Thailand I

I had heard a lot of not-nice things about Bangkok... from the book Earth Odyssee, which described it as one of the most polluted cities on earth, to a friend from the Nepal portion who called it "soul sucking." But to be honest, Bangkok was much cleaner, quieter, politer, and MUCH more Western than Kathmandu. All of a sudden we had a room with A/C, western flush toilet, TP provided, a private (hot) shower, towels on the beds... we were in the lap of luxury. Meanwhile, we were across the street from a mall with A/C (see a theme) and all sorts of restaurants, including such things as Dairy Queen. We did some touristing and saw amazing temples and things, and people were really polite. The only weird thing had to do with tuk-tuks, but that'll have to be a separate story. Oh, and NOBODY HONKS. Which was an incredible difference from not only Kathmandu, but also most urban centers in developing countries where I've been.

So we ended up spending an extra day in Bangkok, which meant two nights and three days. We ate a lot of street food. Then we took a night bus to the south in an effort to reach the island of Koh Phangan, where there is a really famous Full Moon Party every month. When we found out that the party would work well with our proposed itinerary, we went for it.

For the overnight bus, we didn't book in advance so we ended up in third class. I might have chosen third class anyway, but Carla was having some weird skin issues (this seems to be a pattern in tropical areas!) and wanted to be able to lay down and put up her foot, which was unreasonably swollen from a mosquito bite. It really turned out ok-- there was no air conditioning but the windows opened really far, and I had brought my ground pad (second time using it in 3 months, yay!) so we put that down on the floor and one of us could sleep with our head under one bench seat and feet under the other while the other of us stretched out across the bench (which was a 2-seater; not very long). We arrived in the morning and basically got straight on a tourist bus, then a ferry, then a taxi, and finally arrived at our beach destination.