Trans-Thai Express

So I reckon you can guess that this wasn't an ordinary train journey, otherwise this would turn into quite a dull blog!

I need to go back to Koh Samui to give you some background, we went into a tour office to book the train tickets (everything here is booked through helpful tour operators who sort out picking you up from your hostel, getting you to your destination and then trying to flog their hostel at the other end.) When we told the woman that we wanted to travel to Sungaikolok her face crumpled and she asked us why we wanted to go there, to which we replied "to get over the border into Malaysia and onwards to the Perhentian Islands."

After a few minutes umming and ahhing she agreed (not before telling us she didn't like selling us tickets there and to promise her that we wouldn't hang about) and phoned her contact at the train station booking office who went through the same line of questioning. It was at this point we even started questioning the route oursleves. We had earlier in the day checked out a number of travel sites including the UK Home Office which all basically advised that one should consider if their journey was entirely neccesary and if so then take caution to avoid certain areas. This was OK as we were on a non-stop overnight train and then were going straight to the border.

So we were booked on the 1.56am (I know!!) train...well that was the time it should have turned up. We got to the station early as the connection with the ferry from Koh Pangan put us in Surat Thani at around 9pm. We thought it would be a good opportunity to finish some reading that we had left over from our time on the beach and possibly have a small snooze. After about an hour of waiting I took a little wander to check the train board, finding to my horror that the train was running 290mins late (firstly I had to work out in my head how long 290 mins was and then add it to 2am.) This meant that we were going to get on our 'sleeper' at 7am and that we were stuck in a station for 10hours. Proper sleep was out of the question as the designer of the waiting room chairs had turned the edges of each seat up just enough to stop the blood flowing past your kidneys when you lay on your side and to trap the nerves between two critical vertebrae if laying on your back.

At this point we were joined by Jon, who had cleverly booked a hotel room for the night but upon arriving at the station at 2am was told that the train was delayed til 7am 'but it might turn up earlier' meaning that he had to abandon the comparative luxury of The Queen's beds and join us on the racks.

The train ride itself was quite uneventful, we smugly snuggled down to in our sleepr carriages allowing the rythmic clickety-clack to rock us off...dreaming of making the border and the delights beyond.

It was about 3 hrs into this lovely snoozing that we were awoken by our cabin boy saying that there was a problem with the train and it was going to have to stop...in Yalla. My mind rushed back to the Home Office website and I mentally rattled off the names of the places that you really shouldn't be, you've guessed it Yalla was up there. Not wanting to panic Cath I merely said, "Oh shit."

Our little train dude assured us that things would be ok, we would get another train that would take us to our destination and he would personally make sure that we knew which platform we were to leave from. This was the same little train dude that once we were safely on the arrival platform at Yalla with all of our bags promptly vanished.

Left to our own devices we now paniced a little, it was tunring into a race against the clock to make the border in time as the town on the Thai side of the border was known more for it's female service entertainment business than anything else so we didn't want to to be trying to find a hostel amongst the hotels who charged by the hour!

Cath, Jon and I scuttled down the platform looking for some indication that there was even a train going to where we wanted to go. We were quite the attraction and each person we asked for help first had to get over the shock of seeing these strange beings before they could point us towards our train. Our comfort wasn't eased much by the presence of more people with guns than I have seen since Tiananmen Square.

After a tip off from someone looking half official we jumped through a train onto an opposite platform only to see the last train of the day chugging away...and then chugging back again. A shuffley run and graceful mounting and we were finally on it, it being a small local 3rd class train that was full to bursting and going to stop at every farm along the way!! This train sat for a while before chugging off, chugging back and sitting there whilst the whole of Yalla Unviersity got on (end of shool for holidays.)

We now became very worried about time and asked around the carriage if folk thought we'd make the border that night. The answers varied from chuckles, flat no's, you can stay in my friend's guesthouse to the more optomistc I hope so's, yesses and I'm heading there to's. We were not even sure what our target time was as all of the way along the journey we had differing reports of the time the border closed ranging from 6pm to 10pm (including one chap who said "9 o'clock holding up 6 fingers!) I think the Thai wish of wanting to help and please hindered us slightly as most people were happy to tell us that we were only a couple of stops and half an hour away...looking a little sheepish an hour and 10 stops later.

A couple of stressed out hours later and we arrived in Sungaikolok, the time was 5.45pm and we had to find the border. Once outside the station we found out that the guidebooks were being a little ambitious saying that it was a 500m walk and our only hope was the famed mototaxis - one guy, a moped and a big smile! After haggling for a decent price the three of us mounted, Cath whispering for hers to go a little steady...well we did all have our 18kg on our backs making wheelies very likely!

Skidding to a halt at the border post we paid and a little shakily hopped off our mounts...to find the border did in fact not close until 10...grrr!! Everything was nice and smooth from there, although we had missed the last ferry to the islands we had had enough excitement for one and a half days and were glad to make it to Kota Bharu and a lovely little place called Friends where we could rest our heads properly. A quick visit to the night market for some good cheap local food and then off to bed...well for us anyway as Jon got a little lost and ended up with expensive soggy KFC.