Ko Samui

We arrived in Ko Samui in the best airport ive ever seen, a few huts, sand, ponds with fish, palm trees and the sea behind you and no security. We just got of the plane and walked through a hut, grabbed our baggage and walked out to get a cab. Me and Damo jumped out first and checked in to our hostel, we were meeting Sarah and Gemma at the hostel later as they were a bit behind us. Everyone else had to stay at another hostel down the road so me and Damo went on a walk to find them. 20 mins later after getting a bit lost and getting approached by some lady boys we managed to find them. We all headed out for some munch at what we thought was a nice restaurant. We later found that the waiter was just telling us what we wanted to hear and our 3 course meal turned into one course with us having to pay more if we wanted more food. We should have been used to this by now but we were all still learing the tricks that get played on tourists.

First impressions of Ko Samui were not good, it was like being in some club 18-30's holiday destination filled with tourists, clubs, bars and drunk people. Ahh well it was another spot i could tick off in Thailand. We had booked 3 nights so had to stay but it was much better once we saw the beach. I read that Chaweng beach was the best in Samui so i had booked the hostel there and i was glad i did. The beach was brilliant, white sand, 3 foot waves and surprisingly quiet considdering that the party strip was behind us.

The second day we decided to go and see the island so got a tour that takes you pretty much everywhere. We were all dissapointed though as everywhere was just buy this buy that, tourist traps here there and everywhere. It just felt very fake, there was a temple we visited with another "elder monk" (dont believe it for a second) except this monk used a mobile phone, was putting the cotton band on the wrong wrists and touching women and after seeing it and hearing what our tour guide said in Chiang Mai it was just obvious that it was all just to grab money, i mean there were even slot machines where you put in a few baht and it will flash to tell if you are lucky or not, just rediculous. Also on the trip we saw some monkeys collecting coconuts, a waterfall and some more buddah statues but again it was all just set up to get money of people.

The second night Sarah and Gemma arrived (they were a day behind as they went to Pai, a place near Chiang Mai that is really cool and i wish i had gone with them now!) and it was Sarah's b day so it was party night. The night before me and Damo made frinds with the guys next door to us who were all out on their travells and had the same views on Samui as we did so we got along great. We invited them out for Sarah's b day so we had a massive goup of us now which was cool. We started the night of with a game of ring of fire (look it up on the net if you dont know what im on about) which got us all in party mode, along with the Changs, Vodka and Mekong (Thai Whiskey, pretty dangerous stuff). After the game we headed out with only one place in mind, the Reggae Club. Yes i know, another reggae club but this one was massive and played all sorts of music, it was just more of a name. Live bands and live dance shows, as soon as we walked it we hit the dance floor. Everyone danced all night, the club was on the Chaweng lake so you could go and chill outside to cool down if you wanted. It was a brill night, everyone danced all night and i cant remember what time we got back.

The next few days we just spent chilling on the beach, not much else happened on Samui. I did enjoy the waves, managed to learn to body surf and got hit by a few big waves but soon got pretty good at duck diving to avoid them. Looking forward to seeing more waves and doing a bit of jet skiing! One thing we did find was a 40 baht food alley which was better than anywhere else we ate and became my place to eat each night saving lots of money plus the fact it was opposite where we were staying. It was a small side street selling really nice thai food for 40-90 baht, about £1 - £1.50.

Full moon party was approching fast and we had an early boat booked for the 28th taking us to Ko Pha Ngan and our beach huts!!