January 1, 2026
Day 121 — Ranong to Ko Phayam
New Years Day and we were up with the larks to go catch a boat to Ko Phayam, an island paradise a short jaunt from Rayong.
Though there were many sailings of fast tourist boats to Ko Phayam, these were not for us, as we had large awkwardly shaped metallic luggage that the fast boats could not take. This meant we were destined for the “slow boat”, which only had 2 sailings a day, the one for us being at 9 am. As we did not yet have tickets, and with the slow boat pier being a good 7.5 km from our hotel in central Ranong, it meant an early morning wake up call for us to get ourselves down to the dock and get things sorted.
The early morning ride through Ranong and along the gritty backstreets to the pier was actually kinda fun. The monks were up and doing their rounds of alms seeking, the city was waking up, and we ended up down at the docks when all sorts of early morning work was beginning.
We sorted out tickets and verified we were in the right spot, then watched as all sorts of cargo got loaded below decks on the ferry. Ko Phayam is a smallish island with many backpackery tourists staying at bungalows and eating banana pancakes, so there’s an endless need for bottled water, beer and toilet paper to go over. Plus a number of mopeds and on this sailing, two bicycles.
Even though it was the Slow Boat (2 hrs) and not the zippy tourist fast boat (half hour), it was actually an enjoyable ride. We cruised out slowly from the slip and made our way out of the channel, sliding past all the grungy dockworks into more open water. Our course took us out past mangrove swamps while long tail boats chattered past. To the north was the most southerly continental point of Myanmar, and many of the islands on our right as we headed into more open waters were Myanmarian (? It’ll always be Burma to me). At one point, we were treated to dolphins playing in the wake of the ferry.
We snoozed in the sun on our hard bench seats, and after a while we cruised closer to Thai islands like Ko Chang, also a tourist destination (I mean, what isn’t a tourist destination in Thailand), though less built up than Ko Phayam.
We alighted at the long concrete pier at Ko Phayam, got our bikes down the gangplank, and as we were both hungry and too early to check in at our bungalow, settled in at a cafe at the foot of the pier to get coffees and and eggs. It was quite the tumult of coming and going, a sizeable percentage of which was foreigners zipping around on mopeds. Hopefully there was a clinic specializing in road rash on the island.
Second breakfast ingested, we crossed the island to our bungalow to check in, a mammoth 3 km journey. It did have a hill, and, as always, it was quite hot. The owner provided us with an extensive orientation to the island, though we were only interested in getting to the beach.
Our destination for the afternoon was the most northerly beach on the island, which did involve a bit of a bike ride to get there. After a while, the concrete paved road devolved into a potholed track, then disappeared entirely and became a dirt path. It was a national park, so wound its way through large trees, with the occasional monkey, and with very loud cicadas serenading us.
It was a lovely sun drenched white sand beach, with water that was practically bathtub temperature. You could spend all day in the water. Which we kinda did. It was difficult to get too deep, as the beach was quite shallow and there were clusters of sea urchins to navigate. But we put up with it.
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We tolerated this dreadful state of affairs as long as we could, then headed back to the bungalow for a late afternoon rinse and cool down.
Late day found us at the beach closest to our bungalow, which was popular for having limestone outcroppings with holes in them, which seemed to be hugely popular photo backgrounds for couples and families. We wandered around, then settled in with a beer at a beachside bar to watch the sun go down.
Dinner was at a local roadside restaurant — a kickass green curry and a papaya salad. Then back to the bungalow to tuck ourselves in under the mosquito netting.
This bike touring stuff is hard to take.
Today's ride: 18 km (11 miles)
Total: 5,415 km (3,363 miles)
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