Getting off the ferry at Koh Lanta was a fraction of the stress of getting on at Phi Phi, the hoards of people pushing past had dissipated in favor of a nice smooth ramp with orderly people in single file at arms width apart.
We had decided on 'Lanta Family' as our resort of choice and as luck would have it there was someone from their resort doing a free taxi run which was a result. We got into the back of his truck and took in the island during the 10 minute journey to our new digs. It looked awsome, early comparisons were made with Koh Tao: it was fairly small and densely forested in the middle. The Thai people were once again smiling which was a big relief, and as we cruised down the main road with the wind rushing though our hair, we had no doubts at all that we had made the right decision to come here one day early.
We were picked up by a chap called Tong. He was really friendly and spoke good English. He was the main man at the resort and sorted us out with a room for 600Baht which at 1st glance seemed fairly good value. The resort was right on the beach (although the bungalow itself was set in from the beach a little). It was a fairly picturesque resort with numerous little lantern lit huts on the beachfront as seating for the restaurant, with the 'Chocolate Bar' to the left of these. Much to Vick's disappointment there was no actual chocolate here on sale! The drinks were also fairly expensive which was a bummer.
Anyway we booked up 4 nights at this place and as soon as we had chucked our bags into the room we were ready to explore. So we went to Tong and inquired about a bike. Also bloody expensive!-100 baht more than we we're used to. We initially folded but then having found out how expensive taxis were we hired it out..
We were well impressed with what we saw on the island but it quickly got dark and so we headed back to our resort after having done a little pitstop in the 7 Eleven to grab some rum and coke to celebrate our arrival on this awsome new island. We decided to eat in the restaurant that night. It was really good, Matt was blown away by the second best curry he'd had in Thailand, a Massaman (best curry was definitely the last night in Freedom Beach where we managed to wangle some pineapple into the Green Curry!)
That night we stayed up on the balcony and drank rum, whacked on the ipod and banted till the early hours. When the rum was gone we decided to walk along the beach and check out some other bars-the 'Chocolate Bar' had been pumping out some ghastly club music for hours so we gave it a miss. We stumbled across a bar which was far more our scene which had some local Thai Rastas playing live. There was a dancefloor area on the sand and a really nice vibe which was brilliant. Unfortunately there was also a trio of very unconvincing lady boys who seemed keen to talk to us, we toyed with the idea of getting a banter snap with them but feared it may just egg them so we headed back to where the Rasta's were grinding out a heart wrenching rendition of the late great Mr. Marley's 'No Woman, No Cry'.
We staggered home after our last drink hadn't sat too well on the stomach and hit the sack.
Over the course of the next few days we encircled the whole island and got some wicked pics. We didn't eat at our resort again and found some amazing dirt cheap restaurants in the main town. We were really enjoying the island but a big problem was emerging. Our resort wasn't quite as good as we had first thought. Now, remember we mentioned Mr.Tong? Well, he turned out to be a bit of a money grabbing old git. It turns out that Vick was onto him from day one, Matt was fooled by his friendly demeanor but Vick had secretly reserved a few chips on this fella. Now the room itself had turned out to be fairly average and on reflection, a bit overpriced. The shower didn't stay on the wall and was cold water only. The lino on the floor was just chucked down, the surface area of which bared no resemblance whatsoever to the surface area of the floor and the whole room was totally infested with ants. All this we could deal with however one thing tipped Miss. Barrett over the edge. Mr. Tong had kindly placed his loud and rubbish music blaring 'Chocolate Bar' about ten meters from our bungalow. Anyone who knows Miss Barrett will also know she is not the heaviest of sleepers and any form of external noise when her head hits the pillow is not welcomed, in fact certain other residents of 23 Barbrook way will testify to the fact that it is often met with hostility..
Well, Tong wanted to drain as much money as he could out of the guests of Lanta Family and so kept his bar open until 4 am. Not a problem for Mr. Ashenden who slept like a baby but the Vickstar had to wait until 4am until sleep was even an option.. The first night had been OK as we'd had a few drinks which aided the sleeping process but after two consecutive sleepless nights, Vick put her foot down on a move. Unfortunately we had paid up front for four nights, but we tried to get the last night refunded so we could move to another place we had found which looked amazing. After much hassle, we managed to get 80% of the money back on the last night.
We kinda fell out with Tong at the end of our stay-he didn't like the fact we wanted a refund but mainly hated the fact that we were drinking on our balcony and not wasting money at his crappy bar, it got pretty petty actually-he had refused to give us an oil burner for our balcony even though there were loads of them at his bar..
Well anyway, we moved to the new place for our last night-Lanta Thrip House. The place was actually a guest house but it was immaculate. The room was probably the best we've had in all of our travels with a fridge and air con and a nice balcony for 800Baht. It was run by a lovely woman who really helped us out during our brief stay. We wanted to move onto Malaysia the next day (we had to-our 30 day visa was on the brink of expiring) and she told us the best way to get there as well as booking up our boat ticket off the island.
That night as we no longer had the bike, she offered to give us a lift and pick us up from a restaurant! When we left we felt a little gutted we hadn't had more time there but we had to move on.
Now, as we have highlighted already, Vick and Matt are quite possibly the grittiest, rawest grizzled travelers ever to have left the UK, and we decided it was time to make a purchase to aid our travels. We looked at a few options: Firstly, a better quality first aid kit-Matt had already mangled his big toe during a bike ride, Secondly a travel fan-we had experienced more than our fair share of sweaty nights. We even considered a second mosquito net as an extra line of defense against our blood sucking friends. In light of all of this and putting our pearls of gritty wisdom into action we made our decision and settled on...
A portable DVD player and 15 DVDS!!!
Quite simply a stunning purchase-boring bus/train journeys now very much a thing of the past! The DVDs are of course all pirate (costing a quid each but almost all perfect quality!)
The next morning, we got the minibus which boarded a ferry across the water from Lanta and arrived at Trang a few hours later. When we got there we were told that we would have to make the journey to Hat Yai that day (we had planned on spending the night in Trang) because the train to Butterworth was at 5am the next day from Hat Yai which we wouldn't have made had we stayed in Trang that night. If we had delayed it would have meant overstaying our Visa. So we arrived at Hat Yai at about 8am, and with the help of the really cool minibus driver who wouldn't drop us off until he had found us a hotel within our price range, checked in and dropped off our luggage in the room. We were really hungry and so decided to explore the local area on foot and to our horror discovered something which we found rather distressing: THE CHINESE WERE BACK!!!
And with them came all the things we had just about pushed to the back of our minds: The dirty streets, the spitting etc. We were gutted about this but knew this was only a brief stop. We found a Auzzie restaurant called 'The Sizzler' serving the most amazing buffet salad and desert bar ever. Of course, Vicks ensured she got her moneys worth that night!
The town really was the pits, it was basically one big brothel with loads of hookers sitting outside the bars trying to reel in the punters with shifty glances. We put the prostitute infestation down to the influence of the Chinese (China was really bad for this too), as did we the presence of about a million rats lining the gutters and pavements..
Now we hadn't actually booked our ticket to Butterworth which left at 5am the next morning, and the ticket office had closed well before we arrived at Hat Yai, so we had to set the alarm for 4am and hopefully get hold of one then-we were really concerned the train would be full and that we would have to spend another night in Hat Yai. The train was about two hours late but luckily we did manage to get a ticket and so we boarded, and said our goodbyes to Thailand. We left with mixed feelings of both sadness and excitement. Excitement at moving on to a new country but real sadness at leaving Thailand. It is a wonderful county-despite the influx of tourism, almost the whole country has coped with this unscathed and to be honest most of the plebs stick to only a few areas meaning the rest is really rewarding to discover for a couple of wizerned old travelers as ourselves.
We had to get off the train on the Thai/Malay boarder to show passports etc. We had a slight problem here: We had overstayed our visa by one day! Our alibi was that our guidebook clearly stated that they allow one-day leeway on the departure date.. Sadly as we had jipped up in England and bought our guide book from that market stool in Chelmsford that sells old books and magazines for about 10p, we had wound up with a guidebook which was two years out of date.. and guess what-that little leeway rule has changed during this time! Oh well, we had to pay 500 Baht each and fill out an unnecessarily long form and we were then able to return to the train..
A few hours later and we arrived at Butterworth..
xx
Thailand
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