Sanuk!

This morning's adventure was to waterfall Erawan, one of the most beautiful and famed throughout Thailand. Its named after the hindu god erawan, the elephant with 3 heads as the falls are supposedly resemble him. We set up a trip with 10 others interested in the trip and got a van ride to the national park about 50 minutes away near the elephant camp from yesterday. The falls are incredible, there are 7 different steps to it, we went the entire trail and it was definitely worth it. Never have I seen water so blue and clear, equivalent to the beaches in Greece, just amazing. We took tons of pictures and go pro videos in the water, rock sliding down into the water as well! However I have a slight issue with water creatures I can't seem to get over, so the fish nibbling my toes made me anxious as anything! I always think I can handle being in natural water, then I get super nervous, shaky and panic! So ridiculous, a fear of fish haha. So some amazing waterfall swimming, and exploring behind the falls, and meeting interesting people, like a young guy teaching ESL in Bangkok for a year. Not to mention tons of monkeys and baby monkeys, and wild peacocks because that's totally normal.

Afterwards we got some street food from the park before our van ride back, chicken pad Thai and more of the delicious papaya salad I've had, and some awesome chips that look like homemade plantain chips but are sweet, like with honey on them. Now we are back at our resort, going to walk more of the trails along the river and bridge and spend time at the pool. Tomorrow morning we leave for Ayuthaya which should be incredible. The ruins of the old capitol, through the research I've done it keeps making me think of a Rome of eastern Asia, awesome!

To back track a little, I will be posting my recipe's from Jays family for sure! We made green and red curries, sweet and sour stir fry, spicy soup, spring rolls, fish cakes, and my favorriittee sticky rice papaya dessert. Needless to say I was in heaven!!! Just so incredible to learn all the true recipes and tricks to making authentic dishes. It was like a cooking show over there, they had everything cut up and laid out, jay would translate what they couldn't and I took avid notes and they made sure I did the cooking too so I could learn! afterwards we dropped jay off at his temple and went back to our hotel in Bangkok.

Early the next morning we left for Kanchanaburi, upon our arrival we took boat rides through th canals to the floating market. Really cool because I remember seeing th market and boat ride on anthony bourdain no reservations! Then we went o the bridge on th river Kwai, the ww2 site that POWs made and died creating, part of the "death railway". Basically a massive tourist site, but we just stayed for lunch at an awesome restaurant on the river.

Next was the elephant camp and bamboo rafting down the river, both amazing! Elephant picked me up by the trunk, gave nick a "massage" with his trunk and we got to ride. Got a few pics and videos!

a few pictures..

A few busy days!

Just woke up at our hotel in Kanachaburi, finally have some free Internet, so figure it's time to catch up! It

How can I possibly sum up our first full day in Thailand.. It feels like 3 or more combined into one! To begin the hotel is incredible, including our breakfast spread every morning of Thai and English food. We started out with some tours and sight seeing of Buddhist temples. There are 31000 in Thailand, 411 in Bangkok alone as its 94% Buddhist and 4% Muslim population. We first went to temple of the Golden Buddha and then Wat Pho, the oldest temple in Bangkok with the reclining Buddha. These are HUGE! 5 1/2 tons. Learned a lot of amazingly interesting information, about the lives of monks, Buddhism tenets and more. An interesting tidbit is that the happy Buddha or Buddha with the big belly is not Buddha at all! He is an enlightened monk, he gained weight so that others would not confuse him for the actual Buddha. We started learning the different mudras or attitudes for the mains of Buddhas postures at home for the trip, really interesting! Like the reclining buddha is when he's on his right side, symbolizing how he dies on his right side when he entered nirvana.

At the temple of the Golden Buddha we saw some monks, made an offering of the incense and lotus flower and received a string bracelet from a monk that had been blessed. Supposed to ward off evil spirits and bring good luck.

After the temples we went to the outdoor market in the city center, crazy! It was massive and we got so incredibly lost! All I know is we started near other tourists and such and ended up inside in a maze, unable to guess our way out surrounded by pets for sale. Flying squirrels on leashes, meerkats, cats and dogs, turtles, cocks... And then came across a cock ring and an active cock right with some gambling! Only locals nearby and us looking extremely touristy with our cameras tried to get some footage before booking it the other direction!

That night we decided to opt out of some cabaret dinner show the tour had and went with another couple to a Muay Thai fight in town.. what an adventureeee. We took a cab to Lampini stadium and tried to buy our tickets.. Which for Thais is 1000 baht, for us they were charging 1600 baht! Turns out the cab driver was I on this scheme and had called to let them know we were coming and for everyone to not sell us tickets for under that price and all make money off of us! Pretty crazy, so once we get in we start to realize that our cabby called and that he got a percent of interest etc so crazy. Interesting fights though, incredibly uncomfortable for me. It starts off with about 13 year olds, then goes up to about 18 year olds. And these kids can be rough!! Super tough kids, a few left the ring in a daze, knocked out. Definitely some bruised ribs and cuts as well. The last fight was entertaining for sure, a French guy against a Thai! The French won, which was surprising!

Day 2 in Bangkok we slept in, spent time at the hotel at our pool and gym and got ahold of Jay in Bangkok. We had touched base before we left, but hadnt been able to contact him since entering Thailand due to our lack of Internet. Our hotel connected to a mall, some went into the mall to a local Starbucks and a younger Thai lent us his Internet for a moment so I could get his number and message my parents to let them know we arrived okay. The kid knew English, and is apparently going to New York Ina few weeks so Nic gave him his parents number and email in Case he ran into trouble in the states to repay him (hope that's okay Mr and Mrs Martino!! =] ) So we called jay from the hotel and he let us know that this would be a hard time to see him because he is currently a monk! He signed up for 10 days and was extending to 21, but this ended up working out perfectly for me because i had really wanted to sign up for cooking lessons while here, and when I told jay that he set it up for us to come over to his home and spend time with his family and learn to cook with his mom, aunt, sister, and grandma. A 40 minute cab ride later we meet jay and his dad and spend the rest of the afternoon and evening at his beautiful home!

This will be an experience a remember for me. Times like those are especially touching for me. just like Staying with Jenny's family in Costa Rica and just like seeing my family in Nicaragua.. Being able to feel at home in somewhere so distant in a culture so different from our own is just amazingly humbling and touching.

More to come later! Our bus just arrived for our hike to the waterfalls, and pictures to come tonight!

Arrival in Bangkok

After 16 hours of flights with a layover in Beijing, we just got to our incredible hotel right outside of Bangkok! It's incredibly classy and modern but not generic! To backtrack... Our flight to beijing was 12 hours, so I just motivated myself by thinking it was a day at work, like 7-7 and could hopefully fly by. Just one large screen in the front of the plane, so no tv or movie watching, but that was fine by me. Unfortunately I could not rest for the first few hours despite my exhaustion so started reading "The Happiness Project" which I already love! And we read our guide to Thailand book and practiced some language.. Beijing's airport was eerily quiet. It's a Friday night here, so Friday at 5 in that huge airport and barely any noise, and it wasn't empty either! Much different atmosphere than a US airport. We practiced some calligraphy.. Then boarded our next flight and now are here, 300 am, and we set out for sightseeing at 830 in the morning. So for now, some rest and a shower after this incredibly long day, and hopefully more to come with pictures soon!

Los Angeles round 2

Sitting at gate 26 for AirChina I think I'm just beginning to comprehend that soon I'll be in Bangkok, across the globe. Our 24 trip to LA felt like a vacation already, early morning drive to Reagan airport in traffic, flights with crying babies, an interesting but incredibly talkative passenger next to you that doesn't pick up on the social cues of "nice meeting you, can we continue this conversation in approximately 3 hours after a nap"? Always meet interesting people on planes though, you just never know when you want to open the conversation floodgate because we are in 3 inch proximity of one another and escaping the conversation isn't always possible or polite!
Arrived in LA, sunny, 70-80 degrees and beautiful as is always guaranteed, Abbie picks us up and we're off to the beach side of LA to get some drinks and lunch by the water. We stop in at Cabo Cantina (I hear it's Stef Weaver's favorite LA go to!) get 2 delicious key lime and melon margaritas to share with lunch and get to enjoy the weather catching up outside.. Then to Venice beach boardwalk, seeing fisherman and surfers.. Then to Santa Monica pier to ride the ferris wheel to get the incredible view from high of the LA coast.. Malibu , Santa Monica, Venice, Hermosa, Long Beach.. All the beaches visible and follow a few miles of coastline and each with different personalities and "clientele" i guess you could say. Then walked a few canals of Venice beach, incredibly beautiful homes and makes me think of Long Beach NY and the Martinos, and makes me wish to see the real Venice!

Later that night we decided to go out for drinks at Cat & Fiddle in West Hollywood. Down the Sunset Strip, which seems to be never ending with traffic, pedestrians, lights, restaurants, bars, and shops. Makes me think its LA's style of Time Square. A really neat British pub style restaurant with an outdoor beer garden with a fountain, lights throughout the trees, outdoor heaters (because 65 is too cold for californians, I don't hate it either!!!) and the outdoor seating. By then, I am EXHAUSTED! Practically falling asleep at the table as I had gotten 5 hours or so of sleep before waking up at 530 am to drive to the airport and now it was 3 am our time.. Feeling incredibly happy I got to spend more time with Abbie, see more of the city and appreciate it more!

Next morning we wake up at 7 am... Knowing we'll be stuck sitting for 16+ hours on our flight, Nick went for a run, I did some yoga on the balcony, then we want for a walk around the neighboring blocks. A smoothie stop on our way to the airport, and here we are! Now it's about time to board, and I'm surrounded by a language I do not in the faintest sense understand.. Chinese? Flying to Beijing first, so I assume so. My first trip truly feeling as though I can't communicate, we'll see how quick I can learn!

And so it goes..

Feels as though the time keeps flying, I leave for LA tomorrow! Been so busy with work, went to Long Beach for a long weekend, Nick's teacher of the year dinners in DC and at Mountain View, and now our trip to Thailand has crept up. So thrilled.

So far my veggie garden is booming & have some beautiful herbs planted thanks to Mrs. Martino as well as a wine grape plant..

My favorite recipe since my last posting was the sweet potato pizza I made, amazingggg. I ate half a pizza it was so good! Normal pizza dough, a pureed sweet potato for the sauce, then roasted sweet potato, onion, kale, and feta cheese on top baked. It was incredibly original and delicious, for sure a pinterest recipe find I'll be keeping.

Here's a link to the pinterest recipe as well, I made mine with feta instead
Recipe

Tomorrow we leave for Los Angeles, to stay with Abbie for the night at her apartment. Then it's off to Beijing, then Bangkok =]
I am learning how to use instagram so I can upload pictures easier, working on my google map so I can better show my travel locations, and burning some books in cd to my zune and deciding which books to bring along with me! I have the Tina Fey book on tape, "Shit my Father Says" and "The Happiness Project" which are topsellers, "The Lost Girls" and then my "Meditations from the Mat" book to bring along with me to entertain me on these incredibly long flights...

So until tomorrow, and some blog updates in LA and my other stops with some photos to accompany..

a link to my travel map..
Map

Spring

Can't believe it's already been a week since I made my post! Maybe a 2x week blog posting should be added to my goals list.. =]

This week has been a good one, Nick's final lacrosse game last Sunday was a rainy one, but an awesome last game! Lost in the last moments though. Now weekends can be weekends with sleeping in and lazy delicious breakfasts & coffee. Not to mention it's been getting warmer so got to make my first coffee smoothie of the season. I'll share here, it's super easy!

Chocolate Coffee & Banana Smoothie

First you'll need to brew some coffee, just normal measurements. One of my must haves are coffee ice cubes over the summer, just brew coffee and place into some ice cube racks for future ice coffees and smoothies. Cool the rest of the coffee.

Depending on how much you want to make mix about..
*2-3 cups of cold coffee
*coffee ice cubes
*a frozen banana
*about 1/2cup of milk or yogurt.

That's the base! And from there you can add syrups, peanut butter, chocolate powder, or whatever type of flavoring you like. I put sugar free white chocolate syrup and a scoop of our chocolate protein powder. Yum!

Another new favorite is Frozen Banana Ice Cream

It's healthy creamy ice cream goodness made purely with banana and milk, incredibly cool and easy!

Peel bananas and keep them in the freezer so you can make some whenever you get a sweet tooth =]

Cut up two frozen peeled bananas and blend in food processor with 1/4 cup of milk or yogurt. Pulse the blender until it's creamy, with my Ninja it only takes 30 seconds or so but depends! It's delicious plain, or with chocolate almond milk. I like to add the chocolate protein powder to this as well, super tasty!

Throw in some fresh or frozen strawberries, blueberries or flavored yogurt.. can never get old!


I've done some reading this afternoon in my Meditations from the Mat book before I nap for my nightshift, this stuck with me:

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

Good quote. I've done lots of what I like to call "research" the past two weeks; I mean watching Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations show on Netflix =] I've been paying attention to where he's traveled, and getting a firmer idea on what locations I want to see, and what my next travel moves will be.. I love to travel and explore new areas and learning how others live, it's a huge world out there! However have to remember that most importantly one has to be open minded, & with this, a change in locations isn't always needed for new discoveries..

For now, a nap before work. & tomorrow some new recipes to try, like homemade sweet potato gnocchi!