I’m writing this from A’s Coffee Shop in Thonsala, the port town in Koh Phangan. According to the framed (and signed) photo on the wall this place comes highly recommended by Sam Fox. Excellent.
We’ve spent the last few nights on Had Salad beach, a beautiful quiet little bay with lovely clear waters for swimming. The beach itself is very narrow, particularly at high tide, and you often have to paddle to walk the length of it. we’ve had a nice chilled time here on Koh Phangan, which was pretty much enforced by my back, but now we’re ready for some action! By the way, if you ever come to Had Salad you HAVE to eat at Jang’s Kitchen, literally the best Thai food I have ever tasted in any restaurant in my life EVER. Thank you for that recommendation Jess!
Yesterday was a bit of a highlight. We rented a Jeep for the day to explore the island. We drove all the way along the coastal roads first, looking at all the beautiful little beaches, before stopping and having a walk around the food markets at the main port town.
Anybody for a catfish kebab?
After that we drove through the centre of the island past an elephant sanctuary. Barry pointed out on Skype yesterday that this was a little surprising given that we’re on an island, how did they get here? No idea…
We then stopped and walked up to Paradise Waterfall which was lovely. We had a dip in the clear cool waters and I took a few amusing videos of Jack having a go on the rope swing (one successful, one disastrous!) which we’ll upload when we figure out how to get them off the camera!
After this we visited the most northern beaches before heading back to our resort and putting the Jeep to bed for the night.
Jack dropped me here at the port this morning before heading off to return the car and make his way back down here for the ferry. It was ferry sweet of him to do so (get it?!) as it meant I didn’t have to sit in an extremely bumpy taxi for half an hour to get here, last time we took one of those taxis it hurt my back so much I was in tears by the end. He is a gem.
So we’re now heading to Koh Tao, a place famed mostly for diving and snorkelling. We have a few nights here before we head across to Khao Lak on the mainland where we’ll be meeting the newlywed Teales (yay!) as well as exploring some national parks and little villages by bike. After some enforced rest, we’re definitely ready for some action!
Big love to all – I’m hoping for some snow days off work for you all too!
Debbie xx
P.S. I wrote this a few days ago but have only just had a decent wifi connection so it’s a bit out of sync with where we actually are! We’re still on Koh Tao x
