Ang Thong National Marine Park

This morning we had a very early start. We were picked up at 7:15am and we drove over to the other side of the island to one of the piers. The boat left around 9am and headed to the marine park. It took quite a while, reaching the first stop at 10:45.

The first stop was Wua Ta-Lab island.  We had an hour and a half here. Our first activity was to visit the viewpoint. It was only 500m but it was all stairs, they were very steep, and it was very hot. It was hard and sweaty work but we made it. We were the first up there. Not many people from our boat actually attempted it. More fool them, as the view was absolutely stunning. So worth the effort. We could see multiple islands across the sea. We took photos and then headed back down which required a lot of concentration as the steps were just essentially tiered rocks which were quite uneven. It took us about an hour in total to do the viewpoint. When we got down we got a drink and went straight into the sea. It was such a beautiful island. The sand was white and the sea so blue, lined with palm trees. I could have spent a lot longer there.

We got a boat back to the boat, as the big boat couldn't get near the shore, so we were ferried to and from it by longtail boats. On the boat we had lunch, which was chicken in various sauces with rice and then sailed to our second stop, Mae Koh Island.

We arrived at 1:15pm and had until 3pm although everyone was back on the boat slightly before. We climbed up some very steep steps to a viewpoint to look at the lagoon. It took less than ten minutes. We had a look and took some photos and then returned to the beach for a swim. Whilst we were in the sea some very grey clouds appeared and the wind suddenly picked up. One tour group was immediately sent back to their boat but we stuck it out. The clouds actually amounted to very little; it was spitting a few drops of rain for about 2 minutes. We had gotten out of the water anyway as we had needed to move our stuff to shelter and we sat on a bench for a while before eventually getting back in the water.

While we were sitting on the bench there was some commotion and there was a girl behind us who appeared out of no where absolutely sobbing and crying. She had sustained some kind of injury and the way she was acting she may have broken her leg. But Lauren had seen her moments before waving her arms around as if trying to bat an insect away. Some yellow gel stuff was applied to her chest and a wet paper towel was held over it as she cried and cried while a big group of people gathered round. After about 15 minutes she was helped to her feet.  Not sure what happened after that as we went in the water but it was a lot of fuss for what seemed to be an insect bite/sting.

We got a long tail boat back to the boat around 2:50 and had Pepsi and biscuits, setting off back towards Koh Samui around 3. It took two hours to get back and it seemed like forever. We got back into the minibus we came in and were dropped off at the hostel sometime before 6. We showered and got dressed and then went to an English pub for dinner. Then we came back to the hostel and crashed.