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Published: January 17th 2007
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Wednesday 10th
Due to the early escape to bed the previous night we woke up early. We managed to drag ourselves the few yards to the sea for a pre-breakfast swim which was nice and refreshing. The weather was rather cloudy but we decided to hang around our guesthouse, Seaflower, for the day. We passed the day playing volleyball with two English guys and generally relaxing on the beach. The afternoon was more of the same. We spent the evening in the restaurant/bar where I nearly died from a Jungle curry which Alex had coaxed me into eating and Alex struggled through the spicy fried basil with chillies - we were very grateful for a couple of Singha beers each to take the edge off.
Thursday 11th
I managed another pre-breakfast swim and then we sorted our flights back to Bangkok out soon after breakfast which meant we could avoid another long boat and rail journey. The sky was blue with very few clouds and we had no hesitations in hitting the beach, passing the rest of the morning sunbathing and reading. After lunch we decided on a walk to a nearby lake but soon returned to the
guest house due to the baking sun. We picked up a coconut from the side of the road on our walk which we managed to get into for the milk and flesh but the main reason was to carve it into a lampshade as we have three of them in our hut which look great. We rounded off the afternoon with more reading on the beach and playing frisbee in the sea - it's a hard life!!
Friday 12th
Needing a change of scenery we hired a moped for the day at a huge cost of 150 baht (about two pounds) and set off around the island. It turned out that we were the only tourists who had any sense of safety though as we went for the helmets where nearly no-one else had - I know how it feels to fall off a bike though and didn't want to try it helmetless. We drove up to the N.W. corner of the island and stopped at a place called Haad Mae Haad. There was a great beach to relax on and it was quiet too so we spent the whole morning there. We could also walk to the
island of Koh Ma along a spit of sand which was just underwater.
After grabbing some lunch we made the short walk to the Wang Sai waterfall which was ok but not spectacular. Back on the moped we drove down the middle of the island, through the capital Thongsala where we bought a tank of petrol for 70 baht, and continued to Haad Rin for a nosey. We did have some fun on the hills approaching the town seeing as I was struggling to change gear (due to big feet) and even managed to stall the bike despite it having an automatic clutch.
We relaxed on Nok beach, better known as Sunrise beach, for a while but soon set off back deciding that neither of us liked Haad Rin due to being too overdeveloped. We got back with no dramas but did see a guy picking himself and his moped up after taking a gravelly corner too quickly.
Saturday 13th
We hung around Seaflower again for the day and I managed to carve out another coconut lampshade as the previous one had cracked - we enjoyed the fresh juice again. Hopefully we'll have no problems getting
it through customs. After a lazy day sunbathing we headed to the end of our beach and to the next small cove where there is a Pirate Bar. We relaxed here with David and Rebecca from our neighbouring hut while sipping on cocktails (Tequilla Sunrise, Margarita and Blue Fizzy) before returning to Seaflower for dinner, more beers and a chat with the ever present bar man, Suthi, whose favourite phrase we soon learnt - sounding much like 'sing-song quart nah' (aka two bottles of Singha please!)
Sunday 14th
This turned out to be just as lazy as Saturday seeing as it was our last chance to top up the suntans before returning to the English winter in a few days time.
Monday 15th
Monday was another travelling day. Thankfully we had a relaxing start with another early morning swim before breakfast and packing our bags before catching a lift to the port for the ferry to Koh Samui. Once on Samui we were quickly shuttled to the airport where we were to wait for about five hours for our flight. We passed the time in the open air airport taking advantage of free internet, free food
Drinks at sunset
Rebecca, David and Simon and football on the tv while hoping none of the planes strayed the short distance from the runway to where we were sitting in the departure lounge. We had a fantastically short flight compared to the train journey and we were soon back in Bangkok, catching a local bus back to the city centre and the Kao San Road area where we found a hotel for the next three nights.
Tuesday 16th
We started the day by wandering the local streets and found ourselves in a tailors getting measured up for some new clothes for when we hit London. Meandered next to the Royal Palace where we joined the crowds looking around the highly decorative palace buildings, statues and seeing the Emerald Buddah. We caught a tuk-tuk back to the Kao San Road where we needed a rest from the heat. Back on the streets feeling refreshed we set about doing some shopping, looking for souvenirs and picking up a couple of bootleg DVDs and CDs. A couple of beers were needed to keep us going as well as Pad Thai picked up from street vendors and a banana and chocolate pancake for me. We also had to
stop in at the tailors for a fitting of our in progress clothing. After a long day trawling the streets we retired for the night.
Wednesday 17th
The first stop of the day was Wat Po, the oldest temple in Bangkok and home of a huge (over 45m long) reclining Buddah. We enjoyed walking around the grounds and wondering why they could need so many statues of the Buddah in one place as there seemed to be hundreds. On leaving the Wat we made our way to the river to catch a river taxi for some waterborne sight seeing. We alighted at the River City shopping complex where we enjoyed the air-conditioning while perusing the many tailors, jewellery and antique shops. The prices would have been a bit out of our budget though as the complex joined onto the Bangkok Orchid Sheriton hotel and seemed to be aimed at slightly more wealthy travellers and businessmen. Wilting in the heat we caught a return taxi back up the river to call in at our tailors again for a final fitting and to grab some food and a well needed drink.
The rest of the day was just spent
looking at stalls and having a nice Indian curry for tea as well as a beer or two.
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Mum F
non-member comment
Winter blues!
Lovely to see the weather out there. Hope you have your winter wollies ready for your return. The gales are blowing , the wind is howling and the temperatures are going to drop at the weekend-at the moment they're about 7C. Are you sure you want to return??? Looking forward to seeing you soon. Lots of love. Mum F.