads had “CAUTION!” for a 20% grade and when you went up the hill you were looking straight up at the sky, just holding on. The worst were the hills leading to the southern-most point on the island, Hat Rin.

One of the steep hills

At Hat Rin they have an immense Full Moon Party that attracts up to 25,000 people on two little connected beaches. We were lucky enough to be on Koh Pha Ngan for the full moon party! which we didn’t go to because it’s just not our scene.

Our scene is more like the following: A monastery in the jungle. We drive through the gates and down a long driveway to a series of small white buildings behind the main temple. It’s humid, warm and the light is beginning to die. There are people sitting on steps in sarongs or shorts, and we walk into a little courtyard where a guy shows us where to change. I got a plaid blue and red sarong. It was awesome.

We use a bucket and dipper to shower quickly, then up the steps and into one of the two doors for the sauna – men on the left, women on the right. Open and close the door quickly or people will complain. Inside, the first thing I notice is there’s almost no light except a little natural light coming through a couple slits on the side. The ceiling is about 5 feet high and the little room is about 4 feet wide and 12 feet deep – about the size and shape of a large coffin. It’s a steam sauna – very humid – and they infuse the steam with herbs like lemon grass and maybe menthol. Taking a deep breath cleans out your lungs, you can feel it go down your throat and into your chest. On each side run tiled seats where there’s – oh – 9 people packed in, sweating, talking, meditating. Because of the hot yoga I’ve been doing at home for the last 9 months, I felt confident enough to sit in the sauna without panicking, which I’m sure I would have done otherwise.

After rinsing dead skin off our bodies outside the sauna, we find the host again. He takes us back to a small open building that has a roof and three walls, the last side being a curtain that separates the room from the main courtyard. A nun takes me, lays me down on a pad and sheet and gives me the best massage I’ve ever had – she uses tons of oil (again, herb-infused) and is very very patient. She knows her shit, you can tell. For an hour I just let her tell me what to do, and I relax and listen to the rain and whatever’s going on in the courtyard outside.

Finally, I return to the sauna and sweat the oil out of my pores and meet Azure, who looks like a new person.

The sauna at Wat Pho

Koh Pha Ngan wasn’t bad. We actually liked it a lot, probably our favorite place so far as long as we weren’t near Hat Rin.

Right now we’re in Bangkok, which is a manic mix of very modern malls, gritty neighborhoods and the most touristy backpacker areas you can imagine. There’s an immense flea market on weekends where we’re going to blow a bunch of money when we get closer to the end of our trip. Diesel Jeans for $10!

As I was writing this, Azure was booking a flight to Chiang Mai in the north. We’re leaving tomorrow evening. There are jewelry making classes, cooking classes and boxing classes. I’m… so excited.

I hope you’re all enjoying your Decembers. Write back with gossip!

Take care,

Mike and Azure.

So Azure and I spent a week or so on Ko Lanta and just loved it – the best thing we did was rent a motorscooter ($5 a day) and scoot all over the island. Most of the people who visit Ko Lanta stay on the west coast of the island, so Az and I made our way over to the east coast and biked through the little towns that aren’t as touristy – old chinese fishing villages, a community that lives in the mangroves (swamp-like forests that protected the community from the tsunami – currently under threat from resource harvesting), groups of monkeys, etc.

Whenever we’re scouting our next trip, I always search the internet for pictures of where we’re going and I’m always frusterated. I mean, what does Thailand LOOK LIKE? I find pictures of couples posing in front of a sunset or on the back of an elephant and that simply doesnt help, and I just end up hating those people. So I like the pictures that Az took because they look like what Ko Lanta looked like to me.

On Tuesday we left Lanta and came to the east coast of Thailand to meet up with an Israeli couple who are planning to sail from here (Ko Samui) down to Sinapore later this month. We were pretty convinced we’d join them until we found out they wouldn’t be stopping at all for 6 days, so we wouldn’t be able to swim or go to land to eat curry or anything – just throwing up from sea sickness and not sleeping is how I picture the voyage. But we are living on their boat right now and we’ll stay with them for another 4 or 5 days as we hop to another island for snorkeling and SPEAR FISHING.

Life on the boat is all about efficiency. This couple dropped everything about 10 years ago, sold all their belongings and decided to take off. They talk about Micronesia and Panama and The Phillippines like they’re stores down the street. They have so much knowledge about fixing electronics and using coconut trees to build houses and all sorts of stuff you can only learn through a decade of this kind of living.

Every system they have on the boat has a backup, so they have sails and a motor (and enough gas to go 1200 miles). They have a rain catcher and a water maker (converts seawater to potable). However, it hasn’t rained for 12 days and the pump from their water maker cracked so they’ve been hauling water from shore in these huge black jugs to fill their tanks.

Last night, after everyone went to bed for the night, Azure and I decided to take a shower on the back of the boat. So we got a bucket of fresh water from the jugs, got a cup and stood on the back deck dipping the cup in the bucket and pouring water in our hair, then shampooing, pouring more water and rinsing. Dipping the cup again and doing conditionner, soap, pouring more water and rinsing… It was so warm last night, we just stood there dripping wet and looking at where we were: in the middle of a quiet bay on an island in the tropics, the water was so calm I swear we could have stepped off the boat and walked to shore. The dinghy was tied 15 feet from the boat, but it looked like it was just hovering, held in the air between us and the dark mountain that makes up the northwest corner of the island. And of course the stars and half-moon and the clouds that actually brighten the sky. Just an amazing night.

The moon is different closer to the equator – it goes through its phases horizontally rather than vertically, so when it’s half-full it looks like a bowl. The stars are also different. I don’t know a thing about astronomy but when I was in India I immediately recognized that the sky looked different, and it’s the same here. You don’t know that you know your sky until you’re at a different lattitude.

Anyway, we’re healthy and safe and going spearfishing tomorrow. Thanks to everyone who’s emailed!

Take care,

Mike & Azure