Koh Samui, the Island of Palms

After Phuket, this year we wanted to "taste" the other Thai island famous for tourism: Koh Samui. So, after having decided a couple of years ago that our winter ends in February, we booked only the flight at the agency (Thai Airways) and began searching online for the accommodation and the strategically best location of the island to stay. The island is not very large but offers a great many options in more or less touristy areas. Our choice fell on Lamai Beach as a location and the Utopia Resort as accommodation, and both turned out to be perfect. Lamai is certainly less chaotic than Chaweng and in some ways allows you to holiday more peacefully. The resort is very well structured, on the beach and immersed in a splendid tropical garden. Once we had taken possession of our accommodation we immediately rented scooters and, map in hand, plunged into discovering the island.

The island has a main road (Ring Road 4169) recently asphalted and widened and most of the secondary roads are concrete, which makes it easy to reach all the beaches and the many itineraries. What strikes you about Samui is the "green" that covers it almost entirely and that contrasts sublimely with the white of the sand and the blue of the sea, a hinterland made up of spectacular limestone and granite reliefs covered by dense tropical forest, coconut palms as far as the eye can see, multicoloured flowers but, above all, its beaches.

At the end of the two weeks we had ridden about 600 km, visiting many and certainly not all of them, from the most famous and long Chaweng (including Chaweng Noi) and Lamai to others such as Bo Phut, Mae Nam, Thong Yang (Big John beach), Thong Krut, Banh Kao and some found by chance whose names I wouldn't even know, with the typical little place on the beach where you can eat or drink something directly with your feet in the sand, usually run by a Thai family, as always extremely warm. Compared with Phuket the beaches are narrower, so you are directly in the shade of the palm trees, and the sea is a little rougher, which is not so good for observing fish near the shore. Besides the sea, on Samui you certainly don't get bored.

During our wanderings we came across many interesting places of worship and otherwise: from the Big Buddha temple, to the Kunaram temple famous for the well-known mummified monk with glasses, to a pagoda between Taling Ngam and Phangka Bay where another mummy is kept, to the Snake Farm (a show with cobras, pythons and scorpions), to the zoo-aquarium (with tigers, leopards, sharks, giant turtles), to the Na Muang 1 and 2 waterfalls, to the much-photographed Hin Ta & Hin Yai (Grandfather & Grandmother Rocks) and to many view points where you get unique breathtaking views. Since for us, lovers of the sea, all this was not enough (ironically speaking), we decided to devote a day to an excursion to the neighbouring islands, where snorkelling reigns supreme, and more precisely to Koh Tao and Koh Nangyuan, which proved to be up to expectations.

And in the evening?? Well, a new entertainment begins. From the aperitif, to choosing where and what to eat, to shopping where haggling over the price is obligatory and fun, to drinking a beer or a cocktail in one of the many go-go bars, to the various cabaret shows (the Ladyboy ones are very funny) or watching a Muay Thai match, a real meeting point for the Thais with endless betting. The only recommendation is not to move around too much with your own vehicle, because if by day the driving of the Thais is reckless, at night a high alcohol level is added that increases their dangerousness and being involved in accidents is not pleasant. In Lamai we always went out on foot, while when we went to Chaweng, in the evening, we used their public transport, which is nothing other than pick-ups with an open bed; you find as many as you want at any hour and you are safe.

The thing in common that we found with the other trips made in Thailand is the spirit of its people. For the Thai people, smiling and always being very kind is a universal language that unites peoples of all races, and you notice it from the moment you board the flight of their flag carrier and throughout your stay in this country you are accompanied by this simple and elegant form of greeting of bringing the hands together near the face, lowering the head slightly, hinting at a natural and sincere smile that transmits a serenity to which we Westerners are perhaps no longer accustomed but which we certainly appreciate, respect and immediately adapt to. Sawasdee Ka, Sawasdee Khra.