I woke up earlier than my 8 a.m. alarm on Saturday morning. Which rarely happens. I’m the kind of person who sets two alarms just so I know when my last five minutes of sleep are. I love sleep, but I haven’t slept past 10 a.m. in over a month. I have to wake up at 7 a.m. for school every day and I don’t like to waste any of my weekend time, so I’m always getting up early. Saleem and I packed up our things, dropped off the room key and headed to 7-eleven to find the bus. We saw a huge song tow, the biggest I’ve ever seen, so we figured it was heading to the park. We peeked our heads in and saw two other travelers who confirmed it was headed to Khao Yai. I had a couple minutes to spare so I ran to Sev for some peanuts and juice.
The ride to the park was nice because the air was cool and the natural scenery was breathtaking. For the first time since I’ve been here I really felt like I was in the jungle instead of some city or town. A half hour later we were at the park entrance. Saleem and I had been talking about how we wanted to pay the Thai entrance fee of 40 baht instead of the tourist fee of 400. We walked up to the entrance booth and showed our passports both of which said that we were employed at Anubanchonburi. I thought the ranger said three as in 300, but when Saleem turned around and smiled I realized she had said free. I had expected to put up a little fight, but instead the outcome was better than what I wanted in the first place. The ranger explained to us that we would have to hitchhike to the welcome center. A second later a pickup truck pulled up and we jumped in the back along with the two Croatians that were on the song tow with us.
Riding through Thailand’s oldest national park in the back of a pickup was the best morning of any I’ve had in Thailand. Mountains that were covered in green, lush foliage surrounded me. I felt strangely at home 8,000 miles away from Pennsylvania. Twenty-three kilometers later I hoped out of the truck and thanked the driver. Saleem and I wandered into the visitor’s center to figure out what we would be doing with the day. The two girls at the counter were adorable and helpful even though they could barely speak English. After a couple exchanges we planned on hiring a park guide to take us on an eight-kilometer hike to Haew Suwat falls. Saleem told the girls that they were helpful and they answered, “We are Thai.” I haven’t heard a more truthful statement, especially after this weekend.
We stashed our packs behind the counter and put on our leech socks. While we were tying up our socks another couple decided they wanted to walk to Haew Suwat, so what was going to be a 500 baht tour turned into only 250, again I couldn’t believe our timing and luck. We lathered on bug spray and sunscreen and set off into the jungle with our guide Choo. He was constantly pointing things out to us. First he showed us what the leeches looked like. I couldn’t really understand him so I thought he was showing us little black inchworms. It wasn’t until part way through the hike when one was on my hand that I realized they were leeches. I removed the one from my hand, which was extremely difficult to do because they’re like little suction cups, but later I realized one got me on the thigh. It didn’t hurt and I didn’t even notice until I saw the mark so mai pen rai. Choo also showed us enormous ant hills like the one pictured above. It looks like a huge mound of dirt. That thing was rock solid. We also saw ant hills that big on the side of trees, it was crazy. We heard gibbons and caught a glimpse of one, but I think we were too noisy to really sneak up on anything. Choo also showed us a cinnamon tree and some type of tree that is good for making perfume. He didn’t speak English so I didn’t really catch a lot of what he was trying to say. I saw a lot of elephant poop, footprints and paths where you could see broken trees that they plowed through but sadly no actual elephants. Choo also showed us some sweet trees that I wish I could show to you, but there was literally no way to take an accurate photo of those monsters. They were enormous. The roots were taller than me. There was also this one tree that you could look inside and see all the way to the top. It is the photo above that’s mostly brown with a small circle of white sky on the top right. There were vines everywhere too. I mean everywhere (imagine me dragging the word everywhere out for ten seconds). After an hour of hiking I started tripping over vines left and right. There comes a point where you stop lifting your feet up as high as you should and you don’t duck low enough, you basically become a human pinball in a jungle filled with trees, rocks, vines and spikes. Everything is covered in spikes. Everything. You think your moving a nice leafy fern out of your way one second and the next you’re pulling thorns out of your hand. Even the kindest looking plants and vines had spikes on them. I guess everything needs a little protection. The trees and plants are what amazed me the most. At one point I had to simply stop and hug a tree. I couldn’t contain myself. I was just so happy to be in the jungle with all these crazy plants, it was an urge so I just did it. Choo laughed at me, he probably thought I ate one of those mushrooms he showed us along the way.
After four hours of hiking Choo pointed out a sign that said fifty meters to Haew Suwat. I could tell we were all pretty pumped. It was 2 p.m. and none of us had really eaten anything substantial. The sign was false, we walked a lot more than fifty meters, but we finally made it to the waterfall. It was so beautiful. The adjectives I’m using in this post don’t do justice to how lovely the landscape was. I hope my pictures can communicate a little bit of what words can’t describe. We were a little bummed that you couldn’t swim in the falls, but nothing could put a blemish on our awesome trek so we hobbled over slippery rocks and took photos for awhile. Soon it was time to head back so we hitchhiked with two different people to get back to the visitor’s center. Along the way I spotted a couple monkeys. They are mischievous little buggers. I saw one dropping all the clothes off of someone’s clothesline and another eating fried chicken that he must have found at a campsite. I was getting so hungry that I considered having a monkey steal me some food, but before I knew it we were back at the center. Saleem and I ate lunch and then planned on walking to another close waterfall, but we couldn’t find it anywhere. We were really tired and full from lunch so we decided to call it quits and hitchhike to a lookout point. The second truck that passed us pulled over and just like that we were on our way. We couldn’t believe how easy it was. We stopped at the vista, but it wasn’t too spectacular so we stuck our thumbs out again and soon enough a pickup truck that already had a family in the back pulled over for us. We rode to the entrance with them and then hopped out and thanked them for the ride.
Our next mission was finding a hotel before it got dark. We walked along the road and spotted a huge sign with a bunch of photos of hotels and their distances from the entrance. The signs were in Thai, but we figured they couldn’t be too far away, so we started walking east. After fifty meters or so we saw another sign for one of the hotels that said 50 kilometers. We decided that they were probably all about the same distance because that’s what it seemed like on the huge sign, so we turned around and walked back to the main road. By this point we were pretty tired and it was starting to get dark. We talked to a young man at a roadside stand and he said that there were hotels within walking distance, but it would probably take at least a half hour so we tightened our waist straps and continued on. After another twenty minutes we saw what looked like a really nice place to stay. We started to wonder allowed about a swimming pool and soft beds. We walked into the lobby and then walked out. Way too expensive. It was thirty bucks a night and even though that included breakfast, we really didn’t want to spend that much this weekend. The ladies at the hotel told us to keep walking and we would find one for 300 baht. We walked and walked and walked for what seemed like forever. We were tired and it was dark, but we were both still in a really good mood. We had just had an awesome day full of hiking and one more long walk wasn’t going to ruin that for us. After stopping at two more places we finally found the hotel with the help of a night security guard. ‘The Guesthouse’ was only 300baht and it had a private bathroom. I immediately got in the shower and it was freezing. I had just said something about how cold the water was and magically the water heater turned on. It was a small miracle. It was the hottest shower I had in Thailand. I don’t know how many more things could go my way; my weekend was full of good luck and simple pleasures.
After freshening up, Saleem and I walked back towards the park in search of food. We ate a restaurant that was cowboy themed. It seemed pretty pricey, but it was close and there was live music. Really, really hilarious live music, all sang in English. My personal favorite of the night was Puff the Magic Dragon. After waiting a long while for food our dishes came. The waitress set down two plates of beef, veggies and rice. I was bummed. I ordered curried fish and vegetables, but that wasn’t what was in front of me. I didn’t want to wait another half hour for food, but I really did not want to eat a plate full of beef. Another minute later my fish came, an enormous whole fish, a fish that could feel a family of four. Apparently Saleem somehow ordered two dishes and I ordered an entire fish. We were baffled, but more food is better than no food, so we dug in. As much as I hate wasting food, I knew I couldn’t eat the entire fish. The portions are usually just right in Thailand so I always clear my plate, but not this time. That dinner ended up being my most expensive and the only one I couldn’t finish. It was delicious. After stuffing ourselves silly we walked further down the road to get some ice cream because no matter how full you are there’s always room for dessert. On the walk home a man on a motorbike with a sidecar offered us a ride, again another Thai offering help, offering a ride to who knows where to two strangers in the dark. We declined and thanked him and walked home talking about how awesome this country is. Our only topic of conversation all day was Thai people, how helpful they are and how everything fell into place even though we didn’t plan out our weekend. Having a great time in Thailand was effortless.
