Home
|
|
Travel
|
| World Trip |
| Thailand |
| Islands |
|
Games
|
|
Interests
|
|
blog
|
|
Links
|
|
Guestbook
|
Thailand |
|
|
| Islands, Sep 24 - Oct 10 |
|---|
We decided to hit the beaches again, so we headed south to Koh Samui. We "splurged" and took a 1.5 hour flight (instead of a 14 hour train ride) to this tropical paradise. The airport in Koh Samui felt and looked like a theme park entrance ...which was appropriate for this resort/party/vacation island. We spent our first few nights in the northern part of the island, in Maenam Beach. At the end of our beach, there was a cozy restaurant which put candles and rugs out all over the sand at night ...right up to water. It was very charming!
We rented a
motorbike one day and tooled around part of the island. We checked out the
Big Buddha. This golden statue is
enormous ...and it sits on the edge of a cliff that overlooks the ocean. You
can actually see the Big Buddha as you fly onto the island.
Maenam Beach was a very quiet and relaxing area, but the beaches were a bit churned up - so the water wasn't very clear. We also craved more excitement, so we switched to Chaweng Beach. The beach was much nicer here ... clear water, long stretches of white sandy beach ...and lots of restuarants along the water! We ran into Michelle & Jo (two sisters from England that we met in Bali). Michelle and Jo are at the end of their 1 year RTW trip. We enjoyed hanging out with them very much (morning coffee at Starbucks, evening drinks at Dejavu, checking out the lady-boys, our last night at the Green Mango)! I think I did the shopping for all of us! There were so many cool things ...beautiful silk, lamps, vases, but the hand carved soaps were really impressive.
We
did an elephant trek in Muang
Falls on the interior of the island. It wasn't the most comfortable ride, but
it was definitely worth it! The elephants were beautiful! I even got to feed one, but my aim was so
terrible, that the bananas I was throwing at the elephant kept hitting it's
face and falling to the ground! All the elephants on the island used to work
in the lumber industry ...so hauling tourists around is a much cushier job
for them. The tour company also had some cute monkeys on their site.
We were only in Chaweng for 2 days before we realized we should head over to Koh Phangan (another island just north of Koh Samui) before the full moon. The full moon parties on Koh Phangan are legendary. We heard about these parties from other travelers, so we wanted to check it out. We left 5 days before the full moon, and the ferry boat to Koh Phangan was PACKED with people. It felt like we were on a refugee boat!
After
hauling our backpacks around for 2 hours, we finally found a decent place.
The Top Hill bungalows turned
out to be a great place to stay. The "resort" opened just 4 months ago, so
the bungalows were very clean. It was a far distance to the main beach, but
this provided a nice escape from the noise ...and let me tell you, there was
a lot of noise ...every night! Also, the bungalows were built on the side of
a hill overlooking the ocean ... the kind of ocean view we could never afford
at home!
The full moon party turned out to be an all night rave party (and well into the next day). Every bar on the beach had enormous loud speakers ...it seemed to be a contest as to which bar could blast out the loudest techno music. It was neat to see, but not quite our kind of scene.
We went
back to Koh Samui and enjoyed some serious beach time. We even got some tattoos! We did a one day tour of the
Angthong marine reserve national park. This reserve is made up of many small
islands. We hiked on one of the islands to an emerald green salt lake. It was very picturesque! We
also kayaked around some of the smaller islands and found a really nice
beach! Everyone got off their kayaks and swam around in the clear blue
waters.
We had a fantastic meal (with real wine!) in Chaweng at a small restaurant called Betelnut. The style is California fusion and the chef/owner (Jeffrey Lord) is also from California. We blew our budget for the month (due to the wine - 400% tax in Thailand), but it was worth it!
Before leaving Koh Samui, I wanted to take a cooking
class at the Samui Institute of Thai Culinary Arts (SITCA). I ended up taking a 2 hour
evening session preparing 4 dishes. This was an EXCELLENT course! The classes are limited to 5 people. The
facility was spotless and they had top-notch equipment. The instructor was
very patient and eager to share his skills with us. We had an introduction
to Thai ingredients ...I never
knew things like Kaffir lemons, galangal, and marble sized eggplants
existed! We made a red curry paste
from scratch, chicken with red curry, stir fried vegetables, andTom Yum soup. Our spouses or
partners were invited to join us at the end of class to taste all our dishes. Wow!! I've
never cooked such amazing dishes before (I think Lon would agree)!
| region | lodging | $US / night | rating | notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Koh Samui | Coco Palm | $11.36 |   | Nice, but thatched ceiling |
| Samui Island Resort | $13.64 | | Great beach, basic room | |
| O.P. Bungalows | $15.91 | | Clean, air con, central but quiet | |
| Koh Pha-Ngan | Top Hill Resort | $11.36 | | New, clean, quiet, nice view - but far from beach |