My Adventure in Thailand.

The highlight of my summer has been travelling in Thailand. With my best friends, gorgeous weather, beautiful beaches and wonderful people… I had the time of my life!

BANGKOK

Arriving in Bangkok, we were met by a taxi driver who we couldn’t communicate with. He couldn’t understand where we wanted to go, and couldn’t read a map, but nevertheless, we started driving. Ten minutes into our journey, our driver starts behaving oddly – wriggling in his seat, twitching his head and making strange noises… Then he got out of the car in the middle of a traffic jam, and farted! He got back in and said “oooh, bad tummy!!” Another 5 minutes later he was sweating profusely and moving about in his seat. He pulls over the car and sprints to a building, crouches down and…. (!) Then we noticed he’d left a little wet patch on his seat too!! (!) This was our first experience of Thailand :)
I have never experienced weather like in Thailand, the air is so humid and I could barely breathe with my bag on my back! Our hotel, when we finally arrived, was gorgeous (and air-conditioned!) We decided to go and explore the area, and we had only just left our hotel when we had a run in with a stray dog - which scarred us for life as we all thought we were going to be eaten alive. Forgetting that incident, we had a great first night on Khaosan Road. I ordered a Green Thai curry and can only advise other people with a sensitive palate not to! I never learned my lesson the whole time I was in Thailand and continued to order the curries.
On our first full day in Bangkok, we went to the Chatuchak market – which sells everything – even puppies!! But it was so incredibly hot inside this market, and I can’t even describe the state of the toilets… Then we went on a river tour around Bangkok on a longtail boat. You can see two completely different sides to Thailand, the grandeur of the hotels and temples and utter poverty in the shanty towns. We even saw the back of a prison which looked terrifying and the last place on earth I would want to end up! In the evening we went for a few drinks on Khaosan Road again and did some more shopping.

KOH PHANGNAN

The next morning, we were up bright and early to travel to the South East Coast of Thailand. We were travelling in style and flying from Bangkok to Surat Thani. (Although, we had just heard that there had been an inland plane crash in Ko Samui, carrying British passengers, so we weren’t exactly calm travellers!!) Arriving in Surat Thani we caught a bus to the port, but our bus was late leaving so we missed our connecting boat… And ended up waiting for 3 hours for the next boat to Koh Phangnan. Eventually, we arrived on the island and were bundled into the back of a jeep – literally, 17 of us squashed in with all our backpacks! (They have a distinct lack of health and safety in Thailand). We met some lovely people on the way to our accommodation, and had one of those oh-I-hope-this-isn’t-our-stop moments when we arrived…. Only it was. And no one else got out of the jeep. It was pitch black - we literally couldn’t see two feet in front of us, but we were taken by a lovely Thai lady to our hut, which seemed rather dismal. The room could easily fit 5 people, but my friends and I were all scared so we climbed into the same bed and huddled – safety in numbers! The hut seemed really fragile and it was a violently windy night; the door barely locked and we were terrified we were going to be broken into! We decided to sleep with the lights on (again, for safety. You are much safer in the light.).All huddled together, we were starting to relax… and as if on cue…there was a power cut. All screaming we jumped out of bed and were about to go to reception when… a dog barked. Outside our hut, TWO dogs were growling and pacing about our balcony! Do we sit in fear in the dark? Or take our chances with the dogs? (Given our past near death experience with the dog, we took our chances with the dark). We vowed to leave in the morning, and fell asleep to the light of our phones…
In the morning I was the first to wake. Disheartened, I went to go outside (the dogs had gone). I walked outside and I couldn’t believe my eyes – we were in paradise! Our hut was right on the beach, the tide was out and was bright blue; the sand was white and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I grabbed the other girls and we had a little victory dance celebrating things weren’t so bad after all… We spent our first day in paradise swinging on hammocks, lying in the hot sea, drinking cold drinks, eating gorgeous food, meeting the nicest people... I have never been happier!
On the first night on the island we went to a pirate party, which is a pre celebration to the full moon party! This is where we had our first experience with a Thai bucket (I’ll stick to my Bacardi Breezers thanks!) We met so many great people and I was overwhelmed at how many nice people you meet when you’re travelling! We had only been in Thailand for a few days but had met so many great people from all over the world!
Our first experience of a Thai monsoon came one day while we were sunbathing. Thick, dark blue-grey clouds grow bigger and bigger, and all of a sudden the wind picks up. Me, sensing trouble, said “I’m going back to the hut!” The other girls weren’t so smart and got caught in the rain, haha! All of a sudden the heavens opened and rain the size of golfballs came thundering down, and the wind was so strong I thought our hut was going to blow away like Dorothy’s home in the Wizard of Oz!! Then, in true British tourist style, we decided to sit out the monsoon sitting in the sea :)
We spent the next few days and nights with people we had met from the surrounding beach huts. It was so beautiful there I truly never wanted to leave, and the people we had met were brilliant. We went to Haad Rin beach the night before the full moon party and had a great night partying the night away on the beach. The following night was the full moon, so we had pre-drinks at our hut and travelled down to the south of the island to Haad Rin beach again. I have never experienced anything like the full moon party – 30,000 people on the same beach all partying the night away! One of our friends thought it would be a good idea to jump a skipping rope which was on fire… needless to say he sustained a nasty burn and a hefty hospital bill!! We were supposed to be checking out the next morning, however after arriving home at 5am we were in no state to move out in a few hours, so we stayed another day. We ate in a fancy restaurant that night which is where I ate my best meal in Thailand – a red curry (which surprisingly didn’t blow my head off). We spent the night drinking beers on the beach with all our friends and watching the moonlight dance on the waves…. Paradise!

KO SAMUI

In the morning we forced ourselves to say farewell and left Koh Phangan. We caught a boat to the next island, Ko Samui where we were meeting some more friends from Uni. We found a hotel, dumped our bags and went to explore! Ko Samui is more tourist-orientated, with McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Burger King lining the streets. It had a lively nightlife and once again we met some great people. The clubs were great too, we danced the night away in a club called Mango which was great. The beach was beautiful, however slightly spoiled by all the tourists, and it was not as peaceful as Koh Phangnan. We were constantly hassled by local Thai people to buy their jewellery or have an ice cream! Once our friends had arrived and we’d had a lovely reunion, we organised our first day trip…
The Marine National Park is a group of around 48 little islands all grouped together and it is the most beautiful place in the world I have ever seen. The views were absolutely breathtaking, and we stopped at the first island to swim in the sea, sunbathe and kayak around the islands. Words cannot describe the beauty of this place! We all got back on the boat and travelled around to see some more islands. We were allowed to jump off the boat and swim to shore, which was a slight disaster as I very nearly drowned. Fortunately my friends were swimming the 20minute swim with me and they helped me out… until I genuinely thought I saw a shark coming towards me…. I screamed as loud as I could and consequently had everybody screaming and swimming for their lives…. I was even shouting the people on the beach for help…. Oh how they laughed when we walked onto the shore unharmed and very embarrassed!! In the afternoon we climbed a mountain (which is no easy feat in scorching heat!) At the top you reach what is called the view point, where you can see most of the islands and the Emerald Lake. The lake is preserved by the national park and visitors aren’t allowed in it, but it is stunning and luminous green – absolutely breathtaking! Shame that one of my friends had a call of the wild up there in front of her friends and strangers…. Bless her, she couldn’t help it, we’d drunk a lot that day!! :)
The next day we went on an elephant trek – I was a little concerned about agreeing to do this as I thought the elephants would be badly treated, but they weren’t – the owners really cared for their elephants and had worked with them for years and years. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for them though, not being able to roam free but it was a consolation that the owner truly loved his elephant and had looked after her for 15 years!

KO TAO

After spending around 5 days in Ko Samui we journeyed to the next island, Ko Tao. Arriving at Ko Tao was a stressful experience – the phrase “no room at the inn” embodied all new meaning! We were wandering from place to place just looking for a place to sleep for the night! Eventually we found a place, which was a relief – no one wants to traipse around with a massive bag on their back! It wasn’t a bad room, but it was very expensive and we were told we had to leave in the morning!! And go through the same process all over again! Trust me, it’s an absolute nightmare. Our friends weren’t so lucky and ended up staying the night on the floor of a restaurant! The following morning was very stressful but we did find a place in the end, so we could finally relax. Although there were 5 of us squashed in to 2 beds with no air-conditioning. And two of the girls weren’t very well. And Ko Tao was definitely the hottest island!! The weather in Ko Tao, as it had been for the rest of the time we had been there, was fantastic. The beach was beautiful too. We spent our days and evenings on the beach, every night there was a beach party and we randomly met up with the same people we had met on the first island!
We decided to go snorkelling one day, seeing as Ko Tao is famous for its diving. Our first stop to snorkel was called Shark Bay – and given our experience in Ko Samui, we weren’t too keen to jump in the water! In the end we all jumped in and had a splash around looking at the coral. I loved snorkelling! We were getting further and further away from the boat when all of a sudden my friend grabbed my arm and pointed forward. Gracefully swimming ahead of us was a shark. I was so excited! Surprisingly I wasn’t frightened, it seemed so agile and beautiful! And the local Thai people had told us that these sharks were vegetarian. :) So we swam back to the boat and told our friends, who proceeded to get out of the water. We wanted another look so we swam back, and saw it again! This time is was slightly closer but it was so amazing! On the way back to the boat I spotted this gigantic fish swimming slowly away. So I proceeded to swim after it…. Then it turned around displaying its gaping mouth with huge teeth like razors and swam in my direction… so I swam for my life back to the boat and decided not to follow any more big fish. The day ended in Nang Yuan Island, which is a strip of sand that connects two little islands. Myself and one of my friends thought we would climb up to the view point again on the top of one of these islands. Bad decision considering we were tired and boiling hot, and the climb was practically vertical. We were even pleading with people we came across to carry us!! We ended up collapsing in a fit of giggles but eventually struggled to the top – when the steps ended and we were literally climbing up boulders! The view was worth it, the islands looked so beautiful! We spent our last night drinking Changs on the beach (Thai beer) and talking about how much fun we’d had and how we really didn’t want to leave!! Then we went to a “lady-boy” Cabaret show…. Which was surprisingly a good laugh!

BANGKOK

We travelled up to Bangkok the next day. We caught a boat to Surat Thani again but had a nightmare at the port because I had lost my ticket! After lots of stressful running about and lots of sweating, they finally let me get on the bus, and 7 hours later we arrived in Bangkok. On our last day we visited the Grand Palace in the morning and saw the Emerald Buddha. The temples are so grand and ornate; made up of murals and mosaics they are an impressive sight, pictures will never do them justice! In the afternoon we went to MBK – an air-conditioned shopping centre which is the biggest shopping centre I have ever seen!! My friend was so happy to shop, she cried with joy! (Really). There were so many floors and areas and I spent a small fortune on presents and jewellery. On our last night we met up with some more friends from home who had been travelling separately. After dinner we went to the Baiyoke sky scraper and up to the 83rd floor – (yes my ears popped, and I felt a bit dizzy so had to sit down when I reached the top) but the panoramic views were incredible! Bangkok was lit up and the view was absolutely stunning. We stayed there for a while then returned to Khaosan road for more shopping and drinking.
So there we have it. That was my trip to Thailand this summer, I didn’t want it to end and I cannot wait to go back to Thailand and travel some more in the future. Thailand is such a beautiful place and the people are so wonderful that I cannot urge people enough to go and see it for themselves. I hope you enjoyed my blog, sorry if it was boring… I’m pretty sure that the only people who would have found this interesting are the people that went with me!