Thailand - Bangkok & The Islands

We took the sleeper train from Chiang Mai to Bangkok - a cool 14 hours. I'd heard alot about how amazing Thai trains were supposed to be so I was a tad disappointed when it turned out to be abit of a shit-heap really, maybe it was my own fault for getting too excited about something as basic as a train journey (how things have changed...)

Bangkok was exactly the same as last year - smelly, smoggy, sweaty & seedy but we were using it purely as an over-nighter before we hit Koh Samui. We did a spot of shopping and then tracked down a really good bar we had visited last year which plays live music. We ended up partying with a load of Israelis's til the early hours - a good night.

The next morning we started our journey to Koh Samui (complete with thick heads). In the interests of saving 500 Bht (7 whole quid) we had fashioned probably the most complicated and long-winded journey known to man. Rather than taking an hours direct flight we opted for a triathlon of transport. So, 6 hours later after a 50 min flight to Surat Thani, a 2 hour bus ride and then a 90 min ferry we arrived in Samui and promptly re-invested our so preciously saved 500 Bht in Singha beers and Pad Thai.

The following few days in Samui were either relaxing or lazy depending on how you look at it - up by mid-day, abit of food, chilling on the beach, abit more food, beers then bed. We were staying in a great guesthouse and were sort of adopted by the guys who run the bar so we spent the evenings chilling with them. Some of our best nights have been spent with the locals, they are far more interesting to talk to and have an awesome sense of humour. We did manage to go and watch some Muay Thai one evening at Samui's new posh stadium. We were lucky enough to see some decent Championship fights with three of the six flights resulting in knockouts so its fair to say we got our moneys-worth of bloodshed.

Next stop was Koh Phangan, the island itself is about half the size of Samui and about 10 years behind interms of being wrecked by westernisation. We had arranged to meet Rob & Kristy our Canadian friends we travelled through Vietnam with so we had three good days catching up with them before they headed back to Vancouver. The nightlife in Koh Phangan is based largely around bars on the beach, they all put mats and little tables out at night so you can drink on the sand. Some of them have massive TV screens and show movies so it is like going to the cinema at home apart from it is free and your lying under the stars drinking a Singha beer.

The coolest thing in my opinion though are the fire dancers. These guys are so talented and they basically dance on the shore with either two chains or a long stick which has been dipped in oil and then lit so at night you can just see these mad flames and they do loads of different tricks. At one bar they have a dancer at each end of the matted area where everyone sits drinking and one guy will throw his flaming stick or chain over the crowd so all you can see is a flying ball of fire above your head, his mate will somehow catch it (I have no idea how as it really dark) and do some crazy tricks then throw it back. I'm wondering if there is a demand for this sort of carry on in Clapham...

Koh Phangan hosts a monthly Full Moon Party which is probably one of the craziest nights we have had whilst travelling. We were lucky enough to get accommodation on Koh Phangan but many people don't so as the evening is warming up there is a constant stream of speedboats pulling up on the beach to drop people off from neighbouring islands. By about 11pm the main beach is absolutely rammed with up to 8,000 people all covered in fluorescent paint dancing and drinking to banging music. There is such a good atmosphere and luckily there was hardly any cloud cover so you could see the moon really clearly, it looked really impressive reflecting off the water. The party usually lasts until about 9am and then there is an after-party on the other side of the island. We had been partying pretty hard on the build up to Full Moon so I threw in the towel at 6am..... what a lightweight!

Our next stop - Penang (Malaysia)