Thailand Travels: Day 14, Finding Paradise in Khao Sok National ParkLake

After a rocky ride on the sleeper train, on which I was convinced that we were going to derail, we arrived at Surat Thani at 7am. We were due to arrive at 4:30am so there was a big delay during the night, but that was good for us as it meant we caught extra Zzzz.

We had a quick stop at a cafe for breki, and there we discovered free wifi so there was a flurry of Facebook updates, and then our driver arrived to take us to Khao Sok National Park. We'd agreed to pay 1000 baht (£20) for the activities today which would include hire of a private boat, visit to the national park, lunch and kayaking.

Our new mode of transport was a rather retro school bus which looked amazing and was rigged up with a TV and MP3 player for our entertainment.

After an hour of driving we arrived at the departure spot for Khao Sok lake, it was totally picturesque and the lake looked very calm. At 10am the sun was burning our shoulders already, so we all changed into less clothing, slathered on the sun cream and stocked up on cold drinks.

We left our backpacks on the bus (but bought all our valuables in our daypacks) and hopped on board a long boat to sail to the lake. Sek explained that the area we were going to was a secret beauty spot and weren't disappointed because it was stunning! I sat up front with our driver which enabled me to get unrivalled views of the scenery and brilliant photographs of what I can only describe as paradise.

At one point the boat stopped at a cove which we could walk through and see the stalagmites. We were told to be careful not to touch the tips of the stalagmites because once touched they would become damaged and stop growing. We also stopped briefly to look at the monkeys hanging from the trees and rocks. After the two stops we then continued to sail to the place where we were to stop for lunch and kayaking.

Here a huge spread of chicken, fish (freshly caught that day), omelet, rice and noodles was provide for us. The food was delicious and the group feasted happily. Sek had a different Thai dish to us and let us try it, it was stonkingly spicy and none of us could handle more than one mouthful without having a coughing fit!

Then it was time for us to have a splash about. Kirsty and I grabbed a kayak and went sailing to the another small island across the lake. The others joined us and we ended up making a giant line of joined kayaks. Aldo, one of the Aussies that joined our group, had a Go-Pro and he took a fish eye style photograph of us all joined together in the kayaks. Can't wait to see this photo when we all go back home!

When we were paddling we noticed lots of brown sewage in the lake and we realised that the toilets at the park obviously dump our toilet waste straight into the lake. We made a mental not to gulp any water down right then. :-/

There was a long wooden plank and jumping station at the park which the group had a laugh jumping off and taking photographs. It was quite slippery though so occasionally one of two people slipped off prematurely.

We spent a couple of hours overall at the lake and then it was time to get back on our boat. It was the heat of the day by now and within a few minutes I'd fallen asleep at the front of the boat! I woke myself up just before we were due to dock by rolling and almost falling off the front of the boat, amusing everyone.

The rest of the day was spent driving to out next hotel with a quick pitt stop to see and feed the monkeys at a local temple, The monkeys were so friendly!!! They came right up to our hand to take the peanuts from us.

After that it was straight on to our next accomdation. When we arrived we were impressed to discover we were staying in a treehouse! The treehouse was bar far the best accommodation so far; our room actually had a wetroom and an artificial waterfall in the bathroom!