Koh Samui BC (before children🤣)

So, so typical that the very shortest flight, out of the many flights we’ve recently been on, should be the only one where we have half decent seats. We were in row one which meant slightly more leg room and nobody in front of us to lean their seats back in to our laps, bliss! As the flight was less than an hour long we didn’t really have enough time to revel in our relative comfort before we were landing and being ushered from our seats into the cutest little airport I’d ever been to.The transfer driver was already waiting there for us and with a complete lack of customs or security we were soon on our way to our home for the next 16 days.

Before leaving England this was one of the only places that we had booked as we had wanted it to be somewhere special to spend Christmas with our children. We had therefore, despite having heard how cheaply you could stay in Thailand, paid more for this than any previous place of stay. We were consequently so excited to arrive to get the villa ‘Christmas ready’ and our expectations were riding high. What a mistake!

You’ve heard about all of the beautiful hotels and apartments we’ve stayed in. With very little research we have managed to hone our selection skills down to a few crucial basics with largely excellent results. Unfortunately Maenam Hills Villas had been chosen before our skills had been honed – and it showed. It wasn’t that there was anything obviously awful about it and when reading back through our booking details we realised that all of the information was there in black and white but there was more than just our enjoyment resting on this. Joe and Ellie had both been working really hard anD looking forward to their break. It definitely wasn’t the ‘perfect’ we’d hoped for.😢

Firstly, after driving from the airport passed snatches of beautiful views of the ocean, our villa was nowhere near it. Instead we were 2km away, slightly off of the beaten track up a strange little road, towards the hills and the jungle. Secondly, our villa that sleeps six only has two bedrooms, we must have known this but made an assumption that as it said there was room for six there would be room for six. There wasn’t, there were just two double beds and at 28 and 22 Joe and Ellie have definitely outgrown sharing a room. I wrongly assumed that the sofa would therefore turn into a sofa bed but it didn’t. This seemed insurmountable, especially as after a few days Tom, Ellie’s boyfriend, was also joining us.

Next, the fully air conditioned villa had air conditioning units in both bedrooms but only ceiling fans downstairs. Even if the sofa had been a sofa bed the extreme heat downstairs would have made sleeping there nearly impossible. All that we had taken for granted in every other place of stay seemed a problem here and as we sat, shell shocked, listening to our host Olga (whose unpleasant body odour was also adding to the feeling of unsuitability) explain that we had to pay extra for electricity and they didn’t provide beach/pool towels and if we wanted an extra bed it would be an extra cost per night I just wanted to cry. Looking at my disappointment mirrored on Rob’s face just added to my emotional feeling and I really couldn’t see a way forward. What were we to do?

Once Olga and Arthur, our Russian hosts, had left us and we had opened the doors to freshen the air and had another look around to try and formulate solutions we really felt no better. My suggestion of abandoning the villa and finding somewhere else was not really feasible as Olga had immediately put paid to any idea of a refund and our dwindling funds couldn’t stretch to paying for something else on top of this. If we had just been thinking of ourselves we know we would have been fine but we had wanted the absolute best place for Christmas with Joe and Ellie and this didn’t appear to be it.

After going over various unsuitable ideas we decided to walk into town to see if we could find a car to hire. We hadn’t thought this would be a priority but having seen our location realised it would definitely be an advantage. We also wanted to try to clear our minds and make a plan. Our walk proved fruitless, apart from grabbing a few provisions and some fairy lights we walked home carless and possibly even more despondent. The news that Gatwick had closed due to drone activity when Joe and Ellie were due to leave from there late the following morning seemed like the final straw and we went to bed for a restless, worry filled night.

By the next morning everything seemed to be back in perspective and we realised we have been totally spoilt, the villa was lovely and with a little compromise we could make it work. By 11am we were in possession of a hire car (courtesy of Arthur) and had heard that Gatwick had, albeit temporarily, reopened for enough time to allow Joe and Ellie’s flight to take off as scheduled. Things were definitely looking up.

We pretty much spent the rest of the day visiting supermarkets to buy some staples for the onslaught of two extra healthy appetites and trying to find anything gluten free. By the time we’d hung some fairy lights and wrapped a few little stocking fillers that we’d collected on our travels we were feeling a little more Christmassy and ready for the next days arrival of our eagerly awaited guests.

After another slightly restless night the big day arrived, unfortunately we had to wait until 9pm to collect them so filled our day researching the best beaches and restaurants to spend our festive days. We found there were an abundance of absolutely stunning beaches wherever we went and the last of our concerns about being disappointed with our Christmas location began to disperse leaving only excitement.We also managed to warn Joe and Ellie of the shortcomings of our accommodation as they waited at Shanghai airport. They were much less distressed than we had been and quickly came up with a suitable compromise for room sharing arrangements. By the time the sun was setting on silent beach that eveningwe felt much more relaxed and ready for the imminent arrival.