2012 Koh Samui Scenes & Wildlife

If you are unprepared, it's a little disconcerting to wake up in an aircraft whilst travelling overnight to see a patch of stars over you, but as you focus, you see a novel way of lighting the doorways in the cabin. We've not come across this before.

Here's the same patch of "stars" as in the other picture, with a longer exposure. It was quite pretty and effective when all the cabin lights had been turned off. An interesting use of the white semiconductor LED technology.

Bangkok International Airport is huge and very modern. It took us about half an hour to transfer from the International flight arrival to the local flight departure lounge. Thankfully the seemingly endless connecting corridors are well equipped with moving walkways to make it a bit easier.

As we arrived late at night, and just went straight to sleep on arrival, the morning after is always "exploration" time, and inevitably coincides with Breakfast. This hotel, built on a fairly steep hill-side with the rooms all small chalets set amongst the natural and garden trees was quite beautiful and a delight just to walk around.

Our Tropical Breakfasts are always looked forward to, as we inevitably start the day with a plate of local fruit. We may be able to get most of these fruits in the UK these days, but they rarely taste the same as the naturally sun-ripened (much tastier) versions. You also get the chance to try more difficult to transport fruits like Rambutans and Mangosteens (the small half opened fruits just above my plate here) as well as many others in the Far East.

Well, perhaps not! Madeline doing something we can't remember about now.

This was a display feature by the side of the eating area which always seemed to have animals of some sort in view who were taking advantage of the facilities.

Although quite common in our own ponds, this Water Skater insect was producing quite fascinating patterns on the mirror-flat surface of the pond. I liked some of the patterns forming, so tried to capture it.

This large toad was watching the world go by from the small wildlife pool. The strange colour of the eye could be an internal reflection, or could even be some sort of infection.

Acacia-like trees in the wild area just outside the hotel perimeter adjacent to us, and opposite our verandah area were quite strangely flowered, looking more like inverted orchid flowers.

The gardens here were a mixture of planted flowers and indigenous plants which naturally grew on the hillside. This flower was on what seemed to be a short type of palm-leaf plant.

A 5cm long powerful beetle found walking along one of the hotel paths.

These large ~26cm long Geckos were around the outsides of all the chalets, and appeared after dusk. A few appeared every night on the wall opposite our Moth Trap, for obvious reasons. Their calls could be heard occasionally most nights. Apparently they could give quite a painful bite if handled, which was good reson to leave them alone.

A 3cm long large nymph of one of the giant resident Grasshoppers was found on one of the walls of the rooms one afternoon.

A queen (?) of this arboreal species arrived on our room verandah. Apparently this species is quite aggressive, and bites readily, so is best to avoid handling.