Getting From Phuket to Koh Phangan (The Entire Day!)

So this is going to be a little bit of a rant/ warning for anyone else who is going to make this trip or any similar trip in Thailand.  When traveling for more than I would say an hour be prepared to take much longer than you think you will.  Not only are you going to stop much more often then planned, but most likely you will be asked to get out of the bus at least once, if not more than once.  Let me tell you the adventure of our supposedly three hour bus ride and 2 hour ferry to Koh Phangan.

We got up to catch our mini-bus at about 7:30.  It showed up already packed with people!  We managed to squeeze our bags on top of a couple other bags and jumped into two seats as far away from each other as possible, only real open seats.  The car headed off on what we expected to be off the island, but apparently we had more people to pick up!  So we stopped again, another guy jumped in with a huge suitcase and we all thought this MUST be it!  But nope, we stopped again 20 min later, only this time our bus driver hopped out, walked around, made a couple calls, and 20 min later drove off.  Still not sure what that was all about!  Then off to our final hotel stop where we needed to pick up ANOTHER two French girls.  At this point there was literally no more seats open.  So the driver pulled out all the suitcases, re-arranged them, and created another seat in the middle of them (Guess where your's truly ended up?)  Although I have to say it was like the ski trips I used to take as a child.  Sitting in the back surrounded by stuff, kinda cozy.  Anyway we waited another 20 min for the French girls to actually show up and when they did they refused to sit in the front.  (They needed to have two people in the front, one sitting on that weird in between seat cars have)  Anyway they refused, said it was dangerous, complained and finally after the driver threatened to leave them they hopped in!

By this time it was already around 9am if not later...well clearly this was not going to be a three hour bus ride!  We hadn't even left Phuket yet!  We drove for a while, the French girls complaining the whole way, and finally pulled over to get gas.  At this point the girls complained and the driver agreed to re-arrange all the luggage for them (Again!) Now the stuff was in the front and I was next to the two girls.  Not too bad.

At about 11 o'clock we stopped for lunch at some random gas station.  We supped on chips, oreos, and of course ice cream.  None of the food looked particularly fresh so we stuck to packed goods. Then we all pilled back into the bus, after being told we still had 3 hours left!  Oh well, at this point it didn't really matter, we were just happy to be moving in the van.

At about 2:30 pm we rocked up to another random stop.  Here we were told to all get out and take our stuff.  It was a sort of food/ travel agent location.  We were once again told not to worry and that another bus would pick us up and bring us to the ferry at 3:30.  Ok!  No worries, I had a good book so I settled in.  Joel was starting to get unimpressed though.  And then the lady came around and asked everyone where they were staying and tried to sell us taxi's for when we got there.  Now I had done some research and knew it would only cost 100 Baht per person when we got there.  She tried to sell it to our for 300 Baht per person!  Well we did NOT fall for that, although some of the other travelers did end up buying the taxi.  So we waited, 3:30 came and went, still waiting.  4 o'clock rolled around and finally a tuk tuk pulled up and all 10 of us AND our luggage had to get it.  This was tricky.  Most people put their bags on top where one piece of string was keeping them there.  We were then dropped off about 10 min away (SERIOUSLY?  They should have just dropped us off there early and we could have gotten an early ferry!  But no, we headed into a bus station where we needed to take ANOTHER bus for about an hour and then catch the last ferry of the night which left at 6 pm.  Now we were promised that we would get to the Island at 6 pm.  This did not seem like it was going to happen.


We took the bus ride, then hopped on the ferry.  It was three hours long.  At this point we were starving, tired, and a little less than impressed with everything.  But we sat down, grabbed some food and played a couple games.  The views from the ferry were nice

Ferry Terminal

Pretty Cool

Sunset as we Sailed to Koh Phangan!

Anyway we finally made it around 9 pm.  Then got our 100 Baht taxi (EXACT same one that people paid 300 Baht for)  and made it to our hostel.  On the beach.  Can't wait!