Hi from Koh Samui
Firstly…hello to our new followers–the Travis family from Kirkland. Nice to know you are checkin’ in on us.
So, I often think throughout the day when something is happening–“I have to remember to blog about that!!” and then when I sit down to write I forget so much…
As I said previously, we are sort of “off the radar” for a few days due to the internet no longer being free at the place we are currently staying. We did buy a small chunk of “net time” but are using it sparingly for Troy to get some work done and to upload blog entries or check e-mail.
So this new place we are at is very cool–VERY different than the Sugar Palm. The website said is was a lush tropical garden setting. Boy were they right. It is set up a hillside with full on coconut trees (I know this due to the coconuts–NOT because I know my tropical trees yet!). There are all kinds of shrubs, flowers and ferns too. We were “upgraded” to a villa, which to them is kind of a little house of our own. It has three bedrooms and is unlike a hotel in any way other than the ladies still come in the morning and make our beds etc. The rooms are all wood inside and the shower is not really a shower–it just comes out of the wall and we stand in the floor in the bathroom and shower–maybe this is more traditional showering style here–not sure yet. The rooms all have individual controlled AC with a remote control, so you can adjust from your bed should you find it too cold or not cold enough…so this is nice for those us too lazy to get out of bed to tend to our comfort! (That would be me! I am almost getting to lazy to get out of bed to turn off the lights at night too–Hahaha!) The beds are softer than the Sugar Palm (which had undeniably the most uncomfortable beds I have ever been on), but the pillows are small and hard–so every place has its issues eh? The pool is big and has a waterfall to play under at one end–there is sometimes music–I think the volume depends on whether the guy working the bar likes the song or not : )
We ate at the hotel restaurant last night due to be exhausted from a VERY long day-more about that to come! It was a pleasant surprise to see that the meals ranged from 70 to 100 baht ($2.50-$3 USD)–this is very cheap for a hotel restaurant. As you can imagine!! The food was really good also–and we did not have to get back in a vehicle. Let me tell you why this was important. We had just had the longest day of our life!! I should start by telling what were expecting our day to look like. The very nice lady at the booth outside our hotel told us that a nice big AC van would come to our hotel and pick us up at 7:40am and take us to the ferry terminal where we would have prepaid tickets on the ferry–all we had to do when we got off on the other side at 4pm was get a taxi to our room. So here is how it really went….We were up, packed, fed and in our shuttle by 7:40 am. It was a van that held 12 people–and yes there were twelve people in it–AC was so-so to say the least. We traveled like this (sardines) on our way to Donsak ferry terminal (or so we thought) for 4+ hours (with one “bathroom” stop at one of the scariest rest stops I have ever seen (and I have seen some dodgy stuff since I got here)). The driver actually went to Surat Thani (busy commercial town) and stopped basically in the street and told us to get out and he unloaded our bags in the street. So lesson number one–you never know where they are going to take you. So we are at some kind of transfer station, as in they are going to put us on another bus to take us to Donsak. So this “is what it is” at this point…I am wondering how long?? So I ask the gal sitting behind a desk at her laptop playing solitaire. She says 1 hour. NOW I am getting cranky–until now I was just mildly irritated. So we sit down in the sweltering, smelly, muggy heat (it had to be 95 degrees) and there were probably 40 people standing in this little tiny hole in the wall waiting for another bus. Am I painting a good picture??
I am starting to notice something–people are being taken one by one up to another desk with red stools and as I watch, I see everyone getting out their wallets and coming away with stickers on their shirts. I struck up a conversation with a french girl sitting next to me–as it turns out, she is an adventurous backpacker and she predicted exactly what was going on. They were “pre-selling” taxi rides on the other side. Now this sounds like a great idea doesn’t it?? Take some of the worry out of the trip you say?? Yes, we thought so too—so Troy did a wonderful job of working the guy down from 900 to 700 baht for the taxi to our hotel. It would be a private vehicle, AC, they would be standing there with our name on a card–so we would know who our driver was etc etc etc. What a great deal they say–because the drivers will charge you 200 baht per person if you do not prepay your taxi. Anyway—we come away with our precious “SAMUI” and “Taxi” stickers now–yes, one for all of us. There is one other group to visit the red stools after us…and then –miracles upon miracles, the bus pulls up. Just as my french friend said it would–Haha–nobody goes until everyone has vistied the red stool. So we find our bags in the pile of EVERYONE’s bags and haul them down the street to what appears from the outside to be one of those 2 story touring buses. BK gets all excited—she states emphatically—I have ALWAYS wanted to ride one of these!!. So right after we sit down, I realize we do not have air conditioning and there are ants crawling all over the seat in front of me—but if there is one thing I have learned to get over on this trip, it is my feelings about bugs. I started off trying to squish them as I thought I could take care of it—but then I gave up–live and let live?? OK—so we thump and bump down the road for another 45 minutes (me sweating like PIG–I did not know there was more in me) and we screech up to the terminal (I think we are cutting it close as I saw the helper on the bus run full steam both ways into the booth to get our tickets (YAHOO I think to myself–at least the part about getting the ferry tickets included was right). So the bus stops and we all pile out in the parking lot and once again, they toss our bags out on the pavement. But we are rolling with it now…We trudge across the parking lot in our collective pools of sweat—maybe we floated–I do not know…we get on the ferry…Jackie is asking me–do you think they have chicken fingers and fries like the ferry to Granny’s? I say–I doubt it honey! What they do have is no AC (was not necessarily expecting it-but it WOULD have been nice), all the Thai people sitting under the fans (because they know what they are doing obviously) and chips and Thai style cup of noodles–so given that it is 2pm now and we have not eaten since 7am the chips are looking pretty good–the kids all scarfed down a bag each and then we got some Thai style snack/cookies things that were actually pretty good.
So this is where it gets dodgy again!! The ferry docks and we pack up ALL our bags again (CAN YOU SAY SHERPA??)…we walk all the way down the terminal to the main land and start our search for the guy with our name on a card. We are not alone in this search—all the other people who were in that shack with us are all looking for their private cars to take them to their hotel. There are a couple of drivers there who are looking for fares–the mysterious thing is they kind of seem to know what we are talking about but when we ask where to go–they play dumb. So they wait until all the people are off the ferry that they have offered the 200 baht ride to and then another miracle occurs–now they will take our slips and give us a ride. Hmmmmm…
So they jam 10 of us into a decrepid old van (riding in all these vehicles here is really starting to make my 12 year old minivan at home look like a cadilac!) So no private ride for us…at least our bags made it into the back of the vehicle and at our feet. The other 4 people had theirs nicely set on top of the van—the roads here are horrendous–so with every bump and thump, they got more and more nervous because their bags were not strapped down. I was starting to get pretty nervous (and I could tell BK was too) when we saw some of the areas we drove through on the way to the hotel. Then haleluijah–we pulled up to our hotel and it looked more like my kind of place….The ladies left in the van asked me to check on their bags when I got out–WOW–they were there! I was not really expecting them to be…
So lesson number 2–not sure how to put this—but I know it has something to do with the taxi. I think the scam here is that they pre-sell the taxi rides on the other side to make some money for their tourist agency but it does not guarantee anything as the drivers on this side wait to see if they can get a “full fare” first and then when the ferry is empty and they see that they can not–they will take us pre-booked folks. So if that had been their lucky day—it would have been very unlucky for us to say the least. Fortunately for us, we had a young Irish fellow in our van that teaches English in Phuket that helped the driver understand he HAD to take us to our hotel VS dropping us off on the main drag and us having to make our way via walking or another taxi to our actual hotel.
There will be a full moon here tonight—and this is apparently a big deal to celebrate in an all night party fashion. We of course will not be doing this–but our hotel is having a special buffet supper with some special music and prizes (or so they say) from 7-10pm. So we are going to hang out here and partake–if I can stay up that long……There is going to be mango and sticky rice for a dessert option–so we are all looking forward to that…
More to follow…
