Ranong: hot springs and mangroves

 12.29.2012

After the school-wide party ended on Thursday, Kathleen, Brandon and I found ourselves with 6 full days of freedom.  On top of that, we managed to pull a few strings to travel south for free.  We hopped a ride on the crowded Sirindhorn school bus that takes girls who stay in the dormitory to and from South Thailand during school breaks and at the end of semesters.  It was definitely a squeeze, but the price was more than right, and we even got a free meal!

Fon (the Mattyum 5 student we stayed with for this portion of the break) and her family met us in Champon late in the evening and took us back to their house in Ranong.

12.30.2012

The next day Fon and her father take us out to do a little sight-seeing of Ranong.  This is just a quick look about town.  Most Thai city streets look the same from what I can tell...

Ice cream mochi, tea flavored.  It's all too easy to get addicted to ice cream here, especially when presented in such a cute way :D

Fon's parents' new 5-story house.  The first floor is an electronics store.

Hot spring area:

A temple across from the hot springs

Water bearing goddess

The water comes from their ponytail.  Brandon might be interested in learning this.

I loved this hedge that looked like a little owl!!  It seemed to be gazing off into the distance, wishing it weren't stuck in a pot.

Kathleen and Fon checking out the first hot spring.  Not for swimming!

Man-made well for the spring.  It has created these deposits over many years.

Looks like neat zombie fungus

The water was very clear, and HOT.

 Taking a walk around the hot spring grounds:

Little cousin (?) of Fon's with a mullet

Fon's dad, and cousin

I'm blinking, yay!

Thai people always go swimming in their clothes

This area had a separate structure with a concrete floor that is heated by the hot spring.  It was a hot day and we wanted nothing to do with it really, but we laid down for the experience.

Another hot spring.  People were swimming in these heated pools, but we felt too hot even outside of the water!

3 kids, 1 bike... knowing Thai kids it sounds dangerous to me but it seemed to be working out alright.

Then we had a scrumptious home-made meal back at Fon's house:

No, the meal was not the dog.  This is Wan.  He is 1 of 2 dogs of the household.

Family portrait featuring what I am assuming is traditional Thai head nobbles!  Fon is at the bottom.

Then there is Fon's sister's chihuahua pup!  It's name is Lookmoo (little pig).  They really like to dress it up.

The shop at the bottom floor

Cool lanterns

A really intense water feature in their house.  It was kind of memorizing!

Off to see the mangrove preserve!  Where the forest meets the ocean.  Kathleen and I were especially excited to visit this!

Walkways were setup throughout the forest, the ground was maybe 7 to 10 feet below.  The dog up ahead on the path apparently hangs out here all the time.  You'll see him in later pictures.

The muddy forest floor is home to many worms, bivalves and other creatures.  You could hear a whole symphony of slurps schlepping around!

We came to an edge of our section of the forest.  It was breath-taking!

But then we heard a commotion starting.  It seemed we were caught in the middle of an interspecies fued!  The resident mangrove dog we had seen earlier was furiously chasing a band of macaques native to the forest.  He was having a ball while the monkeys were screeching with fright!

This fellow came running across the bridge for his life!

The dog joyously crosses the river to close in on the evading primates

We had a lot of fun watching this strange and highly unexpected turn of events.  The monkeys, of course, couldn't be caught because the dog couldn't climb trees, but he sure gave them a good run-around!

Cheeky monkey!  Err... dog.