Happy Easter!

I heard that the lakes are opening up (as in, the ice is melting) in Minnesota lately.  Oh yeah?  Booyah

Sorry that was mean.  I just got back from Langkawi, which is an archipelago consisting of 99 islands (only two of which are inhabited) in the Andaman Sea south of Thailand and 30 km west of peninsular Malaysia.  Although all I saw was my hotel, which was in Datai Bay, it looked like there were a lot of things to do there...But since I didn't see any of that all I have to report is as follows:

1.  Lots of eagles! And although I did not see them they have great hornbills (also available at the HK Zoological and Botanical Gardens...but it is probably slightly better to see them in the wild in their gorgeous natural habitat) and also eight species of kingfisher.  One thing that is remarkable about kingfishers (and I guess eagles) is that they have them both in Malaysia and Minnesota.  And India.  Sort of like...no other naturally occurring creatures.

2.  Two kinds of monkeys, which may or may not be featured shortly in monkey of the week.

3.  FLYING LEMURS galore.  Also sometimes known as colugos...they look like scary giant bats that fly from tree to tree, but really all they do is jump around.  Like House of Pain.  No pictures since they were nocturnal.  Most excellent viewing spot: outdoor table at the hotel's Japanese restaurant.

4.  Sand crabs!  They burrow into the sand and then filter the sand for delicious food such as algae.  Then they make little balls out of the sand so that they know what sand they already ate.  Clever eh?

Here is a far off view of their sand ball piles:

Time for a close-up of a little guy:

Another little guy:

A big guy (see just to the right of the vertical center line and slightly farther under the horizontal center line):

More beautiousness: