It’s New Years Eve & I’m starting the morning off with much relaxation! I slept until 8:15am; Mike and I had 9am appointments at the spa we have been eating at in Lamai so couldn’t sleep in too much. We also still had the rental car so needed to take advantage of it as much as possible since it was 1) a long ride over to that side of the island in the pickup taxi’s, and 2) waaay too much of a fare for a regular taxi. We arrived at The Spa and each had a 1 ½ hour back, neck, and shoulder massage. Then we also did a treatment I’ve heard quite a few times from people called coning. It’s where they put a stick of bamboo in your ear and light the top of it with a match. As the stick starts to burn down, the bamboo tube creates a suction from the ear and extracts any excess “guck” you may have stored deep down your ear canal. At the end, they unroll the leftover portion of the tube and show you the extracted part so you know whether or not anything came out (and probably a good sign that you need to clean your ears better!). They did each side separately. I barely had anything there which was nice to know! But also, in addition to it extracting excess guck, the procedure is also known to help clear any sinuses, headaches, etc. I’m pretty much a big believer in alternative medicines, and I will admit that I felt so much better than the night before as far as any sickness I may have been catching. So something definitely worked!We still had a bit of time before we had to return the car so decided to have one last meal at The Spa. This time we pigged out on dishes of fresh, tropical fruit. A big variety boat of pineapple, mango, papaya, banana’s and more! A good healthy start to our day so far! After returning the rental car, we decided to start packing some things up early, gearing ourselves for a very late night on Kho Phanang for the Full Moon beach party, thinking if we happen to get back very late in the AM, at least we’re ready to go – especially since I had to catch a plane at noon. At the hotel, they were offering boat rides leaving at 9:30pm, and coming back at 5:30am. We really didn’t want to be in the madness for that long, so decided we would see what other options were available. But I think we waited a little bit too long. We piddle paddled around for a few hours after packing some things up, catching up on Internet, booking transportation and hotels for our post new years travels, answering emails, and going back and forth with our friend Spiegs who happened to be in the ER at the time with a concussion! (crazy guy!)… with the time difference being 12-15 hrs from all of our friends back home, it’s hard to be online when everyone else is, so catching up on things was nice, especially since I had bills to pay and my Cambodia arrangements to figure out.
But all that talking and catching up now limited us in opportunity hours to get to and from the Full Moon party. From talking to a few guys that were staying at our same place, I found out there was a 2nd boat option that just came about. “Speedhawk” was offering speedboat tours on the hour, and coming back starting at 3AM. This was much better than the one the hotel was offering. And luck have it too, it was starting to rain, so we figured, let’s go later after the rain has stopped, have dinner in Kho Phanang, then catch the early boat back to Kho Samui. Well, seems like everyone else wanted to catch an earlier boat too because by the time we went to book the boat ride, only time available was the 11pm boat. Crap – now plan B. Since the ride was only 20 min long, at least we’d get to the party before the countdown – so we were still good. Everything was arranged, and our ride was to pick us up between 10-10:30pm.
We figured we’d head to our favorite hangout place, Cactus, for dinner, but when we got there, it was a fixed menu for like 950baht (approx $30), and the menu wasn’t really that appealing. So we headed over to this place we had seen so many times on our walks to dinner, and one we had laughed at each time we passed it – Mr. Poo’s BBQ! Each time we went by it was packed with locals, so we figured it had to be good; we just kept laughing at the name! We didn’t know what to expect, but we were game to try. It turned out to be like a Korean BBQ place, where they have a hotpot in the middle, and all the raw meat and veggies is put on top to cook it. Some of the meat wasn’t too appealing unfortunately (bugs crawling), so we chose what looked good and less buggy. Mr. Poo was great; helping us with the noodles, picking out what he thought we’d like, and showing us how to cook the meat. All-in-all, the meal was pretty good! And totally cheap – like under $3 for all you could eat (the bugs would have probably cost us extra).
With the rain coming down pretty fast earlier, and the wind blowing pretty hard, I was a little freaked out knowing the year before there was the Tsunami just on the other side of Thailand. We timed things perfectly though, the rain had just stopped, the air was steady, and we finished dinner early enough to freshen ourselves up quickly before our ride to the boat came. It was 10pm and waiting with with us were a few young Aussie boys, all pumped up, ready to party on the island with their shoeless feet & full bottle of Jaeger Meister! We waited, and waited, and waited – each time the guy at the reception desk saying “Ride be here in 5 min”… well, we waited til 10:45pm and had to figure out, do we wait more and risk the boat leaving or catch a taxi over? The Aussie’s flagged down a cab who said he knew where Speedhawk boat was at, so we jumped in… we didn’t want to risk missing the 11pm boat and then be stuck not being at the party for the countdown. I’ve learned in Thailand, expect the unexpected and don’t think that anyone knows where the heck they are going! The driver took us to Seabreeze, Seatran, everything else sea related except Seahawk! So about 20-30 min of going back and forth on the same 1-mile street and not finding where we needed to go, we finally came to the landing dock – totally hidden from the street. The boat was just about to leave. They could fit 4 people on, and there was 5 of us… the Aussie’s were great, telling us to go, so Mike and I wished them happy New Year and jumped in the water to get to the boat. We were soaked knees down but we were on our way!
So let’s shorten the story a little more… the ride over was fast and bumpy, the island was packed with people, and we had about maybe 5min to get from the landing doc to where the party scene was at the beach. We hauled butt – people everywhere! Drinks being sold in sand buckets, people painting themselves, and partying from every nook and cranny of the street. We made it to the edge of the beach, or should I say, the beginning rim of the party madness. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…. Happy New Year! OMG! We had just made it! Fireworks went off, people were all over, music from every angle we turned. We pushed our way through the crowd and just started walking to where the music sounded best. We danced at various places for about 2 hours, thinking we’d make the 3am boat back. But we were having such a good time so… why not stay another hour! Our clothes and shoes trashed from all the people and the beach water/sand, we would maybe never experience this again so why not enjoy the most of it – and the music was really really good! I hadn’t danced in quite awhile so it was nice to just let loose. Making our way back to catch the 4am boat to Samui, people were passed out along the beach, along the streets. Complaints of wallets being stolen, food vendors lined up, people ditching mopeds – it was a madhouse and no one wanted to stop partying. At the boat, we did what we could to get on – we pushed our way through all the complaining people, literally jumped full body in the water and made our way onto the boat. I didn’t care who i cut in front of, that boat was not leaving without me. D renched from the water, shoes trashed from the beach & pee & everything else I walked in, we were back on Kho Samui by 4:30, and in bed by 5am….
Happy New Year!
