As we reached the end of our adventure through Laos, our attention turned to Thailand, working out where we’d like to go and how long we’d like to stay in each place. One highlight of Thailand, for a lot of travellers, is the full moon party which takes place on an island called Koh Phangan. We had it in our minds that the Full Moon party would be on a date towards the start of April (the party is when there is a full moon, so once every lunar month, which is about every four weeks). This would mean that we’d have a week or so to travel to Koh Phangan (going through various stops in Northern Thailand on the way). But when it came to actually finalising some plans, we double checked the date of the full moon and were shocked to find it actually fell on the 31st March 2018, not a week or so into April! This caused a major problem to our plans – there would be no way for us to meander through Northern Thailand to get to Koh Phangan, so our only options were to either miss the full moon party, or fly directly from Laos to Surat Thani (which is a ferry away from Koh Phangan). We were somewhat reluctant to take the flight option, firstly because where possible we are trying to minimize the number of flights we take, secondly it works out a lot more expensive to fly around everywhere and lastly it would mean we’d fly directly to the south, and then we’d have to make our way back to the north (to see northern Thailand) and then travel back to the south to see the rest of Thailand (and end up at Bangkok which is where we fly to Russia from). This seemed like an awful lot of effort just to go to the full moon party. On the flipside, the full moon party is the highlight of a lot of travellers time in Thailand. Ultimately we caved to FOMO (fear of missing out) and decided to take the option of traversing the country several times by plane, in order to go to get to Koh Phangan in time. To give you some idea of our travel route:

So our updated plans took us from Luang Prabang in Laos to Surat Thani airport in Thailand. For the first time in our lives, at the airport, a chauffeur was waiting for us, with a piece of paper held up with our names on! Not bad for a cheap hostel just outside the airport (we elected to stay here as we arrived late in the evening, and would be getting a bus and ferry combined transfer from the airport to the island of Koh Samui). The next day, after our various forms of transport, we finally made it to Koh Samui and headed to a cafe at the end of the jetty to meet Rob, a chap from England who moved to Koh Samui a few years ago and started a hostel and bar. He explained to us that his hostel is in a quiet part of the island and that taxis are expensive to get around, but luckily for us, he picked us up from the ferry and transported us to his hostel. The hostel was more like a villa, and although it had the capacity for 22 people, on the first night there were only four of us staying there, and on the second night, this increased to six. So we felt like we were living a life of luxury!

We went to Koh Samui as a place to chill out and relax for two nights, before we head to Koh Phangan for two parties which run throughout two consecutive nights. If we were going to make it through these two parties we’d need some rest beforehand! We weren’t particularly keen on hiring scooters to explore the island but were fortunate in the fact the owner Rob was happy to drop us off at a few different places as he ran various errands on the Island. The two other people staying in the hostel with us on the first night were Ashley and Kerry, two girls from Canada which were loads of fun to spend time with. We ended up going for meals and out for drinks with them, along with them showing us various party games they play in Canada.

We were all on a bit of an economy drive, after overspending earlier in our trips, so went for cheap options including having Pad Thai from a Chinese market, which was both delicious and also freshly prepared in front of us (the sellers only bring enough fresh ingredients for the day, and once they run out, they close their stall, so you know the food is fresh and that they aren’t using leftovers from previous days).

The Chinese market was set up with lanterns and decorations everywhere and an imposing statue in the background…

On our last full day, we went to a beach bar (also owned by Rob, he seems to have connections to half the businesses on the island) and met a chap called Dan there, who manages a pair of luxury villas up the road. He offered to show us around the island later, as he was planning on showing his brothers the sites whilst they visited him. Dan said he enjoys showing people the highlights of Koh Samui, so the more the merrier. That evening, Gemma made the sensible decision of calling it an early night, ahead of the all-night parties the following two nights. Steve, on the other hand, was less sensible and went out to explore the nightlife of Koh Samui with Ashley and Kerry and took Dan up on his offer of showing us around the island. Luckily for us, Dan isn’t really much of an alcohol drinker, so he was the designated driver and took us to a bunch of different places from parties on a beach (preparing us for the Full Moon party), to podiums inside dance floors to various bars in-between. At the end of the night, he took us back to the luxury villas that he manages and blew us away with how high end they are! A private pool looking overlooking the sea, a huge entrance/hallway leading to a luxury kitchen and front room and a bunch of kingsize bedrooms – this would definitely be a nice way to spend a week if budget allowed! The girls and I enjoyed some complimentary snacks whilst Dan and his brother swam in the pool and at the end of the night (well more like 3:30 am) Dan dropped us back at our hostel – still wearing his dressing gown/robe that he put on after his swim!

With our final interactions with Koh Samui over and done with, we headed to Koh Phangan to finally find out what this party island had to offer. At full moon, it is well known for two events, the first, and most obvious is the full moon party itself where between 10,000 – 30,000 people descend to Haad Rin and party, with lots of different music, fire shows, buckets of cocktails it is many revellers all night party dream. The night before the full moon party is the Jungle party, which is a party located in (can you guess?) a Jungle – you get a shared van to take you down to the middle of the jungle and then you start walking into the jungle, start to hear some music in the background, then start to see some lights flashing…

When you get to the clearing for where the Jungle party is set up, you find wooden stages, bars, dance floors and everything else you need to party, presumably all being powered by a diesel generator.

As promised, the party was set to go on all night, we stayed until about 3 am, we were very aware that we had yet another big night at the full moon party, and didn’t want to totally exhaust ourselves, but as we left the party was very much still in full swing!

With Jungle done and dusted, our real purpose for being on Koh Phangan arrived, the Full Moon party. There are a few traditions/rules that nearly all Full Moon party goers have to abide by, firstly you need to wear clothes which are as colourful and crazy as possible, secondly, you need to enhance this by using luminous body/face paints.

Secondly, you have to consume the majority of your drinks from a bucket, for which there are many sellers along the beach more than happy to supply and then join in with the fun.

Next, you just have to party and enjoy yourself.

Now, whilst partying you absolutely need to enjoy yourself, have a good time, make lots of friends… but don’t have too much fun, and end up passing out in the drunk pen on the beach – you and your possessions maybe safe there, but people will take photos of you!

At the end of the night, the last thing the hostel wants is all their bedding stained with all the glow in the dark paints everyone has doused on themselves, so it is encouraged to jump into the swimming pool, clothing optional, to get rid of all the paints. It is a great plan for that particular night, but it leaves the swimming pool out of action thereafter.

So the question is: was it worthwhile to have to fly up and down the country in order to get to Koh Phangan in time for these parties? Absolutely yes – we made some amazing friends, partied in a way that we haven’t anywhere else and had loads of fun. It is something we’ll always look back to with fond memories. On the flipside, we did hit quite a major snag – Gemma came down with an illness that is similar to dengue fever. It completely wipes you out for a week or two and leaves you feeling less than perfect for months thereafter. It is spread by mosquitoes and after speaking to the hostel staff, apparently each month, from the 200 guests that turn up for the full moon party, typically one ends up with dengue fever. There is a private hospital nearby, so we got Gemma over there to be looked over, they used ice packs to bring her temperature down, prescribed strong painkillers for the bone-crushing pain and paracetamol to reduce her temperature. We had planned to leave Koh Phangan a couple of days later, however, this illness kept us on Koh Phangan for another eight days. It was not very nice for Gemma, it put a spanner in our works in terms of our proposed schedule, and meant we got to see Koh Phangan when there aren’t any parties on – and it is a very different place. Our hostel went from having 200 people partying like crazy every night, to only having 6 people staying at the hostel. It was like walking into a ghost town after a bomb has gone off. But ultimately we were on a beautiful Thai island, so whilst Gemma recovered we made the most of it by checking into a little private bungalow on the beach where Gemma could make a dog friend.

With a lot of love, medication and bedrest, Gemma slowly recovered and was excited to be leaving Koh Phangan for the next leg of our adventure, which would take us to Pai, Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai (where we planned to make some elephant friends at an elephant sanctuary).

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