17th Jan 2007 After an early night we woke feeling refreshed and my stomach had settled down to take another good hammering. After a refreshing swim before the sun got up we had a leisurely breakfast and caught up with the papers ands booked into a cookery course for Friday, before taking a taxi to Hat Sai Khao(White Sand Beach). This is the most northern resort on the island and has been extensively developed, by now the sun was beating down and my fair maiden was really feeling the strain and fading fast. A great excuse for a pit stop to refresh with water and a Singha for myself before exploring further and realising how we had made a great choice with Kai Bae & K B Bungalows. By mid afternoon it was time for more refreshment and a spot of people watching in the Tapas Bar before taking a taxi down the coast to Hat Khlong Phrao that is made up of northern, central & southern beaches and covers a very large area that is getting very developed and not really our cup of tea so we headed back to our haven. Back on the beach we bumped into Matt & Claire who had just got back from Seim Reap with tales of woe about their overland journey on the bus that sounded an absolute nightmare and made us very happy that we had spent the cash and flown. Dinner in house and hit the sack early as both exhausted from afternoon heat.

18th Jan 2007 Much of the same relaxing - except today we really lost the plot and all idea of what the day was when we waited in reception for 20 minutes waiting for the car to take us to our cookery class, to eventually be told it was Thursday and not Friday as arranged. We had a good laugh and celebrated that we had an extra days holiday left. Swimming and more massages were the order of the afternoon and dinner back at the little French cafe.

19th Jan 2007 Lazy morning before getting ready to go cooking at the Blue Lagoon a simple little school in an idyllic location up the coast where the sea has broken through to create a beautiful lagoon. There were 7 of us on the course 2x Aussie, 2 x Swedish,1x Amsterdam + us and we worked in pairs to create a selection of 4 soups, 4 curry's and a sweet of mango & sticky rice. Our tutor Ju was very entertaining and everyone enjoyed the experience and felt the resulting dishes were the best food any of us had tasted on the island-- but we would wouldn't we! Having eaten we gave dinner a miss and walked up to Southern Hat Khlong Phroa to check out the Amari Emerald Cove Resort that was very swish but as with all of these expensive Spa Resorts you can be anywhere in the world and lose all touch with the locals. However the plus is they serve terrific gin & tonics. Grab a taxi down the road to the liveliest bar around and enjoyed a few tunes before heading back to the Paradise Bar close to our resort for a nitecap that turned into quite a session with a brash American called Don who had arrived in town that after noon in his Ferrari 440 spider. turned out he is big in jewellery and had just floated his company and boy did he love to tell everyone. His Hummer was arriving the next morning and he invited everyone in the bar to go round the island with him in the afternoon -- guess what hasn't been seen since.

20th Jan 2007 Very thick heads so we laid in till late before grabbing some strong coffee at a very good little internet cafe where we sat and watch a local trim the palm trees that are at least 40ft high which is quite a feat as he has no ropes and uses only his hands and feet to climb up & down- pretty scary. Crashed on beach and Ann has overdone the sun, now looking like a prize lobster so she will have to be very careful. At about 8pm we strolled down to Porn Resort for some cocktails and barbequed king prawns that were the best seafood so far-- totally chilled out we paddled back along the beach about 11pm and crashed out. This relaxation really takes it out of you!!

21st Jan 2007 Eventually realised the computers in our resort have memory card readers so have now posted a small selection of pictures -- I hope the wait has been worthwhile.