We are now in Bangkok after a few beach and island focused weeks in Southern Thailand where the weather has been very hot and sunny. It's been a mix of busy boat tour days and laid back beach and pool days. In between I've spent some time changing how image posts work here so that I can post a bunch of photos in one go which will hopefully be a much better way to share things. 

We left Koh Samui where I left off last post by ferry which ended up being a bit stressful. We had decided to wait until the morning off our departure to choose the best timed boat as it looked like there were departures all day. When we went to book that morning we found that only a few were still available, the most suitable of which was in 90 minutes and left from the other side of the island. Luckily we were able to get packed up and into a taxi quickly enough that we made it with about 10 minutes to spare. Had we missed it it would have been a long wait to get the other available boat late in the afternoon.

The ferry's destination was the island of Koh Phagnan which is best known for its crazy full moon beach parties. That's not really our scene and luckily it wasn't close to the full moon so things were very relaxed and fairly quiet. We decided to rent a car here since Grab (similar to Uber which isn't in Thailand) is not available on the island and the only taxi option was really expensive and charged per person. We got a cute little blue Suzuki Swift which was perfect and made getting around much more comfortable. The other more common option would have been to rent a motorbike which a lot of tourists do but we felt like the paying a bit more for a much safer option was worth it. There are some insane tourist drivers around and the roads on the islands are often not the best.

 

Our main excursion from Koh Phagnan was a day trip to Ang Thong National Marine Park. The park consists of several picturesque islands covered in jungle. We stopped off at the largest of the islands to hike 500m up to a view point. It doesn't sound all that far but it was steps the entire way, with some sections being very steep. Everyone walking it was absoultely drenched by the time they reached the top but the views were worth it. We were lucky to see some monkeys one the way too.

A section of the steep hike. 

Next up was a stop for lunch where we were ravenous after the exertion. The food was great although you had to be quick to get the watermelon that was for dessert before it got swarmed by hundreds of wasps. Lunch was followed by some kayaking and then a final stop at a lagoon called Ko Mae Ko. It's technically a lagoon since it is connected to the sea by a cave beneath the ground but it looks like a lake from above with steep cliffs leading down to the water. The return journey back to Koh Phagnan was very rough as the wind had come up during the day but we made it back in one piece!

Ko Mae Ko Lagoon

After Koh Phagnan was a short two night stay in Koh Tao which is another island about an hour to the north. It was probably a bit of a mistake to come for such a short time as we only had one full day here. Koh Tao is renowed for snorkelling and diving and most of the activities are focused on that. We did a round the island snorkelling trip on an old converted fishing boat and saw some great fish and coral. I even saw a huge turtle which was fun since I'd never seen one before. There were quite a lot of sea lice in some parts which feel like little prickly stings as you swim so that wasn't so great. I also stupidly managed to get quite sunburnt by the end of the day which I think was partly caused by the sea lice since I was trying to brush the off and probably wiped away all of the sunblock I had on. 

Koh Tao streets

The sunburn was a real pain the next day as we had a big travel day. We were switching coasts from the East to the West, travelling to Ao Nang Beach in Krabi province. This journey required a three hour ferry followed by another three hours in a van, both of which were very uncomfortable with a sunburned back! Ao Nang was quite a nice spot but was very touristy. There were lots of restaurants and tailors with people outside trying to entice you inside. I've never understood why places do this as it's an instant turn off for me. I also wonder how often people decide to buy a new suit from a stranger on a whim. I guess it must work if so many places are doing it. Ao Nang has a really nice night market which is mostly food but has a lot of variety. It was almost overwhelming trying to decide what to eat with all the heat and smells from the various food stalls.

 

Ao Nang Beach

A short boat ride from Ao Nang is Railay Beach. It's only accessible via the water due to huge cliffs which make it very picturesque. We had originally planned to stay here instead of Ao Nang and had booked a nice hotel very early on but sadly by the time we actually started planning the trip we realised that the dates were much too late and in the meantime the prices had shot up. We did visit for a day though which was fun. 

Railay

Access to Railay is via these longtail boats which travel back and forth all day

The final island that we visited was Koh Lanta which was a couple hours south of Ao Nang. It's just a short car ferry from the mainland so it felt a lot less islandy than the rest, not that that was a bad thing. Koh Lanta was much of the same with lots of beach and pool time, and nightly sunset viewings. One thing that did stand out here was the food. We had a great little bakery/cafe just down the road from our hotel that we visited three times that made its own sourdough and great smoothie bowls. Dinners were excellent too and always really cheap. It felt the most laid back of all the places we visited.

 

Phi Phi Traffic

From Koh Lanta we did a day trip to the Phi Phi Islands which are an extremely touristy but very beautiful group of islands just under an hour away from the mainland. The islands were made famous after the movie The Beach was filmed at Maya bay on Phi Phi Le. The number of visitors is quite insane with what seems like an endless stream of boats going in and out. Because of this access to Maya bay is now over land only with no swimming allowed, and no boats allowed inside the bay in order to protect the coral which had been severely damaged by anchors. We were quite lucky with our timing on our tour and managed to visit Maya bay when the crowds were quite small. 

Phi Phi Traffic again

 

 

That ends the beach and island focused part of our trip. It was great to be able to visit a few different areas and do some good day trips. In terms of the beaches themselves, I was a little disappointed. There is a huge amount of rubbish both on the beaches and in the water. Some places are better than others (Koh Samui was horrendous) but sadly even in national parks isolated from where people actually live it's still a big problem. It's quite sad to arrive at what looks like a wild beach to find thousands of plastic bottles washed up above the high tide line. A lot of the beaches were also very tidal, and quite muddy when the tide was out. It probably makes me sound a bit spoiled to complain about it, but I think for a place that's famous for it's beaches the majority weren't really that special or enticing. The scenery on the other hand was quite awesome and is definitely worth seeing, just don't expect it to be some sort of perfect paradise like all the travel blogs make it out to be. 

Next up on the trip is a visit to Khao Sok National Park, a few more days in Bangkok, and then on to Vietnam. It's been hard to keep these posts up to date but hopefully I'll be able to catch up a bit. In the meantime the image posts will be more frequent and up to date.