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David's Travels
It was an early start for the mamouth trip from Langkawi to Koh Phangan and considering we'd been playing poker with some Aussie guys and drinking until 5am, we were all a little worse for wear and harldy fit for the various modes of transport we'd be using throughout the next 24 hours! The journey began with with the rather swift ferry from Langkawi across the border into Thailand, arriving at Satun. After sorting our visas and declaring our job titles on the form (I've been something different everytime - most recently a student, it still feels right!), it was an "Adventure Bus" across Thailand to the East Coast. We've since re-named this style of mini-bus as the DVT Bus due to the lack of leg room and blood circulation we had while on board! This is the part of the journey where we met Gemma who declared she was from Birmingham, but later retracted the statement, admitting she was actually from Redditch.....call yourself a Brummie?? We let her off though as she was a top girl and as we were all heading towards the Full-Moon Party, it made perfect sense to make our threesome a foursome! It was on this leg of the trip that I started feeling really rough - I really shouldn't have been drinking the night before! I kept going and managed to ride it out! The "Adventure Bus" took us to Had Yai on the East Coast, where we were able to get a train to Surat Thani, the port for the overnight ferry to Koh Phangan. The one thing that struck me immediately in Thailand were the amount of people wanting to rip you off; it soon became fairly straightforward ro get rid of them though, however I like the pricing system used by taxi drivers. One fare for tourists and pretty much a quarter of that for Thais!!! Anyway, we got to the night ferry in good time and booked ourselves on. By this time everyone was in the party mood but me, I was suffering badly and sat saying nothing cluthching a bottle of cold water to my head to try and calm my temperature - this wasn't drink related you may be suprised to hear! The night ferry is basically a load of mattresses thrown onto one level of the boat which was full of fellow party goers. It was a really good trip and once feeling a little better, enjoyed it. Loads of people chatting, playing cards, and playing music, all except the Buddhist monk who prayed in the corner! We got down to some serious UNO with a group of Israeli girls! As we booked late, we were staying on the West coast of the island, about 30 mins away from where the party would be, however our hostel owners ran regular journeys there for us if you don't mind hanging out the back of a pick-up over the steepest hills I've ever encountered. It wasn't about being excited about the party on the way, more whether you'd still be alive by the end of the journey!! I'll breifly touch on the night before the full-moon, it was very messy and resulted in me paying a fine to a taxi driver, we'll leave it there......... The night of the party and I could hardly face a drink! Good work Mr Hand!! I soon managed to put that behind me and we managed to bump into Gemma and her mates so we had our crew for the night. One of her lovely mates, a four foot nothing Kiwi who was obsessed with rugby tackling people, took me out when I least expected it, breaking my flip-flops and sending my beer flying. It was barefoot for the rest of the night for me then! I got my own back and a large amount of respect from her and her mates for doing so....(I must stress that I didn't break her flip-flops though!) There was loads of lovely food, cheap beer, body painting, fire eaters and just loads of people from all over the world and all were pretty friendly. The party itself was just madness! The only way I could describe it to Dave on the net the other day was a cross between Ibiza without the t*** , and Glastonbury on speed! I have never seen anything like it! It was non-stop all night and there were sound systems banging out every sort of music you would want to hear including a lot of techno - the sort to make your ears bleed! As many of the bars toned it down, the sun came up and it was brilliant sitting there watching that, although meand Gemma continued our party at a bar playing drum & bass at 6 in the morning and got down to some Roni Size! (The pics don't do it justice, we were advised to get a disposable as there are a lot of muggings at the party). Most people partied on into the next day and as I'd lost Stu and Henson had gone home really early, I chilled with Gemma and her mates and went for lunch before slowly making my way back to our chalet - I couldn't let the side down by going home early! They are obsessed with "Buckets" on the island. Beach buckets with stupid amounts of alcohol in them at crazy prices, there were some states as a result. I learned the hard way about these the night before and wisley stuck to the beer the night of the party! Anyway, all in all the party was amazing and we had a great time, although walking the roads barefoot the next day in the midday sun wasn't pleasent! The island as a whole and our accomodation were also very nice - don't be put off by it being the Thai Lanzarote, there are quiet places too and it's definitely worth a visit. We'll be back there with Dave and Pete!
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