Monday, October 5, 2009

Thailand: A Retrospective - Day 4

If childbirth is greater agony than pushing through the stiff, taut, bloated, sunburnt legs the morning after a crippling burn, I have another reason to add to the list!

After wailing and crawling to the bathroom and battling waves of nausea and coating myself with coconut oil, I finally managed to leave the room and make it down for breakfast - bacon and eggs! But a travesty - they removed all the fat from the bacon!!?


The plan was to fill up so that the Sea Cave Canoe tour's provided lunch would be easy to ignore were it unsuitable. That lean bacon didn't make things promising, despite the three eggs...

We were then packed into a minivan and whisked up to the mainland, herded onto a dock, loaded onto a barge, and bobbled over to the ferry upon which we'd be spending the day in between jaunts in inflatable canoes through caves and into hidden lagoons in the centre of a variety of Thai islands. Our guide happily snapped dozens of photos of us (earning his tip, of course), handing the beau the oars to complete the facade of a self-impelled experience.


After a day of floating around, clambering inelegantly in and out of the sopping canoes, lying down in the canoe to avoid the really low rocks in the caves (eeep, claustrophobia alert!), and keeping my sizzling legs covered, the buffet lunch was finally served. I predicted it correctly - lots of exotic Thai treats that were little more than flavoured rice or noodles, a gorgeous fish that was sadly smeared in sweet sauce, and lots of fruit and veg. Frustratingly, the pain of the burns, the disappointing breakfast, and the constant stair-climbing and trying not to fall into the ocean when entering and exiting the canoe all had me ravenous! So I had to go for the least offensive option - fried chicken. I originally picked off the light breading, but some obviously made it into my system, because within minutes I had teeny stabs of pain in my stomach... But on the plus side, my hunger was sated!


The weather took a not-so-unpleasant turn after lunch - as we unloaded on the island where we were to spend an hour of 'recreation', the skies unloaded as well! We were hustled off our beach towels an back into the canoes, but no matter how fast our guides paddled, all were soaked by the time we reached the ferry. I was glad I was wearing my bathing suit under my shirt and sarong!

We returned to the resort, moisturised our burns, and headed up to Little Tiger for a tasty repeat of squid friend in butter - this time with fried garlic as well!


After the exhaustion of the day, and desiring escape from the continuing pain and swelling of sunburn, we both hit the hay nice and early - in fact, pretty much every night throughout the holiday had us drifting off by 9-10pm. Lovely!

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