Koh Rong Samloem

Mapai Bai Village on Koh Rong Samloem

Home sweet hut

View from the hut- beach is 50 feet away

View of Koh Kuon and Koh Rong  in the distance from the beach

View in the other direction

Beautiful sunset

Sunset over Koh Kuon- the next closest island

We spent 3 days on Koh Rong Samloem- an island off of Sihanoukville on the Gulf of Thailand. A two hour slow boat ride over brought us to the tiny village of Mapai Bai. The island is very small-- about 5 miles long by 1 mile at the widest. Besides the village there is not much more than a half a dozen beautiful white sand beaches dotted with a few resorts. There are some plans for larger scale development, but it is mostly happening on the bigger island of Koh Rong, which is about 5 miles away.
We stayed at a small resort just outside of the village. A really quiet place with 5 beach huts and a small restaurant. The most rustic place we've stayed at- electricity only from 6pm-midnight, so no A/C but a good fan for those hours and a sturdy mosquito net. Also no running water. (What they call a bucket shower here, which means a 50 gallon bucket that they fill twice a day and a scoop to rinse yourself off.) There is a toilet but no flushing- just a bucket of water to push things down. No cell service or Wifi, of course. It was just fine and the view all around more than made up for the lack of amenities.
The water was turquoise blue and clear. We took a snorkeling trip on a diving boat and saw quite a bit of sea life. I was also able to see a pair of hornbills on 3 different occasions. It was really lucky as they are pretty rare- they've been over hunted and the villagers treasure their eggs.
We didn't do much except sit on the beach and loll about in the hammock. All the time we spent on the beach we maybe would have to share the entire stretch with one or two other people and a few stray dogs. It was a really nice break from civilization.
We returned to Sihanoukville yesterday, which is a container port but also a rather unattractive beach town. We spent the night and then moved on this morning to a really sweet town called Kampot further down the coast. Another cool town on a river with pretty French architecture. We thought we would just stay two nights before moving onto Vietnam but are thinking of adding an extra day so we can rent a scooter for a couple of days and check out the countryside, which includes spice plantations and a seaside town famous for it's crab market.
Mike was feeling a little sick yesterday but rallied enough to eat a huge plate of ribs at a restaurant that our new friend in Phnom Penh, Meg, recommended we try. You can't keep him down for long.
More about the Hornbills-
http://kohrongsamloemconservation.org/2011/10/birds/