Tropical Savanna

The volcanic island of Komodo (along with Padar, Rinca and an archipelago of smaller islands) is a part of Komodo National Park, an area that was founded in 1980 and declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991. The national park was formed to protect, and is an eponym of, its most famous denizen--the mighty Komodo dragon (Varanus komodoensis), the world's largest and most dangerous lizard. The islands are

Determined to make it to Doi Inthanon, Thailand's highest peak, we made our way north to the Chang Pheuk Station first thing in the morning. Locating a songthaew that was bound for Chom Thong district was very straightforward as they were apparently fairly frequent. The songthaew departed almost immediately for the two-hour journey south and only ended up costing THB35 per person. The journey was along

The day began with incessant drizzle so we were forced to hunker down in the room and to wait it out. By the time the sun eventually came back out, too much time had passed for a trip to Doi Inthanon to be feasible, so we opted to ride around a 100 km circuit, called the 'Samoeng Loop', instead in order to visit some of the attractions that the loop had to offer. I also figured that it was quite apt to loop around the

We began the day with plenty of food, ordering yellow curry THB89/4 and red curry that we shared THB89/4, and three plates of rice for myself THB30). After settling the tab, we all grabbed our bags and jumped on the new van (get someone from Jira's homestay to call for the times beforehand) that went straight into the city of Chiang Mai for a mere THB35, that ended up dropping us off at Tapae gate. Once we

The sun was out in all its glory that morning, prompting us to quickly grab our climbing gear and to head out to the Crazy Horse Buttress as soon as we could! We decided to head straight to the Furnace this time around, mainly because of the number of times that we had passed by the wall. The two routes that we decided to warm up on were located on the far left of the wall and had their anchors veering off to the

We made our way, bright and early, out of Chiang Mai's Tha Phae Gate (East Gate) and eastwards to Warorot Market (ตลาดวโรรส), the point where the yellow songthaews that made their way to Mae On District for the buttress of Crazy Horse supposedly waited. We hadn't had much time at all to see the city since we had arrived in Chiang Mai late the day before, but that hadn't left me discouraged in the slightest as we