Thailand. Lovely Thailand.

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After another sleepless night on the train (we’ve had a few!) we arrived in Surat Thani, weary and aching. Luckily we found a decent hotel with a good mattress for £7 a night, so we checked in and slept... For 2 days!
Feeling slightly more rested we continued with our journey and got a minibus to Khao Sok national Park. Signed up for a 2day and 1night camping in the rainforest, spent one day at the guesthouse seeing a multitude of frogs and lizards - including gliding lizards which soared past us a couple of times! Had a good meal at the guesthouse then played Jenga against the man who would be our guide for our camping trip, and who apparently never lost at Jenga - Sexyman. We beat him 2 out of 3 games!
The next day we were up early (but not as early as we should have been due to sleeping through our alarm!), had breakfast and were off. We were taken by pickup truck to the bottom of a hill, then handed a couple of plastic bags each with 6 litres of water and a tent, along with our bag and camera. We struggled quite a bit (I say we - Ben had a little trouble but I was whinging and moaning within 20 minutes, meaning as soon as we had a break after half an hour, Ben took both bags of water and me the tent and camera - which were much easier. Job done.) It was a really steep climb for about 2 hours. We stopped about 4 times, each time I thought my legs were about to implode from the pressure of using muscles which had not been awake for a long time - probably since the Great Wall! On one of the stops we were handed what I thought was cocoa leaf - I was stupidly expecting something slightly chocolately, but no it was pretty bitter. Found out after a while that in fact it wasn’t cocoa but coca leaf, which is not used in chocolate production but rather cocaine.... would explain the slight buzz and energy boost... hmmm....!
After the arduous climb, we came across a rafflesia flower - a rare flower with the biggest bloom in the world. It had been blooming for 6 days and was past its best - which is the first 3 days - but still pretty amazing to see! We continued our trek along fairly level ground for a while and came across several rafflesia pods which were growing and on which was due to open in a couple of days. Didn’t make the hike up there again when it did!
We carried on trekking for a couple more hours, down the other side of the hill and then along a river, until we got to an isolated waterfall where we stopped and went for a swim in the waterfall’s basin. After the hard trek it felt amazing - if a little cold - to jump into the pool and swim about for a bit. As soon as we got out we were followed about by leeches. Decided they really are the creepiest things in the world (Sorry Hannah and Pete!). We were constantly batting them off our legs and feet - but not always quick enough. I got bitten once, as did Sexyman - but Ben had about 10 and his socks and shoes ended up being quite bloody!
We stayed by this waterfall the rest of the day, and as we went off frog hunting, Sexyman worked (we did offer to help, but he declined). He took old bamboo that had fallen and chopped it up - making a big fire (where many leeches ended up!), then he cut down a bamboo tree and made all manner of things with it. Used one big section for steaming rice, another bit for boiling water for tea and coffee - including a ladle made from a thinner piece of bamboo. He then stripped some and made a sort of clamp to hold chicken in place and then also some cups for our tea and bowls for our food. Dinner was pretty amazing - found out Sexyman had previously owned a restaurant and bar (and used to do the cooking!) until he lost everything in the tsunami and so now was working 6am-12am 6 or 7 days a week for £4 a day!
After dinner, we headed out on a night safari. The rainforest was alive with the sounds of frogs, cicadas and other animals and soon we came across many frogs - different types and sizes all along the shallow river we were walking along. Sexyman also found a weird looking fish, a civet, a sleeping kingfisher, crabs, more frogs... and a deadly mangrove snake about 100metres from our camp! Hooray!
The safari was amazing - but I made the unfortunate mistake of trying to keep my shoes dry - so after walking for about half an hour we came to a fairly deep part of the river we had to cross. Now Sexyman did the whole trek barefoot - I figured it couldn’t be that hard, so I took my shoes off and left them on the bank then continued barefoot. It was ok for about 5 minutes, then every slightly sharp rock or even bumpy rock caused immense pain, second only to standing on several twigs that had fallen from a thorn tree. Sexyman had to help me and took a lot of my weight so when I stood on something sharp I leaned on him completely. Somehow we made it back to our shoes an hour or so later - I was very brave and had managed not to cry once! Stepping back into shoes felt amazing and I was soon happy that I had kept them nice and dry and thought perhaps the pain had been worth it! Just after we saw the mangrove snake, we had to cross the river one final time - had fairly decent sized rocks and we’d had no trouble crossing earlier so we walked across - Sexyman leading the way. I decided one of the rocks he stood on looked a little small - so I went for a big flat rock... that turned out to be a collection of scum. Which doesn’t hold a person’s weight. I went in. My shoes were soaked. Balls.
We got back to our camp and we both put our shoes by the fire to dry - Ben’s had also been soaked earlier in the day and again on the safari - but he didn’t mind so much. After a final cup of tea we wished Sexyman a good night’s sleep (he was in a hammock - don’t think I would have slept much knowing how close a deadly snake was!) and we got into our well zipped up tent. Didn’t sleep too well due to the ground being covered in rocks and us only having a sleeping bag to lie on (I lay on both!) and no pillow! Ben wasn’t bothered - he can sleep anywhere - I, however, like at least some form of bedding and do not consider rocks sufficient. Still, I got a couple of hours at some point and then it was morning.
Sexyman cooked us a breakfast which consisted of 3 slices of toast and butter (usually 2 would do me), half a pineapple, 3 boiled eggs (Ben had 4) plus tea and coffee. Biggest breakfast ever and I could barely walk afterwards. Still, the show must go on and after packing everything up we were on our way - this time Sexyman managed to take almost everything as we had eaten and drank most of the contents of his bag! So I just took the tent and Ben took our bag and camera. We went back a different way to the previous day - this time we went along a river most of the day. I say along, it was actually through the river a fair bit and abseiling down next to waterfalls. It was hard work, but I found it more fun than the day before - probably because a lot of it went in a downward direction! It was a beautiful day’s trek and we saw a couple more snakes, several huge tadpoles, fish,birds, lizards and even a few long tailed macaques up in the trees! We were watching these for a while until some stupid English couple came along talking and laughing loudly and scared them off. All they wanted to see was a bloody waterfall! Not impressed...
After a few hours trekking - and one fairly dangerous river crossing where I got my by then pretty dry shoes soaked again - we crawled through a gap Sexyman made in the barbed wire fence and we were back at our guesthouse. Hungry for Pad Thai and mango fruit shake - then tired enough to go to bed at 3pm. The hardest but most rewarding couple of days of the whole trip so far.
After a day’s rest we were on our way again. This time our destination was Krabi. A couple of hours on a minibus and we were there - we checked in to a hotel and spent a couple of days eating well at the local markets and planning our next trip - to Railay.
What a mistake that was. Next to Minsk the worst decision we have made so far. The word ruined does not do this place justice - what was clearly once a stunning setting for rock climbing and swimming in the crystal clear waters is now so jam packed with resorts that the nice side is ridiculously expensive and packed with the usual overweight and ridiculously underweight or toned tourists and the side we were on - well there was no beach, just mudflats and a new resort being built meant there was dirt and mess everywhere plus a fair amount of noise. The place where we stayed was a bungalow surrounded by other bungalows everywhere, so no privacy - plus the mattress was damp and the toilet blocked. The quality of the food was adequate and the only saving grace was the sunset - which we sat on the beach on the posh side with a couple of beers and planned our escape - tomorrow morning as soon as we woke up. We were planning on going to Koh Phi Phi or Lanta, but listening to others these are pretty over-developed and expensive. We decided to give them both a big fat miss and return to Krabi then head south to find a decent, more deserted island!
We did as we planned and were at the boat stop at before 8am - we were told to wait a few minutes. Two hours later we were on our way, never to return and very glad of it! We spent a joyful day in Krabi, loving it more than before - especially the mango and sticky rice which we bought 4 of (the lady couldn’t believe it and kept double checking - it is our favourite food!) and the next day we headed to Trang.
We spent one night in Trang - sorting out where to go next - we were going to head to Ko Ngai - which the Lonely Planet gave a good write up.... but they had also favoured Railay so we found an internet cafe and checked our choice before making another mistake. And had we not, it sounds like another mistake would have occurred! Apparently another place which has been a little ruined by tourists - so we chose to go to Koh Libong instead.
Finally a right decision! A truly beautiful island, we took a longtail boat then, after refusing to pay 100 baht each to get across the island on a scooter, we started walking, then soon had a driver pull up next to us and agreed to take us for 120baht for both of us. This meant him putting my bag in front of him, me sat behind him, then Ben wearing his backpack and daypack sat behind me.... on a scooter intended for 1-2 people! It was an interesting ride and we only came off the path once and only into some thick grass and nothing worse... our driver thought it was quite funny, as did I... Ben, having trouble holding on anyway - wasn’t laughing as much, but did see the funny side!
We spent 3 nights on the island, just swimming, snorkelling, sunbathing, going for walks and, always a favourite, eating. We could walk 5 minutes from our resort and have almost half a mile of beach to ourselves... and the hermit crabs! The coral was hard and not beautiful, but we still saw many fishes, crabs, sea cucumbers, shrimps and various other sea creatures. On our last day we heard some weird clicking whilst underwater but didn’t think much of it. We then spent the afternoon lazing about on the beach and watching some type of big fish jump several times quite far away... could potentially have been a dolphin- which might explain the weird clicking noises!
We truly loved the island, but ran out of money and the beds weren’t too comfortable - so we decided to head back to the mainland - glad we finally found a real island getaway and only cost us about £20 a day accommodation, food and some travel - bit cheaper than Koh Phi Phi!
The next place we decided to get to was Pak Bara. To get here from our resort we took a motorbike with a wooden sidecar attached - where we sat with our bags - for half an hour. A 20 minute longtail boat ride, a 1 hour minibus drive to Trang, a 3 hour local bus ride (with music blaring so loud that even with earplugs the noise could cause your ears to bleed - but it only cost £1 each...) then a 15 minute sawthaew ride to the Pak Bara, where we checked in to a guesthouse made up of 8 small bungalows with an ensuite of sorts (no sink) and many gaps for bugs and one huge spider to get in (probably snakes and other things aswell if they so chose!). A travel agent told us there was a Thai holiday for the next 2 days and tried to get us to buy tickets then and there - but we decided to wait until tomorrow to see what time we wanted to go and to check accommodation as Thai holidays are notorious for everything being booked up. Looked into it a little more and found out Ko Adang where we were planning on going becomes hellishly crowded over Thai holidays.
We went out to try and get some food but the place was like a ghost town - a few people were about and we managed to get a mango shake - but it was like the place had been deserted - so we headed back to our room and ate some Pringles that we’d bought earlier. Nice healthy dinner. Being little else to do, we went to bed and slept. For an hour or so when we were woken up by someone knocking on our door and saying something like “niem” - guessing a local word... they knocked about once every 5 seconds and said “niem” each time. We ignored it for a bit, but after a couple of minutes we thought we should check it wasn’t important. So Ben got up and armed with his trusty leatherman and said “hello”, the answer that came was further knocks on the door and the repetitive, creepy call of “niem”. Ben again said “hello” and after a short pause, the knocking reply continued but this time accompanied by the high pitched Michael Jacksonesque voice saying “hello”.
We decided not to say anything else and wait for the guy to go. What happened instead was he pushed the door (luckily the lock held with the aid of Ben’s bag propped against it), then rattled the bars on the windows, then went round to the back of the bungalow and tried to lift the thatched roof up! Luck was again on our side and the bungalow, however shoddily built the bungalow was, one skinny guy (I peeked through the window once) could not get in. But he was relentless and soon was back at our door, knocking away - this time he put an even more high pitched voice so it sounded like a woman. Outside we could also hear several motorbikes pull up, which we were slightly concerned may be a Thai gang and could be the reason the town had been so empty so early (all other Thai towns seem to wake up about 4/5pm - never close down!).
As the whole silence thing on our part didn’t seem to be doing the trick, Ben said “hello” one more time. This time a different reply, “I want to come in.” This was followed by a slightly hysterical laugh on our part and Ben replied “But we don’t want you in”, and the knocking and “hello” resumed.
“Go away,” Ben tried.
“Open the door,” came the reply.
“No, it’s late, we’re not opening the door, go away!”
The door knocking took another break as again the guy tried the window bars and the roof (seriously the roof?!?). This had been going on for almost half an hour, before I managed to find my phone and called the Thai police. Who don’t really speak English. And I don’t speak Thai. After about 10 minutes he eventually gave me the number of the local police for me to call (I think!), I thanked him and hung up. By this time the guy had gone, clearly he understood police and didn’t want any trouble!
Long into the night after what we assumed was a male Thai prostitute on some form of drug, there were motorbikes pulling up outside our bungalow every 5 or 10 minutes, then driving off again. We did check a number of times that there wasn’t a big crowd amassing, but they seemed to be nothing to do with us, just another bungalow a little way away that something was clearly happening - but as long as they left us alone they can do what they like.
We both got very little sleep that night and as soon as we woke up we pretty much left - didn’t want to wait around for a ferry to the islands and as we’d been told it was a Thai holiday we decided to go to Satun for a night or to then come back.
We made it to Satun, but never went back! Satun was really nice with very good food and we stayed in a decent hotel (still only £17 but it had a bath and a stunning view where we watched eagles flying around!), then we decided to get a boat to Langkawi, an island at the top of Malaysia, rather than chancing the drugged up prostitute again.
And this is where we are now. In a beautiful location, surrounded by monkeys, frogs, monitor lizards, hornbills, brightly coloured birds, buffalo, crabs etc, with food included and really good bungalows with ensuite, fridge, aircon, and free wifi for £17 a night. Only had a couple of slightly unnerving moments here - one was a guy with a machete who was obviously protecting a house for someone.... which we were watching the sunset from! And the other was a whirlwind about a mile down the beach - we thought we might be blown away but then it suddenly disappeared! Today we leave for Penang to experience Chinese New Year, Malay style. So we wish you all a happy new year and we’ll try to update you soon.
Goodnight and goodluck.

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