Chaing Mai. Bangkok. Koh Tao (Turtle Island).

For our last day in Chaing Mai we decided to ride bikes to a wat (Buddhist Temple) called Doi Suthep. The name means drawing closer to heaven, pretty cool since it is at the top of a mountain. Our bikes were of true wal-mart quality, but had sweet bells and baskets on them :) We ended up riding 32 miles, 7 of those miles were super steep like riding up South Mountain in Draper. Everyone was cheering us on, Thai's on thier motorcycles and tourists in the back of trucks. The top was pretty, but the best part was going down. We were laughing and smiling the entire time because getting up was so hard! It was really fun. We felt very accomplished. We got Thai massages, one hour for 4$ then hopped on an overnight train bound for Bangkok. We walked around Bangkok then got on another overnight train headed south towards Koh Tao (pronounced "Got Dow").
It is beautiful here. We have been doing scuba classes to get PADI certified. It doesn't seem like we are in Thailand anymore because there are SO many westerners here! Lots of young hipsters from Europe are here where it is rad to not wear shoes anywhere. I hope their Tetanus is current :)  Today I asked a Thai lady if there was a market to get breakfast she said there isn't one on the island. So then I asked where Thai people living here eat breakfast, she smiled and said 7-Eleven. We left Thailand on the pier!
We stumbled upon a resturant this morning that had a buffet breakfast for 6$ a piece.We only had 30 minutes until scuba lessons started but I am sure we got our money's worth! It was awesome, and we will be back there again tomorrow. Life is good. Wish you were here!

As if riding up the mountain  wasn't enough, we had to hike up 309 stairs to the wat. We are lookin our best after that ride.

Doi Suthep (pronounced doy su-teb). Still lookin good!

Second Class sleeper with a fan. Not as plush as our last sleeper car, but its about $6 cheaper.

View from breakfast on Koh Tao.

Bangkok from the river ferry.

Lomprayah,  the high speed catamaran we took to Koh Tao.

Chiang Mai

Through the excellent train system of Thailand, we have made our way to Chiang Mai. I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Our overnight train was much better this time around. We were in the 2nd Class air con sleeper. Our seats (pictured on top) would convert to bunk beds (pictured on bottom). The only issue this time was that they left the lights on all night and being on the top bunks meant it was difficult to sleep. However, we sat next to a guy from India who has several businesses in Thailand and one of his coworkers. They were on their way to Chiang Mai for business at one of his offices.

We trekked to our hotel from the train station. We made it in time for the Annual Chiang Mai Flower Festival. The next few pictures are from the festival. 

Crowd control isn't like it is in the US. 

Traditional dances from the surrounding countries and Thailand were displayed on the stage all night long. A night market with food and merchandise vendors lined the plaza. The night ended with fireworks which we heard from our hotel.

Church in Chiang Mai was awesome! There were a lot of Farangs (Thais use this word to describe western people. Pronounced "Fa-wrong-s"). There was a group of people who were teaching English in china from BYU. They came down for vaca. The Branch in Chiang Mai has been split into two branches. The work in Thailand is moving so fast. Last month the mission baptized 164 people! When Shelley was here the mission had about 100 missionaries. Now, there is 162. The missionaries were told that if the work continues to be this steady, they will attract the attenttion of the First Presidency and could have a Temple announced for Thailand within a year. The field is white and already to harvest. 

A Few Pictures of Our Day

We did laundry and our hotel didn't have a dryer. Next best situation, hang dry in our room all night long. Good thing for an air conditioner. 

We took a bus to Chok Chai Farms and had a famous Chok Chai Steakburger. It was super good. Hamburgers are hard to come by in Asia and this one was super good. 

To get back to Khorat we needed to hitch a ride on another bus. The problem was, all the buses were on the highway. As we were waiting (don't worry moms, this is what people do in Asia and there were others waiting to do the same thing) a policeman pulled up on his motorcycle and asked where we were going. I turned him over to my trusty translator and off he went to flag down a bus for us. We had waited for about 30-40 minutes total before a bus finally pulled over and we climbed aboard. The bus ride home was cheaper than the bus ride to Chok Chai. 

A Relaxing Day

Ever since we have been in Thailand, we have felt like we have been on the move. Today, we played the relax card and took things a little slower. We didn't even leave our hotel room until 10:30ish. It was so nice to be in a clean and comfortable hotel room. We found some breakfast from a lady with a pull cart near our hotel. We had sticky rice and muu bing (this one is easy..."moo bing"). Muu bing is pork on a stick and it is good.
We walked to the center of town and found our way through markets. We felt like Andrew Zimmern on the Travel Channel when we would wind and weave our way through a market and we would discover a locals market hidden from the tourists. We were the only white people there and we were glad this market remained hidden. It was much more smelly from diffrent fish. I don't think tourists could handle it.
We rented bikes for 3 hours for $4 (120 baht) and just cruised around town. It felt super nice to play the relaxing card and not really do much.
A couple of things we've noticed lately:
-We are not as hungry as often now. We think we may be getting use to the diet here.
-Our hotel in Ubon had a scale and Spike has lost about 7 lbs. in the last 4 weeks. Not a bad diet plan. If Atkins, Jenny Craig, or Weight Watchers doesn't do it for you, come to Southeast Asia.
-How simple life can be. We don't need all the fancy things to have a great life. We can get by with less.
-How similar we are with the people all over the world. We have witnessed time and time again of people coming home after a long hard day at work and love being with their families or going about their busy lives or just trying to make some simple money to pay for food that day for their family.
-How much the Lord has blessed us. We have tried really hard to do all we can to remain obedient out here and everything has fallen into place with our plans over the next three weeks.
Enjoy a few pictures.

Thao Suranari Monument. She was a local hero who hide Thais in her basement from invaders from Laos.

Shelley eating Kiewdiew (pronounced "Ga-wit-deo").

Khorat Pictures

Here are some pictures of our day.

10 days of solid Chaco wearing! Eat your heart out all you granola eaten, tree huggin, Loganites. You could get this to on Feb. 4th if you meet us in Southeast Asia. This shout out goes to Nate Julian and Chris Checketts.

Shelley and Sister Gung. We ate lunch at The Barn. The best Green Curry we've had in Thailand yet. Shelley and I ate like ravenous dogs. We were so hungry and thirsty. We actually left a meal feeling full. The first time in a month!

Church in Khorat

Sister Wipha, Shelley, their dog Sushi, and James. Sister Wipha owns a laundry business and saved up enough money to take her and James to the Hong Kong Temple this Summer. Their first time to the Temple was two years ago.

James rockin out on the guitar.

Nakhon Ratchasima or better known as Khorat

What a fun day we have had! Anything will beat the awful nights sleep we had at our hotel last night. To bring you up to speed, we had booked a hotel in Khorat a few days ago. However, after reaching Khorat on a super hot and sweaty train ride and talking to a tuk tuk driver, we quickly learned that our hotel was in a town about an hour outside of Khorat in the province of Khorat. We bit the cost on the first nights expense of our booked hotel and started trekking to find hotels.
Our search started and ended fairly quick because we were both exhausted from the heat and getting more ornery as we walked. We stopped at the first hotel we found because the lady at the front desk said that the room is 250 baht (or about $7.50 USD) per night. Not bad. We checked out the room. You could definitely tell it was for 250 baht. The shower only had cold water. The room was full of spider webs, had only a fan, and the "mattress" was a firm piece of foam that resembles the pads we use on top of the houseboat, but it was as hard as particle board. The pillows were even more hard. We made it through the night and a couple cold showers and packed up to move onto someplace else to help our sanity. What an adventure.
We found a diamond in the rough. This new place has a/c, a nice clean shower, and a real mattress, and only cost 400 baht or about $12. We have been excited to sleep ever since we found it.
Our day has consisted of visiting with a few of Shelley's peeps. We met Sister Gung for lunch. Shelley had the opportunity to find, teach, and see Sister Gung get baptized while she served in Khorat. Sister Gung got back from serving a mission in Thailand in October and is busy working for a magazine company.
Today was a day of silence for Spike because he doesn't speak Thai (other than "hello" and "thank you"). I just sat back and watched Shelley and her friends talk Thai and we both loved every minute of it. Shelley got to speak Thai and Spike got to see his wife use her talents.
After Sister Gung, we met with Sister Wipha (pronounced "we paw") and her son James. Sister Wipha loves Shelley so much and James is so good at the guitar. He is 17 years old and can hear a song and begin playing it for the first time. We quizzed him with the Eagles and Jack Johnson and he was spot on. We would play a song on YouTube and he would begin to play along about 20 secs into the song.
It is always humbling to enter the member's home. In all the homes, the pictures we take for granted in our church libraries are always the ones used as decoration on the walls of their homes, but the pictures aren't eloquently displayed. The pictures are simply taped to the walls without a frame. These members are so willing to give and always want to take care of others.
How blessed we are!

THAILAND!!!!

What an adventure we have had over the past 4 days! We have had very little or no internet access during this time, so we apologize for no entries. A little about what we've done.

On Thursday night last week, we flew from Siem Reap, Cambodia to Bangkok, Thailand. We learned that if we fly to Thailand we can receive a free 30 Visa and it would have been the same amount of money if we drove over, received a free 15 day Visa and needed to renew our Visa for $120. Needless to say, we opted for the faster route. The flight was only one hour as opposed to a 10 hour bus ride.
Friday, we just hung around Bangkok and figured out all our train routes and tickets through Thailand.  We also joined in the festivities of the Chinese New Year.  We saw the Princess of Thailand.  We made an appearance during the celebrations. Friday night, we got on a train and headed to Ubon Ratchathani. Ubon was Shelley's first area in the mission and it was a long train ride there. Check out the picture below to learn more.
Ubon was wonderful. It was so much fun to be in Shelley's old stomping grounds and where she kicked the pavement to share to Gospel. We saw many of her friends and members at church. Two special people to Shelley are Sister Ging and Sister Mee Nida (pronounced "manita"). Those two sure love Shelley and were so excited to see her. There wasn't much to do in Ubon. It was somewhat of a ghost town. Many people were gone and shops were closed for the New Year.
Now we are in Khorat (Shelley's second area). We took another train to get here, but to our surprise it actually was on time today.
Below are a few pictures of our adventures.

The only overnight tickets available were the 3rd class seats. These chairs were like sitting in a church pew for 13 hours. So uncomfy!  Plus the windows never really sealed and we actually got cold. Also, the seats were barely big enough for two American butts side-by-side.

Trains vendors would get on and off the train all night long yelling and walking up and down the aisle trying to selling their loot.

The morning after a terrible night on the train.

Church in Ubon.

Sister Mee Neda, Sister Ging, Shelley, Spike

Train today. 2nd class seats. Much nicer.