4 May

The morning the lady's husband, a retired police commander, gave us a lift to the bus station. Every 5 minutes we would be approached by an agent who wanted us to take their minibus to Surat Thani. When we told them we wanted to take the local bus because it was cheaper, they would tell us there was no local bus or it was more expensive. We waited for 1 ½ hours before a bus came, checking that it went to Surat Thani, we boarded and paid the money, almost a third of the minibus price. This was the first true "local bus" we had taken for a long distance, no aircon, heard seats & open doors, not so bad. If only we can find more of these cheaper busses!

We arrived in Surat Thani, but were just dropped in the middle of town not near any bus station. We tried finding a bus station, but most Tuk Tuk's only take you to an agency. One guaranteed us that he would take us to the bus station for a reasonable price. We got on and drove around, by the end of the 3 km we were literally 200 m from where we started. We got into a hefty fight seeing as he had driven us around in a circle and dropped us off at another agency, but we got nowhere. By now our frustration with the Thai people was mounting as every second person had a different story and half of them lie just to get you to use their or a friends company, in order to get a kickback. In the end we settled on a agency seeing as 1 ½ hours sniffing around had brought us nowhere.

The bus picked us up 5 minutes later to take us to the pier where we boarded a car ferry for Koh Samui. The ferry ride was not so eventful and it didn't take long before both Leanne and I were asleep.

On solid ground again we find a Sangwa to take us to the other side of the island, where back packers stay. Koh Samui has become the jewel of Thailands islands and subsequently has attracted honeymooners and family vacationers. They are prepared to pay a little more than the average backpacker and subsequently all prices have started to rise.

The sangwa dropped us off in the middle of nowhere, turns out it was the start of where we had to be. The walk started and it wasn't a short one, we tried everywhere for accommodation, but the prices were 3 times what we usually pay. In the end we settled on a place just meters from the beach, it was 700 Baht for the night, but we were to tired to continue our search. At least we were only 10 m from the sea and had a great view.

We hired a motorcycle and drove to different night markets looking for something nice to eat, a little more difficult here than other places. Stopping at the 7/11 we buy a beer and head back to our accommodation. We enjoyed a late night swim in the ocean with our beer, almost no one here and the water is as quite and tranquil as a lake.