Stern's Tucking Awesome Adventure: Frankie's Last Stand: The Thai Islands

Yeah this all happened more than a month ago...

Oh glorious, glorious day – today we head to the Thai Islands, where I shall spend the remainder of my days in SE Asia (July 8-20). We fly from BKK to Ko Samui, where we take a ferry to our destination of Ko Phangan (at this point, let me just tell you that Ko means Island in Thai).

Our resort on Ko Phangan is totally bomb. Infinity pool with swim up bar overlooking the beach. Ocean water so warm you could bathe in it. Swoon.

We are met there by Kevin and Eduardo, the European couple we met in Chiang Mai! Yay they made it! As I slather myself repeatedly with SPF 30, we chill by the pool and befriend Karen, a lovely Dutch woman with two gorgeous 16 and 17 year old blond daughters. A fun Dutch couple (seriously those people are everywhere) are also staying at the resort, so we all 4 groups dine together before heading off to the Half Moon Party. Yes, Karen, we’d be happy to take your stunningly beautiful teenage daughters to an enormous jungle party fueled by alcohol, black light paint, and 19 year old British kids on gap year!

Half Moon Party was pretttty legit, except for the fact that it was NOTHING but trance music. Frankie and I and the crew danced for ages and ages and ages. One of the Dutch girls made out with a few people, I think at the same time (“She just loves black men! She told me cheated on her black boyfriend with another black man last night!” – her mother, the next morning). We drank some buckets and beer. Frankie and I got painted. Et cetera, et cetera. Here are some pictures!

Needless to say, we sleep in the next morning. When we awake, a bunch of us decide to rent motos and take a tour of the island’s road-accessable beaches. Stunningly gorgeous, as to be expected. Everyone makes fun of me for slathering myself in SPF 30, like, every time they look at me. We have an amazing Thai lunch with an open kitchen that Frank claims is the best he had the entire trip. It was rather, rather good.

For dinner we have amazing seafood at a restaurant called Fisherman’s, which is owned and run by a local fisherman and his Irish wife. Nice work bagging the farang, buddy. We call it a recovery night, and I find out what Kelly’s been up to while I was away (sorry Kelly).

The next morning Frank and I depart for a day on Ko Samui, from which we will head to a night in Phuket, on the other side of the isthmus. As Frank gyms it up for the day, I find a nice little spot on the beach and relax with some free wifi, pad Thai, and big bottles of water.

We get to Phuket that evening, and stay on Patong beach. For the record, Patong is the Jersey Shore of Thailand. The beach is dirty as hell, the streets are trashy as hell, there are as many prostitutes and lady boys as there are tourists (many of whom are fat, Russian, or both), and it’s about as commercial as it comes.

Frankie and I get some swim suits and check out a gay bar. Same story as Bangkok and I’m getting a few strange looks. I make my exit, and head back to the hotel to wish my very lovely doppelganger of a niece Hannah a very happy 5^th birthday. Just think it was 5 whole years ago that I was sitting in my sophomore summer mineralogy lecture when I got a frantic Skype message from my sister-in-law in Argentina that they were having the baby and didn’t have time to call anyone before they left for the hospital and it was my responsibility to tell the family. Oh the years, where do they go?

The next day we take the ferry to Ko Phi Phi Don, where Frankie and I will spend our last 3 days together before he heads home and I head back to the east coast islands.

(so vain)

In case you haven’t gathered, these islands are stunningly beautiful, made of dramatic limestone cliffs. It is, however, strongly monsoon season on this side of the isthmus, and we don’t see the crisp greens and blues of the seas that this area is famous for. The streets of KPPD are narrow, and no motorized vehicles are permitted – just people and bicycles and handcarts. There are a plethora of SCUBA shops, and we decide to spend the next day trying out scuba (heretofore not capitalized even though I know it to be an acronym like RADAR)! We take it easy among the throngs of 19 year old British kids on gap year, and pass out early to ready ourselves for our undersea adventure.

Frankie and I get an instructor all to ourselves which is perfect because Frank turns out to be a baby about breathing underwater and having pressure in his ears (jk, Frankie). Underwater I make full use of my sweet new rugged camera, which is waterproof to 12m, just the depth we go to. It isn’t quite as easy catching shots of fishies as you bob up and down underwater, but I managed to get some gems.

After our scuba adventure we climb up to a lookout point on KPPD where you can see the double beaches flanking the narrow strip of land connecting the two large mountains of the islands. Well worth the hike.

Since it’s Frankie’s last night with me in Thailand, we decide to go all out for an evening filled with buckets, a fancy sunset dinner, and dancing. We meet a pair of English sisters and party with them all night. Highlights include me finding a pub serving $9 Guinness draughts, an amateur Thai boxing ring, running into JESS LANE (my sorority sister that I had no clue was in Thailand), rediscovering that buckets just do not suit me, face painting, dancing my ass off, watching a Frenchman get a bamboo point tattoo right on the street (“Tu n’as pas peur de hepatitis?”), and Frankie getting his last meal of delicious street food.