Thai island N°2 – Koh Jum

I started early this morning to make my way to the pier in Koh Lanta for Koh Jum. Koh Jum is half way on the route to Krabi. Nevertheless they charge you the full fare of 400 Baht (11 EUR/8 GBP) to get on the island.

The island is not yet developed for tourism and only a few brave foreigners get stranded here. There is no electricity nor internet on the island. Although all of the 20 sites run generators to offer electricity as well as wifi between 6pm and 11pm.

Even though it is very basic living here I am glad I decided on getting here. Construction works for the first street made of concrete have just finished and the first cars arrived. The island clearly will change in the next few years under these circumstances. It took me a while to finally decide on going, because it is Christmas soon and I am a bit worried I will spend the very first Christmas without family on a secluded island without any other people I could make friends with. Thank god it is not turning out like this. I already made friends with four Germans. It is pretty weird though, because I haven’t spoken any German in a while (all the other people I met so far where non Germans). But let me go back to the start. As already mentioned I got up early to catch the ferry to Krabi, which would drop me half way through at Koh Lanta. Because there is no pier on that side of the island longtail boats from each resort pick up guests in the middle of the Andaman Sea and bring them to the island.

Longtail  Boat of the place I was staying at

As I found out a bit later guests of the resorts would always wait for the longtail boat to arrive to check for newcomers. Makes sense somehow. It is not much to do on the island, so watching new people arriving is kind of exciting.

I stayed at New Bungalow in a simple bungalow with cold shower and a squat toilet for 200 Baht (4 GBP/6 EUR). Toilet, shower, bed and mosquito net- very basic, but what else would I need?

After I had dropped my stuff I took a little walk through the jungle into the village. It was a nice walk along dozens of palm trees with monkeys jumping from tree to tree. The fisher village was pretty tiny and only with a handful houses. I stumbled across a little super market where I filled up on water, bananas and cookies and then made my way back to the bungalow.

Later on whilst having dinner I got approached by two guys, who invited me to sit with them and their friends. It turned out all of them were German. Was pretty weird to speak German again after such a long time of travelling with non-Germans. I found out the couple in the group is always spending their entire year’s holiday on the island and the two boys have just met and are also travelling by themselves. Hanging out with them totally erased the fear of spending Christmas on my own. Now bed, more tomorrow!

Note: This post was written on Dec, 22nd 2014