St Stephens Day

Happy St Stephens Day...We left Kho Phangan after a relaxing 8 days here, more importantly our resort (Haad Tian Beach Resort) I can't fault it one bit, well maybe the staffs taste in music! But credit where credit is due everyone always had a smile on their face and the staff couldn't do enough for you. So a big thanks to Dang, Sow Elzanne, Joe the Driver, The Guy who says KAP alot and the Guy with Dreadlocks (sorry I'm not good with remembering names), and the rest of the staff...you're all a credit to your industry. So off on another ferry to Kho Tao this time, only 45 minutes or so it says...45 minutes equates to over 2 hours in Thai time! Arrived at the island an headed to the Sairee Beach area, with no booking we were winging it I minded the backpacks and Tina went off for half an hour only to come back empty handed, I found out before she came back the fancy resort (which we assumed would be expensive) had a bungalow for 400baht ($12) it was great but only available for 1 night, so feck it we took it anyway...so let that be a lesson don't assume anything! I met an Irish guy who lived here for 9 years I was easily identified by my Dublin jersey, he said he hasn't seen an Irish person in weeks and now there's drives of us here!

So now all the chaos is sorted, what better thing to do then have a swim in the ocean, have a chang and watch the sunset...we had the nicest curries (nice and spicey) so far across the road from the resort.


(Pictures of the Room and Bunglaow are Haad Tian Beach Resort, Koh Phangan)

A Koh Phangan Christmas

Nollaig Shona.....A mild disaster at the start of today..we went out for lunch and I realised I didn't have enough money so had to leave tina in the pub and drive back 20 minutes each way...I did meet an interesting English woman on the way back hitching a lift, she hopped on the back of the bike and we had a chat on our way into town. A roast dinner was on the cards and we knew of an Irish and English pub both serving roasts, we went to the Irish pub (The Harp) and in the true spirit of Authenticity the roast was nearly double the price of the English pub (The roast was over $20), that and there wasn't one Irishman to be found in the place, and the pub itself wasn't anything special. We went to the Mason Arms and had a turkey roast, it was so good 4 hours later we got another 1 to share. I had my first Guinness here in 3 months and it was a decent sup, I got a nudge off someone with a Dub accent asking me what the Guinness was like, the pub had a load of Irish in it, not surprising given the greed of the Irish pub. I headed long before the Queens speech and when I saw the David Beckham poster in the jacks I knew it was time to leave! We headed back to the resort and made our calls to friends and family and at this stage Christmas day was nearly over....Enjoy the snow folks and I'll enjoy the Sun for now!

Kho Phangan

We got a kayak today and it made an interesting journey...and lots of bickering, We took the kayak to Haad Salad for lunch and I had a delicious green curry for breakfast! We ventured to the next beach where we noticed the canoe itself had little holes in it and began to fill with water in the middle of the ocean, we'd travelled a good 20minutes before things started to go titanic on us! We turned around and got here to land OK..so the rest of the afternoon was spent by the pool and we hiked to Haad Yao beach later to have a beer while watching the sunset, there was 2 businesses setting off fireworks, very interesting technique of light and run!..A few of the rockets failed to launch so big explosions on the beach!

Koh Phangan

Got a motorbike today and they gave it to me with not even enough juice to get to a petrol station! Had to walk it to the end of the road and go down the hill on it! Luckily there's plenty of local petrol stops with the petrol in rum bottles. We went snorkelling at Haad Salad, some exotic fish and bits of coral, but not very busy. We took a drive to a waterfall and then headed to Haad Rin where the full moon party happens, one things for sure I'm glad were staying where we are, this beach is what you'd expect to find in Spain. The hills on this island are pretty steep and the bike can struggle up them with lots of new danger signs in accident blackspots.