Sunburn at Cha-am

I realize I've formed a bad habit of talking about things in a nonlinear way (time-wise, at least). And I've resolved to stop doing that. But New Years seemed more important for the last post. Now, let's rewind a little bit . . .

For the three days I had off before New Years, Rachael and I decided to head to the beach. I'm a little shocked it took me two months to get there, but that's part of living a minimum of four hours from any beach. Our indecisiveness made for last minute planning and much changing of said plans. Originally, we were going to go to Krabi. Then we looked at travel time compared to how much time we'd actually spend there, and changed our plans to Koh Chang . . . which changed to Koh Larn, which changed to Bang Saphan, then to Hua Hin. We can blame it on the hotels that we ended up in Cha-am (just north of Hua Hin and about 2 1/2 hours southwest of Bangkok), because by this time it was hard to find anywhere that wasn't completely booked.

So, after a two and a half van ride from Victory Monument in Bangkok, we were let off at Cha-am and got to the hotel by motorcycle taxi. Here's a view of the hotel from the fourteenth floor, where our room was:

Yes, I got a jolt of vertigo every time I looked down. Although, technically we were on the thirteenth floor. It was one of those hotels where they like to pretend for their more superstitious clientele that the number 13 doesn't exist. And this is the view from the tiny balcony in our room:

The beach was beautiful. Maybe not the celebrated white sands kind, but coming from Seattle where the water will turn your toes into ice cubes during the warmest months and the sand is more accurately described as pebbles, this was good. Yellow sand littered with seashells and water the perfect temperature. What surprised me most was how shallow the beach was--from the road, there was a line of trees, a line of umbrellas, a line of sand, and then water. You were never more than about thirty steps from the water. This is the widest stretch of beach I found:

The first day, the beach looked almost deserted--especially compared with what I was expecting. When the weekend truly hit there were more people to be found, both Thai and tourist. The tourists came mostly from places like Norway--and judging by how many Norwegian restaurants we found on the road along the beach, this was a pretty normal thing. At one point Rachael commented on how strange it was that nationalities seem to flock together even when they're on holiday--the whole idea reminded me a little of some of the commentary in E.M. Forster's "Room with a View."

The moon rising over the water that first night was one of those things that my art professors used to tell us never to try to paint or even photograph--it just wouldn't translate.

The next two days were busier, but not so busy that the beach was as crowded as, say, a beach in Florida. The water proved to be perfect swimming temperature, waves were practically nonexistent, beach chairs could be rented for about a dollar . . . and I let myself spend most of my time either reading, swimming, or walking along the beach listening to music. Some things I did not do, even though they were available: buy food or souvenirs from the vendors who wandered from umbrella to umbrella, ride a banana boat (pulled at crazy speeds by Thais on jet skis), or horseback riding--offered by barefooted Thai "cowboys" (meaning they wore jeans, flannel shirts, and cowboy hats) who rode the tamest horses I've ever seen up and down the beach. It was all very relaxing, except for the sunburn. Despite being careful about reapplying sunscreen, I wound up with lobster-red shoulders that are still peeling almost two weeks later--although it's turning my arms a darker tan than I ever thought I could achieve.

This is the sunrise I saw walking down the beach on Sunday morning (Sunday a week and a half ago, not two-days-ago Sunday):

And wouldn't you know it, those art professors were right--the picture doesn't come close to the real thing.