Koh Tao

Unless you are able to pay a lot of money, there is no convenient way to get from Chiang Mai to the islands on the eastern side of Thailand. (Read corrupt governments in cahoots with corrupt airlines). We were going to have to fly to Bangkok, stay the night there and then the next morning fly to Koh Samui and take a ferry to our first stop, Koh Tao. At the recommendation of a friend, we decided to take the night train from Bangkok to Chumpon and then catch the 7:00am ferry from there. In theory it sounded like a great idea...we'd save a day of travel by taking the night train along with a lot of money and the train is the last form of transportation we had yet to utilize on our trip so we thought "why not!?!?". Fast forward 26 hours and we still hadn't arrived! Let's just say it is going to take us less time to get to San Francisco from Hong Kong than it did getting from Chiang Mai to Koh Tao. Our train was delayed 3 hours which caused us to miss the 7:00am ferry which caused us to have to wait until the next ferry at 1:00pm. We had to wait here though, so it could have been worse!
Once we arrived on the island they threw us in the back of a pick up truck to take us to our hotel. After being in the same clothes for 26 hours, we could not have been happier!
The next few days we just relaxed. A friend of ours from San Francisco and her sister happened to be on the same train as us and stayed at the same resort, so we hung out with them a lot. And relaxed some more!
On our last full day there we took a snorkeling trip around the island. Koh Tao is very small so within a few hours we had hit 3 snorkel sites and had already circled the island.
The day ended with a stop at a tiny private island called Koh Nang Yuan where we proceeded to hike to the highest point.
And then swam in the crystal clear water.
We then made it back to the boat for our return trip home right before "it" happened. By "it" I am referring to the perfect storm that caused me to think who I was going to leave the $.50 remaining in bank account to. Let's just say I have never been more happy to wear a neon orange life jacket in my life!
But here we are safe and sound in beautiful Koh Samui!

Location:Thailand