Bang Bao Pier & Elephant Trekking

January 5 proved to be a lay-on-the-beach kinda day. I got a lot of reading done of Nelson Mandela's autobiography. Am really trying to finish this monolith of a book so that I don't have to carry the weight back home. Getting close, only another 200 pages to go.

I walk into town for dinner and decide on a place that had chickens roasting on a spit. I order 1/2 a chicken and stir fried vegetables. Seven Russians come in for dinner. They bring their own bottle of vodka and are drinking it straight up. They've also requested bread so one of the restaurant workers crosses the street to Tesco (similar to 7-Eleven) and returns carrying a loaf of white bread. The loaves of bread here are not anything like what we get back home. The bread is thinly sliced, perfectly square and it would equal 1/2 a loaf back home. I've noticed that if you ever order something and they don't have it on hand, they never tell you they don't have it. They simply send someone out to buy it: bananas, bread, milk... you name it, it comes walking in the door within minutes.

Being as I'm starting to feel like I'm running out of time on Koh Chang I wanted to venture off into parts unknown today (January 5). Before coming here I thought 10 days would lead me to boredom on this island but that hasn't been the case. On the recommendation of the house guest from Macao I decided to check out Bang Bao Pier today.

I walked into town and had muesli and coffee at the bakery and then I tried to flag a songathew. I was told to not pay more than 150 BHT to get out to Bang Bao Pier (which is the furthest I have been on this island). Taxi after taxi stopped and I was quoted anywhere from 200 BHT to 300 BHT. Finally, after about 6 taxis... I threw in the towel and agreed to 200 BHT. Within 1/2 mile or so, the taxi stopped for a family of 4. They too were going out to Bang Bao and they were squabbling over paying 100 BHT a piece. I told them that I was paying 200 BHT because I was alone but that 150 was apparently reasonable. They hummed and hawed and decided to take the ride at which point the taxi driver told me he would only charge me 150 BHT because there were now 5 of us going to the same place. Thank you tourists from Tunisia!

The ride takes me past my previous guest house, Lazy Republique. It's too bad that I wasn't aware of Bang Bao Pier when I was sort of staying in the neighbourhood. In any event, I enjoy the taxi ride here, sitting in the back of a pickup truck watching the goings on, on the sides of the road. It takes about 30 minutes or so to get out there, most of the road hilly and switchbacks which seem to be the norm here in Thailand. A straight stretch of road is a rarity for sure.

There's not much of a "town" out at Bang Bao, but the pier stretches for a very long ways and the pedestrian area is the width of your average sidewalk with businesses side-by-side on either side of the passage-way. It's about 11:30 AM and I walk up the pier... many businesses are closed. I don't know if it's too early in the day (nothing here on Koh Chang seems to be open before 10:00, and it's even hard to find a breakfast joint at 8:00 or 9:00 AM), or if it's because it's Sunday. I walk up and down twice looking at the souvenirs but don't buy anything except for water. 

 Hospital @ Bang Bao Pier

 Miscellaneous items for sale.

 Polluted waters @ Bang Bao Pier

 Housing @ Bang Bao Pier

Once I pass through the shops I'm now out on the actual pier on the ocean. It's lovely and kept up very nicely with plenty of areas that jut out off the pier for sitting in the shade. I walk to the very end, it's a long way, and take some photos. This is where the scuba boats and fishing boats depart from.

A few people had told me the Greek restaurant was very good so I decided that is where I'd have lunch today. Honestly, by this point I am really very tired of Thai food. I didn't realize that I was a picky eater until coming to Thailand where the food is so very different from what I'm used to. I've always known I am a very visual eater. So many of the foods here are simply not that visually appealing to me and I've ordered a few dishes where I pick out the veg and chicken and push the noodles aside. For days now I keep thinking about how much I'm looking forward to returning to my juicing when I get home. I'm really missing it.

The Greek restaurant is in fact run by a Greek family. Their restaurant is absolutely beautiful. It's on stilts over the water and the patio area is simply lovely. Feels very natural and a lot of fore-thought was put into the place. Everyone dining there is looking for shade and they have plenty of tables in both the sun and shade. It's a scorcher today with the temp currently sitting at +32 C and no noticeable breeze. I order a pita wrap. Oddly, lamb isn't even an option so I choose pork. It was most likely the tastiest Greek meal I've ever eaten. Delicious and unforgettable.

 Interior of Greek restaurant.

The best Greek meal I've ever eaten.  

There was a shop on the pier that had piqued my interest but it was closed the few times I had walked past it. Closed meaning there was a rope across so you couldn't enter but you very easily could've reached in and taken any of the handmade leather items. I thought it very unusual and interesting at the same time that it was only a rope to keep people out of the place or from stealing anything. I guess that is really putting your trust in the goodness and honestly of mankind isn't it? Anyways, after lunch, the shop is now open. I am blown away by the craftsmanship of all these handmade leather goods: wallets, purses; sandals; jewelry. I'm even more blown away by the prices: 1400 BHT for a pair of sandals. That's about $42 Cdn. I buy a pair of red leather sandals that feel like I've owned them for years already.

It's a long 30 minute wait in the heat for a taxi that'll bring me back to my end of the island. I wait with a Russian couple who have been waiting even longer.... taxis are few and far between this far from nowhere. We get a rookie driver who doesn't have a clue what to charge us. I offer him 200 BHT telling him I paid 150 BHT to come out this way and he agrees. He drops me on the highway by the 7-Eleven and I walk the 15 minutes back to my guesthouse where a cool shower never felt so good.

I don't feel like walking back into town for dinner and I'm getting tired of the selection in town. I go next door to the Panviman Resort Hotel restaurant. Now that I'm inside the entrance of the Panviman I get a get a good look at the place. It is very lovely. I don't know how places make a go of it here. So many large venues are basically pretty much empty. I'm one of about 10 tables with patrons in the entire restaurant which looks as if it has at least 70-80 tables. Many places I've dined, the staff out number the patrons. I have a chuckle because it's a linen and cloth napkin kind of place with candlelight on the tables and it's dark, the moon is shining on the ocean... I realize it could very well indeed be a romantic evening and I'm alone. I smile inside and chuckle at my confidence to dine alone in a place such as this. I order a pre-set menu of pork chop with mushroom sauce, some lovely steamed veggies and fettucine. It was all fine. Not spectacular, but fine. The meal with a glass of wine came to less than $18. I never know how to tip here. I've been tipping 20% most of the time but really have no clue if it's too much or too little. Although in hindsight I realize the hotel automatically charged 18% on top and I left 150 BHT tip to boot. No wonders the two waitresses who barely spoke 10 words of English between them looked at me oddly a few times as they looked at the bill and then me. In the grand scheme of things, the money will do them a lot more good than it will do me. I have no clue what type of salaries they earn here but have only heard they are very low per month.

I have noticed that workers at the guesthouses I have stayed at seem to work 10-12 hour days, six days/week. I left a 50 BHT tip for the "maid" (as the owners call her), when she cleaned my room the first day but she left the money on the bedside table. I don't know if I offended her or if she didn't realize it was for her (I had put it under the pillow). In any event, I just thought it was odd and I felt weird about the fact that she didn't accept the money. I know her husband just had eye surgery this week and their healthcare would not cover the cost so Ian and his wife donated the funds to pay for it. It appears the total cost was about $400 Cdn for the surgery. My room is only cleaned every 3 days so tomorrow will be the second cleaning (and I check out tomorrow). I am unsure if I will just leave some money on the bed again for her or if I will hand it to her directly. She doesn't speak any English so we'll see how it goes.

Tuesday, January 6 is the day I am to go on an elephant trek. Ian, the British guesthouse owner, arranges a pick-up for 2:30 with the original elephant trekking company on Koh Chang. Apparently it's the most authentic as you get to ride through the jungle and other companies keep their elephants within walking distance of the highway. I wait in the scorching +33 C. sun for 30 minutes and ask Ian to follow up. They forgot about me! They tell Ian they'll be here to pick me up at 3:30.  This time, on Ian's advice, I wait under the shade of the deck on the river.  Ian tells me the taxi driver will come up to the house to fetch me.

I get in the back of a pickup truck with 5 others. It becomes quickly apparent that they are just returning from a trek. They are chatting in English and are a Russian, two Brits and two Norwegians. The Russian gets dropped off first and then the four of them discuss their "fear" of Russian women and how assertive and pushy they are (but say the Russian men are pretty nice). I'm dropped on the highway and told to wait for another truck that will take me to the elephant camp. Within a minute my ride appears. Eventually there are about 10-11 of us in the back. It's a 35 minute drive to the elephant camp but I get to see lots of the Island that I only passed through when I came from the ferry terminal 8 days earlier. Back then I didn't process much of what I was seeing. Now I get the lay of the land. Wish I had a day to spend out at the White Sands area of Koh Chang. It looks like a shopping mecca that stretches a couple of miles. Ian, my guesthouse owner, calls White Sands "the big City" and I gather he isn't fond of the area but it looks right up my alley and I probably would've enjoyed my evenings much more if I had stayed on that part of the island. Oh well, live and learn, once again.

The elephant camp is huge. It looks to be multi-generational family and there are kids from 3-months old, a few toddlers and school-aged kids who are just in the midst of returning from school at about 4:30 PM.  Their uniforms are various colours which, I presume, categorizes them by grade level.

Multi-generational housing at the elephant camp.

The camp has been in existence for 21 years. They own 10 elephants, the oldest being 51 years old. Elephants live to be about 100 years old.

  

 Road to the elephant farm

NB:  in 2014, I had no clue that riding an elephant was controversial and is frowned up.  Now that I know better, I wouldn't do it again.

We are greeted with a bottle of cold water and a plate of sliced pineapple. I have to hang around for a bit on my own as I booked a one hour trek and the others booked two hours. I don't know what they did for the first 1/2 hour while I was walking around chatting up the women of the residence, talking to them about their kids... but the rest of the group came back and we all climbed the steps to the elephant stand and got on top of our elephant which entails removing your shoes and standing barefoot on the elephant's back. Kinda scary for me.  Elephant hair is very prickly. The trainer sits on the elephants neck area and it appears that kicking the elephant behind the ears is what makes her walk (all 5 elephants are females). I am on the middle elephant, there are two in front of me and two behind me. We walk through the jungle, through a creek and then we come a point where my elephant departs from the rest as they continue on for another 30 minutes. My trainer says "spider" and I'm thinking "so what, a spider", as the trainer takes his cane and points to a bush at my eye level and says "POISONOUS!" This yellow and black thing with legs that are - no kidding - 5" long is the size of a saucer. I kid you not. The trainer keeps saying "POISONOUS" and I"m saying "Then why are we so close to it?" as we're at a standstill and the elephant keeps bashing into the tree that the spider is on and the spider is about 3 feet away from jumping on me. Finally we move on. Whew! That spider was amazing. I had no idea they could be so humongous. I'm thankful the trainer was looking for such things.  I attempted to capture a photo but all I got was a blur.

All the elephant trainers looks really young (one of them looked like he was 14). My trainer spoke very good English, he wanted to make conversation. I found out that 4 of the trainers all come from the same town in Northern Thailand and my trainer had been working with this company for a year. He says he does six elephant treks a day for very little money. Don't know how true the "little money" part is or if that was his way of asking for a good tip. I didn't even realize I should tip him (although I have tipped guides that Sutthi hired for us), but thankfully the Norwegian in the pickup truck said she had tipped her trainer 300 BHT which was my first heads up that I should probably follow suit. Near the end of our trek, my trainer hops on down from the neck of the elephant and takes many photos of me sitting on the elephant. I thought that was a very nice touch and am appreciative to have some photos of this once-in-a-lifetime adventure. I get off the elephant and am given a huge vat of bananas to feed to her. Amazing. That trunk is exactly like a Hoover vacuum. It just snorts up the banana, peel and all, and right away her trunk is out looking for more. Elephants eat all kinds of fruit: bananas, pineapples, pomelos. They eat 5,000 KG of food a day. A truck pulled up and was unloading a huge amount of pineapple leaves (elephant food). The rest of the group returns and we all get back into the pickup for our 35 minute ride back to where we came from.

I was very enthralled by the living conditions of this multi-generational family. Their huge home on stilts is built on a muddy hillside. The little toddlers are stepping gingerly over tree trunks and around elephant dung with no hovering-over-lest-you-should-fall adults nearby. The kids are just allowed to be kids and all that entails. One toddler (she was unsteady on her feet), picked something orange coloured off the ground and stuck it in her mouth and started chewing. No adult noticed. I just smiled... all the adults were probably raised the same way and lived to tell the tale. One thing about Thai people is their clothing is spotlessly clean and these little kids' clothes were too. Surprising given how dusty and polluted Thailand is in general.

I get the truck to drop me at the 7-Eleven and I go to the family run restaurant for dinner that I went to on my first day at this end of the island. I ordered some "crispy noodle" dish but it came with huge wide soggy noodles that tasted like flour & water. I pushed the noodles aside (again!), picked out the chicken and veg and ate those.

As I am just entering the mile-long road to walk back in the dark, about 10 seconds behind me I see a taxi drop a guy off. He is carrying bags and is walking in my direction. I'm excited and say to him "if you're going my way, I'll walk with you because I'm afraid to walk down here alone". He doesn't say anything but he smiles at me and I figure it'll be just fine. I find out he is Dennis from Russia and he is staying at the Panviman Resort next door. He struggles over his English and he keeps apologizing and I tell him "don't worry because I don't speak any Russian" and I am trying to speak super s-l-o-w so he can figure out what I'm asking him. It was nice to have the company and the 15 minutes passed nice and fast.