The ferry from Koh Tao to Koh Phagnan was interesting, there was a guy bought on screaming in pain, it looked like he had a broken leg and he kept screaming and holding his chest so I guess broken ribs too, he had fallen off a motorbike and was being taken to Koh Samui for treatment. He screamed every time the boat rocked. We got a taxi straight away at the pier to the Bungalows which we had booked for 2 weeks in the Ban Tai area, in a little wooden bungalow right on the beach. Our parents would not be pleased to know that the taxis here are like pick up trucks and everyone sits in the back along benches, some have a roll cage, some don't, the driving here is not too bad though, we are pretty sure it was much much worse and scarier in Sri Lanka when we went there in 2009.

The bungalow is really cool and you could not ask to be closer to the sea, about a 6 metre walk and you are swimming! The beach is clean although glass does wash up on the beach and we guess this comes from the full moon party beach at Haad Rin down the road. The accomodation is basic here, we do have nightly visitors of cockroaches and huge ants in the bathroom but I suppose that is too be expected! The toilet you have to flush yourself with a bucket of water and we have no hot water but you don't need it, you would have to be a freak to have a hot shower here it is so hot! But there is no bedbugs which we are pleased about, we heard so many warnings about bed bugs from other people but so far we have not seen any! Fingers crossed! We have suffered mossie bites when we have been out at night but not nearly as bad as the ones in the US and also thre sand flys in NZ were much worse!

On the first night we were here we went for a drink up in the bar and met the barman, a Swiss stoner who lives and works here. He offered us moonshine magic mushroom shots with a smile and said 'Welcome to Koh Phagnan!' a sign of things to come here as this place is drug mad. We went out to a sports bar and ate some burgers and drank really good cheap cocktails but the place was full of old white men chatting up young, thai women, it was to be expected but we had not really seen it in Koh Tao.

Most of our time here has been spent in the hammock on our bungalow balcony, reading, chilling out and stuff, we wanted this part of the trip to be relaxing but we also wanted to sample some of the mad parties, which we have! We have met some lovely people staying here and its funny seeing everyone so hungover at breakfast in the mornings, the place is family run and so laid back to the point that they all smoke weed all day here but that is just their lifestyle!

The first party we went to was on xmas eve and we prepared for it by joining in on the island spirit and going into Haad Rin and buying neon t-shirts and neon body paint for the event! We spent all day xmas eve in Haad Rin and pretty much saw everything, it is a dump to be fair. The beaches are dirty and littered with remants of all the parties they have on the beach and the streets pretty dirty too! It is peak time here so maybe in quieter months its nicer but we would not come back. It is a bit like Malia or San Antonio, everyone is here to party and that is it really. We went into a travel agents to try to book onto a boat trip to Ang Thong national park but he said we would have to come back in a few days as the sea is too rough for any boats. We were disapointed as we wanted to do the trip on boxing day but he pretty much said there is no chance as bad weather is forecast. We had our xmas eve tea in a bar, Ash had pie, mash and gravy and Beck had sausage, mash and gravy and it was good! That night when we got back we painted eachother with the neon paints, got a little tipsy and headed for a short walk down the beach to the Black Moon Party. It was really impressive, a huge spider web tent lit up by black lights, fire dancers, and all the nut cases dancing their t*** off to trance music. It cost us 600 baht to get in though which was more than we thought (12 pound), it was a cool experience and again we met some cool people, an Irish girl who had worked as a cleaner in a mining town in Western Aus and had earned enough for a house deposit when she gets home. We stumbled along the beach and crashed back at the bungalow!

Christmas day we woke up to a lot of Thai shouting, Ash looked out the window and said 'Bec the sea is coming up here' she did not believe him at first but had a look and the sea was a couple metres higher than it should be and waves were rushing all the way under the bungalow and up to the bar which is about 20 m from the sea. The bungalows are on stilts so that was okay but the electric and water was switched off due to the flooding it was causing. We asked the barman if it is normal and he said he has never seen it like this ever. the Thai lady owner was worried if it rained it would get worse and last time it rained lots and they turned the power off it was off for a week and the sky was pretty grey so we werent looking forward to a week without power. Everyone kept asking if it was a tsunami and they just said it was rough waves. We ventured up to town to see if anyone was serving food as we were starving we found a place that had its electric on and had a full english brekkie to cure our hangovers. When we got the back the water had eased off and they were trying to pump the water back out to sea. We spent the day sleeping off our hangovers and reading, chilling out on the balcony etc. We had our Xmas dinnner around tea time when they switched on the electric again. We had thai food which was nice but different for xmas day and Ash's was too spicy haha! We skyped home to our families which was really cool and we got to see everyone and they all looked really white haha! We got ready and had a drink with an English couple who had not been home for 2 and a half years, they had been working in Australia and travelling around, they had worked in call centres and got paid $25 an hour and were allowed to drink beer at work, jealous! we headed up to get a taxi to this party which was going on at a waterfall in the jungle, but when we tried to get a taxi the driver said "no, no people at waterfall you go to haad rin" (were there was a full moon party going on), we said that we didnt want to go and wanted to save it for new years but the other couple went so we waited for a taxi and got took up into the jungle. We got dropped off next to this dirt road and you could here the trance music in the distance we assumed that if we walked towards the music we would reach the party, we had to walk down this tiny little dirt road in the middle of the jungle to get to this party and once there the taxi lady was right there wasnt many people there, but that didnt bother us because we dont like big crowds anyway. we sat by the waterfall had a few drinks watched the lasers, which Ash loved, defanatly the least christmassy day christmas day ever. Bec also tripped up on the rocky path and cut her foot but luckily no medical treatment needed, just lots of iodine!

We didnt really do much until new years eve apart from go to yet another party, this one was in the jungle on the 27th and there we saw the best fire swinging people we had seen so far in Thailand. The day after we were supposed to go to a different hotel for a couple of days so we got up early (9am) and the taxi never arrived, after a few phone calls we couldnt be bothered to go as they werent very well organised, Bec was relieved and went back to bed as she had developed a bit of a virus. So we stayed and whilst there Ash began to read his first ever book H.G Wells "The first men in the moon" . That was pretty much what we did for the rest of the time until new years chilled on the patio, Ash in his hammock and Becky on the bench, this was also due to the terrible weather and some days it rained all day and night, not what we were expecting from Thailand, but we enjoyed just relaxing anyway. It was soon the new year eve full moon party the biggest beach party in the world, we got ready in our new full moon party vests (which you have to get if you are attending a full moon party!) and we also started painting each other with flourescent body paint, well I say painting but in the end it just came down to us throwing paint at each other and it had the desired affect! We were both covered in this paint, but it was so much fun doing it we felt like we were kids painting each other with our fingers. Ash strapped upbecs cut foot with duct tape toprotect it from the ming that is haad rin beach. We went up to the bar to get a taxi and on the way an English couple, Dan and Kirsty, asked if we were getting a taxi so we shared a taxi with them to the party and we ended up staying with them most of the night. It was the most crazy beach party ever the beach was absolutly packed and there was supposed to be 30,000 people there that night.After watching the countdown and firewaorks at midnight, Kirsty was really drunk all of the sudden and could not walk, so Ash and Dan carried her to the taxi rank which was hard with the place so packed and her so floppy! As soon as we got her to the taxi she perked up but Dan definately wanted to take her home so we bid them farewell and headed back to the fun. We had a good night and spoke to some really interesting people, an Israeli guy, an English guy who had travelled around rural China, and various other drunken or drugged up people. There was a lot of people crashed out on the floor and people being taken in ambulances. They say at least one person dies at this party every year due to swimming whilst drunk or high on drugs or driving a motorcycle out of it. We had had enough at about 3 or 4 am and headed back home where we met an English guy in the taxi who had cut up his foot on glass on the beach and had to pay 80 pounds for stitches, the A&E staff must be raking it in tonight! He said his mate got bit by a dog a couple days ago and had to head off the island for rabies treatment, he said it was pretty emotional because his mate thought he might die, makes you think how many risks people take coming travelling really. We then stayed up talking to our neighbours till about 5.30am we tried and tried to stay up for sunrise but did not manage it!

New Years day we woke feeling rubbish and went for breakfast where we saw Kirsty and Dan and promised to meet up on Koh Tao in the next few days, we were all worse for wear. It took days for the neon paint to come off our skin and with only 2 days left in our bungalow we set about recovering from the party!