Leaning In

Our first few days in Thailand haven’t exactly turned out the way we might have thought. We arrived in Bangkok in the early evening of the 1^st February, exhausted from the 24 hour long journey and ready to shower, eat and sleep. Our plans of having an authentic Thai experience grabbing some street food from the vendors we had seen when we arrived outside our hotel didn’t last long when we realised they had all packed up for the night. So we headed to the end of the street and, hanging our heads in shame, walked into McDonalds. All I can say is at least we ordered meals that we can’t get at home! 

17 hours of sleep later, we felt much more alive but had slept through most of our day in Bangkok. We ventured out to Khao San Road to take in all the interesting sights, sounds and smells of Bangkok including a skinned alligator and lots of scorpions and spiders on sticks. We visited, what I can imagine will be, our first temple of many during our time in South East Asia, Wat Chanasongkram. I don’t think either of us thought we would see monks power washing but there you go!  

We found a nice little spot for some food and a couple of jugs of Chang helped to cool us off! Then we headed back for an early night as we had to leave for the airport at 4am.  

We touched down in Koh Samui a little after 7am. One thing we have learned very quickly about Thailand is the stark contrast between the chaotic and sometimes perilous streets, with the calm and smooth air travel. The airport was a breeze and Bangkok airways gets a 10/10 from us. It’s the way flying used to be, or at least what we imagine it was like! Koh Samui airport is like a theme park, all open-air buildings with the shuttle buses running about and planes taking off and departing, all set against the stunning backdrop of the Koh Samui landscape. What a welcome! 

We had planned to stay in a lovely little beach cottage and as I’m sure you have guessed with how this is going so far this didn’t exactly go to plan!  

As we had arrived so early we hung out with our bags on the beach for a few hours, playing some card games and eventually getting some food and an obligatory Chang for lunch! 

When check-in time came at 2PM we were excited, we got in, dropped our bags and well.. fell asleep! When we awoke, we were confronted with a cockroach. Naturally this gave us a bit of a fright, but we chased it off and reckoned it was a onetime thing – nothing to worry about. With this done we headed off for dinner.  

After a few beers and some very nice Thai food we got back around 10PM. We started to shift our belongings about when low and behold, another much larger cockroach fell off of one of our bags! Enough was enough, we had to deal with this. Olivia went for help, surely they would be able to get rid of it.  

Right enough a man came straight away. He swiped the bug with his cane brush and it went sailing into the room, becoming lost in the process. When he couldn’t find it he simply laughed and said, “It’s okay, they don’t bite” and left. Obviously we weren’t happy. Now we knew we weren’t alone we couldn’t go to sleep. Instead, remembering this is technically our honeymoon we found a lovely 5-star resort down the road, booked a taxi and checked in the same night! 

Now we should mention a few things. Saying we are in a lovely hotel would make you think everything is fine and dandy, that’s not necessarily true… 

When we arrived in Koh Samui Ryan, in his infinite wisdom, decided to go for a swim without any suncream on. We can’t have been in for more than 30 minutes; but as it turns out that’s long enough! When we awoke in our new hotel room he was suffering with some pretty nasty heatstroke. Thankfully he married Olivia, who is basically a nurse. She looked after him all day with cold towels, plenty of after sun and regular reminders to hydrate.  

We’re a couple of days later now and he is feeling much better! This is the third time in as many days that he has managed to hurt himself, having previously caught his toenail on the backpack nearly taking it off and walking all of 15 minutes in sandals causing deep cuts in his feet. Saying he is a walking disaster feels like an understatement.   

So our first few days in Thailand have involved us becoming practically nocturnal; only going outside when the sun is going down. Not exactly what we had imagined when we booked to come to this beautiful but there you go! We’ve still managed to make the most of it and enjoy our lovely accommodation and the nearby rasta bar.

Koh Samui has been a real highlight so far, despite some of our accommodation woes and illness. The landscape, the people and the food are all wonderful. It truly is an island paradise! (If we were to give one piece of advice it is to bring plenty of bug spray, it is a tropical island after all!)