In September, I decided to take my colleague's advice by taking a little vacation around Christmas. I wanted to escape from the Dutch winter gloom to somewhere sunny and, preferably, a little warm. My first thought was the Canary Islands, but I wasn't impressed by the results of the web research I did on them. I somehow settled on Laos, probably based on some online travel article I read on the beauty of Luang Prabang. After researching flight prices for a few weeks, I settled on departing from Amsterdam to Bangkok on December 31st, and returning from Bangkok on January 21st.
After more research on getting from Bangkok to Luang Prabang once I was in Southeast Asia - and more reading on Bangkok and Thailand - I decided that my time would be best spent staying in Thailand rather than negotiating the slow journey from Bangkok to Luang Prabang. And, after further consultation with friends who have been to Thailand multiple times, I decided to recover from jet lag in Koh Samui, a beach resort island in the Gulf of Thailand. So, immediately after my 12 hour flight, I booked a one way ticket from Bangkok to Koh Samui.
Koh Samui is the largest island in the Samui Archipelago, which is an hour flight south of Bangkok, and about 20 miles east of the thin strand of Thailand that borders the Andaman Sea (which is, as best as I can tell, the Indian Ocean) on the west and the Gulf of Thailand on the east. It used to be primarily an agricultural and foraging community (coconut harvesting, fishing), but the money of wealthy Western tourists has transformed the coastal perimeter into a destination for (mostly) lounging on the beach and eating, getting "dates" with Thai women, and drinking (naturally, these are not mutually exclusive activities).
I spent five days on Koh Samui. Retrospectively, this is a bit too much time for someone with my taste in vacation activities. Much of the crowd felt younger (or, at least, more into drinking and dancing) or older, and I found the tourist resort nature of the island a bit off-putting. Also, although cheap by Western standards, the island is one of the more expensive places in Thailand.
This isn't to say that I failed to enjoy myself on Koh Samui. On the contrary, I indulged in Thai massages in open walled bungalows only meters from the beach with the sound of the ocean drowning out the chatter of the beach goers on the sand. I ate in beach side restaurants, alternating between reading a book and simply staring out into the sea. I joined a day tour of the island, where a van full of people were shuttled around to a variety of sites, including the "Big Buddha" (a 40 foot high statue overlooking a cliff), a jungle park in the middle of the island where I took a quick, hour long solo hike to the top of a waterfall, and a "monkey show," where a man demonstrates how a trained monkey climbs coconut trees to retrieve coconuts.
I also took a day trip to Ang Thong Marine Park, a largely undeveloped and uninhabited array of 40+ islands west of Koh Samui. The hour long boat ride across the teal waters was alone worth the price of the tour. But the real treat came when the large boats that transported the tour group docked a few hundred feet from one of the largest islands, and we took smaller motor boats to the sandy shore. At this point, all ~200 people on the tour had the option to do whatever they wished - swim, snorkel, kayak, drink beer, or hike to a lookout point high on the island. As much as I do enjoy beer (though my affection is tempered when the beer comes from Southeast Asia), I took the hiking option.
The trek up the trail was substantially more difficult than I had expected. It was one of the steeper trails I've hiked, and I was grateful for the thick, taught rope that ran alongside the path and saved me from falling down or off the trail several times. It was also the slipperiest trail I've ever hiked, with runny mud surrounding smooth, slick slabs of rock. After a little less than an hour of hiking - and some pretty profuse sweating in the hot and humid tropical air - I made it to the summit and took in a glorious panoramic view of the tail below, the boats in the water, and the other surrounding islands.
I'd spend another day on Koh Samui relaxing and recovering from the swimming and hiking of the trip to the marine park before departing for my next destination: Khao Sok.
I spent five days on Koh Samui. Retrospectively, this is a bit too much time for someone with my taste in vacation activities. Much of the crowd felt younger (or, at least, more into drinking and dancing) or older, and I found the tourist resort nature of the island a bit off-putting. Also, although cheap by Western standards, the island is one of the more expensive places in Thailand.
This isn't to say that I failed to enjoy myself on Koh Samui. On the contrary, I indulged in Thai massages in open walled bungalows only meters from the beach with the sound of the ocean drowning out the chatter of the beach goers on the sand. I ate in beach side restaurants, alternating between reading a book and simply staring out into the sea. I joined a day tour of the island, where a van full of people were shuttled around to a variety of sites, including the "Big Buddha" (a 40 foot high statue overlooking a cliff), a jungle park in the middle of the island where I took a quick, hour long solo hike to the top of a waterfall, and a "monkey show," where a man demonstrates how a trained monkey climbs coconut trees to retrieve coconuts.
I also took a day trip to Ang Thong Marine Park, a largely undeveloped and uninhabited array of 40+ islands west of Koh Samui. The hour long boat ride across the teal waters was alone worth the price of the tour. But the real treat came when the large boats that transported the tour group docked a few hundred feet from one of the largest islands, and we took smaller motor boats to the sandy shore. At this point, all ~200 people on the tour had the option to do whatever they wished - swim, snorkel, kayak, drink beer, or hike to a lookout point high on the island. As much as I do enjoy beer (though my affection is tempered when the beer comes from Southeast Asia), I took the hiking option.
The trek up the trail was substantially more difficult than I had expected. It was one of the steeper trails I've hiked, and I was grateful for the thick, taught rope that ran alongside the path and saved me from falling down or off the trail several times. It was also the slipperiest trail I've ever hiked, with runny mud surrounding smooth, slick slabs of rock. After a little less than an hour of hiking - and some pretty profuse sweating in the hot and humid tropical air - I made it to the summit and took in a glorious panoramic view of the tail below, the boats in the water, and the other surrounding islands.
I'd spend another day on Koh Samui relaxing and recovering from the swimming and hiking of the trip to the marine park before departing for my next destination: Khao Sok.
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