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15 Apr 2001 : Koh Samui - Thailand Printer friendly version
Beach life - Tamarind Retreat to Tongsai Bay by sue_and_nathan in diary yearaway
Our last night at the Retreat turned into a real wildlife fiasco. Sue was sitting there writing her diary for the day when from the top of the wardrobe next to her came the BIG sound of a lizard barking and when I say BIG sound, I mean BIG, HUGE enough to make us both jump out of our pants and scoot across to the other side of the room. We then sat on the bed only to find lots of little black bugs on our nice white sheets. While we were worrying about them Sue looked up to see the lizard emerging from the top of the wardobe - he was a real big cretin - enough to make us two scared anyway!! It took a bit of encouraging to get Sue into bed and when at last I managed to turn the light off the barking started again, only this time from the rattan curtain just above Sue's head - though not above her head for long as she'd moved onto my side!! When we got up in the morning the truth was confirmed, that BIG lizard must have been more scared of us than we of him because our nice bamboo mats were covered in lizard poo!!
I must say after that we were quite releived to move onto Tongsai Bay Cottages at the Northern end of the island. This is the super dooper luxury bit of the trip - the real honeymoon bit! Our initial impressions of the place were great - the views from our villa, which is high up and overlooking the bay, are fantastic - real tropical island stuff.
We discovered here what a wonderful invention air-con is. Sue has always insisted that fan rooms are better, but she seems to have changed her mind in this heat - not the hardened traveller after all, huh? You really need a break from the constant humidity and personally I can't stand sleeping under something which sounds like the propellers of a helicopter!!
Oh yeah, did I mention the beach? Lovely white sand surrounding a blue sea with barely a ripple. Our balcony overlooks all of this and we can even see it from the bath (which is also on the balcony!)
This hotel is a real change from the last place, Tamarind Retreat was a unique experience that we both enjoyed and I would recommend it to anyone (as long as you're not too scared of sharing your room with plenty of friendly wildlife!) but this place is sheer luxury and, boy, do you have to pay for it. We're were getting used to a large Thai meal on the beach for 300 Baht for two, but here we're easily spending 2000 Baht - back to London prices again!! Have a look at their site to give you an idea - it's http://www.tongsaibay.com
We have both gained heat rashes so we looked in our Lonely Planet travellers heath book. It wasn't very helpful, but I did notice an interesting entry for the plague, it mentioned the usual stuff about it being the black death of medieval Europe spread by rodents and then went on to say,"You should obviously seek medical advice as soon as possible if you should have the plague." I have noted this advice!!
It's Songkran at the moment which is Thai new year - a time to douse the Buddha with water, douse your elders with water and soak one another around the pool with huge water guns! We decided after our soaking to have our first dip in the sea - Sue sat in an inflated inner tube and I swam her out to sea. We'd been enjoying this for a while when I felt something sting my leg - we came rushing in and it turned out to have been a jellyfish. Nathan got plenty of attention from the hotel staff - three ladies came up to the room and rubbed something called 'Morning Glory' into his inner thigh. If the sting had been any higher I wouldn't have let them near him!! All seems to be okay now - think it's still a little sore, but it wasn't anything too awful.
Coming to the end of our luxury bit tomorrow and then back to Bangkok where the real adventure begins. Feeling pretty excited about that - a little nervous as we're not really sure whether we're going to be able to handle the heat and the pollution together!
Off to the beach now for some lunch. See ya then
 
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11 Apr 2001 : Koh Samui - Thailand20 Apr 2001 : Bangkok - Thailand
Rest and rehabA few more nights in the capital