Koh Lak/Lanta After leaving the monsoon drenched Island of Koh Phangan we thought we'd try our luck with the weather on the West Coast, so headed across land to Koh Lak. The main attraction in this area is scuba diving the Similan Islands, which is something I'd wanted to do ever since I was aware that they are within the top 3 dives sites in the world. Plus with Easton recently passing his Open Water it would be great for us to do it together. Unfortunately Mot...

Villa Verdee - The name of our luxury 4 bed detached villa with an open plan kitchen-diner & lounge not to forget the ensuite swimming pool. This was another one of Simon and Beck's kind favours which we are truly thankful for. It was high in the mountain and forest area, all secluded; it really was a beautiful setting.The pad was something from MTV cribs!! With only a 20 minute walk to the local village (Ao Thong Nai Pan Noi), not too far out nor too close, ...

Its here that we met up with Jamie & Bennett, & for the next 10days the 6 of us were going to be 'holidaying it up' in a luxury villa that Simon & Beck had organised. First things first…the boys went off in search of mopeds, whilst Beck & I got acquainted with the sun loungers by our very nice pool. It is sooo nice to be out of backpacker accommodation & be able to hang all your clothes up in a wardrobe, buy nice fruit to put in your own fri...

Even though Phi Phi is still a tropical paradise island, the place had certainly changed since I was here a few years back. The first thing I noticed was they'd replaced the shabby wooden pier with a brand new concrete one, which in fairness with the amount of foot flow that goes through here I'd be surprised if the wooden one didn't snap under the weight of all the people. Plus more bars, shop & Guest houses had gone up everywhere, very different from Railay...

Finally we have arrived in Thailand's South Islands and met up with Simon & Becky. We were really looking forwarded to catching up with them and spending the next few weeks chilling in the sunshine! We'd arranged to spend a night in Ao Nang before catching the longtail boat over to Railay the following morning. We hadn't heard of Ao Nang before we arrived but it was a nice chilled holiday town right on the beach. After checking into some reasonably priced acc...