My luxury 10 dollar bungalow was not all the worth it had seemed - the mosquito net must have been inside out because when I woke up the inside was covered with the little bastards. The white mattress (no sheet or blankets in the heat) was covered with red blood stains from when I'd rolled over and squashed them all mid-bite. Ha.
I'd booked myself on a boat trip yesterday but wasn't entirely too sure about where I was getting picked up. The hotel I'd booked it through (100 baht cheaper than going through mine) said go to the beach. Im on the beach? So i waited near the surf like an ass for 10 mins when I saw a big boat and a little boat picking people up go flying right past my stretch of sand. The boat had "New Happy Tour" on them - thats my boat! Ran back to the hotel who called a few people and eventually turned the little boat around to pick me up. Thank bloody christ.
The boat was packed, mainly with Thais. The few Farangs on it were German and old, sinking beers fast whilst trying to impress their Thai dates. Dont know why they bothered as they were probably paying for them. I wasn't entirely sure where we were going to go, all I knew was that we did some snorkelling and maybe other stuff. I was surprised when the boat pulled up and we started fishing! The reels were plastic bottles wrapped in line which worked surprisingly well, though the fishing didn't last long as all the Thais kept eating the squid that we were meant to use as bait.
With all the lines in we had lunch - the usual rice, fruits and bbq chicken kebabs. No kidding they had a fire going in a drum to cook everything!
Our next stop was the long awaited snorkelling. As we collected our goggles the cook threw all the leftover rice into the water and the fish went beserk! We should have gone fishing here. The water was really warm, though you could see the damage to the reef from overuse. Still there was plenty of fish and a fair bit of color on the reef, a lot better than depot beach. My goggles were asian style, meaning too small for my western head and I constantly had to readjust them. I swallowed a mouthful of water which is worrying as hell, god knows what I'm digesting.
I thought the trip was over and we were just heading back around the island so I kicked back on one of the deck chairs on top of the boat. But again I was surprised when we stopped at a fish farm. It was scary walking on the lone wooden plank supported by barrels around each fish net, some of the sharks they had were over a metre long! It gets even scarier when you chuck some of the bait into the cage and the fish go wild, or when you have to pass someone going the other way! I nearly lost a finger hand feeding turtles, but some of the Thais played a joke on their friend and pushed him into a cage containing two black fin sharks and a giant turtle! The sharks didn't seem to care but the turtle nipped at his ankles as he got out.
Back on my little beach I was worn out and settled in for a beer as it got dark. Then more seafood and noodles before settling in to watch a movie "No country for old men" which was ok but again another movie I'll never know the ending for. Stupid pirated dvds.
