Khao Sok Lake Adventures -- Thailand's Bamboo Huts Part One

I know that I am blogging Thailand completely out of order, but I have a deep fear that I will never get the whole trip blogged. Consequently, I’ve decided to blog my absolute favourites from the trip first so that they will FOR SURE make it up. This way, if someone asks me for Thailand travel tips(which happens quite often), I’ll have a place to send them for the highlights.

We had seen the photographs of this place online, but nothing prepared us for the absolute beauty of being there. We signed up through this website (the link has the exact spot we visited):

https://khaosoklake.com/travel-item/krai-son-raft-house-khao-sok-thailand/

And we did the 3 day, two night tour. It was out of this world. We heard monkeys—all sorts of monkeys—all day and night. We saw all sorts of animals and even heard an elephant(although it never came down to the water to see us…we could see the tops of the trees that it was knocking down). The food was amazing and the pace was slow. As a group of travellers, we are not good at slowing down. The idea of sitting on a beach and reading a book all day does not appeal to any of us—okay, it might appeal to Jack, but he loses out since no one else agrees. Here, with only the basics to keep us occupied, we read, we kayaked, whenever we were hot, we just jumped in the lake. It was bliss.

For anyone interested in doing this tour—we were picked up in Krabi(they arranged this with us beforehand). In a really nice, large van and brought straight to the tour office where we met our guide and walked down to the pier. It was one of the more expensive things we did while we were in Thailand, but worth every single penny. If you cannot manage the 3 days, 2 nights—do the shorter tour. I think it would be sufficient for most people. We stayed in one of the more ‘rustic’ options. They do have nicer huts if you need a little more luxury when you travel.

Hopping on our traditional boat that will be our mode of transportation for the next 3 days.

One of our guides…really, I think he was our ‘driver’ as he didn’t speak English and mostly manned the boat.

This is the beginning of our first hike(you do two hikes during your stay). They pulled up and said ‘this is the hike’ and we could not find a trailhead for the life of us. Because there wasn’t one really…you were meant to just walk right into the jungle. Yup. How badass is that?

What I really remember from this hike was how difficult it was—truly more of a scramble. We wore Keens—which are amazing sandals and closed toe as was required for this hike. But, as sandals…they allowed our feet to breathe…which we thought was super smart of us…until right after this photograph was taken and I realized that my foot was bleeding. I took off my sandal and nearly threw up because my feet were literally covered in leeches. Huge leeches. I would have taken a photograph but I was too busy being a total wuss and freaking out while being perched on a rather precarious ledge. After that…whenever we stopped we noted how quickly the teeny tiny leeches crawled towards our feet. So. Many. Leeches.

The view.

This time our hike began at the foot of a waterfall. Which was weird, but we had already experienced one of Thailand’s sticky waterfalls, so we just trusted the guide and began walking UP THE WATERFALL. It is really an incredible experience and worth doing at least once if you visit Thailand. We were lucky to visit two different sticky waterfalls.

There are so many images from this part of our trip that I have decided to split it up and will post the rest in a separate blog post…but, don’t you agree? It looks amazing!!!

Family Adventure Session in Ottawa

This fall, I spent a week in Ontario photographing families and presenting at The Uncommon Creative. One of those families was this lovely crew in Ottawa. If you are a photographer, you may recognize them as the duo behind Green Tea Photography. It is always a special honour when other photographers trust you to document their family. This is about 1/5th of the images I gave them, but enough to give you an idea of our time together. They just wanted to adventure around their neighbourhood which is what we did…starting at their home and ending with a lovely dinner together. The adventures we do together in an Adventure session don’t have to be big and grandiose. They just have to be YOU.

Enjoy!

Published

One of my goals for 2019 was to submit for publication more. In January, I submitted to the NAPCP’s request for black and white images for their next Inspired Magazine. And, lookie here! This image of Jack from our travels last summer was selected to be included. Making goals is one thing—doing the work to achieve them is always another. People often ask how these things happen…it is always about searching for the opportunities. Being aware when you see the call and taking action.

To see more about this issue, go here: http://www.napcp.com/blog.php/2019/01/31/new-inspired-magazine-tracy-sweeney/

Thank you to the NAPCP for including this image. It was super fun to create!

The Photographer's Revolution Podcast

Did you know that I have a podcast? Well, I do!! It’s called The Photographer’s Revolution and is OBVIOUSLY aimed at photographer’s, but I actually think that a lot of other creatives and mamas can gain so much by listening to it as well. It’s a lot about the creative process and being a mother, but also about believing in your own self worth.

I just posted a new podcast today where I speak with my friend, Amy Rushbrook but I have also spoken with so many other amazing creatives—Summer Murdock, Tara Whitney, Jen Downer, Alpana Aras. Go check it out and give us a like on iTunes if you feel so inclined