Travel: Bangkok to Krabi/Railay

Dan and I bought overnight sleeper train tickets to Krabi from the travel agent at Suk 11 guesthouse. About 900 baht for a bed with AC. This includes the bus ride from the train station to Krabi. From Krabi get a van to Ao Nang. At Ao Nang get on a longboat to Hat Ton Sai or Railay. Its cheaper if you have a bunch of people in the boat. Get a bungalow for about 250 baht on Hat Ton Sai.

Pay attention to the tide when planning traveling between the beaches. The boats can't leave when the tide is out. Say whats up to my boy Samsung at the Rock Shop on Hat Ton Sai, see if he still has my tournament frisbee and my AC/DC shirt that I gave him.

UPDATE: Air Asia added Krabi as a destination from Bangkok, so check that before you book a train ticket. If you don't feel like taking a train but there is no flight to Krabi, fly to/from Phukhet with Air Asia. Then take a 2 hour boat ride to/from Railay beach.

Rock Climbing

So Dan went back to Bangkok and I signed up for a morning of rock climbing. I took the beginner's course which was fun. The climbing was pretty hard at times and you work a whole new set of muscles in your hands and forearms. I've decided to stay another night here because an Air Asia flight back to BKK is only a teeny bit more expensive than an overnight train, except the same thing has happened, the booking was not confirmed, so I will call in the late hours of the night when they shouldn't be busy.

So I'm hanging around this beach, which is practically an island, its isolated. There are mountains behind us so there aren't a ton of people here and its fun. One of the girls working at the restaurant that I always sit at told me she loves me and paid me 2 baht (2/40 of $1) to give me 2 kisses on the cheek and for me to kiss her on the cheek. Her and her friends including one "ladyboy" (as they call Thai males that have long hair and dress and try to act like women, surprisingly convincing until you look at the shoulders and the waist) were having quite the time talking about me. I just sit there and laugh at them laughing.

I also saw a bunch of small monkeys playing around on this net back in the jungle. Yeah we've just got monkeys running around. Why would I return to Bangkok? I don't know, I think its to play pickup and to plan leaving the country, since my visa expires 5 March. I can leave the country and come back in 5 minutes later and get a new 30 day visa but i don't know if I want to do that.

Tomorrow I will rock climb again, maybe learn to "lead climb".

Railay Thailand

So I'm here on the beach in Thailand. The place is pretty cool. I'm not on an island but we are only accessible by boat because there are cliffs all around us. There's about a 400m beach with these long tailed boats (taxis) and some rocks out in the water, and cliffs with people rock climbing. Dan and I have really just been chilling. I will take a climbing lesson on Friday before I head back to Bangkok.

 

On Wednesday we met up with this girl Hermine who lives and works in Shanghai. She was on our team at the hat tournament. She is on the next beach down with some friends. The reason its the next beach is because a cliff and some rocks stick out into the water essentially separating them. We walked it at low tide though, its tricky. We met up to go snorkeling.

 

It was the sunset trip, so it left at 2pm, we decided this was best to avoid the 10-2 sun. We went out on a dive boat with about 26 people and stopped at a bunch of islands, which are really these huge rocks sticking out of the water with no beach. But there is coral down on the bottom and lots of cool fish. I saw an octopus and some neat colorful fish. This snorkeling trip was far better than my last one in key west. In key west my mask didn't fit so it filled with water and and I couldn't relax and breathe through my mouth so I inhaled lots of seawater. This time I was A OK and managed to dive down and swim along the bottom. It was neat. Since we were out in the afternoon we never saw anyone on the water since all of the other tours go in the morning. When the sun went down we ate dinner which was this seafood curry and vegetable curry. It was quite delicious, the first time I've had sweet potato in curry. Then we went for the night swim to observe phosphorescent plankton. You really can't believe it until you put on a mask, stick your head in the water and kick your legs around. Then you see all of these sparks and its cool. The plankton absorb the sun all day and then illuminate when they are touched I guess. So that was a nice day, I coated myself in sunblock after learning my lesson last summer and my chest is still pretty white.

 

One night Dan and I tried to take a boat to Ao Nang, the main town that these beaches are accessed by, to meet Hermine and company for dinner. So we say "Ao Nang" and hop on a boat and the guys are like ok. They were eating dinner so we sat down and they offered us some food. Since we just had 2 people they said it would be more expensive so we said ok. So we figured we had to wait for dinner to finish. So when dinner finished they broke out some tobacco and rolled some joints, maybe there was something else mixed in. So we waited for them to smoke. They kept joking and saying "Ao nang tomorrow morning, and then laughing." Then they told me that they were waiting for some water and that it would be here in 30 minutes. So I said "how many bottles do you want, I'll go buy some right now for you". One guy said "how much money do you have?" So I said, "how many bottles do you want?" Then another guy said "One million" and they all laughed. Another boat came in about 50 meters out from us and stopped. They guy pointed and said "water". I was a little confused and thought the water was on that boat or something. Maybe it was special water. The guys broke out a big rug mat and started playing cards. Dan and I were like we aren't going anywhere soon. Then some foreigners came up and said "anybody going to Railay West?" (the next beach). I told them we were going to Ao Nang but that the guys were joking with us and taking a while to get going. The girls said well it looks like your boat is high and dry, they must be waiting for the tide to come in. Thats when we realized what the joke about a million bottles of water was and we laughed. So yeah, we stayed where we were for dinner and learned to take note of the tides.

 

Today is Thursday, Dan doesn't like the overnight train so he has a flight out of one hour away Phuket for tomorrow morning back to Bangkok. I am hoping to get a train ticket for Friday night so I can arrive in Bangkok in the morning and go straight to pickup. I'm also hoping this girl from Bangkok that plays ultimate will give me a couch to sleep on. Tomorrow morning I'm taking a rock climbing class. The climbing looks so sweet here so I figure I can't pass it up.

Railay Thailand

So Dan Axon (frisbee team captain and guy that knew my dad from back in the day from frisbee) and I decided to take off south to the beaches and meet up with another girl from our hat tournament team. We took an overnight train. The trains in China are a good bit better, you pay a bit more though. But this wasn't bad, the layout is just more conducive to someone stealing your bag though. We then took a bus and then a van and then a boat to get to this beach resort which is surrounded by cliffs and only accessible by boats. Its cool. There's lots of rock climbing, I might give it a shot if my leg manages to loosen up. The plan is to chill.

Hat Tournament

Friday afternoon I rolled back into Bangkok and met up with the Beijing crew and went to the Bangkok Hat tournament registration party. I hydrated like mad and ate a lot of fruit and stuff to get me ready for the heat the next day. At the party I met some people and I met a guy that was about my dad's age and seemed to remember playing against him (ultimate frisbee) back in the day. So I talked to him for a while. I had to explain why I was so young to everyone so that involved explaining what I was doing in Asia and how long I had been playing ultimate etc. So the next day we met our teams, I was really excited, there were 6 fields, stereo speakers playing music to all the fields, lots of tents and drinks etc. My teams captain was the guy I met the night before, Dan, who knew my dad. So my team went 2-2 on Saturday. We had a lot of good players with experience, but they all just handled and didn't play as many points as they should have. Also our inexperienced players made a lot of bad decisions. But oh well. I had some nice grabs and sky'd a few people and earned the respect of my team. I was fairly sore at the end of the day with some cramping so I got a massage at the field, it felt good, so I went back to the guesthouse, showered, and got another foot massage. The party that night was fairly wild, the food was great, but I didn't stay long.

 

The next morning, we had to play the early games since we didn't do well enough on Saturday for a first round bye. So as we were warming up I saw the other team and got a little intimidated, thinking it would take all we had to beat them. I questioned the willingness to win of my team and didn't know if they would have the energy to pull it out. The other team scored first and I was like hmmm. Then we said no and proceeded to score point after point, winning the game 13-6. I had some nasty d's in that game. I'm doing a better job of jumping earlier than before so I get up to the disc before the other guy. So that win was motivating, our team stepped it up and got excited. The next game was against a team that had a bye, so they were fresh for that morning. They went up early on us, we managed to hang on to keep it 7-11 when it looked grim. (Games to 13). But then U2 started playing over the stereo system and I said ok, lets do this. So I scored like 2 or 3 crucial and motivating points off of deep grabs or whatever. However we couldn't hold on D when they had game point and a tall guy scored on me when I tried to cut off his in cut near the endzone and they threw it up the line to the corner and I had no play. Oh well. We went out with a bang which was good, especially after some of the lackadaisical play from the day before.

 

Unfortunately a guy on my team ran into me from behind when I tried to poach in the lane and I think his knee hit my calf muscle. I got a charlie horse that I managed to play with for the rest of the game but afterwards when I wasn't moving it got really tight. So I said, lets get another massage while we watch the finals. So the massage lady proceeded to assault my calf muscle causing me to grimace and squirm. It didn't help, it made it infinitely worse and it hurt me continuously for the rest of the night. The next day it was still tight but it didn't hurt.

My hard play that weekend earned me an award, I think it was either team MVP or one of the "7 Dawgz" which might be a team of tournament MVP's. The Bangkok team calls themselves the "Soi Dawgz" after all the stray dogs that are all over the city.

Travel: Chiang Mai

Bangkok to Chiang Mai
As always, check www.airasia.com for cheap flights. I paid about $70 US for a round trip, that includes the heavy taxes. At the airport hop a taxi to your guesthouse. Pun-Pun guesthouse is nice, if you say Pun Pun the driver will know. The guesthouse has good food and the owner is from Fredericksburg, VA.

I used him to book a one night trek. The trek was ok, nothing impressive, very canned and touristy. But it was fun and my time there was limited.

If you have lots of time consider going to someplace close to the Burmese border, like Pai or further. Its possible to find some treks that actually go out and search for hill tribes, as in nobody really knows where they are, the guide just has an idea where to look.

What to do in Chiang Mai

So is almost $200 worth it for 3 days 2 nights at an elephant reserve learning about and taking care of elephants? Or $150 for 2 days 1 night? Thats what I thought. Well I'm thinking about it. The guy from Fredericksburg running the guesthouse I'm at now in Chiang Mai said there is a couple coming back from the elephant park this evening and I could talk to them about it. If I don't want to go then I will go on a trek for a few days. But to go back to Bangkok and tell my ultimate frisbee peers and my friends coming down from Beijing for the hat tournament that I learned how to feed elephants and then clean up their you know what? Maybe thats priceless. ......Now its 30 minutes later and I've walked along the river at Chiang Mai and the guy at the guesthouse has made one of the treks that he can sign me up for sound pretty enticing at only almost $40. And you get to ride elephants along the way. Hmm.

Flying in Asia

Flying in Asia is a bit different than in the US. Its more of like a more expensive bus service. You buy the tickets at most 2 weeks ahead of time, in my case 10 minutes ahead of time this morning. The flight may or may not be full. My $100 flight from Kunming to Bangkok was on a 737 with about 30 people on it. I had 3 seats to myself. So did everyone else who  desired it.

 

And one really funny thing that got me: While landing in Bangkok, BKK has two parallel runways like most airports. Well in between these runways was a golf course! Just right there, people were playing. A Big Bertha driver and a nasty slice and you might be able to get your ball stuck in the "737 engine hazard".

 

In Bangkok I went online to Air Asia, which is an airline that flies around SE Asia. I ordered a round trip ticket to Chiang Mai in the North of Thailand. It was about $75. $25 each way and about $25 in taxes. Thai Airlines would have been double that. But the website said that there was an error with my order because they were so busy and that I may or may not get a confirmation email, but that I should not order again. The British guy running my guesthouse said not to worry, that happens all the time. I saw that the money had been charged from my card so I figured my credit card would suffice to pick the ticket up. So I show up for my 6:45 am flight and it turns out I have no ticket, but I give them my credit card and 5 minutes later I had a ticket. 1 hour later I'm in Chiang Mai.

 

 

Travel: Kanchanaburi

Go to the bus station on the west side of the river in Bangkok. I forget if thats the north or south station but it doesn't make sense. 70 Baht for the bus to Kanchanaburi 2-3 hour ride. When you arrive, walk to the river and look for a place to stay. If you walk North along the river, the road goes up a hill and turns right, after that is "Need a raft" Guesthouse. It is a rafthouse, 90 baht for a room with a fan (and loud roosters and party barges all night). But the food is great and the guy is nice. The place is nice too.

Ask him where to rent a bike and rent it for like 20 baht per day. I rode to the Bridge on the River Kuai, then rode north across the northern bridge and then a few kilometers away to some temples and towns.

I hate roosters

Today I was woken up again by the roosters at 3 am, and then around 6 am the party barges floating down the river thumping dance music were still going. But oh well.

So I took off on a public bus to Erawan Waterfalls Park or something like that. There were 7 levels to the falls, they all looked pretty sweet, with varying degrees of height etc. And as an added bonus, the water was typically tropical green. There were lots of foreigners there, mostly European. And people say Americans are fat, well don't overlook the Europeans. And they aren't very conservative in the way they dress.

Enough complaining. I walked away from the falls on some "nature interpretive trail" which was fairly overgrown and rarely travelled. I heard some movement in the bushes sounding like animals so I crouched down and waited. I heard 3 animals from different directions and one was up in the trees, and I thought I saw one, maybe a black monkey or a black wild chicken cross the path in front of me but I wasn't sure, brush was too thick. That was my jungle excitement for the day. Then I made it to the top of the falls and went for a swim in some of the pools. The water at this point was blue.

Then I went home. I'm on the river side of the raft house, not the bank side so hopefully the roosters won't be as big a problem. Otherwise its chicken for breakfast lunch and dinner tomorrow.

Back to Bangkok tomorrow.

The Bridge on the River Kwai

So I got sick of Bangkok and going to my friend's hometown didn't work so I picked a place close to Bangkok and hopped on an 8:30pm bus. Now I am in Kanchanaburi, about 2.5 hours west of Bangkok. Some of yall may have seen the movie, "The Bridge on the River Kwai". Well, this is the town where that bridge is and where the POW camp was. A Japanese POW camp for British, Australian, Dutch, and American soldiers during WW2. They were used to build a railroad bridge.

So I got into town and called some guesthouses and went to the one with rooms. It is a couple of floating rafthouses linked together with rooms built. The rooms are simple, fan and bed, but they are clean. I opted for the cheaper room with the shared bathroom facilities. 90 Baht, or $2.25. The owner speaks good English and he's nice, plus he cooks food for you right there. There is a cool lounge area with a big tv and lots of dvds. The only problem were the roosters roaming around right there on the bank that decided to host a concert in the middle of the night. It was very bad. I woke up and heard them and was like oh, the sun must be rising. No way, I don't know what time it was but it was pitch black and a few hours away from dawn. I think its because there were lights outside.

Next morning I ate french toast, walked and rented a bike and road to the Bridge. There were a bunch of foreign tourists there, but they just went to the restaurants and shops. There is a museum created by a Buddhist temple nearby that has pictures, paintings and artifacts from the POW camp. The pictures of the ulcers that the prisoners developed was fairly disturbing. The bridge and scenery is not like that in the movie, here its fairly simple. I walked across the bridge and on the other side there is nothing to attract you. But I kept walking and took a dirt road that led me into a little residential neighborhood with lots of trees, not like the small but city style on the other side. It was nice.

Rode back through town, ate lunch at this place. I don't know any Thai dish names and don't know any specific Thai dishes, so I haven't eaten much Thai food. At this small place I was the only person there, and the music was Thai when I walked in, but I think they switched it and "Country Roads" by John Denver started playing, followed by a bunch of American songs. I think they popped in the cd for white people. Whenever I tell people I'm from Virginia they always go "Oh, Country Roads!". I tell them no, thats West Virginia but close. Asians love their karaoke. And Country Roads is a staple on the western song list at any karaoke bar. In Beijing, Karaoke or "KTV" is THE recreational thing to do, go get a room with friends/coworkers etc and get some drinks and sing. Sometimes companies will take their employees to KTV, sometimes they don't even drink. But yeah, I mention the song because it seems like stuff that happens in Asia is always funny or has funny reasons.

I rode on south and across the river in search of some "wats" (temples) on a map about 8km away. I rode through some nice farmland for corn and I guess rice, banana trees etc. These might be called the suburbs but they were small neighborhoods that were interesting. I saw this one temple place sticking out way above the trees and closed in to investigate, while wondering whether or not I was allowed to take pictures. The entrance I used looked completely empty but when I reached the top of the steps I saw tons of people posing and taking pictures, much in the way Chinese tourists do. Then I noticed they all looked Chinese and then I heard them speaking Chinese. So I got excited and starting talking to this mom and her son, asking if I was allowed to take pictures and they said yes. They said my Chinese wasn't bad, I told them I studied in Beijing, and found out they were on a tour and all from Beijing.

So that was neat, getting to talk Chinese. I really wish people here spoke Chinese, I think it would be infinitely more fun to be able to stop and talk to everyone that waves and yells hello to me. People like to sit around outside of houses, and if they were Chinese speakers I could get some interesting conversations going. So I think my return to China will be sooner than I had originally planned. And if I go back early enough, that saves me from having to get a new VISA. We'll see. Some pictures are up, I'm only putting up a few at a time since things take longer without my computer.

Tomorrow I will try to wake up early enough to get out to some waterfalls about 1.5 hours away. Will go back to Bangkok Friday for some ultimate. Next week try to get up north to Chiang Mai and maybe go out treking for a night or two.

Jack Bauer has saved the world 5 times in the past 96 hours, what have you done with your life?

So I haven't seen too much of this city. I was dead tired from playing ultimate in the outrageously hot weather and I haven't made much of an effort. I felt homesick upon arriving since I couldn't speak the language so what did I do? I walked to Chinatown and ate there and talked Chinese to the waiters.

I think there are interesting sites to see but I can't seem to get myself motivated to find them. I've hung out with these 2 girls from my class in Beijing that live here, and one suggested I go to her hometown somewhere far from the city, so I'm waiting to hear if she can go. I'd like to leave the city during the week and return on the weekend for pickup ultimate so I can get in shape for the hat tournament.

Woke up at 5:30am to watch the Super Bowl. $7 got me into this western restaurant and an American breakfast to watch the game on a large projector. It was fun. Unfortunately it was broadcast on ESPN international which did not include the normal Super Bowl commercials, so we watched rugby ads, int'l soccer ads, and these bits of "Wimbledon Gold Moments" of old tennis players. I might search the internet for the good commercials.

Pictures are slow coming up because this internet place that I go to has problems with my portable hard drive. Or maybe its because I dropped it, only from about 2 feet though and the drive was off. And I've been able to access it once so I blame the lousy computers here.

Bangkok, Thailand

So now I'm in Thailand. Its hot, humid, and for the first time in a while I feel like I'm in a foreign city. Bangkok is very much different than Beijing, the streets are much narrower so you feel like the city is taller. The people look different, darker, the girls are cuter. Even going to Kunming for the first time last week I didn't really feel different. I think its because I was used to Chinese people and I can speak the language. In fact my Chinese is quite good I think, enough to evoke a "your Chinese isn't bad" from everyone that I talk to. And now that I'm in a new country with a new language I feel really out of place. Fortunately, far more people speak English here. Anybody who is anybody can speak some English. And there are tons of foreigners. But they all look European.

Tomorrow and Sunday I'm playing some ultimate and then trying to find a place to watcht the Super Bowl at 6 am Monday morning.

The countryside

So the day after Chinese New Year's Eve, we rolled out to MoJiang county, the childhood home of Dr. Yin and his friends. It was 5 men and Dr. Yin's 10  yr old son in this guys VW Santana, a car which I haven't seen in the US, it looks like an older Pasat. We drove through the mountains on a new highway ( 10 years old) and after about 3 hours got to this small town inbetween some mountains. We met some guys that were friends and rolled to the town market which was happening that day. It was really exotic, people were selling food, and we walked into this building and sat down with some more friends for lunch. Some of the food was good, the barbequed pork was the best.

Then we went to our hotel, which was a nice place. We then went to one of the guys' mom's house which was up on a hill. It was sort of old, her son told me she was moving to a new one next year. From there I went with the guys' daughter and her friend and YinMoRan and we went to this hill with an observatory on the top. MoJiang lies on the tropic of cancer and on this hill there were some statues and stuff dedicated to that. We walked around and then back to the town and ended up at dinner.

The next day we went to this town a little further out and some of us swam in the river. Two guys walked with a net and caught some small fish that they ate at the next meal. That was fun. In these towns, some of the houses are made out of concrete blocks, the newer ones are all poured concrete. Since this region is basically one season all year round with a bit of rain, the houses are very open. They are nothing special to the eye, just plain concrete walls.

The next day we drove to another county which was of a different minority, the Dai people, who resemble Thai people I hear. Either
some Thai people went from Thailand to Yunnan, or back in the day the Thai people came from this part of Yunnan. Anyways. Since they are in the mountains, every possible piece of land is terraced so that you have small platforms on these hillsides. There they plant stuff like sugarcane, or they fill the terrace with water and plant rice. It really looks cool. Some pictures will be up soon, as soon as I can find a computer to hook my hard drive up to. Speaking of that hard drive, thats one of the best 800RMB/ $100 that I've spent. I've taken upwards of 2gigs of pictures. Its so convenient, I just fire away with the camera and when I'm full it takes about a minute to pop my memory card in and transfer the pictures. Done deal and I'm good to go. It will take forever to sort through the pictures but oh well.

The next day I was told we would go climb a mountain, so I got excited because I could see the mountains and they looked fun. I was getting ready for about 6 hours of hiking, thats what they told me. I was planning how much water we would need etc. So we went driving away from town and it looked good, but then we pulled into this place with a ton of cars, and it was some ancient leader of the town's house. So so. Then we drove and ended up at this entrance to a stream that came down the mountain, there were a ton of cars parked here as well and there was a guy at a table charging admission to walk up this stream. Thats China. It was a cool walk, crowded with people, all wearing street clothes or clothes you would wear out to dinner. All Chinese men dress the same, in some sort of suit with a jacket, no matter what your income level or what your current activity is. And the women with their high healed boots that they like to wear. Walking along on these rocks. And I had my Timberland boots on with my technical soft shell jacket and the detachable top lid that turn into a waist pack from my new backpack, ready for 6 hours of hiking. But it was like 20 minutes to where you couldn't go any further. But it was still cool, the water was clear and deep, unfortunately the whole way you could see trash that people had discarded. Not to stereotype a country, but I do criticize China for its people's trash habits. During our car ride YinMoran would throw his trash out the window, and everywhere I see people just toss stuff. So I'm enjoying this stream and a wrapper from dried salted fish bits (Chinese like weird snack foods) comes floating down. Oh well. It was a fun walk though. Pictures will come. One thing worth noting was the yellow "caution wet floor signs" that you see in school or in a building when somebody has mopped. These were placed along the trail and the stream. It was funny. We did some other stuff and went back to Kunming.

My last day in Kunming I played tennis with "old turkey" one of the guys in our crew that went to Mojiang, got a haircut, went swimming with them and ate at some big wide open restaurant with a stage. It was a minority restaurant so they did some dances and came around with a bamboo bottle of rice liquor. They wanted to pay me respect, I get a lot of attention since I stick out, and to pay them respect involved drinking their liquor. During one of my instances of paying respect to the various minority groups, the girls held me in the chair and poured the cup of their liquor into my mouth for me. But the stuff wasn't very strong so it went down easily. The Chinese and their alcohol, its something. I'm told women aren't supposed to drink, or they can't physically drink, but I see them do it a lot. And everyone makes a big deal out of it, with mini toasts every 5 minutes and a lot of loud hee hawing accompanying. Oh well. Off to Thailand.

Chinese New Year

The street was hazy with spent gunpowder. There were firecrackers going off everywhere, whistling bottle rockets flying past my head, roman candles being shot down towards the street from apartments, and the explosions from the heavier fireworks rocked the pedestrian bridge over a small river that I was standing on and caused car alarms to go off. It was the Chinese New Year Spring Festival or Chunjie, and the locals were going at it. With me carrying a huge bag of assorted fireworks that are illegal in most states in the US was Yin Mo Ran and his friend from next door and Wang Ping, Dr. Yin's wife.

 

We stood on the bridge and shot roman candles over the river, shot two nice and loud explosive flowers up, and felt the bridge shake when some young teenages dropped some big firecrackers into the water and then exploded. When we ran out of ammo we met up with the young doctor and her friends who had two large boxes in the trunk of her Jetta. We proceeded out into the suburbs where it got thick. In an area being developed there were some bulldozed plots of land and people were just lining the streets letting her have it. Everyone and their grandmother was lighting something, and we rolled up the windows after some close calls with flying debris. We parked and watched the action for a while. Random people would run out into this field, set up, light, and run back. It was like watching a fireworks show in the US except everything was being shot 10 meters from you. This girl's friends carried their boxes, each of which required two people to carry, out into the field and lit them off. Each box cost about $120 US. They were quite impressive. The funnier moments were when the car alarms would go off after a boom and when the men would light the kind that shoot out of a cylinder and explode, but after lighting the cylinder would fall over and so we would have explosions, like the big flower ones, right in front of us. The lights would zip across the ground. It was an adrenaline rush. Well worth seeing.