Ao Nang to Ko Samui

1. 10am: Pick up from Hotel at Ao Nang, Krabi

Prepare to squeeze with 8 adults and if you’re really lucky, a crying baby or 2!

Oh, and if you're 1st on board, good luck, cuz you'll spend the next half hr picking the other passengers. Thankfully, we were the last. Annoyed that I didn't get to sit atop the songthaew tho. Bummer.




2. 10.50am: Alight at Krabi Town Bus Terminal

Takes about 35min to reach Krabi towns' private bus terminal. Pretty glam, with marble tiles and fountains. You'd think the angmohs are an assertive bunch but funnily enough, they often wait for instructions, sitting in the songthaew till the driver had to scream GET OFF!

So you gotta present the receipt as proof of purchase and they'd give you a sticker (pasted mine in my FatCookie book) and ferry ticket stating "Surat Thani to Ko Samui". Got on the coach around 11.30am, snooze time.



3. 2pm: Guest stop at Surat Thani
After the 2.5hr journey on the rickety and stuffy coach, we finally reached Surat Thani and alighted for our well-deserved 45minute lunch break. Guest house seems to be right outta some Chinese swordsman serial, bamboo galore. A guy came around, asking if we'd require minivan transfer service from the pier to our hotel at Ko Samui. Thank goodness we said YES, cuz the 150B per/person price was a steal compared to the standard taxi rate of 600B per/cab, as we later found out.



4. 3.50pm: Reached Don Sak Pier (Surat Thani)
The coach actually took 1hr to reach another pier, dropping off dudes that were heading to Ko Phangan. Another 10min and we reached Don Sak Pier, where the Seatran Ferry departs for Ko Samui on an hrly schedule.

We caught the 4pm ride, and the pic on our left is actually taken from the upper deck of the ferry. See all those bikers? They're actually riding into the lower deck, where other lorries and coaches have been parked. Ecclectic mix of excited angmohs on noisy Harleys and bored natives on their tutting mopeds.

I'm just a speck in an infinite stretch of nothingness



5. 5.50pm: Reach Na Thon Pier (Ko Samui)

1hr 50min spent with hardcore smokers and twitchy poodles (their owner had an uncannily similar permed do), we finally reached Ko Samui. Snapped pics of 3 forlorn faces cuz they had righteously rejected the minivan offer of 150B earlier and were apalled by the taxi fares. Poor Latinos. Our driver asked us for our hotel names and said he didn't know 4 of the 5 hotels stated. Understandable, since new hotels in Ko Samui emerge every 2 days, thanks to the burgeoning tourist industry.

40min later, the astute B. whispered that she'd spotted a dubious sign saying "Hillside Village", following which I smartly prodded the driver and treated everyone to a jerky halt. Several handsigns and an illegal U-turn later, he happily dumped us at the foot of a hill. B. trudged happily, with her 3foot backpack and Oakleys. I trotted behind, tripping over my trolley-bag and wincing from the heavy Tote resting on my sunburnt shoulders. We walked past rows and rows of Semi-D's and in my fatigue, I hallucinated that I was walking through an estate in Serangoon Gardens, heading to my beloved Chomp Chomp.

9hrs since we embarked on our journey, 5min to dying from fatigue and we finally spotted 3 eerie little bungalows. I totally felt like a heroine in some Thai ghost movie.

Welcome to Ko Samui.