Dawn/Todd Sword Ceremony

Maggie figured out a way to animate the weddings' sword ceremony which is presented here for your viewing pleasure.

Click on the picture to run the animation. It will run repeatedly until you hit the browser back key.

Have a banana?

Banana trees like this grew all over. This one is beside the road to the small village that was close to where we stayed.

Pond with lily pads

The little house was where the staff stayed during the day and had the computer that gave us wireless access to the internet.

The pond was at the back of our villa and covered in lily pads and flowers. It was full of fish who swam under the back windows waiting for leftovers.

Start of the day

Every day started around 6:30AM with a swim with the grand daughters. Maggie and Zoey having fun! Some days you could even get your coffee in the pool. Terry (Krista's Dad) made the first pot almost every day. Thanks Terry!!

Long boats

Length = 30 ft, has a water cooled V8 on a pole. Propeller was at the end of a 15 ft shaft. So, long shaft is long tailed. The boat driver stands just in front of the engine with his legs on either side of the shaft that runs from in front of the engine all the way back to the propeller. He rests on the shaft and steers the boat by leaning one way or the other. For sharper turns he either moved further left or right or got off the shaft and pulled/pushed the shaft. The boats had three seats across and held about 9 people but could be crowded to holding more. We took these to the various islands.

Where we stayed

The villa faced the Thalane Bay in the front with the back of the house located over the pond.

No Clue

This guy was holding the traffic lights in Karbi. There was one on each of the corners. No idea about why or who or what in the culture this might be related to if it's even cultural. A closer look will let you see he looks rather 'cromagnum'. Any thoughts?

Mangrove tree in a lagoon

Our boat took us into a lagoon through the single entrance. Spotted this mangroove tree. Plants are so very adaptable. If you look closely, you can see where a few new trees have poked out of the water and have a few leaves showing.

Rock Fish

Exotic rock fish climbing the walls. Apparently Thailand is a rock climbers paradise. Lots of people come to swim out to the rocks and then free climb.

Disappearing into the jungle

Same lizard moving into the jungle. After it was another 5 feet or so into the underbrush, we moved up to see if it was visible but it had totally disappeared. We could still hear it moving around. It actually sounded like a cat moving around in there. Spooky to think that something that large could make such a small amount of noise.

Monitor lizard in Thailand

This monitor lizard was approx 5-6 feet long. It was on the main tourist path into the jungle and was a real surprise. When it finally moved it didn't seem to move very fast but I have a feeling if it was hunting, it would be a lot faster. Check out the claws on this puppy.