Couchfish

Less diversion and more stopover, Labuan Pandan sits on the east coast of Lombok, a little north of the ferry to Sumbawa. A blink and you’ll miss it village, it boasts scenic black sand beaches and excellent offshore islanding. Perfect for small budget families.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.... Photo: Stuart McDonald.

While there are half a handful of places to stay, I always settle in at Pondok Siola. Set right on the beach, the lawn garden is dotted with deckchairs and palm trees, all looking straight out to the Alas Straight. We’ve driven down from Senaru on the north coast, but take our time, arriving in the early afternoon. 

I’d say just in time for a late lunch, but the food, while tasty, can take a while to arrive. Instead we order dinner then hang out on the beach and in the gardens for the rest of the day. Oh, and organise a snorkelling trip for tomorrow.

Pondok Siola. Simple but comfortable. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

When people think islands and Lombok, the Gili islands on the west coast are the first that spring to mind. The east coast has two clusters as well, and that’s what will be keeping us busy over the next two days ... or so.

The first day we leave after breakfast and our outrigger takes us north for an hour to Gili Lawang (map link) and Gili Sulat (map link). Both are mangrove islands, and have little in the way of beaches. The snorkelling though, is a different matter.

The kids and I jump into the channel between the two islands and snorkel along the north coast of Gili Sulat. It is excellent, with a long slow drift current and a deep drop off. The guide points out a beautiful yellow head moray eel, but later, the true highlight comes. Drifting on the edge of the blue, I dive down looking for morays, then as I turn, two eagle rays glide past. Just gorgeous—I almost jump out of the water with surprise—as do the kids!

…the sea shells she sells are sea shells for sure. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Later we tie up to land and follow an elevated walkway into the mangroves. The walkway is in bad shape, but the mangroves are in better condition. The kids enjoy spotting crabs and other critters in the mud.

The afternoon gets lost back at Pondok Siola. A few icy beers, cards with the kids, snoozing on the lawn—you know the drill—it’s a holiday!

The next morning we get going earlier. The sea is flat like a mirror and we make fast time skating south to the coast of Gili Petagan (map link). Jutting out to the island’s south is a massive coral garden, and shallow, under a metre. The outrigger drops us off out to sea in the east. It seems too deep, but once we’re in the water we see why—the current is fast!

The water is pretty clear. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

We daisy–chain hands and just float. No need to paddle or anything—the current takes us over the reef like we’re on a moving footpath. Beautiful soft corals sway and tonnes of fish dart left and right beneath us. The kids: mesmerised. In just 30 minutes we’re out back over the deep, but the boat is waiting, picks us up and takes us back around to repeat it. And again.

Just across the water to the south is Gili Bidara (map link). A blip of an island, absolute white sand and decent off beach snorkelling await. Later the kids fossick for sea shells—the beach is quite clean by Indonesian standards. We walk all the way around the island and it takes just 30 minutes. The inland is covered is sweet potato farms, with a few fisherman huts. That’s it. I ask it is possible to camp here. The boatman from Pondok Siola explains, with a bit of notice, no problem. Next time.

Gili Bidara. Bloody awful. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

There’s another island just to the south, Gili Kondo (map link). It is larger, and more popular and we get ready to head there. Then our boatman suggests, after looking at the two sunburnt and exhausted kids, we save it for tomorrow.

So we do.

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What am I doing writing about the Boxing Day Tsunami? In June? Good question. Having lived through one cataclysmic event you hope you won’t experience another, yet here we are. The events of December 26, 2004 have been on my mind for a while now—I don’t think they ever really left—and the more I’ve thought about it, the more I can see a parallel between it and Covid19.

We were staying with journalist friends in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, when the Boxing Day Tsunami hit. The plan had been to head to Tangalle, the four of us together, but then one came down with dengue fever, so we lingered. He having dengue probably saved our lives.

I spent the next five days travelling with Sam as she covered the south coast devastation for AFP. A spell that will never leave me. On the day of the wave, when we were still in Colombo, a friend in Phuket had called, clearly in shock. The scene there was terrible, with many dead—I said I’d come and see him as soon as I could.

Pala Withanage gestures towards the flattened remains of his seaside home in Polhena, Sri Lanka. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

A few days later, Phuket. My friend was in bad shape. He’d lost friends and introduced me to others who had lost family, sometimes children. The stories were horrific, often delivered over chained cigarettes and heavy drinking.

At Surin Beach, a slim, handsome Thai man, a friend of my friend, talked about being trapped in a car park, cars being smashed around by the water. He’d been running from the wave, holding his daughter’s hand but couldn’t hang on. He’d been searching for her in the days since and now thought the worst.

I’d heard a near identical story from a European tourist in Sri Lanka. She’d clutched onto her husband as the wave hit, her child held by her other hand. She wasn’t able to hang on to both, and her infant slipped from her grasp. When I met her in a small medical centre on the south coast, she was travelling clinic to clinic, hoping to find her child. No words.

Signs asking after missing loved ones, Khao Lak. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

I left Phuket and took the ferry to Ko Phi Phi. Like Phuket and Khao Lak to the north, Ko Phi Phi had been devastated. One part of a pier was underwater. When I looked out, I could see across the isthmus to the other side. It was like a bomb had gone off.

It had been over a week since the wave, by the time I reached there. Most bodies were gone and the living moved around, getting the clean-up underway. I met one foreigner, a dive instructor, collecting flip flops, building a pile of them.

She ruminated that she’d often find single flip flops on the beach pre-tsunami and wonder where the other one was. She had found plenty of sets now though, and kept them in a separate, smaller pile, “just in case”.

Flip flops. Tonsai, Ko Phi Phi. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

I hiked over to the far side, to a small resort I know the owner of, to check she was ok. Her restaurant was badly damaged, but the ramshackle bungalows, because they were up the slope a little, had mostly survived. When I got there she was walking the beach, gathering flotsam. On seeing me, she ran up to say hello, offered coffee and we sat for a spell.

She’d lost friends, others she wasn’t sure about, “still early” she whispered as we sat watching the turquoise water, “maybe they’re ok”.

She planned to rebuild. “The tourists will come back”, she said, “Thai people are strong people, we will make this better.”

Back in Tonsai (the main village on Ko Phi Phi), the scene was similar. Locals, Thais, expats and tourists all working together. Cleaning up, piling refuse into mountains to move it onto barges and fishing boats.

Tonsai. Like a bomb went off. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Another dive master, a gruff and burly, well tanned European, told me how he’d run up the stairs of a hotel to escape the wave. He broke down as he related what it was like watching the wave from above. He said he heard the Earth groan as people screamed. The day after the wave, walking on the beach, still in shock, he realised he had stood on somebody’s hand, the rest of their body buried in the sand.

Phi Phi came back. Perhaps not in the form many of us hoped for, but it came back. People came together. They rebuilt, and helped out others not as lucky as them. And the tourists returned, and to Sri Lanka too. It took some time, but eventually in greater numbers than ever.

The tsunami, the randomness of who it killed and who it spared, and the overall devastation it wrought, has faded from many memories, though not all.

Starting anew. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Today, in the midst of the era of Covid19, I’ve thought a lot about those days post tsunami. It destroyed so many and so much, yet out of the ashes, two civil wars came to a close, and destinations did grow back, stronger than ever.

That Boxing Day death toll has sadly already been eclipsed by Covid19, and the latter has a long way to go yet. As was the case with the wave, survivor’s livelihoods—and tourism—have been destroyed.

One day we’ll get a handle on this plague, and, as was the case post–Tsunami, the way people work together and help each other now, will be vital in shaping the world that waits at the other end.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit couchfish.substack.com

If you’re killing time in Bangkok, Ko Samet to the east or Kanchanaburi to the west are the logical options. I say go west, break it with a night or two in Kanchanaburi, but then keep going—to Sangkhlaburi. Spitting distance from the Burmese border, it’s an ideal diversion from the Thai capital.

I grab a morning minibus from Kanchanaburi for the roughly three and a half hour run west along Route 323. Given the minibus speed I try to keep my eyes shut, but I pry them open as we head west by Sai Yok then Khao Laem National Parks. The last 45 minutes of the drive is just stunning, with the lake running out to the left. Then it all screeches to a halt by the market in town—just in time for a quick bite for lunch.

In the past I’d hit Burmese Inn—for years the cheapest spot in town—but it was looking poor on a previous visit, so instead I head to another backpacker stalwart, P Guesthouse. It is a newer place and has decent rooms and friendly staff. The real selling point though, is its lawn terrace which has excellent lake views across to the Mon village.

Moody weather. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Set on the rim of a reservoir, the lake splits the town. The more typical Thai town is to one side and the Mon village and their impressive temples are on the other. Resorts (including some quite fancy ones) and guesthouses are flung out around the reservoir’s banks. 

Traditionally a Karen town, an inflow of Thai and Mon settlers gives it a diverse vibe. This is reflected not just in the people, but also in their houses, temples, and food. This diversity came together in 2013 when Sangkhlaburi’s wooden bridge collapsed. People of all ethnicities joined forces to piece together a floating bamboo replacement. A permanent new bridge opened the following year.

The height of the lake varies by the season. With the light getting long, I hire a small boat to take me out to the remains of the original town. It takes us about 30 minutes to get there, and it is eerie as we pass stands of long dead trees. 

All broken down at Wat Samprasob. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Little remains, but some of Wat Samprasob still stands, pieces of a broken Buddha piled in front. It is interesting, and photogenic, but the true pleasure is just being out on the water at this late hour. After the sunken town, we head over to the wooden bridge—it seems enormous with the waters so low.

I finish off the day at See Daeng. It is a hotel restaurant, but well regarded for its Thai and Karen food. On a past visit David has raved about a Karen–style pork salad, but I’m not in the mood for savoury pig intestines.  

Early the next morning I walk to the wooden bridge. At 850m long, the original was the second longest wooden bridge in the world. While I could cross it in as little as ten minutes, I take my time. There are floating houses and rafts tied up below the bridge and I watch the lives going on below me. With the misty mountains in the background, it is just beautiful.

The old wooden bridge. With dog. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The Mon village sits at the far end of the bridge and there are a clutch of small food stalls laying in wait. I have a simple Mon–style khanom jin—thin rice noodles doused in a fish curry sauce with loads of fresh vegetables on the side. Filling and delicious. 

From here it is about a kilometre on foot to Wat Mon and the Buddhakaya Chedi. The chedi looks like a giant corncob from afar, though the intention was to mimic the Mahabodhi stupa in Bodhgaya, India. Each niche holds a Buddha image and the views across the lake from here are some of the best. Another few hundred metres away is Wat Mon—so known due to most of the monks being Mon.

I could walk back, but there are a few bored looking motorbike taxis hanging around. I give one some business to take me back to the bridge, which I again take my time crossing.

Cruising. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Afterwards I head to Baan Unruk Bakery and Cafe which is run by a local NGO. They support programmes designed to help displaced single mothers and kids who have fled Burma. The food is good (it is vegetarian so no savoury pig intestines in sight). There is also a small gift shop.

Talking about Burma, back at P Guesthouse I hire a scooter for the run out to Three Pagoda Pass. Just like it says on the can, there are three small pagodas and a pass. Some have said these are not original and that the real deal are at the bottom of the lake. Others say these are the only ones. Who knows!

With a few more days I could organise some trekking into the surrounding national parks—or just, you know relax by the lakeside. Sangklarburi is whatever you make of it.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit couchfish.substack.com

Tim and I walk out of our guesthouse in Bac Kan, northern Vietnam. It is 7:30 am, early 1995, and we’ve spent the previous few weeks hitching Vietnam’s northwest. We’ve now turned to the far north and while parts of the northwest were challenging, the far north is moreso. We don’t really talk to each other much anymore.

* Note: An apology on the photos in this piece. All my pics are on slide, so I had to take pics of them with my phone. Accidentally retro!

We take a four kilometre hike out of town then throw down our bags and wait. Silently. A dirt truck picks us up, and we sit on a pyramid of soil on the tray as we clatter to Phu Thong, maybe 20 kilometres north. We don’t speak.

The view from the back of one of our many trucks. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Phu Thong, we figure, is our best bet for Ba Be. The truck drops us by the market and we start asking around for xe om to Ba Be and back. I don’t remember this bit, but my diary reads:

“Watch out for the motorcyclists in Phu Thong trying to rip you off on the trip to Ba Be. We eventually got two bikes there and back on the same day for 100,000 dong, though the starting price had been 200,000 dong each one way.”

In the annals of Phu Thong market, there is probably a corresponding entry:

“Early January 1995. Two tiresome foreigners refused to pay a fair rate, and in the end we took them almost for free just to be rid of them.”

Xe om drivers of Phu Thong, I apologise.

The trip takes two hours one way to cover the 40km, in my diary I describe the road as “ghastly,” though I don’t remember it. What I do remember is the forested last stretch, I write: “Elfish”.

How can you wash your bike in this? At Ba Be Lakes. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The lake is lovely, and it seems offensive that the xe om guys wash the caked mud off their bikes in these waters. We dawdle and are offered a boat trip. We refuse, “too expensive,” and just sit by the edge throwing pebbles and soaking up the view.

At a smoke break on the way back, our drivers ask where next, Hanoi?

No, we’re going to Cao Bang, we say, mispronouncing it so badly we need to write it down. Much confabbing, then they ride faster, skip the market and leave us at a mate’s house who is driving there—he’ll take us for 25,000 dong each.

The drive is as spectacular as it is shocking. Mountainous, but as in the northwest, brutally deforested. Imagine a mountain getting a Brazilian—every nook and cranny, smooth as smooth can be.

Bye bye trees. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

We reach Cao Bang after nightfall. We’re delivered to a truly appalling hotel, and our driver explains he’ll be back in 30 minutes to eat.

Back to my diary:

“The hotel is a horrible place. Gross toilets, cold water, so rude.”

For me to say the toilets are gross means they’re on par with the ones at Istanbul bus station that had s**t on the ceiling.

Yes, that bus is coming towards us. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Our driver returns, drunk. Into his Jeep we head to a booze and food joint. Everyone gets hammered. Of course he drives us back afterwards, but when we try to escape to the hotel, it’s “no no no,” and we’re back boozing and eating—just opposite the hotel this time.

Morning comes—68 hours too early. We grab our passports off the desk (taken for security), where they’ve sat all night. First ride is on a brick truck to Thach An, an hour south of Cao Bang, but there we get stuck. We stand by the road for hours. Kids stare. We don’t speak much. When hitching, eventually you just run out of things to say.

Simple living. You can see the road on the left. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Then who should pull up, but our Jeep friend from the previous day. He looks and smells like he never stopped drinking and sure enough, once we get going, Tim says he’s drunk. We stop to eat—food and hair of the dog.

Then, a little out of town he hits a dog, killing it. The party stops.

He pulls up, opens the door, falls out, then walks back to talk to a man on the street. The dog is between their feet, dead. They talk. He walks back to the Jeep and gestures to us, rubbing his fingers together.

We need to pay for the dog.

I don’t remember what we paid. I do remember us handing him some money, being asked for more, more again, then “ok ok”. He walks back to the man and gives him the money. We’re done.

One of our rides. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

His driving settles, then the road gets mountainous—we’re clipped to the side of a ridge. There is no safety railing and it is scary. He drives, half watching the road, half leering left and right looking for something. When he spies it, he lurches across the road—a food shack. We eat, then the shots come out again. One round, two rounds, three rounds, four. Jesus.

Back on the road. It’s no longer scary, it’s terrifying. My memories are foggy—I remember sheer cliffs, demented driving, no safety barriers and him talking in Vietnamese non–stop.

I’ll never be as happy as I am when we reach That Khe.

After the previous day we forgo hitching the last leg to Lang Son. The three and a half hour trip in a local bus costs 7,000 dong. The bus is so crammed I can’t fit inside, so I hang out of the door for the entire trip. The road is awful. When we hit a bad patch the railing I’m holding onto simply snaps off. The second on the bus gestures at me—just throw it away.

The train to Hanoi, at Lang Son. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Lang Son by early afternoon, there’s a 3:30 pm train to Hanoi. Waiting, we meet four British women who’ve just crossed from China—they’re the first Westerners we’ve seen in at least a week.

Later when we’re all hanging out together in Hanoi, one of them remarks that they thought when they met us we were really odd.

“All you did was talk. It was non-stop.”

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit couchfish.substack.com

Anyone who knows me knows I’m not a particularly loud speaker. I’m not a whisperer, but unless I’m really off on a rant (as has been known to happen on occasion), even if you’re at the next table you’ll struggle in your eavesdropping efforts.

Others, like the Australian at the end of the boat, are the opposite. I cannot not hear him—no matter how much I try. Ho hum, just a day and a half of the boat trip left to go.

This video captures the appeal—but look how crowded it is on board!

Allow me to rewind slightly. I filled the previous morning zip-lining at the Gibbon Experience, then transferred back to Huay Xai. Once I’d dumped my gear at a guesthouse, the rest of the day was lost in a riverside cafe with a frosty Beerlao (perhaps two), eating, and watching the sun set over Thailand.

In the morning, a gaggle of eight of us, tickets in hand, lined up and climbed into the “backpacker boat”. Ahead of us, a day and a half trip on the Mekong River, with an overnight stop at Pakbeng.

Good night Thailand. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

As with the boat from Xieng Kok, our vessel is a wooden cargo affair, upgraded slightly to make tourists more comfortable. The toilet has a door (though it it still nothing more than a hole in the deck—aim carefully), and there are red plastic chairs to sit on. One of the more entrepreneurial crew members has a drinks cooler—he’ll sell us chilled Beerlao later.

Eight is a low load. I’ve seen these boats with twenty plus on them. And about an hour into the trip we stack the chairs and recline on the deck—far more comfortable.

While the weather is threatening, the trip is beautiful. Every time I’ve done this journey a new or different angle on the river has been my most memorable moment. This time it seems, the most memorable aspect is going to be the Australian.

Pick your chariot. Photo: Cindy Fan.

The group is a typical mix of uniformly Western travellers. There’s the Australian, plus me making two, a middle aged Dutch couple, two 20-something Canadian women, a German and an Italian—both I’d guess in their mid thirties.

The other Australian though, is easily the youngest, 19 or 20, and he’s from the most painful of traveller sub-species—the competitive traveller.

He’s been bragging to the two Canadians about the “unspoilt village” he has just come from (Pai). Earlier he was on about Ko Tao, “where they filmed The Beach” (they didn’t). Before that, he says he drank snake blood at Lumpini Park in Bangkok, something I’m positive is a lie.

Slow boats come in many sizes. Skip the olive green one! Photo: Stuart McDonald.

I turn and lean against the railing, watching the river slide by. We’re in a smooth stretch, moving fast, slicing through the chocolate water. I watch the ripples from the prow, they foam like a bad latte then shoot out to meet the cliffs we’re passing. I put my earphones on and fall asleep as we near Pak Tha.

I wake, and he’s in a heated discussion with the Dutch couple. Apparently the beach he stayed at on Ko Pha Ngan was far better than where they did. The woman has long lost interest in the conversation but her partner is arguing the point.

This is the worst aspect of the competitive traveller—an inability to understand that travel is different things to different people and that, well, it isn’t a competition. It isn’t pleasant having someone tell you where you stayed was a dump (unless it was Sihanoukville), especially when it is being done so gracelessly, as by the Australian. The Dutch guy is bristling.

The Mekong from the river bank at Pak Tha. Photo: Adam Poskitt.

I try to gather which beaches they’re arguing about as I know Ko Pha Ngan very well. I’m horrified to learn I actually agree with the Australian. Where he stayed wouldn’t have been my first pick, but I would never have recommended where the Dutch couple spent their time. What I think though, doesn’t matter, it wasn’t my trip and they loved it. But the Australian just wont let it go.

On and on they go. He pauses to go get more beer, just for him of course, and while he’s gone, there’s a quick and annoyed exchange in Dutch. You don’t need to speak a word of the language to know she is over it.

He returns, quaffs the beer, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, and gets straight back into it.

Ships that pass in the night. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

“Look I don’t mean to be rude, but it is just a s**t beach and I don’t get why you stayed there. Why didn’t you move?”

“We liked it. We loved the village and the food. We didn’t want a tourist beach.”

Ha ha, he’s calling the Australian a tourist and he bites. Big time.

“I’m not a tourist, I’m a traveller.”

The entire boat groans as one. Can we throw him into the river yet?

His line is enough for the Dutch woman though, and she leaves, climbing onto the roof. Once up there, she yells something down and her companion follows.

A speedboat refuelling. You don’t see these much on the river anymore. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

There’s a pause and the Australian looks at me, but there is no way I want to talk to him, so I escape to the roof as well. The Dutch guy is getting told off as I settle down on the hot tin roof a metre or so from them.

The scenery is sublime.

The Dutch guy leans over to me, his partner still shaking her head, and apologises.

“I’m sorry about that,” he says, “I just can’t stand people like him, they make me crazy.”

Then he laughs, “We’ve never even been to Ko Pha Ngan!”

The day passes. We see people panning for gold on the river bank—they use mercury to bind it, making for an unhealthy way to earn money. Further down, men cast glittering white fishing nets. A village here, a village there—smudges of brown in the surrounding olive. We pass the occasional other boat, but it’s mostly just us, on the roof, and it is pretty magical.

The boat landing at Pakbeng. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

By the time we approach Pakbeng the three of us have been on the roof for hours. The occasional beer run, playing cards, chatting about what we do—they’re both academics on a sabbatical. Time passes. Slow.

That’s why they call it the slow boat.

Tomorrow: A close encounter in Pakbeng, then finally, Luang Prabang.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit couchfish.substack.com

When you’re on the ascent of Mount Kinabalu, it can seem like time stands still. That whole one step forward, two steps back thing. Your guide says there is just ten minutes to go, but you’re sure your watch says that was 18 minutes ago. Or 48 minutes ago. Time takes on a whole new meaning—and not in a good way.

Hammock out of shot. Photo: Sally Arnold.

You might not know this, but in the shadow of Mount Kinabalu lies a place where time takes on an entirely new meaning. Where time stands still, but in a good way. So much so, the name of the place is Lupa Masa “forget time” in Malay. And after a Kinabalu ascent, you’ll be wanting to forget time for a while.

Lupa Masa* is a jungle hideout, roughly a 45 minute trek from near the entrance to Poring Hot Springs (map link) in Sabah. Maybe sooth your feet at Poring before the walk. 

Jungle nightlife is limited. Photo: Sally Arnold.

My instructions are brief and vague—as befits a jungle hideout. “Get to Poring and on the right there is a laundry shop, ask there for more information.” That is it.

Once gathered, the “more information” bit is: “Walk down the road, take the trail and just keep going.”

So I do.

The river at the base of Lupa Masa. Look at that water! Photo: Sally Arnold.

The forest envelops me. There’s no signage and the trail, while clear, is not worn nor rutted. The canopy thickens, the (few) sounds of Poring fade, replaced by birds and the faint sound of a river. 

I reach a fallen, sodden tree blocking the path. I see the rotting bark is scuffed by trekking boots, so I know at least I’m heading in the right direction. The sound of the river gets louder, then I realise I’m standing above a small waterfall. It ditches into a narrow charcoal stone crevice and I think it must be beautiful from below. The trail continues, I leave the waterfall behind me.

The humidity is punishing. I’ve only been walking thirty minutes and I’m drenched—as sodden as the trunk I just climbed over. Then the forest eases, the trail curls around to the right, and I’m there. Alone.

Be sure to zip up that sleeping bag at night. Photo: Sally Arnold.

Ramshackle doesn’t come close to capturing first impressions. I think “Wow if I ever ran a guesthouse, this is how it would look”. This is not a compliment. There is a slapped together common area, and a deck out back. I walk out to the deck and I feel like I’m standing in the forest canopy.

I drop my bag where I’m standing and just breath (well, pant to be honest) and soak it up. The humidity is killing me, so I strip off my shirt. The air is so still I can feel the sweat beading then running down my back. The air might be still, but it is far from silent.

More of the river and forest. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The river is there, birdsong, a gust of wind rustles in the canopy. Then I look to the right and there is a hammock.

Perfection.

Lupa Masa describes itself as a “rainforest camp”. The concept is, you live in the jungle and perhaps just chill on the veranda in (my) hammock. Or go trekking. Or night wildlife spotting. Or learn jungle survival skills. Or go swim in the waterfall (take my word for it, it is freezing). Or all the above.

Or none.

Regardless of what you choose to do, what is important is that you forget about time while you do it. It is surprising just how easy this is to do.

Accommodation is rudimentary. Some opt for tents. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

By the time two other guests appear I’ve been in the hammock two hours. It feels like thirty minutes.

“Oh hello” one says, “are you new or do you work here? We’ve just been swimming in the river and saw a monkey thing, do you know what it is?”

Seeing my blank stare, they continue “You don’t work here do you? Here, get out of the bleedin’ hammock and we’ll show you how this place works—it is grand.”

Feeling like I’m in their hammock, I sheepishly get out and ask how long they’ve been here.

There are plenty of critters. Photo: Sally Arnold.

“Oh I don’t know. Jess, how long has it been? A week?,” Jess shrugs her shoulders. Then they both turn to me, as if they’re inviting me into a secret club;

“Do you know what Lupa Masa means?” 

* On finishing writing this, I went to check Lupa Masa’s contact details and discovered they closed in January. Sadly for good it seems. Maybe they’ll re–open—you have time right?!

Disclosure: Lupa Masa was started by a couple of friends of mine.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit couchfish.substack.com

The official boat departure time from Monywa in Burma’s Sagaing Region was 4am (yes, ayem), so we got there at 3. A and I had spent the previous night exploring Monywa’s nightlife scene. As there was none (that we could find), 3am didn’t seem like a push.

It was.

Hello Monywa. Photo: Mark Ord.

We were heading up the Chindwin River. How far we didn’t know, but as the boat started in Monywa (map link), it seemed as good a place as any to start.

The boat had two decks—we’d purchased our tickets the previous afternoon. I want to say our shared cabin had reclining seats pulled out of a dead bus, but maybe they were out of a Kombi. We made our way to our assigned seats (yes, assigned) hunched over. As I can sleep anywhere, I went straight back to sleep.

Pick your chariot. Photo: Mark Ord.

I don’t know how much later it was, but we were still moored. A woke me up.

“Hey mate, you have to see this,” they said.

There were perhaps three or four rows of transported bus chairs and we were in the second row. Immediately in front of us were a set of small TVs.

They were screening a video of foreigners eating live monkey brains.

No, it wasn’t Indiana Jones. It was some dated film of decadent foreigners eating monkey brains.

Like this, just even worse dressed.

I blinked. Wot?

Then, post blink, the broadcast switched to a Buddhist monk. He was giving a sermon in Burmese. I don’t speak Burmese so I don’t know what he was saying.

Then the video flicked back. The monk was gone replaced by what I guess was a '70s soft–core flick.

Then the monk was back.

Then the soft–core was back.

Then the monk.

Then the monkey brain stuff again.

Are we there yet? No, we actually haven’t left yet. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The cabin was perhaps half full. A and I were mesmerised. It was one of the most bizarre public transport experiences I’ve had in Southeast Asia. If I had to guess, I’d venture the monk was railing against Western decadence. It could just as much have been ‘70s Western fashion. I don’t know. My mind whirls.

What I do know is the river travel in Burma is unforgettable.

After about two hours the video got flicked off and we started roaming the boat. We stood by the railing, watching Burma wake up and slide by. It was just fantastic.

Dawn on the Chindwin. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

There was no food or drink on the boat. Every now and then, we’d pull into a village and the locals would paddle out in sampans. They were selling cigarettes, noodles, snacks, and then, upon seeing foreigners, beer. Lots of beer. Warm, canned beer.

The first night was at Kalewa (map link). At the time, there was talk of this opening to an overland route to India. One of the last impediments to an overlander’s dream falling. The border wasn’t open, but roadworks were well underway in anticipation. It is, at least pre-covid-19, now open—some paperwork required.

Kalewa was a smudge on the riverbank. Half mud, a third wood and the rest rutted tarmac. A local rode us out to the main tourism mainstay, a suspension bridge. There was a huge tree where the boats would lean to, its roots holding onto the shifting bank for grim life.

Are we there yet? No. Does it matter? No. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

We checked in with immigration; they were more bemused than put out. Then we investigated Kalewa’s nightlife—lower key than Monywa seems a fair description. We slept in a small flophouse. The beds were hard. Hard.

Most of the next day we pushed upriver. A mishmash of mountains and forest slid past. Then a half–sunk barge loaded with earth–moving gear, scoops grasping at the fast-flowing water. Collapsed bridges, then sampans with cigarettes and beer. Kids everywhere.

We pulled into Mawleik (map link) towards the end of the day. It had a real guesthouse, and the ground floor was an internet cafe. Sitting, listening to dial–up, another Westerner rolled in. He was a tour guide for a high–end cruise parked out front. He couldn’t abide another moment with his pax so had sought refuge in the internet cafe. 

Still chugging. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Their boat was a faux paddle steamer. He was taking them down the river that night for a candlelit dinner on a sandbank.

“W*****s!” the guide spat out, “I’d rather eat with you guys.” 

An hour later, A and I sat in a riverfront restaurant. Iced beers and a mix of Burmese curries laid out, the river slid by. The stilted restaurant sat on the bank, with the muddy water so close we could have leapt into it. We chatted, elbows on sill, watching the customers board for their romantic dinner. 

Later a local fixer, also an English teacher in the parts, introduced himself. If you have ever been to Mawleik, you would have met him. 

What IS it with golf?! Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Did we need a guide for the next day? He’d show us a colonial-period golf course—those Brits I tell ya. Oh and and the grounds of a hospital where every WW2 Japanese patient committed suicide.

And he did.

Our ride home arrives. This photo still makes me laugh. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

A day later, we took the boat back. It was just as good.

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We’ve been lazing on Ko Libong for a few days when the kids ask, “Where’s next?” We’ve already been to see the dugongs, walked up and down the beach a bit and visited a nearby fishing village. They’re idle and looking for new distractions.

Please do watch to the end to see cheeky Will get his just desserts.

When I reply, “Ko Sukorn,” they both look at me blankly.

“What does it have?”

“Nothing.”

“So why are we going there?”

“Because it has nothing.”

“Oh.”

We’ve spent the last few weeks island-hopping Thailand’s southwest and each island has had “something”. Ko Muk had the Emerald Cave. Ko Kradan, reefs. Ko Rok, more reefs. Ko Libong, dugongs. So the appeal of going somewhere with “nothing” takes some explaining.

How crabs fill in their days on Ko Sukorn. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

“We’ll stop at Ko Lao Liang on the way, for a snorkel, but when we get to Sukorn, we’ll just hang out.”

More blank looks.

“Don’t worry, you’ll understand when we get there.”

We charter a longtail for the run south. This allows us to break the trip at Ko Lao Liang to snorkel and wander down the beach. It is an hour or so to there and another hour to Ko Sukorn. Lao Liang’s reef is pretty banged up, but the setting is sublime and we have the entire joint to ourselves.

Oh so pretty at Ko Lao Liang. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Ko Sukorn (map link) lacks the appeals of many other southern Thai islands. There are no limestone massifs, no white-sand beaches, and due to its relative proximity to the mainland, the water is not clear. There are just a handful of places to stay, and all close for the off season. Tourism is an after–thought for the vast majority of the predominantly Muslim residents.

But it is this lack of mainstay appeals that lends the island its appeal. If you’re busying yourself on the more, well, busy islands, Ko Sukorn makes for a solid diversion.

Second row still gets you a sea view at Sukorn Andaman Beach Resort. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

All but one of the main places to stay are set on a single long smooth greyish sandy beach. The drop off is as smooth as the sand, and it feels like we can walk straight out for miles. We grab three kayaks from where we are staying at Sukorn Andaman Beach Resort (email: [email protected]), and paddle the length of the beach. We’re travelling with the current on the way down and the kids find it fun and easy. When we turn to return, the going is harder. They alternate between walking and paddling and moaning. They give up about 100 metres shy of where we are staying, and I drag the kayaks back to the resort.

The rest of the day is lounging, eating and throwing ourselves into bathwater sea now and then. The sun sinks, instigating a brilliant light show of oranges, purples and deep rich blues. Ko Lao Liang and, further south, Ko Phetra, are silhouetted. Despite there being “nothing to do”, the kids go to bed early—knackered.

Sunsets deliver. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The next day we hire a scooter and spend half the day circumnavigating the island. The ride is just shy of 20 kilometres, but it takes us hours. We go to the southernmost point where there is a pier jutting out to sea. If we squint, we can make out Ko Tarutao and, further still, Langkawi. 

We ride into the main village on the mainland side of the island. It’s noodle soup for lunch, along with sickly sweet lemon iced tea. The lady who runs the hole–in–the–wall shop takes our photo along with her similarly aged kids. She says she’ll get it printed and stick it on her wall. She doesn’t see many farang in these parts.

Where rubber comes from class starts in 30 seconds. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

We continue on our way, winding through breezy rubber plantations. I pull up to show the kids how the rubber tapping works. My son looks at the sap dribbling out at a glacial pace—“it’s white,” he exclaims. Later we pull up at the farmer’s house. Rubber sheets hanging, lengthening with gravity. “It’s still white,” he says again, then declares he’ll “search it up” that evening to find out why car tires aren’t white.

Next we pause at a viewpoint. The inland mountains of Trang and Phattalung provinces are clear as a bell. A longtail crawls by below us. The day is warm now, but a breeze rushes up the escarpment towards us bringing with it not just cool air, but the smell of salt.

We curl around the northern tip of the island. There we find a pretty, almost-white-sand beach with an abandoned resort on it. We explore, treading with care over rotten wooden decks and peering through broken windows. Later, the kids ask about ghosts on the island.

Crescent moon and another light show. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Then we’re back to where we started.

The light show kicks off again. Maybe a half dozen other people nurse cold drinks on well spaced–out lazy chairs. Silence.

The sun sinks, the stars come out, accompanied by a slivered crescent moon.

The kids go to bed early again. These islands with “nothing” can sure keep you busy.

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People say they remember where they were when they heard that Lady Di died, or the 9/11 attacks. Me? Yes, I have those, but I also remember when I first watched Jaws. I didn’t get in the ocean for about a year after that.

Years later, friends would roll their eyes—kind of like how a Great White does just before it delivers an underwater appendectomy—whenever I trotted out the Jaws excuse.

Not a bad spot to learn to dive. Video: Samantha Brown.

I’d always reply “one day”.

That day came on the Togean Islands in Sulawesi. As with many first–timers to the islands, we went for a week, but stayed for three. Decamped at Island Retreat, time went slow. Swim, eat, jump off the pier, rinse and repeat.

At the time, the resort had an English Dive Instructor and we became friends. We’d chat about all sorts of stuff—everything except diving. Day by day, we edged closer to the question:

“Stuart, you’ve been living in Southeast Asia for 20+ years—why don’t you dive?”

Seems as good a morning as any. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Then the morning came. I’d read the books and checked the gear. The two of us got on one of the resort’s wooden boats and motored off the beach maybe thirty metres. My kids sat in the prow and cheered as I back-rolled into the crystal water—not a Great White in sight.

We floated. I fitted my mask, checked my weight belt and all the other gizmos. Then I made the OK sign, waved to the kids and sunk below.

There are few things like taking that first breath underwater. As many Australians, I learned to swim young, but they never teach you to breath underwater. Sitting crosslegged on the sand, light dancing through, sound distorted. There is just nothing like it.

The Togeans. No photoshopping required. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

I looked up and could make out the fractured outlines of the kids peering over the wooden prow. Watching us two humans sitting on the bottom of the sea. How weird is that?

We were living rubber time on the island so it took me a week to get my certification. Then all I wanted to do was dive.

Once qualified we’d boat each day out to an atoll to dive. There wasn’t a diver other than my instructor and I for miles. For the nervous learner, the conditions couldn’t have been more perfect.

Jump in here? Photo: Stuart McDonald.

The closest atoll started at maybe three metres down and the wall dropped to the centre of the earth. Sheer. Off to the other side, the Big Blue.

One time an eagle ray drifted in from The Blue. I’ve never seen something so close to magnificent levitation in my life. So graceful and elegant. I was a metre off the wall, perhaps twenty metres down, watching it drift past like a hallucination.

Other days, a German family would join us. The son was as cocky as they come—painful. An Italian free-diver also joined us. I loved watching the snorkellers above us. I’d think of them through the eyes of a Great White eyeing throw downs. 

The colours are prettier underwater. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

We were at about 25 metres when the German kid found a huge lobster in a crevice of the wall. Its luminescent white antennae swaying in the current. I say luminescent, because once you are at depth the colours all change. The reds glow, hints of purple pulsate—green and lime fusions you could never paint without chemicals.

The kid signalled to the Italian he had found something interesting. The Italian free-dived down. He put his hand on the kid’s shoulder enjoying the lobster then signalled he needed to go up. After all he still needed to breath.

“No I don’t want to take that German kid out on the boat again!” Photo Stuart McDonald.

Ignorant or unthinking (most likely both), the kid offered his mouthpiece to the Italian. The Italian took it. Later he said he just wasn’t thinking. Anyone who dives knows how dangerous what he did was. Even I did.

Realising his error, the Italian left us, trying to vacate his lungs on the way up. Like a martini, he was lifted, but shaken, by the experience. Back in the boat, my instructor tore strips off both the kid and the Italian. “You could have killed him” I remember him yelling.

Diving is amazing and serious in equal measure.

Seemed a slightly inappropriate celebrationary dinner, but it was delish. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Days later, just my instructor and I did a night dive off a small island out of the bay. While the colours of the atoll wall were amazing, nature’s light show in the dark took it to a whole new level. 

I can only describe them as fairies. They’d float past us, and we’d highlight them with a torch. Their beauty magical. I felt like I was on the set for Avatar. Everything glowed against a satin backdrop. I could have sat there for hours.

Years later I had my “Italian moment” in the water off an island near Kota Kinabalu and never dove again. By good fortune, my only “wound” was losing the feeling in half my face for six months. Glass half full and all that.

Diving is amazing and serious, but the amazing bit is right up there and I’ll forever be glad that I gave it a go.

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When people want to dip their finger into the Mekong Delta from Ho Chi Minh City, My Tho or Can Tho are the first two off the rank. I say go further. Try Sa Dec.

“So it’s during the crossing of a branch of the Mekong, on the ferry that plies between Vinh Long and Sa Dec in the great plain of mud and rice in southern Cochin China. The Plain of the Birds.”

So writes Marguerite Duras about the river crossing in The Lover. Standing on the car ferry taking me across the same body of water, I think things have not changed much.

The novel probably aged better. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

My Tho and Can Tho attract thanks to their floating markets, but Sa Dec isn’t that much farther. Something about it makes it worth the effort. The town’s fame among foreigners may lay with the novel, but the real attraction is elsewhere.

I’m lucky enough to have a local as a guide, Annie. We’d met in Saigon, and when I messaged to say I was in town, we met up and started eating.

Hu Tieu Ba Sam kicked into business in 1968, serving up cheap and delicious bowls of hu tieu to the homeless. Today, three generations later, it still does the same. That said, today the clientele is more cosmopolitan, with no shortage of Vietnamese instagrammers on location.

Hit me. At Hu Tieu Ba Sam. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Its accolades include the best bowl of hu tieu in Southeast Asia—I’m not going to pretend to be able to judge that. But the bowl was as delicious as the plastic stool and general confines of the joint were tiny. Eat on the pavement would be my parting advice!

Famed for its market gardens, Sa Dec is a madhouse just before Valentines Day. Luckily we were well outside that insanity and we had the gardens to ourselves as we scootered around. A few home stays lie out here if the Sa Dec hotel scene (which is not great) isn’t doing it for you. There’s also the house made famous by Duras, but having visited, I’d say swing by for a look, not a sleep.

I’ve not the sweetest tooth on the block, but Annie wanted me to try a local ice cream. The place was closed, so we ducked next door to Mai. It’s an open-air cafe known for its crab soup. What should I order, I ask? Sup cua bach thao, says Annie. So I do.

Melt in your mouth pig brain. Don’t knock it till you try it. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Think crab, shrimp, three types of egg and a delicious melt-in-the-mouth chunk of pig brain in a glutinous soup. Maybe better than it sounds, depending on your penchant for pig brain. 

But there is more to Sa Dec than just stuffing face!

Around 12 kilometres north of town lies Xeo Quyt. I bet if you’ve heard of Cu Chi or Vinh Moc, you haven’t heard of here. It was a secret Viet Cong base hidden in the jungle (well a large swamp), and that’s where I head to the next morning. One day food, one day war history and all that.

Xeo Quyt. I asked my guide if there were snakes—she laughed. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

It’s a 30-minute ride north of Sa Dec to Xeo Quyt. Upon arrival I’m dispatched into a sampan for the paddle through. I’ve crawled the Cu Chi and Vinh Moc tunnels but within minutes I’m thinking, how could you fight a war in this?

The boat trip takes me around a circuit for about an hour, and then I’m free to backtrack on a series of pathways. The forest is wild—this is the kind of jungle I’d die in within a day, without anyone even trying to even kill me. At one stage there is a flooded bunker that a sign suggests I crawl in—I pass, but back in the day, I guess you just got wet.

Yeah, no snakes at all. Photo: Stuart McDonald.

Afterwards I scoot back into town and call Annie. Let’s eat some more! I say. She’s busy, so I swing by Hu Tieu My Ngoc. I think the food is great, but when I mention it to her later, she says, “Oh, expensive and too many tourists there.”

What tourists!

Last stop is chicken wings by the water. There is something about cold drinks and chicken wings by a canal. Barges bang past, heading out into the great plain of mud and rice in southern Cochin China, as Duras would have called it.

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