Stories We Haven’t Told You Yet - Part 3

Toe Tape- For a good part of this trip we have been taking a lot of steps - whether in boots in the garden or hiking. This has meant that Paul’s toes have often been taped up to prevent blisters. The tape would normally last several days and the once-white adhesive not stay that colour for long. One night in Nepal, after noticing the not-nearly-white tape, Maya, our home-stay host quietly asked Gayle if there was anything wrong with his feet!

Speeding Ticket - Recently we woke up to an email that looked very suspicious - you know the ones that say “overdue account”.  Turns out it was a legit email from the Yes car rental company and one of us had a bit of a lead foot, going 85 in a 70 zone and got nabbed by photo radar at 7:15 am.  This was the day we were driving to the Black Water cave.  Google maps gave us about 2 hours, but the night before, one of the locals suggested that was light so we pushed the limits a bit. We ended up arriving before the place even opened!  

Peanut Butter and Jam - During our time as van-lifers in New Zealand we picked up a jar of peanut butter that became a staple for our many hikes. Paul was overjoyed, when in Nepal, he learned that Gayle had secretly packed it! At our second home-stay we had lots of bread- plain, white, dry, bread. During one of our many walks to Sarangkot we purchased a small jar of jam to partner with the peanut butter. We began secretly squirrelling away some bread in our pockets at meals and snacks so we could make peanut butter and jam sandwiches in our room.

The Smells of Travel - Pictures, videos and blogs do not capture all of the senses!  Tika and Maya both made tea that smelled amazing! Nick’s cooking - especially the slow cooked beef was a nose treat, every time! Terrie’s kitchen had the smell of home cooking and fresh coffee. 

On the more offensive end of the scale are:

• The persistent smoke from cooking, brush and garbage fires in rural Nepal
• Urban smog, dust, diesel smoke and open sewers in Kathmandu
• The nose-abuse of Debbie’s house with 2 large and aging dogs, 2 cats and the occasional chicken.
• One word- Manure!

The 3 Dollar Bed

Thursdays at camp have been special because we take hikes to remote locations to have a night hike. We also get to sleep away from camp.

Truth being told, the details are always a little scarce and volunteers can be seen scrambling to find and pack required gear or money that has been announced at the last minute. 

Thursday’s hike was to the Baobab tree. Details about sleeping arrangements mostly came from rumours and volunteers that had previously taken the trip. We surmised that there was a “big tent” and a house. Just before leaving the inevitable announcement came - “make sure you have a sleeping mat because there’s not enough room in the house.” Picture rats scurrying.

Fast forward a few hours. After the night hike was over the information about rooms in the house was still not clear. A few of us started claiming areas in the tent and 2 or three headed to the porch of the house. Gayle, whose sleeping mat was not holding air, was angling for a bed in the house. I had a mat so found a spot in the tent and got ready for the night. 

Just as I was coming out to brush my teeth, Gayle found me to say that she had negotiated a deal with Fedy, one of our guides, to get a double bed in the house. Just 5000 Ariary! ($1.50) She didn’t have too much trouble convincing me to join her. 

 

I hastily packed up my bed, passing my mat to Fion and moved into the bedroom.  As I was leaving the tent, I overheard Malagasy Paul, our other guide, trying to rent the same bedroom to Martha. I resisted the urge to interfere and slid quietly into the bedroom. 

The “bed” was a thin mattress on the floor with empty beer bottles, pots, pans, buckets and tools in the room. The floor had a hole directly to the outside near Gayle’s head. It smelled. There was a light on all night. Oh well, what can you expect for $1.50? 

Moments after settling in, Fedy came to ask for payment. I produced a 20000 note and he gave me back only 10000. The number of people in the bed and therefore,the price, had doubled!  

Somehow, $3.00 didn’t seem overpriced, though as we learned that Tim paid $1.50 to sleep on couch cushions on the floor and Mattia paid $1.50 to share a bed with 2 boys (one of whom fell out - onto Tim).

Seriously, you can’t make a story like this up!

Questionable Science

Science is a way to observe and explain the world around us. It follows a set of so called "protocols". Things like asking questions, designing experiments and/or procedures that can be followed and repeated by others, implementing controls during studies to ensure data collection is valid. These are concepts fundamental to scientigic research. Needless to say we were both excited when we learned we'd be collecting data to compare wild and anthropomorphic (in contact with humans) lemur groups. I mean, we are at the MRCI - Madagascar Research and Conservation Institute.

To prep for our lemur survey we started by learning several behavioural codes. To name a few: T meant traveling, FOR was foraging, TIU stood for “tourist interrupted” where normal behaviour is stopped due to humans. With a laminated code cheat sheet in hand, we trekked into the jungle looking for the local conspiracy of lemurs. How cool a group of lemurs is called a conspiracy, right? About 200 m up the mountain, boom - lemurs! We had found a small group of 5. We quickly paired up to watch a selected male or female. 

In science class, when we do an experiment we usually have students identify experimental errors. It's a great way to promote thinking. See how many errors you can find in what we did.

We started our observations, and were to share them with the recorder every minute. (Although no one paid too much attention to the clock.) Each time someone moved, the lemurs stopped and gave a death stare. Each time someone shared an observation with the recorder, another lemur death stare. Needless to say, there was a lot of TIU - tourist interuption happening! 

After about a 30 minute survey of wild lemurs, we relocated to the Lemur Park to observe lemurs who have regular contact with humans in an interactive petting zoo like setting. Again we paired up to watch our selected male or female lemur, much like before. It didn't take long for these curious lemurs to come closer, and closer, until they were literally crawling on one of our crew - Mika. Strange, but whatever. Sometimes you need to sit back and just let science happen. 

After about a minute, Mika realized that he had snagged a banana from breakfast and zipped it into his pocket. Oops - in the lemur park the saying is “no banana, no friend” as bananas are used to promote interactions with tourists. Mika’s intended midmorning snack caused A LOT of TIA - Tourist Interaction with the “scientists”. Although hilarious, this lemur survey was definitely a bust. As our science students would conclude, banana in pocket was a major source of error and multiple recordings of TIA on our data sheet!

Hopefully our next lemur survey will be more controlled, or at least banana free.

The Night Hike

From almost the instant we arrived people were telling us about the overnight trip and the “Night Hike”. There were stories of sleeping in an old church and on the beach with hikes to see creatures that only come out a night. 

Thursday was the big day. The night hike is a treat for only the “Forest” program, so there are often requests from people in other programs to join. At 2:30 the group corralled in the dining area - about 14 of us in total. Our back packs were loaded with sleeping bags, pillows, mats and flash lights.  Unfortunately not everyone had been read the gear list and a few were going to be sleeping on a hard concrete floor.  

Our journey began with a 90 minute walk to the church building where we cleared the simply made pews and many cockroaches - Paul gave special attention to the ones crawling up his neck!

We dropped our gear and then walked another 20 minutes to the peak of Nosy Komba.  This culminated in an incredible view is the sunset over Nosy Be and some fresh fruit and juice. At the top the air was clear, cool and fresh. In our sweaty clothes it was almost uncomfortably cold!  Everyone enjoyed the break from the heat. 

We had anticipated some data collection along a marked transect, however, it’s Vanilla season and we didn’t want to disturb the plants so that was cancelled. After dinner at an unbelievably remote “Restaurant” (we believe that it is just someone’s home that has been set up to set 15 ‘Forest’ people every 3 weeks or so!) we headed back got the church to gear up for our night hike. 

Pans on, bug spray misted and flashlights in hand we followed Fedy out into the jungle for a slow and quiet walk. Within minutes he had spotted frogs and geckos. Some only about finger nail size! We also saw giant snails, 4 snakes and some cool spiders. (This chameleon is a Brooksia Stumpfii)

After about a hour we returned to our church accommodation hopeful that the cockroaches had not returned. Everyone was very tired and we all fell asleep very quickly. Unfortunately, the air in Gayle’s mat did not stay for more than 10 minutes, so it was an uncomfortable night for her! Needless to say, by morning, the church was a bit of a smelly train wreck.

,

We were on the trail down by 6:30 am. The Forest crew has a very light program on Fridays so many people could be found engaged in a much needed nap after breakfast! 

So Many Malagasy Questions

After having spent my first week at the Madagascar Research and Conservation Institute, many questions have surfaced. Here goes:

Q: Can you get clothes clean by washing in brown river water?

A: “Clean” is a relative scale, right. No one else is clean!

Q:Why is the ground wet below a pipe running away from the sink?

A: it’s hard to maintain things when competing with the jungle!

Q:How much is enough water to drink when it's 38C and feels like 43C?

A: Have you peed lately?

Q:Is it OK to sleep with a gecko in my bed?

A: it’s way better when the gecko sleeps in someone else’s bed! (Same for spiders and snakes!)

Q:Are these cramps just gas, or will it become diarrhea?

A: plan for the worst. Put some “loo roll” in your pocket!

Q: How much is too much rice?

A: if the previous question is a problem, eat more rice.

Q: Where does the garbage actually go? Yellow bins everywhere, and Nosy Komba is a small island.

A: There are no fires burning close by, but maybe that happens at night. 

Q:Why do all the bird species sound the same? Or is that just me?

A: These green pidgeons sound like puppies. The angry cat sounds come from bulbols. The rest well…

Q:Do giant cockroaches bite? (We slept on a cement church floor, and this was a REAL concern!)

A: whether they bite or crawl on your face, it’s still bad. 

Q: Who "borrowed" our sunscreen?

A: Based on the number of burnt faces, backs and legs returning from this weekend’s “fun” away from camp, no one here has ANY screen.

Unbelievably Hot and Sweaty

I mean really sweaty!

It’s 1:08 am. I have awoken to my body dripping with sweat. My sleeping bag, which serves only as a sheet between me and the mattress, is drenched. Despite being in an open air hut, with the sound of waves rolling into the rocky shore below, the air is still.  A hopeful walk under the clear and starry sky didn’t help at all. As I struggle in the dark to key this memory into the iPad, I constantly adjust to keep my limbs from touching my torso or each other. 

Yesterday was 32 degrees. The weather app says it felt like 36, however my body registered a much higher number. Our day began with a 2km hike up to the agro-forest to plant saplings. After clearing brush with a machete and digging with a 4 kilo piece of rebar for 90 minutes in the morning sun my clothes were sopping. It certainly didn’t help that I was wearing pants to prevent insect bites. 

And that was just the start. 

Between the various activities throughout the day, there were three changes of clothes, at least three showers and one swim in the ocean. When I arrived to my cabin at 9pm, having barely moved for 3 hours, I had to, once again, hang my clothes to dry.

Today will bring more of the same as we are hiking to collect bird and reptile data. Our accommodation will be an old church floor at the top of the island after a sweaty night-hike to find nocturnal critters. (More details on this in a future post). 

And, I can’t wait!  Sweat is temporary, these experiences and memories will last for a long time. 

Perhaps I should get some sleep now. I’ll be up early to hang my sleeping bag.

Life at Camp

We are now a few days into our latest adventure and decided that we’ll give you a sense of camp life at Turtle Cove. 

The “camp” is Madagascar Research and Conservation Institute which is located on the ancient volcanic island of Nosy Komba or Lemur Island. The facility is built into the jungle and the huge basalt boulders that define the hillsides. 

This idyllic setting is part of a group of islands off the north west coast of Madagascar that separated from Africa about 160 million years ago. The island itself is only about 2 km in diameter and has no roads or cars. There are a few small villages and some small hotels and other homes dotting the perimeter. Our camp has a small, postcard image beachfront that is the home to many green and Hawkesbill turtles. 

Our camp is made up of mostly open air facilities including a kitchen/ dining area, main house and several cabins with 3 bunk beds. Interestingly, cabins are named not numbered - Paul is in Salty, Gayle is in Outhouse. 

There are roughly 30 volunteers and 15 staff here that participate in 5 different programs- Marine Conservation, Turtle Conservation, Community, Construction and Forest Conservation. The latter is where we’ll spend most of our time. Most of the staff and volunteers are young adults, with a few “more experienced” of us thrown in. Picture summer camp for grown ups- many not wearing much.

Although there is a defined schedule, camp life mimics Madagascar’s Mora Mora (Slowly, Slowly) way of life. Each evening at dinner “the board” of activities is revealed for the next day. 

A typical day is breakfast at 6:30 with work or training beginning at 7:30 and going until (roughly) noon when the lunch whistle blows. We start the program again at 1:30 and continue until about 3 or 4. Today we went to the jungle to collect data on birds. We then planted some cacao trees before heading to the jungle to collect bamboo for a new tree nursery. This afternoon we have some more training on birds and other Madagascar wildlife. Dinner is at 6 and we usually play cards or dice after for a while with the other volunteers.

We are having an amazing time and enjoying meeting lots of new people from around the world. We are also looking forward to some fun weekend adventures visiting the neighbouring islands. 

Arriving in Madagascar

Coming to Madagascar has been a bit of a dream for a while. You know when people ask what places are on your travel bucket list, I'd have to say Madagascar was on the top of mine.  So you can imagine my excitement as the Nosy Be airport was coming into view. My excitement might also have been delirium, as we'd been traveling for 30 hours by this point!

We disembarked on the tarmac (I love when we get to do this!) and walked into the airport. As Paul and I were sitting close to the front of the plane, and are fairly fast walkers, so we were near the head of the pack. Straight away we were handed two identical and poorly photocopied quarter pieces of paper, that were our unofficial immigration forms. We immediately grabbed our pens and went to work filling them out while loosely standing in line. It soon turned into chaos as more travelers entered this scene. People were being given forms, looking for pens, and seeking clarification. I did wonder why we weren't given the forms to complete on the plane before arriving, but... 

When I finished filling out both forms, I looked up to get some guidance on the next step. Right away the official immigration police officer grabbed both forms and handed them both to a short woman. It did seem sketchy, but who was I to question it. I trundled off to the Visa desk, proudly showed my tourist visa I had got back in Canada at the Madagascar Consulate in Ottawa. She gave me a smile and head nod, and pointed to the immigration desk.

I rolled up to the immigration desk, handed over my passport and was greeted with a stern "papers"? I quickly pointed and said, "I gave them over there." But as I pointed, I saw no short woman with papers in hand. Oh dear, this wasn't going well. I ventured back into the fray to find either the short woman or new papers to fill out. As I turned to scan the room for Paul, another Immigration Police Officer was coming my way. I saw Paul standing behind the immigration check desk and I heard him say something like "Go with him. Money."

Although thoroughly confused at this point I did go with him to his immigration desk. He started filling out the poorly photocopied and unofficial immigration form for me. I pointed to the first immigration desk and said "my passport". He retrieved that for me. In the end, my passport was stamped and I moved into the luggage retrieval area.

It was at this point Paul said, "I paid him." When Paul had gone through immigration, the officer had come very close and whispered "tips for us?". Now we know what $20 US will get you in the  Madagascar airport. And we're a little more vigilant about being scammed. Lesson learned. Don't give your forms to a short woman! - if it were only that easy. 

Top Ten Jungle Photos

Our trek with Kalu in the jungle outside of Chiang Mai did not disappoint. It was the perfect mix of nature, culture, sights and food to round out our adventures in Thailand. This is a must do trip for anyone heading to Thailand.

Here is the story of our trek through pictures.

1. We started the day with a shower in this amazing waterfall.

2. Next we visited a hot spring and had the entire place to ourselves.

3. After lunch we walked to a geyser then about 3 hours to a remote jungle village. It had rained so the leeches were out in full force. (Double click the image and try to find the leech.)

4. Gayle helped to cook dinner.

5. After sleeping in a rustic private bungalow, we had an amazing breakfast. The coffee was grown in the village.

6. We hiked an little, the had a long bamboo raft ride.

7. We got to feed and swim with elephants!

All Roads Lead to BKK

I

Suvarnabhumi Airport (BKK) is the main air travel hub in Bangkok. It is a sizeable, modern facility with only 1 terminal but 8 separate concourses - each with multiple gates. The walking time is listed - often 10 or more minutes. We’ve even had to take busses to and from our planes.

Since leaving Auckland, BKK has been our start and finish for trips to Nepal, Phuket and Chiang Mai. Today we are spending 8 quality hours here as we wait for our 2 am flight to Ethiopia. We are now experts at navigating air travel in Bangkok - a skill that I am sure most of you are jealous of!

Over our multiple trips though this airport, we have learned a few things: 

1. The electric taxis are easier to get, but are twice the cost of hybrids!  (That is, if the driver chooses to go by the meter. Since the meter was “broken”, we ended up paying just about the same.)

2. The cheapest way in and out is by the Rail link which costs only about $2 per person to take the 30 minute ride to the centre of the city. (Although, we ended up stuck for about an hour waiting due to a broken train.)

3. You can eat very well in BKK. All the chains are here, as well as many specialty restaurants. We found a market today with about 20 stalls that sold food for just above “street food” prices. The busiest spot, of course, is the Thai favourite - 7/11. Despite all of that, we brought some PBJ sandwiches along to keep the costs down a little.

4. The currency exchanges will not change Nepali Rupees. We have about $30 worth that we failed to exchange before we passed security in Kathmandu. We have a good deal for anyone heading to Nepal!

5. There are very impressive automated floor cleaners that have steering wheels but no drivers. They have no problem avoiding people, luggage, furniture and evidently, stairs.

6. There are multiple cart retrieval staff who mostly sit watching videos. 

7. The duty free stores have free candy samples. Gayle was a big fan of the coconut flavoured ones  

8. There are electronic signs outside of some of the washrooms showing how many free stalls and the location and distance to the nearest free stall.

9. The free wifi lasts about an hour. It’s now 12 am and I have just reset my account for the 6th time!

Cooking With Class

Back in October, once we had established our “vacation” location as Thailand, we decided that our third stop would be Chiang Mai, a city in in the northern part of the country. We’d heard about people who had come here to work with elephants and build a school and we knew there would also be some jungle hiking to do. While formalizing our plans, Gayle decided that a Thai cooking class would be an excellent opportunity to learn not only about Thai food, but to embrace the culture a little. After scouring the reviews on Trip Advisor, we booked a 1/2 day class with the Smile Organic Farm Cooking School. 

We departed in a van with a few others at about 8 am. Our first stop was a local market, where our guide gave us a tour of the stalls - explaining what each sold. The farm was supplying all of our food to cook, so, in order to keep the Thai economy flush, we purchased some donuts!

Upon arrival, we found our kitchen and our group of 10 new friends and donned our aprons. Lilly toured us around the garden and we finally had a much better sense of what we have been eating for the last week. (The delicious green balls are actually a type of eggplant and there is a type of basil that is very spicy - ask Paul - he still remembers both his ears burning as he could barely speak after chewing the basil!)

Next it was time to chose our menu items - one curry, one soup and one stir fry. Gayle selected: Hot and Creamy Soup, Red Curry, snd Pad Thai, while Paul chose to make a Panaeng Curry, Hot and Sour soup and a cashew chicken stir fry. Since we always share anyway we got to try 6 new dishes!

To get us started, Lilly demonstrated the ingredients, cutting and wok techniques as we all took turns helping to make spring roll ingredients. Next we, were sent off to our woks to start chopping and cooking. Within minutes the heat was on - Paul even lost some hair on his fingers! 

 

Lilly was amazing. For each course there were 4 different dishes being made - add in one vegan and one fish allergy and she had her hands full. She expertly directed us, even giving different groups code names to keep us organized. She told us the order to add things, when to turn the heat up and down, and most importantly didn’t let us burn anything!

After making and eating all of the stir fry, we made the soup and curry. We were pretty full so we took most of those home with us to eat later. One of the bonus features was that we didn’t have to do dishes!

We both commented about how well put together the whole thing was.  The script, the pace and the supports were all smooth and well-oiled. 

Sometimes The Result Is Better Than The Plan

Bangkok has been a challenge for us. We were greeted by hot and humid temperatures of over 40C, prostitutes a street over from our Air BB, feral cats, and the general busyness and pollution of a major capital city. That being said, we made up our minds on our last night to visit the famous Buddhist Wat Arun Temple. All nighttime pictures revealed a gorgeous golden shrine - and Trip Advisor does rank it as the number one site to visit in Bangkok.

We started to plot our journey using Google maps, only to realize the temple closed at 6pm.  It was 5:12, and we were a good hour away. Oops. Should have looked at this a bit sooner. We discussed options, and decided to go for it anyway. An outside view would still be spectacular.

Google gave us multiple travel options, and we decided on the one where we could maximize our BTS Skytrain day pass: BTS green, transfer to BTS blue, then transfer to BTS gold, and finish with a 38 minute walk to the temple.

Things were going remarkably well. Great city views, air conditioned trains, picture worthy river crossing, arrival to the gold train. We hopped off, exited the blue, found the gold and pressed our day pass to the entrance gate. Denied. Try again. Denied again. Guess the gold line was a premium service not included in our day pass. Not sure how we missed that (maybe it was in fine print, or large Thai print that we cannot read ;).

Quick brainstorm and decision. We'd go back a BTS station and walk alongside the river. It was a good plan in theory, but there was no foot path along the river. However, we did land at a pier, and there just so happened to be a shuttle boat bound for Iconsiam. We didn't know what that was, but it was a boat ride and it looked free, so we jumped on. We soon realized Iconsiam is a VERY fancy high-end mall. Perfect. Gayle is always looking to add to her Louis Vuitton  collection and you all know how well Paul would handle a fancy Mont Blanc pen!

We disembarked our “sunset boat cruise” and stepped into a patio dance competition with a party atmosphere complete with food trucks and a digital light show. While it was nice to have a look at the Maseratis on display (really!), the best part was probably the skyline view of Bangkok from the 7th floor of the mall.

With smiles on our faces, we reflected that sometimes the result is better than the plan. Our temple adventure grew legs and turned into something much different. 

Guess we'll just have to enjoy the pictures of Wat Arun Temple.