Southeast Asia: Day Eight - Thailand Cooking Class

Once we woke up in the morning we found that Mom, Sage and Dad had went shelling at the beach. When they got back we ate breakfast at the hotel and headed back to the beach for a swim.

After awhile we returned to our apartment and had great cheesy fries for lunch while we relaxed by the pool. We stayed at the hotel until late afternoon when we were picked up by the cooking class taxi in the back of a pickup truck that was fashioned into an 8 seater with open air windows. We drove all over trying to pickup the rest of the people and got to the cooking class an hour late. We were expecting to meet the class instructor but it turned out he was also the taxi driver. He told us to guess his name and some guy actually guessed his name Rasha. Rasha was really shocked but it turns out he saw his name on the wifi password. They gave us papers with different dishes we could do. We each picked one type of soup, one type of noodle dish, and one type of curry. Then we started. First Rasha showed us some of the ingredients that we would be using for the dishes and made a lot of jokes and some were pretty funny but he was the one laughing the most. He would tell a joke and then laughed the funniest laugh I had ever heard. After he showed us all of the ingredients we started cooking coconut soup.

We ground up some lime leaves in a mortar and chopped lemon grass. The best part was that he showed us the ways to make it sweeter or spicier or tangier so it was just the way you wanted it. We set aside our soups and started on the Pad Thai. The Pad Thai was quicker and we had already cooked some at home before but the one we made was a lot better. Then we made our curries.

Rasha told us how to make sure it is the right level of spice. Dad went for hot, Kaden and I went for mild, Zaddek went for low, and Sage and Mom didn't even put a pepper in theirs. After we finished cooking our arms were sore from the mortar. We sat down and finally got to eat what we had cooked.

It was delicious. Once we had finished most of the three course meal we put our leftovers in containers before starting our dessert. Zaddek and I helped Rasha cook a few dishes of Mango and Sticky Rice and Banana in Coconut milk which were really good too.

There weren't any leftovers from dessert and when we finished we jumped back into the truck for a ride back to the hotel. We thanked Rasha before heading up to the apartment.

Total truck rides: 2

Total miles walked: 0.9 miles

Southeast Asia: Day Seven - Krabi Travel Day

After breakfast we had one last swim in the beautiful pool before running up to the room and packing up. We left the hotel and and took a van to the Bangkok airport. We flew to Krabi, an area on the west coast of Thailand near the islands of Phuket and Phi Phi. After the 2 hour flight we took a shuttle to our hotel/apartment. As we drove we passed lush jungle vegetation and beautiful beaches. The landscape and houses reminded us of being in Costa Rica.

Once we arrived at the hotel we relaxed a bit until sunset when we headed to the beach. The beach had a row of restaurants with beautiful hanging lanterns and tropical music playing.

We went to one Mom had read about and got some tropical smoothies and Pad Thai for dinner. The Pad Thai was amazing like always and the smoothies were really good too.

After we finished eating we watched the sunset before walking back to the hotel for the night.

Total planes: 1

Total taxi vans: 2

Total miles walked: 1 mile

Southeast Asia: Day Six - Bangkok, Thailand

We had a nice breakfast at the hotel and headed out on a water taxi boat to the Grand Palace. We took a wooden boat from the hotel to the water taxi terminal and then got tickets for the taxi boat.

It was a bigger boat but was super cramped and everybody was shoved in. After a thirty minute ride that felt more like forever we got to the Grand Palace stop. We were rushed off the boat into a dark creepy market alley with all the vendors trying to sell us stuff. Once we got out of the market we headed right for the Grand Palace.

When we got there we needed long pants to get inside so all the boys got elephant pants before heading in (Mom and Sage already had some.) At the front entrance everywhere you looked there
were colourful designs on buildings and statues. It was amazing.

We explored the beautiful temples and architect. There was every colour of the rainbow in millions of little tiles and paintings. The feeling you have when you're there is insane. It's too much to take in the whole time because you're just in awe with the sheer beauty of the architect around you. We spent quite a while walking around the temples before we headed into the main temple with paintings covering all the walls including paintings of Hanuman the monkey god of strength and knowledge.

After checking out the main temple we left the Grand Palace not wanting to leave just yet. We walked the streets in search of Wat Pho. We stopped for lunch at a little restaurant open to the street and had some great curries and pad thai for lunch and a fruit popsicle to stay cool in the heat. Once we got to the temple we saw the giant reclining Buddha that had feet almost as big as Kaden's.

We looked around the rest of the temples and Zaddek bought a tiger scroll painting from the market before we left and started towards our last stop of the day, Wat Arun. We got back on the taxi boat and headed two stops over. Once we got off it started to rain really hard so we took shelter in a temple for a few minutes before figuring out we had missed the Emerald Buddha. It wasn't at this one. So we sat in the rain waiting for another taxi boat. Dad ran off to see a bit more of the temple while we were there. We didn't think he would be back in time but he made it. After sitting in the rain for 20 minutes we got onto a boat and got seats this time. We got off the big boat and got on a smaller one that went right to our hotel. We had a nice dinner and swam in the pool for awhile before heading to bed after a long day.

Total taxi boats: 5

Total miles walked: 4.9 miles