Saturday - 9 April 2011 - Goodbye Chiang Mai

Sawadee Ka! So I was awake early this morning around 1.30am, I was in agony with pains in my back and kidneys, don't know whether it was dehydration or had something to do with the food we ate last night. A bottle of water and 2 panadol later back to bed for another hour or so sleep. when Rick woke up he said he was feeling a bit under the weather too, had to have something to do with the food last night. Off to our last breakfast in Chiang Mai, finished sorting and packing our clothes in our new backpacks, checked out of the guesthouse and waited for Chartree to pick us up and then headed to the airport. He gave us both a hug and told us he would see us next time we come to Chiang Mai, such a nice man. We checked our backpacks in rather than carry them around with us and waited for our Bangkok Airways flight which was delayed half an hour. finally we boarded and the flight left at 12.30pm. It was an excellent flight, only 1hr 45mins and the food they served was yummy. We arrived in Samui at 2pm and met our driver who took us to the resort. Beautiful resort close to the main village of Chewang, we were met by our holiday welcome agent who is taking us to breakfast on monday morning and then checked into our room. It turned a bit pear shaped from that moment on. The room was nice but instead of a sea view we had a view of an overgrown jungle waste area and the airport runway, not happy jan. I rang our agent and told her so. I told her we did not pay big money to join the vacation club to get the worst room in a nice resort when we had always had excellent accommodation every other time we had come to Thailand and used our vacation club. The room had a tiny balcony you couldn't even put a chair on it let alone 2 people, we were both smokers and like to sit out on a proper balcony with outdoor furniture with a seaview not a view of an overgrown jungle, I asked her to try and get bus into Q Signature resort in Cheong Mon which is where we normally stay and had requested in our email weeks ago a reservation there. I also told her we would cancel our bookiong and use that 2 weeks some other time as we would rather pay 500 baht a night (cheap) and get better accommodation close to everything and with better views, we would not be happy spending 2 weeks in that room, it would drive us nuts. Well after a few phone calls back & forth low and behold there was all of sudden a cancellation at Q Signature (bullshit) so they now had a room for us there and they would send a car to pick us up and take us there, which they did. We arrived here at Q Signature and they were falling all over themselves to make us welcome, but then again we have stayed here so many times before and the service has always been excellent. The resort has been undergoing a refurbishment and has done since we were here 18 months ago, its a huge resort so its going to take a long time to finish, the room we were given is a studio apartment that must have been shut down for its refurb, which is half done (not a cancellation which we knew was bullshit) so they have put bits and pieces of different furniture and that in and done what they could to get the room ready for us. But hey its still pretty good, great view, balcony with outdoor furniture and on the beach which we love cos it has all the great little cheap restaurants we know so well and the massage sala we went to almost everyday when we were here last time, love it. A much better place and location to celebrate Songkran Festival on Wednesday, Thursday & Friday.. Woo Hoo! We finally settled into our studio around 5pm, so it was a long drawn out day. Walked down to the local 7/11 to get milk and supplies since we have our little kitchenette as well with cooking and tea and coffee facilities. For dinner it was off to the resort restaurant for seafood BBQ dinner. We are now totally wacked and ready for a good nights sleep. Looking forward to tomorrow, I think a day of total relaxation, rest and maybe even a massage on the beach is what is called for. So until tomorrow! Kob Un Ka!