Recovering, but long train ride

Friday, October 17th

Needless to say, we were pretty slow this morning, but I did wake up at 8am to hand in our laundry for washing.  Pom greeted me with her normal welcoming smile but did comment that I should go back to sleep and that I was smelly.  I probably smelled like smoke and alcohol combined.  Nasty nasty.

I did fall back asleep, and at 10am, we both woke up to pack and got ready for the day. We were pretty slow moving, but eventually got our stuff together to check out.  We scheduled a one hour Thai massage for 250 baht ($8) after lunch and internet surfing.  You must be wondering why we don't do this everyday.  It's because we're low cost budget backpackers.  We had lunch at the first place we went when we got to chiang mai.  It was good like last time.  I then surfed the net at wawee coffee while stephanie took a nap on the comfy chair.  An hour later, it was time for our massages.

Thai massage has a lot of stretching and less kneading.  Either way, it loosened up our very tense and overworked muscles.  We then waited to go to the train station at the guesthouse.  While we were packing our laundry back into our bags and closing the bill, we chatted with Pom.  She is very nice, so we exchanged emails.  Her english was very fluent, and she opened up to us.  At first she thought steph and I were very quiet because we kept to ourselves, hanging out in our rooms all the time.  Eventually (I think after we asked her to come out) she realized we were friendly and nice.  She is dating an irish man that just visits her every few months and constantly emails/sms.  I'm not sure if we are cynical but we think that man might be just playing her...like have another family back at home.  She is so pretty and nice.  Hopefully it's for real.  She also told us it's very difficult for Thais to visit america, especially women, because the US is afraid they won't go back to thailand.  So sad.  All the best to pom.

At 5:00pm, steph and I hopped in the back of a red truck to drive us to the train station.  We had an hour to spare, so we went to a cafe for some dinner.  We shared a taco plate and bought a sandwich for our overnight train ride.  Mexican food had been much missed this trip.  I'm dreaming of la esquina right now.

I didn't mention our travel for this trip yet.  We are taking a 12hr overnight train ride to bangkok, staying there for the day and that evening taking another overnight train to surat thani, then bus and ferry to one of the eastern islands.  We are still not sure which one we want to check out first.  Playing it by ear.  So yes, we are not showering for 2 days straight and will continue to wear the same clothes.  I know.  Pretty gross. We will try our best to stay in the shade to avoid sweating, if that is possible.

On the train we met two females that are internal auditors.  They must of thought we were weird because we asked to put the beds up at 6:30pm.  We just wanted to lay down and do our thing - blog, read, eat - before sleeping.

I am happy to report this train is much better than the other one.  The bathroom is just as small but less smelly and there's a door to shut out the train noises.  But, it's still dirty as I spotted 3 roaches already.  I guess you can't expect that much for $25.

 

We are still sad about leaving, but I guess it gives us more reasons to return someday soon.  Farewell chiang mai and hello beaches.