It is our last full day in Koh Tao and we began with a lazy start to the day.  We had a bit of a late breakfast and spent a couple of hours talking it easy by the pool.  We are starting to rough out some ideas of what we are going to do with our time in Chiang Mai so poolside seemed like a good place to do that.

As they often do our plans here have changed a bit – our travel buddy Erica has decided that she wants to stay longer in Koh Tao to take in the island vibe and to do some rock climbing.  It does not come as a huge surprise to us as everyone has different things that they gravitate to, but we had thought it would be a bit farther into the trip before she ‘ditched the olds’ 😉 All is not lost though and we are not fully relegated to the ‘boring people’ designation because we have added a new person to our traveling group.  There is an Irish chap named Thomas that is staying at the same hotel as us, and he and Erica had started chatting a couple of days back.  While sitting about we started talking about traveling, photography and the typical topic of where everyone was going next came up.  Thomas was thinking about going to another island but had not made any firm plans, and when we started talking about Chiang Mai he got quite interested in the place.  He booked a ticket straight away, and wants to take in some of the sights with us up north.  It is always fun to meet interesting people and seeing the sights with friends just adds to the adventure, so like we did last year with Jackie, Bruce and Stephanie we have banded together for a few days before Thomas heads back to Ireland.

We the day now half gone Mrs. Columbus and I decide that we should take the rest of the afternoon and go for a walk/hike up to a viewpoint that is noted on the map.  The island is not that big, and we can see the place where the viewpoint is from our hotel so it does not look like it is all that far, and according to the people at the hotel it is about a couple hour walk, so off we go to conquer the wilds.

As often happens when we go out exploring we find that we have overlooked some details or need to deal with the unexpected, this trip is no exception.  The first thing we did not really spend much time thinking about is how high up the viewpoint is.  After setting out on the walk we look on the map and see that the vertical rise is about 350 meters (about 1200 feet), which would not be so bad if it was gradual over a distance, but the jungle does not build things that way, and the road ahead is uphill, uphill, uphill, and to really make you feel the burn throw in some downhill so that you can walk back uphill again before the next rise.  Mother Nature throws in her bit as well because it is hot, humid, and because the road goes through the jungle, you can’t even catch a breeze 🙁

However this is not our first rodeo and we like a challenge so we press ever forward on our way to the top.  There are a few times when I wonder if we should not just walk back to town and rent a quad for this, but we push through to the end knowing that the reward at the end will offset the effort.  Finally we make it to the top and from here we can see almost the entire island and the view is spectacular.  We sit on top of a big boulder at the edge of the viewpoint and take in the breeze and the vista for a few minutes enjoying the surroundings before starting the trek back down to the beach.

The good news is that the downhill is much easier than the uphill and aside from having to stop for the occasional snake crossing the road we make pretty good time and are back in town in time for a refreshing dip in the pool before meeting up with Erica for dinner and to say farewell before we head off in the morning.

We have our travel arrangements sorted out for the next leg of our journey up to Chiang Mai – this was not that easy as the internet here in Koh Tao is I think supported by some rusty tin cans and some string to the next island over, which has it’s own set of tin cans and string…..

With that out of the way, we are just making decisions about what to do with the rest of our time in Koh Tao as we go along.  This morning after a late breakfast and some Skype time with Rachael we decided to get the water taxi to take us over to Koh Nangyuan.

Koh Nangyuan is a pair of limestone outcroppings that are connected together by a sandbar just a few hundred yards off the north-west tip of Koh Tao.  There is a dive site just off the west side of the island, and the snorkeling is said to be pretty good, so along with the beach between the two rises the place is fairly popular with day trippers.  Going on a day trip involves sticking to a schedule and traveling in a pack with a bunch of other tourists, so we chose to pay a couple hundred baht each to jump in a longtail boat and cross and return at our leisure.

The boat ride is about 10 minutes and we have our beach to beach service.  There is a small fee to enter the island (it is a reserve area) and the park workers at the entrance are also stripping tourists of their plastic water bottles as there is no plastic or cans allowed on the island.  Like we saw at Ang Thong this policy actually helps a lot as we don’t see as many of the discarded bottles, plastic bags, and take-out containers that we see in so many other places.

The island is basically 2 large limestone ‘islands’ that rise up a few hundred meters connected in the middle by a sandbar.  There are some bungalows on each of the islands so you must be able to rent them and stay overnight if you are so inclined. There is also a restaurant and a dive shop here to service the day trippers from Koh Tao and the people going to the dive site that is located just off the island.

There appears to be a wooden walkway that circles each of the islands, so Mrs. Columbus and I head off to do some exploring. In typical Thai fashion, many things are not built to the same set of standards that we would see back home, but that does not slow us down and we head off down the rickety walk around the larger island.  What does slow us down however is when enough sections of the trail have been washed out by the sea and the trail ends abruptly.  We try going the other direction in hopes that it is just a few sections that are out, but we meet with the same results.

The smaller island has a similar set of walkways and signs pointing to a viewpoint so we head off in that direction with hopes that the trail is better maintained. Things are looking up as the path is mostly intact even if it could use a bit of repair.  Ironically they suggest not sitting or leaning on the railing – in the sections that are still there it would certainly not hold much.

The walkway leads us around to a path that goes up to the viewpoint.  After lots of stairs, some narrow paths, and a bit of a rock scramble at the top we are rewarded with some fantastic views of the entire island and the sandbar.

After our descent from the viewpoint we have a couple of hours left to relax on the beach a bit and play in the sea.  This also gives me a chance to try out my new waterproof camera I brought along on this trip.  The snorkeling here is OK, but nothing spectacular, but I do manage to get a few fish photos and the camera works pretty good.

At about 3pm most of the day trip boats have packed up and left, and they start to put away much of the stuff on the island for the day.  Just as we arranged, at 4pm a taxi boat is ready to take us back to Koh Tao.  We get in a bit of pool time at the hotel before going out for dinner and then calling it an end to the night.  We have one day left here and are thinking about a hike up into the hills before we leave for Chiang Mai and the next step of the vacation.

We are well into ‘Thailand mode’ now – we are starting to forget what day it is and the pace of our agenda has slowed a lot.  We took the ferry from Koh Samui to Koh Tao a couple of days ago and have just been taking it easy since we got here.

Koh Tao is the smallest of the 3 islands in this island group, and is most well known for it’s scuba diving scene.  There are dozens of dive shops here and I suspect that the overwhelming majority of people that come here are divers or people who want to get certified.  It is not the #1 spot in Thailand for diving (that is supposedly the Similan Islands on the Andaman coast) but it is the busiest because many of the other areas will close during the low season due to the weather and to provide some time for the reefs to recover, and there are a number of dive sites here that are all fairly close together so easy for dive tours to get to.

The island also has a bit of a hippy / backpacker vibe pretty much everywhere – not like the party scene in some of the islands, but people definitely go out after their day’s activities and wander the few streets or hang out in a bar for a few drinks.

We spent the last couple of days just lounging by the pool and doing a bit of wandering around but nothing overly busy.  We did find a massage place right across the road from our hotel where the lady who I am sure is 50+ gave me one of the best Thai massages I have had, so I will certainly be going back for more before we leave here.

Just after dinner last night we were heading out to walk around and we had our first real rain so far. The sky opened up and it rained – hard rain – the road we were walking on goes down hill towards the beach and in a matter of minutes it went from perfectly dry to 2 inches of fast moving water.  Luckily we were just steps away from a covered doorway to hop into just as it started.  The rain lasted for about 15 minutes, and over the next hour or so there were a couple  more outbursts like that and then it was mostly over.  It rained some more during the night, but we were long asleep by then.

Koh Tao is not very big so we will probably do some exploring by foot today and tomorrow maybe up to a couple of the viewpoints and across to a small island just off the beach from where we are staying.