Koh Pha Ngan…

Layout of the two major islands in the area, Koh Samui and Koh Phangan...

At low tide, deeper water was at least half a kilometre away...!! At high tide, it wasn't much better...!!

I was up at 5.30am (for reasons I couldn’t quite figure…!!) and decided to take a quick swim before Trevor and Chenty put in an appearance…

The beach was a short distance from my chalet, and followed by a small pack of dogs, I made my way down to the waters edge and took a look around to see where the best point of entry would be…

It took me all of two seconds to come to the conclusion that a swim was out of the question…

The resort, and many others that we later looked at, was located in a wide and very shallow bay…

So shallow, that after a 10 minute walk, directly out to “sea”, through water that barely covered my ankles, I turned around in disgust and headed back to where I had left my towel…

I should have known that disappointment lay ahead, because the dogs had happily followed me out, probably knowing full well that they were not going to get their bellies wet on this particular “walk”…!!

It certainly looked idylic, but swimming here was out of the question... And to my mind, being ona beach where you could not enjoy a swim in the sea, was pointless...!!

I had eagerly looked forward to a few days of sun, sand and sea, and after a long ferry ride, and a stressful search for a place to stay, made in the dark of night, was now faced with a score of “two out of three”…!! I was less than pleased…!!

I went directly back to my cabin, and loaded the bike…!! I then rode between the other cabins, and headed for the reception area to await my friends there… When they finally arrived, one look at my face was enough to tell them that we would not be staying another night at Beck’s…!!

We met this young Israeli couple who were on their honeymoon... They took more than just a passing interest in our bikes and wished that they could join us

After a quick breakfast, we headed back to Thong Sala, and rode on to an area known as Ban Tai, where Phil was staying…We found the Sea Gate, which we had passed in the dark the previous night, and decided to check in without messing about any further…

The Sea Gate chalets... Basic, fairly comfortable, but most importantly, affordable...!!

We rode our bikes between the little beach huts, almost down to the waters edge, and got our gear into our respective cabins… By luck we managed to get the two nearest to Phil’s, mine being the one closest to the sea…

But a swim here was also out of the question…. The best we could do was walk out a hundred metres or so, then wallow in water two foot deep…!! It looked as though a decent swim on Koh Panghan was not to be after all…!!

Long tailed fishing skiffs lay tied up in a small bay close to our resort...

Phil rented a scooter and the four of us went on an out-ride around the island…

Phil on his little black and blue pony... Getting his big frame up some of the steeper hils would prove difficult for this scooter...!!

We left the island main town of Thong Sala and headed north along the coast, passing through Ban Hin Kong and Hat Yao before stopping at an expensive resort complex on Chalaokhlam Bay…

The Wilson gang check out the beach at Ban Chaloaklam...

While I enjoy the view from a different perspective...

Prices here were five times higher than what we were paying in Ban Tai, but the location and the views out into the bay were superb…

We motored back down the centre of the island and then rode down to the southern tip and the village of Haad Rin…

We envied this water buffalo who had found water deep enough to submerse itself in...

It is here where the infamous Full Moon Party takes place every month… Revelers crowd the main beach where alcohol is served by the “bucket”…. Literally…!!

All denominations welcome here, including Trevor, who is a denomination on his own...!!

Don't get caught without a bucket...!!

Ah... The Emma Bucket...!! Many had fond and later painful memories of her...!!

Usually, about a third of a litre of the hard tack of your choice, is emptied into a plastic bucket, to which is added a tin of Coke and a tin or two of Red Bull…

Armed with a straw, or more than one if you are planning to share your bucket, you then find a spot on the beach from which to listen to the blaring music coming from a multitude of sound systems, and watch the craziness around you… All inhibitions are put aside, and the old saying “What goes on tour, stays on tour” comes into force…!!

To quote from one guide book : “It is not so chilled out unfortunately, as drugs are rife, and dodgy pills and mushroom teas send an average of two Farangs (tourists) a month into psychiatric care…”

Positively charming by all accounts…!!

The small stands that line the beach here advertise their buckets in a number of unusual ways…

One hoped that a picture of the daughter was provided...!!

Just about says it all...!! It all hangs out at Haad Rin on Full Moon Party night...!!

Phil and two of his friends had managed to work their way through five buckets the night before, AND managed to make it back to Ban Tai (about 8 kilometres away…) on a single scooter, falling off a few times along the way, but incurring no damage apart from selected memory loss and the mother of all hangovers…!!

It is not only the Full Moon that brings out the party “spirits” on Koh Panghan… There is also a Half-Moon Party, as well as  Black Moon Party…. Soon I am sure, adverts for Crescent Moon Parties will begin making an appearance…!!

Amid the sea of promiscuity in Haad Rin, I came across this sign... Yeah...there was more than enough of it on the beach...!!

One good thing about our trip to Haad Rin, was we had finally found a place to have a decent swim… Just a short distance from where waves were gently lapping the shore, we were able to get into water up to our necks, and spent a half hour relaxing there, watching a variety of young folk either sleeping off the effects of the previous evenings “buckets”, or just catching a tan on the wide and almost deserted beach…

The beach at Haad Rin.. Finally a place where we could swim...

We spent the following day wandering through the busy little market in Thong Sala, and cruising the back streets of the town to find places to eat… The Sea Gate resort was within easy walking distance of many restaurants, the market, as well as the little harbour where ferries dock at regular intervals…

Chenty had more than enough varieties of fruit to choose from, including the red version of the Dragon Fruit...

This crowd seem anxious to throw off the reputation for ripping off tourists...

After a few days lazing about, wading into the warm clear water to wallow, taking rides on the bikes and eating/drinking too much, we decided to move on to Koh Samui, but discovered that there was no direct ferry which we could load our bikes onto…!!

Our bar on the beach at the Sea Gate Resort... Not too shabby...!!

Freshly caught fish are flayed and hung out to dry...

After a night at the Full Moon Party, you might need a bit of this... You never know what you might pick up on that beach...!!

This threw a spanner into the works, as we had heard that Koh Samui was a better place to enjoy swims in the sea in, as it had deeper water on most of it’s beaches…

We would have to take the three hour ferry back to Don Sak on the mainland, and then board another ferry for a two hour trip back to Koh Samui… We agreed that this would represent a torture too unbearable for us to cope with, and quickly gave up on seeing Koh Samui…

Phil had no such problems, and hopped on a direct ferry to Samui to spend a few days with his mates, and later reported that the island was a really fun place to hang out…

We packed up the bikes and got ready to go back to the mainland… The earliest ferry we could hook up with left at 10.30am so we had plenty of time to get ourselves sorted…

Trevor gets Big Red thinking he now has THREE passengers...!!

The ferry that would take us back to Don Sak, arrives in Thong Sala... Not without mishap...!!

We watched the ferry backing into the harbour, bashing into the concrete pillars before the captain finally got his bearings and eased the vessel up against the dockside… He had probably enjoyed something a bit stronger than coffee on the way over from Don Sak…!!

Miss Koh Pha Ngan 2011, poses with a few well placed props in Thong Sala harbour...

Trevor and I decided that we would like to ride across the mountains again, this time from east to west, and prepared to cross the peninsula for a second time, to spend a day or two in Ranong, in western Thailand, from where we planned to take a boat into Burma to get our visas extended once again…

We had enjoyed the few days we had spent on the island and at the Sea Gate Resort, which as a cheap and cheerful alternative to the bigger and more expensive places, had suited our needs perfectly…

At the Sea Gate Resort, the Big Fella was parked within metres of the beach...

©GBWT 2011