Many Happy Returns
Since my first visit five years ago, Koh Chang has called me back again, this time to celebrate my sixtieth birthday. In my bamboo hut on the beach, there was no mirror and nothing to remind me that I am no longer a spring chicken so it was a bitter-sweet moment when I met someone in a bar who was reading “Thai Girl”, my novel set in Koh Chang. He stared at me and, with a look of amazement said, “Thai Girl’s a really great story… I love it, but I’d no idea you’d be that old.”
Yes, it is a bit strange me writing a novel about travellers not much more than a third my age, but then ageing is all in the mind and I remind myself that you’re only as old as the woman you feel. Anyway, Thailand and especially Koh Chang should always be prescribed for anyone suffering from a northern winter or world weariness and then nothing really much matters any more, age least of all.
For us this time there was drinks on the beach at 15 Palms on White Sands Beach, a sensitively designed bar that’s magical at night, then great late night music at Oodie’s Place and unparalelled food and atmosphere at Thor’s Palace. Elsewhere I’ve described Thor’s green curries as “one of the world’s great sensory experiences”.
Who doesn’t love great places like these, not to mention the sand and seascapes, but as a freak for unspoiled tropical forest, I rate Koh Chang very highly indeed. You need to walk up a watercourse to get into the jungle, so I share the Koh Chang Guide’s concern at the increase from 200 baht to 400 baht that you have to pay the National Park for entry to the Than Mayom and Klong Plu waterfalls. Surely their takings must have fallen sharply because of this unjustified hike in the price.
Anyway, advised as always by the Guide, I followed its map to Klong Nonsi waterfall. Passing the hospital on the east side of the island, you cross the river bridge and there’s a concrete track leading inland just past some foodstalls. There’s no sign to the waterfall but it was worth the effort looking for it. The watercourse was dry but further up I found a pool with no blue pipes running out of it that was big enough to bathe in. The fish found me interesting and nibbled my extremities as I lay looking at the jungle around me. Somehow they must have survived the terrible flooding of the end of last rainy season and despite the drought they’ll still be there next year.
It wasn’t so much the ‘waterfall’ itself that was special as the sheer peace and tranquility of the durian groves and forest that I so love. Another day, I drove to Klong Son and turned up the valley past Ban Kwan Chang elephant centre, surely one of the most unspoiled and spectacular places you could ride an elephant anywhere in the world. Walking over the rocks up the dry river to the Nang Rom waterfall, I was amazed at the sheer scale of the trees, soaring upwards above me and of the rich greens of the vines, ferns and rattans that cover the forest floor, tropical jungle at its finest. This river was much bigger than the previous one and there were many places you could still take a dip, which of course I couldn’t resist.
Five years ago, I stayed in the huts above the Plaloma Resort for two of the best weeks of my life, made some amazing backpacker friends and filled my notebooks with ideas, impressions and idiosyncratic characters. You can meet them all in my novel, “Thai Girl” which now to my delight has become a bestseller. (See my website and my blog). That’s why returning to Koh Chang is always a bit of a nostalgic pilgrimage for me and why I can’t quite get it out of my system. But then if you want to face up to a serious milestone of a birthday and have a good holiday, then there’s no better place to go and do it.
Andrew Hicks
