Are you ready to cram your brain with all kinds new information???
Ready to "get some knowledge"? (name that movie)
We'll be seeing and learning lots of new things today. Or, at least, that's what the brochure more-or-less states! We'll have to decide for ourselves what we think.
Let's go stuff ourselves silly at the breakfast buffet and meet in the hotel lobby. The guide is going to pick us up in a van in about an hour. We've got this tour all to ourselves.
OH MY GOODNESS!
Thank goodness we've got a private as our littlest ever-so-cheerful traveling companion just decided to throw up! ~blech~ Hmmm…don't you think we should turn around and go back to the hotel? NO??? Our tour guide doesn't seem phased by it all. He suggested that we proceed with the tour but with a quick stop at a t-shirt shop to purchase a change of clothes for Ava.
Thank goodness it was an isolated incident and she's not sick anymore. Whew!!!
So…our first OFFICIAL stop on the tour is to an elephant "home". Elephants are not indiginous to Phuket. (so why are they here???? Maybe just to extract money from tourists!?!)
Anyway, we are tourists so let's ride on some elephants!
These models are 2-passenger, so we had to split up…
Mark and Ava….
going on a short elephant ride.
Check out the elephant camp – and the other trainers and elephants.
and here are the living quarters for some of the trainers and their families. Definitely a bit of humbling culture shock for us westeners.
Our elephant trainer or driver….sorry for the blurry photo. He stopped half-way through our very brief ride to become a salesman and sell various trinkets and necklaces. *sigh*
Are we amused by this???? (No…not really…)
Ava and Mark dismounting from their elephant.
Hey…how about we buy a fruit basket from this lady so that we can feed the elephants???
Mmmm….apparently elephants love pineapples!
and they love bananas too!
Hmmm….we'd better wash our hands after feeding those elephants.
Oh boy…this is kind of turning into a tourist trap….we can pay more money and go watch a snake show. But let's not…
Alrighty….this has been amusing but I think it's time to go.
Time to get back in the van and move on to the next destination…..
Okay. We're here! (and where is here???) It looks like we're stopped at a scenic outlook. And…here's another photo "opportunity". You can pay a few Thai Baht and have your photo taken with an eagle. We'll do that, but after we take a quick look at the scenery.
At least the scenic outlook is beautiful!!!! We're now in the southern part of Phuket.
Okay, okay. Why don't we pay the few Baht and have our photo with an eagle.
Ava even got to hold an eagle!
Time to get back in the car and head off to the next destination….to the Big Buddha. This Buddha is called Mingmongkol Big Buddha and is made of marble and is 45m high.
Here's something I didn't know- there is a different Buddha for each day of the week. You are supposed to …I'm not clear on this…worship? pray to? donate money to? to your Buddha. So, which one is your Buddha? Which day of the week were you born on? What if you don't know which day of the week you were born on (I mean…you can figure it out ..eventually.)??? There is a Buddha for that too!!!!
Hmmm…let's take a look around this building next to the Big Buddha. Huh! There's a monk way over. I wonder what he's doing??
Well…let's go find out! Apparently, if you donate a few Baht he will give you a prayer bracelet and a blessing.
Annika's turn:
And now Ava's turn:
Time to get back into the van and drive back down the mountain and head to the next destination. Wow! It sure is beautiful up here.
Next stop…a monastery.
Cool building! I love that roof line!!!
One difference we've noticed between China and Thailand traditions. In China they light firecrackers whenever and wherever. Here in Thailand they light the firecrackers (I mean the loud, banging variety) in this chimney of sorts:
Gold leaf Buddhas. People add gold leaf to the Buddhas for good luck.
Oh my…look up. Check out the gorgeous ceiling!!!!
Here's another gorgeous building.
Is it time to leave? Already??? Really??? We barely got to see anything. I want to stay! Darn!!!!
Okay…off to the next stop… a cashew factory. Do you know how cashews are grown?? Not me.
Ah…here's a cashew tree:
And there are baby cashews growing on it:
Watching a worker remove the cashew seed from the skin. Apparently there is something inside the cashew skin that is dangerous to touch.
The yellow fruit is the cashew fruit. The cashew nut actually grows outside the fruit (not inside it).
Have you ever tried cashew fruit juice??? Noo???? Well, here's your chance! It's actually sweet and yummy. I wonder why I've not seen cashew fruit juice for sale before this.
Let's buy some yummy cashews while we're here. What flavors do you like? We chose honey, plain and a spicy Thai flavor. Mmmmm!!! I LOVE cashews!!! Do you????
Back in the van! Umm….next stop…. a tourist trap souvenir shop. Ugh! What kind of tour is this??????? Can we move on?? Please?????? Get me out of this tourist trap!!!!
Whew. Sorry about that. Ready to move on?
Guess what?? It's time for lunch. Thank goodness! I'm ready to eat! Apparently we're going to some small Thai restaurant. Sounds good, right?
So….this wasn't what I was expecting. Sure, it's a small restaurant but it seems the only other customers are from other tours. And the food is just blah. This certainly isn't the Thai food everybody raves about.
Hmph. Can we move on???
Ah…quick detour. We're trying to find some palm sugar that one of the recipes we cooked the other day uses–the guide kindly diverted our tour to a local market. Why couldn't we stay here longer??? Why wasn't this part of the tour? This is way more interesting than a tourist trap!
Whew. Last stop for today- rubber tree farm. I think I'm ready for this tour to be over with. Tourist stop after tourist stop is getting on my nerves. How are you holding up?
We're all getting into a ox-drawn cart for a short ride around the farm.
This land is luscious and green!
Pineapples growing in beautiful rows!!! (as if they were carrots)
Check out the monkey!
Let's learn how rubber is made. Hmmm…the rubber trees don't look at all like I thought they would.
Rubber starts out as sap from the rubber tree. You cut a strip of bark off the tree and the sap runs into the bucket.
The sap collects during the day and then is collected.
The very, very brief sap-to-rubber synopsis: The rubber sap is mixed with sulfuric acid and it sets for many hours. Then it becomes a squishy, rubbery, thick mat. You moistened it with water and start pressing it with your hands at first and then use a rolling machine to roll it into a thinner sheet of rubber. The final pass through the rolling machine gives it a unique ridged texture (perhaps to create more surface area for drying?). The sheets are hung up to dry before selling at the market.
Here are some rubber sheets drying. The farmers sell the sheets to a dealer which in turns sells it to factories. The rubber sheets get turned into shoes and anything else that needs rubber.
Star fruit!!! Do you like star fruit? I'm so amused by the shape of this fruit!
Have you ever wondered how coconuts are harvested??? (no?) Well, here in Thailand they use….
Monkeys!!!!
Here's how they train the monkeys to get the coconuts from the trees:
What a great little monkey! Why don't we give him some treats for his hard work? He loves the watermelon!!
This is a traditional Thai house- it's all open.
Here's how the rice grains are separated from their hulls (at least, how they used to do it in the old days). Our guide told us it was the women who were in charge of doing this task. (so…what is the man's job???)
And here's the super exciting part of the day….as we were almost ready to get back in the van and head back to the hotel we felt an ..
EARTHQUAKE!!!!!
Wow!!!!
All the locals were on the phone with their families getting the news. Apparently there is a tsunami warning for Phuket. YIKES!!!! Time to get back to the hotel and find out what's going to happen. Are you ready for this???? No???? Me neither!!!!
The hotel made an announcement asking all the guests that are staying on the first and second floors to stay in the hotel lobby (at the back of the second floor) until that all-clear is given. Thank goodness our room is on the third floor!!! Let's go see what's happening in the lobby. It seems that everybody has their iPads or iPhones out and tuning into news websites to learn more about this earthquake that happened off the coast of Banda Aceh.
Bit of a deja vu for our little family. Remember the tsunami last year that destroyed part of Japan and then made its way across the Pacific Ocean? Well, we were in Hawaii when that happened!
Whew!
Thank goodness nothing happened!!!! After many hours of waiting anxiously for news ….the tsunami warning and then tsunami watch has been lifted. Thank goodness!
Good luck sleeping tonight!!! All this excitement…I'm going to have trouble sleeping! Or not. It's been a v.e.r.r.r.r.y. l.o.n.g. day!!! We're signed up for another snorkeling trip tomorrow so TRY to get some sleep.