Day 15 - The road *from* Ko Chang

---

Ko Chang - Wed. Jan. 23rd

The Infernal Optimist

On a trip that lasts two months, you can't expect every day to be fantastic. Some days are great, others are boring, and you try like hell to avoid bad days. Still, they can't all live up the expectations that you've been crafting in your head for months prior to leaving. So, with that, we hit the proverbial eject button on Ko Chang and got ourselves out as quickly as possible. After having had a great two-week start to the trip (Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Angela & Paul), we didn't want to sit through (or pay for) a leg of the trip that had nothing to offer us.


Our private taxi pulled up in front of our room at Coral Resort on Ko Chang 15 minutes ahead of schedule and that worked just fine for us. It was touch and go for a few minutes as the kid's put in charge of the resort at 6:45 am figured their asses from holes in the ground (all with a friendly smile, of course). We had a very tight schedule to catch the ferry to the mainland, and then start our 4 hour drive to Pattaya.

Back in Chiang Mai, we were still planning on "island-hopping" through the east coast islands (Ko Si Chang, Ko Samet & Ko Chang - with possible jump offs to Ko Kut etc.) with a likely night or two in Pattaya. On the last day in Chiang Mai, while we were exchanging used books at Gecko Books (which I *highly* recommend to anyone in Chiang Mai - it's still the best used book store we've come across...5 locations!!), I overheard the owner (an American expat) telling a customer that Pattaya was best to avoid. He said that it's a gambling, nightlife town (confirmed by all guide books), that is therefore a homebase for many Thai gangs. He went on to clarify that, while places such as Chiang Mai are quite safe (and most other tourist places in Thailand), Pattaya was a town that a "farang" (i.e. - us), could get into some real trouble just for looking at someone the "wrong way". The owner also said that Thais fight much differently than "Westerners". Westerners will rough you up and hurt you real bad. Thais will finish you off.

Hmmm....mental note: skip Pattaya. Not really looking for "nightlife" anyhow.

The reason for flying out of Pattaya was to catch a direct flight down to Phuket, where we would be taking a ferry to Ko Phi Phi (once Angela gets back to us of course). Even though we haven't heard from Angela & Paul, and there was a good chance that they would only be getting our e-mail (the one saying, "Guess What?!") until they left the island and it was too late; we felt that it was worth it just to get out of that part of the country.

As it turns out, hiring a private taxi to take you to a direct flight to Phuket from Pattaya (through a travel agent, no less) is cheaper and faster than booking the flights yourself and finding your own transportation to the airport. Crazy, but we're glad either way.

Why we skipped the other islands

I realize that I'm back-tracking a bit here, but maybe you're wondering why we didn't just move to one of the other islands...

Our old book (Let's Go!), didn't exactly "talk up" the islands off the east coast, but they did their best to say that the beaches on Ko Si Chang weren't that bad if you could avoid the side that had busy tankers floating by, and didn't mind garbage. (tempting...) And they said that Ko Samet was alright, though didn't speak as highly of it as they did Ko Chang. Of course, we lost faith in this book completely in Chiang Mai and wanted to see what our new Lonely Planet had to say.

Well...

Ko Si Chang was a write off, and Ko Samet is a National Park that is covered in mosquitos. Keeping that in mind (and the amount of malaria medication that we have to ration), it didn't really make sense to go to the expense involved to "see it for ourselves". We plan to see a bunch of islands down south...we don't need to see every island in Thailand.

As for Ko Chang, the Lonely Planet was pretty honest, (we went, we saw, we stayed for a Chang and we left), so we trusted that if Ko Chang was "the best" of these islands, we were just going to adapt and move on from that coast.

Driving Thai-style, baby!

The drivers in Thailand drive with a certain (as the French say), "I don't know", that puts the fear of God in you while commanding a deep respect for a) their ability and, b) they're respect for each other. They're good, they drive very fast, I've yet to see a case of "road rage" (a mere sport back home), and I still don't understand the rules of the road. Either way, our driver got us to the airport almost an hour earlier than the quoted time (including a bathroom break).

Airlift us to Paradise, please!

The food on Bangkok Airways is good for a laugh. It's edible, though a bit incomprehensible. It comes in a box that looks like the company also delivers to school cafeterias, and consists of 1) cold noodles with a 1/2 inch piece of chicken, 2) a few cold carrot slices with a mystery dressing, 3) a surprisingly good lemon custard muffin-type product and 4) an oven-dried banana (which we're suspicious of for no good reason). And the beer only costs a buck, so I'm a winner either way.

I've taken a bunch of small flights back home and you're lucky to get peanuts. It's a fine airline, considering the flight is just over an hour long.

Fuckit...I mean...Phuket

We've heard from just about everyone we've spoken to or heard from, that the best thing to do in Phuket is: leave.

Our only reason to be there is to connect to Ko Phi Phi, but since we haven't heard from Angela, we're going to spend at least a night on Ko Phuket while we figure out what to do.

We've decided (after hours of consultation with Lonely Planet), that we'll head to Kata Beach which lies towards the southern most point, south of Karon and the mother of all Phuket beaches - Patong. Every piece of info we have had screams: stay away from Patong.

We take a minibus to Kata, which is about an 1 3/4 hours from the airport (factoring all the stops along the way as the others get dropped off at various resorts). Before anyone gets dropped off (about 20 minutes into the drive) the minibus pulls into its office. Kim and I groan as we know exactly what's going on now and the other travellers just look bewildered (Why are we stopping? What's going on?...They're trying to sell you shit!!!).

All smiles and "Sawadee Ka's", the travel agent opens the side door to the van and says that she just needs to know where we're all staying because they don't know of all the resorts on Phuket - so please tell us where you're staying for our database and, if you don't have a place to stay yet, we can help!!

Kim & I just hang back and let them all herd in to give all of their info. The ones who haven't booked a place yet have big heavy binders slapped in front of them with beautiful pictures of all of the resort in their "database" (read: binder). Of course, we don't have a place to stay yet, but we've been around enough to know at this point, that the pictures rarely represent the truth, you'll pay an inflated price with these folks, and more important - you don't get to see the room before paying (favorite Thai saying: "You pay now! You pay now!").

After about 30 minutes, everyone starts filing out, and we go to get back on the bus. Except the wily travel agent does a head count and realizes that she's missed two...that'd be us. So, we lie about where we're staying. A nice British family told us that they'd stayed at Kata at Peach Hill resort last year, so when she asks, "Where you stay?", we say, "Peach Hill". She says, "upper or lower?"....uh....upper? Yeah, upper.

To be continued...

---