Elephants, Jeeps and Mopeds.

Those were our three methods of transport today.  :)

We got up early this morning to get picked up for our tour of Ang Thong Marine National Park, only to discover that the tour is actually happening TOMORROW.  Oops.  We ate breakfast at the resort restaurant overlooking the ocean and made a different plan for the day.

After breakfast, we asked the resort to bring us some mopeds so we could drive to a waterfall.  Michele had never ridden one before, but we assured her it was easy.  We also assured the resort personnel that we had all ridden mopeds before, but “not for a while.” :) I am sure we did not inspire confidence in the moped rental company, as I put my helmet on backwards (I didn’t notice until 30 minutes later…) and Michele promptly ran her moped into the curb.  :)

Michele practicing her moped skills at the gas station.  :)

It was only about a half hour drive to the waterfall, and we were surprised that the whole area in front of the falls had been turned into a massive tourist trap complete with ATV rides and elephant rides, and they wouldn’t allow us to ride our mopeds up to the falls.  We had to pay to take their Jeep to the falls or walk a mile uphill on the narrow, winding road with the real risk of getting smashed by their Jeeps flying down the road.  We opted for riding in the Jeep.

Michele was excited about the elephant rides, so we did one with her before visiting the falls.  This elephant ride was different than in Chiang Mai; we didn’t get to drive, :) and we had to sit in a metal seat on the elephant’s back rather than bareback.  Michele had a friendly and talkative driver, but ours was quite sullen, only talking to us to say, “I take photos, you give me tip.”  He did take some nice pictures of us on the elephant.

Michele on the elephant ride.

Gavin and I on our elephant.

All of us and Michele's happy, friendly mahout.

After the elephant ride, we took a hair-raising ride on the Jeep to the falls.  We were seated in the open-air back of the Jeep on metal benches, but our view of what was in front of us was blocked; all we could feel was our driver tossing the Jeep around the narrow, curvy road, and not being able to see if we were heading toward a collision with another Jeep coming the other way!

We arrived at the base of the falls, and had a small hike to get up to the larger falls.  It was a nice waterfall and had some tiny pools to dip our feet in.  It took the obligatory yoga by a waterfall photo, of course.  :)

The sign says "Warning, Dangerous, One by One."
We weren't sure if this meant literally one
person allowed on the bridge at once, or that we
should go single file.

Not the best workmanship on these bridges. At least the drop is only a few
feet if they break.  :D

Astavakrasana at the falls.

Shows better how if I fell out of the arm balance,
I would take a nasty tumble down those rocks. :)
Also you can see the "do not climb the falls" sign
that I obviously disobeyed.  :)

After another thrill-inducing ride down, we rode our mopeds back to the resort.  We ate some fruit in our room for lunch, then our pickup for a zip line adventure arrived.  We sat on hard metal benches in the back of a truck again, this time for well over an hour, on the dusty, noisy, fume-choked Koh Samui roads.

The zip lining itself was fun.  One of our guides took all our cameras and took videos and photos of us with our own cameras, which was nice.  One zip line I watched a guide jump off the ledge and bounce all the way down the line, so I tried it, too and for the first time finally got a little bit of a thrill on a zip line.  :)  On the last zip line, Gavin and I got to go together on two parallel lines, and we got to mess around and flip upside down, etc.  :)

Geared up and ready to go!

Gavin zipping along.

View of Lamai from the top of one of the towers.

Me being silly. :)

Gavin and I on a zip platform.

After another long, dusty ride in the back of a truck back to the resort, we decided to relax at the resort for a while.  We checked out Rocky’s tiny beach, which was the only unimpressive part of the resort, which we love otherwise.  We wandered into water the temperature of a bath, and I noticed some little crunches happening under my feet.  When I discovered they were thousands of tiny SNAILS in the water, I jumped out of the water really quickly and headed for the pool instead.  :)

Later in the afternoon, Michele and I had scheduled massages in the open-air pavilion overlooking the ocean.  Mine was very nice, good pressure for relaxation, and really nice smelling massage oil.  The massage ended just before sunset, and our massage ladies gave us some nice ginger tea to drink while we watched the sunset.

While we had been getting the massages, resort staff had begun setting up a bunch of tables, a grill, electric lights, and buffet on the beach.  We had a reservation for this dinner, so we went back to the room to shower and change, then wandered back down to the now-dimly-lit beach for dinner.  The buffet foot was good, and the spices were really nice on the grilled meats and fish, but EVERYTHING was overcooked; rubbery calamari, dry chicken, fully brown/well done beef...  It seems that whenever Thai restaurants try to approximate Western food, it doesn’t come out quite right.  :)

Setting up tables for the beach barbeque. You can see the pavilion where
we did our massages in the center of the photo under the trees.

Michele and I at the beach barbeque.

All those lights were added on the beach by burying electrical cords in the
the sand for temporary lighting!

After dinner we got to watch a fire show similar to the on we had watched on Koh Phi Phi last December, but much more professional and impressive; hardly any dropped batons, and the show was so close to us that we could feel the heat from some of the batons!  The moves and twirling also seemed more intricate and smooth.

The fire dancers. Literally the only decent photo we got of them.

After the fire show, we headed back to our room to sleep.  Tomorrow is REALLY our tour and dive in Ang Thong Marine National Park.  :)