Category Archives: Travel

The highs and lows of Langkawi

Another early start as the bus was collecting us from Ben’s House at 7am for our trip to Langkawi.

In the usual Thai fashion, it took 3 buses, 1 ferry and a taxi to get us to our destination. The buses got gradually worse as we edged closer to Malaysia. But the journey wasn’t all bad. While on the second bus we got talking to a Welsh couple from Newport called Kyle and Kylie, who were on their way to Koh Lipe. Another strange coincidence that Kyle lives about 5 minutes from Heidi’s family home. A good couple of hours went by with us swapping travel stories, our future plans and what we were missing about Home.

It was great to get another stamp in the passport and I had high expectations of Langkawi due to friends recommendations and I had also worked previously on travel brochures that had featured Langkawi as a main destination. My preconception of Langkawi was paradise. That concept was crushed within the first 24 hours of being on the island.

As the taxi dropped us off at Pantai Cenang, the rain came down. Griff and I were already exhausted from the 10 hour journey and now we had to drag our rucksacks along Pantai Cenang’s beach front looking for accommodation in the rain. The hunt for a place to sleep became frustrating and I started to lose my patience. Everywhere we found was either out of our budget or rotten. After an hour we finally stumbled across a very sweet lady who happened to know someone who rented out a studio apartment. She made a few phone calls and we were told to wait in a nearby restaurant. We hung around in Haroo Restaurant, eating up their Wifi until the lady who owned the studio arrived. We negotiated a good deal for the studio for 5 nights, which was a real bargain seems we had access to a fridge, kitchen, bathroom and TV with DVD player. My grumpy mood had started to subside.

Heidi and I took full advantage of not having to get up for breakfast and caught up on the rest we needed. The day was spent at the beach waiting for the Rugby World Cup Final to kick-off. The weather was scorching but we were slightly disappointed that we couldn’t enter the sea to cool off due to the mass amount of Jelly Fish floating in the water. I’ve been previously stung by the Water Wobblers and I don’t plan on it happening again.

The search to find a bar playing the game also became frustrating but you can always count on the Irish! Debbie’s Irish bar had the game playing only on 1 TV screen, which made it an interesting watch as the pub was packed. Whilst in Debbie’s the mosquitos took a fancy to me and I got bit multiple times on my arms and legs. That night my skin was on fire and the bites blistered. One of the blistered bites popped when I accidentally caught it on my bag. It wasn’t a pretty sight. A sleepless night followed as my skin crawled.

Day 3 brought more promise. Heidi and I hired a taxi driver for 4 hours to take us to the Bird Sanctuary and the Kompleks Budya Kraf. Our driver was as mad as the Hatter. He told us jokes and bizarre stories in broken English. One of the stories was about a crazy exchange between himself and a Eastern European tourist who refused to pay for the cab, so he dropped the tourist off at the police station and attempted to burn his passport. Though our driver was eccentric, he was very helpful and took me to a local pharmacy to get a cream for my mosquito bites.

The next day was the highlight of our stay in Langkawi. Griff and I headed to the Langkawi Cable Car, which carried us to the summit of Gunung Machincang at an incline of 42 degrees. The view of the island at over 2,300ft was breathtaking and in the distance you could see the coast of Thailand. The cable car alights at 2 stops; the Middle and Top stations. At the Top station you also have a chance to walk across the Hanging Bridge, which curves from one peak to the other. I’d advise anyone who journeys up Gunung Machincang to take the car all the way to the top. The views are amazing and walking across the Hanging Bridge is an exciting experience.

Once we had returned to ground level, Heidi and I stopped off at the Rabbit Enclosure, where Griff was attacked by multiple thumpers. After Heidi cleaned up her scratches, we took a stroll along Pantai Kok. While we quietly walked along the beach, out of nowhere swooped a Hornbill. These birds are massive once in flight and their wings sound like a propeller starting. The bird perched in the tree, as another Hornbill soared above us and joined the branch. We took quite a few pictures and I was lucky enough to snap a couple of the Hornbill in flight. I’ll post the images once we return to the UK.

We continued our walk towards the lighthouse, which is now inhabited by Monkeys. From there we strolled around the Marina and took some time out to grab refreshments and to soak up the view.

Every evening from roughly around 7pm there was a heavy downpour and usually a thunder storm, which made going out quite difficult. Having a TV with a DVD player in our studio became very handy and we spent most evenings catching up on the latest DVD releases that we hadn’t seen. One night we declared; “Movie Night”, so we stopped off at a nearby French Patisserie and loaded up on over-indulgent treats to enjoy while we watched back to back films.

Langkawi had its highs and lows but while travelling I’ve learnt that all of the experience is valuable, especially the lows, as they test you on both your character and mental strength. As we journeyed over to Penang on the ferry, I reflected on our time in Langkawi and what it had taught me about myself. In the future I need to have less preconceptions of places, people and situations. Also, I must stop comparing and take things on their own merit. Even though the beginning of our Langkawi journey was difficult, the island itself is beautiful and to be honest, Langkawi’s tourism positions itself as more of a luxury holiday destination for exotic breaks, rather than a place for longer term travellers and backpackers. This is reflected by the higher prices of accommodation and restaurants. To conclude, Langkawi is a visual paradise but not this Valley Boy’s Shangri La.

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Krabi: The final days in Thailand

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“The name’s Bond… James Bond!”

Heidi and I maxed out our final days in Thailand. We took tours to Phangnga Bay (James Bond Island) and Koh Phi Phi, met some new friends, witnessed an immense fork lightning storm and by chance discovered Phra Nang. I’m not sure my writing skills are worthy enough to describe the incredible time we had but I’m up for the challenge and where I struggle to paint a detailed picture, I’m hopeful the photos will do Thailand better justice.

Phangnga Bay

Being a ‘Bond’ fan, I couldn’t contain my excitement when we booked onto our tour of Phangnga Bay, also known as the ‘James Bond Island’ due to the location being used for the filming of ‘The man with the golden gun’. The trip was an early start but I was raring to go.

As the mini van did the usual rounds of pick ups, to our surprise we were greeted by a familiar, friendly face. Danielle, who was the lady sat next to Heidi on our rough, overnight bus trip to Chumphon had booked onto the same tour. We then spent the next 2 hours catching up on each other’s journeys and crazy stories. Every now and then we’d be interrupted by our tour guide Ruddy who would fill us in on the day’s plans, which he insisted on repeating twice for good measure.

The tour started with a Longtail boat, that went past the Floating Village and through the Mangroves, where we weaved through a low cave. At this point the tour split, as half went off to Kayak through the Mangroves and the unlucky other half – which contained Griff and I – had to watch and enjoy the views from a larger docked boat. When booking the tour we were never offered the option of Kayaking and if we had, we definitely would have taken the opportunity.

The views of the limestone cliff formations around Phangnga Bay are incredible and I imagine they have inspired many fantasy writers and artists over the years. The highlight of the tour, was the famous eroded limestone cliff from the Bond movie; ‘The man with the golden gun’. The island that overlooks the impressive, rock formation is a huge tourist trap and you have to hustle for a great photo opportunity. I wasn’t going to miss out, so I stormed forward, with the sea up to my waist, soaking my shorts, t-shirt and bag. A bit fanatic? Probably! But I feel content in the images I captured. Luckily the day was hot and humid, so my clothes dried quickly.

The Longtail boat took us back to the Floating Village for a buffet lunch, which was inclusive in the tour. Danielle, Heidi and myself all assumed that the lady offering Coca Cola and Sprite was part of the buffet. We were wrong. Whoever said; “the best things in life are free”, is a liar because my can of Sprite cost me about £2!

After lunch the Longtail returned us back to our mini van, which proceeded to the next stop on the tour. Here we visited the Monkey Temple. The temple is cave and as the name suggests, monkeys occupy the inside and literally hang around the entrance. Stupidly, I left my glasses in the mini van and the dark, slippery climb within the cave became quite dangerous and I was glad when we exited to go feed some monkeys.

Feeding monkeys never gets tiring, as these curious little fur balls are quite unpredictable and provide some brilliant photo snaps. One of the guys on our tour decided to place a banana on Danielle’s head, which I think for most watching was a nervy 30 seconds before a cheeky swinger snatched it off her head.

The final stop on the tour was to a Waterfall where we spent about 45 minutes swimming and launching over selves off rock-faces about 8 metres high. We had a great time on the tour and we arrived back to Ben’s House just in time to watch an impressive folk lightning storm from our balcony. I have never witnessed a lightning strike that was so close. One of the lightning folks must of fell about 100 metres away. Exciting show but scary stuff!

Koh Phi Phi

Our tours were coming thick and fast. We had 2 more booked on back to back days. Koh Phi Phi Islands tour was next, followed by a speed boat tour to Hong Island.

The Koh Phi Phi tour was also by speed boat. The boat collected us at the Nopparat Thara dock and sped off towards the Bamboo Island. There we had a good hour to enjoy the sunshine and trialled Heidi with snorkelling in shallow water where there were little amounts of fish. (For reference to Heidi and her phobia of fish, please check out the article; Waterfalls, Tiger Temple and the Floating Market)

From there the speed boat whisked us off to Monkey Bay for some real snorkelling action. With Heidi’s new found confidence she bravely entered the water. After a few erratic moments, Griff settled down to enjoy the experience of having sea life swimming around her. I wish my knowledge of fish was better so I could name the fantastic things we had seen but I can confirm that snorkelling has only fed my hunger to try scuba-diving.

The next stop on the tour was to the famous Maya Bay on Phi Phi Ley. Maya Bay was the filming location for Danny Boyle’s directed movie ‘The Beach’, which is based on the book with the same name by Alex Garland.

Just like the James Bond Island, Maya Bay is infected with tourists. Probably a hypocritical statement but it’s true. Though the bay itself has lost none of its beauty and for any keen photographers, there’s plenty of great shooting points, especially if you’re not shy in getting wet.

After Maya Bay the tour ventured to Phi Phi Don for a break and some lunch. There we were given another hour to eat, shop and browse the largest island in Koh Phi Phi. Griff and I actually got lost while browsing and only by chance found our speed boat just in time to head to our last snorkelling point. On the way, our tour guide kept pointing to the sky and shouting “Seagull! Seagull!”. I thought he’d gone slightly mad as who would be interested in seeing a Seagull? It was only until later when talking to a fellow traveller, that I’d realised he was saying “Sea Eagle”.

The final snorkelling point was the last stop on the tour. Before I had a chance to put on my mask, Griff was in the water. Kudos to her for hitting her fear head on. The weather started to chuck down but it didn’t matter too much as we were in the water.

We had a great day out visiting Koh Phi Phi and the bad weather didn’t dampen our spirits. While on the tour we had met a lovely couple from Indiana called Ben and his wife Nikki who were on holiday with their 3 other friends, Adam, Ramie and Keri from the States. Ben was American but Nikki was from Cardiff, which they must had noticed my Welsh towel while we were on the boat. We roughly arranged to maybe meet everyone for drinks in the evening in the ‘Centre Point’, which is a bar area on the Ao Nang beach front.

Later that evening we did meet up with the gang. Everyone was great company and very welcoming into their group. This was refreshing and a huge relief for both Griff and I, as even though we love being in each others company, there’s a limit to conversation and personal space when you are spending 24 hours a day with each other. Up until the Krabi tours, we had struggled to meet people and we had put it down to that we were a couple. But from talking to Danielle and the American gang, everyone was experiencing a similar issue with making friends. We got the impression that people only seemed to mix in the dorm rooms of hostels or on booze cruises. Once they are in their “Special” groups it becomes hard for anyone else to join their circle. This wasn’t what I was expecting while we travelled. Luckily for us we’d found a group who were up for a laugh and conversation. The night went by fast and ended around 1am. A few shots were consumed, which with some great negotiation skills by Keri who managed to get 3 free shots for everyone at a Heavy Metal bar. Though I wouldn’t recommend Thai Heavy Metal to anyone, it’s definitely no Iron Maiden.

Ben and Nikki told us the story of how they met and how many plane journeys back and forth Wales and the States kept a long distance relationship strong. The story was good to hear seems Heidi and myself will be apart for a short while in 2012 but nowhere close to the distance that they where travelling. We also found out that Nikki had attended the same university as Griff and I, and at the same period of time that we were there. For some lectures, Nikki would have been in the next room to us and we had shared the same lecturers. How bizarre that 7 years later we all would meet in Krabi. In all, we had a brilliant night out and since then we have kept in touch with Ben and Nikki, and will either see them in Wales over the forthcoming festive holidays or hopefully State side in the near future.

Phra Nang

Heidi and I were both tired and I was slightly hungover from our late night drinks. We slowly ate breakfast as we waited for the tour to Hong Island to collect us from Ben’s House at 8:30am. 8:45am approached and I started to get slightly worried, the lady at reception kindly called the tour operator where she got no answer. We had booked the tour about a 5 minute walk from the hotel, so I ran down to find out what was going on while Heidi waited just incase the mini van arrived. The office was closed and didn’t open until 9:30am. Next door to the tour office was a guest house, which was some how connected to the tour operator. I spoke to the lady there who then called the tour guide directly, which they told her that he was on his way to collect us. I ran back to tell Heidi the good news. 9am rolled on and still no sign of the mini van. Again, I ran back to the guest house to find out where he was, which I got a confused answer of he’s on his way. The time was now 9:15am, we were both beginning to lose hope. Our receptionist came out to ask if we wanted her to call the tour operator again. We gladly accepted her offer and waited as she grilled the person on the other end of the phone in Thai. I’m not sure exactly what was said but we were told to head to the tour operator where we would get a full refund as the tour had decided not to go due to a lack of numbers. Disappointed and I was still a bit hungover we trudged down to the tour office to get our money back in full with a lot of apologies. While in the office we were greeted by the familiar face of our tour guide from Koh Phi Phi. He recommended that we charter a Longtail boat to Phra Nang and have an explore of Railae Bay. With nothing else planned and we were already packed for a day of adventure, we took his advice.

To charter the Longtail was only going to cost us 1/5 of what the tour to Hong Island had cost. On the journey over to Railae Bay we briefly met a friendly and very helpful couple called Mike and Shelly who were off to climb some difficult looking limestone cliffs on Phra Nang. They had been regulars to Phra Nang and explained to us all of the great locations to visit. We swapped stories and emails before we parted ways on Railae Bay. On another note, for anyone who’s interested in photography or looking for a photographer then take a look at Mike’s fantastic work at www.sakasphoto.com

Railae Bay was unbelievable and the weather was gorgeous, which also helped when taking in the moment. Mike and Shelly had recommended that we head to Phra Nang beach, as that was their favourite spot. So we followed the signs towards the beach. Along our way we discovered a muddy, clay hill climb that would take us up to Phra Nang’s view point and to the lagoon. The climb was slippery and steep with ropes to help you clamber up the jagged rocks. This was not the sort of climb you should do without the correct footwear but before I could even consider, Heidi had strapped on her rucksack and was heading up in flip-flops, so I followed suit.

The climb was tough and even though I would consider myself to be fitter than the average person, I was struggling and sweating heavily. The flip-flops were causing all sorts of problems and making things difficult. Along the way we passed other climbers on their descent who warned us that the climb down to the lagoon was steeper and more treacherous.

Reaching the view point was worth the pain and struggle. Our hands and legs were orange from the clay. But it didn’t matter as we had a breath taking view of Phra Nang.

Wisely, I recommended that we heed the other climbers warnings about the descent to the lagoon and not attempt to venture down in such inappropriate foot wear. I think Heidi was slightly disappointed but I was proved to be right as we slowly ventured back down the hill. About half way down the straps on my flip-flops broke. The rocks were too sharp to go barefoot, so I had quickly fix the straps to a point that they were wearable. This proved extremely difficult as every 4th or 5th step a strap would pop back out. Finally after a lot of commotion, we made it to the bottom. The climb down was horrendous and relief washed over me as I stood there covered in orange clay and dripping with sweat.

Though the sweet is never as sweet without the sour and around the corner was the jewel in Phra Nang’s crown. We had made it to the beautiful Phra Nang beach. Within seconds I’d parked my towel and was in the clear blue water changing it to a murky orange, trying to look less like a Valley Girl on a night out in Cardiff who’s been too slap happy with fake tan.

We took our time catching some sun, relaxing in the sea and watching the very skilled Cliffhangers. If you’re into serious rock climbing then Phra Nang is the place for you.

Later in the afternoon we took a stroll to the Bat Caves. Again, this is a climb you shouldn’t do without the proper footwear but luckily for me, my flip-flops held up. The cave has great views over Phra Nang beach and you’ll see the odd bat flying above your head. There’s also a tunnel that leads through the cave to the other side of the limestone, which overlooks Railae Bay but don’t attempt to venture in without a torch as it’s pitch black for a decent part of the trek.

Phra Nang was the most adventurous day we had had so far on our travels of Thailand. What had started off as a disappointing morning turned into an excellent day out and we now had a lot more spare cash from the refund.

That evening we felt content that we were leaving Thailand with a bang and were excited of the prospects of our trip through Malaysia.

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Krabi: Thailand Transport and Ao Nang

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The journey from Koh Samui to Krabi Town was long and complicated. In usual Thai style, it had taken 3 buses and 1 ferry to bring us 5 kilometres short of our planned destination, where we then had to jump into a Tuk Tuk for the final leg of the journey. Griff and I had been picked up from Sunset Resort at 8am and didn’t arrive into Krabi Town until around 8pm. We were exhausted and had used the last of our energy arguing with the bus driver who had brought us short of our proposed destination, who also tried to drive off with Heidi still on the bus. A bit of luck was on our side though, as we discovered a great hotel that was value for money called Mansion Hotel.

Back to buses in Thailand. For anyone wanting to travel through this amazing country on a budget, then buses are by far the cheapest option. But with the budget prices, comes a no frills service that is bizarrely run. You can book your tickets through hotels, tour operators and directly at bus stations (if you can ever find them). They will hand you a receipt as confirmation that will have stamped in bold, capital, red letters “NO REFUNDS”. The usual protocol if you are being picked up at a hotel is that a mini van will arrive and you will show them your receipt. Depending on the service, they will either take your receipt and replace it with a coloured sticker or you hang on to it until you arrive at the bus station where then your receipt is taken and you’ll receive your brightly coloured new friend. Don’t Panic! This is the norm, everyone with the exception of the locals will have a sticker and don’t worry as no one else will have a clue what is going on either. But some how that colourful little friend will allow you to be ushered from bus to ferries and back onto buses. On most journeys you’ll more than likely find yourself to be moved onto more than one bus, this is very common. Griff and I are now veterans at Asian buses and being dropped off at a little make shift cafe, to then be told another bus will be coming shortly, has happened often. Your first experience may have a slight horror film feel to it but I assure you the other bus will turn up. The only real issue we’ve ever come across is being left roughly 5 kilometres short of the distance and this has always been the case when the final bus is late because they’ve been picking up passengers illegally from the side of the road. It happened a year ago to us in Pingyao, China and it happened again on the way to Krabi Town. Luckily, unlike the Pingyao situation there were Tuk Tuks at hand and we weren’t stranded on the motorway. The ‘Pingyao’ story is definitely for another time.

Generally, all road transport in Thailand is an absolute mess. Experiencing it for yourself, you’ll understand how so many people get killed yearly in Thailand. I’m not sure of the UK law on non-Europeans driving in our country but if this is not already the case, I personally implore the British Government to insist on testing anyone who owns a Thai driving license wanting to drive in the UK. I have witnessed a family of four sharing a motorised scooter with the baby at the front with no one wearing a helmet, double-decker buses overtaking on blind corners while on mountainous roads, taxi drivers turning the hard shoulder into a 4th lane on expressways and farm animals strapped to the roof of trucks going up busy streets. That’s not even to mention the Bangkok traffic. I’ve actually wondered if licenses exist or if they are given out in cereal packets? From travelling around Europe, the Middle East and China, I thought I’d seen it all when it had come to transport but as my favourite saying of this trip goes; “I was wrong!”.

Ao Nang

Our time in Krabi Town was brief and we had only used it as a resting spot after another mind-boggling, lengthy journey. But Heidi and I were on-the-go early, searching for our new temporary home. We hunted up and down Ao Nang beach front hoping to find the perfect place for the right price. Again, the ‘Travel Gods’ answered in the form of the hotel Ben’s House. Free Wifi, a decent selection of free breakfast, a super deluxe room with on-suite and a balcony, all for £7 each a night.

We spent a total of 8 nights in Ao Nang, using the area as base camp as we took part on a couple of tours and explored multiple islands. Our experiences over these 8 days were epic and I can’t do them justice in just this journal entry. I will follow this post with another, solely on our last days in Krabi and the tours.

Ao Nang in itself is a lovely spot. The area is split into 2 beach fronts; Ao Nang beach and Nopparat Thara beach. In the middle of these beaches there is a road that breaks of the main street and heads inland. Less than a 5 minute walk up this road will lead you to Ben’s House.

Both beaches are decent but we visited in Monsoon season, so a lot of driftwood and other rubbish had been washed up onto the shore but there’s still plenty of places to lay your towel. Ao Nang is the busier of the 2 fronts but that is still a very small number. Nopparat Thara beach was our preferred spot as at the far end of this coast line – where the Marina sits – you’ll discover a small mountainous rock formation in the sea, which has an accompanied beach. This beach is easily reachable by walking as the sea is very shallow. Griff and I spent a couple of days out on this secluded area, catching some sun and taking a relaxing swim in clear water. My only advice if you decide to venture off Nopparat Thara beach is to take a big bottle of water. Unlike being on the mainland, there’s no quick access to a shop or locals wandering the beach with ice-buckets filled with water bottles and the little island can become a sun trap.

One of my other favourite highlights about Ao Nang was the food. I LOVE food! For me, travelling and food are my main passions outside of art and design. I’ve noticed I hadn’t gone into too much detail about food in my previous travel entries and to be honest other than Monsoon Restaurant in the Sukhumvit, the street side restaurant in Bangkok and the Sunday Roast in Koh Samui, nothing had really blown me away. Until we found Jeanette’s Restaurant along the Ao Nang beach front. We visited ‘Jeanette’s’ on multiple occasions and each time the food was superb. Spicy Papaya Salad! Thai Beef in sweet chilli, lime and basil! Honey and Seasemme Seed Chicken Wings! And my personal recommendation; Massaman Curry! I’m in food heaven just thinking about it.

On that note, I’m now too hungry to write anymore, so I will continue the Krabi journey in the next entry.

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Koh Samui Archipelago

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Koh Tao.

As the ferry docked into the port on Koh Tao, we were greeted by a mass of taxi drivers, diving instructors and guest house owners. We waded through the crowd and spotted the diving rep that we had been chatting to on the ferry. He had offered to show us around a few accommodations, as long as we had a chat about the possibility of booking a diving tour. It sounded like a fair deal, so we jumped into the back of his truck with some other island hoppers and headed about 10 minutes drive north away from the port. After the diving chat and a few viewings of accommodation, we found a room opposite the ‘Davy Jones Locker – Diving School’. Time to relax and catch some sun!

Koh Tao was beautiful and we had some fantastic weather. Griff’s bad luck was back to haunt her on the first day. We had spent the day exploring the area we were in, relaxing on the beach and taking a dip in the sea. Even though Heidi was wearing SPF50, she still managed to burn. The sunburn was a bit irregular and looked as if it was caused by the sea removing the cream, as Heidi had burns in the shape of water marks. One in particular went across the left side of her face and over her eye making her look like ‘Ziggy Stardust’. So naturally, I nicknamed her ‘David Bowie’ for the duration of our stay on Koh Tao. Cruel? Yes! Funny? Very!

The travel books state that “Koh Tao is a Diver’s island and anyone looking for relaxed, beach action should look elsewhere, as most accommodation only want people who are booking onto diving courses”. I couldn’t disagree more. Yes, the guest houses and beach huts are connected with the diving courses and tours but never at anytime where we made to feel unwelcome or pressured to take a diving course. Koh Tao was one of the most relaxed places I have ever visited and while there, ‘Bowie’ and I lost track of time and days.

Highlights of Koh Tao were exploring the secluded Shark Bay with its perfect beach and rows of palm trees dotted across the cost. Also for the evenings we would recommend the Lotus Bar, which sits directly on the beach. Lotus Bar has a beach life ambience, rugs line the sand for you to sit on with short tables and Singha beer bottles as candle holders. No need to get up as there’s table service, so you can lay back, relax and watch the impressive show of fire twirlers.

For anyone travelling Thailand for any lengthy period of time, Koh Tao is a ‘Must See’.

Koh Phangan.

Koh Tao was a brilliant start to our island hopping adventure. But part of me was feeling slightly reserved as we travelled across to Koh Phangan on the ferry. From word of mouth and Alex Garland’s best selling novel ‘The Beach’, I knew Koh Phangan had a reputation for being the party island with its infamous ‘Full Moon’ parties. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve never been shy of alcohol fuelled events that have gone long into the night but those university days are long behind me and I’d much prefer a good, old fashioned pub with great company or a decent restaurant where I can get home at a reasonable hour and keep the hangover down to a minimum. Yes! I’m getting old and my hangovers now last at least 2 days.

I was hoping the hearsay was inaccurate and wanted to give the island a chance. We’d done some research into Koh Phangan and we were aiming for the quieter end of the island. The truck taxiing us to our destination pulled into Haad Rin Nok and the driver yelled; “FULL MOON PARTY!”. I believe Heidi’s description of my face was; “pure horror”. We had misread the information we had on the island. Instead of being away from the craziness, we had stuck ourselves right in the middle of it.

There wasn’t much accommodation left on Haad Rin Nok and what was available was too expensive for our budget. Griff and I finally found a beach hut that was £9 a night. The hut was rough! The guy showing us around didn’t help much either as he was high and could barely stand let alone string a sentence together. It was getting late, we were both exhausted and overwhelmed by the experience, so we took the room and promised to either find a better place in the morning or jump onto the next ferry to Koh Samui.

After a lot of duct tape and fiddling we had put up the mosquito net for the first time. We decided to take a wander and get better acquainted with the area and hope to find a solution to our current problem. Also I was creeped out by something that was crawling within the walls of the hut and didn’t want to find out what it was.

Griff and I strolled over to the next beach on Haad Rin. This area was less intense but I still had a bad vibe about the whole situation. We inquired into a few accommodations but nothing was either in budget or was of any quality worth staying. Then a shining light appeared in the form of the Outback Bar! So, I pitched my idea to Heidi that we would get up early, have breakfast, watch the Wales vs Ireland rugby game in the Outback Bar and then jump straight onto the first ferry off the island to the promised land of Koh Samui. She was sold!

We spent the evening in the Outback Bar, tucking into some good grub and maxing out their wifi. Griff and I tried to spend as much time as we could in the bar so we didn’t have to go back to the wall moving hut. As funds ran low, finally we had to go back.

The Full Moon party was 4 days away but that didn’t stop the build-up preparations. The music blasted throughout the night and into the early hours and finally stopped around 6am. I had watched every hour go by from midnight but instead of tiredness, I felt relief and fell asleep for a few hours.

Griff and I hadn’t unpacked, so we checked out as soon as we were awake and headed for breakfast at the Outback Bar, watched Wales beat Ireland and jumped on this first possible ferry we could.

While on-board, we plotted ourselves on the top deck and swung our feet overboard. I felt like a new man as we baked in the sun with Koh Samui in the distance.

I wouldn’t want to put anyone off from visiting Koh Phangan, as I believe everyone’s journey is different. I’m sure most people would love the party atmosphere and the wild nights. The island itself is gorgeous and from what I’ve been told the North is more tranquil. But for this ‘Old Boy’, it wasn’t my scene and I can say without any doubt I will never return.

Koh Samui.

Hello Koh Samui! I was in a far better mood than I had been in the last 24 hours. Within minutes of being in Koh Samui we’d found a cracking little place to stay and it had put my faith right back into ‘Beach Huts’. The staff at ‘Sunset Resort’ were very friendly, the quality of the hut was 100% better than the hole in Koh Phangan and it was cheaper. Bonus!

Right across from the Sunset Resort was a sweet little pub called ‘The Lord Nelson’, run by an Australian man and his Thai wife. There was wifi, free pool table, great food and they did a Sunday roast. What more could we ask for? Griff and I became regulars in the pub over the next 6 days.

Koh Samui was all about taking our time to relax on the beach, enjoy the sun and have the break we’d been craving for. That’s exactly what we got and a little bit more. Griff and I also found time to tour the island, visiting Big Buddha, a Mummified Monk, a Monkey show, more waterfalls and some rocks shaped like genitalia. I kid you not, the genitalia shaped rocks are a massive attraction in Koh Samui and are named the Grandfather and Grandmother rocks. There’s a legend behind these rocks but I’ll allow your own curiosity to Google the story.

Heidi and I also took full advantage of the one day we had bad weather. Griff spent the day catching up with her blog (Lolita & Me) and I used the day to be very productive working on concepts for a client’s branding project. That evening we also watched the speed boats leave Koh Samui heading towards Koh Phangan for the ‘Full Moon’ party. It was quite a spectacle to see the boats lined up along the coast and the fireworks going off late into the night. But I enjoyed it from the comfort of our beach hut across the sea.

Koh Samui was another picturesque island and we highly recommend the Bophut Beach. We stayed on the beach front of Bangrak, which is the next one along the coast from Bophut. In Bophut you will also find the ‘Fisherman’s Village’, which has various restaurants all serving quality food at reasonable prices, especially the lunch time specials.

The Koh Samui archipelago brought us highs and lows. Koh Phangan had been my biggest challenge so far but Koh Tao and Koh Samui had more than made up for that one bad day.

This reminds me of one of my favourite quotes; “The sweet is never as sweet without the sour, and baby… I’ve tasted the sour”.

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