Saturday
Lastnight really wasn't that bad, Liam slept on top bunk and I was on the bottom. He says he slept well mostly, although it was very bright because they never dimmed the lights. It was a bit better for me because I had his bunk blocking a lot of light but I still woke up at regular intervals.
We were due to arrive at 8am, I was awake by 6.30 and Liam was still dozing. However we found out that there was a 2 and a half hour delay for some reason so we wouldn't be arriving until 10.30. We spent that time just lounging around, Liam sleeping and me reading.
We finally reached the other end, and we caught a tourist bus. We were on that for about half an hour before getting off to change again. We waited around for 20 minutes and had a bit of breakfast before getting on for the 2 hour journey. The views became quite nice with lots of cliff like structures dotted around. After that journey we had one last part, after waiting for a further 15 minutes we caught a third bus which took us straight to your hotel. We got there about 2pm ish.
After stressing around trying to book hotels for the next leg of the journey we went out to explore.
We're around a 20 minute walk to the beach, there's plenty to look at on the way with shops, massage parlours, street vendors, beauticians, all sorts. We got to the beach which was quite a long thin stretch of sand with lots of people all chilling out. It was already about 5.15pm at this time so the sun was also beginning to set. It was one of the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen, it was so big and red. That and the far off islands and boats in the calm water made it look wonderful. We walked along the sand with no shoes on, relishing the warm water and looking forward to having a proper dip tomorrow (Liam more so than me it has to be said).
After about 45 minutes we decided to head back as we were both tired. We walked past a load of massage parlours and told each other we would definitely have one tomorrow. Liam treated himself to his first thai banana and chocolate pancake before we found a restaurant for food.
It was pretty slow going back to the hotel due to my flip flops hurting my feet but we got there eventually and I settled to write these blogs and Liam faffed around doing whatever it is he does on his iPad. Looking forward to a relaxing day tomorrow, we both need it after the last few weeks and in particular the last few days!
Sunday
We had a leisurely get up today and wandered down to the beach for a nice few hours in the sun. We spent about 3 hours in total in the sun, Liam spent a lot of that time in the water with his new goggles. We both sat together in the shallow water for a while, it stays about thigh deep for a long way out and it's so warm. Not really much to say about that other than it was lovely and I read a large portion of my book today. We also got harassed by a thai lady with Botox to go visit her massage parlour. We had said we would have one so the fact that she spent most of her day and energy coming to us every now and again we thought we might as well go to her as the prices are just the same. Liam had an hour back and neck and head massage, I had an hour full body coconut oil massage. By the end of the day we were both nice and relaxed after sunbathing, massages, and generally looking at all the lovely sights around us.
Monday
We bought a ticket to go on a boat across to one of the nearby islands. The boat trip was nice because we got to see our stretch of beach from a different angle, you could see the jungle like cliffs on the sides. We left at around 11, it took 10 minutes or so and we had until 3pm until pick up. The island was beautiful, there was a bar for drinks and food and white sand all the way around. The sea was gorgeous and lots of small fish were swimming really close to the shore. There were a lot of people some times and other times not so many due to different boats coming and going with different island tours.
We smothered ourselves in sun cream and re applied tonnes of times through fear of getting burnt because the sun was so hot. I stood up most of the time and read, that way I was getting aired from all sides and also sunned from all sides....again Liam spent most of his time in the water! We had the most wonderful banana fruit shake, it was just paradise! Liam went for an explore with the camera a bit later on and found what he described a completely deserted section of the island that reminded him of King Kong.
When we got back we headed straight for a shower before going out for food and a couple of drinks. On the way home we went into one small bar for a cocktail and we're pretty sure what we witnessed was a thai prostitute at work which was quite interesting to observe!
Heading on our way to the next place tomorrow.
