Today we said a fond farewell to Kaw Kwang and made our way to Ao Nang.

First up was breakfast. Breakfast here has been one of those help yourself to a variety of breakfasts that catering for all: cereals, croissants, toast, pancakes, potatoes, meat, fruit, salad, other indistinguishable food stuffs, as well as the obligatory egg station.

Next it was time to pack. On the way here Helen’s rucksack had strangely gained in weight, in that it had become bloody heavy compared to mine, so we needed to sort that out. After a bit of trading we came to something that would work. My rucksack now being heavier, I am ‘the man’ of course.

We had to wait an hour between checking out and making our way to the pier. Picked a book for the boat:

So another visit to Ban Sala Dan pier – the personification of organised chaos. Where we were stickered up and placed, hopefully, on the correct ferry.

On the way to Ao Nang we dropped off and picked up a few passengers at Railay Beach (it’s on our list of places to go next week) – although dropping and picking up passengers at sea is a hair raising experience. Railay looks fantastic, looking forward to the trip there.

The boat took about 3 hours in the end, and as is the way, we ended up in the right van heading to Krabi Resort, our base for the remainder of the trip.

Krabi Resort is a pretty posh place – some would even say luxury – we were even taken to our room by cute little bell boy cart.

This evening we had a quick look round the resort before having something to eat. More tomorrow.

Day 9 – Ko Lanta. Ao Nang.

Fact of the Day: The Thai language has 44 consonants and 32 vowels. Plus six tones that are critical to pronunciation. For example, the word ‘mai’ means ‘no’, ‘wood’, ‘new’, ‘silk’ and ‘burn’, depending on which intonation you give it.

Our last full day at Ko Lanta today. After much consideration we opted for another relaxing beach day.

Breakfast went well.

The rest of the day was spent on the beach alternating between pool and sea for a cool down. The place seemed a bit quieter today for some reason – although a couple of families from the UK were to appear in the afternoon with their screaming kids.

We also bagged ourselves a couple of well cool hats. If you can’t look silly on holiday, when can ya!? Although, Helen does seem to think she actually looks cool.

We had a little explore around the rocks and mangroves at the far end of the bay – the original plan was to attempt to get round the corner in time for the sunset. However, when Helen saw the ‘razor sharp’ rocks that needed climbing across as well as the ‘slippery as ice’ rocks that blocked our route, she decided against ‘risking her life’ to see a sunset.

Dinner was lovely.

Also managed desert tonight.

In between dinner and dessert we did both have a near death experience. Most of the time here the worry has always been the mozzies. Tonight, our focused changed. Picture the scene….

We’d just given our dessert order to the waitress, I had begun writing this very blog post, Helen was on her phone sending me some pictures. Then it happened. I could hear the distant rumble of wings, big wings. Something big, something scary was heading directly at me at break neck speed. For a split second my life flashed before, but with the reactions of Jackie Chan, I unleashed a karate chop worthy of Bruce Lee. My aim was perfect, the beast barely touched my face before I sent it straight at Helen (not my intended target – I was in survival mode). Her reactions were less Bruce Lee, and more Bruce Forsyth, as the beast smacked her straight in the face and dropped to the table. It was then we realised it was a cockroach, the biggest cockroach the world has ever seen. The Beast from the East. In a split second it was gone, leaving behind two tourists as gibbering wrecks, and heading for the bar for a stiff brandy.

Tonight, once recovered: Friendly Bar.

Day 8 – Ko Lanta. The Beast from the East.

Fact of the Day: In Thailand, the head is the most important part of the body. Consequently, no one must ever touch another person, even a child, on the head.

This was our first whole beach day of the trip.

The plan was to bag some sunbeds and chill by the beach. The place we’re staying at is in a lovely position, at the far end of Khlong Dao bay on the west coast of Ko Lanta Lai. It has a pool, a lovely sheltered tree/grass part, right on the beach with the usual bar and restaurant, and with plenty of other restaurants and bars all close by. All good.

Just before sunset I did manage a lovely run along the beach: 1.6 miles to the end of the bay – popped in the sea for a cool down – 1.6 miles back.

In the evening we walked down to a bar called ‘Focus’ for cocktails. It was the sort of place that you can imagine would be banging in the high season. But tonight, it was very quiet, at one stage we were the only people in it! Our only job was to consume cocktails and avoid the hole.

Day 7 – Beach

Fact of the Day: Thailand is the world’s largest producer of tin.

It was an early start for breakfast and then a 7.45am pickup to Rassada Pier to make our way to Ko Lanta.

It was the usual get in a minivan with another load of tired travellers (although you do get the odd smile and grunt of acknowledgement) and head to the pier. Only today we had the added of excitement of me having to sit on some sort of pull down attached seat, well you could barely call it a seat, for the journey.

[This would be the position of the picture of said seat – except I needed both hands to hang on for dear life – no chance of working a camera as well.]

You can’t get a ferry directly to Ko Lanta, we had to change ferries at Ko Phi Phi. The ferry we took was absolutely fine – complimentary food and drinks – bit of a battle to get rucksacks from the pile stored in the depths of the boat, but overall not too bad at all. 2 hours to Ko Phi Phi.

So after a short stop and change of boats we were on our way again. Less comfortable boat for the second half of the journey. Although, again, made it in one piece. 90 mins and we had arrived at a very chaotic looking Ban Sala Dan pier.

There were various boats all docking at the same time, 1000s of people all clambering from one boat to another, some going, some coming, 100s of taxi drivers looking for fares, and everyone frantically looking through their pockets for the 10 baht entry clean up fee (some sort of mafia organisation no doubt), but as is the Thai way, you seem to get where you are going. For us, a fella holding a Kaw Kwang Beach Resort sign.

10 mins later we were in the back of his van and making the short 10min journey to our next stopover: Kaw Kwang Beach Resort situated within a beautiful bay.

Check-in was pain free, as is usual, so that by about 3ish in the afternoon we were in our fantastic little beach hut bungalow chalet thingy.

After a lovely dinner of rice, noodles, stir fry veg, satay chicken and onion rings we headed on a gentle stroll along the beach looking for a cool hip bar to chill in. We found it: The Mookandabar.

Lovely Thai fella owned it, he was very excited about the evening’s footy, Liverpool Manchester City in the Champions League. He did ask ‘what my team was’ – my reply of Charlton Athletic offered less excitement.

Day 7 – Phuket. Boat. Ko Lanta.

Fact of the Day: Thailand is home to the world’s hairiest child. I like this fact.

After a late breakfast of omelette, croissants and toast we set off in a taxi (yes, that’s right, no minivans in sight today) for the 20 min drive to Patong Beach.

And what should happen as soon as we set foot out of the taxi? You wouldn’t believe it!!We win a free 18 night stay at a 5-star resort just round the corner, as well as a plethora of iPads, iPhones and other lovely tech. Stavros, their local rep was also very happy – although his acting needs some work – as our good fortune meant he picked up a few quid too. I mean, what are the chances of us winning just that like!?! And all we had to do was just jump on a tuk-tuk for the short trip to this new spangly resort to claim our prize. Suffice to say, we turned down this one in a million chance win, well we had things to do, find a couple of sunbeds and relax on the beach for starters. Sorry Stavros.

The rest of the day went something like this:

• Chilling on the beach
• Lunch – very salty disgusting Thai food – the worse food of the trip so far
• Inadvertently wandering into a coffee shop that was closed and ordering drinks – the fella tried to tell us it was closed. We couldn’t understand what he was saying – he served us drinks anyway, which we sat inside, drank and relaxed – we left. At which point we realised it was actually closed. Oops.
• Chilling on the beach – and believe it or not you get free WiFi on the beach.

It was our first bit of beach action on the trip. It was lovely to relax in the sun. Headed back to the hotel at about 6pm in taxi. We had a lovely lady taxi driver who attempted to ‘chat’ with us on the way, even though she knew very little English and we knew absolutely no Thai – traffic was mega busy – 1000s of scooters and minivans everywhere. We had dinner and drinks at the hotel and a reasonably early night. Early start tomorrow.

Day 6 – Patong Beach.

Fact of the Day: Thailand has a slightly different order of priority for occupying public transport seats. It is as follows: monks, the elderly, pregnant women, children, women.

Today we checked out of the lovely Sasi House to make our way to Phuket. We had two options for the trip: the minivan, or take a boat.

We choose, well actually I choose the dreaded minivan, of course I did, I’m a glutton for punishment. Well, I was thinking that there is going to be plenty of boat action ahead, so today was a road day. Helen was entirely convinced.

We booked the trip, 800 baht each, it was due to take roughly two and a half hours. Unsurprisingly, it ended up taking a tad more.

All began very well, an 11am pickup, driver was on time. There were a few couples on the bus already, we were expecting to get straight on the road to Phuket. That’s what we were expecting. It didn’t happen quite like that.

First stop was some sort of out of town bus station where we were told to get off the bus, given stickers with ‘Town’ (Phuket Town) written on and sent to wait in the shade. About 10 mins later and ‘Phuket Town’ was called out and we made our way back on the same bus we had just exited!

Luggage went on the roof, passengers inside (I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was the other way round) and off we went to Phuket. It took quite a while, 4 hours in total, including a couple of fag stops for the driver.

We were dropped off in ‘town’, which ended up being a bus station. So it was a 200 baht taxi to the next stopover, a B&B in Old Town Phuket: Cool Residence.

After a bit of chilling we headed into Old Town for food. It was a short walk to ‘Old Town’ good and proper, although it wasn’t particularly clear what was ‘Old Town’ and what was just ‘Rundown Town’. We wasn’t that impressed.

However, we did find a lovely restaurant, ‘Le Cafe’, where we had the most beautiful food we’ve had on the trip so far. First impressions can be deceiving. Also a chance for Helen to show off her humidity hair.

Day 4 – Krabi. Minivan. Phuket.

Fact of the Day: It is strictly against the law to criticise the monarchy.