Woke up before the 8:30 alarm after sleeping ok (the guys next door were still discussing the previous night) and started to pack. We had reserved a room in Ko Samoi for the night so I decided not to shower and instead just repacked, wearing dirty clothes. We were done by 9 and checkout was not until 10 so we went and got ice cream for breakfast at the 7-11 and I used 10 minutes of internet. (10 minutes on Ko Tao was was 2x as expensive as a full hour in Chiang Mai.) Then we were back by 9:30, checked out, bought t-shirts and went for a long walk on the beach.
We came back and tried journaling but sat with some people to pass the time and also photographed the beach.
Then we caught the ride to the ferry. This is when the "fun" began.
On the way to the ferry, I noticed that our tickets for the ferry said "The Loft" which is where we stayed in Ko Samoi on the way to Ko Tao and we had arranged to stay elsewhere on the way back so I changed it. Then on the ferry, I was still bothered by trying to think about how we were going to get back to Israel, even with the time differences on Tuesday with 2 days, 3 flights,one day in Bangkok and one in Addis ahead of us. I asked Yo to check again and she pulled out the sheet and said see- our flight to Bangkok is at 9:15 on the 21st. I turned to her and said today is the 21st and it's 3pm.
S%#T!
I remembered there being problems with wondering if I would be able to finish the SCUBA course in the time that we had and had even gone ahead and booked a room in Ko Samoi for the night before the flight so that we would be close but then with the ferry schedule (only 2 a day) we got confused because I thought that there would be no way that we would have left Ko Tao on Shabbat so it must have been for the following day. Thankfully I remembered that when we were booking the ferry tickets, there was the option to go to the airport from the ferry (a free drop-off was provided with the purchase of the ferry tickets) so I told Yo that we would go to the airport and and see what we could do. The boat ride to Ko Samoi was very rocky and the staff started handing out bags to passengers who were not feeling well. It did not help with the spinning issues.
On the bus to the airport, there was a guy (kid) handing out papers and collecting tickets. Our tickets said Chewang and not Airport only because when we got on the ferry, that was the plan. The kid started to give us a hard time and told us that we have to pay 100 Baht each to go to the airport. Yo started to tell him that we were entitled to a free ride and were not going to pay more. She also told him that we had asked on the boat (I had) and they said that we could just switch where we wanted to go without a problem. He started to yell and Yo stayed nice and cool. When he went to the back of the bus, I turned and asked some non-English speakers if they had been charged extra to go to the airport. One guy said that they were told that it was 30 baht more but that they were not charged extra when they actually went to get their tickets. Yo got exact change out of her wallet to give the guy and when he came back, she tried to explain that we were willing to pay 60 baht total and not 200. He got pissed! Yo calmly told him that she would like to speak to his supervisor/ boss/ manager/ head and finally he told Yo that he did not have a phone. Yo explained that we also did not have a phone so it would have to wait until we got to the airport where she would speak to a supervisor to clarify fees. When we got to the airport, we got off the bus, grabbed our bags and there was nothing else about fees.
We went to the stand-by counter and tried to get a flight to Bangkok so that we could try and not miss our 1:30am flight to Addis. After checking in every 30 minutes and going to the bathroom a few times, we reached a point where we were told to check in an hour. I told Yo that I wanted to go and find some food before all the places closed and in case we were stuck for the night with nothing to eat. I found a pizza place which was 2x as expensive as in the restaurant areas of town and then I saw the ice cream shop and thought of Yo who for the past two days had been saying how much she wanted a chocolate milkshake. I figured that she should not suffer alone so I got two. Yo was so happy when I got back.
I then went back to the desk 15 minutes early just to thank the guy working there for trying so hard to get us on a flight (there were about 10 people waiting for stand-by) and about 10 minutes later (7:30ish) a lady came and told us to grab our stuff and head to the last desk. They could get us on a flight at 10pm. YESH! Whoohoo! Then we splurged and got a pizza with toppings- to go. We then went to "Park Avenue"- their shopping plaza on the way to the gate.
- It was wildly entertaining putting a pizza through the x-ray at security.
- the Ko Samoi airport is one of the nicest that I have ever seen.
- There were huge fish tanks in some of the bathrooms and others had Israeli soap bottles (obviously refilled).
- Also, the gate was lounge chairs in the open air seating areas, flatcreen TVs showing soccer games and and area with complimentary wi-fi and computers.
When we got to Bangkok, we had about 2.5 hours to get our luggage, clear customs and board the plane. It worked brilliantly!
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