Walking from Phitsanilok toward Sukhothai and Myanmar – by Onanong Hukharn

Cars and buses were driving very close to us on this part of the road west of Phitsanilok.  Keith decided to tie a blue shirt onto a stick.  Then with his stick and rag we walked along, him feeling safer, but I felt shy a little!  When we walked many people looked at us with strange expressions on their face.  They thought we waiting for the bus or maybe that we had no money to buy tickets. 

One couple stopped their car.  Both of them were very nice and friendly. “Where are you going Kha?” (that is a polite greeting like sir or ma’am)  Sukhothai I answered! 

They said ,”Oh dear that far from here please get on the car we going the same place”, then they asked me more questions.  “Why do you have to walk?  Are you not tired? Why are you doing this?”

I replied, “We will walk all the way across Thailand. This trip is really spectacular.

They had more questions like “where do you sleep?  Do you bathe in the rivers?  What do you eat?”  And the most difficult question for me to answer, “Why are you walking?  You will get hot and tired.”  I tried to explain we were doing this because nobody had ever done it before.  I said “kah we meet nice people like you and get to know more about Thailand.”  The nice couple offered me a ride one more time before driving away.

As they drove away I felt even more shy (sic embarrassed) about what Keith and I are doing. But I told him I would do this, so I must do it. 

This ends Onanong’s comments for now.

The day went by quickly.  It was a day without any really memorable events.  We walked, we rested and then we walked again.  Some days are like that, even on a great adventure. 

As my watch moved toward 3:00 p.m. we arrived at the outskirts of Sukhothai.  Once we passed the City sign and had officially entered the city, Onanong flagged a songthaew (pick up truck taxi).  We pushed our packs into the back on the floor between the bench seats.  Weary from the 18 kilometers (10 ½ miles) we had walked that day we stepped into the back of the songthaew to gratefully ride the next 2 kilometers to the TR Guesthouse where we planned to stay for the next couple of nights.

The Songthaew dropped us a few blocks from the guesthouse, leaving us a short walk before we would get to dump the packs for  few days. 

A clean brightly decorated bakery was temptingly situated just where I clambered from the back of the truck taxi.  There was a display case filled with various cakes and pastries.  After a long hot day of walking a piece of cake sounded heavenly.  I left my backpack lying at the door of the bakery while I purchased a full double layer chocolate and vanilla cake.  Meanwhile Onanong waited patiently, not once reminding me that I was still supposed to be on a healthy diet plan.

At the guesthouse, once inside our room I placed the cake on a table.  Since we planned to stay in Sukhothai 4 or 5 days, I emptied my backpack so I could launder everything.  Then after a shower, shave and a second nice hot shower I went out with Onanong to find some dinner.

After dinner we returned to the room. I had big plans to eat that cake we had bought earlier.  Sitting down to a small table in the room I pulled out a folding knife I carry. It is spring loaded to open and has a very sharp 7” blade I use for peeling fruit or cutting cake.

As I made the first slice, a swarm of large red ants burst from the cut in the cake.  I jumped back, cursed and then finished cutting that piece of cake.  By then the ants were swarming all over the tabletop.  I quickly moved my laptop off to one side of the table. 

With the large slice of cake removed, we could see ant tunnels throughout the cake.  Apparently these industrious ants had found an entrance to the bakery display case and in just a few hours had set up house in my cake.

I closed the box on the cake and ants and folded it inside a plastic bag.  By then it was late.  I was tired, Onanong was tired so we just left the cake, thinking the ants were trapped inside the bag.

I slept in until sunrise the next morning.  As the sky grew bright enough for me to see easily in the room, I climbed from bed and opened the laptop.  The Macbook Pro powered up while I brushed my teeth.  Then sipping a cup of hot tea I opened my email program and began downloading mail from the night before, which time is daytime in the USA and Britain.

I noticed a few of those red ants crawling near the laptop and brushed them to the floor.  As I waited for the email to download the laptop screen began to get strange colors and missing spots.  Clearly something was wrong.  I jammed a USB memory stick into a port and as fast as possible began transferring my most important files, those I knew were not backed up on my backup drive.

As I finished and ejected the small memory stick my laptop screen was turning some awful blue and orange colors one pixel at a time.  I just sat and watched the computer turn to garbage.  Finally I turned it off .  Then knowing what I would find I picked the dead thing up and began shaking it.  Perhaps 50 or 100 red ants swarmed out and ran in circles on the table top.

I was too disgusted with myself to bother the ants.  I ignored them as they swarmed around the table searching for their next portable home.  I looked at Onanong, shrugged my shoulders, said “let’s go change this for a cake with no ants”.  I grabbed the ant riddled cake and headed for the door.  Onanong was quiet, waiting for me to explode in anger.  But how can you blame ants for searching out all those warm crumbs of food that had accumulated in the spaces on the keyboard between the keys. 

There’s probably more than one lesson in this story, but I never bothered to try and figure out what I should have learned from the incident.  I found new cake without ants.  I eventually bought a new laptop.  I still eat too many sandwiches and salads while I write on this laptop.  I do try to put it away in the carry bag at night when I’m traveling.

Ants Attack my Laptop

November 2011 and I found myself walking across the widest part of Thailand.  For about half the walk my Thai friend, Onanong accompanied me.  While it is not too unusual to see a backpacker in Thailand, it is unusual to see them actually walking with a goal other than to drag their packs from one guesthouse to another as they move down the road a hundred yards from one guesthouse to another. 

It is even more unusual to see Thai people walking any lengthy distance.  On this stretch of highway Onanong was walking along with me.  She is a tiny woman, standing 150 cm (4’-11” ) and weighing just 42 kilos ( 92 pound).  Her backpack perched high on her back seems larger than her when she walks in front of me. 

We were walking from the city of Phitsanilok toward Sukhothai the ancient capital city of the Kingdom of Siam.  Part of the road wound perilously through the mountains, a narrow, winding thread of concrete that at some places had no shoulder so we were forced to walk on the roadway or on a steep and slippery dropoff. 

This stretch of road was really dangerous.  I had visions of a car or bus careening around a corned and just knocking me and Onanong off the edge of the cliff like roadside.  We couldn’t walk on the opposite side of the road, because the road was blasted and carved into the rock mountainside.  We could not risk being caught between the sheer vertical rock face and some careless driver. 

To add to our visibility I took a broken branch and used the sturdy stick like a flagpole to tie a bright blue shirt onto the end of it.  I carried this makeshift flag so that it stuck up higher than my pack, fluttering in the breeze.

“Keith, what is that for?” Onanong asked as I cobbled together this makeshift warning device.  I explained it was so drivers might see us better.  Then in characteristic Thai fashion she didn’t say much more about my warning flag.  However as we started walking again, I noticed Onanong was lagging behind me a bit.  The gap of 10 yards made it seem as if she wasn’t really with me.

Later that day Onanong confessed I embarrassed her carrying the flag.  The entire idea of walking and sleeping in strange people’s yard was quite embarrassing to Onanong.  So much so, that when she walked with me, we generally found some National Park campground or a guesthouse or lodge to room at overnight.  Only when I was walking alone did I sleep in yards, schoolyards and on some temple grounds.

For me this adventure was a challenge of the physical kind.  Walking 5 to 15 miles, day after day, carrying a backpack when the temperature was pushing 100 degrees in the shade was tough for me.  Getting up in the morning, eating a banana and then waiting while the Ibuprofen eased the pains in my body enough that I could get up and carry the pack again was challenging for me.

The mental difficulties that Onanong faced as a devout Thai woman trying to throw off the cultural shackles of 2000 years of history, to do something beyond the comprehension of the average Thai was far more difficult a challenge to overcome.  Whenever a friendly driver would stop and offer us a ride, Onanong was forced to face the same barrage of questions each time.  “Pi, you need a ride?  Are you walking because you cannot afford to buy a ticket on the bus?  Are you okay?  Is this farang (foreigner) forcing you to walk so he can save money on bus fare?  You want to go to Myanmar, why don’t you ride?”

Onanong’s challenge was of the mind, something far more difficult to overcome than the few aches and pains I suffered with during our walk.  She could not swallow 2 Ibupropen then wait 15 minutes for the embarrassment to go away.  It dogged her every footstep.

Onanong wants to say a few words about this walk.  Here is what she has to say.

Haji Ajmal Shamali, The Loudspeaker and Me

My friend and Afghanistan Presidential candidate Haji Ajmal Shamali is a quietly devout man.  While living in quarters provided by Ajmal in Kabul in 2009, I came to Ajmal as a person who walks quietly, but carries a deep and profound love for his religion and for his country within him.

At the time I lived in a room on the second floor of a house that is situated next to his business office compound.  Next to the office compound is a mosque.  As with all mosques this one has a speaker mounted on a tall steel pole.  The mullah’s prayers are broadcast on the speakers.

The first of five daily prayers take place one hour before sunrise.  The mullah announces his call to prayer loudly via the loudspeaker.  The first night I slept in that room I was awakened at around 5:00 a.m. by what sounded to me like a man standing in my bedroom and shouting at me.

I leapt from my sleeping pallet wondering if I was being attacked.  My first thought was that armalan, my night time bodyguard must have fallen asleep or been knocked out.  Spinning around in the dark room in a ridiculous parody of some Kung fu fighter, I found  nobody there.

Then I realized the sound was outside my bedroom window.  Gazing out I saw a big rusty speaker mounted on a pole at the elevation of my window and seemingly aimed directly into my window.  For the next month, I woke every morning at the same time to the mullah’s call to morning prayer coming to me in a loud thin sound that vibrated as if the loudspeaker were about to come apart.

Then one morning there was no prayer call.  I slept until awoken by daylight, around 6:00 a.m.  The speaker had come apart and was no longer functioning.  When I went down to the office I mentioned to Ajmal that I had slept in because there was no morning prayer over the loudspeaker.  He shrugged and said thank you.  I wondered why he would say thank you, but then I sat at my desk and began my work day, thinking no more about the loudspeaker.

The next few mornings were – for me anyway – blissfully quiet.  I can honestly say I did not miss the loud 5:00 a.m. wake up call. 

Then on a cool morning, with the sky still black and sprinkled by thousands of tiny stars, the call to morning prayer once again blasted into my bedroom.  I again leaped from the floor, but this time I knew I was not being attacked.  On this morning the sound was much louder than before.  The thin tinny quality was gone and I could actually understand what was being said over the speaker.

When Ajmal arrived at the office later, I mentioned to him that the loudspeaker was back to working again.  I told him it sounded louder and much clearer.  My good friend smiled and then told me that Yes he had gone immediately to he mosque and made arrangements for a new and better speaker to be installed.

I smiled and went back to my desk where i buried my mind in the work on the computer screen.  But later that night, as I lay in bed reviewing the day’s activities I smiled once more as I compared Haji Ajmal Shamali’s response to the broken loudspeaker to what my response had been.

Working closely with this man day after day without him ever preaching to me one time, has made me more introspective about my own religious beliefs.

My impressions of the Baja Desert

My impressions of the Baja Desert

In the newsletter today, I want to talk about the desert areas we pass through as we drive to and from the lagoons of Central Baja. I usually talk about the whales in these newsletters. This time I will say something about the desert and the mountains of Baja. We travel through this desert week after week as we bring people south to see the whales of Mexico.

This narrow region of hot desert mountains visually characterized by huge rock gardens and dry stream beds stretches 120 miles east to west, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of California and 1,000 miles north to south. It has mountains, sandy white beaches, high and low desert, bustling industrial towns and remote villages without electricity.  There are mines that have been chiseled deep into raw rock and factories along the border that produce everything from auto parts to kids toys.  There are areas so remote they have remained unchanged for thousands of years.  There are resort hotels with swimming pools where the guests float in heavily chlorinated fresh water while viewing the salty Pacific Ocean just a few steps away.

In this newsletter I will only look at Central Baja, where there are no large concentrations of people.  This area of few towns and a population of about 50,000 people stretches across an area over 700 miles long. Beginning at the small village of Socorro just south of San Quintìn the area I think of as Central Baja continues south to Ciudad Insurgentes and spans both Baja California Norte and Baja California Sur.

Much of the moisture that the plants and animals survive on in this region is deposited on the plants and rocks during the fog shrouded nights that are a regular phenomenon throughout much of the year in Central Baja. All along the Pacific coast of California and Baja California a vast layer of low lying marine clouds seems to always hang just offshore.  In the evening this marine layer moves in over the shoreline covering all exposed surfaces with a cool moist layer of dew.  Mice, insects, plants and birds obtain some of their water from this moisture.

As we drive south on our whale watching trips that depart from San Diego, the scenery undergoes radical changes.  The bustling frenetic energy of the border towns of Tijuana and Ensenada is replaced by the more serene, but highly productive agricultural industry.

We pass thousands of acres of cultivated farmland.  These fields are tilled and manicured month after month, year after year to produce an unending supply of tomatoes, peppers, onions and other assorted vegetables that go from the field to tractor trailer rigs to the dinner tables of Americans in the USA.  San Quintìn is a large town, getting bigger, that marks the end of this agricomplex.  Now we see the scenery begin to change from rolling oak and grass covered hills to the rugged desert I’ve grown to know and love.

The roadside rest stop at Cataviña is in the mountains at an elevation of about 2,500 feet.  The town grew up near a spring known for centuries to the native Indians who populated this desert, long before the Spanish padres began building missions in Baja.  This tiny village survives on the money spent here by people driving the highway north and south.  Just a few years ago, Catavina was an essential gas stop.  Now, with new stations in El Rosario and Villa Jesus Maria, it is possible to drive right by without even thinking about gas.

There are thousands of Cardon Cactus dotting the landscape surrounding the town of Catavina.  A look alike to the southwest Saguaro Cactus these slow growing plants live over 100 years.  Slow growing to a height of 30 feet, the tall frame is supported by a hidden hardwood core.  Cardon wood is used by ranchers for corrals and buildings.

At first sight this land seems barren and lifeless. A typical first impression is that there is nothing here except cactus and rocks and of course the ever present turkey vultures soaring high overhead. Nothing could be further from the reality. This land is teeming with life.

The oceans that surround this desert peninsula are well known for the abundance of fish they contain. Fishermen from around the world dream of traveling to Baja for at least one great fishing adventure! The land has its share of wildlife, too.

On the way home from Guerrero Negro one morning, I stopped in the mountains just north of Catavina to stretch my legs. There, where our ride down trips stop for lunch I decided to climb up to the cave painting site that I hadn’t been to for several months. My good friend, the Indian cave guide Alex was back after a brief stay in the hospital and had a new palapa style home half finished.

I talked with Alex about his new home and then walked alone up to the cave paintings.  I sat quietly for two or three minutes admiring the blossoming scenery around me.

The Elephant trees were in bloom.  The flower is not colorful, but the insects seem to find them anyway.  There was a ribbon of blue and yellow wild flowers running alongside the highway paving.  The colorful flowers that were bright yellow or a nice shade of pale blue as I drove south a few weeks earlier were fading now.  The cardon cactus was about to bloom.  Dozens of green appendages sprouted near the top of each cactus.  The flowers sprouts grow mainly on the west facing side of the plant.  The pitaya cacti were loaded with green fruit that ripen by mid-August or early September.  The cirrio trees were as full of life as I’ve ever seen them.  The top notch of every cirrio was crowned by a starburst of blossoms.

The heavy winter rains of the year past caused the desert to bloom with life.  With more green plant life growing, the fauna increased noticeably.  The population of rabbits and kangaroo rats had doubled or quadrupled.  This undoubtedly would lead to an increase in coyote and cougar populations later.

Sitting up on the big rounded rocks by the cave site my senses gradually slowed down, following my quick drive up the peninsula.  As the vibrations from the road slowly subsided, my fingers uncurled from the shape of the Suburban’s steering wheel. I felt myself come into sync with the just awakening desert.  All around me there were animals moving in search of an early morning meal.

Across the road I noticed a cottontail nibbling on some tender green shoots that were just beginning to sprout. Then there was a flock of 25 small birds pecking at the ground near the rabbit. I was too far away to identify what type they were or what they were eating.  Nearer to me, hundreds of large red ants swarmed from an anthill to harvest food scraps stuck tight to a paper plate that had been carelessly discarded by a previous cave painting explorer.

Overhead a pair of midnight black ravens cruised north, following the highways’ white striped centerline.  The clever ravens have learned to search for crushed insects and the occasional rodent to be found early in the morning on the highway.

Drawn from my momentary study of the many critters searching out their morning meal by the deep rumble of a diesel engine, I turned and watched a heavy tractor trailer rig creep by in slow motion. The driver shifted gears, gashing the metal teeth together, slinging Spanish curses out into the morning air while he fought his ancient rig to get up the momentum needed to carry him over the steep incline that is the road north from Catavina.

His noisy passage broke my quiet contemplation of the land around me.  I thought back on the days past when Cataviña was nothing more than the La Pinta hotel and a Pemex station.  In the last 20 years an entire community has grown up here as I’ve zoomed by.  There’s now a police station, city hall building and dozens of other stores and houses scattered about.  There’s even a new and very strange dome house that was just built north of town and has a sign saying it is a museum.

Looking at the many graffiti covered boulders off in the distance I continue to believe that it is only a matter of time before someone defaces this ancient cave that I’m sitting just outside of.

Thankfully my thoughts were pulled from those unpleasant thoughts by a ruby throated hummingbird that darted from my left side to hover momentarily in place while she sipped nectar from a yellow wild daisy. She moved on and was replaced by a string of honeybees. I watched a stream of these yellow and black insects move to and from a narrow black crack up high on the rocky hillside. Near the entrance to the honey drop a fat horned lizard lay sunning himself in the brisk morning air. The time was 6:35 A.M. and the temperature was 41 degrees Fahrenheit.

A fuzzy black fly landed on my cheek and brought me back to the moment at hand. That was one animal too many for me. I waved the irritating critter away and climbed down the hillside returning to the Suburban. The knobby tires rumbled as I bounced onto the newly re-paved highway, quickly getting up the speed necessary to pass the still struggling big rig that I had observed from atop the Cave hillside.

Two or three miles down the road I got a clear stretch and passed the smoky truck.

It is true that life is hard here. Whether living in the mountains or on a sandy shore side beach every creature must work at survival. Alongside the road ahead of me a trio of vultures squatted down protectively as I roared past them and the remains of an unfortunate cow. There are few fences along this highway. The range cattle roam freely, constantly returning to the string of green plants that grow along the pavement of the highway where the nighttime dew runs off and provides irrigation for this foliage upon which the range cattle feed.

There is more diversity of life forms in this desert than most people realize. After traveling through this dry region just once none of us are surprised to learn that there are over 80 species of cactus to be found up and down the length of the Baja peninsula. But to be told that there have been 192 species of bird identified in the Baja Peninsula region is a big surprise to most people.

One of those birds is fairly common here and that is the roadrunner.  Although I didn’t see one on this trip, last month I saw one sprint across the road with a dead snake in its mouth.

Although I haven’t seen a rattlesnake in more than 10 years, I always advise my fellow travelers to tread carefully lest they disturb a sleeping rattlesnake. All told there are 43 reptilian species (and dozens of sub-species) present in the Baja desert.  Although primarily dry desert there are 4 amphibian species found here.

The morning was still too cool, so I hadn’t seen many reptiles moving around.  Sometimes with a little luck we can spot a desert iguana or a chuckwalla.  The vegetarian chuckwallas are the largest lizard in the Baja Peninsula.  Their favorite food is yellow flowers.  I have smelled and tasted several different flowers that I’ve seen chuckwallas eating and they have all had different flavors.  I don’t know what it is about yellow flowers, but it’s almost comical to see one of these large lizards sprawled in the middle of a clump of green foliage with bunches of yellow flowers stuffed in its mouth.

Included among the 69 species of mammals found on the Baja Peninsula is one of my favorites, the kangaroo rat. Those of you who have camped on the shore at Laguna Ojo de Liebre have certainly seen one or two of these interesting rodents early in the morning or late in the evening. When I used to camp on the shore regularly, I loved to wipe the sand smooth around my camp, place a few flakes of oatmeal on the sand, then in the morning I would marvel at the hundreds of tiny rodent prints left by these industrious mice.

Kangaroo rats are nocturnal animals that live in shallow burrows.  They have cheek pouches for storing the seeds that are their primary food. They are all well adapted to living in the dry Baja Desert environment since most of them never need to drink water. They have super-efficient kidneys that can conserve water by concentrating their urine.  This small and prolific animal is an important food source for coyotes, bobcat and owls.  If you see them in the night, hopping across the roadway you probably will not be able to tell that their tail is longer than their body.

In addition to the native endemic species, there are some newcomers.  One interesting and successful transplant was brought to the peninsula by the whaling ship captains.  This is the Osprey or Sea Hawk.  Here’s one raptor that doesn’t eat mice. Guerrero Negro has many osprey nesting on manmade perches placed atop light buoys and power poles all around the town.

Central Baja is home to a small endangered population of less than 200 pronghorn antelope. Near the town of Vizcaino, which is located inside the Vizcaino Biosphere Reserve there is an important antelope preservation project underway. The biosphere reserve has set up a breeding area intended to add to the sparse pronghorn antelope population.

It’s interesting to note that the wild pronghorn antelope are so reclusive that from one year to the next, when the biosphere reserve biologists attempt to take population counts, the number can vary by several hundred percent. One year they may only count 30 or 40 and the next year nearly 200.

Many of the cave paintings found in Baja contain depictions of the antelope. Recently I was thumbing through a book of photos of Baja wildlife when I came across several images of the pronghorn antelope. The photos were made from an aircraft flying at low altitude.

I was instantly struck by the startling resemblance between the photographic image of the antelope herd running and some of the primitive rock paintings I have seen on past trips. I will never again view those ancient drawings as "primitive". The rock artists have captured the spirit of these antelope perfectly! That photo is the glaring proof of my own narrow minded preconception about the rock paintings. Those early painters obviously knew the antelope with an intimacy that I will never know.

The gray whale has been given many nicknames over the years.  One of them is “the desert whale”.  Since these friendly giants live three months each year inside lagoons that are surrounded by this desert environment, they too might be considered a part of the desert ecosystem.

Where else, but here in Baja, Mexico can a person sit on a remote desert shoreline and watch whales spout just a few yards away.

A different version of this newsletter was first printed in 2001, revised and then published again in 2005.  It’s been revised and updated to reflect what I've seen on recent trips through Baja.  This time I added information about the Kangaroo rats.

Author Bio:

Keith Jones is the founder of Baja Jones Adventures, Jones Adventures, Tigress Tours in Thailand and Butanding Tours in the Philippine Islands and has led thousands of people to Mexico and other interesting locations around the world. He specializes in gray whale tour, blue whale tour, gray and blue whale combo tour, giant panda bear tour, walk a tiger tour, shark tour, African safari tour, African gorilla trek, arctic narwhal tour and Magdalena Bay whale watching tour. He also writes about Baja travel and gray whales. Keith Jones is the author of Gray Whales My Twenty Years of Discovery.