Spring Break 2014; Thailand, One More Time

The beach in front of our hotel at Koh Samet

For Millie's final Spring Break with us, we decided to fly to Bangkok, shop for a few days and get to a beach, preferably without flying again.  Then, the political situation in Bangkok got a little crazy in the streets and a some kind of small bomb went into one of the shopping malls we frequent, so we changed plans.

Instead, we went to an island, Koh Samet, a two hour+ drive by taxi south of the airport.  Our taxi driver took us to a dock, and introduced us to his friend, who took us by speedboat to the beach in front of our hotel as the sun rose over the Gulf of Thailand.  We waded ashore and waited until the staff showed up and checked us in.  Fortunately, our room was available immediately.  Since we had been up all night flying and driving, we slept.



Our hotel on the beach was not your 5 star, giant chain but a small place with a pool, a restaurant, wifi, sun, shade and the Gulf.

Actually, we never did find the nice part of town; the island is a middle class Thai family weekend retreat from Bangkok with none of the major chains. Lots of boat traffic, but not much wildlife.  Unlike the Western tourism-developed areas like Koh Samui, this was kind of backwater, but under extensive development. Like some of the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri in the 50s: hotels were strings of small cabins overlooking the beach or the rocks.  The newer, fancier, bigger ones were being built next door.






We walked down the ferry pier to this statue coming out of the sea, had dinner at a restaurant on the beach, and bought wine and junk food at a 7-11; mostly, we read books and worked on our tans. Then we headed back to Railay, near Krabi, opposite Phuket, and up the coast from the Malaysian border.

This is the one place in Thailand I wanted to see again.  We had come before, in October, 2012.  Railay is a half-mile wide peninsula so covered with giant limestone rock formations that the area is accessible only by boat.  Our hotel was on the west side of the peninsula, facing Phuket Island and the Andaman Sea, but we could have stayed anywhere, and it would have been spectacular.  

Swimming with the fishes in the Andaman Sea

We did almost the same things this time: a one-day, crammed-into-a-snorkel/tourism-boat trip with 20 or so strangers (but good snorkling), spent an hour one morning kayaking around the rocks with Millie and witnessed several absolutely breath-taking sunsets.  Mostly, we did the pool chair, bar, beach, pool, nap routine, punctuated with a stroll down "walking street", a little alley of bars and shops leading away from the beach.  And I got a Thai massage.

Then we headed back for one night and one day in Bangkok.  Millie got us to a mall with a cinema, settled us into Captain America 2 and went shopping.  Later, we had really good Vietnamese food, and Gail and Millie found another mall to explore, this one below our hotel.

The next morning we got to a floating market and toured Jim Thompson's home below, a museum.

Thompson was an American OSS agent in SE Asia during WWII and returned to develop the silk industry in Thailand.  He got rich and famous but disappeared on a trip to Malaysia in 1967.  He had built a home in Bangkok by combining five traditionally built Thai houses (high pitched roofs, floors on stilts, separate cooking area, etc.) After a late lunch, we headed back to the airport and on to Dhaka.