Arrived in Ko Tao on the 28th, we leave tomorrow for Ko Samui. Will write some more soon.

Wednesday 28th November

The journey from Hell

So we arrived on Ko Tao this morning at around 9.30am.

We got on a bus last night and travelled the 7 or so hours to a place called Chumphon. Us and a few others were going to Ko Tao while the rest were going on to Phuket. So, we were deposited at the side of a road at 3.30am where another bus driver met us. We sat outside a café for half an hour or so and met an overly friendly drunk guy who pulled up on his motorbike and stopped for a can of Singha. He was pretty harmless though - to us anyway. I'm not sure how harmless he was to himself once he got back on his bike and set off into the night. We had to hang around until 6am waiting for other people, then we were taken to the harbour to get on a high speed catamaran. The bus driver had joked with us about 2 metre waves at the moment but we arrived at the harbour to the sun rising (pictured). It all looked lovely and serene so we happily boarded the boat looking forward to a pleasant morning journey.

It started off ok enough but within 10 minutes, sure enough, we were bouncing around with waves washing more or less over the top of the boat (doors closed, of course). The crew, obviously well practised in what was about to ensue, were busily handing out plastic bags and tissues. Of about 100 passengers at least half were looking extremely pasty faced (Matt and me included) and a third were making full use of their recently received receptacles (Matt and me included). Some guys were on their 2nd and 3rd bags. One of the crew was rubbing some menthol oil in everyone's hands to sniff; not sure if this was to alleviate the nauseas feeling or to mask the general smell of sick in the air. I have not felt this ill for a LONG time and I am never motion sick. It was a HUGE relief when 2 hours later we arrived at Ko Tao.

We found the pick up for the Ko Tao Coral Grand resort, although we hadn't booked, we were taken and decided to treat ourselves to one of their bungalows. It's really quite lovely; there are quite a few bugs around but we were aware that this was generally the case here. This island is most visited for its diving but we have decided to save the pennies for Australia.

The beaches are lovely, the only minor drawback is that at this time of year the tide is quite high so there isn't that much beach on show. However, we'll spend our few days trying for a bit of a tan but not too much as we don't want to look like wrinkled prunes in later life .