Ko Samui mui muy muy muy caro!!! ¡Ay, caramba!

We had a deadline to get to Ko Samui by February by February 27th to make it to my time share week we booked 6 months ago. When we went to the train station in Bangkok to book the overnight sleeper. They were our of 1st and 2nd class sleepers. They were sold out of 1st and 2nd class SEATS (which recline). So, as desperate as we were we booked THIRD class seats. Hard seats. I didn't know you could pin point the uncomfortable feeling of these seats as third class. It was pretty terrible for an overnight train. What saved us was the netbook we have from Costco. We watched 3 movies which got us from the boarding time of 7:30pm to about 2am. At this point Kevin was actually falling asleep. We were both getting sick as the lack of sleep continued. Oops.

We feel in and out of 7 minute intervals of Stage 1 sleep, never reaching stages 2 through 4 and especially REM. I set my ipod alarm for 6:15 and found myself alarmed by the tiny sound coming out of my pocket. We put our large backpacks on and thought we were getting off at the next stop. This was misinformation in our hazy lack of clarity. We waited right by the train doors. We were being bounced around in these tiny doorway compartments with backpacks on both our back and front. Finally, we were released.

The overnight train was to Surat Thani, we then got a "minibus." Actually ended up being a 2 level super bus and it still couldn't fit the insanely large amount of backpackers. Kevin and I have become insanely competitive in a sense. We are very quick to get seats, we are aware of more things than others. For instance, when Kevin and I were in line to get our luggage underneath the bus we noticed seats on the lower floor. When you enter the bus the stairs go directly up. I snuck past the bus toilet and we made our way to the only last 8 seats on the bus. Lucky us. The 6 people in front of us were already coming back down the stairs as they had just discovered there were no more seats at the top. We anticipated this and man did this save us from being late to the ferry dock.

The ferry dock was filled with the highest concentration of backpackers I have ever seen in my life. They were all just sitting and waiting. This large amount of people could only be explained by the Full Moon Party.

2 hours on the ferry and we had NO CLUE how to get to our hotel from the dock. Taxi cabs on this island are quoted at 5 km for 15$. This is demented. Who is paying this? It was almost 40km from the dock to our hotel which would rack up to $120. Not going to happen. So what they also have in Thailand is a form of transportation called Songtaews. A Songtaew is a pick up truck with two long benches in the truck bed that accommodate two rows of people and more that that for locals. We still haven't figured out how much they charge tourists for this. Luckily we were approached by a minibus company rep who offered us hotel drop off for 200 Baht each which is about 6$ per person. We asked for a discount since every price we are quoted is highly inflated. He said he could do 2 of us for a total of 300 Baht (about $9). He then told us not to tell the other passengers because they all paid more. I was obviously fine with that.

We waited for the check in at the timeshare private residency called "Q Signature" We paid for what would be our only meal at the hotel and it was pricey. Everything on the island of Ko Samui is priced like it is at home or MORE. But, we aren't in the U.S. It's Thailand and where is all the money going anyway?

We checked in to our 1 bedroom place and it was wonderful. By this point Kevin and I were coughing and blowing our noses with an even higher frequency and we were planning on 18hours of sleep or something ridiculous to catch up on our health.

So we slept from 4pm to about 10am. Feeling better but not 100%.

Day 2 we took the free shuttle to the Chaweng Beach. Before relaxing at the beach we actually had put together a plan. We would look for a grocery store to stock up on food for the next week and we would book our transportation to Ko Pha Ngan: Full Moon Party. So we did all of that.

Success.

Funny part: At the grocery store we considered getting a few beers but noticed the sign saying it is mandated by the government no alcohol sales shall be made today to honor the Buddha holiday. Pretty impressive. Strange how countries will actually have this old fashioned prohibitionist law to ban alcohol We understand Buddha promotes purism but we thought that would be more optional than mandatory. Especially in the laid back country of Thailand.

Day 3: March 1st: we feel better and we are preparing for our 7pm departure to the Full Moon Party.