Meet Oz from Koh Samui, Thailand. We could only get this one picture of him as he was a hyper little pup with quite an early interest in the party life. All he could do was run around us in circles telling us about all these parties he has been to, the ones he plans to go to, the ones he plans to throw, and the band he plans to start. Can you guess what music scene he is into?

See the resemblance?

The nicest airport we’ve been in.

The time had come to leave Thailand and do a visa run. A lot of people take a bus through southern Thailand and into Penang, Malaysia or to Laos, but a 15 hour bus ride didn’t sound too alluring to us. Luckily we found out about Firefly Airways, one of Asia’s low cost airline. So for $30 each we bought our tickets to Kuala Lumpur and showed up at the airport.

Kind of like the movie theatres in Bangkok, the airport on Koh Samui blew me away. An open air design, there’s lots of plants, free WIFI and more importantly, FREE SNACKS! That’s right folks, I’m dedicating 2 whole pictures to the awesomeness of this airport. Juice, coffee, donuts, croisants, this is the way to treat your customers. They obviously aren’t worried about the single penny like the cheap-ass North American airlines that order you the craptastic food that even food banks would refuse. Here they treat you like a respected customer, not cows on an assembly line waiting to be moved. Or worse, suspected criminals with full body scans, patdowns and the bullshit no-liquid policy they have. Service versus complete incompetence. Who would have thought that this business model could work?

Landing in Kuala Lumpur we followed our Footprints guidebooks advice and went to the StayOrange hotel chain. StayOrange is the cheaper alternative for the Carleton Hotel Group. Much like the IBIS chain all over Europe is the cheaper version of Sofitel (and generally great). We had stayed at the Carleton as a treat when we were in Utrecht, and were looking for something comfortable with wifi access while we got our visas.

Carleton Utrecht vs StayOrange Kuala Lumpur – just not the same.

We like Orange things. We own an Orange Loft (yes, painted all orange) and it was pretty small. All 485 square feet of it. We lived in it for 3 years in Calgary and were perfectly happy, so when I say that the StayOrange Hotel room is small, I have some context. About 2 feet wider than the double bed, there ain’t much room. But we’ve been traveling and used to small rooms, so that wasn’t really the problem.

Is that dirt? No Betsy, it’s deadly mold. I guess they don’t want repeat customers, or healthy ones.

Strategically placed bag and quick action!

It’s a good thing that the room was so small, as the only place to put my backpack was against the clear glass window of the bathroom. I’m not sure who designed this room, but I always like a little privacy while doing the deed. Know how hard it is to concentrate, reading a book and take care of business when you feel like your in the zoo? Talk about performance anxiety.

After a couple nights of the AC not working, and the workmen working outside our window at 6.30AM we decided to leave. Lucky for us we found another budget hotel called Citin Hotel, and man are we happy we found it. This was more like it, with a frosted door on the bathroom and a big comfy bed and pillows. Add in free breakfast and their recommendation to the best Indian food we’ve ever had, and it really gets 5 stars from us.

I know what your thinking – what about our Thai visas? This was actually the easiest part of the trip. We went to the embassy and waited in line for an hour and put in our application. At the time they were giving the visas for free, saving us $50 each or so, and it was super easy to do. Our big recommendation if your doing a visa run is to walk straight in and get a number before filling out the application. So many people would go get an application, spend 30 minutes filling it out and then get the number. We saved tons of time doing it this way.

If your doing a visa run into Kuala Lumpur, defiantly stay at the Citin Hotel. It was a great price (125 ringit including breakfast) and has excellent food next to it. But StayAway from StayOrange unless you like mold and watching other people take a shit.

I was not paid to write this review, but if somehow Citin Hotels is reading this please contact me! I’d love to stay at your hotel again for free!

Arriving to the Jungle Club helped us forget the horrible 24 hours we had spent in search of the perfect beach bungalow. We had arrived at Lamai beach only to find our confirmed email reservation didn’t mean anything. They had given up our bungalow before we got there. We then chose another place that ended up ripping us off for one shitty ass sleep. It seemed everything was going wrong that day.

We walked around and found another place to stay, Sunshine Bungalows. It had WIFI, was on the beach, and wasn’t too expensive at 700 baht. We checked in, put our bags down and went for some food right away. While we were eating we overheard the owner talking to someone about a bungalow for 400 baht, and as soon as he left we asked her about it. It seems she didn’t show us that one because it was “small” but we could change to it if we wanted to. So, we moved into the smaller bungalow, went to the beach to watch the comets and then to bed.

Well, the pillows were shit, the bed wasn’t any better, the bathroom door didn’t close and the beach had broken coral sand that makes my feet want to cry. The next morning we immediately decided to get the f* out of there (GTFO). The problem was on checkout, the crazy lady was charging us the 700 baht not the 400. She said that she had to clean the sheets of the bungalow we didn’t stay in – which wasn’t needed nor done I’m sure. 15 minutes of going nowhere arguing went by that resulted in Scott throwing the extra money at her as we left. Word to the wise, if your looking for accommodation on Lamai Beach, don’t go to Sunshine Bungalows. They don’t have mosquito nets, there outer and inner doors do not seal, the WIFI is weak and very slow, their beds are crap and they like to rip you off. You’d be much better going to the next place we went to!

We found ourselves an internet cafe and searched once again for a place to stay on Koh Samui, beach or not. Just something different! I saw the words “Jungle Club” go by on the screen and thought to myself the worlds jungle and club in the same sentence has never failed us and I told Scott to click on it. Low and behold we found a very unique place to spend our last days on the island.

The Jungle Club is located at the top of a mountain on Koh Samui between Chaweng and Lamai beach. The only way to get to it is by a 4×4, up a very steep and bumpy dirt road. It’s quite an adventure just to get there! Before I say anymore let me show you some pictures.

  

  

Has anyone ever seen a nicer looking infinity pool?

Don’t these images make you want to stay here?? I know they sure make me want to go back. On top of this beautiful place, the staff are amazing, the food is divine (GREEN CURRY FOR THE WIN!), the blended drinks are mouth watering, and the free wifi actually WORKS! You can even get a massage up here, play a game of volleyball/badminton, watch a DVD movie and use their free shuttle to town twice a day. Looking to stay in something more luxurious? They do have more expensive guesthouses that all look like a perfect romantic getaway. Seriously, if you are coming to Koh Samui, try and stay here!! I can’t stress this enough. The only drawback of the Jungle Club is the restaurant is a bit more expensive… but you are at the top of a hard to access mountain, what else can you expect? Check out their website here and book yourself a hut!