Finally arrived at the Sanctuary

Sunday, October 19th

This morning we were still travelling on our way to Ko Pha-ngan.  We were supposed to get to Surat Thani at 6:30am, but 7:30am rolled around and we were still on the train. By then, we became a bit nervous that we might of missed our stop, but then again the train never stopped.  And yes, we did ask someone working on the train, but we're not sure if he fully understood what we were asking.  The dilemma of the language barrier.  As we waited for our stop, Steph took another nap, while I read, blackberried and enjoyed my oatmeal cookie for breakfast.  We were both pretty gross - the last shower we had was on the 17th at 11am.  So you can figure that we were getting smelly.

Whew! We did get off at the right stop and chaos began right away.  We got hustled onto a bus that was supposed to take us to the ferry terminal to go to Ko Pha-ngan.  It was for 450 baht versus our expectation of 250 baht.  In the grand scheme of things, it's still only $13.  But, we were skeptical because our tickets only said bus and not ferry, and we read in the lonely planet that this is a classic scam.  We got on the bus anyway since there seemed to be no other buses.

The whole time on the bus we were skeptical about whether the price included the ferry, but eventually we made a stop and got ferry tickets which listed a price of 250 baht.  So 200 baht for the bus ride seemed a bit hefty, but it was a 2 hour ride to the ferry terminal.  By this point we'd been travelling for roughly 40hours and still not reached the island yet.  We weren't sure how long the ferry was going to take to get to Tong Sala in Ko pha-ngan since there are several ferries and the time ranged from 2.5 hours to 7 hours.  Hey at least we knew we were getting to the island.  Eventually we did confirm we got the speedy 2.5 hours one - whew!  The ferry there was pretty easy going.  But when we got there we were squeezed into a pickup truck looking vehicle to get to Had Rin town for 150 baht.  From there we catch a water taxi for another 150 baht to Haad Tien where the sanctuary was located.

By 2pm (43.5hours since we started our journey) we made it to the santuary in one smelly piece.  We opted for the dorm rooms since it was 120 baht ($4) each versus 325 baht ($10) each.  The sanctuary was definitely a remote place.  It is on a small beach in Ko Pha-ngan.  Very nice and quiet.  Everyones purpose there was to relax and detox.  There's several different methods including diets, yoga, meditation, and colonic fasting etc.  We opted for yoga and meditation.  Check it out at www.thesanctuarythailand.com.

But before we started detoxing, we needed a shower and some food.  It felt good to finally be clean and pleasant smelling.  We then sat by the beach to have our first real meal in days.  The menu at the sanctuary is huge.  All healthy options, mostly vegan with some fish and seafood on the menu. Steph and I both got a shake and the heavenly salad which had fruits, nuts, and cheese on a bed of fresh veggies.

During lunch we met Kristie, a girl from New Zealand that has been traveling for some time.  To our benefit, she worked at a tour agency in New Zealand for number of years, so she gave us some good tips for our travel there.  She was really nice and loves animals.  She told us her experience at the elephant camp in chiang mai, where volunteers help rescued elephants.  This place, unlike where we went to, treats elephants with care.  No beating.  No trekking.  It sounded pretty cool, and made me ashamed of what I did.  But, we didn't know any better.  Now we know for next time.

We chatted for a bit, then I went to use the internet.  My blackberry only works at a remote corner of the beach, and I needed to send an email out, so I paid for the internet facility, which is pretty pricey - $1 for 10mins.  In town we got $1 for 1hour!  Oh everything here is paid at the end, so everything gets charged to the room.  It can get pretty dangerous after a while, so we are keeping track of our own tab.

At 6pm, we went for an hour long meditation.  Yes, I was trying to meditate and be silent and free of thought for an hour.  It was hard, but it felt good afterwards.  We practiced active meditation, where we did different sessions every 15mins.  The first session we concentrated on deep breathing, the second session we gazed at a candle, the third session was free flow body movements (not dancing) and for the last session we laid on the ground and relaxed.  I felt very awake afterwards.  But, I'm not going to lie, there were many instances where I had to pull my mind away from thoughts and concentrate again.  We plan to do this again, so maybe I will get better at it over time.

Dinner was the next activity.  Once again, the menu had so many options it was hard for me to decide.  I ended up getting a delicious tuna melt and Steph had an olive, feta and hummus platter.  Afterwards there wasn't much to do besides reading, chatting, and sleeping.  Maybe here I will actually finish my books.  I do have to admit it was pretty nice lying on the hammock listening to the waves crashing onto shore while I read my book.

The aaccommodation was adequate, a simple mattress on the ground with a mosquito net.  It was a bit hot inside the mosquito net, but once you forgot about the heat, relaxed and concentrated on the ocean crashing in, it was easier to sleep.

This will definitely be a good experience for me to learn to sit still, but I don't think I will ever fully appreciate it.  I like to be chill, like sitting in a starbucks for hours, but I also like to have my options to be active/connected if I want to.  I am happy we are here.