The night before leaving we had dinner with Dennis at the Mangrove. It was an interesting night as Dennis was waylaid by Mike at lunchtime and was therefore very drunk. We were therefore compelled to join him....
Hurriedly packing we made it to the boat with about 5 min to spare - luckily the ferry port was the one closest to us, a whole 5 min away.
Unfortunately my sprained ankle stopped me doing any diving. Choco also wanted to do some diving but as he looked like a plague victim- he had a rash…. bright red spots…. which were huge…. covered his whole body… but eventually joined up and just looked like he was sunburnt. So instead of diving we spent our time eating very bad food, reading and sleeping with the occasional snorkling session thrown in for good measure. We quickly tired of this and went back to Ko Samui to see a doctor about Chocos spots. As I suspected they were just an allergic reaction but a very sever one. More pills - lots of antihistamines, some to stop the itching, along with sleeping pills made life more bearable for him.
We had had enough of Ko Tao but not the beach life.
View from our bungalow in Ko Tao
Choco read about a place, Ao Khanom, which was compared to Ko Samui without all the tourists. It was on the mainland not far from Samui so we headed over. Ao Khanom was the main town but we were after some relaxation so we headed to beaches. First night we spent on Ban Nai Phlao. Most of the accommodation available there was very old and fairly awful. We found one lovely resort which wasn’t hideously expensive – after looking at the 4 other options available and moved in for the night. They had a bus load of German tourists arriving the following day who were staying for three weeks, therefore we couldn't (and didn’t want to) stay longer.
The following day we headed south in search of alternative accommodation. The ride was gorgeous, rubber plantations giving way to coconut groves. Small windy roads dotted with banana trees…. beautiful. We rode past a resort which appeared to have a handful of wooden bungalows and decided to take a look. We wandered around hoping to find someone to ask about the accommodation available. There were a few Thais working but no one was interested in us. So we showed ourselves to a room. They were wonderful, exactly what I had been looking for. Made nearly entirely out of wood, except some parts of the bathrooms, they were simple but clean and new and perfect. We still couldn’t find anyone to talk to. Choco suggested just moving in and waiting for someone to find us. I decided to call the number on the resort’s pickup. We were told to move in. We wandered around the resort aquainting ourselves with our new home. We walked along the beach, which was lovely and deserted. There appeared to be some other buildings at the other end of the beach, more bungalows and a restaurant, but they weren’t being used. Interestingly, the bungalows were empty of any furniture and some of the other buildings were falling down, but they didn’t appear to have ever been used. The bungalows were in the middle of a coconut plantation and we wondered if this lethal crop had anything to do with the lack of use. We hoped this wasn’t the case when we realised our bungalow was also surrounded by coconut trees. The resort was still under construction, so unfortunately the kitchen wasn’t serving food, but we were told they would cook for us if we told them what we wanted. We decided to head into Ban Nai Phlao or Ao Khanom for most of our meals. We did bring food back some food one day and it was cooked up for us – I was hoping to cook it myself but alas….. Another night we had dinner at a place in Ban Nai Phlao. The owners were really friendly, they had seen us riding around – there were so few tourist and Choco is so tall that we were somewhat memorable. They gave us a map of the area, suggested which sites we should visit and even offered to loan us a torch for the cave. The following day we decided to see all three at once. We headed out to the cave first, getting there looked fairly simple on the map. We found the right road and thought we would soon arrive. All went well until we reached a T-intersection, Choco asked which way to go, the map said straight ahead, not possible…. We turned onto the main road and found a sign to the Cave but after an hour of riding around we decided to give up. We turned around and headed back to a mountain which we were told had a great view point. We rode all the way to the top only to find a telecommunications tower. The view point was actually very close to the base of the mountain…. but there was nothing to indicate this…. on the map or at the view point. We decided not to look for the waterfall which was next on our list… but went back to ThongYee and spent the afternoon on the beach. Two days later we went to a nearby waterfall – not on marked on the map. We trekked though the jungle for a while before heading back. While the waterfall wasn’t all that impressive, the scenery was beautiful. All in all our Ao Khanom/ThongYee experience was very relaxing and enjoyable – aside from an all-night-fight by our neighbours on the last night. I really hope to get back there soon.
We headed back to Samui and had a very trashy weekend. The first night started with a Korean BBQ, progressed to cards and vodka at our place then on to Green Mango and ended with (the highlight of the weekend) Choco waking up on a bench at 6 am with a Ladyboy grabbing at his crotch! He also attained a number of bruises and scratches during the evening/early hours of the morning…. We also said goodbye to Dan and Scotty – drinking involved, caught up with Colin who was back from the Rig– much more drinking involved and caught up with Pan for a few lunches – very happily no drinking involved.
We will be picked up at 6:30am tomorrow to go to the airport but before doing that we will see Colin then have dinner with Dennis…. Wish me luck, it may be a very messy flight!
Jungle Trek
Harvesting a Rubber Tree
