Sunday, Feb 26 – Thursday, Mar 2
This year’s Precoa trip was a 10 day, 3 city Thailand tour. We started out in the country’s capitol city Bangkok and stayed there for 5 days. Before I write about the trip I have to document the intense logistics it took for us to get there.
We bought a flight for my mom to come to PDX late Thursday night so she would be here with the kids when we left bright and early Friday morning. A few days before the trip we booked a hotel right next to PDX so my mom could drop us off at the hotel after we pick her up and she could take our car home because it would save us a second trip to the airport the next morning and more sleeping time since we could wake up right next to the airport.
It doesn’t typically snow in Portland enough to stick to the ground or build a snowman, but Wednesday night, 24 hours before my mom is supposed to arrive in PDX Portland got 12″ of snow in one night. It set an 80 year record and was the second highest in recorded history for the area. So the city basically shut down and it was very difficult to get anywhere. Several flights canceled, freeways temporarily closed, abandoned cars on the freeway… it was a mess. And of course school was closed because the roads weren’t safe to drive on. The last day of work we had to wrap everything up to prep for being gone for 2 weeks turned into a work at home with 2 kids and brainstorm how to get to/from the airport day.
Thursday was full of canceled flights but by Thursday evening most flights were okay and my mom luckily arrived safely and on time. We asked our friend Taylor to come to our house. He parked at the bottom of our steep neighborhood road and walked to our house to spend the night and next morning with our kids. Tenny knows and loves Taylor so he was excited to have a friend come over but Murphy was nervous about it. In the morning Taylor told us, “Murphy will contently sit on my lap and each breakfast but she won’t look at me or respond to my questions.”
After Taylor arrived at the house, Lucas and I walked down the steep hill with our luggage and ended up sliding down most of it. Lucas banana peel slipped and fell at the bottom of the hill and cut open his hand. We met our friend Trevor at the bottom of the hill and he slowly drove us to the MAX train station where we rode an hour to the airport to pick up my mom. The 3 of us called the hotel shuttle and it took an hour for them to pick us up. It would have normally been a 6 minute drive but the roads were that bad. The 3 of us shared 1 king sized bed for the 5 hours we had left before we had to be back at the airport. Then we woke up, took the hotel shuttle back to the airport where Lucas and I checked in for our flight that was magically still on time and my mom got on the hour long MAX train ride to the transit station. Trevor kindly picked up my mom from the MAX station, drove her to the bottom of our neighborhood hill where our next door neighbor picked her up in their 4Runner and drove her up the hill. Once she got home Taylor walked back down the hill to his car and slowly drove home to his own family. It felt like a miracle that all of these steps worked out to get everyone safely where they needed to go. And all of this happened BEFORE Lucas and my 24 hour travel (3 flights) to actually get to Thailand.
Tenny LOVED the snow and wanted to play in it for hours. So at least one person enjoyed it 🙂 Since the trip was so long we flew up my mom for the first 9 days and Lucas’ mom for the last 6 days. The kids were happy to spend time with grandma and JoJo and keep going to school with their friends during the week. Also, both grandmas let them watch TV during the week so Tenny was in heaven.
By day 3 I had already had 3 massages. I’ve always been a fan of massages but when they are $9 for an hour long massage it’s really hard to say no. Full body massage in the morning… foot massage in the evening… couldn’t be better. The street outside of the hotel entrance had 6 different massage places so there was no need to make an appointment. Just show up to the one you want if there is a wait you check out plan b.
As with all escapes trips, Lucas had to work on the days leading up to the celebration event. This year, they invited all of the people putting on the celebration event to come 1 day early so they could do a whirlwind excursion day and see the sites so they don’t miss out on seeing Bangkok since the majority of Bangkok days will be rehearsal/prep days. In just one day we visited the floating market, the Grande Palace, the train market, a coconut farm, the flower market (learned how to fold lotus flower pedals), rode in a tuk tuk, took a ferry to the other side of the river from the hotel to eat dinner, and spent hours (collectively) in a tour bus.
One day when celebration event rehearsals were going on me and some other +1’s ran around the city together and got to explore. We rode the public transit train, took a few taxis, saw the big Buddha, ate some delicious food (favorites being pineapple fried rice and mango sticky rice), saw some temples, and signed our names on a tile that is going on a newly created dragon sculpture.
The celebration event was amazing, as usual. But it was more elaborate than ever and the amount of work everyone put into the event paid off big time.
I really wanted to buy some fake crocks for me and the kids but all the shoe stores we found in China Town were wholesale only. “Must buy 6 of the same size and color” 🙁 But don’t worry. I found all kinds of other fun things like comfy flowy pants for the equivalent of $5 USD.
The day after the celebration event we did 2 excursions in one day. Morning bike ride through the city and an evening scooter ride through the city (mostly China Town) and dinner. We were out and about from 7:30 am to 10:30 pm so we were really grateful for a slow morning the next day. Even though our body clocks woke us up at 5-6 am.
Lucas jumped on an opportunity to photo bomb our friends who were taking a picture on the other side of the river and he managed to make it right between them!
The waffle looking thing above is a croffle. It’s a raw criossant cooked in a waffle iron and it’s unbelievably good. At first I thought it was a fancy breakfast item that only hotels would have but then I started to see it in several locations including the South Korea airport. I’m for sure going to try making these at home.
I’m including this photo of Lucas inside a temple because we spent 5+ minutes in here and as we walked out he said, “I just realized there is a giant Buddha in here” 😂 This was one of several stops on our super fun bike ride tour through the backstreets / alley ways in Bangkok.
