The DMZ

This post is a bit late...but better late than never!

I was in Seoul for work two weeks ago, and Jill met me there for the weekend.  We didn't do much of anything Friday night because Jill wasn't feeling great (she flew there directly from the US), and after a long week I was pretty beat as well.  We had a long day planned for Saturday though so it was good for us to get some rest.  We had signed up for a tour of the DMZ which is the Demilitarized Zone on the border of North and South Korea. It's about a 1.5 hour drive by bus from Seoul to the border, and our bus left around 9:00 AM.

Our first stop was the Dora Observatory where you can look at North Korea from a safe distance.  We didn't spend too much time there which was ok because there really wasn't a ton to look at once you get over the fact that you're looking at North Korea.

This is the view of North Korea from the observatory.  Notice how lush and green the area in the foreground is - that is "untouched" land of the border.  You can "rent" the binoculars for 0.50 cents, but there is a line at the observatory that once you cross you cannot take pictures.

This is a view of the Kijong-dong village in North Korea, which is essentially a "propaganda town".  The entire village is essentially fake - nobody lives there, and the buildings are just concrete shells. The windows are painted on, and the lights in the "town" are set on timers. The flagpole you see is the third largest flagpole in the world, and the flag weighs almost 600 pounds.

You can see the observation deck there on the left hand side with the binoculars

 The next stop was to visit the tunnels that the North dug out as a way to invade South Korea.  They dug a total of 4 tunnels (it's possible that there are more, 4 is just how many the South has found), but when they were discovered the North claimed they were for coal mining...even though no coal exists anywhere near where the tunnels were found.  You are able to go down into one of the tunnels, but unfortunately you can't take pictures down there.  Honestly the tunnel was exactly what it sounds like...a tunnel. There was a small museum that gave some interesting facts about the tunnels and some of the history behind the conflicts between the North and South, but we honestly could have done without this portion of the tour.

 After the tunnels we visited the last stop on a train line in South Korea before you enter North Korea.  Other than the photo op by the sign for Pyongyang it was just a normal train station.  The train is so infrequent though that you could actually jump down and walk along the tracks.

That's the way to North Korea...

 After the train we got to the most interesting part of the tour which was the JSA, or Joint Security Area. We actually had to get off our bus and go through a briefing conducted by the U.S. Military which gave some more background on how the JSA came about.  We also had to sign waivers that basically said we understood we were entering an area that has the potential to become a hostile war zone and that we could die.  It sounds a lot more intense than it really was, but a little unsettling nonetheless.

This is actually the border between the North and South.  The guy in the foreground was our Military escort throughout the JSA.  He told us when we could take pictures, what we could take pictures of and gave us a bunch of other directions while we were taking pictures here.  For example, we weren't supposed to point or gesture toward anything, make any sort of extreme facial expressions, or take pictures of anything behind us.  You'll also notice the South Korean guards standing watch.  These guards are constantly on duty, and are in a combat-ready stance at all times (you can't really tell from this picture).  You'll notice the guard on the left is half-standing behind the blue building, and that is to give the North less of a target should they decide to open fire.  Ironically, the Demilitarized Zone is actually the worlds most heavily militarized border.

You can see two North Korean soldiers just above the blue building...

Christmas card 2014...

After getting to gaze across the border we actually got to go into a negotiating room, and they told us that in the room, you can technically cross the border and be in North Korea...don't know if that's true, but if it is then Jill and I can say that we have technically been to North Korea...

The border is supposed to be right smack down the center of this table.  So to the right is the North and to the left is the South.

You could take pictures with the guards, but you had to stay at least a tile and a half away from them

I tried my best to mimic their battle-ready stance...I'm not so good at it...

After the JSA the tour was over and we got back to the hotel around 4 PM.  All in all it was a cool experience and I am glad that we did it, but we would have been happy with the half-day tour.  There honestly is not that much to see besides the JSA, so the best part about it was just learning more about North Korea...and just how bizarre it is.  Like it's the most heavily militarized border in the world, and yet tours can go and take pictures, but the military escorts you and there are strict rules about what you can and can't take pictures of?  I don't know...just very, very bizarre.  North Korea fascinates me in that it really seems to be a completely different world.  And I guess that's how the leaders of that country want it....but I guess it just blows my mind that a country like that can even exist, especially given all of the reports of human rights violations.  Then throw Dennis Rodman into the mix and it makes it even more bizarre.

Til Next Time,
Luke & Jill

The Maldives

This past weekend Jill and I took advantage of the 4 day weekend here in Hong Kong (we got the Friday and Monday off for Easter) to go to the Maldives.  We were fortunate enough to be able to stay at the Park Hyatt Maldives Hadahaa, and we had an amazing time.  It's probably the most scenic place either of us have ever been.

The hotel sits on an island all by itself (literally-there is nothing on the island besides the hotel), and it is not the most convenient place to get to.  Our flight left Hong Kong for Male (pronounced "Mahl-ay" - the capital of the Maldives and the only place to land for international travel) around 6:00 PM on Wednesday, and we didn't arrive to the hotel until 2:30 AM on Thursday.  It's a 6 hour flight from Hong Kong to Male (we had a 2.5 hr layover in Male), then another 55 minute flight to Koodoo, then a 30 minute boat ride from Koodoo to the hotel.  So, like I said, not the easiest place in the world to get to.

After a long and tiresome journey we were very pleasantly surprised when our escort to the room dropped us off at a room over the water (we didn't know prior to our arrival if we would get an over-water room).

View from the deck of our room

Jill cooling off.  It was awesome to be able to get into the water whenever you wanted.  There is a reef that surrounds the entire island, and the snorkeling was amazing.  In addition to an abundance of fish we saw octopus, needlefish, and blacktip reef sharks.  Side note on that -  I was out snorkeling by myself at one point, and Jill decided she was going to join me.  Her way of letting me know she was there was swimming up behind me, undetected, and grabbing my calf.  Let me just say that when you're swimming around in waters that you know have sharks,  being startled by something grabbing your leg is not the best feeling in the world.  Luckily we were in the ocean, so the mess from having crapped my swimsuit was easily washed away (I didn't really mess myself, but I did almost wheel around and start throwing punches at what I thought was a shark).

Rainbow over the hotel

   

The first day Jill and I did just about everything you can do on the island...which is hang out by the water, relax, and snorkel.   The first night we made a reservation to do a 4 course meal on the beach which was a lot of fun.  The scenery during the day was gorgeous, but it was almost as good at night because there is essentially zero "light pollution" so you could see what seemed to be every single star in the sky.  You don't really see the stars in Hong Kong...

Our second day was a lot of the same - relaxing and snorkeling...

Another Rainbow

And another Rainbow trying to form

We were moved from the water villa to a pool villa after the first day, but we weren't complaining because we had beach access from the room and a private pool.

This was the view from where we ate breakfast every morning

A lounge area near the bar

The second night we had signed up to go on a little fishing excursion.  We rode a boat out about 20 minutes away from the island and got to fish with hand lines for about an hour.  Unfortunately, we only caught one fish, but our guides on the boat caught a couple extra.  The cool part was that the restaurant at the hotel cooks your catch when you return, so we had extremely fresh barbecued red snapper, and white snapper sashimi for dinner that night.

You can probably imagine what we did on the third day....relaxed and snorkeled.

On Saturday night the hotel hosted a happy hour on the beach.  For entertainment there was traditional Maldivian music and dancing.  We did another dinner on the beach for our last night.

An addition to the reptile/amphibian photo series.  As always, I freed this little guy right after taking his photo.

We found out that due to the schedule of the local airline, we were going to have to leave the hotel on Sunday at 2:30 PM.  The unfortunate thing about that was our flight from Male to Hong Kong didn't leave until 10:30 PM.  We could've taken a later flight to Male, but the hotel wanted to play it safe because if there was any delay at all on our flight from Koodoo to Male we would have missed our flight home. 

View of the island as we were leaving...

The Koodoo airport...and I thought the airport in Presque Isle, Maine was small...

Because we had so much time to kill in Male the hotel arranged for a guide to show us around the city for a couple of hours.  Our guide was very nice, but in all honesty we weren't blown away with Male.  It's kind of dirty, it was very hot, and the limited amount of sites aren't all that impressive.  I don't know if we were just tired or what, but Male just didn't really do it for us.  We were glad we did it (better than sitting around in an airport), but by the time the tour was over were looking forward to the air conditioning in the airport. 

We got to see the office of the President of Male

A Mosque - The Maldives are 100% Muslim, and this was our first time in a completely Muslim country.

The President's quarters

Another Mosque

Our flight left Male on time Sunday night and we arrived back in Hong Kong around 8:30 AM Monday morning.  It was a once-in-a-lifetime trip for us and we are so lucky that everything worked out for us to go.  We would highly recommend it, but if you do go to the Maldives, go for longer than 3.5 days, and just know that everything (regardless of what hotel you stay at) is going to be expensive.  Also go in with the mindset that all you're going to be doing is relaxing...so bring a lot of reading material or be prepared to sleep a lot....because after snorkeling/fishing there's nothing else to do!  But that's what makes it such a cool experience.   

Hope all is well with everyone.  A big shout out to Abby and Ross for their wedding - congrats!

Til Next Time,

Luke & Jill

Bangkok

Hello There,

I'm writing this long overdue post from Phuket.  This post is about our trip to Bangkok, but I came to Phuket early for the weekend before meetings next week; however, the weather is not cooperating....so thought I'd play catch up on the blog.

A few weeks ago Jill and I went to Bangkok for a weekend to celebrate Jill's birthday.  We got in late on a Friday, and spent the most of Saturday visiting temples. Since we moved to Hong Kong we both have seen a lot of temples, and in all honesty they start to run together and look very similar to one another.  However, we both agreed that what we saw in Bangkok were probably the most unique temples we've seen with the only exception being the temples at Angkor.  They were all very colorful with really ornate designs that we found to be really unique compared to a lot of the other stuff we've seen in Asia.

We started out on Saturday by taking the train from the Grand Hyatt Erawan Bangkok a few stops and then hopped on a river cruise (which was a bit disappointing because the river was just lined with hotels) up to a spot which was centrally located around a few of the different places we wanted to see.

The first place was stopped was the Grand Palace. The palace has been the official residence of the Kings of Siam (and later Thailand) since 1782. The king, his court and his royal government were based on the grounds of the palace until 1925. The present monarch, King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama IX), currently resides at Chitralada Palace, but the Grand Palace is still used for official events. Several royal ceremonies and state functions are held within the walls of the palace every year.

The only downside to the day was that we had heard (and were told by the concierge at the hotel) that you couldn't wear shorts or open-toed shoes in any of the temples, so we both wore jeans and sneakers.  Only problem was it was about 95 degrees and what felt like 100% humidity...so we were both really hot.  When we showed up; however, there was a stand for free sarong rental so you could enter with no problem...and there were a lot of people wearing sandals...so we were pretty cheesed off about that.  I ended up just sweating it out in my jeans, but Jill ended up just buying a pair of cheap, loose-fitting pajama pants to wear for the rest of the day and she was much happier after getting out of her jeans.

The next stop was Wat Pho, aka the Temple of the Reclining Buddha.  Its official name is Wat Phra Chettuphon Wimon Mangkhlaram Ratchaworamahawihan. The temple is also known as the birthplace of traditional Thai massage.   These pictures don't do it justice....this thing was huge...

Being as hot as it was, we made a pit stop in a coffee shop to get a bite to eat and soak in some air conditioning. 

From there we made the last stop of the day at Wat Arun, or Temple of the Dawn.  We had to take a short ferry ride across the river to get there.  The temple derives its name from the Hindu god Aruna, often personified as the radiations of the rising sun. Wat Arun is among the best known of Thailand's landmarks and the first light of the morning reflects off the surface of the temple with pearly iridescence. Although the temple had existed since at least the seventeenth century, its distinctive prang (spires) were built in the early nineteenth century during the reign of King Rama II.

The stairs to climb the temple were extremely steep...again, these pictures don't do it justice...

Hard to tell, but that's Jill up there.

View of Bangkok from the top of the temple

Looking down the steps...it was basically a ladder...

We had to get back to the hotel because I had booked us a couple's massage for Jill's birthday.  We didn't have time to take the river cruise back to the train, so we had to haggle with a few different cab drivers for a fare rate to get us back to the hotel, which was about a half hour drive.

The massage was great...it also included a facial...so yeah...I got a facial.  Wasn't a big fan of the facial...but the massage was great and Jill was very happy with it.

After the massage we had a late Thai dinner which was really good.  Before we sat down we had fully intended to go out for a while to experience the Bangkok nightlife...that is what it's famous for, after all.  We had a particular rooftop bar in mind that was supposed to have a great view of the city, but we soon found out that the bar, and a couple of other places we had in mind to go, were closer to where we were earlier in the day.  After about 3 minutes of contemplation we both decided that we were perfectly content going to sleep after dinner....we're getting old.  The hotel surprised Jill with a birthday cake after dinner which was really nice...especially since we were the last ones in the restaurant, so it wasn't like a Benihana birthday celebration where everyone looks at you and claps...

Staying in was a great decision because we were able to get up early Sunday morning and spend a couple of hours by the pool before we had to head to the airport.  All in all the weekend was a success!

Hope all is well with everyone in the states, and we are both wishing G'ma Henard a speedy recovery.  We're thinking about you!

Til Next Time,
Luke & Jill