01.18.20  

Traveling Younger is an ongoing education, and even with research and advance planning, sometimes, well, shit happens. Over the last few days we have been tested by things, some within our control and some not.

We went to Chiang Mai, Thailand for three days and loved it. The small town was a nice change from Bangkok, but one thing we did not escape was poor air quality. When we got to Bangkok two weeks ago we saw about one out of five persons wearing breathing masks. I always thought that people wore them over here due to crowds and preventing illness, but it seems they do double duty since the pollution is that bad. Almost from day one we said that we should get and wear masks over here, but never did. I had a raspy throat for a few days which I think I’ve adjusted to, but in Chiang Mai we also found very bad air. It seems that in Thailand they have “burning season” and this one knocked Kathleen out for several days. It required an emergency room visit at midnight and various meds to open up her clogged sinuses and lungs. These burning seasons can release lots of pollen and allergens and if you do have an allergy it will only be compounded by the burning process. I am sure our two hour hike earlier that day (to an 8400 feet elevation) didn’t help, either.

Lesson learned: don’t mess with your health.

Better to look dorky and breathe better than to suffer the dangers of bad air.

Supplemental health lesson #2: traveling in a different country involves exposing yourself to their water and their food. Be careful, but not paranoid. Bottled water is cheap, and brushing your teeth with tap water is probably OK. Street food is always a risk, but look for stands that are clean if that’s possible.

We were supposed to travel from Chiang Mai to Vietnam the night Kat got ill. We spent several hours in the ER and fortunately her vitals were good, so she was discharged with half a dozen meds to help her out. We stayed up the rest of the night and got to the airport for an 0800 flight, stood in a very long line, then were denied entry. We knew that Vietnam required a visa to enter and offered what is called a “visa on arrival.” You get there, pay some money, and are allowed a 30-day visitor’s pass. But even with our research and speaking with people, we were not aware that we also needed advance permission from Vietnam to enter. They offer an online e-visa which usually takes a few days, but can be rushed if you want to pay the premium. It didn’t matter since there was NO WAY to catch a flight that day, so we had just two options.

Stay in Chiang Mai, deal with Kat not feeling well, find another room and try to rush a visa through. Or, return to our home in Bangkok, apply for the permit from HERE, and let Kat recover in a place she was more comfortable. So that is what we did. We ended up losing the entire trip cost to and from Vietnam, but we learned…

Lesson learned: even if we think we know the rules, double and triple check everything. Bureaucracy lives here just as much as in the US. These mistakes cost us money plus time since now we have to reschedule our return.

Lesson #3, but this one is harder to predict.

We always planned to visit Chiang Mai, but didn’t know we would like it as much as we did. We planned just 2.5 days there which was not enough. In hindsight, we should (and could have) stayed for a week, it was that cool. Unfortunately when you plan side trips they can be affected by things like liking or not liking a certain town AND the weather. We planned to go to Halong Bay in Vietnam, and the weather forecast was not good: cold and rainy. That would not have been good for Kat’s recovery, so who knows, maybe this all worked out the right way?