still hot...

well i arrive in NYC at 6:30 this morning...and immediately flew to new orleans to visit some friends and have some special little boy time as I am the substitute caretaker of two special little ones for a week. the reinforcements are coming in on wednesday...but i'm on my own till then! praise the lord for NO JEG LAG SO FAR! i was abel to sleep 10 whole hours on the plane here...and felt like i woke up in the morning just as my flight arrived in the states...in the morning. as i'm typing i'm getting a bit tired...but that's it. we'll see if i sleep tonight.

i flew through immigration and customs at the JFK airport...and ran to the delta terminal to re-check my bags and then board my second plane of the day to atlanta. i was bumped to first class as they double booked my seat. imagine the chances;) i spent a few hours in the atlanta airport and then boarded my third plane of the day...and arrived safely in new orleans by 3:30 pm. the wonders of aeronautics. i thought it appropriate to continue writing on the 100 degrees sight considering it's almost that in new orleans...reminds me of thailand...which now seems soooo far away...

the party's over...

as i affectionately remember my dad singing..."the party's oooooooverrrrrrr" in his most whiny voice...i concede that my fabulous overseas adventure is over for the time being. i just completed my final exam...and will head to the airport around 10 pm tonight. i can hardly believe it's been a month. a thai massage is on tap before dinner and then a final horrah with the class for dinner. i'm scheduled to get into NYC at 6 am tomorrow...i will claim a whole day of my life back! reflections on Thailand to come...

back in bangkok...back to reality.

well the time has come. back to school. clare leaves at 6 am tomorrow and my class began today. it's a little rough sitting through it in light of the past two weeks...pray for me;)

the beach!

ok from the top. here is a small selection of the many pictures from the beach...i have no idea how this will format but here goes. above, clare posses with a bunch of random students who came up to her and interviewed her for their english class. let's just say it was funny...borderline hysterical. and based on my knowledge of people liking to be in pictures...i snapped this one and they went wild and proceeded to insist on many more...

now...the sketchy elephant safari...the background might look to you like we're trudging through a construction zone. that is because we were trudging through a construction zone. our elephant's name was jason;)
ahhhhh the beach in phuket...

emily and clare at the beach in phuket...and just so you all know...clare got a racoon burn from a different pair of sunglasses and tried to cover it up in this picture with the "big" subglasses.

kayaking in PhangNa bay...perhaps our favorite event of the entire trip....

inside a cave in phangna bay...our new friend john from brooklyn is in the background! this cave is only accessible during low tide...

kayaking in another cave that you can only get in by boat, under rocks...scary yes. there is only one period of time each day that you can kayak into the cave...and this was it. we had to lay down on the boat and our noses almost touched the rocks above us!

the entrance to the cave...

sunset in phuket...our first night.

the beginning of the sunset in phuket our first night;)

our toes in the andaman seas

our view to the south from our beach spot...

and that's the lot of them. as you can imagine, there are hundreds. the views were breathtaking...and it was incredible to be on the other side of the world doing the exact same thing we do in atlantic city;) but the colors are a little different and the people around us were a lot different. we did plenty of lounging, sleeping, and sunning...a bit too much sunning;) the trip was amazing...we are both so thankful that we were able to go...and go together (shout out to leah, we wish you were here;).

PHUKET!

well, delayed as we are, it's friday night and this is our first post from the beach...we arrived safely on wednesday morning...and went directly to our hotel. we dropped our stuff and set out on an adventure to the next town over...we took a local bus and arrived in the town only to find it quite..."seedy." we explored the town and eventually set out on a trek to find the kayaking outfit that we wanted to take a trip with the next day. (since we don't have a phone, we have to do things the old fashioned way;) the lord provided...and protected...about an hour later we were very lost...well not lost, we knew where we were, but had walked about 6 miles past our destination. very discouraged because we couldn't find number "346/7" on the road we'd been hiking for over an hour, we spotted a hotel van and asked the driver what he knew. wouldn't you know, he told us to hop in and he drove us to our place. sooo...kink in our calculations...i mis-transposed the number...the actual address was 367/4. i'm retarded. but we found our place and bargained a great deal for our adventure at sea the next day.

yesterday (thursday) was incredible...we kayaked around miles of islands and caves in the andaman sea. it was so fun and beautiful. for those of you that know me and my strange ability to run into someone i know...here's the story of the week. we step into the van that was taking us to the pier...and wouldn't you know there was a woman in the van from weston connecticut...and hired clare to babysit when they both get home! crazy...

today we spent lounging on the beach, by the pool, and getting a little too much sun in the tropical mecca...tomorrow we're going on a little elephant safari and then heading home to bangkok...well not really home;)

we're not sure we'll really understand just how amazing this trip has been until we're not on it anymore.......

pictures to come on monday...won't have internet until then. be well.

pics!

here are pictures from our weekend in chiang mai...it was beautiful save one small thing...a few cockroaches in our guesthouse! yikes...TOP TO BOTTOM: the top picture is a cockroach that i killed! clare and i at top of doi inthanon, the highest peak in thailand. two hill-tribe boys playing in the rice patties (and peeing on them). the boonmee mansion where we stayed. clare and i at the summit of doi suthep, a temple at the summit of another mountain. and last but not least, another of the one thousand things to see before you die, the four season resort, chiang mai. clare and i ate dinner there at the "poolside terrace" because it was the muuuuuuch less expensive alternative.

leaving for phuket in the morning, will be back in bangkok late saturday night...we will be enjoying the beautiful beaches of thailand!

back in bangkok

back in bangkok, we arrived safely and now it's blog time. these are pictures from thursday in bangkok...we went to the top of the tallest building in thailand...sweet view. we did a lot of wandering and checked out the country's bets university, chulalonkorn. and...we went with a friend to get her a tattoo...don't worry there are not unatural markings on clare's body nor mine!