VISA RUN DOWN TO MALAYSIA

Now I had planned to stay in Thailand for christmas and new year I had the hassle of the long run down to Malaysia to get a new visa stamp. The first stop was my old favourite Hua Hin but this time I was going to use it as a base to visit other places during the day but have a good place to go out at night. Within an hour of arriving I had met 3 people who remembered me from previous visits.


The first daytrip was to the town of Phetchaburi which sees only a handful of tourists.






Had a good look round the historical park which was full of monkeys. After all the time I had previously spent in Hua Hin I left wondering why I had not been there before.


The second trip from Hua Hin was to the beach town of Cha am. I left a bit late and it was very hot when I got there. 90% of the people there were Thai. On the beach they all sit in the shade until late afternoon unlike the westerners. Spent about 2 hours in a bar talking to a Brit who had retired there.


I had a day of trying to get as far south as I could and made it as far as Surat Thani. For the traveller it's purely a junction town where you only go to catch the ferry to the islands. It was a case of arrive, walk round, eat, sleep and leave the following morning.

The following day was more of the same, I didn't want to go back to Krabi again but it looked a far better choice than Trang. Headed back down to Ao Nang beach for the night. Went into a bar and got talking to 3 lads from Norway and ended up staying out till the early hours. Had an unexpected good night.


Had the third day in a row of long bus rides choosing to stay at Songkhla. There looked a days worth of things to see so I stayed 2 nights as a break from long bus rides. The corridors of my accommodation were full of bats. There were a lot of westerners in a small street full of bars. They were probably working there as it was an oil town.








Spent the day exploring town and had some food stolen by a gang of monkeys. The town seemed fairly clean for that part of the world but there was an area of beach that looked like a rubbish tip.

I crossed the border to Penang in Malaysia, this was now the 4th time I had been there and the third on this trip.






I was glad I booked my room in advance on the internet as everywhere was full up because of the motorbike races. I never seen anything like that before. I do have to admit that motor sport is not "my thing" I don't get how you are meant to be following a race when all you see is a bike that takes a couple of seconds to pass your field of view.






While in Penang I met what was likely the most stupid person I had ever met on my travels. Like myself he was on a weekend visa run but was teaching English in Burma. Turned out he had a load of drugs on him, the amount would have probably only got him a fine back home but in Malaysia would have easily got him many years in prison. Worse still he had carried the stuff across the border. I didn't even like being in the same hostel as him and was glad to get away from there.

After another long bus ride to Surat Thani, another overnight stay and a ferry ride I finally made it to Ko Samui where I was going to take a well needed break from Buses and trains.