So after a long absence I've finally got round to adding to this. Blogging a month at a time seems to be the way I'm going to do it, so no point fighting it anymore.

Before I summarise the joys of Thailands beaches, I'd like to use this platform to vent my anger at STA Travel. How I love freedom of speech online. We had a mammoth trip from Bangkok to Buenos Aires with stop oversin Bahrain, Heathrow and Rio. A daft route I know, but the cheapest. We had a 2 hr connection in Bahrain until ourt flight got moved, giving us a 12 hr connection. Upon contacting STA, the exact response I got was:

'It's not our problem, you need to phone the airline'.

Seriously, in those exact words. Upon mentioning that I am currently in Thailand and calls are very expensive, he repeated the above sentence, adding that they appreciate me booking the flights through them. Thanks STA.

To top it off, our flight to BA went via Sao Paulo AND Rio (something they didn't mention to us), meaning we had to backtrack from Sao Paulo to Rio, and then fly over Sao Paulo again to get to BA. Have they not heard of a carbon footprint! Any by the way STA, your blog site is clunky and has crap SEO. Rant over.

Despite STA's best efforts, Thailand was amazing. The agenda was simple: beaches. We wanted to follow the crowd to the Samui Islands to see what the fuss was about, but caught whispers of an island that was like Koh Phangyan was like 10 yrs ago. So we headed to the east coast, to Koh Phayam.
Seriously, this place was heavan. A bamboo beach hut for 4 pounds, a 3km beach with no buildings higher than a 2 storey wooden bar. All the huts and bars were set back in the trees, so the beach was completely unspoilt. Laid back with good food, good people and good times, I didn't think anywhere like that existed in Thailand anymore, and I really hope it will keep it's undeveloped charm.

With the intention of staying 3 days, we eventually pulled ourselves out of the hammocks after 9 days and headed for Koh Tao. The snorkelling there was incredible. We stayed in a the small Tanote Bay, and spent 2 days watching barracuda, parrot fish and a whole host of others whose names I don't know swimming around us in clear waters.

After Koh Phayam and Tao, we were in need of a piss up, so headed to the Black Moon party on Koh Phangyan. Bit like the full moon, but a different beach and loads of psychedelic decorations. After another boozy day 2 days later, we decided to head to Koh Samui.

On Koh Samui we stayed on Meana beach. Yes, you guessed it, 4km of amazing beach to relax on, and again the intended 3 days turned into 9. I'd recommend this beach over any others on Samui. We got a moped for a few days to get to the others, but they were a bit of a let down. Chaweng, supposedly the best, was so rammed you couldn't even see if the beach was nice or not, and every 20 mins or so planes flew directly over it after taking off from Samui airport. The planes were so low you could see in the windows. Not the Thailand I had dreamed about.

Luckily, Koh Phayam, Koh Tao and Meanam beach on Koh Samui were exactly what I was looking for, and I felt completely relaxed like never before. I realised this on Koh Phayam, when a frog that was staying in our hut didn't return from a night time food hunt. I actually worried about that frog, and only that frog for 2 days until he took up his usual position on a hanging shelf. It dawned on me that if the most I have to worry about for 2 days is the well being of a frog, then I must be halfway to enlightenment.

So there's the quick overview of Thailand. Lacking on details I know, but I did spend most of it in hammocks and sun loungers. I'm now in Argentina being far more active, so expect an update at some point in the next month.

Hasta Luego!