After leaving Nong Khai we choked through the dirty streets of Bangkok catching a glimpse of the king who left the hospital for the first time in four years. His picture is everywhere around the country and Eugene claims he made eye contact through the Bentley!
We were happy once again to leave the concrete jungle and head to the real jungle of Khao Sok National Park. It is the largest continuous nature reserve in Thailand. We arrived in the rain once again and stayed in a river jungle lodge overlooking the Khao Sok river. We were disappointed to hear that the park trails were mostly closed due to rain. So we waited it out and woke up the next day to unexpected sunshine!!!! We rented a motorbike to cruise around the limestone carst landscape making our way to the lake in the center of the park. Where we enjoyed the views and a swim. The scenic drive, the overlooks, and the dirt road detours were the highlights.
The next day we were pleasantly surprised with another gorgeous day. We headed to the hiking trails to find out that they were all open!!! We scored. We hiked through the jungle listening to the birds, spotting monkeys, dodging a snake, swimming in the river pools, and picking off leeches!! It was exactly what we were looking to do, until.......we stopped for our snack and turned around after 5 miles into the jungle. After the snack within 15 minutes I was feeling a little gremlin moving inside of me. We booked it about half way back before I started vomiting. Luckily we made it to the muddy road where a bad-ass Thai ranger chick was on a motorbike heading out. Eugene put me on the bike and she rallied the rest of the 2.5 miles out of there. The funny part was that she insisted on taking a picture before we could leave. Maybe it was her first rescue and she wanted to document it. The food poising lasted about six hours total thankfully cause it was bad. We were able to catch our transport the next morning out of there to head to the beach!! And we arrived in the rain again!!!
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