Koh Samui

After completely my diving course the next stop is Koh Samui. I arrive at the ferry pier and am immediately be hassled by taxi drivers wanting 3 times what you should pay to get to where I am staying, after much bartering I agree on 200baht (Bangkok taxis are so much cheaper) what they didn't tell was that it was going to be me, my 2 rucksacks and skates on the back of a moped. If you've seen the size of the rucksack and knew how heavy it was you would know that I would have fallen off the back at the first corner. With that I go in search of another taxi.

Eventually I arrive at the hotel - it was awful!!!! The advice that they give at reception is that you lock your door with your own padlock when not there - this is all well and good if you have the bracket on the door to affix a padlock - mine didn't! So you can only imagine what's going through my head - now safe and secure is this hotel - I was fully expecting for all my stuff to be gone by the time I got back in the evening. Pleasantly surprised when I did return that all my stuff was still there! - result!

So I head to chaweng beach which is gorgeous but very busy and very very hot, which was great but shade was non-existent so you could only do an hr at a time before either heading back to hotel or a bar on the beach.

Koh Samui is very lively lots of bars to choose from, I even found a bar called tropical Murphy's to watch the 6nations in - the eng v scot game didn't kick off till midnight! I was nearly asleep at the bar after watch Ireland and Wales!

The days here mainly consisted of beach early morning, then a very late breakfast whilst the sun was at it strongest and a bit of travel planning then back onto the beach. Oh and trying to sort my rucksack out - the lock broke so I couldn't get into it properly, the combination lock decided to corrupt whilst locked - not helpful.

One afternoon I headed to Ark bar on the beach which is one of biggest beach bars, to have one beer, then ended up meeting a couple of girls from Ireland and ended up staying till 10pm. I was only staying for one.......famous last words I know. And looking at the pictures I attempted to take of the beach at night on the way back I certainly had had more than a couple of beers! The worst set of pictures I've taken since being away! And with the camera I've got it's quite difficult to take a bad picture.... I blame the beer!

The next day I decide I will head off to Boh Phut and Fishermans village, which according to the map doesn't look far.......oh how wrong could I have been!!! 2hrs later and completely lost I realise I have to walk around the airport and I'm still miles off and given how expensive the cabs are I'm determined to get there under my own steam. Another half hr later and after being following by some rather large horrible dogs and a massive hill in the blazing heat, I find a big tuk tuk and jump in that! I arrive and it's a lovely little village with loads of little shops and restaurants overlooking the beach.

I decide on the way back, now I know where I went wrong I will go the correct way, which I did, but it took nearly 3hrs to walk! The map was clearly not to scale.....again lol. Anyway for once I proved that I could in fact read a map without the use of my iPhone!

It's been a funny old week and not my favourite if I'm honest, Koh Samui is great, but I think i would have enjoyed it more if I hadn't been feeling so rubbish, it's fair to say that the home sickness well and truly kicked in this week not helped by a rough hotel which I was never sure if my stuff would still be there or not! All is well now and I have left that week behind as I head to the oasis of calm that is Koh Lanta.......an update on that later this week, but what I will say now, it's amazing how different one place can make you feel, I write this as I'm sitting in a hammock on the beach totally chilled and feeling a 100 times happier than last week :)

Hope everyone is well

Lou x