Thai Tales

Thai Tales

When our two week holiday in Thailand in April this year came to an end I was definitely wishing for some monumental catastrophe to prevent our flight taking off, never in a million years would I ever have believed my ears when the lovely lady behind the counter in Bangkok airport told us that the volcanic ash cloud arising from the eruption in Iceland meant we were “stranded” in Thailand until further notice!! I had to physically restrain myself from jumping up and down for joy for there were many, not so happy faces around us! In fact the majority of the airport was filled with angry, impatient, yelling tourists, so we did what any logical forward thinking travellers would do…. we legged it. Rushing out of the airport as fast as we could, we caught a taxi into town and checked into the cheapest room we could find, before anyone could say UK airspace was open again. Dumping our bags on the tatty bed we headed out into the evocative chaos of Bangkok and tucked into a huge freshly cooked plate of pad thai….. ahhh the joys!
And Bangkok was where we stayed as day after day news headlines flashed across our screens showing the extent of the ash cloud, it soon became quite apparent that we were not going to get back to the UK or work anytime soon and there was simply nothing, anyone could do about it! How extraordinary! So yet again we conjured up a plan to make the best of this unplanned extra time in this most amazing place and caught the overnight train to Chiang Mai, “Place of the elephants”, in the north on what was fast becoming one hell of an unplanned adventure. The north was everything it promised to be and more, beautiful sunsets over lush green paddy fields, waterfalls and of course incredible food. However the one thing we craved was the border; if we could just manage a few days in Myanmar that would be the icing on the cake, or rather the chilli on the pad thai. Myanmar, once upon a time known to the world as Burma, was only a short bus trip away, and we desperately wanted to skip across and visit that most beguiling of countries so plagued by political torments but so wonderfully rich in culture and natural wonders.
However the country’s isolation and repressive junta has, by some miracle of irony contributed to the preservation of much of its environment and ecosystems as well as some of the worlds most endangered species such as tigers, leopards, rhinoceros, forest elephants, gibbons, as well as an abundance of bird species. The thought of exploring this forgotten landscape was almost too much to bare, but before we could rustle up the necessary paperwork Eyjafjallajökull started to get over its hissy-fit and the ash cloud began to dissipate. Bangkok, Mumbai and a forty hour journey back to Cornwall was calling so sadly we never did make it across the border into Myanmar. My appetite to visit that enticing land has only grown and so it was with a mixture of great relief and joy when I read that the Government of Myanmar have announced that 2.500 miles of the Hukaung Valley will be declared a wildlife reserve to protect tigers and inevitably all the other wildlife that inhabit the forests with them, now I just need to find a way and the time to get there…