Getting to Koh Tao
Well folks I feel I have been letting everyone down with my lack of blog posts but fear not. We are back with a double post for you. See my plan was to make a post for each country but what to do when one ends up in a country for longer than expected? A new challenge for the blog. Anywho see my very nicely drawn map to see where we went in Thailand or checkout Ryker’s (soon to be) interactive map where you can see everywhere we’ve been. We should have one post right before this all about Bangkok.
We left Bangkok on 7th of February. We spent a long time debating where to go, seeing Thailand had many marvels of sealife, each a different experience. Do we do the classic Phuket? Or go to the rarely explored Koh Chang (Northeast of Bangkok). Eventually we settled on the well known island chain referred to by the biggest island, Koh Samui (Fun Fact! Koh Samui’s Four Seasons is where the third season of white lotus was filmed and DOUBLE fun fact, Ryker and I are watching it for the first time.) The Koh Samui island chain is made up of three islands and we started our island hopping adventure on the smallest island: Koh Tao. So small it takes just 15 mins to drive North to South and 8 mins to drive east to west (~8sq miles).
Right now it’s “high season” in Thailand. I have never paid attention to that and I didn’t think it would make much of a difference, maybe slightly more crowds? I’ve been to India, I can handle crowds, I was not worried. What I failed to think about was the combo of small island and large crowd meant very little housing. Ryker and I took an overnight bus from Bangkok to a ferry terminal in Chumpton waiting at 5am for our ferry to Koh Tao when we discovered the reasonably priced Airbnb we had booked was a scam. Now imagine, we are tired, we did not sleep on the bus, we arrive in t-minus 2 hours, we’ve already booked and paid for my 3 day scuba certification. We need to stay on this island. I stared into my very mid coffee in despair, wondering if I would need to sleep on the beach with the mosquitoes, and while I was wallowing Ryker solved the problem. Booking us two hotels on opposite sides of the island. Thank the lord, I was not meant to sleep on the beach. But my expectations for these accommodations were low. I mean the entire island only had 4 hotels left for our dates.
We arrived in Koh Tao later that morning and Ryker rented a scooter. We proceeded to, and by we I mean Ryker, haul both of us and our 35L bags on one scooter to the north end of the island to see what kind of hotel awaited us. I need you to understand how extreme of a feat this felt like: a bag smushed between Ryker’s chest and the handle bars, then little old me, clinging to Ryker for dear life, and then my back pack, up and down the mountainous terrain of Koh Tai which had shockingly steep up and downs on a very narrow and bumpy road. 10 mins later we see the entrance, with a practically vertical drop down. Ryker channels all his dirt biking experience to safely navigate us down.
Stepping off the scooter, I felt like I had entered the world of White Lotus. A man rushed forward to grab our bags, and then rushed away, only to come back seconds later with an ice cold electrolyte drink that tasted like the nectar of the Gods. Booking late, meant we paid more for a room and the only rooms left were the best ones at the property. These “king suites” had the best view on the island, we were assured. We only had to venture up about a ½ mile from the lobby up a vertical face, taking narrow and curving paths. Anyone else in the name of safety would have sucked it up and trudged up, but not us - we had the superpower of Rykers 20+ years of motorcycle wisdom to back us up. Ryker, again, did the impossible and delivered us into the hands of one of the nicest hotel suites I’ve ever seen.
Have no fear our late booking did bite us in the ass. We were only here for one night before transferring to a little bungalow with a box spring masquerading as a bed.
Life on Koh Tao
A little history lesson about Koh Tao for you! This little island wasn’t inhabited for the longest time. And when this tropical paradise was finally discovered, guess what Thailand did with it? If you made the wild guess of a prison you would be absolutely correct. 1933-1941 Koh Tao acted as a political prison for the Thai government, a perfectly isolated place, making escape impossible and malaria rife. In 1947 the prison was abandoned and the prisoners moved to the mainland but it wasn’t until western travelers started arriving in the 1980s that Koh Tao’s popularity grew. The island (well post prison) had been entirely centered on tourism, specifically scuba tourism.
So if you see any geniuses on Reddit claiming the island is “too touristy,” feel free to politely remind them that they are a tourist. I firmly believe any bimbo who complains about places being “too touristy” should have their passport taken and be forced to walk through the street while others yell “shame” at them over and over.
The whole “you’re taking away from the Thai locals” argument doesn’t hold up particularly well either. Of the roughly 1,500 permanent residents on Koh Tao, a large portion of the workforce is actually Burmese migrants who came here (snuck in one may say….) for opportunity — which, whether people like it or not, is exactly what tourism creates.
History lesson over. The short is yes Koh Tao is touristy but Ryker and I found it was one of the best parts of the island. Everyone is on vacation so everyone is down for a chat and a beer on the beach.
One of the main reasons Koh Tao became so popular is because of its world class diving, and it’s actually one of the cheapest places to get scuba certified in the world. I got mine for just $354 which included all the gear I needed, 4 dives, and a bro tank which Ryker promptly stole. I loved scuba diving. It’s wild to be 50ft underwater and look up and see fish swimming above you, actually quite magical.
As part of the certification, I learn a bit about the science of what happens to gas when it’s under pressure, how to share air in an emergency scenario, and how the equipment works. The most helpful things I learned were how to take my goggles off underwater and refill them with air. (Which was insanely scary to do for the first time 40 ft down). And how to pressurize. See I never learned as a child that when you dive down in water and it starts to hurt your ears that one can simply pinch one’s nose and blow to pop one’s ears and the problem is fixed. This was a mystical magical discovery for me. I had always dealt with the pressure when diving down before. Ryker is convinced everyone already knows about this little trick, I’m convinced it’s this novel life hack. I’ll let you be the judge.
On my final dive, mother nature herself looked down from the heavens and decided to grace me with her presence. I was swimming back to the boat, goggles off when my instructor started yelling to go back down. “Back down?” I thought, “we just came up,” but he sounded so panicked I started to comply. “Why would we need to go back down?” my monkey brain immediately assumed a boat was about to run me over and the only way to survive was to dive under it. In fact, in this very popular scuba spot with highly trained boatmen, this was not the case. In my tizzied state, I lickiety-split had my respirator in, goggles on, and turned to dive down. The second my face went under I went still, I was face-to-face with a whale shark. Whale sharks are beautiful creatures, and big. They can grow up to 32ft in length. I didn’t know that at the time, the 10ft one I was looking at maybe 12 inches from my face looked huge. I watched in awe as it swam directly under me, so close that if I reached a foot out we’d be touching fins (get it because I had flippers on). Given that I didn’t know where whale sharks fell on the ‘I like head scratched scale,’ I kept my hands to myself. Jokes aside, seeing a whale shark is a rare experience, people come from all around the world and dive for years and never see one. I feel so lucky that I was able to see one on my 4th dive. Choosing to take on something that scared me (scuba diving) taught me that growth often waits on the other side of discomfort. (see the real photo that is NOT fake actually taken of me with the whale shark below)
Ryker also went diving with me on day two of my certification, he sadly was robbed of seeing Sharkey McSharkertun but he did get something equally awesome! He made friends with a really cool Scottish man and his diving instructor. In fact, Ryker was so charismatic and beguiling that he got us invited to dinner! So off we went to a Korean restaurant on the other side of town. I took this as an opportunity for a side quest: learning to ride side saddle. You see all the cool girls doing it, how hard could it be: just sit sideways on a scooter, both feet on one side. Indeed it was more difficult than I perceived. But I did it! My thighs were on fire but I made it all the way to that restaurant with zero complaints and I am very proud of myself.
Ryker here!
We pulled up to the restaurant on our scooter… looking all fly and shit. I put the kickstand down, looked up, and there were J (scuba instructor) and Roxy (J’s girlfriend — also a scuba instructor) sitting at the table right in front of our parked scooter! Shortly thereafter Cerian (like Kiran) and his girlfriend Dory joined us. Talk about a wonderful night. I think Meg and I are figuring out the types of people we want to spend our time with on this yearlong adventure: interesting people, from cool places (SCOTLAND and KOREA), who are down to do something new (scuba diving), who are also game to hang out with us (getting invited to the only Korean restaurant on the island), who are down to have a good time (drink one million beers), and have fun interesting conversations ranging from wind energy in Scotland, to the frequency of whale sharks around Koh Tao, to the correct way to say “haenyeo” — Meg nailed it on her very first attempt. Roxy is from Busan, Korea and complimented Meg on her excellent use of the word, which comes from the book Island of Sea Women on Jeju. If you are reading this, special thank you to the four of you.
Koh Pha Ngan
Koh Pha Ngan is home to the famous “full moon party” where folks black out on a beach and there are contained fires, or something… you know I’m not really sure… see it was not the full moon while we were there. Fear not, we found out there was also a ‘Half Moon Party’ and a ‘Crescent Moon Party’ and a ‘The Moon Doesn’t Matter We Want To Party’ Party. These did not appeal to us, many of the flyers advertised transportation “one-way only,” which does not at all sound like a recipe for drunk driving. Obviously these very responsible party-focused individuals will all, in their drunken stupor, be respectful citizens and graciously pay a hyper-inflated taxi price. Right?
The Full Moon Party, or any moon party was not on the Corey agenda. In fact we were staying on the opposite side of the island from all the partying, all the way north in a little fishing village called Chaloklum. We rented an apartment a 2 mins walk from the beach and a little scoot to the Muay Thai Gym. That’s right folks, we were here to get swole, to become fighters, champions I dare say.
Hum, this did not go according to plan. After one class I tapped out. I had a blast doing Muay Thai. I want to be able to kick butt with my own two hands but I decided I’d like to dedicate this week to catching up on sleep while we had a very comfortable bed at our disposal. Ryker however preserved and did a class everyday while we frequented Koh Pha Ngan.
Are you loving my fun facts, I hope you are because its: FUN FACT TIME. Muay Thai is the national sport of Thailand and is more than a sport here but a huge part of Thai culture. It’s known as the ‘art of eight limbs’ because one can strike with either hand, kick with either foot, as well as elbows and knees. This is a standing up fight (unlike MMA where you see bro’s and broette’s cuddled up on the ground, each trying to cuddle harder than the other, and by cuddle I mean break arms and the like). Muay Thai also provides a way out of poverty for many families. Meaning kids start learning very young and there is still rampant debate about the permissibility and morality of allowing children to fight, especially when there is a big pot of money to be won.
Ryker’s Muay Thai Experience: SO YOU WANT TO LEARN MUAY THAI??!
Well me too. This is something I have been wanting to do for a while now. Not Muay Thai in particular, but there has been a part of me that has wanted to get back into something physical — more than just weight lifting or pilates. It’s that rugby itch (ewww that sounds kind of weird) but that itch to do something competitive again. So what better place to give it a try than when you have a month in Thailand?? Rittisak Muay Thai Gym is where I trained for a week, 2 hrs a day for 6 days… let me tell you… I don’t think I have ever sweat this much in my life. 2 hrs of cardio in 90% humidity. Wow… it got sticky that’s for sure. But in all seriousness, learning the absolute basics for a week was incredibly rewarding. There were loads of people from all over the world that come here to train or just learn. I met some fantastic people and everyone there wanted you to do your best, push you, and have fun. One story from the week. It was day 3, and I had moved past the ‘beginner’ stage into the normal group with everyone. I was doing some pad work with one of the instructors. Whistle blew and I went to grab some water and come back… but before I could make it back to the instructor, another instructor told everyone to grab a new partner (didn’t apply to me, because I wasn’t sparring). Well… some person there grabbed me as their new partner and started throwing punches and kicks at me!! I tried to explain, but his English was not very good and he kept them coming. It was not until my instructor saw me getting pummeled by this other guy that he stepped in to grab me and told the other guy to get another partner! HAHAHA. Fun times! Will be doing more of this once Meg and I are back stateside!
Other things that were accomplished.
Hiking to Bottle Beach: We went up and over a mountain on the way there and SAW A MONKEY IN THE WILD. Due to my lack of internet connection we took the long way back around the mountain where there wasn’t really a path, just scrambling up and down steep jungle terrain and lava rock faces. Oops, but hey we are training for the Coast-to-Coast in September and you can bet your buttons I will never hear the end of it if my father is in better shape than me. I WILL be going on the Coast-to-Coast in such good shape that I plan to actually skip the whole thing and all the hikes you’ll be hearing about us doing till then are actually intense, hard core training.
On the Northwest tip, Koh Pha Ngan connects to an itty bitty uninhabited island called Koh Maa (which means horse island but no one knows why). You can only get there by wading about 500 ft through the water. We went because I wanted to get a Geocache. It was much further into the island than expected but after climbing over some rocks I got the cache and a nice view to boot.
We got tan!! Finally, I was very tired of being pale, and in Thailand, how embarrassing. We also managed to get tan while wearing sunscreen and with no burns. (Don’t worry Granny I still wear sunscreen on my face and the back of my hands at every waking moment and Ryker does too!)
That friends is our Thailand trip! We will take a ferry and ten hour bus back to Bangkok, spend a day on admin and eating mangos before flying to Singapore for a short 48 hour trip and then to meet Miles in the Philippines.
Now ~12% of the way through our trip we are starting to get a hang of things. I am feeling like I am getting a miniscule amount better each day at the art of traveling. Learning how far in advance to book things, to plan, while still leaving room for flexibility is a welcome challenge. We have not yet gotten tired of Thai or Asian food in general and haven’t really missed the gluten rich environment of the USA. We do miss our purple mattress and pillows, and having a consistently comfortable place to sleep every night. But so far this trip has been everything we’ve wanted it to be and more. Ryker and I are just getting closer, better communicators, and partners. We have found that journaling, physical activities, and choosing to venture to activities not places brings us the most joy.
We miss you all very much!
Much love, Meg and Ryker