The well oiled machine that is the Full Moon Party

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After all the fun at Kanchanaburi, we were dropped off at the railway station. All we had to do was wait 3 hours for the train, endure the 10 hours train ride, transfer to a bus for 2 hours (that was overcrowded with full mooners - standing room only), wait 2 hours for the ferry (the train was an hour late so we missed the 10am, had to wait till noon), then travel 3 hours on the ferry before arriving on Ko Pha Ngan. Easy!
We got to the resort at about 4pm, having been dropped off at the railway station at 6pm the previous day. Remember we spent most of the day before in the water either bathing elephants or swimming in a waterfall, so you can imagine we were not in the finest fettle of our lives.
After a quick shower we were all set to investigate the beach....

As it turns out Ko Pha Ngan is not great. Every month they have a Full Moon Party on the beach, attended by approx 10,000 people. It is like New Year's Eve, and the locals take every chance to farm the tourist dollar. There is also a new moon party every month (in between full moons - obviously) and 2 quarter moon parties per month (can you guess when they are?). To summarise that's a shit load of parties.

We got to the Full Moon Party on 1st June, and it was just like New Years Eve - a bit of an anticlimax. A lot of people loved it, but it was just too big, too much going on, everybody engrossed with themselves. I have had much better nights than that. But the pop was pretty good. You buy a bucket with a quarter bottle of spirit and a mixer for $8-10 and just carry it around until you are ready for a new one! We opted not to take the camera out, but if you google Full Moon Party there is an official website that can answer any questions you need answering.

Part of the Full Moon package is that you have to buy 4 nights accomodation. Our was pretty good, 20m from the beach with pool, bar, gym, sauna the works. The first night we had a seafood & steak bbq, all you can eat & drink for 800baht (approx 12 quid). We got through at least 12quid of wine alone. let alone fresh oysters, king prawn, squid, snapper and fillet steak. We certainly left on an upper from that deal.

But the morning after full moon we had to check out. So we packed our bags and jumped on the ferry for a 2 hr jump across to Ko Tao. But thats another story..........

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