We were up before it was even light! We got our stuff together and I waited at the hostel while Mark went to get MCDs breakfast! A few mins after he left we had torrential rain and I sat watching the electricity box on the other side of the street sparking! Hmmm! After a few mins I heard a bang and all the electricity went out and I was sat there in darkness on my own until it came back on..scary!
Our minibus was quite late picking us up, perhaps because of the rain but there was barely any space for us or our bags so it was a tight squeeze! It was chaos at the ferry port, noone seemed to know what they were doing and we were stood around for ages! We finally boarded by the boat was late leaving. We were on a tight schedule as we had to be in Bangkok in time to catch our train to Chiang Mai. The walkway down to the boat was very old looking and just made from wood. It wasn't even and not very steady, I was convinced we were going to end up in the water! The boat was lovely and modern and quite fast, although rough at times! It wasn't a bad journey, about 5 hours to Chumphon on the mainland. We arrived to yet another rain storm and the sea was quite rough so they had trouble securing the boat. We got our waterproofs out and had to walk on yet another dodgy walkway that must have been about half a mile long! Not good, especially as it was wet and slippy! We had to wait around for the bus to Bangkok and weren't impressed when it arrived. The lady in front of us couldn't sit down as the bus was leaking on her! We were sat right at the back so had to endure a bumpy ride. The journey was ok and went quite quickly and we arrived in Bangkok late, but with just enough time to get to the train station with time to spare! The beds were made up already as it was a sleeper train and we got settled in for the night! It was quite cosy and much nicer than we thought it would be!