Scooter in the Rainstorm, Boat to Island to Boat to Koh Tao

  December 3, 2022 - Saturday

Early morning wake up and on the scooters just past seven. We have 130km to go and it not nice out today. Unfortunately the rain is persistent this morning and we set off fully clad in rain gear. In no time we are pretty soaked and it's slow going at first. It lets up when we near the coast and for the most of the way we are cruising along at our normal speed and just getting spray off the other vehicles to keep us from drying out. But as we near the end of our journey I'm not sure if it could've rained any harder. It was constant and we both found we drank quite a lot of water just by cruising along with a little speed. It slowed our progress quite a lot and when we arrived at the piers it was a scramble to find where our boat left from. After a few wrong turns and mounting time pressure we luckily stopped on a corner and a local first tried to sell us some leaves to chew then pointed us down a street right across from us saying that's where the ferry was. We set off again going fast and determined not to miss check in and not sure if we were even going down the right road, it looked more industrial then a ferry spot. Luckily we followed it to the end and with no signage until you're right at the ticket booth, we found our ferry. We parked the scooters, hopped in the van are were taken to a different pier that had a speed boat. A little confused because we were booked on a catamaran, we boarded confident we would find our way there as there we a bunch of other people also going to Koh Tao. We all were given coloured stickers saying our final destination and it help all of us corral our way there. 

The speedboat dropped us on Koh Phra Ngan for a bit. We saw groups of other pink sticker people waiting, so we weren't worried we were getting off too soon. Not long the slower catamaran showed up, we think it left when it was full and knew a large group of people would be getting off on Koh Phra Ngan to allow the rest of the people destined for Koh Tao to board. It was a full boat, three levels full of people and uncomfortable plastic chairs. We happily went into the 100 baht VIP lounge and slumbered back in the A/C and the big comfy chairs. We were laughing at all the people slumming it in the cheap seats, its only 100 baht for such a better experience. Then it started pouring rain, the whole upper deck of people without a cover raced down to our level, but none came into the VIP lounge! We didn't get it, but I guess everyone wanted to save the couple bucks. Turns out no one even came by to collect our money so we were VIPs for free and got the enjoy the luxury of the quiet lounge mostly to ourselves. 

We disembarked and were quickly directed to a new scooter rental by Richard, our Air B&B host. He set us up with two scooters and showed us a few stops on the way up before going up to our Top of the Rock Villa. It's the highest house on the island and has great views all around. Graham had a swim and a nap while I went out to order pizza for delivery and pickup a couple beers and snacks. Not long later and the pizza arrived, about as good as it gets in Thailand. Crisp crunchy crust, saucy and lots of mozzarella. We at different times felt like an excursion but the other was feeling chill, so we just stayed in and relaxed, enjoyed the breeze and played on our phones. We started a movie in bed and was just falling asleep when a big wind push before a rainstorm came blowing through the house. We had left doors and windows open that kept banging and we had to secure before realizing some of our cloths that were drying on the rail had blown away. Graham lost a sole for his shoe and went to bed mad that he couldn't find it, it would be disappointing to not have walking shoes anymore. It was a restless night, wind gusts, rain and fans blowing non stop.