Holidays Part 2

After a fast-paced week of being urban life, we were looking forward to an easier few days in the tropical holiday destination of Bali, Indonesia. Bali is a place steeped in history, with wonderful cuisine and beautiful scenery to offer. We spent many days exploring the beaches, swimming and sunbathing, but we were also keen to explore less well-travelled areas too: we visited some beautiful temples, watched the sun set over the sea, tried traditional Balinese coffee and tea, climbed up waterfalls and even fed monkeys which sat on our shoulders.

Before we knew it, we were flying to Thailand to visit the Phi Phi Islands, easily the most stunning place I have ever been. It was simply paradise! We treated ourselves and stayed in a hotel just seconds from a number of beaches.

After going scuba diving for the first time in Bali, a couple of us decided to complete a qualification in scuba diving whilst in Koh Phi Phi. We saw so many different species of fish, lots of black-tipped reef sharks and even turtles. The turtles seemed to float effortlessly from place to place, eating constantly. It was amazing to swim through shoals of fish and see what was beneath the surface.

We stayed in Thailand, this time flying to Chiang Mai in the north, close to the border with Myanmar. Chiang Mai is a city famous for its hundreds of Buddhist temples, as well as elephant sanctuaries and night markets.

One of the best bits had to be our day spent with the elephants. We drove for a couple of hours to reach an elephant sanctuary which cared for old or rescued elephants. We fed the elephants whole bunches of bananas at a time; they took them gently from our hands with their trunks. After breakfast, we were able to wash them in the river just next to the sanctuary. Unfortunately, many elephants are exploited or abused, so we were careful to choose a sanctuary where riding was not allowed, where the animals were well-cared for and were free to roam.

Chiang Mai is also famous for its temple, Wat Chedi Luang, with a ruined chedi, or roof. We did this on the last day, exploring the grounds of the temple and marvelling at the temple which was ruined in 1545 after an earthquake.

Last stop, Bangkok!

Bangkok is home to many more ornate temples, tuk tuks and a famously lively street life both during the day and at night. So lively, in fact, that the sheer density of traffic meant that we couldn’t get a taxi for two hours to get to our accommodation.

In Bangkok, we visited many temples which were all different from each other. Inside the Wat Pho, there is a 46m long reclining golden Buddha, and another, called the Gold Mountain Temple, is at the top of a hill in the middle of the city, giving great views at sunset.

We also went scuba diving again to a city slightly south of Bangkok called Pattaya, though the visibility was not good so we didn’t see seahorses like we had hoped. We did see lots of coral, pufferfish and another turtle though!

Five countries, 8 flights, 35 days, 11,260km, and around 600,000 steps later, we arrived back in Tianjin with a few days before classes restarted to settle back in.