Thailand Days 3-4: Koh Sok National Park

Welcome to the Jungle

After a 13 hour train ride to Suratthani, we hopped on a bus for two hours and then on a sangtheaw (pronounced song-tao and is basically a truck with a canopy and two benches in the back) for another hour long ride to the boat launch in Koh Sok National Park--the world's oldest rain forest and largest rain forest preserve. In retrospect, I'm so glad I joined the tour. Trying to get here on my own would have been pretty much impossible. Lonely Planet said themselves that the only way to get here after the bus drops you off is to hitch hike--wouldn't have been doing that if I were alone. So, once we got there we waited for our boat to be prepared and then we hopped in, only to hope out five minutes later; our boat started to sink. Tons of water began pouring into the boat through unsealed cracks as the driver started his motor. It didn't take too long for all of us to notice and start abandoning ship.

Our first boat, before we hopped off. This is the whole team. (left--front to back) Alex, Will, James, Abi, Alice, and Rosie. (Right--back to front) Chris, Jenny, Zoey, Dane, and Michelle. Alex, Will, Dane, and Michelle were my buddies on the trip; my Australian amigos. :)

From the boat launch, it was another hour by boat to our floating raft houses.

This is our group leader, Pui. She's 28 and from Chiang Mai in the north. A really funny girl, always making goofy faces, holding my hand, and sneaking up on people. I can't say that she did much explaining of things when we went out but she was really fun and enjoyable to have around.

Once we arrived at the raft houses, the first order of business was to rent a kayak for two days: $3. Not bad, eh? Soon after I hit the lake for a quick tour of the islands around us. This is the view from behind the paddle.

This is our lovely abode for the next two nights: floating bamboo raft houses that connect two islands. Mine was the one just in front of the kayaker. Unfortunately I didn't take a picture of the inside but it was romantic and wonderful. I had the room all to myself which included a queen sized bed and a lovely mosquito net plus a window open to the jungle covered mountains on the other side of the lake.

Alice and Jenny out on the lake.

The boys relaxing on the porch, reading some books and drinking beer while several others took a dip in the lake. This is how we spent most of our time--relaxing or swimming in the clearest teal green, warm water ever.

Once again, vacation from my point of view. I spent a lot of time on the porch and in the lake out in front of my place, reading books and enjoying the sights, sounds and smells of the jungle. In this particular book session, I was listening to monkeys echo through the gorge, looking up occasionally to silhouetted jungle peaks, and breathing deep the cool breezes of orchid scented wind.

But my momentary check-out on planet earth was cut short and I was torn from my book when Chris, who was sitting on his porch next door, said, "Hey, um, Kortney, a snake just crawled into your raft house." I jumped up so quickly that I knocked my chair into the lake and my book almost followed. I turned around just in time to see the little snake tail zip through the crack between the wall and the floor and into my house. Screaming ensued. But that didn't last for long. I was going to kill it. So I picked up my towel, rolled it up headed inside, beating the floor and kicking the mattress as I went. At one point I came back out because I hadn't seen the snake in a while and I wanted to make sure he didn't escape. Rosie and Chris looked at me and in all seriousness said, "You don't have to kill it. You know, we're Buddhist and don't believe in killing things." I wasn't sure what to say because I wasn't sure if they were joking or not, but I did say one thing: "Well, I'm just going to help him along and release him into a better life." They didn't laugh. Ooops. Misjudged that one. It wasn't long before people started gathering outside and other girls started screaming about the snake, which drew in one of the local Thai guys, Mr. Green, who took over the snake killing mission while me and everyone else stood outside and watched for either the snake or Mr. Green to come running out. The snake came first and Mr. Green followed, moving from one raft house to the next. We watched the snake moved through three successive raft houses before Mr. Green finally killed him. Yeah, that's a pit viper. He was in my room. I spent the next two nights in a ball in the middle of the bed with the mosquito net securely tucked under the mattress and didn't sleep well until I was out of the jungle.

On our last full day in the jungle, we took a boat for a half hour to the end of the lake and then hiked about an hour to a lagoon where we planned to take these bamboo rafts to the other side of the lake and go cave exploring. However, once we got there we had to wait about an hour for our raft to come pick us up, so we occupied ourselves with a little more swimming. Lots of fun. The water was clear, warm and so refreshing on a really hot day.

Out on the bamboo raft. We were literally sitting about two inches over the water. In some places on the raft, water was actually coming over the bamboo. A little scary, especially considering our previous sinking adventure!

Walking through the cave was a little challenging for us. There were only two lights which were held by our two Thai guides (I should note that they were ran off car batteries which they carried with them all through the cave, and yes, that one man's "flashlight" is a giant florescent light bulb). I wish I had known we were going to the cave (I wasn't in the loop) because I would have brought my head lamp. Inside was really cool though. We had to jump across one big crevasse (eek!) and be careful on some slippery rocks, but once we were deep inside the cave was really big and dry with amazing rock structures. But the most amazing thing about this cave was the coral growing inside--and it wasn't under water! It was completely dry! Cool, eh? There is a picture of it in my web album.

On the jungle hike back to our long tail boat.

One of my favorite things about staying in the raft houses was all the alone time I had. It was so relaxing. One day I grabbed my kayak and headed out for three hours of paddling by myself around some islands and a little monkey spotting. The only down side was I forgot to put sunblock on my back before I headed out and returned a few shades lighter than a fire truck. Oops. This is a picture of me out on my adventure. I also have some video I'll post later.

On our last night out in the jungle we took a boat out on the lake to go watch the sunset. It was really beautiful and a nice end to our sojourn in the jungle. But the adventure wasn't quite over yet: on the way back we hit a tree sticking up out of the water. It pretty much scared the hell out of us. No one saw it coming. Not even the driver. I turned my head to talk to Michelle and next thing I knew she was screaming and I heard something hit the metal canopy bars over our boat. I turned around just in time to see a branch barely miss some one's head and break off into their lap. Someone could have been seriously injured. We were so lucky. The only casualty was our boat; the tree made a hole somewhere below the water line and we started sinking. Ha. It was to be expected. In the morning, we boarded the boat again and headed off to another park of the park for two more nights at Art's Riverview Lodge.