My first visit to Koh Samui, from 9th May to 13th May. It was triggered by my expiring Krisflyer miles, so I had redeemed the miles hurriedly for this trip in January. It turned out to be extremely worth it, because the Krisflyer miles go by mileage instead of fare price. A flight to Koh Samui can be expensive for that distance; I think Silkair charges between $500 to $800 for a return ticket... for a 1 hour 50 minutes flight to Thailand! Bangkok Airways flies there too, but the prices are not much lower.
Day 1
We reached our hotel, Code, rather uneventfully, especially since we had arranged for an airport transfer beforehand. It cost us THB800 (S$33.78) for a half-hour ride, which I felt was a bit expensive (akin to paying Singapore cab fare prices in Thailand). But considering that Code was located in a rather ulu place - around five minutes drive away from the main road, and up a very steep hill at that - the price was still reasonable. Because we learned later that cab drivers in Koh Samui would always insist on a hefty mark-up on the cab fare for just those five minutes.
Code was located at the northwest part of the island, a distance away from Chaweng, where most of the restaurants and shops are at (the east). The hotel was quite impressive. Not for being posh or luxurious, but because of its design and openness. The room was like a studio apartment - it was basically just one big room, with the living room, kitchen and bedroom all in one. Here are some pictures:
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| The "fully-equipped" kitchen, which was small but handy |
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| The comfortable sofa, with the television (bottom left) |
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| The bedroom, which could be separated by a sliding glass screen |
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| The view from our balcony |
Instead of having a fixed phone line in the room, they issued us a local mobile phone, which came with their reception and manager's numbers. I thought it was brilliant, as we could bring the phone out and use it to call back the hotel in case we need transport or something else. We were not charged on the local calls we made while in Koh Samui, by the way.
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| A Nokia phone which lasted us for three full days without charging. Can our smartphones do that now? |
The gym was small, but suited our needs. And we had the whole gym to ourselves today too.
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| Some basic gym equipment |
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| Free weights |
For dinner, we took the hotel transport down to Bang Por, which was just five minutes away. We chose a restaurant which many locals seemed to frequent. The food was quite reasonably priced and tasted all right too.
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| Outdoor seating by the beach |
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| "Indoor" seats |
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| Clockwise from top left: chilli served on coconut husks, grilled pomfret, kangkong, grilled squid |
Day 2
We decided to try the breakfast at the hotel's only restaurant, Vanilla Restaurant. Topped up THB500 (S$21.11) to our room charges to include breakfast for two of us, which was quite worth it as the food was quite good. It was certainly quite relaxing to chill and take in the sun and greenery, though it became a bit warm after a while; the place was not air-conditioned and only had some standing fans.
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| Enjoying the scenery |
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| European Breakfast |
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| Poached eggs with smoked salmon |
After breakfast, we went to their pool to tan. It was those kind of "infinity" pools, where the edge seems to extend to the ocean. The turn-off was that the pool was full of insects! They were probably from the night before, when the pool was well-lit and the insects just flocked in... so we had to spend some time splashing the insects over the edge to "clean" the pool.
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| Taken from our room balcony |
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| Enjoying a suntan at the infinity pool |
Next stop was at
Chaweng for lunch. Chaweng is Koh Samui's biggest and busiest town, and is rife with hotels, restaurants, and bars. Hotel transport to Chaweng was not cheap, at THB800 (S$33.78), so we took the more affordable (and troublesome) option, which was to take the hotel transport down to the main road at THB100 (S$4.22) before flagging a common pick-up taxi at THB100 per pax. So the trip cost us only THB300 ($12.66)... but took us perhaps twice the time (and half the comfort).
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| From the back of the pick-up taxi |
The weather was scorching. By the time we reached our destination, a restaurant called Spago, we were hot and thirsty. And the place wasn't air-conditioned, to our dismay. But fortunately, the food was pretty good.
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| Soft-shelled crab salad, tuna loin, pasta with asparagus and crab cream |
The main courses were quite good, but the salad had way too much mustard in it. If they could reduce the amount of mustard by half or even to a third, it should be much better.
It was back to the unrelenting heat again after lunch, so we walked for a short while before seeking refuge at a Movenpick cafe for ice cream (and air-con). Stayed there for quite some time, then went for a foot + neck + shoulder massage that was ridiculously cheap at THB180 (S$7.60) each. But their massage skills and service standards were quite poor; both of us didn't really feel the "shiok" factor during the massage, and the two guys attending to us kept on talking to each other and giggling.
Dinner was at Duomo, an Italian restaurant recommended by a friend.
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| Ristorante Pizzeria Duomo |
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| Squid ink pasta with salmon |
We were not that hungry yet, so we just ordered a salad and a pasta to share. The pasta was definitely one of the best that I have tried so far - just the right amount of cream so that it is not too thick, pasta done just right, salmon was quite fresh, and the overall taste just blended in very nicely. This was the best meal we had while in Koh Samui.
Restaurant name: Duomo
Address: Chaweng Beach 60/33 60'34, Chaweng Beach Road
Day 3
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| Lunch in our room + movie on iPad |
A rather simple lunch in our room - pan fried chicken thighs, smoked snowfish, canned tuna, and canned lobster bisque. We bought the chicken and snowfish from Tops Supermarket the day before, while the tuna and soup were brought from Singapore.
Dinner was at Fisherman's Village. The general manager of Code had recommended
Starfish and Coffee for seafood, so we decided to give it a try. It was disappointing in many aspects: the place was full of insects and poorly ventilated, service was poor, food was only decent, and prices were higher than we thought. Highly
not recommended.
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| Entrance of Fisherman's Village |
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| View of Fisherman's Village from the jetty |
Day 4
Our flight was at 955am, so we had breakfast at the cafe again once it opened (7am). The standards seemed to be deteriorating day by day! Our first breakfast here was excellent. On the second day, the mushrooms were sour and one out of our four poached eggs were overcooked. And today, the mushrooms were sour and all our poached eggs were overcooked! As we had to leave by 745am, there was no time to send it back to the kitchen. Pfft.
When we reached Koh Samui on the first day, we didn't get to see this part of the airport, which we did today. The airport's design was quite unique; it was a rather open and outdoor concept, and had shops lining the pavements.
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