Honeymoon recap part 4: finally the White Lotus portion

Sophia and I left Bangkok after 3 nights with mixed feelings. I love Bangkok but admittedly it lost a lot of it’s luster since the last time I visited. Sophia was just overwhelmed with such a crazy and hectic city. We were both really excited to start the cliche beach honeymoon portion of the trip.

Sophia had found Koh Lipe with some searching a few months ago. It was lauded as the Maldives of Thailand and everything I read confirmed that statement. Furthermore, it was a much smaller island that was less developed and the backpackers largely had not shown up yet. And lastly, there were some good dive sites so it seemed like the perfect location for us.

We were late to the game with booking hotels so options were slim unfortunately. Luckily, I had stumbled upon this new resort opening up with 0 reviews and only fake pictures of what the resort would look like. The resort would open December 15th so we would literally be there within 2 weeks of opening. It was a huge gamble, but they offered 50% off so Sophia and I said, fuck it let’s do it.

That ended up being possibly one of the best decisions we’ve made as a couple. After a flight from Bangkok to Hat Yai, then a 2 hour van ride to the pier, and another 1.5 hour boat ride to Koh Lipe, we made it to the island and the resort. I was riding a bit of a high as my Huskies just beat Texas in the Alamo Bowl so not much could ruin my excitement that day.

We got to the resort and Sophia and I both looked at each other and joked that this was giving us some serious White Lotus vibes. The staff had waited for our arrival and then sat us down with some drinks while they checked us in. After an orange juice and some coconut ice cream, we were escorted to our room which opened directly to the beach.

It was absolutely perfect. The resort and rooms looked exactly as the fake photos. We were both a bit surprised to see all this happening… it is Southeast Asia after all. Of course for a 2 week old resort, they still had a lot of things to work out such as the restaurant and the service, but for 50% off, we hit a gold mine.

Our 5 nights on the island was a magical time. We spent a lot of it doing well… not much. The island takes about 20 minutes to walk from the northern tip to the southern tip. And then there’s the western side which you can walk in 30 minutes, but there’s not much there besides some resorts. There was an amazing “walking street” that housed many restaurants and bars.

We spent a lot of the mornings sleeping in and enjoying our beachfront villa. At some point, we would take the 10 minute “stroll” into town to get massages and/or grab lunch. In the early evening, Sophia and I would start our nights at the local watering hole for a few cocktails, then grab dinner and more drinks. Rinse and repeat.

Notably on the food front, we had some amazing Thai style hot pot at Huamai Somtum along with some fire Esan style dishes. We found a favorite seafood joint at Ranee Thai which was a local spot next to the only “club” on the island. I also forced Sophia to come with me to find this lady named Mali who would go pick up some local fresh fish and serve it up sashimi style.

Mali was hilarious and it was a bit of a unique and rugged experience. Sophia dubbed it her first “Bourdain situation”. We sat in Mali’s “barber and beer” shop while Mali prepared some local fish sashimi style and fried one of the fishes. She sat with us for about 45 minutes entertaining us and cracking jokes. The food was amazing, especially the raw fish. It felt like this could be served a Michelin starred omakase restaurant. It was truly and experience I’ll never forget and I can’t wait to come back and find Mali again.

Our other notable activity was diving on the 2nd. Of course we had chosen to go diving on a very windy and choppy day. Sophia got seasick and I got close to joining her in throwing up off the side of the boat. It was less than ideal, but we got to dive and had a good time overall. We also got to partake in an engagement ceremony underwater. This Dutch couple in our group got engaged and it was a cool experience being able to watch it happen live. I had my GoPro and was able to play videographer for them.

We ended up becoming friends with Sebastian and Caroline and spent that night grabbing drinks with them. And then hung out with them again on our last night on the island. On our last night, we also met a Finnish couple at dinner who also joined us for drinks. It was an amazing way to cap off the island portion of our trip.

I was a bit sad to leave but after 5.5 full days on the beach, both Sophia and I were ready to get off the island. Overall, Koh Lipe was probably the best part of the entire honeymoon. We had a lot of alone time, but mixed it in with some good hangouts with others on the island as well. Sophia and I will always view Koh Lipe as a special place and we can’t wait to go back.

Tomorrow, I’ll write about the last leg of our trip in Singapore.