After spending our first few weeks on the east coast of Thailand, we decided to give the west coast a try! We crossed over to the town of Surat Thani, still in the south but on the Gulf of Thailand. We never know what we’re going to get when we show up at bus stations to buy tickets for local buses, but this one seemed especially hectic. We waited hours for this bus to arrive, which actually ended up being a van where we had to squeeze into the back seats next to the luggage. We’re used to local buses stopping often and dropping off packages/picking up take-out food and dropping it off for people along the way, which I actually kind of like because it’s pretty charming and I always wonder how they plan it. But my absolute favorite stop this time was our driver randomly pulling up to a stand on the side of the road and buying a wooden back-scratcher. I guess he had an itch that just couldn’t wait!

Surat Thani

John found a homestay on Airbnb at a woman’s house just outside of the city of Surat Thani. Neither of us have ever stayed at a homestay before so we didn’t really know how it worked, but when she immediately served us the most amazing homemade Pad Thai we realized we struck gold. Our host, Nun (or our “Thai Mama” as she called herself) was the sweetest woman and a truly amazing cook. She cooked every meal for the three days we stayed with her, each different and each one of the best things we’ve ever eaten. John was constantly asking her what was in each dish so he could try to recreate it when we get home (yay!). She also let us help cook when we wanted, so we got some informal cooking lessons.

One day we took a solo excursion to a mangrove forest on the coast. It had a boardwalk to take you out through the mangroves and if you’re lucky spot some wildlife! This was however our first experience where we really felt the inconvenience of not renting a motorbike. We’ve met so many travelers that have been in motorbike accidents – and witnessed a few ourselves – so doesn’t feel worth the risk to us. But getting to and from this remote location was a challenge! Luckily our Grab driver that dropped us off was very nice and gave us her phone number so we could call her when we were ready to be picked up. 

During our time with Nun she took us on a sunset picnic on a lake, went to a couple night markets, went kayaking, and spent a lot of time playing with her kitty. Nun’s English was limited so we google translated a lot, but she was so sweet and was such a warm host! We hope we get to visit her again someday.

Koh Tao

There are several islands off the coast near Surat Thani, and we chose to visit Koh Tao (Turtle Island) because it was supposed to have the best snorkeling. Our boat to the island was on a much bigger boat than our previous experiences, but the sea was just as rough. There were people all over the boat throwing up (thankfully they had passed out vomit bags earlier) but thanks to our best friend Dramamine we were prepared. Honestly we’re probably single-handedly keeping the motion sickness medicine market alive on this trip. 

Koh Tao is more of a party island, with a different club throwing parties every night that is the “place to be”. We lost an embarrassing game of beer pong to a couple from the UK that had never played before. We’re getting old!

Our first day we rented kayaks and snorkels and paddled out to a tiny nearby island. We didn’t realize it was a private island though and we were immediately told we had to pay several hundred baht each or else get off the island within 5 minutes. As cheap as we are, we weren’t about to paddle all the way back without some snorkeling and lunch first so we reluctantly paid and were allowed on the island. The snorkeling was pretty good, and John found another Trigger fish to follow that miraculously didn’t bite him (we hadn’t yet learned how aggressive they can be). Our second day we went to “Shark Bay” on the south of the island that was supposed to have some of the best snorkeling in the area. Unfortunately the visibility was terrible and we couldn’t see anything, and after about an hour an incredible storm came through. We watched the storm from a cafe you could only access by wading through the ocean, so we had to wade back out during the storm. It was an adventure! 

Overall Koh Tao wasn’t our favorite island we’ve visited, but like all Thai islands it was beautiful and has its own unique vibe. Also, it was so full of scuba diving resorts that it sparked the idea of John getting scuba certified. We thought of it too late to do it on the island, but it lead us to a dive resort back on mainland Thailand.

Chumphon

Chumphon is a tiny little town back on the east coast of the mainland. It’s mainly a launch off point to get to and from the nearby islands, but they have a small dive culture as well. We found a dive resort where John could get his open-water certification and planned to stay there 5-days. Unfortunately we didn’t know John needed a doctor’s note in order to be cleared for the class, so with that added cost it no longer made sense. So instead we ended up only spending 2 nights and hung out with the dive instructors at the resort, which was surprisingly fun!

We also made it to Thung Wua Laen beach, which John had visited last time he was in Thailand 9 years ago. We ate at the same beach-side restaurant (using old pictures to remember exactly where it was) and spent the day walking around the little beach community. Unfortunately the beach there was covered in trash, clearly carried in by the tides. I can’t imagine how often they have to clean it up – it’s such a shame because it’s not local litter just an accumulation of trash carried around in the ocean. It seems to be a problem all around the beaches of Thailand, and they have volunteer clean up crews visit different beaches every week to pick up the trash.

One of my favorite parts of Thailand has been how kind everyone is to complete strangers. We needed somewhere to put our luggage while we walked around the beach, and the ladies at one of the restaurants let us leave them there all day. They also called us a cab to go to the train station – although cabs in places like these tend to be people’s friends that have a truck. It really is a culture more focused on helping one another out, and we really liked it!

Our plan after Chumphon was to the take the night train up to Bangkok for a few days before we head to the north of Thailand. But this was one of the few times our last minute planning actually backfired – it was a holiday weekend so all of the beds on the sleeper train were sold out. So unfortunately we were left to sleeping on normal seats the whole ride – aka not sleeping very much. But we made it to Bangkok and started the next phase of our Thailand adventure!

Christine