First morning...

Morning comes early around here. By 5am, the roosters and the dogs are letting me know the day has begun. I gather the bags I will be leaving at the guesthouse for 1 month, and deliver them to the owner. I have a shower and meet Michael at 8am for breakfast. He fills me in of some info about Q, who was the gal who ran the bungalows I stayed at for 2 months last trip to Koh Chang. Seems there was some family dispute and she has chosen not to run them any more. The Uncle now runs the place and I am sure it has lost its appeal. Breakfast wraps up and I head back to my room to get my bags and head to the pier. Once there, I say goodbye to Michael, and board the boat to Koh Phayam. It’s a 2hr trip with great scenery, so I relax and take in the views of the Islands, wildlife, and fishermen at work. The boat is not completely full, which may have something to with the drop in Thai tourism since the December political disturbances at the Airports etc. Also the fact that the Thai govt. decreased the length of a free Visa by 50%. You were able to stay for 30 days each renewal, now it is only 15. This means if you are on the Island, you must leave by boat and travel to Ranong, arrange a Visa run to Burma, go to Burma by boat, pay them the $10US to get a transit stamp, turn around, visit Thai Immigration and get you 15 day stamp, get back to the pier by 2pm, get a ticket for the last return boat to Koh Phayam/Chang. This process can take an entire day and the better part of $50US. Considering that many of the people that come to these two Islands are long term and/or entire season renters, this can mean 8-12 of these trips. Anyway, my boat pulls in right about on time. I get my bags and hit the pier looking for my landlady Chiyoko. About half way down I see her. We introduce ourselves and hire a motorcycle taxi for my ride to the house. My driver is a young guy and we head out in Koh Phayam’s small road system. They are made of concrete, about 5’ wide and tend to be in a state of disrepair, as Ranong Province is Thailand’s wettest during the rainy season. All this water washes out most roads on any type of slope. It takes us about 10 min to make the trip and Chiyoko is waiting for us at the house. We go over some formalities and I ask some questions about locations of the market, laundry, and other need to know services. I tell her I will see her in an hr or two, and start to unpack my shit. The house is great. It has it’s owm small kitchen, balcony off the upstairs bedroom, shaded sitting area under the bedroom and is set in the “jungle” surrounded by nicely planted grounds. There are mango, banana, cashew, coconut trees, and the whole place is set in a working rubber tree plantation. There is one other house on the way in, but other that, you feel like you’ve been dropped in your own little pocket of the wild. I take a couple of hrs. to relax and realize that I have come to the end of traveling for a while anyway. At about 2pm I head up to see Chiyoko at their own home. Down the path, onto the roadway and up about 200m. We go over a few things and I sign a rental agreement , while she copies my passport etc. I ask her some questions and I head back to the house. I had heard that Lek, the woman I had spent 3 months with last time, had started to work on this Island and I decided to take a walk down the beach to see if she was working at a bar owned by a friend of hers. We had stayed there one night after a reggae show in 2007. I headed towards the beach about 7pm and walked the stretch or bars and bungalows for about an hr, trying to recognized the place. On my way back, I saw “Lazy Bar” and realized that this was the place. I went to the bar and asked the girl working if she knew Lek. She said that she did, but that Lek was no longer working there and had gone home to Ranong. With that information, I headed back to the house a little deflated, but it is probably for the best as things went really sideways trying to say good-bye last time. As my plans are to be in Laos within 45 days or so, we would probably have a repeat performance of that show, and we could both do without revisiting that… no matter how much fun was to be had in between.. Got home, hopped in the shower, baby powdered up and hit the sack at 9pm.