Kenting

So moving right along in a none to speedy manner (I know it's been a week).
Once we all got ourselves awake and clean we packed up and headed over to the Outback for some tasty meat. It was tasty and our waiter was wearing some of the tightest pants I've ever seen on a person that still allowed mobility. I seriously wondered if he had actual circulation running to the lower half of his body. It was amazing.
By this time it's around 1 in the afternoon and we should get to Kenting which is the goal destination of this journey. Ryan desired tea so we crossed the bridge and acquired tea for all (by the way, tea here is an art that is done in many awesome forms. please refer to the bubble tea post).
There are buses that will take you to Kenting for a pittance, but we are selfish individuals and did not feel like putting up with the mass transportation system. I had it on the authority of my roommate Katherine that we could get a taxi to take us where we wanted to go for a mere 1400 NT (roughly $45 dollars for an hour and a half cab ride). We flagged down a taxi and Justine haggled with her mad Mandarin skillz. This man would only take us for 2000NT, to which I said No. He explained that he had to drive all the way back and I replied that I didn't care. I know it is possible to get this trip for less than that and we are not paying 2000. He started to drive away and we stood there for a moment trying to decide our next course of action when he backed up and agreed to 1500NT. I agreed and we loaded up and enjoyed a beautiful drive along the coastline. (well we finally saw coastline about an hour into the trip, but still the sun was shining and it was a gorgeous day.)

We were taken directly to our hostel, which turned out to be fantastic and I will happily stay there again if I get down to Kenting again. The Surf Shack Bar and Grill.
We got checked in and stowed our things in our rooms and prepared to head out and explore. The first order of business was to acquire scooters. Ee (the lovely lady who was running the hostel took me to the scooter rental place next door and Justine helpfully translated) I love having friends who speak the language here. It makes it so much easier for me to sluff off and not learn.
We hopped on the scooters and drove roughly 200 feet up the street to the first shop we saw selling floaties. Ryan still needed some kind of flotation device to swim with in the morning. He perused his options (which were not stellar at this place) and we moved on.
We headed in the direction of Kenting (our hostel is right outside of Kenting) and after driving for about 5 minutes (if that) Ryan suddenly pulls over. I stop and he informs us that we need to go Zorbing. Basically you get in a large inflated ball and you roll down a hill. Two people had to go at a time. Justine and I went down first and screamed and grunted to the amusement of all withing hearing distance. There is a microphone in the ball and the guy loading you into the ball tells you to scream before he pushes you down.
You are strapped into the ball with shoulder and ankle harnesses, hand holds and a seat belt. This does not prevent you from being thoroughly battered and feeling like the second run was a wholly bad idea for your shoulders which you are going to put through a 3000 meter swim in the morning. Still it was fun and I'm glad we did it.
It was a bit windy and the man took the pic just as my hair flew in my face. The gloves we're wearing are to protect our hands and help us get a grip on the hand holds. (click on the pic to see it full size. I stole these from Justine off facebook and I don't know how to size them so they will fit. if anyone knows how to do that and would tell me how that would be much appreciated.)


After the tumbling down the hill in the hamster ball we headed back out on the scooters in an attempt to locate the beach we will be swimming at in the morning. I have not heard from Susanne, the only person who has any information about what the hell is going on in the morning, but she did mention that the swim would be at Nanwan beach.
We stopped at the first beach we came to and checked out what was what. From what we could see there was no indication that there was going to be a largish swimming event here on the morrow, but that is probably partially because I can't read the signs. There did seem to be a run going on because there were lots of cones in the road and we would occasionally see runners with numbers pasted to themselves.
So here is Justine and me at the beach.

Ryan and me at the same beach. We had found the beach and Justine and I decided it was too windy to really enjoy being in the water so we headed out again and found the night market. We entertained ourselves with that for awhile and ultimately ended up at a restaurant called Smokey Joes. This is the Indian statue out front. I felt a need to pose. I have no idea what is going on with my hair. I think it was a mix of the wind and the horrid little helmet they give you with the scooters.
Anyway there was good food at Smokey Joes and we happily perused all the highly racist and non-pc things that are still allowed in countries such as this. (such as the statue. there were old ads and other examples scattered about the restaurant as well)
Here's a pic of the night market. The stores and stalls run both sides of the street and since this is a main road all the traffic runs through as well.
We entertained ourselves a bit more in the market and Ryan found himself a float and a way to make it stay with him.
Thusly adorned we headed back to the hostel to attempt to get some sleep before the ridiculous hour we would have to be arising at. I still have not heard from Susanne and Katherine is calling me trying to find out what the heck is going on in the morning as well. Just to make things a little more stressful my cell battery is dying and I have of course not thought to bring that charger with me. Gads. I finally get a hold of Susanne at around 11:30 and she has no answers for me. She's going to check us in at around 6 and find out all the answers to our questions.
I like Susanne a great deal. She's a lot of fun to spend time with and comes up with some great ideas for things to do (like this swim). The issue here is that she is very laid back about life. She doesn't need to know what's going to happen exactly when and where. She knows it will happen and she will get there and do what needs to be done. The rest of us aren't as laid back and want to know what the hell is happening when and where.
So again none of us slept very well that night either.
All turned out to be well though. We finally met up at the beach. Ryan acquired an actual lifeguard tube to swim with instead of the floatie and we all swam 1500 yards out and back to the beach for a total of 3000 meters. The pic below is to give you an idea of what the sky looked like during the swim. It was quite overcast and the wind was picking up a bit. It was plenty warm enough and the water was gorgeous to swim in. Even this overcast you could see straight to the sandy bottom a good 800 meters out. The water got increasingly more choppy and the swells got bigger the farther out you swam. I was getting pretty tired about halfway back and was also managing to get a cramp in my calf. I made it though. It was a good swim and I'm glad I got to do it.