Forget backpacking - we are now tanning. The agent who sold us boat tickets to Koh Lanta showed us a lovely small speedboat in the brochure, which turned out to be a 200 man fast boat. We've been done - oh well, it was only 5 pounds. (monthly wage for new cicil servant here is 100 pounds).

We were picked up and taken to the accommodation which were little air-con bungalows by the beach. A very small company with about 3 staff - not plush but seemeed ok and with some building work going on. We did a bed bug check - and it failed! We moved to the room next door which passed the bed bug check and went for some food on the sea front bar.

The beach whilst lovely at high tide (with about 0.5m of sand remaining) and with waves lapping at our feet, but at low tide exposed some prety nasty rocks and so were not so convinced about the swimming potential! So the next morning we moved to a new resort at the Northernmost tip, where we got a big air-con room of nicer quality, incl breakfast, and a pool that had a waterfall. The pool is an 'infinity' pool with the water toppling over one edge so that when you are in the pool, it looks like you are swimming into the sea.

We then hired a moped with Ian getting a crash course in how to drive it. We nervously drove to the bottom of the island at 30 mph (about 1 1/2 hrs) for chips and cheesy bread, followed by a return trip. The open road is great. Lindsay also had a go at driving, for 100m!

Walking along the new hotel beach front, which is much better, we came across a couple of 5 star hotes. The room rates range from 130 - 300 pounds a night. Some haggling later and we had secured the beautiful basic rooms for 97 pounds. It then turned out that the room we thought was the basic room was actually one of the best and we would have to pay more for what we wanted. Lindsay turned on her annoyed face and we ended up with one of the best rooms for the cheapest price discount - nice one. The room is massive split into 3 parts and leads directly into the swimming pool. the pool is about the size of the english channel. We are looking out for the Beckhams but they have not been seen yet.