Koh Samui: Lamai Beach

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We arrived on Lamai beach, down the south end at the Green Villa which was run by 2 french men and were shown to our room. We walked up the steps of our little shack and opened the door which revealed a double bed and just about enough room down the side to place our bags. Opening the door to the bathroom we discovered a toilet without a flush; with a bucket of water next to it…at this point we felt we were proper travellers. We soon realised we were not alone in in our little shack after finding lizards and giant ants crawling around, this would account for the price we paid a night of only £6 for both of us.
Unpacking a few bits we went to the restaurant and had a brunch of cheese sandwich and chips, before going for a walk down to the beach. Once on the beach the view was amazing with the clear blue sea and the sky which did not have a single cloud. The sun was burning down and the sand was hot to walk even with flip-flops on so after a refreshing dip in the sea we decided to head back to the pool. We chilled for a bit by the pool and then headed to our room ready to explore some more.
After a long walk down the beach we discovered a pizzeria that had all you could pizza for only 200 baht a person, we decided this would be the place for dinner. Sitting down on the loungers we watched the stars as we waiting for our food, and noted the moon looked very much like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland; and we wondered how is was going to be full by the 14th. Our pizza arrived and smelt amazing we tucked in and soon found ourselves eating 3 12 inch pizzas between us! They were delicious and we made a note to return Monday night when the same deal was on again, this time making a pact we would devour 4 pizza!
The next morning we woke in our love shack after a very much needed 12 hours sleep. After talking the night before about possibly moving to different accommodation so we could have more space we decided to stay at Green Villa. Although the hut was much smaller than the bungalow we stayed in Chaweng, the love shack was a lot cooler and the cheapest we had come across so we thought being the hard core travellers we are we would stick it out for the next 4 days.
The sun was shining and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky so off we headed to the beach again, the hot sand burning through our flip flops. Today was the hottest day we had had and we couldn’t manage more than twenty minutes in the sun before running down to the sea to cool off. Peckish we brought some bbq’d sweet corn off a Thai man on the beach, having eyes bigger than our belly’s we had one each, but now know for next time to share as we were pretty full by the end of it. The beach was too hot so we headed back to the pool which being situated in a tropical garden is much more shaded, and often we were only the people by the pool so had some nice piece and quiet. As it was 42 degrees we didn’t last long sat out in the sun so we seeked shade under a little wooden hut by the pool and caught up on some blog writing.
We were hungry and decided we would try out some more food at our restaurant; we went for pad Thai and vegetable tempura. The vegetable tempura was scrumptious with sweet chilli sauce but the pad Thai was a massive portion which we struggled to finish. After dinner we walked along the beach and found a bar called bikini bar were we settled down to watch Shawshank Redemption that they played on the big screen. We ordered some fruit shakes of watermelon and orange and lying on some beach loungers we settled down to watch the film.
Its Saturday so we decided we would have a nice lay in, waking leisurely we went for some breakfast of toast and marmite, with black tea using our Tetley tea bags, as we decided it was the milk making the tea not taste quite right. We got ready and headed down to the beach, were we presumed our usual position of me in the shade and Zoe in the sun. Although today the sun had even defeated Zoe as she said it was too hot for her. So after only a few hours down beach we headed back to our pool and sat in the shade writing letters to family and sadly I did a bit of reading up nursing stuff… We got some cornettos from the 7/11 for only £1 for 2 and sat in shade enjoying them.
Later that day Zoe started to get Thai tummy and was running to the toilet, we tried to figure out the source and the only thing we could think of was the pad Thai the night before. We got ready for dinner and got a taxi to Lamai night market as we weren’t sure how to get there walking. When we arrived we wandered along and took in the sights the road looked more like they did on Chaweng beach with shops and restaurants everywhere, although no starbucks. We decided on a little authentic Indian restaurant for dinner and had a lush meal of 2 veggie curries, yellow rice, poppadum’s, 2 garlic naan and 2 drinks for only £8!The food was delicious, after stuffing our faces we went in search of the night market.
Finding the market we soon discovered it was no night bizarre like the one in Chiang Mai, we found nothing we liked so went in search of a place to sit for a drink. The boys we had met in Chaweng had said they would be at the ozzie bar so we went and sat down, looking at the drinks menu we decided to go for the cheapest opition which was a coke and Fanta, still costing us £3! We finished our drinks and headed back to our place so Zoe could get changed as she was sweating profusely.
Arriving back down the main street and sat at a bar on the street and ordered the cheapest drink of Sangsom and sprite. After a while we noticed a very annoying noise and people were getting up and moving; we discovered that there was going to be thai boxing so we moved to sit by the ring. After over an hour of sitting and waiting the chanting started and 2 young boys about 8 years old wandered around the stadium collecting money off people. His money was then hung around there neck, we presume as a show of how good they were. The fighting started and we found it all quite wrong so watched 2 rounds and left. We walked around a bit around the square and bumped into the boys we had met in Chaweng at Green Mango, we wandered over and said Hello then spent the rest of night chatting about our travels and what they were doing. The night ended early and we walked back along the beach and were followed by a dog. Which at first was fine as all the dogs follow you for a while; but once we got to our shack it stayed outside all night scratching and sniffing at the door.
After a very broken night’s sleep we woke to find the dog was still outside, we got ready at a slow pace hoping it would leave. Eventually half an hour later it had gone, so we ventured out for breakfast of cheese omelette on toast. The weather was so hot we decided not to go to the beach so spent the day by the pool. Spending most of the time in the shade, even Zoe found it too hot and we both stayed sheltered most of the day.
We decided we had been craving pasta, so ordered tomato pasta and garlic bread at our place. Making the same mistake as we did in Bangkok when we ordered macaroni cheese, we remembered that Western food is not the same as back home. As we sat at the same table we did every morning for breakfast; once again the birds began to serenade us by singing and slowing edging towards us for food…

We headed out to Lamai market again and headed to the same square the boxing had been on, were loads of cheap food stalls lined the street. We got in line and ordered nutella and peanut butter pancakes that were amazing! When queuing the heat and smell coming from the stalls was immense and queuing for half hour made the pancakes worth waiting for. Even though the process could have been sped up if the pancake man wasn’t spending most of time watching Man city vs Man united on TV across the street… We devoured our pancakes and wandered around some more to find a travel booking place, we found one and booked our taxi pick up and boat to Koh Phangan for only 300 baht each…bargain!
Waking the next day we discovered we had both been eaten alive by bugs and it was incredibly hot in our shack. We got up and ready quickly and headed out for breakfast of toast and black tea; recently discovering the cheapest way of breakfast is to get toast and butter (add our own marmite) and just hot water (add our own teabags…tetley of course ). Before we dropped off some clothes to the laundry as it was cheap only 30 bahts a kg, ready to pick up before we leave tomorrow.
We then headed to the beach for the last time and sweated in the heat counting 3 songs on our ipods until it was time to get in the sea. The sea was lush and warm but refreshing once getting out of the heat, when in the sea there was far too many speedo sightings which again were very disturbing. We gave up on the beach as the heat got too much and headed back to the pool. In the pool we commenced boot camp aqua aerobics style once tired out we decided it was time to get out and get ready for the pizza party.
We got ready and headed down the beach to the pizzeria, when it started raining slightly and a beautiful rainbow went across the horizon. We made it to the pizzeria and ordered 2 pizzas, scoffing them down fast we ordered a third. The owner asked if we wanted the same and Zoe said no different…thinking we may get cheese or something else he came back with seafood surprise! Wondering what we were going to do with a pizza both of us wouldn’t eat, we spotted a French family sat across from us and asked them if they would like our pizza. Discreetly passing them the pizza we waited until they had finished to grap back the plate in the hope we could get away with ordering another one…but as Zoe picked up the plate the mum shouted across to us ‘ thank you for giving my children the pizza’, right as the owner stood over watching. Our plan of a fourth pizza had gone right out the window!
Deciding we were actually too stuffed to eat anymore we paid and headed back for our final night at Green Villa. We got back and packed our stuff up ready for our boat to Koh Phangan where our next adventure will begin…..

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