Thai Rhapsody. Song two
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In the morning, after drinking some water, we set off on our first expedition. There is little time for “rest”, but there is a lot to do. So I decided to immediately rush to the tiger temple. To do this, we crossed the road and sat down at the bus stop. It was 7 am. About five minutes later, a songteo stopped near us. I went up to the carrier and said the magic phrase "tiger cave". He nodded to sit down. Songteo, if anyone does not know, is something like a pickup. Carrier cab and body with two parallel benches. There is a roof. Boards are open in good weather. In case of rain, oilcloth curtains fall. The weather was good and we rushed towards the airport with a breeze.
A little before reaching it, we turned into the depths of the mainland. Having dropped us off directly at the temple, and taking 150 baht each, the driver rushed back.
I was wearing shorts and a T-shirt, so I put on a pareo. The rest were dressed relatively well.
After examining the temple from the outside, we moved to a staircase of 1300 steps leading to the mountain.
The steps were high, but narrow. Verka began to slow down after the first flight. And I warned that we would have such a slide in the program. Train, Vera, train! She assured me that she was training - she walked every day to the 3rd floor. I told her to go at her own pace. When it comes, then it comes. And Vadik and I ran upstairs. Well, how did you get tired? They crawled away, rather. Just a little faster than the Verka turtle.
“Pain and sadness are dragged to the bottom, the load of previous mistakes” (c).
Well, nothing, you look, along the way we will drop a couple of kilos of karma.
It took us 45 minutes to get up. On the way we met a couple of toilets. Everything is civil. The boards were interesting. True, I understood them, probably in my own way. For example, this one:
I realized that the ladies, accompanied by two men, can rise at any time. But spending the night with them in a cave is categorically no way!
And that cute dog upstairs is meditating. Please don't disturb her!
Seeing this dude, Vadik and I, without saying a word, unanimously issued: “The Knight in the Panther's Skin! ".
In the reports I read recommendations to take plenty of water with you. Listen, fool! She's heavy as hell! And I drank hardly 100 grams. On the rise, an experienced mountain tourist in the person of Vadik does not recommend drinking a lot. And at the top there is a faucet with drinking water. And a barrel of rainwater to wash.
Having taken a picture of everything around, including meditating dogs, I remembered that I saw some other sights on the map. Monastery, yes. Only now we were at the top. And there was no monastery nearby. Vadik said that we need to go down, and then climb another mountain. Ah-ah-ah! Rise again! But we will not leave here without seeing everything!
They began to descend. Verki is nowhere to be seen. Already at the very bottom I felt the smell of cigarette smoke. There are “no smoking” signs everywhere. A group in striped bathing suits (sorry, T-shirts) was walking towards them. The two men were dressed the same as children from orphanages. I suspected it was mine. And they were smoking. Vadik told them: “You also smoke! ". To which they replied: “And we also grunted tequila from the morning! ". Wow, health people! However, they turned back.
My legs were not tired at all, but when I went downstairs, my knees began to tremble. Verka was sitting on a bench by the fountain. She says that she mastered the ascent right up to the first toilet. I said it was only a tenth of the way. We still had some strength left, and we decided to try to climb up to the monastery as well. But in fact, everything turned out to be very simple. We had to go up quite a bit. Then a little down and already flat. There we ended up, according to the sign, in a prodigy.
Taki in nature believe the prodigy!
The monks were absent, apparently, they were in the temple, so we were able to take a good look at everything without violating their privacy.
Seeing this, Verka decided that this was a selling point for all sorts of ritual garbage. How I cried! This is an altar, I say. Probably.
Skeleton in closet:
Like our relics, apparently.
And what trees are here!
And the mushrooms!
Well, a purely avatar forest! However, I forgot about the movie. Should be reviewed.
And this is where the monks live. Probably.
And here they relieve themselves:
Don't go to the forest! Aesthetes, damn it!
After looking at everything, we went back. On the stairs we met a couple of young russo-tourists. They asked us if we should go there? Well, of course it's worth it! And upstairs, I ask, have you been? No, they say, we are plump! And what was the point of coming here, you ask? Free tour? Although, probably, there are three in one - hot springs, blue lakes and this is a misunderstanding (in their opinion). I saw this tour on the street. It cost, it seems, 1000 baht per person. But in the reviews they wrote that the blue lakes are Plitvice for the poor. Vadik and I were on Plitvice, so we were not interested in local lakes. And the sources with the crowd - well, fuck him! And it's expensive to go there on your own. We (more precisely, I have) somewhat different interests.
There was another temple at the exit that we almost missed. Shut up, beauties! I wanted to take a picture. One of the monks sitting in a row waved his hands at me - get out, they say, settle down. Well, we got off. Everyone looked and took pictures.
Verka naively thought that we would go back the same way. But I disappointed her. On the map, I saw that not far (a couple of kilometers) from the tiger cave there is a Big C hypermarket. We headed there. On foot. What is there to go? And songteo was nowhere to be seen. However, we met along the way. In fact, it went in the opposite direction. But the woman behind the wheel slowed down. Just in case, I asked if she would take us to Big C? She shrugged her shoulders and said yes. Only she broke the price for 50 baht from the snout! Here's another! We're almost there! (we are almost at the track).
On the way there were local food outlets. In one of them, I could not resist and bought some pancakes for 20 baht. My companions did not appreciate them. I had to choke on one. Then I saw a bowl of soup with chicken feet on a poster. Om-Nom-nom! I don't like chicken. Only some of its parts. Paws in particular. But Verka pearled ahead like a bulldozer. We went out to the track. No, it's time for breakfast! We only drank water in the morning. And it was already almost 11 o'clock. Seeing another eatery, she firmly wrapped everyone inside. Ordered rice with pork.
We were served some more chopped cucumbers and some pods and glasses with ice so that we could pour our warmed water there. Verka, however, bought herself some kind of poisonous red garbage in a bottle for 5 baht. She loves all kinds of rubbish. The spices were served separately, so Verka ate it without any problems, and we sipped ourselves heartily. We paid 140 baht for everything.
In Big C, of interest was a liter of rum for 430 baht, ready-made and raw shrimp.
The prices for them were different, and I would not say that they were low. But we scored all sorts of raw little by little. Including the discounted ones (which, in fact, turned out to be no worse than the discounted ones).
Suspecting that we would not be able to rent a house with a kitchen, I took a kettle and an aluminum bowl with me just in case. I was thinking of cooking shrimp in it. By the way, I also needed an aluminum basin for another. Since the third segment, Bangkok-Krabi, was not operated by Qatar, but by Thai Airways, I did not know if the luggage would fly all the way to Krabi or if it would have to be picked up in Bangkok. In order not to take risks with such a short connection, we did not check in our luggage, but limited ourselves to hand luggage (7 kg). But if I can still do without any nail files, then I couldn’t let my eyebrows sprout as they please. Therefore, I took tweezers with me, putting it in the aforementioned basin. It's gone! At customs, he (tweezers) was not noticed. X-ray was severely deceived.
Let's go back to Big C. Fruit is a total disaster there. We didn't find anything interesting. Imagine, but there, too, almost all fruits and vegetables are imported! For example, avocado is New Zealand! And I, stupid, naively believed that Tae was just a fruit paradise! In SL, I remember, I thought that all the fruits were exported from Tai. Apparently, there is nothing particularly exotic anywhere in November! Well, only manga-pineapple-bananas. Everything is so trite!
Well, we didn't look at junk. I wanted to go back to the sea. In short, apart from rum and shrimp, we bought almost nothing.
We went outside. To go back, it was necessary to somehow cross the highway. It turned out to be difficult. No transition was observed nearby. I had to risk my life and throw myself under the stream of traffic.
Switched. We stand, we wait. Stops songteo. Red. Without asking the carrier, we are loaded. And he brought us to Krabi town! Yoker Babay! I tell him: “Ao-Nang! ". And he took 50 baht from us and pointed to another songteo - white. Well, at least we looked at the city a little. There is nothing to do there. We saw only from a distance a pretty temple, but a river. You think!
Changing to another songteo, let's go home. At the exit, we looked at how much you need to pay. I took a hundred square meters from the Chinese. Well, I gave the same. It turned out that the road, both there and back, took 150 baht from us.
After eating shrimp with beer and having a little rest, Vadik and I went to watch the sunset. Verka remained to rest.
The sea - well, purely our Azov! The same dull green and small. Because the sand is almost the same.
Sunset was a solid four on a ten-point scale.
By the way, I apologize for the quality of the photos. The equipment is useless - telephones and an old digital soap box. I can't improve, and I don't have time.
After sunset we went to the mosque.
There, as I knew, in the evenings there is a market with cheap (relatively) food. There we bought beef skewers for 20 baht, trays with squid in batter and three breaded shrimp. And then, and then - for 30 baht. And a dragon shake. For 50 baht (or 40 - I do not remember exactly).
Unlike the dragon we bought at the market the day before, this one was red cut and probably sweet. And the one from yesterday is white and unsweetened. We didn't like it! And there were no such red ones on sale. However, how to guess what is inside him?
At home we sat on our veranda. Verka had to drag her chair. We liked the food. The skewers were tender and juicy. The fat is delicious. Only now the meat surprisingly resembled pork! No, well, finally! Sell pork under the mosque! She also wore a hijab!
However, what do I understand about this? When I read the word "halal" on the map, I wondered what it means? I assumed the word was synonymous with "kosher. " But I found out that it's not that easy! Kosher may or may not be halal.
"There are dreams without dreams, but there are no dreams without sleep" (c)
Something like that!
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