halong bay, vietnam

i think this looks like a skull.. do you see it?

we stayed on this adorable house boat for a night and tanner and i got upgraded to the honeymoon suite. 

 

 our second night in halong bay was spent on monkey island in these adorable bungalows. we hiked around while we were there and saw monkeys and some beautiful scenery. this place would be ideal when it's hot outside, but unfortunately, it was only in the 50's while we were there.

 we were told that these monkeys drink coke and beer so we put it to the test.

halong bay is one of the 7 natural wonders of the world. the scenery was beautiful and there were so many rock formations, it looked 3D. the water was so calm for being out in the ocean which i was very happy about.. i don't have very strong sea legs. our boat tour was nice and we took 2 stops. one was to go through a cave and the other was to canoe around a floating village. the next day we stayed on monkey island and had some of the best pho soup i've ever had. like i said, it was a little on the cold side while we were there which put a damper on things. tanner and taylor did jump in the ocean but i wussed out. i had my swimsuit on and put my feet in then said, no way. it really was an awesome place and now we just have to go back when it's hot :)

one time, we went skydiving

 tanners birthday was back in august and on the morning of his birthday i woke him up and told him to get dressed. then we got in the car and he kept asking where we were going. i, being awful at surprises, was excited that he didn't know what was going on. he kept guessing what we were doing and then he asked, "are we going skydiving?" what?!! how in the world did he guess that? i caved and told him yes.. 

skydiving is awesome. what a rush! 

the first thing they do is have you watch a movie made in the 80's about how they're not liable for death or anything going wrong. then after 15 minutes of hearing that you could die, you sign a waiver indicating you understand and can't do anything about it. how's that for comfort? we jumped in our itty bitty plane and started heading up, and up, and up. i asked about half way if we were getting close and they said not really. the thing i liked most is that it's pretty rushed.. they don't give you time to second guess if you want to go through with it. we reached our elevation and in 5 seconds we were outta there. the freefall is so fun! the collar on my shirt kept whipping my ear and i thought my ear was going to tear off.

i liked the freefall more than when we opened our parachute. after the parachute opened we started making large circles to land and it made me queasy. tanner said he also felt sick and wasn't even able to drive home. other than the ear whipping and the queasiness, it was awesome!

new year's eve

 i know it's a little late.. but this was our new years. pretty neat right? we had a nice dinner, which i wish i could rave about, but we all agreed that the food was not that great. the experience was though!
(i think thailand thought they were being creative when they made it a western themed night)

we watched lanterns light up the sky from afar, and it was breathtaking. we all sent off our own lanterns with our personal wishes and new years goals. 

 i've always had a hard enough time trying to stay awake 'til midnight, but being on a completely crazy time change, made it that much harder. i'm definitely not what you would call a party animal. 

after dinner we went down to a night market and got our nightly foot massages. we walked around and snacked some more before heading back to our hotel to watch the fireworks and light our lanterns. it was beautiful to watch.

 this was my best new years to date, it was fun, mellow, and i was with loved ones. 

just the way i like it.

floating market

 we got out of the city of bangkok to visit the floating market. we took a boat ride through some canals, which felt like a disneyland ride to me, that brought us to here. all of the food was SO good. even the weird looking stuff like what tanner is eating. those are little gooey coconut pancakes and i wish i would have gotten my own. delicious! besides the traditional pad thai, sticky rice with mango was my favorite food in thailand. couldn't get enough of it.

 another favorite thing of mine were these fruits pictured above ^^^ the ones that look like a weird coconut. i don't remember what they're called, but the middle is a white, sweet, chewy fruit.

 we drank our fair share of coconut water. gotta stay hydrated.

i usually get tired of a certain food when i have a lot of it in a short period of time. and thailand was no exception. i found myself saying it will be a while before i eat thai food again. well, after thailand we traveled to a few other countries and i found myself craving thai food. it hadn't even been a week! lucky for me, we had a layover in thailand before we came home. we had a half hour to eat and we took advantage of it! pad thai, mango sticky rice, and bubble tea. i flew home with a happy stomach.