LIFE IS A BEACH - Beach Images Compilation VIDEO

Since it has been a little bit colder here in Munich for the last few days, I've been really longing for some quality beach time! And then I remembered all the beautiful beach footage I still had from various trips, so I decided to make a little video. So channel your inner mermaid and enjoy!

Island Review: KOH SAMUI

Koh Samui is one of the three most popular vacation islands in the Golf of Thailand. It's the biggest one out of the three of them. Koh Samui even has an airport that you can fly to directly from Bangkok.

WHAT TO SEE

Fisherman's Village

The Fisherman's Village located at Bophut Beach is a really charming little place on Koh Samui. The real center of it, is the one long street parallell to the beach. There is lots to discover! There are so many different restaurants and bars and due to the many many tourists here, you can even find European and American food. Though I would recommend to stick to Thai food! We tried this Pizza place one night and if you are used to real Italian Pizza like us, you will only be disappointed. (As Germany is so close to Italy, we have really good italian restaurants here)

One thing I like most about Fisherman's Village is, that there are plenty of souvenir shopping opportunities. You can buy those typical Thailand-hippie-clothes, cute little bracelets and necklaces, scarfs, buddha and elephant figures. It is the perfect place to get your friends a little Thailand gift.

The downside of eating out or shopping on Koh Samui is, that it is far more expensive than on any other island we've been to. Koh Samui is a very touristic island and while other travellers might like that, we didn't like it too much. 

Big Buddha

The Big Buddha statue is the landmark of the Koh Samui Island. It is situated on a little peninsula and if you arrive on Koh Samui by plane, it will be the first thing you see of the Island. The golden statue is 12m high and looks quite impressive when you stand at the bottom of the stairs leading up to it. As at every other buddhist temple, you have to dress approprietly here too. Meaning: cover your shoulders and your knees or they won't let you in!

Wat Plai Laem

The temple Plai Laem is featured on many Koh Samui postcards because this is where the big colorful Buddha and another huge Buddha statue are situated. There is not much to do here but marvel at the two statues but it is definitely worth a short stop on your sightseeing trip through Koh Samui.

Grandfather Rock (Hin Ta & Hin Yai Rocks)

How would you call a rock shaped like a male genital? The Thais called it Grandfather Rock and it became very popular with tourists. There is also a counterpart called Grandmother Rock but it is not as unmistakably identifiable as the Grandfather Rock. They are located at the end of Lamai Beach.

Near Grandfather Rock is a little market place where you can get coconut icecream and there is also a very cool Bar called the Rocks Bar that you shouldn't miss visiting.

BEACHES

The two most popular beaches on Koh Samui are Lamai Beach and Chaweng Beach. To be honest both of those beaches are not on the list of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. But please note that this is criticism at a very high level because Thailand has soooo many breathtakingingly beautiful beaches that the Koh Samui beaches we've been to, just didn't make the list... Sorry Koh Samui!

Nevertheless are both beaches with their sea promenades nice spots to spend an afternoon swimming or watching the sunset at a restaurant table directly on the warm sand.

LAMAI BEACH

CHAWENG BEACH

WOULD I VISIT KOH SAMUI AGAIN

While our time there was nice, I would not visit Koh Samui again because I feel like I have seen everything I wanted to see and I simply did not fall in love with it the way I did with other Thailand islands. I am glad I visited Koh Samui but i probably won't return. There are so many other thai islands that we did not visit because we didn't have enough time. So if I return to Thailand I will focus on the islands that are left on my list ;).

Taking the Night Train from Bangkok to Surat Thani

After we had spent about one week in Bangkok, we longed for the island life in the south of Thailand. The prospect of sunny beaches and the warm ocean of the golf of Thailand was very alluring and our first destination was the Island of Koh Phangan. In order to get to Koh Phangan we had to travel more than 650 kilometers down to the coastal town of Surat Thani. From there, we would be taking the Lompraya Ferry out to the islands. Phew! That was gonna be a loooong way to go.

Since we weren't really keen on sacrificing a whole travel day, we decided to take the Night train down to the South. Everybody like the idea to sleep on the train and wake up in the morning when we would be just about to be arriving in Surat Thani. After all we were 4 people travelling and all decisions were made democratically. 

At 8pm our train left Bangkok.

When we first got on the train, we accidentally sat down on the wrong seats. We hadn't really checked our tickets very thoroughly. Our actual seats were in First Class including air condition, however we sat down in Second Class which only had a fan. It was soooo hot and humid, I wondered whether I would be able to sleep at all. It really is extraordinarly hot in Thailand during may and june. When the passengers arrived who had actually booked the seats we were sitting on, we noticed our mistake^^. Believe me, I was soooo relieved once I was in the wonderfully cool AC air! 

So, First Class and AC! Sounds good? Well, First Class in Thailand is something entirely different than First Class in Europe. Naturely we were prepared for the cultural shock but it still kind of hit us. It does take more than five days to adjust to the ways of Southeast Asia. When we took the Night train for a second time at the end of our trip, we were much better acclimatized than the first time. We actually enjoyed the ride. 
First Class on the Night train isn't really any bigger than Second Class, but it has some advantages still. First of all, there is of course our beloved Air Condition. Second of all, in First Class your seat can be transformed into a small bed at night, while second class passengers have to sleep sitting up. I can't even sleep on a plane, I would not have been able to sleep on that train like that for sure.

Another First Class advantage is the "bathroom". Bathroom in quotation marks because it mainly consits of a very charming metal outhouse, two metal sinks and a very old mirror. But nonetheless it was nice to even have the possibility of brushing your teeth and freshen up a little bit.

Soon after the train had left Bangkok the conductor handed us a dinner menu. Dinner is not included in the price of the ticket but that doesn't really matter because it is as cheap as anywhere on the streets of Bangkok. And it was good too. 

When it was time to go to sleep, the conductor made our beds. Each bed had a thin mattress, bedsheets, a pillow and a thin blanket. I have to admit it was more comfortable than I thought. Depending on the Seat number you have, you get either the lower bed or the bunk bed above it. Everyone wants to get the lower bed because you have more room and of course you have the big window. But when we booked our tickets, we were already very late and all the lower beds had been booked, so we had to take the bunk beds. Every bed also has a curtain that you can shut during the night to have some privacy.

I listened to Music for a long time before I really fell asleep. The train ride isn't smooth at all, it's very bumpy but I think the rocking of the train actually helped me fall asleep in the end. 

As the conductor told us we would be arriving in Surat Thani the following morning at about 6am, we set our alarm clocks. When I woke up at about 5:30am I realized that I had a surprisingly good night. The conductor was nice enough to tell us exactly when we had to get off the train. We were still sleepy and every station we passed looked the same, so that was very helpful of him. The staff on the train are in general really nice.

Going by night train was a really good idea for us. We weren't half as worn out from travelling as we would have been if we had travelled during the day. I would definitely recommend it to any traveller who doesn't want to loose a whole vacation day travelling a long distance. Of course you can also cover long distances by plane but the experience of spending the night on a train in Thailand is quite unique and I wouldn't have wanted to miss it.

Thai Cooking Class in Chiang Mai |ENGLISH|

Since before the beginning of our Thailand trip various friends told us that we simply had to do a thai cooking class when we were there. As we spent more days in Chiang Mai than in any other place we visited in Thailand, the opportunity presented itself. My boyfriend Simon found this great Cooking School called the Basil Thai Cookery School online. So we signed up right away for the next day.

At around mid-morning the next day, we were picked up at our Guest House by our lovely cooking teacher "Apple". Obviously not her real name but she told us to call her Apple as we probably wouldn't be able to pronounce her thai name^^. We were the last ones to be picked up, so after we hopped in she took all of us straight to a little market.

Our little group consisted of two American travellers, a young couple from Great Britain and the two of us. When we arrived at the market Apple taught us about all the different fruits, vegetables and spices that were used in thai cooking. It was a really interesting experience as there are so many vegetables that you just don't come across in Europe. After our little introduction to the ingredients we had a little time to explore the market by ourselves while our teacher did the shopping for the actual cooking later on.

The market was not very big but therefor very authentic. Except for us, there were hardly any other tourists, which I rather liked. We bought some fruit shakes and watched the thai people do their shopping and interacting with the traders. In Thailand going shopping for food is not just an annoying chore but a social experience. 

At the Cooking School, we were all handed a little list, where we could pick a dish from each category, that we wanted to learn how to cook. The categories were: Noodles, Stir-fries, Soups, Appetizers, Curries and Deserts.

 

So let's get cookin'! We started out with the first category. Depending on what we picked on the list, we were given the ingredients we needed. Apple showed us how to dice the various vegetables and after that we were introduced to our cooking stations. There were exactly six gas stoves next to each other with already waiting Woks on top of them. We were taught how to use the gas stove correctly and when to put them on which heat level. There were only three different heat levels.

Our teacher Apple rushed from one student to the other and helped us. Sometimes she would stand beside us and yell "Stir, stir, stir, stir!" like a little drill sergeant, which was kind of funny and made us all sweat and stir like crazy. We were really lucky to have such a genuinely nice and communicative teacher like Apple. We all liked her instantly. Also, her english was really good, so we had no problems at all understanding her.

We worked our way down the cooking list and everytime a category was done, we sat down at the big table in the front room and ate what we had just cooked. Our group got along very well and we offered one another to try our dishes as not everybody had cooked the same dish from that category. 

If someone couldn't finish their dish or wanted to take it home, Apple packed it in those typically thai take-away plastic bags. And after a few dishes, I really had to do that too, because I was getting sooooo full from all that delicious food. And this way, dinner was already taken care of.

Halfway we had a little cooking break where Simon and I went to a little shop nearby and got some iced coffee. It was getting really hot next to those gas stoves and the humid climate in Thailand didn't help either^^.

I really liked how the class was set up. I liked the friendly, open atmosphere. My favourite part was when we learned how to fold and roll springrolls ourselves. I had never done that before and they turned out sooooo good!

After the class was done, each of us got a little cook book with all the recipes for the dishes we had just cooked. It also has definitions of thai vegetables and spices in it and it has detailed instructions on how to cook rice the correct way. Because apparently cooking rice really is rocket science ;)

We sat at the big table for a while flipping through the little book and chatting away with our group and Apple before she drove us back home to our Guest House.

It was a perfect day at the Basil Thai Cookery School and I would definitely do it again.

A few facts before you leave:

PRICE: 1000 Baht / Person (~27€ / ~28,50$ / ~20£)

TIMES: |Mo - Sa| Morning Course: 9am to 3pm

                          Evening Course: 4pm to 8.30pm

LINK: http://www.basilcookery.com/home/

              

Have you ever done a thai cooking class? 

What was your experience?