So, we are at the point of having been on Ko Samui for four weeks and we are about to move on tomorrow morning to Malaysia. Our stay has been enjoyable to say the least, TP has managed to do very little but Jen has successfully completed her TEFL course with a really good grade. We have visited most of the key sights and feel that we have probably ‘done’ Samui.

Overall it is a really enjoyable place to visit and I think most people looking for a beach type holiday will find it an enjoyable time . However if you are hoping for some cultural experiences (beyond the monkey show and the Thai boxing etc) you may feel that other destinations hold more promise. We have used our scooter to visit most parts of the island and have to confess that the interior is rather attractive. The land back from the main road, which essential makes a full circuit of the island close to the beaches, is a mixture of fairly wild ‘jungle’ interspersed by coconut groves and banana plantations.

There are several substantial hills (although locals refer to them as mountains) with deep valleys cut through by streams and waterfalls. Our scooter, making full use of all of its 125cc, found it quite difficult to get to the top of some of the hills with both of us on board as the gradient of some bits of road is totally mad. At one stage, Jen even got off and jogged up the hill behind TP and the scooter, as the bike just couldn’t make the hairpin bend with vertical ascent with both of us on it.

Journeys have also tended to be complicated by the fact that frequently a road will run out of surface and turn into mud tracks that we have been reluctant to travel on . At this stage we have had to turn round and go back down the hill and try another road (we have mentioned the unreliability of Thai maps in the past). At one stage , after a circuitous journey, we were sure we could see the place where the road had run out on our previous try. Eventually, Jen’s desire to visit the Magic Garden on the mountain was lost by too many failed attempts to find it. Her enthusiasm for it disappeared, as it seems has the garden.

For those of you who may have heard about the plane crash on Koh Samui, it did not affect us directly. It happened the day before we left and we were departing by sea. Our friend Clare was supposed to be flying that evening and the news came through as she was about to leave Save House. Apparently everyone was being diverted over to the mainland to another airport, so we presume she made it home eventually. The TV cameras were at the ferry pier when we departed the next morning, filming us along with all the diverted ‘farangs’ (foreigners) , of whom there were not many! Most people on the ferry actually seemed to be locals going about their normal businsess.

Anyhow, it is time to ply you with the remaining photo’s of our time on Koh Samui before we head off to Malaysia….