Chasing Waterfalls on Koh Chang
Trip dates: December 9, 2016 - December 14, 2016
After spending a week in Bangkok, we were off to explore another island, this time on the east side of the Gulf of Thailand. Koh Chang is much bigger than Koh Lipe, though still a bit difficult to get to. We took a transfer minibus from Bangkok to Trat, where we then got on the ferry to Koh Chang. This Thaisland is only accessible via two ferry routes.
We had about 5 days total in Koh Chang and took the opportunity to relax and take it easy! We stayed at the Erawan Hotel, which was on the street right across from the beach with the mountains behind it. It was a great location as we were in close proximity to the beach but were protected from the sounds of partying by the mountain. If you decide to visit Koh Chang, we highly highly recommend the Erawan! I especially loved their pool which had lounge chairs set up in them and their staff was some of the nicest we've had on this trip. The GM in particular was extremely helpful.
As mentioned, Koh Chang is a much bigger island than Koh Lipe and definitely had a different vibe to it. There were several different areas that tourists stay in on the island, each with it's own character. You can't walk the island and needed to rent a motorbike or hire a songthaew (pick up truck taxi) to get between any of the different areas.
We stayed near White Sand Beach, which is a super touristy area, but it was nice because it was walking distance to the street vendors at night. There's a fair variety of food available and it's way cheaper than eating on the beach!
We did a lot of relaxing while on Koh Chang and didn't explore it too much while we were there, though there's a handful of activities available since the island is mostly jungle with tons of waterfalls. One of the days, we got a private car from our hotel to take us to Salakphet Bay to go kayaking. The Bay is just south east of where we were staying, but the road around the island doesn't connect and is a U-shape, so we had to go all the way north and around the island to get to Salakphet. We had initially considered renting a motorbike to go ourselves but the roads are super windy, there's still a lot of traffic on the roads, and there wasn't really anywhere quiet that we could practice. So we decided to be safe and just hired a car.
I guess Salakphet Bay isn't as touristy since our driver didn't really know where to go to get us kayak rentals. We ended up going to a random hotel in the bay, which was pretty dead and empty, and rented a kayak from them (200 THB for the day).
The bay was pretty empty except for just a handful of other kayakers. We paddled to the nearby mangrove forest, going inward for a bit before turning around and back out into the bay. We then headed to the tiny island of Koh Sai Khao in the hopes that we'd have it to ourselves. No such luck, though we only shared it with maybe 3-4 other groups so basically had a beach to ourselves. It was a nice break from the crowded White Sand Beach by our hotel.
Funny story, once we kayaked back after spending some time on our (semi-)private island, we got back to the hotel only to realize that Eric's flip flops were missing! At first, we thought that maybe Eric's shoes had fallen off the deck into the muck below but after some minutes looking around, we couldn't see them. The hotel lady asked what we were looking for, then got on the phone and told us to wait a few minutes. Several minutes later, we see a little jetty boat coming towards the hotel from the island we were on. Turns out, the boat driver stole Eric's flip flops, thinking it was his/someone else's somehow? He managed to return Eric's shoes and we made the hour-long return journey to our hotel.
Salakphet Bay is a bit hard to get to, depending on where you're staying on Chang. It's a much quieter and less visited part of the island though, so it's worth checking out if you have the time.
The other noteworthy activity we did on Koh Chang was to chase down a secret waterfall. There are tons of waterfalls on the island, but the one we sought was Kai Bae and not even on a map! Of course, there's information on the web for how to get there so it's not completely secret, but it's definitely more secluded and a bit off the beaten path. We saw a local tour guide with a group coming back from the waterfall as we were getting there, and one other couple, and that was it. When we got to the waterfall in the early afternoon, we had it all to ourselves! The trail to get there is a bit hard to see at times, but you mostly follow the blue pipes and climb some rocks and eventually, you'll find it. It was super hot and humid on the hike up there, so I ended up jumping in and cooling off under the waterfall. Eric, surprisingly, did not, since the water looked a little murky and had some water bugs hanging around. Crazy huh? I went into dirty water and Eric didn't! There were also a ton of aggressive mosquitos on the jungle-y parts that kept buzzing at our ears, so we had on a lot of deet that day.
You can check out this guy's blog if you want to visit Kai Bae Waterfall yourself. Some pictures of the path with directions also available in the gallery below.
We left Koh Chang feeling rejuvenated and relaxed and headed off to Cambodia via land transfer. More on that mess in the Siem Reap post!
