Crossing the Mekong back into Thailand After another night in the big city it was time to say Goodbye to Lao and head back to Thailand and allllll the way down to Ko Samui in the Gulf of Thailand.
The first leg of our trip was a minivan to the border. At the border we went through the Lao check point and hopped on a ghetto thai bus to cross the bridge over the Mekong. Since it was a beautiful day we saw a lot more going over the bridge compared to the way into the country when it was rainy and gross. Off that bus and through Thai immigration and then the search for a lift to the Udon Thani airport. We thought we could catch the same airport operated shuttle that we took there but there were none to be found. Instead a few taxi guys approached us and we quickly agreed on a good price for the one hour drive (cheaper than on the way there, point us). Our ride ended up being a ute (pick up truck) with an extended cab, but only so much extended that 4 of us could sit inside, the other four eagerly got to sit in the back with the bags. They weren't the happiest 3 after that hour of 100km/h speeds. Since this leg of the journey went so smoothly we arrived at the Udon airport almost 3 hours before our flight and had to sit around an hour before we could even check-in, and then another until we could go through security (small airport: 2 gates). BUT the plus side to this was the DAIRY QUEEN in the airport. The ice cream even tasted like real DQ soft serve, amazing!
Back seat riders
DQ, that's what I like about Texas, I mean Thailand...
Eventually it was time to fly and our flight was on time and short. We arrived in Bangkok, got our shit, and went to find a taxi or something to the train station. We ended up getting the Airport Express bus for pretty cheap and our driver was like bat out of hell. Weeeeeeeee!Once at the train station thins started to take a turn for the not so good. First we learned that the last train that night, at 10:50pm (it was almost 8:30 by this point), was not a sleeper aka it only had seats no beds! Also, this train got into Surat Thani after the last bus had left to the pier so if we took it we'd have to find our own way there. The train people told us to go to this travel agency and try to get the bus which would take us straight to the pier. We did and they told us the bus only had two seats (we're a group of 7) and then tried to sell us a 1500baht (about $50) package of train and fast boat to Ko Samui. Fuck that we said and went back to get train tickets. The train ticket guy tried us to take this fast boat for 1500B as well but we told him no and got the train and slow boat for 1180B. Sorted.
We spent the next 2 hours finding dinner (the KFC attached to the station was out of chicken! so the boys took tuktuks to a MacDee's but of course the tuktuk driver took them to Seafood restaurant b/c like the suit places if they bring customers they get free fuel vouchers. They eventually got their big macs) and waiting. The train was a little late but only by about 15 minutes. We border and drank the beer we'd brought on and then tried to sleep in the uncomfortable seats.
At a little after 6am the train stopped at our station: Chumpon, and we got off and tried to find our boat company who would take us to the pier and put us on the boat. Well we found him and he had more bad news: our boat had been cancelled due to big waves in the gulf. His english was poor and he didn't seem quite legit, he wanted 150B ($5) from each of us to get us upgraded to take the fast boat, so we ended up squeezing on to a tuktuk with some other people. We arrived at the pier for the fast boat and were told the same thing by the people there: pay another 150B each to get on this boat. We thought this was bullshit; the company that ran the slow boat should of paid for our upgrade b/c they'd cancelled our boat, but that company's representative was long gone. We grudgingly paid the money since we really had no other choice, unless we wanted to spend a day in Chumpon, but we had a reservation at a hotel in Samui. On the positive side the fast boat to the island would get us there in about half the time.
The fast boat pier at Chumpon
Our hotel room at Laem Din Hotel
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