Half-Moon and Koh Tao

View South East Asia in a larger map

Half Moon party was everything I imagined and more. Picture 1000 half naked neon-painted backpackers in the middle of the jungle with rave music blarring until the early hours of the morning. The vibe was incredible.

It also included one very sobering event that was quite tragic. We arrived and began dancing on these large stone steps. We noticed this really drunk dude passed out on a small bench at the top of the steps and was sort of just sitting there past out. Then all of a sudden out of nowhere, passed out, he topples over, tumbling head first down two levels of stone steps hitting his head and landing on his back. When we went down to see, he was completely unconscious and bleeding from the eye and ear. He snapped out of it and regained consciousness. He had nobody with him. The police came, flashed a light in his eyes, gave him some water and left. We had met a Kiwi at the party who was a doctor and was convinced this guy needed to be in a hospital, so we carried him out and found him an ambulance, which they were initially reluctant to take him. Anyway, this event made me realize these parties are good fun but dangerous and the concept of liability and accountability in Thailand is non-existant.

In line with that, last night my travel buddy Arnold was struck nearly in the face with a flamming numchuck (they were putting on a fire show on the beach). The fire struck him in the chest and blackened his shirt, scaring the crap out of him in the process. The bar's response: "you shouldnt have been sitting so close"...guess what?the bar sets up the cushions for people to sit on and we werent close. They even refused to clean his shirt.

Moving on to greener pastures...

We left Koh Pagnan (half-moon party island) for a much smaller island 40 km north called Koh Tao. The vibe here is much more low key. It is known as divers paradise. it actually has the world's busiest dive school and people from all over the world come to get their certification for cheap. The people seem to be much more active and the focus is less on nightlife and more on what the islands underwater world has to offer. We have been here for a 4 nights and I'm really enjoying the tranquility. I decided not to dive since I had already tried it in Panama, instead I stuck to the more cost efficient alternative of snorkelling which was still really amazing and saw lots of really cool fish. I even did a 1.5 hour swim to this tiny island at the north of Koh Tao. The beach there was the most beautiful I had ever seen and the color of the water was unbelievable (I'll post some pics to try and do it some justice).

I also celebrated Halloween here. It was sad, for the first time in several years I would not have the props to be my usual character of Harry Potter.... instead, getting our hands on some blue paint and a chef hat, I became Papa Smurf and my friend Helen Smurfette. My dutch friend Arnold needed barely a costume to pull off Schwartzanegger. All we needed was to paint an ammunition belt over his chest and give him a bandana and some wounds... it was spot on. The lady boy cabaret bar even put on a special halloween cabaret show which was a bit disturbing but fun to watch. Then we headed out to a few halloween parties around the small town. Arnold loved his first Halloween (they dont have it in Holland) and vows he wants to make it to Canada for the next one.

Anyway, my days of beach bumming are coming to a close, tomorrow I leave for Bangkok. I think after three weeks on small islands, living the beach bummer dream, its time to move on to a bit more adventure and nature. The plan is to get a feel for Bangkok for a few days and then head into northern thailand.

Hope life is good back home.