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Published: February 10th 2012
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Feb 9
th “The pretty island of Ko Ngai has a squeaky white sand beach that stretches along the Eastern coast and virtually the whole island is ringed by coral and sparkling clear water.”
That was the description of this island in our Lonely Planet 2004 guide. Sounded idyllic so we decided to make it our next destination.
We left the island of Ko Jum early morning and after several modes of transport over land and on the sea and an overnight stop at Pak Meng we have arrived on the island of Ko Ngai. Pak Meng, the little town from where we got the ferry had a beautiful view from the coastline of several tall lime karsts rising up from out of the sea. We were hoping the island would have similar views.
We were not disappointed; as the ferry got close to the island the lime Karsts surrounded us. Once on the beach we sat awe struck just taking in the view, it was simply gorgeous!
The guidebook had been right, the sand was beautifully
soft and white and a short swim out in the clear water took us to some nice coral with a good variety of fish. Sadly as we explored further away, lots of the coral was dead and there was a lot of boat activity, which probably explains it. Since our guidebook was written, five or six expensive resorts have appeared but fortunately they were set back tastefully in the trees and didn’t put a blot on the landscape. We were lucky enough to get a room in the only budget resort and settled down for a few days to just drink in the views and snorkel the reef.
We took a walk over to the other side of the island, the path was quite overgrown and jungle like but opened out into a huge coconut palm plantation fringing the shore line. It was completely unspoilt and pretty.
We got onto the beach early on our last day with the intention of an early snorkel before the boats start arriving. Unfortunately the surface was covered with little brown things, on closer investigation we realised they were tiny jellyfish. Hundreds of them,
about the size of shirt buttons, within minutes we could feel little pricking sensations so the snorkel to the reef was quickly aborted. By mid morning they had dispersed a bit so we tried again, there were still a few but we negotiated our way round them and once on the reef there appeared to be none. On the way back however we were inundated by them again, hence the title ‘ Jellyfish Soup’ it just felt like we were swimming through soup and the tendrils seemed a good bit longer than earlier in the day. How fast do these thing grow!? Luckily there was no lasting sting once out of the water.
Our Thai visa is shortly coming to an end so we will have to start thinking about either getting out or getting a new one. On Friday we will leave for the mainland and figure out the best way to do it.
Update: We are now in Satun on the mainland, arrived too late to get a new visa so will go tomorrow. Found that the hotel has wi fi so taking advantage.
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Sharon
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Ko Ngai
We went to Ko Ngai, too. However, I had forgotten about it completely until I saw this blog, but I still can't remember the island.