We extended our stay for a day. How could we not? I wanted to snorkel on another boat, and they weren’t sailing on Sunday. OK by me, because I had wanted to stay another night anyway. And the weather was better on Monday.

This time, the boat was much smaller, a catamaran with a maximum passenger load of 20 (we were 19) and a crew of 3. Our skipper was Michael, an interesting Belgian who’s been living on Koh Chang 7 or 8 months of the year for 7 years. Unlike the big boat last week, which had at least 50 passengers, we got time to chat with our fellow vacationers: 4 retirement-aged Dutch people from near Holten, 2 retirement-aged Norwegians from near Bergen, 2 young women from London (one French, one of Indian descent), and a solo French man, also retirement age, with very little English. The rest of the passengers were Swedish (3 youngish couples, 2 children) and they took over a large section in the front with one of the two net seats, and didn’t mingle with non-Swedish. The first question one of them asked as he boarded the truck on the way to the harbor was, in Swedish, “so, who’s Swedish?”

When our group, comprising those 2 Swedes, the French, the 2 Londoners, the 2 Norwegians, and us arrived, the Dutch (2 sisters & husbands) were compasctly sitting on one bench, but the 2 other Swedish couples (related) and 2 kids had already spread their towels over the larger of the 2 front nets, their bags over the entire bench facing the Dutch, and their bodies all along the front of the main body of the boat. Needless to say, their bags and bodies were eventually displaced.

The eventual arrangement was all the Swedes in the big front net and ledge, the 2 Norwegians and Matt on the small front net and ledge, and the rest of us (and Matt, frequently) in the shade.

It looks like Matt should expect a burn, but both of us sport colorings to match our fishy friends with whom we swam, day in and day out: on our dorsal sides. We kept trying to sun our front sides, but other than our faces, we’ve stayed pretty pale there.

This was an amazing day. At twice the cost of the other snorkeling trip, it was well worth it. We went to fewer places, but with fewer people in the water, I felt like I was alone with the fish and the coral. And the urchins, which kept making me think of Weeping Angels, not a good thing. The French Londoner stepped on one, but she was pretty ok.

I loved the rock fish. The first one I saw surprised me a lot, because I’d been admiring this patch of coral when suddenly part of it twitched, and it was a fish! After that, I saw them everywhere. I chased a big rainbow fish all over the place, nearly getting myself trapped by urchin-covered boulders at one point. And special event of the day: I found a conch! A living conch! I did something I was told not to do, and touched it, to see if it was alive, and when I dislodged it slightly, I saw its snaily body flutter and reestablish itself. Cool. It was about the size of both of my fists together. When I popped my head up, Matt was standing on the beach, so I called him over & showed him too.

Between stops for snorkeling, we enjoyed the catamaran much more than we had enjoyed the big boat we’d been on last week. It felt like any boating outing, super gezellig. We had a delicious lunch, fresh fruit for snacks, free unlimited water, and could drink beer and soda if we wanted. After our last snorkeling stop, the wind picked up and we hoisted the sail. We sailed back and forth for about an hour.

It was a happy and tired group that returned to our resorts that evening, but we were just in time to walk out over the pontoon bridge at the Blue Lagoon and enjoy sunset.

A man came out with a funny bird. The bird would hop away then return to him. After a while, he walked up to the bar behind us and the bird came and visited us for a while. It made very funny noises. Sometimes it almost sounded like human speech, then there would be a bird-like whistle.

After the sun set, we went a bit further, and had a delicious beach dinner at the Pilot Bar (great service, good food, friendly prices) before heading home.

Sunday

Today we slept in, then rode further north up the beach to a bakery for breakfast. After breakfast we rode around for a while playing Matt’s interactive video game, Ingress. Eventually we decided to go try the next beach south of our beach, Kai Bae beach. This one was pretty nice. There were fewer organized cafe spots than our beach, and less beach, like White Sand, but there were swings and it was very laid back. There were some pebbles just as you enter the water, but nothing sharp, and the water drops off a little sharply to about waist depth, at which it stays for quite a distance. Since we had bought our own beach mat yesterday, we didn’t need to rely on cafes for chairs, so it was fine.

That’s Matt lying in front of the white car.

Elephants came out to play!!

We came home around sunset, showered and changed for dinner at Phu Talay, another seafood restaurant next to Iyara which also had good reviews. There, we ordered stir-fried soft-shelled crabs, garlic fried squid, and a whole sea bass deep fried then served with Thai herbs. Yum!!

Dessert was awesome, too. We had fried bananas in a buttery sauce and this amazing dessert, which was like a coconut milk and tapioca soup served warm in a young coconut. The water and meat of the coconut was incorporated into the soup. Yum!!!

After dessert, we went to a small market and carnival, sponsored by Chang Beer, with games and a stage. We wandered there for a while then headed back.

Tonight would have been our last night, but we extended our stay one extra night. Tomorrow we will go snorkeling and sailing on a catamaran. The next day we will return to Bangkok, and the next morning after that we’ll fly home. 😦

Oh, this is how they sell gasoline around the island, in whisky bottles!

Saturday

The next day, yesterday, was brilliant. We rented a scooter first thing and rode it to Klong Plu waterfall, where we hiked then sat by the water for a while.

After sitting by the water, we hiked up to the top of the falls, and I sat near the edge. I started hearing a lot of whistling, and eventually I saw the park ranger waving his arms at me to get down. So we hiked back down.

Then we swam in the pool at the bottom of the falls. It was really pleasant after the hike. That’s me swimming. Fresh water was great. It felt good to open my eyes.

Eventually, we got tired of swimming, and we hiked back to the scooter. We rode around for a little then decided to have lunch at Iyara Seafood Restaurant, which is really lovely, on the river just before it meets the sea, still on Klong Plau beach, “our” beach.

The food was excellent. We ordered a spicy tuna salad, the “small” BBQ seafood platter, and fried cashews. The seafood was amazingly delicious!

After lunch, we cruised north and finally decided to chill at White Sand Beach. White Sands Beach is the main tourist beach on the island, and so there were lots of bars and restaurants along the sand. There wasn’t as much beach, although it’s longer, but the sand slopes smoothly down into the water. There is no treacherous coral or rocks, but there is some litter. It was a pleasant enough place to pass the afternoon, if not exactly my taste. And it to really cleared out around sunset!

We ate street food on the way home, stopping here and there.