Whilst I was in SE Asia, I decided to celebrate the Christmas festive break on a sunny Thai beach – so was recommended to give Koh Samui a go. It’s generally known for it’s full moon parties, but I wasn’t really up for loads of parties, but just to relax and reflect over the past 6 months of my Singapore work assignment – and what the future holds for me.
The past couple of weeks have been an amazing adventure for me outside of work, and this also gave me time to think through how I would need to deal with this when I return to the UK.
I decided to book up about a few weeks ago, and booked my flight on Bangkok Airways – which surprisingly flies between Singapore and Koh Samui directly (brilliant), and then looked up at various comparison sights on accommodation options. I knew I could stay at cheap and cheerful hostel type of places, but I also wanted to stay somewhere more comfortable – so went for a resort type of place at Lamai Beach.
I found Samui Tonngad Resort on the comparison websites, and it seemed pretty nice. The facilities and location seemed to meet my needs – and it wasn’t too expensive. In fact, I managed to negotiated a 6 nights + 1 night free discount for my booking – haha! Anyway, I duly booked it up and looked forward to the break. The American breakfast was very tasty, but I made a request for a Thai Breakfast on the second day, and continued to have this for the rest of the trip – as it was actually very tasty – Chicken or Pork in a soup with Rice – with herbs flavouring.
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My Spacious Room
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I Always Love These Towel Creations 🙂 Very Artistic!
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My TV – In Case I Get Bored
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Methinks this will be a very relaxing week!
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The Samui Tonggard Resort
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My Thai Breakfast
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The main entrance to the resort
The resort was actually between the infamous Chaweng and Lamai beaches (closer to Lamai Town / Beach) and was a very tranquil with an almost private beach – which was perfect for my needs. The only drawback was that the resort was extending the Villa buildings, and this meant that there was a lot of construction on part of the resort area – which was slightly off-putting, but I didn’t let it get to me. The thing that really was a bit annoying was the weather – it was sunny on the first day, overcast on the second and third days, raining on the next two and sunny on the last day – always the way! Haha!
But I enjoyed the resort and the beach / pool side areas – and the food at the resort – in most cases, there wasn’t a lot of people around, so almost felt like it was a private pool or beach just for me – haha!
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Relaxing with a Singha Beer
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Relaxing with a Singha Beer
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The Doggies on the Beach
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Chilled and Relaxed Beach Scene
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Thai Fish Cakes – Nice with a Singha Beer
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Nice Relaxing Lunch
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My Green Curry with Singha Beer
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Relaxing with a Beer – Very Chilled!
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The Doggies on the Beach
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Perfect Beach Setting at my Resort
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Looking Down Lamai Beach
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The Resort Beach – Nice and Relaxing
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The Lamai Beach Waters – So Relaxing
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My Private Pool – No One Else in Sight 🙂
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My Beef with Basil Thai Lunch – and Chang Beer
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Relaxing with my Thai Lunch
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Chang Beer overlooking the Beach
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The high tide hides the Beach!
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High Tide comes into the resort area
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The high-tide comes up towards the upper part of the beach
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A walk up Lamai beach back towards my resort…
A couple of days I had to walk towards Lamai Town to change some money, and by the nearest Bangkok Bank there was a Irish Pub called Mulligans Pub, which I went to a couple of times. It was quite nice. I went there for an evening meal, and then returned for Christmas Lunch – very festive I know – but the closest I could get to a Christmas Turkey with all of the Trimmings – and for 690BHT (about £14 / S$28) – so not too bad at all 🙂
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The Christmas Tree Fountain
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Yay – an Irish Pub
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The Mulligan Irish Pub
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My Steak and Rice Dinner with a Guinness – at the Irish Pub
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My Tomato Soup Starter…
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My Christmas Turkey Lunch in the Thai Sunshine 🙂
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Aaron and his Christmas Dinner 🙂
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Christmas Pudding and Custard…
I also found another restaurant – called Flower Paradise Restaurant, which was priced very reasonably, located a couple of hundred metres from the resort. It was a nice place, run by a Swiss gentlemen and his wife. The setting was very enjoyable, a fair number of what appeared to be locals were here, and the food was very good – and not expensive at all.
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Cute Bear Rice – with Chicken and Cashew Nuts
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The Beer Hat Collection
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Thai Green Curry with Bear-Shaped Rice and Chang Beer
On the second day, I decided to go for a Tour around the Island – these was called an ‘Amazing Sightseeing and Safari Tour’ – at 1,850BHT. However, as I purchased it from my resort, they actually gave me a 150BHT discount, so I only paid 1,700BHT (around £35 / S$70). Not bad at all methinks!
We visited the Big Buddha at the north of the island…
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Aaron and the Big Buddha Backdrop
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The Big Buddha – Looks Nice on a Sunny Day!
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Nice Colourful Roof Designs
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The Nice Backdrop
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The Bells!
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The Big Buddha – 15 Metres Tall
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Shrine – Give and Respect
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The Waters around the Island
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The Fountain and Big Buddha Backdrop
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Hats anyone?
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Tourist T-Shirts
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The Entrance Monuments
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The Entrance Monuments
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The Koh Samui Map
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Our Tour Jeep
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The Funny Tour Guide – on the Other Jeep
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The Big Buddha
We then back southwards to the Grandfather (Hin Ta) and Grandmother (Hin Yai) natural rock formation.
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Nice Rock Formation…
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Looking a bit bent
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What a lovely image, hey?
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The Hidden Vagina
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The Big Knob
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Grandpa and Grandma Rocks
We then went to Namuang Safari Park where we would spend the next few hours enjoying an Elephant Trek and see various animal shows. I am not that keen on some of the animal shows, as feel this is a very artificial setting, but I guess it is still ‘enjoyable’ to see the various animals: Monkey, Crocodiles, Snakes, Birds etc.
The elephant show:
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Elephant Washing
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Altogether Now…Awwwww!!
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The Thai Elephants – Welcome Ceremony
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Seating Elephants
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Elephant Hand-Stand
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Playing with Rings
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The Ace Football Striker
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Tug of Wall with an Elephant
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Looking very cheeky
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Elephant Sucking!
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Elephant Playing with a Thing
The crocodile show:
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The Croc Pit – Better Not Mess with ’em!
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Looking Very Relaxed!
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Nice Teeth!
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Playing with the Croc
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Messing with the Croc
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Showing Affection to the Croc
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Show Me the Money
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Grabbing the Money
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I think I can see the S$100 bill
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Fetching the S$100 Bill
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Talking to the Croc!
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Tasty!
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Posing with the Croc!
The snake show:
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Showing Whose’s the Boss
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Touching the Snake
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Talking to the Snakes
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Python Snakes
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Eating Snakes – Yikes!
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Snake-ware – very fashionable these days 🙂
The Tiger and Tiger Cub Photo:
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The Tiger Cub Relaxing
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The Tiger Looking Hungry!
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The Baby Tiger Cub – and companions 🙂
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I wasn’t afraid (much!)
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Enjoying the company!
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Looking for lunch…I am too boney so don’t look at me!
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My Tiger and Aaron
The Elephant Trek:
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My companion’s friends on their elephant
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Had to join another tourist for my Elephant Trek
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The Elephant Riders
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The Elephants Turning the Corner
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An enjoyable elephant trek
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The Companion Elephant Riders
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Nice Tushes!
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The Elephant Ride was Very Comfortable!
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Looking Cool on the Elephant
We left the Safari Tour and went back to the Jeep, which drove us to the Namuang Waterfall 2 – where you can swim 80 metres high-up (the highest waterfall in Koh Samui Island). Very enjoyable and refreshing indeed.
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Slashing into the Namuang Waterfall 2 Waters
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Swimming at the 80 Metre Height
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Enjoying the Namuang Waterfall 2
We then continued our trek …
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The 4×4 Jeep Behind Ours
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The dirt track road (needed a 4×4)
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Nice Car Parking
Where we then arrived at the Buddha Magic Garden (aka Secret Garden) – a bit of a story telling scene – but very enjoyable set-up.
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Small Waterfall
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Buddha Magic (Secret) Garden
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Stone statues
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Stone statues
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Stone statues
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Stone statues
The jeep then took us to the Mummified Monk (Wat Kunaram) shrine – very weird and interesting to see in any case.
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Mummified Monk (Wat Kunaram)
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Mummified Monk
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Mummified Monk
We then returned back to the resort – we did pass a Tesco Lotus store – made me feel at home seeing a very familiar UK brand 🙂 I walk around during the afternoon and noted a few interesting sights and images which I took photos of…
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Tesco (Lotus) – Every Little Helps!
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Dogs Crossing the Road
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JR Restaurant – Nice Setting
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The Local Petrol Station! 🙂
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My resort apartment – haha!
I think it was a great little break from Singapore, and a great way to chill and relax before my long flight back to the UK. Hopefully the tan won’t make my UK friends jealous or envious in anyway!! 🙂