Koh Tao, Koh Phi Phi ....Thailand

  My companion and I had just made it to the ferry dock at Ban Thong Sala on Koh Pha Gnan after a punishing trip in the back of a truck from Thong Nai Pan Noi. The ferry sailings to Koh Tao had been cancelled the day before, and the morning sailing also did not leave from the dock. After insisting that I did not want to return again to Koh Samui after already spending 5 days there, we eventually boarded the ferry for the 45 km trip from Koh Pha Gnan to Koh Tao. The smooth waters that I viewed from the dock soon turned choppy.

  About one hour into the trip I was starting to realize what a mistake it was to get onto this overloaded wooden boat. As the vessel rocked back and fourth and rose up and down in the waves many people were getting sick right where they clutched for safety. By 2.5 hours into our journey most everyone was very worried; it was horrifying when the boat slammed down from the tops of the 3 metre swells because I could hear that the boat was on the verge of breaking apart. Each time the front of the boat rose up into the air I wondered if it could survive the impact on the way down. The trip time was doubled with the slow pace, this was a very worrisome sailing; so stressful. Somehow the boat made it to Mae Haad Pier at Koh Tao, we felt very fortunate.

   We made our way up to the north west coast and found a little bungalow on a bluff that had a good view of Nang Yuan Island.

                                             

                             

We walked downtown via the beach, where possible, it was just an okay beach; very long. After a little walk around we made it back to our little village, where the generator operates from 6pm-midnight, and got settled for the night; thoughts of the harrowing boat ride were still fresh in my mind. The next day we visited Nang Yuan Island which was actually 3 islands connected by sand beach. We climbed to the highest point for a good view

                             

and the rest of the time was spent leisurely swimming and laying around a beautiful beach. The next day we walked the 5 kms to the ferry dock with our packs, they seemed a bit heavy on this morning. The ferry ride this day was an excellent experience; the weather was beautiful, which made for nice views.

  We overnighted on Koh Samui and then caught the first ferry to Surat Thani; from there we caught a bus for the 155 km trip to Krabi. The scenery was okay, many jutted mountains; too bad our bags got drenched on top of the taxi that we took to the bus station. We found a guest house that was very reasonable and then we walked around Krabi, fairly nice little city I thought. In the morning we caught the one hour ferry to our 6th Thailand Island, Koh Phi Phi, we would celebrate New Years here. The island was jam packed, after searching everywhere we were lucky to find a women in a small house who was renting a bed. We had an excellent New Years at the Jungle Bar, we met so many people and had a blast.

                          

When we made it back to our lodging at 3:30 am we had to get rid of 2 Thai's that were sleeping on our bed; at 7:30 a guy opened our bedroom door just to look at us; needless to say we were tired the next day.

  On Jan. 1st a very nice bungalow became available so we moved our packs down the beach and settled in. I then hiked up to the viewpoint which give a great view of Aow Ton Sai Bay and Loh Dalam.

                        

                        

After that I walked to the opposite end of the beach where I found many monkeys in the bush and sat to watch them interact with each other for an hour, very entertaining. That evening we were spoiled by a delicious sea food dinner and a nice stroll on the beautiful beach.

                        

The next day we took a long boat trip around Phi Phi Lay which was very nice; the boat stopped at a large cave.

                                       

                            

We then headed around the big island, stopping for lunch on a nice beach. After lunch we went to Bamboo Island which was also very nice. We walked the beaches and spent a lot of time snorkeling; this was a great day.

  The next day we were going to be moving on so I went for one last walk early in the morning. I found another viewpoint that needed about 1 hour to climb and was the view ever worth it......stunning. We loaded the ferry for the 1pm sailing and the boat pulled away at 1:30 only to turn around before we got out of the bay to be met by a long boat with 4 passengers; once those passengers got on the boat was turned around and we set sail. After a few minutes some workers on the ferry started a 20 minute argument with these passengers; these people had paid for the trip in Krabi and the workers wanted them to pay again. The captain stopped the boat in the middle of the sea and threaten the passengers to pay or he would take them back...it seemed like the rest of us were forgotten. There seemed to always be nice scenery from our boat excursions.

                           

  After some delays and a 35 km sailing, we arrived at Koh Lanta and settled in to Lanta Sea House; it was time to get familiarized with another island,

  Koh Samui, Koh Pha Ngan....Thailand

  My companion and I took the familiar 12 hour train ride south from Chiang Mai to Bangkok, the locomotive was delayed and took 14.5 hours to arrive in the capital. I did not take any photo's out of the window since the scenery was for the most part repetitive; there were a couple of nice shot's if I had had the camera at the ready. We stayed on Khao San Rd again and made plans to get out of Bangkok the next day.

  On the morning of the next day, after I took a long walk, I hired a tuk tuk to go to the International Post Office to mail some boxes of souvenirs. On the way back I could not get any tuk tuk driver to agree to take me back; the distance was too far away from their usual routes. I ended up to get on the back of a motorcycle and felt lucky to arrive back at the guest house uninjured; the driver weaved in and out of traffic nearly missing many vehicles; he had a helmet on and I did not. We were to leave Bangkok to head south at 4:30 that afternoon.

  We were picked up at our guest house at 4:15 along with 2 other people in a van....we picked up  others on the way to the bus station. The van passed all these nice buses before stopping; we sat in the van for 30 minutes until the driver drove to a slummy area where he dropped us off and told us the bus would come at 7pm. We had heard many bad things about buses so we were very worried when this junker bus pulled up. Turned out that our driver did an excellent job, he was very defensive on roads where big trucks and buses race head on. There were some good views from the bus

                      

We arrived at Surat Thani at 7am after 12 hours of travel and arranged to catch the 8:20 vehicle that would take us to the ferry for Koh Samui; Koh means island in the Thai language.

                       

                       


  We booked into the Nice Resort #1 which was right on  Lamai beach with plenty of  restaurants and night spots. The next day we rented a motorbike and toured around the island which has so many nice beaches;

                                      


we stopped at one location and took a 30 minute walk up to the waterfall. Once we got back to home base we ate at the Starry Hut for the second night...exceptional seafood dinners. We went out that night to the disco area, there were so many partier's. We watched cross dressers put the moves on men who had had many drinks. My companion told the guy next to her that the "woman" he was flirting with was actually a guy; very hard to tell sometimes, the guy didn't believe it. The next day we moved bungalows to a quieter place and spent time on the beach. I was walking along and a guy I knew from my small hometown rode by, I caught up with him and we chatted for some time; it is a small world. Later in the day I saw what I thought was a fire truck; I heard screaming from people and yelping. A man jumped off the back of the truck with a spear and was targeting stray dogs; two other guys were throwing the dogs on a pile of about 100 dogs in the back of the truck, I was shocked to witness their animal control.

   A lazy beach day later; the previous night time saw monsoon rains and power outages in Lamai. I toured the whole island again on the motor bike, one would not get tired of the 50 km trip around Thailands second largest island. We spent one more whole day on the beach, the weather seemed perfect for it.

                       

The next day we went over to visit Ivan and Diane on Mae Nom Beach, our Chiang Mai hiking partners; at night I went to the Thai Boxing competition in Lamai, this sport is very entertaining to watch.

  Next morning we loaded a taxi and headed to the west side to catch a ferry to Koh Pha Ngan, our second Gulf of Thailand Island. Once the ferry landed we took a boat to Ban Thong Sala and found a bungalow on a cliff with a nice view. After a couple of days just hanging around the beaches, like this one with all of the moss/seaweed

                                       

 we hired a taxi to take us on the interior road down to Thong Sala where I could catch the ferry to get over to Lamai so I could rent a dirt bike to use for travel. The road was very rough and seemed as though it was not an option for transport in the rainy season. We rode the dirt road by motorcylcle back up to Ban Mae Hat which has a Thai fishing village. After viewing some nice scenery and more beaches we stopped at the Phang waterfall only to find out that we had lost our camera while bumping our way up steep, rugged hills. We turned back immediately, backtracking as best we could, but to no a-vail, our camera was lost. There were about 30 photo's of nice views that were lost in the camera; we would not get those memories back.

  The next day I took the bike back down the rough road so I could return it in Lamai, the weather was taking a turn for the worse. Once I got back onto Koh Pha Ngan the rain was incredibly heavy; this was a large tropical storm. I caught the truck ride to the north of the island; after about 10 minutes the truck stopped and a new driver got in, he smelled like booze. After joking with other passengers about his incapable driving the guy got stuck on a muddy hill. All us passengers got out onto the slick hill to try to push; an unforgettable sight was the old Thai passenger that slipped to the ground 3 times in the mud, each time holding up his plastic bag of soup in the air. We made it back to the village...bag of soup in good condition, but one of the western women lost her sunglasses while pushing the truck.

  The next day the storm had blown over so we decided to stay until the day after Christmas, the locals were so friendly and with beaches like this one there was no point to rush.

   We participated in the X-mas dinner for 150 Baht which was an excellent meal. Another storm moved in for the next couple of days; the road was closed and the water was too rough for a boat out of paradise. Finally we were able to get off of the north coast by taxi....locals were happy when they heard it come up the road since it brought some supplies. After an adventurous drive down to Thong Sala we found out that the ferry had been cancelled the whole day before, and the first sailing in the morning also. My companion did not want to go on the 45 km ferry ride to Koh Tao and I did not want to go back to Koh Samui too early; the water seemed very calm. This insistence to get on this ferry was almost a life ending mistake.