Koh Phangan

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Hey all, wow just worked out we're on week 31 of our travels, and I'm currently writing from a coffee shop in a large busy supermarket near the main town of Thong Sala on Koh Phangan, hiding away from the heat again due to the AC in here! I swear it's getting hotter... or at least more humid... the rainy season has began here in Thailand, we had a downpour this morning whilst we were having breakfast, it's a nice break from the heat and reminded us of our first few weeks in Goa... the monsoons will be over there again by now! We've had a busy week here in Koh Phangan, starting last Friday coming over from Samui which took about an hour and was chock a block with young backpackers heading over to Phangan for the full moon party on the Monday night. The hostels are cashing in on the fact that a lot of people come over just for this period, so have a minimum stay of 4/5 nights. So we stayed at Venus resort from Friday to Wednesday, a guest house at the end of Haad Rin beach, where the big party takes place and although our room was ridiculously hot with only a fan giving out hot air, the owner was a nice guy and we met two lovely girls from London, who we'll hopefully keep in touch with as they're heading in the same direction as us. We again rented a motorbike and explored the rest of the island, the roads being very easy to navigate as there is only one main road leading most of the way around the island and up through the jungle in the middle. On Sunday, the whole island celebrated New year (the rest of the country celebrates over 3 days over the weekend) with a massive water festival/mass water fight, to wash away the bad luck and to bring new luck into the next. It was brilliant and everyone joined in with water guns, bottles, buckets and hoses - even van loads of people throwing off buckets of water on passers by!! All of the island had such a fantastic day, it brought everyone together and is definitely one of my highlights since being away. We drove over to Thong Sala the main town, about a half an hour drive from Haad Rin on the south coast on this day and it was mental, the town even brought in a water tank with hoses attached and set it up in the market place, the town was packed with people soaking wet, it was so fun!! On the Monday night we went to the full moon party with the British girls we'd met and had fun dancing in the sand with 40,000 other people covered in uv paint, in tops we'd decorated ourselves - the beach wasn't as big as we'd imagined and it was in a whole lot better state, white sand and clear waters 😊 I suppose as the party has been going on for more than 20 years now, the town has an effective clearing up system, and they must bring in a lot of money from party goers, charging 100bt (£2) to get into Haad Rin on that evening - a lot of people would have been staying outside Haad Rin. After 3 days with our bike, we had an unfortunate experience as we drove up a dirt track on our way to a sign posted view point, the back tyre fell into a groove and the bike skidded over. Me and Mj were fine apart from a few grazes but the bike maintained some obvious marks that we couldn't rub off... when we gave the bike back, the guy wanted us to REPLACE every scratched part and as we were on an island it meant the cost of shipping the parts as well. So after nearly an hour of negotiating we managed to pay half of what the guy had originally asked for... So after all that, we came away with 2 lessons: lesson 1: we're not renting a particularly heavy bike like that one again (compared to the other ones we'd rented, this one was without doubt the heaviest) and lesson 2: although we've been up tracks like that before, we'll park at the bottom and walk up next time!! Anyway I'm trying not to let it get in the way of my love for driving bikes around where we go, nothing like this has happened the whole time we've been away and by being a bit more careful about the bike we're renting and the condition of the road, hopefully it won't happen again... I guess I had just got complacent... anyway we left Haad Rin behind on Wednesday, and for the past two days we've been staying at Blue Parrot beach resort on Ban Tai beach near Thong Sala. It's a nice little collection of beach huts by the sea with a nice restaurant attached, although the sea looks more like a lake due to there being no tides and there being land straight across - Koh Samui. It's a beautiful calm sea and its nice to just look out while having breakfast and with dinner in the evening. We've met a couple and their friend from Brighton so had a day with them yesterday, we all took a songtheaw (open planned taxi van) to a lake up the coast where they had set out a mini 'total wipeout' course (Google it!) It was so fun but actually really tiring!!! We had such a laugh though and Mj took some funny pics and videos of us all. Luckily I didn't get too injured...just an achy back today! So it's Friday today and we head off to Koh Tao tomorrow, where we'll hopefully catch up with the girls from London and the 3 from Brighton we've met whilst here. We think we'll stay about a week as we plan to spend the first few days scoping out a good dive school (there is over 50 on offer!), and then do an open water course which takes 3/4 days and will enable me to be able to dive all over the world. I'm very excited but quite anxious about the thought of it, however if it's anything like snorkelling (which is probable!) then it'll be a hard time getting me out of the water!! So next time you here from me, I'll hopefully be a qualified diver!! <br style="color:� font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15.8599996566772px;" />Speak soon!xx<br style="color:� font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15.8599996566772px;" /><br style="color:� font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15.8599996566772px;" />

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