Part III. Koh Samui

Wanting to get off the beaten path, we decide to take a two day detour through Koh Samui. A tropical beach island located between Pattaya and Phuket, Koh Samui can most easily be reached by air. You can fly there with Bangkok air. The fare from Pattaya (U-Taphao Airport – 40 minutes from Pattaya), Phuket or Bangkok. One way fares range from about 2500B – 4000B, and only about an hour away. Basically, you have two choices in making your travel and lodging accommodations. You can do it yourself, or go through a travel agent. We used Malibu Travel, located on Second Road, near Soi 13. They got us a slightly better hotel rate than what was offered by various internet sites, but the airfare was a little higher than Bangkok Air’s website. For convenience reasons, using a travel agent is probably the best way to go. The only issue is that Malibu used the voucher system for hotel stays. You pay the agent in advance for the hotel room, and that payment is non-refundable. That means if you pay for a week in advance, and you end up not liking the hotel, you’re screwed.

Koh Samui is not a big island, but the action varies according to what beach you stay at. We chose the busiest beach Chaweng. First the good: beautiful beach, greater water sports, a good amount of restaurants. Now the bad: ripoff taxis, very expensive, yet very mediocre hotels (relative to Pattaya), not an abundance of hot women (most of the action centers around beer bars, the two gogos I saw were really lame, and there were tons of European tourists. Although we planned on staying in Samui for at least two days, we only prepaid the hotel for one day. We stayed at the Chaweng Buri Resort for about 2800B/nite. Even though it was pretty centrally located, we were pretty disappointed in the accommodations. The bungalow wasn’t that impressive, and it cost at least twice as much as comparable (non-bungalow) lodgings would cost in Pattaya (or Bangkok for that matter). Moreover, there was NO HOT WATER in the shower. Thankfully, it was pretty hot and muggy in Samui. We had looked at the Coral Bay Resort (fully booked) and Chaba Samui (looked really nice, but they told the travel agent that they charged a 900B JOINER FEE. Tired of Thai cuisine, we checked out the Brazilian restaurant (kind of upscale by Samui standards). Very lame. That’s what we get when we try to mix two premier monger locations. Using this as a rule, I will never try a Thai restaurant in Rio either.

Uninspired by the gogos and the beer bar women, we checked out this place called the Pink Lounge. The women were pretty good looking, but when we were quoted 2000B for an hour, we passed. Instead, we decided to try our luck at the row of massage places near the Starbucks (one of Koh Samui’s landmarks). My buddy and I are grabbed by two reasonably ok looking women and they take us to this room with three of four mats separated by curtains. At this point, I am hoping for a massage with perhaps a little extra. However, my girl gives NO indication that anything extra is available. What made things worse was that, even though the massages are 200B for 1 hour, the other two men in the same room who started their massages around the same time I did left within 30 minutes. I KNEW something was going on, but I didn’t know why I was being deprived. Sure enough, back downstairs, my buddy has a huge smile on his face. Fuck! He got FS, but paid 1500 on top of the 200B for the massage. At that price, the Pink Lounge would have been preferable. Or maybe I’m just rationalizing. In any case, we ended up bailing on Samui after only one day. Next time, either I’ll bring a girl from Bkk or Pattaya, or we’ll check out one of the other beaches. Changing the flight was relatively painless, as was the trip from Samui to Bankok, although you should be aware that the Samui airport is covered, but not enclosed. That means that it is HOT there, and during torrential rainstorms, it could be quite wet as well.