We arrive at Pattaya Beach (on Ko Lipe) an hour before our scheduled departure. This is actually quite early because "departure" means the time they start loading bags onto the boat. The process involves passengers lugging their bags out into meter-deep water and waiting for one of the boat staff to notice them. The bags are then stashed in bins under the benches. Bags too big to fit underneath and those that show up late get piled in one of two heaps at the front and back of the boat. Then passengers load. There are seats for most but the last few aboard end up sitting on improvised seats (thin mattress pads) placed atop the wall just in front of the 4 outboard motors. As the boat pulls out of the bay, I try to count how many health and safety violations the operators would get nailed with at home. I lose track as the boat hits open water and starts what will be about 90 minutes of water-park worthy entertainment.
The wind has been blowing and the seas are a bit rough. The boat is open on top with only a canvas pulled across a metal frame to protect the passengers from rain and spray and there's a gap between boat and canvas on all sides. Within ten minutes, the young Thai girl sitting next to me is holding a plastic bag to her face. I glance at her mother who explains to me in Thai-lish that she's feeling sick from the petrol smell. In my head, I weigh suffocation against nausea and decide that my Thai and the mother's English are not good enough to get into such a philosophical debate.
As the boat continues to rock sideways through 2 meter waves, water comes splashing through the gap, thoroughly soaking everyone in the back third of the boat. The German woman at the back left corner seems to getting the worst of it - not only is she soaked through but so is the suitcase she's trying to protect. The Ukrainian couple in front of us is holding up lifejackets to deflect the cascade and the three Thai men sitting on the wall at the back start using their mattress pads as improvised shields. I look back periodically to make sure all three of them, perched precariously on the wall above the motors, are still holding on. The young Malaysian couple across from us are both looking pale. Drenched and apparently sea-sick, she heads to the front of the boat and takes a seat on the floor out of the splash zone. All blood seems to have left her face and she spends the last half hour of the trip, eyes closed, head lolling back and forth with the heaving of the boat, desperately trying to keep her lunch moving in the correct direction. Beside me, Leah's eyes are closed and she has a look of pained concentration on her face - she later tells me she spent most of the trip visualizing a big dry white towel folded neatly on the bed at our hotel in Hat Yai.
When we arrive in Pak Bara, we discover that the minivan-bus, for which we already have a ticket, has no seats left and we'll have to wait 10 minutes for the next one. At least this gives us a bit of time to change into dry clothes before the two hour bus ride. The next minivan-bus shows up 15 minutes later and leaves 2 minutes after that, empty. A third one appears a while after that (I stopped paying attention to time - why bother?) and we get on, thinking we're lucky because the driver has to move a couple bags around to make room for us. "Thinking we're lucky" because he repeats this process twice more as others appear. Leah and I both have seat belt issues and give up trying to put them on. When I try to figure out why mine wasn't working, I realize that our seats started life in another van and were bolted in at the back of this van when someone realized that there was no point having trunk space when luggage could just as easily be piled up on one seat with any overflow stashed between the seats and the door. At least the roof of the van doesn't leak as it's now raining quite hard. We remain dry for the next two hours.
When we arrive in Hat Yai, those who speak Thai are dropped off at their chosen destinations. When only the Ukrainian couple (the ones with the life-jacket deflectors) and us are left, the driver hangs up his cell phone for long enough to yell something at us in Thai, at which point we are unceremoniously dumped at a street corner somewhere in the middle of town. When the dust settles, we look around for some sign of where we've ended up. A friendly local woman who speaks English (remarkably, one of these always appears in a moment of need) asks us where we're going. Our hearts sink when she says "is that in Hat Yai?". Eventually, she points us to a Songthaew that the Ukrainians are already getting into, "he'll know". We tell the driver the name of the street our hotel is on, showing him the piece of paper where we've written it down, and he nods confidently, pointing us into the back of the Songthaew (a pick-up truck with a canvas cover over the flatbed and a bench down each side). The Ukrainian man helps haul our luggage on board and we squeeze in at the back. After the Ukrainians get dropped off at the correct hotel, our confidence is bolstered. About ten minutes later, the driver stops in front of what looks like a hospital, gets out of the cab, comes around to the flat bed of the truck and asks us if this is where we want to go (in Thai, of course). At this point, the difference between the street called Rajyindee and the one called Rajyindee Soi 7 is starting to become apparent. I show him the piece of paper with address on it again, pointing out the entire name. He looks at it again, makes a face, pulls out a pair of reading glasses and checks it again. This time, he nods more vigorously. We later discover that street names in Thailand are a bit more structured than at home - Rajyindee is a main street and Soi 7 refers to a lane (the 7th one) branching off it. After a few U turns to circumnavigate the canal that runs through town, we finally pull up in front of the hotel. Next challenge, dinner...
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