Thailand

We left Phi-Phi on a smaller boat than the one we arrived on. It was full of people all basking in the sun out on the top deck nearly all of which were headed for the Islands on the East coast. The trip from phi phi to Phangan took a little longer than we originally estimated. In the tour shop it said “arrive Phangan 5:30pm” this however turned out to be “arrive Phangan 10:30pm” grrr. After the first boat trip we had to wait around for about 45 min to get on a bus to bring us to a bigger bus that proceeded to drive at a top speed of 40km per hour. The roads are excellent and there isnt that much traffic on them at all, but the buses still drive very very slow (Everyone drives slower than Vietnamese drivers).

So from the big bus to a lunch stop for some tasty noodle soup and an hour wait, then another bus to the port - another hour wait. Finally we boarded a car Ferry at dusk and headed off on the 4 hour 2 knots an hour journey to Phangan. We kept our spirits up with a nice cold chang beer and the backpacker’s trusty friend… Mr Super Noodle.

Since we were arriving kinda late, we didn’t want to have to go looking around for accommodation. So we booked a bungalow near the port area for the night. The place was new and quite nice, but WAY to far away from all the full moon party action the far eastern side - “Had Rin” Beach. We got up early the next morning, checked out and left our bags in the overnight place to go searching for some accommodation near Had Rin.

We jumped in the back of a local taxi and headed for had rin, keeping our eyes pealed for names of resorts we (Lisa) had been looking at online. All the places we had read about were a few miles away from Had Rin and up REALLY steep hills. We rented a moped in Had Rin and drove about the place looking for a bungalow with a nice beach view and not to far away from the centre. This proved to be very difficult, and after a lot of looking on the southern part of the island we decided Had Rins beach (sunrise beach, on the East side) was the one for us. With lots of nice white sand and being right beside everything, we would put up with the loud party town reputation it has and stay there.

On the quiet end of the beach we noticed some bungalows on the small hillside overlooking the beach and the sea. Ten minutes later we had paid the (so-so interested
) lady of Moutiainside Bungalows for our first night of many we would stay in our little tropical bungalow. It reminded us a lot of the one in Koh Tao, but with less places for woogies to crawl in at night. Plus it had a great view of the whole beach, all the bars and importantly the sea. It was also only 350baht a night and meant we wouldn’t have to rent a moped to get anywhere. It took us two runs, some sunburnt arms and all the petrol we had put in the bike that morning to get our bags over to our new bungalow.

We spent the next week exploring Had Rins shops and restaurants and lazing about on the beach during the day. It’s a nice little town with lots of restaurants showing movies all day and a couple of cafes (which we became fond of) exclusively playing friends episodes every minute of the day and night. The weather was gorgeous most days with the occasional shower that lasts for a few minutes and then out comes the sun again. We even bought a big yellow hammock for our balcony to lie in and read Jeffrey Deaver books in. After Wordsworth (AKA Lisa) seen the secondhand bookstore, shes been going through Jeffrey Deaver novels like a fat kid goes through cake. Now she has me obsessed with them, they are a good read tho. Like CSI on the TV, but without all the slow motion boob shots. Anyway what else we get up to, I got my phone fixed for a tenner so we could finally get some texts again. We drank more lovely Thai Whiskey and beer, bought some pirated DVD’s and bummed about til the full moon party.

Everynight running up to the party we contemplated whhyyy did we pick this beach to stay in as we tried to get some sleep. At about 12am each night, all the beach bars/clubs lash up the volume of their speakers trying to outdo eah other. We kinda got used to it tho and some tissue in the ears worked a treat.

The day before the full moon party I felt like shit, must have gotten a bug or the flu… but I was not in good form. Luckily the evening of the party I felt better and was able to help Lisa drink some buckets!!! The party was well organised with about 6 areas playing music. One place near us, a big place on the beach erected especially for the party, the usual bars on the beach further down and finally at the end of the beach the original party organisers at paradise bungalows also playing music.

Come 11pm the place was packed with loads of drunken people all over the beach with lots of fleurecsent paint on them. Their was a good atmosphere about the place and occasionally we heard one of two good tracks in diff places but all in all the music as we much expected left a lot to be desired. Then again I suppose we are a copule of music snobs, whereas everyone else there just wanted to get out of it and dance to something familiar, or just really fast and loud and maybe jump through the odd hoop of fire. The party went on until about 8am the next morning with speedboats constantly picking up and dropping off partygoers from Ko Samui nearby. I think we stumbled home around 3ish Lisa donning some lilluminous glasses and a half drunk bucket of whiskey.

The next morning our water wasn’t working and the Aussie girl next door told us they had seen some guy out of it on a mushroom shake climbing around the back of our hut and ontop of their roof trying to find the party. They told him he was in a bush and not the beach. Then he told them he was trying to get to Devon LOL.. so they brought him down to the beach and let him swim to the English channel. Unfortunatley for us tho, this was not before the twat had climbed over our water pipe, breaking it and sending water everywhere. One of the guys next door tried to fix it and turned off the tap to stop the flow til it was fixed. Which wasn’t til about a stinky 5pm the next
day haha.

Hey all
I have no funny stories about needing to go to the toilet and there not being one around I'm afraid. I, unlike other travellers, do not discuss my toilet habits online. Anywhere else is fine. Dinnertable, company meeting, Colin's Funeral etc etc..

Koh Phi Phi was a bit of a waste of dosh imo. The place is still a mess.
The 'street's are still strewn with rubbish and wood and bottles and the paths are pure mud after the Tsunami. It is sad because the scenery surrounding the island is amazing.

We hired a hut that was about a million steps up the mountain side. It had nothing except a great view. Twas tres expensive for the price too. But our 'hotel' area did have an infinity pool! Unfortunately the tide was constantly out so the view of hte infinity pool viewed out to the blank beach. tee hee hee

We only spent two days here due to the krappy weather. It was cloudy and never stopped raining. The weather was too krappy for Jim to do a dive too. (It would have been Barfneyland on the boat), so after a couple of days we decided to head to the East coast.
East coast of Thailand > West coast of Thailand.
East coast wins hands down.

So seeing as how we did little of interest and I'm writing this two weeks later and can't remember anything about it, here are some pics. he he

Well folks, back to Thailand – the land of smiles and sexy massages.
We were delighted to get cheapo mc cheap flights to Bangkok and then on to Phuket. We arrived in Phuket at about 12 at night to lashings of rain. We heh hehh hellllll..
But the weather wasn’t going to get us down in the dumps – no sirree bob. Once again we had wifi in the room, air con, and our own fancy balcony aswell as a fridge stocked full of beer and fizzy pop.

The next couple of weeks are a lazy blur. We got into the routine of doing absolutely feck all. We stayed up late, drank lots of beer and hit the beach. The weather was so-so at best – we had maybe 5 days of fantastic sunshine.

I got a terrible hair cut for about 4 quid. It was going fantastically and I thought I was going to be gorgeous until she pointed at my ‘fringe’ (eh I don’t have one) and started to chop. ARRRGGHH. Now I have a very ugly sixties style mop + fringe. Lol

We rented a moped and drove around the ‘island’ – I had a go at trying to drive it. My lack of ability to hold the yoke was my downfall I reckon.
On our way back one of the days we passed a whole load of monkeys on the side of the road going nuts and stopped off to have a look. Hella cool.

During the second week, there was a military coup up in Bangkok. The military took over from the government while the Thai PM was in the states. It was the most peaceful coup in history and no one was very bothered – including the Thais. The coup claimed to have the approval of the King and everyone loves the king, so all was well. Later we heard on the news that perhaps the Thai PM had had some warning as the rumour is he “sneaked a lot of riches” out of Thailand. He he

Then later in the week, I gave James a LegoMan haircut. Lol. It looks fine I told him, it just is a bit thick and sits on the back of his head like a Legoman’s hair.
It’ll grow out in a few days.

Not much to report – the usual goings on in a beach town. As a great man once said – “Lisa, There’s an Art to Doing Nothing.”

After a couple of weeks, (the time is flying), we decided to head to Koh Phi Phi for a couple of nights – so we can go a-snorkelling and Jimbob can do a dive on the World’s 3rd most beautiful island.

We always end back up in some places, and they are usually shit holes compared to where we have just been. Bangkok is one of those places. You just can’t understand anyone ‘wanting’ to live there. It’s smelly, dirty, hot & sweaty, the traffic is terrible, the air is terrible, there’s rubbish everywhere on the streets… I dunno…

But anywho, we braved the traffic in a taxi to the general Post Office where we posted some stuff home. Then we walked for ages to the skytrain and headed off for some grub. We went to the food court. You have to buy a card first, then take your card with you around to all the different food counters that you want food from, then swipe your card for the amount and then go back to your table and wait. I was in no mood for this new approach to lunch and didn’t have much patience for it.

Afterwards we decided to get hair-dos. I didn’t like my dark look and decided to get some highlights. Our hairdresser was very nice and chatted to us about all her favourite TV shows (CSI, Lost, Fear Factor – lol). Then we yapped about who in celebland had had surgery (Melanie Griffith, Fergie, Goldie Hawn etc.
She got a phone call from her husband during my hair but she fobbed him off saying “I’ll call you later (sigh), I’,m busy with my client, I’m busy with my client”. I felt very important indeed.
Our hairs turned out satisfactory (apart from the perfunctory process of blow drying my hair into a mushroom shape) and we headed off home. We sussed out how we were going to get to Siam Reap tomorrow morning, without being ripped off by every Tom, Dick & Harry in Cambodia, and later ventured out for a bit of grub in a restaurant that looked like a jungle.

I am sad to leave Thailand, it has edged it’s way into the top spot for us.

Well we struggled to get ourselves up and out of bed to go and get the ten o clock ferry. We’ve gotten used to the lie ins and lazing aboot. Twas great, but we must up & out of ze country as we have no time left on our visas.

Before leaving we removed some tape we had used to block up some woogie holes and the tape took a wad of the varnish off some of the slats. Lol. But eek. Lets get oot of here before they catch us. (I don’t think they would have even noticed tbh) but still we hotfooted it to the ferry terminal. (I kept looking around to see if he had followed us on his bike. At one point our taxi driver got a call and I was wondering if we were going to be summoned back for payment, but we finally made it to the terminal safe).

As we bungled onto the ferry, we decided (due to our aversion to boat trips) that we would sit up on deck outside. But it pissed down. The wind was crazy, the rain was lashing down on us & the boat was being volleyed from side to side.
I went downstairs to try to get us some noodles for breakfast. The stormy weather was much more preferable to sitting & moving around downstairs. So we ate our noodles (very close to our face - as if you tried to eat them normally the wind blew the noodles off the fork!) up on deck and moved closer and closer to the middle of the upstairs decking. There were only about 5 of us up there in total. I’d say everyone else was inside pointing and laughing.

Finally we got to Chumphorn, where we hopped onto a very cold, aluminous pink double decker bus for our journey to Bangkok. 8 hours. I wasn’t looking forward to it, but the bus was comfy, the road was sealed and there were some videos on the TV.
(Lots of countries have videos on the TV, but in the crazy ones, usually the TV is too distorted, (ala Peru) too loud (ala Cambodia) and too gunwielding (all of the places we’ve been). However on this bus, it was juuuuusssst righhhht and the ‘movies’ were in English. All was well. We even got to stop for some rice n pea, and then back on the road again.

Just before we got into Bangkok, our bus broke down. It was sitting on the side of the road for quite some time, before we decided to investigate. At this stage, half the bussians had gotten off to get taxis already. But just as we got up to check it out, the driver yelled “Let’s Go” and off we went.

But our long day of travel was not over yet. No sirree bob. We jumped into a Tuk Tuk to take us to our hostel (which in fairness was a bit away) and got stuck in stinky, hot, dusty traffic for another hour. Our Tuk Tuk driver was pleading for more money all the way there, as soon as he realised how long it was going to take him to get us there. The traffic in Bangkok is awful.

Eventually we got to our hostel, which was freezing due to the air conditioning. Our room was like an ice box and they said the control to it was in the next room down from us! What? But we were pooped, at this stage it was half ten at night or something. We managed to find the ‘killer’ switch for the air con and went downstairs for a pretty crappy curry.
Then zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Back to the port and the fast boat to Koh Tao at 7am. We made sure we were first in line to board so we could get a prime position on the open upper deck with a table and chair. The journey flew by and in no time we were arriving at Mae Nam port on the east side of the Island. Knowing we were in for the big sale from all the scuba dive centre reps as soon as we docked, we decided to pick the beach we wanted to stay in and pick a scuba centre near there. After giving all the beaches info a quite once over we decided not to stay at busiest beach but one nearby called Cheong Lok or somink. So bags into the back of a 4X4 taxi and off we zoomed. Ten bumpy minutes later we where there, after checking out a room in one place and getting some scuba course info we figured it didn’t really matter where u stayed once you were doing a scuba course. The dive centre would pay 5 euro off your accommodation for each night u stayed there during the course, so it was just a matter of picking a nice dive centre.

I took a wander down the road and came across this fancy new dive centre building called “Big Bubble 5 star PADI Dive Centre” while Lisa minded the bags up the road. When I went in everyone was so friendly and I knew straight away this was the place we were gonna dive with. The guy said he had accommodation available down the road and he would take me to look at a room. Off I popped on the back of a little moped up the road over some very steep hills and eventually to this lovely secluded beach called “Freedom Beach”. The best was yet to come, all the rooms were little wooden huts on stilts facing out to an amazing view of the rocks to our left, coconut trees below and further below the small sandy beach. The hut was pretty basic with a bed a fan facing it and a tiled bathroom attached to it. The only thing that had me thinking hmm will Lisa like this or not was the fact that all the floor boards had gaps in them so you could basically see the ground below the hut which at night could be a potential woogiefest in our room.
Although it had the gaps it had so much more character than the sterile brick room with tiles and not near the beach I had viewed earlier. So I told the guy we would take it then drove back to Lisa to pick up the bags and sort out our course that would start in a couple of days time with our soon to be instructor Klaus.

Lisa loved the place and we soon threw our stuff everywhere and settled in. But not before we went to the supermarket to pick up some masking tape to seal up those floorboards and gaps here and there. We also decided in order to get about the island without having to get taxi’s everywhere we would need a moped. So we got a nice new flashy Honda hairdryer jobby hehe and whizzed into the main beach, bar and shop area of the island called Sairee beach. This area has some lovely bars with mats on the beach surrounded by oil lamps and palms stuck into the sand. We stayed here having drinks until the sunset and the sea had come to lap against our legs. It was sooo relaxing we couldn’t help think that John and Karen would have loved it if they were still with us.

We spent the next couple of days eating great food and drinking by the beach. As our time in the hut went by we had a new big cockroach to greet us each evening when we would come home and occasionally during the day we would see a big lizard peeping his head into our loo. Luckily there were no mosquitos in our room and I don’t think we got bitten inside the hut once.

Our first day of diving was a feckin long one. We were given our open water course book to look through before starting the course and on the first day we had to watch about 4 hours of videos on the first 5 chapters of the book… booorriiinnggg. After the vids we had to do tests which Lisa and I aced (they weren’t that hard, plus the instructor leaves the room with the books still lying there) We finished at about 7pm that evening and the six of us went out for some dinner and drinks. There was one nice English girl, one German girl from Berlin, one Dutch guy and a loud yank from San Fran with a big US ARMY – IRAQ 2001-2002 tat. They were all very nice and good fun to hang out with (in small doses).

Day 2 involved us sailing to that amazing island off the north west coast we had been the week previous with John and Karen snorkelling. Before we learned to set up our equipment and do buddy checks we were told to jump into the water and swim to a boat about 20 meteres away, then back to our boat and thread water for 5 minutes. This was unexpected and was fecking tiring. This was to obviously make sure we could actually swim and therefore be allowed learn to scuba dive in open water. Klaus told us a few years ago a Korean girl drown at this part.. grim. Lisa was starting to feel nervous about doing the underwater skills. The main thing getting her all nervous was the taking out of the regulator and replacing it whilst underwater. We eventually all got into the water and swam to a shallow area (the same place with all the fishes we were in the week before) and started to do our skills. Lisa was getting very nervous under the water and didn’t want to do the skills just yet. So Klaus encouraged her to stay and just concentrate on breathing calmly underwater and watch us do our skills then maybe try herself.

The skills flew by.. regulator recovery, half mask clear, full mask clear, take off mask put on arm open eyes and replace and clear, swim around with mask off then return to same original place and replace mask, breath off your buddies alternate air supply and remove BCD and replace it. It was a lot to do but I found it a lot of fun. Unfortunately this was not the case for Lisa. She didn’t enjoy it at all and decided not to continue with the course. She felt to complete all the skills she would need a few days and maybe individual instructor attention. Klaus incoraged her to join the next group tomorrow there and do them again but she just felt too uncomfortable so decided to leave it :o(

Klaus said that he would be my buddy for the remainder of the course so I wouldn’t be buddyless scuba jim haha. The next day was great, after a buddy check we went for a 12 meter dive around a sandy / coral area for about 40mins. Doing a few more skills and checking out lots off cool sea creatures like sea slugs, sea cucumber, yellow and blue stingray a sea snake and a massive school of barracuda plus loads of other colourful fishes. We did another dive an hour later at a different dive sight again seeing some nice fishies.

The forth and final day consisted of two deeper dives at two more different dive sites. The weather was quite choppy and my ear (Full of water for the past few days) was wrecking my head, plus I didn’t have any breakfast…. So after a while I started to feel sick so in the water asap to help clam it down. We had to swim with a compass on our wrists and show we could navigate on the top of the water and later at the bottom of the sea about 20 meters deep. Then again we had to practise of fin pivoting. Scuba diving is not so much about swimming under water but more about getting your breathing and buoyancy perfect so by breathing in a certain way you float up a little and by breathing out a lil you sink a little and by breathing in and out steadily u remain neutrally buoyant and its like you are flying effortless over coral (never touching it). Its like riding a bike, you cant really teach anyone to do it, you just kind of pick it up. The feeling is truly amazing when you finally get it and are 20 meters deep just gliding over all this amazing colourful coral and surrounded by amazing sea life. On the last dive after a nearly puked a few times under the water lol and when we had performed our final task, Klaus took out an underwater board and pen and wrote “Some new divers are born” and shook all our hands as we all beamed with smiles. Before we ascended and got back on the boat we got to see a little family of clown fish (Nemos). They were so cute looking and apparently never move away from the little noodley sea coral creature they live off.

The next couple of days we spent lying on the beach during the day, going to nice restaurants during the evening and boozing it up. One of the nights we went to this amazing Italian restaurant and after dinner we were getting on our bike and driving off when we spotted a familiar face from back home…. Rob Hatchell and his motley crew of familier Dublin faces and one from Bayside (Claire Young). So off we went to have a load of drinks with Rob and his mates then onto some bar/club thingy down the beach and drank until I decided it was time to leave and I should fetch the bike from about 2 miles away and whisk us home, which I done ever so gracefully. It was good fun seeing Rob seeing as we thought he was in OZ, but it turns out he was only on his way there with some stop offs in asia. Two weeks earlier he was on the nearby island Kohphanyang for the full moon party where the eejit was jumping through hoops of fire and on one jump fell and seriously burned his arm putting him in hospital for a week.

The next week we spent laying in the sun by day and exploring the islands bars and restaurants by night. Koh Tao was so nice, a little slice of paradise. Somewhere we would defo love to revisit. The last few days the weather started to get very stormy and wet (see pics) so it was time to move on before our visa ran out.

We were sad to say goodbye to our little hut although on the last morning we removed the masking tape and a lot of the paint from the floor so we made a hasty exit before they noticed it and maybe decided to charge us for it haha.

The next day we used as a veg day. We did lots of hanging around on the beach. We got some snorkels and snorkelled about in the unclearest water in the land on Choeng Mon beach and then went for a spin to Mae Nam beach to watch the sunset from the pier with a beer. Later on there was more cocktails and beverages on the beach as we watched a young chap who had his shorts hanging around his knees. We could see his bottom as he had a HUGE hole in the behind of his pants. It was too funny. (Lisa)

The following day, the four of us got picked up at 7:15am and wizzed off to the port to get the fast boat to Koh Tao. After some confusion over what tour and boat we were supposed to be on. We finally boarded the big boat that docked at the port. IT turned out to be quite a fast boat with one brief stop at Kophanang and onwards to the north of Koh Tao. Karen was quite nervous about getting in the water so she was given some special treatment by the boat guys while Reesa, John and I jumped into the crystal clear water all snorkled up. WOW!! The water was so clear, warm and calm. We could see everything below us… giant pieces of reef and loads of colourful fishies. We were in the water mincing about until we were called back to the boat for a lovely buffet lunch.

After lunch we moved to our second snorkel sight, a small island off the north west coast of Koh Tao. This place was soooooooooo picture perfect. Perfect sand running into gorgeous warm and clear sea. To make it even more amazing was the amount of fish swimming everywhere as soon as we took a peak under the water with our masks. As we swam out further it gradually got deeper and deeper. It was like flying off a cliff at one point where the sea floor just dropped to about 10 or 20 meters. John was well impressed as were Lisa and I (Seasoned snorkelers lol)

After much snorkling about and lying on the beach in the sun we had to get back to the boat for the return journey to Samui. On the way back we opted for sitting up-top deck in the open air to avoid sea sickness. After a short while Lisa, John and Karen all dozed off in their seats lol I started the video function on the camera rolling and watched “The dance of the sleepy heads” hahaha their heads kept falling back in their seats and then up again and back down etc. It was even funnier as they started to do it in sync. An hour and a half later we were back in Ko Samui. (Jim)

We all got ready TO RUMBLE. But alas it was to no avail. We were all pretty pooped out and twas not long after dinner before we called it a night. It was one of those decisions where you are either going to go mad or go home. We went home. We bid adieu to our favourite couple who travelled all the way to Thailand to have fun in the sun and meet up with us two smelly backpackers. We had a brilliant action packed two weeks and I wondered what I would look forward to now! :0

We decided to stay in Koh Samui for another day to chill. We trotted down to John & Karen’s place the next day (pretending we were staying in their hotel) so we could get some fancy seats and have a swim in their pool. But we went for lunch and then decided we couldn’t be arsed sunbathing. So we did sweet fa and went out for a really nice dinner on our own beach later on that night. The whole beach was lit up with little lights and each restaurant had it’s own sunloungers and tables out. We had a yummy dinner and then just called it a night. We went back and packed our stuff up for our trip to Koh Tao in the morning.

The next day was CANOPY DAY so it was all sytems go!! For everyone else that is! I was feeling sick as a dog. But after a while and after more tablets, I finally felt a little better and decided to get up and go! What a great day.

The Canopy brochure told tall tales of how we could swing through the trees like monkeys whilst strapped to cables that connected one tree to another high above the jungle floor.

We had decided to drive to the Canopy Adventures. He he. It took us a short while to figure out which road was Soi 7. When we finally got the jeep through most of the ‘rough as fuck’ roads, we came to the bottom of a very steep muddy bumpy rain soaked hill. Now unfortunately our sleek black jeep was not a 4 wheel drive. So while I clutched the seats with white knuckles in the back of the car, Jim and Karen gave some encouraging ‘back-seat driver’ instructions.
Up roared the engines and down rolled we.
We then tried some guerrilla attacks, by sneaking up the hill from the left and then from t he right but down rolled we.

Johnboy eventually took a last ditch attempt up the right hand side! (ditch being the operative word – as outside my window (THE RIGHT SIDE) there was quite a substantial fall to a ditchlike place below). And finally with much shitting of pants and revving of the engine, we made it up the hill! Woohoo. Only as soon as we got up there, there was the entrance to the Canopy adventures! We could have parked the bloody thing at the bottom of the hill and strolled up! Lol

So in we trotted (me secretly dreading the drive back down) and called upon the merry men of the forest to bring us a-jungle-swinging. The lads were only to happy to oblige and they soon stuffed us all into some harnesses and gloves. Then we had to trek the 200 or 300 metres up the mountain in the sweltering heat. We were all nearly b*lli*ed before we even started swinging! He he.

At the top we did a test run on the pretend cable. We each went one at a time. Our harnesses were attached to the cable, then we had to put our right arm on the cable just behind the harness and when we wanted to slow down or stop we had to pull sharply downwards with our right arm. We all had a bash and it seemed easy peasy lemon squeezy. That is – until you had to jump off a treetop 200 feet up in the air. Jimbob went first on the first cable. He thought it was cool (I just asked him there now). He tried not to look down though and speeded down the first cable. Upon reaching the other treetop, he whipped out the camera and took pictures of the rest of us coming down the line. Hee hee. John & Karen went after and everything seemed to go tickety boo (except the harness was hurting John’s balls). On my go, I was a bit nervous about initially jumping off the tree but once I was in the air it was cool. I thought it was great crack.

The next few cables and swings were grand and we all got through them without too much nervousness or knee trembling. Then we came to the big fast one. The guy told us, to go fast first and then slow down coming towards the end. I went first in order to take some pictures of the others. I launched myself out and went f*cking flying down the yoke! When I was getting to the next tree I yanked down on the cable behind me but hardly slowed down at all and had to really give a right oul pull in order to try and slow myself down. It was exhilarating and a lil scary.

Next came big Jim who managed to fly down and slow himself right at the tree. What a pro! :p

Then twas young Karen’s turn. Karen was feeling a lil bit nervous and had cussed the whole idea of swinging through the treetops (it was Karen who encouraged us all to do the canopy swinging! ).
So on the really fast long cable, I was waiting with the camera, taking small videos. Off launched Karen from the other tree and she came flying down the cable!!! She was too small to try and slow herself down and by the time she got to our tree, she was like a bullet whizzing by at 300kmph!. The guy managed to catch her by the feet but the rest of her body kept going and me and the camera nearly got bumped off the edge of the tree by Henry’s arse! It looked very funny, but when she landed, we weren’t sure if she had done her neck an injury so I quickly switched the camera off.

After establishing she was alright, I switched the the camera back on and videod Johnboy who had a slow and controlled descent down the cable. It was like Superman had arrived for as soon as he landed, he put his hands on his hips, turned to Karen and said “Are you OK?”. (cue superhero music) I have it all on video and showed everyone afterwards and it got a right auld laugh.

The rest of the cables were not a bother after that. The lads (not I ) had a bit of height fright going down the really steep steps attached to the trees. I was surprised that I was not afraid at all. I got a bit rattled when some dude jumped off the tree platform I was standing on and the tree went flying but other than that the rest of the adventure was fantastic and we all really enjoyed it.

There’s nothing monkeys like better after swinging through the trees then a banana, but we decided to go for a swim in the waterfall first. Well actually we didn’t. The waterfall water didn’t look the may west to me so I didn’t get in. Johnboy was the only one who pranced about under the waterfall with the water spiders. It made for a great picture.

We made it back down the hill in the jeep without any hassle and went for a quick spin to the Big Buddha statue to take some pictures. We then went to the fanciest of places for lunch. We were sitting outside in the hotel grounds, admiring the infinity pool when all of a sudden the wind started to whoosh up and the rain poured out of the heavens. We moved inside the hotel to eat our sandwiches but we were not alone. There must have been at least 15 flys swooping down on our table. It was disgusting and it really put us off our lunch. I’ve never eaten a sandwich so fast. I was guarding it as if I was in prison. So we quickly escaped and went home for a quick shower before meeting up for drinks later.

Before grub, we had cocktails, then headed to this really cool chic and fancy pants place in Chaweng out on the beach. We all got tres fancy dishes – except me – I got vegetables in gravy. LOL.

Later we hit this really cool bar called The Pharmacy – which was done up exactly like a clinic. The place was completely white and sterile, with doctors and nurses written on the bathroom doors and they served us our shots in little plastic pretend syringes. He he

We also visited other bars before we headed out to the Half Moon Party by the lake. The place for the party was kitted out fantastically. There were lots of games, food stalls, comfy chairs and a big stage with the dj on it. There was one game that involved throwing balls at a stage to try to knock pretty young Thai girls into buckets full of water. The music itself was a bit progblandtastic but it was fun. I’d reached the ‘you’re not getting drunk no matter how much you drink’ stage again. (often reached on holiday due to excessive drink consumption). The lights at the gig were cool and we could see lots of people with aluminous tattoos. (I think I saw Skinny from Swords there too).

After a few hours we called it a night.

Well we were all pretty fucked on the plane. We just about missed the f&ckin yoke, then when we got on, some bird asked John to be ‘Careful’ whilst putting his luggage up in the overhead lockers. He he. Me & Jim tried not to laugh whilst John did a cheeky reply and we all sat down.

The plane itself wasn’t too bad, although we were given noodles for breakfast. I thought I was going to get sick for at least the last hour of the plane journey. I was dying to get off the plane so I could do a barf. As soon as we got to Koh Samui airport, which let me say was a beautiful airport made of wood (but I couldn’t really appreciate it), I rushed to the jaxx. After lots of puking and face washing, I felt slightly better.
We were offere a taxi for a ginormous amount of dosh that we refused (as we were seasoned travellers now) and settled for a second offer (which was also slightly ott, but I was sick and we were hungover).

The taxi driver didn’t really know where we were going but we got him to drop us out at a place that resembled our place name. The only proof that we had of our hotel, was a piece of paper with the name on it (no address & no proof of payment - oops). Normally I would be appalled with my lack of readiness, but when you’ve been travelling for 5 months and constantly booking things ahead of time, things seem less important.

I went to go into an internet café to look up the exact address of our hotel, but the internet guy asked me where we were going and then pointed at our hotel, which was only 20 metres up the road. I was very grateful, considering most people would have probably charged us 50 quid for that piece of info. I don’t want you to think that I am becoming a hardened traveller as I have not become that.yet...that is yet to come

Our hotel was as cheap as beans and was fantastic. It had a TV, and no mozzies and a big comfy bed. And it was only 5 mins down the road from John & Karen – which was the whole bleedin point. We were delighted when John told us, that we were only a spit away from them

As soon as we arrived, I headed to the bed. I was afraid to leave the vicinity of a bathroom. I was not alone. Karen was feeling the same at her end of the field. The two of us were near bathroom bound.

After a few hours I decided to risk a trip down to the beach. Johnboy was already down there chatting up the ice cream guy. (the icecream guy couldn’t get away!!
Me & Jim decided to go get a snack whilst Johnboy went jet skiing. John’s jetskiing went superbly and after the three of us went up to see if Karen was ok. Karen was feeling a lil better and the four of us went down to the ship shaped pool in their complex for a swim. I felt a lot better in the water and felt like maybe I could go out that night.

We all met up later and went out for some fancy dinner. I should have not bothered to drink, but I’m Irish and pretty lame at refusing ze drink. I had a light (enough) dinner and some yummy long island ice teas. Eek.

After dinner we had a look in the book shop and admired the cute dogs that were abundant. Then we went to look for some snorkels in the shop, but they were quite expensive so Jimbob bought a rocket instead. Fireworks are perfectly legal in Thailand and we headed down to the beach to set it off. We trekked for quite some time to find an empty spot. It was pitch dark and with only the moon for light, we finally found a half empty spot with no hotel guards watching. (he he – even though fireworks are illegal, the auld Dublin feeling that we were committing a crime remained!)
The three of us maintained a healthy distance whilst Jim lit the fuse. (Jimbob only gave a passing couple a few seconds before he lit it up – we expected it to take a few passerbys with it!!) After a triumphant and impressively loud firework let off, we all headed back to base.
The drinks did me no good the next day. And that’s for sure.

The next morning, we met up in the morning for breakfast on the beach. But during my huevos, I had to leave the gang to go home and do some pottywork. Basically the first few days in Koh Samui involved a lot of potty work for the four of us. He he. So I left my eggs and trotted home to bed. (Later I heard Jim had eaten the rest of my huevos – I dunno if he tainted them so he could benefit!!)

After a few hours of watching Australia Network and whopping back the motillium, I decided enough was enough and headed back down to the beach. As I arrived down, Jimbob & John were out wrestling a kayak and I joined Karen in the strenuous task of sunbathing. then the four of us went out jetskiing. I really enjoyed it when I was in the winners chair, but as soon as Jimbob was steering I was bopping al around the place and not really enjoying it that much. I thought my arse was going to break. The water was really calm though and we were able to go mucho fast around the bay.

Later we had all decided to go check out some Thai boxing, as we had missed it in Bangkok so we all met up for some grub in the local Irish bar. Yummy westerner food of lamb chops, fish burgers, beef burgers and strange curry were shared and washed down with trunty cocktails (John – 8 long island ice teas, Jim - 6 Mai Tais, Karen & Lisa – 3-4 martinis as were both feeling a lil ropey still!)

We asked the barman for the tab and it turns out sure John & him both knew some people from wherever John used to live in Dublin. Small world. We bumped into a taxi for the unwarranted taxi ride to the Thai boxing Arena – which ROCKED. Thai boxing was unanimously (sp) fantastic. . I took loads of photos as the fighters were rolled out. It started off with the youngest fighters, who let me say, took the whole thing tres seriously indeed. There was lots of praying and blessing the ring, whilst the announcer spoke very hilariously in Thai. We all stood up for the Thai National Anthem and finally after that, they were off. There was a band in the corner playing fabulous snake charmer music. (He he we originally thought that it was a cassette). We watched and whistled and clapped for the blue corner or whoever looked the weakest and got round after round of whiskey in! At this stage the lads had had trunty cocktails and lots of whiskey. I was not far behind but no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get my drunken hat on at all. Booo.

The thai boxing rocked and we stayed for the whole night of it. Then we headed to the big backpacker area to join trillions of Americans dancing badly to really bad hip hop slash r n b slash prock (poprock).

Later we were all blathered and we went back to John & Karen’s hotel room for some extra drinks, copious waffle and some exploration. Jim was being a smartypants and had thrown some poor young one's flip flop off the balcony. Whilst swinging it around, his fabulously expensive Buddha beads had fallen off into the jungly land below. Jim then had a bit of a wander around on the roof looking for his lost Buddha Beads. In an effort to find them properly he half fell, half stumbled off the roof and ripped his pants. Eek! Twas on our way home the next morning that I managed to find the beads in the ditch. Woohooo. ALWAYS RETURN FOR THE BUDDHA BEADs!

The next day the two lads were Dying. He he he. (I was secretly laughing as me & Karen had been dying a few days before). We all piled into a jeep and went for a spin around the island. (The whole island takes an hour to get around if even). The four of us though were a right state. We settled for an early dinner in a local grill house and headed off to bed.

After sleeping through an alarm clock we forgot to set and awaking to John’s phone call to Lisa, we woke up with banging hangovers and very very late for our flight to Chiang Mai. After a heated taxi ride to the airport we finally made it just in time to meet John and Karen and check-in for our flight. The flight went grand as we all began to get over the hangover or fall asleep. John and Karen were whisked away by their travel rep as soon as they grabbed their bags. We were informed there was not enough room in the car for us to backpacking hobos, so we jumped in a cab to the DangWangDingWongTongDingALingLong hotel.

The hotel was very fancy, a lot nicer than anywhere we had stayed so far on our travels. There was some confusion with the hobos check-in and the nice Thai lady informed us that if we would take a twin room she would upgrade us to the “winners suite”, lol, cant remember what it was called but it was on the same floor as J & K so that suited us juuuuuuuust fine.

We relaxed by the pool for the morning and afternoon. Afterwards we had a walk about the market area that was located a block away from the hotel and a look around for a restaurant recommended to us by the travel rep earlier. We eventually found the restaurant and just our feckin luck the kitchen had just closed. After deciding we would leave it for the following evening, we rambled into a small restaurant place nearby. The food, as all food in Thailand was very nice and fecking dirt-cheap.

After the eats it was onto a trusty Irish bar where we consumed some Thai whiskey and beer and laughed our way back to the hotel and into bed as the next day was Elephant Trekking day.

After scoffing down as much free breakfast buffet as we could we went downstairs to meet our rep who would drive us about for the day. He was a nice guy who had very good English and could fecking talk for Thailand while we all tried to keep our eyes open in the back seat of the van. After about a 2 hour drive we reached the Elephant area. To get to the Elephants we had to cross a wooden “Indiana Jones” stylee bridge. Oh and no dogs are allowed over as the Elephants are scared of them hehe.

Our guide first brought us to buy some banana’s or sugar canes to feed the nearby elephants with. That was great fun, as soon as you hold the bananas near them their long trunk comes over and starts sniffing your hand, curling round and scoops them into their mouth. Before the Elephant bathing show begun our guy walked us over to a giant mother and her ickle baby Elephant. The baby was sooooooooooooo cute. It had big hairy eyelashes and loads of hair on its head. When we held out our arms his snotty little trunk would wrap it around your wrist and get it all sticky haha (see pics).

The bathing show was pretty cool (see pics) the Elephant riders and their Elephants all lined up and demonstrated how they bath their elephants by making them lie down in the water and splash their own rider with their trunks. Each Elephant has one rider for life. They sit behind the elephants head and use voice commands (up to 50 words), physical movements and a small metal prick on a stick to control their movements. Apparently Elephants have a very short attention span, so to make them concentrate and focus on the task at hand the rider rakes the elephant behind the ear with the metal prick thingy. It doesn’t hurt them at all it just makes them concentrate. Oh and the old saying “an elephant never forgets” is true. They remember people who have struck them when young and aren’t very friendly towards them.

The next show was to demonstrate how the Elephants were traditionally used. Typically they were either trained from birth as fighting Elephants that would ram/charge and perform aggressive movements for combat, or trained as logging Elephants that would push, pull, drag, and lift logs along the jungle floor alongside the loggers cutting down and move them long distances. Nowadays since the logging industry has stopped in Northern Thailand, Elephants are mainly used for trekking and performing for tourists. This is much less work then they would have previously done logging, so they lead a much easier and happier life. The logging show was impressive, seeing them effortlessly follow their riders instructions to lift and move massive logs. At the end they had one of the small young elephants named Jasmine PAINT!! for us (see pic) John bought the picture she painted and later Lisa and I bought another she had painted that day.

From the shows it was onto the trek. We had to climb up a ladder into a little tower that allowed us to get onto our Elephant. The Trek was a lot of fun, about an hour of riding into the jungle past little streams up and down little steap hills. The elephants never stopped pooing all the way, apparently they eat so much, a lot just comes back out as a pulp that the locals use to make photo frames and cardboard with. We were brought to a little village in the jungle to see how the jungle people lived.. LOL well that’s where we thought we were going. We were brought to a little village alright, a village full of stalls selling trinkets for tourists make by the villagers…. Pffttt. Back onto the Elephant and onto the return trek thought the river back to the Elephant place for some fecking great Thai food lunch. Sufficiently stuffed we were brought down by the river for a relaxing ride down the river on a bamboo canoe. With some Thai guy pushing us along with a long stick. It was all going swimmingly until big dark clouds decided to appear overhead and let rip with a shed load of rain!!!! See pics, we were drowned by the time we reached our destination where out rep was waiting in the van. Heading home we had a small stop off at the Orchard & Butterfly farm… it was such a gay place.

Elated by our Epelump adventures we went out that evening for some foot massages and then delicious food in the restaurant we were too late for the night before. After the fewd we went back to the Orish bar to get outofit on jugs of Sang Som whiskey and redbull. Although there were all these young Irish backpackers there playing killer pool and singing “Na Na, Na Na Na Na, Weh hey hey, Goodbye” so after the 10th time it was pissing us off. Eventually it stopped and we got drunker. John then proceeded to smash a saucer off the ground by accident which got a big wooohoooo off the others followed by another verse of that oh so catchy number we were subjected to earlier.. but it was pretty funny. After that we went to the hotel we were staying in’s disco. It was quite a big venue and when we went in they had these Thai girl band singing covers. It was pretty funny and after much confusion at the bar with our English orders we had lots of drinks. John befriended some gay Thai guy and we eventually called it a night.

The following day John rented a 4X4 jeep and we eventually made our way about 15km outside town and up to the winner’s temple lol I cant remember the name of it but the story goes…. Elephants that are born white in colour are given to the king and hundreds of years ago the King at the time attached a holy gold thingy on top of a white elephant and let it roam free up the mountainside. Wherever the elephant stopped was the point where they would build this big temple. Well the poor thing feckin stopped alright, dropped dead from fatigue at a very high point. So that’s where the built the temple. It has some amazing views of the city below and some nice 'feed the pony' buddha statues to admire within it.

We had some eats in the car park at the base of the steps up to the temple. The food was again fecking great and costing us swf. A short drive back down the mountain and we visited a nice waterfall along the way. We went on a lost cause drive to find this adventure park but eventually gave in as we were getting lost and had no directions hehe. We dropped back the 4X4 relaxed & showered then made our way to the riverside restaurant. This place was recommended by a friend of Karens I think, and the rep guy we had the day before. The food was lovely and the portions were large. The place was packed upstairs where a Thai band were playing covers to a big Thai crowd who were loving every minute of their performace. We grabbed a tuk tuk to an Irish bar about 3km into the town, it was pretty quite apart from two English lads with guitars doing crappy covers. We got all the drinks in until they were closing and kicked us out.

One of the girls working in the Irish bar told us the place to go after dark was called rush or trush or some shite lol so we tuk tuked our way there. It was jam packed full of foreigners and local girls looking for business. We grabbed a table and some buckets of Thai whiskey and redbull….. Well Lisa and Karen got HAMMERED! lol it was pretty funny Karen kept running off to dance and lisa kept trying to get me and John to drink as much as we could while she counted “One potato, two potato, three potato” etc. Shortly afterwards, John and I made the executive decision to get the girls ooouutoffthere we did and made our way home to hotel Tropicana.

Once again the next morning required us to get our shit together, pack up bags, get to reception, check out and get the ride with the rep to the airport to catch our flight to Ko Samui. LOL well it defo did not go as smoothly as it should have. We got downstairs hung over and tired. I had to run to the jacks as the whiskey wanted to say hello, so John checked out our room. Lisa came down and went with John an Karen to the car to wait for me. THEN the lady at reception told me we forgot something in the room (Lisa’s wallet) so I had to go all the way back up to floor 23 on the SLOWEST lifts in the world! It took ages and an irate rep told me to make my own way to the airport as she was bringing the others and we might miss the flight…. GROAN. So after about ten minutes of lift drama I got the wallet and met my darling Lisa, who had waited for me, :p in the reception area and we jumped a cab to the airport.

When we pulled up to the curb their was a 5 min security check before getting into the place, further stressing us out as the check in time was now well and truly over. But well done to John and Karen, they checked us in without our passports (lol only in Thailand) and we rushed to the airplane in a little car. They took my backpack and put it onboard and we jumped on the PROPELLOR engined plane for the journey to Ko Samui.