Ko Phangan & Farewell Thailand

We hopped a quick ferry ride to Samui's sister island, Ko Phangan, best known for its monthly full moon raves, but also home to some secluded beaches. Our first home here was Blue Hill Resort, which is currently undergoing a renovation to into an upscale resort. Lucky for us, they hadn't finished yet, and we got a room overlooking the water at a bargain price. The collection of bungalows were largely empty, and at times it seemed that we had the entire place to ourselves. The highlight was their infinity pool that looked out on Ko Samui.



As usual, we rented a motorbike and explored the island's beaches ('hat's) including Hat Son, Hat Yao, and our favorite Hat Salad.

A couple days into our stay, we realized that our Thai visas had expired. It turns out that we had been given a one-month visa our first time in Thailand because we entered through an airport, but our land entry (from Laos) only earned us a two-week visa. Since we had hoped to make it to Thailand's west coast (Phi Phi & Krabi), we headed to Ko Samui's immigration office to resolve our issue. Here we got a eye-opening lesson on dysfunctional and illogical government.

The immigration official informed us that we could purchase a 7-day extension (which we did in order to exit the country legally), but that she could not provide us with a 14 or 30 day extension. Ok, we figured, it seems logical we can't just stay forever. A bit harsh, but understandable. But wait, if we wanted to stay she told us--no problem--just board a bus on a 16-hour round trip to Ranong on the Burma border, where we could board a long-tail boat, cross a river, stand on a small concrete island for 10 minutes, pay $10 with a crisp ten-dollar bill ONLY (for sale for the equivalent of $20), and then begin the eight hour bus ride back. After doing this, you would be given another 14 day extension for entering Thailand via land.

We both laughed that the official and encouraged government policy was to promote this ridiculous practice instead of just charging us more money for another 7 days. We factored in the annoyance of doing this, the bragging-rights of going to Burma, and the impending monsoon season on the west coast and decided to bid farewell to Thailand a bit sooner than planned. So nice work Thailand, less tourist dollars!

With our remaining days, we decided to return to Ko Phangan and spend the remainder of our time at Hat Salad. We got a great room at Cookies Salad (weird name, but whatever) that looked out over the entire bay.



This made for a great happy hour each evening with our favorite beer.



We continued to explore the island, and chartered a long-tail boat for a ride to Hat Khuat (aka Bottle beach).



Like all the beaches we've seen, the water here was beautiful blending from crystal clear shallows to light greens to dark blues. It's just a beautiful place.



As the full moon party approached on the 9th, the island began to noticeably fill up and we were excited to have timed our exit appropriately.

So we bid a fond farewell to Thailand (we've spent a lot of time here) and hello to Bali & Indonesia. First stop: Gili islands for water sports, diving, and of courses, more pretty beaches.