New Year’s Eve into New Year’s Day

Christmas is over, my birthday is over, what is next to look forward to? Definitely NOT New Year’s Eve.

It has never been my favourite night and in more recent years we have tended to be away skiing to avoid the perceived pressure of forced enjoyment. New Year’s Day is also the best time to go out to ski early, the lifts and slopes are always quieter as people catch up on sleep or nurse their hangovers. Anyway, as usual I digress, we are away, but I was dreading it as I knew Joe, Ellie and Tom were heading to Ko Phanang for an all night party and I knew I wouldn’t sleep until they were safely home. 😩

The feeling of dread started as soon as I woke up but determined to still enjoy the day I jumped out of bed with a plan. Today we were going to Na Mueang waterfall. Joe, Tom and Ellie had been extolling the virtues of moped riding for days. They waxed lyrical about the freedom it gave and how a journey on the moped didn’t feel like a journey at all. Rob had also been desperate to have a go so my plan was to bite the bullet and, with Rob as driver, hire a moped. It definitely also had something to do with me having turned 49 the day before but I decided not to over analyse that and instead to just go with the flow.

Once everyone was up I explained my change of heart. Despite my incompetency in Marrakesh and to give Rob a chance to have some fun I would, as Rob’s passenger, try riding a moped again. The young ones were very enthusiastic and impressed with my decision and although Rob looked a little nervous he was definitely up for it and set off with Joe, to practice before hiring our own.

Now, I don’t want to lay any blame at Joe’s door, it wasn’t his fault that on the previous day, my birthday, he’d told me that my shallow dive was like a belly flop and I needed to go deeper and push off more to improve the aesthetics, or that the result was me grazing my nose on the bottom of the pool.And it definitely wasn’t his fault that within five minutes of setting out with Rob they were both back with Rob’s limbs and digits looking a little worse for wear.He just always seems to be at the centre of near disaster.😩

I had tried to explain to Rob before he left that mopeds didn’t turn in quite the same way as a road bike. Apparently he’d been doing fine on the straight, it was only when he came to a turn and accelerated towards a wall that he decided it was better to bail out than to accompany the moped into the wall. A good decision I thought!

The above photos don’t actually show the full extent of Rob’s injuries. His knee particularly, had a few deep cuts and swelled noticeably and his toe oozed liquid when ever he stood up – but my children and Tom will verify, over the next few days he barely mentioned it.🤣

After Ellie had shown her nursing proficiency in cleaning out the gravel and reassuring her patient, Joe had broken into laughter whenever Rob described the fall or another sore body part (his hip was also grazed and swollen) and Tom had sensibly stayed out of the way, I settled Rob on the sofa, fed him arnica and sent the three youngsters out to play (on their mopeds). Rob needed the peace and quiet to heal and abandoned the waterfall plan preferring to lie and watch Netflix. After checking regularly on the wounded soldier I retired to the pool to recover from the trauma.

The rest of the day was fairly quiet, I did encourage Rob out for a stroll and he had a lovely, much needed haircut before we visited Maenam temple and a lovely little bar called Khun Anna.We got home just in time to say goodbye to the revellers as they set out on their visit to the party island of Koh Phangan. I might have also given them a little lecture about staying safe and not drinking too much, I don’t know why because I’m not sure they took much notice but it made me feel better.🤣

After relaxing for a little while in order for Rob to do some more healing we went out to dinner. We thought about trying lots of new places and looked at many on the way but, for the second day running, we found ourselves at The Treehouse.

We again had a lovely mealand enjoyed their facilities whilst strolling along the beach.We were home and in bed by 11 and asleep soon after, but not for long.

I don’t know why it is but when Joe is in London and Ellie in Birmingham, although I am aware that they go out, I can still sleep. Unfortunately, as soon as they are sharing the same roof as I am, this is no longer possible until they are safe in their beds. Even though I knew they had planned to stay out all night once I woke up at 2am, to Rob’s groans as he turned over, I was awake and there was no going back to sleep.

Luckily I had lots of WhatsApp company as 2am here was obviously only 7pm at home so I managed to catch up with lots of family and friends and get the Happy New Years in early. Paris, at home in Canada, was a whole twelve hours behind. As she shares some of my anxieties over Joe’s wellbeing we also exchanged messages. By about 8.30am, after many anxious hours, my chickens were at last home to roost. I checked that they were all in one piece, messaged Paris to reassure her of this and was finally relaxed enough to think about sleep.

I must have very temporarily slept but was awoken suddenly by knocking and shouts. I rushed from my bed in order to locate the source of the furore to find that our cleaners had thought that 9am on New Years Day would be a good time to carry out their weekly service of our apartment. Through gestures and simple, whispered words I indicated that now wasn’t a good time and hurried them, with their fresh linen, mops and buckets quietly back out of the door. It was just after 9am, the sun was shining brightly and I knew for sure that I wasn’t getting any more sleep so might as well start my day.

It was a very quiet New Year’s morning. Rob joined me briefly by the pool before he realised it was too hot, he couldn’t cool off in the pool because of his extensive injuries and the air conditioned villa was far more conducive to effectively exhausting Netflix. At some point after midday Tom and Ellie emerged sharing stories and pictures of the previous nightBoth of them had enjoyed themselves and although Ellie had lost her purse and Tom some cash they agreed that they were glad they had gone.

When Joe eventually emerged around 1pm I realised how well he’d heeded my pre night out lecture. Although he had arrived home safely, through the course of the evening he had managed to lose his shoes, his phone and Tom and Ellie. He borrowed my phone to attempt to locate his own but we all held out little hope, apparently the beach had been extremely overcrowded and along with Tom’s money and Ellie’s purse it could be anywhere. Joe resigned himself to being temporary phone less and vowed to order a new one as soon as he got back home.

Once everyone was up, showered and had come to terms with their various losses we decided to head for Central Festival for an early dinner. This is probably the biggest shopping centre in Koh Samui and as well as having a large supermarket, various department stores, gift stores and many restaurants it also has an extremely large outdoor market with an abundance of street food stalls, these were the main attraction.

Just as we were all ready to leave Ellie received a short face book message, from a lad called Nick, asking her whether she was travelling with Joe as he had his phone. Although Ellie didn’t recognise his profile picture Joe did and vaguely remembered drinking with him before asking him to look after his phone while he went to the loo. Inside his phone case Joe had also left his monzo card which is how Nick had discovered his surname and traced him back to Ellie. Thank goodness for our unusual surname and lovely people, like Nick, who was willing to put himself out to return the phone. Delaying dinner slightly Joe exchanged hurried messages with Nick and arranged to collect his phone the next day. Although this involved a return trip to Ko Phangan it seemed a small price to pay for being reunited with his main means of communication.

Feeling relieved, we all set off in the car for Central Festival, or more accurately its neighbouring food market. We spent a happy couple of hours there exploring the market and sampling various local dishesbefore heading back for an early, New Year’s Day, night.

Happy 2019 to you all. Xxx