Some would have us believe that life continues in a purely linear fashion. I have found a beach in thailand that challenges this assertion. The beach is called Haad Tien, on the island of Koh Phangnan, and it exists within a space so far removed from my normal perception of the world that it is difficult to describe. It'd be best to begin with how we got there.
After Pai, Peter and I went south. We did so in the most extreme way possible. Anxious to move after a week soaking in bliss, we jumped headlong into a 48 hour journey from thailand's northernmost province (Mae Hong Son) to it's southernmost (Surat Thani) from bus to bus to train to bus to ferry to paradise, again.
The highlights of this trip include:
1. Being slapped awake with moist towelettes by a stewardess trying to arouse me from my painkiller-induced slumber.
2. Using an entire can of OFF on a bed full of bedbugs while we waited for our train in bangkok.
3. Letting Peter bleach my entire hand with hydrogen peroxide on as he tried to clean my wound on said train, while people in the aisle walked by and gave us very screwy looks.
While in Bangkok, we met up with our friend Jasmina, a girl we met on Kho San my second night here, who saved me from being molested by a ladyboy. She's half-thai, half-english, and has lived in Bangkok all her life, and we would've been lost without her. Her friend owns a guesthouse on Koh Phangnan, and that's where we found ourselves, thoroughly delirious after those two days of hellish movement, on a white-sand beach complete with turquoise water and coconut palms. Her friend's name is Kim, and her middle name is Palita. The guesthouse is named the Palita lodge after her, and while we were there her and jaz took it upon themselves to show us why Koh Phangnan has the reputation of being one of the most amazing party islands in the world. I swear the entire industry on the main beach (Haad Rin) is dedicated to transforming itself into gomorrah by the year 2005. In the meantime the island remains absolutely gorgeous, and it took us 3 days to thoroughly understand why.
My friends Orion and Roxy showed up at Palita on the third day, literally out of the blue. They had come straight from Cambodia, and the only information I had given them was a one-line email that said "Palita Lodge, Koh Phangan." the day before. Then they appeared, with a puff of smoke.
That day we let Jasmina take us to another part of the island. We went to a dock with longtail boats, and jasmina spouted some stuff to them in thai. We got into this brightly painted green and red boat, about 20 feet long, with a massive engine attached to a ten foot tailpole with a propeller at the end. This kid, no more than 16 years old pushed us off the dock, kickstarted this engine twice his size, let it roar to life. The wind had kicked up that day, and the waves were rolling in huge swells. This kid maneuvered these waves like a champion, riding his tiller over the swells, hitting them straight on, not letting them roll us. He laughed every time we'd jump over a whitecap, spraying us with water and shout "freeshower! freeshower!" Clouds kept tumbling over the sun, and the water went from deep blue to green, drastically changing color as the light shifted. I was there, sitting on this boat, soaking with water as we traversed the most vivid and lush scenery i've ever seen, with huge smooth blocks of granite jutting out at odd angles from every shore not covered in white coral sand and palm trees. I rubbed my eyes and found an eyelash on my finger. I was supposed to make a wish. I looked at it, looked at my friends, looked at the world around me, and sat there, stunned.
In that moment, for the first time, I could not think of anything more to wish for. Beauty does not usually exist in such quantities. This place has it in spades, from every angle, at all times.
We found ourselves on the shore of Haad Yuan, knee deep in water after jumping from the longtail boat and paying our vivacious captain. This beach and its neighbor (haad tien) became some sort of gravitational anomaly over the next two weeks, as we'd leave for a few days and find ourselves pulled back there inexplicably. At one point we flew all the way to bangkok, but maintained an orbital trajectory that forced us back to that same beach 4 days later. I have now been there on three separate occasions, and as far as I know Peter is still there, unable to escape.
There are good reasons why. We thought Haad Rin was amazing until we saw these beaches. Thick tropical rainforest just beyond palm speckled grasses, bungalows for 100b per night, incredible food and a place called Guy's Bar, overlooking the coconut palms that sells the most amazing mushy leechy shakes i've ever tasted. And the best part is that it's only accessible by longtail, making it half as populated with people who are twice as interesting. I think we all had a DiCaprio Beach moment when we came to terms with how damn cool and beautiful that stretch of coast was. We spent the day running around those beaches, climbing rocks and swimming. The swimming actually ended the excursion, because Orion cut his foot open on coral (although it diminished none of the epic and beautiful nature of that day).
I hope you have all had an amazing new years. Ours was spent on that very beach. It was tremendously inspiring and pure watching the first sunrise of the new year.
Since that moment on the water I figured out what i'd have wished for: That you were all there with me to share that experience. Despite the fact that you all would've sunk the boat, I have no doubt that one moment of collective bliss would have been entirely worth it. I promise.
Near death experiences and jungle adventures to come. I'm off to Malaysia in the morning to jump the border because my thai visa has run out. Not sure what my next step is. On my own again.
Much love,
Tobias