Travel Diary: Koh Samui & Koh Phangan New Year Full Moon Party

Hi everyone. Hope you all had a great new year, we know we did.   Hope you enjoy this update, it's been crazy. 28 December My best friend Hannah is arriving today. Today we had our last free breakfast and checked out of AKWA. I think the owner is selling it and some suits were there with him so he was extra nice to us!!! After a 10 minute walk in the rain we got to Laem Din Hotel which is on the next road over. Me and Shaun actually went and used the gym!! Very hard work! We actually had a Christmas Dinner, even if it is 3 days late!! We went to The Duke and had turkey, 2 “roast potatoes”, mash, peas, carrots and sweetcorn ... the end! Was a bit of a let-down but made us feel a little Christmassy! At 9pm we went off to the airport to collect Hannah ... so exciting it’s been way too long! We took a very warn out Hannah to the hotel, checked in and cracked open the champagne!! After Han had a quick shower we went straight out to show her “GoGo Street”! Such a crazy place! We then headed to bar street. And the first thing Hannah hears a Thai person say is from a beautiful “woman” in the road who shouts to Shaun “You wanna suck my c**k!!!!” Brilliant!! After a couple of buckets in a bar mine and Shaun’s memories now draw a blank so I can only give you an account of what Hannah can remember, piecing together the pictures we have and making assumptions about the items we found in our room the next day! So ... we had 2 buckets in the first pub and lots of cracking crazy shapes on the dance floor. Perhaps on our way home we went to the beach (as there is sand in our bed and we are covered in the photos!), we sat on someones apartment porch which maybe led us being chased by a security guard, then we went back to GoGo Street and had another bucket and tequilla shots and bought some flower necklaces from a 10 year old girl ... I think that’s it!!!! As for the photos, we can only apologise for our drunken states ... 29 December I woke up very confused, not remembering the majority of last night, with Hannah in our bed, me fully clothed, Shaun half clothed and a banging headache! It was literally like the film The Hangover ... we had random clues in our room i.e. flower necklaces, a half drunk bucket, Hannah’s fags left everywhere and photos on the cameras to fill in the rest!!!! 30 December Hannah experienced her first and last Thai massage/torture today!! These woman did the craziest moves on us which I couldn’t help but laugh at when she was doing it! Tonight we went to watch some Muay Thai. We had a few drinks up by the roof top swimming pool which looks over the whole of Chaweng Beach and behind at the mountains before heading to the boxing stadium at the end of the street. The Thai boxing was really good with many knock outs and bloody endings! 31 December Today we are heading over to Koh Phangan for the infamous New Year Full Moon Party on Haad Rin beach where up to 50,000 people flock for the night! Me, Han and Shaun got picked up at 4pm and taken here, there and everywhere before being dropped off on the beach by the boat port. At 6.05pm we finally got on a boat (an hour later than scheduled, unorganised is putting it nicely!). We were dreading getting on the boat because the sea looked so rough and we soon found out it was!!! The 48 ft speed boat was jumping out the waves and was chucking water into the boat absolutely soaking all of us! The 30 minute journey was the most horrendous 30 minutes of our lives!! We eventually arrived in Koh Phangan looking like drowned rats, soaked through and met Tom (Pinsard) an hour and a half late! After Shaun bought a whole new set of clothes and Hannah had tried to dry her hair on the fan in the shop we headed out for some tea and a catch up! We joined the human traffic jam and eventually made it onto the beach. In total we saw about 10 Guerns, you can’t get away from them!! What can I say ... I will let the pictures do the talking it was an incredible night. Best New Years EVER!!! 1 January 2011 – HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! After watching the sunrise it was 7am and time to get the last boat back to Koh Samui!!! Fortunately the sea was calm and we made it across without getting soaked! As we walked into the hotel we noticed they were serving breakfast, so whilst still completely and utterly drunk we thought why not! We slept in until 2pm and really couldn’t do a lot for the rest of the day!! We managed to head out for some tea and booked a jeep safari tour for the next day and then came straight home for an early night!! 2 January The next morning the dodgy looking jeep arrived at our hotel 20mins early while we were still eating our breakfast. Our first stop we watched a elephant show, were elephants performed tricks like hand stands and slam dunking a basket ball, they also performed massage on the audience by placing one foot on their back and sucking at their skin with their trunks, also one “special” massage were the elephant sucked the mans ....... Next was the monkey show were the monkeys could ride bikes, bow, play basketball and climb up trees and collect coconuts. Next was the elephant trekking. A high light for most peoples holiday to Thailand but not mine. Our guide did not speak a word of English and our elephant was a bad one (bad elephant!) he kept trying to eat every tree he saw and didn’t want to walk, (i don’t blame him really). Every twist and turn i thought the saddle was going to fall off it kept moving so much. Hannah and Jodie loved it but never again for me thanks. Our guide also made us flower jewellery made from banana leaf, very impressive while driving an elephant. We jumped back in the jeep again and headed for the waterfall. Not as nice as we had hoped but still pretty cool. We then headed for what would be the most random of tourist attraction, the mummified monk. This is exactly what it says it, very strange indeed. We finally headed for lunch where the 4x4 came into its own. Travelling through the jungle up down and over all terrain pushing the jeep to its limits, it was now time for me to enjoy and the girls to be scared. We eventually got to restaurant that sat at the top mountain and ate local Thai food over looking Koh Samui. After lunch we headed for the big budda where everybody in the truck gave a sigh of relief to be back on tarmac. The big budda was indeed big, it was huge standing about 60 metres high. We found a small shop selling sculptures made of car parts and material found from scrap yards. That night we headed out for an all you can eat fillet steak feast. Me and Jodie had been before so we knew what to expect but this time they tried telling us that they didn’t have all you can eat, when i was actually reading it to them out of there menu. After a bit of confusion we had our steak and it was awesome!! 3 January Up early and me and Hannah went to the beach whilst Shaun slept in until 2 pm!! After not wearing any sun cream all day we fried and Hannah is absolutely lobstered!! 4 January This morning we got the big boat over to Koh Phangan to meet Tom for a night out. Since there are no middle of the night boats back we have decided to get a room for the night. We went straight to Black & White and got a 4 person room for 1200 baht. We all headed to Haad Rin for a sun bathe before me and Hannah headed back as Hannah is a little fragile with sun stroke! After we woke up from our accidental sleep we met the boys at the beach where Shaun went with Tom for his first jet ski ride. In the evening we had a few drinks in the room before we headed out to Nic’s Restaurant. Me and Tom had amazing tapas and Shaun and Hannah shared a 2 person pizza, Shaun could have eaten in to himself though! We went down to Haad Rin and started our session. At the Cactus Bar they put on games and shows every night. They, of course, had the fire dancing. They actually let a drunk guy have a go on the Poi’s ... what a bad idea, they slipped out of his hand and hit a group of girls sat watching! These things are on fire by the way! They also did fire breathing ... as ever Tom the mentalist had a go! A few gulps of paraffin and you blow it and try and light a fire stick! Absolutely mental! Shaun and Tom played the balloon game and Tom had a go at the skipping rope and fire ring again, and as always he caught alight and put a few holes in his shorts! Will try and post the video. Unfortunately Hannah felt unwell with sun stroke so went home early only to have us wake her up at 3am drunk after we had a chicken burger and chips! 5 January We woke up, hung over, (aside from Hannah who still has sun stroke) and checked out of Black & White for the final time and headed to the boat. Tom has decided to ditch the hostel in Phangan and come back to Koh Samui with us as well. After we had gotten showered the afternoon rain started as usual at 3pm!! As we didn’t fancy wading through “Cholera Road” as Hannah calls it, we had lunch in the restaurant in the hotel. After some food we headed to Bar street then onto Ark Bar for a few buckets. Then we went for the essential drink at GoGo Street. We eventually got kicked out of GoGo Street at closing and lost Tom to a massage parlour at 4.20 am! No Bobo! 6 - 9 January Since Hannah left on 6th January we haven’t really been up to a lot. We spent a day down the beach and a couple of days up on the roof top with the boys shooting silly movies all day! We met Tom for our final dinner and beer and said our goodbyes before heading back for an early night on the 9th! Next installment coming now ...