Blog : Koh Samui

Arriving to Koh Samui, out first Thai island, to the east of the main land, was no mean feat... From KL we walked, took a tube, train and coach to the airport and then flew to a small port town - Surat Thani - and after standing for an hour in a non moving Q we boarded a coach to the ferry and once we arrived at the island we then had to take a taxi for our last leg, to get round to the other side of the island to our accommodation - Nids bungalow! We were absolutely knick-knacked when we arrived and pretty relived as we had taken a gamble that Nids bungalows would have space for all three of us as wed left it too late to book online so we were chancing our luck with a walk in, to a place who's name we couldn't even remember correctly from hostel world! But we got there and the lovely staff at Nids were really accommodating and sorted us out with three bunkbeds in the only dorm - an eight bed, so we were pretty lucky as with us three it was full!

My first impressions of thailand were murred slightly by the weather, overcast, cloudy and grey, not the beautiful blue sky's and crystal waters that i was expecting. Also the change in currency to something so high stumped me and i found myself thinking 100bart for water was a hello of a lot of money... Only to calculate that it was actually £2, much better! After all our travelling we really didnt do very much other than nap, mong on our beds and have a little wander around the bungalow grounds... Nids was quieter than we had thought as it was mainly couples bungalows and then just our little dorm room at the back, rather than lots of single travellers looking to talk to others and hangout, but the vibe was nice. The bungalows were cute, there were loads of dogs, cats, chickens and roosters (f***ing cockadoodledooing at the crack of dawn though) plus millions of other animals in pens, pools and cages. The pool area was really clean and hard to believe really that it was part of a hostel! After wed had a shower and that we really didn't want to venture t the main strip for food, a fifteen minute walk away... And so we ate at Nids. There was no green thai curry on the menu, exactly what we all wanted but Nid herself said it was no problem and shed make us our dinner! It was delishious, mixed green vegetables with a traditional tasting coconut sauce and steemed rice - yummy! I was so hungry i even had seconds (by this i ordered a second main course to feed my growing tummy, thighs and ass! I went to sleep a happy girl that night and slept all the way through to late morning.

Nids offered all guests free breakfast until the legendary timing of 12pm... Great stuff! Instead of all the Australian hostels we were in that served it between 7-9am only! And it was alright... A plate of fruit, scrambled egg, toast and a glass of OJ! Nommm! The sun thankfully came out the next day so we ventured the fifteen minute walk to the beach, which was lined with bars and resorts and pumping music... It was cool but it wasnt necessarily how i had expected thailand to look - Malia-esque! The beach had white sand and lots of people to watch though so we wandered along for a bit and the girls found a bar with some good tunes and free sun loungers so settled themselves. I wanted to get my bearings of the place so said id go and check out the Main Street but after about 100m i came across a little man on the beach bbqing sweetcorn and couldn't say no, so went back and sat with the girls and ate my sweetcorn and the free banana he gave me -a very yellow meal! We sunned ourselves for the next couple of hours but i felt very conscious that all the girls around us had made a big effort and were decked out in jewellery and fake hair pieces galore and i was sat there sweating, in a mismatching bikini with bbq black bits in between my teeth! Sexyyyy! In the late afternoon we headed back to our hostel, via a resort called monkey something, where wed seen a really cute massage pagoda set up and we all decided to have traditional thai massages and our backs cracked and everything... It was so relaxing when the girl were rubbing my head, i was almost purring! It was a full body massage and they massage you absolutely everywhere apart from your lady garden (even your boobs!) and for a very short moment i understood why happy endings are so popular over here haha! Count down to B coming out has definitely started with urgency now!! Hilariously Al even had a lady boy doing hers! The woman really hurt my neck though, digging her thumbs too hard and aggressively into my muscle and it made me flinch and i had to stop her doing that! After the massage, which was £8 for an hour, al wandered home for a nap and kate and i walked up the main road to suss out what was occurring... There was two maccies, a subway, a Pizza Hut, a starbucks and even a Boots! Not quite the markets and bric-a-brac stores i was expecting again! I got a nice pineapple juice though to tide me over on the pretty long walk home, about 35 mins because of how far wed meandered up the beach! We did find the green mango club though, which was meant to be cool for going out and it looked fun so we decided to go there later that night...

We ate green thai once again in the hostel because it was so yummy and easy as cheap and popped on some going out clothes and headed for green mangos with two Dutch girls from our dorm and an Israeli bloke. We went to hush bar first as they were offering buy one get one free on buckets... At night the strip had malia written all over it! And we sat and had a white rum (aka paint stripper) and coke bucket in front of the football on a big screen, which was quite enjoyable :) we then went into green mangoes where the drinks were more expensive... £4 a bucket instead of £2 and we had a vodka coke one between the three of us. We were a few pennies short though, about 20ps worth but the Barman just waved it off. We've encountered that quite a lot here in asia! The music was really loud and there was loads of people raving away, it really reminded me of being at Swedish house mafia and when the DJ played one of their songs we all had a good old boogie! There was a fight in the club though that got a bit out of hand, with quite a few drunk boys just getting involved and shouting abuse, so we went into the second area, which was more chill out and then made our way home...staggering via MacDonalds for the girls obviously!

Id been asleep for a few hours when i heard a massive bang and Al was lying on the floor in the middle of the room! She looked like shed been getting down from her top bunk to have a wee but slipped and bless her, banged her knees on the stone dorm floor. For the rest of the night she snuggled in with me on my bottom bunk! And the next day she was hobbling a little bit and had a sore knee cap! We spent the whole of the next day chilling by the pool and sunbathing which was heaven as the pool area was really clean and the sun loungers comfy! I got almost three quaters of the way through my new book as well - into the wild. Its really good but i mainly just look at Bs handwriting in the front as he sent it to me in australia for christmas, what a cutie!

That night we decided to venture out of the hostel, to a resturant id found on trip advisor that had really really good reviews and looked sort cheap! We got a taxi bus there, which was like a van with no glass in the windows and just benches against the sides! It was certainly an experience... We ate spring rolls, tofu bamboo red thai curry and rice and it was so so tasty :) and just outside was a thai roti man, so we all had a banana and choco roti for pudding which was amazing but made me feel ridic full! It was a good job al couldnt walk and we had to get a taxi back as i would have needed rolling home! The dinner was so cheap! I think it came to £6 each for absolutely everything - woohoo and i want to write another review on tripadvsior for them as the food was so good! Back in the dorm, after a few phone calls home i passed out in a full on food coma and slept like a baby until the morning! When we had another beautiful day by the pool, eating green thai curries, pad thai noodles and messing about sunbathing an swimming :)

In the evening we went to another restaurant for dinner. This time we walked (and Al hobbled) into town and just found one that looked ok. In the end it was just that - ok only. No one really felt like thai that much so we went to a place that did a mix of foods. The girls had pizzas that looked rank, all soggy with far to much cheese and not cooked enough! I had a thai coconut soup with was alright but i didn't really like the veggies in it... We all had a crepe on the way home to cheer ourselves up (and fill us up) mine was banana, raisin and Nutella - nomm, great diet!

We had had to move rooms that day, as the dorm was fully booked, into a two person bungalow between three of us which although uncomfortable was actually cheaper than the dorm for us! I had a pretty funky tummy that night though and didnt want to stink out the bungalows tiny bathroom, so in between facetime sessions with B i had to run to the bar toilet, hope no one was there and deposit my stomach sludge... Not nice :( i was flitting between goosebumps and sweating and shivering... Something didn't like me at all! Back in the bungalow i tried to pack up all my stuff as well, as we had to get up really early to visit the immigration office the following morning, before our 1230 ferry to koh phangan, to extend our tourist visas. We thought we would be able according to online blogs and forums, extend our visa for an additional two weeks (as currently it runs out half way through the boys holiday with us!) and we dressed conservatorly as other people had advised is the normal for government offices... Unfortunately some of the information wed been given down the line was wrong and at 9am we found out that no we couldn't extend our 30 day tourist visa by another 14 days, only seven. Which takes me to the exact day that B leaves thailand, having come out to visit me for two weeks :) so i have to leave on the same day, which from Bangkok overland (cheapest) isn't very easy to Laos, our next country. Especially when we were quite looking forward to taking a slow boat down the Mekong river into Laos but with the tight timings, for me that is now not an option :/ so ive started looking at flights to Luang Prabang which are £140+ an expensive bit of piss poor planning really but the you live and you learn motto is being cracked out almost hourly to justify it at the mo! The one thing i defo dont want to do, although we were even advised it in the immigration office, is to overstay our visa, even by just a couple of days as the online blogs and horror stories of jails are far to much to risk!! And the chances actually if getting caught really arnt that slim! So a route rethink is now on the cards...