It’s like a scene from “The Beach,” minus Leonardo DiCaprio. Part 1.

After 2 months-ish in Thailand, I finally made it to the beach. O.M.G.

I was supposed to go to elephant camp last weekend – like, real overnight elephant camp – but somehow it filled up on me. Even though I had a semi-reservation. Blah blah, translation issues. Sorry Kim, for dropping the ball on this one.

We found out on Monday that we would not go to elephant camp. Vacation started on Thursday, and was a week long thanks to a line-up of holidays and school events. 1 sports day, 1 King’s birthday, a weekend and a school competition in the city that gave us days off. Excellent.

So what else would we do but hit the beach?

After a full 8 hour bus ride and a tragic navigation of the Bangkok bus station on a holiday, I found myself on a bus to Pattaya. It was a short 2-hour trip from Bangkok to it’s hedonistic beach-side counterpart.

Let’s rephrase that – it SHOULD have felt short. But thanks to a bitchy bus-ticket lady, I was assigned the fifth-middle-bitch seat in the last row of a fully-packed bus. So, if you looked down the aisle of said bus, you would have seen me, pouting, having a silent elbow battle with the old Thai man to my right. Totally passive aggressive – a loud sigh, a dramatic shift, an elbow to the side. Then silence. Then the next person goes. Repeat.

Finally the dude found the air-con and seat adjustment lever, and started to fall asleep. It only took an hour.

He wasn’t very bright.

So I land in Pattaya, snag Kim at the bus station, randomly pick a hostel/guesthouse strip from the Lonely Planet map and head out. We wander and find a place. A quick glance at the landscape and we’ve officially dubbed the place Cancun meets Miami. Spring break on steroids. Niiiiice.

In the heat of the night, all of the old white men are out. In full force. I don’t know if this has something to do with the strikes, and maybe an old white dude convention got stranded here? In any case, it’s gross. Gross, gross, gross.

But there IS a McDonalds. And Starbucks. And Au Bon Pan. I’m ashamed to say I hit them all – but other than the Starbucks, it’s wasn’t too pricey. And I only got ice cream at McDonalds. And I had the new Christmas Frap flavor!!! But I will never do it again.

We have a beer, street food, somtom. Time for bed – maybe it’ll be nicer in the morning?

Call me a snob, but it was not that nice in daylight either. Crowded, narrow beach, no hiding from the peddling vendors selling EVERYTHING you could ever imagine – sunglass, food, sheets, bedspreads, pedicures, massages … I FINALLY find a pair of sunglasses I like, bargain them down 100 baht, and break them exactly 5 minutes later. Ugh.

We wander, see a gorgeous sunset and go to bed early. We’ll catch the early early 7:30AM bus out of here and get to Koh Samet, an island a few hours away.

Koh Samet was much better. Stay tuned.