The laidback island of Ko Lanta
10 March 2010 | Ko Lanta, Southern Thailand
We arrived at Ko Lanta just as the sun was setting. It had been a long day and we had a quiet night on board the Makani Kai leaving the exploring for the next day. As soon as we pulled the dinghy up on the beach we could feel the relaxed vibe of the place. I would imagine this is what much of Thailand would have been like some years ago, there are of course the ominous signs of big and fancy new resorts being built but they have yet to go the way of Phuket, all sun lounges and no soul.
We were excited to see so many restaurants on the beach, our Thai food odyssey was not yet over. We settled into a restaurant with a balcony overlooking the beach, elevated enough for the cool ocean breezes to wash over us but low enough to indulge in a spot of people watching. The red faced, overweight Europeans walking around with no hats or sunglasses burnt to the colour of an Australian sunset. Haven't these people heard of sunscreen?? We ordered some fish for a change and waited for our meals only to be told they had run out of fish, it was not yet midday, a Pad Thai instead was not much of a sacrifice, the juices were fresh and cold and that was all that mattered. We ate our meals quickly and left the sun worshippers to their own devices while we went exploring.
Our attempts to hire a motorbike were met with reluctance, we only had a copy of our passport and most places required the real thing. Finally we found Deng and her family who happily hired us a brand new Honda Scooter, called a Scoopy it looks very similar to a Vespa and was so shiny that we were a little worried, when we go exploring we tend to go off road a bit.
We rode into Ban Saladan the main town of Ko Lanta, it's a mishmash of mini-marts, restaurants and souvenir shops. Turning around we headed to the other end of the island, taking random roads and ending up at a viewpoint with a restaurant, the view was awesome. Heading back down the hill we entered Old Lanta Town, this used to be the islands original commercial centre and used to provide a safe harbour for vessels travelling between Phuket, Penang and Singapore. The town boasts some really old architecture with some of the buildings being in excess of 100 years old, it's a beautiful old town that has maintained its traditionalism, providing a sleepy alternative to the more touristy Ban Saladan. It also lacks the beach front of the other side of the island instead the houses are built out over a muddy, mangrove style of waterfront. While we were there they were celebrating the Lanta Festival, stalls lined the streets of Old Lanta Town and a stage was set up for the entertainment later in the evening, restaurants advertised End of Festival parties with free shuttles home. We chose to head back to Ban Saladan and enjoyed another Thai meal overlooking the water in a restaurant on stilts where my Red Curry nearly blew my head off even though I asked for 'farang' (tourist) spicy.
Just past Old Lanta Town is Sanga-U Village, this village houses the 'Chao Le', they are sea gypsys who according to all the reading material are trying to live as traditional a life as possible. Their houses though reminded me of the houses built by the UN for locals in Sumatra, there was nothing traditional about them at all and most had been painted an awful bright orange colour. They have been in this area for quite some time though and the legend is that there was once a large stingray that landed and beached in Ao Prao inlet. The stingray later turned to stone. From that moment the local villagers saw people walking in that area as if there was a settlement there, the Shaman explained that these were the 'Lords of the Sea' and their own ancestors. Since the stingray is called Sagga-U in the Chao Le dialect they called these people Toh-I-Sagga-U and this is where the name Sanga-U Village came from.
We decided to stay an extra day and made use of the motorbike again the next day. We rode up back streets, through Rubber tree plantations and everywhere else we had missed the previous day. Finally suffering from motorbike back and bum we headed off for the final massage we would enjoy in Thailand. Jay has become quite a connoisseur of Thai massages and luckily his final one was one of the good ones. The girls there were a little rough and ready though, yelling out to everyone walking past and smoking like chimneys, something I had rarely seen while in Thailand. Reluctantly we decided to leave the next morning, next stop Ko Muk and then on to Langkawi.