The first step

Yesterday marked a small milestone in a larger goal to become a travel writer. Its probably a goal that many writers/ journalists want to achieve - to be paid to travel. Either that or being a war correspondent. Neither of which I imagine are easily achievable, especially in the formative years of a journalism career.

Anyway, if you haven't seen it already, here's a link to the travel piece I wrote about Sa Pa, northern Vietnam. Its more or less the same as the one that was in the Marlborough Express a few weeks ago.

http://www.thephuketnews.com/in-search-of-serenity-31719.php

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A lesson in compromise

Travelling alone is great. Unburdened by compromise; the master of your own destiny. Go wherever you want, whenever you want.

Travelling with others requires a different mindset. What do they want to do? What can I give up doing? What is the general consensus within the group? The benefits of travelling with others as opposed to going lone wolf are obvious. Camaraderie, conversation, cheaper prices.

There are two main subsets of groups travelling together, which can be further subcategorised in terms of the dynamics of the group (which I don't want get into right now). The first are groups of friends travelling together for their entire trip. The other are "lone wolf" travellers coming together to travel for an indeterminate period of time - mostly for convenience and the reasons mentioned above. Most of the time I am the latter.

An unwritten, unspoken agreement seems to exist among solo travellers that you will travel together until it no longer becomes either financially viable or if your plans change. Or, *gasp*, if you get sick of the people you're travelling with.

I've been travelling with a girl I'd met at a hostel in Chiang Mai, in northern Thailand, who had vague plans to travel to Laos just as I did. I seemed to have a more solid plan - go a bit further north to Chiang Rai then spend two days cruising down the Mekong River from Thailand to Luang Prabang, Laos. At this time I'd decided to leave two English girls I had been with because they wanted to go to Laos and I wanted to head to Chiang Rai first, but that's another story. She had asked if she could come with me to Chiang Rai seeing as she was just kicking about Chiang Mai not doing much. I agreed and we've been with each other ever since (about a week now). Everything was going fine - both of us seemed to have a similar mindset when it came to travelling - accommodation-wise anyway (cheapish places which mean more money can be spent on other things. All you need is a bed to sleep in and wifi). Then we met another girl on the second day of the slow boat trip. She was taking the long way back to Scotland after spending 18 months living in Australia.

The three of us then entered this unspoken, unwritten agreement that we would be together until it was no longer practical. (She has since gone south to Vang Vieng whereas we are heading north into the jungle). Things were going grand until we hit dry land again. Where to stay?

Suddenly we needed a place with three beds, but we each had different criteria and ways of finding it. Normally the way I travel, especially when arriving late afternoon or evening, is to pretty much find the first place with a decent rate to spend the night and sort myself out for the next day. What to do and whether to move on to another place etc. Either that or book a few nights in advance online then figure out a plan from there. Our Scottish friend was using an app to find cheap hotels to stay in and paying that little bit extra for a fancier place. For me that money would be better spent on food or for tours or souvenirs.

After wandering around Luang Prabang (which thankfully is not that big) in the early evening with all or luggage we finally settled on a place - three beds, a big room, a cheap price between three. A little bit run down, but bearable. That was not the last I heard about how we could probably get a good hotel for a few dollars more.

This probably wasn't the first time I'd realised other people travel in different ways and have different criteria for what they want to get out of travelling etc. But it was an example that made me want to write about it (obviously).

It also got me thinking about what kind of person I'm like to travel with. Of course I'll never know, but I'd like to think I'm not too bad.

The main factor for me in anything is price. If its out of my price range or if I think it costs more than it should I'll say so. I'd also be more likely skip it or find an alternative or - if I really want to do it then I'll try save money in other places (food etc).

I get a bit irritable when I'm tired and/ or hungry and sometimes have to fight the urge to snap at people. When in a group I tend to be a contributor rather than the leader in a conversation or in decision making. But I'm more likely to go with what others want to do to save time, frustration and to make the decision making process quicker.

I sound like a great travelling partner, right? 

Though, to be fair, I've been lucky enough to have been with people who more or less want to do the same things as I do.

Or are they just compromising with me?    

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Of Animals and Trekking

Lunchtime: A baby elephant feeds on vegetation in northern Thailand

     

The sound of a bell in the middle of the northern Thailand jungle stopped me in my tracks. Above me on a hill to my left, a cherub-faced Asian elephant stood grazing on overgrown vegetation. Its probably the closest I'll come to seeing an elephant in the wild - this one that we've seen at the start of our two-day trek belongs to an elephant camp nearby. Elephant trainers, or mahouts, teach them commands which years ago would have been used to put the elephants to work in the jungle (possibly still the case) though more likely now for trekking with travellers.

The trek takes us 12 kilometres, mostly uphill, through jungle, over streams and through sticky rice fields (not that the rice fields themselves are sticky - its the kind of rice they grow) to Lahu Village where we spend the night on a mountain by candle light and mosquito net. It was different to my Sa Pa experience in northern Vietnam. Firstly, it rained almost all of the first day leaving the 12 of us and our guide Eddy soaked right through. Even my change of clothes which were in my backpack is slightly wet. The jungle setting also means mosquitoes. Lots of mosquitoes.

I'm growing quite fond of trekking. Something about getting away from the city, seeing and feeling more of the countryside, a better appreciation of the simple dinner at the end and feeling like you've earned it.

The start of the trek (a package deal), however, was a case of having to endure before getting to the good stuff. I don't think we hit the track until after midday (we were picked up about 9.30). The first stop was an Orchid farm - nice enough, but flowers don't tend to get me too excited. The next two, a snake farm/ show and a long neck village, seem depressing and exploitative. The snake trainers knew what they were doing, but seemed to show little respect for the reptiles. One put the head of a snake in his mouth and the other trainers seeming flippant and were unnecessarily aggravating the snakes. It was not a place I would have gone to of my own free will.

The village seemed like it was set up for tourists with the women, who lengthen their necks and legs using gold bangles, selling woven knick-knacks like a sideshow attraction. I felt bad even having my camera out. It may have been better if, as travellers, we had one of the women explain why they do what they do instead of being dropped off and being told we had 20 minutes to walk around.

Woah, this is getting negative. And long. Let's move on.


One of the better experiences in Chiang Mai was ziplining through the jungle with Gibbons. Surprisingly, or maybe not so, the company (Flight of the Gibbons) was set up by a Kiwi company. And it kind of showed - the whole trip from pick-up to drop off seemed like a pretty slick operation. Our guides, Mr Cash and Mr Good, were a pair of jokers trying to mess with our group at each platform - holding us back when we were ready to fly through the jungle canopy, pretending they'd forgotten something - but there was still an inherent level of trust in them. Mr Cash had been with the company since a few months after it opened about five years ago. Before that he'd worked at a hotel and applied for the job when he saw a listing in the paper. 


After a good 2 and a half hours of flying through the trees (which also included a sighting of a Gibbon family - mum, dad and son) we were dropped off at a nearby waterfall and then a hearty lunch before being taken back to our respective hostels. The trip also came with a free ticket to the zoo and a bandana. Score.


The Chiang Mai zoo itself was big - big enough to warrant a monorail and an open-sided tour bus - I won't go into much detail because you've been to a zoo before. But I didn't imagine the first time I'd see a koala would be in Thailand.


Right, this is getting too long and uninteresting for my liking so I'm calling it quits on this post. 


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Travelling pays (an update)

Apologies to some (you know who you are) for the no blog entries lately. But after my trip to Sa Pa in northern Vietnam I felt compelled to write something for my old paper back home. My first paid gig as a travel writer (Hoorah). There's also another paper which will be running the piece (which I'm not being paid for). I didn't want to publish it here before it got printed because there's some kind of etiquette around that, I guess. Maybe its just politeness and courtesy.

I also didn't want to write a completely different piece about Sa Pa, because well, I'm a little lazy like that. And I haven't done anything worth blogging about.

Here's a link to the story and to the photos.

Since Sa Pa, the friend I was travelling with went back to NZ and I spent a week in Hanoi not doing much. I had a flight out on June 11, he left on June 2. Half of that time was pretty frustrating because felt like I was in limbo, just waiting to move onto the next place. A problem with haphazard booking of things.

I re-met some people from our first night in Hanoi and also another who I mentioned in a previous blog post who we'd met all the way up Vietnam.

I'm now in Chiang Mai after a domestic flight (Hanoi to Siagon), an international flight (Saigon to Bangkok), three train changes to get to station where I caught a 17-hour train trip to Chiang Mai.

Short and sweet and keeps people off my back for a while. Ha.

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