It was great to arrive at Koh Sok national park after the overnight boat trip from busy Koa Tao island. It was also great to be surrounded by the Koh Sok jungle with its craggy giant limestone mountains rising to the heavens. We welcomed the super chilled, boarding on sleepy atmosphere with open arms.

The plan for our time in the national park was to do a lot of day hikes to the many waterfalls that find this wilderness home. The first day was rather easy, with a wide dirt track leading us to the waterfalls, which weren’t that spectacular, or maybe I’m just a waterfall snob being from New Zealand (in the parks defence, we did just hike to the closest one as we ran out of daylight).

Our second day was a totally different story. Up early and off on a different trail, and I use the word trail in a very loose context, the cows in the outback have better trails to follow. After a hour ofnavigating through the jungle we lost the “trail”, but found the river. Other people further behind us gave up, but we were determined to see this 11 tier waterfall.

My logic was, if we follow the river up we will come across the waterfall. So off we went walking up through the river. We saw our first snake after only 20 mins, albeit a very small one, the boys back at Woodie Woodie would call it a worm, but it was nonetheless a snake (Woodie exploration I didn’t even flinch, all those rubber snake tricks paid off).

40 mins into walking up the river and a million spider webs later we sat down to have a snack. We were just about to leave, then Mandy starts shouting “urrgghhhhh get it off me!”  I look down and right there is a leech locked onto her calf getting its daily hit. After digging my fingers into its sucker and ripping it off I look down. Surely enough I had one locked onto my calf with his entourage making their way up my shoes. I declared war on them.

Instead of retreating we pushed on into enemy territory wanting to lay our eyes on the 11 tier waterfall. Under constant attack from the enemy leeches, spiders and snakes we pushed on.  But there is only so much one can take. When the 3^rd snake was sighted, a cold beer seemed like a better idea than a mystical waterfall. We turned around the headed back to find the monkey track that we had come in on.

After making it back alive, we had a cold beer, showered, ate dinner looking out over the limestone outcrops that were lit up by the lighting. Then it was time for a well deserved massage. We tracked down won, the name of the lady that supposedly gives the best massages in town.

We arrived at Wons place and were enthusiastically greeted by her 3 year old son. He ran straight into Mandys arms and grabbed her boobs – just doesn’t work the same when your 27. The son finally calmed down and went and sat next to his dad on the sofa to watch the nightly entertainment – us. Our massage was to take place in the family lounge which was also there TV room and bedroom. It was all pretty uneventful, until she asked me to take off my pants. Mandy had already done this and was in her underwear, the problem with me was that I was not wearing any underwear. It took some explaining and hand gesturing before I could get the message across. Like most things in Thailand, the outcome ended up in smiles and laughter and me borrowing some of their fisherman pants. Note to self, wear underwear to get massage.

This morning we got a public bus to Khao Lak on the western coast, the jump off point to the world famous dive spot of the Similan islands.

In one hour we leave on a 4 day/4 night live-aboard dive trip, where we will do 14 dives in 4 days. The Similans is meant to be amazing, people who have done 500 dives have said this to be their favourite dive site. So as you can Imagine, I’m super excited. Will write all about it when I get back, and also my ladyboy caberet experience.

Chao