around the world in 1985

set off from Norwich with small backpack and large hopes. Can you see the small back pack? weighs about 10kg.

Wednesday 19th December 1984

DSC0000506

Thursday 20th December, 1984.

Golden buddha Bangkok

Friday 21st December, 1984.
Visit Burmese Embassy. Visa takes 24 hours (i.e., Monday) and 100B. Pleasantly tatty colonial building in own grounds. Will leave passport at embassy until January. No Tom at breakfast - disappointed. Check out notice board and mailbox at the Nitheharoen Sohe hotel Khao San Road, surprised to find letter from Tom! Amongst letters dated 1980 and year old telegrams. Tom’s too relaxed on Koh Samui and can’t face the 1400 km haul to Chang Mei, also has visa problems.
Lunch time, is it too late to check out Mrs Top Guest House? Yes solly. One hour later I’m packed and on the streets. Someone turned up wanting the room.
Spend hellish 2 hours padding hot pavements, Bus 94, I can reliably report is extinct. Have lost bus map. Eventually get to Huallapong Rail station. Helpful info desk, purchase 3rd class ticket to Sunit Thani, bus to Ban Dom wharf and ferry to Koh Samui all in 177B.
Train leaves 6.25pm arrives Sunit Thani 7.50am. My seat is reserved, plastic padded with room for two, but just too narrow and too short to sleep comfortably on. Have fried rice with vegetables in kitchen car, followed by 20mg Temazepam. Sleep for 3 hours whilst the aisle is paraded by vendors selling dried squid, soft drinks, hard drinks, sticky sweetmeats in plastic bags, and armed guards. These guys warn you against accepting drinks from strangers - they may be drugged, and move on a Swiss guy hassling us for his bungalows on Koh Samui. Read book in the night.
Woken up by cockerel crowing in seat behind me.
Arrive Sunit Thani in rain, brolly causes mirth. Bus laid on for the journey (jarang).
Three hour ferry ride. Sea rough. English rock music over the tannoy. Start journey with Boy George, three hours later we’ve journeyed through a couple of decades and turned the clock back to the psychedelic sixties and Lucy in the Sky, Yellow Submarine, etc.
Meet Kevin (Scottish) and John (Aus) and am regaled by their drinking stories and exploits down Pat Pong Road. I think Koh Samui will be a little bit quiet for them. Proceed to Lamai Beach and check in to first shack that’s free as every where is very full. Paradise bungalows. Double room 40B. I occupy it. Wander up and down a bit. Huge beach with extraordinary phallic rock formation at one end. Island covered in coconut palms and beach fronted by collections of coconut thatched wooden sheds and bars. Some very attractive and imaginatively constructed. Monsoon winds blow and the waves are huge.

Sunset among the coconut palms

Saturday 22nd December, 1984.

beach hut Ko Samui

Sunday 23rd December 1984
Meet Tom at Weekender for lunch and have ‘special’ omelette, 40B, and receive a hefty dose of psylocybins. Felt very flushed after 40 minutes, and spent the rest of the day in a wow-eee blur of perceptual distortions. The minutiae of my surroundings became fascinating; a girls skin covered in visible capillaries, green sky, blue palms. Very difficult to talk sense. Spend hours watching the waves come in! Wow - look at that one. Half the camp are spacey, a crazy game of volleyball is played, and a palm tree is painted with a fluorescent Santa.

My beach hut Weekender Chalets

Monday 24th Christmas Eve.

The Great Danes

The Orchestra

Christmas day

View from our hut

Boxing Day

Weekender Chalets

Koh Samui beach scene

Our compound looked like a Japanese prisoner of war camp this afternoon. A tall east European with a crew cut has come off his motorbike - like so many others. The local clinic have liberally painted his scrapes with Mercurochrome and added a good collection of dry dressings. With him limping around I half expect to see Alec Guinness staring madly at me in the khazi. (visited Kwai bridge on the last trip and it’s nothing like the film). Play backgammon. Lose. Sleep in windy bed. Luckily no rain tonight.

Party on the beach

Thursday 27th December 1984

Early morning swim