Well, Koh Phangan is definitely not Koh Samui. I could tell the minute we got on the ferry, there were backpackers everywhere, and many of them American. It’s the most Americans we’ve seen thus far. The ferry was easy, only about a half hour on a high speed catamaran. When we hopped off, taxi/tuks tuks were everywhere. We found one easily for 100 baht each and headed to Rainbow Bungalows on Ban Kai beach. It is beautiful.

We have a four person bungalow with a queen bed and two twins, our own private bathroom and hot shower, not so bad for $17 a night. I’m really glad we did our research. We had booked a hostel at Coral Beach and thank god we cancelled it. We’ve walked by a few times and it seems crazy. All party all the time, definitely not our scene.

Rainbow Bungalows has a restaurant attached. It has amazing food for great prices. We really lucked out because it’s been raining a LOT and hard. So walking to get food would be a real pain.

The beach is right outside our room, it the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen.

I had some great Rud-Na that reminded me of the Thai food at home, clearly better here.

We met a cool Aussie named Phil and he rounded us up to take a taxi to Haad-Rin, the party beach. There was a British girl in the taxi that the driver tried to kick out so we could get in. Luckily, we convinced her to come with us and chilled all night. I love finding girls to hang out with. There was a German girl and Norwegian guy from or Bungalows who also came with us. We went to this sneaky little bar on the beach. Called Reggae something, I forget. It was all black lights and neon paint, very cool. We painted all over each other but it looked terrible in the real light.

We decided to head to the Waterfall Party, because it seemed like the popular thing to do. Since taxis aren’t the cheapest, we decided to walk from our Bungalow. Luckily we were able to hide here for a while because it started down pouring. Once there was in a break in the action we headed to the party because it was “close”. Well, the sign was close. We walked on a windy road avoiding oncoming taxis and motorbikes for a while. After about ten/twenty minutes, a taxi picked us up for free. Thank god she did because it started to POUR. We got to the entrance and had to pay 300 baht to get in, that put a bad taste in my mouth. That, and we had to walk about another twenty minutes up and down muddy hills in the rain. I was worried about slipping and hurting my knee the entire time. Luckily Spense stayed back with me and steadied me when I needed it. We finally made it, and it was just not for us. I think Glover actually enjoyed it, but maybe I just didn’t have enough to drink to mosh with the Europeans. I was distracted by the rain and the expensive drinks and the doom of walking back home. Beers were 100 baht, double the price they are everywhere else. There were some fire throwers, which was cool, except they dropped it A LOT. Not the most comforting thing to stand next to.

At about 1am we decided to hit the road. Not before buying some Spring Rolls of course. I really can’t resist the food here… On the way down I had Chandler and Spense on either side of me helping me down the mountain. This time we took a taxi all the way down, no way were we walking in the craziness. I was a very happy camper when we got home. I passed out within minutes and had the best sleep I’ve had this whole trip.

Even though Koh Phangan is much more of a party spot than Koh Samui, I think I really like it here. I’ve taken some of the most amazing photos. You’ll see!

One love.