It was finally time to leave the beaches for good and get to the north of Thailand: Chris and I booked the night train at 10 pm from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, far up in the north. The train ride is about 14h, but as we booked a sleeping wagon, this shouldn’t be a problem. When we arrived at the train station, we were a bit early, so we took the locals as an example and made ourselves comfortable on the the floor.

After about 90 minutes of waiting, we could board the train. Of …Read More

Koh Tao – a very small island (about 21 km²) in the north of the gulf. It’s world famous for its diving as the water is really clear and it’s the cheapest place on earth to get a PADI diving license. In fact the issue more new dicing licenses than every other place, even more than the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. So when I was sitting on the ferry to Koh Tao from Koh Samui for 3 hours, I really thought about getting a diving license, but in the end I decided against it, …Read More

Before going to the gulf of Thailand, I wanted to pay a visit to the Khao Sok National Park, as I heard only good things about in various internet forums and François (the Belgium guy I met on Phi Phi) also had been there and liked it a lot. Apparently Francois also talked to Chris about it, as he decided to come along. Francois even gave the both of us a card from the place he stayed at, as he hardly recommended it.
Chris is as lazy as me, so we both slept very long …Read More

After Koh Phi Phi Chris, Pauline, Ian and I took the ferry to Phuket, a big half island on the west coast of Thailand. It’s most famous beach is probably Patong Beach. But because accommodation is very expensive there, we decided to stay in Phuket Town, which is located in the middle of the island. Pauline had been to Phuket Town before and knew a good hostel. We were all pretty tired on the first night, so we just went to get something to eat and then enjoyed the free wifi (which seems to be …Read More

You probably go conform with me, when I say, that my first visit at Maya Bay (“The Beach”) wasn’t beautiful at all. So did the others. And we thought it cannot be, that we have been on Koh Phi Phi and did not see the beach in all its beauty, so we decided to get a long tail boat and head over the Koh Phi Phi Leh for the day. Along came Pauline, Elsa, Tony, Ian (a great guy from England) and Chris (another German fellow). When we reached the bay, the water was at …Read More

The next day, me and a couple of people from the dorm decided to walk to Long Beach, as it was supposed to be not affected as much by low tide as all the other beaches. It’s about a 30 minutes walk along the coast. As a change, the weather was not soo good, a few clouds here and there and a little bit colder than the days before. We played ball for a while in the water and on the beach and just relaxed…
 
It was true, that we were able to swim much longer …Read More

On my first night on Koh Phi Phi I met Francois (from Belgium) and Ana (from Argentina). Both decided that evening, that they wanted to do a snorkeling trip on the next day. Originally I had planned to spend another day on the beach and then go snorkeling, but as it is definitely nice to have some good company while snorkeling, I changed my plans and also booked the snorkeling trip for the next day.
Unlike on Koh Lipe, this time we had a “big” boat and not a long tail boat. Besides us three there …Read More

My original plan was to go to Koh Phi Phi right away after Koh Lipe, but as Freddy (one of the Swedes I met on Langkawi) was always talking about Koh Lanta and it was on the way, I happened to make a quick stop over there. But now as I can make a checkmark next to Koh Lanta…let’s go to Koh Phi Phi, the famous island where they filmed the beach from the movie “the beach”. Phi Phi wasn’t very war from Lanta, only about a 1h ferry ride. I booked the early ferry …Read More

On my second day on Koh Lanta Gonzalo and I decided to rent scooters and explore the island. The main thing we wanted to see was a big cave that is on the island. I’ve never driven a scooter before so this was a new experience and my driving style was a bit shaky in the beginning, but I got used to it pretty fast and then it was just a lot of fun. I had no problems with driving on the wrong (left) side of the road at all and there wasn’t much traffic …Read More

Leaving Penang in the morning, I took the ferry to Langkawi, a big island on the north west coast of Malaysia. The island is so close to the border of Thailand, that the whole island is a duty free zone, which is good for the beer price and shopping in general. It’s quiet touristy, even the locals go there for their holidays. I got a shared cab from the harbor to the beach my guesthouse was on (I got a recommendation from the owner of Father’s Guesthouse in the Cameron Highlands). It was quiet nice, …Read More