The Koh’s

Dear D,

One weekend last month I went to Koh Pha Ngan and Koh Tao with K, M, and L. We left on Thursday morning and spent a grueling day of travel by songthaew, bus and boat. The boat was crowded with orange/sunburned Westerners, some in nothing but a bra and shortshorts, sunbathing on the deck of the ferry. And I wondered why some Thais think Westerners are shameless. Just because your house has a really nice pool and I get to wear my bathing suit there doesn’t mean I should walk half-naked around the rest of your house right?
Anyway.
Our ferry sailed along, neatly outstripping a heavy-looking storm.






By the time we made it to Koh Pha Ngan, the sun was down, it was raining and the last ferry to Koh Tao had left hours ago. We walked about Thong Sala’s night market and surrounding area in mounting frustration when we realized we couldn’t get a songthaew or taxi to the bungalows our guidebook recommended for less than 100 baht per person. Finally we voted on renting two motorbikes for the night since those were only about 150 baht per bike per 24 hours. Great deal, right? We chortled to ourselves as we drove down the island’s main road at the idea of all those poor tourists who don’t know how to ride motorbikes and were out there blowing money on taxi rides around the island. Then we turned a corner and were suddenly faced with the most aggressively and stubbornly steep hill I have ever seen in a road. And it went on and on. M and I were on one bike and in 2nd gear, which was apparently not low enough, because halfway up the hill, despite our encouragements, the motorbike refused to chug upwards any longer and began to roll backwards down the steepest road in all of the world and into oncoming traffic. “Get off the bike!” hollered M and I did. Luckily the traffic seemed used to this type of thing happening on the monster hill and drove around us without mishap. We wrestled the bike over to the side of the road and found ourselves right in front of the bungalows we were trying to find in the darkness. The bungalows turned out to be closed and two in our party nearly got attacked by the guard dogs. We tried the place next door and that’s how we found Thong Yang. The place looked pretty good at night and our bungalow was 20 feet from the water, which I couldn't really see, but I could hear the gentle lapping of water and see the lights of Koh Samui right across the water.

The next morning we realized just how beautiful the place we stumbled upon was. The air was cool, the water shallow and still and an ethereal fog hung around our little camp of solitude.










The four of us split up for the day: K and M wanted to check out Hat Rin, L and I wanted to find some hiking/waterfalls. According to the free tourist map, the roads near the waterfalls were paved, but we quickly found out that was straight up wrong. With L as my passenger, we spent several death-defying hours steering the motorbike up and down treacherously rutted dirt roads set at unbelievable angles. By the end my right wrist was aching from gunning the bike up mountains and my right ankle was stiff from keeping the brake all the way down even as the bike continued to careen and jolt. I lost count of blind curves and hills during the drive, but I became quite good at laying in on the horn when approaching one. At one point we stopped for directions to the nearest waterfall and heard, “keep going, long drive, up down up down, shrooms, beer?”

We found the waterfalls, but they were dry:






I was sort of upset about risking my life for an anticlimactic pile of dry rocks. We kept driving east across the island and managed to make it to the eastern shore. The beach we found there however was well worth the drive.



We did some jumping off this rock face into the ocean. Fun!



And climbed up to a restaurant in the sky for a view of the ocean…




…and the mountains we had to cross to get there.





Another death-defying bike ride back into town and a lemongrass sauna at a local wat rounded out the day.

The next day we were back on another ferry, this time to Koh Tao. The lovely family running Thong Yang recommended a resort run by family friends called Tao Thong. Now aware of how dangerous the driving on the islands was, we bypassed any rental and had the resort pick us up. Tao Thong was amazing. I instantly wanted to be able to come back with everyone from home.








I stayed with M and our bungalow faced the ocean. I finally went snorkeling for the first time! I stayed in the water for hours following the colorful tropical fish. I saw a pale pink anemone and a bright white one, each with its own set of protective clown fish. It was so amazingly beautiful, I never wanted to get out.

…And then I had to leave the next morning. The weather was perfect for a 4 hour-long boat ride though. Even so, it was hard to say goodbye at the pier.








Here we are, baking, at the front of the boat...




Back on land, we took a funky bus back to Surat. It reminded me of the buses in India, except this one had a caged bird pet in it.




We ended up stranded in Surat for the night and after ruling out the backpacker hostel nestled between brothels, found The One, an upscale hotel with a mainly Thai clientele. A friendly bunch of retired Thai women befriended me and M, so we spent the night singing karaoke with them. And then this man insisted on serenading us for song after song after song.



That about sums it up. It was a fantastic trip.
Here’s this last little gem, spotted on the window of a minibus.




Yes to sexy,
L