Greetings from Paradise

Yes, heaven can be found on earth - it's at Koh Samui.

This little island is like nothing either of us have ever seen. The beaches are powdery and white, the sea (the Gulf of Thailand, to be precise) is the blue-green everybody dreams of for a beach vacation, the barrier islands are close, lush and green, and the distant hills are the perfect frame for all of this. There are plenty of tourists here, and yet the beach never feels crowded and it's certainly never loud. Palm trees everywhere, vendors selling only the freshest fruits and grilling up delicious yellow corn, all under the warmest of suns. This really is paradise!

How are we? Not surprisingly, soaking all of this up and loving every minute of it. Most importantly, we've done very little while here. We got in (per my last post) late on Thursday, and spent the evening on Bophut beach, which is on the north coast. Bophut is relatively small, very quaint, with maybe two dozen charming little restaurants or pubs amidst the beachfront hotels, all of which are small. We had a room with a balcony that literally fell onto the beach, with the water maybe 50 feet away at most. We booked the night before - and paid less than $40 for it! We'll never find such a deal again.

Anyway, after lounging on Bophut for the morning, we headed to our planned stay at the Amari Palm Reef Resort, on Chaweng Beach. Chaweng is the largest and most popular of Samui's beaches, on the east coast. It's heaven (see above). The hotel is glorious, the pool is fantastic, and the gulf waters are so warm and soothing, it literally feels like you're taking a bath when you go for a dip. We went snorkeling for a few hours today, and though the array of fish was not the best that either of us had seen, we swam amidst a huge collection of coral that neither of us had seen before. It was spectacular - and the water was so shallow (or the coral so large), we could touch it!

Aside from that, we've spent our time sleeping, reading, enjoying the pool (both in it and along the decks), eating, and relaxing. All of these activities are quite easy here on Samui. This was the best way to end the trip; a perfect wind-down to a hectic and exciting three weeks here. If any of you make it out to this part of the world, you really must spend a few days on Samui. It truly is the most beautiful place I've ever seen.

With that, I'll end what should be our last post from the actual trip itself. We're off to Bangkok tomorrow afternoon, checking our luggage early, then into the city for a celebratory last meal - and, of course, some last-minute bargain hunting. Our flight to Seoul leaves at 1:20 am local time on Tuesday morning, so we have no hotel tomorrow night. We have a three hour layover in Korea, so you'll possibly hear from one of us then.

Back to utopia...