We woke up early, with another long day of travel ahead of us. We were in reception of the hotel by 5.50am, which was lucky because our minibus to the airport was early. Having had just a few hours of sleep, we were back on another bus and zipping off to Don Meung airport in Bangkok.

The minibus only took half an hour to get to the airport as the driver was hooning it along, so we had some time to kill . We looked for some breakfast and struggled to find anything. We eventually got an egg and potato sandwich (weird) and a waffle, plus coffee. Our first meal for 24 hours. We got our bags scanned and checked in. Though there was a long queue, this time it moved swiftly. We passed through security equally swiftly and failed to find food other than cr*p snacks in departures. Soon enough, we boarded the plane and were on our way to Surat Thani airport.

The flight was only an hour long, and we napped a little. On landing, we picked up our bags and unsuccessfully tried to get some cash out, before finding the onward transport we needed, and immediately boarded another bus to get to the port in a place called Donsak. This bus took a little over an hour, and when we arrived at the port, it was raining, lightly. There were some giant puddles around to show that it had been raining more significantly. This was a bit of a shock - we just didn't expect rain in Thailand. Off the bus, we scooped up our bags too late after the driver had already dumped them on the wet ground, and joined a queue for the ferry .

The ferry was a large car ferry, with ample seating upstairs. We picked the calmest spot at the back and the middle of the ferry, bought coffee and snacks, and settled in. The seats were large, comfortable and they reclined. We did a little more napping, wandered around the boat, though didn't see much due to the rainy atmosphere. We did see Koh Samui in the distance, through the rain. About three hours later, we arrived into Thong Sala town.

We got off the boat and expected lots of touts shouting at us about transport and accommodation. There weren't. We were approached by a couple of motorcycle drivers - impractical with big bags. We found a sign for transport and went there. The people asked where we wanted to go, so we told them. Then they tried to con us. They claimed that, as we were some of the last people off the boat, that there was noone else going our way, and we'd have to pay for a whole taxi (not quite a taxi, but a four wheel drive with seats on a flatbed. More like a small truck) . All said in a very sympathetic voice. We walked off of course. We received shouts of "how much you want to pay?" so Ken suggested a fifth of the original asking price. This was readily accepted. We cursed the shysters, climbed into a taxi with some others (funnily enough, suddenly there were other tourists going our way), and set off the 7km north to where we were staying.

We were dropped off directly outside of Nice Sea Beach Resort, walked in past many dogs who didn't take any notice of us, and checked in. We met the owner, Mrs Nice, otherwise known as Ellie, and went to our cabin. This cabin had walls, excitingly, and a floor with tiles. It did not have large gaps between the wall and the roof. It had air conditioning and was ant free. It had a good, hot shower, clean towels and bedding, many windows to look out onto the sand and beach just a few steps away... it was absolutely ideal. It was by no means the cheapest of accommodations available on Koh Phangan, but it was worth it. Plus we didn't have to deal with wildlife making homes in our stuff . Later, we met the other owner, Mr Nice, who lived up to his name, and the rest of the staff were also very nice people. We were so happy to have a few days of peace and quiet somewhere so pleasant, and to not have to sit on a bus. Ignoring the shyster experience, we were very much enamoured with Koh Phangan.

We'd decided to go to Koh Phangan to get some Thai island, beach and diving time in. In particular, we wanted to get some good diving under our belts. We'd weighed up which of the islands in the Gulf of Thailand to choose - Koh Samui, Koh Phangan or Koh Tao, eventually opting for Koh Phangan. Then we decided where to stay on Koh Phangan, as it is a big island. We chose the west coast for sunsets and more secluded beaches, and close proximity to a whole host of vegetarian and vegan restaurants. Nice Sea Beach Resort was available. It looked, and was, perfect. Koh Phangan has a reputation as a party island, hosting full and half moon parties. It was neither when we were there, but the island was still very busy with tourists and people seeking a good time.

Whilst we were planning how many days of diving to do, the weather had other ideas. When we arrived, the day was grey and a bit dull. Not surprising, considering the weather on the mainland. When we looked into diving for real, we found out that noone was going diving because of the weather. Apparently there was a storm on the way and the waves were large. In the west, we were sheltered from the waves and so had no idea . Our discussion on how many days of diving to do turned into a hope that we could go diving at all. We resolved to keep in touch with the dive shops to see what the deal was each afternoon. In the meantime, we were not upset to see the sights of Koh Phangan island, go snorkelling, and rent a motorbike (despite the Lonely Planet's insistence that this was a bad idea).

In the evening, we got some really good but expensive (comparatively) food from a vegan place across the road from Nice Sea. We made our way to the nearby 7/11 and purchased snacks and booze, and had a quiet evening in. It was wonderful to finally sleep well in the quiet atmosphere after travelling for what felt like forever to get there.

On Saturday 19th, we picked up our very cheap motorbike from Mr Nice, and zipped south along the coast to Thong Sala. We'd seen a Buddhist vegan restaurant on Happy Cow's listings which was meant to be very cheap as well. So we headed there and had a great lunch. Next, we went back north, to the north west corner of the island, to check out the snorkelling spot of Koh Ma . This was an island, connected at low tide to the mainland via a spit of golden sand. It had coral in the immediate area. However, when we were there, the tide was high and the sea was choppy. We watched some people struggle to reach Koh Ma and thought better of going snorkelling in what would be bad visibility.

We hopped back on the bike and zipped eastwards, to the dive centre area of Chaloklum. Here, we spoke in person to some dive shops. The news wasn't good because of the weather. On the way out of the village, we stopped into Wat Chaloklum, took in a tiny emerald Buddha plus some larger ones in the Wat, and met a friendly dog who accompanied us out. When we got back to Nice Sea, Ken went for a swim in our much calmer bay waters. The water was a little cooler than Koh Rong's, possibly due to the weather. We took dinner at another vegan restaurant by Nice Sea, bought and drank some wine, and enjoyed the ambience.

On Sunday 20th, we took the motorbike to the Phaeng Waterfall, in the middle of the island . It was a short walk from a car park to the base of the waterfall, which cascaded nicely from a height. We imagined it would be very impressive in the wet season. From here, we climbed up through tree roots and boulders to reach a view point, looking across to the south west corner of the island. It was very pretty, and popular, despite there needing to be a rope to help people reach the top.

After we'd had our fill of the view and waterfall, we hopped back on the motorbike and headed to Haad Rin in the south east. This is the party area of Koh Phangan. We thought we'd go check it out. First, we headed to Sunrise Beach, which was a good long curve of golden sand, peppered with sunbathers. We enjoyed an ice cream and headed to Sunset Beach, which was harder to get onto. Eventually, we looked at it from a high up vantage point, and headed back to Thong Sala and to the Buddhist vegan restaurant for another great meal. On leaving Thong Sala, a dog decided to hop on our motorbike and come for a ride with us. We tried to persuade her otherwise, but she seemed to know what she was doing . On the way back to Nice Sea, we would periodically stop and put her off the bike, but she always climbed back on again. When we reached Nice Sea she of course smelt the dogs on the property and headed off in the same direction of travel. We could only hope she knew where she was going.

Back at Nice Sea, we went for a Thai massage in the attached massage parlour. This was more like punishment than a nice experience! It was a pressure massage, which involved, but was not limited to, our limbs being stretched and pulled around, bearing the massagers entire weight, cracking of fingers, toes and backs, and having our hair pulled. The massagers are incredibly strong. Jayna went for a swim to relax after the massage, but found the water too cold for comfort. After showering and getting some booze together, we sat and watched the sunset from the beach chairs, and relaxed. Eventually we gathered ourselves together and went to get some food from a buffet in one of the vegetarian restaurants nearby.

On Monday 21st, we had a slow start, and headed to a meditation place for lunch, on the way to Koh Ma to try snorkelling. When we reached Koh Ma, the tide was lower but still covering the majority of the sand spit. We guessed the tide was going out, so went for it anyway. When we reached the island, we chose the sheltered side to snorkel in, but the visibility was quite poor. We did find some coral and some parrotfish, and loads of sea cucumbers, which was nice . The view was too obscured to enjoy it properly, however. After we'd had our fill, we made our way back along the sand bar to the main island, hopped on the bike, and zoomed off to a dive shop to see what was happening with diving.

We went to The Dive Inn and were pleasantly surprised that they were planning on going diving the following day. It was our last chance to dive off Koh Phangan, so this was good news. We sorted our fins out, filled out a couple of forms and were off. Ken did some skyping of work colleagues and relatives, and we settled in for a early night before diving the following day.

On Tuesday 22nd, Ken said he felt a bit snotty in the morning, which was a bad warning sign. Choosing to ignore this, we then finally went diving off Koh Phangan! We went to the infamous dive site, between both Koh Phangan and Koh Tao, called Sail Rock. This area is famous for large fish, including attracting whale sharks and occasionally sharks as well. We were picked up by our dive master, Raf, and picked up another couple along the way - Candice and Joel . Candice and Joel were learning to dive, and were also travelling for a year. We swapped travel stories, and stories of how none of us liked India, before they went into the classroom and we went to get on the boat. The weather was overcast, and the sea was a bit choppy. We took up Raf's offer of sea sickness pills, and were off. The boat ride to Sail Rock took about an hour. There was only one other dive boat which joined us - we counted ourselves extra lucky at this point to be diving - did our briefing, kitted up, and giant strided into the water.

The first dive was to 20 metres for 50 minutes, with a visibility of 10-15 metres. We circumnavigated Sail Rock and, whilst we didn't see any of the larger pelagics we were looking for, it was a great dive. We saw giant barracudas, teira batfish, big-eye trevallys, orange-spotted trevallys, herring scads, titan triggerfish, double tooth soldierfish, a black-tip grouper, a big-eye snapper, malabar groupers, varicose wart slug, pick-handle barracudas, longfin bannerfish, a giant grouper, cleaner wrasse, crocodile needlefish, golden trevallys, huge shoals of queenfish, rock oysters, mangrove snappers, and generic angelfish and butterflyfish that we see in most dives . One part of the dive was entering the 'chimney'; a chimney of rock with entry/ exit points at 6m, 12m and 18m. On this dive, we entered the chimney at 18m and exited at 12m. That was pretty cool.

The second dive was equally as good, seeing the same fish as described above, plus a golden jellyfish. This dive was to a maximum depth of 21 metres, for 43 minutes, with slightly worse visibility. The currents were stronger on this dive, and this time we entered the chimney at 6m and exited at 18m. We really enjoyed that.

On the boat ride back, the weather became increasingly worse. It took twice as long to reach the pier on the way back because the boat had to travel slowly due to the large waves. The rain also started to come in, and really hit when we reached the dock. We quickly escaped to the dive shop. Despite being only about 100 metres away, we were very wet and cold when we got there. We helped ourselves to coffee whilst Raf did what he needed to do with the dive equipment. We completed our log books with Raf, who was the most thorough and diligent dive instructor we’d had and a really nice guy as well .

We met Candice and Joel again as they finished their day of instruction, swapped more stories and blog details. It was a while before Raf was ready to leave, and by this time we were very cold. Unfortunately, this did not assist Ken with his developing cold, which we blamed on the coughing and spluttering driver who took us from Trat to Bangkok. By the time we reached the hotel, Ken was suffering. We took hot showers in our cabin, and got warm. Then we had to venture out for some food. In the 200 metres between our hotel and the nearest eatery, we got absolutely soaked again. And the same thing happened on the way back to the cabin again. It was not a pleasant end to the day!

On Wednesday 23rd, it was time to leave Koh Phangan! Next stop – Kaoh Lak!