Greetings from Koh Samui

After nearly 20 hours of travelling we finally made it to the island of Koh Samui. It was an exhausting and uncomfortable journey comprising 11 hours on a smelly bus to Sura Thani, a two hour wait, an hour bus ride to the pier, a 90 minute ferry ride to the island and then a 40 minute mini-bus to our guest house, "The Loft". by the time we arrived we were both exhausted and after lunch, slept most of the afternoon. It's now about 10pm at night. We are spending the next five nights at Chewang beach on Koh Samui, followed by four nights at Krabi island, three nights at Koh Phi Phi before heading to Phuket and flying to Singapore on 18th.

As I wrote from Bangkok, we had an amazing time on our tour in Kanchanaburi. The tour started with a visit to the POW cemetery followed by a visit to the JEATH museum adjacent to the famous Bridge over the river Kwai. JEATH standing for Japanese, English, Australian, American and Holland POWs who died building the railway. I knew nothing of the story of the building of the death railway built using prisoners of war and asian labourers by the Japanese nor of the cruelty and terrible conditions under which they toiled and died. After this visit, we took a train ride on an old rickety train along part of the death rail line. It was a strange experience sipping tea and eating the sponge cakes provided trying not to forget that over 100,000 people died building the very line we were rattling on.

The rest of the weekend was less sobering and a lot of fun. We spent a great few hours at the Erawan falls swimming in the pools (filled with the same fish that bit our feet in the spa) and also met some really great people on our tour from France, Dubai and other places. Two nights we slept on a floating house boat alongside the River Kwai. The real highlight thought was washing elephants in the river and then go on an elephant ride later on Sunday. Sitting on top the elephant's leather skin and then dipping into the river is something i won't forget doing!

Sorry no pics at this stage - internet cafe's USB does not appear to be working.