Thailand Part 2: Koh Lanta Paradise!
Trip Start
May 07, 2008
1
30
90
Trip End
Jan 06, 2009
Koh Lanta,
Thailand
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Welcome to our Thailand trip part 2: Koh Lanta. Which is.............
................flaming paradise!!!!!
We decided we needed a bit of rest. Which sounds ludicrous bearing in mind we are on honeymoon and all we are doing is leisure and pleasure. But the leisure and pleasure has been really hectic. So we booked ourselves a week of absolute paradise before the next onslaught of our epic sojourn around the globe.
Koh Lanta is south west of Thailand on the coast and is a small island that has yet to be swamped with tourists and souvenir shops. A few hotels have sprouted up but the place is very quiet and intimate compared to the mayhem of other much more popular beach resorts of scenic Thailand. As a result of the un-invasion of tourists, it really was a haven of tranquillity and isolation. To get to our Hotel, we flew for 2 hours from Bangkok into Krabi Airport, were collected and driven for 1 hour to a port, got on a car-ferry for 20mins to an island, drive for 30mins, get on another car-ferry for 20mins and then drive for about another 30mins to get to our hotel. The journey wasn't as bad as it sounds. It went quickly. No different than clambering around Scotland: except it's warmer, and the people smile.
Our Hotel was complete and utter serenity. It was a resort surrounded by palm trees with infinity pools, restaurants, bars, activities, its own mini cinema where you could hire DVD's and get them put onto the cinema screen for you to watch!! The cinema was the first of its kind in Asia (apparently) and came with leather seats with attached drinks holders!! The Hotel was very very reasonable indeed for what you got.
Main part of our resort!
Really fantastic place. It had lotus ponds everywhere, little wooden bridges from pond to pond and isolated pagoda shelters where you could just sit amidst the small ponds and watch life go past. Or the wildlife. There were frogs, lizards, birds, hermit crabs (at night), cockroaches (nice!), cicadas and a multitude of fish in the ponds. The resort is quite expansive and built on a hill so to get to some of the rooms there were golf buggies chauffering guests around all day - silently whisking by 24/7. Basically, it was Port Merrion - but we were willing prisoners. We booked a mini villa which had its own private infinity pool - probably approx 12 x9 feet - overlooking the sapphire swishing ocean and palm trees. Flipping Heaven. There was a lovely beach which wasn't decked out with chairs or anything swish like that but you were free to go and sunbathe if you wanted to. No giant balls ambling along though.This will be a very boring and short blog because all we did for 5 days was sunbathe by our pool, nap in the afternoon then go our for dinner in the evening, followed by a few drinks in the sports bar or back to snuggle up on the sofa together to watch some DVD's on the plasma screen in our villa. It was so relaxing and exactly what we wanted and needed. Just utter bliss.
The weather while we were there was absolutely fantastic. Blisteringly hot. However, on our last night there, a storm brewed up and the palm trees around us went absolutely mental, the rain lashed it down and there was cracking thunder and lightening. We got a mass of palm tree fronds in our pool! The next day when we checked out the storm continued until we got off the aeroplane at our next destination.....
Love us xxxxx
