Koh Tao, Koh Phangan, Koh Samui

Hello Hello!



Today is the 13th of June, and we are in Kuala Lumpur, in Malaysia.

Here is the update:



Koh Tao, 24th of May 2007, the day we met the shark...



Usually, looking for sharks as i'm swimming in nice waters would be the last thing on my mind (staying away from them would definitely be the top of the list), but everybody here seemed to think that those black tip reef sharks were harmless around here, so off we went looking for the beast. After all, everyone here had seen it, so we kind of had to.



We looked and looked, and after half an hour, decided it was time to go back. We had planned to get the 1.30 shuttle to town to get some money and things, and couldn't hang around for mister S forever.



But as we are swimming back, suddenly, a shadow appears over the sea weed at the bottom. I freeze, and by the time i have grabbed Steve's hand to point it at the "thing" it had reached a sandy part of the sea floor, sort of canals of sand underwater, and it was showing itself in all its sharkness. When i say reef sharks, you might be thinking of little things, the size of what... The arm? haha... or more like HAHAHA! it was the size of Steve!



I thought i'd completely freak out but i was just stunned! It came into view, swimming quite peacefully, showing itself to us, and... Showing off with its baby swimming behind it! Amazing creatures that inspire respect (and a bit of fear hey! let's not forget JAWS)

It just went in its little sharky way and disappeared in the distance. We had to swim back to shore (i was fairly happy to the idea of getting out of the water), but it made a second appearance, as Steve was swimming backwards, it came back behind us. Something tells me he was checking us out. What for? I don't want to know.



As we were driven to town that afternoon, we were able to recount the event to our neighbours, and state that finally, we too, had seen Mister Shark.



The day after, we went to the jumping rock, where we had been once before. We hadn't jumped from there yet though, just snorkelled in the same area, but this time steve did. I personnally was still thinking of my encounter with the shark the day before, and could imagine him with his jaws wide open, waiting for me to jump... So i didn't, and checked the waters carefully as i snorkelled to meet Steve around the corner.



Other event that day, the falling mentis, you know, Menthe Religieuse (in french), big green things that move as if they were dancing. One of them, as long as my index, maybe more, fell on my back as we were having a beer at the bar. I pushed it off, not knowing how big it was, but when i saw her, i was relieved i hadn't broken any part of her. Pretty impressive insect! It had eyes that you could see were looking at you! Amazing...



The night there were spent drinking beer obviously, by the beach at the open bar, watching lightnings in the distance, not only normal lightnings, but orange lightnings, like explosions in the distance!! We got one every night, then later, around 3 am or so, the storm would hit us. The other thing we did, was learn how to juggle with tennis balls on strings. Well, the whole thing about it is when you are good enough, you play with fire balls instead. Apparently, i was a natural, and so that night, after the falling mentis thing, the barman asked if i wanted to try with fire, and i did, it was really cool. To explain the concept, you have strings attached to your index and... middle fingers (no name sorry) and at the end of about 40cms, you have tennis balls attached (one for each hand) and you have to swing them around, and do figures and it looks ever so easy, but it's quite tricky! Anyway, on that night, i did my first fire show! I even got a little round of applause at the end from the bar! sweet



Next day, Steve woke up early hoping he would be able to get a fruit shake with breakfast, while the electricity was still on (goes off at 8am till 6pm) but as he was just ready to leave, our fan stopped, and the electricity was obviously gone again, til the evening.

We got an ENORMOUS spider in our bathroom, litterally over the toilets. So usually it's just infested by mosquitoes, but now we also have an 8 legged monster hanging over our heads while we try to "relieve" ourselves... Well let me tell you, what is relieving is to get out of the bloody place!!!



After spending quite a few days on the same bay, we wanted to change and try to get to an other one just north of our resort, and thought we had seen a trail that could lead to it from our road. It turned out unfortunately to be the local junkyard.. Not so nice. and an other one was the resort's generator house. So after half an hour walk in the sun and the jungle, we walked back. We thought we'd try to go through Jump Rock, by the shore, but that lead us to a dead end. We gave up then, and decided to try and snorkel around to that bay. The way there was a bit worrying cause it was very deep in places, and not great visibility (think shark), but on the way back, we realized that we could actually cut through all the big rocks, pass on top of them, between etc... Steve found a little cave and we went in. Inside were like thousands and thousands of little silver fishes, that as we got in, started circling around us, and more and more were joining in from outside. it was mad, and the best best part of our day.

We did indeed start feeling a bit restless in our little secluded paradise. Doing the same things and, instead of gaining more energy from the relaxation, we got more and more lazy day after day.

Oh, over highlights of the that day (27th may) we saw a monitor lizard (think that's what it was) not as big as the one Steve saw on the first day, but still... And in the evening, Steve taught me how to play chess. Well i'm still pretty hopeless at it, but at least i kind of know what it's all about.



So as I said, we were not really doing enough anymore. I could see my birthday approaching, and i didn't know if i wanted to be there at Laem Thiem anymore. The spider and the rat (oh yes, did i talk about the soap eating rat in the bathroom??) started to get seriously on my nerves, obviously the mosquitoes were at the next stage already, pushing me to paranoia!



So Koh Pangan, here we come. Koh Tao, thank you ever so much, you were fantastic.



Hum. Koh Pangan.

We arrived at the pier and, 1st, it was nothing like Koh Tao. No transparency there, just sandy and messy from all the boats. Not an old wooden pier, but a big massive ugly concrete one. An army of "legal" taxis and air con minivans. We headed for Haad Rin, the party area, where we figured we'd have a good time, and as we were planning on going to the full moon party, best to get a bungalow early. Steve found us a diamond. We have a technic when we arrive in a new place now. We don't listen to all the touts bragging about their resorts. We head for the first bar. Order beers, then, when relaxed enough, one of us goes and checks a few places, comes back with the details, and then the other visits a few places too, and again until we find a decent one that meets our criteria.

In this case, Steve found it for 500 Bath (6 pounds?) Surrounded by bay windows on a hill, wooden interior, fridge (for cold water) big terrasse, big bathroom with hot water and a cool view from the hammock of the bay between Koh Pangan and Koh Samui...

But dear dear dear.. the rest of the place is like Koh San road in Bangkok, relocated, and made bigger: Bars, shops, internet, banks, restaurants. That is all there is and that is all you will find.

The first night we couldn't help but to be glad to be back in civilization, and so we enjoyed some israeli falafels in pitta bread, watched the latest spiderman while drinking beer at one of the numerous tv bars, and then went down to the beach where they had a "warm up party" and, well, pass the details, got pretty drunk, and had a good night. The best of our stay actually.



The next day we felt like hell, and so we slept a lot, drank litres of water, had an english breakfast (of course you can find that!) a walk in the sun (not good!) and then watched about 4 hours of Friends. That is to say that Steve was hangovered. He didn't complain once, and at the end, I was the one to say we should make a move!! Not a very eventful day.



Next day we wanted some beach action, and went to Leela beach, to avoid the busy Sunrise beach. This beach was described in the guide book as quieter, pretty and shaded by palm trees. It was all that. What the book didn't say was that the waters are unswimmable!! Seaweed patches everywhere, really shallow and altogether not very inviting. So we went back to busy sunrise beach, and had a swim there, although swim is a big word, the water is really shallow there too.



Steve then discovered that there was a beach football tournament going on, and so we went to watch. An hour later, Steve was enrolled. He came to me saying: "Well, it's tomorrow too, i can't play tomorrow really can I?..." (tomorrow = Jenny's birthday...). I said: "Send me to a spa for the afternoon and you do whatever you like!" And so that's what we did. Steve started playing that evening with a group of guys from the UK, and then we went to check out the spas...



The next day i turned 24. How did i feel? Not very different, same as each year really!!

I went to the Spa in a 5* resort of the area, and got a body scrub, aromatherapy massage, facial herbal massage, manicure, pedicure, the whole set... 3.5 hours very well spent!



After that i went back to meet Steve on the beach, where he was still playing. They got to the final, and were very close to winning the 4000 Bahts price, but just didn't quite make it in the end... They ended up 2nd, got a trophe, and 2000 bahts instead, which was pretty good anyway!



Evening we had some seafood (tiger prawns, red snapper... yum yum...) and some cocktails... Kept it low as the full moon party was the next night, and so we would celebrate properly there.



So the next day we thought it would be a good idea to just chill the whole day, sleep a maximum, and just go out in the evening and be ready!

How wrong were we. Came 9pm, we were both, how to say, the absolute contrary of motivated? You see what i mean.

To be honest, the party wasn't so much. Well, there was plenty of loud music, but the bars were so close together, you could hardly get the difference between a song and an other. There were so many people you couldn't just stroll from one bar to the other, and, well yeah, the party mood just didn't show up, and so we were a bit disapointed. Maybe we should have come here a few years ago, or maybe we were missing our friends, with whom it'd be really cool...



The next day again didn't do much (well, we did stay out drinking until 2am...), and so the day after that, that restless feeling reappeared again. We were bored. We rented some little bike and went around the island on nice little roads, and were pleased to see that there are still towns that look like fishing villages, with loads of cafes and shops where the locals go (you can easily see the difference between tourist spots and local spots). We overall enjoyed getting out of the Haad Rin Circus, and spending the day doing a bit of exploration.

We still decided to check out however.


The next day we moved onto Koh Samui which we knew would be even more built up than Koh Pangan, but we thought we should see it anyway.



Indeed it was Koh Pangan times 10 000. Mac Donalds, Starbucks, enormous shopping malls, tescos for crying out loud!!!!

That's at the main beach of Chaweng. The street is just full of stuff that tourist might want. It's package holiday paradise.



This time we avaoided staying in the popular bit, and went to Coral Bay, a auieter bay. We found a hotel after a little while, and checked into an "expensive" (for Thailand) but amazing little room at Crystal resort. All white sheets, air con, doors with no holes underneath to let in insects and else, clean bathroom, again, with no insects, 2 leather armchair in front of a bay window, a large balcony and a double sun lounger... lush!!



It's 00.47 here in Malaysia, and i am pretty knackered, so i will write the rest soon, just not now.

Tomorrow we are going to Singapore, and we are catching a flight on the 15th to Bali in Indonesia, around 7pm, flight number ZSFRLT. Just so you know where we are...



Love to all, good night, or more, good day!

Take care



Jenny & Steve xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx