09/03/10: Heading North
After several days of relaxing at Mae Nam, Jisun and I finally decided to go to Northern Thailand for the rest of our trip. At this point we only had a week left, and that kind of limited our options. We were supposed to go to Cambodia or Laos, but the hassle involved wouldn't really have been worth it for a week, so we just settled on going to Chiang Mai instead.
I had never been to Chiang Mai, so I was interested in it. The only problem was that we had already bought bus tickets back to Bangkok. The trip from Koh Samui to Bangkok is an all day and all night affair, which isn't really a good time. Our schedule was to leave Mae Nam at noon in a taxi for the pier. The boat would leave at 1:30pm, and arrive at about 4:00pm at Surat Thani. At Surat Thani, we were to take a shuttle bus to a bus depot, and then wait until 6:30pm to take the bus to Bangkok. The bus was scheduled to arrive in Bangkok at about 5:00am. Not a good time at all.
Now, since we decided to go to Chiang Mai, Bangkok was actually only halfway there. First we tried to organize a train, but that didn't work out for us. We decided that we had enough of bus trips at this point, so weren't willing to sit in Bangkok all day long to take another overnight bus. That left flying. Fortunately we were able to get a flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai leaving at noon. So, we would arrive in Bangkok at noon and then have about seven hours to kill before the flight left. Not too terrible of a situation, and it was more or less better than any of the other options.
Any other options, that is, except for flying directly from the Samui airport or the Surat Thani airport. These options would have been slightly more expensive, but would have saved us the hassle of taking an overnight bus. However, I had already bought the bus tickets, and I am cheap as all get out, so refused to change our plans. Jisun wasn't too happy about this, but we survived after a torturous mixture of taxis, buses, boats, and airplanes. If only we had managed to ride a train, we could have covered every form of public transportation in only one trip.
That was the bad part. The good part was that when we were leaving Maenam, Marie- the lady who runs Seedaeng Bungalows- decided to knock another hundred baht off of our room rate. We didn't ask for it, that is just the type of lady she is. So we ended up paying 600 baht per night, which is about 18$ and not at all a bad price for a beachfront bungalow with a refrigerator and hot water.
So that was our trip from Koh Samui to Chiang Mai. What could have taken us two hours of flying ended up taking about 26 torturous hours of traveling. Hey, I never claimed that I did things the easy way!
I had never been to Chiang Mai, so I was interested in it. The only problem was that we had already bought bus tickets back to Bangkok. The trip from Koh Samui to Bangkok is an all day and all night affair, which isn't really a good time. Our schedule was to leave Mae Nam at noon in a taxi for the pier. The boat would leave at 1:30pm, and arrive at about 4:00pm at Surat Thani. At Surat Thani, we were to take a shuttle bus to a bus depot, and then wait until 6:30pm to take the bus to Bangkok. The bus was scheduled to arrive in Bangkok at about 5:00am. Not a good time at all.
Now, since we decided to go to Chiang Mai, Bangkok was actually only halfway there. First we tried to organize a train, but that didn't work out for us. We decided that we had enough of bus trips at this point, so weren't willing to sit in Bangkok all day long to take another overnight bus. That left flying. Fortunately we were able to get a flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai leaving at noon. So, we would arrive in Bangkok at noon and then have about seven hours to kill before the flight left. Not too terrible of a situation, and it was more or less better than any of the other options.
Any other options, that is, except for flying directly from the Samui airport or the Surat Thani airport. These options would have been slightly more expensive, but would have saved us the hassle of taking an overnight bus. However, I had already bought the bus tickets, and I am cheap as all get out, so refused to change our plans. Jisun wasn't too happy about this, but we survived after a torturous mixture of taxis, buses, boats, and airplanes. If only we had managed to ride a train, we could have covered every form of public transportation in only one trip.
That was the bad part. The good part was that when we were leaving Maenam, Marie- the lady who runs Seedaeng Bungalows- decided to knock another hundred baht off of our room rate. We didn't ask for it, that is just the type of lady she is. So we ended up paying 600 baht per night, which is about 18$ and not at all a bad price for a beachfront bungalow with a refrigerator and hot water.
So that was our trip from Koh Samui to Chiang Mai. What could have taken us two hours of flying ended up taking about 26 torturous hours of traveling. Hey, I never claimed that I did things the easy way!
08/03/10: Mae Nam
The first night in Mae Nam wasn't ideal. In fact it was noisily torturous. Normally this stuff doesn't bother me, but I had just spent a week at Than Sadet, where it is dark and quiet at night. When I say dark and quiet, I mean DARK and QUIET. There is no electricity at night, which means it is pitch black inside the bungalow at night. To go from that to an all night long party was a bit hard to handle.
That being the case, I ran out first thing the next morning and got a bus ticket back to Bangkok for the next day. This was a bit unfortunate, because after chilling out for a while, I realized that I really liked the place and wanted to stay for a few more days. Of course that wasn't a big problem to solve, I just went back to the travel agent and switched the date.
Once that was taken care of, I began my difficult work of sitting around on the bungalow porch and doing nothing. We were staying at Seedaeng Bungalows at Mae Nam, and it was a very cool place. They had what was called a 'trust bar'. That is there was a bar in which no one worked, and you were just supposed to keep track of what you drank and then pay later. Apparently it worked well, because it was still available, and I really like the idea. No less cool was the breakfast area which was also run on a trust basis. I like that style, though I was too cheap to take care of it. There was a fridge in our bungalow and the beers were cheaper at the market, so I just picked up beers there and kept them in the bungalow.
Basically all I did for the next several days was eat, drink, swim and relax. This is interesting because it is exactly the same things I did the previous week, just in a slightly more built up location. It was cool to be back in a bit of civilization, actually. The people staying at and running Seedaeng were all very cool and friendly, and it was nice to have electricity at night. Also, it was cool to have a bungalow directly on the beach, because it made going for a swim that much easier.
Other than that, I didn't really do much of anything. Jisun and I casually talked about where to go next, but couldn't really settle on anything. We already had tickets back to Bangkok, but we couldn't figure out where we wanted to go from there. Of course when you are waking up on the beach to sunrises like these, it is hard to be excited about going anywhere.
That being the case, I ran out first thing the next morning and got a bus ticket back to Bangkok for the next day. This was a bit unfortunate, because after chilling out for a while, I realized that I really liked the place and wanted to stay for a few more days. Of course that wasn't a big problem to solve, I just went back to the travel agent and switched the date.
Once that was taken care of, I began my difficult work of sitting around on the bungalow porch and doing nothing. We were staying at Seedaeng Bungalows at Mae Nam, and it was a very cool place. They had what was called a 'trust bar'. That is there was a bar in which no one worked, and you were just supposed to keep track of what you drank and then pay later. Apparently it worked well, because it was still available, and I really like the idea. No less cool was the breakfast area which was also run on a trust basis. I like that style, though I was too cheap to take care of it. There was a fridge in our bungalow and the beers were cheaper at the market, so I just picked up beers there and kept them in the bungalow.
Basically all I did for the next several days was eat, drink, swim and relax. This is interesting because it is exactly the same things I did the previous week, just in a slightly more built up location. It was cool to be back in a bit of civilization, actually. The people staying at and running Seedaeng were all very cool and friendly, and it was nice to have electricity at night. Also, it was cool to have a bungalow directly on the beach, because it made going for a swim that much easier.
Other than that, I didn't really do much of anything. Jisun and I casually talked about where to go next, but couldn't really settle on anything. We already had tickets back to Bangkok, but we couldn't figure out where we wanted to go from there. Of course when you are waking up on the beach to sunrises like these, it is hard to be excited about going anywhere.
