After 2 months of living on Koh Samui I have finally said goodbye. Sad to leave the new friends I have made during my month long obsession with yoga but ready to move on.
My favorite yoga teacher "Mon"
From Koh Samui I needed to get to Bangkok in order to catch my flight to Vietnam. Since Bangkok is about 450 miles from Koh Samui I could have made it easy and flown (1 hour) but decided that the reason I travel is to have adventures so I opted to take the night train (12 hours).
I had pre-arranged this trip meaning that just like my last venture to the mainland a minibus picked me up from my apartment and dropped me off at the Koh Samui ferry pier. At the pier I was told to board one of the many waiting greyhound buses. A bit confused, we drove to another part of Koh Samui and boarded another ferry. Turned out that the greyhound bus traveled on the ferry as well and then once on the mainland continued on for another hour to drop us off at the train or bus station.
I knew that I was different than most other passengers on board since I had been given a special sticker to wear on my shirt that said “train” in both English and Thai. No one else seemed to have this. After about an hour on the greyhound, the bus helper approached me and since his English was very hard to interpret I assumed he was asking if I was going to the train station. I showed him my train ticket and he said to get off the bus with these 2 other passengers.
Left at this random spot alongside the main road we are told to wait. Unsure of what we were waiting for 10 minutes goes by before a songthaew (a type of Thai taxi) pulls up tells us to hop in the back of his songthaew. He drives us to some random house and tells us that the bus will leave at 7:30pm and the guy at the house will take us to the station. I then realized that I was not suppose to get off the greyhound bus and needed to get myself to the train station. Luckily I still had a few hours until the train left. I tried to explain my situation to both the songthaew driver and the guy at the house and they both asked to see my ticket. Since I had no other ticket, I showed them my train ticket. They took it and explained that they would make sure I got there. Next thing I know the songthaew guy is driving away with my train ticket (thinking it’s some other kind of ticket he needs in order to get paid for ride he gave us) and I’m starting to freak out a little because without that ticket I can’t board the train and that ticket was worth about $25 (a lot of money here).
Praise the cell phone! The other guy calls the songthaew guy on his cell phone and he comes right back, gives me my ticket, and tells me to get into the back of his songthaew. I’m thinking he’s going to drop me off at the train station but oh no. He drives until he spots a local bus heading to the train station and flags the bus down. He motions quickly for me to get out and hop in the bus. All this happens so quickly that I have no idea what is happening – I just do as I am told. The only thing that comforts me is that on the front window of the local bus I see the words “Train Station” in English so at least I know where we’re headed.
The bus (with mirrors and oscillating fans on the ceiling) stops at every little place and being the time worrier that I am, I start to wonder if we’ll make it to the train station in time. We make it with 30 minutes to spare. Perfect timing!
There were several options for seats when it came to booking on the night train. The cheapest I could have booked was a “hard seat” in a non-air conditioned cabin (meaning it was basically a wooden seat and open windows) and from there the prices went up as you increased the comfort level. I ended up booking a “soft sleeper” in an air-conditioned cabin (meaning the padded seats folded down into comfortable beds with curtains separating you from the rest of the train). Most of the passengers were tourists heading up to Bangkok and it was quite easy to sleep most of the 12 hour trip.
Night train to Bangkok
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