Hat Lamai - Rock out with your "rock" out.

Today we arrived in Koh Samui, an island on the gulf/east side of Thailand.  We picked this island because we didn’t get to see any islands on the gulf side when we traveled here in December, and because it had an airport.  :)  We arrived at Rocky’s Boutique Resort and were seriously amazed; what a beautiful place!  Our two-bedroom villa, which we are sharing with our friend Michele who is traveling with us, is the size of an actual house and has two floors!  It also has a small private pool that is about the size of a hot tub, but chest deep.  The whole resort is covered in beautiful vegetation, including my favorite plumeria trees, whose scented blossoms are scattered both purposefully and naturally throughout the resort.

Lovely flower arrangements in big water-filled bowls.

A lotus flower (I think?)  in one of the fish ponds!

Choosing a girly drink at the bar by the pool.

Orchids on the bed...

Orchids in the bathroom.

Breakfast and restaurant area overlooking the water.

More places for relaxing.

Another favorite flower arrangement in water.

The first order of business was to take a nap – we had not only traveled for over 40 hours to get to Bangkok, but we had to spend the night in Bangkok and only got 3 hours of sleep before getting up for our flight to Koh Samui!

After our nap, we took Rocky’s shuttle to Lamai to check out one of Koh Samui’s popular beaches.  We stopped at the first restaurant we saw and had some lunch, including a tasty fresh watermelon juice and some spicy shrimp soup, whose spiciness was fine in my mouth, but gave me instant pain in travel- and lack-of-sleep-upset tummy.  I guess I should have taken it a little slower to adjust to spicy Thai food.  :)

After lunch we walked down to the south end of the beach looking for the “landmarks” Hin Tai and Hin Yai, otherwise known as Grandmother and Grandfather rocks.  Guess why…  (these were actually mentioned in Lonely Planet!)

Hat Lamai.

"Grandfather Rock."

"Grandmother rock."

Scenic yoga posture in front of Grandfather rock.  Because I have the sense
of humor of a 12 year old boy.  :)

After admiring the anatomically correct rock formations, (which didn't exactly come out in the photos due to poor lighting) we walked back to the road to go to the Lamai Night Market.  We walked along the dusty, hot, noisy main road uphill for about a half hour, choking on exhaust fumes and dust stirred up by the cars and mopeds zooming by.  We were tired and hot, so we stopped at a little bakery to have some water and use their internet, and we discovered we had missed a turn to the Night Market and were a long way past it.  Instead of walking all the way back, we were lazy and hired a taxi, who ripped us off $6 to drive 2 minutes to the Night Market.

Michele and I at the Night Market.

The Night Market was pretty small, much smaller than I expected for such a touristy place.  We didn’t spend much time there, though I got a new swimsuit in a store on the same street and Michele got a couple souvenirs.  After our brief walk through, we took another rip-off taxi back to our resort.  We ate an unimpressive dinner at one of the resort restaurants, then ended our day cooling off in our private pool.  Tomorrow we will have our tour and dive in Ang Thong Marine National Park.

Rocky's Boutique Resort lit up at night.