6/24/10 – 6/26/10 (bangkok)

Bangkok – Koh Chang – Bangkok

At 6am we were on our way to Koh Chang. Chef McDang made all the arrangements and even had the hotel limo pick us up at his house. The limos in Thailand are stylish Volkswagen vans that can seat five people very comfortably in the back with two reclining leather seats, a TV with a DVD player, and even a window that can be rolled up to give you some privacy between you and the driver. Since we left so early in the morning Chef McDang also prepared a basket of breakfast goodies and hot coffee. We were rolling in style.

He told us the ride to Koh Chang would be take about three hours when in actuality it was more like five hours, including a short twenty minute ferry ride, but we really couldn’t complain since we had plenty of DVDs to entertain us. We later found that limo driver stayed at the hotel while we were there so he could drive us back to Bangkok. Talk about VIP service though there’s really no other way to roll when you are with Chef McDang. Did I also mention that as we were leaving Chef McDang’s house he surprised us by informing us that he had taken care of the hotel and we just had to pay for our meals?!

When we arrived at Gaja Puri Hotel in Koh Chang we were greeted with welcome drinks and cool refreshing towels. We were then whisked away to our room where there was a cold bottle of champagne compliments of the hotel awaiting us. It was by far the most luxurious hotel we had stayed at during our travels. We felt very pampered. What was also really cool was a towel made into a 3D elephant on the bed. It was the coolest towel decoration we had ever seen. Chang means elephant so Koh Chang is referred to as the elephant island. 

After we got settled we grabbed lunch by the pool and found out from the staff that we were the only ones staying at the hotel. We had the entire resort to ourselves. We just couldn’t believe it! We had to tell someone so we called Jon’s mom and step dad to share our last 48-hour adventure. We don’t know what we had done to deserve all this but we certainly weren’t going to question it. All the excitement had worn us out so we took a nap till late in the evening. We then booked a private tour of the island for the following day with the hotel’s travel guide. We were only here for two nights, three days so we wanted to make the most of our time on the island.

The next day during breakfast we were surprised to see three other guests and found out that they saw the hotel in a magazine and just walked in for a booking. We met our tour guide, Nook, who had a full day planned for us. We went elephant trekking in the morning where we met Sunshine, a 23-year old rambunctious elephant. We went on a 45-minute ride around the forest and made many pit stops since it seemed that there was always some food that caught Sunshine’s attention. However, the elephant driver from Burma did a pretty good job keeping her on track. There were some pretty steep parts of the path where we thought we would fall off but Sunshine held her cool while we pretended we were a bit scared. Towards the end of the ride the driver let me sit on Sunshine’s neck where I was supposed to direct her on where to go. In reality it was more like me holding onto her for dear life and she went wherever she wanted. After our ride we feed her some bananas, which was the best part of the day for her. At the elephant farm they only have female elephants since they are easier to train. There were about twelve in total and one of them was a 13-year old named Naughty. I guess she was the wild and crazy teenager.

We stopped briefly at a Chinese Buddhist temple, where Nook and I offered a prayer. We shook a can filled with bamboo sticks each with a number on it. You shake the can till one stick falls on the ground but if more than one falls then you have to do it again. You only get to shake the can three times and if each time more than one sticks falls then your prayer won’t be answered. Once a stick falls on the ground there’s a number on the stick, which corresponds to a response to your prayer. If you like the response then you make a small donation to the temple and keep the response. If you don’t like the response then you put it back. Both Nook and I didn’t like our response. 

Our next destination was a local fishing village. On our way there we passed by a shrimp farm. We were hoping to go in but no visitors are allowed since the farm has a very delicate ecosystem. There must be the right balance of salt and fresh water at all time in order for the shrimp to thrive so the farmers monitor the tanks at all times. We also bought some tasty local fruits along the way. Some of our favorites were the rambutan and a sweet and sour fruit, which we don’t know the English name for it. Jon said it tasted like candy. The fishing village consisted of wooden houses built on stilts along a river. The local fishermen were all out to sea while the women were at home taking care of the children and repairing broken fishing nets. Some of the houses didn’t have doors so when you walked by you could look into someone’s entire house. It was very rustic living except for the satellite dishes on top of the houses.

We had lunch at the best seafood restaurant on the island where there was a picture of Chef McDang, among other celebrities, on the wall. After lunch we took a small speedboat to a remote island. There was a hotel on the island but since it was the slow season there were no guests except for a few staff. We had the entire island to ourselves with an entourage of four staff of our own. We tried snorkeling but the water was too murky so we just played in the water and relaxed on the beach before heading back to the hotel. By the time got back the sun was about to set so we enjoyed the sunset on a swing right on the beach. It was a nice way to end our day.

During the night a huge rainstorm came through and continued on till the morning. We were really lucky that the day before was clear blue skies. After breakfast we were once again whisked into our limo for the drive back to Bangkok. We arrived at Chef McDang’s house late in the afternoon. Chef McDang had a reunion to attend that evening so we went out with Nun, his assistant, to the night market for dinner. We saw a Dairy Queen and couldn’t resist getting some ice cream. We were even able to convince Nun in having some who claims he must watch his figure even though he is very slim.