Writing this a lot later than I should (again) so hope I get everything in. Also just realised I had these all set to being in the uk :/
So we got up very early in case we couldn't get a taxi to the train station, this wasn't the case and we ended up sat at the station for around an hour. The train from Bangkok to Chumphon was great and it was amazing to see how much the landscape changed as we went along. Leaving Bangkok you saw shantytown like structures, along the way trees as far as the eye can see, mountains and also our first glimpse of the sea :)
I think our whole train was only second class and was nicely air conditioned, fans littered the ceiling but were turned off. They do provide a free meal on the train and also gave us a doughnut/ bun thing. The bun was nice if anything a little on the sweet side. The main food however was a different story, I was asleep and bring veggie anyway wouldn't have taken one however who I was travelling with did, in his words it was "the most disgusting thing I've ever tasted". Do what the locals do and bring things onto the train.
Arriving at Chumphon we were pestered by people trying to hand leaflets out, to get them to shut up and leave me alone I took them and they stopped pestering. We had no idea in what direction we were to head in but to avoid trying to be sold something we said we knew and headed in a random direction until we found a map. A group of young kids came up smiling and saying hello to us, before kids had just not been around us or never spoke a word. I found the walk in the heat with two bags difficult and we were on the 5th floor at the Euro Hostel but we had completed our first step out of Bangkok after a 6 hour train ride.
In the evening we headed out to the night market on Kromluang road. This was the type of night market we had expected to see in Bangkok. Another phat thai, starting to compare them all against each other to find our best. Although I am the only vegetarian we have found it easier to order both veggie to avoid confusion.
That was our one day in Chumphon, nothing much but nice enough to stop over.
