{"id":42,"date":"2021-07-21T17:09:33","date_gmt":"2021-07-21T15:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/?p=42"},"modified":"2021-07-21T17:09:33","modified_gmt":"2021-07-21T15:09:33","slug":"heading-east","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/?p=42","title":{"rendered":"Heading East…"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Thailand – it did not get the name of “The Land of Smiles”<\/strong> for nothing. (I always thought Siam<\/strong> was a really cool name for a country, but that is probably just me). The Thai people are so friendly that they make it difficult to leave, and I guarantee that once you have experienced Thailand you will always want to go back. The first time I went was for a quick holiday with some mates – one Brit and one Kiwi. After flying (on the cheap) from Heathrow via Bucharest, we caught the overnight sleeper train from Bangkok<\/strong> to Surat Thani, then a ferry to Koh Samui and another ferry to Koh Phangan. The Charm Beach Resort was a welcome sight after two days of travelling, and more than a few cold Singhas<\/strong> were enjoyed in hammocks<\/strong> on the beach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We hired scooters<\/strong> and went everywhere on them, except for the obligatory Full Moon Party<\/strong> on Haad Rin beach when we caught one of the many cheap taxis. The sights, sounds, tastes and smells of a Full Moon party will stay with me for a long time – such a wonderful experience! The party continues through the night with everyone in a mellow party mood, enjoying the music and side-shows like fire-eaters<\/strong> and jugglers<\/strong> – many backpackers seem to have one of these (and other!) talents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The food in Thailand is tasty, and cheap. I ate at least four full meals every day, rising before my mates to have a quick swim<\/strong>, breakfast and a walk along the beach<\/strong>, and then another breakfast with them when they decided to get up. Late lunch was had wherever we happened to be at the time, followed by a few beers and then supper and yes, more beers. Often I would grab something just before the kitchen closed for the night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went back to Thailand almost a year later, specifically to dive. This time I flew from Heathrow via Bahrain to Bangkok, then caught a flight from Bangkok to Koh Samui, followed by the ferry to Koh Phangan. It was much quicker and far less tiring. The diving around Koh Phangan and\u00a0Koh Tao<\/strong>\u00a0is pretty good, and I remember seeing turtles,\u00a0sea snakes<\/strong>, triggerfish, blue-spotted rays and moray eels. The hard corals had been damaged by rough seas from the monsoons and hurricanes but the soft corals are amazing. The local dive operators I used were all brilliant and\u00a0professional<\/strong>\u00a0– always comforting to know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Koh Phangan<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thailand – it did not get the name of “The Land of Smiles” for nothing. (I always thought Siam was a really cool name for a country, but that is probably just me). The Thai people are so friendly that they make it difficult to leave, and I guarantee that once you have experienced Thailand you will always want…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=42"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions\/44"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=42"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=42"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelstarter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=42"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}