We woke up quite late, around 10ish and got ready for the day's adventures. We decided to take our new snorkelling gear with us for a test run and I packed a bag of other necessities (bug spray, sun cream, disinfectant hand wipes, etc) while Edd and his friend organised their mopeds.

Edd needed a bit of a practise, so I walked while we went in search of his friend. He managed to get the hang of it and I hopped on the back, acutely aware of his lack of confidence on this 2 wheeled mode of transportation. We could not find his friend anywhere, so he left me at the top of the gravel stretch, on the main road, to go and look for him. I was not exactly ecstatic at being left behind: it was scortching hot, there was no shade, the bit of shade there was, was infested with giant red ants and I was harassed by locals that saw me as a dollar sign on legs. He eventually came back with his friend, I hopped on again and off we went down the main road, in search of an adventure.

Koh Lanta island is actually quite large. We rode for what seemed like ages and I thought we were on the other side. Most of the restaurants were closed and the ones that were open, were empty. There was no doubt that it was low season; we didn't mind there not being many people, but it was a bit frustrating trying to find some where to eat, the places that were open, were run by people that didn't want to work. You entering their establishment for food meant that they had to actually get up and do something. Crisis. If there's one thing the people of South East Asia are, it's lazy.

We found a restaurant that served pizza on a stretch of beach further down south from where we were; we we sat in a shaded area and ordered 2 Hawaiian pizzas and cold drinks. We needed the drinks purely because they would be colder than the water we were carrying around with us. Our food arrived, we ate quickly and then went on our merry way again. The view was pretty average and a storm was coming in from the left; if we wanted to get some decent sun in, we were going to have to move fast.

Edd had been told, via forums, which beaches to go to, so we headed a bit further down south, parked the mopeds and walked through a restaurant to the beach below. We got our snorkelling gear out and fastened our bags to the inside of a lounging area, the storm was coming in and it had started raining, but it wasn't that hard that it would ruin our day.

The sea was awfully rough and I struggled to get out; Edd's friend got caught by a wave and through against the rocks. Luckily he wasn't too badly hurt, minus a few cuts and bruises. The visibility was non existent and the water was so rough the valve in my snorkelling kept shutting automatically because of the waves. This was quite distressing as I obviously couldn't breath when he valve was closed, but it was closed because the waves were so rough and it was designed to close so no water could get in. It was doing it's job, but I was freaking out. Suddenly I saw a massive fish that looked like the rock it was hiding in, swim passed. That was me done. I got out.

The boys carried on swimming in the monstrous waves while I sat under the covered area and read my book. They eventually came out, a bit cut up, literally, and dried themselves. We decided this section of beach was too rough and rocky to do anything of value, so we packed up and headed back up to the mopeds; we set off again in search of a better beach.

Edd spotted a driveway that sloped down, quite steeply, on the right hand side of us. I was not looking forward to riding back up the path later, I'd probably have to get off and walk. We parked our mopeds and walked down a grassy stretch to the beach; this one seem less rough and rocky, we could probably swim here even if we couldn't snorkel.

We swam in an area enclosed by natural rocks and then the boys moved over to the less protected area of beach, to swim in the waves. I set myself up on a sun lounger and told the barman we'd buy drinks when my husband got back (if you don't call your partner your husband in these parts, the local men get a bit iffy. I bite, so my white lie was for his health and safety). Edd got back and was horrified at the extortionate price of beer. They also did not have any cool drinks, it was only shakes, and they were extremely over priced as well; he wanted to go back and swim, but did not want to leave me alone with the seedy barman, so we packed up our things and walked further down the beach to where they had been playing in the waves. I got my book out and they went off to swim.

After finishing a chapter, I joined them in the ocean. The waves were enormous and pummelled you if you were caught off guard. We swam in the ocean for nearly an hour before we had had enough of getting dragged to shore by monstrous waves. We initially carried on riding further down the coast, but got to the national park and had to pay 200Baht each to enter. It was after 4pm and we decided that it would be a waste to pay that much money when it was already so late in the day, we'd come back tomorrow and check it out. Now we needed a drink, of alcoholic content.

Edd had spotted a restaurant on a cliff earlier in the day and (apparently) thought to himself that we had to go back for drinks later. We got back on the bikes (this was tricky as every time we got off to do something, the seat was too hot to sit on when we got back!) and went in search of the bar on the cliff.

Diamond cliff cafe. 10 minutes before happy hour. Bonus. The waiter enquired with management and they allowed us to order 10 minutes early. I got a passionfruit mojito, Edd got a beer and his friend got an ordinary mojito; we sat on the far end and watched the sunset over the sea. It was a great ending to a fabulous day and we were hungry, again!

They had food that was semi-reasonably priced, so Edd and I ordered dishes that we could share. All of it was squid, all of it was delicious. We ate every last morsel of food, having worked up quite an appetite during our days adventure. We ordered a second drink and said goodbye to another day, the sunsets in these parts of the world were amazing. Picture postcard perfect.

We made our way back to our bungalows and stopped at tourist information offices along the way, ending up booking at the first one we'd enquired at. We had decided to go to Koh Lipe the next day, skipping Koh Phi Phi (Edd has promised me we'll come back one day and do Phi Phi as I was not enthralled with the idea of skipping it) we weren't that impressed with Koh Lanta, we'd heard such good things about it, but were yet to be remotely impressed by anything. The issue was that we'd spent nearly 2 weeks in Otres Beach, Cambodia and 5 days in Hoi An, Vietnamand absolutely loved both places. Koh Lanta failed in comparison. To get to Koh Lipe, we had to do 3 sides of a square, fast boats that normally run from Koh Lanta to Koh Lipe, taking 2.5 hours, were not in service due to it being low season. This meant that we had to go back the way we'd come: 2 ferry crossings, then an hour and a half drive south to the next port and a 2 hour fast boat to the island. It was going to be a long journey.

We dropped our mopeds off, paid for our accommodation and packed our bags. Koh Lanta had been short and sweet. We didn't think it was that great, so we were moving along swiftly.