January 19th: Travels to Koh Chang…Dinner in Koh Chang

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Today we woke up at 0515 to leave for the beach!! We were all very tired but excited for the beach weather and the ocean!! We caught our flight around 0810 and thankfully it was only an hour flight! We were all expected that we would be able to catch a quick ferry over to Koh Chang and be there by lunch time but this was not the case! We were informed that we would need to take a 2 ½ hour bus ride to get to the ferry and then another hour on the ferry before Koh Chang. The 2 ½ hour bus ride ended up being around 4 as we made stops at two gas stations and a noodle restaurant on the way to the ferry. We got to the ferry around 3pm and it took us about an hour to get across to the island of Koh Chang. It was a cool ferry because we got to drive our vans up onto the ferry and park them and then go up to the top deck and look out at the beautiful islands. After we arrived on the island, we took another ½ hour bus ride to the resort! By the time we got there I was so tired of traveling because I had not been expecting the travel to the island to take almost 10 hours!! Although the traveling was annoying, it did give me a lot of great time to think and pray which was awesome. ? I also slept a lot too! We walked into the resort and were greeted by some staff who offered up cups of juice and cool, scented towels for our face. The juice was so delicious, and the towel felt great after the long day of traveling. We were all overjoyed and shocked at how beautiful the resort was with some of the rooms leading straight into the pool and the beautiful views of the ocean. We brought our bags to our rooms and we were excited to see that Victoria and I had two big beds that were so comfortable and a beautiful bathroom with all the amenities we could ever need including slippers and a robe! We walked by the beach and took some photos before happy hour where we got some drinks and appetizers before our fancy dinner at 7pm. We all had a great time talking and looking out at the ocean! We had dinner which included a first course of chicken kabobs and shrimp spring rolls, a second course which was coconut soup, a main course which was a curry-like chicken with white sticky rice, and dessert which was a banana and coconut soup that was the best thing ever!! After dinner, we walked by the beach again and saw lots of fish and crabs in the water! It is such a blessing to get to stay at this resort. I reflected today how nice it is to be taken care of so well on this trip and to have everything prepared ahead of time. It is nice to not have to plan things but just to be along for the ride and enjoy everything! I pray I can continue to have a good attitude and remember how much of a blessing it is to be on this trip, even when traveling takes longer than expected! Koh Chang, you did not disappoint!

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