Koh Samui 2015 Day 3 – Big Buddha, Wat Plai Laem, Lamai Viewpoint, Grandfather and Grandmother rock

620am and the sun was blocked yet again by the clouds. Back to bed.

Baby K was sleeping late into the morning and had missed a night feeding. He must be really tired! That gave us some time for preparations and immediately after he woke up, we proceeded to breakfast.

Having learnt from yesterday’s breakfast that although the food was free, we had to limit the amount lest we could finished eating. Ordered the eggs florentine and poached eggs and the rest we took from the buffet table. As usual baby K had his special kids set of utensils and he ate the bread and papaya available. I had latte which came with a face. So did the eggs.

We proceeded to the beach to watch the high tide waves. Today the water actually reached the resort steps. Back at the room, we took a dip in the pool with the opportunistic sun out and about. Then bathed in the huge jacuzzi tub before baby K drank milk (and still puke a little) and then fell asleep in mommy’s arms when she brought him out to listen to the waves from our huge balcony.

Went to book a car for 1500baht from the hotel reception and asked for a small one particularly due to the small roads in Koh Samui. We figured if each taxi trip was going to cost us 500baht, in no time this would equal the costs of a car rental. The only problem was the unfamiliarity of the road and there wasn’t a GPS available.

The first car then was delivered was a Nissan March but the remote was not working. So they sent another car that was a 7 seater Avanza. Not exactly the small car that I wanted but I wasn’t going to wait for another one. It came with an empty tank so I had to pump gas when we go.

Baby K awoke from his nap soon after and we packed and got onto the car for our first attraction, the Big Buddha over at the north of the island. I have downloaded the Google maps offline to get better details and used the map as reference to get there. There was an Esso station on the main 4169 and I asked for 300baht of gas, which gave me half tank, more than enough for the trip. The gas was topped up by the station service staff where I didn’t even need to alight from the car. Just tell him how much and paid after it was done, Then it was 30mins of driving on the single lane road with a mix of upslopes and downslopes. Baby K had lunch in the car en-route.

There were road signs that made navigation easy. As we cross the tiny stretch of land before the location, I parked just on the side of the road on this stretch of land, not sure if there was a official car park in place and we walked to the Big Buddha. We only realized that there was indeed a space reserved for parking as we walked closer but I didn’t bother going back to park the car there.

The Big Buddha sit atop a flight of steps which was not to difficult to reach. Took off our footwear as requested and we climbed to the top for some photos. There was renovation ongoing on the sides but we could still get to the edge to shoot the scenery of the surrounding from the top.

Just around at the ground level were shops selling stuff, mostly souvenirs and so we didn’t stay long and left for the next location, just a short drive away to Wat Phai Laem temple. Taking the left immediately on the main road from the Big Buddha, just a couple of hundreds of meters there was this temple with huge statues. The entrance was quite easy to miss as it was a small road without a clear indication and therefore I had to make a Uturn to get to it after seeing the big statues on the left side of the road.

This time I parked at the parking area and we went in to see the 2 huge statues of the Laughing Buddha and the thousand hands Goddess of Mercy. Bought some fish feed from a machine for 10baht and fed the fishes. There was a temple building that we could also visit that had bright coloured wall paintings and a Buddha statue in it. That was our temporary relief from the sun.

At this area was a cafe but we gave it a miss. The next stop was to get to Lamai viewpoint which we thought we could get lunch and on the way, we saw a huge Big C supermart and decided to visit it. Walking around we couldn’t find much eateries except KFC and MK restaurants that serves buffet. We took a stroll in the huge supermarket, something like the Tesco we visited on the first day. Left soon after without buying anything.

Lamai viewpoint didn’t appear on my Google map so I had to follow the road signs. Again we had to turn in at the right into a small road. The signs would indicate a change in direction from going straight to turning right to making a Uturn when you overshot while on the main road, which I did, and had to wait for the many vehicles to pass through. Even after I Uturn, I couldn’t determine the correct small road and entered the one before, driving on it a little and finding it suspiciously incorrect before going out again. Got off and asked some local people and they informed that “Lamai view” was on the next road.

Took the next road in and sure enough there were blue signs directing cars to the carpark. Parked at the near empty carpark (most people biked there) and paid the 100baht entry fees to the view point. The zipline would cost 800baht but we weren’t be doing that because of the baby.

The Valentine stone, small Siva Tara waterfall and the fish spa were just steps away from the entrance, nothing spectacular. The climb up to the viewpoint was a little tiring, especially with the little one and the bags that followed along but it was easy as there were steps all the way to the bar on top. From the viewpoint we could see the Lamai coast. The cloudy weather didn’t provide the best of the scene. The bar was also packed and unfortunately there weren’t any food so we could only have drinks.

Just before we could leave, the light drizzle started to upsize into a huge shower and for a moment it was pretty chaotic as the staff tried to pull down the transparent sheets to block off the rain but the winds were not doing them a favour. Guests were seen helping out as well. We move to the seats closer to the bar away from the rain.

After some 15mins, we left to descend down the wet steps back to ground floor. Went quickly to the car before the drizzle came back again. Off season weather could be really annoying.

Our last stop was the Grandfather and Grandmother rock (Hin Ta and Hin Yai) not too far from the viewpoint. Again the side road was easy to miss. This one was tricky as the road was a one vehicle width road and so you had to wait if there were cars coming out. Going through the road, we reached a split where a kid directed my car into a parking area. It was 30baht for parking but worry-free to park there since it was empty and manned. We had our snack lunch in the car as the rain continue to trickle down.

Finally when it was time to go, we had to pass through one shop selling souvenirs and get to the pathway towards the rocks. Just a few meters away, we could see the grandfather rock but the grandmother one has to go further down towards the sea where there was a split between the rock (see internet pictures to know what you are looking for). We didn’t know where to look until some guide showed another group of tourist the location and we just followed. However the rocks surface was wet from the rain and so we didn’t risk going too near the water plus it was high tide and waves were crashing onto the rock surfaces. Bought some coconut caramel to bring back home while on the way back to the carpark.

Driving back to the resort was pretty straightforward and it was really close by. Back in the room, wife went for massage round 2 while I entertained the baby before meeting her outside the parlour 1hr later. Proceeded to walk the streets to look for dinner.

It was still very quiet at night with not many tourists in sight. The low season was really bad for business but good for people like us who didn’t enjoy the crowd (like Singapore). We made it to Samui Kangeroo where they served seafood and Thai food. I had a set of 3 tiger prawns and barramundi steak for 399 baht while wife had Tom Yum, prawn cake and fried noodles. We were filled to the brim! Baby K fell asleep while on the way to the restaurant and when he awoke, he was entertained by the very friendly staff that made   him comfortable. They even gave him a baby toy to entertain him while we fed him dinner, certainly made our job a lot easier!

As we walked back to the resort, the streets were just as empty and it was already 9pm. Back in the room, we spent some time at the balcony looking at the moon before the drizzle came and then it was all about clean up and packing before retiring for the night. The short 3 day getaway was coming to an end.