Island in the Sun

The first weekend in June was one of those surreal, "pinch me" types of experiences. We took a bus down to Kep, one of the southern provinces in Cambodia, and took a small wooden boat out to an island (Koh Tonsay) in the Gulf of Thailand.
The ride out there was pretty rough, and we got totally drenched. There were at least 3 or 4 times that I was sure we would get flipped, but we didn't, and we made it safely to the island. Pulling up to the island felt like a scene from Jurassic Park (I had literally JUST finished reading The Lost World while we were on the bus down there). It was a super dense jungle on a relatively small island. We took a quick hike to a different part of the island, and we got settled in our huts.
The huts were super primitive, but they were right on the beach, and it felt great to live somewhere that simple (for a few days). They only have electricity on the island from 6(ish) to 10(ish)PM, and no outlets. We spent pretty much all day every day playing in the ocean, getting coconut oil massages, hiking on the island, reading, eating at our favorite little restaurant, drinking from coconuts, and napping.

Also, fun fact about the island, it was used as a hideout for the Khmer Rouge for a while, even after the Vietnamese army had driven them out of power. There are still old bunker-like things up at the top of the hill in the middle of the island. It's crazy to see these places and realize that this all happened relatively recently. Also, it's bizarre in Cambodia how you can just visit these places without really any rules. You can climb on everything, see everything, and there aren't fences and barriers to keep you safe/keep the sites intact. It's a little strange compared to how controlled everything is in the U.S.


All in all it was a pretty fantastic weekend. It was exactly what you would expect spending a weekend on an island in the Gulf of Thailand. Although beaches aren't really my favorite thing, this was pretty close to paradise.