28th March 2007 - A good nights sleep and a Snorkel-tastic time.

We had already booked 'The Sanctuary' (That's right! We had been there before, last October!) on Koh Phangan, we were just going over early. So the big adventure merely involved going there to see if they had a room. If they were booked we would ask to leave most of our stuff and go off to explore pastures new.

They did have somewhere. A house, called 'Pond House' which could sleep four, so we didn't have to shoulder our bags and find somewhere else (damn, what a shame). The only problem was that Sue and I were sleeping in the loft, directly above Karen who is a VERY light sleeper. I was a bit worried about having to get up in the night to go to the loo, but Karen was very understanding. "That's OK Mark, just go to the loo before you go to bed and then 'clench'!" Has she no understanding of the workings of aging male bladders? They don't respond to 'clenching', you either don't need to go at all or you need to NOW!

Pond House with the steps to the 'loft' on the left

However, I duly squeezed out my bladder at the appointed hour and we all went to bed. At quarter to twelve I finished reading, "OK Sue? Lights out?" "Yes, OK" I reached for the switch, only to find out that it was a two way switch. One way, it turned our light on and the other way it turned our light off and a very loud disco on. It was a very hot night and there was no air conditioning so all the windows were wide open. Bladders were forgotten (full or empty), all four of us vibrated gently in our beds until six o'clock the next morning when the disco stopped and the cicadas woke up! How stupid of me, why didn't I just turn the light on again!

We all got up at about nine o'clock after a very restful couple of hours sleep and decided to move on and find Billy's paradise beach. We found it at 'Salad Beach Resort' at Had Salad.

Beautiful clear water, air conditioning and a coral reef for snorkeling! The only problem was that you had to wade out two to three hundred yards over coral before the water covered your knees. So Billy and I hired a kayak and we set off, Jacques Clousea and 'Skato'.

Kayaks are brilliant for getting off and snorkeling from but not so good for getting back onto again.

"OK Billy, you go snorkeling and I will stay with the boat for a while"

"Are you ready to get back on the boat?"

"Yep" ...........

"OK Billy, you steady the boat and I'll get back on and then you get back on after me."

"Right Billy, now you get back on" ...........

"OK Billy, you get on the boat first while I steady it then I will get on after you"

"Right, now I will get back on" ...........

"OK, let's both try to get on at the same time" .........

(Starting to get a bit tired now)

"Right, you steady the boat and I will get on and lay crosswise across the boat while you get on"

"OK, Billy, now you get on"

"Good, now I will just sit up" ...........

"Right I will just swim away from these rocks before I try and get on again"

"Err Billy, do you want to just paddle over here and then I will try to get on? No no I'm not tired. I'm fine"

We finally managed to get back on both facing the same way and in a sitting position but minus Billy's headband, my snorkel and Billy's goggles (oh no, we later found billy's goggles). Luckily for us we had decided to paddle round the headland to a different bay before all this happened, so we were spared the derision of Sue and Karen.

That's enough of paradise, on the 28th we set off back to 'The Sanctuary' and party! (It's hard work keeping up with these youngsters)