A short hop over the sea, for a few great days in Ko Samui

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After a great New Year and a few days of sun we left Koh Phangan by ferry to go to the nearby island of Koh Samui. We arrived after 30 minutes and jumped in a mini van heading towards Chaweng Beach, the main area and beach on the island, and as we had nowhere booked the driver dropped us off at a resort called Long Beach which he thought may have rooms. The resort itself was on the beach and right in the middle of Chaweng which was great, but the rooms weren’t great and they were more than what we had been paying, so we left our bags there and went to look for somewhere else. After going into at least 5 other places along the beach and finding out that rooms were at least double or more than what Long Beach was, it didn’t seem like such a bad deal so we went back there and confirmed we would take the room for two nights.

As it was hot and sunny again we wanted to get on the beach (as the forecast for the next few days wasn’t so good) so we grabbed our beach towels and walked the few metres to the beach, which was lovely with soft sand and clear warm sea. Walking along the beach were lots of beach sellers, selling everything from fruit and ice creams, to clothes and ball games, but they were friendly and didn’t hassle you too much, Along the beach we could hear' music and could see crowds of people so after a while sunbathing we walked along to see what it was, and came across a really cool beach bar which was having a bit of a party, so we had a drink there before agreeing to go back later that evening. We then had a walk round the shops, enjoying the feel of this island but surprised at how big it was, before going back to our room to get ready for that evening.

When we were ready we could see that restaurants all along the beach had set up tables for the evening so we decided to walk down and see if there was somewhere we fancied eating at. We came to a restaurant which was playing nice music, had big cushions and low tables on the beach which looked really nice and it had fresh fish outside, so we decided to stop there. We had a great meal – fresh barracuda fillet for Scott and steak for Vic, along with a few cocktails – before moving on to the beach party a few doors down. The beach was really busy and everyone was dancing on the sand so we joined in and had some more drinks whilst dancing, and before we knew it it was 2am! We walked back along the beach to our hotel after a really fun night out, hoping that the weather would be good again the next day.

We woke up to bright sunshine in the morning so jumped out of bed, had breakfast overlooking the beach and then settled on the sand enjoying the good weather. We bought a bat and ball of the beach sellers (and Vic bought a bikini) which we played for a while until it seemed to cloud over quite quickly. By this point it was around 12.30pm and as it hadn’t cleared for a while we thought we would leave the beach as it looked like it might rain. We went for a walk and Scott found a massage shop so we went in and within 5 minutes the heavens had opened and it was pouring down – lucky we were under cover! Scott had a Thai massage while Vic did some computer stuff, and when he had finished it was still raining, so we ran down the street and ducked into a pizza place for some lunch. After lunch it was still raining heavily so we went back to the hotel to catch up on our blogs before going to the room for a rest.

The rain still hadn’t really stopped by 6pm and we had heard it was due to stay around for the next 2 days, so while we were enjoying Samui we wanted the sun for our last few days so we decided to move on the next morning and booked a boat and bus ticket to go to Krabi, where we would stay for a day or two then move on to Phi Phi which to get to you had to go via Krabi anyway. We got ready for dinner and again ate down on the beach which was again really nice – Scott had fresh crab which he loved – and we let off some traditional paper fire lanterns into the sky which was lovely. We were pretty tired afterwards so we called it a night and went back to the hotel.
The next morning the weather wasn’t too bad but it wasn’t as good as it had been before so we packed our bags, had breakfast and waited for our pick up to go to the pier. The journey to Krabi would consist of a boat to the mainland first and then a bus to Krabi – leaving at 11am we were told we would be there by 5pm – we should have known by now that ‘Thai time’ always lies!

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Comments

[Denise]

hi
I'm going to miss your blog, its been wonderful reading all your news and your pics have been fab. Have a safe journey back love Denise