Day 21

20/09

I rose early to try and get to the tourist information office when it opened, hauling all my things in case my missing backpack turned up. The hotel desk girl gave me poor directions and after half an hour I couldn’t find it. I decided to try a motorbike taxi, the guys at the stop didn’t have a clue what I was saying, so I just got on the back and pointed in the direction I wanted to go! We cruised up the long road where the tourist information was supposed to be but at the end we hadn’t found it so I got off and caught a songthaew going the other way. Again the driver spoke no English and didn’t know where we were going! After some discussion from his colleagues he dropped me off ten minutes later. I still couldn’t see it but the street number was correct. After trying a few official-looking buildings I eventually found an English speaker who gave me the correct directions.

Inside the Tourist Information were some trainee girls and fortunately a chap who spoke decent English. He helped me with my broken phone and discovered the SIM card had been locked which I must have done by accident. I explained the situation with my backpack and he phoned the tourist police for me. 15 minutes later they showed up, all Thai, one guy called Arron who spoke pretty good English and two other uniformed and armed policemen who didn’t speak much. I explained the situation and had to fill out a incident form. Then they drove me in a police car to the bus office which now was open.

Arron talked with the lady inside for a long time and started making lots of phone calls. He asked me details about the incident. After a while we drove off to another travel office in town, this one I recognised as people bound for Bangkok had got off the bus here. The staff at the desk answered Arron’s questions and the lady spoke English, I described what had happened and she said knew the drivers and the bus – looks like we were getting somewhere. She explained the bus had stopped at three places and they weren’t sure which one the bag might have been dropped at. The police started looking through CCTV footage from outside this office from yesterday. The woman told me they thought they’d found the bag. Great! After more waiting and many phone calls from Arron, it was back into the car to the first travel office again.

The police who helped me, Arron is on the left

After more discussion and calls, it seemed the travel agents were sending us around in circles blaming each other. Arron took a call and explained to me that the bag may have ended up on a bus to Bangkok. Uhoh. Back to the second travel agents. Here they looked through CCTV again and called me over. Sure enough on the CCTV you could see my bag had been unloaded with a pile of others and then left alone outside the office. About 20 minutes later on the footage a woman who is obviously a tourist is pointing at the bag and discussing with someone off screen, and she picks it up and takes it away. They say she’s loaded it onto a bus bound for Bangkok. Clearly she’s well-meaning but not exactly what I needed!

The travel agents phoned Bangkok and found out my bag was there at their office. Phew. Well at least we’d found it, whether it had anything of value left inside remained to be seen (padlocks are easily broken). The buses on that route are notorious for theft.

Arron arranged for the travel agency to put my bag on the next bus back to Surat Thani, which arrived at 6am the next day. They had to drop it at the tourist police office so I could check the contents with an officer. Sounded good. Now I had to spend another night here. It was past midday so I offered to get Arron and the other policemen some lunch for helping me. On the way we stopped at a phone shop and Arron got them to unlock my phone for free. Fantastic. We drove to a local restaurant and had lunch where I met the friendly tourist police chief.

Afterwards we drove to the tourist police station on the edge of town and I took a hotel close by. Arron kindly offered to take me out in the evening after work. I spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on my diary in the hotel, and I met Arron at dusk. We were going to a fitness center outside of town. I still was wearing the same clothes from yesterday, thankfully I still had my walking shoes. The fitness center had a big running track and around it various sports were being played – basketball, football, boules and handball, which is pretty popular over here. There was a small stadium and an outdoor aerobics class in full swing. The place was busy with lots of people on the track. We walked for a few loops and lots of people were looking at the farang (foreigner) exercising at their place! We jogged for a bit and on the way some ladies appeared who Arron knew, and joined us for a few loops. One of the ladies works for the car tax office,  Arron sells second hand cars for another source of income and works with her sometimes. He was trying to set me up with the other girl because she was single! Both ladies looked amazingly young for their age, just like Arron. Healthy people I suppose!

After the fitness center we drove to a small gym, where we used the steam room and some outdoor hot pools. It was great after a busy and stressful day! Back in town the  police chief joined us for dinner. We scoffed a variety of tasty dishes including spicy shellfish, a kind of cabbage in gravy, fried fish and Tom Yam spicy seafood soup. We had a good laugh chatting and learning about each other’s lives.

There’s around 10 tourist police officers for the whole province plus superiors, who are all based in the city tourist police station. Arron’s been in the tourist police for 5 years and before that was local police. He has a degree in political science and taught English for a short while. The police chief has been in the job for 2 years and was a normal police officer before that. Arron lives alone in the city center – owning his own house, the price seemed comparable to back home for the location. I was curious about the big restaurant culture here. Arron told me generally people might eat out 3 or 4 times a week because it’s so cheap, although he doesn’t like cooking so he eats out all the time!

Arron dropped me at the hotel and I thanked him for a good night. He and the other police had really taken care of me, making me feel at home and going way above the call of duty to welcome me. I was a lucky guy!

Day 20

19/09/12

Started the day by booking a ferry transfer to SuratThani on the mainland. In one day I hoped to reach Khao Sak national park, I could get a bus from SuratThani there, over half-way across the mainland (about 130km).

There must have been some miscommunication about the transfer times because over an hour waiting at the resort I was still waiting for my pickup. Eventually it showed up and we went on a death ride across most of the island. The driver was speeding and doing reckless maneuvers to make up lost time. We had one very near miss with oncoming traffic. We reached a dock miraculously unscathed and I was transferred to a coach which took me to the Raja ferry port. At the port were a number of big car ferries and we walked on board past the shell of a big boat on the shore. The coach drove on board. I stayed inside as I was knackered and the views weren’t anything magnificent and read my Kindle. There was a lounge and shop inside with comfy seats and tables, though the boat was pretty old and showing its age. It was fairly quiet, most of the passengers were Thai with some tourists thrown in.

A few hours later we arrived at Donsack docks and got back on the coach. About an hour later we reached the outskirts of Surat Thani and the bus stopped a few times with people getting off. I knew the bus terminated at the bus station or train station so I stayed on. We stopped in the centre and the last people got off, it didn’t look like the bus station so I asked the driver and his assistant, who didn’t really speak English – fortunately I knew the name of the bus station and they drove me a few blocks to there. I got out and asked for my backpack from the hold, miming what I needed and pointing. The assistant seemed confused and discussed with the driver. I kept repeating what I needed and tried to open the hold door but it was locked. The assistant told me, “No, at office” “Your bag at office”. Great.So either I was being lied to or there had been a mistake and my bag had been offloaded at one of the earlier stops. I insisted it was in the hold but they weren’t having any of it, telling me it’s at the bus office. A songthaeow was nearby and the assistant spoke to him and told me that he’d told the taxi where to take me. I was the last person left and didn’t really know what to do. Noone spoke anything but basic English. If they were trying to drive off with my bag, I could make a scene, but I didn’t even know if it was inside. The confusion about the bag’s location seemed genuine and they’d made the effort to drive me to the bus station beyond their normal stop. In retrospect I’m still not sure what the best course of action would have been. Refuse to leave the bus until they opened the hold? Then they could have driven me off anywhere or if things got ugly with my refusal, I wasn’t in great shape to defend myself with the shoulder. Actually I think know phoning the tourist police would have been the best option, that’s if they’d stayed around for me to make a phone call. Anyway it wouldn’t have worked because I later found out my Thai phone had barred me from making calls! Interested to hear what you think I should have done.

Anyway, what I did do, was get in the taxi hoping that I wasn’t being strung up. He took me to the bus office a few km away. The main road seemed familiar but I wasn’t sure if we’d stopped there earlier as the bus curtains were closed. When we arrived it was after 5 and the place was shuttered up. Bugger. Now I was really stuck. I had no choice but to stay here tonight and try the office tomorrow. Thankfully I still had all my money and most of my valuables on me, but the main bag had plenty of expensive stuff including all my travel clothes, hard drive, little camera, credit card and more. I asked the taxi driver to take me to a hotel from the guidebook. When we arrived he recommended I call the tourist police and to him it sounded like my bag had been taken. At the hotel, a little way out from the centre, the staff only spoke basic English. I was shattered and feeling light headed, it had been a hot day and I hadn’t slept well the previous night. I got into the hotel room and rested to collect my thoughts.

I thought I should call the tourist police to get some advice. That’s when I discovered that my Thai phone was blocking my calls. I assumed I’d ran out of credit. The way I saw things, if the driver had gone off with my bag, it would be long gone by the time the police tracked it down anyway, plus there were many places the bag could have been taken so nothing could be proven. Therefore there wasn’t a massive urgency to get hold of them, plus I still hadn’t verified if it was at the office, although the more I thought about it the more unlikely it seemed it would be there.

First step was to get some phone credit, if my bag was gone tomorrow I’d need to phone all the relevant companies. I’d also need to buy a load of basics to be able to continue travelling at all. I only had a very basic map of the city but knew I was near the Tourist Information, it would be helpful to find that for tomorrow. Noone spoke enough English at the hotel enough to help so I went out to hunt around 7pm. I passed shops and restaurants and eventually found a 7/11 and bought some phone credit. I didn’t have any joy with the tourist office and as it was getting late I headed back. I managed to get the hotel wi-fi working after a difficult explanation with the front desk, unfortunately the tourist police didn’t seem to have an English presence online. I tried to top up the mobile phone but got the same Thai voice message. Damn, something was wrong with the phone. I decided my best course of action would be to find the tourist information tomorrow and get them to help me with the phone, then I could go to the bus office and if there were any problems I could phone the tourist police from there. Had a restless night.

Day 20

Started the day with some fresh mossie bites around the ankles. These are driving me crazy recently, I have about 10 around my ankles and they are maddeningly itchy. I have many more bites but the other real baddy is the one on my thumb. What evil creation of nature makes you itchy on the thumb, it hurts to scratch it and you’re always moving it so it always itches. Rargh! I like nature and usually don’t go out of my way to hurt it, but mosquitos fall outside that barrier. They must all die.

The beach along where I was staying

Today I wanted to see the cultural highlights of Samui. After ringing the bank again to find out why my card still wasn’t working (turns out Thai ATMs use the strip, not the chip, and that needs authorising separately), I walked out towards “Fisherman’s Village”. The weather was awesome but scorching. This would have been a better day to go to the national park. My resort owner told me on Samui the forecasts can’t be trusted, the weather is always changing one hour to the next. Anyway the walk took much longer than anticipated, over an hour along the beach and then further along the main road.

Fishermans Village

The fishing village is a strangely European looking place filled with seafood restaurants and shops. Two piers stick out from it, one wooden, one artificial. Some young English blokes were at the end of one fishing. No luck yet, they told me. Still they could admire the nice view over the sea to Phangyang.

The fishing blokes

A shop in the village was full of jolly wooden statues

I walked along the big beach here past posh resorts with sunloungers on the beach, speedboats and watersports. It was quite busy but not manic. Jetskis look fun, I’m going to try that one day. But this beachlife isn’t really my scene, if I wanted to chill on the beach I’d rather go somewhere quieter and natural like Koh Tao or Koh Chang. This is too resorty for me – unless I was on a party holiday (ah Greek island memories!).

Some Thais roamed the beaches selling their wares, jewellery, sarongs, windmills, drinks. Some entrepernurial Thais had little barbeques on the beach doing chicken, sweetcorn and salads. They pulled in plenty of punters as they were cheap compared to the resort restaurants. I bought a nice papaya salad, prepared right in front of me with fresh vegetables, and hid in the shade of a palm tree to rest.

Beach barbie and salads

Then I headed to the main road and caught a songthaew to the other side of the island. We passed through the main beach area ofChaweng which is the most popular part. Sure enough there were loads of tourists around and shops everywhere. I didn’t get to see the beach though which is the best bit! Turned out this songthaew terminated in Chaweng so I had to wait for another going further south. This was a private one but I was bored of waiting whilst the afternoon ticked away so forked out the extra dough.

Driving through Chaweng in the back of a songthaew

I got off at HuaThanon, a muslim fishing village. I’d read about the fishing boats so wanted to see for myself. I went straight for the sea, not hard as I was already there. Walked along an abandoned pier and down some crumbling steps and had to wade back onto the beach. The shallows were muddy and murky. Here the beach was lined with ramshackle shack houses made of everything, with tight, uninviting alleys leading into town, most with fishing gear in front. In the water the colourful fishing fleet was moored, most boats having a horizontal pole sticking out from their mast with massive bulbs attached – used at night to attract the fish. Smaller boats and kayaks were in the shallows.

The beach was badly littered near the houses and the shallows and beach were scattered with assortments of seafood remnants – fish heads, crab shells, sea shells and other rubbish. The water looked pretty skanky and the place smelled rank.

On the shoreline and in the water people were working on fishing nets and boats. Children were playing in the water and digging on the beach, and dogs lounged on the sand. Ducks and chickens pecked around by the shacks and cats skulked in the shadows. It felt a world away from the main road I’d been at a few minutes earlier.

As soon as I set foot on the beach a dog appeared from under a shack and snarled at me and started barking, coming closer. This was bad news, I backed away quickly reaching for some objects to scare it. A bare chested, tattooed man nearby shouted at it and reached for a stone as well, and the dog backed off and I continued quickly, calling my thanks to the guy. Two yapping puppies appeared which could explain the dogs behaviour. I am very wary of dogs here now, they’re so unpredictable – some are very aggressive, some are curious, some are friendly. Some seem fine until the last minute when suddenly they freak out. I try to stay clear on the streets but it’s unavoidable to pass close to them sometimes, whether knowing it or not!

Keeping a close eye out for other territorial dogs hidden by the shacks I worked my way along the beach taking pictures and watching all the activity taking place. A group of guys called me over and gestured that they wanted me to take their photo. Such willing subjects don’t appear often so I readily agreed.

The guy insisted on taking one of me with the other, at this point you have to make a quick judgement call, might this person run off with my camera? It’s a tricky line to walk as playing it safe can not only seem rude but it also seems sad that you’d trust no one. On this occasion my gut feeling from their behaviour was that these guys were sound and there were people of all ages in the area so I wasn’t isolated, so I agreed. Sure enough it was fine and interestingly the guys didn’t seem bothered about seeing the picture on the screen, though a few of them looked, just getting their photo taken was reward enough! I always tell my subjects jokingly they will be famous and a big celebrity though no one ever understands my English.

As I continued up the beach some people would say hello, or acknowledge me when I gave a nod or smile, others would ignore me. Usually children in these places that tourists don’t often go to will be curious to see a farang, but the kids here barely noticed me at all. I didn’t really envy them playing in that water when I’d seen all the crap going into it further down the beach. Some were scraping holes in the beach with shells, maybe they were looking for crabs or worms. One adult in the water was wading around up to his chest, working on the hull of his boat.

At the end of the fleet I headed inland into a coconut plantation where a docile buffalo was tied up. They have quite a lot on the island apparently but this was the only place I saw them, there were more grazing further in. Big piles of coconuts were by the track. A guy came from the beach with his friends to look over the buffalo and it was quite content to have people touching it.

I wandered into the village, now I was on the other side of all the shacks. The narrow street winded past many food st