Aloha from the glorious island paradise of Koh (Kevin) Chang! Christopher and I are winding down from our busy busy trip on this beautiful mountain island rising out of the Indian Ocean.
Getting here added most of the stress that we are now chilling off. Our transit out of Cambodia was based on a street encounter with a taxi mafioso, who told us he could give us a ride to the border for about $15 less than we expected. Sketchy, or worth it? We opted for the latter, and hopped in a dude's sedan the next morning. We breezed down toward the border until the driver stopped by a rice paddy and got out of the car. I thought it was trouble, and then he opened my door and reached in, and my thought became "now I'm going to die." He grabbed a sunshade and attached it to the back window, flashing me a toothless smile. Relief! The border crossing itself was haphazard and confusing, and involved about 5 unmarked checkpoints that we had to walk through, while carrying our heavy packs. Then we took a bus to a station that had no signs and no one that spoke English, and waited for a bus that we hoped would take us to our next destination. Christopher said he felt like a renagade; I felt like flipping out. Luckily, with the help of some very nice locals we made it to the town where we spent the night before catching our morning ferry.
The guidebook described Trat, our layover town, as a quiet little place that really grows on you. A more accurate primer would have described it as "a dump with absolutely nothing for tourists, including restaurants, but boasting the world's majority of ants and mosquitoes." Doom by the Lagoon. Luckily, we only had to spend a night there before hopping on a boat over here to Koh Chang.
The island itself is absolutely gorgeous- a big emerald isle rising out of the ocean. This is the low season, so everything is a whole lot cheaper than it normally would be, almost half price. Christopher and I thought we had stumbled onto the luckiest break of our trip. The rainy season, after all, has always been an hour or two of daily rain, at most, surrounded by hours of bright sunshine. Cruelly, Koh Chang seems to be the only place in all of Indochina where the "rainy season" actually means "torrential downpours almost constantly." Thanks a lot, Kevin. Even though the beach itself is a wash, though, the surroundings are beautiful, the food is great, and we take advantage of momentary lulls in the deluge to walk on the shore or check out the surroundings. After all the hard work of traveling (my life is awful) it's pretty nice to sit on the balcony with a book and listen to the rain. Especially with a pina colada and fresh fried shrimp.
