Thailand - Part Two (Party Recovery)

Following the Full Moon Party we were in full recovery mode (and nursing Kyle's wound). We knew that we'd need some time, so we kept the agenda free and spent the day watching movies in our beach bungalow (it was also Easter, so we made the rounds calling friends and family). We ate our meals at the bungalow restaurant (veggie soup, fried rice, pad thai, and mango sticky rice at various times, all of which were great hangover food). Other than that, we really didn't leave the room, which is pretty rare for us. The next day was still relaxing as well but we spent it at the small, secluded beach down below. After two solid days of rest, we were back in normal order!

While we enjoyed (and needed) our secluded bungalow, after a few days we needed a change up so we moved to the port city on the island. There we rented out a little hut at a beach "resort" for $15 per night. The benefit of staying on this part of the island was that we had much easier access to things to do, cheap meals, and general exploration. We had both been feeling very off for a few days and it ended up, we think, just being cabin fever from being stuck in one small spot for too long. We spent our first day in the port town wandering around like we always do, and everything felt right again. We found a couple of food courts, and one of them had a stand with cheap Thai coffee, which we immediately fell in love with. Thai coffee (and, really, coffee in many parts of Southeast Asia) consists of coffee, sugar, and condensed milk, and it is generally served over ice (although it is brewed hot, so it takes some time to cool down). It was lovely, and the price point was exactly what we needed. Plus, the prices in the food court restaurants were about half off what we had been paying at our bungalow restaurant. Win-Win. For lunch that first day we had basil-fried chicken and rice (a Thai staple), spring rolls, and fried glass noodles with a half-fried egg.

As it was our 6th day in Thailand, we were overdue for our At Home Test which was the required final step of Thailand's Test & Go program for Covid-19. We bought a couple of test kits for $2 each from the local 7-11 (as mentioned earlier, there are 7-11's EVERYWHERE) and worked through the pictures on the box as the directions were all in Thai. We, thankfully, tested negative and tried to do something with our results, but the Thai government is really unclear about exactly what you're supposed to do...so we moved on. We went on an evening beach run as our resort connected to a long, narrow stretch of beach, and spent some time splashing around in the ocean. That evening we went back to the food courts and tried the Thai Green Curry and Tom Yam soups. Both were incredible. Thai food is definitely some of our favorite in the world!

The next morning we decided to rent scooters for the day for a couple of reasons. One, was that the island had a bunch of cool spots that we wanted to see. The other, was that we needed practice on two-wheeled vehicles for an adventure that you'll read about in an upcoming blog post :). We, of course, got more cheap Thai coffee's (plus a breakfast of avocado toast...with shrimp?), walked down the road to the scooter shop (the rental shops are everywhere in Thailand) and got a pair of decent-looking scooters for $5 each for the day. Our first stop was at a waterfall, but the rain began pouring down. We ducked into a nearby coffee shop...which was also some sort of homemade zoo with rabbits, hairless gerbils, emus, turtles, deer, and many others. As the rain continued to dump down, we decided it wasn't worth the fee to enter the first waterfall, so we continued down the road for lunch (more curry and fried rice). The rain finally died and we were able to check out a couple of beaches and another waterfall nearby (and even swam at the base of the falls).

From there we continued on to beach with a sandbar that, at low tide, you are able to walk across to an adjacent island. We then drove along the beach roads before a stop for a happy hour beer at a beachside cafe. We then headed up the hills to a bar recommended by our hotel host as his favorite for sunset (Amsterdam bar) before wrapping up in the dark and dropping the scooters off. From there we headed to the local night street food bazaar and sampled a bunch of different dishes from chicken satay, to to fried quid, to even sushi. We called it a fairly early night as we knew the following day was going to be an absolute adventure trying to get to the Malaysian border crossing (we had actually flipped a coin earlier in the day to decide whether we should go north into the Thai jungle or south into a new country).

"Malaysian border crossing day" was a day to live in infamy on the trip. Asia, in general, is a tougher location than most of the world for gathering information, securing bookings, and general punctuality. We knew all of this, and we knew that Asia was having a difficult time recovering from the recent Covid outbreaks. But still, we weren't quite ready for the surprises to come. First and foremost, we had to get a PCR test in order to cross the border. Thailand, for accommodations, drinks, meals, transportation, and EVERYTHING ELSE is extremely cheap. However, or PCR tests (we walked to several clinics and hospitals to price shop) ended up be $105 each, which was the combined cost of all of our nights and meals on Koh Phagnan for our 4 days there...but we were stuck and had to pay.

After our test and checking out of the resort, we boarded the ferry. There were no online timetables and no way to book that late, so we had to book at the ferry stand. All of the ferry bookies included a bus destination as the mainland ferry port was actually in the middle of nowhere. We asked about a bus to take us all the way to Malaysia...but had no luck and no information about why it wasn't available, despite being listed on their big signs. Even getting a bus from these stands down to the closest big city to the border was a nightmare, so we just booked to the first city inland from the mainland port (Surat Thani). Once in Surat Thani, we began asking for a bus to Pendang Besar, the Thai border town that has an express train into Malaysia. None of the first few bus companies had anything available, but they kept waving us down the street. The final company still didn't, but after a few phone calls by the friendly worker, and following a stranger through several backstreets, we arrived at a hair salon that happened to be the gathering point for a van-load of people to head down south to Hat Yai, the closest large city to Malaysia. We decided this would be good enough for the day. We had about 30 minutes before we left (this is rare in Asia. There aren't many schedules posted so when you ask for a van to a certain location they usually put you on it right away and you wait until it fills up to go). We grabbed a quick bite to eat (rice with pork and honeyed sausages), a couple more Thai coffees (actually a coffee and a tea because of translation issues), and we were off. The van we were in actually was 50% people, and 50% cargo consisting of frozen meats that leaked some juice onto our backpacks. Yum!

We spent the next 6 hours on the van with one stop for dinner and a bathroom break, plus a random van transfer (that's the other thing about busses in Asia. Without warning, you may be directed to another bus/van and you just have to pray that it is going the correct way). We made it safely to Hat Yai, and tried booking the train for the next morning but quickly discovered that the train station was not in use. Undeterred, we booked a van for the next morning, got dinner, and went to bed. The next morning, after a 1 hour van ride, we finally made it to Padang Besar, the border city. Our van dropped us off at the customs house, which was gated off. We tried several entrances before someone finally told us that this border entry point was closed, and that we needed to go one town over. The biggest issue was that we had no way to get there. We were stranded in a small town with no taxis and a tiny little bus station, which was where we headed. An employee there let us know that they had no busses going that way, but that if we waited for two hours at a corner down the street we might see a van going by that was headed that way. After over an hour of waiting, that same employee drove by and said he would take us ALMOST to where we needed to go, but for a largely inflated fee. We had no choice but to accept. He dropped us off in a town 15 km away, and his friend was there in another van, and he took us the rest of the way for another inflated fee.

We had finally made it to the border, and this one was actually open...although it really only seemed like cars and trucks were going through. We went through border control on the exit side of Thailand, weaved through traffic on the long stretch of no-man's-land, and were the only people at the pedestrian entrance into Malaysia (note that we had to unpack our entire bags here for them to search through). After a long, strange journey where we stayed for a night in an unexpected town, crossed the border in an unexpected location, and took numerous vans when we were supposed to be on a train, we were finally in Malaysia! On the other side we looked at each other and said, "Now what do we do?"

Other random Thailand things:

• Thailand drivers drive on the opposite side of the road! Kyle screwed this up many, many times when we scootered.

• A common meal type in Southeast Asia is getting a bed of rice and pointing at random things sitting on heaters for the person behind the counter to pile on top. There often aren't any prices listed, so we were at the mercy of the server, but most of those meals came in under $5 each.

• It is so hot and humid in Thailand that cold drinks served to go often come with the cup wrapped in plastic bags so that the condensation doesn't leak all over you.

Levi's shirt count: 432